Sunday Meanderings Of The Brain

Sunday has not left me rested as my brain is firing off in different think thoughts.

For work, I had to send a memo to minions, reminding them that they must submit receipts for reimbursements before we close 2020. Minions forget and tend to dawdle and submit when they feel like it in future years.

But Money Bags has financial rules and I understand it but minions don’t.

I cannot fathom why people don’t wish to claim back expenses and sit on it?! They must be rich! Or they have different priorities?

I am always disciplined to put up claims within a week, maximum delay of two weeks. Afterall, it is my hard earned cash!

Next, my brain tried to find resolve in making a surgical decision.

But, I came up blank. I do not know how to make a decision just yet.

Sometimes things are not as easy as it seems.

Tossing a coin?

Using tic tac toe?

Using eeny meenie minie moe perhaps?

Beats me!

I continue to ponder….

Tie Breaker 3rd Medical Opinion By White Coats Of Singapore General Hospital

I needed a tie breaker 3rd medical opinion and decided on Singapore General Hospital (SGH).

SGH is the largest hospital in lil red dot with firsts in oncology, cardiology, orthopaedics amongst other specialities.

I consulted the hand specialist there.

The registrar was overseen by a consultant and I was pleased that the consultant answered all my questions patiently and cogently.

So much so that he asked me if I am a nurse to know how to ask the questions and understand what he explained by expanding on the questions replied.

Yes! Education is important to me and I learnt by reading up and asking questions as I wanted to work with White Coats to help self.

Dr SGH was using his brains and he wondered if I had a growth that was causing the nerves to be compressed. Visually we saw a bump and the bump sent electric firings to my thumb when pressed.

So, he ordered Xrays, an ultrasound and a nerve conduction test.

As luck would have it, I could do all tests yesterday.

Bad news is that my nerve test compared to one did in January 2020 has further deteoriated when compared to the one done yesterday.

Dr SGH before seeing all my test results opined that I do need surgery and pretty soon too.

Sigh. I felt like such a hand model placing my hand in so many ways haha…but hey at least I have hands right?!

Ah well….I await the radiographer’s reports and technician’s nerve conduction tests.

White Coats Confer & I Am Conflicted

It seems that for my 2 paws, massive and delicate surgery is required as scarred tissue needs to be hacked away to release trapped nerves.

“How badly trapped are they” I asked Dr James, my neurosurgeon.

One word was his reply, BAD!

Aargh!

Positioning my surgery for August 2021 was a bad idea opined Dr James.

The longer I delay, the chances my nerves can recover is poor.

Dr Bones said that he was not confident that feeling may return to my paws too.

So, I am bummed out.

White Coats never agree with me on alternatives…..it is always surgical intervention and NOW! NOW! Sigh! Sob!

Que sera sera….

Dr James fixed my cervical with titanium rods and screws plus did a marathon surgery with Dr Pang on my spine.

Dr Bones chopped my leg and shoulders.

I trust both but why oh why each time it is urgent surgery and complicated!!

Double aargh!

The Forever Positive Folks Vs The Forever Suffering Folks

Mr Ability To Earn is an example of this category of what I would call, The Forever Positive Folks.

Everyone else is reeling from the effects of Covid-19 and experiencing the fallout of lesser earned revenue, bankruptcy, closed business etc but not Mr Ability To Earn as whenever I do see him, he is always upbeat and saying to me that he is doing very well. I do take this with a pinch of salt, unless of course, Mr Ability To Earn leads a charmed life.

Truth? Untruth? Or a question of face?

Asians are mindful of how their image of wealth is projected to the economic world of “The Haves” and “The Have Nots.”

On the contrary, MR EX is one of “desperado” – “depressed”, “owing millions”, yet he dresses to the hilt, drives a luxury car, lives in a swanky house with family in their bling blings!

Is MR EX the typical Asian businessman? Always saying he is not making money and struggling to make ends meet?

Shrewd businessmen will always bemoan lack of business or not making enough to go by. Their struggles is to expand business, have more sales and earn more profits. They will never say they have huge earnings, unless they are at the level of Asian tycoons like Li Ka Shing or Jack Ma!

These 2 persons I know are at opposite ends.

MR EX touts a life of poverty, yet has a social media blitz that shows him as one the most successful man alive in the entrepreneurial world. He is plastered everywhere in the world wide web across continents, literally! Famous!

Mr Ability To Earn is the epoch of his game in business, winning multiple awards for this or that. Always wearing a plastic smile on his face with a blank look, I can never read his sincerity or genuine care.

People are hard to fathom and decipher.

I will never know and so long as I am not involved with either for business or relationships, other than hi or bye and you go your way and I go mine, meeting now and then to exchange pleasantries, life goes on.

I will continue to hug my inanimate furball and contemplate on life’s vicissitudes – I doubt I will ever get any wiser!

Un-Fun Thoughts & Wonderings About Today’s World

It is one of those days that I would lapse into a mind whirl of wondering and pondering of today’s world.

I reflected back on the last few weeks of happenings around me.

Mr Kind’s mother passed away and he seems to be in a rut over it, grieving and coiled into his own world. He and his late mother were closed and he was his mother’s favorite. I saw the photo he sent me of him at age 4 with his parents celebrating that birthday.

I looked inward to self and wondered how would I deal with my own parents mortality when the time came. Would I crumple into a heap? Would I be paralysed by grief?

I cannot do the above as there is no one else but me. My siblings will not bother. They have made it clear that should my parents passed, just handle everything myself and not bother them. BUT, I must have them at the reading of the will and distribute whatever is willed to them.

Sigh. Living is about money. Dying is about money too. For the life of me, I cannot fathom how anyone can be consciously not conflicted when they pocket money from inheritance but not put in the time to manage the declining years of their loved ones?

Who am I to judge right? I am, afterall the world’s biggest bitch who would really tick them off for their lack of care and love – their sorry excuse is we do not live in lil red dot and now with Covid-19, all the more we will not be visiting as we refuse to pay for the quarantine or serve the time.

What is time and money to see loved ones?

I am keyed wrongly.

I think differently.

I am not a perfect person and I own up to the title of “world’s biggest bitch” most times!

I also saw how selfishly Orange Man took off his mask, defiling all etiology of the Covid-19 disease. How come?

How is he able to “beat” the odds of Covid despite being in the high risk group of higher BMI and age?

Is the Presidency campaign trail worth infecting more people to him?

Then I ask self – is he not ‘woke’ – new slang for being aware of social causes. Soon ‘woke’ will be included in the world of dictionaries.

The English language these days has evolved so much that the Queen’s English, as they say, would kill the stoic users of English.

Shakespeare must have also turned over in his grave when his brand of bard’s English evolved to the Queen’s English and so forth.

I have no answer please…..do you?

I Want To Believe….

I want to believe that everyone on planet Earth is honest. But this my naivete talking because if everyone is 100% honest, there will be zero crime, no crooked politician, no sweat shops, no need for policing, no need for CCTVs.

I want to believe that mental illnesses do not exist and that it is “all in the mind”. But this is wholly untrue as mental illness is a disease and it is a debilitating one too. Some hear voices, others have alters (Associative DID) and yet others are plagued with depression or something or other.

I want to believe that people are basically kind and altruistic. But I know there are few and far between such persons. Based on personal experience, I do have persons who have been genuinely generous and kind. I also know of many who milk others for connections, contracts and getting that leg up to know who’s who.

Is it hard to believe?

Yes. I find it hard to believe in a God (*Apologies as I do not intend to ruffle any feathers here) as I cannot see God nor feel his presence. It is the faith that tells the religious that God exists or in a way that God reaches out to them and touches their lives. Some get to experience miracles. Others get more and more lemons thrown their way. I am one such person that get lemons thrown my way. My own flip side argument would be that if God was not with me, I should be in worst shape i.e. missing limbs, mobility or even perhaps my brain!

I want a simple life.

No need for showy things. Don’t need a Birkin Bag nor Gucci shoes or even a pair of Jimmy Choos!

I want to have food on my table and not starve.

I want to be debt free.

I want to be free of silly wants, needs or believes….

But really……do I believe this is possible?

Getting Back Into The Grind

I need to push myself back to pound the sidewalks and start my road measurements (my term for daily walks) It has been awhile since I have done that, to be exact since December 2019 when I had foot surgery.

I am unsure how my foot has healed and if I start aggressive road measurements, will it aggravate the leg and cause other new things to develop. I truly need to have more surgeries and this is what is holding me back!

Some fear remains but like they say, if I don’t try I will never know. I just don’t want to risk another surgery.

Each annual surgery has taken a brutal toll on my body. I feel so tired from this last one done 1 week ago. I dread the 2 major ones scheduled for August 2021.

I did try walking 6,000 steps now and then from running errands and found how stiff my legs were and sore my thighs were – as if frozen or I call it rigor mortis.

Sigh! I must pluck up courage to get back to pounding the sidewalks and seeing the sights along the way.

Chicken has been doing her weekly walks and this was what she shared with me during her 4 October 2020 walk.

A lovely stray cat that posed for her. I love the juxtaposition of the cat against the lovely blue wall. Nice and well fed too! Our people are kind to the strays as they do stop by and pour kibbles or cat treats for them!

This is Yellow Cassia, a common flowering tree that adorns our streets or sidewalks. I love it when it blooms as it envelopes the tree in yellow blooms. I call this the “Yellow Wattle” of Singapore [This is not the right name for it, but I find that this bloom reminds of the Yellow Wattle I see a lot of in Australia during my visits there]

I discovered the botanical name for this plant Oxalis Triangularis. It reminds me of purple butterflies and something magical about it as if the “butterflies”are flitting about. It is a nice houseplant to have in a pot

Petunias (I think) so pretty in red. In our local tradition for chinese, red is a color of prosperity and people like having plants with red flowers in their homes, especially during Chinese Lunar New Year

Lantanas – lovely bunches of them

I was unable to find the botanical name for this flowering plant

Bonsai tree with a gnarly root that is treasured for the way it looks. It takes years to develop the features of this bonsai shown here

Longan tree. Can you spot the green Longan fruits? Once it matures, it will turn brown. This is a rare find and I am glad that Chicken took a photo to share with me as Longan Trees are rare these days in my lil red dot

A cross breed of pink and white bougainvilleas. I have seen how gardeners cross the breed of this flower to come up with flowers with different hues of colored flowers in one plant. This is done with grating methods.

Chicken is showing Bird and I that in time to come, Bird’s current brinjal seedling will grow this big to fruit brinjal.

Complexity Of The Human Mind

The human mind is a fantastic piece of work really.

Freud and other great forefathers of psychiatry cannot even put their finger on things exactly as the human mind continues to evolve, over time, over different conditionings and stimulants.

As the new normal persists at a rapid pace, I wonder how the human mind will reach its new peak?

I read with a slight laugh at the comments of Orange Man on how “mild” or non lethal Covid-19 was. He dismissed the need to be masked up and that ingesting disinfectants would protect anyone from it.

Now that he is showing “mild” symptoms with this wife, I do feel for him, as I would with anyone suffering from Covid-19. The news put it right in that he is in the high risk group in terms of age plus other factors.

Like any human being, I want him and his wife to survive and beat this. By surviving and beating this, it will endow upon Orange Man a first hand experience and remind all to mask up and not ingest disinfectants to “cure” or protect self.

MR EX texted me to say he was “depressed”. He tends to use this word loosely as he is anything, but “depressed”

He has not committed suicide. I am not saying he should but that a severely depressed person, will contemplate ending one’s life and hence should seek help.

I know the cure for MR EX’s depression! Not medication but tons of dollars at this disposal and fame!

MR EX has a huge ego and this ego must be fuelled by a lot of moolah to splurge. The glamour he basks in when the media or press shows him up as a find and generous benefactor helps him stay woke!

Still, for people like Orange Man and MR EX, perhaps there is compassion within each.

For Orange Man, would this incident teach him to understand Covid-19 and how it is transmitted. I highly suspect he and his underlings did not mask up whilst in AirForce One. “Suspect” because he pooh poohs the need for masks to be worn.

Perhaps he is lucky in that the strain he has, is indeed mild and that he beats it, hands down. If and when he beats it, I sincerely hope he will not pooh pooh it by now touting to others that Covid-19 is no big deal and that he survived it.

He may not realise that he as the head honcho of a big country could have his hands on drugs that others (the rank and file) cannot afford nor have open access to!

Drugs on trial could be given to provide Orange Man with a cure whilst others do not have even a micro chance.

Meanwhile, Mr Kind is reeling from the last two weeks of managing his late mother which ended with her cremation yesterday. I know he needs space to grieve and find his own comfort.

My biggest concern is being intrusive and would just text him once in the morning and once at end to give encouragement.

I hope I am not just seen as one with words as I could not attend the wake nor funeral. I avoid these things as well as celebratory events as somehow if I do, I fall very ill.

Hocus Pocus? It is true to me and so I steer away from these “red” (celebratory events of birthdays & weddings) and “white” (death, hospital visits and all things relating to death) events.

Yes, the human mind is a strange one.

Dr Bones was angsting over his son’s Primary School Leaving Exams (PSLE) – in fact every parent I know would spend thousands of dollars preparing their child for this exam that enables the streaming to sciences or the arts or to a school of their choice. Yes, we have ivy league schools here that parents vie for and so, PSLE is also a stressful time for parents as they struggle to take the “exams” with their child.

Dr Bones himself is a gifted child. His children are also gifted. The child going for PSLE has autism and like Birdman, whose son also has autism, they struggle to keep up with the needs of their special sons each.

My advice to Dr Bones was that he should not blow a gasket in his brain as this was just the start of the schooling years. The next hurdle is GCE O Levels, then GCE A Levels (unless the child chooses the polytechnic route) and Bachelors, Masters or even PhD!

He sent me back laughing emojis! He got my point!

Life to me, is long and arduous journey.

Painful if one has to struggle without relieve or joyous if one is endowed with silver spoon, served hand and foot without need to worry about financials or what tomorrow brings.

Humans are capable of grieving and overcoming grief. Some do not succeed.

Humans are capable of forgiveness and letting go of the hurtful past. Some do not succeed.

Humans are capable of being kind. Some do not fathom the nature of kindess.

Humans are capable of loving and being loved. Some do not understand nor know how to give love or receive love.

Humans are capable of great things. Some do not know how to manage greatness and falls off the path.

Yes, humans are complex beings with complicated workings of the mind.

I am human and I am still trying to make sense of my life – its purpose and how will it end.

Death & Grieving – The 2 May Not Be Congruent

Mr Kind texted me that he is “lost”and feel that the death of his mother is “surreal” as he is numbed without feelings.

I could understand him as Mr Kind is a sensitive and kind man. He may be a man but he does things for family that usually the female does. I should not stereo type here but in Lil Red Dot, rarely do we see persons of his era taking the trouble to do wet marketing for his own nucleus family as well as for his parents.

He cooks, plans the menu and took care of the children. His wife is lucky in that she focuses on her job and ignores meals, marketing, taking care of children or household chores.

Mr Kind’s marriage almost broke down some years ago as he could not stomach the laziness of his wife. I could tell back then as clothes worn by the missus were strewn where discarded only to be picked up by Mr Kind or the domestic helper.

Missus is very lucky in that she is treated as a Queen.

I knew that Mr Kind is strongly bonded with his parents. He is feeling the loss in an unfathomable way as he is not grieving. I feel he will when the funeral is over today and he can have a good bawl in his own personal space.

Further, his father just had a stroke this year and he has not told him that Mother passed away. He is afraid that his father will not be able to take the shock and may also be worst off.

I do not know how to face this when it is my turn to bury my parents. All I hope is that it will not be a long drawn suffering painful journey for them. I hope when the time comes, to depart from earthly realm in as fast as possible, sans pain and suffering.

In my own mind, I have been shortlisting funeral directors. It will be simple as I do not have the bandwidth for long wakes. It should be the same day funeral if crematorium slots are available or next available working day.

I need not splurge on a casket or coffin that costs thousands of dollars as it will be burnt. A simple affair for my parents as I believe if I have treated them well during their living years, it is good enough.

Doing things for the dead appeases the conscience and guilt of the living relatives are my views. I need not do this show for anyone, as there is no one to impress. I need not do it.

All I want is a dignified exit and a fuss free exit.

I have been open to speak to my mum about it and she agrees. She knows that I have no support from my siblings and that I will be taxed heavily to do everything on my own.

I hope to elicit the help of good friends during the funeral as I too, will be numbed and feel the impact of loss long after.

I may want to choose to celebrate their lives and not mourn their deaths as during their living years, I have been at their beck and call and did everything I could have done.

No hoopla, no party like atmosphere, just a private and quiet exit.

Looking Forward To A Life Less Stressed

I have a dream – so did Martin Luther King, Jr. The only difference between this great man and mine is that I am alive still and no where nearing achieving my dream.

I dream of a sprawling vineyard, my own little bed and breakfast to manage in a country with four seasons.

I dream of being financially free from encumbrances of any sort, including being shackled to a ball and chain. I can honestly say that the “ball and chain” I have achieved as I could not settle for just any man or the truth is that not any man wanted to settle with me. LOL!

I dream of being a full time student, financially able to be a permanent student in a university of my choice and enjoying campus life again, but this time without a shoe string budget and drive to class in a trumped up car, in style – the oldest freshman, but yet the coolest there is! I can sure dream!

Whilst walking through the gardens to Bates Motel, I went a father and son walking a corgi each. I struck up a conversation with them as the corgis approached me where I sat on the bench, doing a blog post! Yes, I tend to sit and blog whenever I feel comfortable on my phone.

The son, Adryl, told me how he imported the 2 corgis from Australian where they used to live.

What amused me was that he named both corgis after Shakespearean characters, Hamlet and Ophelia!

Meet Ophelia

Meet Hamlet – Pose 1

Hamlet Pose 2

Both corgis were gorgeous, well cared and well groomed. I could tell that both gents took great care of the pair.

I envied them. They had the ability to be free from work, nary a worry in the world except to enjoy the luscious greenery and pitter patter of their corgis feet as they walked the gardens.

Some say I can also live a care free life. Can I really?

A tad hard as I have 2 elderlies, bills to pay, medical health issues to battle each time and a truckload of inanimate furballs to hug! Garfield watches me out of the corner of his beady plastic eyes and is not too happy as I have not been lugging him about and hugging as much due to my wounded paw!

Some say it is a matter of choice.

I have looked any my life’s choices. I have not had the good fortune of being offered choices in life, other than Hobson’s choice.

Well, life is as life gives and I must make the best of it. Life is there, whether I like it or not or even if I expect it to be this way or that.