... do I even need to put anything here?

It's winifred and the Troublefakers!

I can't believe that I'm leaving tomorrow morning... *cue emo sad music*

It's been a great holiday, even if I had to deal with everyone making comments about my size and my apartment (thanks to wao's heroic cleaning efforts). They were not undeserved, and I actually have made plans to address both of those issues. However, I'm going to keep the details a secret. ^^;;

I'm really glad that I got to meet a lot of my friends, including some from primary school, as well as Espada and Rosina (all the best for the concert!) There wasn't enough time to meet everyone, but that is one of the reasons why I will come back soon. :D

Other things that were notable:
- The humidity is still the same as ever. On the one hand I don't have to deal with chapped lips, and I drank a lot of water (even my mum was surprised), but being sweaty and sticky isn't that great.
- My niece is obsessed with cats. I wonder what will happen if/when she meets Belle and Lillian.
- Speaking of Belle and Lillian, everyone wants more pictures of them. I shall graciously oblige. But wao can't kidnap them.
- It will be interesting times ahead with the economy going the way it is, both in Singapore and in the US. I really hope things will be well for everyone.
- I bought almost 2 kg of bak kwa. Hopefully it will get through (it's vacuum-packed, so it should be okay).

The Seattle Symphony is having a concert with the Labèque sisters! And it's featuring two-piano music! *squees!!!*

Must... book... tickets...

Hmm, I wonder if I want to attend the season premiere (September 12th) as well - featuring Rach 3 and Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto no. 1. Of course, these concerts are only from the UBS Masterworks series and don't include any other concerts that I might find interesting - I'm sure there will be something else that I like! (The Four Seasons in March... Doc Severinsen at the end of February... Itzhak Perlman... Tasmin Little... in April, Joshua Bell and the Seattle Symphony!?!!!! As well as Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, Holst's The Planets and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue)

Slightly bummed that I'm missing out on Rach 1 and Ravel's La Valse this weekend (Valentine's Day), but oh well...

( Details and other concerts under the cut )

I haven't updated since I got here, because I have been busy running around town, meeting friends and catching up on all the things that happened while I was away.

Outwardly, a lot of things haven't changed - most places still look the same (although Orchard Road and Clementi look very different now), and I can still find my way around without getting lost. :) There are a lot of new bus services now, though, and some existing bus routes were altered (some in ways that are rather incomprehensible). A lot of my old friends are still around, and even my former primary school classmates have found me on Facebook. It's really surprising to hear from them after almost 20 years - a lot of them are out of Singapore, but we can keep in touch through messages and so on. Quite fascinating that a lot of them are in the US and Australia, though a fair number are still in Singapore :)

There are also a lot of new places around - I went to a tapas bar with my sister, my friend and some of her friends and we had a really good time relaxing and talking about life in general. Working overseas means you have more to talk about with people, too - you can ask them about where they work and what they're doing, how the hours are, and things like that. And in return, they ask you about life in the US - it's quite illuminating talking about it with other people. A lot of people are settling down or getting engaged; perhaps that's just because I've been away for so long, but it comes as news to me. People have been asking me too when I'm going to settle down, and for the time being I haven't thought about it in particular.

The weather is still the same, and it took some time to get used to, but it's good to be back with humidity and tropical rain showers. :D Other things are the same too, like the home environment - I'm glad that I don't have to deal with it full-time...

My visa interview is tomorrow, and hopefully there won't be any problems. We'll see, though; if I need to extend my stay I'll do so, but it won't be particularly cheap (I think the change fee is $200 plus the difference in the ticket prices).

Tomorrow morning (well, actually, in 13 hours) I leave for Singapore for 3 weeks on a holiday. It's going to be an interesting time since the weather in Singapore (hot, humid, currently extremely hot) and the weather in Bellevue (cold and snowing) couldn't be more different. :P I haven't posted much since just after coming back from testing4l's because I was really busy at work diving in to failure investigations and other work-related things that came in unexpectedly. In that sense it's good that I'm taking this break because, frankly, I need to get away from checking work emails for at least a week.

Things that happened the last few weeks:
- I met nakaemi for the first time and we had hot chocolate at a Denny's. While the hot chocolate itself wasn't too bad (especially the whipped cream), I found it a bit hard to talk to nakaemi for some reason. It could've been shyness, but I also felt like I was blocked in some sense. Anyway, I hope nakaemi and itsacz are feeling better now.
- wao and I went for Karaoke with some of my friends. There was a lot of bad singing, including some Japanese songs and wao doing Bicycle Race (the one Queen song I can't stand). I did Kylie Minogue passably well (well, for a guy anyway) although I'm still hoping some karaoke place has Sophie Ellis Bextor's music (Take Me Home / Murder on the Dance Floor). I felt bad that I couldn't see nakaemi off at the airport when she was leaving, but I had already planned this karaoke event for a few weeks. Given that it could've been an emotional parting (according to the text message I got), maybe it's better that I didn't go?
- wao and I went to the San Juans. Due to a mixup on my part we ended up getting there in the afternoon and didn't have much time to see anything in particular. The sunset was gorgeous though, and wao took a picture of it here, which I am using as the desktop background for one of my office computers.

There are a lot of friends to catch up with in Singapore - my family's interested to know how owning a car has changed things (or whether it even has) and a lot of my friends are going through changes in their relationships towards the next level. If I do decide to get married, I would like to get married at Lime Kiln Point in the summer. :P

Driving in the snow is really interesting. That is almost all.

Well, except for the fact that wao has helped my ungrateful, lazy self by cleaning up and sorting out most of my living room/entrance to save her sanity (cries of "mpitten~" can be faintly heard).

Work is paradoxically getting more interesting as fewer people are around - I have a lot more things to work on now (covering for others) and I finally have some time to get around to projects that I wanted to do but didn't have time for previously because fewer people are around to raise questions and/or distract me from work. I am gaining a new awareness of the power of makefiles.

The last few weeks have been really busy (so much so that I didn't have time to post). I've been really busy with work mostly (dealing with servicing can be quite immersive), but among other things that happened:

- meerkat also came up to Seattle for the Veterans' Day weekend and we had a good weekend together - I finally went to the Space Needle for the first time even though I've lived here for almost 2 years! We also swung by the Cornish College of the Arts, went to a Seattle Symphony performance at Benaroya Hall, Ernestine Anderson's 80th birthday celebration at Jazz Alley and watched (or started to watch, rather) A Taste of Tea. Which reminds me, I should get around to finishing that...

- I went to several karaoke bars and killed my voice made other people deaf had a pretty good time, trying out some new songs that I didn't know I could do, including Glenn Miller's "Chattanooga Choo Choo" (which makes me think of saraphina_marie even though she doesn't live in Chattanooga) and Sara Bareille's (sp?) "Love Song" (I'm not going to write you / a love song / to stay ~ ) as well as (I am somewhat embarrassed to say this) Lil' Mama's "Lip Gloss" from the Xbox 360 game "Lips" as a duet with someone else, in which we each scored over 4 million points. Um I mean.. ^^;;; *hides*

- I met a friend in Seattle who has a pretty interesting goal in life - she wants to be an organization consultant (and is currently doing that on the side). Basically her clients hire her to deal with things they've been putting off, or messes that are too much for them to even think about, and then she provides suggestions about how to organize their homes (and what to buy to get things sorted out). So far we've gone out twice for coffee/chocolate and dinner and felt like we've had a great time both times, but that's all I'm going to say on the subject right now. :P

But more currently, I just got confirmation that wao is now in the state of Washington, and is probably going through immigration right now. I shall be leaving to pick her up shortly, and I'm sure the month that she stays here will be full of happiness, joy, going places, and cats.

Lots of cats.

Even Especially [*] in the snow.

[*] (c) 2004- testing4l. "Especially in .+" is a registered trademark of testing4l and may not be reproduced without testing4l's permission. Or else the zombies/wumpii will come get you.

I haven't posted in a while, because I have been way too busy with work and other things, but here's a quick update:

- meerkat is coming on Friday for the weekend!! This makes me *very* happy and I've been planning things for both of us to do over the weekend! (as well as frantically cleaning up my place)
- wao is coming in December for a month! This is great news because I haven't seen her since February and she's been very envious of Belle and my general cat-ownershipness.
- Speaking of Belle, she's going to be getting a big sister tomorrow! I am adopting Lillian from the King County animal shelter in Bellevue (near the post office!) and bringing her back home tomorrow. It'll be fun getting both of them used to each other's presence!
- I bought an 8GB Zune on Monday. It's a nice blue color and I really love it! The interface is definitely much improved from the first and second-generation models.

I also have a lot of photographs to post, but I am just going to be lazy and link you to the Flickr sets individually.

( Cherry Blossom Festival )

( Sheep and Tulips )

( Woodland Park Zoo )

( Fanimecon 2008 )

( Seattle Mariners baseball game )

( Hypericon 2008 )

( The Grand Canyon and Arizona )

( HeroCon 2008 and the San Jose Sharks )

I went to the Skylark Cafe to listen to winifred and her band, the Troublefakers, and it was just simply awesome!

Here's a picture that I took. :)