Flurry of events

Been a while since he last posted. It had been a very hectic year, new job scope, arrival of apartment and subsequently busy with the renovation and furnishing, then to Australia for about 3 weeks. Let's look at some updates, not necessarily linked.

Got a new pet. Chilli plant. Extracted and dried some seeds from the supermarket bought chilli-padi (bird's eye chilli), planted about 8 of them, 4 sprouted, but only 2 survived. Let's look at the chronology of its growth.
 

First capture, leavers growing nicely

 

Opening up towards the sun

Second pair of leaves coming out

"Side-stretch"

Third pair of leaves coming out

Christmas Eve - leaves grown bigger and wider, with the 4th leaf growth coming out.

He also attempted to replicate his friend's Mom's chicken curry that he loved so much.

Found out later on that he should have gotten the "meat curry", instead of this "chicken curry" one.

Hmm, tasted different and looked of a wrong color

Finally got the correct Baba's "meat curry" powder. Marinating the meat.

Finally, the color looks correct, but still doesn't taste as good as auntie's.

Let's recap furnishing the living room...

Setting up the Samsung 5 series LED Smart TV

Chesterfield sofa, coffee table and TV console in

Figuring out the best height to wall-mount the TV

Huge mess. Getting addicted to drilling holes in the wall.

 

Work accomplished, waiting for the speakers.

Cushions added to the sofa

The purchase from Courts finally arrived after a week long delay and lots of calls

Music alive.

He experienced pink/orange water stains in the shower, and also read that some neighbours experienced the same thing. It was revealed that it was caused by bacteria that thrived on high levels of iron in the water. The tap water that he drank everyday tasted a little too metallic too, so he decided to get a water filtration system. Was contemplating Novita dispenser ($299), Hyflux tap filter (~$128, ~$69 for refill), and found OSIM uPure2 for $128 (~$39 for replacement filter cartridge). Luckily OSIM was running some promotion and he got it for a better price. 

OSIM uPure2 for $99

 
Some pictures of the daily cooking that they had done.

Healthy vegetables for her when she was sick

Brunch before the RT

$1.50 chicken leg from Sheng Siong

Toast with soft-boiled eggs

Had this almost daily during his 3-week leave

Made fried rice from left-over rice. Getting better at it

Likes to lay out his ingredients in recent. Creates a lot of plates to be washed.

Product of the previous picture

Lunch on a certain weekend

Food of convenience. Instant noodles, celery and frozen food.

One dish and one soup, both of very similar ingredients

Convenient food again, with squid balls.

Steamboat for his colleagues

Attempt to go vegan for a meal. Despite having so much vegetables, the stomach still felt empty. Had fried chicken at Long John Silver's after that.

Bought XXL crab one particular day, but she went out with her friends for dinner. He had both monsters to himself.

Also, finally sorted out the mess in the utility cupboard. Bought wood plank from IKEA, sawed it in half, and drilled it into the wall to hold the house phone and the modem.

Cut a hole in the media box to thread the cables out.

Borrowed a saw to do this

Before, the cables prevented the closure of the media box, there was nowhere to place the house phone, and the modem was held with masking tape. Much neater and safer after, eh?