Asian Tiger

Mother in-law’s tongue also known as the snake plant or the Sansevieria, is an excellent indoor ornamental plant for offices, homes and buildings.  This plant is also called the “bedroom plant” because it converts carbon dioxide (CO2) to oxygen (O2) at night.

Besides the precious conversion to oxygen, this plant is able to purify the chemical formaldehyde.  Examples of where this chemical exists are foam insulation, plywood, pressed-wood products, grocery bags, waxed paper, fire retardants, adhesive binders in floor coverings and cigarette smokes.

We will need 6-8 waist-height plants per person for air purification.

As far as I know there are 2 methods to grow the Mother in-law’s tongue:

1. Re-potting - From an existing plant, lift the plant and look for shoot or offsets. Cut though the flesh that is attached to the parent plant and pot it.
2. Cuttings -  From the stem, cut 4 inches across the grain and pot it.  Beware of the orientation to ensure that you pot it the right side up.  In about 4 weeks, you will have a mother in-law’s tongue plant.  If you see new offsets, you can re-pot those as well to propagate more plants.

In both instances of growing, ensure that the soil is moist and not soggy.  Water minimally once a week but before that, test to ensure that the soil is dry before watering. This is because the mother in-law’s tongue dislikes over-watering where the root will rot.

I recently purchased a king-sized Dorma mattress along with a bed-frame.  Before selecting this mattress, I searched the Net for more information on the mattress but could only find Dorma bedding linens.  I’m not sure what this means but to me, it means that Dorma is known more for its linens and not mattresses (it could also mean that Dorma OEMs their mattresses from other manufacturers).
Anyway, it was at Macy’s mattress roadshow sales that I chanced upon Dorma.  I was comparing Simmons to Sealy to Dorma.  I tried all their mattresses on sale and took 2 days to decide the mattress I wanted.  At the end, I chose Dorma’s Crystal mattress based on the price to comfort ratio (in other words, I’m a sucker for big discounts).  The store manager threw in 2 Dorma pillows, a bolster and one king-sized mattress protector.  I must say it’s quite a good deal for the price I paid.

Now that I have the mattress for a month, I must admit that I have had some beauty sleep on it.  The mattress’ pocket spring supported my body well and since I’m a side sleeper, that helped much.  The mattress’ edges are “fortified” and does not sag when you sit at the side.  This mattress does not require turning and flipping on a periodic basis; making it an excellent choice for the lazy me.

In the past, I envy travelling executives who flies around the world for work.  I did not have such an opportunity to do so.  My work limits me to travelling within Malaysia and most destinations are reachable by car.  Over dinners and mamak sessions, I hear stories of how busy Tokyo is and how beautiful Parisian night and how exciting New York can be.  Oh… how envious I was.  I was 20 years old when I took my first flight — and that was to attend a funeral.

Now that I myself am flying in and out the region for work, I begin to drag my feet to the airport.  The early years of flying was fun; every trip seem to be an adventure on itself. Now, it’s a chore — waking up early in the morning, taking the dreadful taxi to the airport (in itself is already a risk. Cabbies are like F1 racers), long waits at the airport and things gets worse during transits.

If only my every flight destination is to some holidays, I will be looking forward to it.  NGC’s Air Crash Investigation series is not helping either.