the entry reeks flame

i thought i'd never live to tell the tale, but hell yeah, i've managed to stick to my financial rationing for the past two weeks (see previous entry). kudos to that! and who's to say that not all things are possible? 

well, as far as craziness goes, burger king certainly takes the cake. the burger makers have launched a new perfume line, aptly named flame. yes, yes, you heard it right. the experts of grilled patties have even created an official website to promote their baffling olfactory invention and it comes with a cheesy, cramp-inducing tagline, "body spray of seduction, with a hint of flame-broiled meat."

let's face it, people. whoever with even the littlest bit of sanity in this freaking world would want to smell like char-burnt carcass? i hardly find that appealing, let alone beguiling. to put things into perspective, burger king might have had other reasons for developing such an idiosyncratic aroma. maybe, just maybe, the perfume could double up as a marinade as well. so just in case you've run out of barbeque sauce when you're working like a trojan at the pit, instead of going out to get another bottle, you could simply spray a little flame on your marinade, for that hint of flame-broiled meat.

nevertheless, i am a naysayer to such tawdriness. some things just never get old. this one, on the other hand, has had its day the moment i've smelt it.

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the entry that burnt an abyss

my credit card company mailed me my latest bill statement. well, it could easily have been mistaken to be from years ago, judging by the dog-eared slip of paper, worn soft from my repeated handling. it wasn't so much of the bill per se that caught me by surprise, but more of the annexed paraphernalia that came along with it.

amidst the stack within the envelope was a certificate-like note, congratulating me on the points that i have accrued for the past year, using their credit card for payment on almost every thing i purchased. i could feel my throat choking for a minute when i read its content. "american express international, inc congratulates wong wern jek for 57,881 points earned since january 2008."

57,881 freaking points! that, which would roughly translate to 92,609 dollars of blithesome expenditure. i had swiped close to a staggering hundred grand in the past year, alone! that amount would have been enough to feed 120 somali children for 8 years. and i thought i had displayed reticence when it came to making purchases. i was wrong.

thankfully, i consoled myself, i had already embarked on a quest of thrift for the year of 2009. wasteful spending would no longer be the ways of the new me, i patted myself on the back. i pulled the bill out and my smile faltered. i was flabbergasted. the letter was jammed with lines after lines of transactions made for the month of january -- i had bought into all the whatnots and shitez and swiped my plastic at every perceivable occasion. the letter was scorching my eyes i wanted to tear my eyeballs out.

singapore telecoms  216.84

the heritage bangkok 75.35

king power tax free 42.49

phuture singapore 105.00

cicada 36.00

marutama ra-men singapore 35.30

topman 147.05

10th div 826.02

klee bar pte ltd singapore 106.00

klee bar pte ltd singapore 34.00

wala wala singapore 44.00

shell yio chu kang singapore 22.75

ck tang - main store 575.00

ck tang - main store 137.00

black chamber singapore 69.90

sole central singapore 199.00

one rochester 38.00

the loof 21.99

revoltage singapore 65.90

the loof 44.00

the loof 44.00

the loof 10.99

swensen's crown prince singapore 69.68

starbucks coffee singapore 10.30

coffee club pte ltd singapore 10.48

spc - bukit merah singapore 37.22

the damage: $3,024.26!!

after taking a breather and an escape from a near-cataclysmic seizure, i decided to make ado about my squandering ways. plastics are good when you run out of cash. but let's face it, the downside is that you never know when to stop.

i had come up with a solution, and a brilliant one it was: stop using credit cards altogether and allot myself a weekly allowance. twenties for weekdays and fifties for weekends. exceptional situations when credit cards can be exercised would be for gas refills or of utmost emergencies. so far, it's been working well for me for the past four days. i'll just have to wait it out to see how long i can sustain...

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the entry where my cerebrum does the talking

the following are a couple of examples of what my brain throws up from time to time, albeit in an altogether haphazard, loony fashion.

in a world where alicia keys has become the standard de facto for elevator music, logic is ... well, logical, and there's no two ways to a math answer, i have always pondered upon what it would be like to be living on a plane where all sense of rationality was thrown off balance. what if poverty was the ideal norm, social crimes were celebrated, and the pinnacle of dsytopia was what everyone seeked? would a society as such self-annihilate?

after a month-long hiatus from gym and an even longer sabbatical from work, i have begun throwing myself into the throes of these two entities. as rewarding as the gym workouts have been after only a couple sessions (i am after all a mesomorph, according to my friend chronos), i seriously am beginning to doubt the theory of "you reap what you sow" when it comes to my profession. nevertheless, i am not giving up hope. yet.

valentine's day is around the corner, and being single, though not miserable, is a straight ticket to not enjoying this occasion at all. i do hope the damned cupid aims a shot or two at me the next year around. i certainly cannot fathom the idea of being single two years in a row.

i would like a well-balanced life like most. i simply don't fancy staying up till the eerie hours of the morning and getting up the following day still tuckered out, despite the adequate (but irregular) hours. the past two nights have been pretty eventful for me: i was in a deep slumber before midnight beckoned, though i slept for way more than ten hours on both accounts. reminder: reel in the sleeping hours for other activities.

so, what goes on through the back of your head?

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the cookiedough status

cookiedough is feeling a little raunchy and wonders if it has anything to do with the full moon.

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the entry of minute spring cleaning

my aspiring lottery-striker of a friend gave me a tip on better sleep at night (or in the afternoons, if i'd like): shifting the position of the bed such that it points to a snooze-inducing orientation.

so it was with much ado, beneath the torrent of silent protestation, that we (my acquiescent maid fe and i) relocated my bed. unfortunately, i was too anxious dishing out instructions and speed-shifting that i completely forgot about the anchoring burden of the bed versus the weedy strength of just two people. the moving around of my furniture left the cemented floor embedded with trails of dents and cracks. we were practically scrapping the floor as we barely hoisted the dense bed above lift level.

more pillage was done at the end of the day

anyhows, disregarding that, i hope my sleeping pattern gets a turn for the better after all that hard bed work. here's a look-ey:

the bookshelf at the far end was where my bed was originally at 

my newly-minted bunk bearing ...

and what happens after i've slept in it.

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