Here's My Story

After reaching Master 5 in solo rank , I reached Master 5 in team rank. These are the last 3 wins: This is a new deck that I created myself. I have yet to try it in solo rank. It's consist of: (1) Scrat Pack (2) Wall (3) Daggerfall (4) Reboomer (5) Xiao Long (6) Wolf Among Sheep (7) Wolf Among Sheep (8) Blastmancer (9) Divine Warrior (10) Spiritmancer Let's try to use the checklist provided by Edelweiss to look at this deck: Average mana cost of around 3.5: yes 8 minions + 2 spells: no. 1 spell, 1 building. Counter to (a) Flying, (b) Swarm, (c) Big units: (a) Xiao Long, Blastmancer, Spiritmancer (b) Divine Warrior (as distraction) + other minions, Wall + Reboomer, Daggerfall, Blastmancer  (c) Wall + Reboomer, Divine Warrior + other minions Specialised cards: Wall, Reboomer, Divine Warrior Win condition: Control. Hit face. Try and hope for good resurrections from tombstones

I've come up with a set of rules that describe our reactions to technologies: Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen ad thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things. - "Salmon of Doubt" by Douglas Adam Hahaha.

And now we have the World Wide Web (the only thing I know of whose shortened form --www-- takes three times longer to say than what it's short for) and we have yet another exciting new model. - "The Salmon of Doubt" by Douglas Adams

On Day 1 of Cycle 7, we got the results of the tumour marker CA 19.9 : dropped from 375 to 244. "Good," said the doctor. Yay! At the next appointment with orthopaedic, we were a little frustrated because they couldn't find my dad's file and so had to ask us background questions all over again. At one point, luckily I highlighted to them that dad was diagnosed with mucinous adernocarcinoma of unknown primary source: they had thought it was cancer of the kidney that had spread to the left femur. However, we were grateful that they tried they best, and that they were friendly and helpful. Based on the MRI results , the orthopaedic oncologist concluded that the femur could fracture anytime and so they recommended proximal femur replacement surgery (costing RM 13-14k!). We were told that dad would be able to walk after the surgery. Estimated time in ward was a week and it would take another week to fully recover. There is a much less expensive and less extensive me...

I reached solo rank Master 5 for the first time. These are the last 3 wins: I was trying to get into top 128 to qualify for the Discord's Snowgiving tournament but I simply ran out of time because of real life activities. Towards the end, I focused on using 5 different decks. The deck used for the above matches is significantly different than the Stormbringer 'Guild' deck I used previously. I had to modify it a lot to counter the plethora of Ravager decks, of which the most annoying one had double Rammer, double Dragon Ball and Shars'Rakk Twins. I wrote a little about this in the video here . The deck build is as follows: (1) Illusory Cleaver: cheap to capture bridge and can kill minion(s) with less than 30hp (2) Scrat Pack: cheap to capture both bridges (3) Dragon Whelp: solid flying melee minion (4) Plasma Marines (5) Xiao Long: deters spell (6) Lightning Bolt: great for killing big minions but have to time it carefully. My main aim was to kil...

I hate cables. They hate me too, because they know that one day I will simply be able to go into that cupboard with a flamethrower and get rid of the lot of them. In the meantime they are determined to extract from me the last ounce of frustrated misery that they can. We do not need the bastards. We shouldn't need the bastards. - "The Salmon of Doubt" by Douglas Adams

Mum's home vacation was quite good: no episodes of self-hurting, slept well, ok appetite. There was still the perpetual complain of dizziness. Thankfully, she made the effort to go for the appointment with physiotherapist, who was supposed to treat mum for vertigo as stated by the ENT specialist. The therapist, however, concluded that mum didn't have that issue after running some tests and I too said that the ENT specialist inclined to think likewise. She also did more vigorous tests, which she said the ENT specialist should have done. At the end of it, she concluded that there was problem with mum's right eye (caused more dizziness than the left one) and balancing issue (when she walked, I think). So she taught mum (and I) some exercises to do at home. The ward's nurse called to ask us to bring my mum back to ward a day earlier than scheduled i.e. on Thursday and that the doctor wanted to see me too. Unfortunately, she didn't know why. Mum was reluctant to g...

This is a spell in D&D 5e. Someone asked the lead designer, Jeremy Crawford, on Twitter a question about it: Radim Havlicek:  Wiz cast phatas force on HillGiant saying "I want to make it think it is in total darkness". It was blinded until save. OK? Jeremy Crawford:  As DM, I'd require the  caster to describe an illusory visible phenomenon that douses the light. OnionPowder:  Really dark sunglasses. Hahaha.

Meanwhile, my dad had been having trouble with 2 teeth for sometime: they were causing him pain and should be extracted. An oncologist said that he could do that but probably need to postpone a cycle of chemo to let the wound heal properly. If we knew that, he could had done it during the 3-week gap . Oh well. She also said that it depended on whether dentist was willing to do it or not. It came to a point where my dad wanted to get them out: they were disturbing his sleep and his eating. After consulting her boss, the dentist at Penaga ordered blood test first but that would mean my dad had to go to Hospital Seberang Jaya to do it to get the results within the same day but that hospital is notorious for lack of parking space and I wasn't with him at the time (my sister's maid accompanied him). So the dentist kindly made special request at Penaga clinic to have the blood test done that day and faxed the results to Penang GH for the go-ahead to extract the teeth. The 2 teeth...

Fortunately, a doctor did see mum on Monday and so she told her about the increasing uneasy feeling . I don't know whether her medicine was adjusted but she was ok on Tuesday: didn't hurt herself that morning and afternoon and the uneasy feeling subsided a lot. She could converse albeit slowly and did smile once. She looked a little pale on Wednesday but otherwise, she was the same as the day before. She looked better the next day. Her giddiness worsened on Friday, to be as bad as before she was warded :( On Saturday, Sunday and Monday, it was so bad that she cut short the visit (only 5 mins with us and that too hardly conversed) because she wanted to nap. On Monday, a doctor requested to meet me later in the afternoon to discuss about doing an extra ECT session on Friday and the possibility of mum going on vacation trial on that day as well. I took the opportunity to tell her that although mum no longer hear voices, she was slow to respond and her giddiness caused her to s...

I love this deck: clearly the core card is the Crossbow Guild but I believed one key factor of making this deck works is its fast cycle. This deck has average mana cost of 3.2. It is possible to sometimes have two guilds in play simultaneously. (1) Scrat Pack: cheapest minions to capture both bridges (2) Wall: defensive card. One of my favourite cards. Brings lots of value (3) Cursebearer: cheap good tank. Great at weakening multiple enemies (best to support him with range minons). Also great at backstabbing big minions (4) Daggerfall: cheap spell with huge range to kill off low hp minions (5) Dragon Whelp (6) Plasma Marines (7) Re-Boomer: great in killing swarms/hordes and also help other minions (or the Wall) in killing greater hp minions (8) Xiao Long (9) Divine Warrior: that 8s shield makes her very tanky (10) Crossbow Guild: core card Let's try to use the checklist provided by Edelweiss to look at this deck: Average mana cost of around 3.5: yes, it's 3.2 8...

When this photo was taken, it was less than a month after this restaurant opened (occupies 2 corner shop lots). Hope this means that their business is good.

There was a 3-week gap between Cycle 5 and 6 because the scheduled week was full (probably because of public holiday) and that my dad didn't want to do it on Thursday as that would mean waiting till Monday to detach the chemo bag (from the chemo port embedded in his body). Despite the longer gap, my dad's condition continued to get better i.e. leg wasn't painful when he was awake in the middle of the night. However, few days before start of Cycle 6, his right thumb swelled. Fortunately, he needed to take paracetamol only once to manage the pain and thereafter the swelling subsided slowly. Another issue he had was waking up with stiffness in his hands. Oncologist advised him to use gloves and socks while he sleeps because it was probably due to the cold air in deep in the night. It worked! We had some good news when his weight was measured: he had gained more than 1.5kg over the last 3 weeks. Yay! Unfortunately, they couldn't locate the results of the tumour mar...

Doctor told my sister  that although he would try his best to get things done (e.g. blood test) in time for mum to start the first ECT session on Monday, realistically it would probably start on Wednesday (it's only done on Mon, Wed and Fri) since it was already Friday afternoon. However, during our visit (my dad and I) on Saturday, I queried and found out that it would start on Monday. Great! This was my first time seeing mum after the dramatic re-admission  to the ward. She was definitely worse than 18 days ago : her hand trembled more while completing a simple art piece that my sister bought for her, much less chatty although she did ask two questions (rather than just responding to our talk), slower to respond and still had tendency to knock her head against the pillar. While concentrating on the art piece, she alerted us that she had the urge to hurt herself but, when asked, she confirmed that the activity was enough of a distraction to hold back that urge. However, onc...

The idea of this deck came from 2 opponents, whom I lost to. It's more expensive than I like: 3.9 average mana cost, higher than the target maximum of 3.5. (1) Crossbow Dudes: cheap range minion (2) Propeller Scrats: cheap flying minon (3) Warrior: good cheap tank (4) Xiao Long: deter opponent from using spells (5) Drone Buzzers: good flying range minion; combo with Dragon Ball (6) Rammer: fast, hard-hitting anti-building; combo with Dragon Ball (7) Stun Lancers: great vs irritating/big minions but countered easily with Fireball; combo with Dragon Ball (8) Dragon Ball: combo with (5), (6) and (7) cards above; combo with Shars'Rakk Twins (9) Infiltration: great for defending and aggression; combo with Shars'Rakk Twins (10) Shars'Rakk Twins: combo with (8) and (9) cards above. As you can see, cards (4) to (9) are core cards of deck. Let's try to use the checklist provided by Edelweiss to look at this deck: Average mana cost of 3.5: no 8 minions + 2 ...

When Mordar became one of the free rotation Masters, I tried it (probably because of the "win online games with 3 different Masters" mission hehe) and, unexpectedly, I like him. So, I built a deck based on the "Mordar Big Minions" deck in this list . The deck is as follows: Grenadier Shock Rock Wall Cursebearer Dragon Whelp Sniper Scrat Xiao Long Drone Walker Cleaver Harbinger This deck is modified partly because of lack of cards and partly because by choice. Notably, I choose Harbinger over Blue Golem because I like the former's long range and it's a flying minion too. I try to keep to the average mana cost of 3.5 but bear in mind that Cleaver is usually summoned to deal with enemy's big minion i.e. it's not summoned for the purpose of cycling through the deck. Let's try to use the checklist provided by Edelweiss to look at this deck: Average mana cost of 3.5: yes. 8 minions + 2 spells: 8 minions, 1 spell, 1 building Counter ...

The day after , I spoke with mum over the phone for a while (my sister visited her). She was much better. She could state that the day before was "horrible", ask me about my back ache and possible cause, and give me "muack muack" at the end of the conversation. My sister spoke with the ward doctor: They'll be adding lithium to mum's medication Blood test 3 months later (specifically to check liver and kidney function) If dosage is determined to be appropriate, then blood test once every 6 months If this new set of medication doesn't work, replace olanzapine with clozapine Unfortunately, not only did it not work, lithium seems to worsen my mum's condition: she hurt herself more often. She also couldn't sleep at night and had to be restrained to prevent her from rolling off the bed :( The doctor had a discussion with my sister: Suggested ECT x6. My sister's concern was that even if mum is alright after ECT, she might revert back to...

From the list of medicine that was prescribed for her short vacation trial  (4 days, 3 nights), I noticed that there was no olanzapine during the day (i.e. only the 10mg for night) sertraline was further increased to 75mg clonazepam was re-introduced at 0.125mg (quarter tablet) twice a day After discussing with my family, I took the opportunity to go back to PJ with Ban for a few days and so the following information was given mainly by my sister: During her stay, there were a couple of times where she had the urge to hurt herself but she informed someone (I requested her to do so and briefed others) and was given an activity to do. It worked :) On the morning of the 4th day, my sister and her husband drove my mum back to the ward. My sister managed to meet both the doctor in-charge of my mum's case at the ward, and the psychogeriatric: They strongly believed that mum could continue to be at home and thus extended her vacation trial by a week. Re mum's 'joyless...

Since our plan to move to Singapore was scuttled , I had been waiting for an official notification from Singapore informing me of the revocation of my PR due to the expiry of my REP . Yet, throughout much of 2017, there was no such notification. However, later on, other entities made a move (goodness how they know):  Income terminated my Dependent Protection Scheme My SingPass was cancelled In both cases, their CSOs said (indirectly by the latter) that I was no longer a PR.  Yet, I still have nothing official. Actually, this matters only when I close my CPF account in the future: I will need to show CPF Board a letter from ICA stating that I'm no longer a PR. However, I felt uneasy that my residency status with insurance companies and banks was still Singapore PR and hence I proceeded to make things 'right'. I also needed to change my address with CPF Board. A good opportunity came up when Ban wanted to attend a short workshop in Singapore and I wasn'...

Mum hurt herself on the night of first day at the ward and the next morning. However, her condition was much better: very aware, chatty and could initiate a few topics of conversation. She hurt herself again at night, of second day but by third day, she didn't do it any more. I tried to catch the doctor at the ward to ask whether there was any change to mum's medication or not but to no avail. So, on fourth day, I asked a nurse there and she told me: an addition of 5mg olanzapine during the day (on top of 10mg at night) of an increase in sertraline from 25mg to 50mg Later on, I found out from my mum that her blood pressure was consistently 130+ and so she was asked to take 1 tablet (2.5mg) of bisoprolol. She informed the doctor that initially she was taking 1 tablet (1.25mg) but because of giddiness, the doctor who prescribed this medicine to her reduced the dosage to half. Unfortunately, on sixth day, she hurt herself twice in the morning, saying that the voice (a...

Dad vomited air, as usual, during first few days of Cycle 4 but kudos to him for trying to eat as much as he could. Despite that, he still lost nearly a kg when starting Cycle 5 :( There was appointment with PCU few days before Cycle 5. By then, even his back pain was gone. The only problem was this: when he got up in the middle of the night to go to toilet, he would feel numbness in his left leg and some pain. So PCU increased Gabapentin to 3 times a day. Cycle 5 was much kinder to him: there was no vomiting of air or food and by Day 2 onward, there was no more pain in his leg when he got up in middle of night. Later he had constipation and slept only a few hours each night for two nights but fortunately, he could sleep normally on Day 5 and moreover, his leg was good enough for him to walk without the using the walking stick. By Day 6, his constipation was gone, with the help of some medicine of course. There was nothing much the oncologist could comment from the CT scan (with ...

One fine day, Discord announced the launch of their game store and right away, there was a free game, Minion Masters, with this description: "Dive into 1v1 - or bring a friend to 2v2 - battle in this dangerously addictive fast-paced hybrid of deckbuilder, MOBA, and tower-defense." That turns out to be apt. This game is still in Early Access and so some expected features (e.g. playing vs friends, vs bots, etc) are missing. A deck consists of only 10 cards. You can have 3 copies of a single card (yes, you can't have multiple copies of multiple cards) but only after you have "promoted" that particular card. There are 3 types of cards: minion, spell, building. The aim is to destroy enemy's base. You choose a "master" to pair up with the deck. Each master has 3 perks that are unique and will affect your playstyle. Conversely, choose a master that suits your desired playstyle. Stormbringer is the starting master and it's unlocked permanently....

Since the last appointment , my mum managed to reduced intake of 0.125mg of clonazepam to once every 4 nights. However, there was no improvement to her dizziness. ENT specialist asked a few questions, got her to do some simple gestures, checked her eyes and her ears. He didn't think mum had vertigo but nevertheless refer her to physiotherapist for vestibular rehabilitation. Meanwhile, mum had to take ad hoc olanzapine at an increasing frequency (on 8 different days) due to "uneasy feeling" and "extreme sadness". This could be event-driven: my sister wanted to rent out the house and moved to a smaller house to earn the difference, due to financial reasons. It was a no-choice situation. We emphasised that unlike previous shifts, mum just needed to take care of things in her room and so it wouldn't be a as stressful. We wished we didn't want to do this but we had to. Things came to a head when within 2.5 days, six times she heard her own voice telling...

OZ has become one of the hardest freelancers for me to play since Beta. He is no longer one of my favourite freelancers, mainly because his dash is weak i.e. it's predictable and so enemies can still hurt him badly during that dash turn. After meddling with the mod sets a number of times, the current mod set I'm using that I used to level him up from, maybe, 15 to 20 is as follows: (for details on abilities and mods, refer to this wikia ) (1) Phaser Laser: Divide and Conquer (3 loadout points) The frequency of which OZ and his after-image can't hit the same target is high enough to favour this mod. (2) Photon Spray: Lucent Burst (3 loadout points) Tagged is equally good but because I have leftover loadout point, I choose this mod. It helps in focusing damage on team's target(s). (3) Zap Trap: Dazzling Luminescence (1 loadout point) Slow is great in putting distance between adjacent enemies and OZ. (4) Made You Look: Tr-Tr-Tr-Tricky (1 loadout point) ...

The US firm has finally stopped making assertions  and properly addressed our queries on a particular part of the accounting standard. Remember the analogy I presented earlier? Well, the accounting standard says that if it's a crocodile, then use method B but if it's a hippo, use method A. The problem arises when the creature is a hippo, wears a hat but cannot twirl. This apparently causes a diversity in views (and methods) among actuaries. The actuary did express his uneasiness over this grey area (note that he thought it was a grey area i.e. both method A and B were viable) and stated that if we had been the first team to perform calculation, he would have chosen method A (previous actuary used method B) and yet strangely, to me, he left up to the US firm (who is signing off the report, it seems) to decide whether to terminate our subcontract or to get us to continue and use method B. The US firm, predictably, chose the latter to "avoid disruption to client". ...

This is probably the shortest PVP match for me: I saw that the enemies have two dashless freelancers (Orion and Vonn) and so I tried to change a couple of mods compared to my standard mods : (for details on abilities and mods, refer to this wikia ) Water Spout - Spray and Play (3 loadout points) Electrifying Eels - Master Angler (1 loadout points) The idea is to max out heals and also max out eels' damage. The more dashless lancers enemy team has, the easier to land the eels. Here's another gameplay where I did very well using these modified mods:

The last 2 days  (Cycle 2 Day 13 and 14) before the start of Cycle 3 were pretty good for my dad: he didn't need to take panadol for his back, could sleep better and appetite was pretty god. However, he needed to take Oxynorm 3 times a day. Hmmmm. Cycle 3 Day 1 started off worse than previous cycle: he vomited once before administration of chemo drugs (we suspect it was the wantan meet he had for breakfast) and twice during the infusion. Oncologist said that this was due to cumulative effect of the drugs. I also pointed out to dad that this time the gap, as per standard schedule, was 2 weeks whereas it was about 3.5 weeks between Cycle 1 and Cycle 2. Thankfully he didn't vomit that night (took the prescribed vomit medicine and dexametasone) and his sleep was a little better than usual. From Day 4 to Day 6, dad felt weak in his legs. Fortunately, his vomiting more or less had stopped. By Day 7, he felt better. Legs were better but still weak. He slept better on Day 6 nigh...

My fridge has a peculiar feature: you put a bottle of good champagne in it, and when you come to look for it you find a bottle of noxious cheap white wine in its place. I still have not worked out how this happens, ... - "The Salmon of Doubt" by Douglas Adams

In this new project , I'm having many instances of disagreement with the actuary. There are 3 parties involved: the insurance company, the US consulting firm who's the main consultant to the insurance company and there's us. At this point, I am not comfortable with some of the things the US firm is telling us because it is not backed by the accounting standard that we're supposed to adhere to and at times contradict it. Despite asking them to address the discrepancies, they added more assertions and create rules out of nowhere! "Their judgement would not be wrong given that they're expert in US GAAP," said the actuary. My issue is this: it is not a judgement call because the accounting standard is very clear on this particular issue (something that they have not addressed satisfactorily when queried). As part of our job scope, we're also supposed to try to match the figures for previous financial year that was produced by the previous actuary. Na...

Freya is one of my two favourite melee champions (the other is Raigon). Unlike some other melee champions, she doesn't have abilities that can heal herself, not even with battlerites. The battlerites I used are based on a tournament player (not sure he's still playing or not): (read this gamepedia for details on abilities and this page for details on battlerites ) (1) Tempest Storm Mace is the only range attack Freya has. So having haste is great in closing gap with enemies, especially if you want to take advantage of the Static condition inflicted by the ability. (2) Twin Hammers Two charges for your only range attack? Sounds good. Also, yet another way to utilise the incapacitate feature of Storm Mace. (3) Lightning Rod Since Freya cannot heal herself, shield is important to her. This battlerite synergises with Thunderclap since it gives her sustain to hit multiple enemies. (4) Torrent It gives crowd-control and can be quickly followed-up with Charged Stri...

Lately, I had been helping the actuary in a new project. We both had to read a particular accounting standard, not only to refresh our memories but also to be updated with the changes these past decade or so lol. There was one particular section that stumped us and I tried hard to convince the actuary to finally accept the illogical conclusion simply because the standard said so. However, to my family and friends, I used the following analogy of what the accounting standard said: If I tell you that a particular creature is a hippopotamus (hippo) and then ask you what animal it is, what will be your answer? A hippo, right? Duh. However, if I tell you that the creature (a) is a hippo, (b) wears a hat, and (c) can twirl around, and then I ask you what animal it is, what will be your answer? Still a hippo, right? Well, according to the accounting standard, it is no longer a hippo. In fact, it is now a crocodile. I kid you not.

Mum followed the psychiatrist suggested method of cutting down clonazepam down to 0.125mg (quarter tablet) each night right up to the next psychiatric appointment. I'm proud of her for trying her best. Fortunately, there was no adverse reaction each time she cut down the dosage i.e. she was able to sleep through the night. However, despite this and the new spectacles , her dizziness worsened instead of lightened. I want to cry for her :( Due to the dizziness, she slept almost throughout the daytime: she got up only to have meals and medicine. She stayed awake after dinner until about 10.30pm and then slept until the next morning. To a particular question by the doctor, I emphasised that this chronic dizziness started when she was warded . Yes, she probably had it before but it was random, not this chronic. After she consulted with the psychogeriatric, she said that they would wait till ENT specialist sees my mum first before planning the next course of action. Meanwhile, giv...

Dad's pain continued to decrease for a few more days but unfortunately it started to worsen. We noted that it coincided with the original planned date for start of Cycle 2. Unfortunately, as blogged before , that started nearly 4 weeks later. Seeing how good the effect of Cycle 1, my dad appeared to be more encouraged and determined to go through this treatment. Cycle 2 was much shorter: 7 hours in total. Unfortunately, the nurse was not as skilled as the one at the ward: his insertion of the needle into the chemo port was painful for my dad :( On Day 3, while the same nurse was in a room detaching the chemo bag, I told the nurses at the desk about dad's experience, of which they said that the needle they used was a little bigger to ensure the connection was made properly, and that perhaps the ward's nurse was using needle that was a little smaller relatively. *shrug* Fortunately, the detachment wasn't painful (my dad expected otherwise). Right up to Day 4 / 5, m...

Since I am needed to be in Butterworth, we couldn't celebrate on the actual day. We'll celebrate the next day instead at an (yes, it is lol) expensive but nice Japanese restaurant and possibly followed by chendol haha. I love you, Ban. I'm so thankful that you love me so much and try to make me happy in so many things that you do. Muack!!!

For quite sometime now, I've changed the mod I use for Grey 's ultimate. For completeness, the build I use is as follows: (refer to this wikia for details on abilities and mods) (1) Tracer bolt - Hunt Them Down (2 loadout points) (2) Hawk drone - Infrared Enhancement (2 loadout points) (3) Tranquilizer dart - Overdose (2 loadout points) (4) Slip away - Agile Escape (2 loadout points) (5) Voltaic cage - Caught in the Web (2) It turns out that the extra range of 1 from "Caught in the Web" matters frequently enough to justify its use. Also, sometimes enemies don't move in anticipation of the cage and so the mod Zapper doesn't provide value in this case. She is still my favourite freelancer. I call her my lazy freelancer (haha) because it's my go-to choice when I feel tired and do not wish to think too much. Here are some gameplays:

A powerful song backed by a powerful voice. Young girl, don't cry I'll be right here when your world starts to fall Ooh Young girl, it's alright Your tears will dry, you'll soon be free to fly, ooh When you're safe inside your room, you tend to dream Of a place where nothing's harder than it seems No one ever wants or bothers to explain Of the heartache life can bring and what it means When there's no one else, look inside yourself Like your oldest friend, just trust the voice within Then you'll find the strength that will guide your way You'll learn to begin to trust the voice within, oh Young girl, don't hide You'll never change if you just run away Ooh, whoa yeah Young girl, just hold tight Soon you're gonna see your brighter day, ooh Now in a world where innocence is quickly claimed It's so hard to stand your ground when you're so afraid No one reaches out a hand for you to hold When you look outs...

This food shop was introduced by my sister and I try to remember this place because Ban loves their la mian soup there. The first time I was there I had dry konlo noodle (can't remember which noodle) but it was disappointing. Barely any ingredient. Stay away from it. The next time, I tried dry la mian: It was delicious! Even the minced pork was juicy (usually dry). The amount of ingredient was quite generous in proportion to the noodle. Overall proportion was just nice for me. Ban didn't say it was light for him and so I guess it should be alright for everyone else.

I believed I tried to be the first 5 to level up Vonn to level 20 but I couldn't match the dedication of some players lol. Nevertheless, I enjoyed playing this firepower, despite the lack of dash. This is the build I'm currently using (and have been using for a long time): (for details on abilities and mods, please refer to this wikia ) (1) Icebreaker: Rangefinder (2 loadout points) I was momentarily puzzled at how an additional 0.5 range can be useful. I quickly realised that it would be the case when you're aiming diagonally. I tried Piercing Cold but as with all piercing mod, it's too conditional for my liking. (2) Cold Snap: Lingering Chill (1 loadout point) This is a good mod because either enemies hit the target this turn or next (you'll get energy either way) or they totally avoid that target, which is great if you have placed it on an ally who's likely to be hit (which you should) but avoid the damage instead. Ice-X appears to be a good mod ...

About three-and-half months after the last test , I retest my cholesterol level at the usual Pathlab outlet but the doctor said that the jump in level was significantly higher than expected given that my lifestyle remained or less the same (despite me admitting to eat murukku nearly every night @@). So he suggested an immediate retest with Gribbles. The gap was a 3-day difference. The results are as follows:                              May 2018          Ref. range                                 (Gribbles) Total cholesterol           4.6                  < 5.2 HDL ("good")               1.81                > 1.03 LDL ("bad")    ...

I bought a return ticket i.e. KL-Butterworth and Butterworth-KL, via ETS. Due to some scheduling issues (in relation to my parents' health), I had to change the date of the KL-Butterworth portion but retain the other portion. Got it done at KL Sentral ticketing counter (it took quite a long time though, imo). Much later, I faced an issue on board the train from Butterworth to KL. There was a lady, sitting together with her family, whose ticket showed the same seat number as mine. I flagged this out to a train conductor and shortly later was told to sit at an empty seat (two of them in fact), while they investigated the issue. About 30 mins before reaching KL Sentral (the last stop), the train conductor and I had a discussion in a small room. He said that my ticket was canceled and showed me what he received from headquarter and that his master list didn't show my name as the holder of the seat. Based on a guess, I told him about having purchased this is one half of a return...

By Day 5 of Cycle 1 FOLFOX regimen , my dad had enough and wanted to stop chemo, thinking that the pain and discomfort he was experiencing were all the chemo's side effects. With information from my sister (I was back in PJ), I called and talked with my dad. In short, I told him that he had the current symptoms previously (i.e. not during chemo treatment) that the hope was that the chemo would be effective to lessen these symptoms but needed time for it to work to consult the hospice nurse (she was going to visit the next day) and the PCU specialist (appointment was 4 days later); tell them where the pain and discomfort were and how them how often they occured The hospice nurse brought a doctor with her this time. They concurred that most of the symptoms were existing ones but the chemo probably caused more bloating (and hence more frequent vomiting of gas). The doctor suggested taking the omeprazole 1 tablet twice a day, instead of 2 tablets once a day. They also encouraged...

My mum tried to follow the psychogeriatric's advice . She managed to successful stop taking benzhoxol but still couldn't go without clonazepam. The dizziness worsened and so, upon Dr N's advice (she kindly responded to my text), we decided to consult GH's psychiatrist as a walk-in patient. Turned out that there was no clinic day that morning and so my mum was attended quite quickly by the stand-by psychiatrist. We were a little worried that she would be asked to go through the outpatient clinic first because there was a sign stating the procedure for walk-in patient but the doctor, later on while we were parting ways, assured my mum that she could go straight to the clinic. We briefed the doctor on the situation and also told her of the psychogeriatric's plan . After consulting a senior specialist, she suggested the following: (1) Cut off the day time olanzapine for 2 to 3 days and observe whether mum's still ok. Incidentally, previously mum tried (without...

Ban and I were in Singapore earlier this month. He was there on volunteer work related stuff while I took the opportunity to do some important errands (I'll probably blog about this later) and to meet friends, ex-colleague and the actuary I'm currently working with. Here are some photos I took: One of my favourite Western food restaurant. Cheap and good. Surprisingly its price wasn't hiked up at its Changi Airport's outlet. Something new to me, at Changi Airport. Still the best dumpling noodle ever. Delicious soup too. Well, I guess "major" disruption happens sufficiently frequent that they had to put this notice up at the MRT station. So cute the bottle. High tea at Intercontinental Hotel. There was also self-service ice-cream. There was a chef who could make pancake to go along with the ice-cream. Wide selection of yong tau fu (ytf) at Changi Airport. In fact, it's the norm in Singapore and almo...

The consultation with GH's onclogist, 2 weeks after the insertion of chemo port , was a breeze: it took about 5 minutes. What took longer, apart from the waiting time of course, was the date of the first cycle chemotherapy. There was some confusion on their part. When it was finally sorted out, we were told that for the first cycle, my dad had to go to a ward because the staff there would teach us about the process. Subsequent cycles would be done at the usual daycare oncology section. The date was 1.5 weeks later. On the day itself, we were told that the chemo drugs would be ready only at around 3-4pm, which means that dad had to be in the ward until about 6pm. I wished someone told us this earlier. Haiz. In addition, it was only on that day itself they asked us whether we brought a sling bag to place the chemo bag in it. How would we know this if no one told us? It was our first time going through this regimen. However, I appreciated a nurse's initiative to quickly check ...

During the two-month period since the last appointment , my mum was gradually getting better. She could drive again. Woohoo! Her range of facial expression had increased. Her taste bud improved (previously, it was "ok" for most food, which wasn't her "norm"). The only constant problem, something that had been happening since the time she was warded, was her dizzy spells. It occurred from the moment she woke up and lasted until at night. Only its intensity varied. The geriatric psychiatrist said that this may or may not be due to the medicine. Three medicine could cause dizziness: benzhexol, clonazepam and olanzapine. Clonazepam was already on its minimum dose (it seems) and so the next step was to cut it off but mum wasn't keen on that because when she tried that (it was like 3 months ago though), she couldn't sleep. So the doctor asked her to stop benzhexol and stick to that as long as her tremor doesn't interfere with her activities. If not, take...

One defining feature of Titus is his dash. His dash's range is the longest of all freelancers, in a straight-line. In a non-linear path, Asana's and/or Celeste's can easily surpass Titus's dash's range. It's a useful ability to get away from enemies. To get much value out of it, however, you (as a Titus player), should dash and hit enemy(ies) which will then reduce the ability's CD by 2 i.e. half it. That's significant. To help him survive better in case enemies anticipate the dash towards them, I like to take the healing mod. In fact, I use the "Holy trinity" build (not my term): (read this wiki for details on abilities and mods) (1) Overhead Slam: Battlefield Triage (2 loadout points) Healing mod. If you prefer a more damage-focused build (then you better hope your support can help you), then Power Hitter is a good choice (2) Berserker Charge: Harvest (2 loadout points) Healing mod. (3) Thundering Road: Rallying Cry (2 loadout p...

At the end of a match, game will show who get which accolade from a selection of 4 accolades. There was a few times I got all 4 and if I remember correctly, that was through playing Support freelancers. I believed one of those times was with Helio. For Frontline freelancers, it may be possible to get all 4 if there's no Support freelancer in either teams, or the player is bad at supporting if there's one. Still, getting 2 or 3, for any freelancer, is already quite impressive. Recently, I got this: Oh yes, my Garrison got Cornerstone too lol. I believed there was at least a support and so it's surprising. Not only that, I also got silver Triple Threat badge. Amazing. Then shortly later, followed by this: This is more believable. Also, bronze Triple Threat here.