Finally, after 3 months of off season, EPL is back!!! Not to mention the Champions League, the Spanish La Liga, the Italian Serie A....

Let the games begin!!! Woot!!!

Yesterday was National Day, the first public holiday for a while. And it was over in a flash, before you know it.

I was involved in one of the NDP parades when I was serving NS, so I'm not very big on catching it on television. It's the few thousand strong choir, the marching contingents, and the mass displays, topped by some fancy fireworks every year.

I'm sure the people putting up the mass displays have been making a lot of effort, and sacrificed a lot of their free time to rehearse for the event. But there reaches a point when you get the feeling that you've seen it once, you've seen them all, if you get what I mean.

Good news elsewhere. Jas' mother has recovered sufficiently to be discharged from the hospital, so she'll most likely be returning home today. Actually, she has been in pretty good spirits for the past few days; she's only in the hospital to undergo the drip on antibiotics, so that the toxic in her blood can be removed. On the other hand, she really needs to watch her diet in the future, so this is something she has to take note of.

So, how was your weekend/holiday?

Thanks to the free satellite photos provided by Google, here is where we stayed in Beijing. Our apartment is the white apartment that is in the centre of the photo. The sandy rectangle to the left is a olympic sized running track with a football pitch in the centre. The slim and long red rectangles on the right is the Beijing West Railway Station.

Marvellous stuff. Too bad the satellite photos for Singapore aren't as detailed.

Been a feel day since I updated anything. Work has been pretty heavy this week, most of it trying to figure out what is happening in the code, before it gets changed everytime I do a CVS update.

Not all has been work though. Somebody found an old but working table tennis table in the storeroom, so we are adding table tennis to the staple entertainment diet of table soccer after office hours.

Jas' mom has been recovering, and should be discharged from the hospital soon. A big thanks to the well-wishers. She's staying for a few more days to cleanse the toxic in her blood. According to the doctors, her condition has been brought along by a history of irregular meal times, and unbalanced diet.

Joo Huat, an ex-colleague of mine, has started a freshwater aquarium for about 4 months, and has taken some pictures of it here. It's very nice, and his selection of fish is very colourful. Take a look.

How has your week been then?

We had a busy 2 days over the weekend. We had dinner with some of our friends on Friday night, and even though it has been a long week, somehow you don't feel like going to bed early on a Friday night.

We did have a lazy Saturday though; I woke up late and watched the marathon of Lost from 12 noon to 5 in the evening. After that, we went for buffet at Traders Hotel. It's a bit pricey, at $42+++ per person, but it is the most enjoyable buffet dinner that I've ever eaten. I ate until I almost puked. The selection of food is just awesome. There were like 6 different sections, each with 4 or 5, and sometimes more, different selections. The special thing was this chocolate fountain, which Jas absolutely adored, where you lance pieces of fruits with a bamboo stick, and dip it into the fountain, and get this glob of molten, shiny chocolate covering your entire piece of fruit...

I had planned to play football on Sunday morning, and then meeting my family for lunch, but I didn't manage to find enough people for football, so I thought I could sleep late and wake up just in time for lunch, but something came up.

Jas' mother, who had been sick with flu for a week, was very ill on Sunday morning. She didn't manage to take in much food during the week, as she often vomitted out what she'd eaten. In fact, she has not been eating for a few days, and she woke up on Sunday feeling very weak. She was admitted to hospital in the morning, and was put under observation. We waited for a few hours before the doctor came to talk to us, and told us that she may have got a lung infection. We were told that they needed to run more tests before they can be sure, so we went for lunch. When we came back from lunch, the nurse told us that she was to be warded for further observations. By then it was 1+ in the afternoon, and we were told to go home first, as beds are mostly available around 3+.

We left the hospital to pack some of her personal belongings for her. By 3.30, the hospital called and told us that they've got a bed for her already. So we went down to the hospital shortly after that. But not before buying 4D for the ambulance number, the ward and bed number.... That's the Seah family for you.

When we reached the hospital, there was another doctor examining her, and he told us that it's either lungs or urinal infection. It's nothing serious but she has to stay warded for a while. In the meantime, they took some tests with her blood, and she went for an X-ray as well. She was put on drip, and as soon as her condition has improved, she can be discharged.

We hope that she recovers soon. It is never good to be ill, especially the elderly. Furthermore, it is especially damaging when she was unable to take in normal food for a few days. It is at times like this, that you realize the importance of a balanced diet. We are, we always are, what we eat.