Just another day

My mum told me I was sick all the time as a kid, we paid numerous visits to the doctor. Luckily, he was one of the more ethical ones and didn't prescribed tetracycline wily-nilly. I remembered at least 1/3 of my school friends had stained teeth - now a well known side effects of the notorious antibiotic.

Now I'm a parent, and when you are faced with a kid that's under the weather - life is a pretty tough gig. They don't sleep well when they're sick, they can't/don't want to go to daycare. 

Well, life goes on. getting sick is part of life of a toddler - or as a human for that matter. For out of everyone I should know better. Knowing doesn't help alleviating the suffering however, just like most things.

Life goes on...

Dani sat 2 out of 5 of her exams last Saturday.. BYOM - bring your own microscope. Budding pathologists and haematopathologists from all over Victoria gathered in this histopathology lab at Monash Clayton. The path people sat through a 4 hour exams (? sore bottom) while the haematology folks got away with a 3 hour one. I tell you, people reckon neurologists are "smart", knowing what my wife has to know, I start to think people might actually be making a mockery of us neurologists....

3 more exams to go, then PhD it is next year, for her that is. My boss asked when I'll be doing mine, well, it will come!

Authorship

This is not exactly true, but nevertheless quite funny. Note the initials of the last author!!

Elisha turns 2!

Elisha turned two last weekend. What a milestone. Her big brother celebrated it in style - less than one minute of getting home, he toppled the box with the Peppa Pig cake inside, straight onto the floor. Peppa Pig cake no more.

She was a bit under the weather too, so we didn't end up taking any decent photos!! Dani has her haematology exams in a few weeks. I'm sure we'll look back at this time of our life later on and realise this, in fact, was not all that hard. I've been told sleepless nights as parents are nothing, nothing when compare to having teenagers at home.

We - shall - see.

Runny nose

This is not Elisha.. it's just a photo I got from the net. Elisha is turning 2 very soon, in May, and she's in the middle of a very bad flu. 

It's the usual story, she started going to this big daycare about 3 months ago, and for the past 3 weeks (feels much longer than that...), she has is constant runny nose. She probably did get better.. and then got sick again, poor thing.

End result? I vomited all my lunch on Sunday, my mum was the same.. somehow she managed to kept her food in a little longer, needless to say, she suffered a bit longer too! My poor wife, has been running on 4 instead of 6 cylinders for a few weeks too.

Well, E will grow stronger out of this. Just like her big brother Jonathan, the ONLY seemingly unaffected one in the family, thanks to exposure to two different daycares when he was at E's age!

Family Home

My parents sold their house in Remuera today. They lived there from 1991 till now, a total of 26 years. Arguably the longest time my dad has stayed in any one place. It was our first and only home in NZ. It was renovated before we moved in, then again just before 2000.

I'm not the most sentimental one in the family, but still, it was still a bit sad. I lived at home till I was married in 2009, a good 20 odd years of my life was spent in that house; secondary school, college, medical school, and, as a busy junior doctor. Heaps of memories, numerous parties, including my 21st parties, of course.

My parents are more then ready to move on, however. The house, with 5 rooms, is now truely too big for them. My parents were in their early 40s, grandma, my sister (4), and me (13) when we moved in. Now, Margaret is working in HK, I'm in Melbourne, and, we lost grandma around 2005. I will be turning 40 myself soon!

The house is ready for a new owner, a young family, like ours, back in the days.

Dreams and Reality - La La Land

A few months ago I read how "La La Land" is going to make it big on BBC news - it was right and after watching it today, it did not disappoint.

I will not even try to write a review here since there are tons of very well written ones online already, for example, here, here and here. The one thing on my mind at the end of the movie was that, it was very well done, and yes, I was upset by the ending - who wouldn't? Do we really have to let the realities of life trump our dreams? Did it make a mockery of the moment when the main characters looked each other in the eye and said "I'll always love you"? Is love really that fleeting? or can you love someone that deep down but end up marrying another person? 

I'm also very happy for the team that's behind La La Land. Their collective effort paid off, and it's a movie that is set to be one of the classics.

Bible Story DVD - 2

My wife doesn't seem to notice I have converted the last DVD to a computer file on youtube... I wondered when she'll find out....

Happy 2017! Brave new world for Jonathan, who'll start kinder properly this year (he started a few months earlier already!), and Elisha, we have a new Day Care lined up for her, opened just late last year, very modern and new.

Bible Story DVD

Finally, after months and months of nagging from my wife, I ripped this video and made it available online. No... it's not because my MacBook (which hasn't got a DVD ROM) was sent for service and I'm stuck with my old gigantic laptop (which has got a DVD ROM.....). It's just coincidence... would she believe me? ^_^

Blessed

I'm blessed. Blessed with a family, lovely wife, healthy kids, supportive parents and parents-in-laws, and of course our helpful extended family. What more can I wish for? Yet again I don't count my blessings often enough. In times of difficulties, in times of frustrations, and in times of getting annoyed. 

One's emotion to the outside world is intrinsically linked to one's worldview, which in turn is shaped by one's identity, one's history. It is when you take stock, and reflect, then you gain clarity. For believers, a large part of this can be achieve through prayers. For the rest, meditation and mindfulness.

It's Christmas soon, it's first and foremost about the birth of son of Man. It's time to count our blessings.