Games and Gym

I am surprised and happy that I managed to gym for the past 3 days. As the body is getting older, recently it is getting more difficult to even go on consecutive days, especially when pull ups are involved. There were pull ups on Friday so to be able to exercise again on Saturday morning after less than 24 hours means there is improvement with my body. Thank goodness there we no pull ups yesterday and today. I also tried sit throughs (which is the progression of mountain climbers) this week. I used to avoid this movement but it is actually not that bad for the shoulders compared to mountain climbers. There was no pull ups today so I tried the hanging leg raise. It is supposed to be a core exercise but my shoulders and arms were more tired from the hanging. At least I know that when the sessions have many shoulder movement, I will skip the hanging leg raise. Now I hope I can get back to my previous fitness level for the push ups and the deadlift.

With me starting to go gym again, it is getting more difficult to find time to play my online games. Currently these are the games I am still playing.

1. Disney Heroes: Battle Mode

I have been playing for around 3.5 years. With more than 100 characters, this is a good example of terrible power-creeping in a game. Still, the Disney magic keeps many of us playing for so long. I used to purchase their daily diamond deals but I stopped for more than a year ago as the power-creeping worsened. When my previous guild disbanded and I moved a relatively relaxed guild (although still a top 5 guild in my server), I only did the bare minimum. As a result, I had a lot of underdeveloped heroes and I hoarded a lot of resources.

I started to be more enthu with the game around 2 months ago when a friend from my old guild asked me to join his guild again. Now I am in the top guild of the server although I am the bottom 10 in the guild. Lol. I realised how much I hoarded and after using those resources, at least I can get quite competitive again. Plus I prefer to focus on characters from Disney Classics or cute ones and recently Pocahontas, Esmeralda, Zeus, Bolt and Ariel were released so I raised them up.

For these Halloween, the game added the 3 Sanderson sisters from Hocus Pocus. I have never heard of this franchise before and initially I thought the cartoons in the game are so ugly. After checking some Hocus Pocus videos on Youtube, I end up liking them as the actresses portraying them were great. I will definitely try to find the full movie when I have the time.

Surprisingly, on Friday I received and decided to buy an amazing offer: $15 for 42000 stamina pots. That is a total of almost 2.8 millions stamina. Normally I can only get around 12000 stamina in a day so the offer is almost 8 months worth of stamina. Too bad I had spend them all within 24 hours or I will miss the additional 10% bonus stamina. That resulted in my biggest achievement in the game so far: currently I have the highest point in my guild for the weekly contest. Lol.. I know it sounds so childish but it is a HUGE achievement for me considering how I have been losing interest in this game for more than a year.

Too bad this greedy game developer does not incentivise players to spend more. I got such a good deal because I have stopped spending for so long. Immediately after spending, the next offer I received yesterday was $7 for 4000 pots. That is bullshit compared to the deal I bought.

2. Saint Seiya: Awakening

This game is a complete opposite of Disney Heroes. Although there is power-creeping, overall the heroes are still very well balanced since everyone has a counter. Ultimately, it is down to luck in choosing the 6 heroes for the battle since player will lose no matter how strong the heroes are if the opponent chooses 6 heroes which counter theirs.

Honestly, I find the PVP frustrating because there is no guarantee of easy win. Lol. Though I know the reason that I suck is because I only build the characters I like even if they suck and I cannot bring them for PVP. Hahaha... I also prefer offensive heroes and do not invest on defensive heroes instead of bringing a balanced team.

It is kind of sad because it is amazing that the characters and power levels are quite balanced for the game to last this long but only to slowly dying because of the poor game developers/management. Not to mention Saint Seiya is overall one of anime masterpieces! Anyway I also have long stopped spending any money in this game.

3. Genshin Impact

This game starts to lose its shine for me. Despite a lot of complaints of no content, I think the content is sufficient for busy people. Nowadays I find it difficult to even squeeze time for daily commissions and daily resins. With the ever-growing roster of characters, Mihoyo needs to buck up with the stories. People gacha because they like certain characters so without involving the characters in the game story, it will just end up becoming a collect-them-all game. Considering the expensive cost to collect the characters, people will slowly leave if this continues. But as of now, I am still hooked and will still spend money for the daily primogems and battle pass. Nope, it is not a waste of money because at least it motivates me to save from my diet and junk food. Hehe...

4. Tears of Themis

This is a card collector mixed with otome game from Mihoyo. Despite the handsome guys, I am not interested in collecting them all so my wallet is safe. Currently this is the game that I feel so relaxed to play since I am not that eager to collect all the cards, complete all the events, or hoard the Visions. Now I have around 80 visions and I do not feel the urge to gacha, partly because for this kind of game usually I am only interested with the seasonal themed cards such as for Halloween, Christmas, New Year and Summer. The last time I gachaed was during the Summer Festival and none of the Halloween cards caught my interest. I hope there will be some good Christmas cards or else I will continue saving until perhaps Chinese New Year haha.. Mostly I afk and just auto-debate but when I am more free to play the story mode or follow the story during events, the story/cases/mysteries are actually well written.

Oooh la la.. how am I supposed to find more time for Final Fantasy VII First Soldier which is coming out this upcoming Wednesday? T_T My eyes...

Bag hunt

As things are gradually back to normal, I am going out more often and my bag is getting too annoying. The 'cracked' leather part is okay, just visually ugly. However, the broken magnetic 'lock' is driving me crazy with the slapping noise when I walk. I was so lazy to go to gym today but I decided to go so that I could go to check out Orchard Road after that.

It is nice to see Christmas decorations although it is clear that the decorations are more muted compared to pre-COVID days. Not sure if it is because not everything has been put up but some outside Wisma Atria was still empty and I did not notice if Tangs had any decorations. Lol.. I remember usually Tangs would be eye catching because they would decorate the whole building since Tangs has little pavement space outside their building.

I checked out Metro at Paragon and Takashimaya and I saw similar observation from the choices at BHG Junction 8. It seems that sling bags may not be the in-thing now. I think my options are only Timbuk2 and Crumpler and their prices are $150-$200 range for the size I need. I am actually surprised when I checked my previous post of my current bag which only cost $86 and it had lasted me more than 6 years. It is really a good buy. I don't think the $200ish bag will last me 12 years. I was planning to check out Bugis Junction and Vivo City subsequently but after I reached home, I decided to check online shops and I ended up buying from Shopee. Lol.. Despite all the shopee-pee-pee-pee jingle since donkey times, I finally made an account. I bought 2 bags and after the small discount from the seller for buying 2, first time credit and 11/11 12% discount, the total spent is $16.66. If each can last me for one year, they are already considered good. Though I hope they will be good surprise like my current bag which I was not sure of the quality since I had not heard FX Creations at that time.

I bought Donki for lunch but too bad there was no chasiu don. What I thought to be omu rice turned out to be an omelet yakisoba. I had to be so hungry that I did not notice. As usual, I always overeat when it comes to Donki. As a reminder, next time I should skip the fried squid. It is not as nice as the fried squid from one of the regular stalls at Takashimaya Japanese Fairs. The new thing from Donki that I just knew is 10 cents for their plastic bags per transaction. Phew.. lucky I am not as crazy about Donki as previously when I used to purchase every week.

I just watched the Catholic200SG prayer marathon which is ongoing from 12 Nov until 20 Nov. Outside the scheduled prayers, it is Eucharistic Adoration. I find it quite nice to help me with my night prayers. Unfortunately, I think the volume is too soft and I have to max out my laptop volume to be able to listen to the background music. It would also be nicer if they use a dark background. It will be more soothing to the eyes and will help to focus on the Eucharist. Currently it is too distracting with so much white. The white background and candles occupy even larger portion of the screen than the Host that we are supposed to focus on.

1-hr confession

Christmas Penitential Rite is just around the corner and I even think of going for confession during the Catholic 200SG Festival. I had no idea why I even bothered thinking about going for confession offered for Landings retreat. If it is God's plan, there is no way to run away. After asking for schedule few days ago, I kept quiet so that I could just let it slide. However, my group facil updated me about the slots yesterday so I could not avoid from replying whether 'Yes' or 'No'. The initial slot I chose had to be cancelled because the priest had to lead a funeral mass. I was so reluctant to switch to the remaining evening slots since I need to wake up at 530am tomorrow to attend 7am Mass. Anyway it was lame to have a Mass as an excuse to skip confession so I agreed to switch to 8pm.

In my heart, I was still thinking about various scenarios and praying that somehow I would not go. What subsequently happened was the total opposite. The priest had to continue with a cremation so he was only available from 830pm. But this time, I was informed not only by my group facil but also by the person liaising with the priest schedule. Ooh la la.. it was even more paiseh to reject two people. Since I saw all the evening slots were empty, I thought I could be the only one. So I used my thoughtfulness by saying if I were the only one for the evening, just cancel mine if the priest had more urgent engagement since I still could go confession nearer to Christmas. That completely failed. Again both of them replied me at the same time 830pm was confirmed.

I had never been to St Francis Xavier Church and it took me 1.25 hours to reach although it does not look very far to where I live in the map. I sort of lost my way in the Serangoon Garden Circus roundabout. According to the website, I only need to walk up the hill from the bus stop. Well I did not see any hill and I could not find the road name sign too. I was expecting the hill to be quite obvious so that at least I could see the cross of the Church. I decided to use the map on the phone and I think it was a miracle that out of all the possible directions I could take at the roundabout, I already chose the correct direction before activating my map. It was around 2-3 bus stops walk but I managed to reach at 833pm. Heng..

By far, today was my most memorable confession. Without realising, I spent almost an hour with the priest. I guess since I was the only one, there was no reason to rush. I think it was 'worth' it for me. Otherwise I spent more than an hour to travel just for a 5-10mins confession. Haha.. I guess it was worth it for the priest too. Otherwise, he opened the hall, switched on the lights and aircon just for 5-10mins is also quite bo liao.

The hardest penance is not saying some prayers or reading some bible verses but confronting the sin directly. My penance was to call my mum which I told the priest not going to happen. He offered an alternative to take a photo with him and the tabernacle and to send it to my mum. Haiz.. I contemplated so hard and I even googled what would happen if I do not do penance after a confession. I found that asking to change penance is okay so that makes me do not feel guilty for refusing the phone call option. I do not want to be transactional about sins/Sacraments/grace/forgiveness and things of that sort. 

Ultimately I asked myself: what is the point for me to for confession if I still do not want to let go of the sins? After all, that is the biggest hypocrisy that always makes me try to avoid confessions: I know I am not ready to let go certain sins (e.g. those involving conflicts or grudges against others) as opposed to I want to although I know I will fail again (e.g. lazy to pray, skip Mass). I am such a shit so I decided that okay I will do it, at least if I get angry and block my mum again, it is the latter scenario. Honestly I find this harder than just the former. By doing that penance, I am basically exposing myself to the opportunity to be hurt again. It is going to be back to square one again: blocking once for all is better for me than to be irritated and to ignore daily. Seriously, God. Why are you making things so difficult for me? Yes just from this penance, I am already back to my biggest sin of not appreciating this gift of life and hope that I will die instead.

God was kind to me as the priest offered to drive me home instead when he heard that it took me more than an hour to travel. He said he might as well drive me and that would only take 15 minutes. I waited for him get changed at the grotto. It was my first time lighting up a candle to put at the grotto. I also took a photo of the Mother Mary statue.

This turns to out to be another reminder of God's presence today. This afternoon I was trying to find The Purpose Driven Life book which I owned. It is one of the first few books I bought since I came to Singapore. I could not remember where I put it and I could not find it. Not sure if I already donated it away or perhaps I kept it in Jakarta. Anyway, I decided to take out The Glories of Mary book to read it again. This is also one book that I bought in my early Singapore days so it has been more than a decade since I read it. When I reached my room, I was shocked to realise how the image on the book cover looks so similar to the Mother Mary statue earlier.

Out of so many styles of Mother Mary statues, seriously what is the odd of seeing two different but yet very similar styles: white veil (no yellow/blue shading, no pattern/coloured lining), visible hair including the central parting, no crown/stars/halo around the head. This also serves as another encouragement for me to just 'suck it up' and do the penance.

Haiz I am scared and not looking forward to tomorrow but I hope my mum will ignore me. Then at least I will not need to fear of being hurt and then repeat the silent treatment or the blocking again. Meanwhile, although these are not penances, I will try what the priest suggested for me to do daily: read the daily Bible reading and to spend 15 minutes in silence with God as a start for me to be able to listen to God's voice better.

Weak!

It is barely the first week November and I am already failing to control my diet. Right on Monday, I received an email from Deliveroo which is celebrating its 6th birthday with some $6 offers and flat $1 delivery fee until tomorrow. I was tempted with Koi's offer for 2 bubble teas for $6 but that meant 4 cups to hit the minimum $12 spending. I planned to buy that yesterday so that I could keep some for today which is a public holiday. I am lucky that the offer was no more yesterday so I was spared from bubble tea.

The sugar and salt withdrawal is making me very moody. So far I have managed to restraint from getting the bottled drinks in the supermarket but I succumbed to less than $2 potato chips. The last few I bought were beer-flavoured Lays. I promised no more after the two packs I bought today. Since today is a public holiday, I decided to relax and ordered food delivery for dinner. Haiz.. At least I made use of the $1 delivery fee and hopefully this will remove all thoughts for food delivery for the rest of the month.

I ordered from Nummun Thai Kitchen because I was tempted with pork sausage. It is quite pricy ($9 for 10 pcs) but it is not something available from the other Thai food places I usually order so I did not mind. Afraid that I would not be full, I added tom yum fried rice ($9) which I regretted. I don't eat prawn and the only topping with the fried rice is 2 medium-sized prawn that required peeling. So for me it was $9 just to eat the rice. I think of it as paying for curiosity and I will not be tempted to order from here again. Anyway I have a nearer Thai restaurant which is cheaper and can be even cheaper when I use Grab self-pick up codes.

Food-aside, I am also feeling so busted with my Genshin Impact. I saved for 1.5 months and went broke on Tuesday for a Qiqi and Staff of Homa. It took me 120 pulls to get one Elegy for the End and Staff of Homa which I should be grateful of since it could have been worse. Surprisingly, I only got one Sacrificial Sword. I am not too upset with C1 Qiqi since I am more of a husbando than a waifu collector. Thus I am not really into Hu Tao and I do not mind a guaranteed pity for Itto on next patch. Of course I would be happier if I got Diluc. It has been more than a year and I still do not have him. I am quite lucky to get C3 and now I have to suppress my aim to get C4 as that may break my pity. Somehow I am always one short of the good constellation as I am also at C3 Yanfei and I restrained myself in the last banner. I am still having fun with the game. It is just a heartache seeing all my savings went to zero.

I doubt I will ever 'save' until this much again as the next few patches will have characters I am interested in

Don't count your chickens before they hatch but I am getting more and more sure that I have to escape from the vaccination discrimination here. Since today is a public holiday, I took the opportunity to keep some of my displayed toys to their boxes to avoid them being too dusty if I have to be away for many months. I only did for the few that I remember where the boxes are. I still have 6.5 days of leave that I need to consume before the year end so I will pack the rest during Christmas-New Year period. By then, it should already be somewhat confirmed if I need to escape or not. Honestly, I am hoping that karma will befall on the people behind all these discrimination.

Halloween

I am not into Halloween since my life is already a Halloween everyday. My heart is so empty, I hate my life so yeah basically I am a living dead everyday. Anyway the reason for my post today is because of my gym which went all out with their decorations this year. They even got the coaches to dress up and lead the sessions with their costumes. I am glad that I went yesterday when I was able to see more coaches dressing up. One dressed up as Levi Ackerman, one dressed up in maid costume, one dressed up as the Squid Game creepy girl doll statue just to name a few.

I am grateful that a couple pulled out last minute from their Mass registration and I was able to go for Mass yesterday. Thank God I somehow was bothered to check for my luck on Friday night and that was when I saw available slots. I felt kinda guilty for taking up a space for the Mass reserved for the unvaccinated but since until before the Mass there was still one last available slot. That meant I did not deny anyone of that slot.

Tomorrow is November and it is time for me to get disciplined with my diet again. I gained almost 5kg in October simply from getting laxed with my meals since I needed to hit my credit card spending. Of course I still blame the fucking vaccine as the initial cause of lethargy and hunger at the start of the month. Add on the excuse of annual 28 October emo. From November, I am back to monthly payment for my gym so there should not be a problem for hitting credit card requirement just from my normal spendings. Haiz.. It is going to be tough to avoid all the bubble teas, sweet drinks and junk food again. What is the point of living!

Nearly 2 decades

It is that time of the year again when no matter how lazy I am, I will drag myself to post something to drown in my own sorrows. It has been 19 years and now my prayer is: how long must I endure this kind of life any longer? Haiz.. Nonetheless, I feel slightly different this year as I am looking at the possibility of hiding back in Jakarta until all the COVID discrimination ends here. I will refuse getting a third Sinopharm dose even if it means I will be demoted back to my unvaccinated status. It is ridiculous forcing people to take the third dose three months after the second dose when currently the only information I know about third dose is at six months after the second dose. Even so, that is for the 60 years and above. Let's see if in the next two months there will be change in rules or there will be data to convince me about the safety of the third dose.

That enraged me over the weekend but I felt better after telling my boss on Monday on my intention.  At least she can plan if she will let me WFH if only those with vaccinated status can be in office from next January or if she will let me work from Jakarta. In worst case scenario, I can also resign since health and life are more precious than job. Currently the only thing stopping me from flying back is I have not renewed my passport and it has less than 6 months expiry. I was planning to renew it in January next year or so but now I am thinking of trying to do it in November of December. With 5k+ cases yesterday, perhaps soon other countries will ban me from flying so I better do it faster.

I have returned to gym and am slowly regaining the stamina back. I managed to go for two consecutive days (Tuesday and Wednesday) but I still have a long way to go with the muscle strength. After pull up yesterday, my back and shoulder are sore and I expect that I can only exercise again on Saturday. Even for push up yesterday, I felt unusual at my elbows, forearms and wrists which means my body is trying to get used on using the correct muscles.

Ironically as I am exercising again, my weight is going up again. I am 63kg now while I was still 61kg before returning to gym 2 weeks ago. Bleah.. I don't know if my weighing machine is spoilt or I have been loosening my diet lately so that I can hit $500 credit card spending this week. I am quite upset because I already cut down on junk food. My favourite Kettle potato chips has increased in price to $5.60 now. Previously they were $4.95 and I only bought during offer when the price per bag would be below $4. With the current price, I do not think it will go under $4 even with sale. That means I have one fewer poison to worry about. Now I have to be careful not to be tempted with those under $2 potato chips.

Despite the weight worries, today is an exception. To commemorate the sad day of the first time I started a new life in this foreign land, I splurged a bit on food today:

Although these seems excessive for dinner, the consolation is that usually I eat these as tea break on the days when I cannot stave of the temptation. I want to say that I will go back to normal from tomorrow but I think realistically, I will be excusing myself until Sunday. At least that is until the 'end of the month'.

Man cave cleaning

Nothing is eternal except for the love of God. It took me 8 days to finish dusting of my man cave. It is long overdue since the last time I did that was around CNY. As previously, it feels like a chore before doing it but it feels therapeutic when doing it. It allowed me to 'play' with my toys more closely. That also means I get to see any imperfections clearly. Whether the material is PVC, ABS, or resin, nothing can withstand the test of time no matter how good I take care of them. This time I did not feel too upset and I have sort of accepted the impermanence of everything. Inevitably, it gets me thinking of the fate of my toys at home in Jakarta. Although my cabinet is covered, it has been more than 2 years since the last time I cleaned them. At the end of the day, I just have to view that whatever amount of money spent on them, they have at least already given happiness in the past 5-10 years.

Yesterday I finally watched Novena Church's production titled Timeless Mother. Initially I felt sian when seeing it running for almost an hour. I became even more sian because it is in Mandarin so I had to read the subtitle. Thus it was God's blessings that I was able to watch everything. I am reminded that miracles do exist. I have sort of given up God when it comes to health matters since my prayers are never answered. Just within the recent 1.5 years, I already lost my dad, an uncle and an auntie. Being trained in medical field also makes me more pragmatic when it comes to health matters although on the other side, it is easier for me to know when only God's miracle will help. Ah and thank God that after watching this, I got the inspiration and am now done with the questions for the next Landings bulletin. At least I can put this matter out of my mind until December.

I am finally feeling back to normal after my second vaccination dose. I gained 3kg in just one week and now I have to train my body to get used to previous diet. Haiz it is a constant battle again against the temptation of sugar-loaded bubble tea, junk food and overeating in general. I hope today is a good start since I managed not to buy any junk food. Yesterday I still bought Salted Egg Lays from mamashop downstairs. This is made in Thailand and I never saw this flavour in supermarkets before. I was expecting it to be more expensive than Lays' supermarket price ($4.75) so I was pleasantly surprised that it was only $4.50. I hardly tasted salted egg so it was a waste of calories. Though on the brighter side, at least I won't be curious and won't buy it anymore.

This is why I am quite pissed with the recent discriminatory measures against the unvaccinated not allowed to go shopping malls anymore. People can survive without dining in but unable to buy groceries in shopping malls is just too much. I am not pro or anti vaccine but I am pro-science. What is the point of yakking about vaccination when the vaccine itself has proven to be of questionable effectiveness? It is just a matter of time before no booster = unvaccinated so even though I escape the discrimination for now, it will affect me too in the near future. On the bright side, at least now I can travel to more countries if I want. Too bad my passport is within 6 months of expiry which is as good as already expired.

Da...zzz...ed

It is day 3 after my second Sinopharm dose and I am still feeling sleepy. I have been mostly sleeping over the weekend and the drowsiness does not go away. So it is clearly due to the vaccine. I won't be complaining because this side effect is definitely much better than having fever or any other flu like symptoms. Hehe... The injection was by the same nurse as my first dose but this time I experienced no arm pain.

As a reward for myself for keeping my food expenses comfortably below $200 last month, I treated myself at Don Don Donki after my vaccination on Friday. I managed to avoid overeating and only bought sushi and takoyaki. If I followed my gluttony, I would have bought the fried squid and some fried fish cake too and then I would just be emoing the whole night from stomachache. Oh I also bought Koi and I was surprised that a large cup + topping cost me above $6 now. My bubble tea limit is $5 so I guess no more Koi for me from now on. Since letting myself go with this treat, I am constantly tempted with all dietary indiscretions again. Sigh.. It does not help that I have been stuck at 60kg and cannot seem to go lower.

Deliveroo sent me a $8 voucher since I have stopped using them. I utilised it for my lunch on Saturday. It was difficult to order food delivery again as anything more expensive than $8 (after the voucher) already looked unappetising to me. Yesterday I bought 3 packs of made in Vietnam Lays because Fairprice had it on sale. The price tag was $1.25 per bag but when I checked out, it was actually $0.95. Darn.. I should have bought more. And surprise surprise, I finished all 3 packs yesterday. Today I was constantly tempted with ordering bubble tea, getting ice cream or potato chips from mini mart, going to bakery for dinner and fiuh.. I managed to restrain myself.

I am currently feeling rather irritated with some Church people pertaining to the bulletin. Jeez... Perhaps I am just a bad team player but I really hate working with people who want their ways and then try manipulating others to agree and do their ways. Then you might as well do it yourself because I am not going to be manipulated. In addition this is supposedly a Church work but why do they seem to have their personal agenda and suggest things for their convenience instead of sticking to the purpose of the bulletin in the first place and trying to make things easier for others. I already feel like abandoning the ship but this is a reminder of the meaning of the Transfiguration which I heard from a homily previously. I cannot be just wanting to be close to God but abandon my life and responsibilities. I cannot serve God if I do not work with others so I just have to remind myself that I do this for God and not for myself. Conflict is inevitable since we are all humans after all.

At the end of the day, I think I am just being more sensitive recently because of the constant feeling of drowsiness. I should not feel as down as currently once this drowsiness side effect fades away.

Things will get better

Looking back at this post from last year, the pattern is clearer now. Storm will always come during the period when I have to prepare my faith story. In the past two weeks, I felt that all the low points in my life which made me upset at God in the past resurfaced again. I am fed up with my family quarreling over household things like food and cleaning house while I am homeless here. I am also sick with helping my landlady every time she falls down. For goodness sake, I am not her personal caregiver. She falls down more frequently and yet does not do anything differently to avoid falling. Some colleagues were irritating last week and I had to keep telling myself not to get too emotional as it was just a heat of the moment. I stopped my regular bottled coffee/tea/mocha for a few months and it makes my body very sensitive to caffeine. Last week I bought 2 bottles for fun and on the two different days when I drank them, I had difficulty sleeping. The improper sleep contributed to my constantly irritated self as well.

The peak was yesterday. I deliberately logged in earlier just in case my office laptop would update something and lag. Everything was fine until when praise and worship began and the laptop decided to update. I had to install and use Zoom using my phone again like last year. Luckily the laptop managed to settle down and I did the faith story using the laptop. Fiuh.. with this over now, these disruptions should stop. That is why only today that I feel calmer and more willing to blog something. I also just completed praying the Rosary and the Chaplet of Saint Michael. Today is the feast day of Sts Michael, Gabriel and Raphael the Archangels which is the reason for me to pray the Chaplet on top of the Rosary today. When I just bought the chaplet last year, I intended on praying both daily but obviously I am not driven enough to do that. So thank God for allowing me to have a good state of mind to pray both prayers tonight.

With the month coming to an end, my money woes ends too. I am unnecessarily stressed trying to hit $500 spending without going 'overbudget' for my meals as I am worried about my weight and without spending on unnecessary things too. I am glad for September, I am comfortably under $200 for meals. Sadly, it is difficult to go under 60kg. I was so happy last week to hit 60kg again but I am at 61kg again today. Bleah... I guess that is a motivation for me to decide on extending my gym membership so that is $3060 down the drain. No thanks to all this vaccination discrimination, it stops me from going to gym and makes me lazy to do home exercises to.

Genshin Impact celebrates its 1 year anniversary yesterday. I do not really care about all the hoohah about the non-existent anniversary reward or atmosphere in the game as I still enjoy playing. Yes I spend money for the game but it motivates me to cut my spending on food. So far this strategy works well since I save more from the food as compared to the actual amount I spend for the game. If only it is effective for my weight loss too hehe..

The game keeps some data and share some of these milestones to celebrate our journey with the game so far. Too bad they do not put how much money I have spent to be part of this. Haha... Anyway, my highlight is Zhongli. I started spending in the game in order to get him last year. I suppose it is not a wrong investment since indeed I play with him the most, even up to today.

I just realised that I never post any picture of him so here is the cool guy who has been carrying me in game and makes me enjoy the game so far. I hope you don't get powercrept or become obsolete anytime soon.

Emotional

I usually blog after donating blood as reminder in case I forget when I am due for the next donation. That means I was supposed to write on last Saturday but I have been lazy and spending too much time with Genshin Impact. I arrived slightly before 10am and I was already the 8th person in the queue. Wew... Lucky for me that there were some first timers among those who arrived before me so they took more time with their forms and I managed to 'cut' queue. I went to Donki to get lunch and decided to skip the usual sushi to try their chashu don. I would say it is cheaper and more worth than the usual tray of salmon sushi. Hehe..

Miraculously I managed to hit 60kg for the first time this week. Ironically, this week happened to be my junkiest week. I finished 6 bags of Kettle potato chips this week. Last week I saw ongoing buy 2 get 1 free promotion (i.e. $9.90 for 3 bags) and I bought one on both Saturday and Sunday. I promise that I will no longer buy potato chips for the rest of the month and I am able to keep up with my promise so far. At least today I was not tempted to buy despite seeing the promotion is still ongoing.

I also lost my cool with work today. When shit happens, my boss will often ask me to settle the shit as I try to be helpful. I know usually others will lose cool and complain to my boss and although sometimes the reason is unreasonable, my boss just wants to help the complainer and asks me to look into the stuff. Hence I come the rubbish bin. I am tired and sick of it and I am not going to be a good guy like last year to just settle all the shit.

Today I snapped because someone who is resigning also mentions that she is overworking herself. The main reason for her to leave is basically the pay and this 'overworking' is not really the matter. The worst part is that she is overworking herself and it is not a problem with the workload to begin with. That's why I refused when being asked about the task distribution. I am already very lenient with my deadlines to the point that I have to adjust my own work to accommodate others and I know that we are not overworking the team. That is why I refuse to even look at the weekly task distribution because the issue is not with the task but with the person. She is not asked to overwork and the deadline of the tasks is not urgent or demanding so it is her own decision and problem that she overworks. Do not make that into my problem!

Anyway this matter was already discussed since last week so I am already really pissed over it over the week. But it was going to pile on me if I did not defend myself today and that was why I lost my cool. Anyway I was not only defending myself but indirectly also my boss and the team lead. I want them to realise that this is not a problem caused by us/management. Our expectations are reasonable and does not require overtime or what. We also do not expect people to overwork. The problem is the person so we should address the person. Do not try to tweak the work as if the problem is with the work/management.

Perhaps the blessing in disguise from this is that I decided not to be a facilitator for the upcoming Landings run. I was asked last week and I had a hard time thinking about it. On one side, I felt that this was one way that God called me to contribute: there are few returnees in the younger age and I am one of the youngest so perhaps I can connect better if I am the facilitator. On the other side, I felt that I did not have anymore mental and emotional capacity to 'take care' of others anymore. I am already tired taking care of others at work. Thus as much as I wanted to help facilitating, I might end up doing disservice if I lose my cool subsequently. In the end, I decided to say no since I know my short-fused self very well. 

My vaccine woe is finally ending and I just had my first Sinopharm dose this afternoon. I think my left will be sore tomorrow but at least I am 50% immune from discrimination now hehe.. The clinic I went to is located at Tanjong Pagar Plaza. Despite the name, I was surprised that this is actually an old shopping centre like in the 90s. I was expecting it to be some atas shopping mall since it is located in quite atas area.

The main drive for me to write this tonight is the overwhelming emotion from losing an aunt who is staying in New Zealand. I was still whatsapp-ing with her until last Thursday. I stopped because I ran out of topic. She was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer few months ago and recently she had been in hospital due to side effects from her first cycle of chemotherapy. Through my communication with her, I thought it was just normal GI side effects from the chemo and it would get better in time. It was really a shock when this Tuesday she was already transferred to a hospice. She just passed away a few hours ago.

I cried quite badly on Tuesday when I received the news as when I saw the photo, I knew it was just a matter of time. She is technically an outside relative as she is married to my uncle who is my mum's brother. Yet she is the most caring aunt because she notes down everyone's birthday: all my uncles and aunts and their spouses, my cousins and even their kids. When she came to Jakarta, she always brought everyone an individual gift. That really shows her love and care for all of us. Before the era of whatsapp, she wished me birthday through email and I still have those emails. She would even be asking about my sister who was not really using email then. Last year during my dad's passing, she was always eager to ask me for the livestream link of the all the masses.

As always, there is nothing I can do except to pray. I hope she is no longer in pain and is now in a better place with God in Heaven. If my dad can hear me, I hope he will also pray for her now to return the favour of her praying for him last year. I am also thankful to God that I still managed to message her last week and the week before that. Earlier this year, I decided to cut off all contacts and I did not even reply her birthday wish. Out of the blue my uncle messaged me two weeks ago. I was initially tempted to ignore since I did not know if my mum asked me to check on me. However, I heard about my aunt's cancer previously and hence I decided to reply my uncle. Surprisingly, my aunt messaged me the following day after hearing about me from my uncle. Today I just heard from my aunt who lives in the Netherlands that few weeks ago she was asked my aunt who passed away if she was able to contact me. T_T

Sigh.. it has been really tough these past 2 years after losing my dad, an uncle just barely 2 months ago and now an aunt. God when is my turn? It is easier for me to go than to see others go before me.