Year End Special: The Accursed 2009 (For me)

It's been a while. Since I started some serious mind-shout-out blog in here. Now, some really strong stuff is going to be here. Quit looking if you are any religious fanatics who do not accept the view of luck at all. Yes. You here me right. Its all about luck in here.

2009 have been a really f***ed up year for me. Especially near the end of the year. And I really do focus on the word "Especially". Like now. Why, you may asked? Well, its nothing. The luck seemed to turn down on me in this "holy year".

I still remember some time in the early 2009. I read a magazine (not intentionally by the way). It talked about my money luck. Says that this year will be the year where my wallet bleed. Being a happy-go-lucky type of person, I generally think of it as a warning to spend wisely. And in that very year, bleeding it is. Really bleeds till almost dry. 2009 is the worst year for my finance. Spend probably more than 2 years worth of living allowance in 1 year. And that would add up to about RM1200 per month. Where the hell did all the money goes, you may asked? Well, many small small (and a few big big) issues. Well, I will go into the major ones, because the minor one I can't remember...Swt...

Major 1: For the first time I bought a digital camera. Initially is for my gf. However, i did something unimaginable: I bought a brand that she did not want (well, my mistake anyway for turning my head for a Kodak instead of Nikon that she said many times that she wanted). She blew off. And I gotta think fast to cool her down. I bought another Nikon, lying to her that I can return the product when I could not (BAD BAD BAD), thinking that I will take over the ownership of the Kodak. The first unexpected major spending. But hey, look at the bright side (at least from my point of view): I got my first digital camera. And you might thought the bad news ends here. NOPE. IT DOES NOT. During the trip to Sabah, I lost it somewhere in the airport, forever. For a camera that I have used less than a month. And I was checking on it every 5 minutes. WTF. Really. WTF. See how f***-up my trip ended.

Speaking about the trip, Major 2: Spending for the trip to Sabah. Well, this is already within the calculated budget. So I will not complained about it. In fact it is well worth the money spend. Still...Wallet bleeds...And at the end of the trip...Sigh...

Major 3: This happened just yesterday. The silly me lost my handphone (RM1100 when I bought it 3 years ago. Served me well... T____T), together with my IC and my Golla bag... T__T
Now how do I tell her about that? Eruption is sure to ensue...Sigh...

Books and books...This year has been hard on books and printed material. Drug Information Hand book cost RM215. Printer cost another RM199. Not to mention with my dear dear now in JB, occational visit will cost RM 150 per trip minimum. Sigh...........

And there is still the "Bad Day" curse. Works every time. On me only of course. For those who don't know what is "Bad Day" curse (only perhaps 2 of my closest friend knows about it anyway), everytime if the song "Bad Day" by Daniel Powter played in front of me, the next day will really be a bad day. Don't belief me? Well you don't have to. It has happened to me for more than 10 occasions this years. And the number of time I heard this songs this years should be about 10 too. So to me it is statistically significant. Even though each and everytime I told myself: This song won't cause any harm to me this time for sure. Yes it did. It is harmfull. To me anyway.

Oh, there is also the case with Acer vs Asus... Also, my favourite pop artist Michael Jackson died this year...Everything is going going gone...Sigh...Not in the mood to further elaborate my sadness...So this will be it for now...

Hopefully 2010 will bring me better luck. And I mean MUCH BETTER!

Cool Guys Don't Look At Explosion!

A very interesting MV. Found it in some comment in Gizmodo. 

Some interesting quote from the lyric:
"Cool guys don't look at explosion!
They blow things up, and never look back!"
"The more you ignore it, the cooler you look..."


Featuring some of your favorite characters, including Joker (!!), Robocop (!!!), Ironman, The Rock etc...Enjoy!

Untitled Rant

This is not suitable for anybody except nobody.
So unless you are nobody, and not existing in this world, you are welcomed to read this post.
Just need a shoutout spot where nobody "is supposed to" "see". And even if you are a busybody (not a nobody) who have nothing better to do, do skip this too.

*SCREAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!*

(Thank you, Edvard Munch, for his exceptionally well done piece of art to express my current emotion)

Do = die. Didn't do = die. So what to do?Sigh...
This "equation" is absurd. But then again, sometimes it carries the truth. It happens. Heck, shit happens, all the time. And it have had to happen sometimes in everyone's life. Most of the time, it will result in negative mood day, or at best, moodless day.

How I wish I could be alone on D-day, quietly doing something (nothing is considered something though), my own thing that is. But shit have to happen. And it is unexpectedly coming to MY HOUSE. Not that I choose it to happen over here. And the one of the "hero" of the day is an "ENEMY OF THE STATE". Escape would seems to be rather rude as the other two hero of the day is a friendly unit. And invitation was sent out for the day.Thus, shits occur.

And shits happen. No need for explanation here. Threshold has been breached. Pressure went well over the limit. Blow off trigger point activated. Ground zero has been zoned in and targeted. All missiles and artillery aimed at dummy. Safety lock released. Expected chance of survival: 30%. Estimated recovery time  needed: Unknown. Either soon (as in days) or never (hopefully not).

Lesson learnt. Do not proceed to function containing enemy(ies) of state. For whatever reason. I just want a peaceful and relatively eventless period. At least let me finish my work before any shit happes.

Scary Picture of the Day

[Source]
This picture was linked from Gizmodo, one of my favourite sites. If clown is your type, you might think again. If clown is not your type, you might have insomnia for a few days after looking at the picture. Pretty interesting, don't you think? Kudos to the artist... (Can't believe I said that...)

Highlight: Joker from Batman and your favourite fast food icon McDonald...Who a few days ago was found to have his arse kicked by Colonel in Youtube...

Too late. You already seen the picture. Hope you will have a good dream tonight, if not the clown that will be visiting you...

Moon Cake Part II

[FPS (first person shooter) beta testing mode]

Went to market early today (woke up at 6.30am, go at 6.45am). Went with parents and younger sister. After the routine breakfast (Loh Mee Banzai!!!), saw an auntie selling moon cakes.

Mum ask the auntie how much was she selling the moon cakes. Since the moon cake is not professionally and prettily packed, just choose what you want and she will put the moon cake into a cheap cheap plastic bag, expect the price to be about RM7-8 with eggs.

Surprised! Its no where near it. The traditional red bean paste and lotus paste cost ONLY RM2.50 per cake! With yolk, the price goes up to RM4 per cakes. Got the shock of my life there. RM4! Then what the hell are the people at KLT or Queensbay Mall selling? Gold and diamond crusted packaging on the moon cakes? Or the paste itself is prepared from some kind of rare food on the earth? Really don't want to say this at the blog, but WTF is the world moving towards? Packaging and money is more important than people's happiness to eat moon cakes? But who will they care? Smart way to make money, which is selling less amount for more premium product, is the current trend, and will be the way of life for the future. Good for investor. Bad for normal 人民. Sounds more and more like communist, am I not?

Bought RM30 worth of moon cakes from that auntie...Sounds a little but it is a lot...Hope they don't taste bad...

Don't think too much...This is life. And my immature mind. But who cares. This is my space to rant. Now...Where is my moon cake...And feed the fish...

Apple starts the war on PSP/DS

Apple finally started rolling the ball on PSP and DS, by saying that PSP and DS are overpriced piece of gadget and uncool.

According to Phil Schiller, Apple's marketing VP, PSP and NDS are too overpriced as their game price is about USD$20-40 per game. Also, he stabbed the heart of the faithful PSP and NDS lovers (me as one of them. PSP ftw!!) by saying that these gadget is no longer cool. Unlike Apple's iPod touch and iPhone. They are cool, small and have 20,000 apps that is relatively cheap compared to PSP and NDS. However, do remember that iPod touch and iPhone price are much much higher compare to PSP or NDS. So Apple calling PSP and NDS overprice is like telling a bunch of monkeys that horse is bigger than an elephant (bad comparison, I know). Also, PSP was (now is not) sold at a lost, but get back the money from the software. So calling them (PSP and NDS) overpriced is a bit too much. Tell that to yourself, Apple.

Brother, you may be right in saying that PSP is uncool. The form factor of PSP is too bulky for my liking. And the price of the game is relatively high. But then again, for the quality of the game (gaming experience, that is), PSP and NDS rules! iPod touch/iPhone is not suitable for many types of gaming categories. Try playing FPS/TPS or fighting game (Street Fighter/Tekken) on iPod/iPhone. You will wish that they have some buttons for it, or else a cheap replaceable touch screen, if you get what I mean. The strength of iPod and iPhone lies on its touch screen and accelerometer. Games that built around these capabilities may be fun, but the fun factor does not hold as long as the button type gaming.

Although PSP has no accelerometer or touch screen, PSP/NDS has buttons. Plenty of them. 6 dedicated buttons to be exact, 1 analogue stick (although badly positioned) and directional pad, not to mention 6 other dedicated button to control the volume, brightness etc. All of which are very important for gaming experience, and is not found in iPod/iPhone. Media wise, PSP plays them decently, but not everyone like its interface, although i do ^_^.

Also, the ability to hack your PSP (if you need help on this, just leave me a message. I am pro here...XD) means that you can play pirated games on your PSP for free, similar to jail breaking in iPod/iPhone. I am not bad-mouthing Apple, but the many apps for iPod/iPhone are not for serious gamers. It is more suitable for database type software, puzzle games and web browsing, but definitely not for most type of games. In addition, iPod/iPhone's media function are much better compared to PSP. NDS? Was never in the range to target iPod/iPhone in that area.

Whats the conclusion? You asked? Well, conclusion is, iPod/iPhone is never good for serious and long term gaming. PSP and NDS kicks Apple's serious arse in that area. However, web browsing and media playing function wise, iPod and iPhone is the clear winner there. So if you are into both gaming and multimedia, the best solution is: get BOTH PSP and iPhone. NDS? Never on my radar...

Now then...Feed the fish will ya? They hunger for your love...

Moon cakes

It is almost "moon cake festival". The time of the year where young people (kids only though) play with cute cartoon lanterns and eat some moon cakes, and probably with pameloes if you can find them.

Now that brings me to my point. Moon cakes. Who does not love them? In addition, it is part of Chinese cultural delicacies. Well maybe some of you do not like moon cakes for whatsoever reason. But most of us do anyway. With or without egg yolks. With whatever stuff inside of the moon cakes. Red bean paste, lotus paste and other "abdominal filler" within the moon cakes, together with the thick yummy crust of the moon cakes...The combination (or probably the crust-only moon cakes) provide the addictive sweet taste that will make you want for more. It makes the taste bud goes all euphoric (at least for me). And what a emesis-inducing description that is...From me who is bad at describing things.

Anyway, the things about moon cakes is price. Once upon a time, 1 moon cake cost only about RM5 without yolk. RM7 with 1 yolk. RM5! And now? With all the beautiful packaging and aggressive marketing, the cost of moon cakes sky rocketed to RM10+ in recent years. Today, I went to Queensbay Mall, and the price of the moon cakes shocked me! RM 20 (tax not yet included) for a NORMAL moon cakes. With no yolk. But I must admit, the size and the packaging of the moon cakes seems (a little bit) bigger and pretty than the standard not so pretty moon cakes. And the funny thing is, people are still willing pay that exorbitant fees for that silly piece of moon cakes. With a nice packaging of course. And what a brilliant idea anyway. And these type of moon cakes typically flood all the market place, including Carefour, which I depends my grocery from. As a result, unless I got a know-how and know-where and a car, I won't be able to get a moon cake that can satisfy both my stomach and consciousness.

Extrapolate that to other things in real life: Every "premium" products are always much costlier than they supposed to be. With better looks and perhaps better quality. Maybe not all are costlier than they are supposed to be. PSP and PS3 are sold at a loss from Sony. Which is great, supposingly. This is a fact of life. But this will also inflate the price of other competitors, knowing that with an inferior product, they could sell the product at near premium price with a cuter or better packaging and aggressive promotion. But then again, what can we do, you might ask. Nothing. Really. Nothing. No one want to go back to the way of communism or socialism where the trade are all heavily controlled. And it is counter productive and counter development, which I do not think any people will want it. Also bear in mind that price that goes up will never go down again. Never.

For now, I am still looking for a "easily-accesible-yet cheap-enough-for-my-wallet" moon cake to fill my lust for moon cakes...

Duck

It has been a while since I found some interesting pictures. The following pictures will not have any hidden meaning (to those who are paranoia about hidden meaning thingy). I am a simple person. And do note that guys are very simple minded creature(refer to The Ugly Truth) as compared to women.

That giant ducky is 9.5m tall, 11m long rubber ducky, currently floating on a river in Osaka. The invasion was not the first time in earth. Other place seems to have been invaded as well...

FYI, I especially love the night view of the ducky, where the duck is gazing the moon...Romantic...???

Life lesson from the lab, Part I (If I am not too lazy to update anyway)

Just want to tell the world I am alive, not that any people will care anyway. From this sentence, you can feel that I am in a "negative" mood. Perhaps it may be caused by the daily routine of lab work, which may progress till late in the night. Or perhaps it is triggered by my lack of precious personal time caused by the research. So I will describe several life lessons I learned from the lab, which can be useful in our daily lives.

Also, perhaps it is because I am a early person. Being with a late person does really reduce the time I have a date with Uncle Zhou (周公). But then again, as long as the date is longer than 6 hours, I am happy with it. Though my mind may be blank during the research, causing me to make hell load of critical mistakes. So what is the divine punishment that I will receive for the mistakes? Bazooka-ed and machine gunned, coupled with a dark aura surrounding me for a few hours. Thus: Lesson 1: What ever you do, make sure you have enough sleep before you do any serious stuff that have high probability of killing you, especially if you are working with perfectionist woman (go watch The Ugly Truth...). Mistakes are not tolerated. So sleep more and rest more.

When doing a research, you will definitely use some machine. Some machines are not so popular and less users will be using them. If you use that most of your time, great. However, if you are using the popular instrument, chances are your machine are being used by your colleagues when you want to use it. And if your experiment is time-sensitive experiment, congrats! You just screwed up your experiment! And you are welcomed to redo it. Luckily, there is a booking system where you can booked to use the machines at certain time that you want, provided you appear within 15 minutes of your booking time. Conclusion: Lesson 2: Always plan your things ahead, at least by a day, or better still, planned everything before you start doing anything. Many people knew these, but not many people implement it. It reminded me of a friend's PM in MSN: Fail to plan = Plan to fail.

Conflicts are common in research. Your fellow researcher may want to use a certain machine. However, you already booked the machine. So technically you have the right to use it. Not them. However, beware of a jump-queue jutsu (un)commonly used to counter this problem: Lecturer-Who-Don't-Care-About-Other-People-From-Other-Group-Demand-To-Jump-Queue jutsu! FYI, jutsu means technique. This jutsu is commonly deployed by people who do not want to negotiate to get things which they could not, and we have seen a few examples here. So what can I do in this case, you asked, since the lecturers "dai sai", ruthless and even 得寸进尺? The remedy, as shown by CCJ, is to: Lesson 3: Learn to negotiate with the other party. You give one I give one. Everyone happy. But do not push me over the limit. Or you will not get anything at all. In addition, Lesson 4: If the other party want to use it no matter what, DO NOT LET THEM BE if what they want will screw up your experiment. They did not do proper planning. So its their problem. Help if what they want will not hamper you.

When you enter the world of research, there will be peoples who were here before you. So technically, they are your senior. Most of them are pretty helpful and will help you if you ask them, provided they are free and not pissed off you, which is the case of me. One of the master student (at least one) is pretty pissed off me and SL because we worked on the area near centrifuge. The area also contains other machine like vortexing, microcentrifuge, incubator etc. Thus us working there means road block to their work. In addition, we shift to a working bench nearby, and kena halau lagi cause she suspect us contaminating her whatever stuff with bacteria. Meaning pissing off that very same senior again. Anyway, which comes to my point: Lesson 5: Be friendly with the seniors. Do not create enemy out of them. They can help you a lot in the research. I have got to thanks Ms. Chuah for helping us a lot with our research thus far. Oh...And my communication skills sucks. Probably due to my "do not like to talk to people" style. Which is why I am not able to talk to people like SL did, making friends with many people in the lab. Sometime I wonder why I choose to walk this "silent" pathway...Sigh...

Thats it for now. Until I am ready with more material and free time...
Now where is my ice cream...

Fail

Failed a mission today. Terribly important mission. Most importantly, the plan was planned for quite some time. But still, I failed.
T_T

Do not ask. No need to know anything. But it is just that I am too choosy. I insisted on choosing it myself. And a surprise as well. This all ended with my demise. Mampus. And tonight is such a special day too...Sigh...

And furthermore, initiative not appreciated. Got hit back because of my insistence. Not flexible kononnya. Anyway, nothing can be done anymore. With the "Bad Day" played, my day is pretty much black today anyway.

Lets hope tomorrow will be a better day.

Life in a Research Semester

"Welcome to research semester, the semester where there is no examination and the pace setter are you yourself."

So that was what I thought. Or at least it still is. There really will be no examination this semester, just presentation (twice) and a thesis to write. And the pace setter is still yourself. Unless you have got a lousy supervisor who would do nothing to help your research or order your material late, which you would have to wait for another 2 months before you can get the material. Furthermore, you can choose when you want to work on your research. If you want to avoid the crowd, try to do experiment from 8pm till midnight. It is quite fun actually since you may not need to race with other people when you want to use a machine. Or in my case, it is your partner who determine your pace. Too fast, too furious, and too stressful. Don't want to talk about it here. But the truth is: find your working partner who suites your way of doing experiment. If not, it will be headache for both of you.

The research is actually much more tiring than I initially expected. I thought at most it would be 9-5 kind of work, but no. It is not, and maybe it will, but most probably it will never be 9-5. It will stretch both ways. And if your partner is from a different time zone, all the more problem. Early bird and night owl working together = at least one of them will be night owl...

Anyway, this semester, my research project is "Rapid and efficient isolation of multimeric plasmid DNA". It deals with the new method of extracting plasmid developed by my supervisor, Dr. Chowdhury. And nothing to worry about, I will not blurt out the specific facts about the research cause I know it will drown you all. Biotechnology is not for everyone.

Thesis will be up next. Lets hope that my research will finish soon so that I can finally start the paperwork...Sigh...

Finally, everything ended!

Finally! All the official work and unofficial work has been done. Just want to rant about my life here. So if you are not into people's ranting, this is where you should just stop reading and do something more useful.

Just finished my proposal yesterday, and I thought I could relax a little. And boy, I was wrong. Really wrong. Life is still full of problems. Just when I thought I could relax after spending the last 2 weeks doing the proposal, I just remembered that I still got a side project for WH. I got to write an article for the convo mag. Luckily, I already have a rough idea on what to write for the article about a week ago. But still, having booked for most of my time, I have only got less than 12 hours of writing time to finish the article. 12 hours to cover seven deadly sins of my batch. Somehow, it seems almost impossible with the amount of material to write. But I just have to make it. Have to at least write out what I have in mind for the past week. I never really write big before, but it will be the first time I am going to do this. So better make it big. And make it good.

What is the title of my article, you may want to ask. Well, the title of the article is "The Seven Deadly Sins of B106". Basically it describe the seven bad attitude of our class. I don't know whether I am allowed to expose the detail, but the 7 sins are all related to the class. So maybe I shall reveal the info in a later day, one day at a time. That will story for another day. And since the topic is a bit broad, so I am amazed by my speed when I finished producing the piece of work. Over 2000 words are typed in less than 12 hours. Not too shabby. But I have never read through the article, no proofing and no editing whatsoever. Hope WH will not kill me for that.

So here I am. After finishing the article, taking the dinner, watching movie with my sweetie, and now sitting in front of my laptop writing you this blog before I finally jumped on my bed and have a date with Uncle Zhou...

Work, home and pup!

For the past few days (1 week already I think), everyday have been eat, proposal, eat, proposal, sleep, proposal, eat, proposal, sleep. In fact, other than the toilet break and occasional lazying around and class, everything has been about proposal. Damn, when this thing end, I really wish I will have 3 full days of rest, and not getting one will make my mind crazy...

Anyway, like the saying goes 烽火连三月，家书抵万金! Getting a news or call from home during this time really will lighten up your heart. My mum called from home the day before yesterday. A new member of the family has arrived! My house is getting a new puppy! Good for my parents who will be very bored as all their children are far away from home. This will keep them busy and at least won't be so lonely, especially my mum who stays at home alone most of the time.

Whats the name of the pup, and of what breed is that toy pup, you may want to ask, though don't think any of you are busy body enough? Name? I forgot to ask...For the breed, its a dalmatian...crossed with other breed...Making it a mongrel. But who cares? As long as it is a good dog, it is good! Heard that the pup (its a she, by the way) is hyper active, and is hungry for love and attention from the owner all the time. So no doubt it will keep my mum busy for a while, at least until the break for me to go back Penang. When that happen, I wonder how am I gonna torture play with that puppy!

Can't wait for that to happen!

♫ Mahathir is coming to town...♫

Remember the song of Santa Clause? "Santa Clause is coming to town..."

Now replace the "Santa Clause" with Mahathir, and you got ♫ Mahathir is coming to town...♫, which sounds pretty fine for the song anyway. Which Mahathir? The most famous Mahathir, of course. The one and only Tun Dr. Mahathir bin Mohammad, the forth prime minister of Malaysia.

And too bad, the event is for IMU students only. Tun Dr. Mahathir will have a dialogue with the IMU students with the theme of "Leadership in Medicine & contribution to Nation Building".

Now, I don't have any particular grudge against our beloved ex-leader, he is, after all, the guy who made the ISA to its current popularity. In fact, he is also the one who causes all the headaches to the Chinese community. However, he is still a real medical practitioner, who is going to have a dialogue to the students who are Chinese-majority, AND some of them are there because of him. Got to thank him for that anyway.

Now then, am I going there? No. Of course not. Not really because of him anyway. Cause there are some important class that I prefer to attend rather than dialoging (or most probably, listening rather than dialoging). The dialogue may be inspirational, but I am just not interested. He may be the modernisation father, but he ain't no my father. Conclusion: No go for me.

A Touching Story of a Dying Girl, "Up", and Pixar

A very touching true story that I have encountered on the Internet about a dying girl wish to watch "Up", a new movie by Pixar, and how Pixar send their employee to her house with the DVD, soft toys and a poster of "Up". 7 hours after watching the movie, the girl succumbed to her cancer. Rest in peace, girl...

Really makes you want to cry.

[Plagerised from this source]

"HUNTINGTON BEACH – Colby Curtin, a 10-year-old with a rare form of cancer, was staying alive for one thing – a movie.

From the minute Colby saw the previews to the Disney-Pixar movie Up, she was desperate to see it. Colby had been diagnosed with vascular cancer about three years ago, said her mother, Lisa Curtin, and at the beginning of this month it became apparent that she would die soon and was too ill to be moved to a theater to see the film.

After a family friend made frantic calls to Pixar to help grant Colby her dying wish, Pixar came to the rescue.

The company flew an employee with a DVD of Up, which is only in theaters, to the Curtins’ Huntington Beach home on June 10 for a private viewing of the movie.

The animated movie begins with scenes showing the evolution of a relationship between a husband and wife. After losing his wife in old age, the now grumpy man deals with his loss by attaching thousands of balloons to his house, flying into the sky, and going on an adventure with a little boy.

Colby died about seven hours after seeing the film.

With her daughter’s vigil planned for Friday, Lisa Curtin reflected about how grateful she is that Pixar – and "Up" – were a part of her only child’s last day.

“When I watched it, I had really no idea about the content of the theme of the movie,” said Curtin, 46. “I just know that word ‘Up’ and all of the balloons and I swear to you, for me it meant that (Colby) was going to go up. Up to heaven.”

Pixar officials declined to comment on the story or name the employees involved.

THE PREVIEWS

Colby was diagnosed with vascular cancer on Dec. 23, 2005 after doctors found a tumor in her liver. At the time of her death, her stomach was about 94 inches around, swollen with fluids the cancer wouldn’t let her body properly digest. The rest of her body probably weighed about 45 pounds, family friend Carole Lynch said.

Colby had gone to Newport Elementary School and was known for making others laugh, family friend Terrell Orum-Moore said. Colby loved to dance, sing, swim and seemed to have a more mature understanding of the world than other children her age, Orum-Moore said.

On April 28, Colby went to see the Dream Works 3-D movie "Monsters Vs. Aliens" but was impressed by the previews to "Up."

“It was from then on, she said, ‘I have to see that movie. It is so cool,’” Lynch said.

Colby was a movie fan, Lisa Curtin said, and she latched onto Pixar’s movies because she loved animals.

Two days later Colby’s health began to worsen. On June 4 her mother asked a hospice company to bring a wheelchair for Colby so she could visit a theater to see "Up." However, the weekend went by and the wheelchair was not delivered, Lisa Curtin said.

By June 9, Colby could no longer be transported to a theater and her family feared she would die without having seen the movie.

At that point, Orum-Moore, who desperately wanted Colby to get her last wish, began to cold-call Pixar and Disney to see if someone could help.

Pixar has an automated telephone answering system, Orum-Moore said, and unless she had a name of a specific person she wanted to speak to, she could not get through. Orum-Moore guessed a name and the computer system transferred her to someone who could help, she said.

Pixar officials listened to Colby’s story and agreed to send someone to Colby’s house the next day with a DVD of "Up," Orum-Moore recalled.

She immediately called Lisa Curtin, who told Colby.

“Do you think you can hang on?” Colby’s mother said.

“I’m ready (to die), but I’m going to wait for the movie,” the girl replied.

THE MOVIE

At about 12:30 p.m. the Pixar employee came to the Curtins’ home with the DVD.

He had a bag of stuffed animals of characters in the movie and a movie poster. He shared some quirky background details of the movie and the group settled in to watch Up.

Colby couldn't see the screen because the pain kept her eyes closed so her mother gave her a play-by-play of the film.

At the end of the film, the mother asked if her daughter enjoyed the movie and Colby nodded yes, Lisa Curtin said.

The employee left after the movie, taking the DVD with him, Lynch said.

“He couldn’t have been nicer,” said Lynch who watched the movie with the family. “His eyes were just welled up.”

After the movie, Colby’s dad, Michael Curtin, who is divorced from Lisa Curtin, came to visit.

Colby died with her mom and dad nearby at 9:20 p.m.

Among the Up memorabilia the employee gave Colby was an “adventure book” – a scrap book the main character’s wife used to chronicle her journeys.

“I’ll have to fill those adventures in for her,” Lisa Curtin said."

Wikipedia...In a book...

Imagine that you want a book that is full of Wikipedia articles. How would it looked like?

Hint: Wikipedia has more than 2.9 million article in it as of now (June 2009), and most of the article are worth more than 2 pages.

The partially correct answer is:




















Partially correct answer? How come, you asked. Well, that BOOK is only 0.01% of the whole English edition of Wikipedia. You will need to print 952 volume of this gigantic monster book to get all the articles in the English edition of Wikipedia!

The book contains 437 featured articles in 5000 pages, and is 1 feet 7 inches tall! It is done by a graphic designer student named Rob Matthews. [Source]

My Jungle Home

As many of my friends know, I just move into the new home in Teluk Kumbar, from the Island Glades. The reason for moving is simple: The house in Island Glades is rented from a "kiam siap" taukeh boh (老板娘), while the new house is bought by my parents. Before I begin any story, the new house is a double storey terrace house located between a small hill and sea. Sounds like good feng shui, does it not? You might think it is, until you actually live in it.

Well, anyway, here is where my ranting starts: My house is really a wired jungle. Why wired jungle, you may asked. Really simple: The house got everything that is wired to the house, eg. Streamyx (a.k.a. Shitmyx), Telekom, electricity, water etc. However, anything that are not wired or have no physical connection are not available here. Ya thats right. Nothing that is not wired or have physical connection reach here. My new house does not have cellular connection (Maxis a.k.a. Maxshit, Celcom and local terrestrial TV. The exception being DiGi and Astro.

So is there really a problem with that? YES. TOTALLY. Having no cellular coverage (or rather, blind spot coverage) is a big problem for me, though terrestrial TV blind spot is not a big deal except during bad weather. For me, I discovered that near the window pane of my room on the second floor, there is weak connection to the Maxis tower. And perhaps a few other spot on the second floor which I am not really accessible to. So it this is a good news, is it not?

NO. It is not a good news. Imagine this: Everytime you recieve a call, you must maintain the handphone at the window pane while talking. You may say: "Aiyoh, use loud speaker lah, bodoh!" Yes. It is effective that way. But if the line is bad (Imagine this: When I say:'hello, how are you? I am XYZ' to the other person, the person heard it as 'hell....you...XYZ'), it will be very annoying, both to you and the person talking to you. Especially if you talk with your gf/bf that way. It is very annoying and can really test your patience. Solution: Get out of the house to make a call EVERYTIME.

Oh, I am not finish with call yet. There is still this SMS thing. Remember that my room is on the second floor. So what? Is that a big problem? YES. IT IS A BIG PROBLEM. Now the 1 million dollar question again: Why?

Ok. Lets imagine this: One day, I am at downstairs watching my favourite movie. You SMS me at that time. No problem. I can just run up stairs, type my message and reply you. Then I go downstairs again to continue my movie. Sometimes the SMS continues. So I run upstairs again, read the SMS, reply and go back downstairs. Maybe 1 minute later, another SMS come. Maybe this time is from the other person. So I have to run upstairs again...You can see where this is going. So: YES. It is very tiring and annoying to do that almost every day. I have to run an average of 5-10 return trip a day just to answer the SMS. Everyday. Solution: Either shut my handphone until I get back to KL or just run up and down the stairs everytime, or worst still, stay upstairs all the time.

Not every thing about it is bad. For example, I get to exercise everyday. Climbing the stairs is a great exercise for the legs, as well as for my mind as I learn to be more patience with myself. This is especially useful since I am pretty much a hikikomori (引き籠もり) during the holiday.

Anyway, now that I have ranted for the day, heard some SMS is coming. Gotta go do my work out now. Chao!

And feed the fish will ya~!

Hello World!

"Hello World". This phrase is usually used (at least from the website that i visited) when a new things (proof of concept/programmes/hacks etc) is released to public to tell the world that "I am born to the world! Welcome to me!".

So what does it implies here? Pretty obvious, is it not. It is to tell the world that this is the my first blog post in my life after 22 years 7 months and 8 days! Hurray!!! Lets celebrate!!! Lets party!!! .........................Looks like I drowned myself in my little world of fantasy again...Paiseh...

Lets continue, shall we? Why do I create my blog? Do I even talk about myself much? In fact, I am the quiet type who can't even talk anything that is not related to him (ie. gadget, geeky stuff, F1). Life? I don't have a life. Nothing interesting anyway. Movies? Anime can lah. Real movies not too much other than "It is funny", "It is boring" and "Not bad". Politic? I am aware of it, but I am not good at political analysis. So I can't talk much about it. I can only say that BN sucks shit! Sports? I am not as expert as those of them around me (especially the fan of Chelsea FC stayed together with me), I can only remember their name. Motorsport? Now that is my area of expertise...But then, nobody around me is a motorsport fan anyway. So not much to talk to my friends about with the new technology like KERS, slick tire vs grooved tire and double decker diffuser. Technological stuff? Well, at least a few of them are interested in it.

Summary to the paragraph above: I can't talk. I sucks at talking. I have no capability of extending a conversation beyond 2 minutes. Thus, the best way to express myself is to blog. With this simple mind and childish of mine, I hope to keep a public "diary-like" blog about myself. And hopefully nobody do read it. Embarrassing. So that I can laugh at myself when I am 50, 60 or even 70 years old. Ambitious? Perhaps. But will I continue till that time? I have no idea...


Perhaps the good things that happens around me is that my friends do talk. A lot. And with high value thoughts too. Kyle's the politic expert and the Duke of Apple, Ryan the General of Gaming, Skyrider the ultimate Chelsea fan, Lala the King of Fashion and Entertainment, 3Jin the NSAIDs addict (at the time of writing, 3jin revealed that he LOVES NSAIDs) and Alvin the underage. And the most special person in my life, Siew Ling who I share my life with.

So why the sudden, you ask? Well, ever heard of the theory of "Haem-haem interaction" of the red blood cells? When the first molecule of oxygen binds to the haemoglobin, it will increase the affinity of the haemoglobin to bind to 3 other oxygen molecule. BUT that is not my main reason. My reason? I have thought about blogging for quite some time now. But lack of determination stopped me. Why start now, you ask again? To be honest, seeing many of my friends started blogging recently (Alvin, 3jin) reignite my flame of interest again. So my bloggy, here you are, for me to rant, for me to talk and for me to torture! Wakaka!

So let this be the first (hopefully not the last) blog post I will ever write. Perhaps I should rant more in my blog. It is my world anyway, where the world spins around me. I am the Emperor. I am the King of the Universe. Everyone shall bow to me here!

Oh, and if you are free, go feed the fish!