Tomorrow No Care

Tomorrow.sg is making another stir. First the racist blog, the blogger whom btw was arrested and is now on bail, and before that was SPG and now bashing of non-techie "ignorant and lazy" people who do not know how to password protect their blogs or fail to pin up a tomorrow not free picture. Oh.. and there were also those blogs about unwanted pregnancies, personal relationships etc.

Time and again, Tomorrow.sg is seemingly being used as a weapon (my opinion) to order witch-hunts. Sure they might say they're neutral and stuff, but history has also shown that there are times where assassination of kings are not a result of a rebeling lord's direct orders.

I do tend to agree with Tomorrow.sg that asking for permission to quote/link is an unneccessary hassle, but they didn't have to handle things the way they did. Proclaiming themselves to be a blog of singapore(an) blogs, it seemed kind of strange to me that editors would say something to the effect of, "If you can't handle it, don't blog.".

Maybe my expectations of the editors at Tomorrow.sg are too high. Maybe having so many blogders using it as a (the only) portal into blogosphere, and having journalists from the press trolling for juicy stuff to put in their paper doesn't really matter a difference. And that we should subject it to the same principles as a low readership blog. And still expect the same outcomes?

The lunar seventh month is coming to a close and mooncake day is not far off. Hope i don't miss it for the fifth year in a row. Went to hospital last year and had to stay home to recover from the trauma of riding a superbly expensive taxi called ambulance.

Maybe i'll die before mooncake day this year. Oh well.. life sucks, and no, i'm not suicidal. I wonder if anyone will remember to give me white roses for my funeral. Not that it would matter if no one brought any flowers, atleast not to me by then.

Ghost on the Road

I have been rather jumpy lately. Yesterday, while i was walking to the MRT with my colleague on my way home, she began talking about her recent movie, The Maid.

We were walking in the middle of a road as she blathered on about the movie. I began multi-tasking trying to figure a way to get her to move towards the side of the road while listening to her. Walking in the middle of the road didn't seem like the best thing to do for good health. If she were Sharon, i would have walked into her to attempt to edge her to the side of the road. No prizes for guessing which Sharon. Fortunately for her and unfortunately for me, she wasn't Sharon.

Just then, while i was in the midst of my thoughts, she suddenly lashed out, grabbed my arm and started screaming at the top of her voice like she was possessed by the maid! Fortunately for her and unfortunately for me again, hysteria set in before scenes of Happy Tree Friends Live flashed across my mind the logical mind took over and i started screaming with her too!

Well, i was deep in thoughts and she was talking about ghosts...



The pink arrow is the direction we were walking, and the red dot is the ghost. It is merely a red dot because it is indicative of the size of the ghost.

Anyway, it turned out that on the road, like mashed potato, there was a mashed rat. It was not even a zombie rat, trying to twitch and crawl despite attaining a mashed status...

A New Phrase

In lieu with my recent trauma, i shall coin a new phrase, Nogum (No Gum) City. And i don't think it should take too much imagination to imagine what happened.

Hmm... Yeat Yee said she'll snail mail me the newspaper which i was in. But thinking about it, i don't think it would have made it through the customs. After all, there is a limit on the number of copies of foreign press publications allowed in beloved Nogum City.

I'm still thinking of enrolling for japanese language classes these days. One of my cousins actually told me to enroll for some other language instead as japanese is rather "common" in Nogum City. But isn't that the purpose of learning a language? To use it to speak with people who understands the language. What's the use of learning a language where few others are proficient in? Unless i develop some multiple personality disorder and start conversing with my different selves. Oh wait... i do talk to myself anyway... oh well.

Flag in Blogger Dot Com

Gosh... there is now a "Flag" button for blogger dot com... And if you find my blog "Objectionable", you can try to get me unlisted from blogger dot com. Though it will still be available in the web. Which brings into question of what blogger dot com considers as objectionable. I really hope no staff of blogger dot com that handles the flagging thingy is a Christian fundamentalist. Then i'll be up-mined...

I'm in Gum Free Country

In case anyone is curious, i'm back home already.

The Lonely Summit

I could have blogged a little yesterday, but was feeling kind of lazy. Anyway, here i am back in the business center of Summit Hotel in Subang Jaya, using the daily complimentary thirty minutes internet access to blog.

Today is orange night at Bar One, the hotel's bar. Everyone who went in had to be dressed in orange, which made me kind of regret that i didn't bring my orange shirt. Oh well.. Anyway, just now kena bio by a not bad looking girl, got tattoo somemore wor.. Which kind of makes up to the other time i got bio-ed by guys.

This time round, i got a double bed bedroom. Which makes it a really big bed with four pillows for just me. Well... with all those pillows i thought i'll hug one of them while i watched tv just now. And woah... it seems the bigger pillows are nicer to hug! Um... I'm just talking about pillows only okie.

Anyway.. the time that i took to blog this post was left over complimentary internet access from someone whom i didn't even meet. So my room's thirty minutes plus my colleague's room's thirty minutes, i've got a full hour. I'll proabably come back later, maybe even buy an orange T-shirt or something. Ciao.

One Night in Chatterbox

Went for dinner with my cousins and aunties. Was Aunt White Wine's birthday today. Was gonna renew my library book tomorrow, which was due today. But turn out that there was sudden need of my wonderful pressence in Malaysia, so i had to get my colleague to help me return the book.

There is a slight difference this time round. The coach i'm taking is stopping at Petaling Jaya instead of KL city. But the accomodation is still the same, Summit Hotel at Subang Jaya. I'll be bringing a camera this time round.

More about the dinner today. We went to Chatterbox. Didn't order chicken rice this time round. I ordered chicken chop and was cutting the chop into smaller chops and passing the bits around for the others to try. And when passing to one of my aunties, the chopped chop fell straight into my glass of water. If only buying ToTo is so lucky for me..

It seems my blog is becoming a talk of the topic in the family.. Gotta keep a low profile. Less everyone knows about my love life.. provided there is a love life.

After that we went to Coffee Club at Paragon. Taekwando Kid was rather cheeky whenever the waitress came around. Anyway, i didn't do too bad also, i got bio-ed by people also. Two people some more. I would have found it rather flattering, except that the two persons trying to bio me were guys... :/

Anyway, Dancin 'Kid sprained her ankle this morning, and possibly broke a bone and is now on crutches. So poor thing hor? Get well soon 'k?

Truth Through Fallacious Reasoning

Managed to bump into a post, " ARE WE PREJUDICED AGAINST FALLACIOUS REASONING?", written some couple months ago by clayton littlejohn.

In his post, Clayton questions if people are prejudiced against fallacious reasoning. He talks about justified actions and permissible actions and ends off with, "What is it exactly that is wrong with a belief that is true but arrived at through affirming the consequent? What is it exactly that is wrong with the inference? Presumably theoretical reasoning aims at truth. Why shouldn't we have the 'by whatever means necessary' sort of attitude towards belief?"

Let us examine a simple situation. Say we wanted to find out the total number of apples we have. And if you had one, and i had one, then we would know two things. The process to find the total would be 1+1, and the result is 2. In fact, the example is so simple, because we have all learned a great amount of mathematics and this situation is elementary, we know that saying 1x1=2 or 1+1=3 is fallacious and untrue, either in the process or the consequent respectively.

But what of complex situations, where things are not as simple as 1+1? It is then difficult for a consequent arrived at, through fallacious reasoning, to be recognisable as a truth. What happens is the inevitable need for reassessment to confirm that the consequent is indeed the truth. And through such reassessment, the fallacious reasoning must ultimately be discarded in favor of sound reasoning. If such is not the case, then how does anyone recognise a consequent as truthful?

I think Clayton was trying to tell people that they should not disregard, without thought, a consequent that was arrived at through fallacious reasoning, as the consequent might still be truthful even if the means was fallacious. This to me, seems like a very subtle shift in burden of proof.

I thought of another example, which i'm not exactly sure if it does Clayton's post any justice. Say for example, a man is wrongfully accused of assault and is punished for a crime he did not commit. Let's say he was jailed for ten years. Ten years later, someone relooked at the case, and found that the man indeed had an alibi. The man could not have committed the crime of assault because a the time that the assault was taking place, he was somewhere-else committing grand theft. And let's hypothesize that the punishment for assault and grand theft is the same, ten years. Then do we punish the man for the crime he was not yet punished for? By jailing him for another ten years? Or do we call it quits because justified action was arrived at through fallacious methods.

Kind of boggles the mind doesn't it?

Small World

I just went to da bao (doggy bag) my lunch from the canteen. It was raining earlier so i took the walkway that linked to the busstop and eventually into the canteen rather than taking a shortcut across the carpark. It wasn't "still raining" when i went to get lunch, but don't question me on the faulty logic of using the walkway.

Anyway, i passed by this girl at the busstop who looked rather familiar, but didn't really register her in my brain. On the way back, i walked past her again, and she called out to me. It was Sharon, and she was waiting for a bus to get back after going to an interview in a company that is in the same building as me. Woah, coincidental rite?

Um... for those who know the three Sharons that i know of, she's not the one from malaysia. Not Sharon Tay either. Sharon i donno her surname from Norway who was with Ken and i'm not sure but i think still with Ken.

Anyway, since i am an idiot not a master in fine conversations and small talk, i went like, "So you're staying in Singapore forever?" Well... my guess that she is still with Ken and that she is gonna stay in Singapore forever (non-literally speaking), was that she is looking for a job here. While people from Norway are trying to come to Singapore, i'm thinking of going away, ironic isn't it?

List of "Things i Hate in the Internet"

1. Frames.
2. Blinking things, or animated gif whose animation is not much different from blinking.
3. Spyware and/or Pop ups (including scripts that pops a hello message, it is irritating)
4. Clicking on a hyperlink opens a new window (If i wanted a new window, i'll use right click, thank you very much)
5. Color bombardment or running out of black color.
6. Messing with browser's status bar (i prefer to be able to see the target url when doing a mouse over)
7. Flash, applets etc and lacking the option to not have it.
8. Changing cursor shape. Thanks for the effort, but i prefer my arrow and hand cursors.
9. Senseless lovey dovey eg. I love u my darling *muackz* *muackz* *Triplez Muackz*
10. Microsoft.

4th Nationals Qualifier Match Report

I slept on the bus somewhere along orchard road today. When i woke up, the next stop that the bus was stopping was Singapore Polytechnic. @#$%! Couldn't these people who see me alighting the same stop every weekday wake me up? Maybe i'm a little nondescript, not exactly flattering though..

I wouldn't have really minded walking back along the way for that couple bus stops, except that there was a certain amount of urgency in the matter, that i needed to relieve some anal pressure. It ain't fun trying to contain it, and when i've finished my end of the business, it was as if i've achieved enlightenment. A feeling of absolute relief.

A little about my game yesterday. Um... The following is highly related to the game magic the gathering. If you don't know the game, you can stop reading here or skip to Match Six where there is some non-magic stuff. Sorry, have a nice day : ) Y

Yesterday was the second last round of Magic the Gathering Singapore Nationals Qualifier. The next and last qualifier is next week, and it seems that i'm unlikely to be able to play in the Nationals tourney. The deck i used was the same for all other qualifiers, Tooth and Nail.

Tooth and Nail

Creatures 18
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
4 Wood Elves
3 Eternal Witness
2 Iwamori the Open Fist
1 Kiki Jiki Mirror Breaker
1 Sundering Titan
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Molder Slug
1 Duplicant

Spells 21
4 Tooth and Nail
4 Reap and Sow
4 Sensei's Divining Top
3 Sylvan Scrying
3 Naturalize
3 Oblivion Stone

Land 21
1 Okina Temple to the Grandfathers
8 Forest
4 Urza's Power Plant
4 Urza's Mine
4 Urza's Tower

Sideboard
4 Creeping Mold
4 Sun Droplet
2 Rude Awakening
2 Jester Cap
1 Duplicant
1 Boseiju Who Shelters All
1 Naturalize

Match One

My first match up was paired with Johnson, a friend of mine whose decklist, unfortunately, i've already gone through before the qualifiers began. He was playing old mono blue version, with Vedalken Shackles and all. The begining of round one saw not much play. He laid land and waited to counter the important stuff while i played Sakura-Tribe Elder, two Wood Elves and nothing else. The trio managed to beat him 10+ life for the round. He then played an Oblivion Stone with four mana opened. On my turn i tapped out to played an Oblivion Stone and placed a fate counter on it. His stone blew up first, and i followed up with Iwamori only to have it stolen by Shackles. Eventually, my weenies got enough damage through. Tooth and weenies...

Round two was much quicker. He got some counters, but wasn't enough. Tooth and Nail with entwine twice, and he didn't have Twincast in hand.

Johnson dropped from the tourney after losing his second match. I think this affected my tie-breaker badly as i will talk about in Match Six.

Round Score 2-0
Match Score 1-0

Match Two

I was paired with a mono red. Our table was due for a deck check, so i looked at the game next to me while the judges unshuffled my cards. The guy was playing Tooth and Nail too. But he had... Sword of Fire and Ice! Suprise suprise.

Round one i had land and more land, died to Slith Firewalker swining two Swords.
Round two, he got a Zozu and Slith Firewalker out, blockers were burned and Iwamori died to Shrapnel Blast.

Round Score 2-2
Match Score 1-1

Match Three

I was paired up with Yong Jian. Yet another friend, not a very good day it seems. He was playing Tooth and Nail too. We both had our Urza sets but i went off with the first Tooth and Nail with one Wood Elves in play. Kiki-Titan destroyed two of his forest and one of mine. He cast Duplicant, ate up my Titan, and destroyed my remaining forest. Untapped and passed the turn with Naturalize in hand. He did not attack, since i would block with a Wood Elves copy, and passed the turn back to me. End of his turn, copy Wood Elves and Naturalize Duplicant. My turn copy Wood Elves again and went off with second Tooth and Nail.

Round two, we went into land destruction. But i managed to pull a Jester Cap and go off with it. Jester Cap is really good. Removed his Kiki Jiki, Sundering Titan and one MindSlaver. And that was it.

Round Score 4-2
Match Score 2-1

Match Four

I was paired up with White Weenie. The guy seemed pretty pissed off with everything that i do. Like when i ended my turn and he suddenly looked at me, i thought he didn't hear me say i've ended my turn, and he went, "I know!!"...

Anyway, i managed to go off with a Tooth and Nail at five life. Kiki-Duplicant to eat his fliers with Molder Slug and couple chump blockers. It wasn't looking good for me, as i've run out of Sensei's Divining Tops to sacrifice for Molder Slug. Although i had Eternal Witness in play, i needed the blockers too. I would say it was a 50-50 chance for him. But he scooped in frustration.

Round two, i was looking down at scores of beaters with damping matrix and Hokori in play. Oblivion Stone became Oblivious Stone in my hand. Managed to pull a Naturalize and Reap and Sow for multiple Urza's Tower. Blew up his stuff only to run into another Hokori.

Round three, there was little i could do with turn three Damping Matrix, turn four Hokori.

Round Score 5-4
Match Score 2-2

Match Five

Another Tooth and Nail player. It seems Tooth and Nail players were all occupying the last few tables. Tooth and Nail don't seem to be the deck to beat in Singapore Qualifiers.

Round one began with little on his side. He had Viridian Shaman and Jitte while i had Iwamori and Naturalize. He played a Witness to recover Jitte. But the game wasn't really going well for him. I had Molder Slug in hand and enough mana to cast it. Brought him down to six life and he blew an Oblivion Stone at Iwamori and Slug. Tooth and Nail w/o entwine-Colossus-beat.

Round two again began with land destruction. I went off with a Jester Cap. Boy these things are good against Tooth and Nail. Removed Kiki Jiki, Sundering Titan and Mindslaver. And that was that.

Round Score 7-4
Match Score 3-2

Match Six

Match six was delayed as there was some hee hur hoo har between two players and the judges. I was paired with the Tooth and Nail player who had Swords. Sunny, who was beside me, began random chats to help relieve some of the tension. I was pretty tensed up as i might have a chance to qualify through tie-breaker if i won that match. Sunny said something about, "Look there, i think the girls in Bishan are nice." Which i kind of agreed and also does kind of explain why i am so enamoured with Bishan.

In the end, there was a re-pairing and i was re-paired with the same Tooth and Nail player. But i was feeling good about the matchup after having won all the other Tooth and Nails. I think i have alot more practice with the deck, having played it for so many qualifiers.

Round one saw my opponent screwed on forest. But i was screwed on the key card, Tooth and Nail. I had one Oblivion Stone and some WoodElves in play. Topdecked a Darksteel Colossus, cast it with mutiple Urzatron and attacked him once with it. He ran through his deck with Sensei's Divining Top and multiple shuffle effects to find a Sundering Titan as blocker. It really wasn't any use as i had the Stone in play and a Naturalize in hand.

Round Two was brutal. I managed to go off with the first land destruction. Creeping Mold his Tower, and he only laid another Tower to Creeping Mold. I managed to draw all four Creeping Molds and another Witness for the fifth Creeping Mold. Iwamori did the damaging. Fired off Jester Cap for Kiki Jiki, Sundering Titan and Eternal Witness. Didn't go for the MindSlaver though. Thinking back, i should have gone for three Eternal Witness instead, since he had only four forests in play. But going for Kiki-Titan was playing safe.

Round Score 9-4
Match Score 4-2

My tie-breaker brought me up to ninth place losing to eighth place by a 0.2%. Maybe if Johnson didn't drop from the tourney, i could have qualified. Oh well... life sucks anyway.

Thow Gei

Today, at the national day rally, our pm talked about service sector and stuff. Well, the bits which i managed to catch on tv was about service... and thow gei (bean sprouts). So here's my personal thow gei story.

Thow Gei In The Ear Cheek

Shu nu attempts to buy packet of noodle home from the local hawker center.

Shu nu, "Auntie, one packet, dowan chilli, more thow gei."
Auntie, "Huh? How many packets?"
Shu nu, "One only."
Auntie, "Want chilli anot?"
Shu nu, "Dowan"
Auntie, "Dowan thow gei ah?"
Shu nu, "Nonono, dowan chilli but wan more thow gei."

Shu nu's handphone rings.

Shu nu, "Hello, Shu nu here."

Shu nu listens to the phone intently.

Shu nu, "Huh? Buy one more packet for kor* ah? Dowan thow gei ah? Okie okie."

Shu nu, "Auntie auntie, one more packet okie? This packet dowan thow gei."
Ah neh, "Oi. Your brother wan one more packet, ask him to come and queue up."

Shu nu becomes very angry and turns into Ah lian.

Ah lian, "Not your business!"
Ah lian, "Auntie, one more packet okie, dowan thow gei."
Auntie, "Huh? Two packets dowan thow gei?"
Ah lian, "Nonono, one packet more thow gei, one packet dowan thow gei."
Auntie, "Ok ok, den wan chilli anot."
Ah lian, "The more thow gei one dowan chilli, the no thow gei wan more chilli."
Auntie, "Huh? Ok ok."
Ah lian, "Auntie, the chilli packet dowan thow gei leh."
Auntie, "Ya lah ya lah, i heard u the first time already."

Ah lian goes home with two packets of noodles. Kor opens up his packet of noodle eagerly.

Kor, "How come got thow gei!"

* kor = brother

Ghost in the Toilet

I came to the office on my usual time at around 0800 and did my usual maniacal laugh therapy as i opened the door. The offices in the technopreneur building usually start work at 0900. So i get to do my weird stuff before everyone starts coming in.

Entered the office, switched the lights on, put on my winter jacket (though i wear it during winter, alot of people refuse to accept it as a winter jacket...) and went to the toilet for my after-journey pee. But the toilet's lights was a goner since last evening.

The following diagram is the topography of half the toilet. The arcs protruding from the wall are the urinals. And yes, it is a guys toilet and i use a guy's toilet. I am a guy duh.. The pink arrow depicts the path i took. Which means i rounded the wall to bump (figuratively speaking) into the ghost, which is the red circle.



The ghost was actually a guy in white shirt standing silently, peeing quietly into the urinal in the almost totally dark toilet. My instantaneous reaction was to scream and back away from the ghost. Which was exactly what i did. I went like "Aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhahahahaha". Yes, it ended with me laughing when i realise how absurd i was.

When the panic subsided and i've realised that there was no ghost but some guy in white shirt taking a pee, the conversation began.

"What's wrong with you?"
"Huh? You scared me."
"Man, you're hysterical."
Ghost leaves toilet after washing his hands while Man takes a pee. Ghost was heard laughing "hahaha hahaha" outside the toilet. What the hell... you banana b@5t@rd bad boy beetroot beer belly baka bakemono! Okie, name calling therapy really does work.

Some days ago, i cannot remember when, i was talking to my colleague through msn performing work related discussion and happened to refer to another colleague by name. I can't remember what was said exactly, but i went like, "something something Christine something something".

And my colleague went like, "Oi phantom, her name is Christina, not Christine.", dot dot dot. The character in the movie, Phantom of the Opera, was named Christine.

And names just confuse me as efficiently as peanuts made of gold confuses monkeys. More recently i called Dancin' Kid as Runnin' Kid, and i also called Little Miss Tv as Little Miss Drinkalot. Too much is on my mind.

Yay! After so many months, i've finally finished reading Da Vinci Code. Actually, i had only a few chapters left, just that the credits and pictures were squeezing it into quite a handful of pages. And to celebrate the exhilarating event, i opened a letter from CPF. And once more, i held in my hands evidence that there are too much trees on this planet.

I remember a polytechnic lecturer once said in a lecture, that the email was quite a useless piece of technology. And that himself had tried once to not check his email for a full thirty days. And he never lost his job.

The simplistic reason was that whenever someone sends him an email, said person, who upon seeing him, would ask "Did you recieve my email?". My lecturer would than say, "No. What is it about?". Thus, if the email was unimportant, than it didn't matter. But if the email was important, the sender would confirm it in person.

Gay Factor

Excerpt from the homophobia site:

"Evidences of gender confusion or doubt in boys ages 5 to 11 may include:

1. A strong feeling that they are “different” from other boys.[I have a strong feeling that i am more intelligent than the other boys. Omg, i'm a gay 1/1 evidences!]

2. A tendency to cry easily, be less athletic, and dislike the roughhousing that other boys enjoy.[Hmm... Omg, i'm a gay 2/2 evidences!]

3. A persistent preference to play female roles in make-believe play.[Um... Um... Omg, i'm a gay 3/3 evidences!]

4. A strong preference to spend time in the company of girls and participate in their games and other pastimes.[Omg, i'm a gay 4/4 evidences!]

5. A susceptibility to be bullied by other boys, who may tease them unmercifully and call them “queer,” “fag” and “gay.”[Omg, Alvin, u turned me into a gay! I'm now a gay 5/5 evidences!]

6. A tendency to walk, talk, dress and even “think” effeminately.[I do catwalk when i'm bo liao or waiting for the bus. Omg, i'm a gay 5.33/6 evidences!]

7. A repeatedly stated desire to be — or insistence that he is — a girl.[With my powers to turn into a girl at midnight and back into a guy at dawn... Omg, i'm a gay 6.33/7 evidences!]"

From the survey, i conclude that one out of one males in Singapore aged two+ months to 27 have a 90.4% chance of being gay!

The Chopstick Story

Went to Ding Tai Feng for dinner with dancin 'kid yesternite. And counted the number of folds on the xiao long baos, and they were indeed exactly eighteen. Not very sure of the reasoning behind the need for exactly eighteen folds. Aesthetic? Good fortune? I think the reasonning would be more for the later. If it were for aesthetic purposes, they could shape it into longevity peaches and color 'em pink.

I think it might be because that it is the seventh lunar month now, which could help explain the efficiency in clearing the house of customers at closing time. Imagine the shock when the waitress came up to say they were closing. Certainly had a twinge of being chased-out feel to it. Hmm...

Overall, i found the food to be nice. But the rest of it didn't seem very nice. The waitresses thunking stuff onto tables with as much grace as sumo wrestlers doing their feet stamping ritual. And... the chopsticks... The chopsticks are disposable chopsticks! Call me picky, but i find it a neccesity.

Those of you who had dinner with me in my fortnightly extended family gatherings, would probably go like, 'Chey, wat would u care about chopsticks. U always used mismatched pairs wat.'. But hor... i purposely use mismatched pairs one wat. It goes to show how important chopsticks are to me, that i wouldn't use it if i didn't get mismatched pairs.

Yinyin could probably attest to my need for good chopsticks. I once bought a pair of coconut wood chopsticks in thailand, quite a beautiful pair, and brought it to use in Gippy. But one summer holiday later, when i went back to Gippy, i was left with half a pair of coconut wood chopsticks. I never really used any chopsticks in Gippy after that...

Learned of this canto-in-english blog called jut doi siong diu from kenny. Kind of difficult to read at first, but once you get the hang of it...

Amaxophobia - Taxi

Taking a taxi to Serene Center is begining to scare me. It seems many taxi drivers aren't very sure of the place. I boarded a taxi yesterday, told the driver, "Serene Center", and the driver asked, "Ceylene Center ah?". Quite afraid that there was really a place called Ceylene Center, i reiterated, "Serene Center, Bukit Timah.".

"Serene Center, near Bukit Timah.", i said. And the driver replied, "Orrr, Farrer Road ah?". This is not the first driver to tell me that Serene Center is at Farrer Road, i always thought it was at Bukit Timah. But since we have to get onto Farrer Road to reach Serene Center from my place, i just said "yes".

I think i've finally succeeded in attaining an aura of silence, no drivers affected by the aura seem inclined to chat with me or ask me intimate details about my personal nookie life these days. Not that i'm complaining O_o

Invariably, the journey came to a point where almost every driver bringing me to Serene Center have to ask, "Where ah?". And how would someone who automatically starts thinking about what to blog, and never looks at the roads, know how to describe the place?

I could have gone like, 'The building that has a supermarket in it where only rich lonely tai tai(s) go to look for passionate affairs with young men like me buy groceries.'. But such a supermarket couldn't be a prominent landmark since there are such supermarkets elsewhere, i'm sure.

In the end, i had to contend with a simple, "I don't know.". Then every driver who asked me "Where ah?", at this point would ask, "Orrr... the Macdonalds one ah?". Now for those unfamiliar with Singlish, the form of communication that exists in Singapore lauded as gibberish by some, there is a significant difference between 'Macdonalds there ah' and 'Macdonalds one ah'.

For the former, 'Macdonalds there ah', it indicates that the driver is asking me which part of Bukit Timah or Farrer Road, or whatever the place is called, i wished to alight. For the later, 'Macdonalds one ah', the driver really meant that he suddenly recognised the place i was refering to.

Though i guess there must be only one Macdonalds in Singapore...

It seems the bulk of my blogders do not like to read about topics on religion. Fine... i have nothing more to say.

Reservice reduced

Link
The 13 year cycle will be reduced to a 10 year cycle. The three years of BIT (Basic Individual Training) will be removed. Frankly, i have absolutely no idea why they call it a cycle. Anyway, it'll take effect on April Fools day 2006.

Hmm.. do i smell an election coming?

Saw a pwetty girl in the mrt on the way home. She got off at Potong Pasir. Um... look at Mail Order Bride's pic to see how pwetty the girl is, the lips kind of looks like hers. Whoop, i'm so in love. I wanna marry her and migrate to Potong Pasir liao. Cya.

Oh... and a poll for ya... i can't decide.
my poll

I know its weird to being a post with a digression. But i shall digress.

Excerpt from A Pain in the Neck by Grace Chow (Oh, the writing was at a time before the current pm)

"... Lee Kuan-Yew, the first Prime Minister of independent Singapore, popularly known as 'God'; his son and probable future Prime Minister, Lee Hsien-Loong, popularly known as 'Baby God'; and the current Prime Minister, Goh Chok-Tong, popularly known as 'the Holy Goh'

There is something beautifully poetic about the juxtaposition of this threesome. It is the concept of the past, present, and future rolled into a sort-of quasi-religious Holy Trinity; it stands for the immortality of the Powers-that-be. This religious association cannot altogether be written off as flippant: the making of Singapore is after all, attributed to God; he is generally considered infallible; his memoirs sell like the Bible; he lets the Holy Goh do all the work these days and, when the time is ripe, he will send us his son to save us from a life in hell.".

Some of you might have noticed the recent hee hur hoo har about Tomorrow dot SG featuring a racist's racist blog. Here's a flurry of exchanges brought to attention by Singabloodypore. I shall digress again.

Darn... suddenly got alot of work liao, check back later, i'll add more to this post.


More

This brings up the question of what the agenda is, for Tomorrow dot SG. The site itself puts up a statement that goes like: "Don't ask us what's our agenda - we don't have one (except to highlight the diversity of the Singaporean blogosphere)."

A site like Tomorrow dot SG, because it has a board of editors, and serves as a portal into blogosphere for many blogders, cannot be without agenda. The main agenda of it is to bring our attention to "interesting blog posts". But that is the conceptual agenda, of the site. The true agenda would be an amalgation of agendas of each editor who has the power to click the publish button. So when editors order a witch hunt (Outside of the court of law, i don't believe in reasonings that goes like 'despite my actions, i didn't specifically say it'), it truly becomes a rather rhetorical topic for thought, as to whether individual agenda of editors could materialise the conceptual agenda. I guess much of it depends on the processes within.

If you remember, there was a sgblogconspiracy meme started by mr brown couple months ago. Among one of the conspiracies was that Tomorrow dot SG was started by someone from IDA and that it was one of the gahmen's ways to control the sg blogosphere.

"It cannot be true", and one of the reasons cited for it was that the site has a board of editors, who are bloggers come together. It does seem quite sound an argument. But what if these editors were slowly replaced by say... cyborgs under the gahmen control? What if one of the editors tried his best to be nasty and made the other editors fed up and causing them to leave one by one? "Bah, it's just a conspiracy theory." What would a scrub of the universe like me with only a readership of seven daily know about anything.

Enough digression. I actually wanted to talk about faith. Why is faith undesirable. First let us examine the definition of faith.

Faith
1 Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
2 Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence. See synonyms at belief, trust.
3 Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters.
4 often Faith Christianity. The theological virtue defined as secure belief in God and a trusting acceptance of God's will.
5 The body of dogma of a religion: the Muslim faith.
6 A set of principles or beliefs.

By the very definition of faith, it is undesirable because it is illogical. Take the racist's racist blog for example, he says "It is part of my faith that malays are inferior", adapted from Austine Cline's example. Aside from the usual dismissive labeling that he is a racist, we could provide logical and analytical arguments, and find that his conclusions are based on bias rather than statistical data.

So why should we approach any differently when someone says he/she has faith in God? Some could say that the belief in God is harmless for Singaporeans because we're so used to obeying the rules in this pa pa country that no Singaporeans would be fundamentalists. No Singaporeans would deny birth control, deny children their medicine so parents could pray for them, cut off their own penises etc etc. That all these illogical acts resulting from illogical beliefs only happen in countries that chew gum. Maybe, but maybe not.

It is because that faith does not require logical evidence, and that some Faith, condemns logical/critical thinking, which is why a person who acts on faith, cannot inherently know that something is wrong when something goes wrong. Faith, be it believing in a loving god or a god who endorses the killing of women and infants, is undesirable.

What the....

Fwaaaahhhhh!! It snowed in Gippy!! On 10th August 2005!!

Excerpt from Melissa :
"Doug, the caretaker said it only happens like once in 10 years and boy are we sure one lucky bunch!"

I missed it by one year!! Boohoo!!

Oh well, good things in life never happen to me..

Donald Duck: Persectued and Discriminated

Was chatting with Yinyin when the topic of Donald Duck came up. And that's an ugly can of worms from me, since few people see it the way i do. But the truth is, Donald Duck never really did got his break at being a cartoon character.

As a cartoon, Donald Duck was always persecuted and discriminated. It didn't matter if Donald Duck was in the right or wrong. Bees, rats, dogs, all take turns to bully Donald Duck, steal his food, interupt his sleep, spoil his party, make him lose his fishing catch, etc etc, episode after episode. The episodes where Donald Duck gets some reprieve are rare and far between. As a cartoon for children, i think it doesn't have a very nice moral message.

The only real break, the cast as a good guy, for Donald Duck was with the appearance of his uncle Scrooge McDuck and his three grown up nephews. Donald Duck, at that time, had taken to sailing and shows up to rescue his nephews when they get themselves into troubles which have no other means of escape.

But by then, Donald Duck had become a side cast, a guest appearing in Scrooge McDuck and the three boys' show.

Hey Byron, alias me with my gmail account.

Chocolate for the Soul

Went out with one of my cousins. She was reading Cathy comic book and showed me the beginning strip of the book. The strip talked about Cathy's rational for buying shoes, that the shoes were chocolate for the feet.

My cousin then talked about a pair of flip flops which she kind of liked, except that the flip flops costs seventy dollars. Well.. there was the usual parlay of accusations that one of the reasons to buy the flip flops was that she could wear flip flops all the time, even to school, while i only wear my super expensive running shoes for only well... running. And then it ends in confessions that she'd probably not wear it for fear of wear and tear.

Well, given the finances, i didn't think seventy dollars was her kind of flip flops, but then, what would i know about shoes, or chocolates for that matter. Haha.

Anyway she happen to talk about one of her friends, Valerie. And she went like, "She drives a car one leh.". And i was like, "Ask her out leh." And she went on about how i would never have a chance and that her boyfriend (Valerie's) studies in i didn't catch the name university and has some i didn't catch the name scholarship and is gonna have three k starting salary when he graduates.

I would just like to reiterate the fact that the bandit has a very little need and valuation of material things like money. Earning one million more than the bandit doesn't neccessarily indicate a willingness to spend even [amount censored, suspect boss is a blogder] on a girl, something i might well do, which leaves me little for food... But such views on money means i have rather little savings.

But i cannot help but compare the willingness, or the lack of it, to intro girls to me with my colleague, someone whom i would, without any reservations, start name calling like evil, selfish and anti-social. So much so that such words running off my tongue has little weight at all. So when i comment to my colleague that her air stewardess neice looks rather pretty, despite my attempts at villianfying her, she ask me to chat with her neice and stuff.

And it kind of scares me when a girl i'm chatting with for the first time asks me to join her and her auntie's upcoming KTV session. And when i decidedly say no i don't wanna go, i get labelled as undecisive.. hmm... makes one think doesn't it? Anyway, something cropped up that day, i can't remember what, and i was spared the KTV um... implements of torture socialising. But i do believe in integrity. So when i say good things never happen to me in life, then i must somehow ensure that it is true, no?

Oh well... good things never happen to me in life.

Obtw, i doubt anyone would know why i title this post chocolate for the soul. Its kind of hard for me to explain, i'll just leave it at that.

I have quite a number of rhetorical topics which i wanted to talk about. But it seems i'm perpetually sleepy and tired. i need more sleep...

Autumn babies more intelligent

Was listening to the radio just now and one of the deejays talked about a research performed in Germany that postulates that people born in the season of autumn were more intellectual or something like that. And that people born in summer were the least intellectual or something like that. It might be possible until the deejays start giving the specific months, which were September to December, which kind of makes it only three seasons a year.

The deejays then went ahead to comment about various singaporeans born in which months and yada yada. But... what about a country like australia? Where September to December is spring falling into summer, with not even a day of autumn? And singaporeans living in a perpetual summer are all least intellectual or something like that?

Maybe its location dependent, and if i went over to the other side of the world, i'll become a genius and if i came back, i'll be stupider.

Teaching of Sin

Sin, Definition
1. A transgression of a religious or moral law, especially when deliberate.
2. Theology.
1. Deliberate disobedience to the known will of God.
2. A condition of estrangement from God resulting from such disobedience.
3. Something regarded as being shameful, deplorable, or utterly wrong.


Excerpt from http://www.miracles.org.uk/whatisacim.html

The Three Steps of Forgiveness

Step one is the recognition that the problem is not outside but rather inside us...

Step two may be even harder than the first one. We must recognise that it is our decision to keep the problem –– the guilt –– in place...

Step three, the final one, is taken by the Holy Spirit himself, at our invitation...


A fundamental flaw in Christianity is that it is based on a supernatural "sky daddy" forgiving his followers. As seen in the first two steps towards forgiveness, is the induction of the feeling of guilt into a person. A normal person with no delusions of sin, would not see the need for asking for forgiveness. So to convert a person, the evangelist must first cause the person to feel guilty.

If anyone is wondering what is so wrong about the religion, it is that the religion teaches the concept of sin. An unneccessary concept that is detrimental to a person's psychological health by causing the person to feel shameful and guilty over simply being alive. One must realise that teaching a person that he iss guilty of existence simply for being born, is not a moral thing to do.

By definition of sin as something utterly wrong and a transgression of moral law, humans are not born sinful, rather teaching sin is sinful.

Edit:
A slide from the same website

Total despair, purposelessness, futility of hope, no hope, desperation... Aparrently, if i do not believe in God, all these must come to me... how nice.

to remind myself

ok, i'm just sick of emailing to myself that's all. So i'm putting this url up here to remind myself for one week that i wanna look at this blog. The updates are few and far between though.

Sharon Tay

I think i really need to get new shoes... My running shoes are having less to cover my feet with, by the day. Or maybe i should stop running for the time being, so i could have shoes to walk with... Despite my valiant attempts at gluing the pieces together, it seems that even good shoes has to succumb to age.

But i'm always reluctant to buy shoes, as it ultimately costs a hole in my pocket. Yeah, sure there are shoes that are like $10 from the pasar malam. I bought one pair once, and in less than three months, it split and became two pairs, and had little use other than aesthetic.

And it'll be two shoes that i'll have to get. Coz now, i'm wearing my running shoes (my only pair of shoes left) to work. Kind of makes me look like a student haha.

the one about appearing in newspaper

Here's the newspaper cutting from The Star that has me pointing to a RFID reader to the Tan Sri Datuk. Its black and white because it came over to Singapore by fax...

How come no one ever tells me before hand when they wanna cancel something?