Real Men Don't Read Instructions...But They Know The Instructions Exist

MyGirl came up to me earlier and said that something in the Snoopy blogpost struck her.  She looked back at the post and told me which part got her thinking.  The blogpost read:

It was only after I had completed the puzzle and disassembled it, that I discovered instructions inside the box that would have enabled me to finish the puzzle in less than than five minutes.  

(Personally, I enjoyed the challenge and would not use the cheat sheet if I had to do the puzzle over again.)

She said, "Mom, of course there would be instructions."

"But it is a puzzle!"  I argued and pulled out the box to show her CRYSTAL PUZZLE in big bold letters. 

"Mom," she calmly continued, "why would you think there wouldn't be instructions?"

I was still thinking jigsaw puzzles.  They don't come with instructions.  They come with a picture of the completed puzzle in the cover of the box.  And that is what the crystal puzzle had -- a picture of Snoopy and Woodstock standing on a green platform.  In my mind, here is what the completed puzzle is meant to look like.  Go forth and solve the puzzle.

In a matter-of-factly, yet loving tone, she drove the nail home by saying, "Would they sell Lego without instructions?"

I started to laugh. (Lightbulb moment!)  

Of course she was right!  It would be like selling IKEA furniture without assembly instructions.  

It made perfect sense now.  Clearly, instructions would come with this puzzle.

Can I just use the "Instructions were in Japanese" card?

Wickedly Good

I wanted to go and see Wicked (the movie).  RD and MyGirl were more than willing to go watch it with me.  Last weekend,  MyGirl checked online and figured that ticket prices on Tuesday are half price.   So it was a date!  

MyGirl asked whether we should go for the reclining seats for an extra $3.  It didn't really matter to me because I was primarily interested in watching the movie. Watching in style was secondary.  In the end, the kids decided that experiencing a movie in reclining seats would be best when tickets are half-price.  Let's do it.  Go reclining seats!

Armed with the decision of the date and the reclining seat, MyGirl began finalising the ticket booking. She called over to her brother and asked if it was ok for them to split my ticket cost.  RD said, "Sure, no problem."   

When the transaction was completed, she said, "You can just Beem me, Kuya."   

"I can pay for my ticket," I offered.  This immediately triggered a duet of "No!" from the kids.  

Oh yeah!  Awesome kids!  Reclining seats!  Free ticket!  We're going to see Wicked!  

We followed the yellow brick road.

As an added note, I was really happy that we were able to see the movie and the fact that we watched on the seventeenth of December was particularly significant.  One year ago, on Sunday 17 Dec, MyGirl was in Melbourne, GI and RD were at home, but I was at the Emergency Room in Westmead with MacGyver. I honestly thought my number was up when I couldn’t move my arms and legs without focusing and thinking.  It was scary! 

I was fortunate enough to watch the Wicked musical with London Eye back in 2018 and I am extremely lucky to have watched the Wicked movie with the kids last Tuesday.  

Zoom In

When RD surprised us with a visit last July, I requested that they pose for this picture. The picture in the frame on the bookshelf is currently the wallpaper on my phone.  

JULY 2023

This is the bookshelf photo found in the white frame.  It was taken at our first rental when GI came over to celebrate his birthday.

SEPT 2018

The 2018 photo was taken to recreate the photo on the bookshelf at the time.  The bookshelf photo in the brown frame was taken at Cebu Avenue when they were still very young.  

This is one of my favourite pictures of the kids.  

Easter Egg Hunt

I was going around the mall when I noticed a sign advertising an Easter Egg Hunt. 

I scanned the QR code and this is what it said:

Follow the clues to find the eggs. 
Point your phone at the eggs on the floor to bring it to life in AR.

There was a promise of a Lindt Chocolate Bunny if one found all the eggs.

I had followed the clues and found all the golden eggs.  
I took a photo at each of the locations but I could not bring them to life. 

I wanted that chocolate bunny.

This was me as I started the egg hunt on my own.

Here are the pictures I took at each location.

I sent a message to MyGirl and she came over and did the egg hunt with me.  
She was able to bring the eggs to life.  (The clues are in bold blue.)

Start hopping to level 3 where you'll find me close to the Apple egg-sperts. 
We headed for the Apple Store.

Colour me egg-cited, find me where brick lovers create and play on level 2

These beautiful tulips were outside the Lego Store.

Put your egg-sercise shoes on and head to the store famous for their three stripes.

The Addidas store was also on the 2nd floor.

Get cracking, find me outside where the dine-in restaurants are egg-ceptional.

We found these beauties outside.

Egg-cellent de-egg-tive work.  Now hop to the moon and star-bucks to find me on level 1. 

Down we went to the food court near the Starbucks.

She took this picture of us as we completed the egg hunt.

After following the clues and finding all the eggs, we headed to Customer Service to claim our chocolate rabbit.  The lady said the egg hunt was only open to kids 18 years and under.  

What?!  I did not see that in the TERMS AND CONDITIONS.  

So unfair.  I wanted that chocolate bunny!

In the end, all was not lost. I had a fun time with MyGirl.

Big Ben and Many Shades of Grey

It had been stressful at work so I decided it was time to start another puzzle.

Whenever we are working on puzzles, I try to log off early so that I can get some pieces connected.

We started the puzzle after dinner on the 25th.  That was a Saturday.

We managed to complete the edges and the phone booth before 11PM. 
That left us with a whole lot of grey pieces.

We worked on Big Ben, the other buildings and structures on Sunday and Monday. 
By Tuesday, all that was left were several shades of grey.

RD did most of the clouds. MyGirl came a close second in terms of connecting pieces.  

My contribution was mainly "ooh's" and "aah's" as the puzzle continued to take shape. Apparently the "work on a puzzle to log off early" trick did not work this time. 

Unlike our other puzzles that would get disassembled or packed away, I wanted to frame Big Ben. We took down the other puzzle and set up yet another clock on the wall.

Beautiful Mount Fuji

MyGirl has done it again.

This time, it is Mount Fuji.  Done in a week.

 

Tulips For the House

The kids know I love tulips.

When MyGirl was choosing paint by number projects to work on for her school break activity, she included one that had tulips.  

She finished it last 25 Aug. She framed it and we hung it up.

Now we have another good background for pictures.

This was taken to mark Stay@Homecoming 2021.

The Dolomites

We started this puzzle on Monday.

I logged off from work "early" to be able to help with the puzzle.

We finished the puzzle on Wednesday.

I only found out what the picture was all about after we had completed it.

The Dolomites are a mountain range located in Italy.

Beautiful!

 

Then and Now

Facebook flashes MEMORIES of pictures or posts people have posted from years back.   We managed to recreate two of these photos.

First one was one of MacGyver and the two younger kids.  The picture came up as a memory in May.  When I posted the 2010 photo on my FB feed, I added the caption was "I want to recreate this picture!"  Luckily the kids and MacGyver were willing to pose and it turned out great.  (RD even changed his clothes to match the original photo.  MyGirl is now holding on to an iPad.)

2010 and 2021

Then June came around and FB flashed a picture of the two of us taken at Hungry Jack's during his birthday ten years ago.  HJ is MacGyver's favourite fast food place.  So HJ is where we ended up this month to celebrate MacGyver's birthday when the restaurants at the nearby mall were jam packed.  

2011 and 2021

Let's Face It

 My FB feed had this picture from 2016.

It was a picture of me and MyGirl taken with a face swap app.

(The fringe of MyGirl on my face is proof of the swap.)

She took another photo of us the other night.

We look different with our faces swapped.

MyGirl has glasses with a black frame now.  

The difference in our glasses caused some challenges this time around. 

We needed to take several shots to come up with a decent face swap.

I still had to ask which facial parts were mine.

MyGirl is in the foreground wearing black with long-long hair.

I was behind her in a green and black striped shirt.

The eyes and the nose belong to MyGirl.

I am not sure whose cheeks I am wearing.

MyGirl says the smile is mine.

I can't really tell.

Can you?

 

It's All in the Genes

We had such a hard time trying to figure out what to get MyGirl for Christmas.  She has been working part time for quite a while and with her eligibility to get Jobkeeper payments, she usually had extra cash to buy the things she needed. As Christmas approached last year, whenever we asked her what she wanted, she would reply, "I don't need anything."  Eventually, we were able to extract an answer out of her.  She wanted to get one of those ancestry DNA tests.

(I teased her saying that I was 100% sure she was my kid and we didn't need a DNA test for that.  She rolled her eyes.)   

There were several local options available, but in the end, we finally settled on 23andMe.  She did her research and figured that the additional cost would be worth it because the 23andMe ancestry breakdown seemed more detailed. 

The Fedex truck passed by one day in December to pick up the sample and off went a tiny bit of MyGirl to the US.  We waited in anticipation for the results of her Christmas gift to arrive.  

We were expecting the results to come in March but they came in today!

I was with her when she got definitive proof that she is Filipino-Chinese with a hit of Spanish blood.

94.9% Chinese & Southeast Asian.  That's pretty solid.

Aside from the ancestry details, the report provided information related to appearance and senses based on genetics.  This report included things like possible hair colour, texture or thickness, likely eye colour or earlobe type (detached or not), the possibility of bunions, dimples, cleft chin, widow's peak, or flat feet, whether or not she was likely to have fear of heights or public speaking, even what her ice cream flavour preference might be, etc.  

Of all the details found in the Traits Report, I think the one she found most justifying was the result related to Cilantro Taste Aversion.  It reported "slightly higher odds of disliking cilantro."  

Am glad that she was happy with her Christmas gift.  She can now confidently claim that she has Chinese and Spanish blood.  

Christmas Then and Now

This picture was taken in 2009.  It was our first Christmas here in Australia.

The kids were between 16 and 8.

This was the picture from last year.  

The young adults are now between 27 and 19.

 

You Better Watch Out

In our household, I’m the only one that really needs a watch.  MacGyver has an incredible sense of time (and has never really worn a watch) and the kids seem to have an invisible umbilical cord connected to their phone (so they don’t see the need for a watch).  I have passed on Slash-M’s Swiss Army watch to RD and my trusty Timex to MyGirl so they have something to use when they need watches.  GI was never really keen on wearing watches apparently because he felt they were not left-hand friendly.

Anyway, in December last year, MyGirl sent over a picture of herself taken during the awards night at the High School.  (Congratulations, MyGirl for getting the highest ATAR in your school.  All your hard work paid off.)  I noticed she was wearing a different watch.  She told us later that Nayr had given her the watch for Christmas.  Oooohh!

As Christmas approached, RD indicated that he felt he needed a dress watch.  He had gone to Melbourne earlier that month to attend a conference and had the opportunity to become one of the panel chairs. This required him to moderate the discussion and keep the time because the conference was running on a coordinated schedule.  He used his phone but felt it would be better if he had a watch.  Well, ask and ye shall receive.  He told us that MJ had gotten him a watch as a joint Christmas and birthday gift for him and he would get it the next time they see each other.  Oooohh!

GI, who was once a staunch "I don't like Apple products, I prefer using an Android" had recently shifted to iPhone.  He surprised us even more by arriving before Christmas wearing a new Apple watch.  He said that he finally found a watch that he could wear comfortably on his right hand.  And everyone knows that an Apple Watch deserves an Oooohh!

On Christmas Eve, MacGyver received a FitBit as his Kris Kringle gift.  It's a cool gadget.  Aside from telling the time and tracking the health stats, it gives him alerts and notifications.  In fact, he can even read the whole message on his wrist on the FitBit if he wanted.   Oooohh!

Well, that wrapped up the Christmas season and the new watches... or so I thought.  When RD showed me the watch he got on his birthday, he announced, "It's a hybrid watch."

 

What is a hybrid watch?

RD was happy to show off his new watch.

From the outside, it looks like an ordinary watch that simply gives you the time, possibly the date.  However, upon further inspection, there is more than meets the eye. To begin with, the time is synced to the time in your phone.  It can maintain two time zones, in fact.  RD's watch has three programmable buttons.  The buttons can be customised to work as a remote shutter for one's phone camera, for music control, to track one's progress and more.   What a cool watch!

The concept intrigued me.  I had to find out more about this thing.  I went online and discovered that there are a lot of these types of watches out there.

Yes, I knew there were different kinds of FitBits and smart watches. I see many people wearing different gadgets on their wrists that subliminally announce they are actively monitoring their health.  However, I don't really like the black screen, so this concept of a hybrid watch definitely appealed to me.  I like seeing the hands of time moving around.  (I'm old school that way.)

Anyway, I also discovered that these watches come with a serious price tag.  I was not going to get one just for the sake of getting a new watch.  However, out of the blue, or more likely as a result of these AI programs running in the background of one's searches, a hybrid watch for women displayed on my search window showing a price tag that was more than 50% off the original purchase price due to the additional 40% discount for the Christmas season.   (Now we're talking.  A hybrid watch at that price is something I would consider.)

I don't really like buying things online without physically seeing the product.  (Yes, another old school habit of mine.)  I wanted to see how the watch would look like on my wrist, particularly because the model on sale had a very thin wristband.  

My google search indicated that David Jones was selling the watch I wanted for $250.  (Uh, no, I would not want to spend that much for a new watch, but David Jones did not have to know that.)  I decided I'd go to David Jones during my lunch break. 

In my almost 10 years of working in Sydney, it was the first time I entered the David Jones at the city.   (They didn't have to know that either.)  Well, it is entirely possible that it was obvious I did not know where I was going because I entered the David Jones dedicated for men.  The one for women was in the building on the next block.  (Oops!)

I found the watch section and located the Fossil display.  Unfortunately, the did not have the model I was interested in. The staff suggested I try the Fossil store at QVB.  Fortunately QVB is right across my office building so I dropped by before heading back to work.

The Fossil shop was quite a small store.  They had a rack with a few hybrid watches for women but not the style I wanted.  I tried one on although I knew I would not buy it.  (RRP $299, but it was on sale for $199.  It was cheaper than the David Jones online price for the watch I wanted but still over my budget.)  

My trip to Fossil store was not wasted though because I asked this important question as I tried on the watch, "Will this watch work without connecting it my phone?"  (The lady must have thought I was nuts asking for a smart watch but not wanting to connect it to my phone.  Little did she know my iPhone had been giving me notifications for the past month saying that I had no more memory in my phone, that I had already deleted some seldom used applications, and at one point it did not even allow me to take a picture anymore.)   She smiled and politely replied, "No, you need to connect this to your phone because the watch gets its time from the phone."

Well, that was certainly a deal breaker.  I would have to get my phone cleaned up to make space first before even considering making a smart watch purchase.  Fortunately, Apple support for me comes in the form of MyGirl.  I had been telling her for weeks that I needed her help to get my phone cleaned up.  My attempts to back my phone up were unsuccessful.  Since I am currently using her old iPhone, she knew what needed to be done.   She managed to back up my photos and reclaimed much needed storage space after she deleted a whole batch of them.

Now that I had the phone storage issue sorted out, I could resume my hybrid watch expedition. 

I was wishy-washy about getting a new watch.  Do I need a new watch?  Do I want a new watch?  Did I want the Fossil watch I saw on sale?  Did I want to get another kind of watch?

Well, there is nothing like "Sale ends Monday!" to make one decide if they want to buy something or not.  After checking the website for more than a week, when I logged in on Saturday evening, there was a countdown beside the watch I wanted.  Right there and then, I approached MacGyver and showed him the website. 

"Can you please get his watch for me?  The discount ends in 35 hours."

And just like that, I had a new watch.

The watch arrived on Tuesday night.  RD promptly downloaded the Fossil App and customized my watch.  RD currently has his watch buttons set this way -- music volume control up and down with the top and bottom buttons respectively, and music pause-play for the middle button.  (Go figure.)   He took one look at me and made the decision to customize my watch buttons -- top button monitors my steps and the bottom button will find my phone.  (Yes, my son knows me so well.)  

Having worn my watch for several days, I'm pretty happy I took the plunge.  I am now able to track my steps without having to bring my phone with me wherever I go.  I have discovered that if I sleep early, I am able to get 70% deep sleep.  And now, with the final customization of the watch buttons, I am able to track my water intake. 

So special thanks to MacGyver for getting me the watch, MyGirl for clearing up my phone's storage space, RD for setting up the phone and the app, but most especially to MJ for introducing us to the existence of such a wonderful invention.

My Three Caballeros

Photographs and Memories

Look what I found!

I Do! I Do!

Yes, you do!  You do look good all dressed up.

I wanted to make sure to get a picture of the kids 

after attending a wedding shower at Stonecutters Ridge Golf Club tonight.

Now You See Me, Now You Don't

RD and I are constant companions.  We often take the bus to the city and back during the week. It is not uncommon to see us holding hands as we walk.  If I am lucky, he would join me to the mall on weekends.  Typically, we would pass by the library and the shops to browse before heading to the butcher and the grocery to get our week's supplies. 

There was this one weekend that RD and I went out as normal and while we were at Coles, RD got a message from MyGirl.  Apparently, one of MyGirl's friends had seen us pass by and sent her this Snapchat message.

omg just saw your mum and brother and they were holding hands

my heart  ❤❤

I sent a copy of the Snapchat image to the family and in true 'you gotta love her' fashion, London Eye replied to say that she could not see me in the picture.  

💫 -- that's the dizzy symbol for London Eye

I love you, London Eye!