Olive had her first experience of terrorizing a babysitter last night -- two babysitters in fact -- as Sandy and I left her in the care of Aunty Hueh Hueh and Aunty Ngae while we went out to The Esplanade to watch the Singapore Lyric Opera's performance of Puccini's Turandot. Not unlike Princess Turandot, Olive was a bit of a tyrant but at least she didn't pose Hueh and Ngae riddles and chop off their heads if they gave the wrong answer. Olive was finally outwitted by her cunning aunties who dressed in Sandy's clothes, and even wore her glasses, and eventually Olive gave up the fight and fell asleep. Well done both babysitters. You're hired.

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(Continued ...) Phil: two hours later and S$80 worse off, we returned from the hospital. Olive didn't put on a very convincing show of looking ill, she managed to smile throughout the whole visit. In fact she seemed to have great fun, it was obviously a ruse to get out of the house. Sandy and her sisters, who are visiting, all retired for a siesta in the afternoon so Olive and I decided to take a stroll down to the local pub, Colbar, where we enjoyed a few India Pale Ales before staggering back in the rain. After too many sips of IPA, Olive fell asleep in the baby carrier with her tiny hand clutching the umbrella handle. Very cute.

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Ooh, we made The Telegraph! Even baby Olive got a mention, kind of. To read more, click here.

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Finally, we've picked up our F1 tickets! Very exciting. These tickets give us access to the Walkabout Zone, which surrounds most of the Marina Bay Street Circuit except for the Northern Loop where the pit lane, start and finish are. I notice from the rules and regs that we're not allowed umbrellas so let's hope it doesn't rain. Also included in the list of items we're not allowed to bring: pets, fireworks and children under seven. Sorry Olive, that's you out, you'll have to go with your cousin when you're both older:

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Olive opened her first bank account with OCBC, although Sandy nearly defected to DBS after the idiotic staff at OCBC Alexandra Village took one hour to complete the forms and open the account. Olive is now a proud OCBC Mighty Saver and has already chewed the corner off her passbook to celebrate.

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Olive's beautiful blanket (click to enlarge) was made by her grandmother in England. Actually I remember Mum knitting it in Hong Kong, Thailand and Singapore so it's been round the world a few times before landing in Olive's cot in Singapore. The aircon in our bedroom, which Olive still shares (not for much longer, kiddo, I want the TV back to watch EPL late at night), is set to 25°C (80°F) so the blanket is all she really needs. "Thank you Granny!"

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I learn from the Times that Michael Phelps, the American swimmer, eats a staggering amount per day during the Olympics. While Sandy and Olive were back in Malaysia last week I held my very own beer and junk-food Olympics at home (and I won gold!).

Phelps' breakfast:

• 3 fried-egg sandwiches loaded with cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, fried onions and mayonnaise
• 2 cups of coffee
• 1 five-egg omelette
• 1 bowl of grits
• 3 slices of French toast topped with powdered sugar
• 3 chocolate-chip pancakes

My breakfast:

• 2 fried-egg doorstop sandwiches loaded with blue cheese
• 1 grilled sausage
• 3 grilled mushrooms
• 6 rashers bacon
• 2 glasses orange juice

Phelps' lunch:

• 500g (1 lb) pasta
• 2 large ham and cheese sandwiches with mayonnaise on white bread
• 1,000 calories of energy drinks

My lunch:

• 1 sambal fried rice
• 1 kangkong belacan
• 1 kung pau chicken
• 1 can of Coke

Phelps' dinner:

• 500g (1 lb) pasta
• 1 whole pizza
• 1,000 calories of energy drinks

My dinner:

• 1 whole pizza
• 17 mugs beer

So how come Phelps' body is ever-so-slightly leaner than mine? I don't get it. It must be the can of Coke that ruined my BMI.

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Karen and Aik popped by to visit Olive on Friday afternoon and came laden with moon pies (a fancy name for mooncakes?) and durian puffs. Hmmm, I like! Olive was quite well behaved but she needs to learn how to relax when held by others and not cling to me, mummy-slave, all day long.

But, back to the moon pies. This box came from Le Cafe Confectionary & Pastry in Middle Road — who claim on their website (a mooncake shop with a website?!) to be one of the oldest confectioner's shops in Singapore — and contained seven varieties of cake, sorry, pie. My favourites were the savoury and the yam pies; Phil loved the coffee-flavoured mooncake. "For coffee lovers who demand rich, full-bodied flavour". Coffee-flavoured mooncakes? Yep, it's out with the traditional lotus paste and egg yolk and in with, well, whatever ingredients you can think of. A quick search on the net and I see we now have:

• tiramisu mooncakes
• chocolate mooncakes
• raspberry cheese mooncakes
• strawberry jelly mooncakes
• cendol mooncakes
• toffee coconut mooncakes (now those sound good)
• Nyonya sambal mooncake (these don't!)

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Sunday started out cold (30ºC / 90ºF) and wet so we decided to walk up to the new chocolate bar for a hot chocolate and coffee. Laurent Bernard opened its jungle outlet a few months ago and offers a dozen different hot chocolates as well as coffees, teas, champagne and a selection of freshly baked cakes and crumbles. I played safe and opted for the classic hot chocolate. I've had some chocolaty hot chocolates in Paris but this was like melting a bar of dark chocolate and pouring it down your throat. Death by chocolate. I just about finished my pot then ran next door to Colbar for a bottle of Tiger beer to wash it down. I have such a refined palate. My boorish behaviour was confirmed later when Sandy found what she suspected was bird poo on Olive's hair ... we later deduced I must have sneezed all over my daughter's head! (Revenge for all that dribble on my shoulder, if you ask me.)

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