Holiday is coming!!!

If all things goes well and if the boss have no objection, everyone in PP Det should be standing down on next Monday, 3rd of July to prepare for Independence Day of 4th of July! No Alien space craft should be flying in our orbit and no Alien's beam bringing their devestating lasers upon our skyscrapers, and there obviously won't be Jeff Goldberg and Will Smith launching nuclear missiles into the mothership. Instead we got the Great Independence Day sales coming up on through weekend to tuesday!

I am not American so I won't be able to appreciate the significants of Independence Day, achieved through many bloody civil war battles, creating their National day. Its simply another Holiday and an excuse to wake up late every morning. Hmm so whats in my shopping list? With a S$2291 allowance coming into the bank account, this list should not be modest.

- Linksys Wireless Router WRT64G to replace the bloody f***up Netgear one I have
- DC Adaptor for my car seat massager. Just got it from Edwin, hmm... good for those long trips.
- Playseats Video Game driving seats... www.playseats.com giving authetic feel to racing games
- A Web cam. So you guys can see me and I can see you online! As good as face to face chat.
- Some fishing lures. Lures are pretty cheap and in wide variety right here! This should help me catch a BASS.

- (Optional) Change my car tires. Your car brakes effectiveness is limited by the amount of traction in your tires. Right now my tires is probably 50% worn and that approx reduce braking traction by 50% which equal to longer braking distance. So my new brakes might be generating for example 100% of braking horse power but the tire could only utilize 50% of it without skidding the tires. 4 tire change should set me back at USD$120. Woah...pretty expensive but for safety, its essential if you considering that I have been smelling burn rubber a couple of time I applied hard braking and the tire skidded a bit (Sorry, no ABS here).

So much for the shopping list. Will be heading out for a fishing trip with fellow colleagues later on. This time heading to Grapevine Lake more than 10 mile West from where I stay. Stand by for the Fishing AAR (After Action Report) later tonight.

The night is short...so are those shorts!

The night came late and its really short during summer. This picture was taken at 9.10pm in the evening. Imagine that... Give a new meaning to the word "The night is still young". Take some time to get use the timing....

...But it doesn't take long to get to know all the hot chicks in tight shorts. This ladies are real professional at work. Welcome to the original Hooters.

Blunt, insulting, personnal attack but humourous

I really like watching Comedy Central right here and watch those stand-up comedian, talk show host and programs make fun of stars, the president, the mexican, the Yankees. Pretty insulting and blunt sometime but it absolutely tickle your funny bone. I find myself laughing out loud at the agony of my colleagues everytime we watch Comedy Central during guard duties.

Good thing they got freedom of speech right here so people like me can say "Bush got a farty pants" or "The Clinton Clitoris Administration" not only online but also on the street without risking a defamation suit... or I can annouce "Ashley Simpsons new boobs job and how those titties are fake!". Three cheers for freedom of speech!

BUT BUT BUT...In Singapore, you got to watch your tongue. I can't just announce a certain Temasek Holdings member as having saggy breast good enough to hang on bamboo pole? Or how she much have really good "social" skills to solicited so much deal for Singapore? Baseless thoughts you might say but make for a good joke in the right tone. However the kind of "lam pa" or "nuts" the have develop over time under the authoritive system of governance have pretty much silence much of our inner slap-stick and dead pan creativity.

We can only applaud Jack Neo for his wonderful manuver on government policy and personality without offending anyone. But we will never have a Stephen Colbert or Carlos Mencia (go google them!) for they are just too much of a mouthful to to left alone without the silencing power of a defamation suit.

Survival Skills

One of the survival skills often taught in the Army is "How to fish". Today I learn a lesson about nature and the fish.

First thing, "its not dry even if it look dry, so wear boots!". My first fishing trip at Northlake almost ended in disaster. There was no road going near the shore of Northlake and the only one available was locked up. I decided to park my vehicle opposite the road and cross over with my fishing gear to the what seems to be dry, baked sand. With both feet firmly on the ground, I notice I was sinking! Shit, its all wet and gooey beneath it. Half my New Balance shoes was in the mud and so is the ending of the jeans. I retreated back to my car viciously cursing the disguise of mother nature.

Secondly "Fishing are not stupid". Contrary to popular believe that fish do not have brain, I observe that they at less knew whats a hook, whats a bait and what is real food. There I was, at my second destination, a long river and wide cutting through a town, under the sun hopping to get my first catch. Now I know why fishing needs lots of patient cause urban fishes are not naive. 3 hours and I caught nothing. I tried, plastic bait, insects, and hot dogs from my takeaway lunch with no results. Fed up, I decided to leave and come back another day. I threw away the left over hot dogs into the river and VIOLA!!!! A small school of fish came over and nibble away...probably laughing their way through dinner... Now I felt stupid... the fish think better than me...

To be frank, I have never attended the "Learn to fish to survive" survival course, I think I might consider enrolling in case I got stranded in some deserted place next time. In the mean time, I prefer to buy fish from the market and make fried fish fillet out of them...

We got nice Ice Cream right here in the U.S.A

"You know how sometimes it seems like the hurrier you go, the behinder you get? So much to do you can't get unstuck from your to-do-list? Obsessing about time all the time can get you pretty nutsy. So we gigured if we could make this flavor's crunch-factor irresitably distracting, you might make time to face your frustration and eat them. Enjoy!"

Maj Moron LIVE from TEXAS

Super screw-up day but thank god for the help

Screw-up Netgear router

I woke up early in the morning, have my breakfast and realise my wireless internet router got disconnected yet again. So I went to NETGEAR website, figuring out that a new firmware upgrade might help prevent further disconnection in the future. To my utter shock, the network router stop responding after the upgrade, going into COMA.... I spend the next 1 hour of the morning, attempting to recover it. Thank god.... by turning off the modem and than configuring the software in the hardware directly with ethernet cables connected to my laptop, I manage to get back the wireless connection signal. THANK GOD! Its still do disconnect unintentionally sometimes but its better than a dead router.

Screw-up Car battery

Finally, I can leave my house in peace spending the off-days to post letters, do some wine shopping at JRB, Grocery shopping, driving around Dallas and apply for my Social Security card. My first stop was the UPS Store just a 10 min walk from my home to post a "$15 mail-in-rebates." I stop and turn off my car, walk to the UPS counter to send my mail, walk back the car and crank the engine. Its as dead as the network router I encounter this morning. SHIT... It was running really well this morning and suddenly this happen? Really 事事不如意 "SHIT SHIT COME TO ME"... On closer examination, I realise the battery is dead which leave the car in coma, which leave me helpless with out my car. Ok calm down Ric....theres got to be a way out of this situation. So the million dollar question was "What do you do now?"

1- Walk back home a drive my room mate vehicle out to get a new car battery?

2- Call for help from passer by to jump start the car using their car battery?

3- Call the tow truck and pay $$$$$

4- Sit down and cry.

I can neither poll the audience cause the place is pretty quiet, Dial a friend cause my phones not working. So 50/50 leave me with option 1 and 2 cause I am a mechanical man and got good social skills...

So I approach every passer-by (since everyone here drives) and ask them if they got jumper cables in their car and if they could spare me some battery juice. NONE.... no no I mean they wanna help but they got no cables. Out of desperation, I finally walk back to the UPS store and ask the manager, Suzy, if she got a jumper cable in her car. The moment I walk in, she knew I was in trouble. THANK GOD!!! Her colleague, Shikela got a pair in her Cherry red Pontiac GrandAm! Little Red riding hood electrified and revived Old grandfather car! You should look at how excited and relieved I was when the engine crank up! I was so grateful for their help that I walk over to a Chinese restauraunt and ordered some snacks and drinks to be delivered to them later on.

Nothing beats UPS customer services...

...Beyond their call of duties
- Shikela and Suzy from UPS Store, 1717 East Beltline (near Tom Thumb)

Screwed-Up Coca-cola

Ok, now the car is cranking and stuff are running smoothly. The shit is clean up and I am ready to go, sipping on a cup of Coca-cola telling myself better not to shut off the engine before I reach Wal-Mart to change the battery. So I chance upon the neighbour son, Johnson, just before I drove off and he is walking home at the moment. Feeling real good from the help others rendered me, I decided to pass on this goodness to Johnson and offered him a lift home. Drop him off at the gate, and my Coke is finish... thought of just leaving it under the car and drive away but the apartment leasing office guys are right beside my car chatting. So I left the car for the dust-bin and make the grave mistake of switching of the engine.....My natural cycle of always locking up the car whenever I am away from it screwed me up this time....thanks to Coca-Cola. THANK GOD those Apartment office guys got a jumper cable and yet another time, Old Grandfather car is shock out of coma again.

End up spending the afternoon in Walmart (yes, they fix car too....jack of all trade) getting my car battery fix up... Cost me US$46... Due to lack of time...In the end, I have to prioritize and end up only getting my Social Security Application done... Thanks to the Grand Prairie Police, I was able to whiz through the traffic behind them driving slightly over the limits. (WHO SAY COPS DON'T SPEED?)

I miss home cook food.

RICCARDO reporting "LIVE" from Lewisville (smallvilles brother).

After taking the horrible lunch I prepared, I suddenly miss my mums cooking so much that the day became pretty depressing. First it was my "Sweet and Sour" pork which was really too "Sweet and Sour", than it was watching my colleagues who brought along home made food from their wife for lunch during working period. Sigh... for the first time since I am here in states, I seriously miss my home cooking. Morale was badly hit after lunch and the only good food I have was the home made "green bean soup" a colleague of mine shared with me.

Fortunately, Edwin from AirFrame section invited me over for dinner at his home in the evening. I must say his wife was a very good cook! If not for the fact that I was a pretty modest guest, I could have devour every dish on the dinner table by myself! Wow....he is really a blessed man to have great, mouth watering home cook dinner after a hard day at work, without even having to step into the kitchen. Unlike singles man like me who came alone and have to either cook for myself or eat out. Seriously, women should master the kitchen and dishes cause good food captures man hearts. I think I better get a real nice GF when I am back in Singapore and bring her to U.S on my second tour of duty.

That does not mean I will give up on cooking now and resent my fate to canfood, instand meals, microwave meal or takeaways, I still have a genuie interest in cooking. Its one of those process that you can learn about preparation, organizing, measuring, multitasking and safety (you think cooking is safe untill you see the number of knife cuts on my fingers and burn mark on my wrist). Cooking a dish is like Chemistry and Physics in action...the chemistry of sauce and grains and physics of kinetics and heat in motion. You got all your equation on the left (Ingredients) and the resultant on the right (dish). Small changes in equation (amount of heat, salt, sugar, soy sauce, size of meat, choice of garnishing....) can have different intensity in the final result....either it taste excellent, normal, dull or like shit. Normal and dull taste is still acceptable to me cause I am concern about filling my stomach most of the time....SHIT work is totally unacceptable because it can really torture me mentally... Excellent = 色香味全。 So here are some of my rating for food I cook during the weekend.


This is what I consider SHIT in looking food but taste really good! So I consider it a good result.
Its actually suppose to be Luncheon Meat Egg Omellete but eventually turn out to become "Cai Tao Kue". Anyway, I was not the one who cook this dish, it was my room mate.

Mmmm....Pork Ham is black pepper sauce mix with Veggies with Rice. Got color, got smell and got taste. It score EXCELLENT in the score book. Now the secret of this dish is actually the black pepper sauce I brought from Singapore and the pork ham given to me by my colleague (they got a huge piece from supermarket). This is a satisfying Sunday dinner for me.

Ending my blog here with a familiar sigh I can't find right here.... everything is restaraunt style in US....

My first guard duty. My US cook food.

One proud and patriotic RSAF Senior Tech at work.

The best bed isn’t the obvious…

It have been slightly more than a month since I arrived in US and started working at RSAF Peace Prairie Detachment and just yesterday, I was assigned on base guard duties. My duty room was awfully cold in the night even when I am wearing my working attires (long sleeve coverall and pants). Could really term it cold and lonely night. However it was not due to the weather cause its quite a hot early summer right now but more due to the screwed up central air conditioning. Damn….I could not find the switch to turn up the temperature and I was literally sleeping under the ventilation vent, streaming freezing cold air… Manage to grab some sleep before waking up at 3am to do my prowling and take a leak (cold weather make human more likely to go toilet). Found out that the interior of our helicopter is pretty warm and eventually I decided to sleep on the cabin troop seats. Pretty narrow and rugged but sure beats the ice cold sofa in the room. Glad to say, I have a great sleep till the morning.

Simple meal for a clueless cook.

Instant noodle: US$1.00

Can food: US$0.80

My lunch: "Priceless"

I really got to learn how to cook a proper meal else I will be ending up eating instant noodles and can food for the next few months. Currently figuring out how to make pork chop and my favourite "Luncheon meat+Potatoes+Onion+ Tomato/Chili" dish. Will update you guys with the pics of my success or disaster. I pretty much enjoy cooking just as I love chemistry laboratory work back in secondary school times... mixing and matching sauces, sugar, salt like acid and alkaline.

We are not SIA flight stewardess/steward.

In few days time, our Detachment will be going on 2 weeks exercise and the base will be pretty lifeless. Sadly, I was not included in the exercise and thus could not enjoy the R&R program they got at the destination (classified). Anyway, I am already running low on Vitamin “M” thus not going could actually help me save up a bit before my allowance is credited to the bank account.

Our welfare ICs have collected US$15 from all the personnel going for the exercise to set up a mini tea bar for the 2 weeks period our guys will be there. It’s a Great idea to boost moral of the guys who is now even further away from home. Praise for the welfare IC. However, yesterday we got the shock of our life. We were told that US$3 from each contribution will be used to buy “In-Flight” meal for the pilots. Not just ordinary food but takeaways from restaurants…. Chinese, Western…blar blar blar. I find it bloody ridiculous for 2 reasons. First thing, we are going for military exercise and not some joy ride and we got military pilot and not commercialize one, shouldn’t they give up a bit of life comfort and settle for Military Ration (MREs) and not Ala Carte? Secondly, this US$15 dollars are our maintenance guys own money, how could they just suka suka take US$3 each from us? So cheapskate one. I don’t know what our immediate superior was thinking to allow such low class decision to go through… we should really stand up and protest! Treat us as ground crew, technician, grease monkeys but don’t take us as SIA flight stewardess/stewards. We don’t provide in-flight entertainment and don’t teach you how to use the life-vest during flight and we don’t walk around the aircraft serving coffee.

I hope such plans will not go through cause it really cheapens the image of our professional pilots. Whoever came out with this shit ought to be hang unless he withdraw the plan. Come to think of it, I wonder if this “guy” is actually trying to carry balls because I am sure our pilot who are commissioned officers will not come out with and use such underhand method to get their meal.

The Dog Shed

Still look pretty empty right now... with a bit more money and effort, my dog shed will undergo a major cosmetic changes....

Silent Hill sux + American open kitchen concept

The great thing about movies here is that 2 to 3 months after it was first screened in theatre, it will next be shown at a "Second Hand" cinema which is offering tickets at US$1 before 6 and US$1.50 . Now don't expect low grade seats or poor image quality, the cinema still is able to afford big comfortable seats since I am a small built Asian, Great image projection and excellent THX surround sound. Tickets are so dirt cheap that I don't even mind falling asleep during the first part of the movie "Silent Hill" which was totally confusing and to mysterious to be absorbed.... its like a cross between matrix and resident evil. The only saving grace for the movie is the gruesome ending and the 1 dollar face value which save lots of curse and swear from me after the screening... SILENT HILL SUX as much as the video games...


Next stop, American style restauraunt for our dinner....the WAFFLE HOUSE!!!



Most American style restaurant here have a open concept kitchen which means the customer could actually see their meal been made. Not that I am afraid that they might spit on my food and sneeze Pee Sai in it, but I find it really interesting concept to watch the entire preparation process from fridge to stove to right in front of me, on the table. Drinks are always free flow here but nowadays I try to limit on those soft drinks cause ever since I am in US, my urine is always tinted yellow...

I could actually take a picture of them at work and send to their boss!!!

We got a friendly but pretty Ah Gua middle edge man call "Tony" taking our orders... I just can't noticing him making 娘娘抢 everytime he spoke to us. Than there was also this chatty Ah ma who might have not seen any Chinese stepping into their restaurant before cause she ask us where we are from.

Friendly Ah ma posing for a shot while "Ah gua" Tony check out his manicure.
Shy dave, Sniggering Gary and Speedy Fingers Hwa Chuan.

"tiko" Chuan and Ricky

Ending here with a pics for you fellow readers to buy 4D....

My "Lao Pok Car" in a private "Reserved" parking lot.

Reinforcement has arrived

After a 3 weeks long wait, surviving on "MADE IN US" Food, my shipment boxes from Singapore have finally arrived...

The 19 boxes of food, clothings, electronic stuff which is actually just Playstation 2 plus my library of books was scheduled to arrive at my apartment between 8am to 1pm today, however I was glad that my boxes was the last to be loaded into the truck and thus the delivery man have to send it to me first. Ha ha.... last in, first out.

This mexicans/ hispanios are totally shagged out on their first delivery assignment of the day, I bet my boxes are the heaviest they will encounter for the day. Back in Singapore, they will have the luxury of lift at every floor but we got no HDB flats in the US and most buildings are less than 3 storey high (you can see the skyscrapers and sun rise and sun set far away) so it took lots of sweat and brawns from two "Amigos" to bring the stuff up. The kind person I was, I offer them orange juice to rejuvenate their energy before embarking on their next 9 delivery assignment. I thought my kindness was well appreciated when they say "Gracia Senor" (thank you sir) and they were pretty comfortable in front of the camera while taking the farewell pics....

Later on the day, I realise that all my other colleagues who got their delivery actually gave a US$5 tips! Argghh....hope this two guys don't find me a cheapo.

All of the sudden, my empty apartment is filled with brown boxes and I could hardly manuver in the house. But the thought of the "Presents Opening" ceremony, kept my spirit real high today! So lets check out what I have brought to US to stocked up my kitchen... Its like preparing for war... Its like preparing for a food shortage...

2 years supplies of Can food and Maggi Mee! Thats not all you see in the picture, the rest of the stock are kept in the store room due to lack of cabinet spaces. After the unpacking, lots of empty boxes around, so I decided to be the green enviromental friendly frog to recycle and reuse them...