escapades of the elusive kat

I think I started knitting this Slytherin scarf in my 3rd year in University. Not quite 20 years ago but I guess near enough, LOL. I’m not a knitting fanatic. I have 0 skills. I don’t know how to end the knit. If I drop a stitch, I have no idea how to save it. I can’t just look at the knit and know “ah! It’s a xxxx stitch!”. I think I’m doing the stockinette stitch with this one and if I don’t complete a row, I will not know what my next stitch should be just by looking at my progress.

I can only memorise the hand movement and then just go along and mentally crossing my fingers hoping that I didn’t miss a stitch, drop a stitch, or knit a wrong stitch. I am hopeless when it comes to knitting, LOL!

I don’t have enough wool to make it nice and long. Probably can only make it “just” long enough to go around my neck. Or I have to go look for wool that’s near enough the colours! I’ll see what I finally decide on later. I may have to more wool for the end tassels that I think might make it look nice. I have to ask my mom how to do the last row. I also have to ask my mom how to end the end-lines when I changed color (you can still see them hanging)

I’ll try to finish it this year. Or else, it might take another 5 years to completely finish this, LOL!

So I'm out of hospital now. I just want to jot down some things that came to me during my hospital stay.

Stupid Timing
This was a very stupid time to be sick. With my parents off in Europe, with just me and my sister, so with me off in hospital, my sis was alone to deal with the dogs.

General Anaesthesia
Going on the operating table was scary. I guess it doesn't matter what you try to say, it's always scary. You're lying down, almost naked, and you can't control what the doctors will do to you. When they started to administer the general anaesthesia on my IV line, my arm hurt like hell.

That made me think about a dog we had to put down some 20 years ago. The dog was 17 at that time. Pussy (don't ask why my parents named a dog that. And well. That) had stopped eating and drinking and even locked her jaws so we couldn't force feed her. The Australian vet (the best vet in town at that time) told us he will first administer a general anaesthestic for her, and when she's unconscious, he'd administer the heart-stopping drug that would put her down. I remember Pussy struggling when the general anaesthestic was being administered. I guess now I know why. It bloody hurts!

Hospital Room
For reasons unknown to me, I got a single room. Funnier yet, it's actually a store room, LOL.


Far be it for me to complain that I'm in a store room. Hey, I got a single room, I'm not complaining.

Hospital Food
I'm also surprised that the hospital food was actually good and I enjoyed them. Huh. My mom refuses to believe it.

Visits
I'm on the fence about hospital visits. On the day following the surgery, I didn't really want to deal with anyone, as I was still woozy and tired from the surgery and anaesthetics. But on the second day, hospital visits helped pass the time. Anyway, a colleague was also very nice to come visit me and brought me a book, which I promptly read within two days. I do appreciate the gesture, though I'm a bit unsure about the book itself. Do you bring such books as "First Phone Call From Heaven" for someone who just had a surgery, feels like shit, and wasn't even sure if they'd survive the surgery? Granted, an appendectomy is a small thing, but I must say when I was on that hospital bed, I really felt shitty.

In retrospect, it was pretty funny as well.

After care
The doctor gave me 15 days of leave time which I'm really uncomfortable with. I can't hang around 15 days doing nothing. I think I'll get back to work after half the time but tell them outright that I'll be taking it easy.

The doctor also scheduled a re-visit for 13-September. When I saw it I said I can't do it, as I'll be flying out on 8-September. And he goes "Oh, you want to reschedule AGAIN?"

I took issue with the again. I turned into my Mom and went snippy at him. "This is the first time I'm told of this re-visit. No one asked me before. I'm not rescheduling AGAIN."

I'm to visit the neighbourhood health care services centre to change my dressings which I have to go today as I guess I pulled a bit at the wound and the dressing has a wet spot now.

Fees
Ignoring the currency itself, just look at the amount... my dog's 4-day hospital stay was $25,000, just going on the IV drip. My 4-day hospital stay with surgery was $5000. WTF.

I wonder if this is considered cheating on the journaling front. I joined the Hobonichi Challenge, which provides a prompt everyday, and we write or draw about that prompt.

January 2018 theme is dogs... they even have a list of all the prompts each day.

So... I’ve been cheating. As I know I wouldn’t find the same patience everyday to go draw a dog, I’ve been working ahead. I felt like drawing on Monday, so I drew a couple day’s worth. Then I didn’t feel like it on Tuesday. Worked some more on Wednesday and today for a bit too.

I leave enough space to do my journaling on that day though, so I guess it’s ok?

Here’s a sneak peak!



What I like about this now is I’m actually using more water colours. I never liked water colouring... now? Always.

Of course, with the novelty of a new cat, it's always gonna be about the cat! and he's like the friendliest cat ever. The greediest cat ever, the worst food-stealer ever, and whatever you can say about a cat. He climbs up our backs and looks over our shoulders sometimes, it's really funny.


I do make a point to greet the dogs and the other cat first before I have any interaction with Harley. But that other cat is really prickly. We got Harley in hopes of Kitty having a comrade, but Harley has in turn befriended the dogs, even Menina who is really wary of cats in general doesn't mind him now...

This is a crazy household.

There's some issue thingy going on at work and well... in a way it's funny, but in another way it's not. Oh yeah, and tomorrow is the group gathering. Should be interesting. We'll see.

I've been meaning to play on the piano for a few nights already but haven't actually gotten the drive. hm... and I'm contemplating... should I buy the Sherlock 4 DVD or just wait it out for Netflix? I don't want to have a physical DVD lying around, I don't want to watch or download any illegal source, but I wanna watch it. Though from the trailers I think I won't like season 4.

Early day for me. Night!

I mean it and I don't mind it.

So my Wordless Wednesday Post this week is a drawing I did long long long long long long time ago. There's a story why it came up.

Today, one of my dogs wasn't feeling well. She threw up in the elevator and just generally didn't look too ok. So after work, (I got off work early), I rushed home to check on the dog and the apartment. I placed everything I had on my bed, and went walking around the apartment to check for any, you know, vomit or anything.

The reason I put everything on my bed is, I hate leaving my stuff out in "public areas". (I hate that about my sister, she leaves EVERYTHING lying around EVERYWHERE).

So while the parents are out in Europe, Mom told us to "bring water home from work" because we don't have a water filter (the filtered water is more gross than the unfiltered water) so we usually buy our drinking water. Dad used to be 3-4 bottles every week (at 5L, that's 20L of water weekly) and then we refill it to our mini water dispnser thing.

Well, so, apparently, I didn't twist my bottle of water well, so all that stuff I put on my bed? When I got back to see, my bed was soaked. The duvet, the linen, the mattress cover, the mattress, EVERYTHING was soaked through.

Shit.

It was night already by then, so I could only switch on all the aircons, and undress the mattress to the bare core. My mattress is a (was) a special polyster whatever thingamajoo material so it came zipped up in another mattress cover, I removed that as well. All cloth things went to the laundry and then the dryer. The mattress? I had to move it out to the living room, prop it against a few chairs, and put the dehumidifyer right underneath the mattress. Switched on the air con to full blast.

With the mattress out, I saw a load of paper crap I had hidden under the mattress, so that's how that drawing came back. Huh. I sucked at coloring since back then, haha.

Everything seems dry now but I'm still somewhat uneasy about it. I'd feel better if I were given the chance to put the mattress under the sun. I need to sleep tonight, so I guess tough luck, I'll sleep on it, and I don't dare put it out in the open without someone in the flat, (you know, it might rain)... next best is this weekend when I have done all the chores then I can wrangle that mattress out there.

I guess it's really the first time in my life that I was happy about my single mattress - if it were a double bed, then I wouldn't have been able to move it at all.

So with all that work with the mattress and the covers, I didn't have time to do my usual yoga and biking on a non-running day. Though, wrangling the inner mattress back into the mattress cover was workout enough, I'd say.

Hope you had a good laugh at my misfortune. That way at least even my misfortune helped to cheer someone up.

Random kitty cat update:

It's time to say goodbye to my Withings Activite. The final verdict was as follows:

Thank you for providing that information and for working with us through the troubleshooting process.

The proof of purchase that was provided indicates that your Activité is outside of the warranty period. Although this will prevent us from being able to proceed with an exchange, I am more than happy to offer a one-time 25% off discount coupon for the order of a replacement Activité.

If you would like to take advantage of this discount, please know we're unable to ship to Macau so we will require an alternative address in the U.S., Canada, Mexico or the EU.

It's just lovely, isn't it?

So I'll just send them a thanks but no thanks, and from now on, only buy products that have set up shop in town. Stick to the Apple products. Oh and extend my Apple Watch warrenty.

I also went to the shop I bought this at, they basically weren't any more helpful. "If the brand itself says that, we can't do anything."

And now, I can try to dismantle this watch and see how the inside looks like! *cackles*

Na Sexta Feira, na véspera, o meu chefe disse que não podia assistir ao jantar de gala do MECC (Macau European Chamber of Commerce). Tentei pedir uns outros colegas-chefes e colegas-executivos para assistir, mas realmente, na véspera, foi impossível arranjar alguem ir. | On Friday, at the last minute, my boss said he couldn't attend the MECC dinner. I tried to ask some other colleagues - boss and executive grades - to attend, but actually, with such short notice, it was impossible to get someone to go.

Por isso, eu tive de ir em nome do meu chefe. Não foi mal, até encontrei com umas colegas desda da escola secundária e conversamos bastante. | And so, I had to go on my boss' behalf. It wasn't bad, I even happened to meet up with a couple of friends from high school and we caught up a bit.

Este ano o tema do jantar foi Viva! e também houve umas danças espanholas. Gostei bastante do queijo que foi servido. O menu foi assim abaixo: | This year, they had a VIVA! theme and had some ladies doing Spanish dances. I liked the cheese they served. The menu was as follows:

• Serrano Ham with Fresh Fruits, Manchego Cheese and Pistachio Fennel Oil


• Spanish Garlic Soup


• Spanish Spice Rubbed Chicken breast with Patatas Bravas


• Spanish Flan

Perdoa-me que somente copiei do menu inglês e não traduzei em português. | Forgive me for only copying the menu in English and not translating it in Portuguese XD

So I went for a walk this evening. I wanted to start exercising again, and as usual I was thinking along the lines of "awe, if I get the hang of it now, then when I go on holiday in January, I'll break my streak again. I'll just wait until I get back from my holidays to start."

I. Won't. Be. A. Procrastinator.

First day boss is back. He was snarky already. I really don't understand him sometimes. So he has an assistant (me). Why is it so hard for him to let me handle all his stuff? If he'd let me arrange his holidays last week, I'd have already input all his milelage memberships and planned a good itinerary for him. Noooooo.... he flies to Japan in the most stupidest of ways, doesn't use his mileage card, now wants me to claim his missing mileage, while NOT giving me his god-damned boarding pass.

In retrospect, I did manage to scourge all the required information without the god-damned boarding pass, but I can only lodge the mileage claim request 15 days after the actual action day. And the boss is getting twitchy because he wants his mileage. Now. Geez, if you had let me handle everything, you would have gotten it already. NOW you wait, Sir.

On my ability to fish out all that info, I'm kind of feeling proud-ish at having achieved another step towards being an Admin Guru. That's what Admins and Personal Assistants do, right? Somehow turning all-knowing and always having some sort of connection or contacts or ways to get stuff done.

I want to leave time to read a page or two of the Chinese book, so I shall be signing off. See ya!

Ten years ago today, on the then-coldest-day-of-the-year-so-far, I was walking my dog Peppie (see my icon!) and he was preparing to do his Big Business, that I sat down on a ledge.

Certainly, a little black dog jumped on me and sat on my lap.

"oh, who are you?" I asked this little dog. The dog did not answer me. She just looked at me and wagged her tail.

( Read more... with dog photos if you are so inclined )