how would you like being pistachio?

so one time we were walking home from the gym and this lady walks past fede and brushes her hand up his crotch. i was walking behind talking on the phone so i didn't notice and get up and slap her across her face.

as we were walking up the stairs i mope about why he ALWAYS gets the attention and no guys ever tickles my behind as i walk by (not that i really want that of course) and he explained it oh so diplomatically using the analogy of ice cream (because i can obviously relate better):

you are like pistachio you know? so good but not everyone likes pistachio.
i am like chocolate. everyone likes chocolate- few people you meet will not like chocolate ice cream.
but pistachio...pistachio is one of those flavours... not as many people may like pistachio, but the ones that do LOVE it.
chocolate is so generic, but pistachio is unique and special.

i guess maybe i like being pistachio then. and i know lynette LOVES it too (pistachio flavour from ciao bella that is). ;)

i've made up my mind to leave my job in jan next year. for those who have heard this repeatedly, the more i announce it, the more pressure i have to live up to it.
i am no longer challenged and excited by my job and because my account is doing so well, i can pretty much look good without having to bust my ass to do so.
so with the extra time i have i am trying to enrich my life with classes at nyu, gmat, gym etc. i feel like my life has taken a very wholesome turn since the year began and i am finding a renewed energy for what the future holds.
i have mapped out the next year and a half on google calendar so as not to let my "gap" year go to waste. ironic how desperate i am to leave the structure and rigidness of corporate life, yet i struggle for discipline and timeliness outside of it.
in the pipeline is a few weeks in indonesia attending forest management school, internship in amsterdam, community project in ghana or tanzania, marine conservation in madagascar... lots to do and suddenly the 9/10 months i have don't seem so long anymore.

pictures from mexico

i've been on a rampage lately for summer dresses so naturally my curious eye spies all these cute dresses on other girls and i think oh now if only i had that...

so yesterday i am walking down broadway towards my house and i see this girl wearing a cute tunic dress with a brown print. i am thinking oh how pretty i wish i had something like that too....until 2 minutes later i turn onto houston and i lo and behold - the same dress, but on a bus-stop poster ad for TARGET- tarjay!! and as i walk by the next bus stop, the same tunic dress! i cannot decide if it is worse to be spotted in the same thing as someone on the street or to be spotted in the same thing as an advertisement. not so bad i guess if the ad is say gucci, but TARJAY... even me, self-proclaimed budget queen would get a little red in the face if i saw my reflection in a busstop ad for a discount retailer.

messico was amazing. we landed in cancun and went straight to the car rental shop. after half an hour of paperwork etc we finally get into our car, with me in the driver's seat because fede lost his license. i start the engine and move my right hand to the gearbox only to realize that FUCK this car has manual gears.
so exasperatedly fede teaches me clutch/accelerate, clutch/accelerate, enough for me to make it out the gates where i jerkstop on the side of the road and we switch places.
he was determined to make me learn on the trip but i was even more determined to make sure i never left the passenger seat because i LOVE to fall asleep in a moving car. there is something about the soft whirring that is like a lullaby for me.

so we drove from cancun to merida which is a beautiful colonial town. ok, not beautiful, more like quaint. with pretty colonial buildings, squares and churches. we walked into a church where a wedding was going on and we happily joined in the festivities.

next day we went to chichen itza which was beautiful and the photos will speak for themselves.

we then made out way to tulum, a beach town on the caribbean coast. unlike the rest of riviera "disney" maya, tulum was peaceful and tranquil and left to its own. there were eco lodges dotting the beach but each lodge had only a few cabanas so there was no overcrowding. we got a cabana right on the beach and even slept on the beach under the stars one night (the wind actually kept the mosquitoes away)

went cenote (cavern) diving one day and lay on the beach for hours. bliss. i cannot understand how anyone can enjoy a ski vacation after being on a beach holiday. ski trips for me are like fucking torture because you fall again and again down the slope in freezing temperatures, your feet get soaked in your boots, you have to bundle up 24/7, your nose is about to fall off from the cold and you eat like a monster because you're always starving.

last stop before leaving was playa del carmen which reminded me of a phuket or bali. we stayed at hotel basico which was boutique but unpretentious.

pictures to follow.

have you noticed on almost all Singapore Airlines ads, the WHITE business man is as prevalent as the iconic singapore girl? first of all it seems that singapore airlines has not come out of the colonial era- why not the indian techbillionaire or the chinese towkay? second, it perpetuates the shoulda-been-long-gone image of the spg- i mean, what with the beautiful subservient female in a sarong kebaya??!! aiyoh...

a few days ago i signed up for singaporeday and after registering successfully, i tried to sign fede up for it, only to receive an error message saying registration has been closed due to overwhelming response. in the last 30 seconds?? oh well just his luck.

two days later, as singaporeday frenzy broke out again, adele reminded us to register. i told her registration had been closed and i was one of the last people to get in. she said no cannot be, checked with her friend, only to find out that you have to register people as singaporeans! so i did, and it worked!!

i don't know if it was a glitch in the system or the organizers had a powwow and said, eh we got too many people leh how ah? aiyah easy lah- when we get to 500 signups we stop all foreigners and just allow only singaporeans lah. but make sure to put on the website that we welcome people of all races and nationalities hor.

i went to the annie leibowitz exhibit a few months back and saw demi moore's boobs. naked with nipples included.
the photograph was taken as part of the set of her nude pregnant shots for vanity fair. and maybe because she was preggers, her boobs were droopy and unattractive and not full and perky like you'd expect a celeb to be endowed with.

see, even celebrities are not immune to the cruelties of nature- how much less are we mere mortals???

and the other day i saw a colleague of mine and thought to myself- hmm, she looks like she put on some weight.
two weeks later i thought- wow she really let herself go- look at that tummy!
then i thought- hmm... maybe she's pregnant? i decided to ask someone at work who was close to her.
"hey, is Y pregnant?"
nick: "yeah!? like for four months now!! what- you think she just really PORKED up??"
"haha... erm"

pregnancy is not really beautiful i fear.

back in action!! woo hoo!!! gone is the lull that was plagueing my life for the past two weeks.
it is back and better than ever before.

my dress code of late has been my black danskin capri tights with anything comfortable and roomy on top.

what started out as comfy and practical-for-the-fall workout gear soon planted its roots in my wardrobe as my homewear, going-out-to-brunch wear, walking-around-soho wear. basically my so-i-never-have-to-think/never-have-to-get-up-and-change wear. so entrenched in my life are these tights that i decided i had to have 4 identical pairs- and i think i will be adding more to my spring/summer/fall/winter collection very soon.

so now, when i am out and about and have to meet fede at the gym, all i need is for him to bring my shoes and a t-shirt (instructions simple enough that guys won't fuck up hopefully) and i'm all ready to walk at high speed and high incline on those treadles!

on the topic of fashion, i have always been sort of a late follower of trends. like i never really got into the skinny jeans or denim mini minis, and i only got my hair rebonded after everyone was already on the curling bandwagon. so on fede's prompting this week i bought my very first pair of converse sneakers- many years behind everyone else i believe. i had always refused to get a pair because i was convinced they made my already big feet look more ronald mcdonald-ish than they needed to look, and also because i'm not a casual shoes person- if i'm going to wear anything comfortable on my feet, they will be slippers (and of course, consistent with my habits, i have more than 5 pairs of black flipflops). but yes, i have succumbed, even if a bit late, to converse sneakers which i will have to try and carve a new style out of. my only consolation is that they were a product(RED) product so i felt like i HAD to do it for the greater good anyway.