cko birthday nom~nom

Tired of thinking where to bring a friend on his birthday?

 We know just the place - Lau Heong!

 If you're a Chinese residing in Klang Valley, chances are you've dined here before. It's super famous for its signature curry fish head, pork knuckle, sting ray, chicken wing and squid.

Jin's hand-made mini hamper for birthday boy Chua. I can never pull out something this cutesy.

Time for cake-cutting. So many moving mouths as we sang the birthday song... 

...while desperately trying to keep the candle aflame..

 

HaPPy BirThdAy CKo!! 

  The stack of glazed fresh fruits on the cake look absolutely mouth-watering! While we feasted on this rich yet light dessert...

...Derek (as usual) diligently whacked the leftover of dishes.

 

 If derek had teeth made of steel, that humongous pork bone would never have stood a chance.

when colorful's the theme

It was by far the most colorful Friday at work ever. Not only did our office have a 'Colorful Day' theme where we (were supposed to) dress in colorful attire, but my friend Yin Pheng even celebrated her birthday in vibrant colors.

 A lot of us wrote little wishes on sticky notes and plastered it all over her cubicle - chair, laptop, mouse and all!

 A cheesy little gesture from her staff.. "."

 Our eventful day at the office continued with a surprise visit from 4 clowns who gave each of us a toy balloon! What a pleasant delight. And here, we chose the skinniest clown to take a photo with.

 Choy Phyll who initially asked for a pirate's sword was even excited that it turned out looking more like some private part. hmm.

 My colleague Gaik Bee asked for a 'tikus', and till today, is still wondering which part of her balloon looked like a "tikus". It's heart, maybe.

 Moon and Alia with a green poodle.

 At least i think it's a poodle, if not 2 very muscular dogs.

 At dinnertime, we brought Yin Pheng to La Bodega for her birthday celebration.

 And we made sure everyone else in Bodega knows she was the celebrated one that night.

 One thing about Bodega is while it's more suitable as a hanging-out place for drinks, the meals here are generally only mediocre, like my Caesar Salad,

 and their famous Seafood Paella, which wasn't as expected despite the 30-minute wait.

 All we could afford was a birthday potato-bun?

 Na-ah, there was an even bigger surprise when we took out the actual birthday cake -

 topped with flaming trick birthday candles that you simply can't blow out!

After all the huffing and puffing, we decided to cut off the top layer of the huge cake and just eat the bottom part. ;P

tgif brekkie is 'Total-Garbage-I-Feel!'

TGI Friday's is taking it one meal further by serving breakfast, but only at its Hap Seng outlet. As part of its introductory promotion, till 18th July, we can now enjoy the second brekkie set free (the cheaper one) with the purchase of a first one. Sounds terrific right? Plus it's TGIF, so quality must be assured.

Me and pardner decided to try it out one Friday morning, since it was just a short walk from my office. After scrutinising the menu (not all sets include coffee/ tea and juice), we opted for the American Breakfast (which had 2 types of beverage)...

and Three Stack Pancakes.

It was brekkie in al-fresco style - works in the States but in Malaysia, not a very pleasant experience dining in the hot weather amongst the stench of overnight uncollected garbage which was located just beside the restaurant. What a first impression...

Not happy that it took quite a while before our drinks arrived, given we were only the second seated table.
Lagi not happy that they only had coffee ready at that time. Though refillable, don't think anyone would actually want a second cup of this...

dun recall ordering Diluted Black Coffee!

Non-refillable kiddy-sized Orange Juice

The slosh of milk you see is all because their !@#$ milk teapots did not have this little nip to allow a smooth flow of milk into the coffee. =_=

The only satisfactory thing about brekkie was their American Breakfast. Loved every bit of it especially the runny scrambled eggs (my style!), tasty Hash brown and homemade Orange Marmalade Jam. Would you have paid the normal price of RM 9.90++ for this?

 It was another 10-minute wait for the Pancakes and just as we were hoping it to be a really good treat, the waitress brought us this.

wtf, you call these hard, overcooked fugly-looking flat things...pancakes?!! and where's the butter??

Even I could make them better blind-folded!

Such crummy quality coming from a reknown place like TGI Friday's. Even after we questioned the waitress, she dared to claim THAT is indeed how their pancakes look like. Aw, come on, guyssssssss...we ain't five-year olds!

There was just no compromising, and we demanded for a change to the American Breakfast, only to be told that they've ran out of Hash browns and replaced it with baked beans(!). Urgh, talk about keeping stock. Sunny-side eggs turned out to be very raw in the centre - i could still see the liquid egg whites...eww.
And they've replaced the marmalade with butter(?!)

What a shame a blogger (me) had to go through such a horrid dining experience and now, it's plastered all over the internet. Lesson to TGIF - don't start something new if you are not ready for it. 

If not for the Buy1 Free1 promo, or the fact that this happened on Friday, my mood would have been crankier and my reaction.....detrimental!

it's dave's world

Guess what, I recently became Auntie Sylvia with the birth of my nephew on 21st June!

a 2.7 kg 'bun' finally out of the oven at 6am! :P

 Proud parents, Irene and Victor - i think the little one looks too much like my bro!

 Can you believe a newborn just 12 hours old in this world is already looking so alert (not to mention, so serious)? I thought newborns just keep their eyes shut all the time!
The parents named him Lucas (i adorrrrre that name coz it reminds me of hottie Chad Michael Murray of 1 Tree Hill!! lame but i dun care!..).  
Check out his super high forehead, which for the Chinese means high intelligence and good luck! (umm, dat reminds me to check MY forehead width.. :o1 )

datz a full head of hair, Lucas!

 The second surprise came when i found out Lucas became DAVE a week later!
watttt???
Apparently, after soughting some advice from a Chinese master in names, Lucas wasn't such an ideal name and instead of naming the baby 'David' (which sounds sooo conventional...sorree Davids out there..), 'Dave' became the definite choice... and 'Dave' means 'beloved'.......awwwwwwwwwwwwww..

i'm officially Dave Yap Ding Cheng

 dun quite like the name 'Dave' eh, Dave? lol

welcome to the world, baby Davey............auntie Siu~V can't wait to hold you.... ^_^