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September 2007

Viewing posts from September , 2007

epitome of style? 0_0

I AM
65%
JAZZ
Take the Transformers Quiz

Jazz picked his sports car form because it’s the epitome of style. If there’s one thing he digs about Earth, it’s human culture.

Like Jazz, you are good by nature. But beware because mischievous thoughts sometimes tempt you. Your leadership skills are weak at best. You will never be the commander of the Autobots. In addition, you enjoy being one step ahead of your friends as far as trends and technology.

[stolen from Henry’s]

Soooo….. half wrong, half right? :O Some of the questions seemed very unrelated… but I wouldn’t know. πŸ˜›

cooling down

One thing good abt the puasa month is that you just can’t stay pissed for long. Besides, I think I’ve bashed myself up enough already. And yeah, cursing Murphy and his law doesn’t really help me either.

Life without Phoenix has been interesting. A lil boring, but interesting nonetheless. Finding myself in the living room much more often, on my sister’s old notebook sitting on the dining table. Strategically placed such that I can see whatever’s going on in the room and easily make comment on any funny thing that can happen. Although lately, the receiving end seems to be me, what with my slapstick antics before imsak. @_@

Doesn’t help that we’ve unsubscribed to Astro’s Variety package. Channel selection would usually be on AXN. And even that is usually short lived, as my mom has veto power over the TV set. I admit, Korean dramas can be very nice. But no, not going to sit down there and watch all of them.

Thankfully, I’ve received a care package from Fai-chan. X, Perfect Blue, Cinta, and the Ringu novel. Am now about 1/3 through the book, and it’s been very engrossing. Even having watched all the movies, reading this really gives some added perspective and insights into the characters’ feelings… especially their fears. Except Ryuji of course.. he’s just mad. Was actually planning to watch Cinta with my mom, but I surprised that she declined with the reason being it was too soppy. In fact, her reaction was very amusing. Imagine a contorted face with the exclamation “bleah!” Guess I’ll layan it myself.

Speaking of Fai-chan, we had dinner at Prime right before puasa started. The food was absolutely divine, and the ambiance totally immersive. I had the Black Angus filet mignon, medium rare; she had the Argentinian filet mignon, medium well. Juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuicy! But I’ve to admit, there’s only so much rare meat you can take in a sitting… medium would’ve probably hit the spot a bit more. We had clam chowder as an appetizer and that too was fantastic! Totally beats down the stuff you can find in San Francisco. We were also quite captivated with the presentation of things. The salt shaker, especially, were given honorable mentions. πŸ˜›

So we spent most of the evening talking about stuff. Work, our families, our expectations in life. Sharing anime jokes. Poking fun at each other. I really love her company. You’ll never see me talk so much, or listen intently to any other conversation. Tis great to actually find someone in your life with so many similar interests. On the other hand, I’m not much of a conversationalist, so I guess I’ll have to work on that somewhat.

That’s it for now. I’m going to go take advantage of the pre-dawn darkness, and get cuddly with Sadako.

fucked

Yes, I know it’s fasting month, but I’m so seriously pissed off.

Initially I thought my PSU was fucked, so I bought a new one to see if that helps. It didn’t. Using the process of elimination, I then extended the process to the less probably components, and that led me to my RAM.

Two pieces of 1GB Crucial Ballistix RAM, will no longer allow the computer to boot. Okay, no worries. I’ll just send them all the way back to the US for replacements. In the meantime, I’ll just borrow half of Mario’s RAM, which was 2x 512MB KVRs.

So usually when a computer dies, it’s usually one component that’s the problem. With that in mind, I plugged everything back into the original PSU and wallah, everything was fine and dandy.

But my success was shortlived, after sending my computer back onto S3 standby mode. After a few times, it too won’t boot up. Another fucking round of elimination showed that now I have another 2 bad pieces of RAM. Even worse, my hard drive can’t be detected either.

So all in all, i have lost 2 pieces of performance RAM, 2 pieces of value RAM, 1 power supply and possibly 1 hard drive. Add one more power supply that i replaced earlier, and you have a whole lot of fucking failed pieces of equipment. And I still don’t know what’s causing it! Of course, all the signs point back to the PSU, cuz how else can components be instantly corrupted besides static and power fluctuations? But after this episode, I’m just not so sure of myself anymore… I might even come to hate computers… >_<

wiring problems?

so this morning, my bro’s schoolmate’s home caught fire. twice. 1st time the switchbox went aflame. later, a surge somehow created another spark in the master bedroom.

reason: old wiring.

back in my home, i had to recently replace the server’s PSU with a new Powerlogic 500W. and a few days ago the new PSU itself started giving symptoms of irregularity.

yesterday, my gaming machine won’t wake up from S3 mode. shrugging it off, i powercycled the PSU and all was OK. FPS was low during WoW raids, but i didn’t think much of it.

today, the same thing happened, but the machine never recovered. wouldn’t even start the POST sequence. tried switching around my motherboard, as well as other components, but nothing. looks like another PSU problem.

should i be worried and get my wiring checked? we seem to have had at least 2 trips in the past 2-3 months. :O

and it sux that i can’t even play katamari damacy tonight cuz i haven’t burnt myself a copy. >_<

matta fair…

… was packed like sardines! first time i’ve seen the bus station parking garage so full~ discovered a tunnel from the lower levels to PWTC, whose use should probably be limited to daytime only. dodgy~ we arrived at 11, me having twisted and turned in my bed longer than i should, and the lines at the ticketing counters already had an angle to them. t’was rm3 per person, and u get this blue eco-friendly bag to put all your flyers in.

the place was divided into 3 halls. since we were coming from the pwtc side, we started at hall 3, where all the small domestic operators were. sad to say, we spent a bit too much time there, leaving little for halls 1 and 2 where the international tour operators and airlines were situated.

hall 2 was plenty interesting, especially the korean booth, where they had scheduled events throughout the day. there were er.. scissor-twirling performer hairstylists representing the fashion center of Daegu, photograph sessions with fair korean ladies in their traditional dress (too bad i didn’t have a camera, i could swear one of them came straight out of a dorama), and free ski/snowboarding lessons. my mom absolutely insisted i take the skiing lesson, which i did. my conclusion: skiing is easy, and therefore for the old fogies. πŸ˜›

matta fair ski lesson 1

later we moved on quickly to hall 1 where they had a stage for some cultural performances. we managed to catch a japanese taiko troupe, but it’s nothing compared to Fish’s video of an all-female drumstick twirling/throwing in Tokyo. >_< after that we bolted, realising that it was already 7+ and i was running late for dinner. didn't really pick up anything. cheapest tour of korea was 2.6k for 6d4n, with only one day of snow. there was also skiing in beijing/shanghai tours, for abt 2.2k, but only for half a day. sydney was out of the question; it was peak season and there was nothing cheap for the Dec period. did find a full korean skiing tour, but it was 3.6k, with 3 days of skiing with the first 2 being lessons. boo~ talked to the tour boss from korea and he said to call the resort for custom tours. following up to that, i started looking for fares to korea during their low season starting early Feb. typical airfare would be 2k, coupled with a 5d4n ski package at about 800. that leaves quite a bit for food and other things. one place i'm eyeing is Yong Pyong, supposedly the largest ski resort there. i can almost taste the powder...

misc

Sorry guys, the Gold Coast update will have to come this weekend, since I haven’t picked up the 2 Gigs of pictures from Fish yet. And I can’t quite remember what our dinner plans were…

Anyways, a misc update of everything:-

Only being able to watch 1/4 of Memoirs of a Geisha on the plane, I watched the rest of it back home. Such a sweet, happy ending! Glad I watched it. πŸ™‚ Aaaa Chiyo-chan~

I’m no longer holding 2 positions. Got a transfer letter back to my old post on the Monday I returned. *wonders what management is up to*. You could say I’m glad, but not in its entirety. Was pretty sure I could’ve contributed much more. At the expense of my brain cells, but nonetheless…

Caught up with Fish the day after his return from New Zealand. Another boarder-junkie has joined our midst! Hopefully that trip to Melbourne next year will become a reality. πŸ˜€ Wonder if Merv will want to join us… Well Fish didn’t manage to do the 100m Queenstown bungie though, only a 47m one. But it’s ok, we’ll just have to go there again and do it! w00t!

Will be going to Singapore in November for Linkin Park. Mom didn’t like the idea, cuz it was a weekday and everything, but it would’ve helped if she told me before we booked tickets. πŸ™ E-mails should be replied! Anyways, what’s done is done. Sorry, mom.

WoW news: Personal FTK on Karathress. Morogrim is a bitch. We’re almost there on Leotheras. Have started arena-ing. It’s actually quite fun. Of course, being a holy priest means everyone will try to kill me first. Oh noes.

Have started playing BF 2142 again. Lowest video settings at highest resolution seems to help the graphics latency a bit. Merv has overtaken me on the leaderboard. Bugger.

Few more movies to watch:- Pathfinder, Apocalypto.

Reminiscences

I had a conversation today that led to a lot of reminiscing. Much later after I’d gotten home, I continued to recall things from my past.

Midway through that though, my train of thoughts went slightly off tangent to things that used to irritate/annoy/bemuse me. Here are couple of them at random:

1. Pool.
When I was young(er), I occassionally played pool at Sega City. This was a large arcade on the third floor of Sungei Wang Plaza (where all the other arcades currently are) which occupied a huge space including a section with pool tables.

I finally stopped playing there though due to one incident. At that time Sega City was going through a financial crunch (business was bad for them – which is why they no longer exist), and so they decided to diversify their revenue base. Noticing that there was an empty spot as one entered the pool parlour (the spot was too small for a pool table), they decided in their infinite wisdom to plant a karaoke machine there.

A karaoke machine is bad. A karaoke machine with majority Malay songs is worse. Don’t get me wrong, there are Malay tunes that I enjoy listening to, but let’s face it, a huge proportion of Malay songs for the gen-x group is the mat rocker style of music. They usually have lots of screaming, yelling, and trying to hit notes that they shouldn’t be trying to hit.

So yes, 3 ringgit went into the pool machine (no one was at the karaoke machine when I started) and of course midway through the game, the sounds that emerged from the machine was like a cat being skinned alive. Still, I managed to be the one to pot all my coloured balls in, followed by the black ball too…along with the white at the same time.

I was getting extremely annoyed at the singers who continued to belt out their renditions and wanted to leave. But my fellow pool player said since I’d chipped in for the first game; it was only fair if he chipped in for another. So we played game 2, and again I was the first to pot in all my coloured balls, followed by the black…and the white at the same time AGAIN!

[For those who don’t know the rules for pool, potting the black ball is the last thing you do to win the game. If you successfully pot the black ball, and your white ball goes in as well, you lose.]

Ever since then, I stopped patronising the place, and several months later they went bust.

2. Radio Ads.
For those who listen to the local radio stations, there used to be a public service ad proclaiming how if one were to save 10 ringgit a day everyday, after 5 years, one would have amassed, with the wonders of compound interest, almost RM18,000.

Now for those of you who don’t notice immediately what annoys me about that statement, reread the above paragraph and ruminate on it for a bit.

Got any idea?

If no, here’s why. In one year, there’s at least 365 days. In five years, that would be 1825 days.
RM10 multiplied by 1825 comes to RM18,250. And this is without factoring interest. The wonders of compound interest indeed. According to that ad, if I saved RM10 a day everyday after five years, I’d end up with less then the sum of all the money saved daily!

If you imagine that the person saving here is a lazy bum, who takes the effort to say open a fixed deposit only at the end of each year, at an interest rate of 3%, the amount saved should be in excess of RM19,300.

3. English in School.
Some amusing lessons that I received back then:

In Standard Four, I was taught to pronounce words in what the teacher thought was the correct pronunciation. Carpenter is pronounced with the “pen” rhyming with “fern”.

In Standard Five, the teacher taught us that words such as carpenter is pronounced with the “pen” rhyming with “hen”.

In Standard Six, the teacher began a lesson explaining the term, “jiran”. Those classmates sitting closest to me threw me a quizzical look hoping for an explanation as to what it was about. I just gave back a baffled look in response. I couldn’t figure out what this “jiran” was until the teacher wrote out “gerund” on the blackboard.

4. The Gentleman’s gentleman.
I was lucky enough to be invited to a country estate, and sample the pleasures there.

The place was gorgeous, with acres upon acres of greenery in all directions. The first activity that I endeavored upon was horse riding. Now I never am, and never will be an equestrian of even the minimum standards. So midway through the ride, my horse of course decided to buck and throw me off. And of course, it had to dump me in the one spot of non-greenery around us (a huge mud puddle). Unhurt (physically at least), I returned to the manor where the house butler assisted me in getting fresh clothing and taking away the mud-splattered ones.

I apologised for the inconvenience and he remarked with a, “That’s quite alright, sir.”

Still somewhat red-faced, I wandered about the different rooms until I came to the library. Now that was fantastic sight to behold, floor to ceiling bookshelves with thousands of books. I happily explored the different titles, climbing up on the stepladder. In the process of doing so though, I didn’t realise that I had unhooked the ladder from the rails that secured it to the shelves…so of course as I was examining different tiles, the ladder suddenly lifted off from the railings, up to the apex where I frantically tried to push my body weight forward and of course failed most miserably. The ladder went on from the apex straight down where I prepared to crash onto the floor upon my back (yes, this is like a scene in a movie).

Now if I crashed into the floor, that’d be quite alright, but this was at the corner of the library and I managed to slam with substantial force upon the bookshelves behind me, and in the process dislodging a goodly number of books.

There I sprawled on the ground, amongst piles of books at my side and on top of me as the butler rushed in along with an assistant. With my face growing redder then ever, they assisted me to my feet whilst making sure that I wasn’t harmed. I apologised for what had happened, and again the butler looked at me with a straight deadpan face, “That’s quite alright, sir.”

Do bad things come in threes? In this case, it did. I tried my utmost best not to cause any more harm to my surroundings (or myself) for the rest of the day but failed. I went to take a shower, and opened the faucet to test the warmth of the water. Evidently the washer had come loose at the bottom end of the shower spray and water shot out in a sharp burst from there blasting me nicely (it was cold thankfully) as I stood there agape (I was still fully dressed). I, being the genius that I was grabbed to close the shower curtain and prevent the water from flooding the rest of the bathroom. I grabbed too hard. The shower curtain (and rod) came down in a crash, one end smacking quite well on my big toe.

I gave a yell and hopped out of the room. By chance the butler was passing my room at that time and he rushed in upon hearing my yell. He sized up the situation in a glance, strode into the bathroom and closed the faucet. (Which is what I should have done in the first place)

Once more, with my face couldn’t possibly becoming any redder, I apologised for the mess. The butler of course replied with, “That’s quite alright, sir.”

Happily, I was not banished from the estate by my most gracious host, and those were the only three incidents to mar that holiday.