Random photos in Sept

There weren't too many in September as I was away again back in Malaysia.  It seemed like I had just recovered from Covid and the after a couple of weeks, I was back on the airplane again for those long flights - to see my dad in the hospital in Malaysia.

Graham, for whatever reason, decided to get the bows and arrows out again.  We do have a target that was given to us by a friend from last year.  I'm glad he decided to finally use it!

Here's another angle:

The golf net is coming handy for something.  Ha ha!

I'm home for a bit and I'm being sent up to the roof to fix some caulking around the skylights. Ha!

Graham has been flying his drone more these days, after finally getting an additional charger from the company.  We have not been able to find the charger to the drone since last using it during Christmas at Grandma's.  That was December of last year!  

It's been raining so much!

There's mushrooms in the yard! We're guessing these are called "Inky cap" mushrooms.  

Supposedly you can eat them??!  We are obviously not going to try it (yet??!) :-P

Here's another photo of them:

This memory popped up on my Facebook page in September.  This was the first fish Charlie caught at our lake.  He would be so disappointed if he caught one of these now.  Ha ha!

... because look at the fish he has been catching lately!  That's his friend holding the fish up.  As much as Charlie loves to fish, he doesn't like holding it. LOL!!

And we've changed the tires of the truck back to the year-round tires:  

Supposedly the ones from CA, that originally came with the car are no longer good.  I still don't get it though as those other ones still look pretty good to my eye. I'm guessing I don't know what I'm looking at?!  The tire shop wanted about $150 to get rid of EACH tire.  What?!?  Looks like we will have to figure out what to do with them if those CA ones are really done for!

Oops! Covid got me! (Aug 18)

It finally caught up to me.  Yup, the Covid virus.  I felt it the day after we arrived back from Malaysia - achy body and a slight fever.  And sure enough, tested positive!  I was immediately banished into the basement.  Thankfully we are able to have some separation from each other in this house with 2 separate floors.  But geez, maybe next time we should have dusted the ceiling?!  There's a huge spider right above me when I lay my head on the pillow.   Ha ha!!

And then, on the 2nd night, there's a bat flying around in the bedroom.  What the...!?!  I thought I was seeing things but I swear that little bat flew and touched the top bits of my spiky hair.  When I turned on the lights, the bat disappeared.  I thought that maybe it had flown upstairs. So I headed up the stairs and checked the boys' room and also our master bedroom.  Nope! Nothing!

So I went back downstairs, turned the lights off again and there is was again! Bob finally was convinced I wasn't hallucinating. And so, I grabbed Charlie's fishing net and gave it to Bob, thinking he would catch it and we would release it. Instead, he smacked the small little bat and killed it. Oh no!  Well, that was that.

I'm just glad I had decided to mount a little TV in the room.  Lots of binge watching and I get to admire the "sarong" cloth that I bought from Malaysia.  One of these days I'm going to get my sewing machine out again!

My brother insisted that I take some of these when I was back in Malaysia.  Somehow I had packed them with me, so I guess I'll take them now.  I think they are just like Vitamin C supplements that dissolve in water.  Let's see how this goes:

In the meantime, it feels like a hotel down here with room service. LOL!!  Pizza one night:

Fried chicken another night.  We love Popeye's chicken.  He he!  Thank goodness the Covid virus didn't take away my taste buds!

Bob even drove out to get me some Malaysian food. What a sweet hubby!  He definitely earned some brownie points there :-D

Yummy curry puff!  And then, some eggs and toast for breakfast, including tomatoes from the garden:

I'm so glad for some local coffee from home/Malaysia too.  And my neighbor is so kind - baked some banana bread for me and the boys.  We are so lucky to have some good friends around:

By Day 7, still tested positive for Covid.  Boooo!!!

By now, both Graham and Charlie are already back into their first week of school.  Thank goodness for their school buses!

I attempted to sort out some paperwork in the office as I was starting to feel better:

But not being very productive. Binge watching Netflix is sooooooooooo much easier. LOL!!

More personal food delivery - ramen noodles. Yum!

By now I'm wondering if I'm gaining or losing weight.  Ha ha!  Oh, this was what's left of my chicken rice from the Malaysian restaurant. Ha ha!!

After a few more days, I did head upstairs to check out a few things.  Oh boy, my poor plant!

Maybe if I trim it,  the plant might survive??

There's 2 bamboo shoots that are dying here too :-(

And in case you missed it in the previous post, here's the overflowing of dishes while I've been downstairs. YIKES!   

Bobby was lucky that the "Kitchen fairy" did decide to show up one night to clear up some of this mess.

And so as a rewards, a burger (or technically just half of it) and fries, with a side of jalapenos once I was fully recovered by Day 12.  Twelve long days to finally test negative. Sheesh!

I'm so happy to finally be able to sit upstairs again and look, it's the hummingbird!

I cut up some flowers from our garden too.  Actually these were leaning onto the walkway so it was a good excuse to cut them and bring them indoors.  Love the color splash :-)

I also bought some old stamps of my home-state: 

It used to be called North Borneo - as you can see in the bottom few stamps.  And that's Queen Elizabeth II on the stamp, as North Borneo was once a British colony.

Funny enough, during the 2nd trip that I was back in my hometown, I was going through some old photos at my dad's place.  And I found some old stamps just like these.  What are the chances of that!  I wonder if it was my mom that had same them.

I have still yet to use my new (used) putter that I had bought earlier this summer:

I managed to get a new headcover for it while in Kuala Lumpur.  Yup, I splurged on this one - but it's so cute!!

Apart from tomatoes, there were also some peppers in the garden.  I stuffed these with ground turkey and baked it.  Not too bad!

And here are the rest of the tomatoes for the season.  Looks like they are all mine since no one else in this household eats them:

And Charlie caught his first fish again at the lake by the house. Didn't miss a beat with his favorite past time.  Too cute :-)

It's so funny how it was just me that caught the Covid virus while both Graham and Charlie were fine.  We were almost always together on the way back from Malaysia.  Super strange!  Well, Bobby is probably glad that he only had to deal with one sick patient vs 3 patients.  Can you imagine?! He probably would have checked into a hotel room.  LOL!

I'm currently back in Malaysia again (3rd time in 3 months) to check on my dad, who is still at the hospital.  Let's hope I don't catch another bout of Covid again on the way back!

Fishing adventure in KK

Charlie really REALLY wanted to go fishing and so we decided to charter a boat for the fishing trip. My sister's family was also able to come along with us, as well as my brother.

But first, breakfast!  Well, I think more like brunch at this point.  Yummy pork chops on top of fried rice.  This is really similar to one of the restaurants that we used to go to back when we lived in CA:

Here's the gang! Including the lady that works for my dad (sitting next to me).  My dad's office is literally across the street from this restaurant:

We are at the jetty at Sutera Harbor hotel.  We couldn't decide at first whether to do a morning trip or afternoon trip.  My brother kept saying that it would be too hot in the morning.  Well, let's hope there won't be a storm in the afternoon during our 3pm departure.  So far so good!

The water by the jetty is so clear!  You can see all the little fishes in the water:

Here's our boat.  Or what my brother is calling a "sampan" which is a Malay word for a very little boat, normally with no motor.  I'm trying to convince him that it's not so small but let's see how it handles when we are just idling. That will truly test if we are all able to withhandle the waves out in the South China Sea.  Ha ha!

So funny how me and Graham and Charlie are all in long sleeves and my sister and her kids and hubby are in short sleeve shirts. And my brother is just in a tank top!

Graham being silly :-)

Us 3 siblings.  And we are off!  

Hmmm, looking a bit choppy!

My sister jokingly going to push my brother into the water. LOL!

Okay, it's sunscreen time :)

The 2 local guys on the boat were very helpful.  Here's one of them putting the bait on the line for the kids:

Graham is mostly interested in figuring out the sonar:

Okay, let's see what's down there!  My brother on the other hand is already feeling a bit sick.  Funny because we all made sure each of us took some meds prior to getting on the boat so we don't get seasick. Looks like it's not working so well for him!

Maybe a beer with help?!

We didn't catch anything on our first stop.  So the boat guys decided to move to a different spot.  And not long after, Charlie gets his first catch!  It's a baby one. I think it's called a Kerisi:

Okay, my brother is definitely out now.  Ha!

My sister's younger son, Caden caught one not long after as well.  Woohoo!

The boat guys decided to move to another location.  The only bad thing about moving is that they need to keep turning the boat around in circles in order to unlodge the anchor.  I think that's the part that made me a tad nauseous:

Well, Michael - my sister's oldest son was able to get a little fish at the next location.  Yay! 

Charlie keeps trying!!

Graham finally caught his little fish.  Super yay!!

By now, we adults are getting a bit tired.  :-P

The boat guys take us towards the back of one of the islands nearby - Pulau Gaya, and we decide to do some snorkeling:

Almost bottom-out on the boat a bit so we move to a slightly deeper location:

I don't know how Graham got away without wearing a life vest. Ha!

It's their first time snorkeling. Watch them go!

There was not too many fish to see and the water was a bit murky, but everyone was able to at least experience what snorkeling is all about.  Too bad we didn't have our little GoPro to get some video footage under the water. Next time! Nonetheless, we all had a good time!  I think Graham mentioned after that fact that it was actually his favorite part of the entire trip :-)

Our boat guy has leftover bait and he's throwing it into the water to attract some fish for the kids to see.  Thankfully no big fish/sharks around here. LOL!!

Charlie:

And Graham:

Everyone looks alike with that snorkel mask on.

Happy Graham! I took this photo because you can actually see the imprints of the snorkel on his face, but not quite seeing it in the photo:

Graham, Caden, and Charlie are taking a nice break:

Michael has joined in (far right) so it's time for a photo of all the kids:

I said "Muscles!!!" and this is what I got out of them.  Too funny!!

Now, the moms are joining in!

It's really too bad Bobby couldn't join us on this trip. Although I wonder if he would have gotten seasick.  I was so close to being nauseous!

Beautiful sunset on the way back to the jetty:

Nice and cool now compared to a few hours ago when we first started out:

I'm glad someone is paying attention to the boat driving because it wouldn't be so great if we bumped into these big ones!

Graham is relaxing by the front of the boat:

And enjoying the view!

When we get towards the jetty.... O. M. Goodnes! This boat is all lit up like a party boat!!

Someone obviously has some money around here because there's also a big yacht next to it. Sheesh! We should try and get to know those people so we don't have to suffer from sea-sickness in our little "sampan".  Ha ha!!

Here's our bag of small fish!

We didn't get a chance to cook it up though.  We gifted it to uncle Kelvin, who missed out on all the action today. Ha ha!

On the way home,... traffic was pretty bad so we decided on a detour.  He he, durian night market!

This is how much we love durian.  We dropped the kids off by the hotel and told them to make their own way back up to the room with my sister's husband.  And my sister and I plopped the containers of durian on the trunk of the car to enjoy by ourselves in the hotel's parking lot.  LOL!!

YUUUMMY!!!

And this is why we can't bring it back into the room. This is the sign inside the elevator - no durians are allowed in the hotel (2nd one from the left)!  

And actually, no jackfruit and mangosteens either.  I still don't get why mangosteens are not allowed. There's no real smell with that one.  Hmmmm...

I actually did sneak a tiny bit of durian up for Charlie but once I opened up the container in the room, the smell started permeating into the room!!  Charlie quickly said no, and so I didn't hesitate to shut the container.  It was a quick wrap job, back into the plastic bag, brought it straight downstairs and out the hotel and straight into the garbage bin.  Yes, outside of the hotel/building.  HA HA!! The smell is THAT bad.  Well, depending where you're from. It smells really good to the locals :-)

I'm so glad we got to make a quick trip out to fish. Charlie was a bit sad that he only caught one fish, but still had fun spending time with Graham and his cousins.  Next time we'll have to take the boat out further, at least 1.5hr away and possibly even overnight! That might be at least a bottle of Dramamine to help with the sea-sickness. LOL!!