Above all else

=====MONEY===== Every month, I update my spreadsheet of finances. My mortgage, my CPF, brokerage and bank balances. And this time of year, being bonus season (our financial year runs from July to June), gives me more excuses to check how many points I've gotten up to in the Game of Life.  The weird thing is, no one in my family is a spender. My favourite weekday office attire is Uniqlo-sourced rather than, well, whatever brand people are supposed to be wearing, I honestly don't even know (see "I have one suit" ). My weekend attire goes even more rapidly downhill and, following some bargain-hunting, today comprises $4.90 Ts and $6.90 pants with a label that literally says "Fashion" for some reason. My watch is a scratched 2nd/3rd hand Fitbit off Carousell. Our supermarket run comprises making a beeline for whatever is on the "Clearance" aisle and happily browsing through what's new and exciting there. I don't think all this is even about me ...

The Life of Pi is a book (and movie) by Yann Martel, about a boy, the eponymous Pi, who escapes the sinking of his ship on a life raft, along with a tiger called Richard Parker (it's a long story), plus a bunch of other animals from the zoo that was being transported on the ship. In case you haven't read the book or watched the movie, and are thinking that this is going to be a feel-good tale about how boy and tiger become best of friends like Christopher Robin and Tigger, Pooh and the rest of the gang from the Hundred Acre Wood... it isn't. Through the harrowing and seemingly endless months that follow, Pi is compelled to navigate the perils of being cast adrift amid the open sea, while keeping constant vigil against the ever-present threat of the ravenous Richard Parker. They eventually settle into a wary and wobbly stalemate, as they survive violent storms, blistering heat, acute thirst and hunger, and even a deadly life-consuming atoll. Finally, the raft is washed ashor...