Don't you just hate it when this happens?

The last day before leaving for the UK, it was noon and i was all excited and worked up about the trip. But anyways so i thought i would just laze around and tighten up some loose ends of my work when suddenly i was called upon to collect this urgent letter from the client. I look at my clock, its 3pm, and i need to leave the office at 4 to make it back on time with some time to spare before going to the office. One hour to get to sentral and back, seems pretty tight but i should be able to make it. So i packed up everything to be ready so when i get back i can leave right away.

But then theres this tiny little thing. My colleague suddenly said hey since you are going over why don't you pass him this letter? OK, why not. So off i go to sentral taking the monorail and all, and i was starting to rush cause i was trying to make it back on time. Was well on schedule when i arrived at the client's office and he gave me the urgent letter. So i was on my way out when i remembered i was supposed to pass him this other letter so i went back and gave it to him. And guess what, i PUT THE FREAKING URGENT LETTER ON THE TABLE and left it there. Reached back at office empty handed. Fcuk. Guess what time is it then. 4 pm. Double fcuk.

Dont you just hate it when this happens? Well, I do. Considering that if my colleague did not ask me to pass that not-so-urgent letter, i wouldnt forget the urgent one. Still, its totally my fault for being careless and easily distracted, i absolutely hate it.

Breaking

Why is everything breaking down??? I know its partly my fault but first the hard disk.....now i found out that the dvd burner is burnt. How ironic. And also my phone keeps going blank whenever i try to access my inbox or when Nick calls. Money money going down the drain........

Ugly phone in use now!!!

Erasers

08.08.08 : Olympics have finally begun!!! Watched the opening a few hours back, thought it was pretty good although a bit artsy fartsy with the history and stuff. I quite liked some of the performances in particular the chinese characters one (although i have no idea what characters they were), the idea of the footsteps forming the art piece, and skywalking to light up the torch. The fireworks were good but i was disappointed cause someone told me there was gonna be a dragon. There was no dragon!!!! (and probably never will be one sigh )

Actually the games itself don't excite me, except watching the US basketball team play. At least there's something to watch on the tele other than the Korean drama show thats on all the time (my parents love them). As a side note i was quite surprised at how many countries i could name by just looking at their flags thanks to the erasers me and my bro use to collect and play. Those were the days.....

Diablo III confirmed!!!

When this hell of a game (no puns intended) comes out, everyone please upgrade your comps as necessary so we can save mankind together. And after we do that, we save mankind again, and again, and again, till we have multiple heroes equipped with uber items and have mastered all the skills. And please don't play alone when we're not looking. I've given you a warning few years in advance. For now, we'll just have to settle Diablo 2 again (I've lost count to how many times ive played this darn game!)

Korea Trip

 

For those of you who didn't know, i embarked on a trip to Korea recently for 7 days 6 nights with my parents. It was a very good trip, as it was interesting to experience and witness the Korean culture; it was both unique and fascinating. So instead of boring everyone with a day-to-day journal which i always tend to do after every trip, i figured i would just list down a few things i found very unusual and interesting about Korea and Koreans. Pictures are up on facebook for those who want to see how Korea looks like (picture are supposed to tell a thousand words) or wait for me to tell the stories in person.

1. The common one: Koreans eat kimchi everyday, every meal. Its fermented vege and its apparently very very good for your health. I hate it, unfortunately. And apparently you are not meant to finish it, according to Lonely Planet, and they throw away whatever's left behind. And they refill them if you finish them.
2. Koreans almost eat steamboat everyday. The tour guide mentioned that in Korean cooking the sauce and materials are more important than how you cook it. And also they put "ningko" in it (huh???).
3. Koreans eat their meat wrapped in cabbage.
4. Korean ginseng is the best in the world.
5. Koreans eat larva stew.....yup and according the hex it tastes great too. I think i took a glimpse at a stall selling it and instantly grossed out (did i spell that right?)
6. OK enough of food. In Korea, usually only the men work and the women stay behind and do the housework and take care of children. Seems a little unfair right? But wait, there's a catch! Men bring home the money....and gives them straight to the wife! They control the money in the house (bank?)! And we actually saw ppl asking their wife for money to grab some food.
7. Speaking about money. Koreans, both genders, spend 70% of their money on their looks (clothes, shoes, hairgrooming, PLASTIC SURGERRY)
8. Speaking about plastic surgery, it seems about 70% of them do it. And parents give it to them as graduation gifts before starting working life
9. So its no wonder that there are pretty Koreans girls around. But they are really heavily covered with makeup and you never know who has done surgery. You are looked down upon if you can't do makeup. Interestingly, i didn't find any cute f4-like Korean guys (or maybe it just proves how straight i am.
10. The remaining money is probably spent on petrol. Apparently their petrol prices are really really high and their parking rate in Seoul can go up to rm90 per 30 min. That's insane!
11. Dont worry guys, in Jeju island its the other way round. Women do the working and the men stay at home! Paradise!
12. Koreans give out Krispy Kreme for free because its not too popular in Korea. They're too healthy and hate sugar!
13. Korea is known to be a high tech country and its obvious. You can only use 3g in Korea, and free internet is everywhere. They don't even use ADSL anymore, they use VDSL (apparently much faster).
14. However during my 7 days there i failed to find a proper electronic shop except SONY. (Btw Korea's two biggest companies are LG and Samsung)
15. Probably not too surprising, but Koreans go to sauna completely naked.
16. So its obvious they are not too shy about their wee-wee, so toilet doors when opened you can basically directly see the urinals and the cubicals etc (the whole of the toilet). And most public toilets are permanently open.
17. And their hotels only give out small towels. As big as hand towels. Don't even think of wrapping your body with it.
18. The Korean police around the blue house (Korea's white house!) wears sports attire and are on skates!
19. Koreans are really enthusiastic especially in doing their job. In Everland theme park, every employee wave their hands frantically while screaming ANYONG ANYONG!!! when they see anyone. Apparently supposed to be twinkling stars or sumthing.
20. A bit unrelated, but Park Ji Sung is flat footed. Which means its supposed to hurt real bad when you run. He even got exempted for national service because it is considered and handicap. If you live under a shell, he is currently playing for Manchester United and is famous for his tireless running. I have new found respect for him.

That's all i can think about for now. Sorry for the delay!

 

NBA Playoffs 2008

So the NBA Playoffs are back on again, and it really sucks not being able to catch most of it. Things are starting off quite predictably, with most top seeds going through to the next round. There a few slight surprises, most notably the Boston-Atlanta Series which saw the Hawks drag the Celtics into a game 7. When i watched the games that Atlanta won, they really looked like a decent team and i just hope they don't fall into the category of Golden State Warriors. I mean, they pull one of the biggest upsets last year, creating a huge hype of what they could be this year, and now they're having holidays. I like young, energetic, hardworking team but they always seem to get to the first round, and then flop out years after that (look at Chicago Bulls).

Spurs-Suns was another disappointment to me. I never doubted that the Spurs is such a good team, but I was hoping the Shaq trade wouldn't slow the Suns down. But he did. Hopefully we'll see them adjust next year with almost certainly a new coach. Mike d Antoni in Bulls or Knicks would be interesting though. They are a much younger group and will benefit from the former Suns style.

And last but not least, my Houston Rockets. I've been rooting for them for quite some while, but i never saw them going far in the playoffs this year. But, i really think that they have a good group of players now and i hope they can build on that with a healthy Yao Ming next year. And if next year they flop again, its time to let T-Mac go (considering it doesn't happen in the offseason).

Chris Paul is having a break out season, but i think it's going to be the Lakers and Celtics at the summit, with the Lakers coming out on top. They are a whole different team with Pao, which i rate as the best center in the league, and with Kobe around they'll be hard to top.

Anyways, enjoy some of these comics i found. Don't bother reading it if you don't watch basketball.

 

 

Kenny G

Well, all of us know that Kenny G is this famous saxophone artist who has been around for quite some and I'm sure you can recognize most of his songs and not know the titles (since well they dont have lyrics). And we also know that sax sounds can put people to sleep or strip their clothes (they use them in sex scenes don't they?) so obviously i wasn't too excited to hear that my dad got us tickets to watch him perform in Genting. I mean, sure he plays well and all, but it's no rock show.

However, I am surprised and glad that it didn't turn out to be a snooze outing. Far from it actually. This is a guy who made an entrance from the back and walked down the aisle while playing a song (imagine having the cheapest seat in the house but get to be right next to him) and then he set up a box in the middle of the crowd to stand on and finish his song. All this while our Yang Dipertuan Agong is having his mandatory first class seat at the front, facing the opposite direction. It just shows how much respect he has for his fans and how professional he is as both a musician and a performer. His performances were mesmerising throughout and he puts in a nice variety by letting his bandmates steal the show occasionally (he has the best percussionist ever) and he also showed off how long he can hold a note for (he holds the longest record in the world with 47 minutes). In case you havent already figured out, he does it by breathing in through his nose and out through his mouth through the saxophone.

I know you're trying as you read this and failing miserably =P. Oh, and he played "The Moon Represents my Heart" which is the familiar chinese song that goes "ni wen.....wo ai......ni you.......kuo shen........ "

Let There Be Light!

Last Thursday my company was nice enough to organize a trip to Lightcraft for some workshop about....well.... lights. Lightcraft is an established international lighting company that offers consultations about lighting as well as offering a wide variety of high end lamps. If you haven't heard of it, you're probably not rich enough to own any of their products. You'll be lucky to find any lamps that has fewer than three digits on the price tag (not including cents of course!) and that includes those small lamps you hang on the walls or table lamps used for reading. The first hanging lamp we saw as we walked into the store had the price of a Kancil (for those living under the shell, its freaking 32k!!!!!!). It wasn't even a chandelier kinda thing, just a somewhat large modern simple roundish ceiling lamp. We were allowed to test every single lamp in the 5 storey showroom, but we were extra careful not to break anything or we'll have to spend the rest of the year just to pay back the money!

 

But of course, for that kind of money, you are also getting premium lamps. The lady was explaining the difference between buying an expensive lamp and a cheaper one, which is the reflectors which help distribute the light. They demonstrated many types of lights and effects they produce which really was very helpful, and it really shows how much you need to plan in advance during the design stage of architecture if you want to dynamic lighting on the interior and exterior of the building.

Some of the more impressive lamps were the designer wares that were imported from Italy. They all had a very contemporary design and were pushing the limits of light technology. There was a lamp where you could change the color temperature on the go to suit the ambience, a lamp that was like a worm and could be rolled up into a ball, a lamp with a lightbulb not connected through wires, and a table lamp that was so powerful and flexible that it could be switch between a reading light or an uplighter by twisting its head. Some of them were even design by Herzog de Meuron (to non-archi ppl, its the architect who designed some of the impressive Beijing Olympic Stadiums) but they were surprisingly the less impressive one. They should stick to buildings.

Before dinner, they did a nice short powerpoint presentation which was mostly boring stuff about different type of lamps (incandescent, fluorescent, halogen etc. ) but what was interesting was later on when he shows pictures of good and bad lightning. The good lighting that were shown were some streetlights they did which were uplighters, but somehow they were able to illuminate the streets very well. Its hard to describe with words but they created were quite impressive effects. The bad one though, was the highlight of the show. They were pictures of the new Bangkok Airport with some expensive German lamps at the top which emphasized the architecture and structure of the roof very well. Problem was, the airport was for millions of humans to use and the poor humans were trapped in darkness. None of the light fell back down onto them. The funny part was, now they actually "fixed it" by putting reflective wings at the top which helped bring the light back on the ground. So now not only is the architecture not highlighted anymore, the shadows from these lamps created batman signals all over the ceiling and it was just horrendous to look at. So, lesson learnt.

 

All in all, it was a worthy trip (free) and it was both knowledgeable and enjoyable at the same time. I wish i could have snapped more pictures but my phone was running out of battery so i only took some that caught my eye. Enjoy!

New Winamp Player is Out!!!!

I would buy one of these if they came out....just for collection's sake.

Ups and Downs in Basketball

I just came back from my usual Monday night basketball, and today's games were giving me mixed feelings. Our team had a good run in the beginning, we won the first and lost by a point in the second. They were both very good games and i didn't mind losing the second one at all. But after waiting a while we had another game, this time versus a lesser team. At least i thought so. We should have been able to win the match, but we didn't. And it was frustrating, especially when we had the same team that was so wonderful before. So we lost in a matter of minutes and decided to call it a night. I was tired.

Up :
Driving down the baseline and scoring on an impossible angle layup against a center to heads taller than you.
Down :
Missing a wide open three pointer on the next posession.

Up :
Throwing a pin point pass to a cutting teammate along the baseline for an easy hoop.
Down :
Throwing the perfect lob to a running teammate on the fast break only to blunder a wide open layup.

Up :
On an opposing fastbreak, dashing back on defense and managed to stop a wide open layup even though he started running much earlier than you.
Down:
The most frustrating play(s) of the night. On an opposing fastbreak, dashing back on defense and managed to stop a wide open layup. Ball swings to the trailer on the wing and you manage to prevent and open layup too. A shadow runs behind you and you hope its your teammate after you manage to stall the offense for so long, but its not. An easy lob and an easy basket.

You know, it's acceptable when its 3 on 2 during a fastbreak and another defender running back to make it 3-3. Its ok if your opponent scores on you like that. At least your team is hustling back on D. But if its 2 on 1 and the next person running back is still not your teammate, you know things are fucked up. (Also the fact that it was on more than one play and the fast break wasn't really.......fast)

But recently i've been having good runs with good teams these past few weeks...so i guess its ok to have a shitty night once in a while. Last week i was in a team that was unbeaten the whole two hours....that was really special. Well, i'm looking forward to next week!