(not) Friday Five

Yeah sorry my internal calendar is all wonky!

1. Can you do simple sewing repairs, such as replacing a button or rejoining a straight seam?
I can replace a button... not sure about rejoining a seam as luckily enough, I never needed to do that. Though the other time my sister planned to kick out an old single mattress, I cut it in half (for my extended bed). So after just cutting it in half, I had to measure and cut out more of the foam in the middle to make it fit, and I'd need the extra outer cloth to close up the cut. I hand-stitched it and while I'm no seamstress, I can say I can do it nicely enough. I just can't end a stitch LOL

2. Can you change a flat tire?
I'm lucky enough to live in a part of the world where there are gas stations everywhere and they can change a tire if need be, and even if I'm somewhere remotely considered as remote, there is a 24-hour tire/battery change service. I tried him twice and he was always quick to help. But it must be said that I really do want to learn how to change the tires myself.

3. Can you plan and cook a simple meal?
Not sure about the planning, but cooking is easy. Just no chance to do it, with a Dad chef constantly marking the kitchen as his territory. I can only cook when the parents are on holiday.

4. Can you rewire a lamp?
It has been many years, but last time I did, I did manage to do so successfully. It's just a matter of whether I have the patience to actually get it done.

5. Are you a spender or a saver? Are you able to switch from one to the other on occasion?
Mostly a saver, but I may be bitten by the spender bug once in a while. I can't switch at my choice though LOL.

Online shopping and work

A little more weird work today. My boss missed a therapy appointment he had and I received a call. I did not take it LOL. Even if I take it I'm not gonna be able to reach my boss, besides, they HAVE my boss' number. They can dial until he wakes up. Ooops.

My combination of work mates today as follows:

This is weird. As a kid, I would definitely never let my feet show in a photograph, especially without socks or shoes on. I guess I'm playing into that self image thing as well. I had a pedicure a few weeks ago with gel nails and so my feet still look nice and groomed, I suppose.

I thought I had a few Taobao (China online shopping) items that got lost in the mail, due to the Coronavirus thing happening, we did hear that loads of Taobao packages were just thrown out. I wondered for a moment if my items were part of the sacrifice or not... then the package forwarder had a *You have 1 item en route* message, so I thought, well, at least I got 1. Usually I can anticipate it, if 1 is en route, then 1 will arrive in a day or so. So I was expecting 1 package either today or tomorrow. Imagine my surprise when I opened the forwarder's app today and saw the message *You have 3 items in store. Please collect at your earliest convenience*.

I was down the next minute. I'm lucky we have a forwarder pick up just right on the ground floor of my building block.

What did I get? Don't worry, I've disposed of the boxes and washed everything before use.

A bottle to brew tea. I'm already using those small tea bags instead of an infuser (coz I have to wash the infuser if I use one), but usually I leave the tea steeping too long. So now, I got this bottle. Flip it around so the water goes into the tea section (I still put my tea in those disposable tea bags), let it steep however long and flip it back so the water drains away. Genius invention.

A few months ago I bought a similar blue phone case but of 2 swimming fishies (I should have taken a photo of that to show as well), but my Sis liked it too so I bought the same one for her. While she's using the iPhone 11 (weird 3-lens phone) and I have the XR, I didn't like that we had the same case. After some browsing, I find one similar design, same color town (probably it's the same line of product) but of a heron. Chinese style too. Yay.

My Sis saw on one of those random Instagram or Facebook ads about this toy where there is a suction cup to secure the toy and the dog can pull the other end however much it liked. It costed like an arm and a leg. I've now come to the habit of first doing a casual search on Taobao whenever any interesting product pops up (and Taobao has the photo function - upload a photo of the item and they will search a similar looking item - and 'lo and behold! The exact same thing, for a fraction of the price.

It's the same for other things. My Sis bought a nifty backpack thing, again from these ads. I think she paid like USD99 for 2 bags, that would make it around MOP400 per bag. To spite her, as sisters are wont to do (LOL), I did a search on Taobao and bought a similar backpack (okay, I couldn't find the exact same thing). At that time, I didn't bother about price and just bought one that looked nice, as actually I was in the market for a new travel backpack as well. I forgot about it until I received it. So the tag inside had a price tag of around 300 Chinese Yuan, which would make that around MOP350, that's already cheaper than what my Sis paid for. But then I looked back at my actual order (because I didn't think I would buy something over MOP100 from Taobao) and.... I paid 57 Chinese Yuan (MOP65, USD9) for that backpack.

My Sis was annoyed and started to explain how special her bag is, with a compartment to place the phone charger so you can connect it outside of the bag (mine has the same thing), to hers having a secret compartment just on the backside where she can put important documents (okay, mine didn't have that), interior compartment for a laptop, side compartments for umbrella/bottles (both bags have that).

Guess my Sis is annoyed enough haha.

Wordless Wednesday (Before I forget)