To my mother, the woman who raised me, loved me and made sure I had the best. Now that I am a mother too, I appreciate your love and your sacrifice even more.
May God bless you, and grant you a long, healthy and happy life. I miss you and I love you! Happy Mother's Day!
That was the question I heard in a radio pro-marriage ad by a Catholic group this morning. Among the answers given by the many different voices in the ad were "I gave him a big, long hug this morning", "I called her at work today", and other answers I don't quite remember. I wished I could though, because they were good answers - answers that were actually little acts to show your affection for each other and actions that keep a couple's marriage strong.
What have I done for my marriage today? Er, I was in a bad mood last night and using that as an excuse I gave my husband the cold shoulder. 
I did not even respond to the morning goodbye kiss or the "I love you".
The day's not yet over, and there's still time for me to redeem myself, eh!
I am thankful and blessed to be married to a man who puts up with my many selfish acts. It has been a while since he asked me if I would do it all over again, marry him, that is.
Here's my answer for him today. Yes, I would. I would marry you all over again, warts and all! 
According to a Federal Trade Commission 2006 Identity Theft Survey Report about 8.5 million adults became aware that they were identity theft victims.
Identify Theft happens when an identity thief obtains some pieces of your personal information and use them, without your knowledge, to commit fraud or theft.
Identity theft has become so prevalent that many states have passed laws to protect consumers. On May 6, Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland signed
* House Bill 46 - The measure, sponsored by Reps. Tim DeGeeter, D-Parma, and Jimmy Stewart, R-Albany, sets a $5 limit to block access to a consumer's credit history from each of the three major credit reporting bureaus. Public agencies also are blocked from releasing documents containing an individual's Social Security number, while consumers have the option of having information such as credit card or bank account numbers removed from public electronic documents.
Source: BizJournals.com
May 7th is National Grump Out Day. That means for 24 hours, no grumpiness, no grousing, no complaining, no swearing etc.
Today was the first I heard of the existence of a Grump Out Day. I heard about it on the Paul Harvey show this morning, which came on at 8.00 a.m., and when I heard it, I had already shown my impatience with my children! Yes, so early in the morning, and I was already snapping at my children!
Put that grumpiness to a lack of sleep!
I still have half the day to recover my good spirits and refrain from being grumpy, eh!
Yesterday I called my friend who is working in Bintangor, Sarawak. Bintangor used to be called Binatang, and because of the meaning of the word in Malay it was changed to Bintangor many years ago. The only claim to fame that Bintangor has, as far as those of us who don't live there are concerned, is that it has one of the oldest teacher training colleges in the state.
I have invited this friend to join me and my family to the Gawai (harvest festival) celebrations at my parents longhouse which is located in Saratok. Saratok is not that far from Bintangor and she can easily take the bus and I will pick her up from the bus station.
The two little girls are my nieces who took part in the beauty contest for children.
Doug taking part in the blow pipe competition at the long house.I heard a very funny comment over the radio recently. It had to do with face lifts and how those who are thinking about going for one should look at Nancy Pelosi the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and use her as an example as to how not to choose a procedure that will give you that wide hollow eyes!
I think with Nancy Pelosi's case, a person has to have those deep set eyes to begin with to end up looking like her after an eyelid procedure. I do not have deep set eyes so if I did go for eyelid rejuvenation procedure, it is not likely that I will end up with eyes that are hollow looking.
I don't think I like the way my eyelids are sagging more and more as the years go by and I am seriously thinking about getting a laser eyelid rejuvenation procedure. This procedure causes minimal bruising, swelling, or bleeding and the end result is very attractive and natural looking.
One Detroit eyelid surgery clinic is called Accents Cosmetic Surgery and Medical Spa. I have browsed through their website and liked the before and after pictures of the women who had undergone the laser eyelid rejuvenation procedures.
I can imagine the number of years the eyelid surgery would take off my appearance! A pleasant thought indeed!
Yesterday I ordered about a hundred dollars worth of products from my favorite online food supplement store to bring back to Malaysia.
I ordered a bottle of borage oil for my mother to add to the two I'd ordered earlier, and the rest of the stuff was mainly for diabetic care. I want to give one of my friends, who was recently diagnosed with diabetes, something to help her better control her blood sugar, something like gymnema sylvestre and banaba. I bought a bottle each of the two products.
Previously, I love to give away Vitamin C and Vitamin E to friends in Malaysia, but this time since those bottles of stuff for my mother and friend already weigh a few pounds, I think I'll skip the gift giving to the others! 
Hey, have you read one of my latest entries on my health blog? You should read about how diabetes could be the result of intestinal dysfunction and how diabetics who went through gastric bypass procedures had experienced remission in their diabetes! Great news!
You know, all these remind me of how priceless our health is, and how we should take good care of our health because when it is gone, no amount of money is going to be able to get it back for us! 
I love trying out new blog templates. I even have a blog that is meant solely for testing out the free templates I downloaded from the internet.
A few days ago I decided to use a new template for my health and beauty blog. This new template is Adsense friendly and I like the clean style as well as the ability for me to change the colors of the original template. I chose pink because I thought pink would be suitable for a blog that talks about health and beauty. Don't you think so?
However, I have one website (related to my home business) that is in dire need of a makeover. I did the design myself and because my knowledge of web design is minimal, the site does look a little pitiful.
A Web design blog that I just came across called Stylish Design has some really good tips with regards to the design of a web site. Three web designs basics that anyone with a site should consider are Contrast, Balance and Rhythm. Taking these basics into account, the word that best describes the design that I had come up with for my business website is "hodgepodge".
One of the posts on StylishDesign.com that I can identify with is called We are an Adsense addicted generation. Exactly! That was the main reason why I changed the template to my health blog! Not that I have made a lot of money from adsense, but I did receive my first check a few days ago! Woohoo!
I guess if anyone is trying to make some Adsense revenue from his site, content is as important as the web design, if not more. Check out StylishDesign.com for some tips and advice on web design and content.
I can't believe that in about two and a half weeks we'll be flying to Malaysia! I, of course, am excited about the thought of being with my parents and other family members. We'll be going to my parents' longhouse for the Gawai celebrations a few days after we arrived in Sarawak, and will be Sarawak for close to three months. Just me and the kids. Doug will return to California after two and half weeks, and come back to fetch us some time in August.
What I am not looking forward to is being away too long from my computer and my blogging activities! Haha, is that a confession from a blogging addict?
When we were at Disneyland about two weeks ago, we stayed at a hotel that had no wi-fi access. I brought my lap top with me, and I turned it on once. There was wi-fi access available from the neighboring hotel and even though my wireless modem intercepted the connection I couldn't get online because the connection required an access password! What a bummer!
The next hotel we stayed at, there was free wi-fi access and no password required either! Wished there was a hotel like that near the hotel we stayed at while in Disneyland! I managed to post one entry on one of my blogs while in Los Angeles. And Doug was able to get a fix of his news addiction while we were staying at that hotel too.
When we get to Malaysia I am thinking of getting an account with one of the cell phone companies that offers internet services. I don't really know how this works but I think Akmal has the answer to this question. I remember reading his recommendation to Daphne.
I don't feel like tying up my parents' phone line to get on the internet. Of course I don't have an internet account but my brother who still lives with my parents does. Where my parents live, broadband is still not available. Considering the amount I can spend on the internet, a broadband account would have been the best deal for everyone!
I toyed with the idea of getting a new laptop because the current one I have does not have a big hard drive and neither does it have a DVD writer. Doug just bought me a new desk top so .... no go with the new laptop!
For now, what matters is that the old laptop still works for my blogging and internet surfing activities, right?
Doug and I have always been very partial to homes with Spanish designs. In fact, our plan is to build a home that is distinctly Spanish in design. It'll come complete with stucco exterior siding, low-pitched barrel tiled roofs, arched windows, raised entryways and a courtyard.
In the courtyard, we'll use outdoor saltillo tile which can be sealed with a sealer to extend its life-span. I would hate for my outdoor tiles to age and crack before their time!
Saltillo tiles will also look beautiful on the patio. A glossy looking patio with beautiful furniture and green plants. I can just see my Spanish style home!
I have been checking out SaltilloTileConnection.com and besides Saltillo tiles they also carry Talavera Superior Tiles. I can picture these beautiful and colorful tiles on my kitchen floor.
It will be a while before we can build our Spanish designed home but meantime I will continue to dream of that day!
Last week, while we were walking along Hollywood Boulevard in LA, we walked into a store that sold all kinds of things including the guitar. Duncan wanted to buy a small guitar and a small saxophone. I told him to wait till he started some music lessons before buying him some musical instruments.
There was a guitar that cost only $20. Wow, so cheap! Later on Doug thought he should go back to the store and buy the guitar. After all at $20 who cares if he knew how to play it or not?
Then yesterday at the flea market, I saw some really nice guitars for $45 and an electric acoustic one for about $100. I was quite tempted to get one! I know how to play the guitar a little .. just the easy songs with easy chords!
I sometimes joked with Doug that I was sorry that he didn't know how to play any musical instruments! I told him I always thought that the man I married was going to be musically inclined and instead I got him!
Here's Australian acoustic guitar virtuoso Tommy Emmanuel performing Angelina.
The first Thursday in May is National Day of Prayer. President Harry S. Truman signed a bill proclaiming the National Day of Prayer into law on April 17, 1952.
My church was open all day today for anyone who wanted to come in and pray.
The National Day of Prayer also coincided with my weekly Bible Study with a group of church ladies. After our regular study we spent about 10 minutes praying together over the prayer items listed in the National Day of Prayer leaflet.
One of the things that I have been thinking a lot about lately is how to increase traffic to my many blogs. Some of my blogs don't have that many visitors while only two or three have regular readers.
I came across a blog called Aweinspiring.us and one of the posts on the blog is called Easy Way To Improve Your Page Rank / SERP with Back Links From BloggerPlates.com.
What a co-incidence!
I'll be sure to check back Aweinspiring.us for more tips on all kinds of interesting and inspiring stuff.
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