4 seasons instead of tropical weather

How do you know Spring/Summer has arrived?
When EVERYONE starts asking: "OMGEE WHY HAVE YOU BECOME SO SKINNY?!?!"
No, I didn't "become skinny", I just shed off 4 layers of clothes and my poofy cat-eared leopard hoodie. :D 

So.. I've been here in Arizona for 7 months now. Arrived at the end of autumn (HOT!), went through months of winter without turning on the heater, danced through spring after shedding the layers of clothes and now roasting in the soon-to-be all out summer heat.

Speaking of which, I haven't been under the sun much for the past 5 years, so the moment I arrived under the blazing Arizona sun, it literally took me the walk from the shelter of the airport to the coach to start peeling. And the next few days (and months), the walk from the parking lot to the shopping mall or my house to the gym to turn red.

Naturally, I've been hiding from the sun the past seven months that I've been here.
(Yes, even in the winter!)
Another reason apart from sun burn is that I'm allergic to most sunscreens and I hate turning tan because I'm Asian and there will be this horrible yellow phase before I turn back to pale white.

And if anyone is going to advise me to stay tan... NO.
Back to the above point about sun screen, and also no thanks to premature aging, wrinkles, and skin cancer TYVM. Plus, I'm puny and being tan just makes me look smaller. So, no.

Back to the point.

Basically, I've been cowering in the comfortable shelter of my apartment and blasting the air conditioning to fend off the summer heat, not going out into the sun and wind and general dryness of the desert.

And then I did the unthinkable one day. I've always wanted to jog outside but because the guys have been training for their IPPT and I can't keep up with them if they run at the passing time pace (WHAT? I'm not a born runner okay?!), I haven't been able to join them apart from when they train at the gym.
In fact, I can't even complete the 2.4km run here because of the dryness and lower oxygen levels.. I just get so breathless I'm afraid I'll pass out and the furthest I've ever run here is only about 1.6km. And that's in the humid, cool gym!

So, when my friend got called up for a training run in the base stadium and asked my husband to join him, naturally I jumped at the chance and went along. After all, if I get tired, I can go rest in the shade somewhere right? Doesn't matter if I run just 400m or 4m! They can come get me after they finish their run in 12 minutes! :D

When I got there....... They decided to run around the base using the actual IPPT route. Having nowhere else to go and really wanting to get some exercise, I joined in...
...10 minutes later I was seriously regretting my decision and considering sticking up a thumb for a hitchhike back to the starting point.

I've never seriously considered myself as living in a desert because I've been so sheltered but HOLY CRAP did that run drive the point right into me!
It was blazing hot, 40ish degrees celcius, the sun was shining so bright it was glaring off the pavement and I was running with my eyes nearly shut, the air was so dry my nose and throat hurt...

After the first 400m (I estimate) of keeping up with the guys, I fell back and went into a slow jog.
And then my body started shutting down slowly, forcing me to walk.
At about 800m to 1km I was so far behind I could barely see the guys to find my way back.
I started taking short cuts in the shade and cutting across field and gravel.
When I blinked and re-opened my eyes I could barely see.. My vision was fading.
Forcing myself to walk fast in one of my shady short cuts, I could see that the guys were about to turn a corner and I was going to lose the trail soon.
I was desperate for water to rinse away the goop forming in my mouth, to cool my face, arms, and everything else.
I started looking around for a bathroom, or anyone driving past to see if I could catch a ride back.

... And then someone came back to look for me.
He was waving me on to the trail, but I could barely walk by then, my chest hurt, and I was nearly passing out.
I was having a heatstroke but I didn't know it at the time.
I followed him the best I could, and took a few more short cuts.

When I was about 800m away from the starting/finishing point, I spotted my husband who came back for me!
All I wanted to do then was to just get water and perhaps lie flat on the floor for the next 5 hours, so I tried my best to walk quickly back to where we came from without passing out.
I mean, it was already bad enough that I was finishing a 2.4km "run" in like 25 minutes so I was really determined to at least arrive conscious!

FINALLY, I reached the cool air-conditioned building, barely able to walk straight and still clinging on desperately to the edge of consciousness.
I let my husband lead me to the bathroom where I quickly rinsed my mouth and then made a beeline for my water bottle.
I instantly felt so much better in the air conditioning and with some water in my system.
Did I mention that the weather was so dry I didn't even break out a sweat throughout my entire ordeal?!
I only started perspiring when I was in the bathroom!
Anyway, that aside, since I was feeling a lot better, we decided to go out and join the rest who were resting and chatting.

BIG MISTAKE.
After about a minute in the summer heat, I felt even worse than I did during the "run" and started blacking out.
My husband quickly bid farewell to everyone and guided me to the car...
Where my body decided to have a bit more fun and made me puke 3 times before letting me RIP on the passenger seat.
Only then did I figure out I was passing out from heatstroke. -_-

SO. Moral of the story: If you're going to be a sheltered baby who screeches in pain when the sun touches your skin for 2 seconds, DON'T make your first outdoor run in the desert during summer!

 ... This seems like TOO much dramatization for a simple 2.4km run! Doesn't it seem like I "ran" a marathon instead?!

The best part of the story?
The friend who asked my husband to join him for the run didn't turn up.
*FACEPALMS*

On the bright side, I found a way to not sun burn even without sunscreen.
I slapped on a whole crapload of moisturizer before going out in the sun and I didn't burn at all!
Not sure if it's the brand I used (Vaseline) or anything, but it is a great penetrating moisturizer so I guess it really helped. :)

Why even bother?

I don't understand why people still bother to keep up pretenses after such a long time.

I see your 'happy' pictures, shallow people, and I'm tired of the fake-ness of your words and actions.. or lack of.

Real friends or true friends are there forever, regardless of the distance and time spent apart. Circumstances and situations caused the distance and we are all mature enough to understand, forgive, and still be able to chill together when we need each other.

If you happen to feel that, maybe this post refers to you, then it most probably is. :)

Whitening my teeth

Been wanting to do it for ages but was waiting till my teeth were fully straightened before I did it but I wanted to look good for my wedding (who doesn't?) so I decided to do it one month earlier.

Okay it didn't go too well for me because I've got extremely sensitive teeth.
I guess every part of me is sensitive so I should have expected it but I NEVER expected it to hurt more than a freaking surgery!
I gave up after the first round (there are 3) so my dentist got me some toothpaste for sensitive teeth and tooth mousse to prepare me for the next two rounds.

I even had painkillers before we started, I can't imagine how bad it would have been otherwise. It's hurting even a few hours later.
-_____-

My dentist suggested injecting the gums before we start again and I said hell yeah why not!
I'd willingly take 4 jabs in my gums than this shit all over again. :(

Upset! This is the first time I've given up something because it was PAINFUL.

Okay I'm going to roll around on my bed now because it won't stop hurting.
It feels like I just got deep fillings in all my teeth all down to the back. Grr.

Oh, on the bright side, even with one round of treatment I can already see a huge difference!
I couldn't stop showing off to my mum while she was eating just now, lol.
*BIG GRIN*

Cafe Epicurious

After reading the rave reviews about their all-day breakfasts and affordability, I found out that they had an outlet near me at the Rail Mall and decided to give it a try....
MEGA FAIL.

Was pretty peckish so BF and me both decided to have the Full Monty sets.
I guess maybe I've been spoilt by hotel room service breakfast sets but this was definitely not worth the trip, time and money.

For $22 you get: toast, 3 eggs, bacon, sausages, mushrooms, half a tomato, baked beans, orange juice and tea/coffee. Sounds pretty good right?

The eggs I had sunny-side up and BF had scrambled and were probably the only okay items in the set, and not even better than what I can produce in the kitchen myself (and I am no regular in there!).

His scrambled eggs were extremely normal and not salty enough, much like the fast food breakfast type except we were not given seasonings on the table.
My sunny-side ups were a little uncooked on the top (Salmonella anyone??) but I still ate it anyway because I was hungry.

Bacon was streaky bacon terribly cooked, not crispy at all, pretty flat and soggy. Some of it landed in the baked beans which I hate because I don't like my food to mix!

Sausages were terrible. Tasteless little pieces of things fried in too much oil..
Never had such terrible tasting sausages before in my life.

Mushrooms were tasteless and just... slightly charred without seasoning.

Grilled tomato was sour and unseasoned. I've had better even though tomatoes aren't my favourite but I've raved about some at other restaurants.

The baked beans were probably okay because you can't really screw up canned baked beans right?

The orange juice at least was freshly squeezed and reasonably nice but the tea was weak and tasteless.

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You know sometimes service and ambience can sometimes rescue a place if their food wasn't so great?

Nada for Cafe Epicurious.

Ambience was terrible. It was okay when I got in at first then later on larger groups of people came in and it became squeezy and terribly noisy with uncontrolled kids shouting and making noise.

Service? I've seen other reviews that stated service was good.
Well in fact actually service was good... only initally.

I had intended to stay a little longer after my meal to relax (my intended time of stay was maybe 5-10 minutes) but I hadn't even finished my tea before some larger groups of customers needed some seats (there were other empty chairs around) and the staff started hassling us with the bill.
Anyway after the group with the kids came in and sat next to us I was already preparing to go.

It's just unfair that they serve families, groups and people older than us with more respect and give them better treatment.
Isn't my money of the same value as theirs?
I get this problem at most places in Singapore, not only at this food outlet so I'm pretty pissed off by now.

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I finished off my meal with dessert at another restaurant nearby with MUCH better service and ambience.. The dessert wasn't too bad too.

Judge for yourself if you ever want to be tricked by reviewers and go there for a disappointing experience like me.

"Good Parenting"

Me: I don't have enough table space to study...
Mum: Sit on the floor and write lor.

t(-_______-)t

*lies flat on bed*

BF had an off day for our medical check up (there are so many!!) so we decided to head to the Science Center one last time before we leave.

I was foolishly thinking it would be quiet on a weekday but NOOOOO there were so many kidssssssssss OMG.

I noticed a pattern while walking around the place (last time I went there was 4 years ago so it wasn't too fun for me, plus kids' screechings were really annoying me)- the PRCs tend to just try to elbow us out of the way regardless of whether they are young or old, couples or families. WTF?

Come to our country still want to try to push us out in any way possible!
Definitely will not stand for it.
No matter how many Singaporeans they managed to push/nudge/ram out of the way I refused to budge for them, because everyone waits their turn, I waited mine, I was there first so they can bloody hell WAIT like everyone else!

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Since I've been inactive like an inert gas since last year, the walk around SC took it's toll on me... In the later part I was whining already 'cos my legs were so tired!

So BF decided it's time to get my ass out for some exercise (AT LAST!!) and the next day after work he took me out for a jog.. Which turned out to be 70% walking but at least I'm aching today lol.

I need to get out more! :(

New addiction

Anyone who knew me in my secondary school days would have known that I was crazyyyyyy about earrings. I couldn't stop buying and in fact now I have a huge rack full of earrings (but don't wear anymore because I switched to non-costume jewellery a couple of years back).

Apart from my crazy make up purchasing recently, I've also been indulging myself in bags. *sigh*
I just can't seem to get myself to stop even though I still have quite a few completely untouched bags.

My room is freaking filling up with bags! I guess it's time to clear them out again..

Help?