When you are desperate...

You have heard of what crazy things people do when they are desperate, like rob the bank, kill their wives for insurance money, or drink your own urine when you are totally out of water while you are lost at sea. For me, I decided I am going to cut my own hair.

Well, today started out as a very different day. When I woke up at 7:30, looking into the mirror when I washed my face, I could stand my hair anymore.  I need a haircut!

With no proper hair-cutting tools, I took Kioni's craft scissors, a mirror and the extra shower curtain out to the backyard.  It was cold, my fingers don't work very well, but I was determined to conquer the mess.

Four hours later, it's done!  I am happy with it, and will definitely do it again.  I saved myself some money, and most important of all, I got the satisfaction of creating something on my head, that was a great feeling.

Letting Go

Picture from www.janicemarinerward.com

Kioni is playing outside with her two neighbour friends. Dan wrote a google chat to me saying that it is difficult to see our only child playing out there, all by herself, not needing our help or constant care at all. There comes a time when parents realize that their children are not little anymore, it is time to let go, but each step is hard, because that represents independancy, something that the parents are so used to the day the child was born. Different stages of the child's life will require different kinds of letting go, right now for us, it is just letting her playing outside without checking on her every 5 minutes.

Gadget

We received this today from a Freecycler, made a bit of popcorn and they tasted just as they should, minus the butter and salt, clean up is just an easy wipe. Though I like grease and salt, this is good for Kioni because she tends to eat too much popcorn whenever she gets her hand on them.
This gadget is real easy, just pour some popcorn kernel in there, turn it on, and they came flying out of the chute after hot air pops the popcorn.
They have a gadget for anything you do in the kitchen. Some of them are plain waste of money, but this one is agreeable to use, because it is MUCH better than popping popcorn in a pot with oil and mess.

When that day comes....

When that day comes, when we don't move to another continent every few years, then I will start growing a bonsai. I always love Japanese Maple, I think this is what I am going to grow, a Japanese Maple bonsai. Let's see if that day will come. If upon research that growing a bonsai is more than I can handle, maybe just a regular Japanese Maple in the backyard, if we have a yard wherever we are living.

Prepared

"We forgot half of things they teach us at school (high school), but we remember every episode the bullies did to us." - from Criminal Minds

Bullies exist everywhere, they can be 5 years old or 50 years old, they are just really pitiful people who needs attention but not getting it anywhere. We need to know how to deal with them, and we need to handle them with care. I am glad that I am homeschooling Kioni, at least, I can teach her a few more years about life and the evilness in life before she has to face it herself. No mother can protect their children from facing the inevitable, but I can help her better prepared for it.

狗媽媽Izzy

這是唯一的小狗女

在美國的奶奶去年七月份收養了一隻拉布拉多獵犬狗女 Izzy，她是導盲狗協會的狗，但是 Izzy 本身不會做導盲狗，郤被定命了做導盲狗媽媽，協會說 Izzy 身體十分健康，有良好基因，所以選中她做媽媽。跟 Izzy 相處了一會之後發現，可能是因為她天性特別活潑好動，又有獨立思想，所以可能不容易受訓練，選她做媽媽比較好。
今年一月底，Izzy 生了第一批小狗，八隻小狗，七男一女，全都健康活潑，十分愛吃。祺祺笑說他們是Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. （雪姑七友）
我十分愛狗，真想抱一隻回家。可是這些小狗都是導盲犬協會的，長大後都會做導盲狗。
Izzy 還要多生幾胎才會完成她的「責任」，之後，我奶奶就會全權擁有她了。
人真是厲害，懂得怎樣利用動物去幫助我們。狗也真奇怪，願意合作。是猫的話，睬你都傻。

Inspiration from a diamond rose

I often wonder how it would be like for people who can basically walk into a store and buy ANYTHING they want, price is not a issue, because there will always be money at their disposal. I finally have a taste of that when playing with Growing Gift in Facebook.

You can send Growing Gifts to friends, and it is particularly attractive to someone like me, who cannot resist plants and flowers. The trick is, you only have so many seeds to 'buy' the flowers, they all have a 'price'. The more special it is, the more seeds it requires.

Now, the one 'plant' that costs the most seeds, is a rose that is made of diamond. It costs 1000 seeds. Which is hard to obtain, and even if you get that many seeds, you have to weight if you want to spend it all on one plant, or if you would rather use it on other plants.

I surprisingly, found a way to obtain as many seeds as I want, legally (I am not breaking any Facebook rules, nor am I hacking in anything. (Well, not like I can hack into anything even if I want to.) I just found a way. Which in just one night by working hard on it, I obtained over a thousand seeds, and in the process of doing that, I also benefited my friends. After a while, I gradually accumulated several thousand seeds.

The big question comes: Do I want to spend a thousand seeds on the diamond rose? Does it even worth it?
Suddenly, I understand why rich people might not necessarily be happy with all they have.
They are not happy because the diamond rose that costs 1000 seeds are not that special anymore. Yes, I worked hard in obtaining it, but now, it is in my pocket, what's next? They don't have anything that costs more than 1000 seeds.

I suddenly understand why Michael Phelps smokes marijuana and drink excessively. After you reach the top, where are you going to go next?
.

Chinese restaurants

In the U.S., "authentic" Chinese restaurants often serve Szechuan food, Chop Suey and Pizza, and of course, the one and only "fortune cookies."

In Scotland, we see "Chinese" restaurants serving Chinese Take Away and "Fish and Chips". (In the photo above, I guess they permanently run out of fish.)

Now, with the hints above, guess where the following "Chinese" restaurants are located:

Chinese food + tortilla

Chinese food + sushi

Chinese food + paella

Chinese food + creme brulee

So how is your world cuisine knowledge? See answer below.

Answer: (mexico, japan, spain, france)

香港揮春 與眾不同