I'm working in Kuala Selangor today.

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Sometimes I say no just for the sake of listening.

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I struggle. I struggle because it's difficult to be gracious in times like this. I told this to Eric so many times, and he tells me, that if there's anything that Church History has taught us, its that end times theories and the arguments about our faiths within the same faith is just not new. It's something that's been around ever since Jesus left us, and we just keep going on and on arguing over different sides of the coin. Of course it doesn't help that in order to keep on being right, to defend our right to be right, all sides will pull out some obtuse sounding qualifier, 'I've seen Jesus Christ, have you? I've been to heaven, have you?' and expect the opposite party to subscribe to such a argument ender.

'Don't care what you think. I know Jesus is taking me to heaven and if you don't agree with me, then you're going to hell.'

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Pardon my words lah. But, damn christian we are these days. Awesome, indeed.

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BTW, today is Pentecost Sunday. It's the day the Holy Spirit comes upon us, and alamak, ask lah the Holy Spirit to help us to be better Christians in this world. Don't go asking him to make sure you pray right so that you get into Heaven. Its tiring that most Christians are more preoccupied with saving themselves than helping the rest of the world. What would Jesus think, really?

Hutch has tiny bite marks at its corners - Astro used to drag the hutch around to get it in its right position before he jumped to the top.

Please enquire within: minishorts {at} gmail {dot} com. Or drop your e-mail and I will contact you. We can arrange to meet up in the Klang Valley and I will send you the cage.

The cage is also suitable for a cat, but its just nice for rabbits. A baby rabbit can run around and binky in it easily.

They keep dying in my care.

Eric says, maybe I love them too much that's why they have to leave me so soon. April says, you can't get too attached to your pets, its not good for them.

So now Astro has gone up to Rainbow Bridge to join Chewie. The cage will forever be empty. I cleaned it this morning, washed it thoroughly and then called my fiance to tell him, 'I don't think I can have rabbits. They keep dying on me.'

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Then I flew off to Sabah for work. Most of the hotels are fully booked (Sabah Fair and the Labour Day weekend I think), so we found ourselves putting up at the Le Meridien. Its a nice way to nurse the pain, miles away from staring at an empty cage at home.

I think Astro's better off in Rainbow Bridge. Why stay with a rabbit-killing owner, right?

*distraught*

I wonder why rabbits are so fragile.

Really miss the time when Astro was naughty and well. See! What a naughty boy he was…

I'm hopeful, a little, I really wish he will be okay. When I visited him today, and I opened the cage, to my delight he hopped out and started walking around the hospital floors… the sad thing is that when I stooped to pick him up, he didn't kick like he always would, he just sat in my hands and waited for me to put him back into the cage…

I hope to bring him home soon. Please keep praying ya! I know it works.

I got home to see my Astro pooping soft mucous-like droppings, and when I told the husband-to-be, he immediately said, 'Off to the vet we go.'

The last time we had a rabbit that had diarrhea, it died within 24 hours.

The local Animal Hospital off Jalan Tun Razak has 24-hours service, so we drove over 20 kilometres to get there on time, with a very traumatized Astro in a Double A paper box (the rate he kept pooing, I'm not sure if the pet carrier would do him good). At first he tried to look out of the box, but the rumbling sound coming from Eric's modified exhaust either calmed him (or scared him shitless, literally, for he stopped pooing halfway through the journey), and finally he settled down in a corner of the box and waited for the trip to be over.

It was quite the experience, visiting the vet in the middle of the night. There were huge cats and big dogs, and whenthere I walked in with a little box, and people were asking, 'So what type is your darling.'

'Erm, he's a wabbit.'

They all came over, snuck a peek and they all went, 'Oooh so cute!'

There were two old ladies, who had brought their cat over to be neutered the next day, trying to get us to adopt one of the many kittens the pregnant prone cat had given them, 'Miss I give you one lah, you can let your rabbit play with the cat, it will be really adorable, you take lah.'

And then the good doctor came and said the same thing, 'So what have we got here. Ooh so small! Rabbit!'

A little while later my poor Astro was lifted onto a doctor's examining table, and then, had a thermometer stuck up his ass! He was surprisingly gwai throughout the ordeal, staying as close to Eric as he could, as the doctor lifted his tiny bum and said, 'Aiyoh, boy, you poop so much how am I going to see what you've got?'

The little wand disappeared into the bunny's butt-hole and then suddenly the doctor said loudly, '39.5 degrees, NO FEVER, is GOOOOOD!'

Then the doctor disappeared around the corner, and reappeared with a syringe! I panicked, 'Eh what's that! '

'Antibiotics!'

OMG No, the last time, antibiotics killed my rabbit. 'What type?'

'No worries, this is for rabbits,' he said, and then he administered the dosage. My Astro he took it sooooo bravely, either that or he didn't really feel it, cos the moment we let him down, he plonked down for just a minute and then after that he was up and staring at us curiously.

The doctor then said since Astro was so young, and that they needed to check his poo to see what's up, better for us to leave him at the doctors for a few nights. (I think more because the expert who's good at rabbits won't be in till the next day…) So now my poor little Astro is stuck at the animal hospital!

Everybody please pray for him okay? I wanna see him grow up strong and healthy….

I just cannot tahan some of the things some organizations do. With all that *THEY* profess to advocate, can stop printing paper and stop accusing me of throwing away clean paper when they send THREE OF THE SAME DAMNED BROCHURES to my house or not? This terrible sin (in my dictionary IF you are fighting for the ecology and to save the environment and you send three damned brochures to the same address you're committing a sin) was committed by the very famous WWF. Tsk tsk, being famously international doesn exempt you from making mistakes, tau?

I sympathise with the blind and the underprivileged. BENAR, BENAR one.

I just have a problem when the organization keeps sending letters to my house asking me for money.

For some reason, the holier-than-thou bitch in me firmly believes in this. God will definitely provide, and if you keep bloody sending letters to me asking me to donate to this cause, to put aside money from my accounts for your cause (whatever it is), by virtue of the fact that I have already experienced that you can actually set aside your funds for printing of such publicity brochures (whether sponsored or no I don't care lah), I know dah. You don't need the money.

I didn't get any brochures sent to my house from the famous Kuala Gandah Elephant Sanctuary. Sure they're funded by the government, but it doesn't mean they lack a need of extra funds. Why else do you think I strongly believe we should support them? Check out Zoo Negara, they sure as hell need the additional cash, you see them sending out professionally printed brochures in 30-sen envelopes asking people to donate money or not? Tarak kan?

UNICEF so penting organization also doesn't do this monthly sending out to previously donated-once people to ask for money. The Missionaries of Charity also don't send out these forms with photos of dying people or poor orphans asking for me. It's PURE voluntarism, and that's what touches me.

I hereby declare that if you come to my table begging for cash and there's a totally abled person with you, I will totally ignore you. If you mention the word Sharity and come to me with RM20 per 10-piece pack of greeting card and give me some load of bullshit about how 10% of the proceeds will go to charity, I will tell you to go away.

But if you come alone, and you're blind, and you're old, and you're limp, I'll give you my heart, and what's I can able from my purse. If you're just sitting there, and you need a hand, I'll bring you what I can from where I am.

If you come with some folder, and give me a low down of how you're a registered charity, asking me to part with my RM10, then go ahead and label me the selfish and uncaring citizen of Malaysia that the nation needs less of.

My old friend Vince and I met up for coffee after ten years again and we were lamenting on the current problem of too many activists wanting to activate issues without actually finding a way to resolve the rising problems.

I must first say that I generally respect and admire the work that activists and NGO members are doing for a living — I gather it must not be easy, making a living out of complaining about how badly governence (in any area) is being carried out in this world. My main peeve with many of my friends (and God, I have A LOT OF FRIENDS in NGOs ok, my own Godbrother is one) in these activist-organizations is just how much of their time they concentrate into organizing 'activist' events without actually providing enough resources and ideas to resolve the problems that they keep complaining about.

So we were talking about how so many people in NGOs consists of people who are too lazy to work for corporate establishments. I've met several people (friends and strangers) who dish out their contact cards pridefully with a, 'Hi I work for this NGO and we fight for the rights of abused women…' as if it makes them better than the other people who have to become employees of money-making entities.

I can't stand them, sometimes the pride in their voices and the condescending ways which they address us minions make me wonder whether is it truly some cause they are working for, or is it for the glory of 'making a contribution' to society that drives them in their work.

I went to one conference on corporate responsibility a few months ago, attended mostly by corporate organizations that were frantically trying to gather resources in order to formulate their individual CR policies (Corporate Responsibility is the current 'buzzword' in the business fraternity and if you don't have a CR policy, you're as good as dead-lah). So this particular conference was also attended by several glamourous and branded kind of NGOs. My first hand experience of these presidents and patrons of the creme de la cremes of Malaysian NGOs wasn't exactly inspiring.

The short exchanges I was 'privileged' to have with regards to our views on Malaysian society didn't exactly motivate an awareness to do something for my country. Or maybe it was just me, I'm pretty good at picking out the irritating things about strangers and 'nice people'.

The first thing that irks me about these NGO-big guns is how educated and refined they seem to be. Notice, how when they talk, it seems as if they have ALL THE RIGHT DIFFICULT WORDS peppered into their little soliloquys about how much they worry about our doom-headed earth and also all the right facial features to further exemplify how much they worry more about this poor world then the rest of us minions.

Maybe its just guilty me feeling a tad uncomfortable, but after a while it gets tiring trying to defend yourself in front of someone who professes to be more spesel than the rest of us because, 'You know I work for an NGO and I spend my time contributing towards positive change, while you work for a company that is only interested in making money.'

It feels rather surreal especially when the person who tells you that he 'contributes towards change' happens to also be drinking from a mineral water bottle, and oh my, wearing a very expensive pair of Bally shoes (I wear Vincci RM19.90 heels poor me), and dressed in Christian Dior.

Or the other tai-tai from this establishment that 'works towards upholding the rights of women with abusive husbands' whose credits to her work is recorded and dramatized in photos of expensive fund-raising events where everybody comes in Versace or Gucci, and then later the proceeds with be photographed and publicized in functions where the patron Datuk or Datin will give away some ugly looking styrofoam based mock cheque to the poor charity home in question,.

I was complaining to Vincent, and who pointed out, 'And then you have people who complain about the climate and drive Single Occupant Vehicles to work, when they can easily car pool.'

I know too many of that sort. The type who would prefer a taxi over an LRT because the taxi is more comfortable and more reliable. The type who complain about dirty means of power generation (gas is dirty, coal is dirty) who also complain over the 'high prices' that renewable energy demands of its consumers. The type who want the not just a slice of the cake, but want the whole thing and also the plate if possible.

The thing is, I've got a problem with hypocrisy. And to me, NGOs practise this too many times to actually demand the right to be better than all of us. The other problem I have with NGOs is just how many problems they are able to dig out of everywhere, and how little solutions they are able to provide to this problem stricken universe of ours. You see, everyone can create problems, but just how many people are able to provide solutions?

NGOs that keep on harping on issues just contribute towards the problem. So this is where I draw the distinction between myself and an NGO person. I don't pretend I know the solutions - I don't, and I'm honest about my ignorance. I am also honest about my negative contributions towards the issues that plague this world. I contribute to pollution, by virtue of my impending marriage and the possibility of me getting children, I'm contributing to the rising population in this world.

But you see, at least with people like me, the minions like you and me who have to work for money-minded businessmen, we acknowledge our contributions towards the deteriorating state of this world and are willing to admit our shortcomings. My problem with so many NGOs is the fact that too many of them can't stop accusing us of being ruthless when they are equally the same.

It would be nice if some of these activists can start activating an NGO of sorts to push and regulate the current trend in complainists towards growing as solutionists. And then it would be nice if all the current wave of dialogues and problems can start fruiting some resolutions - and then since we all love to talk so much, after that maybe we can talk some more.

I was trying to get Astro to take photos.

Didn't work (and I turned out looking perasan…..)

And then suddenly he popped up and kissed me!

OMG OMG OMG hahahha how to kiss Eric now? I've got RABBITITIS!

Its when you see death that you truly realize the glaring distinction that defines what living is all about. One moment your loved one is breathing, talking, asking you for a drink, watching a show with you, smiling and talking to you; and then just another, and he's just a body, with the very breath of him gone from the whole soul. You're left with a 'that's it', and a painful feeling in the gut that life is never be the same again.

But life, in essence, is going to be the same, you live, you die, that's the constant in life, and nothing on earth can ever change the fact that we are born into this world to die. The question is, not how you will die, but how can you live? Not when you will die, but when will you start living?

We're all doomed, one way or another. But here's the Astro pic of the day.