It’s a very hot and humid day today, which ‘killed’ my interest in doing anything productive except for feeling sedentary.  It was also too hot to nap and I wasn’t sleepy, just feeling lethargic.  Didn’t have much mood to surf the internet too.  In the end, I did some photo transfers from my mobile phone to my laptop to free up space in my mobile phone for more photo taking when I go out.  I also took the chance to organise all my photo folders into themes.

I’ve got a picnic with friends at the Hort Park this evening too.  Later in the afternoon, I’ll need to go out to pick up some curry puff snacks for the pot luck picnic.  It’s gonna be my first time at the Hort Park and I bet it’s hot and humid there too.  Thank goodness it will be held after the sun sets!  I realise that I’ve been so spoiled by the comforts of air-conditioning that a little more heat and humidity than usual can be so annoying. 

If this kind of weather persists, I also worry for my toys.  Some toys can ‘deteriorate’ in such weather conditions and that is disasterous!  I’ve got to check on them periodically, which is a mammoth task for me, due to the sheer volume of my toys and the numerous storage locations around the house!  Argh!! 

While clearing part of my toy storage space recently, I found a new use for a spot that used to house the G1 My Little Pony babies that I had sold in the past year.  I decided to allocate that space to the exclusive My Little Pony figures that I have acquired so far this year, such as the My Little Pony Fair 2008 Exclusive Pony and the San Diego Comic Convention (SDCC) 2008 Exclusive Pony.  There is still some extra space in there for a couple more exclusive ponies that I’m expecting in the mail in the coming month. 

Currently there are still some G1 baby seaponies residing at this space while they await emigration to their new homes with other collectors.  Meanwhile a pair of G3 regular ponies, Starsong and Sweetie Belle (the ones with eye shadow and face designs) have sneaked into that drawer as well but there is still room for the expected newcomers.  After this space is filled, I will have to find new space again.  At least, this limited storage issue can sometimes help me to control my impulse to bring in new toys that are not so crucial in my collection, like the variants (which are a killer for every toy collector!)

Today I went through my cluttered drawers to re-discover what forgotten possessions ! have chucked in there.  As expected during every clutter clearing session, I found some things which I have not laid eyes on for months, much less use them.  My last round of major clutter clearing was in January this year, just before Chinese New Year.

I managed to fill up another bag of waste paper for recycling, and another trash bag of stuff for disposal.  Actually I have lots of custom-built storage space in my room and study but they are all filled up.  It’s really amazing how little bits of new things that we bring into the house each time we return home, can accumulate to such an astonishing amount of unused and unnecessary items over time, which can be like less than a year!

This time round, I put some coins and dollar notes at those clutter spots to test if money will multiply at those spots like the other clutter did.  I put a metal bowl there where I can drop in loose change from my pockets.  Then the accmulated cash can be allocated to savings for the coming year-end Christmas shopping.  Hmmm…….I’m already dreaming of Christmas time already, when it is still autumn in the temperate countries!

I don’t know to feel happy or not at this piece of news - the My Little Pony figures of Starsong and Sweetie Belle (seen above with their names printed on their hind leg) have been spotted by another local pony collector in a sub-urban departmental store here in Singapore!  In yesterday’s post, I mentioned that I did not find them at other departmental stores. 

My pony collector pals here think that it has been a long wait for them.  They were getting bored from the ‘pony drought’.  I think it was more of withdrawal symptoms from ‘pony addiction’!  For me I was hoping that this series won’t arrive so soon but they have arrived. <Checks my toy funds, and scans my limited storage space>

While browsing at 2 departmental stores today, I spotted 5 of the latest ‘Core 7′ My Little Pony characters, the ones with their names printed on their hind legs.  I found Cheerilee, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, Scootaloo and Toola Roola.  They were priced at SGD 9.90 each and there was no discount on them.  I only collect Starsong and Sweetie Belle from the ‘Core 7′ characters series and these 2 ponies were just not on the shelves today.  It’s a blessing in disguise as it can delay my spending on more ponies, for now…

The ‘room hurricane’ swept through my room this evening once more.  Many of my toys sought ‘refuge’ in their ‘hiding places’ as they were terrified of being in my way, in case I picked them up and tossed them into the “To-Clear-Out” box or recycling bag.  Fortunately only cardboard and paper make it into my recycling bag.  Toys that make it to the “To-Clear-Out” box are either for sale or given away to someone’s kids.  I also have a trash bag to contain all the broken or unused items and I managed to fill it up.  I don’t know how I did that. 

Letting go of your things can be hard to do as we get can so ‘emotionally attached’ to them for being with us for a period of time, even if we don’t need those certain things anymore.  A good friend of mine has a clear-cut rule for clutter clearing: if you haven’t used an item in the past year, chances are that you don’t need to use it in the coming year or ever at all.  Hence you can ’safely’ discard it.  It’s easier said than done because of ‘emotional attachment’. 

Our so-called physical possessions are perpetually in transit only.  Eventually they will leave our hands and move on to other owners or places, in some way or another.  We are all their temporary owners only.  Despite knowing all these ‘philosophies’, I still find it a ‘challenge’ when it comes to clutter clearing.  The process exhausted me so much that I ended up very tired and sleepy after it.  I have not even scraped off the tip of the iceberg after ad-hoc sessions of clutter clearing this year.  It looks like I have to much more ‘ruthless’ to really see a marked difference in my clutter clearing efforts.  I shall continue the process tomorrow, gotta go to bed already, *yawns*.

It’s the 15th day of the 8th Chinese Lunar Month today, and is also better known as the Mid-Autumn Festival.  The ancient Chinese celebrated this day by feasting on mooncakes, decorating their homes and streets with lots of lanterns and guessing complex Chinese riddles on the streets.  The kids had fun parading around the streets with their little lanterns.

These days, we still eat the mooncakes and decorate our dwellings and certain streets such as those in Chinatown, with lanterns and other light ups that despict the Chinese legends surrounding the origins of the Mid-Autumn Festival.  We also still organise lantern processions for the kids. 

For me, I have long outgrown the lantern parade.  Instead, the delicious mooncakes are the biggest attractions for me.  I particularly enjoy the ’snowy-skin’ mooncakes with plain lotus seed paste fillings.  I don’t like my mooncakes to have any egg yolk in them.  

Here we have G3 My Little Pony Kimono posing with my box of savoury mooncakes.  She suits the occasion well because of her lantern symbols.  I had to watch her closely while taking the photos, in case she really couldn’t resist and took a bite of the tempting mooncakes! 

Just as I thought that I’m done buying all the non-core 7 My Little Ponies (MLP) this year, Hasbro came up with this babe on their web store this weekend.  It sparked another round of ordering ‘frenzy’ among collectors on the pony forums.  No one is certain whether this pony will be available in the retail stores, or will it be offered via online stores only.  Hence many of us did not wish to take chances and ordered her through the Hasbro Toy Store.  Besides, there is a discount code, PONY10 for all MLP products!

The shipping of products ordered on the Hasbro Toy Store is to US addresses only.  Fortunately, a fellow local pony collector is using vPost to ship in the pony and I did a combined order with her and another collector.  Let’s time how long it takes for vPost to ship this order to us and what’[s the cost per pony.  According to Hasbro’s website, this pony will begin shipping at the end of this month only, hence we shall time its delivery starting from the receipt of the shipping notification email from Hasbro.

“Give Kids the World Village (GKTW) is a 70-acre, nonprofit resort in Central Florida that creates magical memories for children with life-threatening illnesses and their families.”  It is the charitable partner for the My Little Pony 25th Birthday Celebrations this year.  Read more about Hasbro’s support for this non-profit organisation here and here.

The leading rock band of my toyfics world, the Hot Rocks were seen checking out their new stage for their coming weekend concert. The Hot Rocks, consisting of lead singer Hot Shot (black color), R.E.V. (yellow color) and X-Brawn (grey & green color), have been the most popular and most sensational hit among my toys for over a year already.

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As the clutter clearing and room re-organizing ‘hurricane’ swept through my room and study hall this week, many of my toys and other things got ‘uprooted’ from their ’squatter settlements.  My Transformers Legends mini figures became among the uprooted ‘victims’ as they await the allocation of their new accommodations. 

For the moment, they managed to find shelter and a temporary home in this small empty box.  The Autobots and Decepticons were very cooperative in this time of difficulty and they sorted out the space in the box themselves.  However once they are out of the box, they would resume their daily ‘Transformers battles’.  This photo was snapped just before their ‘bedtime’ when all of them were already ‘exhausted’ from the day’s ‘activities’.