29 Sept
Had a meal with Eric at TYCA when he was near my office area for work.
Miso Brussel Sprouts
Fried Chicken
This was an impromptu birthday treat for him, the meal itself was pretty good and it was also quite affordable for what it was. $15.90 for a Lunch Set in a cafe is a good bargain, considering how I have been spending so much more on sandwiches at the cafes near my gym after Saturday classes.
1st Oct
This was the first time I have actually hung out with a group of the people from gym for something that isn't gym related.
A bunch of us (like 12 - 14 people) decided to get together and celebrate the birthdays of 2 of our gym friends.
The meet up was at 6pm, I originally told the group I will only be able to arrive at 7pm, but after realizing that they have plans to go to the KTV at 8pm, which would effectively only leave me with an hour at the restaurant for my dinner, I decided to just leave work early and got there by around 6.15pm.
It just so happened that my boss had cancelled our usual Thursday meetings, so he didn't come into the office and I only had to tell my accountant my decision to leave early, which she intially told me was fine as long as I don't get caught, but then in that very same breath, said to me...
"Just so you know, boss will usually look at all this kind of things to determine whether you will get a pay raise or not"
... I know she wasn't going to snitch on me, but then I just told her...
"It's not like I am going to get a pay raise anytime soon, I have been here for 3 years and that has never ever been brought up before"
... she just laughs it off and then reiterates that IF there is, this decision will usually affect how much raise I get, and I just rolled my eyes in my head because when I told her months ago about my concerns regarding the lack of any pay raise since I joined the company, she told me not to expect anything because my boss doesn't usually do incremenets and that I should be happy that I have commission, which I do agree with to a certain extent.
She may not be a snitch, but she likes to take subtle jabs at people if they are doing things she doesn't exactly approve of or isn't very pleased with, and she accompanies it with a laugh at the end of her sentences most of the time so as to mask it as a light hearted comment.
Not gonna lie, she has been getting on my nerves quite a bit lately. I'm not sure if it's because I am annoyed with her or if I just have some negative feelings towards my current workplace that it is affecting how I am starting to see her. Thursday company meetings have now also become something I dread because my boss has also been adding new responsibilites on my plate, like keeping in touch with potential clients to make sure they don't run away, and just the things that he used to be responsibile for as the "sales" department, so now when we lose a project, our accountant will indirectly blame the designer for not following up with them closely with her sneaky comments.
I digress...
Here is a photo of the bar, it's a pretty nice spot, we had 2 tables joined together, but because I was actually late, I ended up at the second table, and most of the conversation was happening at the first table, it was a struggle intially.
Then the food came, the drinks came, serving sizes were small, people started moving around and Lily finally joined me and sat beside me to chat, so the evening felt more social after that.
I had 2 drinks here, a Gin & Tonic and one of their own Cocktail creations, I did enjoy the former, but not so much the latter. The entire group of us were there for about 2 hours before we got chased out by one of the staff for overstaying our reservation period, then all of us headed to a KTV place at Cineleisure where we were joined by few more people who couldn't make it in time for the dinner earlier.
The KTV session lasted from around 8.30pm all the way until 11.30pm, I drank probably another 3-4 cups of drink mixer, thankfully no one got full on drunk, so there was no vomitting or people passing out by the end of the session. Some did leave earlier than others, I left with the last of us, which was at 11.30pm, shared a Grab with one of the gym members since we stayed closed by to one another, and managed to get home at around midnight.
What's amazing is a few of us were actually able to show up for gym class the next day at 7am!
Post gym breakfast at Whiskdom on Saturday with Lily and a few others.
My social life now revolves around the friends I have made from the gym class.
3rd Oct
Post gym breakfast at Whiskdom on Saturday with Lily and a few others.
My social life now revolves around the friends I have made from the gym class.
It's actually nice that I was able to get what I had hoped for when I joined the gym because my depression before was caused by social isolation at work, and now I am getting enough socialising to get by. I do still feel lingering effects of the depresson on days when I am actually home the entire day, but it doesn't hit so hard anymore.
Rather than feeling just sadness, I now mainly just feel bored.
4th Oct
Went to IMM to get a new pair of shoes because my Nike, the very first pair of shoes I got for gym class, is now starting to fail on me. The soles are starting to fall off so it felt like a very valid excuse to get a new pair of shoes.
This time, I actually went to try on the Shoes at the Nike outlet shop instead of just looking at them and the ones that I wanted to get, the Nike Free Metcon, those did not feel great to wear. Ended up getting another pair of ON shoes, total damage was $200 because I got the Cloud 6 this time around.
It's just so much more comfortable than the pair of Nike.
6th Oct
Had another birthday gathering for another gym member on Tuesday.
This particular one wasn't as happening as the one at the start of the month, but it was still a pretty nice gathering. It was at a resturant that one of our gym member works at, so we got one of the VIP rooms and were able to enjoy some discounts for the food.
We didn't end up staying as late as the previous party, some of us left earlier than others, I pretty much stayed till the end and then got a ride home from one of the gym members ebcause it was along the way.
10th Oct
Went to JB with two gym friends, Brian and Lily after our Saturday morning session, this was something we had plan months in advance, and Lily and I weren't actually sure if it was still going to happen because we had thought Brian wouldn't be too interested to go anymore because he recently started seeing someone and we thought he would rather spend more time with his girlfriend, but he pulled through like 2 days before the trip and confirmed with us about it.
Brian is important for this trip to actually happen because he is our designated driver.
We left for Malaysia at around 11.30am, and the jam wasn't too bad, but the haze was pretty terrible, this was the view as we were heading towards our first destination.
Brian pretty much had the first half of the trip planned with a perfume workshop, he even made the booking beforehand so Lily and I did almost no planning at all. He had arranged for a 1.30pm class because we thought we would be stuck at the checkpoint for a longer period of time, but since it was pretty smooth, we had lunch first at the spot nearby.
The food was pretty cheap, Brian paid for this.
Then we headed to the perfume workshop studio once we were done.
The vibe isn't as great as the eyecandle studio I had visited in Taipei
But they had a lot more notes to choose from. Lily and I had a great time just going through the different scents and shortlisitng the ones that we liked, or at least I did because Lily kinda got overwhelmed midway through the whiffing.
After about an hour of shortlisitng and mixing the scents, we each finally made our own little bottle, I asked ChatGPT to give my perfume a name based on the scents and that was what it came up with. It's a juniper bamboo scent with peony as the opening note. It did grow on me a little, but as of writing this post, I have gotten bored of the scent, it's too one dimensional compared to the scents that I actullay pay hundreds for.
It doesn't really last because it is an EDT, but it was quite cheap, only $35 for the entire experience, if I had done this alone I would probably have been a bit disappointed by the end result, but the company I was with made this really fun.
After this, we took a stroll along a Pasar Malam, had fried baby crab and some drinks, the baby crabs were nice and crispy, and I got a mango slushie with sour plum powder, it was really refreshing, especially with the warm weather.
When we were done with the Pasar Malam, we headed to a mall nearby because Brian had to get some stuff, so Lily also went to get a buy a few snacks back home and she ended up spending about SGD $200.
Once we were done with the mall, I directed Brian to this cafe I had seen online called Tree In One. This wasn't my first choice, my first choice was to visit another cafe called Mood Cafe because it was more my style in terms of vibes,but sadly that cafe closes at 6.30pm and it was already 5.30pm by the time we were done with our mall visit.
A shot of the cafe's exterior at night.
The interior is pretty cool as well. It wasn't too crowded when we visited, managed to get seated pretty quickly.
And the food offering were all so cheap compared to Singapore, but I have to say, the food themselve weren't really rave worthy, it was quite meh, but for the price I will say it was prety good.
We ended up staying in the cafe till about 7pm, talked about stuff. Brian is the first friend I had made in the gym and Lily is one of my good friends that I have made in the gym, so to have gone on this trip with the both of them was the best combination I could have gotten.
Brian ended up driving us home, literally to our doorstep, it was so nice, I felt so pampered during the entire trip.
12th Oct
We officially made the move to the new office on Monday.
I have spend the last 3-4 weeks packing the old office whenever I had time and to finally move from Whampoa to MacPherson, I am still not sure how I feel about it.
I like the new office because it feels more like an Interior Design company (and because I was also the one who designed the new Showroom), everything about the new Showroom is just so much better than the old Showroom.
What I don't like about the new office however is the location. Travelling time has increased, it now takes me about 15 minutes -20 minutes longer to get home and I have lost access to all the cheap and good food around Whampoa, now when I want to get food, the closest foodcourt is a 10 minutes walk away, and the food selection there aren't great. If I want more selection, I can travel to Paya Lebar, but it requires taking a bus and the food there also aren't neccesarily cheap.
I am just waiting for the realization that I have actually moved to a new office to hit me because I have been at that Whampoa office for more than 3 years now. But then again, that Whampoa office was also where my depression started developing so maybe not so much.
17th Oct
Went for my usual gym class in the morning but didn't have breakfast with anyone after class because I had made plans to meet up with Eric for lunch. And also to collect my Niko Neko Matcha powder from him, plus Lily, my regular Saturday breakfast buddy, was overseas so I didn't really have anyone to have breakfast with anyways.
Eric was late, so I headed over to Hvala at Ngee Ann City for a cup of Genmaicha first, this was about $11, it was a nice cup oof Genmaicha, but it's also quite expensive for just a cup of drink.
Walked over to Paragon when I was done with my drink, I am glad I used to work in the Orchard area because it really familarize me with how the different malls connect to one another and the best route I can take from Ngee Ann City to Paragon without being exposed to the Sun too much.
Our lunch appointment was at this ramen place, called Sanpoitei Ramen, which is apparently quite popular. I wanted to get there first to join the queue, but there really wasn't much of a queue and I was seated within 5 minutes.
Eric arrived maybe like a minute after I was seated and we ordered the food, it was honestly a bit meh, not really my style.
I managed to get my Niko Neko refill so that was nice!
After lunch, we then headed back to Wisma Atria for some dessert.
Shared a slice of cake, this was a pretty good slice of cake. Stayed in the cafe for a while, then made our way to Diptyque because I also wanted to refill my bottle of LePapier, but unfortunately, the store ran out of the refill, so ended up leaving empty handed. I did consider getting a new small bottle of another scent to try, but none of them resonated with me.
After this, we made our seperate ways and went home.
24th Oct
Went for my gym class in the morning, had a quick breakfast with some of my gym friends after class and then came back home and booked tickets to Hong Kong for November.
I'm going to visit Hong Kong in November!
I still have 9 days of leave that cannot be brought over to next year to clear, so this trip will help me clear 5 days, and has also set me back probably between $2,000 - $2,500 depending on how much money I will be spending there. At least it cost less than the iPhone Duo, which was something I had really wanted to get but just could not justify spending that much money on after I started keeping track of my spendings.
Anyways, I have booked the flights and hotel for Hong Kong, am low-key regretting my hotel choice. Ideal location would be to get a hotel located in Hong Kong Island, that's where the more modern spots area, I got a hotel in Jordan, which is at the mainland side and it's the older side of Hong Kong. Been working on an itinerary and all the places that I am interested to visit are on the fucking Island side.
That's what I get for making rash decisions and booking the hotel I booked because I saw it being talked about on TikTok. The room is also small as fuck
25th Oct
Met up with someone I had matched with on Hinge.
I found this restaurant near his place called Madam Flod that specialises in Crepes, I thought we could get different flavors to try...
... and we ended up ordering the same thing.
This was actually really tasty and surprisingly filling. I was struggling a bit by the time I got to like the last few bites.
Went to his place after lunch because he literally lives a 10 minute walk away from the restaurant.
He gave me a house tour, told me the design decisions that were made to come to the final layout and it's houses like this that is just so interesting to experience because walls were removed, layout was reconfigured, it's like everything was thought out very well by his chosen ID.
After that, he offered me some booze in the form of Gin and Tonic and we just kept each other company until it was time for me to go, left his place in time for dinner, which I settled alone at Chinatown Point because he was still full from lunch.
Definitely one of the better dates I have had in a while, but not sure if we would actually meet again in the future.
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