Museless

The King is Dead. RIP Michael Jackson

2009-06-26T14:32:00.003+08:00

The King of Pop has passed away on 25th June 2009. Goodbye, and thank you for the lyrics and the music you've enriched our lives with. Hopefully the media will finally ease up on you. :(

Rest In Peace
Michael Joseph Jackson
(29 August 1958 - 25 June 2009)

... RIP Shek Kin @ Shieh Kien

2009-06-09T15:18:00.004+08:00

Rest in Peace Shek Kin

(1 January 1913 - 3 June 2009)

Veteran actor Shek Kin, who is alternately credited as Shih Kien has passed away on 3rd June 2009 at the age of 96. He was famed for his portrayal of villains in multitudes of Chinese kung fu (martial arts) movies. I remember him most vividly as the power-crazy druglord in Bruce Lee's 'Enter the Dragon'. Rest in Peace.

Read more on Channel News Asia.

Shek Kin with Bruce Lee in 'Enter the Dragon'

... of Bachelor number 35 ...

2009-04-03T15:32:00.016+08:00

Cleo Bachelor 2009 Contestant Number 35: Eugene Tham.

That's my friend. I mean a real good friend of mine - the one I went camping with, indulged in bak kut teh between college classes with, got hammered in Langkawi with. Someone I would give up my ~~life~~ ~~limb~~ ~~right hand~~ left pinky for. That means a lot okay? I play the guitar, and my left pinky is extremely essential, especially when playing those chords I never could name.

We humiliated ourselves 2001 at some attitude search and raised all sorts of hell in our college ~~halls~~ corridors. Sadly for both of us, work got in the way of friendship and though we still think the world of each other, there's just never enough time to really meet up and catch up.

So imagine my surprise when one day about a week ago I was droning over my laptop and suddenly I see a Cleo advertisement with Eugene's face popping out at me. Needless to say, I promptly told my friends about it, despite Eugene's short but succinct request to "SSSHHHH!!!!".

I eventually told Fiona, Eugene's college sweetheart, who instinctively blogged about it. Not only did she write about it, she also cited me as her source, saying that if she's going down for this, I'm going down along with her. And since I'm going down, I might as well go all out and start plugging for my Bak-Kut-Teh-Eating, Beer-Popping, Hell-Raising, Lecturer-Kicking, Clothes-Iron-Obsessed, Overall-Nice-Guy buddy Eugene Tham.

Here's what you do:

1. Follow this link to look for him: AskCleo. Once you're on that site, just click the right arrow until you reach Bachelor 35.

Bachelor 35: Eugene Tham

2. Post nice comments, much like this one:

Shout out your best memories of Bachelor 35!
Click on the picture to view comment sample. Alternatively, you can right click, and select "Open Link in New Tab".

3. Also remember to help him out by voting for Eugene online (follow this lin k).

That's all it takes, three simple steps :)

Now, what good is a Cleo Bachelor if he doesn't have his own theme song? Lucky for us, I happen to know of one that just fits right up his alley.

No, not THAT alley.

Song of the moment: Pink Martini - 'Eugene'
Catch it on YouTube here.

Or try streaming it here:

Error Code: 0x86000107

2009-03-26T16:02:00.003+08:00

I was recently vexed to no end when I discovered that my HTC TYTN II (also known as the HTC Kaiser) refused to sync with either my laptop or home PC for over a week, popping up an error message each time I tried. At first I thought maybe something was wrong with the sync options, like perhaps one of the free applications and games I've been installing caused some hidden problem (check it out: tower-friggin'-defense on the go! What better way to waste precious daylight away?).

Countless hours of uninstalling and re-installing applications proved fruitless, while the multiple times I restarted Windows and resetting the Pocket PC just added to the wasted effort. Then I thought of something I should have done from the very beginning - each time Windows pops up an error alert, it also provides an error code if you click on 'Details' or 'More Info'. I, like countless other people who have pledged their dependence on Microsoft, have gotten used to just clicking 'Close'.

Anyways, long story cut short, I Googled the error code (0x86000107), crawled through forum after forum, and tried every suggested solution (download this, update that, tweaked some settings) to no avail. Finally I came across a completely non-technical suggestion and since I’d run out of options, I thought “Why the friggin’ hell not?”

1. I manually wrote down all the contacts and appointments I made since my last successful sync.

2. I deleted the partnership between the Pocket PC and my laptop’s Sync Center (ActiveSync, if you’re on XP), and disconnected the cable.

3. I reconnected that same cable and re-established the partnership.

It worked.

The most brain dead solution possible and it worked. Best of all, it took less than ten minutes.

It turns out that Windows Mobile 6.1 has issues syncing up with more than one computer, and though a fix has been purportedly sent out by Microsoft to their mobile partners, HTC has nothing available for its customers yet.

** solution credit: windowsmobiletraining dot com **

... of (not so) fast paced lives ...

2009-03-26T00:24:00.005+08:00

Streamyx. If anyone out there is considering a subscription with Streamyx for the very first time, I think you should be given a counterpoint to all the marketing hype that they dish out periodically.

I'm not going to delve into the customer service. I'll let you go through that waiting experience yourself. I'm also not going into the helpfulness of their pre-fabricated answers when you tell them of your broadband woes.

What I *will* do is dive straight to the heart of it all: the lack of speed.

Once upon a time I subscribed to Streamyx's 1.0Mbps (download)/384kpbs (upload) package for RM88 per month, but since I've only broken the 600kpbs mark ONCE since I discovered speedtest.net in mid 2007 (I hit 784/382 on 30th September 2008 while testing against a server right here in Kuala Lumpur), I saw no reason to maintain a 1.0Mbps service. I thought maybe their servers couldn't consistently handle speeds beyond 500-600kpbs, so I downgraded to their 512kpbs package. but the moment I switch my service package, my speed dropped to an average of 150-200 kpbs when tested with Malaysian servers. I'm not talking about working hours when offices and businesses are tapping up bandwidth, I do my speed tests between 11pm and 1am. I guess it was never about the capacity of their servers or the quality of the copper wires, Streamyx just DOES NOT DELIVER WHAT THEY'RE SELLING!

Recent speed test results below (bear in mind that I'm subscribing to a 512 / 256 package). Tests were done between 11.40pm to 12.05am local time, Wednesday 25th March 2009 (through Thursday, 26th March if you want to get technical over it).

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia - 213 / 71

Singapore - 203 / 101

Rome, Italy - 131 / 59

San Diego, USA - 352 / 217

Florida, USA - 104 / 84

So what other alternatives are there?

I've been thinking of switching over to P1 or DiGi Wimax, though I hesitate as I've not heard much feedback from their subscribers. I also hesitate because of coverage issues. Check it out:

Neighborhoods surrounding me are covered by PacketOne (P1) Wimax. My neighborhood (Sunway Damansara) just barely got left out. I wonder why I keep getting leaflets from them though.

DiGi Wimax covers my neighborhood, but I reside along the outer rim of their coverage. That makes it quite risky for me to switch to DiGi.

I guess I'm stuck with Streamyx for a bit longer, but if you're still looking for a broadband provider, I'd highly recommend that you shop around for options first. I'm planning to make that transition away from Streamyx once my area is fully covered by DiGi or P1.

... walk, walk, walk (part 1) ...

2009-03-22T23:40:00.003+08:00

I went somewhere and saw this:

Where did I go?

... HTC TyTN II ...

2009-01-18T00:37:00.005+08:00

I've just gotten myself a new toy in the form of HTC's TyTN II Pocket PC phone :D Just got it second hand a couple of days ago through Malaysia's own auction site Lelong for a pretty good bargain. Prices have been dropping in general and I was actually waiting for the HTC U1000 to drop within RM1,000, but I decided that it wasn't going to happen anytime soon.

Instead, I started stalking Lelong for a TyTN II that was in good condition while falling within my budget. A quick piece of advice is to take your time and stalk around for a bit if you're hunting for gadgets on Lelong -- I lost a few bids over a one-month period in order not to break the budget I had in mind, but I finally got what I wanted a few hundred Ringgit lower than what I would have had to pay for if I had chased after the bids that I lost.

Anyway, here's the TyTN II:

In a nutshell, the TyTN II runs on a Samsung Qualcomm 400MHz processor that comes with an integrated GPS chip. It operates out of the box on Windows Mobile 6.0 and offers WiFi, Bluetooth, 3G, and GPRS connectivity options. It comes with 128 MB RAM and 256 MB flash memory, and can support one MicroSD Card for additional storage space. Bundled software includes MapKing and World Card Reader, on top of the usual array of productivity programs that typically come with Pocket PCs.

Upgrading the TyTN II's firmware.

The Pocket PC (PPC) runs a little sluggishly according to XDA Developer's forums so I upgraded its firmware to the latest ROM provided by HTC, which also includes an operating system upgrade to Windows Mobile 6.1 . I faced a bit of problems here as I couldn't get anything from HTC's website, despite registering with them. It seems that the problem is pretty common amongst HTC users, and you can find the ROM update uploaded by users who had managed to download them. You can download the South East Asian release directly from HERE.

Pasted below are the instructions from HTC on how to upgrade the TyTN II's firmware:

Installation Instructions:

Before you proceed, please confirm that this software upgrade is a newer version than what is currently installed on your device. If it is the same version and your device is operating normally, there is no need to reinstall the software.

To check what version is installed on your device, click Start > Settings > Device Information > Version tab, and note the ROM version, CPU, and Radio version.

Warning!

* This is a generic software update. Any additional software or settings provided by your mobile operator or company will be lost. If you require this customization, please contact your supplier first before upgrading.

* Please note that this upgrade will erase any data stored on the device.

Please back up your data first before upgrading your device. Before you run the ROM Upgrade Utility (RUU), make sure you check and do the following:

* The USB sync cable is connected to your device and PC. If your PC is running Windows XPR, ActiveSyncR will run automatically to establish a connection. If your PC is running Windows VistaTM, then Windows Mobile Device Center will establish the connection between your device and PC.

* All running applications on the device have been closed.

* Make sure that the battery level of the device is least 50% (tap Start > Settings > System tab > Power).

* The update will take up to 30 minutes, DO NOT interrupt the update process, make/receive phone calls, disconnect the device from the PC, or press any buttons until the process has been completed.

Once the RUU is downloaded, launch the application on your PC and follow the instructions.

Hope this helps anyone out there having problems with getting the upgrade!

... of arrests at the Police Station ...

2008-11-06T11:55:00.004+08:00

Talk about weird. Two pieces of odd news today, both related to getting arrested at the police station.

Rape victim drives rapist to the police station.

A New Zealand rape victim drove her rapist to the police station. The rapist had fallen asleep on the passenger seat after the assault, and the victim maintained a straight head, driving off and delivering the slumbering assaulter to the police.

Coverage on Reuters here.

Teenager caught breaking INTO police station.

It was in the wee hours of the morning. The police station was closed. Unfortunately for a 16 year old in Sydney, that does not necessarily mean that there are no police officers in the building. Police officers working at the back of their building heard the front glass door crashing and discovered a teenager in their front hall. The teenager was promptly arrested and denied bail, but not before incurring A$2,000 worth of damages.

Coverage on Reuters here.

... of Life sans cigarettes ...

2008-11-05T20:47:00.003+08:00

Sober people who have met up with me over the last one week or so would have known that I've given up cigarettes (again) as of last Friday. That makes today day number five sans cigarettes.

I've dropped the habit of smoking twice before so far, once some time around 1999 for about a year, and again around 2003 for two years. Logical projections would dictate that this time I'd last three years without cigarettes, but let's see if I can go way beyond that.

Attempt number three was made with prior mental preparations (thanks to previous experiences) for the withdrawal symptoms that will hit - runny nose, all the coughing, sudden rush of interestingly coloured phlegm, grumpiness, the craving periods, and susceptibility towards resorting to food as a replacement. Life is, unfortunately, hardly predictable, and all the symptoms I've prepared myself for did not hit as expected.

My nose has gone dry. So dry it hurts, though I've started expectorating oddly coloured phlegm as of yesterday. I go into coughing fits when someone smokes too closely to (and upwind of) me. Surprisingly I'm not hit by any strong craving for cigarettes as of yet, though the urge to pick one up hits when someone smokes too closely to (and upwind) of me. Luckily such situations also push me into coughing fits, killing any urge to light up a cigarette.

The one symptom that I had not expected, however, is that I've been rotating between itsy-bitsy nagging headaches and cranium-crippling migraine spells. I've yet to determine if this is coming from worrying about work and not getting good sleep or the cigarettes, but for now I'd rather blame the tobacco. I'd rather dislike tobacco than my work.

The one big (and petty) advantage I've gained so far is that I don't have to wonder whether to bear the heat and sit outside when I'm at a cafe anymore.

Day five, and the rest of life to go.

... R.I.P. Leroi Moore ...

2008-08-21T03:20:00.004+08:00

Rest In Peace Leroi Moore

(1961 - 2008)

Leroi Moore (aged 46), founding saxophonist of Dave Matthews Band passed away Tuesday 19th August 2008 after suffering complications from an ATV injury on 30th June 2008.

Official band statement on their website reads :
We are deeply saddened that LeRoi Moore, saxophonist and founding member of Dave Matthews Band, died unexpectedly Tuesday afternoon, August 19, 2008, at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center in Los Angeles from sudden complications stemming from his June ATV accident on his farm near Charlottesville, Virginia. LeRoi had recently returned to his Los Angeles home to begin an intensive physical rehabilitation program.

The Announcement on the official Dave Matthews Band Website.

Coverage by Reuters.

:(

... of Animals and Machines ...

2008-08-18T02:30:00.001+08:00

Rat-brained robot to aid Alzheimer's researchers.

In a case of science fiction meets reality, Scientists at the University of Reading have created a simple robot navigated by a blob of rat brain. A blob of some 300,000 rat brain neurons is maintained in a temperature-controlled container as it uses Bluetooth to send and receive signals to and from a simple sonar-navigated robot. Placed within a lab rat's maze, the robot behaves... well, like a rat!

The rat-robot was created as an avenue for researches to attempt to unlock the mysteries of Alzheimer's Disease, enabling them to observe how memories are recorded as the brain learns and what happens when it deteriorates. So far, the brain cells have learnt how to control the robot's movements and will soon be learning how to recognise its surroundings.

Read more about the robot at these links:
technology.newscientist.com
www.bbc.co.uk

Butterflies - can you trust them tomorrow?

In a similar but scarier turn of events, the Pentagon's defence scientists are trying to develop an army of cyber-insects. The idea is to insert Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) into insects such as butterflies during the pupa stage, so that the organs will grow around and integrate with the MEMS chip. The MEMS chip will then be powered by either insect heat or movement, and allow the host insect to be remotely controlled. These insects can then be used to relay information such as sensing for chemicals present in explosives.

Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), which is tasked with maintaining the technologival superiority of the US military, believes that taking advantage of the evolution of insects at the pupa stage can lead towards an assembly line of MEMS-insect hybrids.

"Through each metamorphic stage, the insect body goes through a renewal process that can heal wounds and reposition internal organs around foreign objects," Darpa's proposal document reads.

Read more about the MEMS hybrid project at:
dvices.com
www.bbc.co.uk

On a related topic, check out Darpa's 'stealth shark spies' - developing sharks with neural implants to track vessels undetected.

I think we should all just leave nature as it is :/

... Police taser boy with broken back 19 times

2008-07-29T01:29:00.003+08:00

Right... we jump from the realm off odd news to one of stupidity.

Photo taken from ky3.com website.

Police responding to a 911 call regarding a 16 year old boy who had fallen off a 30-foot bridge fired stun tasers on him 19 times in order to subdue him.

Mace Hutchinson of Ozark, Missouri, fell off the 30-foot Highway overpass and suffered a broken back and broken-off heel. Police who arrived on the scene stated that he was uncooperative and had to be subdued by electric stun guns because he had "refused to comply with the officers," and in order to "keep him away from traffic, to keep him from getting hurt."

The deployment of electric stun guns raised his white blood cell count and caused a fever, preventing immediate surgery by two days.

The Ozark police force are now investigating several unanswered questions, such as how did Hutchinson end up at the bottom of the overpass, but will not be looking into the usage of stun guns.

Read more about it here.

Watch the news report here.

Jerral says:
1. Give a stupid cop a gun, what did they expect - a flag that says 'BANG!'?
2. The kid had a broken back and broken-OFF heel. Officers (yes, that's plural) needed stun guns to subdue him? Either they typify police brutality, or they're a bunch of pansies!

... Pocket PC / WM5 - remove unwanted icons

2008-07-28T20:10:00.004+08:00

I got very annoyed a couple of days ago. I was testing out free applications on my Dopod 818Pro (which runs on Windows Mobile 5), and the whole idea of 'testing' is that you remove the softwares you don't like, or those that do not agree with your Pocket PC.

Everything was good, until I realized that not all applications come with proper uninstalling procedures, leaving my program folder with heaps of unlinked icons and short cuts. Trying to delete these directly from the program folder was quite futile (probably a fail safe, so that you don't accidentally remove a critical program). So how do you get rid of all the clutter? Just follow these three simple steps:

1. Get into file explorer.

2. Go to your root directory (usually "My Device"), then into 'Windows', then into 'Start Menu', and finally into 'Programs'.
(My Device --> Windows --> Start Menu --> Programs)

3. Select and delete the offending icon(s), and keep your program folder nice and tidy!

... of Nun's Buns and Holy Toasts

2008-07-23T17:17:00.009+08:00

Odd news worldwide are plentiful, but I feel like maintaining a theme for today's post - Religious Sightings!

Nun's Buns, and Blessings of the Holy Toast

A bun bearing the supposed likeness of the late revered Catholic nun Mother Teresa was stolen from a coffeehouse in Nashville, Tennessee on Christmas Day 2005. The 'Nun Bun' was discovered in 1996 by a customer and had since been preserved in shellac and put on display to attract tourists. The coffeehouse produced prayer cards, mugs, and t-shirts bearing a picture of the bun until Mother Teresa herself wrote a letter to them before her death in 1997, asking that the sales be stopped.A picture of the Nun Bun, by Associated Press.

If Mother Teresa gets to appear on a bun, there should no reason why the upper hierarchy would be ignored now, would there?

He took a loaf of bread ... "This is my Body" - Luke22:19 taken a little too literally? Picture by Associated Press.

In 2004, Diana Duyser, 52, of Hollywood, Florida, puts up a 10-year-old partially-eaten piece of cheese toast up for auction on eBay. This would not have garnered much attention on normal circumstances, but Ms. Duyser had set the starting bid at US$3,000. And, oh yeah, it's got Mary, mother of God's face toasted onto it.

Some casino finally bought it for US$28,000 (read here)

Holy Chapati, Batman!
But wait, whoever said that Christianity was a Western religion? Back in November 2002, hundreds of Christian Pilgrims traveled to Bangalore, India, to take a peek at a piece of Chapati with the image of Christ burnt into it.

Holy Chapati

As of 16th November 2002, over 20,000 Christians have visited the Renewal Retreat Center to pay homage in front of this holy chapati. And no, Batman has nothing to do with this incident, but I'm going to watch the Dark Knight in a couple of hours. (read more about the chapati here)

Everyone who have laid eyes on these miracle pastries have one thing in common - they feel blessed and imbued with luck. I know a person or two who have been down enough to pay a visit to one of these blessed bakings, but before you spend thousands on a plane ticket, a much cheaper option would be to just make your own holy toasties! For less than 20 Ringgit, you get to be the proud owner of one of these:

Picture taken from World Wide Fred's Holy Toast site.

Clearly defined, no room for debate ("Oh, wait, if you turn it that way, it looks like Elvis eating a doughnut!"). Just the butter, the jam, and the holy toast.

PS: Kinda wrote this on the fly, might re-edit it at a later date!

... ESWC / Indie Youth Fest Pt. 2...

2008-07-23T16:55:00.005+08:00

Talk about posting that's waaaaaay overdue. More pics from the bands that played after those in part 1.

Band Number 7: Tempered Mental

If you've not checked them out before, you should the next time they perform. One of the two main reasons why I was there that day, the other being that Jaz was among the organisers.

8. Estrella

9. Green Paver

10. Deserters

...and a candid of Reza Salleh and Steph, watching from the sidelines

More pics to come from Day 3 of the Indie Youth Fest, but I'll need to pick out the photos I want to use first. Expect a slow update on that :)

... ESCW / Indie Youth Fest - Pt. 1 ...

2008-07-09T02:49:00.009+08:00

The Malaysian leg of the Electronic Sports World Cup, which was held concurrently with the Indie Youth Fest was just concluded a couple of days ago after running for three days (4-6 July 2008) at the new wing of 1 Utama. I actually ended up in the wrong wing on the first day because the advertisements said "Main Entrance" of 1 Utama, and seeing that the old wing has been here almost a decade longer, I equated the entrance to that wing as the 'main entrance'.

I spent most of my time outside next to the performance stage where the Indie Youth Fest was held, which will become quite obvious after I'm done uploading the pictures. I'm also not too sure what happened inside with the ESWC finals, except that Paul Yan added yet another Warcraft III title to his name.

Back on the music side of things, I'm just going to put the pictures up - some bands I enjoyed, some I did not, so I'll just shut my mouth and not say anything about anyone. Bands that performed on the 5th and 6th of July (in chronological order, if I didn't muck it up) are as follows, though I wasn't able to take pictures of every band that went up, nor was I able to take an equal number of shots per band:

1. An Honest Mistake

2. Telephony Delivery

3. Superbar

4. Oh Chentaku

Band numbers 5 and 6 were 'Army of Three' and 'Lightcraft' respectively, but I had run off in search of food during those slots and was not able to catch them.

More pics coming soon!

... are you mental now? Indie Youth Fest / ESWC Finals

2008-07-04T12:15:00.017+08:00

when :
4 - 6 July
where :
1 Utama, Main Entrance
what :
Electronic Sports World Cup / Indie Youth Fest
entrance :
free

Music. DotA. Music. Winning Eleven. Music. Trackmania. Music. Counterstrike. Music. Guitar Hero. Music. Warcraft III. And Music.

why you should go : tempered mental

(8.00-8.30pm, 5th July 2008)

They've performed in Canada, they played for Sunburst, and they'll be performing in Korea in a month's time. Listen to them. Buy their album, "The View From Here". Trust me, it's well worth it.

Listen to some samples here.
Read another blogger's review here.

Other appearing notables are:
[4th Jul] [5.30 pm] One Buck Short
[4th Jul] [7.30 pm] Filmmakers Anonymous Screenings

[5th Jul] [8.00 pm] Tempered Mental (in case you missed it! lol)
[5th Jul] [8.30 pm] Estrella

[6th Jul] [3.00 pm] Jasmine Low (readings)
[6th Jul] [4.00 pm] Otam
[6th Jul] [5.30 pm] Zalila Lee
[6th Jul] [6.30 pm] Mia Palencia
[6th Jul] [7.30 pm] Yuri Wong
[6th Jul] [8.00 pm] Reza Salleh

For further information and full performance list, please visit the Indie Youth Fest blog. Alternatively, you could also surf on over to Junk Magazine, or just click on the flyer at the top of this post.

... sold: one life; speedy fines; cannabis, minus tobacco please ...

2008-07-01T22:32:00.009+08:00

Odd News
Get a Life - part deux!
Perth based Briton Ian Usher, the man who put his 'life' up for auction on eBay, announced that the auction has closed and that the winning bid was by another man, also another Briton living in Australia, who had offered £192,000. Mr. Usher was expecting a higher offer for his life, but says that "what's done is done," and that he had no regrets.

Ian Usher: "No Regrets!"

Read more about it on BBC News
Check out Usher's Website : Alife4sale dot com

Speedy Fines
Effective 1st July 2008, traffic offenders in Holly Springs, Georgia, USA will have to pay an additional US$12 to cover the fuel costs incurred while being chased down by the police. Soaring oil prices have seen many industries transferring costs to consumers, and it looks like the police are starting to pick up these cost saving tactics from the private sector!

Read more about it here.

Odder News
Drunken Swede tries to row home - from Denmark!

A drunk 78-year old Swedish man fell asleep trying to row back home from Denmark. The man had been reportedly drinking in the Danish town of Helsingor, but that final 'one for the road' must have been one too much as he discovered he had insufficient funds for the ferry back to Sweden.

He proceeded to steal a dinghy and attempted to make the 5km trip across to Helsingborg, Sweden, but only made it halfway before falling asleep. He was discovered by the coast guard, who then towed him back to Denmark, where he was put on board a ferry to Sweden after he had sobered up. The owner of the dingy has decided not to press charges.

Read more about it here.

The bees, and the bees, and the bees
A lorry carrying 330 crates of honey bees traveling along Canada's Trans-Canada highway tipped over, freeing over 12 million bees. Luckily enough enough, a downpour has been keeping most of the bees, who dislike rain, hanging onto the back of the truck and on the pavement behind the truck. Now, to find some beekeepers brave enough to wander into a contagion of bees in order to lure them back into their hives.

Somehow I think I've got the wrong Bees.

I'm glad it didn't happen near me! Read on.

Oddest News
Have a joint, but not a cigarette

A tobacco ban has been enforced throughout cafes and bars in the Netherlands, resulting in licensed cannabis cafes giving patrons no choice but to smoke only pure marijuana.

... buy a life!

2008-06-27T15:25:00.017+08:00

Finally took the plunge and changed my blog template. The initial urge to do this was about 6 months ago, but I came across way too many blogspot users who lost their older posts and stuff when they upgraded to XML. Just to cut the story short, I backed up what I had and just applied the changes and it was... surprisingly easy! Much thanks to Blogflak for the dummies' guide.

Odd news of the moment
Get a Life!
An expatriate in Australia has just split with his wife, and have decided to start off on a new life - by selling off his old one on ebay! Ian Usher, who has been in Australia for six years has placed his 'life' for auction, which includes his three-bedroom Perth home inclusive of everything that's inside it, his car, motorcycle, jet ski, parachuting equipment, and - get this - his job as a shop assistant in a rug store, and introduction to his friends in the Western Australian city. As he says, the winning bidder gets a complete lifestyle.

Read about it on BBC news.

Currently Listening to :

Pink Martini
Not too sure how to describe their music. I'd place their style as late 1930s - 1950s with a touches of jazz from that period with multilingual vocals (French, Spanish, and English). Think music from clubs during the American gangsters / prohibition era, from clubs that the Mask would go to, and music that quite fits the Grim Fandango soundtrack. Yes, I can tell that my description does not help much, go look them up on youtube or go buy the album.

http://www.pinkmartini.com

The Dresden Dolls
One pianist, one drummer, and they both sing. How much can you do with just that? A pretty darn lot, if you've ever listened to the Dresden Dolls. Their music is self described as "Brechtian Punk Cabaret" by pianist-singer Amanda Palmer, who was worried that they would get branded as simply "gothic". Checkout this video of one of their songs, Coin Operated Boy.

http://www.dresdendolls.com

... R.I.P. Bo Diddley ...

2008-06-03T22:22:00.003+08:00

Bo Diddley
(30th Dec 1928 - 2nd June 2008)

Bo Diddley has passed away at age of 79 of heart failure.

... freewares - are they any good?

2008-05-29T19:44:00.009+08:00

Met up with some good friends a few nights ago and the topic of computers came up. First it was about one friend's (friend 1) veteran computer which was revealed to spend weeks without getting switched off, and how it needed four fans to keep the machine from roasting. Then attention was diverted to another friend's (friend 2) computer which was fairly new (my own assumption, from the way the conversation went) but operated sluggishly. A slew of questions ensued as we tried to figure out what the machine was used for and what software was being run on it.

We deduced that the problem most probably came from the selection of software my friend had selected, which led to a barrage of suggestions on which software to go for. Noticing the look of "Information overload!" plastered on Friend 2's face, I thought to myself "Oh well, I'll just pop over in a couple of days with a thumbdrive of great freewares and kick the computer into good working shape," only to be told that Friend 2 went abroad on a short trip.

I figured that the next best thing to do would be to compile a list of suggestions for Friend 2, since I'm very likely to forget these kind of things.

1. The PC Decrapifier

Humerous name, but straight to the point! This application removes a ton of junk that normally comes bundled with PCs and Laptops. Some manufacturers offers to remove bundled junk from their computers for a fee, but if you're a personal home user, the PC Decrapifier does it for you for free! You can even check out their list of Crapplications to get a hint of what nonsense goes into your 'brand new, absolutely-nothing-wrong-with-it computer'.

Website: http://www.pcdecrapifier.com
Cost: Free! But they do accept donations of US$5.00.

2. Avast! Antivirus

Antivirus applications are important, unless you enjoy losing data. The problem, however, is selecting the right virus protection software - there are so many out there, free or otherwise, but not all of them are useful beyond protecting against the most basic forms of attack. I'll refrain from arguing for or against Norton and McAfee, but I will say that I consider these two as 'greedy' softwares - they demand a lion's share of your computer's processing power - and using them can sometimes grind my PC down to pre-Pentium speeds.

Avast protects against viruses, spywares and malwares, checks for updates daily. Its settings allows me to run it in the background while I'm on my PC and the processing drain is barely noticeable. My only advice with using this programme is to switch off the audio options, as it verbally tells you when it's done something, such as updating its virus database. Trust me on that, it's made me jump a few times before I turned it off.

Website: http://www.avast.com
Cost: Free for home users! Businesses need to purchase a license under one of its many packages.

3. Web Browsers

I don't like Windows Internet Explorer (IE). I'd suggest alternate browsers such as Mozilla's Firefox or Apple's Safari. I'm personally a fan of Firefox and have not made the switch to Safari because I'm too lazy to familiarise myself with a new browser yet again, but I've tried it out on Macbooks a few time and quite enjoyed it ease of use. I've also been told by friends that the Windows version of Safari surfs much faster than other browsers.

Despite not liking IE, I'd advice against uninstalling it because there are a few transactional and / or interactive websites (such as applying for an American Visa) which only work with IE.

** Edit June 26: Firefox 3.0 for Windows has been released. Currently using it with no complaints! **

Websites:
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/
http://www.apple.com/safari
Cost: Free!

4. Revo Uninstaller

Let's just get one thing straight before we start. Windows' "Add or Remove Programs" control panel applet isn't only slow, it also does not fully remove files associated with the software you're trying to get rid off. Residual profile, database, 'shared', and registry files all add to the clutter that firstly takes up a small amount hard disk space (a minor annoyance), and more importantly, slows your computer down (major annoyance!).

Revo Uninstaller unistalls and completely removes unwanted software and programs. It takes a couple more steps (which really just amount to a couple more mouse clicks) to uninstall an application with Revo, but it'll help keep your PC much healthier in the long run. This utility program has received five stars from both CNET Download.com and Softpedia reviews, so you really can't go wrong with it.

Website: http://www.revouninstaller.com
Cost: Free!

... of a Sci-Fi future today ...

2008-05-29T15:56:00.001+08:00

Interesting. Scientists researching the primary motor complex region of the brain have been able to enable a monkey to feed itself using using nothing but its thought and a robotic arm. The researchers hope to create prosthetic devices for people with total paralysis using brain-machine interface technology. Read more about it from BBC here.

... of migratory senses (part deux) ...

2007-12-20T19:55:00.000+08:00

Looks like I've not been posting as much as I thought I've been. Migration to the new site is complete.

http://dollahandsense.wordpress.com/

Update yer links aight!

Now I'm considering whether to migrate the rest of my stuff onto a new blog as well, since I found templates I really like! :p

... of migratory senses ...

2007-12-19T18:52:00.000+08:00

I've begun migrating my political, humanitarian, global issues and other such related / angrier postings to another blog. I call it Dollah and Sense. It'll take some time before the relevant posts are completely transfered because I'm still trying to get used to the new formats there, plus most of the pictures I'm using are currently hosted by blogspot whereas the new blog is hosted by wordpress. Just thought I'd try something different lah ;)

Link the new page aight! http://dollahandsense.wordpress.com

... of words and starvation ...

2007-11-13T20:47:00.001+08:00

My friend Wei Yein brought this website to my attention. FreeRice dot com is a website where several companies have pledged to donate rice in return for media space and exposure. I guess that's not exactly how they'd like to be marketed as, but another friend of mine, Zal, says I'm among the most black and white person she knows, so here we have it. Basically, you play this vocabulary game and 10 grains of rice is donated to the cause for each correct answer. I hear you say "that's not really much!" but it should amount to something if all of us actually took part. Besides, when was the last time you fed a starving stranger?

... of being left behind the IT generation ...

2007-08-28T17:39:00.000+08:00

It took me

THREE HOURS

to figure out how to plunk that stupid banner up there, and to remove the pre-set boxes that surround the headers, as seen in the templates.

My HTML has gone so bad now that everything's just point and click. I found a couple of wysiwyg editors and thought I'd spend some time playing with them. And then I realized I had no idea how to ftp it onto blogspot. Sigh. Fail lah kes ni.

Thought of posting up some pictures I took in Melaka 7 months ago but I guess I'm too sapped out to tell stories along with it so I'll just leave those for next time.

... of Old Games and Of New ...

2007-06-05T00:33:00.000+08:00

We'll let age take precedent in this post. Earlier today (4th June 2007) was the 20th Anniversary of the very first Leisure Suit Larry game. Written and designed by Al Lowe and published by Sierra, this game kicked off with horribly low levels of sale before quietly gaining momentum in within the computer games market. It eventually went on to win the award for Best Adventure/Fantasy Role-Playing Game of 1987 by the Software Publishers Association.

The cover art for Sierra's 1987 award winning title Leisure Suit Larry

If you hear names "Al Lowe" or "Sierra" associated with a game, it's usually a winner. This game, and its best selling sequels had both until Vivendi's acquisition of Sierra

Now, on to newer things.

Bethesda Softworks, who had bought the rights to the Fallout franchise from Interplay has promised a teaser for Fallout 3 today, so keep an eye on this website. I've been a huge fan of the series (okay, maybe I didn't enjoy Fallout Tactics and Brotherhood of Steel, but I loved the storyline, gameplay and humor in the original two Fallout games) and I'm hoping Fallout 3 will retain the essence and flavor of its prequels. Bethesda has the enviable job of working on the game, but also the unenviable standards of the game it has to live up to. I'm just worried that with that pressure to leave a good impression, they may try too hard to fix what wasn't broken in the first place, but to give them some credit, they've done nothing but magnificent work on their Elder Scrolls series, so that leaves me salivating over what they will come up with!

One of the teaser pictures (shrunk here of course) shown at Bethesda's website

... the Passing of a Kool Kat ...

2007-06-04T23:57:00.000+08:00

The Alleycats, with Loga standing third from right.

Loganathan Arumugam, better known simply as "Loga" of the Alleycats passed away at 10.50am on the morning of Monday, 4th of June 2007.

Rest In Peace.

... of glimpses at the future...

2007-05-22T20:44:00.000+08:00

Let's take a glimpse into the future. Fictional future, of course. Much more entertaining and less worrisome than what we have coming, in my opinion.

First up, the opening credits and theme song for the 1997 - 1998 anime set in the not-so-distant Year 2071, Cowboy Bebop. I swear I'm such a Youtube junkie these days.

This particular opening scene is a little extended, as the story approaches the 'Julia' story arc.

Aight! Next up I have some scenes from Avalon which I wrote about many postings ago ;) The movie sets the timeline as a "distant future."

AVALON TRAILER

AVALON OPENING SCENES

And of course, who hasn't heard of The Matrix? I found a video showing the areas where The Matrix was influenced by Ghost In The Shell, so enjoy!

GITS / MATRIX COMPARISONS

Ok, enough videos. Time for a little flashback. I managed to find, of all things, an image of the very first computer I ever used! Ok, maybe it's not the actual PC I used, but it's the same model.

Back in 1985, I had this great computer, it was an IBM 8086 PC. It ran solely on DOS and came equipped with a CGA (Color Graphics Adapter) Monitor capable of displaying up to three colors (Red, Green & Blue), 256kb RAM and two 5" floppy disk drive. That's right folks, no hard disk attached! It ran at an amazing 2.5MHz. And if you press Control+Alt+Minus, it powers into turbo mode and flies at 3 MHz!

Anyways, I had tons of fun playing classic games on this PC. I think I'll do a post on those games some time soon.

... of Revisiting Glamorous Skies...

2007-05-17T02:21:00.000+08:00

A friend of mine, Izzy, recently asked me about Nana the movie which I wrote about some time back. Well here's the movie trailer and the video clip for the theme song Glamorous Sky. I couldn't find a trailer with subtitles though.

NANA - Movie Trailer

Glamorous Sky - performed by Mika Nakashima

While looking for these videos I found out that the entire Nana movie has been uploaded onto YouTube in 11 ten-minute segments.

And since I'm video hunting, I might as well chuck in the Trailer and Music Video for Nana 2! As with the previous movie, the song is sung by Mika Nakashima but this time the music was written by Takuro from Glay.

NANA 2 - Movie Trailer

Hitoiro - performed by Mika Nakashima

I'm kinda keen to watch the movie but at the same time, I'm a little hesitant. Nana fans have been giving slightly bad to lukewarm reviews on this movie, largely because of casting issues. One of the main actresses, Aoi Miyazaki has declined to reprise her role as Komatsu Nana and several other supporting actors from the first movie have been replaced. I think this will have quite some impact on the sequel because Aoi Miyazaki's acting fit Komatsu Nana's ditzy-cutesy character and had pretty good on screen chemistry with Mika Nakashima.

Anyone who's seen it, feel free to give me a heads up. Until then, I'll just keep my eyes peeled the next time I go movie hunting.

... of old instrumentations.

2007-04-23T15:12:00.000+08:00

I've got a nice acoustic guitar. It's an Ibanez acoustic, and it's 30 years old. People are oft to react with "Wah! Must be DAMN seasoned lah!"

However, it has multitudes of problems. It's neck was accidentally broken back in 1996 and subsequently repaired before it was passed on to me by my late uncle. It's neck has since warped, frets have worn off and it's intonation makes me cringe. There was this one time ("I was in band camp...") where I was just jamming in Exit 10 (near the old Psych department in HELP, one exit before the infamous Exit 11!) when out of the blue my strap came loose and my guitar dropped and hit the cement with a loud Craaaack! There's a handyplast holding it up now. Ask me and I'll show you.

Ok the point of this ranting is that everywhere I've gone to in efforts to get it repaired is rewarded with the same response and conversation.

Repair Man (RM): Eh! This is a nice guitar man!
Jerral Khor (JK): Thanks! My uncle handed it down to me, so I got kinda seasoned.
RM: Wow! I'm sure you must really treasure it.
JK: Yeah, I do. That's why I'm hoping to get all these little things repaired. What do you think needs to be worked on?
RM: You see, that's the thing. (pauses and worriedly looks at my guitar like how my foreman looks at my car)
JK: ... err... "That's the thing?"
RM: Yeah, that's the thing... I think you should just get a new guitar and keep this one as a display at home lah. You see, the truss rod has been damaged where the neck broke, so if I try to repair the warp, I might end up damaging the truss even further. But I can help you change the machine head and bridge lah.
JK: But... but... the main problem's the warp and the frets...
RM: Well, honestly I don't know if your guitar can survive refretting also. Why don't you take a look at this semi-acoustic here. Black color, very stylish. Comes with inbuilt tuner, my personal recommendation...

And yeah... that's pretty much how it went everywhere, with the only difference being the type of guitar being recommended at the end. Sigh.

Anyways, found a cool picture. Should bring a smile to all Calvin and Hobbes fans. It certainly made me smile!

This was built as a tribute to Calvin & Hobbes. I lifted the picture from www.fantent.com.

Listening to: Nausicaa Soundtrack by Joe Hisaishi
Just watched: The Last King of Scotland - A movie I quite enjoyed.

... of Contributions to State and Country

2007-04-22T23:19:00.000+08:00

All I can say is:

SCREW E-FILING.

I'm one for contributing to my country's growth but two factors has led to my unenthused disposition.

1. I question where does my money go to.

2. The God forsaken system better known as 'e-filing'.

... PENANG! 'Nuff Sed!

2007-01-04T03:38:00.000+08:00

I went back to Penang on 6th December 2006 to help look after my Grandmother. She's living with my aunt near Batu Ferringhi. My aunt went on a holiday to China along with her husband and twin girls, so my brother and I accompanied my mom to chill with my grandmother.

Assumption #1: The happy trio took Jerral's car to drive up to Penang.
Assumption #2: Jerral's driving.
Assumption #3: Penang. 'nuff sed.

Conclusion: FOOD FIESTA!

One of the many good things about living in KL is that every time I go back to Penang, I appreciate the food so much more.

My memory's been absolutely horrible ever since I waltzed past the quarter century mark, so instead of telling a story here I'll just talk about some of the pictures I took.

This is Barney the Dog. Yes you got that right the first time. If it were Barney the Dinosaur there I'd be the center of hatred for kids all over the world 'coz I'd have kicked its tail back to pre-history. Anyway, this Barney belong to my twin cousins and I thought it was a retarded Shih Tzu because of the decentralized eyes (opposite of cock eyed, don't know what that's called) and the way its tongue perpetually hangs out the right side of its mouth. Now I know many dogs leave their tongues out when they pant, but Barney's tongue looks like its dead, as if that side of its face was paralyzed.

Nasi Kandar. Despite what anyone else from the other parts of Malaysia say, Penang has the best Nasi Kandar around. Heck, the best Nasi Kandar in the world, since I doubt there's Nasi Kandar anywhere else. I went back to my favourite Nasi Kandar joint next to Chow Rasta Market but I was a little disappointed because the place had changed hands! With a sigh (and a salivating mouth) I thought to myself "Hey, it's still here, so I guess it can't be that bad."

True enough, it wasn't that bad, but it also wasn't really that good anymore either. The people running the place were quite rude, but what ticked me off was that they no longer had their amazing mutton kurma anymore! All good things come to an end, I suppose.

One of those 'spur of the moment' shots. My 6'3" brother walking alongside my 5' grandmother.

The famous "Sisters Char Koay Teow" is something everyone who visits Penang shuld try. We met Karpal Singh having lunch here many years back too. Anyway, look at the size of that prawn! Only sad thing is that it comes in a standard (read: small!) serving size. Tastes great though! The shop has some really good packet nasi lemak and otak otak as well.

Penang has many old guilds and associations predating World War 1. One of these establishments was the Carpenter's Guild, located along Love Lane just before it intersects with Chulia Road, if memory serves.

The entrance to the Carpenter's Guild, established 1855. The place was so empty and quite. Which was exactly how I liked it ;)

One of the many carvings in there. This is the top of an altar and was about five to six feet wide.

OK, time for a That's So Jerral story.

I was taking this Picture:

This is the base and foundation for one of the pillars. Someone was telling me that the foundation was an intricate part of work because it consisted of three different parts and went on to explain on how that made the foundation much stronger than the single piece block which was more commonly used.

So while taking that picture, I backed into this:

As you can see from its age and build (and the myriad of things hidden behind it), bumping into this created quite a big CLUNK followed by a clatter. Take into consideration that I'm not exactly small sized and put all these sounds into an old stone building with a two story ceiling, you get this amplified sound which is echoed by all the walls.

And the result? I scared the heck out of this poor dude:

He must have thought that the building was finally coming down, followed by thoughts of "Damned tourists!" but he promptly returned to his afternoon nap after I gave him a sheepish smile and apologized.

Right. End of story. Too sleepy to go on with the rest of the pictures so that'll have to wait for another day. I shall close with a picture that serves as an inside joke. It'll probably bring a smile, some laughs and exclamations of "Oh My God!" to those who know this story. Ask me if you don't know it and want to hear it, but it needs to be told over a few teh tariks.

... of spiders, amphibians and aquatic creatures

2007-01-04T02:59:00.000+08:00

Tamera's sister visited KL with her husband sometime late October 2006 and I was temporarily recruited as a tour guide. Well, to be more precise, I was one part tour guide, four parts chauffeur. One of the places we took them to was the Aquaria in KLCC. I was quite happy because I've not been there myself, and I finally had a reason to use my not so trusty Vivitar digital camera for something other than work.

Not supposed to flash, but accidentally left it on. Must've scared the bejeezus outta this poor fella.

Can't remember what toad this was, but check out its size! I left a 50 sen coin beside it for comparison.

I like this picture. Kinda sad that this Iguana had many spotlights right above it. Good for the camera though!

This tarantula is unique to Malaysia. They had a whole collection of tarantulas unique to our jungles! I'm suddenly thinking twice about camping again. Focus is really bad because my Vivitar was deciding whether to focus on the glass or on the web, but not on the spider itself.

I really had to take this picture. Very reminiscence of National Geographic red eyed tree frog, except that it's not a red eyed tree frog.

Wassup, turtle dude!

There were many other photo opportunities and moments but my batteries decided to die out on me. That's their way of telling me that I forgot to feed them the night before. I saw some two meter sharks, a couple of remoras under one such shark, a baby kangaroo (yeah I know, I was wondering why was there a kangaroo in a place called 'Aquaria' too), several small nautilus (nautili? nautiluses?), sea dragons (they looked a little like spiny, spiky sea horses) and many other aquatic life that I can't remember at the moment.

No moral of the story, no funny or fabricated stories and no humour to this post, just wanted to put the pictures up.

I just realized that I have to spell 'humour' according to the British dictionary and 'enter' according to the American. 'Humor' and 'entre' just felt wrong to me :/

I am a Malaysian.

2007-01-03T16:11:00.000+08:00

I'm sitting here with my throat feeling scratched out from all kinds of heaty food and a general lack of sleep since Christmas eve 2006. Air conditioner's not helping my throat, but the rest of my body would protest instead if I switched it off.

I'm sitting here with my heart feeling quite on the down side. You see, I've always been proud to call myself a Malaysian. The only thing I've consistently complained about Malaysia since I was a wee young lad was that it had mistakenly placed itself a little too close to the equator and making this place a perpetual steam oven. It also makes me wonder why saunas are quite popular here. Take a 1 minute sprinting session at any local field, sit down, and lo! Instant Sauna!

Many events have taken place and suddenly I question whether my pride in my country has been misplaced or merely shaken. Maybe I'm just ashamed of some of my fellow Malaysians and maybe I'm disappointed at the way the country's being run. And at other worldly events.

Or maybe it just sunk in that I didn't get many Christmas gifts.

Haha. Okay, weak attempt at humor. I shall decide whether to dwell more on these or to post my 2 months worth of photographs and the stories that come with them later on.

Happy New Year.

... Of Gigs! Gigs! Gigs! (Updated)

2006-07-25T11:08:00.000+08:00

Couple of gigs coming up:

1. Saturday 29th July 2006 - La Gourmet House

Zal and I will be there throughout dinner. Should be there around 7pm - 10pm.

2. Thursday 10th August 2006 - Moonshine @ Laundry Bar

Sessioning for another of Zal's sets, this time with Melina of Tempered Mental on bass, Stephanie of Plush Velvet on Drums. Come around 7.30pm, the whole thing should start around then.

Cheers!

Nostalgic Song of the Day : Plush by Stone Temple Pilots
Movie to avoid : X-Men 3 - The Last Stand - I can't believe they actually released this. What a let down! The effects are still cool but I don't know why they moved the story towards this direction.

... Of waking up Tired, part two

2006-06-08T09:55:00.000+08:00

Right. The gig went pretty well, much better than I had expected actually. I sort of managed to wake up before I reached No Black Tie, but just barely. I'm gonna steal some pictures from Wei Yein soon before proceeding to talk further about the gig. Thanks to everyone who showed up!

Gig ended way past midnight, and then there was the goodbyes and "Hope you enjoyed yourselve," and voila... it's 2am. I reached home about 3.30am, after grabbing a quick supper.

Puffy eyes now. Office mates probably think I'm crying or something ;)

J.

... Of Waking Up Tired & Looking at Glamorous Days

2006-06-07T10:13:00.000+08:00

It's gonna be a shitty day. I've got a gig with Zal tonight at No Black Tie. I've got some sort of audition for a gig I'm hoping to do right before that. I meant to practice with Zal last night but was just too tired to stay up for it and on top of that, I had very restless sleep last night, rolling around and waking up too many times. Now I'm at work after waking up tired and wondering whether I can fully wake up before the audition and the gig.

Yup. It's gonna be a bad day :/

So let's cheer me up by writing a movie recommendation! Wee!

Movie Recommendations : NANA - 113 mins

Komatsu Nana travels to Tokyo to be with her boyfriend who's studying art. Chance finds her seated on the train next to Oosaki Nana, vocalist of a newly disbanded rock band, Black Stones. Although they are characteristically polar opposites, the ice was broken when Oosaki discovers that they both share the same name.

Parting ways at Tokyo station, they cross paths again later on when hunting for apartments to rent. After a small debate on who gets to rent the apartment they both want, they decide to move in together despite their differences. Cool, aloof and introspective Nana and ditzy, cheerful and outgoing Nana soon bonded and became close friends.

The Black Stones reunite with Oosaki after recruiting a new bassist and Komatsu wins a pair of tickets to watch Trapnest, the hottest new band in Japan. Komatsu invites Oosaki to watch the caoncert with her, not knowing that Ren, the Black Stones' former bassist and Oosaki's former love had left the band and Oosaki to further his career with Trapnest.

This movie shows that the course of true love is never always straight and smooth. How do the clashing personalities of the two unlikely friends help each other overcome their own shortcomings? Watch the movie to find out.

Overall Verdict : This is a movie built on a good realistic storyline with decent-good cinematography and kickass music. What I liked a lot about this movie is that it primarily tells a story about people ; their lives, their emotions, their struggles and their dreams. The amount of realism and daily struggle put into it relates to our daily lives. I feel that the only setback to this movie is that it's too short at 113 minutes runtime.

Jerral gives 4 1/2 stars out of 5!

Music Recommendation : Check out the song 'Glamorous Days' (also titled 'Glamorous Sky') written by Hyde Romaji of L'arc en Ciel and Ai Yawaza, performed by Mika Nakashima (Oosaki Nana). It's featured in NANA as a Black Stones song. Interestingly I first heard it on Traxx fm a few months ago, way before I came across the movie.

... Of Musical Methods & Pictoral Efforts

2006-05-14T01:24:00.000+08:00

Posting up pictures of gigs in March. Hoping to appease complainants (complaints pertaining to mismanagement of blog content - also known as "no updates") Yin Ee and my only loyal secret fan now that I'm plugging in multiple entries within multiple entries ;)

Two Pics Above : International Women's Day @ La Bodega.

This is where we played!

Foresty pics above: Kampung Fest in Ulu Langat, 26 March 2006

Early Dinner After Kampung Fest! Yum!

Pics above: Zal and Myself - Actors Studio 27 March 2006

Rhapsody - Nicole & Ywenna - 27 March 2006

Kevin Brokenscar with Alda in the shadowed foreground - 27 March 2006

Melina William - 27 March 2006
I wanna be just like her when I grow up! No wait.. I'm older than her. Damnit.

... Of Midnight Ramblings - Wasted Funds, Persian 'Chauns, and Gigs for Fun!

2006-05-13T23:56:00.000+08:00

Continuing from the previous post, I've mentioned that there were so many things that I wanted to put online, but was just to bogged down with work. Most of you would have heard by now that I've left Permanis. I'm attached somewhere now but I don't think I'd like to announce that just yet. Those of you closer to me would know why, the others... well you've just got to ask me over some teh ais ;)

Right, first thing on my list: I can't find my battery charger for my camera! I loaned it to my mom some time ago and now it's hidden somewhere in the house! No more pictures for me until I find it. Thankfully I took a few before I loaned off the charger.

"What? There's no more Bebop on TV?!"

Now, amongst the many things I wanted to add to this blog were writeups and reviews to a few of my favourite Anime series (how do you pluralize 'series' anyway?), including Rurouni Kenshin, Cowboy Bebop, Samurai Champloo, the Ghost in the Shell movies and series, Captain Harlock, Tokyo Godfathers... I've actually wrote a few paragraphs each for about 12 Anime titles as well as reviews for games (Final Fantasy Franchise, Leisure Suit Larry, Monkey Island, Full Throttle, Grim Fandango, etc) and a little tribute to some games that were cancelled.

Anyone who knows me well enough will know I'm just too darn lazy to write it all out again. At least, not now. I'll take my time and pull those writeups together again eventually. Eventually being the key operative word here ;)

Moving on to a different topic...

...Of Wasting Public Funds You Taxed From Me!

Ever taken a look around where you lived and wondered if the money taxed from you to develop that very place were not only put into good use, but efficiently as well? I was in my car, cutting through Section 16 PJ to link up to Jalan Damansara, right after the toll. For the benefit of those who aren't familiar, the road ends in a T junction; you can turn right into a housing area just before the junction, but once you hit the actual junction itself, you can only turn left and follow the flow of the highway. My question is, how many traffic lights would you need?

Four traffic lights facing me. Another 2 lights faces the oncoming traffic from the right.

Voila! They all turn green!

Okay, lame lame... on to the next post!

...Of Persian Leprechauns, Rainbows and That Pot of Gold

You ever heard of this tale where if you successfully follow a rainbow to it's source, you would find a pot of gold buried underneath the ground where the rainbow ends? That pot of gold is supposed to belong to a leprechaun.

Now check this out. I was driving around in Kampung Pandan and saw this:

And I followed it and saw this:

And discovered where it led to:

Puya's House!

Unfortunately I didn't find a pot of gold inside Puya's house, but I did find Puya standing outside his house, smoking a cigarette and looking at the said rainbow. He did not look much like a leprechaun, even under the most imaginative scrutiny. I guess the rainbow theory wasn't true after all, but he did look like he owned the rainbow and was doing a routine inspection.

... Of Gigs, Gigs and More Gigs!

I've gotten some more gigs under my belt over the last week, but since my camera had no battery, there are no pictures for those gigs.

First up was another performance in No Black Tie on Thursday 4th of May, where Zal and I played 2 sets totalling 12 songs for the night. It was really cool because we had Kevin Theseira from Qings and Kueens on the double bass and Melina William of Tempered Mental playing percussions for us. Kevin of Broken Scar came up towards the end of the night for the open mic segment and we had the whole band play along with him. All in all a great night of fun! Many thanks to Evelyn of No Black Tie for the invitation to perform!

Next up was Saturday 6th of May in La Gourmet House, where I played for Zal again. La Gourmet House had a wine tasting evening with French dinner, so along with Rhapsody, Reza and Melina, we were the entertainers for the evening. Thanks goes out to Anthony of La Gourmet for inviting us to play and feeding us too!

Sunday 7th of May saw myself in La Bodega (Jln Tungshin). We did a really great impromptu set for Kevin Brokenscar in No Black Tie 3 nights earlier, and he invited Zal and myself to join him on his set for the Troubagangers gig. Once again, impromptu performance with Kevin (which really rocked!) and later on more impromptu madness and Zal and I played for Nicole of Rhapsody, before covering Time After Time and closing the night with Zal's "Do You Really." What was really cool was that Alang hopped onto the drums and kicked in with us midway through Time After Time. The important thing for that night (besides a good performance) was that everyone had fun and everyone enjoyed the music! Credits go to the Troubagangers for organizing this monthly affair.

Thursday 11th of May, I went down to Laundry Bar at The Curve to was my friends from False Opus give their first performance in over a year. I wasn't expecting to do any open mic since Zal wasn't free, but I bumped into Kevin Brokenscar and instantaneously we just knew we were going to end up on stage! We had no guitars, so we had to go around asking the other musicians for their gear. Got two guitars in the end and belted out Kevin's "Scratch" to an interestingly motleyed crowd. Credits to Reza for organizing the monthly 'Moonshine' gigs, and thanks to the dude who loaned me his guitar ;)

... Of Returning To Previously Familiar Blogs, And Of Missing Entries Chucked In

2006-05-13T22:48:00.000+08:00

Barely a blink of an eye, and another half year has lapsed between my posts. It was pretty sad, as I had much to say. I even typed out most of them on my previous company's laptop, and just before I left the company, I transfered it all into my trusty ol' thumbdrive.

Now the thing is, I can't find that blasted thumbdrive! It's not in my bags and it's not in my old office! Sheesh. There was so much I wanted to say, now I'll probably just dump it all into this post.

Let's start off chronologically. I wrote an entry on 26 Nov 2005 and mailed it to myself, and it goes as such:

26 NOVEMBER 2005...
... Of Shirt, Pants and No Black Tie

"The room was wooded in all directions; the ceiling, the wall and even the floor, in a fashion that one would rarely see in Malaysia. The place was this smoky jazz bar that I've always dreamed of playing in. Even at this time, 2 hours before the first of the night's patrons have walked in, I stand on the stage with Zal, going through our sound test the the audio engineer, I can still smell the leftover cigarette smoke that has been absorbed and have become part of each wood panel's personality."

Good evening, friends and strangers alike. About 2 years ago, I would have written an introduction like the one I've written above to introduce a night's performance at the ever classy No Black Tie on Jalan Mesui, behind Istana Hotel. The No Black Tie that I've grown accustomed to was panelled with light colored, seasoned wood, with the wall on the left racked with hundreds of empty bottles of wine. Each bottle would have its own stories to tell, as how each stain on the wood has its tales. A picture of Miles Davis stares from the stage and welcomes each visitor as they walked in.

By 9 O' Clock in the evening, the room will have already been filled, and a cloud of cigarette and cigar smoke hangs suspended in the air as if time has frozen as the room begins its journey back in time to the 1930's American jazz era.

No Black Tie has been famed for its quality in musical performances and has set the benchmark for independent and amateur musicians, with its strict quality control forcing musicians to strive for improvement and fight for the permission and honor to perform there.

Musicians and music lovers alike were greatly saddened when this performance hub closed over a year ago.

Fast forward to the present day, No Black Tie has reopened with a bang, relocating 5 doors down the road to a larger venue. Reopened barely a month, I had the honor of being 'allowed' to play there with my long time partner in crime and wonderful friend, Zalila Lee. With many thanks to Evelyn, the proprietor of No Black Tie and Reza, the show's organizer, we opened the night with a 30 minute set, playing 6 songs written by Zal.

(Left - Right: Non participative baby grand piano, Jerral, Zal)

We encountered some minor problems as we went on stage. We were given stools that were higher than the chairs I was accustomed to, and lower and less stable than the high stools that come with most stages. It wasn't exactly much of a problem, but I was conerned about falling off as I swayed to the music, but by the third song, I was able to gauge a safe 'range' for me to move around. Zal and I were also quite deprived of sleep, Zal because of her consecutive performances at La Gourmet House in The Curve 2 days prior and myself largely because of work.

All in all, though, we had a lot of fun performing as a duo again, and I made my first impromptu attempt to shush the talking crowd when they got too noisy. Quite interesting, seeing the nice, quiet and appreciative front row crowd smiling in amusement, some people in the middle helping me shush the people at the back, and the people at the back wondering what all the shush-ing was all about.

The other performers for the night were Isaac Entry with his southern bluesy style, who quite amazed me not only because of his fluency with the guitar, singing and crowd interaction, but because I knew him about 5 years ago as a drummer who didn't play guitars or sang. Reza himself walked up next, with all the women in the room hooting and cheering even before he began his music. He was quickly followed by this Chinese dude who sang primarily Mandarin songs. Can't remember his name at this point, but I think it was Steven something. The last featured act was a duo called 'Rhapsody' who just blew the crowd away with their wit, charm, attitude and last but definitely not least, the Tori Amos-ish music they belted out. To any music lovers out there, check them out if you ever see their name being featured.

Mia: Astounding the crowd with her cross legged levitation trick.

Mia Palencia made a surprise visit for the open mic segment and as always, she gave an excellent soulful performance. I shall close the description of the night with a message to Mia: My Aunt Ninny's Petunias to "I can't sing in Malay!" That was a great song!

Thanks to everyone who turned up that night, and a special shout out to Zal for asking me to perform with her, and cheers to Wei Yein, Puya, Viji, Intan, JJ, Glenda, Rubini, Michael, Michelle, Fariq 'Aminal' Halim, Fiona, Leonard and Nigel. Hope y'all really enjoyed the show, and that exclamations of "You rocked!" and "My god, that was amazing!" weren't just empty words one's obligated to say to one's friends. Good night! =)

...Of Sharing Festivities and of Black Earth

2005-11-04T00:19:00.000+08:00

** A note first. This post was meant to come out on Thursday, but I've been running around since the hols started. I apologize for any typos and / or grammatical errors for this post. Shall take a look through and edit them when I have a little bit more leisure time. Cousin's getting married on Sunday. Cheers all! **

Happy Deepavali and Selamat Hari Raya to everyone celebrating and Happy holidays to all who'll be enjoying a break! Malaysia's a great place to experience a melting pot of cultures. Granted we get other countries with larger diversity of cultures, but I think in Malaysia, you really see that melting pot effect. Though not often, we get to see Chinese and Indians in Baju Melayu (Traditional Malay Clothes), Chinese and Malay girls in Sari (Traditional Indian Women's Clothing) and Indians and Malays in Cheong Sam (Traditional Chinese Women's Clothes).

This integration of cultures also see happy people like me pigging out on food from different cultures. I've had nasi lemak with chinese veggies and Indian curry. Yum! But it's also in Malaysia you get to see people with weird food combinations on the buffet lines. I've personally seen someone with nasi lemak with kurma gravy and grilled sausages and Chinese fried prawn dumpling with mayonnaise on the side, some sort of salad with thousand island dressing, and a helping of Indian 'Vadai' (Vadai, Wadeh, Vadei... never figured out how it's spelled) to boot.

Recipe for an interesting stomach, if you ask me. Come to think of it, you're quite likely to find something like that on my plate now and then. Malaysian food. Yum!

Another nice feature we get in Malaysia is what we call 'Rumah Terbuka' that translates into 'Open House.' An open house is simply an open invitation for anyone to walk into a house during a festive celebration, such as Hari Raya and Deepavali, where guests are (obviously) greeted and served food and drinks. I'm not too sure how this started, but my theories are:

1) A celebration where personal friends and relatives were invited and grew into a larger scale to include people in the streets, or

2) Families being thankful for their fortunes and giving back to society and to the less fortunate so that they can enjoy the mood, food and general festivities.

Personally I'd like to think that Malaysians are nice and generous enough to follow the second theory. Anyone with better insights feel free to educate me :) And invite me while you're at it! :D

I see open houses more often with Malay and Indian homes, very rarely (and sadly) with Chinese homes (where celebrations are usually with invited guests only). Yes, we're stingy buggers. :P

Also, anyone with any idea in which other countries and cultures do we find open houses? I've seen it in Indonesia, and I'm wondering if it happens in India as well.

My family's never held an open house before. I actually wonder what it would be like, having strangers walk into your house and all. Would be quite horrible if a couple of kleptomaniacs walked in. "Right. Someone just took my Scratch and Sniff 2000 Limited Edition Pink Underwear(tm). Nobody leaves until I recover it! Err... not that I wear it or anything. Just sentimental value, you understand."

Almost everyone serves some sort of liquor or liquor based food duing festive seasons, be they Chinese, Malay or Indian. Yeah, yeah, we 'know' Muslims don't drink. The bottles are purely decorative ;) Anyway, stay away from Chinese liquor, especially if it came from China. I'm speaking from personal experience here. I bought this bottle of liquor when I was in China. Translated to English, the name meant "Black Earth." Somehow I should have just taken that as warning number 1 to stay away. Black Earth is stilled and drunk around the Chinese borders of Siberia to stave off the feeling of cold. Warning number 2, and yes I know liquor makes you lose body heat and only gives the illusion of warmth.

Back from the digression, my friends and I caught a whiff of the Black Earth and it just scared the bejeezus out of us. Even the worst alcoholics among us refused to touch it. Nonetheless, after much deliberation, we took a capful each. ONE CAPFUL. I'm never touching that shite ever again. It helped clear the cockroach problem my host had though. We poured a third of the bottle down a sink hole on the floor and it cleared his cockroach problems for quite a while. So let's look at it from this perspective: Coackroaches can survive TNT, but Black Earth kills them. Conclusion? Stay away from any beverage named "Black Earth!"

On a different tangent, I love festive holidays, be they Deepavali, Hari Raya, christmas, New Year or Chinese New Year. That's the time where Kuala Lumpur's free from traffic. That's also why I usually opt to stay in KL during these holidays. Home to KL City Center under 20 minutes, 15 if the colorful gods of traffic lights are feeling favourable that day!

I wish a happy and safe driving to everyone who will be going outstation. Keep within the speed limits, be careful when you don't. Notice I said "when you don't" and not "IF you don't" because I know almost nobody sticks to the speed limit here. Interestingly though, there's a list of speed traps for this festive season that's being circulated on emails. I really wonder the validity of this list and more suspiciously, from where it originated.

Of Girls named dUCky, Meanie, Belly, and half a shot of Maliteracy

2005-10-15T08:01:00.000+08:00

I met Karen back in 1998. She was amongst those I knew who was skewed towards the higher end of the intelligence scale and used to smile a lot. It was through her that I came across Dave Matthews and Neil Gaiman. And Counting Crows and Moloko for that matter. I guess being exposed to certain things by a significant other holds greater impact in our lives than we realize. I can't imagine myself reading Famous Five while listening to Britney Spears. I really can't. *shudder*

Likewise with Yin Ee who literally shoved "Catcher in the Rye" into my hands and Shelley who introduced "Tuesdays with Morrie" and "Vernon, God Little" to me affected my reading direction. Zal brought Jazz to my life and reinforced my preference for Alanis and Cranberries, Shelley reinforced Tori Amos and introduced Etta James and err... Shelley music.

I don't remember who introduce Portishead to me though. It's either Adrian or Karen.

I discovered Frente, Sneaker Pimps, Massive Attack and Billie Holiday by spending excessive time in music stores.

And it's 8am, I just woke up 3 hours ago after an 8 hour sleep and I'm sleepy again. Maybe it's something to do with the really nice rain outside. Great sleeping weather.

Good Morning.

Good Night.

* * * * * *

Currently Reading: Mitch Albom's "The five people you meet in heaven"
(Feeling too lazy to look for a picture of the book cover)

Of Early Mornings: Nocturnal Tendencies Defeated

2005-10-15T05:25:00.000+08:00

I can't believe it. I was supposed to meet Cass for a belated birthday dinner with her and I fell asleep. I, Jerral, fell asleep. In the evening, nonetheless! I'm so sorry babe! Will call you tomorrow and get an ear lashing. *cringe* I've also missed Nigel's farewell party. Who's Nigel, you ask? Read on.

I was supposed to meet her around 8.30pm and I fell asleep around 7.30. My phone's alarm has this auto 5 minute snooze thing if you don't acknowledge it after 30 seconds and I woke up to it at 4.30am. That's means I slept through 95 alarms and woke up on the 96th!

I slept in my work clothes and contact lens on, woke up with a weird sore throat (can't figure this one out), bad back and neck (I literally dropped on the bed and snored, I guess) and my right eye has had this smoky film for the past 45 minutes. Ever tried sleeping 8 hours with contact lens on? Your eyes attempts to do a Vulcan mind meld with it and ripping it off your eyes feels like you're tugging at your cornea.

NOW.

What made me slumber on through the entire evening and made me wake up so darn early on a friggin' Saturday morning? It's not so bad if they were still airing Robotech on Saturday mornings but I'm digressing.

I started work in Permanis Sandilands Sdn Bhd as a Brand Executive yesterday morning. Permanis is the local bottler and marketer for Pepsi Co International. It's in Bangi, at the Southern borders of Selangor. I happen to reside towards the Northern side of Selangor and reaching work at 8am just means I wake up around 6.20am and leave before the 7am traffic begins. If I'm lucky I'd grab a bun from some petrol station along the way.

First day of work was pretty interesting. I found out which brands fell under my portfolio, met some of the research and advertising agencies we'll be working with and got paraded around the offices like a trophy. At least they were friendly :) They probably thought I was pretty unfriendly coz I was just sleepy the whole day, and why I try not to feel sleepy by concentrating on something, it just looks like I'm extremely stand off-ish. Kinda miss having Zal, Viji and Puya around. Really wished they were working in Permanis as well :P

Anyways the good news is that they're moving to Bukit Bintang within a month. Somehow I have a feeling I might have to get up even earlier to get into KL in the mornings, but hey, I've got options for lunch now. Can even hang around KL if I want to avoid the traffic, plus I'll be quite close to Cass and Yineemeanie and probably a whole lot of other friends that have slipped my mind at moment. I can see myself asking them for lunch, but have to avoid places where they sell Coke ;)

The people I've met here were great. I was kinda worried they'd be dry and boring, but these people are kinda wacky in their own ways, though the wackiest and friendliest was this guy called Nigel who has just left the company. Wish he was here a little bit longer, 'coz he seemed like someone really fun to work with and I think I would have learnt a few things from him. I'm sort of taking over part of the brands under his care, and I now have Lipton Ice Tea, Excel Isotonic and Gatorade in my portfolio.

Try asking me some questions about the company (not questions about work, that's slightly different) and I'll answer them according to my employee's handbook. :)

Once again, my apologies to Cass, and also to Nigel. Waking up 6.20am is not something I'm accustomed to. :(

Of Dave Matthewsism and Duplicity

2005-10-12T21:57:00.000+08:00

I'm a big fan of Dave Matthews and his band, better known as the Dave Matthews Band. Oh wow. Creative branding aside, they have collectively created some of the best music I've heard in this lifetime. I hope I'll come across them again in the next, if there happens to be a next lifetime for me.

Anyways Dave Matthews music was introduced to me by an old friend of mine, Boon Yew. I was amazed at the composition and fingerwork for "What would you say?" when I first heard Booners play it. I've pretty much embarked on a mission of sorts to convert people to Dave Matthewsism ever since, preaching to fellow musicians who have the bad luck to have to work with me and to the poor ears who has had to sit down and listen to me out of courtesy.

Of course, being Jerral, I'm not only promoting Dave Matthews all this while, but my own brand of music as well. I'm just using Dave Matthews and whoever else anyone wants to hear as a platform to introduce music as per how I think they should be (I don't change Dave Matthew's music though. Quite sacrilegious, if you ask me).

Left - Right: Jerral and Zal performing in the Commonwealth Club a few years back.

People I've tried to convert over the years. They can comment on how successful I've been if you ever get to meet them or if they come across this entry!): Zalila Lee, Fariq "Aminal" Halim, Fiona Jane, Patricia "Ah Pat" Yip, Yineemeenie, Izzy, Ee Von, Intan Bintang, Shelley Belly, Debbie Tang, Ayunami, Davina, "Ah Long" Wei Yein and Puya. Can't remember if Shuks has heard me play or sing, but she should be on that list too. Yes, I have friends with interesting nicknames, and note that Fariq is an AMINAL, not animal.

Feel you should be on the list? Hit me with a comment if you ever see this blog. Gimme a spankin' high comment count so I can compete in some popularity contest or something.

Occassionally (read: once a year, twice if I'm lucky) I get flattered by an unexpected "Hey! I saw you at [insert performance] the other day! Remember me? I was the one who [insert incident]!" to which I would respond with the never changing "Oh yeah! My God! I've not seen you since then! How've you been doing, man?"

If you ever catch me saying that (unless you're a personal friend) then I've probably forgotten you and that incident, but it usually comes back a couple of minutes into the conversation. *Sheepish Grin*

Anyways Dave Matthews himself heard how I've been covering his music and sends his personal support and endorsement below.

Jerral did WHAT to my songs?!

Ayu has complained that I don't mention her whenever I talk about my music. So here it goes - She loves my simplified renditions of miscellaneous Dave Matthews songs and also my version of Jamiroquai's "Black Crow." She's a gorgeous and smart lass and has a great taste in musicians ;) She enjoys a good laugh, is a fan of Russel Peters, has a great sarcastic wit and does not take lightly to being insulted during a game of Literati. Her current whereabouts are to be kept confidential, but several unverified reports have surfaced saying that she has been antagonizing sheep around the region where they shot 'Lord of the Rings' when she's not busy playing Literati. It's best to stay clear from Lamb Chops for a while. :P

Digressing from music, I'm half a chapter away from finishing Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys. Might do a review on it if I feel like it over the weekend. Cheers, all!

Song of the Day 1 : Love Me Butch - Freefall. Yes, I'm feeling nostalgic.

Song of the Day 2 : Mono - Life in Mono.

I should mention at this point that Dave Matthews and his band remain a constant inspiration to the little musician who lives inside me. I apologize for any duplicity caused in his name and for using that picture of his, which kind of makes me wish I had a spankin' cool music video myself.

Of random events being blogged together

2005-10-02T21:32:00.000+08:00

HAIKU!

Haiku is a a traditional form of Japanese poetry that consists of only three lines. They do not rhyme, but have a strict structure (tongue twister ain't that?) where the first line has to contain 5 syllables, the second 7 syllables and the third 5 syllables again.

I used to play a lot of PS2 games based on Japan and often saw these weird forms of poetry. Sometimes they made little sense to me, sometimes they made no sense at all. Sometimes the third line makes the entire poem profound and meaningful.

Here's my first attempt at it:

Stirring my coffee.
Looking at the morning sun.
You're not here, goodbye.

Oh well, ain't so great after all. Thank God I'm not a poet.

OK. Wednesday 28th September 2005 saw Viji Puya, Zal and myself having lunch at Pizza Uno in Centerpoint after yet another wasted morning in the office. I was having a bad bout of diarrhea and was battling with myself whether I should be eating all these creamy, olive oily Italian food. It was a mental contest between Jerral the Hog and Jerral the Wise and Conscientious One.

The food on our table!

Needless to say there was no contest and I pigged out. Thankfully the stomach did not object to the type or amount of food I put in that day (Seafood Bisque, Spaghetti ala Vongole and Ice Blended Mocha).

Puya promotes the virtues of Tabasco Sauce during lunch

Fast forward to Thursday 29th September 2005, 7.20pm. Location: Megamall, heading towards ICOM on Jalan Pahang. Zal was in ICOM for a performance and had asked us to come around 7.30 tp get good seats. I was hoping to perform in this gig as well but i) I couldn't make any of the practices and ii) I wasn't an ICOM student nor was I in the alumni.

Anyways, Puya and I picked Wei Yein up in my car from Megamall around 7.20 and we headed off towards KL. To cut the story short, I missed a turning and next thing you know I was on Jalan Raja Chulan, having made quite a long scenic route to my destination. We hit Jalan Tun Razak and ran smack into the infamous traffic jam there. We hit Jalan Raja Chulan around 7.45 and by the time we got to the Jalan Pahang roundabout it was already 8.15.

Anyways we managed to drive, park and get into ICOM in time to catch the second song of the performance! So what made this gig so special that we wanted to go so badly(Besides Zal being a great friend of mine)? Zal was playing for Zainal Abidin! Puya was enjoying himself so much he was clapping and singing along to the songs when Zainal went up.

Zal's at the center. Her face is just barely visible, between Zainal and Elliot, the Timbales dude for the night

Because of all the rush, neither of us had the time to grab some food for dinner and Wei Yein suggested that we adjourn to Jalan Ipoh for some Dim Sum. Yum! There was food, more food, and then there was Puya telling us stories about the Mahabharata and the Mnokey King.

Wei Yein: "And that's why Santa Claus is only this small!"
Puya: "No way! I mean.. really?!"

Puya, all ready to knock out disbelievers of his stories with a Bruce Lee punch

Wei Yein: "I wonder if I should believe what Puya's telling us."
Zal: "I shall curi her chicken while she thinks!"

* * * * * *

Currently Reading:
Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman
Hardcover
US$26.95
ISBN: 006051518X

*MPH was on sale. Got it for RM50 ;)

Of soothing my musical soul

2005-09-27T20:55:00.000+08:00

I immensely enjoyed myself performing with long time compadre and music partner Zalila at La Gourmet House situated at The Curve last Sunday. I got a call from Peter, an old Taylor's College classmate of mine sometime last weekend informing me that he had this friend who was launching his cafe and needed 'something' to spice up the atmosphere and asked if I would be interested to perform there. The events that followed suit are quite straight forward and before you know it, Zal and I were slotted for four sets through out the day.

I was about to list down the songs we did, but realized how much more typing it would involve, so I'll just leave them out and pop in a picture of us playing those songs instead :)

Thanks to Davina for the pictures!

It was great fun performing again after such a long time. Thanks to my friends who showed up for the performance (in order of who came first, so no one gets jealous who's named first!): Yin Ee, Gerard and family, Ee Von and family, Davina and family (starting to sound like a Chinese New Year guest list now...), Peter Toh, Wei Yein, Patricia and Alvin. Oh and Ee Von brought her friend Anrie along too. Also cheers to Leonard Khoo who was our soundman for the day. He actually tweaked our sound down to even individual strings on the guitars just to get a great sound going. Thanks dude!

And oh yeah, cheers to Anthony who invited us to play at La Gourmet House's launch on Sunday.

I'm often reminded of this friend of mine, Debbie Tang whenever I perform. I think she's the only person I can think of who not only likes the way I sing, but actually brings up a time when I sang for her many years ago during random conversations. :) I sang for her, now I'm wondering when she's gonna dance for me? ;)

* * * * *

Interesting Stuff:

1. Cyborg Name Generator: What's your cyborg name?

I came out as "J.E.R.R.A.L.: Journeying Electronic Repair and Rational Assassination Lifeform"

I also checked out some of my other friends' names and here's what I got:

i. Z.A.L.I.L.A.: Zeta Artificial Lifeform Intended for Logical Assassination

ii. P.U.Y.A.: Peacekeeping and Ultimate Yelling Android (LOL)

iii. V.I.J.I.T.H.A.: Versatile Intelligent Juggernaut Intended for Troubleshooting and Hazardous Assassination

2. Are You Dumb? Click here to found out!

3. Origami Boulders aka wadded paper. With optional Haiku poems! I found his comments page so darn funny. The combination of his wit and general knowledge is kinda short of amazing. Check it out here.

4. Transformers Joins the B-Boy craze! Soundwave and Rumble shows it all off! Click here to watch them.

Reach Community Shield

2005-09-04T23:57:00.000+08:00

Puya dragged me into this charity futsal tournament benifiting the Good Shepherd orphanages yesterday. Was a pretty interesting tournament for me because I've not played regularly in the past 2 years. I think I've only clocked in 3 or 4 futsal sessions in the last one year, so I was extremely low on both match fitness and consistency.

My game as a whole was just bad because my movements were sluggish until our 3rd match, game awareness was just non existent and my touch was just horrendous. To top the disadvantage I brought into my team, we could only muster 6 players as opposed to the 7 that everyone else had because... well we just didn't have enough players!

Like I mentioned before, I played a very "Yes, we're all here to lose for charity," attitude before I got kicked twice, once on my lower back and once on my butt before the old fire flared up and I began regaining my old game and passion back. The wonders of getting pissed off by dirty playing opposition teams. I got launched into this "No way am I letting these idiots win!" mode and was closing down oppositions players like Adam Sandler did to non H2O fans in The Waterboy. Hurt the idiot who kicked me as well, but hey, the Fairplay Gloves come off when I'm getting roughed up, for a charity game, no less!

I gave my team a good defensive options after that incident, but was a disadvantage when we attacked. Obviously I didn't get all of my old game back, but I think I did fairly well for someone who has played an average of one game every 3 months.

Anyways, surprise surprise, we topped our group thanks to a bizzare own goal by the group favourites that gave us a 2-2 draw. That was the game I got kicked. We even won through our quarter and semi final games but were beaten on our final match by Blue Ice, a team that managed to scrape into the quarter finals after finishing 3rd during the group matches. Kudos to Blue Ice as they had lost their goal keeper in either the first or second match (can't remember) because of a badly swollen hand.

No pictures at this point because I didn't bring my camera with me.

Digressing a little, for some reason everytime I enter either a football or futsal tournament with Puya, it's always after I've had a long lay off, and always happen to end up in what would be called the Group of Death. Every single time for the past 4 years we'd end up as the underdogs, with everyone expecting us to finish either last or second from bottom. Each time we'd either win the tournament or come in second. 4 Golds and 3 Silvers together, if I remember correctly.

Oh, and Puya would lose his temper at least one game per tournament! Hahaha the good thing is that he's learnt to stay calm a lot since I first met him, where turning a losing game into a winner was secondary and hurting somebody was on top of his priorities. If only we had Christopher Conrad with us that day. I won all four of my Gold Medals in HELP with both Puya and Chris.

Playing this tournament was really good for me on a psychological side. Puya once mentioned that he's never seen me so broken in spirit as I have been lately after working in Next. This game actually got my spirits fired up again, so it felt like a broken person reluctantly walking into a game and a renewed man walking out of it. Cheers mate!

Troubagangers!

2005-09-01T19:25:00.000+08:00

Ahh.... first gig in ages! I performed 2 songs with Zal on Merdeka Eve at La Bodega KL. It was pretty interesting, walking back into this scene (made possible by my decision to leave my previous company!) because I saw so many familiar faces but pretty much nobody recognized me anymore. I'll accredit that to the fact that I've lost some hair lenght, gained some weight and have become a little fairer than my usual self.

We opened with a cover of Shelley's Resident Fool, presented after we've added the Zal and Jerral brand of weird attacks and percussive touch to it, and a fairly new song by Zal simply titled Get a Job. We were meant to play a third song but the organizers said that they were a little behind time and thus we ended up with only time for 2 songs.

Other performers there that night would include Hanafi and Friends where they did a great cover of the Beatles' Come Together and Melina, who was on the djembe for this act, added her superb vocals to a song called .. err.. I don't remember what it was called. But it was good, and that was my point.

Shannon Shah was the featured act and was really great as well. His Inter Galactic Love Song is one that's not to be missed. Catchy lines hooks you in and his lyrics will make you tear with laughter.

Ok At this point a random reader would wonder "Where's the pictures?"

Well, I brought my trusty camera with me that night but since I suddenly realized it was just too hard to both perform and take my own picture, I entrusted the said camera to a friend of mine so that she could snap some pretty cool pictures of Zal and myself (she's pretty good with the camera).

Unfortunately she forgot to snap those pictures.

Cold Forsaken Night

2005-08-30T01:15:00.000+08:00

In the cold forsaken night,
I dream of things that could have been,
Of hopes, ambitions and of dreams,
Of money, riches, problems solved,
Of loneliness, sadness and long lost loves.

I thought of you.
Each time I'm alone at night,
Remembering your arms that held me tight,
Stealing kisses through the night,
In a lover's hold when there's no light.

I thought of you.
How I held you when you cried,
It's not as if we haven't tried,
To work things out, to make it right,
I've let go, but this feeling's have not died.

Have you forgotten me?
This forsaken night as I think of you?
Have you forgotten I was always there for you?
Do you even remember words you said to me?
"Forever," hence "we will always be."

I crave your presence and detest the absence.

Where are you now? Who are you now?

My long lost love in loneliness,
Of money, riches and above all else, happiness,
Of hopes, ambitions and of dreams,
Of everything that could have been,

I dream.

In the cold forsaken night.

* * * * * *
Movie Recommendation: Howl's Moving Castle by Hiyao Miyazaki Studio Ghibli (2004)

Synopsis:

Sophie, an average teenage girl working in a hat shop, finds her life thrown into turmoil when she is literally swept off her feet by a handsome-but-mysterious wizard named Howl, and is subsequently turned into a 90-year-old woman by the vain and conniving Wicked Witch of the Waste.

Embarking on an incredible odyssey to lift the curse, she finds refuge in Howl's magical moving castle where she becomes acquainted with Markl, Howl's apprentice, and a hot-headed fire demon named Calcifer.

Sophie's love and support comes to have a major impact on Howl, who flies in the face of orders from the palace to become a pawn of war and instead risks his life to help bring peace to the kingdom.

(Synopsis taken from http://www.tribute.ca/)

...Of Bling Blings, Faithless Friends and Future Steps

2005-08-28T18:29:00.000+08:00

Of Bling Blings

I bought myself a chain. At this juncture most people would probably go "Jerral with a chain?!" so I shall state that again. I bought myself a chain. For some reason almost everyone I meet looks at it and go "Ooh! Thundercats!" which prompts me to give them my stare of disconcertment.

So yes, I bought a Final Fantasy VIII Sleeping Lionheart chain. I'm currently exploring ways to shorten the chain a little on Zal's suggestion.

Faithless Friends

I'd like to send a word out to Yin Ee who insisted that I forgot her birthday. I called her out for dinner a couple of days before her birthday becuase I was going to be busy on her actual birthday. I had gone present hunting (which is never an easy thing for guys to do) some time before that, and just needed to nail an appointment with her to meet up.

We ended up in William's in Taman Mayang with Eric, a colleague and friend of mine. After the initial introductions, Yin Ee cheekily accuses me of not remembering 'something' to which I played along and went "Didn't remember what?"

A lot of ribbing followed from her and after a while I told her "Eh actually I remembered lah, I've even gotten a present already" where she instantaneously quiped back "Yeah right! You're gonna walk across the street now buy me a lighter or something right?"

"No lah, he actually told me that he wanted to meet you tonight because he may not be able to see you the next couple of days" says Eric in my defences (by the way, he pretty much quoted me word for word).

"Wah... do you guys often cover for each other like that?" came Yin Ee's response

She remained pretty convinced that I had forgotten her birthday, partly because of my superb acting when I played along, and more largely so because I *do* have a habit of forgetting things.

Only at the end of the night when I brought her present out from the car was she convinced that I did remember. Even whilst I was walking to the car she playfully called out "You're not gonna give me a lighter or something and said that you bought it right?"

I got her a bottle of Givenchy 'Very Irrisitible' because I thought that aptly described her. Kinda corny, I know, but I hope she likes it anyhow :)

Hmmph! Faithless Friend! :P

... and of Future Steps

I've been exploring several opportunities following my departure for Next Event Sdn Bhd, within the industry, within a similar marketing line and going towards corporate marketing. I've ruled out staying in the industry for the moment because there's just too many reasons why I wanted to leave in the first place. Thinking of taking the corporate route because opportunities like this don't come very often. But then again, I've not decided on anything at this point, though I'd have to within the next couple of days.

* * * * * *

Song of the Day: "Blue Fields" composed by Nobuo Uematsu and Orchestrated by Shiro Hamaguchi

Book Recommendation: "Koko" by Peter Straub
ISBN: 0451162145

An old chapter closes; a new horizon beckons

2005-08-28T18:24:00.000+08:00

Where does one start when trying to recap the events of the previous month? Let's just kick off with the more positive events.

I've left Next Event / Next Marketing Communications Group as of last week. It was kind of a melancholic decision; I was really happy because I felt that work there was just too demanding. I put in an average of 15 hours a day for half a year, taking only 4 Sundays and 2 Saturdays off and a further 2 days on medical leave. Sometimes I work from 9am to 9pm. Those were the better days. Usually I work from 9.30am until anywhere from midnight to 3am.

So yes, I was erally happy to leave that sort of environment. It was no longer work life, it had become a way of life.

Sad... well I'll have to admit I'll miss the people I'm leaving behind, as well as all the fun traveling around Malaysia and Singapore and meeting new people all the time.

Attendees of my farewell dinner at The Olive, Plaza Damas, comprising of current and previous employees of Next Event Sdn Bhd. (Clockwise from lower left: Puya, Zal, Louise, Jenny, Jasrene, Mindy but you can't see her for some reason, Stella, Glenda, Wern Yi and Ee Von)

Anyways, we gathered some of Next Event's current and previous employees for a farewell dinner for me. We went to The Olive, an Italian restaurant in Plaza Damas. I got there late as usual, but on my own defence, I was already working on a freelance project the day after I left Next and was actually quite exhausted.

Friends and Colleagues. I'm the head that sticks out in the center.

... of Sleepless nights and stress filled frights

2005-07-25T19:44:00.000+08:00

Far Away by Tobias Zeising
found on Deviant Art.

Sunday night. Finished work around 1.30am, went to bed around 2.15am. And for the life of me, I just could not fall asleep! Many were the times I was in that limbo-esque state betwixt conciousness and the realm of the dream king. In this state, much like in the state of dreaming, our senses are easily confused and memories and imaginations can occur with an amazingly high degree of realism.

Many were the times I was close to successfully dozing off when suddenly I either heard my clients saying something (4 different times), or remember something that's really pressing, jumped up and realized it was done and over with long ago (twice), and there was even a point I thought I was covered in bugs (once, but wtf...) and jumped out of bed brushing off my limbs before realizing that my bed wasn't infested with bugs after all.

By the time I was internally calmed enough to try to sleep again, it was about 7 am and the sun was coming up.

I thought "What the heck... if I go to sleep now I'll never wake up in time for work!" So now one can guess at the amount of caffeine I'm consuming to keep my engines running. Coffee... one of God's gift to homo sapiens, alongside with Sex and Chocolates. And Playstation 2 as well while I'm at it .

I've never been so badly affected by work stress before, and if I were to hear the same story from someone else I would think that person was exaggerating. Sigh... someone come take me on a vacation!

Here's a picture that aptly describes my mental state of health. A picture paints a thousand words eh?

Group Sense y'all...

2005-07-25T10:04:00.000+08:00

Whoah... 6 miles to the next loo!

I bought a new phone. Well it's actually second hand, but being overworked and underpaid meant that I have a limited budget to play with. I was actually looking out for those Samsung phones that go for about 500 - 600 Ringgit, but realized that their PDA functions were kinda hard to use without a stylus. After extensive searches around, I concluded that PDA phones were just too darn expensive! Cheapest ones were going for about RM1,200, which was a far cry from what I've set aside.

One day I came across a pretty nifty looking second hand PDA Phone that was not bulky and does not come with a price hiking x.xx megapixel camera that I will end up not using since I'd trust my digital camera for that.

Not only have I not seen this phone or brand in the market (warning no. 1, Jerral!), I've also not heard of it before (warning no. 2, Jerral!). But it was being listed at slightly above 700. I tried to talk the fella down, asking for RM500, expecting a 'pasar malam' scenarioto ensue, and without batting an eyelid, he dropped the price to RM600! (warning no. 3, Jerral! DO NOT BUY THE PHONE!). Elated that I could get a PDA phone for only 600 (I tested it there for about an hour, with the salesman giving me a "please just take it and go" look whenever he thinks I can't see him). So after an hour, I decided that it was a little laggy.

All Palm powered PDAs have a hard reset option, so I thought ok... let's get it back to factory settings and clear whatever nonsense that was done to it by the previous owner. Hard Reset and *POOF!* ... everything was in Chinese! I can't read Chinese, neither could the person who was selling it to me. Apparently GSPDA is a brand from Hong Kong, and original settings are in Chinese because this particular set somehow made its way here from the Hong Kong market. Anyways, that's when I found out that this phone has a back up function, and someone managed to find and ran the 'restore' command. Sad to say, I stupidly transfered all my phone numbers into the phone before doing the hard reset, and after restoring to the back up point, I the previous owner's phone book instead. :/

The phone has a small 0.3 megapixel camera so I was hoping to find some 'interesting'picture but alas, there were only a few pictures of the owner taking test shots of his dining table. How boring!

Anyway, here's a pic of the phone I got. It's a Group Sense PDA (GSPDA) G88 Xplore. Powered by Palm and comes with PalmOS 4.1.2 if I remember correctly.

GSPDA Xplore G188

Funny 'To Do' messages left inside by the previous owner:

"gi ambik duit dari xxxx!" - translates to "go take money from xxxx!" Hahahah I'm more likely to remember to go take cash from someone than to remember checking the phone, since it's just a note and not a reminder or alarm.

"hari ni makan ikan" - translates to "today eat fish" I was like 'wtf?!? a reminder to eat fish? Maybe that's a code word for some other nefarious deeds :) But still, are things like that necessary for a 'To Do' list?

Funny messages i should leave inside should if I were to sell the phone :
"buy more condoms. 12 pack. ASAP!" Hahahah should leave the next person laughing :)

Any ideas or suggestions for funny messages I could leave? Drop me a line! :)

* * * * * *

Crimson Room
Try to escape from the crimson room. took me about 10 minutes to get out. Ok so maybe I was a little blur and sleepy at that time :/

Song of the Day: Tempered Mental - Honestly
http://www.temperemental.com/

... Farewells and Reunions ...

2005-07-04T20:56:00.000+08:00

"Where Rain Grows" by David Preissel

Taken from the Deviant Art website

I've just had a 9th year reunion of sorts with a group of my old school mates. A funny sort of 'reunion' because it was primarily a farewell for one of my friends who will be migrating to Australia. AND the birthday of another friend. I find it both funny and annoying that almost all the guys have been putting on weight, barring a couple of people while all the girls look as fresh and young as they did 9 years ago!

It was an interesting meeting for me. I've always thought that it's the people you meet after college who matter and would remain significant in our lives. It was only when I saw these people again (most of them barely changed since the last time I saw them 9 years ago!) that I realized deep inside I really missed seeing each and everyone of them. Even to those I don't speak to as much, being around them put me back into this comfort zone that I've totally forgotten.

Word up to (in no preferential order here... going alphabetically!) Alfzall, Alvin, Daniel, Eevonne, Ernest, Hon Yik, Joy Yee, Keng Yung, Michelle, Melissa, Peng Guan, Pink Kee, Shen Lene, Sue Ann, Robert & Wai Peun. Was great seeing y'all.

I'll try to post some pictures here if anyone remembers to send me what they've taken :/

* * * * * *

Someone else I didn't like has just passed away. He was my old discipline teacher who had a mouth that would easily go up against any old english sailor. For some reason he hated me as a student and I hated him period. Anyway, his demise was brought to our attention during the farewell-reunion we had. It was nice to see everyone giving a moment of silence to reflect on his departure, but there was none of the "You know what... he was actually a nice guy..." eulogies because that would have gotten me on that person's back and spoiled the ambience for the rest of the evening. None of my friends liked him when he was alive, I'm glad none of them opted for the hypocritical route and praised him post humously.

Song of the Day: Vanessa Mae - Sabre Dance

Book Recommendation : "Ender's Game" and "Speaker for the Dead" by Orson Scott Card
ISBN: 0812550706
Available at MPH Malaysia for about RM30.00
Check out a Review of Ender's Game.

Can't believe I'm sick today. What a waste of a day!

...Of Spooks and Spirits

2005-06-30T16:03:00.000+08:00

Do you believe in the supernatural? That perhaps there exists on a paralel plane to ours a diverse system? I generally tend to be a skeptic and a cynic with many issues, but thinking about it, there are spectrums of light that we cannot see no matter how strong, sounds that we cannot hear no matter how loud. We know this because we have created machines that can perceive these silent sounds and illuminous lights, but we have all have five senses. What if there are other things that we cannot see, hear, smell, feel or taste but are all around us? Imagine that they can't normally see us too and get as frightened as we do when we see each other.

I myself have had many non malignant encounters. The most recent one was while I was in Kangar for work. Was trying to sleep in Hotel Federal there one night when suddenly I felt someone or something blow a hot breath against my left cheek. I opened my eyes and saw nothing except Viji snoring away on another bed about 10 feet from me and thought it was just my imagination. I laid back down on the bed and before I even closed my eyes, there was another breath blown against my left cheek again. I shot upwards, looking bewilderedly around and seeing only Viji, still happily snoring away too far for him to have done that and jumped back into his bed. Ended up giving salutations to the unseen visitor, introduced myself and explained that I was just bunking there for the night, switched on some lights, and hid under the covers until I was asleep.

One of my earliest encounters that I could remember was when I was 6 years old still living in Damansara Heights (back then when you could still see hills all around you). I was having dinner with my family when I saw a man in a brown shirt walking up the stairs off the corner of my eyes. I looked up and saw nothing and continued eating (being the pig I am). A moment later I saw that same man walking down the said stairs, still in his brown shirt and pausing in the middle where our telephone was. I looked up again and saw nothing, but as soon as I looked at my plate of rice, he was there again off teh corner of my eyes, looking around the house very nonchalantly. I just kept staring at my rice so that I could 'see' what he was doing when my dad asked me "Is anything wrong with your rice?"

I told him that there was a man in a brown shirt near the telephone on the stairs and he jumped and spun around, thinking there was a burglar in the house, but saw nothing. Questions ensued, like "Why did you make that up?" which I countered that I was not and that the guy was still there. "What's he doing?" and I answered that he was just standing there looking around. "Why are you staring at your food?" to which I replied that it was because I can't see him otherwise. when my dad asked me to point at where this 'person' was standing, I looked up and pointed at the telephone but he wasn't there anymore. Nor was he there after that when I tried staring at my rice again.

MY dad took me to see a medium in some temple to ask her about it and the moment I sat down, without saying anything yet, she says to me that I saw someone in the house, and that we need not worry about it as that was just a being who happened to reside at the hill where my old house was, and that he was just curious about the new family who had just moved in. Weird stuff.

I think the funniest I can remember was when I was living in Desa Kiara Condominiums about 6 or 7 years back. There was a spate of minor accidents happening within the apartment. My brother would open a Milo tin and I heard a loud "BOOF!" sound from the kitchen. I ran in and saw his surprised face covered in Milo powder. Funny thing was there was almost no Milo spilt anywhere else. The same day my brother was holding on to a mug, watching TV, and I saw the mug just break off from the handle and crashed onto the floor with my brother bewilderedly telling me "I didn't do it!!"

Don't remember the specifics of the other incidents that day, but I remember our Astro decoder going crazy, the iron grille gate dropping off its railing at the balcony and computer switching off AND on again by itself (it was an old pentium 166. You press the power button, it switches on. You press the power button again, it switches off. No other way.)

Anyway my parents visited the abovementioned medium again and asked why are things going weirdly within our apartment. Her response was this: You have a spirit that resides within your home. It has been frightened by a ferocious face with a big moustache. Go home, hang a red cloth at your door and get to know who this new face is.

So we went home. Red cloth was hung up on the entrance doorway. Now came the problem of looking for a guy with a big moustache. Desa Kiara has about 800 - 900 apartment units, let alone people. As we were leaving my apartment for some reason, we found out that there were 2 Korean men who had just moved into the apartment across from mine a couple of days ago. One of them looked like he's in a bad mood and has a small, bushy haywired moustache. Could be coincidence, but we said hi and all that and voila! No more whammies at home.

Anyone has any stories to share?

Song of the Day 1: Lisa Loeb - Dance with the Angels
Song of the Day 2: Nobuo Uematsu - FFVII - Aerith's Theme

Book Recommendation: The Twice Born by Dr. Uma Mahendran
ISBN: 9839942603
Read the REVIEW if you're interested.

Books and Movies! Weee!

2005-06-29T17:44:00.000+08:00

Avalon (2001) by Mamoru Oshii

This is one of the few movies I greatly enjoyed in recent years. Directed by Mamoru Oshii of the 'Ghost in the Shell' fame, this film manages to showcase what many other filmakers could not; amazing live actions scenes that are terribly exciting that are not overcooked into unbelievability. One of the things that made me a fan of his Anime work is that his films always has a larger underlying philosophical message or question that encapsulates the entire story, and he does not disappoint with this live action film. Most importantly, he reminds us all what many have seem to forgotten; film making is an art. Anyone who was a fan of Ghost in the Shell or The Matrix will definitely enjoy this film.

This movie opens with the line "Some young people deal with their disillusionment by seeking out illusions of their own" and leaves you seated gripping on to your chair wondering how sure are you that what you know is real? The movie is set in a post holocaustic world in the future (think cyberpunk) and revolves around an illegal game, pretty much like Counter Strike except that the players' minds is carried into the game's universe.

The lead character, Ash is a local legend among the players and spectators as she belonged in a group that had dominated the game until it was disbanded. The movie begins to kick into gear when she discovers that there is a rumored secret level where only the elite can hope to find, but for some reason, everyone who has supposedly found is has turned into a vegetative state, including members of her old group.

I can't find a genre to drop this movie into; it's psychological, sci-fi / cyberpunk, art film all crammed into one film. Check out some reviews here and also at DVD Vision Japan.
Also check out a write up on the director, here.

* * * * * *

On another note, a friend of mine, Fiona, has just opened her multiarts studio offering Dance, Drama, Music, Rhythmic Gymnastics and Martial Arts lessons near Plaza Damas in Sri Hartamas. Address is 19-2 Prisma Ville, Jalan 19/70A, Desa Sri Hartamas, or you can visit the website for details. http://www.talenthub.com.my/

Song of the Day 1: The First Donuts - Phiosophy in a Teacup
Song of the Day 2: Tori Amos - Cornflake Girl

Today's Book Recommendation: The Sandman series by Neil Gaiman.

... Of Death, Eulogies and Epitaphs

2005-06-28T16:58:00.000+08:00

Death is quite a funny thing. Yeah people who are left behind in the world of the living are left griving, but I think it should be seen as the last big adventure of our lives. We're going somewhere else on a journey that no one else has lived to tell others about. Death is the one thing that makes our lives precious, the end marker of our alloted period on earth that motivates us into persuing greater things while we still can. Without death, our lives would hold little value and no meaning.

However, what I don't appreciate is that most of our sins are absolved upon the time of our death and only good things are said at our funerals. I knew someone who died recently who was quite a buggered asshole but even the people whom he had offended / pissed off / wronged had only the nicest things to say about him.

Admittedly it would be odd if someone went up and said "Yeah, I remember the time he buggered me up where the sun don't shine..." or engraved "Here lies So and So. Why he lived, I don't know" but I would have just said nothing at all instead of "Oh, he was the salt of the earth..." and all that. Maybe I'm just not as forgiving as some others but hey, I'm entitled to my opinions :)

Anyways, I think when it's time for our friends and loved ones to go, we should let them go rather than try to hold on to them. When I saw my grandfather in the ICU with 20 - 30 tubes stuck all over him a couple of years back, part of me was asking God to give him a few more years, but outwardly I whispered to him "If you feel it's time for you to go, please go and be at peace."

Not to say I was cold or anything, I was crying my eyes out but if I were in his position, I'd rather move on than to be artificially kept alive on tubes, respirators and more adrenaline than what's considered 'safe' under normal circumstances.

A word to any friends or family who sees entry, if by any chance I should be totally dependent on life support, do me the largest favor of my life and unplug me. Would it be euthanasia? No, because I would have been dead anyway without artificial life support. Besides, I don't want to wake up one day and learn that I need to have someone wipe my butt everyday.

Interesting websites:

Al Lowe's website. He was a game designer with Sierra for many years and best known for creating games such as Freddy Pharkas and the Leisure Suit Larry Series. Great place to visit for some laughs.

Sith Sense - Darth Vader attempts to read your mind.

Song of the day : Kaki King - Playing with Pink Noise
Kaki King's Official Website
Log in with Yahoo and watch her music video here

... of Starting Afresh OR "I Put On My Wizard Hat"

2005-06-25T04:10:00.000+08:00

This is annoying. I neglected to feed lines into my old blog (yes.. yes... since Dec '04) and now it's locked away from me. It's still accessible at jerral.blogspot.com and I'm still using the same account to say this here and now.

So, right. I'm here again, new address, same person, probably still the same lack of time to think / blog as consistently as I'd like to. Think way too much at work and leaves me drained.

I once heard a saying... you work with your hands, it leaves you too much time for your mind to think with. I work with my mind... does that leaves me too much time to do nefrious deeds with my hands? :P

I found a website that made me laugh so friggin' hard. It's mean, but if you're willing to laugh at someone else's expense, check it out. You'll understand why this entry's alternatively titled "I put on my wizard hat" :) Bloodninja .

Also, came across a guitar phenomenon. Well maybe I've just been out of it so long I'm no longer keeping up with the music world. Check out Kaki King. Amazing work on the acoutic guitars.

Cheers!

Song for the day : La Mer by Nine Inch Nails (The Fragile)

2005-01-01T16:20:00.000+08:00