Fishing My Way To Made Of Honor

aka Fishing for THE ONE

That secondary title there? I meant it. Literally. No kidding ya.

Lest I be branded desperate (I already am!) let me set matters to rights by explaining that I've gone fishing to land me some excellent goodies.

In conjunction with the June 19, 2008 premiere of the movie Made of Honor in Malaysia, Hong Leong Online and Nuffnang are joining forces to bring a few selected lucky bloggers an experience to remember.

According to Nuffnang's blogpost here, the goodies up for grabs are :

~ an exquisite 8 course dinner at J.W. Marriott KL for you and your partner
~ an exclusive invite to the movie premiere of Made of Honor immediately after

All this magic takes place on 12 June, 2008, so you get to see the show a full week before the rest of Malaysia. Hehe. Just think about it... 8 course dinner with wine wor... plus wedding themed fashion show... and bagpipes performance... souvenirs to be given away... prizes to be won... what's not to like? *grin*

All you gotta do to put yourself in the running for the very nice stuff I already told ya about above there, is head on over to this site here and play the FlipFlop Flippy game. You'll need to play the game (over and over and over and over again until your wrist aches and you fear you might be developing early stages of carpal tunnel syndrome) and take a screenshot of your highest score. Then, craft yourself a blogpost (like the one you're reading right now), stick your results in the blogpost, and email it to the good folks at Nuffnang (flipflopflippy@nuffnang.com). It you're one of the highest scorers, you could be on your way to that tete-a-tete for two at the JW Marriott KL!

Ta-dah! My best score to date. And this is after many frustrating moments of trying to land the big fish and getting stung by the electric eels. Aitelyu, those eels are evurl. *grin* Oh yeah, my blogger friend Paris Beaverbanks posted her score here and I'm sorry to tell you dearie... I beat yer score! Muahahahaha. Oops, sorry. I had a minor Dr. Evurl moment there. Caused by being stung by those darn electric eels one too many times over the past few days while trying to get my own higher score. Dang, this FlipFlop Flippy game is addictive!

So, think I stand a chance? I've checked out a number of my competitors' scores and so far last week I've only seen two persons score higher than me... 13500 and 12750 (by kyspeaks). Ish. How to beat that? I'm not even going to go near the Hall of Famers on the FlipFlop Flippy website. (50000+ is the record! *faint*)

Anyway, if THE ONE for me comes along while I'm at this movie premiere, I wouldn't mind one single bit! No sirree! *wink*

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End note : To that handsome/pretty, very excellent, extremely nice, wonderful person working in Nuffnang who's reading this post, could I be one of THE ONEs to win? *blinks Puss-in-Boots eyes for added effect*

Baby got back

Remember this post? Well, I'm not crying anymore (but still got just a little heartache remaining)...

'Cos rinnah's got herself a new baby! (Long time readers will know my *over-rated* use of the word baby on guys I like for my car and my new gadget toys so don't go and think one kind, 'kay!)

This post is made purely possible by the sponsorship of the Bank of DAD for kindly extending a 12 months, interest-free repayment plan to me to enable all my unhappiness to go away. Hahaha. (But actually hor, I was applying for another model... unfortunately intended amount for that one was too big... cheh!)

Wanna see my new baby? Yesh? No? I dun care! I'm gonna show you anyway! Scroll down...

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Ta-dah! You say nice or not? :o)

Image credit

Yesh, rinnah got herself a new baby phone and this one's even better than the last one! Teeheehee. This is the Nokia N81 8GB version... all sleek metal and smooth plastic (kinda reminds me a bit of the iPod Touch / iPhone in areas).

I was shooting for either the N95 or the N82, both of which are my dream phones, but the N95 8GB was waaaaay out of my budget *sob* and my financier dissuaded me from picking the N82 *sob* as he was concerned that a first edition might be "buggy" since it was a first release. So I settled on this model lor. :o)

Look out for a detailed review of the N81 in a few weeks time over at rinnah's marketplace!

Is you crushing on anyone online?

A little something something to entertain myself and chase away the Monday blues... plus hopefully spark some serious commenting on this blog? Dunwanna turn into a bimbo blog... but the subject I'm blogging about is so... bimboistic!

Anyways, I found this cute post about having a crush on a blogger... and wondered... is it possible? (FYI, the definition of a blogger crush = having a crush on a fellow blogger.)

I guess it is gua... since having a blogger crush would be like having a celebrity crush (whether the blogger is famous or not).

Since having a crush is defined as a "temporary romantic attraction", I'm curious to find out... what would make you have a crush on a blogger? Is it the way he/she writes? Or would it be because of the many many pictures that some bloggers post? Or is it something else? Does the relative anonymity of a blog make it easier or harder? Or is physical presence/contact required for a crush to develop? And the billion dollah question... do you/did you have a crush on a fellow blogger? (Of course, this post would have much more responses if my blog were more widely read. LOL.)

Okay-lah, to make this a more interesting Monday post, I will say that I did (past tense! past tense!) have a crush before on a guy who had his own website (no, I'm not linking it here for you all to go "pat" at). If you ask me now what was it I liked so much about him I would have to say it was mostly because of his writings - they were serious, heartfelt, indepth and personal. All about emotions la. So I got carried away with the writer in him lor. (I have to add a caveat that I know this fella IRL by sight and through a friend of a friend of a friend link. Hah, but he didn't know I stalked his website! And he doesn't know I blog. LOL. Considered blogger crush or not? *wink*)

I wonder whether anyone will comment on this post or not?

p.s. Er, with posting this post I've just scuppered all my chances of people thinking I'm normal at this Saturday's blogger tea party, rite? Rite? Lawl.

p.p.s. Can I blame this post on listening to too much Josh Groban on auto-repeat? *grin*

Take Five On Friday!

So I got tagged again by the Giddy Tigress about two weeks ago. And this tag should only be completed and posted on a Friday. How dictatorial! *pulls a haughty face and flips hair like a beauty pageant contestant* Lawl.

Image credit

Here goes the tag...

DO YOU PREFER...

1. To watch or to participate?
Depends on what la! Never specify also... if it's an activity I like, you betcha I'll be participating. I might even initiate it and lead in the activity. If it's something I don't like, then I'll be watching lor.

2. Malls, catalog shopping, or the Internet?
Malls, definitely. Didn't you know already that the Curve and 1Utama are practically my home away from home? Well, now you do know. But I have to add a caveat that I don't like malls when there are lots of people - e.g. school holidays and public holidays.

3. A bath or shower?
I don't have the luxury of having a bathtub in my bathroom, nor the time to go soak and play bubbles so I'll go with the shower.

4. To talk to people by telephone, in person or by email?
Depends on the subject but I prefer to either express myself by the typed word or in person. Somehow I just don't "get the feel" of talking to another on the telephone. For one, you can't see the person, facial movements, gestures, etc. These are the things that make conversation, well, conversation! And I think I express myself better in the other two methods.

5. Typing or writing?
Gonna steal someone's answer here and say writing by typing. Cos I'm lazy to write by hand - too much writing makes my hand cramp! (Hated exams, btw. I'd come out of the hall with hand cramps and aching wrist.) Plus my perfectionist nature would make me want to form my letters perfectly and cross every T and dot every I. So writing is just too much work!

Now, I wanna tag :

Adino
Adrian

Klang Valley bloggers tea party

Yup, you read that right. rinnah is having a blogger tea party to get to know the faces behind the blogs, especially those anony-mouse ones.

If you wanna know the who, what, when, where and how, keep reading...

Who?
Organizer : rinnah (and Paris Beaverbanks as co-organizer)
Attendees : So far... there should be six of us.. besides your lovely organizers - zewt, angeles, winn x 2 will be coming
Who else : You, you and you reading this! If you're a blogger / blog-reader in the Klang Valley, you are invited to come join us. Email your RSVP to me at rinnah [dot] lee [at] gmail [dot] com.

What?
Blogger tea party loh. Tea party because it's more informal than a lunch or dinner and you can come early / late and leave early / late too. Less protocol. Hehe. To get to know your fellow Klang Valley bloggers.

When?
Next Saturday, 31 May 2008. Tea time begins at 3.00pm and ends whatever time you want it to end...

Where?
IZZI – Uptown, PJ
No. 45G & 47G, Jalan SS 21/37
Damansara Utama
47400 Petaling Jaya
Selangor Darul Ehsan
Malaysia

Telephone : +603 77290855
Fax : +603 77290955



How?
Like I mentioned above, if you're a blogger / blog-reader in the Klang Valley, you are invited to come join us. Email your RSVP to me at rinnah [dot] lee [at] gmail [dot] com. Feel free also to let other bloggers know about this get-together.

Addendum @ 14:40hrs : I forgot to mention that Izzi has free WiFi access, so any bloggers from places other than the Klang Valley can also join us remotely cos I'll be bringing my laptop... let me know how you can be contacted online, yea?

I'm really looking forward to meeting you all, so I'll see you soon, 'kay? *wink*

Frustration, irritation and disgust

Sorry to be in such a rant-y mood, but I am feeling extremely irritated by the actions and attitude of a certain work colleague. I'm no saint myself, and God knows I've tried and tried, but I cannot help but be irritated and disgusted with his actions and attitude. Am I just being persnickety?

~ He never bothers about anyone other than himself and what he likes or what he wants to do. And he will not hesitate to try and force his opinions on others around him. E.g. He doesn't like shellfish, so he will tell anyone else eating shellfish that it's bad-tasting and unhealthy. Or when I suggested archery as an activity, he pooh-poohed the idea by saying that "Archery is stupid". Similarly when another colleague organized a bowling outing. If you don't want to join us, just say so and leave it at that la. Why go and ruin everyone else's mood by running it down just because you don't like it? Sour grapes. Ish.

~ He does away with common courtesy like "Please" and "Thank you" or "Excuse me". General politeness like "Hello" and "Goodbye" are also foreign words to him. But then again, this isn't surprising in a guy whose infamous phrase is : "Go and eat sh*t la. Don't disturb me." Oh, and I was NOT happy when he called my mom in a disrespectful manner this morning. He told me, "An old aunty called you". Hello? You're talking about my mom, okay! I don't say anything rude about your mother even though you have her face tattooed on your leg. Bleh.

~ He doesn't like to plan ahead for eventualities (he was the reason why we had some difficulty securing lodging during the Medan & Lake Toba trip) and his idea of travelling is to NOT confirm his accomodations or travel plans or transportation. That just smacks of plain ol' irresponsibility to me.

~ This is the guy who flat out blatantly lied to me about where they were during the Chiling Falls expedition. And he did the same this morning, telling me that my ex-boss' father was critically ill in hospital and close to dying. (It sounded credible because he just had a discussion to my ex-boss' husband before he said the same to me.) Guess what? It wasn't true because I checked with my ex-boss' secretary who told me that my ex-boss was at work and everything was fine. I've said it before and I'll say it again, I HATE LIARS.

~ He was invited to play basketball for the company over the weekend. He's never played basketball before in his whole life and he refused to go for the pre-game briefing. He told the organizer "I'll be there for the game but not for the briefing". When the person asked him how he intended to play without knowing the rules and whatnot, his flippant response was "How hard can it be? I'll just take the ball and run with it and knock down anyone who tries to stop me". Even if you're a basketball legend, it is not kosher to behave this way.

And that's just a quarter of his other annoying personality traits.

I don't know why, but having to face this person everyday at work just makes me go "Urgh" and I feel like smacking some common sense into his thick skull. Not that it'll change him one iota, except to hurt my own hand. I wish I could leave it well alone, but this person will come and bother me even when I'm doing my best to pointedly ignore him and not talk to him because I don't want to get upset over something that I cannot control. It's like the more I "tak layan" his antics, the more and more shocking stuff he wants to say and do. So childish!

Okay, in all fairness to him, he is a nice person when he chooses to be - practically all the stuff he bought while on holiday was for his girlfriend. He sometimes (only sometimes, mind you!) waits for the girls to go out for lunch and holds the elevator for us. When he feels like it, he belanja's the department ice-cream. But other than that... it's like sheesh! this guy could be called a jerk.

Anyone got any tips to give me on how to handle this exasperating colleague of mine?

Fab Five of February

Picture taken by rinnah at the 2007 Flora Fest

I have a confession to make. o.0 *blink blink*

You see, rinnah has been very lazy of late. Oh yes! We are stepping into the month of May and I have only published the THHC™ chup results for January! Oh me oh my! *runs around like the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland*

To all my fansee... sorry la... the offline real-world life suddenly seems very busy of late. The work deadlines were pretty close together (a number of submissions to do within days of each other and are still coming thick and fast) and not so new (read: delayed) projects have now come back with a vengeance. LOL. I've even been leaving the office later and later... used to be 5.30pm sharp, then 5.45pm, then 6.00pm, 6.15pm... you get the drift. Nowadays my average time to leave office is no earlier than 7.00pm. Aw man! That is so not the work culture trap I wanna fall back into! Then when I get home it's exercise (if I feel like it), dinner, teevee (my AI fix), bloghopping, shower, sleep. Where got time, you tell me? And with my Indonesia trip series, I have half a mind editing photos while the other half a mind is busy trying to keep up with my favorite blogs... the number of unread items in my RSS reader is close to 1,000+. Bleh. And owh, I've already declared RSS bankruptcy a couple of times but within a matter of days its back to the same old levels. When the weekend rolls around I have activities to check out, friends to meet and catch-up with, places to go and see... help! my world is spinning faster and faster and beyong my control. Guess that's why I named my blog It's all about the spin...? LOL.

Aiyah, I got diverted off the topic. See? Easily distracted of late. *grin*

Actually hor, I ramble on so much above is to divert you from the very small results of the THHC™ chup results for February. Laziness to the max leh. Only 5 posts for you to chup and it takes me forever to compute the results. Ahahaha. Oh yeah, another confession to make. I worked on other (time-sensitive) blogposts first before this one... like the Chiling Falls trip, the Indonesia trip series, baby announcements and Mother's Day dedications. And I still have tons of back-dated drafts in my work folder that need to be edited, polished and pictures added. And I've become a wee bit addicted to editing and putting my own photography work in my blogposts. All of that consumes time! Argh!

Cheh. Kena diverted yet again. (Kononnya!) Sorry ya. Back to the subject at hand. Here are the Fab Five of February!

1st - l b
2nd - angeles
3rd - may

4th - parisb
5th - winn, chev, kyh

The tales of T H E H U G H U G C L U B™ (THHC™) can be found here.

Now, let's KFC (keep fingers crossed) that I won't dilly dally again till the next edition of chup results!

Mothers are God's gift to mankind

Photo taken by rinnah at Lake Toba, Indonesia

rinnah would like to wish the following wonderful ladies a very happy Mother's Day. I salute you for your courage, your stamina and most of all your love for your families. It's not easy to be a mom (dunno when will be my turn) even though this is the highest calling any female will have in her life.

~ my Mom! (the Ellen O'Hara to my Scarlett)
~ my Mama, my mom's mother who looks down from heaven
~ the Giddy Tigress, mommy of Ethan boy
~ Eastcoastlife, mommy of Jaymes
~ King's Wife, mommy of Allyfeel and Sam
~ Nyonya Penang, mommy of two boys
~ Laundry Amah, mommy of Kieran and Kylie
~ Zara & Zaria's mommy
~ Everyday Healy, mommy of Elizabeth
~ Poey Chin, new mommy to Rachel
~ Wennnn (soon to be mommy of BB, any time now!)
~ (Momma) Misti, who mothers us all in blogland
~ Chev, mommy of Ah Boy
~ Misha's mommy
~ Trinity
~ Collin's mommy
~ Zewt's mommy, we remember you even though you are no longer with us on earth
~ And last but certainly not the least! uhm, Adrian's wifey. :o)

My wishes also go out to all the mothers of the bloggers I read and follow in my sidebar and RSS feeder. I apologize if I've missed out any lovely blogging mommies whom I read or who read It's all about the spin...

And finally, a touching blog post by stars go blue on what every mother wishes for her children.

Happy Mother's Day.

Baby you're so wonderful

Today is a very special day.

Today, a beautiful baby angel came to earth to become the daughter of a special couple. :o)

Everyone, say hello to Princess Leia baby Rachel, the newborn daughter of Adino and Poey Chin!

Dearest baby princess Rachel, jiejie rinnah wishes for you :

"God's bountiful grace, beauty, blessings and presence to be ever-present in your life.

The brightest sunshine, clearest skies and coolest breeze to accompany you every step of your journey in life.

That you will experience the deepest, purest, truest love, joy and happiness always.

To be the greatest blessing ever to your parents, family and to all whom you meet."

I can't wait to meet you now and when you grow up. :o)

Luv & hugs,
jiejie rinnah


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And you know what? Baby Rachel made her debut just in time for Poey Chin to celebrate her first ever Mother's Day! So congratulations to both Adino and Poey Chin, and a very special first Mother's Day greeting to Poey Chin. Rest well and be back soon! (Our Scramble games will be waiting for you. Hehe.)

GAP presents Marie Digby showcase in Malaysia

A short list of reasons why rinnah will be attending the GAP presents Marie Digby showcase next Wednesday :

a) It's free. LOL. How often do you have international artistes coming to our shores and you get to watch them at no cost?

b) Marie Digby is so pretty. Who says I cannot like an artiste for the way she looks? Ahahaha. Although I frequently make references to females who are prettier than I am, this should be in no way read as, uh, you know, a preference for my own gender!!!

c) rinnah adores Marie's song Say It Again (need to find a place to download it!) but is not a fan of Umbrella (dunno why... could it be the repeated ella's at the end of the chorus?) even though that is the song that brought Marie her current fame and recording contract.

d) It's a live acoustic event (but dunno how good the sound system will be though - hope it doesn't suck big time).

e) rinnah gets to practise her n00b photography skills... again.

By the way, Marie Digby is also Mix.fm's Artist of the Month and they are running two contests - a singing one and an SMS contest with great freebies. Click here for more details.

Advertlets is also having a Marie Digby contest in conjunction with EMI Music here and you could stand an opportunity to win Marie's CDs and maybe a guest pass (for two) to meet Marie in person!

*rinnah is crossing her fingers and toes in the hopes of winning something since she plans to enter both contests! Oh and also hoping her big sis the Giddy Tigress' lucky streak in winning contests of late will rub off lil' sis...*

And no, this is NOT a sponsored post, 'kay? I'm not famous enough yet. Haha. This is a community service notice brought to you by rinnah. *grin*

So, make a date to meet me Marie at 1Utama, yea? *wink*

From Indonesia with love - Day 1, Part 2

Continuation from Day 1, Part 1 here.

We booked ourselves semi-private transport to Lake Toba (average 4 hour trip) after discarding the notion of traveling with the locals on bus (the transport cost us RM 28 per pax). I thought it was cute how they refer to cars as "mobil" and vans as "bus". Oh, if you say "kereta" to them, they'll think you want the train instead of a car! They really pack their trips to eke out the most profit and our "bus" had a full passenger load of 8 passengers and 1 driver. If you're smoke intolerant like I am, Indonesia is so not the place to be. The locals smoke everywhere and all the time, even in the enclosed confines of a vehicle. *choke*



You can't really tell from this pic but they drive really really close to each other! Like just inches away. If you think KL drivers are scary, you haven't met Medan drivers yet. ;-P The horn is an instrument to be used all the time - to say hi, to tell the other vehicle to speed up, to tell the other vehicle you're overtaking, to stop pedestrians from crossing the road, bla bla bla... if anyone wants to look for budding rally drivers, look no further than Indonesia...



This is a place we stopped at briefly for toilet break and to stretch our legs. You can get local delicacies here, but we were afraid that our *delicate* stomachs couldn't handle it so this time around we just look-see look-see only (one of my tripmates tried roadside food on the way back). Dodol seems to be a specialty... we bought some back but I dunno what happened to it. Maybe my colleagues finished it? LOL.



Pretty church in Parapat. This is one of my favorite pictures. *wistful smile* Parapat is a town on the shores of Lake Toba. The whole Lake Toba area - Parapat, Tuk Tuk, etc - is mostly Christian due to the indigenious Batak people who were converted by missionaries. So, there's a lot of non-halal food there and you can freely use the word "babi"! My Muslim tripmate had a bit of a hard time finding proper halal food. They are also deeply religious people and we saw many people going to church (it was the Easter Sunday weekend).



This shot of Parapat was actually taken on the day we made our way back to Medan but I don't have a shot of when we boarded the ferry due to the mad rush (the ferry was about to depart). This was the adventurous part where we got lost. Ehehehe. Not our fault!

We asked the locals which ferry we needed to take to get to Sosorgalung harbor, which was near to our guesthouse, but instead got directed onboard another ferry, which eventually berthed at Tomok harbor. (The ferry fee to Tomok is RM 1.40 one way, if anyone wants to know. LOL.) Tomok is like a 10 - 15 minute drive away from Sosorgalung. We only found out after the ferry left the harbor from Parapat and friendly locals tried to chat us up. I don't know about the guys, but I was certainly panicking inside cos it was getting dark (even though it was only around 7.00pm) and we didn't know how to get to Sosorgalung. We had no choice but to get off at Tomok because the ferry would be going straight back to Parapat, and we were thinking that it was the last possible ferry. The moment we got off the boat, here came the touts again. They wanted to "sell" us on the idea of taking private transport to our guesthouse for an extorbitant amount (RM 70). We said no, but they were very insistent, even following us to the little shack nearby where we had our dinner in an effort to stall them.



Here is my mee goreng dinner. I didn't enjoy this meal very much because I was worried. It was dark, we were in a foreign place, I didn't know how we'd get to our guesthouse and we were persistently being "cornered" by the touts on our transportation plans. They knew we had no transport and would be pretty desperate. We certainly didn't want to pay that much because the guesthouse owner told us when we called for help that a local price would only be around RM 10. Don't worry, the story ended happily because as we finished our dinner, we negotiated a closer-to-normal transport fee (RM 17.50) and reached our guesthouse safe and sound at last!



This shot of a guitar on a sofa doesn't belong to me, but I uh, am *borrowing* it to show you the guesthouse living area. We cleaned ourselves up and chilled out for a bit at the living area even though it was past 10.30pm to enjoy our welcome drink (on the house) and watch some DVDs since the satellite dish wasn't operational due to a lost remote. And owh, here is where I got this post's content from. Lawl.

Are you still with me? Let's go to Day 2 next!

Those looking for more private photos *ahem* (like those with my face in it) should go to my Facebook. There are lots there. LOL.

Twitter-ing your life

See that graphic above? It's a tag cloud of all the stuff I've twittered before. Cool, ain't it? It's from TweetStats.com and it's absolutely free! (No, this is not a paid advert. LOL.)

I find it very interesting because I can see the number of times I have used certain words in my tweets... like work, monday, home, time, today, weekend, friday, feeling... I really should mix up my tweets more often, eh?

If you're not on Twitter yet, why not give it a try? Twittering actually got me mentioned in a literary publication (okay, I stretch the truth a wee bit, a thesis is also a literary publication what. *grin*) before. If you're already on Twitter, gimme a holler so I can "follow" you. You can follow my tweets here.

Now, I'm off to try installing Twhirl onto my lappie so I can tweet even more!