Christmas & other things

Blessed Christmas!

Woke up to the sad news of the demise of George Michael.
But nevertheless, it certainly has been a good stretch of days over this festive weekend. After fretting over (just a little bit,really) the food prep (maybe 15%) and the guitar playing (okay, tbh close to 51%) on Saturday, praise be to God for the guiding hand and lifting of spirit. I suppose it was a splendid night, and as it was apparent with most of the food being polished off their plates.

Saturday started with rendering the video for the night; and raced off to hunt for some disposable plates (Mom can't seem to find the party-wares somehow) but we found sets of nifty looking plastic wares at the 2 Ringgit store. With just over afternoon, I decided to send the car to wash, fueled up and also a much-belated haircut, although not in that particular order. Got home with enough time for a good shower before starting my prep. Pretty good our workflow that day; I finished my 2 dishes and Mom was practically finished by the time Harry and I left bout 6ish; picking up the 2 brothers a coupla streets away.
Must've been eons since I last wore a necktie, proper knot and all. Reached TBC with a solid hour to spare; which was a timely thing for me to have my last rehearsal and regaining some confidence I might say.
I suppose I did okay, a few instances of wrong chords were struck and coupled with a few louder bangs of those that I could play decently. As the night wore on, confidence grew of course, and I didn't have to refer back to my 'notes' (or even write on my arm as I half-planned to)
By the 4th house it was already 10pm; (and way past Dad's bedtime) and we braved the night's light drizzle of rain while I placed the call to Mom to get her big-sized helper to plate the dishes etc.

All in all the guests gleaned off the food, and surprisingly the salad was the first to go 86 and we cleaned up by midnight and slept like a log.
Funny thing is, my Christmas 2016 video (that costs 2GB of my limited space these days) didn't get used to its' potential, oh well. :D

Woke up early and went to TBC for service, which doubles as a baptismal, which is also Harry's big day!

I suppose I was pretty exhausted, and with DiGi's coverage being a pain during every festivities, it certainly didn't help with my finishing up my greeting e-cards, (and its subsequent Christmas wishes on social media) I kinda spent the rest of my Christmas with the cat and reading this week's cat comics and er, some Futurama (to clear some disk space; since I have duplicates lying about)
Some of my eventual e-cards that I made, and oh yeah, the recipe!

Thanks DiGi, I'll make my amendments

le Originale

ok, this is 98% Canva

The other one for the other account

The Guitar Story

My,..I certainly have quite a huge task this month.
I agreed to help Pastor C out for this year's Christmas Caroling, since as you might need jogging your memory; Taiping Baptist Church are practically always shorthanded somehow with their almost non-existent of youths. And since I've been helping him out these few months on our fortnightly visits to the Old Folks Homes as backing guitar (and in which became main guitar) I did a Ezra Miller-esque Barry Allen and said "YES" when he asked 3 weeks ago. (oh, of course, not as eager-beaver like in that Justice League trailer)

Went for the first formal practice last Sunday, got the playlist and yeah of course with my recent round of guitar-ing activity, I find myself in increasing difficulty setting to just remember any chord transitions; I do somehow am afraid my memory ain't as good with me being over the hill age-wise; but this nasty short-term memory ain't processing as fast as they used to eh? I might deduce the fact that we somehow just might be conditioned in such as we are too easily absorbed into quick links and our attention span waned thanks to other technologies aka distractions, don't you think?
Anyhow, last Sunday went by pretty OK, and I was pretty upbeat that I can pull it off seemingly how hard could caroling be? encouraging myself; and even Harry asked me have I caroled before (he was with us as he'd stayed on after service for his baptismal class, yay) when I was a wee lad; in which I could be certain I never did play the guitar on caroling, but hazily I do remember doing it somehow or perhaps twice practically a figment of memory with no real comprehension on the when (teen years in Taiping or was it young adult with FGT)
..of course as I shifted through the few bits of both Westworlds (the 1973 movie and the new series finale and writing about it) the days counting until Wednesday when we went to Sunshine Home; I was back to square one: I can't remember the chords, nor some of the rhythm of some songs; both the Christmas hymnals and even the usual few that I alternately played on the Sunshine visits. Thus, I started to feel a bit of nagging fear around the corner that seems to be sneering at me, and spat "Are You Sure?"

I am not even a decent guitar player. Even worse at bass. I suspect I am somewhat tone-deaf in addition to me not being able to read music..but I've played for people and performed in the past. Pretty alright, I suppose, all of the time. I suppose I could carry a tune well enough (imitating-ly ~ I reckon there is no such word, man) and somehow look (half) decent performing it, whilst bandmates/members masked my instruments?
It should be about 21 years ago when I started to hold a guitar and twanged a bit of sound from it. I remember hazily and suppose it must've been some sort of glory days then to have the bunch of us musically illiterate small-town boys learning our chords and practice and jam. Sweat, parched throats, banged ear-drums, tears and blood staked into the mash-up for the simple joy and fame (and dreams, of course)
Eventually some of us went on and became better in playing music, and even 1 of us actually majored in music (I suppose) and in the music industry somewhat. But as for you, Mr Constant Backslider, you have certainly devolved as years go by, of course the bulk of the last 15 years (or so as I recall roughly) of not really touching any instruments has been because of that, although I might say I still do play a mean The Drug's Don't Work still (yeah tried it out finally the other day, albeit with a few mishit of chords; but the feel is still there)
But enough of that.
What I really want to put into scope here is this.

As Pastor C came for a 1-on-1 sesh with me; I was running through the back of my mind that I am facing a sort-of uphill battle to learn quite a bit in this short span of time. Technically in the next 10 days or so, to build up the confidence for the Caroling (should still be able to knock it off easy) and then the 'big one' on Christmas Day for the segmented medley.
But I suppose with prayers, discipline (oh no, something that I lack at times, well most of the time) and with almost all of the tv shows on their mid-season breaks (well, except these additional 5 extra episodes of Vikings Season 4) I suppose my distractions would only come from the few comics and oh, a trip to Penang this Monday; and a wedding to attend this weekend as my run-in to Christmas. Gah! Christmas Cards and gifts!
I am sort-of cramming a few of these: reading sheet music, some easy scales (fingers were forever stiff as *#$k) , remembering sheets and notes and chords, okay, I really do have in good faith the Lord will provide...and of course I've gotta be putting my hours in to getting conditioned to play the guitar.

did this moments ago (yeah took a break since fingers numb much faster) and hey,  I like this quote yo!

p/s: oh, I finally lost my months-old DIY guitar pick/spectrum on Wednesday's visit. Felt a wee bit sad when I was searching for it yet again, but alas it really has gone invisible. Serves me right, as I made it from such a clear looking material. Rested my case, and finally went about to purchase a damn pick from any store...but no! They only sell them in bulks of 4 for RM 10. Hot dang. I seriously don't remember the price of one; but I suppose, nah, forget it. It is high time for me anyways.
But Mom somehow told me there should be a box of my old spectrums lying about in my room amongst my keepsakes...and there I was thinking I lost them years ago when I lost most of my belongings. Oh well...

WESTWORLD

Finally caught up with the season finale of HBO's Westworld and it certainly ranks dead high on this year's Must Watch list. 

Basically adapted from the premise of a (possibly reaching cult status) an old 70's film of the same name written by the late Michael Crichton (and oh, only found out he directed the film too?) and pretty much influenced himself to go on and write his more famous Jurassic Park(s)..(and in which influenced T-800 somehow?)But my, with 40 years or so of film-making advancements and technology; we are certainly in for a treat over the span of 10 and a half hours in its maiden season. 

Sci Fi? Check

Paranoid Androids? Check

Mystery? Check

Western? Check

Nudity? Check

Violence? Check

Existentialism? Check

Nolan-esque twist? Check

Awesome music score by Ramin Djawadi of GoT fame? Yes Please!

Rodrigo Santoro? Check oo-la-la

Perfect cast, no doubt with (Sir) Anthony Hopkins and Ed Harris in their roles; and the rest of the casts as 'hosts' both at times acting splendidly as 'robot' and in their 'Westworld roles' , notably lead Evan Rachel Wood, Jeffrey Wright and Thandie Newton..even a certain ex Mrs Musk shines in her role as a 'host' too.

One does note the many references to gaming world rather than a theme park, as with so many feels of it being 'open-world', easter-egg, NPC's, level hardness, and in The Man in Black that eventually got consumed to be sucked-into being as the completionist gamer. It also serves a healthy dose of trivia in recognizing the few auto-piano (ain't sure what that contraption should be called) tunes of modern classics such as the 2 Radiohead songs and Soundgarden's Black Hole Sun.

I suppose if you are quite familiar with either Nolan brothers' style of writing, (plus, as a series you get a bit more time to figure things out along the way,anyway) you should be able to predict the many twists to the plot(s) and this certainly is the most rewarding imho, as the reveal(s) were stacked up in a very balanced story-telling and always, leave you wanting for more. The pledge and the prestige.

Until next year (or is it 2018?) then, "Cease All Motor Functions"

CW-verse | Arrow-verse Mega Crossover 2016

My, goosebumps all over when they assembled. and many times over too! Then it was Arrow's 100th episode that assembled various casts that has been 'dead' to the timeline that paid homage to the comics (plus 2 cast members that looks a weird yet passable CG; must be scheduling I think) and then tying most of the lingering subplots from all 4 (well, 3 to be exact, nothing from Supergirl I think, except the few easter eggs) for an awesome finish to the best crossover ever.

Tonnes of popular references, and some were pretty meta (ie: Superman, and Tommy being a doctor in Chicago) and they sneaked in Princess Bride, yet again.
Earlier this year when Barry crossed over to Supergirl; it was pretty apparent those 2 had chemistry; (Grant Gustin is just that charming and complements everyone else in almost any scene, right?)but this time around I suppose Melissa Benoist gels with everyone she shares screentime with. and it is indeed a welcome addition to get bit-cameos from the other characters, both on their own show and every bit involves everyone someway or the other. Now that's some level that the showrunners achieved (or in their words, level of insanity every year for crossovers), so you DCEU executive jackrabbits should be smart to learn something you know. I am waiting eagerly for the stink to hit with your next few slated releases, and its companion Full Versions video releases.

Of course, it would've been more of a global scale if every other unaccounted heroes/vigilantes and or villains showed up for the final fight with that world threat..but I suspect we might get that trick later on with the years (or at least DC would stay the eff away from having a say about CWverse)

Can't wait for next week when they resume with the new repercussions of this week moving on.

"To things not being normal, 
To life being full"

November Rain

Surely it must've rained a big deal in little ol "Rain Town" Taiping this past November.
Of course memory serves me short (hazy? pun intended) as I skimmed through the pictures that was automatically ear-marked November by the phone, and with my current Day 4 of CW-DC Arrowverse Crossover Zombie mode; that certainly doesn't help jogging the mind's eye.

November was pretty good, I might say since we had some pretty memorable milestones in our walk with the Lord, as well as it has certainly been a great month of me catching up on my favorable pastimes. Nevertheless, I suppose I've been caught out somehow as I was very much unproductive with my very low output of digital images, I don't think I did even 5 pieces of images in total, across all my endeavors. Shame. Shame. Shame.

Anyhow, on with it. (Remember, K.I.S.S, Kevin. Summarize it and hit the showers and finish up Legends of Tomorrow!)

Sunshine Homes visitations: We hit 2 believers in a day! and one of them was this old brother who'd incidentally became unconscious during our session; thank God as we laid hands and prayed for him to regain awareness to accept and do the sinner's prayer. Hallelujah!

We continued our Wednesday sessions to Emmanuel Women's Home (or something like that, can't recall for sure) Quaint nifty home nearby Sunshine Old Folks Home. 

The womenfolk does have activities, crochet-ing and well, they help with prepping their food too. Of course, this home houses able womenfolk, whereas everyone had seen better days at Sunshine.

We sneaked in a couple of visits to this senior gentleman who neighbors Taiping Baptist Church. Kind and pet-friendly man; he hid behind his house (must've been to light up a smoke) on his grandchildren's birthday one day, and he saw Bunny & the Gang (Pastor Cheah's dogs : Bunny is the humongous Labrador Mix, The Gang refers to the other 2 young clowns) peeking and calling out to him for treats. He took the half of the birthday cake(s) and fed them by hand..and that was how Pastor saw it to tell us the tale.

On the 26th, we joined Taiping Baptist Church's family gathering, a 3D2N stay in Ipoh. 

Of course, I for one was raring to go when I knew about it, since this would totally mark the first time we are going to a family church camp..of course as days sniffed closer; (and with Mom and her worries of us 2 ass-hats sneaking off for smokes) the self-doubt sets in. The elephant in the room was the language barrier; I mean I do understand Mandarin somehow, sparingly; but this is going to be practically a full-on 3 days of Mandarin and even conversing in it (which is technically my worst) 

But I suppose I asked for not the whole nine yards from the Lord as I asked only for the strength to comprehend the sermons, and He did deliver. I am pretty sure I get the implications and hidden messages from all the sermons and this is a mean feat since there were 3 hour-long sessions from this Reverend Bai from China and it was evident as I understood his jokes too in thick accent. (and to a certain degree, playing RoTK 13 with mandarin language)

 Praise the Lord!

Moving along, yeah Ipoh. In the family I had the least things in common with Ipoh (they lived here for some years, years before I was born) but of course growing up in Taiping I had a few flings (both 'with' and 'in' teehee) with Ipoh and the other Perak cities no thanks to my busy/active middle school life, which is a lifetime away. But I do remember one thing, I wasn't like some of my friends that glorify Ipoh and traveled down for leisure, just for the malls, etc whenever they got their dad's car for the weekend (yeah, small townies had to resort to that, but I suppose I was being a dick since I associate Penang as my hometown then, yeah. Dick)

Oh, how different it was. I mean my last pass-over Ipoh must've been 5-6 years ago when I visited an ex-colleague based here; and I've certainly forgot Ipoh for it also being the food capital of Perak. We had a leisurely stroll on the final day, and I must say I did an imaginary tearful joy at having this particular dish I've only been reduced to having the discount version (though not 'discount' in price!) when I lived in KL.. the infamous Ipoh Koay Teow Soup. It should easily be more than 20+ years since I had a sniff of the authentic bowl of noodles; no matter where was the original one.

Bad Photo I Know Right : Ipoh's Chee Cheong Funn, got schooled from Harry that they are somewhat special, as evident in the addition of the mushroom gravy and mushroom bits. Yum yum awesome! But I had their other infamous noodle; which I never did like before this; Hor Hee (yes, in the family, Heidi named it such during our CNY steamboat dinners, little did I know it is named as such as a dish. I was taught that this specific 'space-ship' looking fishball is Hor Hee; if we called it "Space-Ship"...the elders wouldn't know it meant that. But we still call it Space Ship, even though I don't like eating it, since it is fish, somehow. But I can say I love the Hor Hee dish now!

Yes! of course this one is from a tourist-y place, but it still brings age-old memories

Skeptical at first; but I ate my words as I saw it for myself. I must say I was dead impressed. Buns are good, the varieties got me impressed really. But my favorites are the Real Squid Balls, tender juicy bouncy balls.

Our gathering was at the Oasis 5, Jalan Raja Dihilir; an awesome church venue. Huge spacious rooms and I suppose it is very accessible indeed.

Landscape of the back

looks dead like I pawn off an official picture. but no, just an opportune shot. 

Rare occasion to selfie. Of course without much practice, couldn't time a decent one with Mr Ozzie Ostrich

boat ride view of Gunung Lang and it's cleavage?

I only have pictures from the third day, somehow must've been preoccupied with the camp, helping out getting food, picking up speaker-brother Dr Lawrence Lim from his hotel nearby, and making coffee for Dad (and seeing to his tablet too, shared responsibility with Harry)
Guess must've reverted back to the introverted shell as I only thought of getting a selfie with Lawrence after we sent him back to his hotel. It certainly was a good 2 session of health talk from him; as I too am inspired to follow his dietary lifestyle, not his lifestyle, not yet jose. I mean, I can't fathom tuning in the night at 9pm and waking up 5am (he does his morning devotions for an hour and a half) but I will certainly aim for that one day... maybe the 7am's? :D
But I certainly am aiming for a good level of reduction in skipping dinner at 'normal' dinner time. His dinner is no later than 5:30pm, so that is an achievable goal somehow. Of course with staying at home and our meal times (and Dad with his food habits) plus the occasional *ahem* awesomeness of my cooking, it needs TIME for it to be reasonably possible lol. Of course, I'm aware Harry had been lowering his dinner intake ever since the last meet with Dr Lawrence earlier this year, and Mom has always been a small eat; it needs time to adjust our meals as I can't just simply excessively tone down on my dinner intake as this will certainly mean leaving loads of leftover rice for Fried Rice! and Larry isn't exactly stopping by to visit every single month. Okay. I better speed this up. Dominators are waiting to be pawned by the heroes & legends, man.

gosh, can't remember this alley. 

Mom with Rev. Bai

And so here we are, the final month of 2016. Mental note for the Christmas gift list, and of course looking forward to the conclusion of Civil War II, and this coming weekend's season finale of HBO's Westworld. Probably should do a post about Westworld, after I watched the original film and err, the book. But heeyy, I am pretty behind on my Goodreads Book Challenge!
Too many books too many graphic novels, too many Marvel, too many tv series, so little time. (oh, for one, I accidentally missed out on catching Doctor Strange in the cinemas, what an embarrassing relapse in time/day-keeping!)

supposed death of Iron Man. Not too shocking since you kinda have been teased and forewarned with/from other new titles.

3-Way Sweet Potato Fries with Roasted Garlic Aioli

Ipoh.

There and back again. 

(remember to insert a hyperlink, tomorrow when the post is up)

Anyhow, dropped Aunt Girlie off at the bus station on Tuesday, and then stopped by the fresh produce stalls near Kamunting for Mom to stock up on them bananas. We found a major piece of a sweet potato (in which I shall henceforth christened Hulkbuster; although, in retrospect it should be Black Panther's Hulkbuster armor with its color scheme, but I can't remember if it does indeed have a name?) and since Mom wanted to get it for its' tiny little shoot to , um, well, re-grow it back, I offered her to do something with the rest of that spud. In any case, she was unsure what to cook with it due to its size, so I stepped in promising something else, though at the back of my mind I knew I wanted to do some Sweet Potato Fries, yet I knew I had to keep it a secret from her since her sort-of dislike to All-Things-Fried.

So yeah, I've never did these hand-made fries, except when I did/learnt them on one such kitchen roll-out during the ol' Kitchen Manager days. Of course, as with all things, in theory it should work! :D

To be fair, I switched it up a bit and since I wasn't sure Mom will be okay with the fried stuffs; I decided to leave those that I pre-baked as it is, hence I am left with 3 styles of fries, well to be fair, it isn't exactly tri-style, since it is just bake vs fried, but perhaps someday I shall do a proper third way. So on with the game recipe!

3-Way Sweet Potato Fries with Roasted Garlic Aioli

Ingredients

The Fries

Sweet Potatoes - washed, scrubbed (or skin-off up to you) cut into similarly 1/2 inch shoe-strings (a minimum of 1/4 inch is the thinnest I'd go, I suppose it might be too thin)

Seasonings & Dry Batter

Oil; Olive 

Salt & Pepper

Smoked Paprika

Onion Powder 

Asam Boi Powder ~ perfect with guava!

Starch - I use Sweet Potato Flour : gah! case of dipping chicken in egg batter!

Roasted Garlic Aioli with Ulam Raja

Garlic; Whole - roasted whole til browned, then hulk-smash

Yolk & Oil & Juice ~ aka Mayonnaise. I started late, so I had to make do with el-cheapo packeted un

Kalamansi; Juice of 1 - decided to change it a bit

a bit of Olive Oil to further smooth it a bit

Ulam Raja; Chopped - a few sprigs chopped up and folded into once the mayo has set/chilled

Prep Time : 20 mins or so           Cook Time : 10,15 mins depends on how many batches, really
Wash Up Time : oh, pretty messy doughy and oily! oh my
Satisfaction Level : Yes, yay high, killing 3 cravings under an hour's playing around the kitchen.

How-To Steps

1. (I am not going to list out the usual pre-heat oven/toaster/car/ etc here) Wash and prep the tatters, peel off if you have to. With a proper knife you should be able to cut it to 1/2 inches, then proceed to split those again lengthwise 1/2 inches to individually thick fries. Whenever you get to parts that will result in short and stubby fries,..well it generally falls to you on how to cut em up.
From here, I split them into groups of 3 (well, a group of 2 in this instance : 2/3 of them in a pile for Frying, and the 1/3 for Baking) with similar pieces by color. Toss about with some oil.

2.

Bake ~ Line the pieces on the tray, making sure it is somehow oiled I might add. I didn't salt these for I wanted these to be plain and boringly baked (teehee, bias much?) 

Fry (1) ~ Over an ever ready pot of oil, fry half of the potatoes for <5 minutes to a nice golden brown. Those fries lesser than 1/2 inches should be done under 3 minutes. Whisk/Net/Chopstick these out and season with pinches of Salt, Pepper & Paprika for the Mat Salleh fries. 

Fry (2) ~ Spoon some Starch on a plate/container and add in a few pinches of Salt, Onion Powder, Pepper. Mix them well. Dust and coat the remaining fries and proceed to fry for <5 minutes for a crispy golden brown finish. This batch should be sprinkled generously with Asam Boi Powder for some Taiwanese fries.

3. This step should've been number 1, since I made them earlier. The Garlic Mayo.

Roast the garlic, pulverise or blend whichever you may fancy, fold in the mayo (or DIY mayo, I ain't gonna judge) the juice and seasoning. Leave it to chill and socialize and marry. Prior to serving, pop into the garden and pick whichever you have in excess to rough chop it up and mix into the mayo.

4. Plate up and Sweet Potatoes.... Assemble!

Okay, next up, November Update where I need to crack my lo-memory state and try to figure out things from my monthly transfer of phone pictures to the camera roll...but I have a sneaky feeling I might not have that many worthwhile pictures other than the Ipoh family camp... oh my..

Well, I guess I could do the CW DCU's crossover event episode 1 first in the meantime. Go Flash!

,

October in Pictures

Trying out this collage as a blog graphic (just to see how it fits kind of) , perhaps this might be how I'd weblog an entry for every month, seemingly I can't (and somehow sort of lost any bit of motivation to do so) be back to regular weblogging somehow, with the mounting excuses it certainly defied the whole intention of blogging.

October has and perhaps always had been a mix-bag of bittersweet month, evidently more so from last year onward. In short, I wouldn't really pin it as a bad month (for me); it's just synonymous with so many other things that if I were to simply put it as a "Them Feels" Month is too general in nature.
I struggled (and procrastinated reasoned successfully) to not do/write about 5 posts that was pretty high-up on my list to do prior to October, and hence I found myself unprepared when it (the month) rolled over and I asked myself; and justified that there will always be a tomorrow. Of course, it does and it doesn't and perhaps all in all this is me 'reporting' and justifying my spent month, in chronological order:

Heidi's birth-date was on the 10th, and we finally got together and managed to move her urn to the niche, sort of a moving-in of the final physical items, after like 17 months.
I suppose I am half-happy with the final plaque bearing an absolute 90-odd percent semblance to my design (She always did encourage and love my designs and etc) but alas, it was a shame there was an annoying bit of spelling mistake on the engravings of a certain word, (engravers fault, not mine) that it had to be it. Now, I promised myself to 'fix' it, by figuring out the possible material for a stick-on for the word the next time we make our way to the memorial; since we certainly are not making the trip north this week for All Souls' Day (yeah, we don't really celebrate that, but we might, someday?)
Our trip was an extremely short one; reach the island by 9am-ish, pick up the urn and towards the ever-green and ever tranquil Penang Christian Cemetery, a quick lunch (yay Penang food), and a short stop in Sg Dua; and then it was back home for lunch.

Wasn't prepared, as I think about it now, could've just brought along that 1 snow-cap of hers I have as keepsake , oh well.

Bucket List #1 : One day, when I could afford and find a master sculptor, man. (this has been around 80+ years!)

certainly not my favorite Dhoby Ghaut's; but that will do in the mean time, that day.

truth be typed, I was mad at the engraver; it wasn't just that 1 spelling mistake, there were irregularities with  the capitals here and there...but then again, I don't think this was made digitally with auto-correct

On another note, Angél was sick a week prior, the vet said he was down with flu (of course, for a newbie with cats aka mois , I was dumbfounded-ly shocked, since I saw the sign of him having a bruised 1 eye and all I thought was he got scratched near his eyelids) and I suppose I must've muttered an idiotic line something like "Cats can get fever?" in Malay. Of course I was lucky enough with my 1 canine boy to not being sick when he was older, but then again, caring for a sick cat is way much harder! It isn't so easy to sneak or feed pills, certainly. But he was alright in under a week.
But on the morning of our trip to Penang, I found Angél's Wife #1 lying in the garden, which was pretty odd, since she was such a nimble ninja (actually both of his waifus are such cats. came for the food, and vanish as soon as you move an inch)
Black Face as what we unofficially call her, had gone to the other meadow by the rainbow bridge that morning. That was the first and final time I got to touch that cat that we know and don't know. Poor kid must've got poisoned somehow from her last scavenging hunt the night before, as I walked over to her owner and told her that my brother has dealt with the carcass. Days later, heard from her that her kitten had also joined his mum a day after. Oh well, poor kitties.
Angél is fine now; but I could still remember the whimper (do cats whimper?) cry from Angél when both of us found Black Face. damn

Mama Cat & Junior, happier times, September. R.I.P

Junior - could've fooled people as Angél. Similar markings, even with the shortened tail; though slightly smaller and without collar., eyes could've been a different shade 

The other big one was on the 7th.
Well, I wish I could avoid that.
The 7th actually has a deeper connection to that, as it was tied to a person of years' past. Yet it now shared an ambiguous date with the day I last see Chance.
1 year. 7 eff-ing doggie years.
I miss the boy.
I miss his fur on everything.
I miss waking up to see that jovial spirit with his hetero-chromia eyes
This is harder than I imagined.
How do you somehow explain this to a canine companion?
Yet I don't seem to do anything about it huh?
 Well, I wish I could avoid that. Choices, man. But. Soon.

the final last 2 pics of him before the pick-up. He must've felt something, 

I remember goading him to come up and take a pic with Angél, I can't brace myself to watch the video, not yet.

So what exactly have I been up to this sad ol' October?
Apart from the fortnight visits to Sunshine (and subsequent visit/prospecting to the other 2 prospective Christian Old Folk's last Wednesday) and attending a few activities by the Chinese Methodist & Chinese Gospel Hall, I did not commit to the 3-day combined camp by FGA though.
Did images for 2 sermon presentations, well, actually stayed up the night to fully start & finish Mom's first ever slides; pretty last minute since she wasn't sure whether to proceed with presentation anyway, but yeah I was proud and happy for her to get the courage to try that something new for herself. I mean, yeah, Dad has grown into this 'new and spank-ly original custom-made images' (not much on the latter, yet, I suspect) presentation slides. Although for Mom's maiden try it somehow wasn't to be, we forgot all about informing the need for a projection; so we made do with the few Gospel-Hallites squinting their eyes to see this RedYacer's screen whenever wherever.
Made a couple of other images as well, though not all were of usage as yet (even the Diwali ones, oh the shame)
Oh yeah, I've finally reconnected with my guitar-ing old self. Well, got the guitar loaned in by Ps. Cheah late September when he couldn't made a trip to Sunshine then, though I only did practiced once then; I've put in a teeny effort to touch the acoustic for a few practice sesh. So yeah, it was pretty alright. It is practically like riding a bike/ or swimming I suppose. You just don't forget how-to.

Taiping Chinese Methodist's 111th Anniversary service. Wow. Chaperoned Mom & Dad as VIPs

Kau Kee Choy Stir-Fry; one of many variations I started doing as these shoots were going on sale, found out it translates to Go Ji Choy as in the Goji berry's Goji. A bit of lazy to research then, but I suppose it is from similar cultivae? These leaves does have some berries, albeit different and so much smaller than gojiberries somehow. 

Lady's Fingers Red & Pale variants: Taman Kaya home-grown! Pretty productive month indeed to have quite a good harvest of our Red Okras (and even abundant Potato Leaves!) and Friendly-Black Chillies but alas; it grew to about the usual length of those locally found okras; however our neighbor's pale colored okras were freakin' huge! Our pale variant plant died off some time ago according to Mum; but both were 'smuggled' in from 4th Aunt's visit to Korea perhaps.

Dad's sermon at TCM Seniors service. That's a lot of senior citizens!

October is also a month of reconnecting with the bulk of tv series returning for their new seasons too.
I was raving madferrit for Marvel's Luke Cage late September, though I only binged it much later when the rest of the other shows were about to start again, well I haven't actually been as up-to-date on most series anyway. A lot more compared to the last didn't make the same-day watch-list; the only exception is that much-awaited episode of The Walking Dead, and most of The Flash. Almost every other show made the new pull-list for a later date. So far I've only caught a single episode (or 2) of each Gotham, Lucifer, Supergirl, Ash Vs The Evil Dead, Quantico, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, (okay this one was 2 episodes, since I think I like the 'new' Ghost Rider) like 4 episodes in I think of Blindspot, the new McGyver maybe 3rd episode. Both Arrow & Legends of Tomorrow were up to the week, though not as frequent.
And it's not just that, I've been cutting it slower too with them comics; week in week out I'd only do the current Civil War II's and actual tie-ins, and the occasional The Walking Dead & Archie (and their line-up) whenever they do appear. But with the way things ended September (Ulysses' vision of Miles Morales killing Capt') we got the inevitable surprise (hey, since it launched so early on) of Doom in Infamous Iron Man, yeah we know it's coming (Doom & Riri) and perhaps sensed a certain somebody's demise months ago but that certainly is a curveball, much too soon!
Pretty miffed to see the end of my much loved Vision & A-Force, but, fingers crossed for more gems to come and discover.

"...back to it! " yikes!

Come on, crossover already

So, what actually was my escape this month?
I hid myself in conquering China. Well, to be precise, shagging my way across making 'friends' & fighting/debating banditos & shady merchants across China in KOEI's (ok, KOEI TECMO) RoTK XIII
Introduced to this series when I was a wee boyo of , err 10 I think, by my brother during my school break it became a major influence on me growing up. I suppose that was in line about the time after my dear sis got me to read too; so when I got back home after the holidays I'd immersed myself in this classical Chinese literature. Gorged into it really like 2-3 times on the decades-old tomes from the school library smelly as f*#k; getting myself on the illustrated simpler bilingual copies like I suppose more than 10 times before finishing puberty mayhap. That was the gist of it. Of course, together with my Dickens',Twains', Dumas' & the other classic chaps; since I could only read English, and if you wanna know more about the Romance of the Three Kingdoms in the early 90's.... that's what you are left with. (since you are hopeless with Chinese symbols)
Anyway, before my connection gets sluggy in half an hour, better post this up, before I justify not to.

Not My ScreenShot