2007: A New Hope

Greetings and welcome. Guess what? I’m back!

(Cheers)

Yes, it’s 2007 and I’m welcoming you back to a brand new season of It’s A Guy Thing. Although no improvements or modifications whatsoever has been made to the site, I am looking forward towards a fruitful and promising year ahead.

So, how were your New Year celebrations? For me, I dozed off in front of the TV while watching the nonsensical New Year talk show on NTV7. To make it even more embarrassing, I fell asleep and it wasn’t even before midnight! It was the first time in years that I haven’t stayed up until at least after 12 to usher in the New Year. But mind you, I had a good reason. As you all were aware, AidilAdha fell on the 31st, so New Year’s Eve night, oh I was back at Kelantan by the way, and I had this awesome korban feast. God knows how much sup tulang/ekor I had. I know it was irresponsible and down right unhealthy but I’m not a fan of any diet regime anyway. One good thing about going back to Kelantan is that even with the absence of any Internet connection (didn’t matter if that quake at Taiwan happened or not) and Astro, which does annoy me every single day, the food is just unforgettably fabulous. Not to mention cheap. I mean, the morning I arrived I had rice with gulai itik serati for breakfast. And true ayam kampong. Not like the ones in the city where you can taste the hormones injected. Okay, that meal didn’t actually come cheap but in terms of originality, you can’t get it anywhere else.

Okay, enough about food. Now I’m back at the city and back at work. Yeah, hip-fuckin’ hooray. But good news though, school holidays are over and that means there’s less queue if I want to catch something at the movies. If not, the only decent time to get a ticket was during the 11am shows and how often am I willing to make that kind of effort during the weekends? Probably never. As a matter of fact, I think I’m gonna catch a flick after work. Which reminds me, it’s that time of the month again to pay Abby a visit.

There are 3 Abbys in my life. One is a female work colleague of mine whom I borrowed a red pen and never returned it. The other is a former school mate, a guy of course, from Sarawak who once sprayed a syringe which was filled with 90 degrees Celcius of sterile water onto the back of my neck during Biology class. I let out a reflex scream and it was pretty embarrassing when suddenly you got everyone’s attention in class, including the teacher at front. The one I’m referring to right now is neither of them but my hot hair stylist at Jantzen. You know, apart from receiving my salary, getting my haircut is only other thing that I look forward to every month.

And there’s something pretty weird going on between Abby and me. You see, every time I get my haircut done, I do nothing but look at her through the mirror at the front. Nothing but pure ogling relaxation. And you know what? I think she began to notice. And I think it kinds of flatters her. Heck, she might even be enjoying it. I say this because previously, we rarely talked about anything except how I want my hair to look like. But lately she began to ask these how-are-you type questions. Like this one time I came after work and it was about 7 pm and before I could sit my ass down she asked me whether I had my dinner yet. For a split second I was taken aback and went ‘Huh?’, but then I answered ‘no’. ‘Lepas ni makan lah?’ she said further rather inquisitively, along with that seductive smile of hers. I told I’d be having dinner at home, with the puzzling look still upon my face. It was probably my imagination but for a brief moment there I had a strange feeling that she was baiting me to ask her out to dinner. You may be laughing but almost the same thing happen the next time I went to see her. It was lunchtime during a weekend and this time my answer to her same previous question was I already had my lunch. An honest reply in which I regretted almost immediately, thinking that how it might have went if I had said ‘no’ instead and replied further with, ‘Would you like to join me?’. Oh how things would’ve gone differently.

As for my last visit, there were no questions about my state of hunger but while I’m usually transfixed by her reflection in the mirror, this time I found a woman’s magazine among the ones piled in front of me and in it found an interview held with Daniel Craig talking about his new role as James Bond. Of course, I just had to read it because in my eyes Daniel Craig is just so cool. For those who’ve seen Layer Cake would agree with me. But midway through my reading, all of a sudden I noticed that Abby was practically standing in front of me. Her thighs were brushing against mine (how else do you think I noticed her?). This is nothing unusual in a haircutting context except that I never remembered her ever doing this. It was as if she was annoyed that I wasn’t paying my usual attention to her and she was making me aware of the fact. Well, it was probably paranoia but it worked anyway. I ogled her from then on.

As for today, I have no idea what to expect. But I am excited by the thought of seeing her again. Such is the dire state of my love life that I’m beginning to have fantasies about my hair stylist. This is so not right.

***

Well, truth be told, nothing happened yesterday. Yes, it’s a brand new day and I sport a trimmed hairdo although I have come none closer to getting laid.

So, today we are going to leave the hair stylist subject alone and move on to other topics such as the big birthday bash. Whose bash, you may ask? Well, mine, of course. And make no mistake, I do intend to make it big. Well, not as big as the parties you see on MTV’s My Super Sweet 16 where once I saw an episode in which a kid was devastated because Kanye West couldn’t come and perform at his birthday party. Damn spoiled rich kids.

Anyway, as far as the venue is concerned, Jes’ place at the Westin is flamboyant enough and I don’t have to pay a single cent for it. Thanks, Jes. Friends with cool places are so hard to come by. So, with that I can focus my resources on other things…such as the two exotic dancers named Charlene and Michelle. We’ve agreed that they’ll pretend to be the nurses who will be attending me, the depressed patient who they are trying to cheer up.

If only that was true.

Fantasies not withstanding, I’d probably just figure out something different for the food, especially the birthday cake. Have you realized how Secret Recipe cakes have become the standard for every small parties nowadays? Sure they taste good, come in helpful large sizes and just about everybody like them. But quite frankly, I’m getting bored of it. My reason being is since their stores are located everywhere in the city nowadays, I can drop by at any one of them to have a slice of their Chocolate Banana on any other day for a quick relief has made it lost some of its exclusivity. I mean, I miss the days when people’s eyes lit up when the cake is rolled into view. I want guests to exclaim excitedly, ‘Ooh, what’s that? It looks so delicious!’ and not another attendee whispering to another, ‘Oh it’s a Rocky Mountain. I had a slice last week. It’s good but I still prefer the Chocolate Mud,’ See what I mean?
So, if not Secret Recipe, what then? Well, I have no idea really. I did list down a few potentials. There’s a nice bakery at Ampang although I couldn’t remember what it’s called. Or I could just opt for something from Top Hat. I hear they make some nice cakes over there. Or I might get something from Westin itself. I’m sure they have a nice little café somewhere near the lobby. Though there’s a 100% chance it’s going to be overpriced. Come to think of it, why not simply ask Westin to organize something for me? Well, it’s not like asking for a favour. I might have to pay a hefty price for it but it will certainly fall into my idea of ‘big’. Oh yeah! Rock on!

Anyway, those are all considerations for the time being. I still have about a month to organize my 25th on the 25th. That’s right. It rhymes. That’s why it’s got to be big.

Another thing, this will probably sound a little aloof, but to save you the trouble and my potential awkwardness of saying ‘thank you’ not so honestly, here’s a few items that you could get me as a birthday gift, should you decide to do so. Kind of like a wedding register. So, here’s the list:

1. An Aston Martin DB9 – don’t worry, I know you can’t afford it. I think there are only a few people in the country who actually can. Even if you can, and you give one to me as a present, I don’t think I can pay for the petrol. Not to mention the road tax. I once saw a Mercedes with a 4.2 litre V8 engine which cost RM5000 in road tax. The DB9 has a 6.0 litre V12 engine. That’s three times the engine capacity of Valerie. It’s basically murder. Maybe I should just forward this in my wedding register. Just a case of convincing the future bride to agree along. She would most definitely think it’s stupid.

The REAL list:

1. Clerks (Part 1) DVD – it’s a movie, directed by Kevin Smith and so far I have a hard time finding it. It’s maybe because of the fact that it was released in 1994. I don’t think DVD technology was there in 1994. They were using something called a VCR. But they did re-release it in 2004 (to celebrate its 10th year anniversary). So, if you could find a copy for me – awesome. And it doesn’t need to be from Speedy or Ezy. The ‘cheap’ ones would do just fine.

2. Liberty Meadows Book 3: Summer of Love – it’s one of those comic strip compilations books like Lat’s Kampung Boy. The graphic artist is Frank Cho. If you could manage to find this book, you’d have a pretty good guess on why I like his work.

3. Next by Michael Crichton – if by blood, sweat and tears you couldn’t get your hands on the above items (I know they are hard to find), here’s an easy one - Crichton’s latest novel. Available in every major bookstores nationwide though, unfortunately, is only available in hard cover for the time being. So it would cost around RM70 a piece if I’m not mistaken. You could share, please, by all means. Just make sure every one of you puts a signature on the opening pages. For the girls, you could add a few X’s and O’s, and a lipstick mark (Jes would know what I’m talking about).

4. Grey’s Anatomy Season 2 – I always miss the show on TV. And I like Katherine Heigl. Do you know tha she’s one of the main girls in 100 Girls. Damn, I love that movie. Oh if you can’t find Clerks, get me 100 Girls. I’d be equally happy. I just hope Kevin Smith doesn’t read this.

5. Remember that Digi ad on TV where everyone is saying ‘hello’? There’s one scene where this man squeeze this pillow-like thingy on his desk which looks like a rat and it gives out this throaty yet cartoonish ‘hello~’? Yeah, I want that.

I guess that’s it for the time being. If I come up with any more quirky ideas, I’ll add to the list later.

Okay, folks, I think I’ll call it a day. But with the shitty state of the Internet connection, who knows when I will be able to post this up. Kind of lessens the excitement of the comeback, doesn’t it? Oh well, ‘til again. Cheers.