Me and Specks

Me and Specks, originally uploaded by Haris Abdul Rahman.

Spent the whole day yesterday sorting things out for the audit in the afternoon. The auditors came and went, and they are pretty pleased with things, which is great. I am sure those of you who had to endure an audit before would testify that it can be an ordeal. This particular one was for an anticoagulant study I have been conducting for the past couple of years. The auditors were from France, Korea and Taiwan. The lady from Taiwan was particularly menacing, but her boss, the Parisian guy was pretty steady and complementary. It may be just a French thing I think.

Lanyau and the othersPavillion in the evening!Anyhow, in the evening after work, I had dinner with Specks, one of my old buddy from school. He is now working for a Pharmaceutical company in London and is just back for a couple of weeks. He brought with him a couple of friends, an actor from Bristol and his girlfriend, a Medical Microbiologist from Cardiff. We had dinner at Madam Kwan in Pavillion, and we were graced by the presence of Madam Kwan herself! They had some Char Koey Teow, and so did I. Another old Terendakian also came with us, Lanyau. They are off to Cherating tomorrow morning having just got back from a weekend in Langkawi. I can see that they were all sporting a tan!

Idlan and his Assessment

Idlan practicing his sumsAnita has been up all night last night thinking of Idlan's assessment this morning. Bear in mind he is only 5, and it is for kindergarden. I think she is a tad over-reacting. Anyhow. She got him up and early and ready to go by 7.30. As usual, our driver was late, and Anita had to do the driving herself.

I used the new DUKE highway today and left the house at 7.30. Traffic was cool on the highway with only a minor hick-up at Jalan Duta exit. Reached the Faculty by 8, and already up and running in my room at 8.15. Quick check on the feeds and email. This is when I learned that Ida Nerina is in the ward after taken a tumble the night before. She had spinal injury but the details about what happened was rather sketchy.

Got a shock when I turned up when I saw that there are 8 Medical Officers now attached to my ward. This is what I call total care for the patient. The ratio is around 1 doctor every other patient when you count out the 5 lecturers as well. So we were practically tripping on each other during Grand Ward Round yesterday. Myself and Bee gave up during Day Care where there were no seat for us. We ended up trouble-shooting then left early to start the Transplant Clinic.

We then had a discussion about our future plan for the Unit over tea. Then head home and looking forward for the usual badminton session. I must confess that I was rather tired and all. I left after 3 games and already ready for bed soon. Guess I am getting old.

Happy Father's Day

The 5 grandchildren, originally uploaded by Haris Abdul Rahman.

As mentioned, we took my Dad (Dada) for lunch today. As he liked steaks, we brought him to Marche at The Curve. All his five grandchildren were on tow and as expected they created havoc. The good news is there was a 20% discount on meals for Father's Day!

We spend a couple of hours there with the children occupied at the playground. Next, we headed across to the Sunday Market. According to my sister, Julia, the stalls were pretty disappointing today compared to last. That didn't stop here from getting a brand new pair of shoes. Next, we walked across to IKANO. Julia wanted to get her children Crocs shoes.

It took us nearly an hour trying shoes out to keep everyone happy. They then headed for the play area back at The Curve causing more havoc there!

Finally we drove home around 4. It was a long afternoon. Both Idlan and Irfan went to sleep at 8 tonight. Idlan has his school assessment tomorrow, and Anita was up awake worried. Imagine if he was taking A levels or something. I'll probably need to get Anita a pacemaker!

Happy Birthday to my Dad

090620 KL Butterfly Park 07, originally uploaded by Haris Abdul Rahman.

Today happens to be my Dad's 63rd. However, we thought we will take him out for dinner tomorrow for a 2 in 1 thing with Father's Day. First thing, I drove to PJ Hilton for a Haematology Study Group Meeting. We spent the whole morning discussing protocols and I must say, compared to the sessions in the years past, this has been the most fruitful.

We actually touched almost every aspect of Haematology, but the gist of it is the the plan to standardise the trefatment for adult Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia. Looking back, the treatment response has been rather disappointing and it is about time that we be more aggressive in terms of chemo regimes. It will take a few more sissions though to get things rolling although from the looks of things, Hospital Ampang will be going ahead as early as July with the new plan.

Lunch came next, after a good chit-chat, I decided to take my camera out in the afternoon. Last year, I went to the Butterfly Park in Tasik Perdana, KL with my gear and was disappointed. Most of my snaps turned out blurry or out of focus. I think the problem was the aperture I was using was too wide, narrowing the depth of field. As a result the focal plane become very small. So in English, aperture (assigned a an f number) is the diameter of the opening on the lens to let light in. The smaller the f number, the wider the aperture, the more light gets in. The maximum aperture is usually indicated at the name of the lens. The main advantage of wide aperture is the ability to increase the shutter speed. The higher the shutter speed, the less like the image become blurred.

However, there is a price to pay for wide aperture. The wider, ie, the smaller the f number, the narrower the plane of focus become. Image falling before or after the plane will become out of focus.

The mistake I made was thinking with the smaller f number and the higher possible shutter speed, I hope the image will be sharp. Unfortunately the focusing on my camera can be tricky sometime. As a result, around 75% came back unsatisfactory. This time around, I increase the ISO - sensitivity of the camera to light, and shot at f8 to 11. I think the results this time around is much better.

Later in the evening, I attended the Medical Department Annual Dinner. This year it was held at Holiday Villa Subang. The highlight was definitely Sanjiv's rendition of "Sound of the Falling Rain" as a tribute to KL Goh. It was hilarious. Iqbal's 15 minutes of stand-up wasn't that bad either. I got to also go on stage to pick up my Badminton's winners medal.

I think I need a new car!

Maybe a van as I can't really stand my kids jumping up and down in the back of the car! This morning, I looked at the milage and it registered 70000! That was in miles, not km OK!

Forgotten also to pin up the pics I snapped on my mobile from the board yesterday! Be sure you guys voted for the right one!