Welcome, 2008!

Happy New Year everyone! =D

Been running around quite a bit lately (shopping, zoo, D.C today!) and so my updates will be so late again. It is also that time of the year where I tend to look back and think about all that I have done (or not done/could have done/should have done!) - now that would be a long story not to be written here for I will bore you to death.

It looks to be snowing on New Year's Day instead of Christmas Day; a case of someone wishing for snow on the wrong day? Have fun anyway, see you next year! ;)

Fuzzy

My favorite stuffed toy, one of the first few gifts from the Husby is turning seven today!

To increase the brown population in the house, I made him a friend - the gingerbread man! Don't they look adorable together?

Merry Christmas

This is specially for Dawn - the Rockefeller Christmas Tree at New York City's Rockefeller Center! Although this may not be the prettiest tree, it is certainly the largest real decorated tree I have even seen in my life. The crowd there was as expected - packed sidewalks that spilling on the roads that had to be closed off. We could not even inch closer to have a look at the ice skating rink below. Anyway, I hope everyone had/is still having a great holiday!

I must admit this is not the best photograph ever, but it was one of the sharpest and you can spot the star. Oh, and here is a little trivia about that star from Wikipedia- The star that has topped the tree since 2004 is 9.5 feet (3 m) in diameter and weighs 550 pounds (249.5 kg)!

Another bonus of this photo? You can also admire the Husby hand and his camera on the side! ;)

On a totally separate note, I am not doing too great now *boo-hoo*The last three days of wondering around NYC has taken it's toil on me (we walked for 10 odd hours on rainy Sunday!) and I am coming down with the flu. So other updates on my trip will be postponed till I am well.

Meanwhile, you can entertain yourselves learning how the Christmas tree is picked for Rockefeller Center (I am glad they used LED lights and that the tree is recycled). And this is one snowman (bottom left hand corner) I have been telling the Husby I want so much; yes I would like to dream in blue too!

Specially for Freo!

We saw this squirrel as it ran across the grass and climbed up the tree, only to freeze at this position you see here at the low branches.

I have always thought that all squirrels hibernate in winter, but I may have been wrong! Judging from this Wikipedia entry, the squirrel above is a Eastern Grey Squirrel, which may be more of a tree squirrel than a ground one; this means it probably has a great store of food gathered in autumn to feed on in winter.

So Freo, does this look like a splitting image of your squirrel friend at home?

Federal Hill - view of Inner Harbor

Click on the photo (taken by the Husby) to see a larger image!

Welcome Violet One!

The Violet one is here in Balmer (Yipee!), and these were the cupcakes we baked together for her birthday - Happy Birthday my dear friend! ;)

As we will be busy exploring the area and stuffing ourselves silly (as you can see from the shadow shot taken at Federal Hill), I will be away from the blog for a while, but I promise I will be back!

Bangkok, tour guide included

Magnet Frog has found a part-time job introducing places for the birds to visit next year! If anyone is interested in going to Bangkok with him as a tour guide, please drop me a line.

Thanks Sis, for the sunny postcard, I wish I could have been there with you shopping, sight-seeing and eating!

I make a good dance partner!

Just yesterday morning, a middle age man with a head with grey hair proposed this to me: "Shall we dance?"!

You see, it was one of those super embarrassing moments I sometimes get - I see someone coming in my path as I am walking, we make eye contact and realise "Hey I in the middle of the path!". Typically this is when we choose to move to the right or left, hence allowing the other party to pass. So I choose to move to my right, and so does the other person! Expectantly, we will all move the the opposite side, again blocking each other's path. Ha, we then stop dead in our tracks, and that was when he asked that question.

My response was "Yes, we should!" with a chuckle as we sauntered off.

Rain rain, go away...

What a rainy Sunday, and another wet week ahead as well (with some probability of snow on Saturday- note the excitement!). Some trivia here - does it rain less on the weekend? Apparently it does, at least in the southeastern part of the US, so is that where Baltimore is??

The day after snow

Snow!

Yipee! First day of snow for this winter in Baltimore! The photo on the right was taken with the flash and so you can see the flakes.

Everyone in the lab thinks I am crazy to be so excited and happy to see snow! Tell me, what is not to like about snow?? ;) It is so adorable to watch the snow flakes fall (they do not seem to go in a straight line!) and it seems so serene. Whats more, snow descends onto the city like a white blanket, transforming the place, giving it a totally different look. The snow even makes the night seems brighter since light reflects off the snow.

But I sure dread the day after the snow, where roads get really icy and slippery! =/

These photos were taken after work when the Husby and I walked home in the one inch of snow. Somehow I have always pictured it would be so romantic to walk when the snow is falling on and around us, and finally today we got to try it out! What I did not count on was the fact that we would not really be holding hands as we really need to stuff our hands into pockets to keep them warm - not so romantic after all! Still, it was fun to take a walk to enjoy this rare sight since it does not snow much in Baltimore.

Maybe we will have a white Christmas this year!

Of December and flurries

First sight of flurries this evening! =)

Brr... It is a very windy day today, but at least there was some sunlight to warm up an otherwise dull Monday. This Wednesday will be really cold, with temperatures of maximum of 36F/2C to 28F/-2C, and who knows, maybe some real snow!

I still cannot believe it is already December! It will be a fun month since there will be Christmas celebrations, which means time away from work. (Hurray!) Back in Singapore, it is also an exciting time for two friends who are having their wedding banquet; congratulations to Cecilia and CT! =)

Woodstock

Last week, a girl from my lab said I sound like Woodstock, from Peanuts. That made me really curious, does Woodstock even make any sounds??

I checked it up on Youtube, and apparently it does! It whistles very well too. Now if only I could do that. Do I really sound like "birdspeak" when I speak?

Freedom!

With a set of wheels, there is now the freedom to go out anytime we want!

No more carrying groceries for 5 blocks (hence cutting down our exercise and we may end up growing fat!) and renting cars to explore Maryland. Instead the worries now are to remember where we left the car at the parking lots and if we have enough quarters for paying for parking.

In addition, I will start a new series of photographs too, just like the one above...

Yesterday we drove out to Hunt Valley Towne Center to have tea with these deers... Just kidding there! =) These deers were spotted at the Towne Center as part of their Christmas decorations, I could not resist snapping a photo of them (albeit a lousy one - I blame the cold weather! ;P ). There is a Filene basement there, which one the main reason why we decided to go all the way up north to explore the area (lovely place by the way!).

For some strange reason, I have always pronouced it as "Feline" rather than "Filene", ha, I am still getting all my words mixed up!

Breakfast

Breakfast of youtiao (I am amazed there is even a Wikipedia entry!) and soy milk, all from H-mart - these really remind me of what food I miss in Singapore! The Husby and I chanced upon the youtiao (deep-fried dough) in the cold section of H-mart, which only required us to pop them into the oven to heat up for 3 minutes. Easy-peasy!

My only regret was not saving some of the sinful youtiao to dunk into the Bak kut teh soup. Maybe next time then!

Loves

I love this photo, for some strange reason....

Maybe it is the blue skies, or how the leaves are so yellow and in contrast to the orange town-houses.

Or it could be that I am in love with the person who has a penchant of standing in the middle of the road to take photographs =)

Cyber Monday

I just learnt that today is Cyber Monday, the Monday following Black Friday whereby the online sales start! Ha, all a ploy to make us part with our money. Also see "Buy nothing day".

Last Friday, the Husby and I only arrived at the shopping mall past 11am, which is considered late because we have missed those sales that started from say 7am to 10am. Still, we managed to find the things we needed without tearing our hair out and fighting through the crowd. I survived my first Black Friday, with some money left in my wallet too!

Just in case you are in the mood for more shopping, here is the Cyber Monday website. I bet everyone felt a little blue today as after having four good days of resting, eating, and shopping, we have to get back to work. Boo-hoo!

In any case, another count down begins right now - Christmas Day! =)

The birds, gecko and one cool frog

Last week, we had a postcard from personalised postcard from Geico welcoming us aboard, and I must admit that the Gecko is really cute! Thus I saved the postcard and pinned it up on the fridge where the birds were...

Suddenly, something green hurled into their view, greatly startling the birds.

It was the Magnet Frog! He had just arrived in the mailbox as well, and was really hungry from his long journey. As such he dived straight for the Gecko, hoping to satisfy its hunger.

To the embarrassment of the Magnet Frog, that was only a postcard of the Gecko!! He then decided to play it cool and pose beside the car. (He does look pretty darn cool there!) Little did he know what the birds were plotting...

Thanks Dawn for the cute Magnet Frog - he has found his spot on the fridge! =)

Favorites

Move over spring, fall is now my favorite season!

Happy Thanksgiving!

It is my first ever Thanksgiving Day in the US! Boy am I so very happy that I have two days off (Thanksgiving Day, which is every fourth Thursday of Nov and the day after Thanksgiving), which makes my weekend super duper long! Yippee! ;)

This morning I dragged Fuzzy and Swede from the comforts of bed out to the living room to watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV, which started way back in 1924 according to this Wikipedia entry. The actual parade takes place every year in New York City, and it was estimated some three million people lined the streets to watch the action - imagine that is almost the entire population of Singapore!

This year a large helium balloon of Kermit the frog made a come-back which was of course the highlight for the frog-lover in me. How I wish I was there to watch these giant inflatables float past overhead (but beware, there has been accidents before with these large balloons and overhead lamps), or better still, from right out my window! I think Baltimore had a parade last week at the Harbor area, but we missed it. For more photos of the Macy's floats, you can find it here.

Swede and Fuzzy enjoying the parade, especially the finale with Santa Claus coming by on his float.

The first time I have seen such an empty Charles Street! Where has everyone gone to?

Thanksgiving Day gives me the feel of Chinese New Year back in Singapore, as most people have traveled home to be with family, and plus the fact that everyone is talking about the feast. I definitely noticed that everyone is in a festive mood. As of last weekend and last night, everyone was doing their last minute grocery shopping. I think all shops and eateries would be closed tonight, even McDonalds was only open from 6am to 12pm today! All the major shopping malls were shut today too. They must be preparing for Black Friday, which is the day after Thanksgiving. (You can learn more about the origins of the name here) There are plenty of sales tomorrow morning which start from 4am (I kid you not!) till noon, and I hear that the practice is that most will start queuing from tonight. In fact, some shops are already offering discounts today, which could jolly well spark off what may eventually be known as "Brown Thursday"!

I am still debating if I should sacrifice some beauty sleep for door-buster sales to find another winter coat... What a tough decision to make! Perhaps some shopping would be a good way to burn off the calories, especially after the devouring a whole 3.77Ib roasted chicken! At the last minute, the Husby and I decided on making this Spicy Rapid Roast Chicken (which turned out superb in my opinion!) instead of turkey since we could not possibly finish such a large bird. This is the only photograph I have of the 2-hour roasted chicken, or what is left of it. The burnt bits are the stuffing that did not fit into the chicken.

And ha... I got the larger part of the wish bone; now I must wait for my wish to come true! =)

Of last week and the coming week

A hastily snapped photograph before the members of my lab descended on the 144 pieces of sushi we catered for lunch last week - we were a bunch of hungry scientists!

I did not take any photographs over the weekend as the weather has been very dreary and I dislike whipping out my camera under such conditions. Instead here is an old photograph I found in my file, of the skyline of downtown Baltimore at dusk. This is what I do when we have boring long meetings - I would be gazing longingly at the buildings in the distance, wishing I would float away on the cloud!

Anyway, hope all of you have a great week ahead. I am sure I will since it will be a short work week and I can spend the next three days debating about turkey - hip hip hurray! =)

Upside down Christmas tree

I cannot help putting this onto my blog - upside down Christmas trees! Here are more from flickr. Apparently these trees have been around for a while, but it is truly the first time I have come across such a thing and heard of it's existence. It looks so odd isn't it? I do not even want to think what an upside down tree could mean! One thing for sure, if I ever get a tree, it will not be this - this ain't natural!

Jelly cup anyone?

Swede saw us eating this last weekend, and scooted over to investigate what is it we were eating. "This looks interesting!" he quipped.

I certainly was very happy to see these lychee-flavoured jelly cups sold at H-mart, and could not resist grabbing one large jar off the shelve. As the Husby and I stood in line to pay for our groceries, we were interrupted by a man standing in the next line. "I read from the Internet that these jellies are bad for the children! They can choke on it!" he said something to this extend. At the back of my mind I wanted to say "No! These are all for ME and not for my children!" In the end, we thanked the good samaritan for his word of advice, but proceeded to checkout with jar nonetheless. These jellies simply remind me of my childhood days where it was so much fun to peel off the silver lining and slurp the insides- I am sure you still remember those days!

However, as a word of caution, I did indeed find an FDA article dated back in 2002 on how these jellies are choking hazards to infants, young children and the elderly. Just be careful when you eat them. As for Swede, after learning of the probability of choking, he chickened out of tasting one. All the better, it is all mine! ;)

Meet my purple bunny slippers

No winter is warm without bunny slippers! (Psst, Walmart has them at $5!) My last pair has retired as they were way dirty, and washing them just ain't the same anymore.

I just hate how I misplace these bunny slippers. Sometimes they will be at my writing table, or beneath the dining table. I believe sometimes they walk off to watch TV in front of the couch, which is what you see here! Perhaps they love to keep Dinosaur the dragon company! (When we bought the rug, I was calling it the Dinosaur rug for some strange reason, hence the name of the dragon) If only there were bunny slippers that come to you when you call them!

Dim sum

I know this is not a photo of dim sum, but of the hour-long journey to enjoy the small delights at Oriental East at Silver Springs. As usual I must snap a photo of all the trees in their glorious colors. Unfortunately it was rather cloudy yesterday, and this photograph looks really white-washed. I still like it, as I can see myself! ;)

The dim sum was great, and all of us ate till we were stuffed, for only $13 per person with tip! Very satisfying indeed. There are no photos of food as I was busy stuffing myself silly. Maybe next time then!

Shoes

Hers and His - I think his shoes are making eyes at mine!

New tenants

During dinner tonight, the Husby and I heard a noise we have been dreading since we moved in- squeak squeak! Nope, we are not talking about any neighbour's squeaky mattress, but rather our furry new rodent tenants.

We have yet to see the mouse/mice, but it is probably a matter of time before we see it them. :/ I wonder if I can collect rent from them??

Caught in the act!

I was trying to grab some Norwegian Cinnamon Buns (recipe from How to be a Domestic Goddess) while the Husby was busy taking photographs. These mighty tasty buns (I know they do not look pretty, but importantly they taste good!) make the apartment smell of cinnamon, which is lovely on cold days. It makes me want to stay home even more!

Day light savings

Day light savings started on 4th Nov over at Baltimore, and we are now 13 hours behind Singapore!

The shifting of the time back one hour is great especially in the morning since there is more light when we leave for work. However, the same cannot be said for when we leave work. The day is getting much shorter now, and by 5pm it is already pretty dark, much like the 7pm in Singapore. It is certainly very depressing to leave work when it gets dark!

The other problem is not all the clocks have been set to the right time either. The computers in the lab switched their time way back last week according to the old date for the start of day light savings (sometime in October), which meant that there had been occasions last week where I was ecstatic as I thought for once I can go home at 4.30pm, when in actual fact it was 5.30pm.

I am not complaining that I now have an extra hour to sleep in! ;) As you all may recall, I was here in early March when time spring forward. How fast time flies by!

Do you like my new banner?

This old banner has retired! In case you were wondering, all the stick figures took it well when news broke of their retirement; none of them threw a tantrum and demanded to be in the new banner. Phew, that was not as difficult as I thought it would be and I was even prepared to throw in a holiday to appease them! Perhaps the stick figures were all more than happy to have their five months of fame!

Which reminds me, someday I have got to tell the shadow in my new banner that she has to retire too... I wonder if she would get mad at me and run away. Boo-hoo, I cannot imagine how life would be like without my shadow!

Autumn

Why I love autumn:

The autumn colors are spectacular!

Hues of red and yellow amidst the green make photographs come to live.

Peek-a-boo: Autumn flats are lovely too! ;)

Happy Halloween!

Chicken the frog has been very excited the last few days - why, he has never seen such a big orange frog before! It does not look quite evil, as a matter of fact, it looks like it has a cheeky expression all day long. Whats more, this frog glows in the dark and keeps him warm!


I think he looks so absolutely adorable sitting there in awe of his new frog friend. And of course, the rest of the toys were buzzing around their new pumpkin friend as well. They love how he keeps them warm in the cold of the coming winter, and smells lovely too.


Alas, I wonder how I am going to tell them that this pumpkin frog would not survive past tomorrow (he is showing signs of drying up badly), it is not going to be easy to remove the pumpkin given how the toys surround it day and night.


On a separate note, someone at work left some Halloween pretzels and chocolates by the lift, and that certainly made me feel happy that I did not have to go trick-or-treating to get some candies. Another interesting event today was about our new colleague from Japan, and he came up to ask me at the end of the day what exactly is this Halloween! He was so puzzled why is everyone going around saying "Happy Halloween" and exclaimed that there is no such thing in Japan. In case you are wondering too, you can find out more here.







And Happy Halloween! I will now leave you with my favorite photograph of my pumpkin, carved by the Husby based on a pattern I found online here and absolutely had to have!

Thank you Blursotong!

Honey, I wanna go to Melbourne! Let's go there after Laos yah?

Thank you for the the postcard from Melbourne Blursotong, I keep forgetting to post this up! The card arrive sometime last week - a pleasant surprise that always bring a smile to my day! ;) Now summer must be warming up over there (or in Singapore, it is summer all year round!), it sure beats the cold I am experiencing here. Catch up with you soon!

Jeans woes

Yesterday I was shopping for a pair of jeans at Old Navy as I desperately wanted another pair. You must understand that buying jeans here is not as simple as in Singapore. Either than the size, I have to look for the length, which is of course short for me given my height or lack there of.

In fact, I still recall the first time at Gap, I was wondering why the shortest pair of jeans were labeled with an "A". Asian perhaps? It turned out to be "Ankle". Ha!

So as I was saying, I was hunting for the right pair of jeans when the sale assistant came up to me to help me. I told him the size, and he said that unfortunately it was all out-of-stock. "However, you could try the girls' department!"

Come on, I am not all that small! There is no chance those jeans would pull up past my hips. Sadly, the jeans I love to get my hands on were out-of-stock online too. Sigh, next time I shall buy more jeans when I return to Singapore then!

Project pumpkin II

Peek-a-boo!

I got vaccinated. Did you?

Beaming Swede, with a sticker that says "I got vaccinated. Did you?". He took my sticker because he finds that the colors match his shirt; I agree with him! =)

But between you and I, I must say that the main reason is because he is afraid he has to go for the flu vaccination, as he once mentioned that he is afraid of needles. Thus with the sticker, it implies that he has already has his shot and no more needles! Maybe next time I can get Swede the nasal spray vaccination instead!

I took the flu vaccination last Friday, as it is mandatory at work (unless you sign the declination form). It is my first time taking the flu vaccination, since in Singapore I never quite felt the need for it. Since I get the vaccination without paying a penny now, I decided to give it a try even though I remain somewhat skeptical about it's ability to protect against the flu (It is just me!). I was thankful I took the shot on my left arm, because it ached for the entire day. In the dead of the night, I woke up with very bad muscle ache, side effect of the vaccination. Two painkillers certainly did the trick and I slept like a log through the night.

One word of caution, if you are allergy to eggs, do not get the vaccine! Influenza vaccine is grown in eggs. You can also choose between a inactivated (killed) vaccine, or the live attenuated (weakened) vaccine. Did you also know that the flu vaccine is different every year? Scientists try to predict which viruses is likely to be on the rise, and engineer the vaccine to protect against those viruses based on surveillance and epidemiology data.

Never enough sunshine

I think my photographs for leaves still leave much room for desire. For starters, I need to grow taller - most leaves in my neighbourhood not within my eye level to take a real close-up shot!

Meanwhile, autumn has descended onto Baltimore, with a dreadful rainy week to kick start the cold season. Tonight it is a cool 11 oC. How I miss the sunshine now; send me some sunshine please!

Research and Nobel Prize 2007

Sometimes when I am free at work (which by the way is really rare!) I sneak into the conference room at the opposite end and read whatever scientific journals they have on display.

It never fails to fascinate me what are the latest findings in scientific research. What makes it more exciting is to learn that the authors that publish some of the papers occasionally could have been the very same people occupying the next lab. Today I am pleasantly surprised to learn that Nature has a journal club site. Maybe someday I will find the courage to share my thoughts on certain topics, namely transcription and translation.

Last year I had a short write up on Nobel Prize winners 2006, so I thought I should keep up with the tradition. Personally I think it is good to catch up with what else is going on in the scientific community and not to be stuck at the bench all day long! This year's winner for Chemistry is Gerhard Ertl, which according to the Nobel site, "for his studies of chemical processes on solid surfaces". I do not have much to comment on this, for chemistry is half Greek to me (physics is the real Greek!). According to my ex-boss, every other year the prize for Chemistry goes to a biochemist, and this year it goes to the chemists. I definitely would be very eager to find out who the award goes to next year!

As for the prize for Medicine, Mario R. Capecchi, Sir Martin J. Evans, Oliver Smithies share the honor "for their discoveries of principles for introducing specific gene modifications in mice by the use of embryonic stem cells". It never quite crossed my mind that someone would win the Nobel prize for developing this technique, which has been widely used in mice work. One of the reasons was the fact that when I learnt of RNA interference, there was much hype about it, thus I knew it was only a matter of time that RNA interference would win something, whereas a technique as simple as gene targeting has been around for sometime. On retrospect, it was last year's award to RNA interference that threw me off the loop; usually the very established techniques win the prize, not so much the recent discoveries.

Hope I did not bore you there! =P

Let's talk about global warming

On our way back from the supermart yesterday with tons of groceries in our hands, we passed two men (the Husby thinks they are more like punks) on the street. One of them was carrying two bags of garbage. We were happily minding our own business, but much to my surprise, one of them had this to say to me as he passed by: Happy global warming!

It caught me off guard all right, I mean what do you say to that? Same to you?

All these discussion about saving the environment and global warming is common these days, as it is evident in the Nobel Peace Prize 2007. There are also more blogs on these topics, which hopefully will help to spread the message that each and everyone of us can do our part. As for myself, I will be certainly be more mindful of the number of plastic bags we take, and definitely try to reduce our usage. After all, did you know that frogs extinction is linked to global warming? That's right, what will we do without frogs! (Never mind the fact that we will probably be suffering extreme temperatures then, but we surely cannot do without these lovely amphibians!)

I never doubted global warming, (partly because they drilled it into me in school) but it was put to the test when I read Micheal Crichton's State of Fear a long time back. I did not quite expect that the book would actually say that global warming is not real (do not quote me there, but it was something to that extent). If you are going to read the book, I say take it with a pinch of salt yah?

Meanwhile, if you are racking your brains to figure out what to do with your plastic shopping bags, you can consider some plastic crafts. However, I would strongly suggest we just try to reduce the number of bags we use, or recycle them. Maybe you can try to say "Happy global warming!" to strangers too, to see their reactions and hopefully get them thinking! (Don't blame me when you get punched in the face!)

Also read: Say the magic words (4) and BYOB

Project pumpkin II

Almost forgot about posting this up!

Project pumpkin is about the first pumpkin that I have ever craved since this tradition of pumpkin craving is not popular in Singapore. Since I am in the US now, I did not want to let the chance slip me by. This pumpkin is for specially for Fairy God Sister! =)

It was disappointing to find out that there are no elves and fairies in the pumpkin, obviously that is not where they stay. Maybe just not in this pumpkin - I should cut open more to investigate!

Back to my project, so that next thing to do is to scoop everything out. The seeds and the fibrous strings are a hassle to remove, but with some determination it will be cleaned out. Keep the seeds so you can roast them to make some yummy pumpkin seeds. On the right are the templates I used to crave the pumpkin; you can download it here.

Use some tape to secure the pattern onto the pumpkin, and using a pin, trace the pattern onto the pumpkin. Do you see the kitty cat?

Next, use a small sharp knife to cut out the pattern. I left this to the Husby since I am terrible with knifes.

The final product - the cat is alive!

The stuffed toys came around to admire the final product, and were quite happy to have more warmth in the cool apartment. Except the birds. They were trembling at the edge of the chair, wondering if it was safe for them since technically, cats eat birds. Even after I tried to explain to them that the cat is not real, the poorthings were still afraid.

Now that I think about it, I should have assured them to seek help from the latest hero in the house: Super Swede! ;)