senzing@UK

Its Tue.. not quite a day to be particularly happie about.. 2nd day of my torturous long week just over.. but I'm surprisingly feeling hyper and chirpy! Thanks to Liverpool for making it such a wonderful nite for the entire football world to remember.. Shadows of the 2-1 defeat to Besiktas 2 week ago were still looming in my mind at the start of the match. But those fears were laid to rest as I finally saw the Liverpool as I know they are, unleashing all their ammunition against the helpless Turks, steamrolling their way to an incredible 8-0 walloping of their oppenents! Such slick passing, fluid movement, flawless coordination, precision timing of runs and terrific finishing! Sprinkle in the long-overdue drops named Luck, and they were running amok, bombarding the Besiktas with our ballistics.. everything seemed to fall 'Pool's way, and the shots led to goals led to smiles and hugs galore! It's a record breaking winning margin in the history of the Champions League, and how apt a morale booster it is! I was screaming the whole roof down with each shot that flew off a Red boot, and which turned into a Red goal.. Wen Seen and Yingyi were simply amazed, while Jieli fell silent, seeing his bigger-than-usual-but-still-as-potent venomous dose of curses towards the Reds' cause being blasted into smitherins'.. 8-0 is one more than 7 I think, Gunners!

Happie as I'm, its still gonna take quite a colossal effort to qualify from 'Pool's current position behind Porto and Marseille.. well but as the commentator said rightly just now.. there aren't many teams who love Mission Impossible as Liverpool does!! Hopefully this is the start of a goal avalanche, and most importantly.. a good long winning streak for the Reds!

Meanwhile.... last weekend was a pretty "happening" one too! A gathering/potluck was planned for Friday nite, and though it had briefly crossed my mind (I dispelled dis thot when I got involved as part of the cooking team), I was still pleasantly taken by surprised to find out on the spot that it was actually a birthday dinner for the November babies! The food was quite simply fantastic.. Kelvin had made up bombastic names for the dishes on parade, but no need names lah.. can eat taste those food I more dan happie liao! There was Roasted Meat (shao rou), Deep Fried Wanton, Veggie Curry, Chicken Wings, Baked Chicken Nuggets, Breaded Garlic Mushrooms, Sticky Tofu Soup (dou fu geng) among others.. such a spread, and so much hometown food!! As if that wasn't enuff.. Charles had bought a mould and built a gingerbread house (miniature one lah of course) for bread monster Carine. He'd also pulled out another trump card in making Bulur Hitam.. tried to make it more jelly-like, and it turned out not bad! Kelvin topped up his Shao Rou power with 2 apple pies and a magic candle which just refused to be blown out.. even so, I was blown away liao.. the food brot a teardrop to my eye (ya rite.. it din lah.. even though I thoroughly enjoyed the food!), and the guys gave me a Liverpool sling bag as my prezzie! It was one I'd seen at Sports Direct sometime back, but felt it was too costly... but well thanx to Jieli noticing it.. it's mine now! It's a Adidas sports sling bag, classily designed in black and grey and red, with the Liverpool emblem proudly embroidered on the side..

Yups totally enjoyed the party/dinner. Thanks so much again guys, for taking the effort. I was really touched. Thanks for the nite and for the present. Thanks to Jeff for organising, and to the various chefs and bakers (haha including myself) for the wonderful food. Thanks to Jieli for buying the prezzie, and to Elaine and Carine for the chocolates! Woohoo it's a foreign land alright.. but there sure is warmth amidst this cold cold climate!

Tokking about cold climates.. these few days have been terrible in terms of temperature. It was 4deg in the morning yesterday, so foggy I could barely see the road in front, and today it was 5deg! Both days, it was 13deg down in plant where I was working, and in our "silky thin" cleanroom clothes, we were feeling the full effects, shivering as we struggled to focus on our work. It only got better later today when the plant lead complained to the engineers and asked them to turn up the heating!

Back to last weekend now.. saturday was quite an experience too! 1st Halloween party in angmohland! My colleagues Angi and Sandeep just moved into their new house and invited us over for a house-warming/Halloween/Guy Fawkes nite Party! I had so much trouble finding a costume for the occasion, but finally settled for an audacious blow-up suit of the Grim Reaper... it was more Grin Ripples than anything lor.. so cute the outfit evrone was just luffing at it haha.. it was a pull on piece, with a fan inside which inflates the whole body, arms and head up like some cartoon character u see walking in Disneyland! The expression on Grim's face was scary... scarily farnie! Well but at least Sand and Angi claimed I had the best and most cuddly outfit and went ard office telling evrone about it on Mon!! Tian ah famous liao!!!

^^ Me and myself!

Another colleague Duncan came without a costume, but with plenty of alcohol.. he'd promised to make some "special" drinks for us, and he promptly got into action, handing me and Freddy cups of a suspicious looking drink with a suspicious smell.. I took it in my stride.. and initially it din feel that strong.. but after awhile it started to make my head heavy!! Duncan was determined to serve me a 2nd cup, and I followed him to see wat he added to it.. wahz in went half a cup of vodka, half a cup of coke and a few drops of lemon... 2 cups mean 1 full cup of 37% alcoholic content vodka! Kids dun try dis at home ah.. but it sure was strong.. After both drinks, plus another bottle of beer, I was starting to get abit dizzy. Playing on Sand's and Angi's WII din help much (so much movement!) though I managed to win my tennis match against Charlene! Chatted abit too with one of their guy friends about job satisfaction vs job prospects of our current work, and I was quite amazed I was still able to hold a decent conversation on such a serious topic then!

The fun din last thou.. midnite was almost approaching, and Freddy and Joseph had to catch their pumpkin carriage.. oops train.. home.. so we took some last fotos and bid farewell.. sadly just before the pizzas they'd ordered arrived. In the end I thot it was quite good fun.. alot of luffs, alot of fotos, some scary costumes (there was even a Santa with a blood-smeared beard!?, Father Francis as Father Dracula, and Eric as the Scream character), some farnie ones (okie lah.. mine lor, and Charlene with her bunny ears and her bf with his Scotland NHS surgery gown and stethoscope). There was little food, lots of crisps and lots of drinks, but we sure did enjoy ourselves!