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!

A Fruitful Day

Breakfast at Chawan .... Nasi Lemak!Managed to recover from my trip back from Melaka. Started the day by taking my children on their school run. I brought my Mum with me to send Irfan to his Pingu School in Bangsar, had breakfast with her at Chawan. I then visited Bangsar Village to see my picture with Idlan first hand. A couple of weeks back, we had our picture taken in a competition. It is for a charity celebrating Father's Day. They were looking for father and child look-a-likes.

Should you guys be passing Bangsar Village by any chance by tomorrow, please vote for us. We are pair number 54! Definitely look a like one!

After Bangsar, we fetched Idlan and headed for Damansara where we had lunch. We also booked a table in Marche to celebrate Father's Day with the family. It will also be my Dad's 62nd birthday on the 20th. After sending everyone back home, went to the post office to renew my driving license, sent my car to the garage for a quick look since the warning lights kept coming on indicating the boot was open when it clearly was not. It only started since we sent the car for service last Saturday.

I then went to make a police report for insurance claim. I had my windscreen chipped while driving a couple of weeks back. Went to the traffic station in Taman Dagang. Everything went smoothly and all finished by 4.30. The only hitched was the investigating officer was out and I have to return tomorrow to pick up the report.

We then packed up to move some stuffs to our weekend house at Taman Cemerlang. Did the garden, and now I am suffering from it, not before going out to buy groceries and dinner. That's what I call a fruitful day ..... time to head for bed!