Profile pic blues

I’m thinking that I should get rid of my profile pic at work. People are recognizing me when I don’t recognize them!

First it was someone who was in the same department. We have both been working there for a while, and before MCO there had been some department-wide activities. I had seen his name before, but I didn’t know who he was. Recently we were involved in an activity together, online since it was during MCO. When I went to the office (since I seldom go in), I asked to meet face to face, so that I would know who I had been working with! Well, we did meet up, but before we did, he told me, “I already know who you are!” I had already seen him around before too..but I never knew his name!

The other day, someone else recognized me when I had no idea who he was. Turned out that he was the newcomer to our team… anyway in this case it may be just because I’m easier to recognize (with mask on)? Because I had seen his photo…though it was only once, during his introduction. He probably had more chances to see my profile pic...since it shows every time I send a message in our group chat.

And now someone meets me at badminton once, we didn’t exchange names, and the second time we meet, he already figured out that we had joined the same online activity (whereas I had no idea -_- )

No fair!

I’m not someone who usually uses profile pics…but at work I decided to use it for practical purposes: Sometimes we message someone and then need to go and look for them (before Covid came along). Without a profile picture, we have to guess whether we have found the correct person! Also, sometimes we may not need to go and look for that person, but with a profile picture, we would at least know if we cross paths with that person one day.

But nowadays, with so many people NOT using profile pictures…and with so many meetings online, I don’t even know who I am talking to most of the time. And it’s annoying that THEY can put a face to my name! Again, no fair…so maybe I should level the playing field by removing my profile pic.

A case of forged identity

The theme for this week was identity.

Well, the contents of this jar definitely have a different identity than what the label says... :P

Cautious kitty

Earlier I saw a kitten sitting on a neighbour's back porch stairs. Beside the porch stairs, there was a stack of overturned flowerpots. The kitten stretched out to the top of the stack, but it was just a little out of reach. A while later, the kitten turned around and went down the steps, then climbed up the flowerpot stack.

I guess this kitty is too young to know that it has nine lives! :P

Say something nice

Quite recently, I think since last year, I have started following Tomfoolery on Facebook. 

He writes poems, and reads them in his videos. This year, he has started doing “A poem a day”, each one just 1-3 minutes long. (It's daily, so I'm glad they're short. :P )

The thing is, instead of simply reading the poems, he sometimes creates settings to match the poem’s content. Sometimes, it is really awesome to see the little details he puts into his videos... like the one from today.

So I posted a comment, and was pleasantly surprised when he replied!

The video is about a message he received from Tom Felton (the actor who played Draco Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies). The two are friends, and Tom (the poet) was tested Covid-positive a few days ago.

As you can see from my comment, there were at least three things that caught my eye in this video. His Facebook page is categorized as "performing arts", and when I see these details, I always think, "Performing arts, indeed!" Not literature, not just readings, but true performances!

By the way, I almost didn't post that comment, because halfway through writing it, I felt embarrassed for raving about the little stuff. So I’m glad that I did post it…I guess that it is nice to find out that people see those details that you made the effort to put into your work.

So I resolve to comment if I have something nice to comment!

By the way, this reminds me how some time ago, I was raving about how Harith Iskander replied to my comment on his Facebook post...haha

Pink and purple gifts

For International Women’s Day this year we received a pack of face masks, a bookmark, and a rose.

At first I thought that the mask was patterned, then I realised that those were stickers that they had slipped into the packet. Kiddy ones, just my type! :D

It's especially interesting to note that the stickers have the MSI logo on them, so they were specially printed for the occasion, and those kiddy patterns were specially selected for us! lol

Though as a friend remarked, those designs are rather feminine-oriented even though the theme for the year is "break the bias"... Personally I'm not complaining because I like those bunnies. :P

The packet states that it is supposed to contain six masks, but I counted ten inside. Just the day before, they sent out a survey asking whether we would be coming to the office (and therefore collect the gift), whether we would be willing to drive through, or not at all... I suspect that they “redistributed” the masks into the packets based on the responses they received! Again, I’m not complaining ;)

A midnight excursion

This little guy is out on a midnight excursion...

...which did not end well for him, since I spotted him.

Once the photoshoot was over, I squashed it. I've written about the case-making moths that these transform into... I need to kill the babies so that there are less moths, and then there can be less abandoned cases all about the house!

(And this photo was not taken at exactly midnight...but it was time to go to sleep, so I think that counts :P )

Desire to win

Aren't their eyes burning with a desire to win?

With a theme like desire...it was hard to think of what to take a photo of. Luckily these two fierce Pokemon came to my rescue :P

Otak-otak from Eastern Wishes

We visited Eastern Wishes again after a long time. I have posted about it twice before.

We basically ordered usual dishes again, trying two new dishes which were seafood otak-otak and pandan chicken.

The otak-otak was very unusual...even though it was good, I actually feel cheated because it is actually seafood in otak-otak sauce, with egg, instead of actual otak-otak.

The pandan chicken had a nice taste, but some pieces were too hard. (over-fried?)

The other dishes were what we had ordered before, so I won't say anything more about them...they tasted the same as on our previous visits.

Revisiting Mak Jah

We had previously visited Mee Udang Mak Jah during a trip to Taiping, which I had written about here.

This time, we dropped by on our way back from Ipoh.

During our first visit, they told us they didn't have sotong goreng tepung, despite the fact that we had seen photos of it in reviews of the place. This time, we discovered that the sotong goreng tepung was from another stall, which had not been open during our first time there. The stall also had cucur udang, which seemed to be very popular, from the number of tables ordering it. So we tried that as well.

I was surprised that the sotong came as whole pieces of smaller sotong, and not cut into rings like most places do it. The batter is really crispy, and I feel it is similar to the batter for the fried prawns (see old post, or below...)

The cucur udang was not as special, though it was not bad either. It comes with tau kua and peanut sauce (like satay sauce, without the satay)

From Mak Jah, we ordered mee udang again, and of course the fried prawns. We also ordered a plain mee udang (without prawns), so that we wouldn't take too much cholesterol :P 

And we tried a char kuey teow, which wasn't as good as the mee udang.

I don't know what's the thing with Malay char kuey teow, but the kuey teow portion is always extremely small!

This time round, the taste of the mee udang (and the fried udang) was similar to before, but the prawns seemed less fresh. Some of them were soft. And some were smaller in size. There were more prawns in the fried dish this time, probably because of their smaller size.

Cottage 75 again

On our last trip to Ipoh, we ordered food from Cottage 75 Cafe again. This time we had a few Grabfood vouchers, so we used it order these!

The prices have definitely gone up since before, plus we were using Grab which jacked the prices up further...so I won't bother checking the prices to write here. I just remember that the lamb shank cost 40+, and the other two were probably at 30+.

We tried the lamb shank for the first time, because we had the vouchers. It would have been too expensive otherwise!

It's nice that they packed the sauce separately. The sauce had mushrooms in it.

Then we ordered the two dishes that had made the biggest impressions during our first visit: the beef burger and the emerald seabass.

Although they don't look as good when presented in boxes, the taste was still yummy!