The Pensieve

My absolute favourite! It had me rolling on the bed…

Stop! Or My Nan’ll Shoot!
An elderly Florida lady did her shopping, and upon returning to her car, found four males in the act of leaving with her vehicle. She dropped her shopping bags and drew her handgun, proceeding to scream at the top of her voice, “I have a gun, and I know how to use it! Get out of the car!”
The four men didn’t wait for a second invitation. They got out and ran as fast as they could go. The lady, somewhat shaken, then proceeded to load her shopping bags into the back of the car and get into the driver’s seat. She was so shaken that she could not get her key into the ignition. She tried and tried, and then it dawned on her why. A few minutes later she found her own car parked four or five spaces further down. She loaded her bags into the car and then drove to the police station. The sergeant to whom she told the story nearly died of laughter. He pointed to the other end of the counter, where four pale men were reporting a car jacking by a mad, elderly woman described as white, less than five feet tall, glasses, curly white hair, and carrying a large handgun.

And a bonus for my pals… Don’t you wish it could happen to us? Maybe I should go hang out at AH sometime… Heh.

You’re Fired!
In Nottingham, UK, the owner of a big frozen food factory was on a tour of inspection. He inspected how clean the place was, the profit, the products, and the employees. On his rounds, he saw one “employee” standing around doing nothing. He asked one of the fellow employees who that guy was and what he was doing. The fellow employee said that guy is on the job, but seems to be waiting around. Not too happy, the boss went to this slacker and yelled, “Here is your money for the money, now leave my building and never come back!” The slacker happily left. The manager came over and asked what happened. The boss said he just fired an employee wasting time and money, but then the manager said, “The guy you fired and gave a final pay check to wasn’t an employee of this building, he is an employee at a local pizza business down the street!”

Since I’m on leave now (though I’ll be back to do a call tonite), I think it’s time I did some reflection about my job. Been through 2 months of it now and I think that I’m in one of the most ‘mistaken’ professions around. (I’m sure other pple feel the same way about their jobs too.)

1. RESPECT
Seems like there’s been a lot of talk abt r.e.s.p.e.c.t (hehe like PINK does it). About how er hem some pple feel that if poly students can enter med, it undermines the respect the public has for us. Well, let me say, respect is the first thing you must learn to live without.
Patients shout at you, they say your ’service’ sux, relatives shout vulgarities at you, nurses ignore you, or scold you or worse, some just tekan you… Your bosses humiliate you… You gotta learn how to live with a damn thick skin or you’re going to break down on the 3rd day of work! Most importantly, no matter how others might ill-treat you, you gotta respect yourself :)

2. PRESTIGE
Oh yeah? Is there a lot of it? (just refer to the para on top). Haha… I think all medical students, whether they have any family in medicine or not, do fantasise a bit about all that jazz that comes with the short prefix in front of their names but this really comes with a lot of shit as well. So it’s not all that pretty clothes, walking through OT doors with a swish and a sense of importance. More often than not, you’re probably stinking under yr scrubs having not bathed in quite some time, having glove powder on yr hands that doesn’t seem to be washed off no matter how u scrub, or having blood splattered on yr pants leg… making it more economical to wear g2000 instead of Raoul. Heh.

3. MONEY
Hey I’m really tired of people insinuating at how much I’m earning. For the last time, let me say, my hourly pay is a mere 5+ bux. And when I go on call, the hourly pay is like 11 bux per hour. Wow, you mean the rest of you are earning less than me? That must be terrible…
Not that I’m complaining about my pay, I’m just provisionally registered after all and I owe the government a hell lot of money (of which they refuse to tell me the break down clearly… Everything is just so muddy!)
Thankfully, I’m too busy working to spend my meagre salary.

Haha Ok, seems like I’m grouching a lot today. If not for the fact that I actually enjoy sticking needles into pple and suck that warm blood out (and enjoy the varying shades and textures of blood different pple have), I’d say I have a thankless job.

Since I’m going on call tonight, I’d better generate some good karma by thanking the universe for all the good things in my job:

1. Ok, I love all the nurses I’m working with (most of them anyway), especially those in the GM ward and the one with the renal unit. :D You guys are great! Esp M.A. Thanks for taking all the bloods for me! Can’t wait to see your baby :D Yeah and P too, your presentation skills are awesome! K too haha for rescuing me on that nite we had that bleeder… Ok and SK… We can only work together in the Day hahah… our karmas really clash badly at night… I still rem the multi-admissions, multi-bleeders and multi-desaturators… Nightmare!

2. The ward clerks! Haha S and B in my old ward… nice to hang out with u gals… and my Grandmummy Lolz… Pls don’t nag at me too much haha… I always do what I promise.

3. The feeling of anticipation, the renewed vigor in my weary steps at 6am… together with the beautiful sunrise (it’s actually just a shade of pale gold on the grimy unpainted walls of the hospital…) Sometimes I break out in a cheer with my fellow nurses.

4. The great feeling as you clear off your passive changes ward by ward… Ie. Like wheeling the phlebo trolley down the ward just doing bloods bloods and more bloods… and the awesome feeling as you use your dying pen to scratch off changes that you’ve completed!

Ok I hope I’ve chalked up enough karma. Wenky just told me the hosp is rather full tonight. I pray it remains thus.

Just got back from a 3 days 2 nites stint at KL. My second visit since the last time I went with MND. Still, didn’t get to go up Petronas Towers… Actually was at the foot and about to queue for tickets, but it seemed like half the tourist population was camped down there by 9… So we gave up…

Anyway, the towers don’t look that impressive or beautiful… or perhaps I just don’t have the eye to admire such modern architecture. Funny how the lights are white now, my mum remembered them being red the last time she went to KL, and the first time I saw them, they were multi-coloured…

Petronas Tower
Anyway, just lifted off some pics from other pple’s sites to share with you guys… It sure looks so much better via photos! haha…

More pics!

We stayed at the Crown Princess which is rather spacious and fairly clean, 4 stars, according to the agency. Not bad… International buffet breakfast included. It’s a wee bit out of the way though, as compared to like Berjaya Times Hotel (which is 5 stars and much more pricey though smack rite in the humongous mall). But at least it looks newer compared to Royale Bintang and Federal Hotel. The latter two are also in the main shopping district, I wonder if they might be a bit noisier too. Anyway, taxis are so affordable you should just take the cab everywhere…

June 31 to Sept 1 is like the Great M’sian Sale, prices slashed vigorously all over the place… (but not so much for the nicer stuff la… Branded goods perhaps… )
I saw this rather nice Tocco bag at Tangs going for like SGD159 but it’s only about SGD110+ there! Some of the malls are scary over there, it’s just branded branded and more branded goods…

Where to Shop!

Bukit Bintang/KL plaza/blah blah…
Majority of the malls are like this… they look like our Queensway or people’s park centre here BUT they carry nicer goods… (thankfully). Prices are all fixed but usually very affordable. Eg. men’s long sleeved work shirts are about 30-4oSGD, and the material’s good too. Women tops range from as little as SGD15 to like 25.

Bintang Walk
A really nice place to spend a night… Start off in the day shopping, though it’s a rather posh place to be shopping… Starhill Gallery’s there, it’s the most expensive place to shop I think. At night, it’s like you’ve got streets lined with just lots of restaurants along the sides… They’ve got al fresco dining too, but the traffic on the road just turns you off.

Planet Hollywood’s a great place for dinner! The food’s nice and place is a bit like Brewerkz, and the portions are just enormous. We had the spicy seafood pasta, the double cheeseburger and the philly cheese steak.

FOS (Factory Outlet)
This is a great place to shop, cuz prices are really low and the quality of the goods can be pretty good. In fact, there’ve got export surpluses of brands like Americane… Vintage Polo… Ralph Lauren… Banana Republic… They’ve also got faux labels and other home labels. Prices range from as low as SGD7 up to SGD40.

Time Square

The newest mall (I think) with Berjaya Hotel (that’s 5 stars) This horrendously sprawling mall has everything! It’s got East/West wings and various courts… Gets a bit confusing and it has up to fourteen floors of pure SHOPS SHOPS and more SHOPS. After wandering through a few floors of one wing, we just gave up and simply collapsed on one of them benches.

Midvalley Megamall

This one’s a bit out of the way BUT still, cab fare was only like SGD3.. hehe… the place is HUGE… I dunno why Sg makes such a big fuss out of vivo, cuz KL itself has at least THREE malls that are larger than vivo. Midvalley’s one of them, it’s got all your branded stuff, your semi-branded like Mango, Espirit… and your cheaper versions like Giordano, Soda… I really love EIC! WHY DOESN’T SG HAVE THIS BRAND?!?!?

Petaling Jaya / Chinatown

Your go-to place for faux leather handbags, beautiful imitations… wallets, sports ware (shoes and jerseys), trinklets, watches… It’s like bargain haven, though you could get a bit of hassling (esp if you are angmoh). Anyway, it’s a fun place to hang out at night. Some of the streets have a bit of local fare… Hmmm but I don’t really know which place serves the best food. -_-

Read some of these hilarious anecdotes while flipping through a magazine at the hotel…

Snakes Alive!
A woman - who wises to remain nameless - from Arizona, got in her car for a drive, and before long she felt something tickling her ankle. She looked down and, of all things, she saw a snake sticking out of the bottom of her pants leg. Terrified by the snake, which was creeping rapidly up her leg, the woman pulled the car over, leaped out and began to kick out, in an effort to dislodge the snake. She failed and the snake crept still further up her pants leg, and she dropped to the ground and rolled around, hoping the snake would slither out.

A man (who also claims anonymity) driving by saw her contortions, and thought, “That poor woman is having a seizure!” So he stopped his car and ran over to help her. Another man driving by saw the first man bent over a kicking, screaming woman. He stopped his car, ran over and punched the first man in the face for beating on the poor woman.

The Helpful Murderer
Valdamair Morelos, 35, confessed to murder in San Jose, CA, and told the judge he wanted the death penalty, but he was forced to trial because California law requires one in capital cases. Consequently, at the trial in January, Morelos occasionally tried to help the prosecution. For instance, after the prosecutor described the killing to the judge, Morelos added, “I blindfolded him, too.”

PS Cafe

It’s really one of the nicest places I’ve dined at… hehe… It reminded me of my trip to Spain, at Granada, where we had such nice al fresco dining. Only of course, the climate was much better and the air was so crisp.

Anyway, just had brunch there on Sat and had a really good time. :)

The menu is sort of fusion for brunch… Lots of waffles and maple syrup kind of thing… Anyway, here’s what we had…

This pork loaf thingy (it’s actually some minced pork with lemon grass and other spices with lots of veggie, strips of bacon and eggs… and this weird tomato stuffed with some kind of cheese…) I had this portobello mushrooms with soft-boiled potatoes with some cheese on top, lots of spinach and bacon and eggs… Also shared this Caesar salad, actually I think the salad’s the best :) Just had too much cheese on top la…

They’ve got a fairly large selection of teas there too.. We tried the lemon grass and the Morrocan mint tea. :)

Oh and then the desserts there look monstrously huge… haha…

Anyway, overall I won’t say the food there is that fantastic BUT the ambience more than makes up for it. I really love the place! :)

Oooh, so cute!

This is a case of 男人不坏女人不爱。

DEXTER

Dexter - spiffy new drama from the States, rather dark and creepy, with really cool Cuban themes…

Starring Michael C. Hall as Dexter Morgan, a forensics scientist who specialises in all things to do with BLOOD. Yup, the splatter pattern, the consistency, the content, the DNA… the whole works. By day he seems like a do-gooder, working closely with the police… A perfect boyfriend and step sister (she is an aspiring detective with the force) but by night, he delivers his own brand of justice - by hunting down and doing away with all those serial killers…

He’s a ’serial killer of serial killers’ says my bro, who’s absolutely smitten with the guy for reasons different from my own though. Haha…

It’s not bad, a bit dark, rather gory…

If you’re not going to watch it, at least catch first 5 min - Dexter’s Morning Routine. They have a wonderfully seductive trailer… :)

He’s cute isn’t he? :D

I am on leave from today till 2 July!

Let’s get those reunions started! yaaaayyyy!!!

Correct me if I’m wrong, but over call this weekend, (I’ve just woken up not long after I fell into bed and remained at GCS 8 for the past 6 hours)…

As I was saying, I realised that somehow the number of attempted suicides just shoot up over the holiday season…

I think it’s true, holidays make some people more depressed than usual. :(

If you go to the ortho ward aka the ward that is MRSA free, and look into the phlebo’s trolley, second drawer, you’ll find a huge bag of delights!

It definitely made my day!

On Sun, three of us went to hang out at Vivo after work, the aim was to…. Just FEED OURSELVES (we were very very very very hungry that day), and to PAMPER OURSELVES ie. watch Shrek 3 and SHOP x3. Turned out, we spent 950 in exchange for a comfy chair, nice air-con and cute music to sleep to. Haha… At some point or another, everyone of us fell asleep. And it was shrek too! Goes to show how exhausted we were… Even EW… who’s hardly ever been caught nodding off was found nodding off at the beginning of the film.

Anyway, I can’t really review Shrek properly, except that it was good fun with a predictable good triumphs over evil plot but lots of blanks to fill in cuz I zonked out every now and then. Sigh…

We had lunch at Fig and Olive Tree or was it Fig Tree and Olive? Anyway, it’s so-so… presentation wise, it’s really appetising, but erm well when you start to eat it’s…. Hmmm not as good as it looks. Still, it tasted heavenly to us cuz we were absolutely starving. Sigh.

Later on we went to shop HEHEHE so nice… and all of us got something for ourselves, or in lulu’s case, she went nuts and went on a skirt shopping spree! HEHEHEH Can’t wait to wear my new clothes :D :D :D (That is just about all there is to rave about for now…)