heh heh

My first post from work I think! I feel like I'm being very naughty. Thank you for the kind words about my last post. It means a lot to me to think people still read this. :D

I'm heading up my first episode from the start this week. For the past few epsiodes I've remained behind to do clean up work, and only watched the prepro happen from a far. For this one I'm in the thick of it from the get go. I hope it will be good. I awnt to do a really good job of getting things ready without doing too good a job because I don't want the other guy to look bad, or create a competition. I'm just eager to try my hand at it.

ok back to work.

Mid Nov

This isn't her happiest expresion, but I like it anyway.

Sorry everyone it's been a while again. Lots have happened in the last three weeks. Singapore is in it's rainy season... or a rainy season... I have no idea how many they have. So it seems that it rains for at least two hours every day, instead of the usual 20 min. It's still hot.

I bike to work every day here. It takes me about 10 min. 15 if I count the time to lock and unlock my bike. It has been really good. Though I did have on e accident a few weeks ago and I think I broke something in my hand. My left hand fortunately. I had thought it was just bruised or sprained so I've not seen a dr about it but it still hurts and I only have about 15% of my strength in it. It's not really so bad. It just makes me a bit crankier than usual.



I've had my birthday. I am now 33. Very old by industry standards. It's been a hard birthday. I realized it's my first birthday outside of Canada. That shouldn't make any difference but it did. I believe I am deep in the miserable stage of culture shock. I'm also heading into a mid life crisis and begin to wonder what I'm gonna do with the rest of my life. This isn't exactly what I want for the next 30 years. And I don't relish the idea of moving into management anywhere. My opinions of management these days are pretty low, and frankly speaking I want better. Lots to think about.

HAPPY BDAY JEN!! 21 again!

I've wanted to post more pictures on this blog, and it would seem today is the day!

It's jens birthday and we have all just gone to Jacobs cafe in changi village for lunch. I love it there. It's very close to the ocean (so it's a little bit cooler) surrounded by large jungle like trees and much older buildings. It has a nice feeling around it.

Here are some pictures from canada that were taken while jen was there for her mom.

Emma took this photo. Amazing for only being 3. For those who don't know these people are:

jen, grandma joy, cheryl, with lily and melanie in the front.

This one is just to remind me of home. Hopefully someday I will return.

Good news!

My friend Chris from Starz days has moved to china! Finally a Canadian buddy in the same time zone. He's working with some big Chinese school/studio. It sounds exciting. He got lots of nice perks too. Free accommodation, food, tv, phone etc. and here I am like a chump paying for my own stuff. Oh well. Chris is into WOW too, so I will have a non Australian buddy to play with that I don't work with. It's really cool to have someone that knows what I'm talking about when I talk shop, but isn't actually involved.

PS My WOW character is named tigaratus. He's a lvl 34 human alliance warrior. I'm kicking butt.

mmm Timmies

It's been just over 6 months in this fine land. I miss Tim Hortons coffee. Kopitium is ok, but it's no timmies.
Before Jen left for Canada, she put together two care packages for our family in Canada. It was amazingly well done. Jen had lots of our digital photos printed and wrote a storey about each photo on the back. We packed some t shirts and some memorabilia from my work with all the photos and sent them off. We thought it would be a great gift. It turns out that Jen beat the gift box home. oh well. I suppose it got a little bit over shadowed with everything going on. Dad is wearing the Singapore shirt we sent home. It was a national day shirt, and we got it after national day so it was on sale (I know you would appreciate that dad!).


Jen came back with stories of Swiss Chalet, and the keg. I pushed them to make sure they had lots of beef while back in Canada. I think (once they loose the weight they gained) they will thank me. I was very jealous. I tired to come back with photos of my bee hoon, or nasi lemak, but it just felt silly.

Jen brought back an article from the Toronto star about Starz animation opening a studio in Toronto. I thought, hmm I wonder where I worked before lucasfilm then? The article talked to the head of studio David Rubinstein in depth about the future of Starz. rubenstien ... Rubenstein... that's not right. I could have sworn his name was David Steinberg. So I opened up my email contacts and I was right! The entire article mentioning his name several time, was completely wrong. This isn't a typo, it's a completely wrong name!! All very funny in my opinion. Poor David.

How come no one else has sent me timmies pictures?

WOW!!! My First EARTHQUAKE!!

My first earthquake!! It was very cool. No one died, a Tsunami alert has been issued though. I hope I'm not speaking too soon. It was in Indonesia, and cnn is reporting it was a 7.8 magnitude then followed quickly by an 8.0.

I barely felt it, but I did feel it.

Jennielynns mom is sick.

Jen and the girls flew back to Canada yesterday to be with Jen's mom Cheryl. She has been admitted to Toronto East General hospital, and diagnosed with a very sever form of cancer that in the last weeks has gone into her lungs liver and brain. The prognosis is not good. Please send your good thoughts and well wishes in this trying time. It is very ... emotional. Cheryl I send you my love and hope for peace.

my mishap and the science center

Good News! My luck is still holding! There were torrential down pours toady, and part of Singapore were flooded for a few hours. It was of course the day I promised Emma I would come home for lunch. I got completely drenched, and slipped at the foot of the building catching my big toe in a storm grate. Apparently flip flops have very little traction. Who knew? The Dr says it's not broken but it's all swollen and purple and hurts like a son of a gun. Sigh.

Last weekend we went to the Singapore science center. It is really nice. We got a family membership so when our folks come to visit it will be one of the places we go to for sure. I like it better than the Ontario science center, but it really has less information. I guess maybe because there are so many languages here there are less signs explaining things. It's really colourful and there are lots of cool exhibit s like a water park! Here are some pics from our first visit.

OOO she looks so smart!

Mel is getting excited looking at future exhibits.

This is Emma in the under water area. She said she was having a puppet show. Lots of fun.

The trip!!

It's not everyday you get to ride an elephant!


This is the Nirwana resort where we stayed.
The elephants name is cheng.

A cassowary and some cockatoos. The resort is a hostel of sorts for endangered animals that have been caught being smuggled. They also had a sea turtle hatchery.

Jen and Lily playing badmington.

It was fantastic. We had a lot of fun. I ate way too much. :)

geography lesson

Ahem. I have made an error. We are going to Bintan, in Indonesia, not Malaysia. It is south east of Singapore.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bintan

sorry for my goof. maybe we will go to Malaysia soon. though I still want to see the great wall in china...

those danged monkies

I promised a pic of the monkeys that ran though our back yard. And voila! It took me a bit to get my phone out and take the pic so they had run down the street a bit. they were about knee height running on all fours. If they stood up I bet they would be 3 to 3.5 feet high. (big enough to carry Emma away and raise her like the jungle girl she is!)

National day is approching

It's funny in Singapore. National day is Aug 9. Singapore will be 42 years old as a nation. Congrats! It's no civic holiday, like we had back in Ontario, but it will have to do. It is actually a really big event here. There will be fire works, parades, air shows, concerts, and lots more. To celebrate this we are going to go to Malaysia!! I know it's not very patriotic, but we aren't Singaporeans.

I believe I have mentioned before that Emma loves taking photos. She is pretty good at it too fro being 3. If she takes 1500 photos (so about a weeks worth) she will get 2-3 good photos. Well last week she decided, after filling up a memory card, that she didn't need the card any more and threw it away. It was very funny when Jen picked up the camera to take a cute pic of our new cats, and noticed there was no memory card. Emma non shalantly announced she had thrown it away because it didn't work anymore. Three year old logic. It's infallible sometimes!!

We will try to take lots of pictures with our old Sony.

lunch

I was served my lunch on a leaf. It was good. That is all.

Familial changes.

So my life has been fairly complicated in the last 6 months. My leaving and going to Singapore, the police incident with the people we had been living with, the joys of traveling on a plane for 27 hours with a three year old, working in a foreign land with people I just don't understand, missing our family from home (we really do miss you guys), the addition of a maid, and now, I'd like to announce our two new cats. Princess Ashley, and Clementine. They were strays that Mel and Jen adopted. The are good cats, and incredibly well mannered for wild cats. I will post pictures soon. I'm sure Mel will have some on her blog first. ;)

Monkey business

I was reminded today that Singapore is a tropical island. Some times I forget how fundamentally different it is here. I can ride the subway (mrt), and go to burger king. I can hail a cab and go to the movies. The main past time for locals is shopping, and the malls are immense. All things that seem very normal, and not really all that different from home. But today... around 10am this morning.. Jen, Melanie, Emma, and I, were walking to my work with lily our maid for what we hope will be an annual family day... when, in our own back yard, three monkeys ran past us and down the street. Monkeys. Three Monkeys. Three wild Monkeys. In our back yard. Then ran past us maybe 20 feet away. It was amazing.

Little India

Wow, we've had some big changes this last two weeks. I almost quit (that would have been disastrous), we got a maid, and yesterday we went to little India. What a week.

Little India is basically central in the island. It seems to be a fairly small district, but it is intensely packed with stuff. We got off the mrt (mass rapid transit) at the little india stop and walked to the ferrer park mrt stop. Most of our walk was along one street, and up and down a few allies. There were lots of shops selling colourful silks and incense. We stopped a few restaurants and tasted lots of different foods. Jen is working really hard to expand her flavour selections by trying more spicy foods. I applaud her for that and thank her because it means I get more selection of foods! The end of our walk was a gigantic shopping mall called Mustafa's. Not my favourite place here so far let me tell you. It was the first time in Singapore that I have gotten claustrophobic. I actually had to yell at people who stopped at the top of an escalator to discuss where they were gonna go next. There is nothing like being ushered into a wall of people.

There were lots of savings to be had there, but I do not plan on ever going back. Especially not on a weekend. Blah!

Our maid is named Lilly. She is a "foreign domestic worker" from the Philippines. She is very nice and having her here has been great. I wake up in the morning and come down the stairs, and everything is sparkling. She washes the floors every day!! She will get annoyed if we try to clean up our own dishes. It's difficult, but we will suffer through it. ;)

Emma took this photo. It was great having the whole family with me, even if I did have to carry emma for hours and hours. :D

Here are some pictures from little india.

Some funky temple. This one has neat carvings all over it. I think it is hindi but I really don't know.

and lunch! There is nothing like green chicken!! mmmmmm

a quick note...

The star wars trailer has had more than a million hits since it was released, and was written about in every major newspaper in the world. Not too shabby for a TV show.

three months

Well isn't this sad? I've been in Singapore for three months. This blog site is three months old. Not nearly as many posts as I'd like, but I've felt very limited in what I can say. I don't want to talk about work. It has dominated 90% of all my relationships since it began. Everyone knows that I'm working on the star wars 3d animated TV show that will air in mid to late 2008. I'm contractually not allowed to say more.

Last Sunday I took my family to the Singapore zoo. It is really nice. Surprisingly nice. Much nicer than the Toronto zoo and really a lot cheaper too. The animal selection is great, and always close by. It must suck to be an animal there. No privacy at all. But for people it's awesome. Melanie was able to have her picture taken with a family of orang utans (that's Malay for man of the jungle). We were only there for a few hours. It's hard with a 3 year old and we didn't bring a stroller. Lets see if I can dig up some photos.

At the entrance to the zoo there were 5 or 6 big bronze statues of some animals and we got a few good pictures here.


This was a cool spot with 5 huge parrots. For a small donation ($5 sing) Mel was able to hold one. Remember she's more than 5 feet tall now. She said the bird was very light.


The feeding of the polar bear wasn't very exciting (though you would never have guessed that based on the crowd it drew). I guess maybe it was more exciting for Singaporeans who have never seen a polar bear before. It did have an air conditioned den, but seemed to prefer being out in the 35degree weather. There were some interesting facts posted here. Things like the fact that polar bears live in a climate that reaches 35 degrees . It neglects to mention that it only hits 35 degrees once a year.

This fearsome kamodo dragon. This guy was the hardest to see at the zoo. She is about 5 feet long (maybe 6), and liked to hide in the back corner. According to the sign she had just had babies. It also said they will eat their young. Maybe that's why we didn't see any.

This is just a reminder of home. Or the home that once was. I miss it, but it's not mine any more.

so much change... but back to star wars!!

I've been very careful on this blog to not talk about work, and the decision to write this post took a bit of consideration. I'm proud of the work we are doing. It is a good team that has been put together.

http://starwars.com/video/view/000478.html

They have finally released a trailer for the clone wars TV show that I am working on. I have to admit it was made from episodes that were done before I got there. Believe it or not it looks way better now.

Moving time

After a series of unfortunate events I have come back to Canada a month and a bit early. I may explain on a later post, but for now lets just say I hate moving. Things have been very crazy. I wanted to take a second from packing (mostly because I hate packing) and put out a big thank you to a few people in particular. Thank you Randy, Eddie, Jen and Jason, Sarah and Adam, my parents, and my in laws. It is great to know that in a time of need you are there for us. You have re affirmed my faith in humanity.

HAPPY MOTHERS DAY!!

This post is dedicated to my mother.

Mom,

I love you and I miss you. It is very strange not being able to give you a hug on mothers day. I really appreciate the love and support you have given me over the years.


"God made a wonderful mother,
A mother who never grows old;
He made her smile of the sunshine,
And He moulded her heart of pure gold;
In her eyes He placed bright shining stars,
In her cheeks fair roses you see;
God made a wonderful mother,
And He gave that dear mother to me. "

~By Pat O'Reilly~

I'm feeling better now.

Things are better today. My self pity is passing. Yesterday I met up with two people from work and we went for a little walk around Bugis (a district in Singapore) to look at toy stores. I wished I had brought my camera, but I doubt I could have taken many pictures. The toys were mostly anime stuff, but it was still neat to see. I really appreciated the tour if Siau Yene or Sonny ever read this. Thanks!

Today I am going to go and buy a headphone extender for Alice (I don't think work will buy her one and I figure I can spare the $3 to help her out), and some new cable wires for the TV here. They have some weird blue putty holding together the cable wire and its ruining our reception, so I'm going to rip it out and replace it.

I slept in for the first time this morning. Right up until noon. It was glorious. It feels like I haven't done that in ages. Of course it helped that I stayed up until two am playing world of Warcraft. I started playing the day Jen went back to Whitby, with the idea that I would "kill" time with it until she gets back. It's helped, but boy does it kill time!!

Self Pitty. This is more for me than you. I just need to vent.

Well today was harder than most days. There were some technical issues at work that I couldn't solve, and that just seemed to take me right out of my comfort zone. Dinner was a disaster. I was cooking some brats sausages in the oven and they burned badly, so I took them out of the oven and I put them in the sink to cool and turned on the water. Well I had been cooking them in a glass casserole dish, and of course, when I put water in to cool it down it shattered. Bleh. I'm tired, cranky, and feel like I want to come home. I guess it's being homesick. I knew this would happen, and I know all I can do is ride it out and wait for it to pass. Hopefully it will pass quickly. Some of the other expats say they go through it every 3-4 months. They tell me it will get easier. I hope so. Somehow it seems saying "it will get easier" seems a bit of a cop out. I miss Jen and the girls. I miss my folks. I miss my friends. I miss Canada. I miss being wearing a jacket. I miss socks and shoes. I miss the go train. Well I don't really miss the go train. I miss the friends I had on the go train. I miss the movie network. I miss my TV. I miss my house and my car. My beautiful beautiful car. I miss incandescent lighting. Everything here is cfc energy efficient.

A few good things happened today. One: I bought a web cam And managed to hook it up with skype and msn! Two I went grocery shopping by myself and did not freak out. (the first time I went I ended up only buying pb and j because everything else was too scary) I cooked my own dinner, and it was not grilled cheese. ;) that was yesterdays lunch. This was rice (with soya sauce) chicken pau (chicken in a bun), with sugar snap peas and some funky Chinese green leafy thing, AND I managed to hook up the computer to the TV so I can watch 300 everything I have downloaded on the TV. Plus it means that even if the DVD player here will not play our dvd's from home (ahem Whitby) we will be able to play them off the computer! Yay me!

I was going to colour correct these imagesw but... it's only my dinner.

I talked to an old friend from my Elliott days Aaron Fritz today. He is doing well and still at the same job he went to after Elliott. That's almost 4 years ago. Good for you Aaron! I talked with Marnie today too. She reminded me to email some of my old friends back home so as soon as I'm done this post that is what I am going to do. If you hear from me in the next few days you should thank her. ;)

Thanks so much Jack! You are the first to do it, and that makes me happy. I'll post this challenge out for everyone to email me a picture of themselves drinking a Tim Hortons coffee to remind me of home. I actually have a few cousins that work in Tim Hortons so hopefully we will get lots of pictures right? We shall see. But in the mean time it's kind of a fun little distraction, and with everything going on it's quite needed. I've added a quote from jack's email at the bottom. I hope he doesn't mind.

"I asked Shawna to take a picture of me with a Timmie's coffee for you. This is the picture she took. I look like I'm hung over, or maybe still drunk. Then she insisted I send this picture. So here you go. Me, drinking a Timmie's coffee, for you. You didn't say it had to be a good picture."

SkyCable Dinning

Jen and I enjoyed an evening of "cable car dinning" from Mt Faber ( the highest point in Singapore) to Sentosa (Singapore's resort island). It takes about 24 minutes round trip, so our dinner was three round trips. One course of the meal on each trip. It was a great night out, though very expensive. $168 sing dollars for the dinner (that's about $125 Canadian). Pretty high price for only one glass of wine each. It took a while before it began because we didn't know what time it was supposed to start so we wandered around Singapore for a while and then waited for about an hour at Mt Faber.

The food was great, although very western. After a few exciting hawker stand visits it was a welcome change. :D

The view was amazing but almost impossible to take a picture of. I have about 20 really blurry photos and only one or tow clear ones. It didn't bounce around so much you'd get sick, but it was enough to wreck some of the pics.

Jen had chicken and I had beef. Actually we split both, and then we had a nice chocolate brownie.

mmmmmm.

I have to admit I feel kind of conceited putting up pictures of myself, so I will balance it out with a nice picture of my eight inch friend here. This is easily the biggest spider that I have ever seen, and I hope to never see it again. If I stretch my fingers out as far as they can go it will still not be as big as this spider. It was sitting in a giant 5 foot web beside the restaurant at Mt Faber. I was about 4 meters from it in this picture. There was no way I was getting any closer, and I didn't stick around long enough to zoom in.

Jen and I on the MRT

This one is a quicky. Jen has been with me for a few weeks now, and together we have explored a bit of Singapore. My next post will have our pictures from the cable car of Mount Faber. ooo exciting!

Our Apt and a cool BBQ

Ok. I admit it. These pictures are not new. I got lazy and did not take any pictures of our new apt. BUT I do have these photos from my cell phone that I took to show Jen the place before we got it. We now live in the top two floors of this lovely four floor building.

This is our pool and our view from our living room and bedroom. It is 1.4meters to 2 meters deep. On the weekend there are about 6 regular kids playing in it. Melanie will have lots of fun. The weight room is beside the far end of this pool, and the BBQ pit would be behind the camera and off to the left. We can see the BBQ from our dining room window. Today Jen and I went for a 15 min walk to the East Point Mall. It was a nice close walk to everything we will need.

This is our dinning room area. Alicia and her friend from Amsterdam went with me the first time I looked at the place. I think it was a good idea to bring a "local" with me. If you read this Alicia, thank you. This is pretty much my living room now. The only thing that is really missing from what I have now is the piano. We asked them to leave it but... what can you do. The TV and stereo are still here. The colours are interesting, but believe it or not that kinda work for the space. There are lots of little Chinese knick knacks that add to the experience. It was funny they had a Chinese style horse lamp that the owners sun tried to tell me it was like the terracotta warriors. I don't think they had lamps back 2200 years ago, but I didn't want to ruin his delusions so I nodded politely and oooed and awwwed appropriately.

It is Sunday here today, and a bunch of people from work were having a BBQ in the east coast park. It was beautiful, and a great chance for Jen to meet the people I work with, and there significant others. We had a great time.

The weather was perfect for a beach side BBQ (which was god because it had rained pretty hard earlier in the day).