Monday, 4 May 2015

Weekend

Lazy weekend

Saturday 2 May 2015

Went to the Keraton 2015: Indonesian Festival, held at Red Square in the University of Washington.

Met up with some other Singaporeans in the area:

Had some yummy yummy Indonesian satay (not to be mistaken with Singaporean satay), zhang (dumpling), kueh kueh and avocado shake (also different from the one in Singapore, but yummy nonetheless.

Kids had a blast playing with balloons


May 3, Sunday
Lazy weekend continues. We went to Snoqualmie. A quaint little town.
We wanted to go to the train museum, buy we missed the last train. We'll go again to take the train.

We took the scenic route back. Passed by Microsoft in Redmond. Huge campus.

Picture of the moon and Mt Rainier taken on Sat.

Saturday, 2 May 2015

Friday, 1 May 2015

1st of May. Also known as May Day and Labour Day. In America, it is known as International Workers' Day, and it is not a public holiday. Bummer.

The children played for a while at the play area in the CC near school after I picked them up.


After lunch, we picked and cleaned up. Then I winged some braised pork ribs.

We had the Stradleys over for dinner.

They brought some awesome made in Seattle ice cream!

Wednesday, 29 April 2015

Too many days has gone by without me posting. Too much has happened.

So I'm only going to note what happened recently.

Friday 24 April 2015
Shawn's wife, Irene. And TC's gf, Karin are in town, so the whole gang came by for dinner. Irene prepared sio bak (roasted pork belly), TC and Karin prepared ABC soup and we did steamed fish, Teochew style (with the salted plum airflown from Sg), coconut rice (nasi lemak) and bacon mixed veg.

Good food and great company. Best combination.

Saturday 25 April 2015
We spent the morning at the circus. The kids had great fun. Especially on the bouncy castle slide, and the pony ride.


Went to Costco in the afternoon. Got lots of supplies. Should have minimal need to go grocery shopping the coming week.

Sunday 26 April 2015
Had a lazy morning, then went to the outlets to get shoes for the kids. Also got some pants for the girl.

Then we drove south to meet the gang, as well as their friend, Gwen, at The Melting Pot in Tacoma for dinner. Basically a fondue place. Cheese for starters, broth for mains and chocolate for dessert. Ate too much, stayed out too late.

Monday 27 April 2015
Took my driving test - both the knowledge test (aka theory) and practical. JH forgot to book the practical for me, but luckily they had a slot. Aced them both! Yay! Was damned stressed about both, especially the practical, but whew! Unfortunately it was Monday, so the DOL was closed. Had brunch with JH and Irene (who also passed her test, yay!) at IHOP. Went to pick up the children. Irene sent JH to work.

Tuesday 28 April 2015
Went to DOL after dropping the kids off at school. Got my temporary license. Paid $89 total - $35 for the application, $54 for the picture (!!!). Paid in cash as I refused to pay another $2 as service fee for the debit card. Unfortunately, it was a crappy picture

Thursday, 9 April 2015

29 March, Sunday

Drove for the first time today! It was a bit unnerving as 1) the steering wheel was on the wrong side of the car, 2) I'd have to drive on the wrong side of the road (technically, its on the right side) and 3) the car was humongous! I'm not sure which I was more nervous about, the extra space I was taking up, and would therefore need to allow for (and not crash into or side swipe anything), or reprogramming my brain with regards to which lane I should be turning into and which I should avoid.

JH had me drive the route to the children's new school. I then drove around in the car park for a bit before venturing out onto the streets again. It went ok. I tended to lean to the right and mounted the kerb (or as they say around these part, curb - that's a verb, darn it!) once in the carpark.

For some reason, I've been rather disoriented since we arrived. My sense of direction has never been very bad and I usually form a mental map of a place quite quickly. However, despite being driven around the neighbourhood more than a couple of times (albeit to different places each time), I've been feeling like the stereotypical female with no sense of direction. I guess I'll need to explore around more.

After taking over the wheel (whew!), JH drove us to the Seattle Gas Works Park. It is on the north end of Lake Union and has beautiful views of downtown Seattle. The juxtaposition of the old industrial equipment next to the lake and the open field was striking. I did not manage to catch any nice photos of it, because the camera kept underexposing it because of the sky.

30 March, Monday
Mostly spent at home doing laundry and cleaning. Also did a grocery run at QFC.
Nice warm day, 18 degrees Celcius.


31 March, Tuesday

Another day spent at home, trying to set up a routine, as well as a realistic budget. Made Nestum coated chicken tenders and a rosemary zucchini and mushroom dish. Need to work on portion control.

8 degrees Celcius today. Rained too. Snowed somewhere, it seems. Puget Sound, I think it was. Hailed in town, too.

1 April 2015, Wednesday

Finally jumped on the tomato rice bandwagon today. It turned out alright. A bit on the mooshy side. Maybe I should take out 7 spoonfuls of water instead of 6. It was not a hit with the children. They ate most of it, but not on their own. I had to feed them.

Dinner was much more successful. I cooked the pork ribs I bought at QFC with the Seah's Bak Kut Teh spice packet I brought over. Yums. Also fried kale with carrots and bacon. Also turned out successfully. Yay! S came over for dinner, and brought a box of donuts. Thanks, S!

2 April 2015, Thursday


Did the American thing today: clip coupons. The children helped.

We also went for a walk.

3 April 2015, Friday
Did some unpacking today, including stuff and boxes from when JH first moved in.

Also finally cooked something western today for dinner. Spaghetti and meatballs.

Well, more like fusion, depending on what carbs it is paired with. ;)

4 April 2015, Saturday
JH brought the girl out to Costco today, and came back with lots of stuff.

Rearranged the furniture a little. Looks a little better than when we first arrived.


5 April 2015, Sunday

Happy Easter! We went for an Easter Egg Hunt in Kirkland. They had different areas for different age groups. The eggs were gone within 5 minutes, I think.
The kids had fun.

We bought some food from a dumpling shop in Kirkland, and had a picnic before and after the egg hunt.

This is the dinner that JH prepared for us. So much variety and so yummy!

6 April 2015, Monday
First day of school for the children!

Checking out the school.

We chose a Montessori School for the kiddos to hopefully ease their transition. They seem to like it so far. It is actually Spring Break now, so there are fewer children around. Hopefully they won't be too overwhelmed when the rest of the kids return next week.

7 April 2015, Tuesday
Went to the Moore Theatre to catch "An Evening with America's Test Kitchen" with S this evening! Thanks to JH who looked after the children! Muaks. Much love and appreciation!


8 April 2015, Wednesday
Super duper sleepy the whole day. Old liao, cannot have late nights out. Funny, because I turn in much later on normal nights.

9 April 2015, Thursday
JH came along to drop the children off this morning as he wanted me to drop him off for his dental appointment. He drove into town, and I drove back. Thank goodness for the GPS.

Monday, 30 March 2015

First Week (thereabouts)

24th March 2015 (Tuesday)


23 hours, 30 minutes. That's the time we spent in planes and airports during layovers today. Not including checking-in in Singapore or collecting the luggage in Seattle. The trip comprised of three legs - Singapore to Seoul, Seoul to San Francisco, and San Francisco to Seattle.

With the reshuffling of the luggage, we barely made it to the plane on time. By the time we got to the gate, the plane was already boarding.

The kids were brilliant on the first leg. Little Lady slept through most of it. Little Man got a little angtsy around the 5 hour mark and wanted off the plane. However, he was able to keep his cool until we landed in Seoul. The Seoul layover was supposed to be 1 hour and 5 minutes, but after disembarking, going through security and early boarding with young children, I think we effectively had 5 minutes at Incheon. But I think the kids managed to stretch their legs and were more settled for the next leg.

The kids were once again brilliant on the second, 10 hour 45 minute leg. After the meal, Little Man again wanted out, but after a bit of convincing, he agreed to sleep. He slept through breakfast, and by the time he woke up, it was almost time to land in San Francisco.

At SFO, we passed through immigration, picked up out luggage, checked the luggage in at the transfer area, and then went to check in for our final leg. Mr Milo was able to change his flight to the same one as the rest of us were on.

We had some time to kill (maybe half an hour to 45 minutes left of our 3+ hours layover), so we had a quick bite (since Little Man missed his meal on board) and watched baggage get off-loaded from an A380.


The kids slept through most of the final leg. They even slept through the landing!

We were met in Seattle by Mr Milo's friends, S and TC. They were very kind to drive all the way to the airport to pick us up. TC even drove to our apartment here in Seattle to pick up our car first! They helped us to load up our numerous luggage, drove us home and then help us unload!


After unloading, we rested a little to recover, and then had dinner at a nice Thai restaurant in the neighbourhood.

Little Man slept peacefully, but Little Lady woke at 2am and stayed awake till about 5am.

25th March (Wednesday)
We all woke up late, and had brunch of waffles and luncheon meat made by Mr Milo.

As Mr Milo had lost his wallet back in Singapore, we spent the afternoon getting a replacement driver's license and SIM card as well as a SIM card for me. I was very sleepy for a couple of hours, partly due to jetlag, and partly due to Little Lady's shenanigans the night before.

On our way back from the errands, we stopped by the neighbourhood QFC and bought some supplies.

Dinner was naan and roast chicken ($7.99) from the supermarket. It was as yummy as the ones from Woolies and Coles in Perth. I then deboned the chicken to use the carcass to boil up some stock.

Once again, Little Lady woke in the wee hours. Slightly better though. She fell back to sleep at 4am.

26th March (Thursday)
We had pancakes for breakfast.

After lunch (chicken noodle soup made with left over chicken and the stock made the night before), Mr Milo brought us to see the children's school. They had a lot of fun on the playground on a hill just behind the school. School was out for the day, but we looked around the compound, and the children had lots of fun playing with the toys in the schoolyard.


After that, we walked further up the hill behind school and came across a community garden. It looks wonderful. I must figure out how we can get a plot.

Dinner was fried rice. I am glad to report that the children ate well for both lunch and dinner. It was a relief as I hadn't cooked for a long time, and the children are generally picky eaters.

Little Lady again woke in the middle of the night. This time, she was joined by Little Man.

27th March (Friday)
Mr Milo's first day back at work. Since I wasn't comfortable driving yet, he drove to work. The children and I spent a nice relaxing day at home. I made meatballs and patties with the ground pork and turkey we bought the other day. We had some for lunch and dinner and froze the rest for another day.

28th March (Saturday)
We ventured to a Target in Bellevue today. Bought some stuff for the home. We also applied for the Red Card, which gives us a 5% discount. However, because there was an issue, they moved us to another cashier without a scanner. There wasn't a price tag on one of the items, so the cashier charges me $1 for it. Score.

Little Man wanted pizza for lunch, but we could not find any in the mall we were in, so we settled for some Greek food. Both Little Man and Little Lady loved the pita bread. Mr Cuppa and I much preferred the traditional gyro to the chicken.

In the afternoon we went to the Mercerdale Park and met up with K, C and family. The kids had fun on the playground.

After that, we all had dinner at Szechuan Chef in Bellevue. It was yummy, authentic Chinese food.

When we got back to the apartment, we watched the live streaming of LKY's funeral on the laptop. I couldn't help but tear a little too. He was instrumental in a lot of what we take for granted in Singapore.

Tuesday, 25 November 2014

Tue Nov 25: so I got a car

Deciding on the type of car
It's not unusual to find different qualities of salespeople depending on the brand of the car. I had a decent but somewhat humble budget, and I was looking for a new SUV. Humble budget and new  don't go very well together.

I could go for a recently used car. I did start out looking for one. There are generally 2 options for a used car: get it from the dealers, or get it direct from the seller (eg. through Craigslist).

The thing about dealer prices is that they tend to be the highest among the various options available. The margin between a used and new car's MSRP (Manufacturer's Suggestion Retail Price) is about a $1000-odd, tops $2000. For say $2000 less you drive a car that's a year's old, and with warranty that runs out a year earlier. Sounds reasonable. Throw in the unknown that is the history and current condition of the car, that's when I decide to avoid the risk.

2015 model cars cross an interesting threshold: all cars are required by law to come included with a reverse camera. I drove a Hyundai Avante (Elantra) for almost 5 years without a reverse camera nor sensor, and I was fine. Since this car will be driven primarily by my wife, plus the fact that it is a bigger car I was motivated to get a reverse camera. Don't get me started on the tragedies of mothers who unknowingly reversed into children.

Conclusion: it's got to be new, it's got to have a reverse camera, and yes I'd like to own a SUV once in my life.

Coming back to the humble budget, Japanese cars like Honda and Subaru are unfortunately out of my reach. American cars are the only bunch that fit my budget (avoiding Korean for now). Among the brands Ford seems to be better rated.

Conclusion: it's got to be the Ford Escape.

The auto landscape
Hollywood and popular literature paints car salesmen as greasy people out to sell you more than what you need. It's kind of true, but in a different sense.

Car salesmen in the States are salespeople who don't really know much about cars. Really. This is witnessed in Ford, Honda, Toyota, and if I remember correctly Subaru dealers. Not all salespeople are that clueless - it's possible but not common to be met with a more experienced one.

Their job is not to help you find the right car, but to assist in finding a car. These are two different things. They can help if you know what you want specifically. If you get technical they'd be lost. If it's not in the computer or printed on a page they can't do much. So what can they do without a computer? Pull u out the car for you to test drive. Help you locate the car in the huge parking lot. In my visits to the dealers I met with more I-just-joined salespeople than any seniors in the job. Turnover sounds high. The guys are selling cars to make a quick buck with little marketable skills. Nothing wrong with that. Just makes the customer's experience a lousy one.

Pricing
Prices in the auto industry is so fluid. There are 2 kinds of salespeople: the one who starts off with the higher price (the MSRP) and throws out tidbits of 'discounts' to get you to commit on the spot. Depending on how gullible you are, once you are hooked onto the latest 'steep discount' offered by the slick salesperson the rest of the discount cards he holds back becomes his extra profit.

Then there's the no-haggle dealers who offers the discounts upfront and leaves it there. If you like the price and the service from the salesperson, you make the decision to buy. There can be more than one no-haggle dealer in the broad radius of the city you live in, but technically they are on different ends of the radius. For example in Seattle there's one in the east, one in the south, and possibly one in the north.

I cannot state enough the importance of doing homework on the cars. It's not clear what exactly to research on until one visits the dealers to discover the variables.

Cars typically come preconfigured by the manufacturer. Few cars are configured exactly the same way. The only way to know the configuration is to read off the big piece of paper on the car, where all the features are listed. Even then it's not possible to recognise the features because eg. a touch screen dashboard is displayed as Model 201A, where 201A represents a set of features that includes a touch screen.

So car configuration affects pricing. It's easy to understand why, but it's not easy to play spot-the-difference.

The other factor that's odd is the duration the car has been on the lot. A new car that sits unsold will get a bigger discount than another which just came in, even if they have the same MSRP and similar specs. Sometimes the only difference is the color. My guess that every day the car sits in the lot, the dealer is paying a loan company interest. So the sooner it's out, the sooner the interest paying stops.

The last factor is the season. Summertime sees more people relocating. People coming into the city may need a new car. So cars and accommodation goes north. Close to December sales is slower. Prices go down. Sounds logical.

One last thing to remember: cars are taxable. In Washington state it's 9.8% - compared to 9.5% on normal sales tax. Tax dollars can add some $3000 extra to the total buy/ loan price. I've been told that should I sell my car in future, I can get back some of those tax dollars. Until then, the bank gets the last laugh as they make more on the interest until the car is sold.







Sunday, 2 November 2014

Sat Nov 1: guys' day out

Driving Theory Test
Drove my SG friends to the 911 Bellevue driving center for them to take their test. For the theory, walk-in is generally ok, even on a weekend. It's best to take it in the morning though.


Passing the test
Generally the theory test is almost designed to pass on first go. It consists of 20 multiple-choice questions. The state driving guide can be downloaded for free at the Department of Licensing (DOL) web site. The most important aid to passing the test is the online mock questions, which is randomly generated from a fixed pool.

A friend of mine barely read the driving guide but took the mock tests repeatedly until there are no more new questions to choose from. He passed with 100% correct answers.


Costs
The test costs slightly less than 20 USD. The person can continue to take until he passes at no extra cost.


Driving Practical Test
For the experienced driver, the practical test can be taken with or without a pre-test run. The pre-test run is about 40min, done before the actual test.

It is really not difficult to pass the test. It is advisable to take a morning test to avoid the traffic along the test route. I did not take the pre-test, and barely passed. But that's partly because my junction stops did not count without a slight jerk backwards, and I didn't signal as frequently as is required officially. Experienced drivers tend to make lazy mistakes.


Applying for the licence
There is a DOL office near the 911 test center. It's a small single-storied building. Although appointments are not possible, I have been told not to be overly worried if there's a small crowd. The stations are well manned, and the queue will clear quite efficiently.

I am surprised though at the cost of the application. It costs more to apply for the licence than to take the tests! 20 USD for a 2-minute eye test. Amazing what the government charges.

On the spot a temporary licence will be issued. The actual card will be mailed in about 2 weeks. I applied last Fri, and should expect it next week.