Below are the most recent 4 friends' journal entries.

Sunday, August 31st, 2008
wild_daisy	1:27p	I'm Sleepy All The Time My cat is starving to death. He has no food, but he refuses to eat my last-minute-resort of fancy feast biscuits brought from the grocery store below. I usually buy his Iam biscuits from the Suntec pet store, but I am too sleepy to go there any time soon. *Daisy looks at starving cat* *Daisy looks at bed* Honestly, some fancy feast won't kill you. Just munch already. It's raining for pete's sake! Current Mood: sleepy (Comment on this)
Saturday, August 30th, 2008
wild_daisy	10:37p	Lob's Birthday Celebration... ...wasn't much of a birthday celebration. When you have a baby on the way, somehow the birthdays and anniversaries fade into the background in terms of importance. Lob's birthday went by quite uneventfully on Thursday. We were both tired and grumpy from work, and we had taken Friday off to keep each other company and celebrate his birthday. But Friday didn't quite turn out the way we wanted it to. We had dimsum at yumcha Chinatown, watch Wall.E in the afternoon (superb animation movie), went for coffee at Coffee Club at Centrepoint (ehehehe...Lob was nice enough to let me have a cuppa), grocery shopping at Carrefour Plaza Sing and finally, dinner at Crystal Jade Kitchen. All in all, I can't say it's a bad day, except the cab we were in on our way home met with an accident. I was thrown forward and left some damage on the front seat, so my gynae instructed us to go to Thomson Medical for an emergency check. Spent two hours lying on the bed monitoring little David's heartbeats, and we finally got all-clear from the gynae to go home at 12mn. After the long day out yesterday, Lob and I made a wise decision to stay in today. We made curry chicken for lunch, and had steamboat for dinner. Now, the two of us are sitting contentedly on our new couch, me sipping tea and him sipping his hoegarden. I think we're more of stay-at-home people. =) Happy Belated Birthday, my favourite crustacean. Current Mood: loved (Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 27th, 2008
wild_daisy	10:15p	Here We Go Again So the thing you covet comes to you finally; do you have the guts to reach out and take it? Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Squids on National Geographic Channel (Comment on this)
Saturday, August 23rd, 2008
wild_daisy	11:31p	Baby Bonus For those not in Singapore, a revised baby bonus policy was announced during the national day rally on 17th August 2008. Because baby bonus policy was backdated to 01 August when it was first announced in 2004, most of us expected this policy to be implemented soon, if not immediately, upon announcement of the policy. Of course, when the policy was formally announced in a press conference on 20th Aug, many mothers-to-be delivering between August and December (me being one of them) were sore that the policy will only take place 01 Jan 2009. After discussion, we decided to come together and submit a petition to the PM office to ask for a backdate on the policy. Our argument was based on two points: 1. Don't announce the policy now if you are not implementing it soon. The effect is about 10,000 MTBs who will be disappointed for the rest of the year. 2. The revised policy is applicable to adopted or PR babies who convert to citizens as of 01 Jan 2009, up to 6 months of age. In other words, non-Singaporean babies bornt in 01 Jun 2008 are entitled to the revised policy as long as they convert to citizenship on 01 Jan 2009. All Singaporean babies bornt before 01 Jan 2009, on the other hand, are not entitled to the revised policy. Needless for me to say, anybody can see how that can enrage the average Singaporean mother who is delivering between Jun-Dec 2008. Here lies the problem. The August - December 2008 mothers had a case to fight because of the date of announcement. Logically, a policy can only be effective as early as the date of announcement. You know, the "with immediate effect" that sort of thing. Rarely do you hear, "with effect of last week" or "with effect of half a year ago"...you get the drift. The Jan - July 2008 mothers also did not see a need to join us in that fight during the time of our petition. Unfortunately, when the petition went through successfully, the Jan - July 2008 mothers suddenly found themselves being treated unfairly. Their logic: the 2008 children will all be attending school in the same year. Why should those borned on and after 17 Aug 2008 be given more perks than those borned before that? I guess I can somewhat understand their frustration, but it's difficult to emphatise with them when one of their agenda is "if we don't get, the Aug-Dec 2008 children shouldn't get too". Now. That's not a nice thing to be petitioning for, is it? In the first place, it would have been effective if you had petitioned along with us, not wait until we succeed before crying foul play, yes? I don't recall those within our petition in SMH to include excluding anybody from the revised benefits (although I did read a couple such angry messages in the Reach forum). Threatening to send your sons overseas so they don't serve NS and to boycott against having children do not help as well. I understand their frustration, but have they considered their actions? All their actions have achieved is to discourage the government from reacting to such petitions ever again. What if it comes back to haunt them one day? Current Mood: sleepy (Comment on this)