Ta-dah! My Diwali dance costume

I just got my Diwali dance costume! I believe it is an Indian traditional costume, but with some enhancements so that it is suitable for shows. It is definately a bright costume. Hmm, that is an understatement. bling bling is more like it.

It is really  P R E T T Y and S E X Y

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NOT!

Do I look nice and slim?

Hmm, maybe adding a bling bling jacket will be nice.

Er, maybe not.

There are more bling blings to this costume! I know rite, hard to imagine. I will post up more pics after the event. Talking about the dance, I am not sure if I feel 100% comfortable wearing this in front of my colleagues. *gulp*

Don’t get me wrong. I think this costume look nice if all four of the girls wear like that. Look nice as a group since it is colorful and vibrant. But, if  the focus is on one person, it is not very flattering, is it? Vain, I know.

Oh ya,  last year’s dance.

Update: Oct 27  12.13 am

– someone mentioned that this costume is silly

– someone agreed that this costume is clown-ish

– I thought of an adjective for this costume: DRAMATIC

Mercury News .. .grrr!!!

So I got a call from Mercury News saying I owe them money.

I have received many calls from them asking me if I am interested to continue subscription and I said no.

I did not even read those newspapers! The reason I subscribe to it is because I was approached by a teen, and Mercury News have some program where they offer scholarships to students who can get a certain number of subscriptions.

I subscribed to the newspaper twice this way. I was careful and paid in cash and did not give away my credit card information. What if those teens lied to me, right? Giving away credit card info to random people are scary. But it turned out, those two teens were genuine and I did receive those newspapers. Good luck to them and hopefully they did being offered scholarships.

The first time, I had to pay $10 and although I receive some calls from Mercury News, I did not continue the subscription. And that was it.

The second time, they hiked up the subscription price to $20, which was fine by me since the guy had an opportunity to get a scholarship. I also received numerous calls from Mercury News asking me to continue subscription but I said no. However, suddenly I owe Mercury News $25!

Let me reiterate, the reason I mentioned “scam” (maybe scam is too strong of a word) “grrr”  *mad*is because prior to this phone call, I had received numerous calls from Mercury News asking me to continue subscription and I said NO.

Sorry guys, if I am approached again for this Mercury-news-scholarship-subscription-thing, I am certainly not going to subscribe. Too much of a hassle. And, now Mercury News has my credit card information. Now thinking back, I should have paid using check.

Mehndi … my first

I had my first mehndi on my hand last weekend! Thanks to M who was so patient putting Mehndi for many of us. Really had fun that day.

You really need to take care to make sure that the color stays on the skin.

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First, mehndi paste was applied on the skin.

After the mehndi paste was dry, lemon and sugar mixture was applied to the skin to increase the acidity of the mehndi design and the adherence of the paste to the skin.

For the best result, try to leave the mehndi paste on the skin as long as possible (a few hours) so that the color will turn out dark.

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Definition from Wikipedia,

Mehndi is the application of Henna as a temporary form of skin decoration, in South Asia, the Middle East, North Africa and Somalia as well as expatriate communities from these areas. Mehndi decorations became fashionable in the West in the late 1990s, where they are sometimes called henna tattoos.

Mehndi paste freshly applied on my hand

Various pretty designs

Some of the dried henna paste dropped off from my skin

Ta-da! The mehndi paste was washed off, revealing the pretty design!

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Diwali performance after-party

Colorful Indian traditional costumes

Ta-da!

My rollerblades! Who wants to teman me?

I have been consuming ice-cream everyday!

My fix.

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Dun worry.. See, I ration the amount of ice-cream. Use a super small cup fill it up till the brim, and you will trick your brain to think that you ate a lot of ice-cream… Okay, maybe this does not work every time as sometimes I have more than one “cup” of ice-cream.

gas price … air gauge …

Gas price is rocket high .. People try to find ways to spend less on gas. Radio stations frequently air tips on methods to reduce spending on gas. One of the method is to ensure that you tires are well inflated.

Heeding their advice, I want to get an tire gauge. I always read reviews of the product online before purchasing it. I came across a tire gauge an Amazon. There are people who complained about the product , claiming that the gauge malfunctioned, always giving a reading of 28.5 psi. A smart reviewer solved their problems! Read the solution here. Scroll down to customer reviews and the solution is the first review listed. It is pretty funny!

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Watched “Dark Knight” and “Hellboy II” last weekend. I still like Ironman better! Maybe I am biased, coz I ate popcorn when I watched Ironman.

Always read the FINE/EVASIVE print … Cellulean.com

I was not not being CAREFUL and did not read the TERMS AND CONDITIONS properly. But in my opinion, Cellulean.com target people like me for business. It was an EXPENSIVE lesson. So, still feeling cheated, I have to write about it

It all started when I read in the magazine saying that this product can help let me quote “Reduces the Appearance of cellulite and unwanted fat”. And you can buy a free trial and pay for the $10 shipping. So, why not? This concoction can’t possiblymake my kaki gajah worse. Not that kaki gajah is not nice since my dad says my mom’s kaki gajah is absolutely beautiful.

I bought the trial, without carefully reading a paragraph which shows up after I click on a check box saying that I want to purchase the trial. The paragraph mentioned about automatic billing and shipment. There isn’t any checkbox which needs me to check it to show that I agree on the terms.  So, they did inform me about this, ONCE.

The purchase confirmation page did not state about the regular subscription, nor there is any email which reminds me about my trial which is going to end, or that they are shipping and charging for the second bottle for … $79! Anyone wants to buy me lunch tmr?

Just realize this when I receive the package today.

Called the customer service, kenot refund. Their 100% satisfaction guaranteed can’t be applied for “purchases” after the trial. Browsed online and there are several posts written by people who had the same predicament as me.

I do not think that they are doing anything illegal (of coz not, will get sued left and right) but they do not really have a transparent and honorable business practice.

As for now, I am not sure if this product really works coz I do not really pay attention to its effectiveness, but since I unwillingly paid for the second bottle, I should start measuring my thighs, arms, tummy etc!

This is how I feel after the EXPENSIVE lesson. Ignore the mouth on the background

Weekend

On Friday evening, I had dinner at a place called Chelokababi Restaurant. The reason of me mentioning this? Well, it’s name sounds like “Cela** ba**” Haha.. ya syok sendiri

On Saturday, we went to Computer Museum History Center. Boring, you might say… It is INTELLECTUAL. The main reason we went there was because we thought there will be a special exhibition, “The Babbage Exhibition”, but alas, we got the wrong date. It starts next weekend. The museum is quite interesting. List: 1971 machine with over 120 miles of hand-wired interconnections; 1969 Kitchen computer priced at $10,600 for housewives to store and retrieve recipes. The user interface was only binary lights and switches (Not too user friendly) Apparently, there is no evidence that any of this was sold; One of first Google Data Center.

At night, we went to Abyss to work-out.

Everyone looking angelic in white

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Currently reading books by Nicholas Spark. I read “The Notebook” a few weeks ago. I love his style of writing so much that I borrowed all the books written by him from the library. Touching stories.

I’m officially a fei po

Ya, I am! Well, I know I am steadily gaining weight … hmm.. about 8 pounds heavier compared to July last year! How about that? I am in denial, relying on the excuse that my weighing machine is not showing the truth, since it is so cheap. Then, I weighed myself at YL’s place. About the same result, but then again, her weighing scale is cheap too! ;P But, after weighing on CK’s expensive digital scale, … well … I feel like fei po lor.

But no worries, I am aware of my situation and have been dieting since forever, but still gaining weight. Why? Kenot control ler. My dad knows me best. Every time I mentioned about dieting to him, he will laugh at me. That’s my reputation regarding this issue. Coz he knows I do not stick to the plan at all. You might be thinking, just 8 pounds, what is the big deal? Well, dear, I have been gaining weight, although I am consciously trying to lose weight. Hmm… maybe 8 pounds is not that bad.

I just L.O.V.E chocolates, desserts or generally anything sweet. Neslo for breakfast, Pocky before lunch, some mini chocolates(Crunch, M&M’s, Baby Ruth, Snickers) for tea, choc/coffee ice-cream or Julie’s love letters(choc flavor of coz) for supper. How can this diet work? But, I do not foresee this eating habit will change much. ;P

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Watched Iron Man on Wednesday. I LIKE! Great movie…Makes me feel like a kid again! Steven Spielberg, is truly a gifted man. Somehow Iron Man reminds me of X-Men and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Love those too.

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Have been feeling really worried about my H1B situation. My full-time job these few days is to refresh my H1B status page. The attorney and his assistant are very responsive to my emails, so, that’s nice.

ERT …? What’s that

I recently joined the ERT ( Emergency Response Team ) at my workplace. I feel that it would be useful to know some safety procedures. There are 3 trainings ro complete: evacuation, first aid and fire extinguisher.

After going for the evacuation training (just in case, the is earthquake o_o etc ), I was giving a big placard indicating that I am a point of contact if case of an emergency.. Very paisae to put the placard up, since all I knew was , if the sirens go off, empty the building.. ;P

I have just successfully completed a basic CPR, AED and First Aid for adult! Upon completion of the training, we were given a certificate of a size of a business card for us to carry around with us. The certification is only valid for 2 years. Hopefully, I will never encounter a situation where I have to use what I learned from the training…

One of the interesting fact I learned was that Good Samaritan law protects those who tried to help the injured or ill. So, if anything bad happens to person you are helping, you can’t be sued. However, you must get the person’s consent, if the person is concious before helping them to be protected by the Samaritan law.

Also, there is actually a mouth to mouth barrier which you can use when you perform mouth-to-mounth. This is to avoid you and the victim exchanging diseases. I think this is neat. I guess what you see in movies regarding lifeguards trying to resucitate other ppl without any barriers do not reflect what happen in real life. 

AED (automated external defibrillator ) is portable electronic device that diagnoses and treats cardiac arrest. If a person has cardiac arrest, AED will allow you to electric shock the person with a press of button. Apparently this device is very common now, available in public places.

In the training, a lot of ppl were concerned of being legally liable if anything bad happen to the victims. Their concerns were not surprising because … well … it is common for ppl here to sue even for the slightest things. Heard of ppl suing McD coz the food makes them fat? So, make sure you ask for permission if you can help before doing anything.

Safety stuffs

Gaming … $$$

I did not know how GREAT my brother is at playing games until …

He sold his online character for a few thousand bucks!

whooaaa……