Monday seems to be always a bad day to start the week. Problems are exceptionally more than other days of the week. Maybe not every time but almost. I get to watch one of my favourite shows; The Gadget Show, so that is fair enough. However, there is almost nothing else on the tv programme list that attracts me enough after that. Funnily, I am quite awake now.

In addition to the tyre booking that I made last week, I booked a brake check as well as an exhaust check. Friday was the day and it did not go too well, but it did go as what I had anticipated. Some parts need to be changed. But it could go worst though. Anyway, the exhaust is fine which I expect it does not. The rear drum brakes and wheel bearing needed to be changed and I ended up paying a couple of hundred pounds. I must say that I am very pleased with the service that I received. Things that need to be changed will need to be changed. The irritating sound while driving has gone. The handling is much better now and brake responses better. I was advised that the front disc brakes would need to be replaced in a year’s time. I guess the clutch will need to be replaced first.

There is always a question in my mind each time my car needs a new part: Why pay so much to repair the car when the car itself does not cost much? Well, I guess that I only need a car that runs fine and economy. I am crazy about cars but I always look for the cheaper yet good option.

Now for the tyres. When I bought the car, it had four Avon ZV3 tyres. One of the front tyres wore faster than the other. I checked the service bills and on several occasion, the owner of the car was only getting one tyre. Is it a car problem or tyre problem? I am not sure though. Anyway, avoid Avon ZV3. It is loud and performs like budget tyres. More importantly, it is quite expensive. In the last heavy snow period, it did bring me home but not without several scares. It slipped once a while and the grip was not brilliant. Alright, it is not a tyre meant for snow but other cars seem to handle the snow pretty well. On wet weather, the grip is normal too. On uneven road, it trembles and sometimes, the tyres seem to have their own sense of directions when I accelerate or brake.

Now, I have two front Avon ZV3 tyres and two rear UniRoyal RainExpert tyres. I could feel the difference immediately. The back is much quieter and the ride is much smoother. The grip is great but it is let down by Avon ZV3. I am not sure whether it is just me but the car responses better during acceleration. The front Avon ZV3 tyres still has a long way to go. Certainly, that will be the last Avon ZV3 tyres that I will ever have on my car.

Once a while, I receive emails from Amazon and Play.com about new promotional products and latest offers in store. One thing that interested me is the Sony Nex camera. The Sony Nex series camera is sort of in the middle of DSLR and compact digital camera. At the moment, it is the smallest interchangeable lens camera available. It also featured in the most recent episode of The Gadget Show where it was compared against Olympus EP-1. It won every category contested; panorama, exposure, action.

In the Sony Nex series, there are two models, Sony Nex-3 and Sony Nex-5. Needless to say, Nex-3 is cheaper than Nex-5 but the features are almost the same. Nex-3 has a plastic body and 720p video recording while Nex-5 has an aluminium body and 1080p video recording.

A while ago, Mee and I have decided that it is time to move on from Canon Ixus-65. We searched and surveyed the market but none of the models available in the market appealed us. I was after something nearer to DSLR performance while Mee was still interested in compact digital cameras. At that time, I was already interested in Sony Nex but it is not compact enough for Mee. The closest we came about was Canon Ixus 300HS. It is top of the range of compact digital camera for Canon. The HS stands for High Speed and it should perform well in low light situation, but in reality, it still nowhere near DSLR performance. In the end, we decided that we should wait and see what the market has to offer.

Up until today, I still think that Sony Nex should be our next camera. It looks great too. Normal DSLR cameras are boring but maybe more practical than Sony Nex. Anyway, who cares? A couple of years later, we might need to poke our head into the market again, looking for newer cameras.

Busy is that word that sums up Mee and my daily life. I was busy with work and Mee too. While she is working temporarily in my workplace, she still works part time in a supermarket as well as taking care of our daily meals. Sometimes, I believe that the supplements that we take each day do help us in some way to keep us healthy. I always like to mention that the PHD catalyst supplements are one of the multivitamins that made me feel the difference. By the way, it is not just multivitamins; it consists of some essential ingredients, which help to burn fat and gain strength.

Vitamin B is also quite essential. I started taking vitamin B more than five years ago. One of the problems is there are so many types of vitamin B. In the end, I choose vitamin B-complex. There is also the biotin supplement which is a water soluble B-complex and also known as vitamin B7. The thing that I find out about vitamin B is that it keeps me awake for most part of the day. I was once told that vitamin B has to be taken with folic acid. I wonder how true it was because all I read about folic acid was about pregnancy. Anyway, that is just my opinion but I just do not feel quite comfortable with the folic acid.

This week will almost be like a no-gym week. Mee and I have only attended the yoga last night. One of the instructors is on holiday this week and her Monday’s class was cancelled. We could not attend today’s body attack or tomorrow spinning class because we had to work late. I might go for the pilates class on Friday and Saturday is definitely my usual free weight session.

While I was reading some information about gaining muscles size and different free weight exercises, I came across glucomannan website. It is a wordpress website that offers advises on healthy food, correct way to exercise as well as fat management. It has not been updated for a while now but there are some good articles worth reading. I might as well leave some comments on the page.

I have just completed tyre booking with Kwik Fit, an automotive repair centre. I used the website before to book a MOT and full service. It was quick and easy. This time, I purchased two new tyres online and I am not impressed. It has a facility to search a car’s tyres by entering the car registration. However, it only worked once out of 10 times. 3 out of 5 times I got an error message which prevent me from booking a specific appointment time. The error message did actually book the time but it did not let me proceed with the payment. Therefore, I had to wait for 20 minutes for the booking to be cancelled. Anyway, their service is what I am after. That particular garage left me a good impression when I had my car’s MOT and full service done. I hope the person in charge will not disappoint me this Friday.

The tyres that I bought were UniRoyal Rain Expert. I have not heard of it before. I would love to go for Bridgestone or Michelin if the price is right but the two brands were not in the list of available tyres. I almost went for Pirelli P6000 but I thought that I should check the forums or read some of the tyre reviews available. I thought it would be hard to find tyre reviews but surprisingly, it was as easy as searching for supplements review.

Pirelli P6000 may be renown in making tyres but among the comments that I picked up were expensive, unreliable and perform badly on wet weather. Honestly, I could not afford changing between winter and summer tyres. Thus, what I really need is a set of balance tyres that work on both dry and wet. UniRoyal Rain Expert seems to be getting raved reviews, which I thought I should give it ago. It is interesting to see how it performs compared to my current Avon tyres.

I look like a busy man. I have not even had the time to write about Mee and my New York trip. I guess that I have forgotten most of it already. I think the pictures might help me to recall some part of it. I do remember that a couple of weeks before going to New York, I thought about getting a binocular or scopes. In my opinion, it would be great for viewing high-rise building or the statue of liberty. Some forum posters advised on getting a binocular or scope could enhance the overall trip’s experience. After the trip, I felt that binocular might be a nice addition. However, it is not essential considering that you might have a map on one hand and a camera on the other, which does not help much.

Well, guess what, I am so tired of looking at the website that I developed at work that I decided to use my own time to design another layout. And it does not really help if I were to finish up writing the New York trip.