Saturday, February 27, 2010

I Can't Feel My Leg!

I was in full panic mode this morning. While having a hearty breakfast with my sister, I shockingly realized, something was amiss, I couldn't feel my left leg, especially in the upper thigh region.

In a perfectly normal circumstances I wouldn't likely tend to rub my own porky thigh in public, until this morning where I got a sudden urge to dust the crust of the "remaining" of the aforementioned breakfast on my lap. And then there it was as I poked it several times and it felt....nothing.

To tell you the truth, it wasn't so much felt like pins-and-needles you get usually arises from sitting cross-legged for hours but more like abnormal prickling-like sensations often described as "feel-less pain" right after you undergoing anesthetizing procedures for molar retraction. Now how can you honestly tell me, I shouldn't be worried and this was nothing?!

The minute I got home, I rubbed all sorts of ointments on the affected area (times two) and hoped for the 'miracle' to work but nope, nothing seemed to work. All I got was oily, minty thigh.

Then I ran to the nearest cyber cafe available and I googled the symptoms on the Internet and immediately ran into all sort of causes from Alcoholism to Leprosy, which made my heart pounding even more violently as I never thought I should've checked the list of 3 millions causes of numbness before. I was literally in tears. Now I feel numb around my eyes, hopefully from constant outburst.

As I type this, the feel-lessness on my thigh still linger and I really don't know what else to do.

People who know me, knows that, I don't get scared easily. I'd make Atilla The Hun like a headless chicken. But this is too much. I know I am not an overreact hypochondriac Drama Queen this time. I am just worried, probably not more than Brad Pitts getting his first breakout. But this is a 'life-changing' experience for me and I am sure It was quite a 'life-changing experience' for my sister too! I tell you, it was quite a scene in the restaurant this morning (sorry sis!).

God knows I need to feel my left thigh again.

Note: Much later, it turned out, it was really an acute case of Overreact-Hypochondriac-Drama-Queen syndrome after all, as everyone expected. I am fine, I just can't help being a clinically challange, psychologically damage person that I am. And being on the heavy side a bit didn't help too.

Friday, February 26, 2010

How Would You Dress If You Had A Choice?

It hasn't been my week. No, that's understatement, I was devastated. I never thought I'd see this coming, not in a million years. They asked us to conform, to bow upon oppression, to follow. To wear the new corporate uniform, every single day of the week!

I am a unique, independent individual. I have a much classy-er, better fashion sense than anyone in PR. I am against oppression and I am launching a campaign to end them forever. (I'm a dreamer, what can I say?) Below is my list for reasons;

1) In actuality uniforms are a nuisance and a destructively inappropriate way of robbing us of our individuality and taking away our basic rights: freedom of expression.

2) I was once mistaken with a movie character just because of the old corporate uniform. Someone blatantly asked me, "Are you a 'Na'vi'? 'Cause you're wearing almost all blue." I have never been asked this before, and I was shocked. I don't want to be confused with that tree-hugging,10ft alien from Avatar anymore.

3) I know a staff, we will just call him Mr. M, who dressed in drag to work just to rebel against the uniform. We can't have that, can we?

4) We work hard for our money, so shouldn't we be able to spend it on something that will please us, bring us joy, and a sense of accomplishment? With a uniform we think things like, "I saved up and Now I have to buy this stupid, tacky, Navy blue shirt. Yuk!"

5) Some people think that uniforms give us more corporate pride. Yeah right! Haven't they heard, corporate song? tie? mug? corporate household products?

6) Uniforms bring people together? Okay, whatever. Clothing does not separate us. In fact, it has absolutely nothing to do with clothing styles. Flame me if you want, but I think that we would become closer if we were allowed free dress. Unity through a uniform? Please.

7) Let's face it...we all look like dorks. Don't you think that a good working enviornment is one in which we feel good about ourselves and the way we are dressed?

8) Two words-Dry Cleaning!

9) How one dresses is a representation of who that person is. On the other hand, a uniform is a uniform. A dull, stale, boring, crusty old uniform. How would you dress if you had a choice?

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Mus Lawless

My head was whirling. This afternoon, exactly 1.30 in the afternoon, as I was digging up my wallet at the ATM, I shockingly realized, I have been on the wrong side of the law for past three months!! I mean, looky here.



I can’t believe how can I forget to check the expiry date on my driving license every two days or so. Who doesn’t do that? Now, I feel like a prison state bound outlaw or murderer or something. I am not kidding, because the only way to get caught without valid driving licence is to have a road block for every 20 yards. And what are the odds? Now with RPK and Bala are running loose, pretty damn good if you asked me.

So I tried to focus on the task in my hands, half-heartedly giving myself a pep talk. Oh well, I thought, just go get the damn licence renewed, I mean how bad could it be ?

(Roll eyes) I knew nothing, didn’t I?

Two hours in the packed, sweltering lobby later, after checking my FB for kazillion times, my number, (three million and two) finally was called.

"Nak renew lesen”, I told the tired looking man in charge simply.

"Hari ni tak boleh, Isnin sampai Jumaat, office hour sahaja”, he said sharply, stingingly and without looking at me. (He was busy counting money)

"Tahu tak mana cawangan lain yang terdekat?”. I asked again, struggling to contain my utter displeasure (disgust) with his attitude.

"Tak tahu”. He simply shrugged, as if I was his long lost illegitimate son trying to milk his money and calling him daddy.

For a brief moment I entertained the thought of killing him and shoving him in my car’s trunk, but I realized I’d probably need a licence for that too. I shook my head in exasperation. It was amazing that no matter how black my mood already was, something always came along to make it even darker.

Is being rude necessary to those people who asked you nicely, or when well in fact it is your job promises to give an exceedingly good customer service to those who matters the most, especially in my goddamn hour of need like this? Some nerve!

As I drove home (illegally, of course) my resentment towards that no-good, awful rotten stinky troll was boiling. If only this was backwater, lawless country....

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Horny Toad And Sexy Amoeba

It’s a long, loong weekend for me. It’s Chinese New Year weekend and I am stuck with no one but my two loyal, fluffy teddy bears. All my friends are gone for the holiday and celebrating. (Which I find it very strange since I am pretty sure none of them are of chinese descendent or married to one!)

Four uneventful, lonesome days proved to much for me, so I did exactly what a socially retarded dude like me would do in time like this - I went and checked out the internet chat rooms.

You can talk pretty much about anything to pretty much anybody on the internet, but people can behave appallingly in chat rooms. You probably innocently popped in with a casual inquiry about the whether and bam, you’d receive a lot of messages asking if you are menstruating.

This is both astonishing and unbelievably scary. Well, unless, you are really into "that", that’s fine with me but I think I better off talking about gardening, ancient history or pressing wild flowers or something. So excuse me for being a prude.

And then there this new way of communicating which made me realized I haven’t probably been in internet chat rooms, gee, for quite sometime. People now love to write in a hurry, you know, the incredibly keystroke-saving letter combination or grouping punctuations to form pictures, as if they were ancient egyptian symbols.

In fact my messages were filled with such ‘codes’, it could send to space: lol for "laugh out loud", brb for "be right back" and ic for "I see" and didkwaysimawpakirirabdwi for "damn, I don’t know what are you saying, I might as well press any key in random in reply and be done with it".

Usually, I do have a very good instinct and great at deciphering and decoding things. I live for meaning. In fact, just the other day, my housemate accused me of talking to a stray dog. (I named her Joy). I am that good when it comes to 'unintelligent' communication.

But this one message stumbled me. One message so laden with enigmatic codes it completely threw me off guard. It took a great mind and even greater patience to remotely convinced myself that this person didn’t just throw insult at me.

Horny toad: I m m****, asl, u 1 sx?

Me (Sexy amoeba): :0 (wide-mouthed surprise)

Horny toad: u m?

Me: ;) (knowing wink)

Horny toad: u no ne f?

Me: :O (even greater surprise, or maybe that’s a pig)

Horny toad: #-)

Me: “{}+:?>< (Of course I made that one up).

Yeah, that was stupid and I was bumped out but hey at least it was mentally stimulating.

And the great thing about internet chatting is that you are completely in control of the situation. In the last resort you can just log off.

N (for ‘end’)

Friday, February 5, 2010

A Battle I Can't Win

I just got back from my beginning-of-the-year holiday. Oh nothing extravagant. Just a mini 4-day, 3 hours drive, getaway with oh well, who-else.



I thought I needed to get the engines going. You know, get my grooves back. Now that the workloads in the office are beginning to pile up and expectations are shooting up from every side, I needed a breather. It’s a new year for god’s sake. I was in a dire need for self-pepping.

I didn’t go very far. Just someplace that near to a beach. I am drawn to water. Lots of it. It gives me a much needed clarity and a point of view.



So what else did I bring back? See, I found out I was good at getting suntan. All I had to do was put my face up to the sun for a couple of hours and voila, people would seriously think I was just come back from a Caribbean Island (or just survived a very bad fire explosions in a tanning salon, depending on which part of my body that they were looking at)



I also, cruelly just found out that, throughout this 4-day 'winding-up' period, I've (shriek!!) gained a little weight. An absolute nightmare. Maybe a couple of kilos, I don’t know, I wouldn’t even dare to step on the scale. I simply knew it. My hips never lie.

The worst thing about holiday is that everything tastes delicious out there. An old piece of keropok lekor you would sneer at in the city becomes an irresistible taste treat. A simple plate of rojak buah with a lot of gravy nuts in it will have me rolling around on the floor in ecstasy.

Before the day had gotten under way, I'd been known to inhale two bagfuls of pisang goreng and keledek goreng all in one sit. With no drink. Yikes.

OK, I came back to KL yesterday with my “new beach body”. So what? I may have 'temporarily’ fall off the wagon in that department, but at least I got my mental health and a new point of view (to top off my new "golden” complexion), right?

Sigh.

I just can’t win, can I?