Yes, another blog from the library during the day... those who know me well will know that means I'm taking my sick day again... (sick DAYS to be accurate since this is actually the second day in a row...) And yes, those same ppl would probably have guessed it's the same old problem... headaches... OK, enough about WHY I'm writing this... (yes, basically just because I have some time to kill )

My mind isn't very coherent the past 2 days, so bear with my random thoughts...

1) Bible reading - some of you may remember I started reading the "Bible in One Year" book last year. Amazingly enough I've kept to the schedule and FINALLY finished reading the bible from cover to cover once! I'm happy about this HUGE milestone, but at the same time, I'm also somewhat ashamed to say that I've only read thru it ONCE after considering myself a Christian for so many years... In any case, I think it's a good first step.  With God's blessing, the next step will be to read thru more slowly and spend more time to reflect/understand the details.

2) Property ownership - I now officially OWN my Mazda3! Days of using half my monthly salary to pay off debt is finally over! It feels good to be 'free' so I can start to seriously consider the next BIG purchase... A HOUSE!?

People always say it's too early to buy a house since we don't really need one... As far as I'm concerned... you need one in your lifetime anyway so you may as well start paying it off early... Haha, 'little kid' and I have been dreaming about it for a while already.. so it's about time to take some action... I borrowed a book from the library called "Personal finance for Canadian for Dummies" to learn a bit more about money management to prepare for the BIG purchase... I REALLY hope this will happen soon... but the thing is I still haven't really started reading the book.... time.. time.. time... you can never have enough...

3) Stressful work - I must admit I never knew a government job could get stressful... Yes I was a co-op before, but back then I was VERY protected... I guess it really isn't about the job, it's more about your attitude towards your job... I thought I've become less and less of a perfectionist throughout the yrs, but maybe I'm still treating things too seriously... Pushing myself too hard...

I guess sometimes you try to cover ALL the bases too well, try to help solve EVERYONE's problem, then eventually the only problems left are all on your own plate... ANYWAY... I'm not really trying to complain about my job or my team or anything... coz honestly they're all good (haha, not saying this because any one of them will read my blog.. coz I doubt it... but honestly even tho the organization has its problems, I don't think I can find any better colleagues anywhere else...) The bottomline is I just have to learn to 'let go' of some 'unreasonable' expectations on myself...

If I've learned one thing the past few yrs, it's that sometimes treating yourself well may not seem the best for the organization at the moment, but in the long run a 'better' you (physically, emotionally, etc.) is what makes a difference. Haha, yes, I've learned, I just need to try to put that into practice... And my latest attempt? I've submitted my one-week vacation request just a few hrs ago!! Desperately looking forward to it...


I think that pretty much sums up my last few months... Oh, and just one more hr till time to go home! I think I really can't stand another day of doing nothing even with this stupid headache and stuff... I'm determined to go to work tmr... Wish me luck!

Was posting the previous blog entry about today's hike and realized I haven't posted pics from the random events this past month. So here they come.

Went to science world in early August.. Haven't been there for a looong time.

And then you may ask why??? Hee, because of this.

The Disney exhibition was pretty cool. Nothing very fancy but you get to learn about the history of the music in Disney animations. And how the use of music in Disney films evolved. And then there were the other regular science world stuff, which I found quite amusing too... Most of them reminded me a lot of Wii games.



This was the one I liked the most. Very cool! Harp without strings but it actually worked!

And then there were the kinds of things that make you smile. The kid looked so amazed, haha!



Another event in August was a mini-farm at Aberdeen centre. Very cute animals.






Other even more random pics...

Something my colleague made during our unit meeting.

A weekend I spent with 'little kid' at my house with bearbear and mickey mouse. It was quite a fun day. We played video game, watched movie, and had sushi take-out!


My uncle came back from HK and brought some souvenier... Starbucks!!! Can you guess what it is?

They're mooncakes!!

They actually tasted pretty OK altho not very traditional... Haha, maybe if they're sold here in Vancouver I'll buy some for my friends as gifts. But now.. too bad! You just have to use this photo as substitute.

Had quite an adventure with mom and dad today, so thought it's at least worth a blog entry. Haha, I guess hiking is not something new since I seem to go with 'little kid' everytime we go on trips, but it's quite rare to go with mom and dad.

We went to the Capilano Regional Park at North Van for the afternoon. Originally dad only wanted to go see the water dam, but we ended up embarking on a LOOONG hike.

Nice view of the water reservoir

The dam... so little water on a sunny day. Haha, kinda looks pathetic...

Here are mom and dad walking 'hard'. It wasn't our intent to walk for 1-1.5 hrs... but the trails were kinda confusing even with a map... We even ran into a huge black dog that looks A LOT like a grizzly bear and got ourselves a little scared.

A cute little mushroom I saw along the way

A resting hut that looks a lot like a mushroom.. heehee..

We then went to Robson Street to do some window-shopping while waiting for dinner. Came across this very cool store window. Look at all the network cables!!

And that wraps up the day! (With mom and dad complaining on the way home that they're so tired that they dunno how to walk tmr )

Sorry for "disappearing" for so long. Been very busy for the past little while, but don't really know why...

Anyway, just a little something to get things started (hopefully I'll get some more time during this long weekend to write a few more short blog entries).

Got the idea of creating a photo album for bearbear from "Toad in Motion" on flick... I found it VERY cool!! I actually saw this quite a while ago, but never got the chance to sit down and create the album. Finally, here it is.. random pics of bearbear and friends throughout the years. Enjoy!

http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/BearbearAndFriends02

Long weekend time! There's not much to write about lately (I guess it's better than having "near-death" experience all the time ). So here are some random pics for sharing!

There's this parking space at a restaurant that I always wanted to park at... just because it looks SO COOL! Finally got my chance last week!


Got this coupon with my Starbucks purchase the other day. Hee, love the little ice cubes!


Went to Toysrus yesterday and got two Nintendo-related candies. I'm really not into candies... but the packaging are too good to pass up.

Even the candies are mario mushrooms!

Bearbear looking very puzzled at the two remotes... One real... One fake...
Heehee, the size of the fake one fits him much better...

Haha, well, maybe not really near death... but it's probably as close as I've got in my whole life... So this is probably worth blogging about...

It happened last Thursday. I started my work day as usual and then came two maintenance workers opening roof panels, checking some electric stuff, etc. They come and go, talk on walkie-talkie, etc etc for most of the day. By mid-afternoon I was already quite annoyed by them coz I couldn't really concentrate to work. So I was moving about in my seat, trying VERY hard to block out what they're doing.

And that set the stage for the "drama"... One of the worker opened up the roof panel on top of my cubicle. I was a bit uneasy at first and asked him if I should move. He didn't reply but just smiled back!? I couldn't make out what that meant and so I decided to stay... since they haven't really  been removing stuff from the roof all day... So... theoretically nothing should fall down right?? Turns out to be a wrong assumption....

So he was working above.. and I was typing below... and I pulled back my keyboard a little and sat back (in one of my many attempts that day to focus)... And then suddenly, A METAL SHEET FELL FROM ABOVE! I heard "WATCH OUT!", and then next thing I knew, the metal thingy has bounced off my keyboard and onto the floor... I felt pain on my hand, but when I looked again it was only a very tiny scratch and a bump on my finger, so I didn't really complain... The worker came down the ladder and apologized and quickly put back the roof panel and left...

I thought to myself: "haha, at least I got my quiet time back..." Not until then did I reflect on what jus happened... I looked at my desk and realized there was a dent/crack from the metal... and realized how heavy that metal thingy must have been.. And IF I didn't pull back my keyboard and lean back on my chair.... The thing would have fallen RIGHT ON MY HEAD!! THAT was a scary thought... And as my hand was still a bit in pain, I thought... What if the metal thing RIGHT on top? What if it severely hurt my hand and... I can't play piano from that moment on?? Haha, yes, I didn't even think about not being able to type which would have affected my livelihood.... just piano..

Lots of thoughts rushed through my mind... Haha, I guess all due to my stupidness of deciding not to move away... But I was very grateful then and now... for God's blessing once again.

Thanks to my supervisor at work, I got a free ticket for the lantern festival (http://www.lanternfestival.ca/). So by paying an extra $25, I got to go with 'little kid'. We were a bit worried since there wasn't a lot of people when we got there, but turns out the $12.50 each was pretty worthwhile.  (Hm, not sure about the regular price $25/person tho... ) The lights were very colorful and grand, so in a sense we could appreciate the money they must have invested in building these displays. I liked most of the displays except for "the bugs world" (for obvious reason, haha) and "the dinosaur's world"... The dinosaurs were VERY scary and bloody... (I didn't even bother/dare to take picture of it ).

Anyway, here are some photos for you to enjoy: http://picasaweb.google.ca/wwyyuen/LanternFestival2008

Thought I'll write a less "philosophical" blog since there seems to be too many of those lately. :P

Small bearbear got a new t-shirt for Canada Day!


Went to the Richmond Night Market for dinner. First time having snacks for dinner on a crowded street, it was pretty memorable!  I got quite messy eating, but it was fun! We also saw a Nintendo gift shop, our favorite place of all! And this is what I bought... Yes, VERY geeky, but it's just the way I like it, hahaha. (After going to night market we went to a self-car wash place in Richmond... That was pretty cool too! $7 for a very special car-washing 'game'. )


Went to watch movie with bro on Canada Day... (and of course wearing my new red shirt!)

No, we didn't watch Wall-E, but it was soooo cute that I couldn't help taking a picture with it. We watched the IMAX version of Kung Fu Panda. The screen made the panda EXTRA fat! But I guess that made it EXTRA cute!? The movie was pretty good too. There was an especially interesting line from "Master Turtle" in the movie: The past is history. The future is a mystery. Now is a gift and that's why it's called 'present'

Yes, a winner in blogging given by Bravenet!!



I was very surprised to receive the notification e-mail and I have to admit I didn't really know what to think of it. This is a direct quote from the e-mail:

We are pleased to inform you that your Bravejournal has been selected as a Journal of the Week! Each week, we pick two journals to be listed as Journals of the Week based on good use of design and/or content and yours has been selected due to the outstanding job you did on your journal.

I've received over 250 hits since then, what wonder advertisement makes! And I've received some comments from the extra visitors, which is quite a good surprise!

I guess I just wanted to take this opportunity to say THANKS both to my long-time readers and visitors who're just passing by! I started writing this blog, mostly just as a way to express myself and to keep a record of various emotions that pass by everyday. So in a sense, I was the intended audience. Of course I also wanted this to be a place where my friends around the world can see what I've been up to when they think of me.

So no, I never really write my blogs with 'strangers' in mind... but I'm very glad that some of my words are reaching out to some unknown person out there! Be it just a smile, or just a minute of self-reflection, or simply an idea, or even a minute of silliness from your hectic life... My blogs have proven worthwhile. Because afterall, isn't one of our purposes in life simply to make a difference in someone else's?

Met up with a friend the other day for dinner and some quiet time at Starbucks. Among the many things that we chatted about, she mentioned how she always wanted to grow up to be a 'special' person but she seems so 'ordinary' now.

Now that's an interesting thought... Did I want to be 'special' when I was a kid? I guess I WAS special as a kid and also the case when growing up... I got lots of attention from teachers, classmates, etc. just from academic success and musical involvements. I never liked the 'spotlight', so maybe that's why I never thought of becoming 'special'.

What exactly does being special mean anyway? To be famous? To be rich? To have a well-respected job like policeman, lawyer, doctor? Haha, I'm just throwing the question out there so you guys can reflect a little like me...

To me, I AM SPECIAL! I feel I'm blessed to have everything I have now and I'm grateful for everything that's happened in my life. That in itself IS special, because there are many unfortunate people out there. But then again, unfortunate or fortunate, it all depends on how you think. So maybe that's the essence of 'being special'!?