mysewingproject has arrived...

i know i've been harping a lot about my side project trove by elixelle but it's still in progress and i'm really hoping to have it up latest by april. however, i'm just so excited to announce that mysewingproject is now up! it's a blog for me to share.. well.. my sewing projects. haha. i'll be posting up more projects each time i complete them. check out my first post on the outfit i wore at dimple's wedding reception.

now to get my other projects up and running. *rubs palms together*

 

bazaar, reception, birthdays and training...

march seems filled with events and things to do. just realized it's been a while since my last post. *eyeing virtual cobwebs* so here are some updates so far...

i can't believe it's been NINE years since graduating high school!! thanks to momok for letting me knowing about the school bazaar and letting me tag along with her, nur and hez. it's been ages since we last met. met a few teachers and friends while i was there too. it was superbly HOT (as in panas) that day. good thing i managed to squeeze a parking spot at harrington's just opposite the school. so i didn't have that far to walk. hehe. the school seemed oddly smaller and well, really nothing much has changed. the canteen was still tiny and the classes look exactly how i remembered them to be. despite the many donations the entire student population have been contributing (and not to mention fund-raisers and bazaars), the only significant changes that i noticed were:

1. the main hall is now tiled up all the way to the canteen corridors
2. there's a trophy display cabinet mounted underneath the class corridor
facing the main hall
3. there's a changing room next to the stage
4. projectors in class

not quite sure but i heard they did some work with the toilets there as well, but i can't really confirm on that cos i didn't manage to take a peek at it. hehe. food as usual was bazaar priced (i.e. over-priced) which made it hard for me to get myself to buy anything. still for the sake of supporting my alma mater, i did spend rm10 there. haha.

tis the season to get married. haha. this is my 3rd wedding this year and as always, the bride and groom looked stunning. i loved how dimple's gown wasn't the conventional white gown but rather a more contemporary green and shocking pink evening gown which was absolutely gorgeous!!

* the grand entrance *

* me with the lovely couple *

my lil bro's birthday was the same day as the reception so we postponed and stretched his celebration to the next day til now. couldn't quite celebrate it on the day itself cos he was still down with fever and a cold. *aaawww* will be getting him a cake this week. hehe.

* isn't he just the cutest?!?!?! *

last thursday i was off to kl to attend a training session the following day. after much queries from travel desk, i managed to stay on til saturday night but only had the hotel booked for thursday night. good thing bestie nyn was so welcoming and had me at her place friday night. *hugs nyn and blows kisses*

my dad offered to pick me up from sentral and send me to the hotel. then we had dinner at belanga at the gardens. decided to try out their nasi kerabu (my first time eating) with grilled fish (i.e. ikan bakar) and ais teller (or es teler in indonesia). the verdict?!? sooo not my kinda food. the only upside to the nasi kerabu to me was the tangy taste of the bunga kantan in the ulam pile. the ais teller wasn't quite the thing for my taste buds. too rich and sweet for me. i gave the jackfruit pieces to my dad who ordered the same thing and strangely enjoyed his. to each his/her own i guess. lol!

my wonderful friends in kl had already booked tickets for dragon ball on friday night. so as soon as my training ended friday, i rushed back to midvalley cos they were coming to pick me up there and i didn't want to leave my luggage with the hotel concierge for too long. haha. paranoid, i know. don't even get me started with the public transportation system in kl. i've exponentially learnt to despise it. haha. had to forego the first komuter that arrived cos it was already sardine packed and positioned myself properly for the next train. i liked the idea of the blue, green and red lines incorporated in the station though so you know where the doors are gonna be when the train arrives. need to remind myself to take a cab next time. i was dragged back into the train 3 times *thanks to my laptop backpack and handbag* while getting off at the midvalley station. thanks to this nice girl who helped pull me out as she was getting into the train. that was nice of her. else i'd prolly be on the way to seputeh or something. haha.

anyways, after dragon ball, we headed off to old town white coffee in cyberjaya for intan's birthday celebration. i think it was supposed to be a surprise but all things considered it went well. it was nice to catch up with shima hunny while driving on the way to cyberjaya from sunway. *smiles*

* birthday girl intan and housemates (they're practically family) *

got back at 3-ish in the morning, changed and were instantly transported to dreamland. *zzzzz* was planning on getting up early to start the shopping escapades but when i opened my eyes, my watched was telling me it was already 12.30pm. haha. there goes the morning. got up, washed up and got ready to go. my babe nyn was already up around 9am but said i was sleeping so soundly (i.e. tidur mati) she let me sleep on. haha!!

soon as we got to midvalley, i was famished!! decided to grab a bite at nando's. was a bit disappointed though. i ordered the grilled chicken breast burger with chips in lemon and herbs and the chicken was the size of a kfc colonel burger chicken patty. ggrrrr... it used to be bigger. so i just restructured my burger to match the meat and ate away. haha.

somehow my family loves dunkin' donuts and as always it was my duty to get some to satisfy their cravings. thank goodness midvalley has practically everything!! went to get something for my mum and myself in jusco, then got a couple of books for my lil bro from mph, renewed my isetan card at the gardens, window shopped around, found my fossil watch *hurray!!!!* and finally dropped by dunkin' donuts to get a dozen donuts for the people back home. then it was time to head for sentral.

fortunately my trip back wasn't delayed. the trip to kl had a 1 hr delay which totally offset my plans for that night. *ggrrr* i love international flights. this one was heading for incheon transitting in kk. international flights = pillow & blanket. haha. although, i was starving so having the meal served more than an hour after take off was getting on my nerves. i get cranky when i'm hungry. haha. like my flight to kl, by the time the food cart got to my seat row, they only had one choice left. fortunately still, the chicken satay with fried rice and peanut sauce taste far better than the tasteless seafood pasta *blergh!* i had to gobble down on my flight to kl. haha. the pudding was weird so i didn't really eat that.

can you believe they served baskin robbin's very berry strawberry AND ferrero rocher chocs too?!?! yum yum.. if it wasn't for my gastric coming around, that would have totally made up for them serving the food late. *grins*

Samsung Omnia SGH-I900 Latest Firmware

Just a few days ago I was considering selling off my 16GB Samsung Omnia (a.k.a. SGH-I900) and buy myself a brand new phone. Somehow I'd gotten bored with it for some unknown reason. Craving for new gadgets, I'd been scouring the web for hopes of finding a worthy replacement. I considered a few *cheaper* options, namely the Nokia XpressMusic 5800, Sony Ericsson T700 and Sony Ericsson G900. Was looking at the hyped up Sony Erisson Xperia X1 as well but I didn't feel like going for another expensive phone *regardless how smart it is* at this present time.

My Omnia and everything that came with it including the Samsung screen protector.

But here's the thing. I was already thinking about scaling down and ditching my Omnia when I stumbled on this blog called My Samsung Omnia *thank you!* which totally saved my Omnia from being sold off. All of a sudden my Omnia was revived! I called up the Samsung CareLine to enquire about new firmware and how it would affect my warranty and all that *I know.. I'm such a square* and they informed that there's no problem with my warranty so long as I upgrade the firmware from the official website. My Omnia's original firmware version was DXHG4 (G4) and today I can happily say that I've upgraded to DZIA5 (A5) which is the Malaysia/Singapore January 2009 version 5.

Noticeable changes:

Left: Audio controls in G4 (Photo courtesy of GSMarena).

Right: Audio controls in A5.

As you can clearly see, the new audio control outlook is HOT! Not to mention so much easier to select with your thumb or fingertips. I love this change. It's just a lot funkier. The widget bar is also more customizable than before which is fab although I usually have my Today screen set up with the regular widget-less Samsung Today screen presets anyways.

Left: Scrolling with G4 (Photo courtesy of GSMarena).

Right: Scrolling with A5.

I didn't quite like the scrolling function previously. The letters were tiny and you really had to use your fingernails or the stylus for this as you can see on the left screen capture. Of course you could just use your fingertips in an up-sweep motion to search through the phonebook or programs list. The new scrolling mechanism helps a lot. It makes scrolling just so much easier. As you scroll up or down the list, the respective alphabets are shown in huge fonts as well.

Here's another something new that came with the upgrades. The Favourite Settings screens. Tap Menu > Favourite Settings and Ta-da!! I love that instead of the power bar labelled "0" and "100" at each end of the bar signifying the levels 0% to 100%, you now get actual percentage of the battery in this convenient screen. These shortcuts to the most common settings options (the regular Settings page can still be accessed at 'All Settings') is pretty nifty. I like. When you tap on the right arrow, you get yet another set of shortcuts which unless you're using the WM2 template you'll have to do it the long way is now conveniently available under One Click Settings. Simple.

What can I say? I am a girl after all. So a lot of the changes that I've noticed are more cosmetic than hardware related. But what I'm really looking forward to is to see if the camera bug has been fixed with this upgrade. The thing is after some time, you can't access the camera function and the phone tells you there's not enough memory to launch the camera so you'll have to do a soft reset to get the camera to work again. But I heard that they fixed that bug in one of the previous upgrades *yes!!* so I'll have to wait and see. As far as battery performance goes, it's definitely much better than my Motorola V3x that I was using a few years back. It was relatively as lasting as my Nokia XpressMusic 5610 which I'd been using prior to my Omnia. Not to sure how long the batteries last with the new firmware though. Can't really gauge that yet since I've only upgraded it this afternoon.

I've read some users complained in forums on the download size of the A5 at about 280MB. Fortunately I'm on unlimited broadband so for me it's not a problem. Using a download accelerator didn't hurt either. But it still did take a little while to download. I'd say about 30-40mins. But the upgrading process in itself was pretty easy and fast. Just remember if you're planning to upgrade your Omnia, make sure you backup your phone data. I used the MITs Wizard 3.0 that came with my Omnia packaged CD which I find a lot easier to use that the WM Device Manager and ActiveSync. Additional "useless" items that came with the upgrade were the trailer videos of Kung Fu Panda, Transformers and a couple Omnia music and video. The new upgrade did come with a couple new games in addition to Solitaire and Bubble Breaker: Asphalt4 *uber cool race game utilizing the phone's accelerometer to move the car left or right* and Dice. Shozu is now gone. But I've never actually used it before and I'm not quite sure what it's for either.

For a detailed review of the Omnia, click here.

All in all, I'm liking this feeling of falling in love with my Omnia all over again. Wish they'd used a better display screen than the WQVGA. It just doesn't do it justice especially coupled with a relatively good 5.0MP camera with functions comparable to a dedicated digital camera. The flash/photo light is not desirable but I don't quite use it anyways. I'll just tinker with the eV settings and use my Ixus for proper photo taking.

back to normal...

woohoo.. looks like streamyx is up and running and fast as usual now. glad the broadband nightmare is finally over and everything is back to normal.

ah... time, where forth art thou, time? aren't we just always in a state of not having enough time. or maybe we just have too much to do for our own good? haha. anyways, i'm still trying to squeeze in time here and there to accommodate all the things that i need to do. time for myself, family, friends and work.

and i'm still trying to find new ways to generate more income. gotta figure out how to get to be financially independent. i mean let's get serious. you'd be lying if you said that money is not that important. costs are going up, even basic necessities like eating is getting more and more expensive. i'd like to be able to buy a house and not have to finance it for the rest of my living years. real estate property is getting really pricey these days. what costs rm200k a few years back might cost more than half a mil today. so that's a big jump and i doubt wages get that big a jump. so there's really a disproportionate scenario going on here. car i already own *which i'll be paying for the another 8 years* so i'd really like to be able to get a home for myself of my choice. truth be told i am a city girl. so you can imagine how much higher the standard of living are for city folks. haha. so yes, my dream house *not that i've found it yet* is gonna cost me an arm an a leg for probably the rest of my adult life. *sigh*

it's amazing to look at people with so much money, they actually help the real estate economy by jacking up the prices. i've noticed that a lot of people buy property *and i mean just snap up property* like nobody's business and before or as soon as the development is complete, they'll sell it off and make another rm30k-50k *if not more* off it. so as these funny people get richer, you end up with a bigger hole in your pocket. *mucho bummer*

but we can't really be all obsessed about money now can we? even though money does make the world go round in today's world *and many more years to come*, there is a bad side to money. money, or rather the obsession and desire for it can make people go crazy, literally! some people rob, steal, extort, blackmail, kill, manipulate, marry, sell their bodies/wife/children, kidnap, lie, backstab, etc just for the sake of money. in fact, money can even make people take their own life. the world is a sad twisted place to live in if you think about it. but the thing about an obsession is, you can never get enough of it. say for instance in this case, if your world revolves around the every essence of money, it doesn't matter how much you have, even if you have a multimillion dollar account, you'd still crave for more. it may start out to be a noble effort *like in the movie 21* but then what with the adrenaline rush that comes with all this excitement at getting money, especially if it's not that hard *fast cash*. thus why robbers keep robbing *with increasing danger i might add* and kidnappers keep kidnapping.

sometimes i find it mind boggling at how creative and smart these people are at tricking or extorting people for the sake of money and yet not be able to make an honest living themselves. is because of the employment system? or judicial system? or bureacracy? i don't know. but it really amazes me. take for instance cable thieves. sesb and telco staffs and contractors have to undergo training and fulfill safety requirements to handle these cables and other equipment and yet thieves have no training whatsoever and they get away unscathed? *say what?* it's scary how law breakers have this insane brain that churns out ideas to reap benefits of what other sow. amazing, simply amazing.

haha. this was actually supposed to be a short post about streamyx back to its normal speed and look where it's taken me?

the wait is over... but still riled up..

*yes!!!!* my camera arrived today. sooo happy!! cute, simple and practical. just the way i like it. i haven't quite test drived it yet... or rather test shoot it. got back late from work today so this was a pleasant surprise. and i did tinker around with it just a teensy bit snapping away with the 32MB card that came in the box. i haven't taken the 2GB card out from the package yet.

as much as i am uber excited with my new toy, i'm still incredibly annoyed at my streamyx connection quality that's been killing my patience these past few days. the worse thing is not knowing why the darn thing is in snail speed! *ggrrrr* funny though it's fast as usual when i'm checking out some sites and crawling when viewing others. yesterday i tried opening tmnet's website and can you believe it?!?! it just went to an error page and won't open. was hoping to get some kind of explaination to why the connection isn't what it usually is. but there goes that hope. haha!! or maybe i missed the service interruption notice in the papers. *hhmmm* maybe.

don't you just hate it at work when someone who just joined the team and supposedly asks you for help to catch up on how things work, process flows, etc and then tries hitting on you?!?!? i do. you see, as much as i'm a team player and always willing to lend a hand whereever i can, i really don't like it when someone just doesn't even have the decency to get to know you and just because you're a girl/lady/woman whatever and they just start distastefully flirting with you. and to think that some of the things that i've been asked to teach or explain are in fact things that he should know in the first place. how the heck does one become and engineer in this field without knowing the difference between a monopole and an aesthetic monopole?!?!? i mean that's not even the techie part yet. seriously, i doubt that one can be well versed in the technical aspects and not know. and i'm pretty sure all of us have internet connections in the office *duh!* and there's this awesome thing called googling (read: Google). hel-lo!! the best part of it all is, the other day he was "updating" his list to update our project manager and he made it look like he did this thing we call 'request to share' in the system when in fact i was the one who did. what a prick!! i mean, we had a meeting all of us and identified some of the items to be done and stuff. so after the meeting he seemed like he was actually doing his part with the registration in the system and requesting. me being me, i double checked on the requesting part *you can't really check on the registering in such a short timeframe* and he did NONE. i'd even forwarded the list to him on which ones needed action. and yes, i repeat, he did NONE. it was something i'd used to do prior to him joining the team so i just went on and did it again. after all, it's not my fault he's slow.

ok. enough ranting cos it's not even worth it. *haha* back to the original purpose of this post -- my ixus -- i'm just so excited that i can now start with my 1st project. the background work is pretty much all set up already. so now i'm just preparing for the launch. haha. nothing fancy really. but it's still my baby. *wink* and i seriously can't wait! so watch out for trove by elixelle cos it'll be up real soon. *hugs*

anticipation and ideas...

although we do have digital cameras *yes, plural.. thanks to my gadget addiction* at home including my last purchase -- sony cybershot t20 -- a year or two ago, i've decided to get myself a camera to call my own *again*. haha. my mum borrowed the t20 during her trip to perth last year and loved the huge lcd display screen. so the camera is now hers. in a way it was another chance for me to satisfy my gadget shopping hunger so after much contemplation and consideration, i'd originally set my eyes on the canon ixus 860 is which had an even bigger lcd screen. haha. i'm a sucker for the huge screens as well. but after having seen and held the camera in real life, it just didn't click with me.

coincidentally nyn had just gotten herself a canon ixus 80 is in pink. so while checking out the 860, i had a look see of the 80 as well. now i liked the fact that the 80 comes in 5 different colours *yay! choices!!* and well, the design was pretty simply and clean cut. size-wise it wasn't too big either and the feel of the camera was good enough for me. so i continued to weigh my options and read up on reviews online *ahem.. research* and still couldn't shake the 80 out of my head. it's cute that it has a viewfinder as well *just like the konica minolta x50 we have at home* which could be fun to use at times *aahh.. flashback to the days when all cameras needed viewfinders*.
so at the end of it all, i've made up my mind and went for the ixus 80 is after all. it is after all a cheaper choice and yet practical and serves my needs for the camera which is all i can ask for really. well, originally i'd wanted to get one in camel colour. but luck has it was contacted by the seller informing me that they only had it in silver *nooooo!!!!*, blue *in a shade i'd get bored of easily.. we wouldn't want that now would we?!?* and pink *my 2nd choice*.

now i sit here in anticipation for the arrival of my brand new camera which i expect to arrive next week. excited. with the camera in hand, i can get started on my work-in-progress projects. *beams*

so many ideas yet so little time and resources. especially since i do have a full time job and my ideas requires quite a significant amount of my time. but as soon as it's ready, i'll let you guys know. ooo... so much to do. i've already hinted on the first project in a previous post and the second, well, it has something to do with this year's resolution. *smiles*


on another note, the fossil watch i've been saving up for has already been sold. was so disappointed to go to the store and the watch not being displayed anymore. *sob sob* and i was really looking forward to getting it. i'm planning to head up to kl early march so hopefully i can find the watch there *crosses fingers*.

price tags...

there must be something wrong with the watson's outlets in kk. seriously. for instance during lunch break i went to the centre point outlet to buy some deo (i like to keep extras at home) and glanced at the price indicated. rm11.50. so went to the cashier and stood in line. first thing that annoyed me was after serving the lady in front of me, without informing me, the girl just stepped over to the other counter to help out the other cashier. *dumbfounded* bewildered if you may, i looked on as she proceeded to help serve another lady after that (who by the way, lined up after me). so i took an annoyed look at her (and she noticed timidly) and lined up at the counter she was assisting at.

if that wasn't annoying enough, when they scanned the deo, it showed up as rm12.05 instead.

me: isn't the price rm11.50?
*cashier keeps punching the cash register then looks at
me like she wants to say "can't you see the register says
rm12.05?!?"*
cashier: rm12.05.
me: *still annoyed* you're price tag over there
is wrong then.
*cashier stares at me while i take my wallet out of my
bag to hand her the cash*
cashier: do you have 5 sen?
me: lemme check.
*hands the dumb cashier 5 sen*
cashier: thank you.
*hands me the plastic bag and turns around to continue
her chit-chat with her colleagues*
me (thinking): isn't she gonna do anyting about the wrong price
tag?!?!?!

so you see. not only was the price wrongly tagged, the staff are ignorant and too lazy to care as well. and to think this wasn't the first time i've come across a pricing error like this in one of their outlets here. don't get me wrong, i love watson's. but they've seriously got to get their staff to be more aware of these things and have better interpersonal skills. whatever happened to quality control?