Real Life Anime Doll without Surgery

I couldn't believe my eyes when I spotted this pic in a Daily Mail article doing my daily surf.

Meet Anastasiya Shpagina also known by her anime name Fukkacumi (please don't ask
me what that means!)

She appears to have modelled herself after these two anime characters:

And she achieves that look with laborious hours of make up. No surgery (yet anyways).

What do you think?

Writing Services for Modifying Child Support Order

Today I spent half the day drafting a hardship letter for Mr X to be sent to the Family Support Division in Missouri. I am very happy with my efforts. Anyone reading that hardship letter would cry and 99% grant a decrease in Mr X's child support obligations. It was a difficult letter to write because I had to get all the facts right, and attached relevant evidence of his extreme hardship - 5 appendices including court transcripts and the works!

I also spent two hours transcribing about 5 minutes of audio. Since I am paid about 75 cents per audio minute, that worked out to be $4, or $2 per hour haha.

The best news of the day is that Google Adsense reported $8.38 worth of clicks on my blogs today. One click on my graciecooks blog was worth over $4. I suspect it was Doug. Thanks Doug!

xo Gracie 

Linkwithin ROCKS!

Now that I'm looking into sprucing up my blogs (and gosh do I have blogs! Check out my About page and tell me I don't have a too-many-blogs problem), I thought it would be good to add 'You may also like' widgets to them. You know, when you get to the end of a great article, you sometimes see other featured posts that make you continue reading more of what the blogger has to offer. That apparently reduces 'bounce rate'. Please don't ask me what 'bounce rate' is. I have no idea.

A quick search for such a widget turned up a free one, and in this case freebies can be goodies! The search also turned up a lot of other complicated ways to add HTML code to your website and I thought to myself, there HAS to be an easier way. This is Linkwithin. No sign ups, no ads, simple and it looks great!

Now please excuse me while I get Linkwithin on all my blogs. :)

Say hi to Princess, my Gram's pooch.  :)

xo Grace

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I'm BAAAAAACK!!

I decided that I am gonna give full-time writing/blogging a decent go (after much thought and careful consideration - including the fact that Spencer said 'ok')... so I have been working hard updating the links to all my blogs and reading up Problogger (Darren Rowse's) blogs on how to make money blogging.

In the past I've made between $30-$50 a month from Adsense ads, and surprisingly my review on Ebates, Fatwallet, Shopathome and Bigcrumbs is regularly referring readers to Ebates so I get about $10-$30 a month from Ebates (thanks readers!). My 'Health Matters' blog is getting quite a lot of hits, and I get a few emails every week from readers asking about weaning off steroids. Not much of this is converting into money unfortunately (very few Adsense clicks or donations), so if I'm going into writing full-time, I might have to cut back on giving free advice to these folks or figure something else out. Aside from that, Commission Junction, Linkshare and Amazon were the few affiliate programs I tried out, the former being the most 'lucrative' (about $10 a month on average).

Looking at what readers were looking for, I noticed that my reviews, and articles with rock solid content, got the most hits. So going forward, I'm going to write more reviews and how-to guides and place contextual ads to Amazon and other affiliates. This way, I get to share with my readers all my favorite things and hopefully they will buy them too! Yes, you too!! :p

That's it for now. Here's a flower for you!

Pink peony in full bloom in my garden

xo Grace


p.s. If you have enjoyed my Rants, Raves and Ramblings, please help support my blog by clicking on any ad and visiting my sponsors. Thanks!

Cooking up a storm & Massages!

Fri, 3 Feb. Rushed around trying to get the surat sumpah signed. Eddie came over and got his massage plus bought a bunch of stuff. Cooked the sauce for the lasagna. Yoga.

Sat, 4 Feb. Shopped early at Jusco for parsley, chicken bones, etc. Eddie came over again. Baked the two choc sponge cake bases for the blackforest cake. Assembled the lasagna and baked them. Made the soup stock then the cream of mushroom soup. Elaine, Simon and the boys came over and I gave the parents massages while the boys played computer games. No workout.

Sun, 5 Feb. Went with Saimas to Dato Latif's son's wedding at FRIM. What a wonderful affair. The food was delicious. I'm going to miss FRIM and everyone so much. Prepped the pizza toppings, assembled the cake, then headed to Popo's. Awesome pizza party. Too much food though haha. Legs & Back + Ab.

Mon, 6 Feb. Picked up Siok Bee's wetsuit, then went to massage Alp, followed by Richard's place with more massages (David, Syerol, Richard). What a workout! No Yoga.

Tues, 7 Feb. Wetsuit swim at Templers with Nurina, Dayan, Darimi, Arif. Then back to my place to massage them :). Core Synergistics. I decided to just forget the two missed workouts (Yoga and Kenpo, from last week), and get back on track this 'Recovery week'.

Weds, 8 Feb. HUKM for Physiotherapy in the morn, then head cracking on Ohba's paper for the rest of the day. Raiha came over in the evening for P90X and to try on Bee's wetsuit. She fits! Did Kenpo.

Sport Masseuse In Da House!

Monday, 30 Jan. First day of the massage course. Learnt legs and back. Pn Salina took over from her hubs after lunch. I also napped at lunch break. Tired la, didn't sleep well at all. Afterwards walked with Pui San at Bukit Jalil, met up with Rupert and dinner satay. Rabbit was very sour?! Had more eggs when I got back. Eating so many eggs!

Tuesday, 31 Jan. Second day of the massage course, did full body massage and think I'm doing okay. Pui San is the most ticklish massage subject ever. I can barely touch that gal! Directly after the course, followed Pui San to Mabel's house where she massaged Mabel and I massaged Mabel's son Matthew. I swear she only did 35 minutes of the 1 hr massage. After the massage, I had dinner with Alp, and shopped for cheese etc. Also picked up a bottle of grape seed oil to be my base massage oil.

Wednesday, 1 Feb. Got my offer letter from FRIM. It's RM6250. Not RM8000 :\ Ah well. Gave my 1 month notice to my landlord. I guess I'm moving out!

Thursday, 2 Feb. HUKM to get the cast of my feet for making insoles. Hope they work. At RM300, they had better work! Spent half the day at the post office waiting for my number to come up to buy a RM10 stamp. And found out I didn't even need to queue up for that. Haizz. Got a bunch of shopping done at Giant, for this Sunday's dinner. I think starters will be cream of mushroom soup with garlic bread, mains will be lasagna, pizza and Papa's fried chicken, sides will be garlic mashed potatoes, salad, fried rice. And dessert will be fruit and my black forest cake. Pizza toppings will be pineapple, chicken, ground beef, sundried tomato, tomato, roasted pepper, fresh pepper, onion, sausage, mushrooms, olives, shrimp, and lots of cheese.

Infinity Swim in the Straits of Melaka

28 Jan, Sat. Woke early to pick up Justin, Faith and Tiff before heading out to PD. Was late :\. The swim was good and I was so glad to see everyone having a nice time. After the swim I helped safety escort the bike leg, and had to leave during the run leg to send Faith and Tiff back for church visitation. Had a nice lunch and chat with Justin. Promised to cycle to Penang with him if he gets a bike. Showered and took a short nap before heading out to dinner with everyone. Went food court hopping! It was fun, going for dinner here, looking for dessert there, and hunting for another food elsewhere. By the time I got home, I was too tired and it was too late to do Kenpo.

29 Jan, Sun. Woke really late, but glad my sorethroat feeling went away. Hopefully won't get fever. Upped my dose of CoQ10 and ALA etc. Just relaxed at home, did a bit of Kenpo. Then went out to Agnes' to get stuff, and met Yip for my stuff. It was great hearing Yip's first hand account of Nepal. Dinner was Jun Kee's low sang, and all sorts of yummy foods. Shopping at Tesco for eggs. Gotta get to bed early for sports massage course tomorrow :)

Fasting and a Painful Jab

26 Jan (Thu) was spent mostly working on Ohba's paper. I'm neaaaaarly to the end. Nothing memorable except I once again slept at around 2am.

27 Jan (Fri). Woke up early, skipped breakfast (fasting) and drove to get blood test and medical examination done. Got jabbed in my gluteus maximus for MMR. Ouch... Took passport pic, got x-ray done, stopped by at Tesco for bread, cucumber, lettuce, tomato, mayo, butter, 100+, water, for tomorrow's swim-bike-run. The scaffolding was up along my apartment when I got back so I quickly closed the windows and drew the curtains. It was too noisy to work, so I baked brownies and oatmeal raisin cookies, and I made egg salad sandwiches. Seeing that the number of participants is increasing, I decided to boil rice to fry some up tomorrow morning. It's 1.30 am now, I should be in bed as I need to wake by 6 am later.

Makanthon & Sushi Tei Cockroach Leg

24 Jan (Tues). Lunch was with Uncle See Kong, Tai So, Edwin, Edmund and Andrew at Mama's. Cherry, Mama's tenant for 2 months, joined also. After lunch I visited Nadya and she told me the details of what had rocked her to the core recently, plus difficulties with her thesis. Gave pineapple tarts and ang pows for the girls. Then to Nat's where I also gave tarts, which were also really well received hehe. Reminisced about the ol' days, and wondered where we would be 10 years from now. Cried thinking about our parents getting old, frail. Then to Popo's for dinner with the clan - char chee yoke, kow yoke, lontong, herbal chicken.

25 Jan (Weds). Had physio at HUKM, which this session was heat treatment for pain relief. I dipped each foot into warm wax 7 times to make a thick glove on each foot. The nurse then wrapped each foot in a plastic bag and then towel, and let sit for 15 minutes. It didn't really do much for me. Felt nice though. Lunch was at Sushi Tei Pavillion with Ken, Melissa and Justin. I could not believe it - I spotted a cockroach leg on the plate of sushi that we had just polished off. It looked like the leg of a german cockroach or Blatella germanica. After Underworld, headed back to Kepong. It's now 2 am. I need to fix this sleeping late problem.

Kung Kung's is 83!

Sat, 21 Jan. Kung Kung's 83rd birthday marked the start of the clan's Glutton Fest. I'd slept 4 am that day, making pineapple tarts. Fortunately the bike ride to Fraser's Hill was called off, thus I could relax at home until 4 pm. Cake cutting was at Popo's at 5 pm. A. Josie made a corn custard cake - tastes a lot better than it sounds :). Then dinner at KK Restaurant, which was okay but made me thirsty for the rest of the night. After dinner we went back to the house and hung around there. Also made a trip to the pasar malam outside the house and got coconut water, nangka, tau foo fah, etc.

Sun, 21 Jan. I can't believe I actually woke at 12 pm. I dreamt that I woke up at 10.15 am, and was rushing about getting ready for church and went to church down the road. My dream stopped there, maybe because I haven't actually been to that church and therefore couldn't dream up how it looks from the inside. I made my way to Ma's and had my packed lunch there, then Faith and I started making wontons. We brought the wontons to Popos to fry. Unfortunately, they weren't so crispy 2 hours later when dinner was served. This CNY 'reunion' dinner was a quiet affair, because all the married women were away at their in-law's houses for their reunion dinners. So that left Ken, Melissa, Melvin, Vic, myself, Pa, Ma, A. Jenny, U. William, Justin, Faith, Popo & Kung kung & U. Jon. When I got back home, I started stuffing ang pow packets. Glad I kept an excel sheet record of last year's amounts. Cuz I would have grossly over given otherwise. Since I have less than RM500 in the bank, I don't have much to give away. Oh ya, found out Justin and Jin Vi broke up. *sigh*

Mon, 22 Jan. CNY Day 1! Sleeping at 2 am or later every night is not good. (It's now 1.30 am yikes). I woke 10 am, and had to start getting ready to go Popo's right away. Wore last year's red blouse. Packed the 2.5kg and 1.5kg weights, and workout clothes also since would be spending the whole day at Cheras. I really enjoyed and cherished the exchange of ang pow packets. It was all very festive. We tucked into a feast. Usually it's 'vegetarian' on the first day of the new year, but Popo has since stopped following this tradition heeh. We had lam yue pai kuat (pork ribs), chai choy (mix vege). A. Jenny made brown rice salad and chicken sambal sauce. I cried watching 'Girl goes Disney' on Youtube. I just felt very emotional because I know I won't be here next Chinese New Year and I'm missing everyone already. Thanks Melvin. We spent some Facetime with Jess, A. Gin, Ali, Mel and Zach. Then we went home to nap (I did a workout). Dinner was at the very expensive Marco Polo Restaurant and Wisma Lim Foo Yong. Nicky gave Justin and I lotsa tips on how to gain weight (eggs, milk, peanut butter). When I got back home, I dragged the pseudotrainer back into the room and put in 30 minutes. I'm looking forward to getting more cardio and leg work in. Not being able to run is making me feel strangely deprived, maybe even depraved haha. I think I can cycle lots without aggravating this plantar fasciitis.