What's not meant to be will never be

Yesterday I decided to take the train to work instead of driving. I parked opposite the station, at a public car park where a full day’s parking rate is at $5. Armed with a bunch of coins, I slotted them in one after another. When I was pushing in the last coin, the machine refused the coin over and over. This isn't the first time I experienced this. Previous times, I cancelled the whole transaction and started slotting in the coins again from scratch. But whenever I reached the last coin, the machine just blocked the entry and there's nothing I could do.

I managed to put in $4.50 and that gave me valid parking until 3.30pm. I didn't know what else to do. I was rushing to work and couldn't get enough time on my parking ticket. So I just used it and hoped for the best.

At work, I told my colleague about it and said I hope I don't get fined. You know, I'm not lucky at striking lottery, but this I struck! When I collected my car later that evening, my heart sank when I saw a piece of paper neatly tucked under my wiper on the windscreen.

As I drove home, I was feeling really upset about the fine. It's not that I didn't want to pay full price, but what can I do if the machine refused my money? I felt unjustified that I have to pay a fine of $30 all because of a faulty machine.

I was examining the fine closely when suddenly, I burst out laughing and had the biggest grin on my face afterwards. That's when it hit me: God sees to it that people don't get slapped with what they don't deserve. You see, the person who issued the summon keyed in the wrong car registration number! Instead of an M, it was keyed in as N.

Don't you think that when something is not meant to be, no matter how much you force it, it just won't be?

The hair - married woman or Tinkerbell look?

When friends first saw me with my short hair, most of their first reactions were this:

1. "What happened??"
2. "Ohh...going for the the 'married-woman' look huh."
3. "Did something upset you?"
4. "Why???"

The only nicer response I got was "So what's with the Tinkerbell hair?". It may have carried the the same meaning as any of the above questions but the hint of a Tinkerbell-look was a little more comforting. After all, I do like Tinkerbell's hair carried off by Julia Roberts.


But if you look at it long enough, it does have that married-woman look huh? Damn!

I want my $$$

The condo unit I bought was delivered a year and a half late. The developer said they're only paying 50% of the late charges because they have some difficulties. Obviously I'm not happy with that and will be claiming for 100% of what's due to me. Did they think I'd care for a second that they have difficulties and therefore forgive them and "donate" the remaining 50% as charity?

So no matter how much hassle it may be to claim my hard earned moolah, I will.

To start with, I'm supposed to bring up some documents to the tribunal and the developer thereafter. And supposedly I'll be called to court to attend the hearing where I will need to represent myself. Apparently it is a sure win case as no developer should be able to run away from what is documented in black and white. Well at least that's the reason I'm told I won't need a lawyer.

I have yet to start the process but will definitely get down to it. After all, who isn't motivated by monetary reward? :)

Anyone out there who has been through this and can offer me some help/tips/advise, etc? I would much appreciate it.

The big temptation

My company's annual dinner is coming up in 2 weeks. I'm quite excited about it. In my 7 years of working life, I've NEVER attended any annual dinners! One of the group I worked for used to be quite lavish and held annual dinners and such. But since I joined, things changed due to the sluggish economy back then. Blame it on bad timing that I missed out on all that.

So when my current company announced the annual dinner coming up next month, I was thrilled and wanted to experience it. "Jakun" or not?

The event is gonna be a formal one and I was thinking of wearing something simple in black. It's the safest colour to wear and you can't go wrong being under or over dressed.

Then this evening we walked pass Beatrice Looi's boutique while on our way to dinner. The window display caught my eye.

Which girl could ever miss the hint of a sale, right?

Is this a message that I should dump the "going black" idea and choose from one of these beautiful pastel masterpieces??

As soon as the idea entered my mind, I was also quick to remind myself a big NO-NO! I gotta keep in mind Point #7 of this post. Whether it's a good reason or not to refrain from buying more clothes, I think it's good to save on the wallet and just go black and commando.

I made a wise decision not to stop and step into the shop for a peek, didn't I? Tell me that I did...

I'm so disappointed

My long wait for the condominium unit which I purchased some 4 years back is finally over. The delivery has been delayed for over 1.5 years. I was quite disappointed as I bought it because I thought the developer, MK Land was a good bet.

When I spoke with them over the phone a few days ago to find out about the key collection process, the second disappointment kicked in. Their staff's service really sucked.

Imagine this:
They sent me a letter to inform of the key collection to an old address which I no longer live in. So I requested for a resend to my current address. And I told them in the meantime, just fax me a copy immediately so that I don't need to wait for the mail which may take a couple of days. That was when I was told they cannot fax to me. I asked why and their reason silenced me for a few seconds because I was in shock.

The reason: "We can't fax to you because we don't have a copy".

Overcoming my confused mind, I asked, "How come you have a copy to post but you don't have a copy to fax?" Now it was her turn to remain silent for a while. Then she asked for my fax number and proceeded to send it immediately. Silly or what?

Then, over the weekend, Ray and I drove over to take a look. We weren't allowed to go into the building since I haven't collected my key. But looking at it from the outside gave me a third reason to be disappointed. I'm not happy with the workmanship at all.

How do you like the colour? No comments, really.

Then there's this cheapo looking rooftop at the main entrance.

Whatever they're trying to patch up, it's a really bad job done.

This is some kind of rumble they left at the basement of the building, supposedly where the parking bays are, I think.

I wonder who's gonna clean up the mess!

Ray commented that the developer has really turned a nice piece of hilltop land into absolute waste because it wasn't done properly. I totally agree with him. The views can be quite enchanting.

There's a mini waterfall that flows down into the waters below.

I can imagine the PJ skyline can be quite a sight at night.

Alas, nothing can be done about all that are disappointing. I can only hope the inside of the unit isn't gonna be my fourth disappointment...but do I dare hope too much? Maybe not.

Guess what?

After losing about 50% of my hair yesterday (previous post), I returned to the salon for a minor fix-up. I wanted the back of my hair to be tapered so that it's not just a big lump in the back. To my non-expert judgement, that should be easy enough, just layer it la, right?

But the stylist said it'll look odd, somewhat hanging. He said it would be better only if he cuts it off a little more and it should taper off nicely on the neck.

So now I don't even have shoulder length hair anymore. It's one of those longish boy-cut style. How ironic, from being afraid to try out the short styles I wanted, I ended up with one anyhow. But if you ask me, I like it more like this than yesterday. Now, I don't need that extra courage to go shorter because it just can't get any shorter than this!

Back I am, but gone is my hair...

For months before the wedding, I've been "saving" my hair - I didn't go for trims for the reason of keeping it long and simple so that it's easier to adapt to hairdoes for the big day.

And now, a month after the day, my hair has grown really long and worse yet, very thick and heavy. I probably look haggard, too. So two nights ago I was browsing through a friend's hair magazine, toying with the idea of getting not just a trim but a different hairstyle. I was tempted to go for a boy-cut like I did 8 years ago. I even showed Ray the 2 styles I liked - one is a messy boyish cut while the other is a sleek and sharp one. However, I am no longer the risk-taker I was. I am actually quite terrified of bad haircuts that stay for months on end.

After much thought, I decided to just trim it. I walked into the salon for my appointment today. The sylist asked me what I wanted to do and instead of saying "Trim please", I said "I'm bored with my hair. I want something else". He suggested a style with fringe and I said no. I don't like covering my forehead. He then suggested some stylish and adventurous style which I also didn't dare go for. After a few more minutes I felt quite bad, because this guy was giving me so many choices and I was just too much of a coward to try any. In the end, I told him to just cut it shoulder length, plain and simple.

He picked up a bunch of my hair and cut it all off in one big snip. I saw the bunch fell to the floor in a thud and what I felt was "Ouch!" But when he was done with it, I felt quite good because my head feels so much lighter! Whether I look OK or not, that's something else la. At some angles I do look weird to myself.

I was told with this cut, I need to blow my hair so that the ends don't curve upwards since it's just about resting on my shoulders. I am quite lazy when it comes to doing the extras in dressing up. That's why I don't even bother wearing lipstick. What more, to blow my hair everyday?? What did I get myself into?

But what's done is done...unless I gather enough courage and decide to go for another snip to turn this semi-bob shoulder length into the boy-cut I've been eyeing. But till I am courageous enough, I will try to make peace with this.