Strong insider selling.
Underwriters stepping in to hold the price at US$38.
Heard they won't do it anymore. Monday is going to be interesting.
Just the way I like it.
There was one time I put a bunch of grapes in the freezer because I wanted to cool them down quickly. However, I forgot about them, so they were frozen when I took them out.
And I found that I like it! :lol:
PowerGrid takes too long to play. I may try these to speed up the game, so that it can be finished in one hour.
The initial plants #3 to #6 are too inefficient. So, we'll start with power plant #7.
Everyone starts with two power plants by bidding. This is the same as skipping the first two rounds of the game.
Everyone places two free cities. This is the same as skipping one or two rounds of the game. Just five cities to go to Step 2!
Bidding is one-round only. This just forces everyone to bid their max value right away.
No hogging of resources until Step 3. It can take time to think whether to hog resources or not. Most of the time, we don't want to do it anyway.
Faster market obsoletion. If the lowest power plant in the market is less than #20, it will be removed at the end of the round. This is to make interesting and powerful plants appear faster.
The first milestone is Step 2. There is typically a "stall" situation just before this event where some or most players are boxed in and are unable to expand. Once Step 2 is reached, the cities open up again and players can expand once more.
(We may need some tweaks to deal with the stall situation, as it just drags the game.)
The second milestone is when the high-capacities plants become available. These can power 5-6 cities each. By this time, the end-goal of 15-17 cities is near, and whoever powers the most cities win.
We planned to use the Philips AVENT system, so we started with 2 feeding bottles with 1-month teat (top left). We thought there was no point getting the 0-month teat.
We were wrong; the 1-month teat flowed too fast for the baby. As a result, the milk tended to spill and it was a chore feeding the baby. (There was just enough milk, so we couldn't afford to waste a single drop.)
Two weeks later, I got the 0-month teats from my brother. It was still too fast for the baby, so the milk still spilled. It took at least 30 minutes to feed the baby in a start-stop manner.
After struggling for a month, Missus found the NUK latex teat (top right). It was a good fit. Finally, we could feed the baby with almost no leakage.
We had to get a new set of NUK feeding bottles as the NUK teats weren't compatible with the AVENT system.
But there was a problem, for me at least. The baby took his own sweet time to finish his feed. He drinks at a glacial pace of 1-1.5ml/minute, so 50ml could take 50 minutes!
The worst thing was, the baby sucked in a lot of air, so it was extremely difficult to burp him. He needed to be burped multiple times.
After a while, I found that it's easier to burp him once, then let him lie down. He'll be uncomfortable under 2 minutes. Then, lift him up and burp him again. Repeat as needed.
Needless to say, it was very time consuming.
After a really long time, I finally figured out why. The baby was latching onto the teat firmly, and that stopped the milk flow. I could prevent that by angling the teat slightly. I can tell because air bubbles would escape as the baby sucks in the milk.
(I have stared at the feeding bottle for so long that I can gauge how much milk is left — while still feeding the baby.)
With my new technique, the baby could finish 80ml in about 15 minutes. That's pretty fast! He also needs to burp just once or twice.
A side-effect is that the baby is more prone to throwing up milk, so I have to handle the first burp more delicately. (The baby tends to throw up a short while after he burps.) Because of this, Missus didn't really like me to use this technique.
The problem with the latex teats is that they wear out pretty fast; they lasted a mere 1.5 months. A pair costs $7.90. I don't mind buying it monthly, actually. But Missus doesn't like the latex teats as they get sticky as they degrade, so I bought the silicon teat (lower left).
I bought S-size (0-3 months). The baby sucked and sucked, but he couldn't drink, so he cried. This happened on every feed, and we had to switch to the old teats every time. We kept trying because we thought it takes time for the teat to break in.
I finally figured out why after one day. The reason was, the baby was using M-size (3+ months) latex teats.
When we first used the M-size latex teats, we were worried the flow would be too fast. But the baby drank fine, so we continued using them. I had forgotten about it.
(We got the M-size latex teat because it was bundled with the feeding bottle.)
So, I bought M-size silicon teats.
And... the baby doesn't really like it that much; it's too hard for him. He will only drink it if he is exceptionally hungry. Otherwise, he'll refuse to drink.
Just when we thought we had to go back to the latex teats, it dawned to us that our day-time nanny has no problems feeding the baby! Hmm...
We asked what teat she used. Pigeon.
So we got that (lower right).
Amazingly, it was totally effortless. 80ml in 10 minutes, zero spillage. Wow, just wow. Finally, feeding became straightforward after three months.
Downside: the baby tends to throw up — a lot. We have to take care not to lift the baby up for a couple of minutes.
Moral of the story? Not all teats are alike. Try another one if there is difficulty in feeding the baby. Don't invest too much into one system first.
I first saw the 3D "crystal" puzzles in Toys "R" Us. I found them quite attractive, although Missus did not think so.
But they are quite expensive at S$15.90 for the smaller ones and S$39.90 for the bigger ones.
ToyStation sells one for S$8.90, but they have very few sets.
As a puzzle, I don't think it is easy to solve. There is no obvious pattern to the pieces, so it is entirely trial and error. Luckily, the instruction manual has a "cheat sheet", so I just followed the pieces' order. :-P
I'm thinking of getting a couple more for decoration purposes. As for the price...
We can get the small one at about S$2 on Tao Bao, and the large one for S$5-6. Can anyone not be astonished by the price differential? :-O
(Moral of the story: the S$ goes a long way overseas. Corollary: keep your expenses to a minimum in Singapore.)
