Arrival Debrief

Yo yo, been quite busy since returning. I could write about the flight, about how we watched several movies. I watched Fever Pitch, Hitch, and Guess Who. All not bad, some quite good.

Meeting Aaron and Jasper (and possibly Say Yang) for dinner tomorrow. My lovey just got a cell phone. Very nice, of course. Had dinner with her parents at Newton Circus, then the car parked next to her dad's car had a lorry that probably didn't put handbrake opposite that rolled backwards and was pushing against the car so probably if he drove off the lorry would roll more and that would be bad.

Well, with the very boring story I should probably go sleep. Feeling a little sick, haven't slept much I guess. Stepped on a snail and heard its shell crack. That was yesterday, when I was walking home from the bus stop. Didn't look. Too squeamish to go back and put it out of its misery.

Rudely awakened by the screeching bus yesterday morning, welcoming me back to Singapore, back to work. The screech is actually very controlled and purposeful, intentional and calmly irritating.

Bloody cockles. Oozing blood from the folds of their bulging flesh. Macbeth should have used lime juice. That might have worked.

I've inserted double insoles in my office shoes, and they're much more comfortable now. Snug as a bug. Or a hug. Maybe even a rug.

Did a science experiment Monday night. Trying to figure out if my new tennis racquet is heavier than the one I have. Tied pieces of thread to each racquet, then hung the threads on 2 ends of a very symmetrical plastic clothes hanger, and see which way it tipped. Conclusion is that my old racquet is probably heavier, but then I realized why the new one seems quite much heavier. The balance is further from the handle. The c.g. is near the chin of the racquet face, while my older racquet has the c.g. at the throat.

So we got back safely, my shoulder is pretty much back to normal, although it still hurts when I stretch it to weird angles (like backwards). Had to check-in my racquet, but it seems to have survived the trip buried amongst clothes. If there are fractures they're internal and invisible.

Assembled a cupboard on Monday night with my dad, we took about 3+ plus in total. It's a rather nice, big cupboard in the dining room, tall, many compartments, with some nice doors. Replaces the cupboard that was ruined by water that leaked from the wall due to a broken pipe, which was fixed while I was away.

Rode out my new bike this morning, and rode it back in the evening. It's good. It's yellow, and nice. We both got clip-on sunglasses in LA, which is kinda cute when we both wear them. Spent most of Monday relaxing, unpacking stuff at her place.

Haven't been given much work yet, as everyone's so busy, preparing for ISO audit. Helped Yinglan a little today with simplifying the process of doing some similar analysis 12 times (on 12 different populations).

Looking forward to the weekend, it's been a long time since I've played tennis. My lovey's new cell phone has a tennis game on it. Meeting Sam at Kallang Tennis Courts Saturday morning, and De En and Andy at De En's place at night. gz can't make it, unfortunately.

Brought 1kg of dark chocolate to office and offered to people. Half of it is almost gone. And I probably ate half of that half. Oh, and while we were checking-in our bags in LAX, lovey realized that we were missing the laptop bag! So I scrambled outside and the guy outside directed us inside and I went in and out and then he pointed me to this room and there it was, kept safely for us to find it. Whew.

My parents bought a new Toyota Camry, it's scheduled to arrive in September. Lovey sold her Toyota Corolla in the US. I got to see the Toyota Prius, I actually expected to see a small sedan, but it looked more like an SUV. Cool.

Postcards from France

Hello all! It's me again. It's been a nice two weeks so far in sunny Los Angeles, hope everyone is doing well! The packing is ok, you know the drill, selling stuff, giving away stuff, cleaning the apartment. The kind of stuff you do all the time, like when you've completed a doctoral degree after four years.

Anyway, I arrived safe and sound, and hope to go back in one piece. But there will be two of us, lovey and me. But in a sense that's just one. Went around the town, the first night was in this bar with red dark lighting and dolls hanging from the walls and shelves.

I actually semi-dislocated my left arm. Was in the ocean helping get the kayaks get offshore. The waves were pretty mean. Capsized many a kayak that hardly got two meters from the sand. I saw a capsized canoe about 3 meters away, and tried to wade towards it, then a huge wave came. I didn't know how to deal with waves, but now I know. Anyway, I kinda turned to use my right side to block the watery onslaught, and got knocked into the water, and when I came up I had lost the sunglasses on my face to the shallow depths (never found it), and my left shoulder felt weird.

I guess it's a semi-dislocation in that the arm probably never got out of socket, but sprained. Good thing is that it's most healed now, I can use it almost as good as new. Couldn't really use it without pain for about 5 days, actually. Took anti-inflammatories, and iced it the first couple of days. This was in Malibu. Sat by the ocean watching people surf.

When a wave comes, if it hasn't broken, you can pretty much just ride it, bobbing up and down as it passes by. But if it's about to break, dive under it, go below the surface of the water before it hits you. Then it crashes harmlessly above you. And doesn't dislocate your shoulder. Saw people surf in a variety of methods. One that's pretty cool is a long surfboard and the guy holds an oar, so you can surf normally plus paddle with the oar further from the beach.

My lovey bought me a pack of cool bicycle cards, that are negative-image like, so all cards are the same color, the background is pink. My dad bought me a bicycle while I was away, so will be getting to see that when I'm back. Seems my granny is doing better, they're feeding her porridge again.

My lovey also bought me a tennis racquet! US$55, after taxes. It's a Prince racquet, and pretty solid. She is so sweet to me. So now I guess I don't have to lend my super-lousy $10 racquet to people who don't have racquet. Bought some head tape too for protecting the frame from superficial damage. Hope that there won't be problems bringing the racquet back, for I hope to hand-carry it...

We also went for a Catholic Engaged Encounter weekend retreat last weekend, and it was quite good. Basically to deal with relationship issues, and start or improve communication on crucial issues, as the case may be. Writing exercises, sharing of experiences, that kind of thing.

We watched Cinderella Man, which was really good. The cinema offered a money-back guarantee if the movie was, like, not so good. We got our money back anyway =)

I'm going to miss the soy ice cream and vegetable meat (ground beef, beef burgers, sausage patties). Can't quite find these in Singapore, but will look harder if we do start cooking seriously. I think I've seen soy cheese in Singapore. The ice cream we bought this time was damn good, same brand (Turtle Mountain) but they have a "purely decadent" line. It's chocolate ice cream with peanut butter swirls. I'm bringing back about 2kg of dark chocolate, by the way.

Flying off tomorrow morning.

Parting Words

Just to inform everyone again to make a mental/electronic/physical note in their calendars or whatever your biological/logical clock is sync'd to, that I am flying in a few hours' time, and will only be back around midnight of Sunday, 24th July (Singapore Time).

I'm taking my mum's tri-band phone, and listening to the radio built into her phone now as I type this. I miss having a radio that I can carry with me all the time and listen to, a radio encapsulated in an object I already carry with me all the time.

The cholesterol specialist (upon the voicing of my concern about my muscle aches) decided that I can go off CRESTOR for a month and have a blood test + checkup done then. Actually when she called me regarding the results of the new test, she said it wasn't bad, and that I could continue taking the drug. But that was because I said I didn't really feel muscle pain or stiffness and that sort of thing that day.

Doreen's mother in law passed away, and so she's flying to Pakistan. Things are pretty bad there, no proper water and stuff, riots and stuff (which she says are attracted by weddings and funerals). And women need to wear shawl and all that, otherwise...

Death and Disease

London has won the bid for the 2012 Olympics. London has just been racked with terrorist bomb blasts. Bombs went off in the underground and buses, during morning rush hour.

Went to see the specialist for cholesterol yesterday, and there's pretty bad news. Creatine kinase (CK) level is about 1.5 times the upper limit of normal (ULN). The link says CK leaks into the blood when muscle is damaged. Cell lysis or something, I guess. I reproduce the relevant passage in the explanatory sheet that comes with Crestor (rosuvastatin), which I'm currently taking, 10 mg/day.

Skeletal muscle:
As with other HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors, effects on skeletal muscle e.g. uncomplicated myalgia and myopathy, have been reported in CRESTOR treated patients. Rare cases of rhabdomyolysis have been reported in subjects receiving rosuvastatin 80 mg in investigational clinical trials which were occasionally associated with impairment of renal function. All cases improved on cessation of therapy.

Patients who develop any signs or symptoms suggestive of myopathy should have their CK levels measured. CRESTOR therapy should be discontinued if CK levels are markedly elevated (>10xULN) or if myopathy is diagnosed or suspected.

[... paragraph on complications with concomitant therapy... ]

CRESTOR should be temporarily withheld in any patient with an acute serious condition suggestive of myopathy or predisposing to the development of renal failure secondary to rhabdomyolysis (e.g. sepsis, hypotension, major surgery, trauma severe metabolic, endocrine and electrolyte disorders; or uncontrolled seizures).

It says in the same sheet that adverse effects can be split into common and rare. Common (>1%, <10%) include headache, myalgia, asthenia, constipation, dizziness, nausea, abdominal pain. Rare (>0.01%, <0.1%) is just myopathy.

So... I'm feeling some muscle ache (myalgia) in my legs, and if this is serious (myopathy), and CRESTOR is bad for me, I'm quite screwed. Other statins are bad for my liver. In which case I can pick my poison: look forward to a heart attack in a decade's time, acute hepatitis, or some rhabdomyolysis which screws with the kidneys too.

Anyway, the specialist said increased exercise can also cause CK levels to rise. Had more blood drawn that day, awaiting results. I think I'll skip my dose tonight, though, just to be safe. Since the time-scales for myopathy and cardiovascular disease are very different.

Played tennis with James yesterday, after that appointment in Tan Tock Seng, after I took a Hepatitis A booster jab at Tan Tock Seng, after I went to polyclinic to get a cream for that inflammation under my left eye. With lunch somewhere in between, at the newly opened Kopitiam at Tan Tock Seng Hospital.

Tennis ball bonanza. Found 20+ balls in the dustbin on the tennis court (which is really weird, first of all that there is a dustbin there, and secondly that there were only tennis balls in it, and thirdly that there were so many perfectly good, but I guess contaminated, tennis balls). I now have 34 good tennis balls, but I guess many of those need some disinfecting in the sun.

Didn't ride my bicycle out today, the front tire was totally flat. I think it's busted. Don't know what happened. Probably need to get a new bicycle if I want to have a bicycle. Or can repair the tire, I guess.

Need to pack my bags. My boss is going off on a week-long holiday (to Shanghai) tonight, she notified everyone yesterday. My other boss is going on honeymoon (New Zealand) in a few months' time. I fly on Saturday morning. Yinglan will probably have to do shredding when I'm gone.

Just bought flight insurance. $78 for $200,000 coverage. Quite expensive, I wouldn't have gone for it but my parents asked me to get. Can buy a tennis racquet lor.

This is Ben's website.

Mega Update

We are post-promotion ceremony but still busy. At least I got to go home on time today, and could take Friday and Wednesday off last week. Happy 4th of July! I've got a huge pimple right below my left eye, which makes it look like I got in a fight and got whacked below the eye. But, as everyone knows, if I got in a fight I won't get whacked lor.

So, to go back in time... went back to work today, did some miscellaneous work that involved a little running around. Yesterday went kayaking in Sentosa (where all the cool kids go, including my sister, who was in Sentosa yesterday also, and my cousin as well) with Aaron and Say Yang. Jasper came along too, but didn't kayak with us. It was ok, but not that fun actually. Capsized twice, but didn't really get sunburnt. Wore long sleeves, a hat, gloves and sunglasses, and put on sunblock.

Not sure how we made it through canoeing for 3 or 4 days during the 21 day OBS. I guess it's not so boring when you have like 20+ people on 10+ canoes, and I guess it's an experience being out on a choppy sea, eating dried food on a rocky canoe.

That was Sunday, met Shaowei after Sentosa, he's in Singapore working for a year before he goes to do his PhD. Another one of the twists in A*Star's contract. The PSC contract also changed in my last year in USA. They took away the allowance they were going to pay us, pro-rating the final year's allowance up till the date we graduated. And this was announced a couple of months before graduation, I think. In my case they paid me only until the end of May even though commencement was held in the first week of June.

M1 is giving free IDD calls to the US today and tomorrow, but the catch is that need to use mobile phone to call. Need to check if I've got roaming. The World Health Organization is calling for ruthlessness in dealing with bird flu. Influenza viruses carry their genes in RNA, which tends to mutate more quickly than DNA.

Played tennis on Saturday morning, took a nap at home, went for dinner with Jasper, bought sunblock for Sunday. At Royal Sporting House, they were playing trance music, and there was this song that kept going "the table, the table, the table". Talk about hard sells. I bought a Wilson backpack for about $40 (2 sig. fig.) after a 15% discount. It's spacious and designed to hold tennis racquets. Can fit 1 or 2 racquets.

If I do buy another racquet, it would be something that has heft, feels solid, weighs about 300 grams (10.5 ounces), and costs less than $100. Other things I might buy even though I have already: a new computer (already got a 5 year old laptop), a new bicycle (mine quite old already, rather rusty, though it still works).

SMU's campus in the city is nice, quite big considering its location. Bus fares are up... Jasper stayed over at Aaron's place on Saturday night. Taking off again this coming Wednesday. Got medical in the morning.

Was off on Friday, played tennis with James, who learnt really fast. Then went for dinner with him, Say Yang, and Pasha. Say Yang told us about this Kelatan clinic or whatever it's called, it's for sexual diseases, how the patients are asked to show their sores or whatever but there's no sink for them to wash their hands after that, which means the door handles are crying out for a WITs suggestion.

Worked late on Thursday rushing something. Not that late, though. Played badminton and tennis on Wednesday, which makes it a total of 3 tennis sessions last week. None for this week, or at most one. Tuesday's promotion ceremony ended not as late as I thought, but later than planned.