The Rambling Post

Hey. So I just wanted to blog today, but when I got to my Blogger Dashboard I just stared blankly at the "Create New Post" button, with nothing to write about.

So today, or tonight, I'm gonna ramble. That's one of the ways I work too. Push the stone wheel off the top of the hill, and let it pick up the pace from there.

I watched Ratatouille yesterday. It was a great film. I walked away thinking, "That would give critics of any sort something to think about". Yeah, you go stand in a corner and think about what you've done, you child of a coffin you (can you believe our grandmas used to use that kind of language on your parents? That should explain the sunken look some of them have). Then I realised, shit, aren't we all critics after all? You come up to me and tell me you haven't been critical of anyone or anything before, and I will shake your hand and tell you how nice you are. Then I'll give you a tightslap you bloody liar.

Now go stand in a corner think about what you've done. You child of a coffin, you.

We are all critics. All the time, we flick a disdainful eye at someone, pfft at someone under our breath. That's being critical, for your information.

Blah, he can't play for shit. Look at the way he's holding the pick it's like the opposite way what the hell. Look at his fretting fingers they're 28degrees off position.

Pfft. He can't golf for shit. Look at the way his cap's slanted the wrong way, now he's got a 32% higher chance of having a horny bird fly smack into his cheek. And speaking of cheeks look at the way he's clenching his ass. Left side tighter than the right. Gonna be responsible for an extra putt or two.

Ahhh look at that stupid beetle. Keeps knocking into the lightshade as if he's gonna break through. Hey, hey dude. Dude, look here when I'm talking. How - hey listen here - how small are you? How bloody big and thick is that plastic pane? Hey beetard do you even know it's called plastic? Stop it for goodness' sake you're irritating the heck out of me. If you ever get exhausted and land on my clean mopped floor I'll bust your buzzing ass you hear me bitch? I got this cup here, this mini sampling cup I took because it's cute, and because I can use it to cup over idiots like you, see? I will trap you, and I will shake you around until you think I'm YO MOMMA YOU DIG ME BITCH? Oh don't you come flying at me threatening me now I will - UWAHHHHHH!! FUCK! Get the fuck back here you son of a beetle bitch I will tear your feelers and wings and legs out one by one you hear?! No one gets away with dissing my head. Oh yeah, that's right come on right here I'll - HA! GOT YER ASS BEEAAATCH. I pWnZ0rx j00 j00 g3t my dr1f7 j00 b1tch 455 c10wN? Now you sit in this fuckin' corner and think about what you've done. Shame on you, you beetle child of a coffin, you.

See? Critical creatures, we are. Mmm.

So, after 4 orbits around Earth, back to the topic. Ratatouille. Good movie, go watch it if you're a critic, we're all critics, therefore watch it.

While waiting for my friend to arrive at Tampines to watch Ratatouille, being an anime fan, I browsed Hobby Point, very smartly located next to Century Cineplex. People who are familiar with anime figurines will know that the latest, or should I say second latest set of bleach figurines had a uber duper chio Ichigo, holding his sword in bankai form. And then there's the real clincher, Ichigo with his Hollow mask on. The problem is these money-making bastards randomize the characters so you never know who you'll get. The last and only time I bought I got lucky and got an acceptable character, 3rd squad Vice Captain Kira Izuru with his square-hook sword, Wabisuke. Now if I have the money I don't mind buying the complete set, like retailers like to pimp it. But there are characters in there that I don't like. I like characters with long swords, and there's this one figurine with a frigging toothpick for his weapon.

What caught my eye in Hobby Point however were new Bleach figurines! Labelled the Bleach Character Stylings series, it features Ichigo, Hitsugaya, Matsumoto, Rukia and Renji in school uniform, and Grimmjow (yeah, the Espada) in standard arrancar uniform, complete with a hole somewhere at the top of his abs. I wasn't too impressed with the pictures of the set displayed on the sides of the boxes. I felt that the details weren't reproduced faithfully enough. Hair shape and mask and stuff like that. I was grooving silently to music on my player, and I could only see the shopkeeper smiling and handing me a complete, still-wrapped set.

With a price tag of $56.

Wait a minute, I thought. If they are 8 bucks each, and there are 6 figurines......

What is this a joke? The price of 7 figurines for assurance of a complete set of 6 figurines?

After enquiring about the previous set, which will possibly come in tomorrow, I hopped over to Comics Connection, and was thrilled to see the whole set taken out to display on their shelves. It was much better than it looked on the pictures. But there were two problems. 1) It seems there was some misalignment with Ichigo's under-eye detail, making him look like he was recovering from a punch and didn't have good sleep for a week. 2) Grimmjow's sword is FUCKIN' MISALIGNED. Just had to screw that one point up didn't you? Ruin an otherwise fantastic figurine series.

Well, ComiConn was selling it for $48 at least. I'm considering, and this leads me to my next point.

I got my dad to pay for my incoming Creative ZEN player! Awhile ago I was absolutely nuts over a Polo Spirit watch (still am, actually. It's luv, baby, know what I'm sayin'?) And the other day he was like, I thought at one point you were crazy over watches?

You said don't need to waste money what since I got a watch already.
Ahhh... can lah... How much?
$269. I think.
Can la, I buy for you.
Actually, don't need la. Just pay for my Creative.
I thought you paying for it with Mummy Kathy's money?
Well, I could use that money for other things.
How much?
$199.
Mmmm ok la. Just tell me when you need the money.

Whee. You hear me? Whee. So now I got 200 to spend.

Wisely.

Please? Lord? Wisely.

IT IS FINISHED

Having accepted the tasks of both editing the Pfingo video as well as post-production for the latest episode of 65bits, I found my circumstances suddenly spiralling severely out of control. I was torn between putting these two episodes online as soon as possible, and satisfying my parents' demands to study more. Of course, there wasn't really anything to study, but even I felt that I was on the computer working on either of these things incessantly. From the moment I bathed and finished the usual routines of reading my RSS feeds and clearing my email, to late at night, when I was either too tired, drawn away by something more important, or distracted away from the task.

More importantly though, I was worrying constantly about these two episodes. Not when they will come out, that is a concern but not my primary one, but just that they kept dwelling on my mind, one after another, one after the other. It didn't help that (1) my computer's a bloody crawler (although I think as a human in a fast-paced society, even a fast computer won't last too long before my task speed surpasses its abilities. Human adaptability, you know) and (2) I kept making mistakes, resulting in unnecessary actions such as having to re-upload an episode three times because of one factor or the other.

I'm a Christian, and I proudly subscribe to my church's beliefs on worrying (ie. not worrying at all [Matt 6:25] why worry about things beyond your control?). Still, a good number of well-taught Christians would tell you that the simplest truths in the Bible are the dead hardest to habitualize. Why? Precisely because they are so simple. The truth is simple, but it's flipside may well be simpler to fall into. I wasted all my time worrying when I could have spent the time to rest and seek joy. For me, it is seeking rest and joy in my Lord. For you, it may be a million other things. Why did I need to worry? I was going to only reach home at this time anyway. My computer is this slow anyway. I can only do so much in one night anyway.

Hakuna matata.

audacity (n.) slapping the referee threateningly

The finals of SIM Student Week happened just last Friday(I think that's the event la). Someone or the other set up a really small Cage and organized multiple mini sports tournaments. Certainly our Buffalo soccer team joined the soccer league. Their performance was nothing short of amazing. They as a team dwarved all the other teams big time with scores like 5-2 not at all uncommon. On the individual level, Akash was Godlike, imba, t3h 0wnZ, whatever you want to call him, scoring like 65% of all Team UB's goals. He won top scorer with probably twice the number of goals as the third player. One of our other players followed close behind in second place.

So it was the quarter finals. I forgot what the name of the team that we were up against was. Probably a good thing, since I really wouldn't hesitate to write it down if I knew. Since it seemed to be an all-Viet team, with huge support from Viets along the entire stretch of one whole sideline, some of my coursemates who were there guessed it was RMIT we were up against. Now let me get this straight before mindless flamers start pouring in. Firstly, it's not a racist thing - it's a simple known fact that the RMIT courses in SIM have alot of Viets in attendance. Secondly, I'm in no way accusing RMIT of being arseholes. I'm just speculating where the team was from. And lastly, assuming the Viet speculation was fact, I'm not saying all Viets are hot-headed mofos. The impression I get of Viets from my friends and coursemates is in fact quite the opposite. But that doesn't make the team competing against the Buffalos any less aggressive.

Now here's what I think. The Cage was too small, everyone knew that. But I do think that because of that, the normal levels of energy expended by soccer players on a standard playing field were impeded. Severely impeded. As a result, most of the players channeled it to the next available outlet.

Aggression.

Plus, from a practical point of view, you do have to be fast and aggressive on a field where it's wholly possible for a goalkeeper to smash-kick a scorcher into the other goal directly. That's where the other teams didn't see the Buffalos coming. Just Start!-BANG-Gooooaaaaallll!

So the first time, one of the opponents, we'll call him Slap won't we, kicked Akash in the calf. The referee noticed it, and gave him a verbal warning before awarding the Buffalos a penalty. And already Slap put up some resistance to that decision. My friends said they saw the referee looking like his patience was being harshly tested. It had been a full day and the previous match was just violent madness a couple notches short of a gladiator deathmatch.

Now let me just stop here for a moment and rave about Akash. This guy is the craziest meat bag I've ever seen in my life. People can tackle him, body check him, and do everything short of committing a foul by ramming him, and he can just stand there, magically absorb the impact, do a half spin with the ball and fire it into the goal. I've already seen him holding a single banana twice. Maybe that's his secret.

So anyhoos, we played on. The second time, the ball flew to Akash and Slap, and he headed into Akash.

For what right? Might as well hit it into a cannon mouth. Barely see it disappear and next thing you know the cannon fires and the ball's up your ass. Akash was like half rubbing the back of his head and half tugging on his hair.

The referee blew the whistle. And right there in front of me, and others on my side, he lifted his shirt, untucked the red card, and held it high in the air.

I regretted not taking Graham's suggestion up to film the entire thing. I wanted to capture still shots of Akash's bicycle kick. Why am I so stupid. It would have been an epic video. On our side, mostly sideline assistants and minders, the reaction was raised mutterings, and a few WHA???s from people like me. On the other side however, there was an uproar. The Viets raised their voices in disbelief, while the Buffalo cheerers started clapping loudly and going 'YEAH! ALRIGHT!'.

Slap also exhibited disbelief at the judgement, squatting on the floor. The referee went around setting the field up for another penalty, ushering players here and there, and things started heating up at an alarming rate from then. The referee once again stared at Slap and waved his hand toward the parting in the net - the "door" of the Cage. Still he refused to move. And when the referee became firm, Slap stood up, and said something inaudible to the referee, while waving his indexing finger, typical beng style. Then he walked up right to the referee's face and gave him three hard cracks on the cheek. Everyone was being quiet, and the cold sound of hand hitting flesh was uncomfortably clear to me. And thus Slap single-handedly (hurhur) shocked the whole field into utter silence.

You know, our juniors, now sophomores actually, remind me very much of Victoria School and her Victorians. There's a certain electric feeling when you experience VS camaraderie, and I kinda felt it again, that day at the matches. It was something I haven't felt in awhile, and it was good.

I'm surprised the referee didn't drop his whistle and knee the fucker in the balls. Instead he calmly reached out and grabbed Slap's shoulder, turning him back to face himself, and from what I gather, threatened to call security. Slap was of course beyond boiling point now, and roared for the whole court to hear, "CALL SECURITY?! HERE GOT SECURITY?!" And stalked out of the court, removing his identifying jersey and flinging it on the ground. Intermittently, there were hollers from our supporters like "GET OUT" or "APOLOGISE LA".

By this time I was so incensed about the whole thing I had kept my camera phone and was watching the whole spectacle with arms folded.

The captain of the team kicked the ball in frustration. And there the referee snapped and called him over, offering his ultimatum. Apologise for your teammate, or it's a walkover. Almost immediately, our guys, bless them, started going "YEAH! YAH! WALK-O-VER! WALK-O-VER!"

In all fairness that team was starting to break past the Buffalos' tactics. I was getting worried about them winning, another reason why I kept my camera. Because of such an unnecessary development, they lost to the Buffalos 4-2.

Now what is this guys? How small is this tournament? Not even every average person knows about SIM here in Singapore. What, are you gonna break the guy's neck in the World Cup or what, with the country's soccer reputation at stake? You're aggressive by nature? Well then don't play, simple. If you have such a passion for soccer, then you damned well check yourself or ask someone to be ready to pour cold water on you if you ever get out of hand like that. And the captain. Setting the wrong example for your team mate? Even after the whole Zidane saga? Venting your anger on a ball after your team mate got red-carded, what is this?

And then the supporters too. Fine, cheer all you want. Jeering? Booing when Akash missed a bicycle kick in front of you? What are you 9?

Grow up.

How does half a tube of Mentos falling 5-storeys feel on your head?

I'd actually like to know the answer, but I'm not about to ask the poor girl I dropped it on. I accidentally dropped it on.

I was at SIM's 5th level, overlooking the activities at the Atrium on level 2. We, meaning Hans Graham and me, musicians audiophiles or otherwise just people who are fussy with sound, were extremely irritated by the atrocious sound coming from the Atrium. Those idiots KNOW the severe limitations of that sort of acoustic build (effectively a huge square-based rectangle). They KNOW that the echo would, and I really have no other word for this, fuck up the audio so damn badly, and yet they still crank the volume up so high. For goodness' sake la your main audience is on that floor. You could do with lowering the volume. Down to 3/4 level AT THE VERY LEAST.

So I was gesturing to Graham how they had two mixers on opposite ends of the stage (for fuck?). And well, as usual, I waved my half-flimsy tube of Mentos around, and it slipped out of my hand.

My problem is that I don't react fast enough. In a fight that may be another case, since I'm prepared. I'm happy to say that I have not been thus tested as yet. But when I'm not prepared, I do the worst possible thing.

Freeze in shock.

Graham and I could only stare in mute horror as the half-tube pirouetted downwards. Smack onto the girl who was standing dead below the tube's freefall. Needless to say, we backed off from the parapet immediately upon impact. Who the hell would accidentally drop something, see it hit someone's head, and continue looking over the parapet, grinning and waving and mouthing "I'M SORRY :D"?

Later Graham said, "Luckily you didn't call out to her. She would have looked up and had the Mentos land on her face."

Which made me laugh so hard I nearly keeled over on my knees. It's very bad, but that doesn't really make it any less funnier.

If the girl whom I unintentionally assaulted today is reading this, I'm sooo sooo sorry. It was an accident, and I will be careful never to stick droppable things over the parapet in the future.

RIPIRIP Creative Zen Micro

I'm not sleepy. RIPIRIP stands for Rest In Peace In Really Intense Pain.

No of course you can't do that. But that's my point.

My Zen Micro died on me.



Perhaps it was rashness on my part. You know how rash actions sometimes end up in murder or rape? (If you found this post by searching for "purple rape" or something, get lost. Now.)

I wanted to load a new album I acquired into the Micro. But somehow Creative Mediasource didn't detect the player's connection, so I went through the data storage method. After that I downloaded the latest firmwares and drivers from Creative, and tried to re-install the firmwares. Problem? The firmware installer could not detect the bloody player!

With less than half an hour left before it was time to leave for school, I made a rash decision to run recovery mode and delete the firmware from the player.

And nothing could be loaded in, whichever computer I tried to do it with.

As far as my mental eye can see, this is the end for my Micro. It's been great using you my dear, but I guess you thought yourself unworthy of welcoming my new wife. Or maybe you were so pissed and jealous you committed suicide.

Either way, I can use your black pouch for my new girl now. Cheers darlin' ;)

Le Cinematographie Fantastique de TPCMM

Reading jayden's blog post brought to my attention these Temasek Polytechnic Communication and Media Management (TPCMM) students who filmed the following lipdub of Umbrella.



Apart from being professional about it, being sexy and all that, I was downright impressed at their continuous-shot concept. It looks like there were final three takes, from the jerks in the screen. Couldn't really tell for sure, but I'd be happy to be corrected that it was indeed one single shot. That would have been just awesome. Amazing. Brilliante.

The planning for the sequence was immaculate, and the cameraperson is superb. The "pass-ons" were slip-slide smooth. And let me be clear for the benefit of those not that in-tune with this field. Just because the camera wasn't steady throughout the video doesn't mean that they didn't film well. Shaky is fine. What matters is transitioning from scene to scene, and wowee they must have practiced like hell. Or if they didn't, I fall on my knees in awe and worship.

Whoever said Poly was second-grade can lick the cast's shoes. All of 'em. Good job guys!

Fine Print

Ever were so bored you started exploring weird things? Thanks to that, I bring you today's revelation against banks and their loaning antics.

I was on bus 74 when I saw the the print ad for StanChart's... something or the other. Smack in the centre of the poster was 6.50%p.a.*. Notice that asterix there?

Having been oft warned by my parents (mostly mother) of unscrupulous bank practices in their global quest to bankrupt you, I was interested (given the circumstances of my boredom) to find out what the fine print said. Now the 6.50 was slightly below my eye level, and when I bent to look at the fine print, I actually winced from my back hurting slightly. That's how low it was.

What matters to me, as far as this post is concerned, isn't the content. They sure make things rather clear in the fine print. The thing is the font size proportion.

Taking the figure 6, I tried to estimate and calculate its area. I didn't have a ruler with me (and I mean not even in my bag. If it was in my bag I would have pulled it out to measure, fuck the stares). I tried to imagine unrolling the 6, (7cm), and it's width looked like 1cm.

The first letter of the fine print however, F, I estimated to be 0.5x0.25cm.

Meaning? Meaning that in the figure 6 alone, you can stuff in almost 60 of those Fs.
Tell me now, I was squinting a little at the fine print. How are middle-aged people whom these ads are targeted at going to read it? Or bother reading it?

Ah but then, that's the plan isn't it? ;)

I Just Wanna Be Your Friend

Sometime ago, I quarreled with a friend who used to be very dear to me. In patching up, he established in no uncertain terms that whatever he meant to me, I wasn't part of his intimate circle. Now you can imagine how much that hurt me. But it wasn't his fault. In fact it was mine. Nevertheless, nowadays, I find my cowardly self seating myself away from him, avoiding eye contact or conversations with him. I guess I felt that if I pretended he wasn't there, maybe I'll be able to forget him, or at least my previous perceived relationship with him.

Regular readers to my blog would know that I don't like to copy-and-paste song lyrics on my blog. In fact, I frown upon bloggers whose content is half comprised of song lyric posts.

This song, however, is so uncannily descriptive of my situation now. The more disturbing part that my problem is with a guy, whereas in the video the partner is shown to be a girl (staring around doing nothing, but a girl nevertheless). Never mind though, that's for another day. Oh uh, obviously the "lover" bits don't apply.



Chinese Lyrics

等待 我隨時隨地在等待

做你感情上的依賴
我沒有任何的疑問 這是愛



我猜 你早就想要說明白
我覺得自己好失敗

從天堂掉落到深淵 多無奈


我願意改變 (what can I do?) 重新再來一遍
(just give me change) 我無法只是普通朋友
感情已那麼深 叫我怎麼能放手


但你說 I only want to be your friend
做個朋友 我在你心中只是just a friend 不是情人


我感激你對我這樣的坦白

但我給你的愛暫時收不回來


So I 我不能只是be your friend


I just can't be your friend no,no,no,
我不能只是做你的朋友 不能只是做普通朋友

English Translation

Waiting
I'm always, always waiting
To be support to your feelings
There is no doubt about it
This is love

I guess...
You've long wanted to make things clear
It feels like I've really failed
Fallen from heaven down to a deep abyss
Just can't help it

I'm willing to change (What can I do?)
To start all over again (Just give me a chance)
I can't be just a regular friend
When my feelings are already so deep
Tell me how can I let go?

But you say I, I only want to be your friend
Be a friend
In your heart I'm only just a friend
Not a lover

I'm grateful you were that straightforward with me
But the love I gave you, I can't take back just yet
So I, I can't just be your friend

I just can't be your friend no, no, no

I can't just be friends with you
Can't just be normal friends

First Thoughts on Getting the Zen

The review unit for the new Creative Zen was just delivered at my house this afternoon, but I passed it on to Daniel barely an hour after I got home from school so that he could play around with it in camp. In this short span of time, I uploaded some songs and a couple of pictures and movies to the player. Not that I needed to worry if I didn't... the player was already stuffed with digital videos and pictures of Creative products.

I'm not sure if it's because it's just the review unit, meaning less accessories and stuff, but all there were in the box were the player, earphones, USB transfer cable (which is like 10cm long) some papers and the software installation CD. Not even a charger to go? As for stuff like pouches or what not, they're all sold seperately anyway.

Next, using Creative Mediasource, the songs were uploaded just fine. Even the album art managed to get dragged in. Pictures were quickly re-routed to its dedicated folder after a quick confirmation dialog. But the movies...

I successfully uploaded my Ping.sg video ad. That actually took quite long already. I was hoping to put FF7 in to test the player's limits (not that I hope a simple action movie would hit the player's limits already), but was a dialog said that it would not be able to play, but do I want to put it in anyway?

I tried an episode of Whose Line is it Anyway? as a last resort, but it took so long to convert and upload I cancelled it after 15min and 22% progress.

Why convert? I thought Creative was able to support multiple formats.

The answer, given in the more details... section of the dialog, was quite disappointing.

The file's resolution of 512x384 maximum resolution of 320x240.

Then what the hell's the point of having multiple formats? I thought it could drag and drop, and the player would at least auto-resize to its own resolutions. I hate conversion precisely because the file's quality may be lost in conversion. As in, it would not be proportionally good.

That said, I have yet to check out the software CD. Perhaps that would bring some ease of transfer in. Please do.

Lastly, drag-and-drop from iTunes was ok, but one has to go through Mediasource transfer procedures to get the file converted and then transferred. Assuming your file is supported in all factors.

We'll be reviewing it in more detail, probably on Channel65, in more detail, so stay tuned.

UPDATE:

9:26pm
Daniel just called from camp asking for the reset hole. Apparently he slot his SD card in, turned it on, and the player crashed.

Yay.

Our New Church Building!!

One-North to have S$660m shopping, entertainment mall by 2011
By Valarie Tan, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 09 September 2007 2137 hrs

SINGAPORE: Buona Vista is set to have a S$660 million shopping and entertainment mall by 2011.


The project does not have a name yet, but it will be built next to the Buona Vista MRT station.

The 50,000 square metre building will have a 5,000-seat theatre for concerts and conferences, as well as 1,000 parking lots.

It will also have four levels of retail and entertainment avenues such as boutiques, restaurants, wine bars and clubs.

It is also home to a large rooftop garden overlooking a pool.

The integrated hub is jointly developed by Rock Productions and CapitaLand, and is part of JTC Corporation's grand masterplan for One-North.


- CNA/so

All New Creations rejoice(d yesterday)! Our new church building, due 2011 (3 more years of e-life Daniel), is part of JTC's One North masterplan. Built next to Buona Vista MRT (that explains the construction chaos there now I guess?), the building houses a 5200 seating auditorium, two 900 seating conference rooms, a 600 seating amphitheatre, and a 400 seating open air conference space. That, ladies and gentlemen, makes 9000 seats per service. The day we have 4 services and people strewn all around the floor, I dunno whether Pastor Prince will laugh or cry. Possibly both.

I kinda feel that this will be a building for great clean fun. Because our church is a major stakeholder after all, and I don't think they'd stand for like tattoo palours or massage parlours or shit like that. Especially when our members and more importantly youth members would be roaming around before and after service.

Thank you God!