New Developments

So there was a sighting of public enemy number one, aka the lizard on Friday morning. Mike saw him wandering around the living room, but he had to leave for work before he could catch him. By the time I got up, he had disappeared again. But we finally cornered him that evening in the kitchen; he was behind the drying rack full of clean dishes. I angrily rewashed all the dishes so they didn't have lizard germs on them, and Mike managed to force the mean thing outside. Success! It was a short-lived victory, however, as I found a new lizard in the bathtub when I went to take a shower. Now I don't even know if the one we got rid of was the one I saw. I think they're organized, and I think they're taunting me.

Saturday we spent running some errands; we returned our broken fan and got a new one, and went to the grocery store to stock up on staples like mac and cheese and tuna fish. As we were waiting at the MRT station, there was this kid sitting close by us making noise. It sounded like he was shaking a box of tic-tacs or something equally annoying, but then Mike nudged me and I looked over at him. This ten year old kid was going to town on a Rubik's cube; he was moving the pieces insanely fast, and solved it in a matter of seconds. He was timing himself, and once he solved it, he just reset the cube and did it again. Mike seemed pretty depressed, because apparently it took him eight months to solve his Rubik's cube. He felt better when I reminded him that WE can buy beer and could totally beat up that kid and take his cube if we wanted to. Take that, nerd!

We spent a better part of the weekend just walking around our new neighborhood. There's a park that's close to Mike's work called Changi Business Park. Although it sounds like a venue for outdoor board meetings, it's actually very pretty. There's a couple of ponds and a trail, and we only saw three other people the whole time we were there. We saw some mice that were living in a palm tree, and a bunch of huge snails. We thought we saw the Ikea from the path, but it turned out to just be a big blue and yellow building.

Yesterday we were thinking about going back to the beach, but the sky looked pretty foreboding. Instead of chancing getting caught in a rainstorm in the ocean, we thought we'd just go check out our big swimming pool. We put on our swimsuits and walked down to the pool and picked a shady spot to set our things. Mike was putting on some sunscreen when the security guard that watches the pool wandered over. We thought he was just coming over to say hi, or to make sure that we lived here, but it was something else entirely. Apparently there's a reason that guys here wear speedos all the time: men are not allowed to wear loose fitting swim shorts in pools. I'll just let that sink in for a moment.

Yup, Mike has to get a speedo if he wants to get in that pool. At first I was really angry, because I wanted to go swimming damn it, and the guard wouldn't let Mike get in the water. He also couldn't seem to give us any reason WHY he had to wear a speedo, or what possible difference it would make. So I grabbed our things and marched back upstairs to pout. Mike looked online, trying to figure out some explanation for all the madness, and we came across some interesting knowledge. I guess in Europe, especially in France, this is a pretty common rule for public pools. The reasoning behind it is that the pools often aren't chlorinated, and they don't want people swimming in shorts that they could have worn around all day. I always thought Europeans just LIKED wearing speedos, but I guess there really is a reason behind gross old men insisting on wearing them. I still think it's a stupid rule for our pool, though, since it isn't a public one. Thanks a lot, Europe, way to be a bad influence. Not only do they drive on the wrong side of the road here, but I have to buy my husband a banana hammock.

So now I'm not really mad anymore, it's just funny. At least, it is for me. Mike is less happy about this development, but I think he'll get over it once he realizes how freeing a speedo can feel.