bus ride

thoughts about my ride on the interstate express bus back to the homeland today:

• semi-modern architecture with typical rustic-level decor and down-on-the-heels feel
  
• 'orrible acoustics so the announcements come out like banshee wails
• and loos where you have to pay to enter and pay some more for access to paper

      BUT

• tech infrastructure to rival the best, with scanned ticketing and on-the-dot departure!

the journey is smooth and i arrive as promised. at the checkpoint, a nice elderly fellow takes me under his wings and shows me where to go to clear immigration and where to find the bus again after that. 

back to the grindstone tomorrow.

melaka

quickie trip to the old faithful location with my mum and with Ji J2 and their girls. inevitable meltdowns notwithstanding, we have a precious time catching up. very thankfully mum is a well super-ager A willfully and charmingly wraps us all around her little finger and E is sunny good natured and blissfully unaware that she should be acquiring stranger anxiety any day now.

time out

life hack: steal time for morning coffee* in the midst of grandparenting chaos.

*my first visit to margaret drive hawker center since they re-opened, and rather a disappointment it is too, in missing the energy and accessibility of the old one. they don't build 'em and cook 'em like they used to.

babysitting

we survive a night with A, HOM and i. from dinner to dessert to shower to story time to prayer to the next morning! even though we cycle thru llama llama red pajamas three times and there are heart-stopping moments in the middle of the night when she asks where mama is. and even though E the dog is distressed by the additional human in the bedroom. 

we feel accomplished (grandparently milestone achieved) humbled (she doesn't mind us!) delighted (nothing beats that trusting little hand in yours) and exhausted. 

with thanks to: cold storage roast chicken, the gelato joint in sunset way, last minute pdf download of llama llama red pajamas, and a random hair clip that allows her to twin with my updo.

baby's day out

A and E visit.

A prefers to be carried. E needs to be carried.

my upper body is getting a workout.

so is my back.

ouchhh.

li'l fashionista

 

A's shoes are giving mine a run for their money.

hot chocolate on thursday - michiko aoyama (2026)

delightfully gentle sweetly unexpected and wound through with rainbow skeins of connectivity that surprise you to the last.

michiko aoyama is getting better and better at this.

and after you finish the book you find yourself thinking thru the interconnections and enjoying them again, which is the mark of a really good story.

managing expectations 2

J2 to A: what will you do in singapore?

A: eat gorgonzola! (with interpretation from J2)

without interpretation, she could be saying, take a bus!

she's home!

the geriatric volvo, i mean. from the gearbox overhaul.

HOM and i survive a sweltering week on public transport by limiting our excursions. we welcome back our independence with much heartfelt relief and many overdue errands. 

time was when we zipped around town on buses without missing a beat. 

managing expectations

A and E visit us soon.

J2 asks A: where are you going?

A: singapore!

J2: what will you do there?

A: take a bus!

J2: and what else?

A: take a bus!

really, if that is all she wants to do, we can stop agonizing over when the volvo is coming home, i tell HOM.

sunday

time was when the weekly activities reached gasp-worthy levels over the weekend and we collapsed into bed on sunday nights in mindless relief tinged with a little gnawing fear of some nameless unfinished business.

HOM and i reflect today that we are grateful for almost complete shutdown once church is done. blinds drawn a/c on and bed covers down. interrupted only by the need to pee and poop E the dog.

grateful.

the convenience store woman - sayaka murata (2016)

highly rated and unfinishable. perhaps because i come to this right after the happy healing hippo of hinode park and find myself slowly being sucked into the stoically impassive thoughts of a neurodivergent woman trying to mask on a daily basis.

i abandon this just as it appears the tension is going to build up some more. because one should not read in order to get exhausted.

the blurb says haunting, dark, and often hilarious. bah.

 

in the shadow of agatha christie

omnibus of crime fiction by female writers from 1850 to 1917. when one is reduced to this you can tell one is a little bit stir crazy and desperate. 

the short stories themselves are surprisingly palatable although they lack the plot lines and build-up of bodies and clues i am used to after half a life-time's diet of actual agatha christie garnished with j.d. robb. the convoluted sentences are correctly fashionable unexpectedly comprehensible and a welcome change from the short fragments favored by ai-generated prose. the editing's a bit shoddy though which is a pity.

excuse me while i return to actual agatha christie.

waiting for august to end

muggy swelteringness

and 

pervasive stickiness

'nuff said.

new favorite hangout

... the car mechanic's!

as of last count we must qualify for preferred customer status of the revolving door variety. the old volvo has a new engine mount new radiator belt new fan yada yada and will soon have an overhauled gear box. 

we've come a long way, this car and us. and it is practically a new car again too.

national bird

spotted at alexandra village. one of an entire tribe.

us chinese souls look at the free ranging birds and wonder why we cannot eat some of them.

the rainfall market - you yeong-gwang (2024)

dystopian premise rendered in child-friendly prose and just vaguely reminiscent of enid blyton's magic faraway tree which nevertheless succeeds in warming the cockles of the reader's heart. i suspect it is the kitten motif.