Cavalock and The Child Free Hypothesis

Yessssss, so finally I have been validated! I always knew this was true, been telling folks but not everyone agreed with me. So there! All Joy and No Fun: Why parents hate parenting.

A very well-written article by New York Magazine. Countless studies have shown that having kids are making more people unhappy and it's just sad that most people refuse to believe this. I don't wanna slip into an incoherent rant here so I'll just pick some quotes from the story.

'Most people assume that having children will make them happier. Yet a wide variety of academic research shows that parents are not happier than their childless peers, and in many cases are less so. This finding is surprisingly consistent, showing up across a range of disciplines.'

'Healthy relationships definitely make people happier. But children adversely affect relationships.'

'Lori Leibovich, the executive editor of Babble and the anthology Maybe Baby, a collection of 28 essays by writers debating whether to have children, says she was particularly struck by the female contributors who’d made the deliberate choice to remain childless. It enabled them to travel or live abroad for their work; to take physical risks; to, in the case of a novelist, inhabit her fictional characters without being pulled away by the demands of a real one. “There was a richness and texture to their work lives that was so, so enviable,” she says.'

'Before urbanization, children were viewed as economic assets to their parents. If you had a farm, they toiled alongside you to maintain its upkeep; if you had a family business, the kids helped mind the store. But all of this dramatically changed with the moral and technological revolutions of modernity.'

Now before you think I'm just taking the quotes to support myself, read the article, it's all there. And we know there's no country with a crazier rat race for parents and kids than this country!

Alright, some food bits now. Did managed to drop by Nando's again when it wasn't that crowded. Half a chicken is just nice for me. Not exactly a place I would keep going but for roasted or grilled chicken, it's way better than Kenny Roger's.

Had breakfast on Saturday morning at Coffee Bean and they have this one-for-one offer that I thought was a steal. Two breakfasts for the price of one. Thought it was only on weekdays but the (almost deserted) outlet at Orchard Central still had it last Saturday.

A little geeking out over the weekend too. Bought almost S$60 worth of Call of Cthulhu products. Best part was finding out the iPhone auto spellchecks the word 'Cthulhu', how cool is that?

Cavalock and The Niku Udon Catalyst

After a long illness, my uncle passed away on Friday. He was the bestest uncle anyone could ever ask for. He loved me unconditionally and asked for nothing in return. He got my jokes and we could talk bout all kinds of stuff. When I was just a little kid, he worked in a certain bank across the US in cities like New York, San Francisco and even Honolulu for almost a decade and he would send back boxes filled with toys and comic books.

When I asked him about drinking and what I should order for the first time in a bar, he said 'coke and rum'. So I told the barkeep I'll have a 'coke and rum' and the barkeep said, 'kid, it's rum and coke, never say coke and rum'. Well, he also introduced me to joys of Baileys and red wine. <^;^>

Oh, another piece of advice I got was when I was on my way to the Big Apple, "whatever you do, don't act like a tourist, you'll get mugged". He was into classical music, opera, country and rock and roll from the 50s and 60s. Ok, didn't get into the first two but Johnny Cash, Motown, Elvis, I was totally there. He subscribed to Time, Newsweek and National Geographic (that mag always had a weird smell), he even opened a DC Comics subscription for me. Anything I wanted, he'll give it to me, no questions asked.

I know the last thing he would want right now is me to be sad. He was a quiet and private person but I bet he'll be excited to know that I might be heading to the west coast next month. I'll miss him for sure but I know life is short and soon, we'll all be together again.

Wow, hope I didn't freak anyone out with this. Well, it's just something I wanted to say. Hey, I still got food stuff to talk about.

My current fav cheap meal. Niku udon or pork udon at Liang Court food basement. Thin and tender slices of pork, a clear tasty broth and it's only S$7. The udon is just of the right texture, not too chewy. The whole experience kinda reminds me of those little udon joints in Shinjuku cos its cheap, convenient and taste really good.

Cavalock and The Hokkaido Fair Paradox

Now I forgot to bring my headphones to the office one day and I'm just nodding off after lunch. That can't be good. Anyway the Hokkaido Fair is back at Isetan Scotts supermarket again and as I kinda expected, there really wasn't anything there that caught my eye. They have like, three or four a year now? I honestly lost count, I know I was at the last one in February.

There isn't a ramen store this time. The beer garden is still there but I gave that a pass.

For lunch, I found myself at the revamped Tonkichi upstairs. They seemed to have more tables for bigger groups now. More stuff on the menu too and a tiny, little sushi bar in the corner near the kitchen. Had my usual shabu set. Difference now are two little extra pieces of tofu I guess. Still one of my favorites so I'm not complaining.

Here's something I wanted to blog for the longest time but just never around to it. Macarons from ET Artisan Sweets. All the way (at least for me) from Holland Grove Road. Unless you have a car, it's pretty hard to get there. As much as I like them, I don't think I got it in me to wax poetic bout them. I'm like the 2,435th person to blog bout them so trust us when we say it's good.

Cavalock and The Sweet Potato Acquisition

An all-snacks desserty update! Now I don't usually talk bout snacks cos I don't do them but here's one that kinda caught my attention and tastebuds so here we go.

Sweet potato chips from Japan, now the only English words on the little cups are 'sweet potato' and Osatsu Doki. Cups are bout the size of the smaller cup-a-noodle ones. Don't mistake them for the Calbee brand.

There are two flavours, the plain one comes in the red cup and the butter-flavoured one comes in the yellow cup. Far as I know, you can only get them at Meidi Ya supermarket, Liang Court. S$2.85 a pop.

The chips are small but thick little pieces. Not very salty but the yellow one does have a pretty strong buttery flavor.

I think they are selling pretty well cos the last few times I was there, it was sold out and then again right after they replenished it. So there you go, if you are ever in the neighborhood like maybe after a meal at Chikuwa Tei (hah!), go take a five minute stroll to Liang Court and grab a cup of chips.

So like after more than a decade I think, I finally found myself back at Robertson Quay or was it Robertson Walk? Anyway, there I was on a Saturday nite and no, I wasn't there for the World Cup. I don't believe in paying millionaire sportsmen to entertain themselves but I digress.

Found myself at the popular Laurent Bernard Chocolatier for the first time. Too bad they ran out of the souffle they I wanted. Got myself a caramelized coffee with milk and the girls ordered a bottle of Moet and a couple of Blackforest cakes, that is I think it was Moet.

Not a bad nite and yes, we all did have dinner at Chikuwa Tei earlier. <^;^>

Cavalock and The High Definition Ransom

*Yawn* it's like past midnite, early Sunday morning as I'm typing this, waiting for my hair to dry before hitting the sack. What a week, new lady boss from the US but not gonna talk bout work here.

My old cable recorder finally bit the dust by deleting all my recorded shows one afternoon last week. Then found out that my model has been discontinued and the only one they have right now that offers recording is their top model, the high definition one. So if you ever want to record any shows at all, you have absolutely no choice but to pay get the most expensive cable box in the market. StarHub, you really suck big time, and you are sooo lucky it's late and I can't think of any worse insult than that. Yah, I had no choice but to get it cos I need to record my shows. Damn, I'm so glad you guys are getting screwed by the World Cup fiasco.

Like I said, it's late and my sentence construction skill is slipping really fast. Time to let the pix do the talking.

Now I know Ice didn't really enjoy her last visit to Ootoya but mine was pretty good. I think my trick is ordering the same thing again, hey, once I like something, I usually stick to it at least for the next couple of times.

Nice steaming pork soup with mushrooms and other veggies. Taste great, only problem was the there were only two pieces of pork in it.

Usual rice with fishy toppings and then dessert!

Caught this new condo while visiting my old neighborhood. Man, if I was still living there, I'll feel like Poland. OK, I think not many people will know what this WWII history buff is talking about. <^;^>

Cavalock and The Wasabi Chikuwa Connection

A couple of years ago, an ex-colleague brought the office to this little Japanese restaurant in Far East Plaza called Wasabi Tei. Great food, huge generous portions too and at damn good price, no GST or service charge if I remember correctly. Down side was it was eat and run place. Trust me, you would wanna leave real fast after eating...;)

You know, I could have sworn I blogged bout it but I just can't seem to find it. Hah!

Anyway the place closed like last year or early this year, or rather some 'ah beng' took over and the quality just plummeted. But just last week, I found out from the best damn food blogger in town that the chef has turned up at a new joint, his own I believe, just across the road from my office!

It's now called Chikuwa Tei, it's a proper Japanese restaurant with waitresses and staff, price has gone up as expected but the quality is all still there. Well, I think I have already spent too much talking, I'm just gonna like the pix do all the talking now. Been there a couple of times already, usually I'll just go for the Take Sushi (S$20), a small side order and maybe a bottle of Japanese beer. So yah, if you see a lone guy nursing a beer there on a Friday nite, that's probably me.

Recently I learnt that me and my office will be heading to San Diego Comic-Con for a working/biz trip in the middle of July. Now if I heard this news, a year or two ago, I'd be happier than a fat tick on a skinny dog. But with my mom's cancer and everything, the enthusiasm just ain't there. Of cos, my mom who is still as feisty and alert as ever, has insisted that I go. We'll see how it goes.

Cavalock and The Bank Run Recurrence

Every couple of months, I'll spend a Saturday morning running around the various banks in the CBD with my errands. First stop was breakfast and this time, decided to go for Coffee Club instead of Coffee Bean. Well, Club's breakfast menu looked pretty good and reasonably priced. Had the mushroom bruschetta set which if you look at the pix, it's exactly that. Cheesy mushroom on toast for only S$6.80, can't really go wrong with that so I'm satisfied.

Anyway I thought it's kinda strange that a coffee joint here doesn't have flat white. Settled for the regular coffee that came with the set instead.

Well, was at Takashimaya in the afternoon and I bet, by the end of the year, the Nespresso coffee machine is gonna be the like the new iPhone. As in almost every other household is gonna have one. Cos they were selling them like crazy at Takashimaya, the machines were all wrapped up and all over the counter. Yah I know it's the Great Singapore Sake but wow, almost everyone's getting one.

Speaking of the Sale, I always say the best thing to buy during the Sale is furniture! Bought most of mine like six years ago, lotsa savings. <^;^>

Gonna end on a cautionary public service note here. Be real careful bout hooking up with people you meet on the Internet. Just found out that an ex-colleague who met her future husband on the Internet, got married and migrated to his country a few years ago. About a week ago when she's like 8 1/2 months pregnant, he punched her in the face. I'm not gonna go into details but really, what else is there to say?

Cavalock and The World War II Legacy

Someone once asked me why am I such a WWII history buff, I told them maybe it's because it's the last real war between good and evil. It was truly the biggest turning point in the history of the world. Nothing was ever the same after that. When I was younger, I could remember names of WWII operations, codes, tactics, datelines etc. Well, these days I don't recall all those details anymore but I still watch almost every WWII documentary on the cable and I still got a ton of WWII stories to tell.

But no, I don't HBO so I'm not watching The Pacific. I am watching WWII: Lost Films right now.

Anyway time for a little more pleasant food talk. Something for all Nespresso owners. Dunno if these brochures are available here at our local outlets but a friend got them in London recently.

It's a small little brochure with coffee recipes in it. I think it's only a London thing cos on the back cover it's a list of outlets in the UK.

According to the brochure, you can find the recipes online over here.

Finally made it to the now famous Nando's at Bugis for lunch. As expected, there was a Q but it moved pretty fast. Chicken was nice and tender, picked the herb and lemon sauce which was the mildest one on the list. They were out of a lot of potato sides that day, so had the coleslaw and corn.

My colleague had the Extra Hot sauce, that's the max level of hotness. Didn't even flinch, he even had to 'enhance' the flavor by splashing extra hot sauce on it. Would I go there again? Yah the price is ok but it ain't worth standing in long Q for it.

Cavalock and The Eternal Quest

Well, the little Japanese restaurant near the office has closed down for good and the Chinese coffee shop next door has taken over it. That's not really a big shock cos the restaurant was selling stuff pretty cheap and a colleague said, “Of cos, they closed down! How could they manage to survive selling S$10 set lunches?” Granted, the food was just a little above average but it was cheap and I would head there sometimes on Friday nites, for a solo meal.

So I started looking for a nice quiet Japanese joint to maybe hang out on a Friday nite. Still searching and open to suggestions.

Anyway spotted this at the new NTUC Finest at Somerset the other day, tempted to try it but not sure if you need some kinda milkshaking machine to begin with. I mean, milk doesn't shake itself rite?

And after all these years, I finally say good-bye to my old passport and hello to the new biometric one.

Cavalock and The London Pub Resurgence

I could never understand the appeal of Vivo City, yah, I know it's like the biggest mall in the country but still, just about everything in there, you could also find in Orchard. Now I'm not talking about the restaurants and food joints there. That's different. Well, there's the cinema but I only caught one show there and that was a pretty sucky experience. Bad enough the movie was Transformers but the toilet was like outside the theatre and somewhere in the next continent. Took me 10 minutes at least to make the hike and return trip.

Anyway, so there I was on a Saturday afternoon, trying to figure out what to have for lunch and I came across The Queen and Mangosteen. It sounded kinda familiar, guess I must have read bout them somewhere. And since I was still missing them English pub food since last year, I figured why not.

Unfortunately they don't serve 'real' English pub grub. Had the onion rings and chilled tiger prawns for appetizers. The onion rings were great, they were kinda like beer battered although I know it wasn't beer but they were battered if you know what I mean. Geez I think I suck at writing food. Oh, and the Thai chili dip was good too.

As for the chilled tiger prawns (were they really TIGER prawns? cos they looked like regular prawns or shrimps to me, sizewise I mean), they were nice but nothing really special. Came with some salad dressing dip but otherwise they remind me of the regular prawns you find in Chinese restaurants.

My main was a delicious mushroom risotto with asparagus and tomatoes. Just the right amount of mushrooms and the asparagus (pity it wasn't white) tasted fresh and crisp.

Now for the best part of an already good meal, the oak sweet cider. A wee bit pricy at S$16 a 500ml bottle but definitely worth it. Light with only a slight hint of apple cider.

Cavalock and The Curse of The Mother Tongue

With all the mother tongue monkey crap controversy going on, I just gotta throw in my two cents worth. Let me start by saying I was one of those who got screwed by that single education policy. Cos I flunked my second language, I was denied something that in some countries was a basic right. And now the people behind that policy finally admitted that they might have made a mistake.

Well, I'm not as eloquent as a friend of mine was when she wrote this on Facebook, "it's amazing how, with globalisation etc, some people still want to retreat to tiny villages of their own making. it's about communication, not language. and language is a constantly evolving creature anyway....i think people should learn languages for the love of it. or for purely economic reasons (cos they want to do business in china, for example). but it's BS to think that speaking chinese makes one more chinese. and to call it mother tongue, as you pointed out, is nonsense too."

Hell, all I'm gonna say is they screwed me big time and well, ....... we'll just leave it at that for now cos you never know who's gonna be reading this.

Anyway, look what I got at Daiso for only S$2 each. Finally found matching ones too. Yah, I bought extra cups in case of company but er ... that's very unlikely. You looking at S$10 right there, to go with this.

The other day during lunch I finally caved in and got this. A double quarter pounder and you know what would really make it better? Olives! Just drop a bunch of them between the meat and bun and I bet it'll be perfect!

Cavalock and The Lunchbox Chase

During every single one of my trips to Japan, I would always head to Tokyu Hands in Shinjuku and gawk at the Bento lunch boxes on sale. You got your classic Japanese designs as well as everybody's favorite Hello Kitty ones too. I always thought it would be cool to bring a sleek black one to work and well, enjoy a hot home-cooked meal kinda like the ones you get at Ootoya at Orchard Central. But do I buy one? Nope, cos it's too expensive and I know no one's gonna use it. I mean, why buy something expensive and then not use it, rite?

So how did this arrive in the office a couple of months ago?

Well, a month before that I took part in an online contest organized by a Japanese website. The site's in English and all I gotta do is send in food pix about Tokyo! And I got a ton of those from my trips to the city. Did a short write-up about my food experience there and uploaded a bunch of food pix from my last trip.

Next thing I know, they told me I was one of three winners. Each of us could choose a lunch box from a pretty long list. I picked this black and rather manly-looking one.

It comes with a big black pouch to put your lunch box in. On the web page, it says it's mirco-wavable but when it arrived, there's note that said otherwise (in Japanese).

Comes in two layers as in an upper and lower compartment, with a elastic band too! I guess you would place the rice below.

As you peel the lid off the top compartment, you'll see a small tray for those little appetizers I think.

They even slipped in a free pack of tissues!

So there you go, after all these years I finally got my Japanese lunch box for free. Now I just have to learn how to prepare a meal to go in it.

I will be closing this blog for now. My mom has leukemia and at her age there is nothing we can do. She is the strongest, bravest and greatest mom in the world. I want to be as strong and brave as her too. I am truly blessed to have a mom like her.

Thank you all for reading.

Cavalock and The Giant Sucker Topology

Two good meals out of three can't be that bad. Started out with a very nice (and cheap) prata meal at Killiney Road. Ever since Casuarina prata closed, yours truly decided to try the store a steps down the road, at the junction just across the NTUC supermarket.

Was pleasantly surprised to find that it tasted even better than Casuarina's and from what I have observed, they only serve your prata when it's fresh and hot.

And I was feeling a wee bit adventurous when I saw this at Tampopo during lunch. Giant octopus suckers for starters.

Well, as expected, they tasted kinda like calamari. But I felt it's a little 'juicer' and not as chewy as calamari. Not a bad thing if you wanna try something different.