whatever: May 2005

managed to resolved the strange comments problem, and tweaked a bit of this current template. yay.

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think i've fallen prey to some bug/bacteria/virus yet again. damnit. how i know i'm coming down with something:

- caffeine takes half an hour or more before it kicks in
- caffeine loses its effects in an hour or less
- unexplainable fatigue (example finding yourself stoning while reading a rather interesting newspaper article)
- blocked airways
- water-in-nose feeling.

yes, when i'm coming down with something, sometimes i get this water-in-nose feeling. like when you breathe in water through your nose. irony is, the sick water-in-the nose feeling is more obvious than when i *do* breathe in water through my nose (quite often, in the pool and in the sea).

yucks.

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just peeled off a nose cleansing mask. works like the brand b pore pack. cept that it's a mask which allows you to control the area which you want to unclog. the extracting power is not as strong as the pore pack. and it does tend to get lotsa little holes as it dries - thus missing those areas of skin, but it does pluck out stuff. i love scrutinising the whiteheads/blackheads that get extracted.

pathetic but true; i get a kick out of seeing those evil things out on the mask rather than on my nose.

hmmm.. clean pores..

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once again i find myself questioning why i have a blog. this was discussed in an earlier blog.

just re-read it. hmmm.

i do tend to ramble on.

i resolve to write in shorter, thus more easily digestible.. prose?

with more paragraphing.

quite a lot of attempts to create some form of formatting in that entry. which i obviously don't really bother now. what with blogger hanging on me every now and then. i've decided to learn from Waiter and type in a word-processing programme before pasting my stuff. and there isn't really much formatting i can do in notepad. but it's a nice basic word processing programme (stress on the word basic).

purpose of the blog

why does this bother me so much?

coz some friends don't get why i blog. and i can't really explain it. and i hate it when i can't explain why i do what i do.

i still maintain that i don't want the blog don't turn into whining zone. and there's stuff that i still want to maintain truly private which goes into my offline journal.

yet i want to be true too (something that Waiter kinda inspired me about too). and whining is me, so are other characteristics which i'm not proud of.

argh. the conflict.

the bit about web design. har. i still don't really bother with it. maybe some day. there's just too many things i'd rather be doing. sigh.

about sharpening my mind. think blogging is also going to be a method to sharpen my writing skills, my communication skills. especially my english! i'm sick of being miss singlish. what's it with me and singlish? i can speak and write proper english. and so i shall. try to.

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stuff that goes on the blog (slightly revised version)

basically it's stuff that interests me or bothers me. eg

- things that bother my conscience example one
- movies
- music
- books
- tv
- my stands on certain issues example religion
- things that get on my nerves example bad driving
- and anything else i feel comfortable letting any random person on the street know.

another thing that bothers me

i blog. yet i don't tell people i blog. i suspect that i don't have any readers.

a friend questioned the purpose of blogging with a hint of disdain. another said that she doesn't read blogs. my brother is another person who doesn't read blogs.

the comments/(non-)actions from these people don't really encourage me to "advertise" about my blog. especially since i don't think i'm a good writer. and i'm worried people might figure out how stupid and shallow i really am from what i write.

i'm quite insecure.

ah well. whatever lah.

i should cook now.

what's playing: tanya's shuang xi dong wu on 100.3 heard my celebrity crush's voice! he speaks in the prologue in the version they play on radio.

damnit. think i’m coming down with some cold or what again. damnit.

maybe that’s why i feel so sleepy. and one nostril’s kinda stuck. yup. no air moving when i place my finger outside that nostril. damnit.

but anyway, i watched infernal affairs! again. but hey, now i remember what the heck happened in the show! yes. i’m senile. ok well talk about it later

amok thoughts

sorry lady cyclist!

stepped out (backwards) of the entry point of the bus this morning and out onto the pavement with my arms flailing about. i was wearing a skirt - not used to it, can't cover the usual distance with a stride, hence the arms-flailing to get some balance. i stepped out backwards coz the guy in front of me stepped backwards and into me (think he found out he was on the wrong bus from the bus driver). and coz there was another lady who was in front of me too, i had nowhere but back to go.

i'd nearly whacked the lady cyclist in her face. and she looked like she had a kid sitting behind her too. i was just too sleepy. still am actually. coffee has not kicked in yet. zzzz..

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offensive odours

do they linger? for example, you happen to have the misfortune to sit next to someone with bo on the public bus. when you alight from the bus, would that bo linger on you? would you be leaving a trail of bo as you walked to wherever you're going?

or maybe you had to enter a public loo that smells really bad coz someone had just poo-ed a really lethal poo recently. would your few minutes inside that small confined space of distinctively unique smelling air molecules somehow transform you into a carrier of that distinctively unique smell?

i wonder as i try not to fall asleep.

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franz ferdinard

what is the great fuss about the band? i was listening to their album and, after a couple of spins, i still don't get why they're so well-received.

compared to garbage's latest offering bleed like me, i definitely prefer blm.

think ff's lead singer's voice is a little too nasal? for me. maybe i need to give it more spinning. blm only grew on me after a few spins too. hmmm...

just changed my template. it's quite pretty isn't it? snowflakes are visually appealing despite the irony that i live on a tropical island.

this template allows me to add links! well, if i spend some time & effort i could probably do that with the old template. but i'm lazy.. think this template still needs some tweaking. but i need to cad! and i need to cad more before i escape to tv-land.

tonight they're showing 無間道 (infernal affairs)! got tony! drool.. slurp. yes i love him..

whatever, i should be cadding now.

whims

what's this you ask? it's the gum wrapper of lotte - hello kitty muscat* flavored chewing gum. i've been keeping them coz i find them cute and amusing. and i'll continue placing them on my blog till i run out of gum.

wonder if they're available elsewhere. bought them on tioman. hmmm..

introducing my as-of-yet-unnamed-elephant (aoyue)

photo one of my aoyue

that's my newest pet. yes it's a blue elephant.

forehead with hole

so what is he capable of besides standing on my plastic folder? he can sharpen pencils. just stick your wooden lead pencil into the hole on his forehead (kinda at the spot where bindis are usually worn - the photo isn't very clear but it's convenient to use my phone to take photos, so there.), turn his tail..

tail. black cylindrical thing.

and voila! sharp pencil! ok. actually i haven't tried to sharpen a pencil. that's coz my aoyue is also capable of shredding paper! that's actually why i got him.

there's a slit along his back where you can slot paper in (albeit, i'll admit he can only shred narrow strips of paper. well. he is a calf.) and by turning his tail (again), paper well get shredded by the black cylindrical thing as shown in the last photo.

and there's little rubber suction caps at his soles which gives him a great grip on a horizontal surface, essential for sharpening and shredding actions.

hee. i'm quite proud of him. sayang..

*muscat : Any of various sweet white grapes used for making wine or raisins. - courtesey of www.dictionary.com well, you might have known the meaning of it, but i've always wondered what the heck muscat is. the japs seem to like this flavour. there's this other muscat flavoured sweet that i like. it's a muscat flavoured jelly sweet encased in chocolate. yummy..

thank you christopher tan!

on 17 may, christopher tan, a senior correspondent with the straits times wrote this article "are we getting fare value for money?". i thought the article was really good.

it challenged the the issue with the concerns of the masses. and what is public transport but transport for the masses. instead of discussing about the profitability of the transport companies, where their profits are from and whether that determines if the price of bus fares should go up, CT asked if we're getting value for our money.

at times, i've wondered about the investments that transport companies put into the system.

investment 1 (i1) - onboard tv.
it's something i choose to ignore despite being a tv junkie. often, my bus rides are not long enough for me to complete a normal length show. so i find it pointless to watch something i can't finish/that is half way though. the other stuff they show are basically news reports, short films and ads. i'm not really very savvy with news, always have been rather overwhelmed by the neverending supply of news. so i'm not really a news fan.

and i don't really wanna watch ads. i can watch them at home

i think it's good that they show short films. provided they have a supply of them. think they showed a local poly's students' works. but for a limited time. and i've only caught it.. half a time? i guess onboard telly's good for showcasing local talents, but they seem to be making a rather halfhearted effort.

the occasional news bulletin is useful and helpful. but seriously, life at this moment is not really demanding hourly bulletins.

so i've always found onboard telly kinda redundant. what more, to accomodate for it, seats are sacrificed. i'll take those seats over onboard telly any day. this, is from a tv junkie.

i2 - lcd screens + satellite-based scheduling
seriously lcd screens are frilly! true, they have better picture quality, and they take up less space, but they also have short life spans (in comparison to the crt) and are exorbitant (especially if you look at how big the lcd screens transport companies decide to buy)!

and what do you mean by that satellite based scheduling has had "(which hopefully has been laid to rest after) millions spend on failed attempts"? millions?? failed attempts?? what the..

true satellite-based scheduling is helpful. but if the technology is not so economically friendly at the moment, i can do without it. isn't the unpredictability of it all part of public transport? i don't what my money to go into silly frills. i'm a pretty average person. what about those less off than me? i'm so disgusted with the transport companies. what about asking what the public wants instead of pushing the cost to us when we didn't even ask for the "incentives" they've decided that "we want".

CT also brought up another good point about how using average fares per trip is not a fair way to generalise the amount the masses spend on public transport.

luckily for me i live in an area with buses that takes me straight to many destinations (straight bus, that's what we call them). so my transport fees has always been quite affordable. when it takes me more than a dollar to get to somewhere, i usually get a little raise of the eyebrow. that usually happens when i've to take more than one bus to my destination or when the trip was just too damn long (for me). can't imagine what it's like to spend one plus dollars and more everyday (like those who live in less accessible places)

this was a really good article for me. really hope someone important enough is reading it. i don't wanna have to spend more money on transport, i'm a semi-employed bum please..

mv06_sommersturm

title: sommersturm
director: marco kreuzpaintner
main cast: robert stadlober, kostja ullmann, alicja bachleda-curus

i really liked this movie. just a couple of days ago, i wasn't having a chat with some friends about sexualism - homosexualism.. bisexualism.. and then i caught sommersturm. it was so.. timely.

basically it's a movie about coming out. i felt that the perspective of the movie was pretty realistic. at least to me it was. ought to get my homo friends to watch it and tell me if it is so.

i really enjoyed it coz the movie didn't feel judgemental. and i guess that helped in the story telling. i didn't really feel any typical subliminal stand behind the movie. it was just a movie that was telling a story about coming out.

thing about homosexualism is that it's still pretty much unacceptable. at least in singapore i think it is. it's still wrong in society's eyes. it's refreshing to have a movie that is so tolerating and accepting.

the plot was pretty well written too. it dealt with the various characters that was important to the main character. think the actors were pretty natural. and the "twist" at the end of the movie was amusing in a slightly cheesy (but good) way.

and the soundtrack. omg. i loved it! it was playful at times, meaningful at others in that it managed to tie up the emotions the characters are feeling. and at times it was just so.. appropriate.

yup. think i love this movie.

tales of a gila bug

tonight i met a gila insect that was unfortunate enough to get itself onto my glue stick (left open).

here's where it first got stuck

it didn't seem so stuck that it couldn't move. coz it can. albeit at a rate of maybe 0.5 - 0.75 step/sec, but still it could lift all 6 legs and move. so why wouldn't it fly away?

here it was after.. 1? 2? 3? mins?..

crazy people in my neighbourhood

i think i can claim that there's crazy people in my neighbourhood.

when i went into my kitchen earlier on, i was a little puzzled by the scene before my eyes. i don't remember the flats across the carpark looking so.. orangey. have someone done something to the flats while i was sleeping the whole day? i walked to the window for a closer look. and behold, a family was burning paper offerings for the dead. at the trash collection centre. and man was it a huge bonfire. i could see flames behind a one-storeyed building. woah.. no wonder the flats looked orangey. anyway, no big deal, i proceeded to have my shower.

later, when i was busy writing an email, my brother walked into my room to inform me of the disturbing thing that was happening outside my window. i looked. and i was very disturbed by what i saw.

a cluster of people dashing towards a huge paper house (approx.. 2+ - 3 metres high).. running towards it with their arms outstretched.. retreated back a couple of metres.. and running towards the house again. it was kinda like a human wave hitting a paper house (compared to the sea waves hitting the shore) and i was like HUH???

it was almost cult like! were they trying to burn the freaking paper house? in the rain? in fact, it rather more like a thunderstorm? don't they know that water puts out fire? burning in the rain? at a construction site??? have they lost it?

they've actually broken down some of the flimsy plastic fencing material and decided to do their burning at a construction site??! do they know how dangerous it is? and how horrible it would be for the construction workers to come in on monday morning and have this big.. pile of ashes and unburnt paper offerings on site??

anyway, after maybe a minute of "hitting" the paper house, it managed to catch fire. damnit, and i thought rain would prevent that. anyway, it became a huge fire. and it started smoking like.. some out of control.. smoke producing thing. i had to close my windows to protect my air. and to think i live on the 7th floor. too bad i forgot to take a photo of the action. i was most tempted to call the cops. but hey.. i'm a kiasi singaporean. with a slow reaction time.

here's the photo i took the day after the fire. compare the size of the damage
to that car in the left top corner. it was a bleedy huge fire lah. kao.

my standard of english

my results of the commonly confused words test..

You scored 100% Beginner, 92% Intermediate, 100% Advanced, and 80% Expert!

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 72% on Beginner
You scored higher than 28% on Intermediate
You scored higher than 85% on Advanced
You scored higher than 76% on Expert

Link: The Commonly Confused Words Test written by shortredhead78 on Ok Cupid

introducing pete! + tioman afterthoughts

just got back from tioman last night. thoroughly enjoyed myself. managed to clock six dives in three days. practised some skills. like equalising.. (something which is really quite simple.. but after a year of not equalising.. it was difficult on my first dive) controlling my buoyancy.. controlling my air intake.. aaargh.. it was really nice. but i really need to take a shower.. so i'll talk about this in a later post. but let me show off my diving "scars"!

(from L to R: my right knee - scrapes courtesey of corals of Renggis island; my left knee - scrapes courtesey of corals of Tomok island; lastly my right lower leg - bruise courtesey of the Marine Park wrecks, actually my left lower leg's somewhat bruised too. but the bruise is pretty slight. too slight to be photographed)

and this is my pet rat. he's named pete for the time moment. i'm not sure if i'll change his name. he's a stuffed furry toy i got from ikea before i went to tioman. when i first saw him, i wasn't sure if i ought to be disgusted or amused. who in the world makes stuffed rats? and who in the world would actually buy them? if you look carefully, you can see that they've even made him a tail (which is resting on the jellyfish's head), whiskers (quite hard to see from the photo) and buckteeth. but he's just so furry! it's really nice to run your hand over his body.. meet pete, my perversely cute rat.

pete the rat
Originally uploaded by isilearine.

whatever

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previous

archives

blogs

pro / group blogs

mustclick

useful things

Monday, May 30, 2005

amok thoughts

Sunday, May 29, 2005

Sunday, May 22, 2005

whims

Thursday, May 19, 2005

thank you christopher tan!

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

mv06_sommersturm

tales of a gila bug

Sunday, May 15, 2005

crazy people in my neighbourhood

Tuesday, May 10, 2005

my standard of english

Thursday, May 05, 2005

introducing pete! + tioman afterthoughts