A few thoughts from Neverland...

1) The Carlsberg people who sit back to enjoy a beer and are interrupted by the gazillion neighbours that happen to be drinking the same beverage? They don't look very happy at all...
2) Who sits on the bed on the wedding night and has a tall pilsner of beer with their spouse?! (In their wedding garb too...) I always thought there was something immensely wrong with that picture. Beer, not exactly the choice for the romantic wedding night...
3) Disney is flogging the Pooh franchise to death...I pity the poor toy animals. They should join a union.
4) Risis has made some really strange David Lynch type ad where, in one rather memorable vignette, the girl falls face first onto the ground...Weird.
5) Finding Neverland, despite it's clunky ending, was infinitely better than a certain putrid 1998 best picture Oscar winner with a similar plot of a playwright and his muse.

Meanwhile, it's 1:23am and I need to go to sleep.

Of subtitling and idiots.

Catching the episode of American Idol tonight, I realised something that TCS 5 happened to overlook...WHY THE HELL ARE YOU SUPERIMPOSING YOUR STUPID SMS BANNER OVER THE BLOODY SUBTITLES?!
While I was trying to read the subtitles, I got barraged by a whole lot of Sly Sim fans who haven't gotten over their jones SMSing their profound love for "Sly Rocks"...which I suspect are the drugs that Sly fans are on in order to actually overcome the nausea of watching the guy on TV.
*Shrug*
Meanwhile, Star World's starting Outback Jack...Reality TV producers have a lot to answer for.
Which brings me to...Desperate Housewives! Now this is a show that I decided to give a chance to simply because my dear wife was curious. Me? Not so much...But then I watched it and after forcing myself to sit through the first 15 minutes, I was hooked. I'm not going to confirm anything till after the 3rd episode but I suspect that this may be the best thing on TCS5 for the moment.
Keeping my fingers crossed.

Packrat, Teacher...

...Wants to break his bond.

Click on the link above to see what I'm talking about...and then see what a crock of horse manure the banner is.

"While other radio stations tell you how cool, or hot, their music is...

...at Class 95, we just do this..."

I've always pictured the narrator flipping us the bird whenever he says that. It seems to make a whole lot of difference. Yes ladies and gentlemen, that is what I think about when I'm driving with the radio on...

Waily etc...

Got a parents' welcome tea on this Friday at 6pm. The Perth Wildcats game is on at 6.30pm. There's a level of torment in my soul...threatens to overflow.
BLEAGH!
*sob*
And live basketball games in Singapore are pretty rare. And it's the WILDCATS! Aaaaarrrgh!

Object of Lust.

Just because I can't have these, not being a resident of the United States, this is presently the next best thing. It's just sad when a cash strapped techie gets gadget lust. It's one of those itches that just refuse to get scratched.
*igh.

Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics.

Somehow or another, George Walker Bush has just taken the oath for his second term in office. Despite the fact that no WMDs were found, the Bush Jr administration still insists that their cause was just. Jeb, the brother who stole the 2000 election for his brother, the commander in thief, might just run for president in 2008. George Walker Bush won with 51% of the vote and the turnout in Washington for his inaugaration had a higher number of his supporters than his detractors.

The American people have a lot to answer for.

Jersey Boy.

Amazingly enough, Jay's still posting. *Shrug*. It's amazing how many people he's managed to piss off...the guy's a genius in his own right.
That said, he's still an idiot.

Machinations

Or: Why I will never cross over to the white side.

I was just talking to W and Terz tonight about the Mac Mini and the iPod Shuffle and I realised more and more that I really can't become a Mac user. I would like to...I mean who can withstand the onslaught of images of little white boxes that are designed to entice? It's style personified.
Unfortunately, I've been wired to pick substance over style and in that aspect, the Mac jus' don't cut it. Let's take a look at the two items of lust that Steve Jobs has just unveiled at CES 2005.

(Exhibit A)

This is what all SFF PCs aspire to look like. It's sleek, it's sexy and it sets the pulse racing...It's Gisele Bundchen. Now take a look at the Shuttle SN95G5. It's quite sleek, not really that sexy and it hides quite a lot under it's rather normal exterior...It's Kathy Bates.
Now...even if you took all the time in the world, there's no way that Kathy Bates is going to look anything like Gisele Bundchen. In terms of acting chops however, ol' Kath should be able to kick GB's @$$ all the way back to Brazil. That said, Ms Bundchen's capable of a heck of a lot that Ms Bates isn't capable of (eg looking good while changing into a bikini post heist)...but it's not the stuff that some people'll need in an actress.
It's the difference between a racehorse and workhorse. The racehorse is a thoroughbred. It's sleek and it's beautiful and it's a true joy to look at. Poetry in motion with well oiled muscles that slide under a perfectly brushed coat. The workhorse however looks like a beast that'll trample you underfoot and as you try to breathe (taking in air that smells of day-old horse), it'll bite off your ear. The thoroughbred, in the meantime, is eating sugarcubes out of the hand of the guy next door, who's undoubtably laughing his head off because you bought the spawn of satan.
But here's the thing, the workhorse it relatively low upkeep. Buy the racehorse and it's going to be a life of getting the best for it. Keep it on the best feed. Buy it a cashmere horse blanket. Same with Ms Bundchen. Get the girl, buy the lifestyle. The workhorse'll probably be chewing on your ear for a while and then eating the pig. It'll eat the hay, the pitchfork and the left barn wall as well. I'm not too sure about Kathy Bates but I think the analogy's run itself into the wall. So let's return to computers.
Buy the Mac, buy the lifestyle. Once you go Mac, you're not going back. You can't attach a set of black headphones to the iPod. It just clashes. You can't use a normal LCD with the Mac Mini...it throws the cutting edge design out the window. You MUST BUY Mac. It's an addiction that's hard to break. And it's really expensive. Don't believe me? Check with people who have paid $30 for a little film that you stick onto the back of the iPod to prevent scratches.
My ol' workhorse is one heck of an ugly monster of Frankensteinian proportions (It's been operated on again and again and now it's a mishmash of crap in there) but it's worked very well for me. (when I'm not blowing it's power supply up...) That said, it's a bitch to carry to LAN parties and it's definitely not going to enable me to game anywhere I choose, but it works. And it works hard. It's getting old but it's still eating up the games I keep throwing at it. It just recently got a new lease of life with my spanking new 256mb video card...something that I doubt a Mac could boast for a while.
That's the main problem...the Mac, in all it's stylistic glory, has not addressed the primary purpose of computers...GAMING. At the heart of all the innovations of PCs today beats the pulse of the world's computer gamers...and we constantly want more. The Mac hasn't managed to keep up in all that.
A Radeon 9200? I don't think so.

(Exhibit B)

A flash player that surprises you with music that you ripped off EVERY DISC you've ever owned? I can just imagine the nightmare of the player choosing to pick obscure hits from the embarrassing "Kylie Minogue's hits from the 80's" and looping the Locomotion till you throw yourself from the MRT platform. Taking control from my hands and putting it into the virtual digits of a machine? I don't think so either.

Convert to the Mac?
iDoubtso

Egads.
Of all the stupid things that they need to fill the forum pages with, this is one of the big 'uns. (Thanks ahead to Terz for stealing the text...)

Jan 11, 2005
Put an end to this dangerous JC 'game'
I AM a parent of a boy studying in a premier junior college in the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio area. Recently, it has come to my attention that rowdy behaviour is threatening to compromise the safety of the students.

According to my son, the violent act is dubbed 'taupok', a reference to a highly compressible piece of brown beancurd. A student would shout 'taupok' and other students would pounce on the targeted person, drag him down forcefully and climb on top of him. Due to peer pressure, more and more students would join in until the stack of bodies is about a metre high.

This violent act is supposedly done in the name of fun but, as a parent, I feel that it is potentially dangerous and even life-threatening.

Furthermore, the 'taupoking' is not a rare occurrence. It can happen up to five times a day, anywhere and to any person.

During the orientation programme for Year One students, even a person standing on the stage during a performance could get 'taupoked'.

Supposing that an average person weighs 60kg, a typical group of 15 would weigh almost a tonne. Just as a person cannot survive without air for three minutes, I am very sure that the human backbone cannot bear the sheer weight of a thousand kilograms.

What happens if the victim's spine breaks? Or if he sustains any other injuries? Who will bear the consequences?

Fortunately, my son has not been a victim of 'taupoking' yet, but he still feels rather uncomfortable about this dangerous act. Also, he feels obliged to join in due to peer pressure, as everyone else is doing it.

Some would say that 'taupoking' is perfectly safe if one assumes the correct position, with one's elbows and forearms touching the floor so as to support the weight, like in rugby. However, not everyone knows the correct position to take, and when surprised one might also forget to assume that position.

I write this letter in the sincere hope of preventing a tragedy. Hopefully, we can keep 'taupok' where it belongs - in that delicious bowl of noodles.

Justin Situ Ren Jun

Ugh...Talk about overprotective moron!s. Geez.
Firstly, let's undo the math.

15 bodies in a pile does not equal to 1 tonne of force exerted on the body at the bottom. Having been said one person on the bottom, I can safely vouch that aside from a REALLY bad smell, nothing's broken.

Secondly, let's talk responsibility.

In typical Singaporean fashion, Mr Justin Situ Ren Jun decides to dish off responsibility of stopping "abhorrent" behaviour to the schools. Here's an idea...why don't you tell your kid to not bow to peer pressure instead of spewing some passive-aggressive crap about how he doesn't know who will be held responsible for accidents (O, he knows who he's going to blame...).

Thirdly...Ah well, that's already been covered by Terz. But here's the thing. Boys will indeed be boys...and I think that the term should be used to describe this kind of activity. (As opposed to this...) Geez.
There are things that we men (and women, according to Nardac...although a female taupok's totally fine with me. :) ) do...they're pretty much stupid moronic things that we have to go through...a kind of initiation thing that is part of a male's journey through life. It's stupid...it's dangerous...but then again, we learn from it. Or we learn to laugh about it. Today's parent tends to err a little too much on the side of caution and I think it's got something to do with the fact that they are pretty detached from their own childhood foolishness to realise that it all added up to who they are now.
Ugh.
Meanwhile, I think that spawn of Mr Situ shall have a rather interesting time in Stamford Junior College*.

*Name changed to protect the guilty. :)

Of Mice and Men.

Funny how the world turns.
I recall an article in the Sunday Times that talked about tissue paper sellers and how what they were doing was illegal. Today's paper lauds one of the countless many who flout the laws of society and yet manages to present it's best face. Good citizen? No. Good person? Beyond a doubt.
Makes you wonder why we keep harping on the one while we should be focusing on building the other.

O waily, waily me!

(Title borrowed from Terry Pratchett's A Hat Full of Sky.)

Here I am sitting at the staff workroom in my new school typing on an iMac. No, I'm not a convert and I probably never will be. The school's great. ******ment's tons better than where I came from and I think that the head honchos have got their heads screwed on right (I hope).
So why the pensive proclamation in the title? My personal computing brick is coming in tomorrow and it looks pretty bleak...
Let's do a little list:

1) They're Gateway notebooks. (company pulled out of Singapore in 2001)
2) They're running Windows XP on 160mb RAM. (For anyone who doesn't know what that means, think of a Mack truck running on a Proton Kancil (mousedeeer) engine.)
3) IT department gave out standard issue rollerball mice.
4) The laptops are reminiscent of bricks.

Aaarrgh!
Considering the fact that I am a teacher who is totally dependent on the computer (working on transparencies tends to end up with fingerprint smudges on my shirt along with melted pieces of plastic...) that leaves me pretty screwed...
Spent the morning basically surfing the net for notebook prices and wistfully making goo goo eyes at the Alienware Area 51 7700. (Probably the coolest notebook out there bar none)
*igh.

Morons and F*ckheads

Looking at my Blog page, I noticed a button that led to a random blog. The first one was a lingerie page that was weird enough...then I went back on the browser and hit the button again to try to get the page to load again...(forgetting the "forward" button once again on my browser).
I came across this. For those who aren't too keen on hyperlinks (I know I don't always click 'em...) this is the offending post.

" Tsunami?

So apparently a Tsunami hit somewhere in Asia. I'm not really sure where it hit because to be honest I just don't care!!* I think it's funny that everyone is now rushing out and sending money to these people. If this shit happened here would any of these other f*cking countries come to our aid? HELL NO!!* Most of these countries would probably laugh at us!!* So why should I care about these people?
To tell you the truth I think these stupid people got what they deserved. Apparently for 30-45 minutes the ocean disappeared and no one thought it was strange!!* People on the beach stood there and looked at all the fish that could be seen!!* If I'm on a beach somewhere and the Ocean disappears my fat ass is running!!* Are you f*cking serious? That shit ain't normal!!* RUN PEOPLE RUN!!!* In 30-45 minutes I could get from my house to outside Philly!!* I could get from my house to past Cherry Hill!!* The other problem I have with this whole thing is that from every picture I have seen on the news the places that got hit didn't look all that nice. They sure as hell didn't look clean so you know what they got a free wash out of it! Don't bitch!!*
If anything this Tsunami proved there are too many people out there that can't swim!!* WHO CAN'T SWIM!!!* It's 2005 now people put on some swimmies and learn to swim!!* If not come on learn to float!!*

Send them money if you want!!*

The Ocean disappears and you don't run?!!* RUN PEOPLE RUN!!!*
Look at it this way atleast no hot girls died!!*"

Some people wonder why people love to hate Americans...Sometimes, you don't need to dig too deep when the shit's already floating on the surface. To borrow a phrase from Terz, what a f*cktard.

*"...multiple exclamation points, a sure sign of a diseased mind."