Finally got my package from DealExtreme. Just needed some replacements for the stuff I bought before.
One was the casing. I like the fake leather casing with the cover for the screen, and I accidentally dropped and broke it.
The other was the stylus. It's coming apart. It probably will still last for a month at least, maybe even forever, but I'm getting a spare just in case. Nothing to lose. This thing only costs 3USD and can be used on any other touchscreens.
Speaking of which, I just saw this stylus being offered on some group discount website for S$10 in a package together with a screen protector for the iPhone. It's still cheaper to get them from DealExtreme.
Finally the screen protector. When I dropped the phone it also got scratched, so a new one is in order.
As for the new stuff, it's a simple Bluetooth headset that's really just a tiny Bluetooth mic-cum-earphone that I can hook on my ear.
It also turns out to be a Nokia knockoff, albeit a decent one. The only reason I think it's a fake is that the area where there's supposed to be a bar code, they just print the words "Bar Code" there instead.
Then again, maybe it's the real deal and that stores are supposed to paste bar code stickers on top of the printed words.
It's going to be useful because I keep my phone in my bag and I always can't hear the ringtone when I'm in the streets. If I turn the volume loud enough to be noticeable over the traffic noises, then it's far too loud when I'm indoors.
On the other hand, I just found a Bluetooth headset of the same size being offered on a group discount website for S$15 while this was bought at US$12-something.
Just a lesson that not everything is cheap on that website.
So now I've got CBBE mod, High-Res 4k CBBE Re-Texture mod, Killer Keos armour mod and Catwalk mod for Skyrim, this place is suddenly a much more interesting place to be in.
The only problem is that playing Skyrim now makes me want to fap.
All those comments about how netizens say stupid things are funny.
Funny because all those things being said online is basically the same as the things one would hear if one could listen to the remarks made by everyone, and not just the people near and within your social circles.
Now that's why people up at the top don't really listen to the masses as much as the masses would like. When they try and listen, they inevitably are going to hear some of the idiocy that even you find so damn annoying.
"The internet" is what you sound like to them.
The thing is, you're most likely wrong about those comments you think nobody would ever make in real life, except they're being said by nobody you know.
The world's a huge place despite the Internet. Even in a tiny country like Singapore there are communities that I've never been in contact with.
Haven't been blogging because I wasn't in the mood. Steroids stopped working.
Anyhow, bought SPAZ for US$3.99 after playing the demo. Not a particularly awesome game, but it's a good deal at that price. There are far more expensive forms of entertainment that I can think of.
Compare this to a movie ticket. S$10 for 90mins would be S$6.67 per hour.
US$3.99 is between S$5.20 to S$6. If the game entertains me for over an hour, it would be a better deal than visiting the cinemas.
And I'm not even including the cost of transport, food and laundry.
As for food, I just learnt that Popeye's is offering islandwide delivery. Not a bad idea. Their mashed potato is better than KFC's after all.
Not now of course. I've got to spend less on deliveries now. Heck, I've got to just spend less now.
Just realized I've got less than the desired amount of capital in my bank account for my business. This means I may have to eat into the money my father left me.
I'm not taking any money for myself from the business this year. Left all the excess to my bro because it's likely that he won't get anymore in the near future.
It's obviously still unconfirmed, but I think he's not going to join me. It's not a completely good or bad thing. Having someone less absent-minded than me here that I can trust would be nice, but there is simply not enough money both for his family and myself in the future.
Moreover, my parents' families have bad histories involving money and siblings. It could be in the genes.
I'll just have to find a way to get around this issue of mine, probably by noting everything down all the time.
After reading the article on twins studies in this month's National Geographic Magazine, I think a lot of it makes sense.
For example, they found that difference between our IQs are 75% inherited makes sense. I mean, almost everyone in the ancient days believed in heriditary rule. It can't solely be because the kings, chiefs or whatever are able to provide a better environment for their offsprings to cultivate future rulers.
Furthermore, incest was pretty common among the rulers of many civilizations, eg Japan until recently. If it was just about "nurture" instead of "nature", adoptions would have been just as common.
There has to be some form of wisdom in it if so many are doing it.
But there's also another factor called epigenetics, which is the degree to which the genetic "instructions" are followed.
This is affected by things like stress in the womb (like if the pregnant woman gets robbed?), and makes even identical twins slightly different even though they have the same DNA.
One thing that brought me some relief was that the probability of several diseases being hereditary was not high, including diabetes and breast cancer.
I think it's obvious why I'd welcome this news.
Friday 27 January 2012
Wednesday 25 January 2012
Rant 931 / Rusty Flesh
The game's really not as awesome as it looks.
If an extraterrestial being gets its hands (or tentacles) on a sheet of printed document, will it try to decipher the meaning behind the symbols or the arrangement of the microscopic inkblots?
There are three equally wealthy philantropists who did the exact same things for charity.
One did them for both public recognition and tax incentives.
The second did them in the belief that he will be rewarded in the afterlife.
The third did them because he pitied the poor.
Nobody ever finds out their true motives.
To the rest of the world, who is the best man?
Man is a creature of ironies. People who stick to their principles throughout their lives are respected because they're rare.
It's just simpler to live with contradictory beliefs.
For example, freedom. They want freedom, yet they also want the security provided by freedom-restricting laws.
For example, money. They want money, which is a physical representation of their productive efforts, yet they don't want to work for it if given a choice.
For example, politics. The vote is meant to represent the (free) will of the people, yet fortunes are spent to tell them who the best person to vote for is... and it works!
Man is a creature of ironies. Deal with it.
Now we see why that Norwegian guy Anders Behring Breivik went on a killing spree last year. Those prisoners have nicer homes than I do!
Sunday 22 January 2012
Rant 930 / Ancient Watermelons
Tried Popeye's chicken.
Their mashed potato is better than that of KFC's but their chicken really isn't unique in any way.
Their spicy fried shrimps are very salty and not very impressive, although it's still better than KFC since that franchise doesn't even have their fish burger anymore in the seafood category.
EDIT: Just found out KFC brought back its Fish Ole burger again, though probably just for the CNY festival.
Tried Recettear. Pretty interesting game. The translation can be a little poor at times but it's mostly fine.
For example, Tear says," Merde," all the time.
It's French for "shit" and is also an expletive.
I don't believe they say that in Japanese, which is the language spoken in the game. Also, anglophones simply don't say "merde" all the time.
Gameplay is a mix of action RPG and simple number guessing.
This game is about an item shop. Instead of playing as the heroic adventurer, you're the person selling equipment and other items to him.
You start off by buying items from a supplier and placing them on your shelves. Placement is important because items displayed at the window tend to sell better.
Selling itself is a number guessing game because it involves a form of haggling.
A customers would come to you asking for the price to a certain item on display, and you quote a price. He makes a comment, then you quote a lower price till he agrees or he quits.
Next you get to recommend items to customers who don't know what exactly they want. They would come to you asking for a type of item and you would search your inventory for something relevant before moving on to the haggling process.
After that you get customers who want to sell you their items, because in RPGs we always have junk loots to sell.
This part is actually quite humourous because of the things they say to explain why they're selling something.
For example,
WHAT KIND OF MAGICAL SANDWICH IS THIS THAT DOESN'T ROT AFTER ALL THIS TIME?
I don't even want to think about the amount of preservatives involved in the production of that ham.
I don't really want to imagine what kind of things they went through together...
Another one.
CAVE CHERRIES!
Not to mention all those wives nagging their husbands to buy swords and iron armour for them.
And the little girls selling me their cherries.
>:3
Finally you get advance orders that really make no sense to me.
These customers would come to you asking for "2 books in 3 days" or something like that. They do not agree on any of the following before leaving:
1) The titles of the books
2) The prices of the books
So basically they just want 2 random books reserved in advance, and they do not get them cheaper or more expensive than just buying them on the spot.
Seriously I'm just puzzled at how they can just do that, then when the day comes they tell me my price is too high even though what I quoted was not any higher than what I'd usually say.
Beyond the item shop, there is the part involving dungeons and monster-slaying.
You get to hire an adventurer and go with him to explore dungeons. You are supposedly protected by a magical field such that you and everything outside cannot interact with each other. However, the adventurer would not be protected, so he or she would be the one doing the killing and looting. You just watch and control him.
After that, you get free loot that you can sell. Moreover, some things that are requested can only be found in the dungeons.
As for plot, it's very short and kinda dark. Recette's father left one day to become an adventurer and never returned. Tear, a debt-collector, arrived some time later and informed her that she had to repay her father's debt in his absence.
Together, they opened a shop using Recette's home to sell things to adventurers who come to their town.
The game proper is very short but after the credits, the player is given an opportunity to save the Game Clear data. By loading this save file, the Endless Mode is started.
In this mode, it's the same as before except Recette no longer has to repay any debt. She just sells stuff forever.
There is also the option of New Game+, which means you get to replay the game using the items you had when you completed your previous run.
Finally, there is the Survival Mode, in which the debts never end and only goes higher every week.
Couldn't find any yu sheng at the Shop N Save, and the tze char stall that we used to frequent was closed since a month ago. I don't really know where to get it in my neighbourhood anymore.
Looks like we're not going to have yu sheng this Chinese New Year.
My mum asked me to arrange for a home visit again for the first day of Chinese New Year. I wonder if she realizes what she's asking.
We did that for Christmas Day. She didn't like it.
There's nothing to do at home. All she can do is lie on her bed for the entire stay, and it's difficult to feed her because we don't have one of those hospital beds that can push her up into the sitting position.
Moreover, it's not easy to come up with something she can eat since she's limited to soft foods.
Still, I've asked the nurses there to arrange for a round trip transport by ambulance. S$120 because it's a holiday.
I don't know what and how to feed her.
She ate lying down with some extra pillows under her the other time, but she's been weakening every day. I'm not sure if it's alright to let her do that again.
I'm not even sure if she's going to remember that she asked for this home visit tomorrow.
We'll come up with something, as we always do.
I just wonder what her reaction will be when she finds out there is no yu sheng.
EDIT: Bought one set from the newer NTUC at Clementi Mall. It was the last set with fish. All the other remaining sets were vegetarian.
Their mashed potato is better than that of KFC's but their chicken really isn't unique in any way.
Their spicy fried shrimps are very salty and not very impressive, although it's still better than KFC since that franchise doesn't even have their fish burger anymore in the seafood category.
EDIT: Just found out KFC brought back its Fish Ole burger again, though probably just for the CNY festival.
Tried Recettear. Pretty interesting game. The translation can be a little poor at times but it's mostly fine.
For example, Tear says," Merde," all the time.
It's French for "shit" and is also an expletive.
I don't believe they say that in Japanese, which is the language spoken in the game. Also, anglophones simply don't say "merde" all the time.
Gameplay is a mix of action RPG and simple number guessing.
This game is about an item shop. Instead of playing as the heroic adventurer, you're the person selling equipment and other items to him.
You start off by buying items from a supplier and placing them on your shelves. Placement is important because items displayed at the window tend to sell better.
Selling itself is a number guessing game because it involves a form of haggling.
A customers would come to you asking for the price to a certain item on display, and you quote a price. He makes a comment, then you quote a lower price till he agrees or he quits.
Next you get to recommend items to customers who don't know what exactly they want. They would come to you asking for a type of item and you would search your inventory for something relevant before moving on to the haggling process.
After that you get customers who want to sell you their items, because in RPGs we always have junk loots to sell.
This part is actually quite humourous because of the things they say to explain why they're selling something.
For example,
WHAT KIND OF MAGICAL SANDWICH IS THIS THAT DOESN'T ROT AFTER ALL THIS TIME?
I don't even want to think about the amount of preservatives involved in the production of that ham.
I don't really want to imagine what kind of things they went through together...
Another one.
CAVE CHERRIES!
Not to mention all those wives nagging their husbands to buy swords and iron armour for them.
And the little girls selling me their cherries.
>:3
Finally you get advance orders that really make no sense to me.
These customers would come to you asking for "2 books in 3 days" or something like that. They do not agree on any of the following before leaving:
1) The titles of the books
2) The prices of the books
So basically they just want 2 random books reserved in advance, and they do not get them cheaper or more expensive than just buying them on the spot.
Seriously I'm just puzzled at how they can just do that, then when the day comes they tell me my price is too high even though what I quoted was not any higher than what I'd usually say.
Beyond the item shop, there is the part involving dungeons and monster-slaying.
You get to hire an adventurer and go with him to explore dungeons. You are supposedly protected by a magical field such that you and everything outside cannot interact with each other. However, the adventurer would not be protected, so he or she would be the one doing the killing and looting. You just watch and control him.
After that, you get free loot that you can sell. Moreover, some things that are requested can only be found in the dungeons.
As for plot, it's very short and kinda dark. Recette's father left one day to become an adventurer and never returned. Tear, a debt-collector, arrived some time later and informed her that she had to repay her father's debt in his absence.
Together, they opened a shop using Recette's home to sell things to adventurers who come to their town.
The game proper is very short but after the credits, the player is given an opportunity to save the Game Clear data. By loading this save file, the Endless Mode is started.
In this mode, it's the same as before except Recette no longer has to repay any debt. She just sells stuff forever.
There is also the option of New Game+, which means you get to replay the game using the items you had when you completed your previous run.
Finally, there is the Survival Mode, in which the debts never end and only goes higher every week.
Couldn't find any yu sheng at the Shop N Save, and the tze char stall that we used to frequent was closed since a month ago. I don't really know where to get it in my neighbourhood anymore.
Looks like we're not going to have yu sheng this Chinese New Year.
My mum asked me to arrange for a home visit again for the first day of Chinese New Year. I wonder if she realizes what she's asking.
We did that for Christmas Day. She didn't like it.
There's nothing to do at home. All she can do is lie on her bed for the entire stay, and it's difficult to feed her because we don't have one of those hospital beds that can push her up into the sitting position.
Moreover, it's not easy to come up with something she can eat since she's limited to soft foods.
Still, I've asked the nurses there to arrange for a round trip transport by ambulance. S$120 because it's a holiday.
I don't know what and how to feed her.
She ate lying down with some extra pillows under her the other time, but she's been weakening every day. I'm not sure if it's alright to let her do that again.
I'm not even sure if she's going to remember that she asked for this home visit tomorrow.
We'll come up with something, as we always do.
I just wonder what her reaction will be when she finds out there is no yu sheng.
EDIT: Bought one set from the newer NTUC at Clementi Mall. It was the last set with fish. All the other remaining sets were vegetarian.
Friday 20 January 2012
Rant 929 / Whoever Says There Is No Freedom Of Speech In The PRC Doesn't Know What He's Talking About.
Best thing is that that guy is a professor in Peking University.
At 6:00 he also managed to insult Singaporeans and Hongkongers at the same time.
This man's PhD is probably in Trolling, because he's seriously good at it.
How can I tell?
His arguments are all incredibly offensive and yet contain no legitimate reasoning. Even if someone wants to debate his answers, there's really nothing to discuss.
EDIT: Whoa! Youtube took it down for violating its hate speech policy. Fortunately it's on Yahoo! News now.
Clearly real men are lawless barbarians. Listen to him! This guy has a PhD, so he can't be wrong!
In a talk show on Internet news site V1.cn last week, Chinese-language professor Kong Qingdong, who was also a guest commentator, was asked to discuss a recent heated exchange involving some Hong Kong locals and a mainland Chinese family.
A report in The Straits Times quoted Kong as saying, “If a society had to maintain its order through strict laws such as hefty fines for littering, as happened in Singapore, its 'law-abiding' look does not reflect the true nature of its people,” he said. “Instead, it shows they are a servile bunch who can be whipped into line.”
Also, it's been reposted elsewhere in Youtube so I'll re-embed it here.
FYI kings only fart xenon. Truefax.
I like the idea of staggering school opening hours to spread out the human traffic across Singapore.
In fact, why not change the time zone of half the island so that the eastern half of Singapore is in GMT +9?
Want to reach Changi from Pasir Ris at 9am? Leave home at 9am!
Megaupload was taken down by US authorities for piracy.
To make this case even more noteworthy, it's been endorsed by multiple celebrities like Kanye West and Alicia Keys. There's actually a music video for Megaupload on Youtube featuring them.
In fact, the CEO of Megaupload is the latter's husband.
In other words, the artists themselves don't actually matter in this piracy issue, since the guys in charge don't actually care who or what they approve of.
Rant 928 / Why Can't I Hold All These Cards?
So I got 3 new cards this week, 2 free and 1 cheap.
First was the PAssion card that cost me S$12 for a 5-year membership. The main attraction for me here is the really tiny rebates and discounts it offers for several supermarkets, including Shop N Save.
The rebates are very little: 1 point per dollar spent, and 150 points for a rebate of one dollar.
In other words, S$1 rebate per S$150 spent, excluding all the cents in every transaction.
This alone isn't worth S$12 even if it's over 5 years, but there are also the other little discounts that may become useful over the years.
To recoup my $12, I'll have to spend $150 * 12 = $1800 over 5 years, or an average of $360 a year, or $30 per month at these supermarkets excluding all the coins involved.
Maybe it's not so bad... I spend like $10 a month just on rice alone at Shop N Save.
Second card to arrive was the Maybank ATM card. It didn't actually "arrive" because I went to Maybank to get it.
I initially wanted to get the iSAVvy savings account, but the banker recommended their normal savings account if all I wanted was to set up that fixed deposit.
So I followed his advice, let him set up a SaveUp account for me for free, then applied for the FD a few hours ago.
1.35% p.a. for 2 years! How can anyone interested in fixed deposits in Singapore (aka time deposits) resist? That's even better than Hong Leong's rates unless you're a frickin millionaire!
Furthermore, all bank deposits in most banks here are only insured up to 50,000 SGD, and I care about this little detail that nobody talks about.
I like safety nets.
So even if I'm a millionaire, I wouldn't want to put all my money in a single bank. Heck, I wouldn't place my million in fixed deposits in the first place.
This is just a Maybank ATM card with just above $500 to cover the minimum sum so that I don't get that stupid "monthly service fee".
The difference between this and what would have happened if I opened an iSAVvy savings account is that when the maturity date comes, Maybank will give me the cashier's order for free and not charge me the S$10-15 fee that iSAvvy account holders have to pay.
The pros of the latter includes the free insurance that comes with the account.
The SaveUp account is basically... nothingness. Its list of benefits is emptier than that of my DBS Visa debit card, which has almost nothing.
This feels like a comparison between vacuum and our exosphere.
Finally, my POSB Go! card. Like my DBS Platinum Visa debit card, this POSB Go! Mastercard debit card has almost nothing and charges almost nothing. No annual fee and stuff.
The only regular fee would be the one I'm going to have to pay to have it replaced when it expires.
Best of all, they're both using the same account, so all I need to care about is which card has the less minute discount.
But TBH they're both just glorified ATM cards with different names.
The most important different for me is that the Visa card has healthcare-related discounts while the other has... nothing that the Visa card lacks.
LOL!
This card shall be cancelled when it expires unless something useful is offered exclusively for it.
At least it's free, so I lose nothing.
The healthcare discounts are important because it's becoming a good idea for me to go for health screening regularly for the rest of my life when my parents are either dead or dying from cancer.
First was the PAssion card that cost me S$12 for a 5-year membership. The main attraction for me here is the really tiny rebates and discounts it offers for several supermarkets, including Shop N Save.
The rebates are very little: 1 point per dollar spent, and 150 points for a rebate of one dollar.
In other words, S$1 rebate per S$150 spent, excluding all the cents in every transaction.
This alone isn't worth S$12 even if it's over 5 years, but there are also the other little discounts that may become useful over the years.
To recoup my $12, I'll have to spend $150 * 12 = $1800 over 5 years, or an average of $360 a year, or $30 per month at these supermarkets excluding all the coins involved.
Maybe it's not so bad... I spend like $10 a month just on rice alone at Shop N Save.
Second card to arrive was the Maybank ATM card. It didn't actually "arrive" because I went to Maybank to get it.
I initially wanted to get the iSAVvy savings account, but the banker recommended their normal savings account if all I wanted was to set up that fixed deposit.
So I followed his advice, let him set up a SaveUp account for me for free, then applied for the FD a few hours ago.
1.35% p.a. for 2 years! How can anyone interested in fixed deposits in Singapore (aka time deposits) resist? That's even better than Hong Leong's rates unless you're a frickin millionaire!
Furthermore, all bank deposits in most banks here are only insured up to 50,000 SGD, and I care about this little detail that nobody talks about.
I like safety nets.
So even if I'm a millionaire, I wouldn't want to put all my money in a single bank. Heck, I wouldn't place my million in fixed deposits in the first place.
This is just a Maybank ATM card with just above $500 to cover the minimum sum so that I don't get that stupid "monthly service fee".
The difference between this and what would have happened if I opened an iSAVvy savings account is that when the maturity date comes, Maybank will give me the cashier's order for free and not charge me the S$10-15 fee that iSAvvy account holders have to pay.
The pros of the latter includes the free insurance that comes with the account.
The SaveUp account is basically... nothingness. Its list of benefits is emptier than that of my DBS Visa debit card, which has almost nothing.
This feels like a comparison between vacuum and our exosphere.
Finally, my POSB Go! card. Like my DBS Platinum Visa debit card, this POSB Go! Mastercard debit card has almost nothing and charges almost nothing. No annual fee and stuff.
The only regular fee would be the one I'm going to have to pay to have it replaced when it expires.
Best of all, they're both using the same account, so all I need to care about is which card has the less minute discount.
But TBH they're both just glorified ATM cards with different names.
The most important different for me is that the Visa card has healthcare-related discounts while the other has... nothing that the Visa card lacks.
LOL!
This card shall be cancelled when it expires unless something useful is offered exclusively for it.
At least it's free, so I lose nothing.
The healthcare discounts are important because it's becoming a good idea for me to go for health screening regularly for the rest of my life when my parents are either dead or dying from cancer.
Thursday 19 January 2012
Rant 927 / Firestarter
So every morning when this man Mark Easton goes to his balcony, he's going to have a slightly different but still beautiful view.
Like 18inches would have made any difference from that distance.
This guy just managed to piss off his neighbour without accomplishing anything.
Our PAP is going for brains, and our opposition parties are going for heart.
The former wants the best minds in the government; the latter wants the most sincere.
That's the impression I've been getting from all the political crap that's being forced into my eyes.
All heart and no brain won't help the country to excel. Case in point: CSJ.
All brain and no heart is risky but when it works, it works wonders. Even if a politician is all about the money, if he's smart he will still see that a prospering country is the way to go.
Of course, if the defecation hits the oscillation, then he becomes totally unreliable.
That's exactly what the PAP risks, although they obviously are trying to minimize the probability of that with the amount of brains they're trying to attract with the money.
The worst part of the article was really the last line:
"Of course, we would like to see capable men and women in the cabinet, but we do not believe that our best people for political office are only those who make the most money,"
I'm frankly surprised that Chen Show Mao could say that. Most people would be more subtle about it but this guy just goes for the ears of the lower income demographics blatantly.
That's not a bad thing, just... lacking in sublety. Opposition parties just don't have a chance at attracting the support of the upper and upper-middle class here, and obviously they need to start somewhere.
Personally I just think that too many people out there expect quick changes and instant gratification when there's a change in leadership. It's the same everywhere globally.
The more people involved, the greater the inertia.
Hence the key is to watch out for the smallest issues before they grow into big ones.
This is the reason why too many politicians fail IMO. They wait till problems become visible to everyone before they try and solve it.
This is also the reason why the current government is receiving so much flak these days. Some of them just didn't manage to solve issues before they become issues, and the PM is responsible for picking them in the first place.
But a change of ministers doesn't make things happen immediately. Trains need time to get built. They don't make them and store them in some humongous warehouse until someone comes over to buy them.
I think the best example would be Obama. The Americans seemed to have been expecting a frickin magic show when they voted for him.
It's just sad that so many Singaporeans seem to be hell-bent on getting the PAP out of the arena.
But all these anger wouldn't have been voiced so often if the global economy was better. Wealth silences issues. When your bellys are full, your wallets are fat and your families are able to get easy well-paid jobs, who cares about... anything?
Just look at Brunei!
Prices of daily necessities, especially food, affects everything. When they go up, it exacerbates any and every issue. Notice how politics changed everywhere when the global economy began to screw up in the last few years?
You can blame China for jacking up the prices of everything, but that wouldn't solve anything.
The world just needs to adapt.
And Singaporeans need to understand the fact that since we have no natural resources, we need to be better than the rest just to be as good as the rest.
I guess it's also about trust.
Simpler people like people they can trust.
People who are more complicated do not need to trust - they just manipulate. Manipulated people are trustworthy to a certain degree, and the manipulator knows exactly how much.
Hence the difference in views.
In the case of the ministerial pay, it's about manipulation using money. Greedy people are the most trustworthy when you can afford their services - you can always trust them to do their best when you have the cash.
Reality is reality. The rhetoric about serving the public being something people want is nonsense to the majority of the world. There are far easier ways to do that that have less impact on their private lives and their public image and are just as gratifying, like offering pro bono law-related services for the poor (apparently they do exist in Singapore and they visit my mum's hospice regularly).
Why else would Mother Teresa be considered as such a great person? People who purely desire to help others are just too rare. They're like perfectly rounded white pearls, or huge natural pristine diamonds - it's just wiser to assume that they're not real until verified by someone you can trust.
I guess this is my way of saying that I just trust greed more in this capitalistic society I live in. It's simply a fact that there are far more greedy people in this world than honest ones.
I'm almost done with Skyrim. I've defeated Alduin once and I think it's going to be the end soon.
Hence I'm diverting my attention to side quests.
I've just completed the quest line in the College of Winterhold. Now I also have this mysterious wooden mask that I found someone out in the open near the entrance of the final dungeon of this quest.
I think I'm supposed to wear it to start a quest.
Also finished the quest about Crimson Nirnroots. Totally wasn't worth the effect but the exploration was fun. This quest basically makes you comb the entire cavern for red light.
At one point I felt too lazy to find the elevator to Blackreach so I used the tcl command to fly. As a result I found some Dwemer treasure up on a mountain near the Alftand Rift Entrance. The weight wasn't worth the price (25 for 888g IIRC), so I just left it there.
I found it intriguing because most Dwemer treasures are indoor, but those stuff were left exposed to the elements.
...
Nvm. Killed Alduin. He's nothing compared to the two dragons guarding the portal.
The only reason I had to reload a single time for this fight was because the Storm Call shout apparently attacks my allies too.
Wow!
I didn't care much about SOPA before, but now I really do!
I depend on the various wikis hosted by Wikia for all my games, and Wikipedia for everything IRL, so when they're down, it's like I've reverted to the ignorant retard I once was.
I think I'm going to have to get used to actually asking someone about things I don't know now, instead of just googling everything.
D:
I feel so... primitive.
Yea I'm against SOPA, not that it actually matters since it's a US law, but I'm against anything the Wikimedia Foundation feels so strongly against.
Hosting a 24-hr blackout worldwide is a serious gesture. I now feel the magnitude of how they feel about SOPA.
Apparently 4chan is also blacking out... in a very different way. Every post made on 4chan is completely blacked out. Only by pointing the cursor on the words or by hitting Ctrl-A can they be read.
Oh wait... Wikipedia is still accessible. It's just a redirect, not a shutdown.
Foreign workers have indirectly widened the income gap in Singapore.
What will the PAP do about that?
“If the middle-class feels that you work so hard and then you try to move up the income ladder but then lo and behold, you‘re competing with all these permanent residents – where’s the home court advantage?”
I think this is the most important issue that they need to deal with now. The lower income groups have never received much attention from them. That's like the opposition's territory.
But the middle and upper classes are where the ruling party tries to get its votes from, so they'd better improve this "home court advantage" asap.
As much as we want this country to prosper through better efficiency, we must remember that this is a country, and a country will always have the burdens that a private corporation does not.
For one, it is one of a country's duties to provide jobs for its people, including those who are less able than the rest. A corporation does not need to care about jobs, just profits.
Holy cow!
My home's electricity consumption just dropped to a level I've never seen before in Dec!
Double digits!
What the heck?!
Of course it isn't exact. It's entirely possible it was reduced from a higher reading to compensate for an overestimation in November. The readings are taken only every alternate month, and November's reading was an estimation based on our records.
It's mainly because my bro and I didn't turn on the air conditioners at all since somewhere in November till Monday. I still have yet to do so even though it's been getting warm again.
I had no idea it makes such a huge difference.
I've tried not switching it on at all myself but the drop was nowhere as large.
I guess the main thing is the compressor. If one of us turns it on, it doesn't really matter as much whether the rest of us follow suit.
Another thing is that this proves that the electricity consumption rates of our computers are nothing compared to those of our air conditioners because our computer usage has not changed dramatically. At most it's only gone down by half.
Rising cost of living?
Pfft...
This month's reading rose so much because it's an estimate again. However, it may turn out to be close or even too low because it's getting too warm on some nights now. Pretty early IMO. Shortest "winter" I've ever seen.
Last year I remember complaining about warmth only in March or February.
I guess CNY is the only long holiday I'll be getting from now on.
The official public holiday for this festival in Singapore only lasts for 2 days, but unofficially plenty of people have holidays for much longer.
For example, the boss of one of the transport companies we work with is only coming back on the first of February.
For my side, my employees are off from tomorrow (half day) onwards till the 30th, although personally whether these days are holidays depends on what crops up when and how urgent they are.
I'd love to state what happens if everything goes smoothly, but after these few months of handling the business, I can safely say that it never does.
After all, a large part of being a boss is to solve problems, while the people under him does the actual work. If problems rarely appear, bosses would be unnecessary.
In my case, I won't have anyone doing anything for me till the 30th, so that makes things a little worse.
I also see any potential issue during this period as a test to see if I can actually handle things without my workers, something which I've always been curious about.
Tuesday 17 January 2012
Rant 926 / In The Land Of The Blind, Nobody Wears Clothes But Everyone Wears Lower Body Armour.
Finally went back to Skyrim. Being a sneaky archer is too easy in most situations that do not involve a dragon.
When fighting a dragon, however, I'm just a simple archer.
Anyway, that's not really hard as long as I stock up plenty of food and potions, and make it a point to keep a certain distance away from it.
Even Alduin was easy when I did that.
Meanwhile, I'm observing that Lydia, my NPC companion, is using all sorts of weaponry to aid in my fights, including bows-and-arrows, shield-and-sword, and double magical staves.
Impressive.
As my personal human pack mule, she has access to the entire arsenal of weapons I looted from various dungeons. I just didn't know she could use them all.
So a cashier's order of mine got lost in the mail.
Pretty serious problem.
I was trying to open a Maybank fixed deposit, but first I had to get an iSAVvy savings account.
So I sent the required documents plus this cashier's order sealed within an envelope that's provided by Maybank itself online. I just had to print it out and fold it properly and postage is on the house.
Then it vanished somewhere in the postal system.
I called Maybank last week, and on Friday, they called me to say that they had checked and nothing from me was received.
That was a pretty big issue but I wasn't concerned about the money being stolen. The main issue was that the money must be recovered immediately and I have to set up everything by Chinese New Year if possible.
The payee was myself so no one else could have used it.
On Saturday, I visited the nearest branch of the bank that issued this cheque and it took a bit of explaining and waiting before I was allowed to request for a replacement. I believe having the receipt with me also helped smoothen the process.
Took one working day before they agreed to cancel the old one and issue me a new cheque on the following working day.
And it's going to cost another S$15 on top of the S$10 that I paid for the first cashier's order.
Not really a problem because the interest from Maybank should cover that, but money wasted is still money wasted.
This time, I'm going to Maybank personally to set up everything.
Jagged Alliance: Back in Action turns out to be a remake of the old game.
I like that.
I never completed the original game mainly because the graphics was a big turnoff. However you want to think about it, graphics (and packaging in general) plays a big part in attracting people and keeping their attention.
It doesn't have to be as good as what we have today because that's going to be old in the future.
It just needs to be better than what we had.
How hard can it be to create a FB event?
Bought some clothes for myself for the first time in my life. In the past, I can seriously wear faded/worn clothes for anything, hence it's always my mum who buys new clothes for me.
Now I need new polo shirts for work. Not button-down shirts because I'm too awesome for that.
Since one shop I'm working with is offering 30% discount for most brands of clothings, I decided to buy some.
I do have some extra shirts in my cupboard but I decided I should buy a few more for two reasons.
First, it's auspicious to buy new pants and probably new shirts for the New Year.
Second, I thought I should get something other than the plain ones that I have and also try out other fabrics at the same time.
In the end, I got two Crocodile shirts for S$180, which is the discounted price.
It was painful but it had to be done.
One was made of "Supima Cotton". It's just American cotton as far as I know. Not sure if I'm supposed to be able to tell the difference between this and the other types.
The other was just mercerised cotton. It looks glossier and feels smoother than normal cotton fabric.
Actually I was shopping around without looking at the price tags. The most important thing to me, initially, was the appearance, or the colour and style.
It was only when the salesperson was searching for the second one for me that I looked and saw that they all exceeded S$100 each.
Stopped there immediately.
Also bought underwear instead of pants to save cost. Both works for the auspicious part.
Now I also got a free pearl for spending over S$50 there. It's quite literally just a pink drop pearl that hasn't been worked on yet and doesn't even come with packaging, most likely because the shop that was giving them away was expecting people to want their pearls in the form of jewellry.
I just took the pearl, rejected all the offers and walked off.
Now I'm not sure what I should do with it. I don't know if it's even real.
Anyway, these shirts better last long.
When fighting a dragon, however, I'm just a simple archer.
The dragon sees all!
Anyway, that's not really hard as long as I stock up plenty of food and potions, and make it a point to keep a certain distance away from it.
Even Alduin was easy when I did that.
Meanwhile, I'm observing that Lydia, my NPC companion, is using all sorts of weaponry to aid in my fights, including bows-and-arrows, shield-and-sword, and double magical staves.
Impressive.
As my personal human pack mule, she has access to the entire arsenal of weapons I looted from various dungeons. I just didn't know she could use them all.
So a cashier's order of mine got lost in the mail.
Pretty serious problem.
I was trying to open a Maybank fixed deposit, but first I had to get an iSAVvy savings account.
So I sent the required documents plus this cashier's order sealed within an envelope that's provided by Maybank itself online. I just had to print it out and fold it properly and postage is on the house.
Then it vanished somewhere in the postal system.
I called Maybank last week, and on Friday, they called me to say that they had checked and nothing from me was received.
That was a pretty big issue but I wasn't concerned about the money being stolen. The main issue was that the money must be recovered immediately and I have to set up everything by Chinese New Year if possible.
The payee was myself so no one else could have used it.
On Saturday, I visited the nearest branch of the bank that issued this cheque and it took a bit of explaining and waiting before I was allowed to request for a replacement. I believe having the receipt with me also helped smoothen the process.
Took one working day before they agreed to cancel the old one and issue me a new cheque on the following working day.
And it's going to cost another S$15 on top of the S$10 that I paid for the first cashier's order.
Not really a problem because the interest from Maybank should cover that, but money wasted is still money wasted.
This time, I'm going to Maybank personally to set up everything.
Jagged Alliance: Back in Action turns out to be a remake of the old game.
I like that.
I never completed the original game mainly because the graphics was a big turnoff. However you want to think about it, graphics (and packaging in general) plays a big part in attracting people and keeping their attention.
It doesn't have to be as good as what we have today because that's going to be old in the future.
It just needs to be better than what we had.
How hard can it be to create a FB event?
Bought some clothes for myself for the first time in my life. In the past, I can seriously wear faded/worn clothes for anything, hence it's always my mum who buys new clothes for me.
Now I need new polo shirts for work. Not button-down shirts because I'm too awesome for that.
Since one shop I'm working with is offering 30% discount for most brands of clothings, I decided to buy some.
I do have some extra shirts in my cupboard but I decided I should buy a few more for two reasons.
First, it's auspicious to buy new pants and probably new shirts for the New Year.
Second, I thought I should get something other than the plain ones that I have and also try out other fabrics at the same time.
In the end, I got two Crocodile shirts for S$180, which is the discounted price.
It was painful but it had to be done.
One was made of "Supima Cotton". It's just American cotton as far as I know. Not sure if I'm supposed to be able to tell the difference between this and the other types.
The other was just mercerised cotton. It looks glossier and feels smoother than normal cotton fabric.
Actually I was shopping around without looking at the price tags. The most important thing to me, initially, was the appearance, or the colour and style.
It was only when the salesperson was searching for the second one for me that I looked and saw that they all exceeded S$100 each.
Stopped there immediately.
Also bought underwear instead of pants to save cost. Both works for the auspicious part.
Now I also got a free pearl for spending over S$50 there. It's quite literally just a pink drop pearl that hasn't been worked on yet and doesn't even come with packaging, most likely because the shop that was giving them away was expecting people to want their pearls in the form of jewellry.
I just took the pearl, rejected all the offers and walked off.
Now I'm not sure what I should do with it. I don't know if it's even real.
Anyway, these shirts better last long.
Monday 16 January 2012
Rant 925 / Winter Has Ended.
Work!
D:
Everybody's closing shop next week, so I've got complete everything before Wednesday.
Tomorrow, Monday, I'm going to be busy.
New goods arrived in Singapore on Saturday, and I was told to expect the delivery tomorrow. Due to the quantity, I'll have to lend a hand to unpack/arrange them.
But I had already booked an appointment with a buyer in the afternoon.
To make things worse, I need a haircut badly. At this rate, I'll be unable to leave for work till 11am.
That's alright, I guess. I'll go for the appointment before going back to help them with the goods. I'll just have to ask if I can go earlier.
I've also begun to catalogue all my goods. I think I'll settle most of the work during the New Year holidays. I won't be having much to do anyway.
I know I should have done this long ago but I didn't realize its importance until now. My mum did tell me to do this months before she was hospitalized but I wasn't informed of its purposes. If I didn't know how many sweaters I have, I can just find the list or ask the workers... or so I thought.
I actually prefer to work alone in the office when they're not around. They love to interrupt me when I'm working in the office.
I kinda miss those days when I can get my holidays to myself, unlike now. These days, I get business calls on weekends regularly. Seriously, nothing is sacred to some people.
Want to get an afternoon nap on Saturday? No, we need to ask if you're going to pay me before Chinese New Year.
Want to have a Skyrim marathon on Sunday? No, I need to check if you've received our latest shipment, and if you have any comments for the samples I sent you earlier.
Want to sleep late on Saturday? No, I need to inform you at eight in the bloody morning that your goods have arrived and we'll be delivering them on Monday.
Then again, I no longer have exams. That pretty much trumps everything I can complain about today.
My bro wants a complete replacement of our air-conditioning system.
D:
Costs over S$2000.
D: D:
I'm far more inclined to spend 10% of that for either a 2nd-hand unit for his room or a repair.
Mainly it's because my unit and the compressor are perfectly fine.
Then again, neither option has worked for long for his room. For some reason his unit's the most problematic one, even though my mum used to switch her's to a lower temperature and higher fan speed.
Maybe I should consider his idea since the cheaper alternatives don't seem to be working very well.
Still, 2k.
If I do buy it, I'll need to ask for an extended warranty if available.
Made more roast chicken again. Same success. So it wasn't by random chance.
Used more rosemary and less basil, and set the temperature to 180 throughout.
Less blackened skin and just as well-cooked. Best of all, still no dry patches of flesh, probably due to the basting.
My bro's gf also made a batch of almond cookies that are really good.
Too bad I can't eat too much of them. Only had two today. Got to compensate for the roast chickens I've been having.
I still need to lose 1 more kilogram by next month to get out of IPT.
D:
Everybody's closing shop next week, so I've got complete everything before Wednesday.
Tomorrow, Monday, I'm going to be busy.
New goods arrived in Singapore on Saturday, and I was told to expect the delivery tomorrow. Due to the quantity, I'll have to lend a hand to unpack/arrange them.
But I had already booked an appointment with a buyer in the afternoon.
To make things worse, I need a haircut badly. At this rate, I'll be unable to leave for work till 11am.
That's alright, I guess. I'll go for the appointment before going back to help them with the goods. I'll just have to ask if I can go earlier.
I've also begun to catalogue all my goods. I think I'll settle most of the work during the New Year holidays. I won't be having much to do anyway.
I know I should have done this long ago but I didn't realize its importance until now. My mum did tell me to do this months before she was hospitalized but I wasn't informed of its purposes. If I didn't know how many sweaters I have, I can just find the list or ask the workers... or so I thought.
I actually prefer to work alone in the office when they're not around. They love to interrupt me when I'm working in the office.
I kinda miss those days when I can get my holidays to myself, unlike now. These days, I get business calls on weekends regularly. Seriously, nothing is sacred to some people.
Want to get an afternoon nap on Saturday? No, we need to ask if you're going to pay me before Chinese New Year.
Want to have a Skyrim marathon on Sunday? No, I need to check if you've received our latest shipment, and if you have any comments for the samples I sent you earlier.
Want to sleep late on Saturday? No, I need to inform you at eight in the bloody morning that your goods have arrived and we'll be delivering them on Monday.
Then again, I no longer have exams. That pretty much trumps everything I can complain about today.
My bro wants a complete replacement of our air-conditioning system.
D:
Costs over S$2000.
D: D:
I'm far more inclined to spend 10% of that for either a 2nd-hand unit for his room or a repair.
Mainly it's because my unit and the compressor are perfectly fine.
Then again, neither option has worked for long for his room. For some reason his unit's the most problematic one, even though my mum used to switch her's to a lower temperature and higher fan speed.
Maybe I should consider his idea since the cheaper alternatives don't seem to be working very well.
Still, 2k.
If I do buy it, I'll need to ask for an extended warranty if available.
Made more roast chicken again. Same success. So it wasn't by random chance.
Used more rosemary and less basil, and set the temperature to 180 throughout.
Less blackened skin and just as well-cooked. Best of all, still no dry patches of flesh, probably due to the basting.
My bro's gf also made a batch of almond cookies that are really good.
Too bad I can't eat too much of them. Only had two today. Got to compensate for the roast chickens I've been having.
I still need to lose 1 more kilogram by next month to get out of IPT.
Sunday 15 January 2012
Rant 924 / Roasted Kampong Chicken
FRI
Gabe doesn't support SOPA.
"In general, we think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem. For example, if a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24 x 7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the U.S. release, and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is more valuable. Most DRM solutions diminish the value of the product by either directly restricting a customers use or by creating uncertainty."
A real bro.
The other reason which I'd also agree on is that games tend to be interesting in the beginning and get boring after the novelty is gone. Piracy helps gamers overcome the hype generated before the release of games to some degree.
I'd compare this to reading a book in a library before buying a copy. If it sucks, I'm not going to pay for it. Same goes for games.
Demos don't help because they're frequently unable to give the gamer an accurate idea of how it would be like to play the entire game. This is because they're usually the first chapter of the game, and the beginning of games are usually relatively bug-free compared to the rest of it.
The way I see it, it's usually gamers with little disposable income who pirate all their games. Not sure how much more revenue they're expecting to gain if they prevent this group from pirating.
As for SOPA itself, I don't know enough about it to make any real comment.
I finally got it.
I shall buy my meat in large amounts from now on.
For example, today I bought 2 kg of minced pork, "半肥瘦", or half lean and half fatty, and coarse grind.
S$24 for 2kg, with another 0.2kg as freebie because he put a little too much meat into the grinder and didn't want to put just that little bit away.
So that's S$12/kg, or S$1.20/100g.
Also told him to split it into 4 bags because obviously I'm storing it in the freezer.
Cooked 1 bag for dinner, minced pork in oyster sauce. Being the fourth time I cooked this dish, I naturally experimented with untested condiments.
The first time, I added light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and sesame oil.
It wasn't good. Either the dark sauce or the sesame oil was the problem, but I couldn't tell for sure which was the one.
The second time, light soy sauce and sesame oil. Then I learnt the sesame oil was the issue. The aroma just doesn't fit.
The third time, nothing else, just the oyster sauce.
It was just like my mum's. Yea, I've been trying to remake her dishes.
Today, dark soy sauce and light soy sauce. It was also pretty good, just a slightly different flavour.
I try to make it very salty by adding minimal water and plenty of soy sauce for cost-saving reasons.
According to my calculations, this delicious meal should cost less than 2 bucks. Best and most filling meal I've ever had for S$2.
SAT
Did another experiment tonight.
Success!
A little too much basil but that's more of an issue of waste than taste.
Marinated two kampong chicken thighs (normal chicken parts were sold out when I got there) in basil, rosemary, oregano, black pepper and salt.
In short, I threw random dried herbs on them and put them back into the fridge for half a day.
I didn't actually know how long I should roast them and I didn't think there were any recipes that were going to give me an accurate timing for this type of chicken, so I made a rough initial estimate of 20mins at 180 degrees Celsius.
Later at 15mins I lowered it to 150.
After skewering them with the skewer meant for a whole chicken (according to the oven's user menu), I thought it was going to be very dry if I just put them into the oven like this.
Then I realized I'd forgotten the honey, so I took out my basting brush and half a tablespoon of honey from my little overpriced tub of honey that I keep in a very cool, dry place that no one else seems to know about.
The honey had turned almost black over the years instead of crystalizing like I thought it would, but it was perfectly edible as far as I can tell.
Nobody here uses honey at all, except for me once in a very long while. For pancakes we have extra tubs of that imitation maple syrup from MCD and for salads we use commercial salad dressings.
So I brushed the honey over the thighs and hooked the skewer inside the oven to form a rotisserie.
This is the first time I've ever used the rotisserie function of this oven.
Hence I'd actually rehearsed the act of placing the skewer into the rotating mechanism in the oven using the tool that came with it (so that I didn't have to hold the skewer with my hands) beforehand.
At 15mins while I lowered the temperature I also rebasted with the remaining honey.
It was not overcooked. The skin was a little burnt but that was to be expected. Moreover, it didn't affect the taste.
This is my best success so far with a completely random recipe I'd made up on the spot.
Gabe doesn't support SOPA.
"In general, we think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem. For example, if a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24 x 7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the U.S. release, and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is more valuable. Most DRM solutions diminish the value of the product by either directly restricting a customers use or by creating uncertainty."
A real bro.
The other reason which I'd also agree on is that games tend to be interesting in the beginning and get boring after the novelty is gone. Piracy helps gamers overcome the hype generated before the release of games to some degree.
I'd compare this to reading a book in a library before buying a copy. If it sucks, I'm not going to pay for it. Same goes for games.
Demos don't help because they're frequently unable to give the gamer an accurate idea of how it would be like to play the entire game. This is because they're usually the first chapter of the game, and the beginning of games are usually relatively bug-free compared to the rest of it.
The way I see it, it's usually gamers with little disposable income who pirate all their games. Not sure how much more revenue they're expecting to gain if they prevent this group from pirating.
As for SOPA itself, I don't know enough about it to make any real comment.
I finally got it.
I shall buy my meat in large amounts from now on.
For example, today I bought 2 kg of minced pork, "半肥瘦", or half lean and half fatty, and coarse grind.
S$24 for 2kg, with another 0.2kg as freebie because he put a little too much meat into the grinder and didn't want to put just that little bit away.
So that's S$12/kg, or S$1.20/100g.
Also told him to split it into 4 bags because obviously I'm storing it in the freezer.
Cooked 1 bag for dinner, minced pork in oyster sauce. Being the fourth time I cooked this dish, I naturally experimented with untested condiments.
The first time, I added light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and sesame oil.
It wasn't good. Either the dark sauce or the sesame oil was the problem, but I couldn't tell for sure which was the one.
The second time, light soy sauce and sesame oil. Then I learnt the sesame oil was the issue. The aroma just doesn't fit.
The third time, nothing else, just the oyster sauce.
It was just like my mum's. Yea, I've been trying to remake her dishes.
Today, dark soy sauce and light soy sauce. It was also pretty good, just a slightly different flavour.
I try to make it very salty by adding minimal water and plenty of soy sauce for cost-saving reasons.
According to my calculations, this delicious meal should cost less than 2 bucks. Best and most filling meal I've ever had for S$2.
SAT
Did another experiment tonight.
Success!
A little too much basil but that's more of an issue of waste than taste.
Marinated two kampong chicken thighs (normal chicken parts were sold out when I got there) in basil, rosemary, oregano, black pepper and salt.
In short, I threw random dried herbs on them and put them back into the fridge for half a day.
I didn't actually know how long I should roast them and I didn't think there were any recipes that were going to give me an accurate timing for this type of chicken, so I made a rough initial estimate of 20mins at 180 degrees Celsius.
Later at 15mins I lowered it to 150.
After skewering them with the skewer meant for a whole chicken (according to the oven's user menu), I thought it was going to be very dry if I just put them into the oven like this.
Then I realized I'd forgotten the honey, so I took out my basting brush and half a tablespoon of honey from my little overpriced tub of honey that I keep in a very cool, dry place that no one else seems to know about.
The honey had turned almost black over the years instead of crystalizing like I thought it would, but it was perfectly edible as far as I can tell.
Nobody here uses honey at all, except for me once in a very long while. For pancakes we have extra tubs of that imitation maple syrup from MCD and for salads we use commercial salad dressings.
So I brushed the honey over the thighs and hooked the skewer inside the oven to form a rotisserie.
This is the first time I've ever used the rotisserie function of this oven.
Hence I'd actually rehearsed the act of placing the skewer into the rotating mechanism in the oven using the tool that came with it (so that I didn't have to hold the skewer with my hands) beforehand.
At 15mins while I lowered the temperature I also rebasted with the remaining honey.
It was not overcooked. The skin was a little burnt but that was to be expected. Moreover, it didn't affect the taste.
This is my best success so far with a completely random recipe I'd made up on the spot.
Friday 13 January 2012
Rant 923 / Creativity Knows No Boundary
Best scream ever!
I want to hear that in a horror movie!
Oh yes that's generic alright. It has both the essential ingredients to make a proper Skyrim video - "Fus Ro Dah" and the arrow to the knee.
How to properly enjoy a watermelon:
1) Chill it in the fridge.
2) Wait till you're thirsty.
3) Cut into halves.
4) Get a spoon.
5) Enjoy.
So after some clarifications, I learnt that:
1) the twenty-sixth in the lunar calendar is a Thursday
2) our business will be closing from Thursday till the 30th of January, which is a Monday.
Meanwhile, I can't search for new suppliers during those free days because in China, the New Year holidays last for fifteen days, which means they get back to work only on the 6th of February.
Ugh... what kind of boss am I?
Afraid of Chucky? Just wait till you see Elmo.
So nectarines and peaches are actually the same species, except nectarines' fuzz-growing gene is recessive while the one in peaches is dominant.
Check out the latest abomination from Pizza Hut.
What have they done to that poor piece of dough?
Or rather, what have they done to the definition of "pizza"?
So it's a pizza with pork floss, bbq pork and shrimp wontons.
I just wonder what Italian pizzaioli would think about this.
"Very interesting mix of Italian and Chinese culture," would be my guess :P
Afraid of Elmo? Just wait till you see Pizza Hut.
Rant 922 / The Cracks In The Wall
I feel like giving up.
It was interesting at first but now it's approaching "uninteresting". I'm going to quit before it reaches "work".
They made organzing outings sound like a chore, so I volunteered to see what it's like.
It felt good at first, but my motivation is waning.
I've long come to the conclusion that they aren't particularly interested in outings anymore. Asking them to go out together for anything is like proposing marriage - they've got to think really long and hard about it.
That's not a really bad thing because there are so many of them, but it's tiring to have to consider so many restrictions set by everyone when planning each outing.
The worst part is anything that's wrong or bad isn't pointed out. Nobody bothers to read the whole description of the proposed event. To me, that means they just don't care enough to want to know what we're going to do.
I have the impression that they're joining to please the rest of us, whatever the reasons.
In the end they just play along till things screw up.
Must I handle every single detail?
I'm not some kind of volunteer manager of theirs, am I?
I'm just trying to get friends to go out together.
I'm just trying to keep friends.
Their apparent disinterest is chafing my desire to keep it going.
Perhaps we are just too different.
Perhaps it's time to let go of the past.
At this point in my life, I'm already letting go of plenty of things from my past.
Such is life.
It was interesting at first but now it's approaching "uninteresting". I'm going to quit before it reaches "work".
They made organzing outings sound like a chore, so I volunteered to see what it's like.
It felt good at first, but my motivation is waning.
I've long come to the conclusion that they aren't particularly interested in outings anymore. Asking them to go out together for anything is like proposing marriage - they've got to think really long and hard about it.
That's not a really bad thing because there are so many of them, but it's tiring to have to consider so many restrictions set by everyone when planning each outing.
The worst part is anything that's wrong or bad isn't pointed out. Nobody bothers to read the whole description of the proposed event. To me, that means they just don't care enough to want to know what we're going to do.
I have the impression that they're joining to please the rest of us, whatever the reasons.
In the end they just play along till things screw up.
Must I handle every single detail?
I'm not some kind of volunteer manager of theirs, am I?
I'm just trying to get friends to go out together.
I'm just trying to keep friends.
Their apparent disinterest is chafing my desire to keep it going.
Perhaps we are just too different.
Perhaps it's time to let go of the past.
At this point in my life, I'm already letting go of plenty of things from my past.
Such is life.
Thursday 12 January 2012
Rant 921 / 10 J Q K A
Runespell: Overture was kind of a good game.
Mostly good but far too short. No wonder it's called "Overture" - it's just an introduction to the real game, a tutorial prologue.
First, the battles. I love the poker-inspired mechanics. Simple.
But they're unbalanced. Then again, they're going to need a mathematician if they want to resolve this issue. That's not going to be cheap for an indie developer.
In the early game when HPs weren't high, I go for full house and four/five-of-a-kind. Later I go for royal flush.
Right from the start I'd start assembling the 10,J,Q,K,A of each suit. The trick is to flip my own cards to reveal new cards except for the last act because I didn't want the opponent to steal the last card I reveal in case it was one that I needed.
All unnecessary cards go to one stack, although each of these trash stacks must end up with at least a pair so that I didn't lose HP.
When I got the wolf priest ally, it became even easier. I cast his ability as soon as I could and kept flipping cards till I get the right ones. The game usually end by the time I hit the enemy with royal flush twice, because I'd have more than enough RP to cast more spells at him/her.
The only weakness to this is the Fear spells, especially the one that takes out 75RPs with one hit.
The spells seem unbalanced in their cost-effect ratio. For example, the ally with that 120RP ability that only does 40-50 damage is totally not worth it.
This ability is only good when everything else is on cooldown and you need need to deal a hard blow regardless of the cost.
Except by the time anyone has 120RP, you wouldn't need a hard blow to end the game.
Finally, maybe it's just me, or did they really call Italy by that name back in the 1200s?
Because nobody call China "China" until relatively recent times. Marco Polo, who lived in the 13th century, was responsible for spreading the use of this name in Europe, and the first recorded use in English was in 1555.
So I checked Wikipedia and they did use the name by then. In fact, they'd have been using that name for that region for about seven centuries by the 13th century.
Microsoft is about to give us the PC version of the Kinect.
No surprise there.
I'll probably get one after the hype dies down a little.
Grotesque Tactics: Dungeons and Donuts is a pretty interesting game. Some of the humour is actually humours.
As the title suggests, the combat is turn-based and the characters move on a battlefield split into square tiles.
In the game, the player is an emo shepherd. He wears dark colours, spots an emo haircut and talks like a faggot.
The story begins in an underground dungeon where a celebration party was interrupted by a man-eating magical mist.
Apparently, they were celebrating the end of the monsters in the dungeon.
Apparently, they were wrong.
As hopeless as it seems, the emo shepherd was able to... help in some way. I can't say how because there are three paths and it would be a spoiler.
After regrouping and finding somewhere relatively safe to stay, the emo hero goes on the quest to get everyone out of the dungeon and to safety.
Anyway this is actually the sequel but that isn't important because the hero gets "hero's amnesia" after the tutorial prologue.
This video makes me sad.
Fifty thousand years of existence. Fifty thousand years!
And we're still producing people like that in a developed country.
I think that's how a lot of people feel as they get older.
Anyway, why do people not try and appreciate new music?
I wonder if most of the people I know listen to dubstep.
Or am I just a strange person for liking some of those on Youtube?
I think some people just stick with what they grew up with because they associate it with "the good old days".
They don't actually like the music that much (except for some, but you probably won't be able to tell them apart without some serious analysis); they just like the feelings and perhaps the nostalgia that the music brings.
In other words, they find the present less likeable than what they think the past was like.
People like that need to rethink what they're doing, or recall all the crap they went through before today.
Mostly good but far too short. No wonder it's called "Overture" - it's just an introduction to the real game, a tutorial prologue.
First, the battles. I love the poker-inspired mechanics. Simple.
But they're unbalanced. Then again, they're going to need a mathematician if they want to resolve this issue. That's not going to be cheap for an indie developer.
In the early game when HPs weren't high, I go for full house and four/five-of-a-kind. Later I go for royal flush.
Right from the start I'd start assembling the 10,J,Q,K,A of each suit. The trick is to flip my own cards to reveal new cards except for the last act because I didn't want the opponent to steal the last card I reveal in case it was one that I needed.
All unnecessary cards go to one stack, although each of these trash stacks must end up with at least a pair so that I didn't lose HP.
When I got the wolf priest ally, it became even easier. I cast his ability as soon as I could and kept flipping cards till I get the right ones. The game usually end by the time I hit the enemy with royal flush twice, because I'd have more than enough RP to cast more spells at him/her.
The only weakness to this is the Fear spells, especially the one that takes out 75RPs with one hit.
The spells seem unbalanced in their cost-effect ratio. For example, the ally with that 120RP ability that only does 40-50 damage is totally not worth it.
This ability is only good when everything else is on cooldown and you need need to deal a hard blow regardless of the cost.
Except by the time anyone has 120RP, you wouldn't need a hard blow to end the game.
Finally, maybe it's just me, or did they really call Italy by that name back in the 1200s?
Because nobody call China "China" until relatively recent times. Marco Polo, who lived in the 13th century, was responsible for spreading the use of this name in Europe, and the first recorded use in English was in 1555.
So I checked Wikipedia and they did use the name by then. In fact, they'd have been using that name for that region for about seven centuries by the 13th century.
Microsoft is about to give us the PC version of the Kinect.
No surprise there.
I'll probably get one after the hype dies down a little.
Grotesque Tactics: Dungeons and Donuts is a pretty interesting game. Some of the humour is actually humours.
As the title suggests, the combat is turn-based and the characters move on a battlefield split into square tiles.
In the game, the player is an emo shepherd. He wears dark colours, spots an emo haircut and talks like a faggot.
The story begins in an underground dungeon where a celebration party was interrupted by a man-eating magical mist.
Apparently, they were celebrating the end of the monsters in the dungeon.
Apparently, they were wrong.
As hopeless as it seems, the emo shepherd was able to... help in some way. I can't say how because there are three paths and it would be a spoiler.
After regrouping and finding somewhere relatively safe to stay, the emo hero goes on the quest to get everyone out of the dungeon and to safety.
Anyway this is actually the sequel but that isn't important because the hero gets "hero's amnesia" after the tutorial prologue.
This video makes me sad.
Fifty thousand years of existence. Fifty thousand years!
And we're still producing people like that in a developed country.
I think that's how a lot of people feel as they get older.
Anyway, why do people not try and appreciate new music?
I wonder if most of the people I know listen to dubstep.
Or am I just a strange person for liking some of those on Youtube?
I think some people just stick with what they grew up with because they associate it with "the good old days".
They don't actually like the music that much (except for some, but you probably won't be able to tell them apart without some serious analysis); they just like the feelings and perhaps the nostalgia that the music brings.
In other words, they find the present less likeable than what they think the past was like.
People like that need to rethink what they're doing, or recall all the crap they went through before today.
Monday 9 January 2012
Rant 920 / Deer Penis Soup With Meat Balls
I'm starting to really respect those guys behind the search engine of Google. When you google "spesskem", you get results for the game Spacechem.
How does it do that??
I'm interested to know the rest of the story in Skyrim, but I just can't find the motivation to play it. Meanwhile, I try to avoid spoilers.
Workers tried to make me give them an extra day off for Chinese New Year.
Fortunately one was honest enough to tell me when my mum used to let them go and when their CNY holidays used to end, because that was one of the many things that she never remembered to tell me.
So their holidays begin on the twenty-sixth day on the lunar calendar, and ends on the third day like everyone else, which means they get only a single free day this year because that day is a Friday.
One kept asking me if I could let them go on the Thursday instead, but I insisted on following my mum's practices.
That was a convenient excuse.
Why on earth would I want to let them go earlier than usual when I have no idea if I am going to get more work for them just before the holidays?
Maybe, just maybe, if things remain quiet for the first three days of that week, I'll let them take the Thursday off. No point making them stay when there's no real work I need them to do.
Moreover, since their wages are calculated on a daily basis, I'll get to save some money by giving them an additional day of holiday.
I can't tell them this. It might give them false hope or something. I'll just see what happens on the Wednesday.
EDIT: Holy crap! I'm glad I didn't agree to giving them another day! New goods are finally coming just before CNY! They're going to be busy!
Blizzard came up with a new offer I almost couldn't refuse: buy 1 year's worth of WoW subscription and get Diablo III free.
I almost subscribed immediately.
Then I saw the price: 180 days cost US$77.
Nope.
I don't play MMORPGs these days. Even when I found out that Lineage II, a game I spent about 2 years on and the first 3D MMORPG I played, has become f2p and removed most of the grinding for players, I still didn't bother to even check out the website.
US$155 for D3 isn't worth it.
Moreover, the WoW today isn't the WoW I used to be addicted to anymore.
Kids in Singapore think that being the President is "the coolest job ever".
If the parents are right about the reason being that they think the President is grossly overpaid for his workload, then this implies that kids today are a bunch of bloody slackers.
I wonder if those parents are proud of this.
These kids aren't going for something they respect, nor are they going for something meaningful.
They're going for something that's easy.
Bloody slackers!
And then you blame the government for bringing in so many foreigners to boost our workforce.
I am not amused :\
1) Money can provide happiness. You're just thinking about those morons who take on too much work for the money in the mistaken belief that they can handle the load.
2) Money can buy time and family. When you spend more to travel faster, you're basically buying time.
With enough money, you can buy a spouse, kids and just about anybody you want. Need blood relation in the family members? Clone them.
You can't buy a perfect clone complete with the original's mind and all that. That's about it.
3) Money is not always there. Think 1997 Asia. Think 2008 US. But neither is your family, so you need think about how you spend your time.
Why do people still insist on feeding our next generation with that simplistic nonsense? This is the 21st century already.
How does it do that??
I'm interested to know the rest of the story in Skyrim, but I just can't find the motivation to play it. Meanwhile, I try to avoid spoilers.
Workers tried to make me give them an extra day off for Chinese New Year.
Fortunately one was honest enough to tell me when my mum used to let them go and when their CNY holidays used to end, because that was one of the many things that she never remembered to tell me.
So their holidays begin on the twenty-sixth day on the lunar calendar, and ends on the third day like everyone else, which means they get only a single free day this year because that day is a Friday.
One kept asking me if I could let them go on the Thursday instead, but I insisted on following my mum's practices.
That was a convenient excuse.
Why on earth would I want to let them go earlier than usual when I have no idea if I am going to get more work for them just before the holidays?
Maybe, just maybe, if things remain quiet for the first three days of that week, I'll let them take the Thursday off. No point making them stay when there's no real work I need them to do.
Moreover, since their wages are calculated on a daily basis, I'll get to save some money by giving them an additional day of holiday.
I can't tell them this. It might give them false hope or something. I'll just see what happens on the Wednesday.
EDIT: Holy crap! I'm glad I didn't agree to giving them another day! New goods are finally coming just before CNY! They're going to be busy!
Blizzard came up with a new offer I almost couldn't refuse: buy 1 year's worth of WoW subscription and get Diablo III free.
I almost subscribed immediately.
Then I saw the price: 180 days cost US$77.
Nope.
I don't play MMORPGs these days. Even when I found out that Lineage II, a game I spent about 2 years on and the first 3D MMORPG I played, has become f2p and removed most of the grinding for players, I still didn't bother to even check out the website.
US$155 for D3 isn't worth it.
Moreover, the WoW today isn't the WoW I used to be addicted to anymore.
Kids in Singapore think that being the President is "the coolest job ever".
Kateline Teo, a 37-year-old mother of two told Yahoo! Singapore, "It's like taking a swipe at the President. I don't think they voted it as the 'coolest or best job' because it's a respectful job."
"The kids probably get the impression that a President's job is easy money and they get paid forever," Teo added.
Other parents echoed this view. Another parent, Mrs Chua, 33, said that "even kids realise that the President doesn't do much but still gets paid a load of money."
If the parents are right about the reason being that they think the President is grossly overpaid for his workload, then this implies that kids today are a bunch of bloody slackers.
I wonder if those parents are proud of this.
These kids aren't going for something they respect, nor are they going for something meaningful.
They're going for something that's easy.
Bloody slackers!
And then you blame the government for bringing in so many foreigners to boost our workforce.
79 per cent of the children said they would prefer to spend time with their families than making money. This was a drop from last year's 96 per cent. The children surveyed gave reasons such as:
- “Money simply cannot provide happiness”
- “We can't buy time and family”
- “Money is always there but my family may not be”
I am not amused :\
1) Money can provide happiness. You're just thinking about those morons who take on too much work for the money in the mistaken belief that they can handle the load.
2) Money can buy time and family. When you spend more to travel faster, you're basically buying time.
With enough money, you can buy a spouse, kids and just about anybody you want. Need blood relation in the family members? Clone them.
You can't buy a perfect clone complete with the original's mind and all that. That's about it.
3) Money is not always there. Think 1997 Asia. Think 2008 US. But neither is your family, so you need think about how you spend your time.
Why do people still insist on feeding our next generation with that simplistic nonsense? This is the 21st century already.
Friday 6 January 2012
Rant 919 / SpessKem Is Unexpectedly Fun
My gaming preference took an unexpected turn recently when I somehow just kept playing SpaceChem, a singleplayer puzzle game involving the production of predefined molocules using what was provided.
Currently, I'm at the final stage of the fourth planet, Alkonost, where I'm again allowed to choose between going straight for the final Defense mission or complete an optional challenge named "Going Green".
I'm on the challenge now and this game is starting to get very complicated.
For example, in one of my reactors in Going Green, it looks like this:
This pair of loops assumes that Input Beta always arrives earlier than Input Alpha. The trouble is that this isn't true, and that sometimes Beta takes forever to get here, and which totally screws up the timing.
If Beta arrives later than Alpha, then top most white Bonder slot would be filled by the red loop before the blue loop can arrive at the Sync in the cross-junction the second time. In this case, they would collide, which isn't allowed.
The trouble is, I can't just put another pair of "Sync" down to synchronise their timings because one blue loop is programmed to take as long as two red loops.
My solution: a complete revamp of my entire system of 5 reactors because this reaction requires me to adjust the timing of the two molecules of the inputs which will take one more reactor than I'm allowed.
The tools mechanics are all very easy to understand. The only challenge in this game is that what you're given need to be processed before they can be used to make what is asked of you.
IMO computer programmers would find this game similar to what they do. It's all about logic and perhaps a bit of judgement about the placement of things.
The two main reasons that keep me interested are:
1) the story. I still don't know what's disrupting their operations but the story at this point hints that an external factor is being hidden by the upper management from the rest of the world.
2) the autosaves. I love how everything is autosaved constantly such that I have yet to be annoyed by any bugs, and every step I make is recorded from the very first to the 9000th so that I can just undo each one till I reach the state I want to return to.
3) the completed system. Once you get the entire system working flawlessly, it's... beautiful.
EDIT: OH SHIT I JUST REALIZED I CAN SOLVE THE TIMING ISSUE USING THE SENSOR! I CAN JUST PREVENT ALPHA LOOP FROM WORKING TILL THE SENSOR DETECTS AN INPUT AT BETA!
I'd already erased the entire map and redid things several times. I'll have to replace everything from scratch.
EDIT 2: Nope, that didn't work. The sensor prevents the red loop from delivering its O atoms on its second lap when blue's S atom is already at the centre. Guess I'll have to make a new plan.
Unfortunately this doesn't work here.
All those coupons shown do not have a minimum purchase requirement even though they allow a discount on small amounts of each product.
This is a deliberate omission which never happens for any coupons here.
The most similar coupon I've seen would be the same except it allows a percentage discount. No such thing as a $1 discount with no minimum purchase because what she did was exactly what the marketing people want to avoid.
Believe me. I've even tried to see to if I could combine coupons the way she did, like the ones from Giant.
What I observed was that the guys working there knew exactly what they were doing, so that any overlaps are carefully avoid other than the few products that still aren't cheap despite a combined discount. They seemed to even taunt me with almost identical products that differ only in brand or amount.
The Prosperity burgers from MCD suck, the sole reason being that it's just black pepper.
The black pepper sauce dominates the entire burger so much there is really no other flavour.
The beef version is even worse because the patty is so soft (unless you like mushy patties).
Sauces and gravy are supposed to improve the flavour of a dish, not become it.
No wonder MCD only whips it out during certain special occasions. Its novelty and the fact that black pepper is so popular makes it successful, but only as long as its novelty lasts.
I procrastinate. The reason is different but the result remains the same - I procrastinate.
I no longer have to worry about failure, yet I still try to put off tasks till much later.
It is a reason I do not wish to talk about, yet I must think about it to find a solution.
I must do it, therefore I must overcome it.
I know I've posted this long ago but I just don't get tired of it.
After watching some more Valkyria Chronicles streamed by someone live from his TV, I really feel like getting a PS3.
Yet I know if I do, I wouldn't have the time nor mood to play it.
Heck, I still haven't finished Persona 4 after all these months.
Maybe I'll buy a new TV someday, one that consumes less power than the one in my home.
Then I'll get a PS3.
Valkyria Chronicles brings me such nostalgia, but I'm not longer the person I once was.
To fully appreciate JRPGs and any games that require grinding, one must possess a certain degree of dislike for reality.
I used to be able to handle grinding, maybe because that's an easier way to achieve anything than what I have in real life.
Now I find grinding very boring.
Currently, I'm at the final stage of the fourth planet, Alkonost, where I'm again allowed to choose between going straight for the final Defense mission or complete an optional challenge named "Going Green".
I'm on the challenge now and this game is starting to get very complicated.
For example, in one of my reactors in Going Green, it looks like this:
This pair of loops assumes that Input Beta always arrives earlier than Input Alpha. The trouble is that this isn't true, and that sometimes Beta takes forever to get here, and which totally screws up the timing.
If Beta arrives later than Alpha, then top most white Bonder slot would be filled by the red loop before the blue loop can arrive at the Sync in the cross-junction the second time. In this case, they would collide, which isn't allowed.
The trouble is, I can't just put another pair of "Sync" down to synchronise their timings because one blue loop is programmed to take as long as two red loops.
My solution: a complete revamp of my entire system of 5 reactors because this reaction requires me to adjust the timing of the two molecules of the inputs which will take one more reactor than I'm allowed.
The tools mechanics are all very easy to understand. The only challenge in this game is that what you're given need to be processed before they can be used to make what is asked of you.
IMO computer programmers would find this game similar to what they do. It's all about logic and perhaps a bit of judgement about the placement of things.
The two main reasons that keep me interested are:
1) the story. I still don't know what's disrupting their operations but the story at this point hints that an external factor is being hidden by the upper management from the rest of the world.
2) the autosaves. I love how everything is autosaved constantly such that I have yet to be annoyed by any bugs, and every step I make is recorded from the very first to the 9000th so that I can just undo each one till I reach the state I want to return to.
3) the completed system. Once you get the entire system working flawlessly, it's... beautiful.
EDIT: OH SHIT I JUST REALIZED I CAN SOLVE THE TIMING ISSUE USING THE SENSOR! I CAN JUST PREVENT ALPHA LOOP FROM WORKING TILL THE SENSOR DETECTS AN INPUT AT BETA!
I'd already erased the entire map and redid things several times. I'll have to replace everything from scratch.
EDIT 2: Nope, that didn't work. The sensor prevents the red loop from delivering its O atoms on its second lap when blue's S atom is already at the centre. Guess I'll have to make a new plan.
Unfortunately this doesn't work here.
All those coupons shown do not have a minimum purchase requirement even though they allow a discount on small amounts of each product.
This is a deliberate omission which never happens for any coupons here.
The most similar coupon I've seen would be the same except it allows a percentage discount. No such thing as a $1 discount with no minimum purchase because what she did was exactly what the marketing people want to avoid.
Believe me. I've even tried to see to if I could combine coupons the way she did, like the ones from Giant.
What I observed was that the guys working there knew exactly what they were doing, so that any overlaps are carefully avoid other than the few products that still aren't cheap despite a combined discount. They seemed to even taunt me with almost identical products that differ only in brand or amount.
The Prosperity burgers from MCD suck, the sole reason being that it's just black pepper.
The black pepper sauce dominates the entire burger so much there is really no other flavour.
The beef version is even worse because the patty is so soft (unless you like mushy patties).
Sauces and gravy are supposed to improve the flavour of a dish, not become it.
No wonder MCD only whips it out during certain special occasions. Its novelty and the fact that black pepper is so popular makes it successful, but only as long as its novelty lasts.
I procrastinate. The reason is different but the result remains the same - I procrastinate.
I no longer have to worry about failure, yet I still try to put off tasks till much later.
It is a reason I do not wish to talk about, yet I must think about it to find a solution.
I must do it, therefore I must overcome it.
I know I've posted this long ago but I just don't get tired of it.
After watching some more Valkyria Chronicles streamed by someone live from his TV, I really feel like getting a PS3.
Yet I know if I do, I wouldn't have the time nor mood to play it.
Heck, I still haven't finished Persona 4 after all these months.
Maybe I'll buy a new TV someday, one that consumes less power than the one in my home.
Then I'll get a PS3.
Valkyria Chronicles brings me such nostalgia, but I'm not longer the person I once was.
To fully appreciate JRPGs and any games that require grinding, one must possess a certain degree of dislike for reality.
I used to be able to handle grinding, maybe because that's an easier way to achieve anything than what I have in real life.
Now I find grinding very boring.
Tuesday 3 January 2012
Rant 918 / Everyone Lives In His Or Her Own World
I've been getting calls from so many girls ever since I took over the business.
I just wish they weren't telemarketers.
And Dell keeps calling me about their new promotions.
The last call was particularly funny.
Telemarketer: Hi, I'm calling from Dell. Is there an IT officer or technician I can speak to?
Me: We don't use computers here.
Telemarketer: HMMMM.............
But it is true.
The highest form of technology we use here is a typewriter and a basic solar-powered calculator.
I can easily switch to a PC because it's much easier to make changes on MS Word, but my mum had bought too many carbon copies of invoices from a wholesaler or something which cannot be used with a computer printer unless I print on all copies separately.
That's a huge waste of ink IMO.
We're so 1970s over here.
Still, it helps to keep the operating costs lower.
I'll make the switch when one of the following happens:
1) The typewriter stops working and I can't find someone to repair it.
2) I cannot find the ribbons outside when ours run out.
3) I run out of blank invoices.
So today a friend on FB was being so excited about getting the Pleasures card from Ritz-Carlton.
That's its loyalty programme.
Costs a crazy S$888 p.a.
I used to wonder why so many people with no money are unable to spend their money wisely.
There are two conclusions I draw from this after some thought.
First, it's a cycle. They can't spend money on only the right things, hence they spend too much compared to their incomes and that prevents them from becoming wealthy.
Second, they spend their money like that precisely because they are not rich enough to spend such amounts casually.
It makes them feel richer, and basically creates the illusion that they aren't as average or poor as they actually are.
Which makes such an act the same as any other forms of distractions like video games, fiction novels, getting drunk and most arts in general.
They take a person's mind away from reality which they view as harsh and maybe even painful.
If life as an average guy with a decent job in a developed country is bad, then how do I describe the life of a child born in the slums of Mumbai?
If you have the money to afford the internet access to read this blog, chances are your life isn't bad at all.
You just think it is.
It's just all perceptions.
Quoting the book Sword of Truth, "truth is perception".
If you can change the perception, you can change the truth.
The objective reality is ultimately of no importance. The moment you have to interpret everything you sense, you are already living in your own perceived world.
Singapore buying electricity from Malaysia in the future?
What the heck?
Responding to this, Prime Minister Lee said Singapore is very open to importing a certain portion of electricity from Malaysia, if the terms are right and if the private sector proposes an attractive offer which Singapore cannot refuse.
I don't know what they're doing.
After all the effort to wean ourselves off the resources Malaysia has been supplying to us, we want to increase our dependence again?
Then what's the point of Newater?
Despite the recently announced pay cuts for our political leaders, their salaries remain extremely high compared to those of leaders of other parts of the world.
I'm not totally against this high pay.
What I find wrong is that this pay cut accomplishes nothing solid.
All this really does is make the public happy for a while, but once the novelty of a big ministerial pay cut wears off, they're going to come to their senses and realize our PM's monthly pay still exceeds most of their annual incomes.
2.2M per year = 183k per month
One would have to make over 15k SGD per month just to have an annual income that matches the PM's monthly one.
That's not even including the annual bonus.
Plenty of foolish people say that the high pay is unnecessary - if people are sincere they wouldn't need that to attract them to public service.
Don't be silly.
A lot of people sincerely want to help charities too. How many people out in this world have a career in non-profit organizations?
Among these people, how many of them can be considered "the best minds"?
Monday 2 January 2012
Rant 917 / Why Can't We Just Shoot The Dragon In The Knee?
So the housekeeper I used to hire first introduced me to her friends who seem to be newbies in this line, then she didn't answer my previous SMS.
Together with the fact that she was often unable to work here due to other commitments, I think she wants to stop this altogether and had been hinting to me that those are her successors of sorts.
Today I SMSed one of them to ask if they could work here this week.
Her language was not what I expected.
I'm her employer (kinda), not her boyfriend.
For example, "sorry" became "sowi" in her replies. And there was a "hehe..."
What the heck?
I only wanted a cleaner. The reason I chose her was because she was the first in years to voluntarily clean my filthy fridge. Not even the original housekeeper was willing to do that unless instructed to do so.
It was so filthy we did not leave anything exposed to the air inside when we stored food there. The mild stench just seeped into everything.
Bringing a friend was okay. She was definitely new to this job and there are only men in this flat ever since my mum moved to the hospice. All that I had to do was make it clear that I'm willing to pay for only one person. Her friend can sit around and watch for all I care, as long as the work gets done properly.
So I bought a translucent glass cup for my candles.
I think it makes a good candle lamp.
The only problem is it lacks a cover and I can't find a similar glass one for it.
Definitely need a cover because my fan makes it flicker too much.
Also bought 12 of these little coin-shaped candles.
I didn't know they smelled like milk candy till I opened the packaging.
Burning these makse me kinda hungry.
Also, how the heck do I stop the final bit of wick from falling and snuffing out when the wax at the bottom melts?
As for the second fondue experiment, I learnt that I cannot just use water. I probably added it too late yesterday, so I didn't see that if I add water to cheese and put it over a flame, it curdles after a while.
By "curdle" I mean the cheese turned into tiny hard bits. Not good.
Apparently, alcohol stops this process or something, so I need some kind of wine.
C&C RA3 might not have been a good game but it definitely had some good music.
Rant 916 / I Wonder If That Works
The Cold Storage at Holland V actually ran out of gruyere cheese!
It's probably because lots of people wanted cheese fondue for their New Year's Day celebrations.
Standard fondue recipes usually call for gruyere and emmental (aka emmentaler), and I was able to find at least 3 brands of the latter.
So I tested my cheese fondue with just emmental and water (no wine at home, only beer and cognac that are not for human consumption) as a simple experiment in which I tested the viability of using aluminium foil, a small steaming rack and a candle for cheese fondue.
The result showed that firstly, aluminium foil alone is not suitable for fondue because it conducts heat so quickly the spot right above the flame will char the cheese.
Second, the cheese does not melt quickly enough with just one of those small candles, even though it chars, before I added water.
Therefore water works, although alcohol works better by lowering the melting point.
I now have a small ceramic ramekin I'll test tomorrow. Theoretically it should work.
The ceramic surface will spread the heat out better, so it won't burn as easily.
I need more of these round, flat candles though.
As for the gruyere, I'll just find some either after 1-2 weeks or at another supermarket.
Arrogance. That's what I observed in myself. Arrogance without a good reason.
I can't help it.
Despite my current income level, I have yet to prove that I can maintain it.
It appears that I can, but I don't know if I will.
I should not feel arrogant just because I made what I made last month.
Yet I was pissed when someone said something to the effect that my friends and I don't make a lot of money.
That was proof enough that it was arrogance growing in me.
Arrogance without a justifiable cause.
How ironic that a person with confidence issues can also be arrogant.
Yet I cannot say anything to deny belittling remarks regarding my income.
It is absolutely important that nobody I work with knows how much I make so that I have more room to lie when haggling prices.
Singapore is a tiny country after all.
Only my mother, brother, accountant and the IRAS can know my income. Not even my wife is allowed this information, if I ever have one, unless she works with me.
Frankly speaking, it is quite difficult for me to keep all the secrets that I do, yet I do not have a choice.
Plenty of other jobs out there require tight lips, so I'm aware that I must get used to it.
The good thing is that I'm quite a miser, so I don't mind not spending on any luxuries, which makes me look like I'm poor.
The only issue I need to keep in mind constantly is alcohol - it loosens tongues.
I know I shouldn't even be revealing the fact that I have secrets, but I feel like I'd burst if I didn't say anything.
Is it because it is overcompensating for my inferiority complex?
It's probably because lots of people wanted cheese fondue for their New Year's Day celebrations.
Standard fondue recipes usually call for gruyere and emmental (aka emmentaler), and I was able to find at least 3 brands of the latter.
So I tested my cheese fondue with just emmental and water (no wine at home, only beer and cognac that are not for human consumption) as a simple experiment in which I tested the viability of using aluminium foil, a small steaming rack and a candle for cheese fondue.
The result showed that firstly, aluminium foil alone is not suitable for fondue because it conducts heat so quickly the spot right above the flame will char the cheese.
Second, the cheese does not melt quickly enough with just one of those small candles, even though it chars, before I added water.
Therefore water works, although alcohol works better by lowering the melting point.
I now have a small ceramic ramekin I'll test tomorrow. Theoretically it should work.
The ceramic surface will spread the heat out better, so it won't burn as easily.
I need more of these round, flat candles though.
As for the gruyere, I'll just find some either after 1-2 weeks or at another supermarket.
Arrogance. That's what I observed in myself. Arrogance without a good reason.
I can't help it.
Despite my current income level, I have yet to prove that I can maintain it.
It appears that I can, but I don't know if I will.
I should not feel arrogant just because I made what I made last month.
Yet I was pissed when someone said something to the effect that my friends and I don't make a lot of money.
That was proof enough that it was arrogance growing in me.
Arrogance without a justifiable cause.
How ironic that a person with confidence issues can also be arrogant.
Yet I cannot say anything to deny belittling remarks regarding my income.
It is absolutely important that nobody I work with knows how much I make so that I have more room to lie when haggling prices.
Singapore is a tiny country after all.
Only my mother, brother, accountant and the IRAS can know my income. Not even my wife is allowed this information, if I ever have one, unless she works with me.
Frankly speaking, it is quite difficult for me to keep all the secrets that I do, yet I do not have a choice.
Plenty of other jobs out there require tight lips, so I'm aware that I must get used to it.
The good thing is that I'm quite a miser, so I don't mind not spending on any luxuries, which makes me look like I'm poor.
The only issue I need to keep in mind constantly is alcohol - it loosens tongues.
I know I shouldn't even be revealing the fact that I have secrets, but I feel like I'd burst if I didn't say anything.
Is it because it is overcompensating for my inferiority complex?
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