A visual study of the juxtaposition of a gigantic, filthy garbage monster with a sparkling clean jewelled goblet upon its hand, its most prized possession. For some reason, it is the one thing in its collection which it keeps spotlessly clean. Woohoo! I get to use the word “juxtaposition” once again! Still no opportunity for the word “curbstomp”, “mandelbrot” nor “ragamuffin”.
Continue readingMonthly Archives: July 2006
More Tales of Connectivity
I’ve been chatting online for more almost four years. I’ve chatted with acquaintances that have now become really good friends (although I’ve never met most any of them, and you know who you are, ya maggots), and I’m also in IM contact with some of my old schoolmates, but I have never had any real time internet contact with my old classmates from ACS, the SPM 1990 people, the guys who were my friends since primary and secondary school. All that changed today. I was online on Skype with Teik Sing, Woon Seong and Tern Lik today, and it wouldn’t be the last. I’ve already sent out a general call to the rest of the gang on our Yahoo Groups and Mei Lin’s already answered. We’ll have more joining us, I hope. We’ve been maintaining our network of friends after more than 20 years and now it looks like we’ll […]
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Great Expectations
I leant of a very heartwarming news yesterday when I was having lunch with Tern Lik (or Tem Lik as his business card erroneously states, heh). Irfan’s Uncle Teik Sing and Aunt Michelle are expecting a baby! Michelle’s been pregnant 8 weeks. I can’t believe Teik Sing and I played in school when we were seven and now our kids will have the opportunity to play with each other. Congratulations to Teik Sing and Michelle! It’s going to be one thrilling ride.
Continue readingOptimus Prime is Optimus Prime Once Again
So here’s what Moriarty from Ain’t It Cool News has to report from ComicCon: ComicCon News!! TRANSFORMERS Announcement! The Voice Of Optimus Prime Is… [[image:prime.jpg:”MEGATRONNNNN!!!!”:center:0]] … Peter Cullen. Yep. You can all relax. Paramount made it official a few moments ago during their presentation panel, and by all accounts, there was much rejoicing. The original voice of Optimus Prime will voice the live action version! It’s great to know Paramount or Michael Bay didn’t opt for another voice actor, or worse, a celebrity voice just to pull in the crowd. Mr. Cullen was also the voices of K.A.R.R. of Knight Rider, the Predator, and the Mogwais and the Gremlins. If I had those in my resume, I’d be real proud of it.
Continue readingMusic Of My Choice In The Car Again
The cassette player in my car hasn’t been functioning for quite a long time, and I don’t have a CD player aboard. So I have been at the mercy of whatever the radio stations been churning out should I want to listen to music in the car. But from yesterday, all that have changed. I am now able to listen to stuff I want to whenever I want to. Yesterday, tunes like Gilbert O’Sullivan’s upbeat “Alone Again, Naturally” and Zager & Evan’s optimistic “In The Year 2525” were blaring from my speakers and I felt so much alive driving alone than I’ve ever been in quite awhile. And it’s all thanks to a little tube I plugged into the lighter socket. The tube transmits the music over a selection of radio frequencies. The car radio receives the signal on the set frequency and plays the music. And the tunes are […]
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Summer Vacation On Zeltros
SWAG’s Theme Art Contest for this month is in the bag, with two points in mind: 1. Terras’ title suggestion, which is My First Summer Vacation on the Planet Zeltros. 2. Darren’s suggestion of using Team: Sabredart imagery once again. Click on the thumbnail for a full-sized pop-up. The Team Saberdart are, from left to right: Raeree Giin – Iktotchi Jedi Knight and de facto leader of the rogue Republic Intelligence task force, Jerec-Kargin – Team medic without his ancient Mandalorian armour here, Harloth Graf – Naboo trooper seconded to Republic Intelligence during the Clone Wars, BU-77 – Genetically altered Kamino-manufactured clone, and former ARC Trooper who lisps, Cassie – Teenaged hellraiser, picked up after the team went rogue, and behind them all, Mavik – Teltior hit man, skilled with the knives, also a latecomer to the group.
Continue readingRuminations of Superman Returns
[[image:supes00.jpg:Superman Returns:center:0]]I went in to watch Superman Returns with high expectations and I got what I deserved, I guess. It was quite a decent movie, but it isn’t as epic as i thought it would be. First the non-spoilerific thoughts: [[image:supes02.jpg:Transorbital Rescue:left:0]]The stills I saw prior to seeing this movie did not do justice to Brandon Routh. He doesn’t only make a terrific Superman, but he does a fantastic iteration of Christopher Reeve’s Clark Kent. The VFX of Superman flying are perfect, and make us believe a man can fly much more than Superman the Movie. Any scene with him flying for any reason is visually satisfying. There could be a scene of him trying to pick his teeth while floating and it would look great I believe. The space shuttle and Boeing 777 simultaneous rescue is everything I wanted to see in a Superman movie. [[image:supes03.jpg:Keyser Luthor:right:0]]Lots of people […]
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Job Done – Heading Home
I forgot to mention in the previous post that Sam and I spent the night at Ambhara hotel. It was quite a comfortable place to stay, with a shopping mall (whose name escapes me for now) right across the street from it. For some reason we were too lethargic when we arrived all we could do after ordering room service – I ordered the nasi goreng pelangi – is fall asleep until sundown. That night our contact met up with us at the cafe downstairs for the next day’s big meeting preparation, then Sam and I went to the mall across the street where he had bakso and I had nasi goreng omelette. I had no idea it was nasi goreng dumped on a humongous omelette – which was delicious, so I ain’t complaining. After the big presentation the following day, we had to head back to the hotel to […]
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Meanwhile In Indonesia
Greetings from Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia. Arrived this morning, I’ll be here until tomorrow for a presentation concerning work and work-related work stuff. The good news is I got some pictures. The bad news is that the pictures were only taken when we reached our hotel room. Here’s the view outside the window. Unfortunately it’s behind the hotel into the alley, you can pretty much see nothing. Here’s the bathroom. You can’t go wrong with picture of the hotel bathroom. Meanwhile behind the cupboard that holds the 21 inch TV, there appears to be signs of life. It’s Sam, Earth’s Supreme Avionics Commander, checking his email and planning for the future of the industry on the planet. Of course, he has to write down his plans first. And finally because Sam is around, I get my picture taken when I’m on one of these trips unlike Germany and Singapore. […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure IX: Bournemouth
This is the final part of our European Adventure. After saying goodbye to Joanne in Leeds, we drove back to London. It was Friday, May 26th, and we were to fly home on Sunday morning, the 28th. The drive back to London was smooth until we hit the M25 (the ring road around London). It was about 2:30 in the afternoon but Monday was a bank holiday, so we hit the rush hour. Everybody left early in order to start the long weekend. So it took us about 2 hours to get from getting on the M25 to Surrey, and I was cursing under my breath the entire time. Anyway, we made it back to Mei’s place, safe and sound, and we thankfully collapsed on their sofa. We relaxed and waited for Mei and Colin to come home from work. We were having dinner at their favorite Indian restaurant and […]
Continue readingBeast Wars – A Series Review
[[image:bwars01.jpg:Rattrap,Optimus Primal, Rhinox and Cheetor… no-prize for guessing who’s who:left:0]]It was just past the mid-90s. X-Files was at its prime on TV and there was news of a brand new CGI Transformers series that will be airing on TV. Being an 80s child, the original Transformers series was one of the shows I followed fanatically. The thought of giant alien robots being able to hide among us in the form of Porsches, Lamborghinis, Lancia Stratos and VW Beetles was very exciting to me and my friends. But after reading the synopsis of Beast Wars Transformers my interest waned. What’s so hot about robots being able to transform into Earth animals on an supposedly uninhabited alien planet? Why is there even a need to hide? I passed on the pilot. But sometime during the middle of the first season, I happened to catch an episode, thanks to the proddings of my […]
Continue readingTravel Trivia
So I was reading Lilian’s iFantabulous site, and she posted a little map that was generated based on the countries you’ve visited. Of course, I had to try it too. Unfortunately, I have only been to 8 countries! Yikes! Here’s what my map looks like: Create your own visited country map or check our Venice travel guide Then I wanted to see how many states I’ve been to in the US – I’ve been to 27 states (more than half, woohoo!). Create your own personalized map of the USA or check out our California travel guide You can definitely tell I do NOT like cold weather – most of the northern states are not yet visited 😀 and yet I’ve been to Hawaii. And in all my years of living in Boston, I never did make it to Vermont, for whatever reason. Even though one of the things on my […]
Continue readingEuropean Adventure VIII: Return to England (Grantham, York, Leeds)
After almost a week of hot sunny days in Spain, we flew back to England from Malaga. We arrived at Gatwick and it was raining cats and dogs. What a welcome, eh? 🙂 We made our way back to Mei’s place, and that evening we went to a barbeque with Mei and Colin and met a bunch of people from their diving club. Unfortunately no pictures of the barbeque because a) it was night time and b) it was still pouring rain. It’s true – the English barbeque in all weather!! The next morning, Mei and I picked up a rental car before she went off to work, and Vin and I packed lightly for our one-night trip up north to Leeds where Vin’s sister Joanne lives. So we got into the very small car (I should have taken a picture of Vin sitting in it!! Sort of Kancil-sized) and […]
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Illustration Friday: Sticky
One more Illustration Friday piece… and it’s really supposed to be a reminder of what I’m supposed to be doing this week. A virtual Post-it note. Hee.
Continue readingEuropean Adventure VII: Malaga – Departure
After a long delay of finishing up the chronicles of our European Adventure, finally I’m back to do the last few entries. After our fun time in Jaen, it was time to head back to Malaga where we would spend one last night in Spain before heading back to England. We took a bus from Jaen to Granada, and another bus from Granada to Malaga and made it back in good time. It was late afternoon by the time we got to Malaga. We didn’t have reservations at any hotel, so we asked the tourist information kiosk at the Malaga bus station, and they gave us a map of hotels in Malaga. Not only did the map tell us where the hotels were, there was a write-up about the hotel, hotel reviews, and approximate prices. So based on price and proximity to the beach, we decided to try the Hotel […]
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Today The Light Switch…
… Tomorrow the world!!! Earlier today Irfan realised that he has a new super power: the ability to reach any high switch on the wall with his hands (albeit on tippy toes). So all morning he’s been all over the house flipping switches. Lights. Fan. Forcefields. Directed-energy weapons. Life support systems. But the best thing all week has been his newfound skill of asking to use the toilet when required. Many thanks to Irfan’s Tok & Opah for teaching their grandson while Ain & I were at work last week. The other thing Irfan did with his grandparents was watch Pixar’s Cars together. The first time they watched a movie together, but the third time Irfan’s watched Cars in the theatre. Cars appears to have become Irfan’s favourite movie. He asks to see it again almost every day. He can remember names and tell who’s who on sight. He points […]
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