Sun, Sand, Surf and BOTEF!

Well done and not medium rare is what I'd have to call my skin at this moment. If someone were to ask me to discribe myself in 2 words, it'd be "Simply Red" <- this courtesy of Shaun who as it turned out, become redder (if that is at all possible) than me.

By the end of the day, he pretty much looked like a cooked lobster absolutely glowing red.



Battle of The EPL Fans (BOTEF for short) was organized by SAFRA Radio stations Power98FM and 883Jia FM. The event was held at Sentosa (yeap...the perfect place to get burnt under the sun. Actually, the weather was a little threatening in the morning but the winds co-opereated and sent the clouds packing and scurrying which meant loads of sunblock for us office dwellers.



The Nivea tent was a godsend to some of us and the babes at the Nivea tent were hot (metaphorically as well as literally).

Being my first on-site event, I must say that I had a great time there as well. Most of us were busy with tasks given and my job was photography. I must say, having shot whole day events before, this was a heck of a lot easier. It also gave me more opportunities to hide from the sun compared to what some of the other guys had to do.

The photos of the event itself are HERE and leave a comment if you feel that a shot grabbed your attention.

I must add now though that a thurough cleaning of my gear would seriously be required.

Some of us were busy playing Futsal, and some others, well...this is what the spouses and children did...



There were the SAFFC players..



There were VIPS...



And...there were Babes and Hunks!








New word for the day : Soliloquy

Ah...the Nostalgia...

I don't know if you remember this but when I was in like my second year of kindergarten or primary 1, they had this cartoon going on Channel 10 (RTM 2 I think). After searching for it, I managed to track it down.

This was one of the most beautiful theme songs for a cartoon that I've heard. Almost brought a tear to me eye.

After remembering this cartoon, I sorta began digging for others and found this one too.



Remember Marine Boy? He had to chew some gum in order to breathe underwater...hahaha...

I'm gonna go search for more nostalgic TV Series Opening themes! :P

New Word : Syllogism

There's nothing worse than...

The inability to follow simple instructions...



We ordered a meal from McD's and asked for delivery. Because we're in a secure location they have to wait outside and call my mobile number which was clearly given and repeated back to me upon arrival.

Well, through the chain of command, my instructions must have been truncated since I never got the call from the delivery dude. Suffice it to say, that the main delivery office called me up and claimed that the guy called and someone who was my namesake said that they didn't order anything.

When I went down to the guardroom, the said that the delivery dude did turn up, didn't call but instead, asked the guards on duty if anyone ordered a meal from McDs to have it delivered. Of course, those poor 19 year-olds would say no because they didn't have a clue as to who ordered the friggin meal. That's was why I had pre-arranged for them to bloody call my mobile phone instead.

Anyway, besides that, the straws that came were broken and the curry sauce that I asked for with my nuggets didn't come but was given 2 packets of BBQ sauce instead. Geez! I guess even with all this technology of a central call centre/logistical distribution to the nearest restaurant for delivery etc, it still pins down to the guy that has to take the instructions and follow them.

God!

Word of the day : Megalomaniac <-- does it describe me well?

Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde

I think I suffer from that Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde type of schizophrenia. After all, once in a while, I do believe that I can be the Sensitive Peace-Loving, Tree-Hugging, Environmentalist/lobbyist Guy and other times, I turn into Mr Dominating Elitist All-brawn No Brain Fascist Pig.

Those that know me well enough would probably have seen both of these characteristics (especially the latter) pop up.

In any case, I feel rather tired that my relationships aren't getting anywhere. The job's really great so career-wise, I ain't got no complaints there. When it comes to relationships though, I think I've stagnated. I'd love to move forward but I seem to he held back all the time.

If it's not one thing, it's another. Maybe I'm looking at it wrong but it's probably and possibly due to the fact that I try too hard and not let things progress naturally. In any case, it's stuck in 2nd gear and it's quite uncomfortable.

Well, I found out that I've been requested by the highest authority sitting in our office to be the official photographer for this coming weekend's event, Battle of the EPL Fans (BOTEF). At least I get to go on site for the event...heh. It's gonna be great.

I've also managed to get the Photoshop software working on this Mac so it's gonna be great working on the pictures. Now all I need is to calibrate the display so that it renders the colours accurately.

Interestingly, there are only 2 words in common usage that end with 'gry'. Angry and hungry. The rest are not common usage words and can probably only be found in the complete oxford dictionary.

Word of the day: Neologism - Podcast is an example.

MacIntel Whispers the Time!

Yup...it does! You can set the clock to tell you the time every hour on the hour, more or less...I've set mine to talk to me, thus keeping me company once every 15 minutes.

I think I'm coming down with something...I've just about sneezed my nose silly, my eyes are swollen and I've got this uneasy, heaty feeling within. I sure hope I don't come down with anything though. I'm pretty sure the flu bug's running rampant though.

KXXZ is back! She's down with the flu though (but I'm pretty sure I'm not getting sick cause of her). She insists that eating ice-cream while having a bad cough will not make it worse...well, I rest my case.

Went to the lawyers today to get the property transferred from dad to mom and me. I guess they're really going forward with the divorce. I don't know why but I feel so caught in between them...I hate it. So many things to hide from parents, and having to take sides, that's the crappiest of crappy crap.

Anyway, I'm just rambling on and on and on...

Apparently, there's only one word in standard english usage that has 5 consecutive vowels. It's "Rousseauian". What does it mean? Well, according to the Oxford Dictionary, it means "pertaining to Rousseau or his views on religion, politics, education, etc." his full name's Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Well, whoever that was :P...I better go wiki it up.

How I wish I had a page on wikipedia dedicated to me...I also wish my name was as cool and had a Jean-Jacques or Jean-Luc in there somewhere.

Well, that was the word of the day...

Weekend's Over...

So a relatively uneventful weekend and it's over. Was out at ECP last night with Damian and gang...the usual. Nothing much to report happening there though.

So how do you console a friend whose GF has been caught cheating on him? At the same time, he's inconsolable as well as insecure. Would it work by bringing out clubbing and introducing him to more potential "players" out there?

In the end, he might curse at you for going along in the first place. I guess the only solace one can find in such a situation is in believing in oneself and keeping busy. With what though...I guess there're a million things one can do or think of to keep busy. Oh well...

I've been in those shoes before and I must say that it hasn't been a very nice experience.

I've got a pretty busy week ahead and I suppose that's good too. We'll see what crops up this coming week after the return of KXXZ

Word of the day: Polyglot

I'm on air!!!!

Guess WHAT!?

My first lines on air are "Brudder, must be disciplined. We are preparing for the SAFRA Benjamin Sheares Bridge run and Army Half Marathon."

So if you hear that on the air, you'll know who said it. Heh.

So what's been going on lately? Nothing much actually. Apart from the routine stuff that I'm tasked to do, once in a while, something interesting happens although today is not one of those days.

Amy did mention that someone told her that I'm very young...I do wonder who it would be that mentioned that to her. The fact of the matter is that I'm like the 5th oldest person in the company.

I think maybe when I renew my contract, I might ask for a different position...who knows? That's like 2 years away from now though so I've got plenty of time to practice.

I'm beginning to miss KXXZ who's spending the next few days in HK.

Next movie on my list after watching The Transformers will be The Simpsons. Can't wait for free time to go watch it.

Well, here's to working towards my celebrity status.

Word of the day : Interregnum

From 1986 to 2007...

"One shall stand, one shall fall" - Optimus Prime.

This is the exact same line spoken in the 1986 Transformers : The movie by Optimus Prime just before the big battle. As homage to the original, that same line was said in the Transformers 2007 movie as well. How cool is that?

With digital technology the way it is today, comic book heros are no longer restrained to the comic books. And what was seemingly impossible back in the 1980s and 1990s is now brought to life in such a spectacular manner.

It's interesting to note though that Star Wars, Ep. I, II and III does suffer from unrealistic CGI characters (a tall lengthy Jar Jar Binks being a prime example). Comparatively, I've always felt that Micheal Bay Movies had better CGI work. Take Bad Boys for example, you probably didn't even realise that there was CG Involved right?

There ya have it...

Word of the day : Punctilious

Sleep...eat...whatever...

Lets see, according to my calculations I stayed awake for...


OMG! 63 hours!!!! But I must admit that I wasn't alert for probably 1/2 the time I was awake with my eyes open. Catching little catnaps in between (in which the longest lasted for 45 minutes) did help though.

Cigarettes help as well.

Carl's Jr. Makes the best burgers, period. I seriously always enjoy the Bacon Double Western thingamajig.
It wasn't as messy as I thought it would've been though. I'm getting skilled @ burger munching. Anyway, dinner with KXXZ was great but sometimes I wonder if she really enjoys my company. Well, I guess I'd have to keep wondering.

There are TV series and then there's "The West Wing"...I've always enjoyed watching stuff written by Aaron Sorkin.

I must say that it did become less witty and interesting after the departure of Sorkin at the end of the fourth season. Naturally, their ratings took a nosedive as well. Of course there will be some fans out there of the series that are trying to get NBC to continue probably to like the 10th season or something.

How many times have I watched an rewatched the series...it's time I completed my collection and bought season 7...the final. I must say though that I think not enough credit has been given to the casting director because without such a great cast, it wouldn't be as good.

Oh well, sometimes, things just fall into place for no apparent reason and they also sometimes fall apart for no apparent reason.

I STILL LOVE MY MacINTEL!

I'm gonna start a section on "New Word of the day".

Today's new word is : Anthropomorpic

MacIntel...Hahaha!

Yeap...it's just another day. Amazingly, I had dinner with KXXZ @ Botak Jones. According to KXXZ, the hungry one will get his/her food last. In the case of today, her prediction came true. So I was enjoying myself stuffing her with chips from my Hot Dog set.

It was a rather good dinner actually. It also gave me the opportunity to flip flop and pour out my frustrations over the past few days, weeks, months and years. At least she can offer a listening ear which is really nice.

Dinner ended on a pretty good note for me although I keep wondering if that was true for her as well. In any case, I shall learn from Commander Taggart (of NSEA Protector) to "Never Give Up, Never Surrender!".

Lets see what happens after...

I did mention to her though that to live a moment of happiness is better than not to have experienced that happiness at all.

Oh...I've got my Mac X86 wireless working by using the D-Link DWL-G122 USB


I've also got an external speaker hooked up to the Travel Pac USB Audio device because the internal SoundMAX 1986 card doesn't seem to have any Mac drivers. So, the Philips speakers are doing their job pretty well.



So the final setup of the Asus A8Fseries laptop running Mac OS X 10.4.9 looks kinda like this:

Big Ass TV

Well, not as big as my old projector but 40 inches is pretty decent don't you think?

Went down to collect the "free gift" of an LG Home Theatre System only to find out that the wait was over an hour. Also, the friggin box is HUGE!

Word of advice to marketing managers out there...it's a bad idea to let 3rd parties handle freebie collections. RewardsLink was the place to go collect the HT set. Guess what? The queue of over an hour was also due to the fact that they were friggin understaffed. Out of 5 counters available, only 2 were manned. Can you imagine?

Obviously, the other three counters are meant to look impressive and serve no other purpose.

I feel that LG should've allowed people to collect their so-called "free gifts" wherever they purchased the principle product from. That would save a huge hassle of going downtown, thus incurring furter costs (such as parking, ERP and transport) to pick up the product.

Also, they ought to have a warning to inform people of the size of the box the HT system came in...most were taken by surprise. The fact that the collection place was so understaffed meant that customers couldn't get a hand in bringing the product to their cars.

The hotline? Gosh, I don't know why they even bother with it. It's impossible to get through and if you ask me, it's probably because they've left the phone off the hook...

Oh well...this is called service HAHAHA!

Night Shift...

It's the night shift in the studios again...

Oh...and I recently grabbed the picture taken by Vincent (Nightlife Sg - my namesake) of us guys @ Double-O for the Kawaii event.



Quite a good night for the three of them and Damian got sabo-ed by us too! Hahaha!

In any case, the night shift affords me some time between doing maintenance and writing my blog. I've also got this other photo of myself playing DJ in the OAS.



I'm still wondering what it is about me that makes me attracted to the wrong people...Oh well...I'll have to keep wondering I guess.

Out of it...

I'm so freaking out of it that everything's an eye opener for me now.

What am I referring to? The clubbing scene that is...

I guess after abstinence for so long, it's only fair to say that I'm no longer with the 'in' crowd. Things are gonna change though cuz tonight at Double-O, I began to realise what I've missed for the past couple of years.

Time for me to move back into the scene before I pass my use-by date. Hah! It was good fun today with D taking the stage and making a fool of himself infront of all of us (and for the benefit of some girls). I say girls because women and ladies would probably not find him as attractive. Youth has its benefits I suppose...

Damn, I sound like a grumpy old man now...

Suckers...

Sometimes, I just wonder what will make me learn the lesson...

Am I such a masochist? or just plain suckered?

When matters of the heart are concerned, I guess I'll never learn from the past. It's kinda like a cycle which happens to me once a year or more...

Lets see....it started post-puberty when I was 14 and it's been having it's semi-annual cycle...

As usual, in the end I get burned but what do I do? Never give up hope...geez.

Such is the power of nature and instinct that I doubt if I'll ever stop. Heh....

Sometimes I wonder...

If I'm placed so low on the "strategically important" list of people that they tend to forget that I exist...

In any case, the dust has pretty much settled on how I feel so it's of little consequence to anyone out there. I just got back from getting a new backup drive which is 500gigs...at least now I can copy the stuff over from the 320 gig drive that I got that's a little defective.

In any case, my tossup now is...should I get another 300gig drive as a replacement? Do I really need that much space?

Yeah, the mind boggling things that I think about. I'm beginning to feel that 1 terabyte ain't enough for all the stuff I had...minus the 120 gigs that I lost when my friggin Seagate died on me. Not to mention the fact that even though I purchased the HDD in 2003, the warranty started from 2002 which means that its 5 years are up. Dammit.

Contradictions...

"Woman's at best a contradiction still." - Alexander Pope

It's strange that one would contradict oneself without knowing it. Perhaps given the situation, one might not realize the contradiction at that point in time.

Women and time are contradictions. One complains about another forgetting the time after falling asleep yet while having a conversation with another friend, she forgets the time herself.

Having passed on other appointments on a saturday night I was eager to at last be able to spend more time together. But alas, it was not to be. Oh well, I shall be magnanimous and say that it's okay, and that it happens especially when conversations about the heart, family and relationships are concerned...NOT!

It was a sore spot I guess which ruined an entire evening for me. Having spent hours driving around wandering aimlessly while waiting for "the call' which never came to be. I guess it's the kinda thing that happens to me more than to others.

The person in question would obviously be reading this and might or might not be bothered about the fact that I was. I guess I did make good use of the earlier time I spent waiting grabbing some songs from my CD collection and compiling them into 1 disc. At least it wasn't a complete waste of my evening...

Aristotle...

"Probable impossibilities are to be preferred to improbable possibilities."

However, in this case, it should read

"Improbable possibilities are to be preferred to probable impossibilities."

Confused? Yeah you ought to be. This is almost exactly how I felt after having a conversation tonight. Now I won't go into details as to the conversation per se but suffice it to say, that I was probably more confused after it than before it. This is begging for another quote "Post Hoc, Ergo Procter Hoc" or "After it, therefore because of it"

Once again, I am left with a greater dilemma than ever; but as someone very close has mentioned very recently that, "matters of the heart are both confusing and complicated." I couldn't agree more except that my heart is very clear, so is my conscience but I'm confused as to the reaction I received.

In any case, I have no choice but to keep pursuing the matter I suppose until one day, it can be resolved. I need more resolve than what I have now so it's time for high resolutions. Hahaha!

Interestingly as well, I was dropped a bombshell in that that particular heart belongs to another. Well, the ironies in life never stop and fail to amuse me. For once I thought things were great and well...as usual, it got worse again.

C'est la vie, eh?

What's going on?

Things are falling into place, 1 piece at a time. But matters of the mind and heart are pretty different. How does one regard the confusion that sets in when matters of the heart are concerned? It's close to impossible.

But then, impossible is possible with an im....

Does one draw courage from knowing the fact that matters of the heart can and often destroy friendships?

It's such a catch 22...

Power sial!

Hey...it's been a while since I've updated this page. Many apologies to my faithful readers out there. It's been a pretty hectic couple of weeks really. With the job interview that lasted for 3 hours, the contract signing which took another 2, and the super rush to start the job (within 3 days of signing the contract).

That didn't give much time for it to sink in...that I'm now at least getting paid on a regular basis. Hahaha!

The pay was a little disappointing but it doesn't matter cuz it'z the working environment that's important (well, at least it is to me). The people are nice and friendly and even the big boss gave me a nice first-day talk which is pretty rare here.

I must say that I enjoyed my first day at the station so it looks like a good start.

Hope everyone's been doing well too!

Stomp slamming Singaporeans?

When Stomp, The Straits Times' Online portal was launched, I believed that it was an interesting way of getting the news. From people out there who can be on location where things are happening as they are happening.

After some time, I started realising that channels such as "What Bugs Me", "Caught in the Act", "Ugly Commuters", "Motoring Goondus" and "Singapore Sotongs" also are beginning to serve other purposes. One of them being to serve individual "self-righteousness" by posting their peeves about what others do.

To a further extent, it being hosted on the Internet means that what peeves these people have are actually spread around the world.

Should we be supporting this slamming of our own country? I suppose that shame might teach us the lesson of becoming more civic minded and socially responsible but I doubt it will have a lasting effect. Look at what CWO (Corrective Work Order - for littering) has become? Initially, the newspaper coverage and all led to littering offenders being publicly shamed but that was at the initial stage when public interest was high. Now, they don't even bother reporting when CWO is being carried out so what shame is there? It's more like serving a public service sentence now more than anything.

Which is probably whey SPH shouldn't bother keeping those channels in Stomp unless all they're interested in are page view dollars.

Writer's block...

Here I am, instead of trying to write something useful for the mag publisher (which is due in there morning), blogging instead. What's there to blog about?
Dunno really. Spent most of the day wasting away @ C&C Alexandra trying to get the power window fixed.
A job that's supposed to take ½ an hour took closer to 4½hours! :P Why you might ask? Because, they had the part but it was in some warehouse somewhere and they have to get it sent over.
I mean, c'mon...how big is this tiny red dot that we live in? 4 hours to get it? I could've driven myself to the warehouse to collect it and bring the darn thing back for them to replace for pete's sake.
Oh well...at least it wasn't a TOTAL waste. They had a decent enough internet connection with PCs for customers to use so I spent most of my time there trying to sell off stuff that I no longer needed or used...
And all that for what? So that I can pour more into squeezing out more from the car.
Granted it's freakin' ugly but hey, at least it's got a decent motor in it that can punch out some serious torque. One of the guys in our group's already running a dyno proven 300+Nm of torque.
I just realised that feelings that've been buried deep down and left unnoticed can surface with a vengence. Right now I feel pretty crappy which is why I'm banging on the keyboard trying to write something sensible. Ah...to want to write it down yet want to keep it in confidence. That's a major contradiction that I've got to get over. tough but hey, I'm a tough guy ain't I?

Boost

Ever since whenever, I've dreamt of owning a turbocharged car. Now that I've managed to get one, it's as fun as I expected it to be and more.
Being able to tweak the car is even more fun. For the past six months, I've been debating with other owners of the same model of car regarding the issue of Boost Cut. Tonight, after some thought, a little online research and some experimenting, I've finally sorted it out.
Where previously we were limited to 0.8bar of boost, my ride is now capable of 1.2bar which is decent to say the least.
Well, lets just hope that the engine holds out.

Almost half a year on...

If life were a computer game, and I was a character in it, I'd say that the past 10 months or so has given me at least a ton of experience points. However, life is not a computer game (much to my dismay) and experience comes from painful lessons.

Needless to say, the ups and downs just keep coming with downs coming more and more often.

I sold the good ole Mazzy and got myself a Mitsu this time round. It's uglier but at least it outperforms the Mazzy by a huge margin. You'd think that I'd be all excited etc and blog about an event as significant as this but events were happening around me that were bigger than that.

In any case, these couple of weeks have been up weeks so I'm blisfully enjoying myself. I just hope that the downs don't come as hard as they did in Nov/Dec. I don't think I can bear another downer like that.

I was tough getting over it but yeap, I found strengh in myself and worked my way out of the pit. Now, I find someone relatively close to me falling into the same pit and it's a little scary to think that that was how I was 5 or 6 months ago. The only consolation I can give this person is to jump into that pit with him and show him the way out. After all, I've been there before and have an idea of what's inside.

I would should try to update this more often but being as lazy as I am, there will definitely be times where I'll ignore it completely. I just hope that it hasn't put people off reading whenever there are new posts (not that I get alot of readership anyway).

Now, on to commenting other things going on around...

STOMP, the Straits Times web portal for reporter wannabes seems to be getting a pretty decent load of traffic (which I play a part in contributing as well - traffic, not posts). In any case, I'd say it's the best way to get people to do their work for them...for free too.

All they have to do is follow-up after the initial report is posted. How about that! If not for the pathetic speeds, I'd say it's quite an entertaining sight seeing how we're so "concerned" about the people around us. Hahaha!

Well, that's about it for now. Nothing much else to say heh.

Hmm...Upgrades

This picture was taken in 2003 January 16 1519hrs


And this one, 2006 July 12 1143hrs

Obviously the guy has upgraded...keeping up with the times I must say. I guess it wouldn't be nice to post his car number plate on the web so I've deleted it but based on prefix and suffix, you can see that it's the same car...

And both times, he zoomed past me. :P There have been other instances whereby I've seen the same car...for example, last month, I saw the Lancer that ended up in the ditch along Stevens Road with the same guy (in the picture)driving it.

I didn't have enough time to grab a photo though, unfortunately but sufficed to say, the car was repaired.

Okay, so that's about it for my blogging tonight. Just thought I'd share these little interesting coincidences with my readers (if you're still here).

Technology

You gotta love new technology. It makes one feel like a professional providing the opportunity of "instant replay". It also makes things a heck of a lot more affordable than before.

I find it quite amazing that the younger generation's only opportunity to see what used to be common domesticated farm animals such as a chicken running loose would be at the zoo. Younger generation would equal youths that are below twenty this year. Born circa 1986.

Nothing much was accomplished this week or last. I guess it's time to get off the old butt and start working again. Things might be easier if I had an idea of what everything was about. In any case, it's time to get moving.

A Good Time?

Someone must've have had a good time last night. The evidence left behind is way to compelling. Although I must add that it must've been physically uncomfortable for the floor is cold, hard concrete/ceramic tile.

At least they practiced SAFE SEX...

There's always this thrill of making out and getting naked in public I suppose. That the idea of the possibility of being caught is there. It just turns some people on. But the least they could do is clean up afterwards...the lift was littered with used tissue paper...probably remnants of the activities which included the contents of the wrapper left behind.

Well, whoever's the one that scored, the best muffins and bagels are on their way!

Why oppose?

Not being the ruling party doesn't necessarily mean that one MUST oppose the ruling party. So why are they called the "opposition"?

If I had a political party and if the incumbent kept calling me "opposition", I'd want to set the record straight. I would want to be called the "alternative" party, the alternative choice; anything but opposition.

The word opposition has such negative intonations. It's not there to generate good feeling but more to the tune of discontent. The alternative party doesn't necessarily have to oppose new legislation IF it benefits the country and its citizens. It's a matter of questioning and keeping the ruling party in check.

That's what democracies are all about. A 1 party government doesn't have to mean that it is better to rule. If the ruling party cannot handle any line of questioning and would spend more time and energy countering each other, then they are obviously not fit to govern. If they feel that since they are the majority government, they don't have to listen to anyone else to answer to anyone else. Which to put simply means that they can do whatever they want and nobody would keep check on them.

Since when is that good? Sounds very much like a dictatorship to me. Dictators can give handouts once in a while as well. It doesn't mean that because you give out share and create medisave (which incidentally is your own savings anyway) that a government with an overwhelming majority is not a dictatorship.

The term dictator doesn't mean "Adolf Hitler". It doesn't mean misery and suffering. A dictator is one that rules with total authority. A dictator is one that is domineering. A dictator doesn't have to answer to the people. We are lucky that we have elections once every 5 years. This is so that even if we had a dictatorial government they are answerable AND liable to the people. That keeps them in check because if they screw up in any way, nobody would vote for them the next time round.

"What is the opposition's job? It's not to help the PAP do a better job ... because if they help the PAP do a better job, you're going to vote for me again and they're going to be out of a job for a long time. So their job is to make life miserable for me." - PM Lee in a lunchtime election rally.

To be capable of such thought and bring forth into a speech is selfish to say the least. When is the government about winning and when is it NOT about how best to SERVE the public?

Issn't it quite possible that not EVERYTHING the PAP does is in the best interest of the public? We've learnt to accept whatever's been legislated simply because there've been no opposition in parliament. It is as simple as that.

Is the minority voice actually heard? It's usually drowned out by majority noise.

I'm not here to say who's right and who's wrong. I believe that this General Election is gone to the point of character attacks and inelegent bantering between the parties. So much so that the matters at hand, things that concern everyone has been all but ignored.

Concerns such as means testing for healthcare as it was brought up by Sylvia Lim of the Worker's Party. Does the PAP have a ready reply that's good enough to convince borderline cases that fail to obtain subsidies swing their votes?

I wonder if anyone's done a poll about what the people would like to hear and what the major concerns are for the next 5 years.

Whatever the outcome, I believe that this GE has gone off track and it's sad to see it go this way.

Lack of Respect

Who the heck do they think they are? Total disregard for the MM and the government. Asking questions that shouldn't be asked, interrupting and trying to show that they've got brain? Geez!

One even said that she was afraid of asking a "stupid" question.

From where I was sitting, all the questions asked were stupid. It must've been disheartening for the MM to build up the country to this level only to have those who have never been through the tough times criticize the way it's being run now.

What do they know about politics? If they think that they're so capable, why not run for office? Yes, the people should question the government and keep it on its toes but what should be questioned would be the manifesto and not the method.

Does the govenment have any plans for the future? How can they assure the same quality of government that has been running the country in the past?

Questions such as these pop up in my mind.

Would "poaching" scholars into the civil service followed by joining the party be good enough? How will they ensure that Singaopre is not left behind in the global chase for a better life? Is there any way that the government can help to improve the quality of life here?

These are questions that should be asked. Not questions like "Shouldn't you be retiring?"

If I was the MM, I would shake my head in disgust and pose this back at them, "If the younger generation of Singaporeans thought the way you did, how can I retire?"

It's pathetic...it's political bashing...it's ridiculous. Period.

Outspoken Immaturity

If you've watched the dialogue with MM Lee, just as I have, you be fearful of what today's young think of politics.

Question such as "Do you think you're arrogant" and ..."the playing field is so skewed, it is impossible for us to have a good check" (with regards to the opposition not being able to play politics at a level field)

These questions are questions that demonstrate the immaturity of the young today. After all, the people have voted the PAP into the majority of parliament themselves. Was it because of lack of choice? Perhaps and perhaps not.

Why do are there walkovers? Simply put, because there are no opposition candidates to contest. Is it healthy? No but who will step up and an independant? People are not afraid of voting for the opposition. Not so much as people are afraid to RUN AS the opposition. Politics is a murky world. If you're in the opposition, the majority government will do it outmost to discredit you. Unless you have a squeaky clean past record and a good track record of success, you don't stand a chance because they will dig up everything you've done before.

They won't do anything illegal since these things when found out, will totally discredit them and what they've build so far. The smart people know that. That's why they join the winning party and in Singapore's case, it's not such a difficult choice.

We're comfortable with the goverment now. Yes, once in a while, when a new policy is passed, we make some noise over it but after a while, we learn to accept it. Just as we've learned to accept that there will be little or no opposition.

My question to the PAP is this, "Would new candidates in the PAP be characterised as people following orders? Would they have a mind of their own and if there is a conflict of interest with regards to certain policies, would they be able to sum up the courage and stand up to say "I don't believe that this is what my constituents want".

Sleeping early

There's a wonderful feeling to hitting the sack at 7pm and waking up at 3am...

Well, yes, I do get the full 8 hours shut-eye time but apart from that, being up at 3 gives me the wonderful feeling that I'm fresh and fully awake to do my stuff.

Like write my blog & play Need for Speed Most Wanted.

I'm now driving an Aston Martin DB9...but only in the video game. I wish I had one for real though. The sound effects are alright but I wouldn't say that it's true to the cars themselves.

It's a fun game of dodging the cops etc but the soundtrack's a killah! Pity I can't find any online to stream here.

National Service and Bonuses

I understand the fact that Singapore Permanant Residents can't vote. I also understand that SPRs might not share the same national loyalties or patriotism as citizens. What I don't understand is if that were the case, why I'm serving National Service.

Of course there are sensitive issues with regards to which camp or unit I'm in but sufficed to say that I'm trusted by MINDEF not to leak any military secrets. Yet, I don't receive the NS Bonus. Okay, politically, I understand I suppose. After all, this is an election year with the GE coming up, obviously they have to dangle some carrots from the budget and give it to people who can vote.

But why call it NS Bonus when it's not across the board? I wonder how many SPRs serve NS like I do. And since it's called NS Bonus, I would automatically assume that I am eligible. So far, there hasn't been any statement issued stating that SPRs who served full-time National Service and are currently Operationally Ready with Active In-Camp Trainings are not eligible.

Yes, it's only a $100 but still, money is money and MINDEF should at least make a mention of it. As an SPR, I believe that I'm contributing as much to the nation (National Service wise) as any citizen.

Oh well...something to bring up I suppose.

Typing in the dark

Yessss...I can now type in the dark. Thanks to the new Saitek Eclipse keyboard with illumination. I don't know why, but manufacturers of PC notebooks till now, haven't got it in their heads that with the LCD Monitor so close by, it's almost impossible to see the keys on the keyboard behind the glare of the display.

Unfortunately, the Saitek's an external keyboard. It helps when I hook it up to my laptop but I feel that it's a little cumbersome. Why can't PC Laptop manufacturers get it right? Apple's Powerbooks have illuminated keyboards and they work wonderfully well. IBM's ThinkPads (now marketed as Lenovo) has a keyboard light which works pretty good but that's about the only one that offers built-in illumination.

I just wish that design engineers would steal ideas from one another once in a while. Just so that the provide that little extra value. Oh well...at least I'm enjoying my new kayboard (which incidentally costs $99).

Accident

"Guess what happened? I just drove my car straight into the temporary fence and into a pit. Its still got its ass sticking out but hey, I'll need a tow truck to get it out."

This was probably what the owner was trying to tell someone on his cellphone. I guess due to the wet and slippery condition of the road, he might have tried to take the turn with a little too much gusto.

It must've slipped cause from the looks of it, the car went straight into the barrier. Anyway, the workers lurking nearby would probably buy some 4Ds with the number plate of the car.

It's a good thing that no one was injured though. At least I saw none.

Mentors...

There seems to be a push towards mentorism in the current political regime in Singapore. Mr Lee Kuan Yew retired from the political limelight (sort of) in 1990 and became Senior Minister taking on a more "consultancy" role with Mr Goh Chok Tong at the helm of the People's Action Party. After his retirement in 2004, he took on the post of Senior Minister and our dear SM Lee become Minister Mentor (a post specially created for him).

It looks as though the older generation still feels the need to "tutor" our new leaders. It's almost as if the entire cabinet is still tied to "mommy's apron strings". I mean, they're so unwilling to let the children grow up and move on. When is this going to stop? Really.

Now, Dr Tony Tan, has made a similar announcement in that he's going to retire from politics but continue to "play a mentor role" (Straits Times, March 26 2006). I'm sure that our younger generation of politicans are more than capable of running the country but I guess it's really hard to let go. Kinda like parenting. It's not easy when a parent finds that the child has grown and is ready to move out. No matter how old you get, parents will still and always treat the child as one. It's the bond that makes us special and different from other animals.

Of course not everybody would agree with all the policies of the current government but seriously, do we actually have an opposition that's worthy of taking the seat of power? Singaporeans are always outwardly complaining about the government but inwardly, they don't do anything. Most are ready to criticize without thought but honestly speaking, without the PAP, would Singapore truely be where it is today?

I'm not pro-PAP but until such a time where there's a better political party that can run our country putting the nation's interests first and not political agenda, I'd stick with the PAP for now.

Camera phones and the 25th century

Lets see...what will happen when 3G mobile telephony takes over the current 2-2.5G? Everyone's gonna have a phone with a camera built-in. It's the natural progression of things issn't it?

But then again, 2G may not be totally phased out. After all, there are still sensitive installations such as military camps that prohibit the use of mobile devices with built-in cameras. Makes you feel a little like James Bond doesn't it?

Trying to sneak a miniature camera into somewhere. Those fellas at MGM never even thought about a mobile telephone with video capabilities. Neither did the producers of Star Trek. They had video conferencing alright but it's usually between two captains stuck on the bridge of their ships.

We've gone beyond the 25th century with regards to this aspect.

Sporty citizens

So we won the gold medal for women's table tennis at the 2006 commonwealth games.

But who really won at the women's table tennis? The top competing teams were dominated by players of Asian (and to be more precise, Chinese) decent. Of course, it being the commonwealth games means that besides england, every other country is basically a migrant country with few or no true "locals".

To what extent would a person be considered "from" a country? Or rather, what qualifications would it take for a person to represent the nation that they're representing? Would citizenship be enough?

It's hard to say and the debate's been going for quite some time here. Trouble is, with globalization, everyone's migrating to where-ever they feel that there are greener pastures. It's almost like as if we've gone full circle and have become nomadic again.

We started as hunter gatherers like a billion years ago without any technology and now that we've "arrived" technology-wise, we've become hunter/gatherers again. What is happening to the world? But I digress...

Of course I should be congratulating the winners for a fantastic effort and all the hard work that they've put in. Yet I can't help but keep thinking, would we be here if not for our foreign talent which we've welcomed with open arms?

After all, if she (or they) had remained in her (or their) home country, success might not have come as easily and the rewards that she's(or they've) reaped here so far wouldn't be as lavish had she(or they) remained behind.

Well, whatever the outcome, with Singapore being such a global city, I can only say that I'm proud of our achievements.

Well done Team Singapore!

Phone contracts

I've got so many concurrent phone contracts running that it's not even funny.

The problem with buying new phones these days is that you keep signing whatever contracts they shove at you. It all started with the purchase of a motorola phone back in 2003...I signed on a 24 month contract and a year later, i purchased a nokia which put me on another 2 years...

After that, it's all a haze. Now, all I know is that the contract will go on till 2007 march...geez.

Tammy wannabes

Read in the paper that there are a couple of Tammy wannabes out there now.

I wonder. Maybe doing a search for "Bukit Batok" and "Airport" might turn up something. But then again, why bother? I prefer the real McCoy.

It's been a hectic week. I wonder why. So many jobs yet the money's not rolling in. Perhaps it has something to do with me not asking for it when it's due. Ah well.
We just love expos. The IT fair ended today and I ended up buying 2 19" LCDs although 1 of them is not for me.

Managed to get a pretty decent bargain though. Philips going for S$459...

Went to the Civil Service Club today. Obviously, the people that go there are not all that civilised. I guess most of the people that've gone there so far are the general public cause it's still open house. Can't wait till they start the club proper and limit to members and guests only. At least then, I can get a bowling lane and can go about knocking down pins without having to make a booking first.

Bus Stops...

I sometimes wonder if LTA works with MOE as well as the local public bus companies.

If ever there was a dangerous school entrance/bus stop/zebra crossing, it'd be the one that's right in front of the main gates to Bukit Timah Primary School (BTPS).

Lets see...

The bus stop sits near the crest of a hill and at the crest of the hill is the zebra crossing and main gates of the school.

Every day, without fail, doting parents would indiscriminately park their cars inches or even on the zebra crossing. Take into account that the road is a single-lane, dual carriageway.

Didn't they forsee this problem when they designed the school? It makes it all the more dangerous when there's a bus in the bus stop (which incidentally does not have a bay) thus forcing vehicles into oncoming traffic.

At the same time, parents who decide that in a housing estate, u-turns are legal anywhere and everywhere, make them without so much as looking to see if the road is clear.

I've had a couple of close calls from these idiots in the past but still, LTA, MOE and whomever else doesn't seem concerned at all (at least enough to do anything about it).

I guess nothing short of an accident's gonna make them budge.

Ownership

Did you realise that you don't really own any of the big ticket items in Singapore?

Take for example, a car. It costs you an arm and a leg, and most probably you'd be in debt for a lone time to have one. But you never really own it.

You get the car, you have to get permission to own the car in the form of a COE.
This "COE" allows you to have the car for 10 years. After which, if you intend of continue owning it, you'll have to pay again for permission.

Of course, should you decide to keep the car for more than 10 years, you'd have to pay an increased road tax and you don't get any of the taxes that you paid when you first bought the car back at all.

So do you really own the car?

I doubt so.

Housing is about the same. For the 75% of us that live in public housing, we lease the house, paying rent and at the end of 99 years, have to return it to the government.

Says a lot about what we pay for doesn't it? It seems that we're spending more time paying "rent" than anything else. We're just tenants in this country.

We the citizens...

Our economy is First world.

We are socially Third world.

Who can we blame?

Garment lah! Who else?

In Singapore, the garment is introducing "means testing" for special needs children.

What does that mean?

If you're a special needs person in Singapore, the garment is trying to say, "You have to take care of yourself just like everyone else (with the exception of the very poor).

We're not going to help you unless you're able-bodied and poor. If your family can support you, there's no reason why the garment should bother. This especially if you're a special needs person. In other words, be a burden to your family, not the garment.

Afterall, does the garment think long-term for people with special needs and their families? What about health insurance (the inability to get insured), health-costs, living expenses if he's dependent? Issn't the financial burden on the family already enough?

Shouldn't the income be pegged higher? Say $8K (which incidentally is the same for housing subsidies)?

After all, $8,000 is when the garment feels that people no longer need subsidies and can afford to go private. What determining factor did they use when they pegged means testing for special needs/early intervention programmes at $2500?

Did they consult anyone?

If it ain't broke (cont'd)

So came friday, 3 March 2006 and the final day for me to renew my road tax without having to fork out additional money for penalties. It again dawned bright and clear like a spring morning in the northern latitudes.

I made my way happily back to Viacom again optimistic that I can finally get it done. There were 3 of us in the room. 1 dude was already at the counter but it took the lady half an hour to get his road tax done. She was still trying to figure out the "system". The next dude took another 20 minutes. By the time it got to me, I happily shoved the renewal notice and certificate of insurance through the receiving tray (much like I'm trying to pawn something) along with my POSBank card.

She began by looking at the renewal notice. Then pointed at the date to me and said, "Your this one ah...cannot use NETS to pay. Oni cash or cheque."

I was stunned.

She shoved everything back through without a word.

I snatched it without a word.

I stomped out fuming...as if the day before's experience wasn't bad enough.

Well, a head's gonna roll.

If it ain't broke...

LTA's upper management are probably the biggest bunch of unmitigated scoundrels around.
They're the ones that make the decisions and the lower level staff have to pay for some of their more poorly made/idiotic ones.

Here's why:

"ANNOUNCEMENT ON PENALTY FEE WAIVER

As we stopped collecting road tax from 24 to 27 Feb 06 to facilitate the launch of e-Services@ONE.MOTORING, LTA shall waive penalty fees for road tax expiring between 24 Feb and 4 Mar if renewal is made by 4 Mar 06. Renewal may be made at authorised road tax collection centres. However, please ensure that your motor insurance is valid at all times." taken from One Motoring website.

Now, sufficed to say, that my road tax had the unfortunate expiry date of 3 March. So unbeknown to me, I trotted merrily down to Viacom @ Bt Batok to renew it. That was on 27 Feb...monday. I saw the sign stating that road tax would not be collected till 28 Feb. So.."Okay" I thought, seems reasonable that they're expecting some downtime.

As I was on my deathbed on tuesday and wednesday, I couldn't make it down to get it renewed. Thursday however, dawned bright and promised to be frightfully spring-like day with not a cloud in the sky. I trotted back down again slightly before lunchtime to beat the lunch crowd.

Unfortunately, there was already a large crowd of 20 or so. At first, I thought it wouldn't take more than 2-3 minutes per person to renew the thing so I took a number and waited...and waited...

and waited...

Half an hour had past and still, the queue number hadn't budged. Well, I didn't have the luxury of waiting all afternoon since I had a shoot to attend to. So I gave up my queue number after half and hour's wait.

I got most of the shooting done for the afternoon with the exeption of the IMM one which didn't really had any particular timing set. So I managed to pursuade Sheerin to wait while I went for a second attempt at renewing my road tax since I was in the Bt Batok vacinity.

I took a queue number again and this time, after waiting for an hour, the queue moved 4 numbers...well, if this was the speed at which she was doing it, I'd say that I'd be waiting till 8pm to get it done. The counter lady came up to me and looked at my renewal notice...she then said that I could still do it tomorrow (3rd March) without facing penalty.

So I decided that I wouldn't subject the poor Sheerin to the exasperating wait any more, and proceeded to IMM for the shoot.

End of part 1...

Sick and nothing's helping

It's the kind of low-grade fever that refuses to go away. After seeing the doctor (who is incidentally a locum), I took the prescribed medication only to suffer from palpitations, shortness of breath and accelerated heartbeats.

Bad enough that when one is sick, the best cure is usually lots of rest, with all the symptoms of taking the medication, sleep/rest seems to be out of the question. If ever I needed to stay awake, I know what combination of medication to take. Although I might be stoned for an hour or two.

My mouth feels like sandpaper and my extremities are so numb that I cut myself without feeling any pain. It's kinda weird not to have any feeling at all. That coupled with 2½ days of continuous photography is not helping much.

Oh well...I guess if there ever was a bad week in my entire life, this would be it.

I can see you...NOT!

Since when is a camera a "Urine Detection Device?"

I was searching high and low for a camera in the 1.5m by 1.5m by 2m box but couldn't find any. i suppose the little circles near the bottom of the lift walls were the "Urine Detectors" but it doesn't take any photos.

Did they really have to put the symbol of a camera there? I wonder. The newly upgraded estates actually do have cameras in their lifts. Where the signal actually goes is a mystery to me though. Imagine 1 block of flats having an average of 2 lifts. And within a smallish estate, there are 80 blocks. So, some poor dude's gonna have to look at people doing the previously mentioned things in the lift.

The guy'll be heading for therapy after a few years of that for sure.

Gone are they days when the lift was private enough for a quick smootch in. Now, they have windows on the doors so at almost every floor, people can take a peek inside and see what's going on.

Well, public housing is becoming just exactly that. Public.

Commerce...

Trust human beings to try to capitalize on everything.

Now, even blogs have ads...and I'm not talking about ads which the bloghost companies are putting up. More along the lines of ads whereby the bloggers themselves are getting.

This so-called "sponsorship" is now putting limitations on what the blogger can or cannot say. I guess they're just marketing on the fact that such and such a person is getting loads of hits/page-views so lets put one of our ads there and support him/her financially for the work done.

But on the other hand, if he/she says something that goes against our company interest or is not widely accepted by the public, we have to pull out. Oh man! So now, the blogger has to go "I'm thinking of what to write and while I'm doing that, I'm sipping my (popular soft-drink brand) - and I'm thus making the choice of a new generation of what to put on my site"

Riiiiiiiiiiight. I guess sooner or later, we'd all be sponsored.

I stumbled across this a few years back and looks like it's gonna be true...just take a look at the picture below:



Well, for a preview of what I'm saying about blogger's sites a good example is here.

Wasting Time

Here's one for the cut waste panel set up by the Singapore Government.

I spend 3 minutes a day taking the lift in and out of my house. So, in a week I spend 21 minutes in the lift (that excludes waiting times and I'm basing this on 1 up and 1 down trip per day on average). In an average month, I would've spent 90 minutes in the lift. That means that every year, I spend 18 hours taking the lift just to get to and from my apartment.

Lets take it that I'll live for another 35 years (I'm being optimistic here). I would've spent 26¼ days in the lift. That's almost equal to an entire month!

No wonder people multitask while they're in the lift...

They dig their noses (evidence of that is usually found on the wall with left-over booger stains), pee (whenever there's no "Urine Detector", smoke, eat, drink and take photos (like the one above).

So, what do you do in the lift?

Under pressure

For the 75% of Singaporeans that live in public housing, water pressure must've been one of the banes of every day routine. Taking a shower this morning, I realised that once the washing machine is chugging water in, my nice lovely stream of water become barely a trickle.

There I was halfway through rinsing shampoo off my head and there issn't enough water for me to do anything much less get the shampoo off. There's nothing you can do as well cause there are "standard diameter pipes" that you have to install...I guess otherwise, you'll deprive your neighbours of any showering experiences. HAHA!

Just heading to the loo and doing the big business before showering can be quite exasperating as well. Imagine after flushing the goods down the bowl, it takes another 5 minutes before the cistern fills up and water starts getting redirected back to the shower head. And if you've got skid marks in the bowl that requires additional flushing, you won't be taking a shower for the next 10 minutes at least.

Well..that's one of the daily banes that us public housing dwellers have to go through. At least the lifts are bearable now.

Zed's dead baby...Zed's dead

I've been noticing this.

Ever since the internet exploded in Singapore circa 1994, the English language as it is here has been evolved in to "netsspeak". At the same time, companies began using "z" in replacement of "s" bacause it just sounds cooler.

For example:

Brewerkz
Bakerzin
Werkz Photography

Just to name a few of the more popular ones. Just out of curiousity, does it necessarily make it sound better? What's wrong with Breworks? or Bakersin <-- okay this one I can understand after spelling it out...Works Photography????

Even now, our kids in school are abbreviating their essays. Very soon, I'm going to be writing my blog using nothing but abbreviations and weird (so called wired) spellings.

I shall coin the term for how we speak on the internet (IRC, IM, etc.) as "Wired Speech"

IMHO /me thinkz itz nort badz n idea.

Confessions

I have a confession to make. I do on occasion, when I'm alone at home parade around in my underwear. Yes, you heard right. I'm guilty of a little exhibitionism. Now before you go about thinking to yourself "I didn't need to know that", I'm saying this because apart from the fact that I live on the top floor (yes, it's a penthouse - at least by my standards...okay okay...a public housing penthouse), I also have a pretty unblocked view. However, I do suspect that if a neighbour really wanted to look hard enough, he/she might find a way to do so.

So, just out of curiousity, would parading around your own house in undies constitute exhibitionism?

Anyway, I just thought I'd get that off my chest.

Nevermind. I still have no idea what constitutes what here. Soon, even chewing gum will be illegal. Oh hang on...IT IS! Can you imagine if the internet was as popular back in 1992 as it is now? What would happen? I'd shudder at the thought. I remember hearing about the news when I was still in Canada. Most of my Canadian friends were saying "What the heck?" except that the "heck" was usually an expletive.

Yes, "what the fuck" did not originate from Singapore.

Oh...one last thing...(I have to end the post with this)

Tammy, try to look at the flipside of the hoo-haa that's going on about your video. At least you'll have a heck of a story for the grandkids. ;)

Sin Singapore

Sin City...it's about an imaginary city called BaSIN City somewhere in the US (probably East Coast). Well, if you've read the comic and seen the movie, good on ya.

And now, back to the real world...

Singapore..Hmm...the name is pretty provocative don't you think? What's been happening here in this little island state. Well, we've had bloggers jailed for racist comments which is not necessarily a bad thing; we've had peeping toms with pinhole cameras jailed; we've had a scandal of a couple of poly students video-filming themselves having sex using the handphone and losing the said handphone only to find that the video has been splashed all over the internet.

So we have our share of sexy, scandelous and downright disgusting activies going on...yet, men here are still at it. With the prospect of being publicly humiliated if they're caught, they still risk it. With the the prospect of being flogged, jailed and fined, they still do it. Is there nothing that will stop these men from doing it?

No...there issn't. That's the way nature has always been and that's the way nature will always be. Procreation is the single driving force of any animal (and yes, humans are animals as well). The debate of elevating ourselves from other animals has been going on forever and I won't start one here. Just take it that that's what we are for the sake of arguement. Now, the main difference between humans and animals is that we have morals, we are intelligent (though there are some people out there that might prove me wrong), and we are capable of creating things.

Well, the nature of man is that procreation is made pleasurable. We've gone slightly beyond that and have experimented with various styles, use of props, visuals, scents and sounds. Basically, making full use of all our 5 senses. Well, whatever it is, we will always be slaves to sex. That's the way it's always been, that's the way it'll always be.

World Wide whirlwind...

I've signed up to so many different websites, online forums, email accounts, photo galleries and what-not that I'm beginning to lose track of all my different personas. Apart from having usernames of my choice not being available, I suffer from occasional bouts of "online schizophrenia" as well so that doesn't help any.
Even in instant messaging, I have 3 different ways to keep in touch with people from Yahoo to MSN to ICQ. Being an early adopter of ICQ, I started with having a 4 or 5 digit ICQ account number (I forget if it's 4 or 5) and now, I've settled on a 7 digit account which hopefully, I will remember for the rest of my life.
I should start a service which allows people to consolidate all their different accounts into 1, simple webpage. Maybe that'll earn me some cash. But the prospect of having to travel continents is rather daunting. Perhaps I could suggest to Microsoft to start something like that and perhaps get a 9-5 deskjob out of it...NOT!
Getting lost in information is becoming common these days. Trying to find information via the internet is another daunting task. This is the world we live in today. The age of MTV, Video and radio is a thing of the past. We've moved on. It's now interactive or inactive. Even with television, they're trying to integrate websites of some form or other. Is it really that worthwhile? Is it productive or counter-productive? People spend more time on the internet bantering idly more often than not.

We don't really live in a global village. At least not yet. We are still separated by borders, culture, language et al. eBay for example may be global but there's still country specific sites, shipping to within a country etc. Japanese websites are still, well, in Japanese; the same goes for Korean, Chinese, Taiwanese websites. In order to be truly global, we as humans have to come up with a language that's easy to understand, is able to describe everything and is adobtable by everyone. So far, it seems to me that English is the popular choice. What have we learned from the internet? Nothing much except that it gives terrorists another way of telling people that 'They did it' and 'They'll do it again'.

Has it really made life easier? I don't know. Email has helped speed communications up a little but what's an email compared to a phone conversation? Where does it bring us? A little convenience perhaps cause now, instead of having to send in the warranty card for my recently purchased LCD TV, I can just register the bugger online. Ah...the convenience of not having to walk to the postbox. I'm not surprised that in the distant future, humans are all gonna evolve into 500kilogramme slugs with no arms and legs since computers and speech recognition's gonna handle everything.

Oh well...

Journal Entry #120

I make a terrible businessman.

I hate 'entertaining' clients and whenever someone entertains me (as a client), I feel obliged. I'm probably most suited to be the client instead of the businessman who's trying to wring every cent out of your pocket which is the intention of the so-called 'entertainment' in the first place.

Mother has always said that I was too soft. Soft is good isn't it? After all, that's where compassion comes from. Alas, that's also where misplaced compassion comes from. I've been told time and again to be at least a little more firm. Well, I can't help it if I'm a total sap. Blame it on the gene pool that I came from.

With a family history of aristocracy & academics in ancient (and I really mean ancient) China, I feel cheated; as though I was born a couple of hundred years too late. At least back in those days, they were somebody.

Now, just to make a name as a photographer, I have to sell my soul and plead with Lucifer himself. Not that I wouldn't have done it anyway. I am, however, totally bribable. Geez, if I was a girl, I'd probably end up as a hooker. But, fortunate as it may seem, I'm spared the option of the oldest profession. I might make a good Geisha though. After all, I am quite rhythmic.

I'm no idea why but whenever NH is around, my lips just seal shut. Probably due to all the post-mortems that he does of me once we're alone. He gets overly critical sometimes but I'll have to admit, there are times when I am quite "off" as well. Completely missing the point, subject matter at hand and going way off course. Which brings me back to the beginning which is, I make a terrible businessman.

Journal Entry #119

Must be a late night thing. The quiet streets 12 floors below...sets up an atmosphere good for reflecting and looking back at the day's events.

Roads are treacherous these two days. Seen a couple of accidents already. Most likely attributed to the large amount of water on the roads. Haven't quite got the ambient lighting for the living room right. Must work on that further.

No TV to watch at home but have many DVD's...getting sick of watching same movies over and over though. Time to get some new ones. Must also remember to buy more E14 bulbs.

Love the weather now. At least it's cooler. Don't know how long it'll last though. The longer the better.

Just got back from meeting with NH. Nothing much to discuss so spent more time in idle chat than really anything serious. It's therapeutic, having these conversations. Talking about our dreams and desires. Not much chance to talk to someone like that. Most people are too realistic to listen to idle banter. Apart from doing it online that is.

Was wondering if I can OD on Vitamin C...must've chewed at least 7 grammes worth. Only side effect from what I gather after googling "Vitamin C Overdose" is Stomach ache and diarrhea. Well, must remember not to buy any more chewables. Too addictive.

Someone mentioned once that I'm prone to substance abuse. I suppose it would be true except that I have quite a bit of self control.

Journal Entry #118

Happy New Year...

How can the new year be happy? It's just another year and a year less to live. What's so happy about it?

Yes, New Year's Eve has a certain atmosphere to it. Everyone partying, enjoying themselves. Probably one of the few days in a year that has the most sex going on. all the emotion, the hugs, suddenly feel closer to the person sharing the moment with.

That's when guard let down. What happens next? well, use imagination.

Every day is like a new year, every passing moment, once it's gone, it's gone forever. There's not turning back. Like the old debate of the millennium rollover...

Did it happen in 2000 or 2001?

Well, the new millenium began in 2001 and the old one ended on 31st Dec 1999.

My opinion. Anyway, 1999 sounds like a larger number than 2005 for some reason...probably due to all the 9s.

Journal Entry #117

Most interesting news read today was about how roughly 4000 passengers were inconvenienced when 32 year old man jumps on to inbound train at an MRT station.

Saw police last night taking notes and witness statements at void deck. Might have been a fight going on. Irritating family on 8th or 10th floor involved.

Year coming to close. Just 2 days left. Must remember to spend time reflecting events in the past year. Look forward to 2006 but it's just numbers on the wall. Time is there to prevent everything from happening at once.

Own theory of big bang is when time began. Everything happened at the same instant thus causing bang. From then on, becomes irreversable. Perhaps when momentum from original bang runs out, time becomes reversed. Hard to say. If that happens, everyone will live 2 lives (and cats 18).

Have been told off for being full of useless information. Information never useless. Use for it will surface sometime or other. Own theories seldom written down. May face backlash. Might not be a good idea to keep written. Well, at least some may think that way.

Journal Entry #116

Some might argue that blogging is a waste of time. On certain occasions, it would be true. However, it can also be argued that it's better to put the day's events somewhere as a release of frustrations of the day in question.

Humans are inherently stubborn thinking that their ideas are always the best. Have yet to meet anyone who issn't an expert on something after the event has occured.

Dad said that a long time ago. After the event has occured, everyone becomes an expert. However, nobody brings it up before or during the event. Guess that's why there are post mortems of events.

To see where they went wrong and how to avoid it in future.

Detest the idea of being a 'freelance' photographer. Company is there with name but impression of local idiots is still that once you're hired, they own you and can choose whenever to call you down for a post mortem.

Seems that this is occuring more often than not with the two magazines in hand. Probably because of the nature of the relationship between the two parties. No idea how to prevent reoccurence. Must remember to be able to dictate terms in future. Position currently held not good for that. Have to gain foothold before moving.

Will see what tomorrow turns up.

Journal Entry #115

Suffering from gastric pains. Must remember to reduce intake of acidic liquids.

Pain attributed to too much orange juice. Saw quote being hijacked. Grammatical errors in hijacked quote anyway. Not too bothered by it.

Trying out firefox, netscape and mozilla on toshiba. IE still works best and fastest. Too bad Safari is for OS-X. Might be good with PC. Mac/PC argument still ongoing. Get both would be best.

MSN getting problematic. Frequent disconnections. Possibly due to lack of wireless relay in house. Gastric pain becoming unbearable. Still, more bearable than pain suffered in yesterday's 'accident'.

Haven't been doing much this holiday season. Too much work to warrant going out. Getting too tired anyway. Might start to party again after January. Now's a bad time.

Toshiba's working like a charm. One of the few things working well. Keyboard should be illuminated like PowerBook's though. Difficult to find keys in the dark.

List of Bills to pay for next paycheck:

Singtel
SP Services
TV Licence (idiotic bill)

List of items to purchase after next paycheck:

1) Sony Ericsson HBH-300 Headset
2) Saitek Keyboard
3) USB Powered notebook LED light

Total should be no more than $700 on both bills and purchases. Remainder to pay for car installment, road tax, and service.

Melancholy

On porch again. Never will understand family. One minute generous, next, selfish.

Everyone's gone to the Northern Summit. Except me. Feels weird being left alone here.

Perhaps we'll have a Southern Summit next year...who knows?

Quite emotionless now apart from a touch of melancholy. Might have something to do with music currently playing on the laptop. Must admit that there's some pleasure in this feeling though.

Neighbours moved out. House now derelict and sad condition. Have been neighbours for over 35 years. Suddenly seems all quiet. Miss the old days wonder what happened to them.

Had dinner and dance shoot. Turned out pretty good. Found out "illusionist" used cheap props to perform. Can see "illusion" from where I was standing. Not well performed as well. Must remember to be professional and remove obvious support for "self levitation" trick.

Attractive young lady at event today. Somehow looks familiar but can't place her. Must investigate further.

Lifestyle magazine photos turned out well. Limited shots though. Was a rush job so not much choice there. Have worked on some pictures for self reference. Will post once magazine is out which should be in less than a month.

Feels a little strange writing journal again after absence of some time. Must be that it's not worth a read though cause no one's really going through it.

Well, getting tired so will end here. Might write again sometime in the near future. If there's a future that is. You never know...

Marathon

I admire people with determination. And it's never more evident than when a person does a full 42km marathon. The amount of pain you have to endure, the fatigue and perhaps, the agony of defeat.

Win or lose, completing the marathon itself is a task. This year, it was dominated by the African nations. Not like as if it doesn't happen almost every year.

Anyway, that's the pictures I took of the event...I was fortunate enough to find a good spot at the media box near the finishing line.

Ode to Oli, my loyal friend for 10 years.

Ode To Oli
March 1995 - November 7th 2005

Oli Oli,
You were taken from your family and brought to ours
You were so little, frightened and alone
You became our good friend and a member of our family
You are more than our pet, you were our companion

You shall be missed
Your final moments we were there
You looked at us to say goodbye
You shall be missed

You lived a good life
You had good food
You had great care
You loved us as we loved you

Farewell, my dear friend.

AMG Craftsman...

Okay...so today, I found out that there's a Mr Audija working as a craftsman at AMG cause his name was on a plate that was glued to the engine cover.

Proudly does it say "Handcrafted by so and so" (See enlargement). Drool over the engine cover? Yeah...Road Tax for the bugger (a C55) is $7928 per annum which comes to about $21 per day. Yes, you heard right. $21 PER DAY...that's just to keep the bugger registered...

Anyway, besides that, I took the opportunity to take some photos of the engine, closeups etc...thought that the photos came out pretty okay. Well, you guys be the judge okay? :)

Untitled

Seriously, I'm too lazy to even think of a title. Such has my life become that all I do is 1) Procrastinate and 2) Bum around. Looking for the ultimate bum? Look no further; Ya found 'em!

Unless of course you're talking about photography...now that's altogether different although I must say that I've kinda lost focus on the type of shots I wanna take.

The song which they're playing for "Traffic Watch" on Class 95FM is from Thiesto's Album....it's Disc 1 track 11 though I can't remember the title...sad huh.

My mind's a gibberish of sorts now. Probably because of the lack of sleep. I figured that when a person sleeps, it's basically to allow for the thoughts of the day to kinda be organised in the brain. It sorta sorts out the short term memory and moves it into long term memory.

It's like say the computer...information stored in the RAM while the PC's on gets sorted out and stored into the harddrive when you put it in "hibernate" mode. If that didn't happen when you're sleeping, you wake up with amnesia. Alternatively, if you didn't sleep enough, you start having problems focusing and concentrating on the task at hand. That's most likely due to the brain having to sort out info in the fly which it ain't too good at doing due to having to manage the other millions of information at the same time.

Anyway, that's my take on what the brain does, memory and sleep. If you guys think different, feel free to comment.

Just another post...

Well, it seems that I've neglected my blog for almost a week so out of pure guilt, I'm writing this one. Nothing much has happened since the day I went out for a drive with Da Babz. It certainly looks like I'm beginning to settle down.
I noticed that most people blog about what they did and what happened during the time when they woke up and the time that they wrote their entries.
I also realised something else though.
There was this girl (whom I shall not name) that requested I add her to my friendster list. Well, that's exactly what I did and I added her to my yahoo instant messenger as well. Well, guess what, the first time we spoke, she tried to borrow money from me. Not trusting that I'd be genuine, she requested that I do an interbank transfer of funds to her account. Well, to think that some people were thick skinned enough to borrow money from someone they barely knew. I suggested that I pass her cash instead (it was only $30 so it wasn't any big deal) but she insisted that I do a transfer from the ATM instead.
Duh! To think that I'd really be dumb enough to trust someone whom I barely know from the net, never met before and don't even know if she's the genuine article!
She claimed that she knows men and what they want. All of the men that she's spoken to had ulterior motives of wanting to "sleep with her" or so to speak. Erm..I think in this case, she really thought too highly of herself. Besides, she gave me the lamest excuse ever.
Apparently, her brother had left the country without giving her any pocket money and she couldn't affored to take a bus, taxi or whatever mode of transport that was available to her to get to work which happened to be as some hostess in a KTV. I suggested that I give her a ride to work instead and whatever tips she got as being a hostess she use to get back afterwards.
Guess what? She told me that the boss of the KTV kept all the tips for newcomers incase they don't really know how to "treat" their customers. I mean what more utter rubbish and pathetic lameass of an excuse can she come up with? As if that wasn't enough, after she had mentioned that all guys had ulterior motives of wanting to sleep with her, I did mention that I wouldn't fuck a person I've yet to meet and have only been chatting with online for a day. She thought that I was trying to boost my own ego by insinuating that she'd wanna sleep with me. Duh...what makes her think that she's all that desirable anyway? HAHAHA! I can't get over that bit.
Anyway, sufficed to say, she deleted me from her YIM and I returned the favour. Afterall, I really don't need such morons as friends (particularly ones that think of me as the moron as well).
Nick's completed the BoomBox Inc. thingy and the first draft of the completed artwork looks pretty impressive though I had some ideas to chip in as well. He said that it was only a first draft and proceeded to edit and ammend the thing so I'm still waiting for him to send me the second draft.
Oh...my car was hit by a bloody Nissan Sunny again..this is the second time. This time though it was a hit n run that happened at the carpark outside my place. Fortunately, one of the people living across the carpark saw the incident and took down the bugger's number plate. I made a police report so too bad if you get points deducted for "hit n run". You certainly deserve it for messing around with my set of wheels.
Anyhow, I'm about to hit the sack so until the next entry which I hope would be better than this one, adios muchachos!

Eating Air

There's this mystical element that I enjoy when I'm driving slightly above the speed limits of the road, blasting the stereo and singing along to my favorite tunes. It's even better when someone like the BABS tags along. She's got this new girly hairdo that makes her look like some 16 year old high school senior.

Babs mentioned something really hilarious. She saw this guy in a ceebic revving his car but rolling slowly and she said that if she were waiting for him to pick her up, she'd be getting nowhere fast given the way he's revving and coasting. Now that it's put in text, it doesn't sound as funny but you'd have to be there to hear it for yourself.

She got herself the same phone as the one I'm using. SEK750i. She's still learning about it but after complaining that the ear-piece was soft, I suggested she remove the plastic covering so that the sound can actually come out of the speaker. Duh...well, that's the babs for ya.

The SEK750i can shoot in this mode called panorama which is really cool. It's 3 pictures stitched together to make 1 long photo and it's done quite seamlessly and easily...here check it out...



Okay so it's a little small but hey, I've got limited bandwidth budget here at the office. Nevertheless, it was real good seeing her again after such a long hiatus.

Spammers...

It's really interesting that even comments in blogs have spammers. Those idiots will just about try anything and everything to 1) irritate you, 2) make life more complicated and 3) sell their crap.

Come on! GET A LIFE! Spamming only makes people hate you more. It doesn't work! It serves no purpose in this or any universe. Humans are always looking for ways to make a quick buck I suppose.

Speaking of which, there are also some that really lack EQ. Take for example the publisher of a certain magazine. Squeezing every shot for his editorial articles into a 1 day shoot is bad enough. To tell the photographer "Try taking this...we might use it for a future issue" is downright LOW. I mean, how much lower can a person go? As it is, the limbo pole's already almost at the floor.

Obviously, the magazine will not be all that interesting since the same model's used throughout. With the same stylist and the same art director and the same photographer with the same background. It's gonna be a heck of a boring issue I can tell you. Even the clothes the model has on is limited.

I guess being new to the magazine publishing world, he's rather clueless as to the kinds of images that people want. Oh well...his prerogative.

Ice with Wings please...

The six has been re-I.C.E-d and Winged! So chio now! Woohoo! The plus point is that now, I'm getting stares from pedestrians and drivers of other vehicles cause it looks way cool!

Wanna see?

NAH!




One thing that came to my mind when I had it done was "does it look too 'beng'?" Well, to some, like my sisters and mom, it does. First thing they said was "Eeeee! So Beng!!!!" Well, can't be helped cause they prioritise differently and look at beauty in a traditional way.

Yes, some might say the same thing but honestly speaking, I don't spout hokkien profanities all the time, I don't speak loudly in hokkien and I certainly don't have the attitude that makes a beng a BENG so to myself, I'm just a guy that wants to add the aggressive look to my rather stock vehicle. And the Wing has certainly done it!

Anyway, I'm a little too tired for a full post today due to a full day of photography in that sauna of a studio of mine so I'll end it here. Hope all you readers have a pleasent evening.