Goofball

Rupert is as endearing as he is goofy. Or maybe it's the silly part of him that makes him endearing. He has just tried to climb up on my lap as I sit typing.

When he was a puppy, I used to plop him on my lap when I was on the computer, it was the only way I could make sure that he was not being naughty somewhere else.

Now, he's too big to fit on my lap but that doesn't stop him from trying to get up. He tried to lie down for a while but as his backside gradually slid down my legs, he gave up and decided to take a nap on the floor instead.

He's got a whole lot of floor to choose from, but had to lie on my work bag where I'd dropped it in one corner. It can't be too comfortable to lie on because there're pokey things in it like an umbrella and a Walkman.

But hey, this is the dog that will sleep with a chewie bone sticking into his ribs.

More animals

And now, we've got birds. There're a bunch of pigeons and sometimes a couple of mynahs who come to use the water pooling from the moisture from the aircon as their drinking fountain.

I'd worry when that drinking fountain becomes a swimming pool.

Poetry in motion

We were walking on the path across the field to the mall when the wind blew a child's parasol across the grass. There's a haiku in there somewhere, L remarked.

It also seemed like a good time to test the camera in the new cellphone.



Yellow umbrella
Wind-waltzing across the field.
Who will dance with me?

Call me anytime

... because I now have two cellphones. I don't really know what to do with two since with just the one, it was already underused but I guess I can now accessorise with them -- I can either carry the pink or silver one to match what I'm wearing for the day.

My service provider offered me the sleek silver Sony Ericsson free if I renewed my contract for another two years. Since I'm sticking with them anyway because of my corporate plan, I decided to take up the offer. The previous phone, the hot pink one, was also free, from the last two-year contract.

This new one is armed to the teeth with a web browser; magnetic mouse pointer for surfing; picture and video blogging; web feeds ticker; Google maps -- all of which I don't know how to use.

Would you believe it, I mostly use my cellphone to make phone calls?

Before and after

Someone needs a haircut...



... and got one.

Poor thing was so worn out by the trauma that she practically fell asleep on her paws, even though she had just been harnessed and leashed to go for a walk.

Three's a crowd

Rupert had painstakingly dragged Big (when you buy two stuffed dogs, one big and one small, it's a stroke of genius to name them Big and Small) into his crate. Then he realised that there wasn't a whole lot of space inside after that so he sat at the doorway to contemplate what to do. Then he keeled over and had a nap. When you're a Dog of Little Brain, thinking is a very strenuous affair.

HRH, meanwhile was having her nap on the couch. When she woke up and discovered that Big was in Roop's crate -- which she annexes sometimes for a nap -- she tried to take things in paw.


There isn't room in here for all three of us.

Not one of mine

This isn't Rupert. It's Jagger, who yesterday afternoon followed us upstairs to check out the new toys.

He and Roop had a delightful game of chase around the apartment, which both couldn't quite call off even though both were tired. Roop ran into his crate but Jagger only went in after him. Roop then squirmed out, and E shut the door on Jagger, who didn't mind being shut in a strange crate at all but promptly lay down for a breather.

What on earth did I buy?

So I'm taking the receipts out of my wallet after a hard day's shopping yesterday and checking them. I can just about make out Kalas Cutlery, Brada Laptop Su, Blund Soft Toy, Grono Table Lamp, Sparsam Blb (bulbs for the Grono), Heat Pot Stand, Sagolik Jar and Gosig Golden So (2x -- so that must be the two stuffed dog toys).

But what were Bastis Blond PA, Rationell Vaire, and more worryingly, Forsiktig Child -- what, I bought a child yesterday?

New toys -- for both me and the furkids

The thing about shopping at Ikea is that after you get what you went there for, you wander around the displays and end up buying a whole lot of stuff that you didn't think you'd need until you saw that it existed.

Such as the laptop tray. It's hard plastic on one side, just nice to put a laptop computer on, and soft cushion on the other side, so it rests comfortably on your lap. Nifty invention, much better than having a breakfast-in-bed tray that I used to use when I was using the laptop on the sofa or in bed.

We also bought some stuffed toys for the furkids. Ikea is one of the few places where the children's toys are pretty good for dogs too because the eyes are embroidered on rather than buttons, ie, no little bits that the dogs can bite off. So we got a big dog and a small dog -- for our big dog and small dog.



HRH: It's bigger than me, whaddaya expect me to do with it?


Heave ho! Hmm, it's not working.


So if I can't move it, I can use it as a cushion.


Roop: Big is not a problem for me!

Watching the watcher

Night has fallen and the curtains are drawn, but nothing stops the Queen from watching over her realm.

Four dog night

I came home last night to find an extra furry welcome -- two doggy neighbourhood friends, Jagger and Diamond, had popped round for a visit. The dogs -- and their humans -- had meet in the field downstairs on their respective evening walks and decided to come up for some wine (for the humans).

Need a tissue?

One of the little idiosyncrasies of Singapore living is to chiope (reserve) a seat at the food court/hawker centre by placing a packet of tissue paper on it before you go off to get your food.


It was a damn smart agency to put this slogan on giveaway tissue packets as an ad for an online air ticketing/booking site.

In Tokyo, pocket-sized tissue packets like these are practically an advertising medium -- you can't leave or enter a subway station without having them shovelled at you. I used to think that the Japanese never needed to buy tissue paper -- C, my Tokyo friend, certainly never did. He once said that if he felt a cold coming, he'd head to the subway for tissue before he'd head to the pharmacy for cold tablets.

Are you a leader?

The Malaysian ruling party has gone from dismissing (political content) blogs as rumour mills to saying that candidates for some party posts must have blogs. Guess they underestimated the reach of blogsphere in last month's elections.

"All candidates must have blogs," the Umno general-secretary told AP. "If not, they are not qualified to be leaders."

Which must make a lot of people I know more qualified for leadership than the people now ensconced in Parliament House.

Life with dogs

I'm beginning to think that Hillary Price, the genius cartoonist behind Rhymes With Orange has a spycam in my house...


... that's how it is on our couch, in our bed -- two small dogs that occupy a very big space.

Back to work

It took a week off work to lessen (but not completely eradicate) the stiffness in my shoulders. And it took one day back at work to tighten them up again. Sigh.

L said that while I was gone, the dogs would get up from their naps and walk around the house, peer into the rooms, as if looking for me. They weren't upset or anything, it was more like they thought they were playing a game of hide and seek with me, he said.

Queeni yipped sharply at me when I came back, as if scolding me for playing the game for too long. Rupert bounced at me -- but then he does that even if I'd just stepped out for a minute to take out the trash. But at least Queeni gave me her customary face-washing welcome. Maybe that was the joy of leaving the house -- the welcome you get when you return home. I hadn't had a doggy facial for a week. I don't care what my mother says about dog licks and hygiene, I think my face is all the better for a doggy kiss.

Today is Qing Ming, the Chinese tomb sweeping festival, where you're supposed to honour your ancestors. So, quite understandably, when we took a taxi to the crematorium yesterday, the cabbie thought that we were going to the columbarium part of the complex.

It was the first time we were going to the new crematorium/columbarium complex at Mandai and I wasn't familiar with its layout. The cabbie knew how to get there but didn't know where to drop us off. Telling him that we wanted to go the crematorium and not the columbarium didn't help, he didn't speak much English and clearly couldn't tell crematorium from columbarium (and who could blame him), and I didn't know the Chinese equivalent. Telling him "the funeral place" also didn't help, he couldn't distinguish funeral from the joss sticks and paper offering thing you're supposed to do at Qing Ming.

Finally he had a communication brainwave. "Ancestor or burn?" Which in a nutshell, got the columbarium/crematorium thing down pat.

"Burn," I answered weakly, trying to dimiss mental images of was going to take place in the next hour.

Eddie would have thought that's funny.

Other people's words

Eddie's best friend, Q, in his eulogy, said we should publicise Eddie's blog because otherwise it is a loss to the blogosphere and to journalism, so here it is. I never even knew until today that Eddie had a blog. All this time he was reading mine for the doggy pictures, he never told me about his, named after his dog too. There's a pix of Sophie on it

More eulogies from other people, because I have run out of words

Remgold

Obituaries in The Straits Times and The Business Times

Obit in My Paper

Tributes from media colleagues

More tributes

Eok.net.

Yellow Canaries

No words

Men deal with shock by withdrawing to the couch with beer. Women go get their hair done. My hair now has streaks of copper and ash in different shades. Thanks, I think, Eddie.

What is there to say when you've just returned from the funeral of a friend? I look at the entry of a few days ago, where I thought I'd spend my days off from work doing this, that and the other and it is laughable. Plans of mice and men, the gods giggled, etc. And I had written about how strange it was, to think that eventually I spent my birthday at a wake. Eddie's widow shares my birthday. How much more she had to go through.

The funeral was kinda funny in that you could straightaway tell which were the media people (E's job for 20 years) and the PR people (he left journalism to join a PR agency last year). The journos had open-necked shirts, some with their shirt tails sticking out, were in sneakers or sockless. The PR people wore ties, jackets, suits and hid behind sunglasses -- the women looked like Jackie O at Kennedy's funeral. The two camps were sitting on opposite sides of the funeral hall. And ever the split between.

A PS from the previous entry -- Sophie may come over to stay for a while. Queeni had better be nice. Rupert will love to have a new girlfriend.

Still sad

At Eddie's wake, all I could think of was Sophie the grey mini Schnauzer (who was mentioned along with the family in the obit), forced to stay home while everyone else was at the funeral parlour. How do you explain to a patiently waiting dog what happened?