Jade Greenleaf's Sanctuary

Cancer Predictions:

Your personal life is relatively secure at this moment. Take advantage of the lull in family conflict to concentrate on your own goals. If family problems crop up again in December, consider making an appointment with a family therapist. Your energies this month should be spent on work matters. A new prospect is emerging in now that will need to be capitalized on in the beginning of 2010. Start planning now. A new market for your project or service is likely to emerge. Remain informed. For single Cancers, it look as if a quirky Capricorn will be pulling at your heartstrings this month. You've been noticing this austere character for weeks and are not entirely sure how to approach them. Why not ask if they would do you the honor of accompanying you to the theater or to a concert? Before buying tickets, inquire about their interests. Do they like jazz? Classical music. Gourmet dining? Do they favor a particular sports team? For moderate Capricorns who like to do things "right", your courtesy and manners will impress them far more than any brusque gestures designed to sweep them off their feet. Should you have decided on a new car, I do hope you opted for an energy-efficient model. These days it's the only way to go.

Snake Predictions:

One blight on this clement end of the Ox year period has to do with your being invited to participate in committing an immoral act. Someone in your social milieu will attempt to convince you to become involved in a campaign to ruin someone else's reputation. As the targeted person is someone you really don't adore, you may indeed be tantalized at the prospect of joining in the rumor mongering. You and the others don't like this person because he or she is rankly hypocritical and has been known to debase the status of more than one other person you know. So when you are asked to join in disgracing his or her name, you are sorely tempted. Please resist. The hypocrite will meet his or her own demise soon enough, and when that happens, you won't have their welfare on your conscience. One item you should watch out for, as the Ox year finale draws near, is your tendency to be convinced that what you believe to be true is absolutely so. An event which is likely to occur at the end of November will test this flaw in your character. You so want everybody to give credence to an idea that you have about what's best for a certain relative that you become stubborn about it. This could be about an older person who needs care or someone in your immediate family whom you have decided needs your help. Do iron out this misconception on your part with friends and family members before trying to implement this character's rescue. The relative who seems so needy may just be attempting to get your attention, which in some odd way flatters you. Reason with your head. Not with your vanity. Heed the advice of wiser than thou.

From my very smart friend, Strannik:

"The question is whether you should continue (with something)... if it gives you pleasure, continue. If not, stop. Pleasure should be your standard of judgment; not whether you're right of wrong to do so."

Excellent... :)

Cancer Predictions:

A minor cold or sore throat could put you to bed for a few rainy days during October. If you do fall ill, take advantage of the time at home to do some long-neglected reading. Listen to music. Absorb information from something more enlightening than the nightly news and your internet service provider's home page. Read the prose of people more intelligent than yourself. Avoid thinking about house work and the grind for a few days. Instead of doing laundry or cleaning the oven, be creative. Sew, cook, paint or write in your journal. Your family picture is blurred by someone's laziness. This character's uncooperative attitude has affected the rest of the clan and is causing no little conflict. Be sure that if someone isn't pulling their own weight then they aren't getting their piece of the pie. Cancers need to feel like their home life runs smoothly. You usually manage to bring home the bacon. Your kin should meet your efforts in kind. Car troubles could bedevil you around the 23rd. Plan on dishing out a bundle for some pricey repairs. Take into consideration the value of the car. If it's dead weight, consider trading it in rather than further investing any money in its carcass.

Snake Predictions:

This month is likely to bring you more joy than any other in this year. The financial situation should be well under control which always makes you feel more settled emotionally. This new sense of calm brings along with it a chance to kick back and enjoy your life, spend time with family and friends and finally occupy yourself with something besides climbing the ladder to success. Certain community projects have been beckoning for the last few months. But, with all you had in your plate, you simply haven't been able to involve yourself. Now, you can finally participate in the Halloween parade and prepare for the upcoming holidays with your children and/or nieces and nephews and grandkids. If you have none of the above, please remember there are many little children who are without the means to have fun at the holidays. Either their parents have absconded and left them to fend for themselves, or they don't have the extra funds to so much as put a Halloween costume together - much less think about what they will do at Thanksgiving and Christmastime. Pitch in and help them out. And while you're at it, try to impart some of your own newfound self confidence to them. Take them somewhere special and have a heart-to-heart chat about their life. Once you know what they're up against, perhaps you can manage to make some long term changes to improve these kids' lives concretely. Also, your health picture is brighter. Those chronic headaches and skin ailments have begun to abate. Enjoy every minute. 'Seems we can put up with anything so long as we have our health.

After watching the show, I didn't quite understand why some critics didn't quite like the movie. Wolverine may not be the character I like best in the X-Men cartoon series, but he sure is one hell of a compelling character. Hugh Jackman isn't one of my favourite actors either, but I thought he played the character with dignity and a touch of compassion. It was very interesting to see how the character of Wolverine evolved from young - I had always thought that his only mutant power was self-healing, but apparently he was born was "claws" too. It was also interesting to watch the external factors that drove his character to finally agree to be experimented upon by William Stryker, who is also another very compelling X-Men character.

The movie was also full of action and also introduced how Cyclops was brought to Professor X's school. I loved the end bit where Patrick Stewart had an appearance as the Professor, albeit uncredited. :) I also liked the irony of how Wolverine strove to have an ordinary life with an ordinary woman, who in the end, turned out to be really not so ordinary afterall.

The movie left off with a host of potential sequel storylines and I'm really looking forward to the next Wolverine movie already.

Truth be told, I haven't really watched any really fun or good romantic comedies since Four Weddings & A Funeral... it's really not easy to make one, I think, without having the ending come off as cliche. But with Sandra Bullock helming The Proposal, it's hard not to watch it...

The story's rather typical - A pushy boss forces her young assistant to marry her in order to keep her Visa status in the U.S. and avoid deportation to Canada. Sounds like "Green Card" and a host of other movies... and the ending's also fairly expected - of course, the couple in question would end up falling in love after getting to know each other better! So, what's so watch-able about The Proposal?

For starters, the scenery of Alaska... haha!!! They fly there to meet his (Ryan Reynolds) family and she, a bona fide city gal, had to endure all kinds of country-roughing in order to convince him to keep his promise to marry her. The scenery's pretty damn amazing for sure. For another, Ryan Reynolds is really a very very nice piece of eye candy, very worth watching... but his boyish good looks makes him look half a generation younger than the nearing-50 Bullock, which was quite a shame, as she looked extremely hot and good for her age. If I looked like that when at that age... I'd be over the moon! Haha!!! Besides the lovely couple that saved this otherwise staid script, some little moments and subtle nuances in the movie also prevented this movie from being graded as dreadful. At least, I would give it a C+.

Seriously... what do dinos and the Ice Age have in common? Nada! But that sure didn't stop the scriptwriters and producers from having hell of a fun time producing the 3rd movie. Manny, the Mammoth, and his new wife are expecting a baby; Diego the sabre-toothed decides to leave the tribe to seek out his own fortunes after realising he's becoming soft and... old; and Sid decides, of all things, to pick up 3 dinosaur eggs to start his own family!!! Thus starting the whole journey of the female T-Rex, in her bid to find her babies, ended up bringing all the dino babies and Sid into a totally different world buried under all that ice.

The tribe had to reunite, and under the leadership of a weird weasel, journeys out to save Sid. It's not easy to make sequels, especially when the 1st one becomes unexpectedly good and well-received (think Bourne Identity). But Ice Age 3 was still a whole roller coaster of fun, guffaws, jokes and sweet moments, perfect for a family outing for both adults and children to enjoy together. Nevermind that dinos don't exist in the Ice Age - the imagination of the writers know no bounds and the addition of a female squirrel - Scratte - to fight with the original male one for the acorn was just simply a tad too... chuckle-inducing. Nevertheless, the movie makes for a good afternoon of relaxation. Definitely worth watching!

I'm a great fan of the Harry Potter books, having read each and every one of them at least 5 times... But I've never been satisfied with any of the movies... any! And I'm definitely not very satisfied with the latest either. Every time I finished a Harry Potter movie, I'd leave the theatre feeling as if there's something missing, something not quite dealt with...

I didn't like how the director dealt with Katie Bell's accidental brush with a cursed necklace - the 3 who witnessed the entire situation behaved as if they already knew what was about to happen. I also didn't quite like the ending, which was the most crucial of the story. The crux was that Harry was immobilised in the book, thus explaining his inability to fight off Draco and lack of attempt to save Dumbledore. But in the movie, he was hiding at a lower level from where the exchange between Draco and Dumbledore was taking place... the way the entire scene was dealt with left much to be desired indeed.

I had always wondered if the HP movie franchise would have been much better if handled by a Hollywood company instead... the storytelling would probably have been much more interesting, the action sequences more compact, etc... Oh well... I had stopped going to the theatres for the HP movies since the 3rd one... and I am fairly sure I wouldn't be spending money on the last 2 movies (of the last book) as well.

At Regina's suggestion, the girls treated me to dinner at Alaturka Restaurant. It's a cosy little place between Bugis and Lavender, that sells Turkish and Mediterranean food. Truth be told, though I really loved my trip to Turkey more than 15 years ago, it was my first winter travel then. And back then, Turkey wasn't very developed for touring. While the sights were unforgettable, we spent alot of other time trying not to feel too miserable about the cold, hence I don't really recall much about the food, except the pumpkin pie, the kebabs and the butter rice. So I was really looking forward to this dinner.

It wasn't really difficult to find, and it was nestled right in the midst of several intimate little eateries. I like that area very much, there's so much to explore there!!! The first thing that struck me about the decor was of course all the blue mosaic, that's so typical.

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For starters, we ordered Hummus (Middle Eastern Chickpea with Tahini Dip), Borek (Pastry in Feta Cheese, aka Turkish Spring Rolls) and Ekmek (Home style plain bread). The dip was super super super yummy, especially when mixed with the soft, warm and fresh bread. In fact, the dip was so good, I can still literally taste it now as I'm writing about it. The "Turkish Spring Rolls" were fun to eat, as they were filled with cheese, but very filling.

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By the time we were ready to order mains, we were already half full. Nevertheless we still ordered 1 lamb and 1 chicken kebab. The lamb turned out to be too dry and rather tough but the chicken was still quite soft and juicy.

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The pictures of the lamb and chicken seemed almost similar huh? The kebabs came with butter rice, which was a bit too cold for my taste. I remembered having really delicious butter rice in Turkey, but this one was a bit too dry already. Throughout dinner, we had warm apple tea to wash down the food. It was a delicious balance of sweet and sour taste. :) I don't like apple juice very much, but I liked this tea and how it was served:

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Unfortunately, we weren't able to stomach dessert... nevermind, there'll always be next time. I found the food quite good value for money, and and the restaurant's rather accessible, and yet far from the madding crowds. Heh! This is one place I'd definitely want to come again.

Trying this again today made me realise how accurate the analysis is. Perhaps, the time of change is really about to descend...

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You are striving to make favourable impressions all of the time and you are going out of your way to make the impression that you are something special. You are constantly on the watch to see how your friends and neighbours are reacting to your various ploys. But this is so unnecessary because most of the time you are in control of the situation - and you are, in the nicest sense of the word, a 'manipulator' because you use various strategies very cleverly in order to influence and obtain the necessary recognition.

Now there are many things in life that you require as essential to your well-being but, try as you may, something always seems to be getting in your way. A word of advice - 'keep trying' and you may be pleasantly surprised to see just how matters turn out.

You are very demanding - and insisting on total involvement but you do not reciprocate with the same depth of feeling. However, it could well be that maybe an unprecedented surprise is awaiting you in the near future. For just as one whilst paddling in the sea, could flounder into a whirlpool, so you may be drawn into a loving situation that has high emotional demands - and you could well respond with a depth of emotion that you never even dreamed that you possessed.

You pretend that you are a carefree individual and that nothing really bothers you - that you are so self-sufficient that whatever problems beset you they simply flow off you as water flows off a ducks back. You are experiencing considerable stress, trying to conceal yourself from the rest of the world. In actual fact - deep down, you are not at all happy. You feel lonely and you need someone with whom you can 'Let your hair down' and share your hopes, dreams and high standards. You are imposing unnecessary self restraint on yourself. You would like to demonstrate the unique quality of your character to all and sundry.

You are presently worried about your future and you feel that whatever you do will go wrong. At this time you are your own worst enemy. All the disappointment that you have experienced, coupled with the fear that there is no point in formulating fresh goals, have led to anxiety. You would like recognition and a position of trust but you are concerned that these hopes and dreams may not be realised. You are very argumentative and insistent that you are right - maybe you are - but you are pushing too hard. Take it easy, let go, and smile. Smiling and agreeing with people works wonders - try it and see.

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