29 Sept 2015
Will I... spend 341GBP a night for a Panorama room at the Park Tower Knightsbridge in London? I could also get a room with a less awesome view for 287GBP there.
So I have these 5 nights that I'll be staying in London on my own, 7-10 Dec and then 3-5 Jan.
Did some research and found that among that available London hotels in the SPG programme, the above hotel is the best in terms of location while Sheraton Skyline Hotel London Heathrow and the Aloft London Excel are the best in terms of price. From what I can tell after reading the reviews, the Aloft London Excel is mainly a no-frills business hotel that's pretty new and has minimal amenities in a rather inconvenient location for exploring the city. In contrast, the Sheraton Skyline Hotel London Heathrow is a convention hotel that has pretty cool amenities but is also ageing. Moreover, the Skyline Hotel isn't actually very close to the Heathrow Airport despite its name. As for its Club lounge, it's apparently getting old and can be quite crowded at times, the latter making it noisy and limiting the choices of food and beverages, hence potentially turning it into a redundant feature. After all, lounges are supposed to be quiet! On the other hand, I'll be there only on weekdays so it could be better than that.
Both are equally inconvenient due to their locations, with Aloft being served by the Jubilee line and Skyline served by... various public buses and the Hoppa bus.
One option is to stay in one of the two cheaper ones on the 7th till the 10th of December 2015, than stay at the Park Tower Knightsbridge in January, mainly because all their rates are lower in the later month.
However, another option is to stay at Le Meridien Picadilly in December. It's got the same age problem as Skyline but it's got a far better location at the city centre. The issue is that it's only slightly cheaper than Park Tower Knightsbridge.
The Park Lane Hotel London is out of the question because I expect to waste a day suffering from jetlag in the hotel. It's under renovation so it's going to be impossible to chill in during the day.
Or I could try the Great Northern Hotel. Everything about it seems pretty cool and it's slightly more expensive than the Park Tower Knightsbridge. Unlikely.
As for the ski trip to Japan, I'm thinking about sucking it up and just stay in a place where I have to mix around with others.
02 Oct 2015
For the ski trip, I'm cancelling it. No time.
Ordered a kickboard to learn a new swimming technique. This doesn't seem to be widely taught here in Singapore as I had trouble finding any coach or school offering a course on the underwater dolphin kick.
After a lot of reading and watching videos, I came across this website teaching this technique and one of the videos showed that the board is useful in practising the kick.
I've already done the exercises on the wall and the plan is to try it out with the board soon. This technique is awesome!
03 Oct 2015
How do people see soy milk as a vegan replacement for cows' milk?
Soy milk tastes and smells nothing like milk! The only resemblance is the colour, that's all.
But if you see it as a different thing, then yes it makes sense. I'd describe soy milk as having a different aroma - if you add it to coffee, it gives a very slight difference in taste.
Then again, I could try with almond milk and tell you the same thing. Could be awesome too, almond mocha.
4th Oct 2015
What a dilemma. She wants to sleep over at my place every night (no sex, we're too tired from our schedules, mainly hers of course) but her dad might explode if he finds out. As I recall, she told me a long time ago, back when we first started dating I think, that he would chase her exes out of their home at 12am. Clearly, he is a conservative/protective father regardless of his opinions in the upbringing of a child. Moreover, he's already scolded the both of us once, literally shouted at us, for being late.
If he finds out that she's sleeping over, regardless of whether it's anything more than that, it's obvious that his voice is going to be the least of my concern.
It was a decision between my heart and my mind: she wanted to spend more time with me and vice versa so that's one of the few ways we can do that due to her long classes; but this was going to hurt everyone if her parents ever find out.
In the end, despite her extreme response to my suggestion that she stayed home, she eventually decided to agree because she felt I had already decided on it. I'm not even kidding - she ran home crying once I raised that up. It was only due to her poor stamina, the slightly longer route she took and my sustainable brisk walking speed that I could reach her lift lobby about 2-3 minutes before her.
You know what the worst thing is? For such decisions, you will never know for sure whether it was the right one. Only when things go well long enough that I will know it was probably one of the many right decisions that we made that made the relationship work.
Drank a whole bottle of Carlos Rossi sparkling white wine last night because I no longer need such a thing and I felt like drinking alcohol to see if there's any improvement in my alcohol capacity.
First of all, it sucks. Then again, it's ok for its price. Seriously, I'm never going to touch this brand ever again. I'll just drink less but better wines.
Second, it was gassy so it took a while to finish, and by the last mouthful I was quite ready to puke. But I did not. Phew.
In the end, I didn't fall like the last time, fortunately, but I did fall asleep very quickly once I went to bed. No breakfast was necessary this morning. Just felt so full.
Conclusion is that my capacity has not improvement significantly and I still can honestly say that I don't get hangovers. Lucky me.
My sister-in-law's friends brought a bottle of Pio Cesare Moscato d'Asti (unknown vintage) last night too, but I never found out how much that guy paid for it at 1855. Upon checking my receipt from Grand Vin, the local distributor, it had cost me S$38 per bottle of the same wine (2012 vintage) and shipping was just my bus fare from Jurong East to Buona Vista. Probably a dollar.
I'll have to enquire at the nearest 1855 shop about the price when I remember to. Just curious about whether I had actually saved anything. The decision to buy from the supplier came solely from the assumption that suppliers always offer lower prices than their clients.
07 Oct 2015
Bought a tiny 50ml bottle of Vaseline after reading that I could dab a bit of it using a cotton bud and apply it on my sinuses to deal with the nosebleeds I get in colder climates.
Last night I tried using it as a moisturizer on my fingers and it was literally just a touch of it on every fingertips, and it worked pretty well. Now I wonder why people buy other moisturizers.
...
Ok just checked it out and learnt that frequent inhalation of fats will lead to lipid pneumonia. That sounds like it means ANY oil and petroleum-based products, since as I recall, oils and fats are supposed to be digested in our bodies into lipids and other stuff.
One solution is something from Burt's Bees, but I think I'll just get a nasal moisturizer from a hospital and also the saline spray that I've been using to rinse my sinuses.
But I'll continue to keep this bottle of Vaseline for my hands.
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