Change

We were car-less for the past one week, and we rented one to "tide over" the period.

What's new? The man like to change car every two to three years and this time round 1.5years. (Getting from bad to worse.) This is one of his bad habits.

Anyway, adios to BMW and not-so-welcoming-hello to Lexus GS.

I am someone who is very loyal to brands I like. Just so happen that L is not on my list.

BMW World VIP Night

Was invited to the BMW World VIP Night located at the Marina Bay Sands. With 50,000 sq ft of displays, interactive booths, lifestyle merchandise and fun-filled activities for all ages. It was a night of free flow of white and red wine, oysters, chocolate fondue and lots of sinful desserts! Yummy!

The event showcase the concept and vintage cars. There are guided tours that narrate the stories behind the shiny red cars.

The one and only BMW GINA Light Visionary. A car completely clad in a flexible fabric skin, that changes its shape at the press of a button!

BMW M3 GTS, a powerful car!


BMW 8 Series


BMW Z1, vintage.

BMW Z8

BMW vintage , driven by Elvis Presley.

On that day was also the Asia Premier of BMW X3. Kev's next target.

Thanks BMW for the wonderful night!

Weekend Fun

Last Week's Happenings

Last week we welcomed our two first visitors to our new abode when we officially moved in. J and E.

And the boys had a whale of a time playing at the pool and eating hotdog buns.

Before the swim or rather dip...

Ziv always repines that it was too hot to swim under the blazing sun, however, he changed his mind at the drop of the hat when he was told that he would be having an aqua buddy.

Trying to operate the jacuzzi.

After the dip...

This week's happenings

On Friday evening we got our new car and we have been driving two cars on the road because there were so many errands to run. First it was getting the new car, Kev drove the new one while I trailed behind (since I do not know the way) to park it at the Performance Motor. Then on Saturaday morning, we sent the new car to fix up window film and then drove the old car to brunch and later to collect the new one... Confusing, I know. Actually all these can be solved since our the PML salesgal offered to help us run all the errands, however, Kev declined, because he can't trust anyone with his cars.

Managed to snap a picture of the gleeful driver on the way to Performance Motor in the morning. Another gleeful passanger was seated behind fascinated by the panaromic roof.

Thereafter, revisited Spruce for brunch.

Kev's brunch. Big breakfast.

My brunch... Egg benedict on sliced toasted bagel with grilled shrimps soaked in hollandise sauce. Perfecto!

Ziv had a long beef sausage for Ziv all for himself. It was almost like a practice to go down to the playground under Spruce. Even playing alone did not deter the boy from running here and there. I have to gave Kev some credits, cause these playground pictures were snapped by him, while I leisurely sipped on my latte.

From this picture, Ziv seemed to have grown taller and bigger.

This weekend, we welcomed with open arms another set of guests to our abode. J and her two chummy daughters, J and S. Ziv remembers them as 'jumping sisters', because Ziv had fun bouncing on their beds last Christmas. And of course, they were here for a swim. Just yesterday, J and I met up for MJ. In less than 24 hours, we meet up again.

J bought like 50 breads from Four Leaves for the kids and a box of nicely decorated donuts for Ziv, so much so that I decided to take a picture of them.

And by the way, our company is having a photography contest and I decided to take part in this contest. This is my photo for the competition. And the caption for the picture is 'Friends'. It is hard to capture moments like this. It will be framed up on our wall even though it doesn't win me any thing in the contest.

Goodbye RSZ...

And hello... BMW X1...

Just when I thought that I am the ONLY one in the family who will buy birthday present for myself months before the day comes... I have a companion now! Great minds think alike? Or birds of a feather flock together? Kevin pre-booked his BMW X1 this afternoon from Performance Motors after our brunch at Spruce with the Yip family.

Kevin, who often falls prey upon by new car models (just like every other guys in this world), always has the tendency to change his automobile once every 2 to 3 years made no exception this time round. He has been eyeing on the arrival of this SUV model since last year and it will be coming to this sunny island this June or July. Just in time for his birthday.

I am ecstatic that he is finally able to actualize his dream of owning a conti after so many years. By the way, this automobile has a reasonable price tag and it is deemed as one of the cheapest or second cheapest SUV in conti car market. (Kev will grind his teeth when I said that).

May I present the BMW X1 (we booked a white one)

We were in the Performance Motors showroom test driving and chatting with the sales consultant for about 4 hours till the point whereby Ziv becomes so familiar with the logo that every time he spots a BMW logo he will exclaimed, "Daddy's car!", regardless of the model.

Next up, news about our house. Good news! Our new abode is expected to TOP in 1 or 2 weeks' time! Was invited to a poolside party this evening and took a few pictures of our unit.

Our unit is the penthouse as highlighted in the picture below:

Not only Ziv is thrilled looking at the swimming pool, I almost wanted to jump into it to have a dip because the weather these days is just too humid and boiling hot!

The gym room is facing the swimming pool, club house is on top of the gym room.

At this point of time, my life is really fabulous!

Sadness

So how does it feel when you lost 2 things that you rely on largely for the past few years?
My house.
My car.

There was a saturnine atmosphere in the air yesterday and today. We were told yesterday that we have to hand over our house keys to the new occupants come 21 Oct. And today, I was told by Kevin that the new car owner is taking over the car tomorrow.

Now, the reality starts to kick in. Initially I was still very contented about the selling price of our house and the amount of money I will get back after selling the car. But right now, I am reticent about selling them even though we made some bucks when selling off the house and the car was practically under-utilize.

There go the days where I can go anywhere I want without calling the chauffeur, there goes the days where I can decorate my house in my style.

Maybe I am too emotional, on the other hand, Kevin seemed to be dealing it with ease, often, with an insouciant shrug of the shoulders. Maybe he is more realistic or cold-blooded, selling the house with profit, why not? Selling the extremely under-utilize car, why not?

Men.

When mentioned about our new rented abode, Kevin is always full of brio. I don’t quite understand what so great about paying off monthly installment for someone whom is not even an acquaintance. Anyway, our rental is $2.5k monthly.

We are getting our keys for the new abode on 19 Sep and moving in at our own pace, with some minor renovation, after our Paris trip.

Although our new place is slightly bigger than our current one, but it just doesn’t matter to me. It doesn’t have the Celeste’s style, anymore.

One more thing, I am missing my neighbour already, although I always joke about them.

I hope Paris will cheer me up a little or maybe stop the pain temporary. And it will really be a bonus if I can get hold of the coveted Hermes Birkin 35.

Driving Me Crazy!

I vehermently believes that driving makes one loses his/her patient. I am one typical example.
Usually when Kevin is taking the wheel, I will upbraid him with remarks such as, "Can't you wait?", "Is there a need to drive that fast?", "Why are you filtering at the last minute?". I was utterly wrong.

If someone who is sitting beside me, he/she will certainly be passing those comments too. I understand how a driver thinks now.

Being irascible and losing cool over other drivers is like every other day incident. The number of cursing and swearing per day multiply day by day while the patience for probation drivers gradually ebbed away.

Being a member of the widely disdained female driver myself, I do fathom why the men think that way. I believed it is partly due to that female drivers drive in a shilly-shally manner.

For example, the other day, I was driving towards the traffic light when it just turned amber, the Jazz in front of me almost drove through the pedastrian crossing, however, stopped on the pedestrain crossing abruptly. I nearly knocked onto her car cause she hesitated on dashing past the traffic light when it just turned amber and while her car was already over the first stop line i.e want to dash but dare not dash. My intention was to dash through the amber traffic light after her, and FAST. If she had given the indication that she had no intention of beating the red light, then I would have stop behind her. Kevin said obviously it would be my fault if I crashed onto her car, and I absolutely agreed, however, I think being hesitant while driving will in fact cause more accidents on the road.

Next, so what happened when 2 impatient drivers meet each other?

Last week I was driving Kevin's car, I have to specified its Kevin's car cause, my car is under-power and very often people treat me like a doormat that they simply cut my lane dangerous knowing that my car has no power to drive faster than 100km/h.

So, while driving on the straight road, this Wish, can't wait for me to drive pass and U turn right under my nose. Impatient as I can be? I sounded the horn over and over again even after I drove pass him. And I slow down in front of him and sounded the horn again at him. Cause I realised something about drivers, they hate to be horned consistently, as in on-off horn for long period of time and I enjoyed doing that to irritate people. I think these impatient morons deserve that.

If there is ever terrorist on the road, that will definitely be none other than our friendly taxi drivers. Stop as and when they think that there are potential customers on the road side, be it, these people standing by the road are digging their noses, or tidying their hair. Any actions involved using hands, will translate to "I am flagging for cab." Drive fast behind them at your own risk.


Road Hogger are road hazzard. Every morning I have to "downgrade" myself to drive within the 3rd lane to wait for the 8.55am ERP cause the difference with driving through the ERP before 8.55am and after is $2.50. Little as it seemed, take $2.50 multiply by 20 days, you will see
the difference. Unfortunately, my clock seems faster and sometimes slowly and hence the prediction is never accurate, on many occasions, I passed through the money-sucking gantry at 8.54am and there's nothing I can do but to curse at the inventor and implementor. However, one day, a Malay driver, did what I thought was ultimate. He stopped right in front of the gantry at the 8.54am and waited for the money-sucking machine to turn 8.55am. How brillant?! And at one time, I thought, how i wish I am behind him, how i wish that he is obstructing my way of traffic that I can pretend that I can't filter out and then 'stuck' behind him. Unfortunately, I was at the other lane.

Driving everyday makes me learn alot of things.

1. Never trust the driver infront, behind, beside you. Trust yourself.

2. Don't mess with female drivers unless you want to send your car to the garage.

3. Steer clear from taxi drivers. They are like time-bomb, explode on you anytime and unexpectedly.

4. Avoid sports cars, fake sports cars (no power but heavily modified), at all means. They hallucinated that they are in the F1 racing track and they cut lanes like they are rushing to meet the death god. Their engine are sometimes deafening.

5. Avoid P Plates. Half of the time, I believe they don't know what they want.

6. Want to irritate the moron on the road? Sound your horn on-off again and again. This sure makes his/her blood boil.

For The First Time

For the first time, I drove to work this morning in my own car. The traffic condition on CTE was pretty alright.

I woke up at 8:11am and left the house at 8:45am. Reached Telok Blangah Nature Reserve carpark at 9:10am and office at 9:25am.

What a day!

I choose to park at the Nature Reserve cause it is free parking whole day, however, it only applicable to visitors of the park, but then, who cares? Some of my colleagues had gotten summon cause it seems that the Fatimahs and Ahamds recognised their cars, I then thought perhaps I can drive my own car for 2 days, change and drive Kevin's car for a day and then back to my car again. Brillant?

First day of driving on my own,

I missed having the luxury to eat my breakfast on the car, while Kevin is driving.
I missed someone to cheer with me when the ERP charges changed (to lower price) when I reach the gantry.
I missed the small talks and gossips with Kevin while he is driving.
I missed the time where we will laugh crazily at Glen and The Flying Dutchman on Class 95.
I missed the time where I can just jump off the car and dart towards the gate when I am late for work.
I missed the time when I can sit back and relax ignoring whatever blindspots.

With that, I decided to declare car-less day every Friday. Where Kevin will still send me to work and pick me up from work. Just to have a taste of what it is like last time.

Because of having a second car right now, I decided to make an effort to have dinner with Kevin everyday after work.

Ziv seems to know that Mummy is driving her own car that he wakes up at 930am today.

Coming Saturday will be Ziv's Birthday. Time flies!

I GOT IT

She's got it
Yeah, baby, she's got it
I'm your Venus, I'm your fire
At your desire


"Venus" by Shocking Blue

Yes, I GOT IT.

I got a R1 for 34k. Paid 10k for it and loan 24k. Paying it over 5 years.

I got the gun metal color, yes, its not cherry pink. The color is not what I desire, but I CAN'T wait (that aside, people deem that as an illness since I can hardly wait for anything).

What a happy day despite all the shit from my agency. Separate post perhaps. They suck.

Car Hunting

Last weekend was car hunting weekend for us.

Have binged on IT bags and clothes for years and now, its time, to splurge on a car.

Our second car of the household.

Kevin warned, "No more bags, no more shopping!" And I thought, "Who needs a Birkin when all I need now is a CAR!"

My choices are, so far;

Mitsubishi I


The interior of the car is considerably capacious despite looking all tiny and cramped. Enough for 2 passengers behind with sufficient leg space. The futuristic design is something which I prefer. It comes with "Style" (sports) and "Casual" version.

Subaru R1

2 door and adopting a sporty look as compared to its brother, R2. R1 "promotes" egocentricity as despite having seats behind for passengers, it has NO leg space. That means I can put Ziv behind and he will only roll and not fall. Fuel consumption is low and that is a super plus point.

Its hard to decide cause both of them priced at the range of 35k to 44k. And I am going for a 2nd hand one, since, I don't intend to drive the car for long term.

We shall see...

Beep Beep Horn Horn

I finally passed my driving test on 18th Apr! Yayyyyyy!!!

I got 18 demerit points, what a close shave!

Was prepared to fail for this second test because, I have not been attending lesson for nearly 3 months (before this test). And I almost forgot which are the accerlerator and brake pedals.

My first driving experience? A few minutes after I got my temporary driving license (a piece of white paper), I drove to Bishan from SSDC and then back home. CTE, is my first traveled expressway. Phew, the traffic condition was still manageable despite the peak hour.

To celebrate the day, Kevin bought tickets to watch DIM SUM DOLLIES. The long awaited DIM SUM DOLLIES are finally back in action. I remembered watching their first performance at the Esplanade and they were hilarious. The jokes were so funny that until now, both me and Kevin can still laugh over them.

This time I have booked tickets on the 5-Jul. Hopefully this time it will be better then the first time. KY was telling me that I should standby an ambulance outside Esplanade just in case I laugh too hard and the baby comes out, since by 5-Jul, I will be 37 weeks pregnant and normally first time preggy deliver earlier than expected due date. Hmmm…. I hope I don’t deliver in Esplanade.