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Spotted in Bintang Walk.

I was on the LRT to Bangsar when I saw this:

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Goodbye, red sky. The end of the world is near.
Into tripods we fly. Black void of death we fear.
We satisfy the thirst like our blood was beer.
But you choke and you die and we live to cheer.

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This effect was done with Vivid color settings, +2 EV, and ISO 400 sensitivity. There was no color or brightness adjustment; only resize and sharpen! Interestingly, the pillars look like they were negative; this is because of the moss on top that made it look inverted.

So I can't register an account without a company letter. How did I get my own ATM card when I was 16, then?

So I've gotta register nearest to my company. I don't have a car or the time to go to Putrajaya. And Putrajaya isn't that near Bukit Jalil is it?

So I couldn't hear the guy mumbling behind the glass. Does that warrant a "aiii budak ni" as I took a seat? (Funny how I could hear him then.)

They screw up the bank cheque by misspelling the receiver's name. (I realized this later.) I wanted to transfer funds into an account (I provided the account number) but she made me a cheque to mail to them. Obviously both of us were confused, and so I asked if they had any service to send it to them. Does that warrant a "isssh budak ni kurang ajar" as I walked away, still within earshot?

The one day I decide to do business with this bank, you have lousy service. Some people don't go to the bank often. Remember that we aren't familiar with your procedures.

So I got in a taxi. The guy was filling up a form. He asked where I came from. I told him my story.

And now, the narration is from the old Chinese taxi driver:

FACK THEM LAH! Back in the days before ticket numbers, I was queueing up for over half an hour. The counters were busy chatting away and taking their own sweet time to count their money. So I shouted,

OI WHAT IS THIS SERVICE? YOU WANT TO TALK, GO TO A COFFEESHOP!

Huah, I tell you, the manager got up from watching his surveillance TV to see what was up. The guard even aimed his shotgun at me!

HOI! SHOOT FOR WHAT? SHOOT LAH! BUKANNYA I NAK SAMUN (IT'S NOT LIKE I WANT TO ROB THE BANK)! I JUST WANT SOME SERVICE!

Somemore the fella damn smart. Want to shoot for what? I was in the middle of the queue already. He'd hurt everybody else also.

Fwah, I tell you, everybody was cheering me then. People clap man. Hmmph. Next time, you sound them nicely. Hah, I really showed them that day. Hahaha.

Hey, I was scared too when he shouted. I could only laugh along.

I've been ranting too much and not making much sense. If pictures say a thousand words, I leave you with 20,000 words worth. Sequence reads left to right, top to bottom:

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• I am finally a man! I broke a chair! And yes, my mom did not want us to unwrap the plastic wrap. After I broke it in we tore off the plastic.


• This is where real men pee.


• I was experimenting with slow shutter speeds. Except that my Canon Powershot A400 does not have shutter speed settings, so I had to use EV +2, ISO 50 and center-weighted auto exposure to get it real slow. Yes that's a break shot.


• The transfer of momentum.


• Some fun you can have with two see-saws - make them alternate, and then...


• hold hands. All four see-sawers will be shaking hands without moving their arms!


• A new soft drink that came in a plastic can with an aluminium cover. Where do we throw this to recycle? In plastic or metal?


• Setting my camera to ISO 400 gets this ghastly building.

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• Kedai Kopi Tian Hong, somewhere off Salak South (if my colleagues ever bring me there again I shall remember to record a video showing how to get there)


• Outside KL Sentral, on the Brickfields road, on the KL Monorail side, is a killer Ramly burger stall in front of what else but a 7-11. The burgers are prepared in 5 minutes! There is no compromise in quality, with cooked patties and salivatory-gland-exciting barbeque sauce.


• An iguana in the office!


• Flash the fountain.


• Same effect as the pool table pictures; on an escalator though.


• I think this one is trippier. Kids, don't run down escalators!


• Minced clouds, I say.


• More interesting clouds.

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• I finally got a picture of the PUTRA LRT, without some seats attached.


• Stairway to heaven.


• Cats love playing with upturned cockroaches.


• Oh I went for the Songwriter's Round #19, with (from left) Shanon Shah, Izzy, Eugene Ng and Ariff Akhir. I forgot my camera for the kickass Jamasia gig ARGH!

Oh, and can anybody figure out this ringtone (72 KB)? Dave? It's the Beautiful ringtone I received before here.

So I slept at 11pm Monday, and 11:30pm Tuesday. Accomplishment!

The rest of this is a majorly procrastinated post.

Back in the days of school, I used to sleep a solid 8 hours. Yeah, I was proud of it then. Getting into work and college and online addictivity got me on 6 to 2 hours of sleep. :(

Jenifur once wondered why time seemed to pass much faster now.

I attribute it to sleepiness. Back in school everyone was good and sober and came home in the afternoon and went to sleep at 10pm and remembered how to program their VCR to record late night talk shows.

Nowadays we're complaining and being proud of staying awake for 48 hours, but for what? We're comparing eyebags and dunking teabags like it was a good thing.

Time goes faster when you're sleepy.

I can't even sleep past 10 hours! When I do get enough sleep, I find the day to be slower because everything is more vivid and I'm more aware of the time slowly creeping. Waiting for/in public transport is a chore only when you're wide awake. Smelly people and pervy oppurtunists only bother you when you're wide awake. Don't worry about missing your stop; routine will make your body clock instinctively wake you up one stop before.

I have a digital watch that has a countdown timer and a stopwatch so I will be awakened when I reach the bus stop. So what if you old fogeys think analogue watches are more classy, I value practicality and punctuality. Or I'm too sleepy to care.

I am now wide awake, and I can tell you this: Heightened consciousness is a real bother.

I received a ringtone last night, at 9pm. I accidentally pressed the right soft key of my Nokia 3350 and it was gone! I frantically searched my Tones menu for a way to retrieve it, and at least thank whoever it is who sent it for the ringtone. Unfortunately it was nowhere to be found.

I went to sleep wondering who this mystery ringtone sender was. Was she my secret admirer?

I woke up the next morning, and I received another ringtone. It was titled "Beautiful". I saved it, but there was no way to know who my secret admirer was!

Ah well, some of you with good old Nokias might be able to reconstruct it and find out what song this is:

Tempo: 180 bpm



Yes, it's monophonic. None of that fancy polyphonic stuff.

I slept at what was technically 5am Sunday. I woke up at 3pm for lunch, then went back to sleep. I woke up at 6am Monday. That makes 18 hours.

People can be so proud of staying awake for 72 hours, but whatever for? It's even harder to stay asleep that long. My phone beeped at 10pm. I woke up and struggled to get back to sleep on the 10th hour.

Man life sucks. I hung out with two girls and I was the lamppost.

Well it still beats hanging out with two guys and being the lamppost.

Originally written back in March 2005. I felt like blogging some filler.

I woke up this morning with a bad bad cold
I woke up this morning and boy was I feeling old
I woke up this morning or so I was told

I carried a shotgun to blow off his pale face skin
It took more than his skin, it blew his skull within
Forgive me oh please pa, I didn't wanna sin

I'd been more than keen to have seen what you've seen in him
Obscene he's not clean, the sheen on his spleen was dim

I should've just slapped him, for telling a lie
I should've just slapped him, for saying no in reply
I should've just slapped him, for it's a big mess when you die

I bumped into an old friend in a shopping mall, and this transpired a week later. His messages are in bold.

Hey
Hola!
Been wanting to tell you this for almost a week
Hola to you too...
Sup?
Hahahaha
So yes what do you wanna tell me?
Remember my ex-housemates who were with me at 1U the other day?
Yeah
Well, if it's any compliments, they think you're cute
BUT... with a queer for a straight guy moment...
They recommended that you should shave off the goatie
And I quote them "it makes him look weird"
How weird?
Are they your roomies from THAT SS2 house?
Hahaah... bingo
I dunno how weird, you go ask them yourself la..
LOL
I DO intend to actually, I think it's long enough to have proven its point, and I've probably impressed enough people as the "chinaman who can grow a beard"
What do YOU think?
Beard or no beard?
All I can say is...
I do agree with them
LOL...
(sorry, bro)
See, I wanna be attractive to girls not gays
It kinda makes you look like you're nowhere in between
Hahahaha
Trust me
If gays dun like it
Nowhere in between? In between what two extremes?

He didn't reply, so I went for lunch, and when I came back he was gone.

Oooh Friday night was fun, I bumped into old old friends all over Hartamas! So then, the verdict was made. Everybody saw the beard. It was time to go. Sorry Suanie!

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Left: Botak Chin. Right: Chinaman can grow beard you know.

Botak is Malay for bald, by the way.

On Saturday morning, nobody noticed! It seems that people notice that there was a beard, but nobody noticed that it was gone.

Ah well, there won't be any more Chinese chicks asking me for directions in Malay. :(

Edit: Ooh! Till the last day, my beard continued growing to my right. Weird. I thought it would eventually be heavy enough and let gravity pull it down.

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My friend is a racecar driver! Telltale signs are:

1) Red paint job, because red is a racy color
2) Removed rear seats to keep the weight down
3) An affixation for speeding down empty Kepong roads

Yes people, when you do 2) to your Kancil, you can really feel more horsepower. Serious.

I stole this from Fazri. The What Your Name Means (Numerology) test.

I agree with those in bold and disagree with those that have been struck out. My own comments are italicized.

There are 15 letters in your name. Those 15 letters total to 75. There are 6 vowels and 9 consonants in your name.

Your number is: 3
The characteristics of #3 are: Expression, verbalization, socialization, the arts, the joy of living.

The expression or destiny for #3:
An Expression of 3 produces a quest for destiny with words along a variety of lines that may include writing, speaking, singing, acting or teaching; our entertainers, writers, litigators, teachers, salesmen, and composers. You also have the destiny to sell yourself or sell just about any product that comes along. Sell out, maybe. You are imaginative in your presentation, and you may have creative talents in the arts, although these are more likely to be latent. You are an optimistic person that seems ever enthusiastic about life and living. You are friendly, loving and social, and people like you because you are charming and such a good conversationalist. Your ability to communicate may often inspire others. It is your role in life to inspire and motivate; to raise the spirits of those around you.

The negative side of number 3 Expression is superficiality. You may tend to scatter your forces and simply be too easygoing. It is advisable for the negative 3 to avoid dwelling on trivial matters, especially gossip. I don't like gossiping; it never contributed to the goodness of society.

Your Soul Urge number is: 7
A Soul Urge number of 7 means:
With a number 7 Soul Urge you are very fond of reading, (I don't read books!) and retreating to periods of being alone and away from the disruptions of the outer world. It happens not by choice that I'm alone and I usually have something to compose or take a picture of! You like to dream and develop your idealistic understandings, to study and analyze, to gain knowledge and wisdom. You may be too laid back and withdrawn to really succeed in the business world, and you will be much more comfortable in circumstances that are tolerant of your reserve, your analytical approach, and your desire to use your mind rather than your physical being.

You are very timid around people that you don't know very well, so much so at times that casual conversation and social situations can be strained. You tend to repress your emotions to the extent that some people have a good bit of difficult understanding you. You tend to be very selective with friends and you don't easily adapt to new environments or to new people very quickly. (This totally contradicts my charming and communicating conversationalist bit above! I'm not fussy and like adventure, sometimes.)

The negative traits of the 7 include becoming too much the introvert and isolated from others.

Your Inner Dream number is: 6
An Inner Dream number of 6 means:
You dream of guiding and fostering the perfect family in the perfect home. You crave the devotion from offspring and a loving spouse. You picture yourself in the center of a successful domestic unit.

And then there's the Birthday Calculator that says:

You entered: 19 December 1983; you were born on a Monday under the astrological sign Sagittarius. Your Life path number is 7.

The Julian calendar date of your birth is 2445687.5. The golden number for 1983 is 8. The epact number for 1983 is 16. The year 1983 was not a leap year.

As of 7/7/2005 8:31:40 PM CDT, you are 21 years old; 259 months old; 1,124 weeks old; 7,871 days old; 188,924 hours old; 11,335,471 minutes old; or 680,128,300 seconds old.

There are 165 days till your next birthday on which your cake will have 22 candles on it.

Those 22 candles produce 22 BTU's, or 5,544 calories of heat (that's only 5.5440 food Calories!). You can boil 2.51 US ounces of water with that many candles.

Your birthstone is Blue Zircon
The Mystical properties of Blue Zircon: Zircon helps one be more at peace with oneself. Some lists consider these stones to be your birthstone. (Birthstone lists come from Jewlers, Tibet, Ayurvedic Indian medicine, and other sources)
Blue Topaz, Ruby, Lapis Lazuli

Your birth tree is Fig Tree, the Sensibility
Very strong, a bit self-willed, independent, does not allow contradiction or arguments, loves life, its family, children and animals, a bit of a butterfly, good sense of humour, likes idleness and laziness, of practical talent and intelligence.

There are 171 days till Christmas 2005!

The moon's phase on the day you were born was full.

Hmmm, okay lah.

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Madness! I now have 5 sizes. The new one is second from right. It was wonderful once broken in, yielding my regular-sized speeds of 50-70 seconds. It even made me feel that regular-sized ones were a bit too big!

The biggest and smallest take 2 more minutes because of their size, and so I estimate that finishing them all would take 9 minutes.

From left: over 150% of an original-sized cube; 133% sized one; the original size; the new 83% one and a 55% sized one Warmpaw got me.

Look at your computer time. You are getting sleepy. Well I am sleepy but anyway.

Head over to Kamigoroshi's site and help him to raise money for the National Cancer Society of Malaysia.

I haven't done many things in years, including buying books, but I'll probably go out and get this:
Bunny Suicides (the link will die in a few days due to legal issues.)

I also haven't done quizzes of these nature:

You scored as Materialist. Materialism stresses the essence of fundamental particles. Everything that exists is purely physical matter and there is no special force that holds life together. You believe that anything can be explained by breaking it up into its pieces. i.e. the big picture can be understood by its smaller elements. Materialist 100% Modernist 94% Existentialist 94% Postmodernist 88% Cultural Creative 63% Idealist 56% Fundamentalist 50% Romanticist 44% What is Your World View? (updated) created with QuizFarm.com

I also watched War Of The Worlds, a good movie. Nice special effects, very neat lighting (in the beginning, notice how it has High Dynamic Range, something you'd see in Half-Life 2?) I actually watched it out of curiosity to see how much the ending could suck. But hey! It made sense, and I stood up, pointed and laughed at everybody who paid to see that movie. Then I realized I would have to laugh at myself too, it being the second movie I paid for this year. (Initial D being the first.) Why run to Boston? They drink tea unlike those Americans.

Edit: The girl in the movie was annoying. However she was not as annoying as this one guy who was on the phone in the cinema, standing at the back near a door. Just as the movie was getting to a lull, another guy told him off by shouting "OI! STFU!" (and we supported him) and actually walking up to the back of the cinema to ask him to get out of the cinema. That was cool. Cinemas could give free tickets to angry burly men to tell noisy people off. :D

Believe it or not, the newly renovated Xfresh fishtank has biometric technology. You press your face against the glass and it detects oil levels and shape, and lets you in.

Not.

We use the Cotag system where you hold your access pass against a tag reader (very much like Touch N Go) and it unlocks the door. For weeks, the door was not set up and could not lock, so anybody could just open the door. They fixed up the security recently so we now have to tag in.

Of course, a certain colleague (who shall not be named) forgot this. (Shows how often he comes in.)

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This is the view from outside the office. Notice that below the Xfresh logo in the top-right corner, there is an oily face print!

I saw this colleague smash into the glass with a thud.

"I forgot we had to tag in."

Well even in the old days before we had to, we'd use the handle (that shiny metal bar on the left), or if we were lazy we could use our hands to push. But to go headfirst?

For once, we can say, don't use your head.

No it's not me (my skin is so dry, the only place you can get oil using those blue oil wipes is by pressing on the blackheads on my nose.) No it's not Shaz either.