No, I don't miss you at all!

Do you notice that once you've stepped into the working world, you start getting calls from insurance companies, finance companies, fitness centers and so on? Wonder where they get your contact number? Your wonderful colleagues of course. I'm sure they (colleagues) mean no harm, but don't they have the courtesy to ask first before handing out your private info around freely? I, for one thing don't disclose any of my friends' or colleagues' contacts to any of these companies. Even if they insist on it.

I've handled a few pesky callers myself before and i do try not to be rude. They are doing their job after all. Once, i got a phone call from a certain bank where my credit card is from. The conversation went something like this:

Caller: Good morning, this is (insert name here), calling from X bank. You are Miss L, correct? You are using our credit card...bla bla bla.
Me: Yes
Caller: I'm calling you today to talk about this special package we want to share with you. We are offering you an interest free loan of RMXXXX amount....bla bla bla.... Are you interested with our loan?
Me: I'm not interested.
Caller: But it's an it's an interest free loan of RMXXXX for XX years.
Me: I don't need the money.
Caller: Are you sure? It's an interest free loan. You don't need to pay a single cent extra.
Me: *Annoyed* But I don't need the money!
Caller: Er...*nervous giggle*. Ok, thank you for your time. Have a nice day.
Me: Bye!

What i really wanted to say was, 'Well now, why don't you GIVE me the money with no repayment needed? I would happily accept'. Got... to.. stop... dreaming.

Other phone conversations are with fitness centers. I know a few people who always get calls from them, pressuring them to join by giving them a free weeks trial or deduct their joining fee and etc. Usually, the way to deter the caller is by telling them you have joined their rival. Works most of the time. I used to be a member of a well-known gym. In the first place, i joined because my company get a special rate and part of the monthly fee is subsidies. After i moved in to my new home, i have a gym where i can go for free. So i stopped my membership with the gym. I thought that would be last i hear of them. But alas, it was not meant to be.

Caller: Hie there Miss L, we missed you at (insert name of fitness center). Did you get the sms and email we sent you.

Me: Yes, i did.
Caller: Would you like to rejoin us again? We will waive the joining fee, so..bla bla bla bla..
Me: No, i'm not interested
Caller: Why not? Bla bla bla...
Me: I already have a gym where i stay.
Caller: Oh, you already have gym.....*some effort to make small talk*
Me: *Polite laugh* Yes.
Caller: Well then, sorry for taking your time. Goodbye.
Me: Bye!

Conclusion, they haunt you even after you terminate your membership. And yes, i don't miss them at all!

Stewie Griffin Sings Everything I do

Note: Sorry folks, this mtv has been removed from Youtube due to legal issues.

Check out this MTV of Stewie Griffin's rendition of Bryan Adams' 'Everything I Do'. In the latest episode of Family Guy, he fell in love with Joe Swanson's new baby girl (yeah, Bonnie gave birth at last after 7 seasons). So this MTV was dedicated to Susie Swanson.

I love how at the end when Brian (the dog) asked Stewie if Susie liked the MTV and Stewie answered that he didn't care because he's in love with Bryan Adams now.

Dinner at Sushi Zanmai

Hmmm...i've seen to have been posting a lot about food? Well, i've procrastinated a lot, so that's why the sudden amount of food posts. Moving on, this post is about my first visit to Sushi Zanmai. I've been wanting to try it out for a while now, but there's always a long line waiting to go in whenever i pass it (the 1U branch).

So one day, i was at 1U during dinner time and was delighted to find that there was no line waiting outside the restaurant. So we made a bee line towards it and were promptly seated. Noticed that the food was served quite fast except for the bento sets and donburi ones.

Salted mackerel

Chicken katsu don

Edamame. This dish came quite late surprisingly. It's suppose to be an appetizer!

Soft shell crab maki. Quite small pieces.

Gyu enoki something. Basically it's enoki mushroom wrap in beef slices

Overall the food was not bad. The bill came up to RM60.

Dinner at Elegant Inn

A week ago, i had the chance to have dinner at Elegant Inn, a Hong Kong restaurant at Menara Hup Seng, KL. The food was delicious but on the expensive side. I heard they have another branch in Cheras.

We started off with Yee Sang and then with some pork soup.They took out the meat and served it on the table, then proceeded to serve us the soup. The soup was good, it warmed us all up immediately.

Yee sang

The next dish was my absolute favourite, fried rice! It may sound plain, but the fried rice was really really good. Heard they have a unique way of frying it, involving singeing the rice slightly. Sorry, didn't take a photo of it.

We had a huge plate of crab next.

Feeling crabby?

Can't reach the meat? Use this tool.........what the heck! use hands better!

Jasmine tea? For dirty hands, not drinking!

Didn't take much photos after that. We had vegetables, fish, pig neck (no kidding! cooked in black pepper sauce) and then some pork ribs. The pork ribs were yummy according to those who like fat meat.

See the layers?

After the courses, we had dessert. Each of us had a small peice of fried nian gao. It was quite tasteful as the skin of the nian gao was crispy. When the bill came, we saw that each piece was about RM20. Gosh! Some of the others had tong sui too.

Guess what was the full bill for 8 people? Quite expected coming from a place with such an elegant name.....

Valentine's Kitchen Project

You can't find a better day to hone your culinary skills better than Valentine's Day! That's exactly what i did this Valentine's.

First off was my first attempt to bake. There's a simple recipe for Rock Cakes (some kind of biscuit/cookie thing. Don't know why it's named so) from a childhood book that i've been itching to try ever since i was little. I think i bugged Yin to make them for me before.

The recipe was quite easy with not much ingredients and a few easy steps:

4 oz of self raising flour
2 oz of butter/margarine
2 oz of sugar
1 egg
2 tbsp of currants
4-5 tbsp of fresh milk

Cut up the butter/margarine into smaller pieces and rub it into the flour until it looks like bread crumbs. Then mix in the sugar, then the beaten egg, then the currants. Lastly, slowly pour in spoonfuls of milk while stirring the dough. Don't stir the dough until it's too runny (a mistake on my part), got to leave it thicker. Pre-heat the oven to 200 C. Then scoop the dough into the baking sheet (spread some butter on it first) and then put it on the oven tray. Bake the cookies for 15-20 minutes.

Ingredients

I underestimated the power of self raising flour

A little burnt on the edges, but tasty nonetheless

I'm trying to figure out why the edges burned so much faster. Is it because of the size? The oven function i used? I did use the recommended function to bake and even tried to lower the temperature to 180 C, but it was still the same. Nevermind, will try again another time with smaller cookies. The cookies came out tasting good though.

Next up, i made Chicken Cordon Bleu for dinner. Changed the recipe a bit for my convenience. Hehe

2 chicken fillets
2 pieces of cheddar cheese (suppose to use mozzarella)
2 pieces of salami (suppose to be honey baked ham)
Egg whites
KFC flour (substitute for plain flour and Japanese breadcrumbs)
Lots of vegetable oil

First, you can season the fillets with salt and pepper (according to the original recipe), which i didn't. Slab the salami and cheese on fillet and roll it. I used a few toothpicks to hold it in place. Then dip the whole thing into the egg white and roll in the KFC flour. Pre-heat the oil, and then put the fillets into the oil. Fry till golden brown (they always say that in recipes) or till you think it's cooked!

Hold it!

All fried up

The chicken turned up good as well. So i can declare my Valentine's Kitchen Project a success!

13 year-old father!

The octo-mum story was sooooo yesterday's news. Today, the story is about the 13 year-old boy who just became a father. No kidding! The 4ft tall lad and his 15 year-old girlfriend decided to have the baby after finding out that she was pregnant. That would mean that they consummated their relationship when he was 12!! What were YOU doing at 12?

Read the full story here. He looks so cute with his bambi eyes. Can't believe he's a dad, when he's just a baby himself. A little too late for the birds and the bees talk now. It makes you wonder what are kids doing nowadays?

Umaiya revisited

Just before heading back south for the CNY holidays, me and a few friends had dinner together at Umai-ya, Uptown branch. Before anyone could eat their food, i took the obligatory picture for my blog. Here are the pictures and my pitiful description of each, as i forgot all the names! :D

Fried tofu. Tasted good, although i'm not a big tofu fan

Funky Japanese pizza. Did you finish the rest?

Soft-shell crab maki

Shir's mackerel bento

Khye's donburi. Some chicken and egg thingy. Not nice at all

My chicken bento. Quite nice. The sauce tastes a bit like 'tau chu'

Waitress lighting Ah How's 'fire'

What's inside? Waiting for it to cook

Tada!

Overall the food was quite ok. Wonder if their buffets are any good?

A Promise to rehabilitate

*This is a sponsored post

Hey there! I'm back after a long CNY break after spending 9 days back in my hometown. The first few days of CNY was spent visiting relatives but the other days were spent mostly at home. Managed to catch up on some new movies and I finished 3 books!

I'm pretty sure, many are still whirling from the rush and excitement of the few big holidays in the span of 1 month! First there was Christmas, followed by New Years and then Chinese New Year. Even for those who didn't celebrate any of those would have found an excuse to drink. Now, what most of us don't realize that drinking excessively and frequently would lead to substance abuse. And haven't we heard enough unfortunate stories of what happens with/around alcoholics?

But it is never too late to turn your life back around. With drug treatment centers like Promises who offer professional help, treatment and rehalibitation to people with drug and substance addiction. They offer proper treatment services according to the person's needs.

The first step to rehabilitation is acknowledging that you have a problem. So if you think you have a problem, what are you waiting for?