Monday, September 27

the difference is you

if there was ever such a thing as an unfortunate chain of events, yesterday [Sunday] would have been one.

RetroSpect DayView for Sunday, September 26th, 2004:

1118 woke up for weekly visitation by First Uncle & Family

1130 got cleaned up, had breakfast

1145 greeted First Uncle and First Aunt-In-Law upon their arrival retreat to room

1205 poked my head out of room door in confusion at the staggered depature of my First Uncle and my First Aunt-In-Law. they left within a minute of each other, my First Aunt-In-Law staying to deliver a few parting words first

1215 we sit down to lunch, turned into an excess due to the departure of two expected guests, interrupted by a telephone call that began the fall-out from the argument that occured several minutes before 1205 [details on that scandal in another post, if at all, because this isn't the bit of the day that really hit me hard]

1230 telephone call from mom and dad, within spitting distance of each other only because my mom confiscated my dad's passport and won't let him leave until he "settles everything". mammoth task for a useless man. they wanted me to go back as some twisted sort of mediator. not only did i not want to go, but the logistics simply didn't work out [again, more another time, if at all, because the worst is yet to come]

1330 second aunt and rosemarie leave for second aunt's Buddhism class

1345 Priscilla [my third cousin under my first uncle] pops over, asking if my second aunt is in, then if rosemarie was in, after i told her my second aunt wasn't in. like, hello? how's my second aunt supposed to go anywhere without rosemarie?

1355 Priscilla leaves, leaving behind thirty dollars and a three-hundred dollar check from Joanne, my seventh [i think] cousin's wife. this is related to the 1205 argument earlier. it's a long, lengthy scandal and deserves its own post, if i ever write it

1410 rosemarie returns, after some quips about the scandal, she takes a nap and i go back to my PowerBook

1645 after getting my granddad out of bed [we put him to bed before rosemarie left at one-thirty], rosemarie heads off to get second aunt back from class

1700 rosemarie and second aunt return. i shower and leave for Raffles Place

1800 arrive at Raffles Place Interchange, half an hour in advance. poke around the concourse and deicide to go aboveground and scope the place out first

1815 call xuan to point out to him that the place we were going to is located inside an office building, and office buildings are not open on Sundays

1826 xuan texts back to say to get to City Hall ASAP

1827 i fail to text back the message "Don't asap someone who arrived half an hour in advance.", because my prepaid card's credit balance was below the minimun required to send texts

1830 i meet alvin chow and patrick at the Raffles Place Interchange Basement Three platform

1845 arrive at City Hall Interchange. dax and shiming are already there. xuan is nowhere to be seen

1930 after mildly telling xuan off, including the content of the message i couldn't send and a reminder that i was the one who went to find out in advance if the place was open, the dismal showing moves and arrives at Suntec City Movenpick Marché, where someone pulls out some FHM Top 100 Girls Next Door special and almost everyone starts ogling their goodies, making inane and asinine comments.

2030 at xuan's insistence, we move to Suntec City Cedele Depot for cake

2100 leave Suntec City for City Hall Interchange. patrick takes the bus, xuan's on a different line, dax, wayne, shiming, alvin and i are on the East-West Line

2120 train pulls into Kallang Station. i do not get off, intending to while the night away at the airport

2150 i get off with dax at Tampines Station, and trawl for a movie to watch

2230 i give up, and pile dax and i into a cab headed for Orchard Cineleisure

2245 ten dollars later, we arrive at Cineleisure. deciding not to risk trying to get into Saved! [an M18 film], i got tickets for Dodgeball instead

2350 after applying for Internet Banking, going to Cheers! to get weird ice-cream and drinks, and other attempts at wasting time, we are seated for the movie

epilogue: dax's mom's threatening texts to my phone [his Nokia conked out] was funnier than the movie. i didn't even really laugh. we got a cab ride back to Kallang and dax decided to wander until public transport resumed operations

Expense Report for Sunday, September 26th, 2004:

$43.30 - bill for dinner at Movenpick Marché, inclusive of the Rosti with Mushroom Ragout that xuan wanted to share
$11.50 bill for dessert at Cedele Depot, inclusive of the two dollars i had to top-up for xuan's Carrot Cake
$10.00 cab fare from Tampines Mall to Orchard Cineleisure
$17.50 tickets to Dodgeball
$05.00 drinks and weird ice-dream at Cheers!
$07.80 cab fare from Orchard Cineleisure to Kallang

$95.10 total for the day


well. at least i didn't spend $120 on CDs again.

actually, come to think about it, it's actually too bad i didn't take that money and buy CDs with it instead.

one day i will have spent enough on cabs [especially on cabs when the Midnight Surcharge is in effect] to have been able to buy an old Saab cabriolet with what was spent.

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