Rant 444 / Obama Wins Nobel Prize After Only Nine Months As President?

It's Friday afternoon after class, so I went to Cold Storage for some ingredients with which to make a good late lunch.


Salami and cheese, slight toasted. Parma ham sandwich. A big mug of milk. You don't need to learn to cook to make a delicious meal such as this.










OBAMA GETS A FREAKIN NOBEL PRIZE?!? He hasn't really done anything yet! It's like giving a student a scholarship because he scored well in his first CA/test! What are they doing to the candidate selection process?? Obama's not even been President for a year!

While the decision won praise from statesmen like Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev, both former Nobel laureates, it was also attacked in some quarters as hasty and undeserved.

No shit! It's too hasty alright! It's like making a living person a saint! Way too early to judge, man!

Rant 443 / I Can't Feel My Butt

What I've noticed after watching a few movies that were regarded as very violent in the past, is that today's gory violence didn't start to appear till the 1990s. The Mad Max movie released in the 1980s merely showed body parts removed from the body, without the blood and brain bits exploding in all directions which seems to be the staple of all movies today except romantic comedies.

This confirms, in a way, my belief that civilization had never been actually civilized.

How did we begin? When humans were cavemen, we wore pieces of animal skins and killed each other all the time. Slavery was pretty much normal till the early 20th century. Even for the more civilized populations, there were forms of violence they enjoy and people really never did stop committing rape and adultery.

There were less? Who knows? What we do know is that there were less of such stories when we "became civilized", but this doesn't necessarily equate to fewer of such incidents. It's just like the way Singaporeans almost never mention the death penalty though Singapore does hang convicts.

Even now, we aren't as civilized we like to think we are. It is merely a facade that we put on so that we don't kill each other in the streets. We still like to see people die, whether it's in games or films. We want to see the gore, the pieces of unappetizing body parts flying all over the place. If not, then why are WWE and certain violent games so popular in places where people are considered liberal?

In many films and shows, we glorify law-breakers. Law enforcement officers appear to be more successful if they don't follow the rules. Teenagers playing violent and sometimes fatal pranks are just acting their age. No one looks at the children who gang-rape and violently abuse other children. They merely appear once in the papers and that's it. Discussion? None. Do people really care? Not much.

If we're actually civilized, our self-control should be better than that. Children who stick sharp objects into the bottoms (not referring exclusively to the anus) of other children should have been unthinkable, impossible, in a civilized society. Today, it's the occasional inspiration for another sensational news headline.

Fathers who rape their daughters for years, even decades, is yet another glaring example of how humans aren't civilized yet. Sick? No. Sick is 2girls1cup. Sick is 1guy1jar. This, IMO, is simply another facet human nature.

Using a recent revised version of Internet English I ask, "How do I civilized?"

¯\(°_o)/¯

Six thousand years obviously weren't enough for us to come up with a proper response.

Or more likely, I've misunderstood what it means to be civilized.












I kept repeating the same word till it's painful to read, but I'm too lazy to proofread and edit the above portion of this rant.












The Legend of the Seeker, as I expected, is crap. It gets more and more repelling as the episodes went on. The original Seeker was a much greater man than the one portrayed in the TV series, with a quest more daunting than a mere powerful man. They basically cheapened various elements in the Sword of Truth.












If you have a Hotmail account, it's time to change your password.

More than 10,000 usernames and passwords for Windows Live Hotmail accounts were leaked online late last week, according to a report by Neowin.net , which claimed that they were posted by an anonymous user on pastebin.com last Thursday. Neowin reported that it had seen part of the list. "Neowin has seen part of the list posted and can confirm the accounts are genuine and most appear to be based in Europe," said the site. "The list details over 10,000 accounts starting from A through to B, suggesting there could be additional lists." Accounts with domains of @hotmail.com, @msn.com and @live.com were included in the list.

"Most appear to be based in Europe." It really isn't saying anything.












http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/513760

Made by the same guy who created the Ultimate Crab Battle, Miami Shark is another hilarious free Flash game in which players control a shark that wreaks havoc in Miami.

You can start small by eating people and ducks, or you can aim high and leap up to bite into aircrafts to pull them down. It was hilarious when I was pulling a B2 Stealth Bomber and it went into stealth mode. Despite this desperate measure it went down just like the Apache before it. This is no mere Great White, because you can even drag a NASA space shuttle into the water.


















If you feel nostalgic, you're old.



Admit it; you haven't seen these in years.

One last video of a series that I never really watch, but seemed popular.



If that was your childhood, the following comic cover image will ruin it.

Rule 34 of the others are omitted because they're uninteresting, and not because they cannot be found.



Yes, even Dexter. Yes, even Pinky and the Brain.

And yes, even Rosie O'Donnell. <--- adult content warning. Filtered and summarized content below:

Rant 442 / Derailing A Rant Would Make It No Less A Rant

I never expected complex numbers to be useful when dealing with electronics. The more you know, the more (you realise) you don't.












Singapore opposition is now laughable. Some members of an opposition party were let off instead of getting charged for holding a procession without a permit because their "procession" was so pathetic the judge decided that what happened was merely some guys walking on the street. You can't sue people for just walking from one place to another.

It looks like the Singapore judicial system has a sense of humour.












There is now a lot of talk that the currency for oil may change, giving rise to a new inflation surge to the USD. Usually raising such an issue would result in that person being treated as a laughing stock, but now things are different.

The recent record prices of gold probably wouldn't have occurred if those unconfirmed reports of certain secret talks never surfaced. Despite the immediate denials by the Middle East states that such things never happened, the idea itself didn't die as quickly.

After this latest recession began, anything that has to do with not using the USD probably looks much more attractive than it did before 2008.












The people behind the Empires mod of Half Life 2 is remaking the entire research system, hence explaining why there hasn't been a patch in months. The Empires mod is a hybrid of real-time strategy (RTS) and first-person shooter (FPS), in which all players in each team play as soldiers except one who commands everyone else.

In this game, just like all RTS games, there is a research system which allows different weapons and tanks. It seems they are remaking the tech tree altogether for the next patch, which basically means a major revamp of the entire game.

After the next patch which should be released soon, they will finally do nothing but make Empires v3.0, which they have promised right from the beginning years ago will contain aircrafts. This v3.0 patch will require at least half a year, so everyone expects a lot.

Why is it that everything good seems to be happening the next year, every year?












http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/513573

Speed Scrabble. Well, not really. The goal of the game is to type words as fast as you can with the letters provided. Not using them is fine too, but pointless.












I find that without the Internet, I know nothing. Not the whole Internet, but Google and Wikipedia. I have Wikipedia opened all the time in one tab so that I can check out stuff I don't know.

But I cannot remember them all. Even while I'm emailing my prof about desalination I'm checking related articles on Wikipedia. I dare not imagine what sort of student I'd be without the Internet.

But he has asked me to discuss my questions after his next lecture instead of typing a complete answer. I cannot see how I can go any further than ask prepared (ie mentally scripted) questions without remembering details of what I "know".

I recall this quote from A Song of Ice and Fire, one that Ygritte said to Jon several times," You know nothing, Jon." I feel like Jon now.

Seriously, if you always have Google and Wikipedia opened on tabs in your Internet browser, you practically know everything. It's not a trick or anything, but more like a better way of making use of the Internet.

Which is why I believe a much faster way of connecting to the Internet is inevitable. Even now, everyone like how they can access the Internet via their mobile phones. What if there is an even more convenient way?

For example, by using holograms projected by a smaller device, perhaps the watch or even an implant. It is impossible today, but the concept of the Internet was not even imagined 100 years ago.

You know what I see? I see the Internet as the present stage of Man's path to achieving a group mind.

For centuries humans have sought to find faster means of data exchange. At first, there was the wheel. Carts driven by animals carried people faster than before, allowing exchange of information over long distances via stories and mere conversation.

Written communication and eventually the printing press brought about another way to exchange information faster and allow the data to last longer.

Phones, telegrams and radios were the next step.

Then the Internet.

What can be faster than the Internet? What slows you down in your connection to the Internet?

The concept of the net is the second best medium of data transfer - direct connection between anyone and everyone. Only the physical condition of the wires linking everyone limits the speed.

If such limitations can be overcome, what can be faster? What can exceed the speed of information exchange in a direct link between physical bodies?

A group mind, of course. Direct connection between minds. But that's the far future, the stuff of science fiction of today. If I go any further I'd probably look insane. Hell, someone reading this is likely to think that way already.

Rant 441 / I Am Not Seeing A Relation Between My Boredom And My Rant Frequency

Finally ordered my books yesterday, even though one book was out of stock again. This time it's The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, so I moved the trilogy to my Wish List and ordered the rest. Now they should arrive on Friday.

They shortened the process and delivery time by quite a bit recently. Now it takes about 5 working days from the day you pay to the day it arrives, instead of about 2 weeks( I think).













New Anti-Smoking Ads Warn Teens 'It's Gay To Smoke'

Smoking is gay. Don't be a faggot.












The new McDonald's offer looks interesting. Free coffee with each ala carte breakfast item. Not exactly the most economical deal since McDonald's coffee is more watery than than Pokka's. Still, I know some people wouldn't mind skipping the Hashbrowns for the same reasons they dislike fries.

Rant 440 / The Big Bright Orange Button

It seems I often know things that I'm not expected to know, yet remain ignorant of things I am expected to be aware of. The first time I heard the name "lobster bisque" it was during NS. I thought he said "lobster piss" and I was like "uh... what?"

The canned hamburgers are old news since last year, but was still news to me yesterday.









Let's have a McDoubleCheeseChicken. Double the trashiness, double the cholesterol. The staple food of the passively suicidal.












This is like some kind of natural disaster season. We're getting earthquakes and floods left and right recently. Floods are to be expected since it's the season for them, but there has been quite a few quakes last few weeks.

I believe the world's governments need to stop spending on space technologies. I know its the political equivalent of an e-peen , but seriously if they can't even send men to Mars with the best scientists of today, I don't see the practicality of funding more. Let them be privatised and leave them be. Those hundreds of millions can be better spent elsewhere, like research in stem cells and GM crops.

Even if we can get people to Mars, it merely boosts egos, nothing more. There is absolutely not a single shred of usefulness in sending people to space unless:

- we are able to mine resources from other planets/bodies in our Solar System.
- we can find a habitable planet.

Since neither can be accomplished, all we can do today is observe and theorise stuff no matter how far we fling our machines out into space.












So after the bees disappeared from some parts of the world, farmers in those regions are resorting to using feathers to hand-pollinate their vegetables and fruits. That job must really suck in more ways than one.

The Colony Collapse Disorder sounds creepy, rather like one of those stories about the abandoned ship with everything intact but also with everyone gone, where the things are placed as if the people were planning to return and the food is still on the tables.

In the case of the bees, they simply disappear altogether, leaving their pupa and food behind. Even stranger is that other bees don't steal their honey right after they leave, and other insects don't attack the hive immediately after their departure.

Lots of theories, but no proven cause. Makes this even more mysterious.

This is certainly disturbing...

I'm considering the notion of publishing my post on a daily basis instead of whenever I feel like clicking on the bright orange button.

There really isn't a bad point about it, except I don't want to be expected to post something everyday. The good point is that my posts get less confusing chronologically if I just post whatever I type on the day I typed it.

So the assignment for my Thermodynamics module is to design a desalination system, preferably using renewable energy sources, within a month. It's interesting, but involves a lot of work.

Good thing desalination plants can look quite similar to steam power plants. The only difference is that the seawater is not boiled at 100 degrees Celsius and the steam isn't superheated. Plus the messy steam turbine crap is skipped.

Now I did wonder why I can't just use the same system to both desalinate water and drive turbines. My answer is that to drive turbine, the water must be chemically treated to become soft water. Normal water causes calcium deposits in the system over time, while soft water doesn't. Cleaning the system would mean a complete shutdown, which cannot happen in a power generator unless you spend twice as much to build a spare.

Still, this is the only interesting thing I've encountered this semester.

Rant 439 / Catfight

Kitteh fight!












Did you know that e-stalkers can be incredibly creepy?

There is a method that changes your pictures such that the bras/nipples become visible through the shirt. I don't know the exact details since I never bothered to read them, but it seems to have something to do with changing the contrast using Photoshop.

What I do know for sure is that it works because some people have been taking requests to "xray" photos for others, and I've seen the results. No, they didn't just copy and paste some nude body parts on the photos.












Canned cheeseburgers!! Holy crap! Food technology of today is getting more amazing then I thought. Sooner or later they're going to come up with canned fried chicken. Heat it in boiling water, open the top and voila! Crispy fried chicken! They can probably fill it with pure nitrogen to keep the crispiness like they do with potato chips.

Most reviews agree the canned burger doesn't taste good though. On the other hand, I agree with one of the reviewers that it would taste much better if you're camping in the wild or something, when you take out your burger while others chew on their granola bars.

It's expensive, but if they use it as combat ration no one would be able to say that rations taste horrible. If a soldier gets cheeseburgers as combat rations, I believe he automatically loses the right to whine.





It looks very much like a cheeseburger from McDonalds, except the burger patty doesn't have the grilled look. Looks more like a thick slice of luncheon meat.

Wonder if it's available in Singapore.

Rant 438 / China Hits 60; 4Chan hits 6!

After days of nonsensical protests, some people finally woke up! Those big shots who made noise before are looking like fools. What they were essentially saying was that a famous and successful artist is above the law. That can be summarized into just one word: bullshit.












The creator of the Legend of Seeker series is the same guy who directed Spiderman 3 and is confirmed to be the director of the Warcraft movie. It's not that bad, since it's way better than handing it to the guy who made Alone in the Dark and the Dungeon Seige movie.

At one point, director Uwe Boll expressed interest in directing the movie, even going so far as meeting with Paul Sams to pitch ideas, but Blizzard stated in no uncertain terms it wanted nothing to do with Boll, whose movie adaptations of video games routinely landed as among the 100 worst rated and reviewed movies in recent memory. They went on record to say to him, "We will not sell the movie rights, not to you... not ever to you."

LOL! I have to admit it takes something special in a person to be that notorious.

The Warcraft movie is still in the pre-production stage, so dates are not announced yet. I think they're still searching for a cast. Only the director and screenwriter have been assigned. This film will be written by the same guy who created the Diablo, Starcraft and Warcraft universes, so I have certain expectations now. That $100m budget is also part of the reason for my expectations.












http://blogs.reuters.com/environment/2009/09/25/schwarzenegger-household-green-plan-short-showers-hydrogen-hummers/

He recalled watching his kids take a stool into the shower to sit and enjoy the hot water — for a long time.

“I’m sitting outside timing it now, and it’s 15 minutes, and still they are in the shower. So I open the shower door and turn off the hot water and then all of a sudden they start screaming, because it is cold,” he said, adding that he had created rules: no shower longer than 5 minutes — or else.

(A quick check at Wikipedia revealed to me that Austria was part of Nazi Germany during WWII.)

Don't know about you, but I only take long showers if I have a hard time waking up in the morning. I'd turn on the hot water and just stand under it, still half asleep. Other than that, I don't shower while taking a stool because I need to read something. I'd probably do that though, if I have plastic books/magazines.

Conservation is still important. Yep, and I'm typing this on a 650W computer that I turn on for 15 hours per day. ^.^

I'm such a hypocrite.















Do not eat/drink when you watch these.





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4t03uBWYCw

The above URL leads to a Youtube video that cannot be embedded like the previous.

And for the best I've found so far...