Pickles n' Tickles by JJ

I GUESS you can't really tell how you'd deal with skin ageing until you're living it...which momentarily brings me back to a conversation I had with Martin a few years ago.  "What would you do when your glory days are over?" Martin asked.  He had just laid out my possible initial reactions to future dealings with skin ageing with the focal point being my spotless, velvet-smooth face. Our conversations usually have random pit stops like that. If I could graph them by topic and time, you'd see a rather erratic pattern, much like the current USD/JPY Forex charts.  "You know what I think, Martin? Youth is temporary and when it's time to let go of this perfect skin, I'd surrender gracefully," I said with a saint's conviction, not doubting one second that it'd only take a wrinkle to break a saint. I mean who has a dry T-Zone ? Most google searches would only give you useful references on  oily T-Zones anyway.  Now that the halo i...

LET'S just say that I wasn't very fond of her. Mrs N was a woman with an apple-shaped figure, always dressed in matching tailored maxi skirts and blouses. Her well oiled black hair was combed back and tied in a low ponytail which sat snuggly at the back of her rather short neck. She had a face round as the moon and her forehead was always dotted with a huge, red third eye ( pottu). She spoke with an old-school authority and at that time, most teachers did so and that didn't bother us one bit.  Mrs N taught my class Bahasa Melayu (the Malay language). It's a compulsory subject for a few reasons. First, it's the national language and second, all subjects are taught in the Malay language under the Malaysian education system. Science, Math, Geography are all taught in Malay and the text books also come in Malay (although I never saw a logic to it). So it's important for a student to grasp the language very well. Unfortunately, Malay wasn't my first language,...

THERE'S  no cure for stupidity. The DNA would always project what it's heavily made of and I suppose no education or medicine could change that. I mean what's up with the bible burning fest planned for this Sunday in Penang (Malaysia)? An event to burn bibles in the Malay language simply because they contain the Arabic word Allah . I wish the leader of the group knew how freely the word is being used in Christian churches here in the middle-east. It's not a word exclusive to only Muslims like how his shallow mind imagines it to be. I suppose you could call it one of the desperate sentiments leading up to the nearing general election but still...I shudder to imagine the very notion of it. I'm thinking ... what happened to the very basic respect for other religions, beliefs and way of life especially in a multi-cultural soceity such as ours? It's not cool. Not at all.  I hope the cops are on this like how they would be if the roles were reversed. Not that it wo...

SO the Totally Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies were baked with much pleasure. A fool proof recipe for anyone to follow really. I didn't sieve the flour and used a different variant of sugar and even reduced the call for chocolate morsels. Yet it did not compromise the yum factor one bit ( although I did switch the dark chocolate to full milk chocolate chips! ) Seriously, there is only so much chocolate you could stuff into these cookies before it actually becomes chocolate itself. These cookies have more solid chocolate than you could imagine and baking them was a challenge as I couldn't tell if they were browned and baked enough! Therefore it's important to watch over while baking so as not to burn them. Due to its richness, one probably can't consume more than a cookie at one time but with greed and determination, nothing is impossible of course. I like eating them cold out of the fridge with a glass of warm milk. Bliss!  Here you go. Click here for the recipe...

HOPE that all of you've had a great start for the year. Happy 2013!  It's just day 17 and I'm sure there're broken resolutions already :) But that's okay - I just broke mine with the greedy consumption of a massive scone topped with the sweetest icing you could ever lay your hands on, and tomorrow I'm planning on baking the Totally Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies courtesy of Miss Lawson. The recipe calls for plenty of dark chocolate chunks and semi-sweet chocolate morsels and cocoa powder. No surprise there coming from the ever generous Miss Lawson but just try imagining all that. Baked and warm with half melted chocolate chunks invading your tastebuds with each bite. A total chocolate tsunami it is.  The weather in Doha has been on the low. I'm practically walking around the house with a portable heater blowing off hot air at my feet. When it overheats due to non-stop usage, I resort to sitting out in the sun, catching up on aging while at it.  The ...

I'M feeling empowered by Instagram and that may explain my addiction to the fun application right now. Without any time-consuming photo-editing, I have gorgeous Andrew-Campbell worthy pictures instantly with the app. (Or not, tell me Andrew). My only problem is that Instagram doesn't seem to be stable on my Android phone. The app has random shut-down fits and it's really frustrating especially when I see something nice while on the go. Poofff! There goes the desert full of aimless camels! I have no problems with the app on my i-Phone though - it's perfect except that the 3GS model doesn't allow for good quality photos in the dark. Oh well. Here are more photos.  It's along one of the retail buildings at Pearl Qatar. Love the architecture.  Two - coloured roses at a florist. These are common bushes that thrive here. Must be hardy fellas. Saw this back gate ajar during one of evening walks. Thought it was pretty and for me it's an exciting ...

ONE   would think that going from a busy working woman to currently being unemployed would give me plenty of time. You know, like many hours of don't-know-what-to-do. But it seems like I still don't have enough time. Not sure how the hours fly by but I do spend many leisurely hours basking in the sun and going for walks in the neighbourhood or stalking people on Facebook on top of the real social activities with friends here. I've also been taking some photographs. On and off Instagram and here are some.  It's one of the many sunset photographs I've been taking. Love this one though. It was caught when I was stuck during an evening rush-hour traffic. Another sunset during an evening walk. Thought it looks like a sandstorm in the sky. You could probably even catch the Sand Man if you looked harder. Very pretty. This was taken during a morning walk. I love that the sky is cloudless and so blue here.  This is a typical housing compound here. It'...