One of the earliest movies I had watched was a James Bond movie. It was "The Man with the Golden Gun", when it was screened at the old Lido. (as in, before it closed for renovation). That was also one of the last times my mother brought me to a cinema, so I think I must have given her a lot of shit.
I had heard good things about Casino Royale. It's the first James Bond film since Golden Eye which does not have a stupid title. (Tomorrow Never Dies? The World is Not Enough? Die Another Day?) And Daniel Craig was a very different James Bond, from the Pierce Brosnan type who could do a ridiculous number of stunts without a hair out of place. Some people have called him the best James Bond since Sean Connery.
It's true, I think, although I have probably seen fewer than 5 Bond films. It's a film which reaches deep into the psyche of James Bond, what the man is about, what it's like to have a licence to kill, about his treatment of women. This is one of the most athletic Bonds of all time: check out the open sequence in an African construction site.
It is the trend in recent years to allow the Bond girls a fair share of the spotlight. How to balance their sexual appeal while allowing them to have some character.
James Bond emerges out of the water in one scene here, in a snide reference to Ursula Andress' famous sequence walking out of the water. This time instead of a luscious pair of tits, we get a sexy male torso, recasting James Bond as a physical sex symbol, very much the equal of the Bond girls.
He is also unsuccessful at love: in an earlier Bond film, he was married, but I think his wife died. Similarly, he nabs a chick, but only to use her for information. Later on, she is captured and tortured to death. He also finds love, or so he thinks, before his lover betrays him. It's easy to be cynical like that. Similarly he sticks his neck out to nab a terrorist, but after that gets chewed up by his boss, M, even as he slyly threatens to reveal M's full name for the benefit of the movie audience.
Why did I like this James Bond movie better than a lot of other James Bond movies? Probably because this is the first James Bond novel, the one where you can see his character being shaped. It's incredible that the James Bond guys have kept this novel in their back pocket for more than 40 years before pulling it out.
His problems with long term relationships - well he's got such a big problem with long term relationships that I'm sure some people are sniggering when I mention James Bond and "long term relationship" in the same breath. On "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" he briefly got married but something really bad happened - can't remember what. And the guy playing James Bond was apparently so bad he got retired after 1 movie. (At least Timothy Dalton got 2.)
I'd say that the relationship between Daniel Craig and Eva Green is at the heart of the movie. I think they really loved each other: I think we get a glimpse of the more sensitive vulnerable side of James Bond, who had to comfort Eva Green after she witnessed him killing a few guys. But even though the last action sequence was feeling like 1 too many it was necessary, because we had to see how she betrayed him. Well sort of betrayed him.
Daniel Craig might be one of the least handsome James Bonds, but he's also the most macho of the lot. And he plays the walking mess of contradictions well: powerfully built, but a touch of emotional insecurity. Suave enough, but not that suave that people forget that he's more or less a professional assassin. Craves women but loathes them in equal measure.
This is a more fascinating James Bond - not the one who survives multi-storey leaps, crazy car chases, close combat with bigger and stronger people, all with his tuxedo intact, but rather a battle hardened survivor who lives through every threat on his life by the skin of his teeth. We see scratches, wounds, even an incident with the defibrillator. (Curiously enough, "MI3" also featured a defibrillator.)
This is one of the great Bond films, and it's a great thing for that franchise that 40 years on you still can produce quality product like this. But the thing is, you've already pulled out all the stops on this one: great psychological drama, great action sequences, a great romance. How on earth are they going to top this one for the next film?
Thursday, 30 August 2007
Tuesday, 28 August 2007
Dead knowledge
1. I was on a lunch today given by some people who were consulting for us. They were people from the Knowledge Industry.
Nothing really special. Just something I noticed about people who work for the Knowledge Industry and who do not usually come into contact with people who do things hands on - there is a lot of talking about stuff they read in the newspaper. They were talking about contractors and the circle line, and immediately I knew what they were going to say next - that some Swedish contractor had pulled out of its contract on a couple of stations on the circle line. Then they would talk about how construction costs were rising because of the bloody Indonesians being so anal about their sand. (I'm paraphrasing.)
(One of the persons was from Israel, and I unwisely commented that "you guys have probably more sand than you know what to do with". And then he said, "yes sand is a problem, and actually we do have to patrol and make sure that people don't go around stealing or harvesting our sand illegally", at which point I knew I had to shut up because we were this close to broaching the topic of Arabs and Jews killing each other.)
(Oh, another digression: Israeli guy was visiting China last week, and still really hyped up from climbing the great wall. So he said, "Why am I taking the challenge of solving your (insert big problem from our company here)? Because, it is there, like the great wall is there". I was thinking, yah fucking right. I'm different. Why would I solve (same problem he mentioned)? Because if I don't my boss will fucking kill me. Still, I shouldn't be criticising Jewish people. I learnt from history books that when the King of Siam wanted to insult the Chinese, they called us the "Jews of the East". )
Anyway I'm digressing. What I really wanted to say is that these Knowledge Industry people do have a tendency to just go parrot whatever's being out there reported in the news, and then there are many of them talking the same thing, so they confirm each other on their news sources, and whatever uncertainty there is that ought to be inherent in news reports it just gets swept aside. There is a high element of conformity of viewpoints there.
2. Sometimes after work I drop by at a nearby convenience store after work, get an icy frozen coffee / frozen milo and then take a direct bus home, sipping on it and reading a book as I go along. It's a nice way to go back, because the bus at that time is almost fully empty. (The downside is sometimes you get a non aircon bus.)
I put down a book that I was reading. It was a 500 page book and a library hardcover. It was printed on thick paper so it looked more impressive than it actually was. (I know that there are 800 page books that look smaller than that book.) Suddenly a guy I have never seen before started talking to me, and noticing the book that I was reading.
(I'll tell you how I end up reading books. Sometimes I will look around a bookstore, and a book will catch my eye. The thesis of the book can normally be summed up on the back page (or the front and back flap, if it's a hardcover with a jacket). And it's like in the movies with trailers, once you've read that, you already know 50% of what the book's about. But I will still want to read the book anyway. Sometimes. So I saw the book and I got it from the library. It was "House of War", which talks about the role the Pentagon plays in America being a more bullying force in the world than it ought to be. Yes, a lot of books say the same thing, but this one probably says it a little better than all of it, and this one talks about the entire history of the Pentagon. (Did you know that the foundation stone of the Pentagon was laid on SEPTEMBER 11, 1941, almost 60 years to the MINUTE before 911? Way cool.) About how it's secluded location in Washington DC allowed it to have too much of a mind of its own. (It's like your penis: it's yours but you don't really control it.) Plus there is plenty of history in here, so it actually backs up its arguments with real historical events instead of just launching a mindless tirade against "American Imperialism", so I thought it'd be worth reading.)
OK nevermind, enough digressing, this guy I never met before started talking to me, and he said, wow you are reading such a thick book. We got to talking for a while. He said he was interested in economics and oh by the way have you read "The World is Flat?". Or "Freakonomics"? Well for the more famous books I've read I have by the time I finished reading it memorised an executive summary for it.
("The World is Flat" - Thomas Friedman is usually very optimistic that globalisation is a positive force in that it levels the playing field for everybody and gives many poorer nations a chance to compete on an equal basis. While it is true that a lot of people are being pulled out of poverty and while he is right in many ways a lot of people will always be poor and they will always be stuck in poverty. People have always argued about whether market forces act to lift the poor out of poverty or they act to keep the poor and rich that way, and it's very difficult to settle this particular argument.)
("Freakonomics" - the thesis that abortion is responsible for the lowering of crime rates in the US during the mid 90s is a particularly controversial one. The author discounts a lot of alternate theses which don't sound like there's a whole lot wrong with them. The broken window theory. The economic recovery. Better policing. So maybe the effect of the changing structure of the demographic does not have as large an effect as he thinks it does. However the main idea of the book is still a very compelling one because it makes us think a little harder about cause and effect and shows us that the most obvious theories are not necessarily the right ones.)
OK, end of digression. So we had a nice chat, and I discovered that his name was very similar to mine. That was interesting. Then on my own accord, we exchanged name cards. Once I got his name card, I saw that he was a sales man (for "smart money managing" or some shit.) So either he was selling some financial product or something. Of course there's an ulterior motive for everything. So I don't know if I will get a lot of spam from him. When I was paying for my frozen coffee I ended up fumbling for my change, and he just stepped in and paid it for me. Now this was suspicious. But not that awkward because at least there was an excuse for him to do it. (ie we had a nice chat.) But I don't want to be a pessimist. It was a pleasant encounter so we'll leave it at that.
3. I'm going to get to my main point now, so sorry that you had to read the above shit. Later on, I reflected upon my mode of gaining knowledge, which is through books. They say (I don't have winstar here) knowledge from books is dead knowledge. Which is true. I think about "House of War", and "freakonomics", "The World is Flat". How do I know that stuff is true? I just accept a lot of the arguments made, maybe challenge at the most 5% of it.
Then I'm eating a fish that my maid cooked. I didn't fuck a member of the opposite sex so that I could lay eggs and give birth to the little fish. That was fish mama. I didn't feed the fish. That was the fish itself growing and finding its food. I didn't catch the fish. That was poor old fisherman who has to go out further and further to sea everyday because the ocean is running out of fish. I didn't distribute the fish. That was wholesaler, fishmonger, and my poor parents who go to the market every weekend. And I didn't cook the fish, that was my maid. I don't do anything other than open my mouth and watch the fish disappear into it.
Similarly it's like knowledge from books. It's too easy. Sit back, iced coffee in hand, slurping it on the bus. (See, I get air con and transport at the same time.) I give my brain a nice workout so that it's fit and toned like Andy Lau's chest in "Running on Karma". It's just served on a plate for me. People criticise our education system as spoonfeeding, but if I were to go out and read stuff myself it's not spoonfeeding. That's letting me off a little too easy, it's just spoonfeeding, once removed. I'm not seeing things with my own eyes. I'm not looking around and stitching together information from a thousand different sources. (This by the way is not an exaggeration. Some books I've read have bibliographies with that many sources.) I'm just opening my mouth and waiting for the fish to go in.
And maybe it's just the way that people read things, they will tend to accept around 95% and only question 5%, until they are presented with a contrasting account. Like some managers I know who will do the same stuff they did the day before and have their own blind spots. Some of them are hands on people with a persistent refusal to embrace theory (or maybe we say they are too busy). Others are stuck in their ivory tower all day shut up in their rooms, and not walking around and feeling the air for the wind. I am forced to be fair so I will criticise them both. But I think I must also criticise myself.
Then again, I don't know. I'm a fairly conformist person but I will have some rather quirky viewpoints. The Knowledge Industry way where people just parrot out information is really disturbing and I think that I might have problems fitting in there if I tried. I remember arriving at my current workplace and people seeing me as a nail that need to be hammered in but eventually giving up because this nail does not get hammered in easily. So one half of them is like "hey that's interesting" and this other half is like "shut the fuck up" which should be I think a fair assessment of things.
So what's the moral of the story, after all this shit? I need new skills. I've eaten enough fish that I can probably criticise somebody's cooking with some moral authority, and I can tell you the difference between a good fish and a bad fish. But I need new skills. I need to know how to cook fish, buy fish, maybe I might even need to learn how to fish.
I could be like that guy who just came up to approach me. It's not really like I dispensed some pearls of wisdom to him, but I did have to go through quite a few oysters to get that. And he could have used his friendliness to get more useful info out of somebody else. Maybe I ought to pick those skills up.
Nothing really special. Just something I noticed about people who work for the Knowledge Industry and who do not usually come into contact with people who do things hands on - there is a lot of talking about stuff they read in the newspaper. They were talking about contractors and the circle line, and immediately I knew what they were going to say next - that some Swedish contractor had pulled out of its contract on a couple of stations on the circle line. Then they would talk about how construction costs were rising because of the bloody Indonesians being so anal about their sand. (I'm paraphrasing.)
(One of the persons was from Israel, and I unwisely commented that "you guys have probably more sand than you know what to do with". And then he said, "yes sand is a problem, and actually we do have to patrol and make sure that people don't go around stealing or harvesting our sand illegally", at which point I knew I had to shut up because we were this close to broaching the topic of Arabs and Jews killing each other.)
(Oh, another digression: Israeli guy was visiting China last week, and still really hyped up from climbing the great wall. So he said, "Why am I taking the challenge of solving your (insert big problem from our company here)? Because, it is there, like the great wall is there". I was thinking, yah fucking right. I'm different. Why would I solve (same problem he mentioned)? Because if I don't my boss will fucking kill me. Still, I shouldn't be criticising Jewish people. I learnt from history books that when the King of Siam wanted to insult the Chinese, they called us the "Jews of the East". )
Anyway I'm digressing. What I really wanted to say is that these Knowledge Industry people do have a tendency to just go parrot whatever's being out there reported in the news, and then there are many of them talking the same thing, so they confirm each other on their news sources, and whatever uncertainty there is that ought to be inherent in news reports it just gets swept aside. There is a high element of conformity of viewpoints there.
2. Sometimes after work I drop by at a nearby convenience store after work, get an icy frozen coffee / frozen milo and then take a direct bus home, sipping on it and reading a book as I go along. It's a nice way to go back, because the bus at that time is almost fully empty. (The downside is sometimes you get a non aircon bus.)
I put down a book that I was reading. It was a 500 page book and a library hardcover. It was printed on thick paper so it looked more impressive than it actually was. (I know that there are 800 page books that look smaller than that book.) Suddenly a guy I have never seen before started talking to me, and noticing the book that I was reading.
(I'll tell you how I end up reading books. Sometimes I will look around a bookstore, and a book will catch my eye. The thesis of the book can normally be summed up on the back page (or the front and back flap, if it's a hardcover with a jacket). And it's like in the movies with trailers, once you've read that, you already know 50% of what the book's about. But I will still want to read the book anyway. Sometimes. So I saw the book and I got it from the library. It was "House of War", which talks about the role the Pentagon plays in America being a more bullying force in the world than it ought to be. Yes, a lot of books say the same thing, but this one probably says it a little better than all of it, and this one talks about the entire history of the Pentagon. (Did you know that the foundation stone of the Pentagon was laid on SEPTEMBER 11, 1941, almost 60 years to the MINUTE before 911? Way cool.) About how it's secluded location in Washington DC allowed it to have too much of a mind of its own. (It's like your penis: it's yours but you don't really control it.) Plus there is plenty of history in here, so it actually backs up its arguments with real historical events instead of just launching a mindless tirade against "American Imperialism", so I thought it'd be worth reading.)
OK nevermind, enough digressing, this guy I never met before started talking to me, and he said, wow you are reading such a thick book. We got to talking for a while. He said he was interested in economics and oh by the way have you read "The World is Flat?". Or "Freakonomics"? Well for the more famous books I've read I have by the time I finished reading it memorised an executive summary for it.
("The World is Flat" - Thomas Friedman is usually very optimistic that globalisation is a positive force in that it levels the playing field for everybody and gives many poorer nations a chance to compete on an equal basis. While it is true that a lot of people are being pulled out of poverty and while he is right in many ways a lot of people will always be poor and they will always be stuck in poverty. People have always argued about whether market forces act to lift the poor out of poverty or they act to keep the poor and rich that way, and it's very difficult to settle this particular argument.)
("Freakonomics" - the thesis that abortion is responsible for the lowering of crime rates in the US during the mid 90s is a particularly controversial one. The author discounts a lot of alternate theses which don't sound like there's a whole lot wrong with them. The broken window theory. The economic recovery. Better policing. So maybe the effect of the changing structure of the demographic does not have as large an effect as he thinks it does. However the main idea of the book is still a very compelling one because it makes us think a little harder about cause and effect and shows us that the most obvious theories are not necessarily the right ones.)
OK, end of digression. So we had a nice chat, and I discovered that his name was very similar to mine. That was interesting. Then on my own accord, we exchanged name cards. Once I got his name card, I saw that he was a sales man (for "smart money managing" or some shit.) So either he was selling some financial product or something. Of course there's an ulterior motive for everything. So I don't know if I will get a lot of spam from him. When I was paying for my frozen coffee I ended up fumbling for my change, and he just stepped in and paid it for me. Now this was suspicious. But not that awkward because at least there was an excuse for him to do it. (ie we had a nice chat.) But I don't want to be a pessimist. It was a pleasant encounter so we'll leave it at that.
3. I'm going to get to my main point now, so sorry that you had to read the above shit. Later on, I reflected upon my mode of gaining knowledge, which is through books. They say (I don't have winstar here) knowledge from books is dead knowledge. Which is true. I think about "House of War", and "freakonomics", "The World is Flat". How do I know that stuff is true? I just accept a lot of the arguments made, maybe challenge at the most 5% of it.
Then I'm eating a fish that my maid cooked. I didn't fuck a member of the opposite sex so that I could lay eggs and give birth to the little fish. That was fish mama. I didn't feed the fish. That was the fish itself growing and finding its food. I didn't catch the fish. That was poor old fisherman who has to go out further and further to sea everyday because the ocean is running out of fish. I didn't distribute the fish. That was wholesaler, fishmonger, and my poor parents who go to the market every weekend. And I didn't cook the fish, that was my maid. I don't do anything other than open my mouth and watch the fish disappear into it.
Similarly it's like knowledge from books. It's too easy. Sit back, iced coffee in hand, slurping it on the bus. (See, I get air con and transport at the same time.) I give my brain a nice workout so that it's fit and toned like Andy Lau's chest in "Running on Karma". It's just served on a plate for me. People criticise our education system as spoonfeeding, but if I were to go out and read stuff myself it's not spoonfeeding. That's letting me off a little too easy, it's just spoonfeeding, once removed. I'm not seeing things with my own eyes. I'm not looking around and stitching together information from a thousand different sources. (This by the way is not an exaggeration. Some books I've read have bibliographies with that many sources.) I'm just opening my mouth and waiting for the fish to go in.
And maybe it's just the way that people read things, they will tend to accept around 95% and only question 5%, until they are presented with a contrasting account. Like some managers I know who will do the same stuff they did the day before and have their own blind spots. Some of them are hands on people with a persistent refusal to embrace theory (or maybe we say they are too busy). Others are stuck in their ivory tower all day shut up in their rooms, and not walking around and feeling the air for the wind. I am forced to be fair so I will criticise them both. But I think I must also criticise myself.
Then again, I don't know. I'm a fairly conformist person but I will have some rather quirky viewpoints. The Knowledge Industry way where people just parrot out information is really disturbing and I think that I might have problems fitting in there if I tried. I remember arriving at my current workplace and people seeing me as a nail that need to be hammered in but eventually giving up because this nail does not get hammered in easily. So one half of them is like "hey that's interesting" and this other half is like "shut the fuck up" which should be I think a fair assessment of things.
So what's the moral of the story, after all this shit? I need new skills. I've eaten enough fish that I can probably criticise somebody's cooking with some moral authority, and I can tell you the difference between a good fish and a bad fish. But I need new skills. I need to know how to cook fish, buy fish, maybe I might even need to learn how to fish.
I could be like that guy who just came up to approach me. It's not really like I dispensed some pearls of wisdom to him, but I did have to go through quite a few oysters to get that. And he could have used his friendliness to get more useful info out of somebody else. Maybe I ought to pick those skills up.
Sunday, 26 August 2007
Army Half Marathon
I have never fucked somebody for 4 hours continuously before. But if I did, what I feel like at the end of it would be something akin to finishing the 12km run at the Army half marathon today.
I'm not talking about the post coital high and the cigarette. I'm talking about the girl telling you to stub out that damn cigarette and having another go again and again and again until you are fucking sian. (Or are sian fucking.)
But at least I completed it. Which is OK.
Lost Shingo and sniper early on. Walked 1 side to warm up. (I started without stretching my muscles! Would have been a big mistake.) Didn't see them thereafter. Bumped into my boss blinky, who was there probably with his church buddies. I think he had noticed me first so I said hi to him. Exchanged a few words, and then tried to speed up so that I wouldn't have to keep talking. (ie firstly I didn't want to talk to him, and secondly I am not that fit that I can run 12k and talk all the way.) Then 5 mins later I felt some chest pain and I had to slow down, and almost immediately he came up behind me and asked if I was alright. I said, yeah I'm fine. Damn! I didn't manage to outrun him and he was on my ass all this time! I'm wondering if I should feel more embarrassed that I didn't succeed in getting away from him, or that I couldn't outrun some 40 year old.
Oh, about my chest pains, it's probably nothing much, my heart not fully awake yet. It went away after a bit of walking. But I'm not used to running in the morning. And I read somewhere that it's very strenuous on the cardiovascular system: from sleeping to waking to pounding the pavement 1 hour straight - no good. That's why when we got to the end the ambulances were pretty damn busy.
Bumped into sniper again when I walked out from Kallang McDonald's after taking a leak there.
Anyway they were asking me why I didn't run with an iPod. First I don't have an iPod. Second I don't need one. I am an iPod. I have memorised around 1000 songs and I can summon them into my head at will - guitar parts, bass parts, everything.
Anyway here's a tracklist for running music:
1. Teenage Riot - Sonic Youth
My all time favourite 2.4km run song. They wrote this when they were 30, so it's still good for me.
2. Behind Blue Eyes - the Who
Sniper mentioned CPR to me and the phrase "put your fingers down my throat" came to mind.
3. Sing a Simple Song - Sly + the Family Stone
4. Family Affair - Sly + the Family Stone
5. Thank You - Sly + the Family Stone
6. Endangered Species - Parliament
7. Surf's Up - Brian Wilson
Anyway I'm targeting the half marathon at the end of this year, which means I might have to do this 12km thing on a regular basis pretty damn soon. I'm running a 9km stretch every week, so it's OK. Then I signed up for the Real Run, which is 15km, and I think maybe I'll try to finish the half marathon running all the way (but I can stop for chest pains, that's fine. It's OK because I want to finish the race alive.)
Ran past a few casualties, and we see them as par for the course. If so many people take part, then it's inevitable that you'd have some who can't take the heat. Unfortunately somebody died, even before we started. There was this guy who did the half marathon in like a hour flat, and collapsed and died thereafter, even before it was time for us noncompetitive runners to begin. Well we've been inured to this. Anybody who's been through NS would hear stories about people exercising too hard and collapsing and dying. It happens on a fairly regular basis. i only heard about it later on. I'm not surprised because the field hospital at the finishing line was fairly crowded.
I'm not talking about the post coital high and the cigarette. I'm talking about the girl telling you to stub out that damn cigarette and having another go again and again and again until you are fucking sian. (Or are sian fucking.)
But at least I completed it. Which is OK.
Lost Shingo and sniper early on. Walked 1 side to warm up. (I started without stretching my muscles! Would have been a big mistake.) Didn't see them thereafter. Bumped into my boss blinky, who was there probably with his church buddies. I think he had noticed me first so I said hi to him. Exchanged a few words, and then tried to speed up so that I wouldn't have to keep talking. (ie firstly I didn't want to talk to him, and secondly I am not that fit that I can run 12k and talk all the way.) Then 5 mins later I felt some chest pain and I had to slow down, and almost immediately he came up behind me and asked if I was alright. I said, yeah I'm fine. Damn! I didn't manage to outrun him and he was on my ass all this time! I'm wondering if I should feel more embarrassed that I didn't succeed in getting away from him, or that I couldn't outrun some 40 year old.
Oh, about my chest pains, it's probably nothing much, my heart not fully awake yet. It went away after a bit of walking. But I'm not used to running in the morning. And I read somewhere that it's very strenuous on the cardiovascular system: from sleeping to waking to pounding the pavement 1 hour straight - no good. That's why when we got to the end the ambulances were pretty damn busy.
Bumped into sniper again when I walked out from Kallang McDonald's after taking a leak there.
Anyway they were asking me why I didn't run with an iPod. First I don't have an iPod. Second I don't need one. I am an iPod. I have memorised around 1000 songs and I can summon them into my head at will - guitar parts, bass parts, everything.
Anyway here's a tracklist for running music:
1. Teenage Riot - Sonic Youth
My all time favourite 2.4km run song. They wrote this when they were 30, so it's still good for me.
2. Behind Blue Eyes - the Who
Sniper mentioned CPR to me and the phrase "put your fingers down my throat" came to mind.
3. Sing a Simple Song - Sly + the Family Stone
4. Family Affair - Sly + the Family Stone
5. Thank You - Sly + the Family Stone
6. Endangered Species - Parliament
7. Surf's Up - Brian Wilson
Anyway I'm targeting the half marathon at the end of this year, which means I might have to do this 12km thing on a regular basis pretty damn soon. I'm running a 9km stretch every week, so it's OK. Then I signed up for the Real Run, which is 15km, and I think maybe I'll try to finish the half marathon running all the way (but I can stop for chest pains, that's fine. It's OK because I want to finish the race alive.)
Ran past a few casualties, and we see them as par for the course. If so many people take part, then it's inevitable that you'd have some who can't take the heat. Unfortunately somebody died, even before we started. There was this guy who did the half marathon in like a hour flat, and collapsed and died thereafter, even before it was time for us noncompetitive runners to begin. Well we've been inured to this. Anybody who's been through NS would hear stories about people exercising too hard and collapsing and dying. It happens on a fairly regular basis. i only heard about it later on. I'm not surprised because the field hospital at the finishing line was fairly crowded.
Saturday, 25 August 2007
Estella Warren Samsung commercial
I've always wanted to do a spoof of this commercial.
It's exactly the same as the original, until the part where she tosses him the handphone back. He misses catching it, probably because his left hand is somewhere else. Then the phone drops on the ground and smashes into smithereens. Then he bawls "NO! NO! NO!" in fury, Estella Warren shrugs her shoulders and walks off.
Friday, 24 August 2007
The EPL circus
I'll conclude that watching sports is the height of civic irresponsibility. It's nice that people are cheering on the sportsmen, but really, what's the deeper meaning behind watching sports?
In a way I think there's something about watching sports that isn't - it's harsh to call it selfish, but there's a lot more take than give in watching it. It's like you'd expect the athlete to give it all he's got, and in return you'd give it something completely intangible - moral support? It's a bit like living your life through the athlete, in an arena where the rules are complex, to be sure, but so much more simple than they are in real life.
If the team loses, and gets relegated, it just disappears, and you'd just support another team in the meantime. If it loses out on the title, not much harm. Just a few tears, no real loss. But you'd share in the glory if your favourite team wins. Or you can just cheer on whichever team is winning, it's a sure win situation.
When teams march to the title, there is a sense of inevitability about them, as in, they would keep on producing results, even when they don't play well. It's easy to think that winning and winning, or drawing against another top team, is no more than what is expected of them anyway. And it's assuring, you've spent the whole season wondering whether they were going to win the next match and now you're tired of it, but it's nice for them to shoulder the burden. But now there's that element of treating them as though they were robots.
There's something extremely passive - aggressive about watching sports. Watching TV is one of the most passive activities you could think of, and a complete contrast to the grunting, sweating action on TV. Put an ice cold beer in the hand of the fat slob in the armchair, and you have an extremely perverse picture.
Let's think about our EPL soccer. We would pay Starhub more for the "privilege" of watching football, just as we would automatically still give our hard earned money to that wife we used to love with a passion but now just dole out $$$ to out of habit. And you know that all bets are off that one of the Big 4 will win the title this season.
I used to like the interesting politics that went on during the EPL season. Especially the one where Alex Ferguson wound up Kevin Keegan, that caused him to melt down in front of the TV cameras. (I find that extremely motivated athletes like Kevin Keegan and Bryan Robson aren't that good at being managers because they only know how to motivate themselves and not others. Roy Keane is also an extremely motivated player, and we'll see if he also has that talent for motivating his team.) I liked watching how Alex Ferguson told his players near the end of the 98/99 season that they had to give it all they got because they wouldn't ever have such a good chance at the treble. The miraculous thing about the treble is that the players clicked together pretty late in the season. They weren't leading the table at Christmas. Their route through the FA cup was very fortunate: they needed a last minute goal to knock Liverpool out, and a miracle goal to knock out Arsenal. They won the league by 1 point, which means Arsenal were breathing down their necks to the finish line. And then those close scrapes in the Champions League that every Man U fan knows about. Every title in that treble were scraped wins, and that was why it was so magical. They weren't an all conquering imperious team that could win matches while sitting back.
But I'm a little tired of watching football. Is it a coincidence that after they jacked up prices for EPL subscriptions, we have an unprecedented amount of coverage for the EPL in the papers? I think not. Somebody in Starhub must have been providing a lot of press to the Straits Times. Those damned hand in glove GLCs. I think this circus has been playing the same old tunes for too long. You have the same Rob Hughes in the papers expressing his righteous outrage for whatever stupid behaviour the EPL players come up with, yet you'd take a step back and find that he's part and parcel of this circus himself. You'd have managers playing "mind games" with each other, but we've already seen that since a worthier runner up than Kevin Keegan arrived in the form of an Arsene Wenger. And now all those "mind games" are laughably bland. It turns out that whichever of the big 4 loses the fewest games earlier on will win the Premiership. It used to be you could have upstarts like Leeds, Blackburn and Newcastle challenging for the title. Nowadays the definition of an upstart is somebody who cracks the big 4, and the latest upstarts are Everton, who qualified for the Champion's League one year only to crash out almost immediately, and Tottenham, who would have pipped Arsenal to 4th place if not for the fact that they were poisoned on their last match.
No, I'm thankful for the lessons in life, but it's not something I really care for anymore.
NB: I wrote this entry before the "Sven Goran Erection" one. Guess I still follow what goes on in EPL after all...
In a way I think there's something about watching sports that isn't - it's harsh to call it selfish, but there's a lot more take than give in watching it. It's like you'd expect the athlete to give it all he's got, and in return you'd give it something completely intangible - moral support? It's a bit like living your life through the athlete, in an arena where the rules are complex, to be sure, but so much more simple than they are in real life.
If the team loses, and gets relegated, it just disappears, and you'd just support another team in the meantime. If it loses out on the title, not much harm. Just a few tears, no real loss. But you'd share in the glory if your favourite team wins. Or you can just cheer on whichever team is winning, it's a sure win situation.
When teams march to the title, there is a sense of inevitability about them, as in, they would keep on producing results, even when they don't play well. It's easy to think that winning and winning, or drawing against another top team, is no more than what is expected of them anyway. And it's assuring, you've spent the whole season wondering whether they were going to win the next match and now you're tired of it, but it's nice for them to shoulder the burden. But now there's that element of treating them as though they were robots.
There's something extremely passive - aggressive about watching sports. Watching TV is one of the most passive activities you could think of, and a complete contrast to the grunting, sweating action on TV. Put an ice cold beer in the hand of the fat slob in the armchair, and you have an extremely perverse picture.
Let's think about our EPL soccer. We would pay Starhub more for the "privilege" of watching football, just as we would automatically still give our hard earned money to that wife we used to love with a passion but now just dole out $$$ to out of habit. And you know that all bets are off that one of the Big 4 will win the title this season.
I used to like the interesting politics that went on during the EPL season. Especially the one where Alex Ferguson wound up Kevin Keegan, that caused him to melt down in front of the TV cameras. (I find that extremely motivated athletes like Kevin Keegan and Bryan Robson aren't that good at being managers because they only know how to motivate themselves and not others. Roy Keane is also an extremely motivated player, and we'll see if he also has that talent for motivating his team.) I liked watching how Alex Ferguson told his players near the end of the 98/99 season that they had to give it all they got because they wouldn't ever have such a good chance at the treble. The miraculous thing about the treble is that the players clicked together pretty late in the season. They weren't leading the table at Christmas. Their route through the FA cup was very fortunate: they needed a last minute goal to knock Liverpool out, and a miracle goal to knock out Arsenal. They won the league by 1 point, which means Arsenal were breathing down their necks to the finish line. And then those close scrapes in the Champions League that every Man U fan knows about. Every title in that treble were scraped wins, and that was why it was so magical. They weren't an all conquering imperious team that could win matches while sitting back.
But I'm a little tired of watching football. Is it a coincidence that after they jacked up prices for EPL subscriptions, we have an unprecedented amount of coverage for the EPL in the papers? I think not. Somebody in Starhub must have been providing a lot of press to the Straits Times. Those damned hand in glove GLCs. I think this circus has been playing the same old tunes for too long. You have the same Rob Hughes in the papers expressing his righteous outrage for whatever stupid behaviour the EPL players come up with, yet you'd take a step back and find that he's part and parcel of this circus himself. You'd have managers playing "mind games" with each other, but we've already seen that since a worthier runner up than Kevin Keegan arrived in the form of an Arsene Wenger. And now all those "mind games" are laughably bland. It turns out that whichever of the big 4 loses the fewest games earlier on will win the Premiership. It used to be you could have upstarts like Leeds, Blackburn and Newcastle challenging for the title. Nowadays the definition of an upstart is somebody who cracks the big 4, and the latest upstarts are Everton, who qualified for the Champion's League one year only to crash out almost immediately, and Tottenham, who would have pipped Arsenal to 4th place if not for the fact that they were poisoned on their last match.
No, I'm thankful for the lessons in life, but it's not something I really care for anymore.
NB: I wrote this entry before the "Sven Goran Erection" one. Guess I still follow what goes on in EPL after all...
Wednesday, 22 August 2007
15 minutes
One of Andy Warhol's most famous predictions was that at some point in the future, everybody will be famous for 15 minutes. It was such a famous prediction that the term "15 minutes of fame" became part of the lexicon. I have only 2 things to say about this. Firstly it is an accurate prediction and secondly it has already happened.
I am mostly familiar with Western pop so I don't really know, but somewhere in 1998, there was the death of the phenomenon of the superstar. It used to be that every year there would be some new big names in pop music. I think that it's stopped. To be sure, there are still superstars like Britney Spears, Christina, Justin Timberlake. But has there been a band that became a cultural phenomenon, like how U2, REM, Guns and Roses, Bjork, Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins were the big stars of the 90s? I can't name any. Maybe Coldplay, but they aren't huge like the 90s stars.
Maybe that's why we have the 80s revival, perhaps we miss those simpler times when it was just Michael / Madonna / Bruce / Prince. Maybe we miss those certainties where there were very few who joined the club of those who had put out a record, and the stars were really stars. When people were famous for long enough to evolve in the public's eye, in the limelight, into something that had a personality, who could leave his unique mark on the cultural consciousness. Think about Elvis' hipshake. John Lennon's glasses. Madonna's pointed bra. Freddie Mercury's moustache. Even more minor stars left their mark - Slash's top hat. Kurt Cobain's eye shadow. Thom Yorke's squint. Liam Gallagher's eyebrows.
What can you say about Reuben Studdard other than he looks like Barry White? Or Clay Aitken other than he looks like Barry Manilow?
When the ground is not that fertile, like maybe in a temperate forest, you could have large entities dominating the landscape, like maybe a mighty oak tree, or maybe a lion on a Savannah. But when the landscape is conducive for anything and everything to sprout out from every crevice, then you get something like a rainforest, where there are so many things cluttering up the area that you can't point to any conceivable landmarks.
It could be true that the music scene is more fertile than it ever was, that people are releasing astonishing stuff that passes unnoticed because it's there for oh so short a time. But there's this lack of a sense that you're sharing music with others - I mean share in the sense of enjoying it together, rather than P2P downloading. There's this lack of commonality, sense of rootedness, that what you're listening to is actually a cultural norm.
Everything is disposable, and therefore nothing is of value. We could have the old stars doing their revival tours, like how we held Singfest last week, and we managed to get the Pet Shop Boys and Cyndi Lauper down to Fort Canning. And the old stars will still be the biggest names today because they came from a day and age where it was still possible to be a big star. Today? I haven't even heard The Libertines or White Stripe or whoever it is was famous during all those 15 minute intervals that make up the 21st century.
I am mostly familiar with Western pop so I don't really know, but somewhere in 1998, there was the death of the phenomenon of the superstar. It used to be that every year there would be some new big names in pop music. I think that it's stopped. To be sure, there are still superstars like Britney Spears, Christina, Justin Timberlake. But has there been a band that became a cultural phenomenon, like how U2, REM, Guns and Roses, Bjork, Radiohead, Smashing Pumpkins were the big stars of the 90s? I can't name any. Maybe Coldplay, but they aren't huge like the 90s stars.
Maybe that's why we have the 80s revival, perhaps we miss those simpler times when it was just Michael / Madonna / Bruce / Prince. Maybe we miss those certainties where there were very few who joined the club of those who had put out a record, and the stars were really stars. When people were famous for long enough to evolve in the public's eye, in the limelight, into something that had a personality, who could leave his unique mark on the cultural consciousness. Think about Elvis' hipshake. John Lennon's glasses. Madonna's pointed bra. Freddie Mercury's moustache. Even more minor stars left their mark - Slash's top hat. Kurt Cobain's eye shadow. Thom Yorke's squint. Liam Gallagher's eyebrows.
What can you say about Reuben Studdard other than he looks like Barry White? Or Clay Aitken other than he looks like Barry Manilow?
When the ground is not that fertile, like maybe in a temperate forest, you could have large entities dominating the landscape, like maybe a mighty oak tree, or maybe a lion on a Savannah. But when the landscape is conducive for anything and everything to sprout out from every crevice, then you get something like a rainforest, where there are so many things cluttering up the area that you can't point to any conceivable landmarks.
It could be true that the music scene is more fertile than it ever was, that people are releasing astonishing stuff that passes unnoticed because it's there for oh so short a time. But there's this lack of a sense that you're sharing music with others - I mean share in the sense of enjoying it together, rather than P2P downloading. There's this lack of commonality, sense of rootedness, that what you're listening to is actually a cultural norm.
Everything is disposable, and therefore nothing is of value. We could have the old stars doing their revival tours, like how we held Singfest last week, and we managed to get the Pet Shop Boys and Cyndi Lauper down to Fort Canning. And the old stars will still be the biggest names today because they came from a day and age where it was still possible to be a big star. Today? I haven't even heard The Libertines or White Stripe or whoever it is was famous during all those 15 minute intervals that make up the 21st century.
Monday, 20 August 2007
Sven Goran Erection
I was rooting for Man City this weekend. I don't know why. Maybe Sven Goran Erection makes me hot the way he makes plenty of Swedish babes hot. Maybe it's fun to see Man U have 3 "good games" and only 2 points to show for it. Maybe it's because so many people have put down Man City's chances this season that I like to see them surprise a lot of people.
A lot of people have written Eriksson off as a manager. His finest moments were probably the early days as England, probably when he led them to thrash Germany 5-1. But I've been a local, and I've been a foreigner, and I can tell you that you're always willing to work harder when you're a foreigner. England does not have people playing in foreign leagues, which is why they're so shit. Except for Owen Hargreaves, who is playing in Germany, which is why he did so well in the World Cup.
When somebody who has had success at every level at the club game goes out and has the incredible privilege of assembling a first team from day 1, instead of taking what his predecessors have given him, it's a real opportunity. If a newly assembled team manages to gel from the get go, it is a tremendous advantage, just like Newcastle during the season when they led the table at christmas: nobody knows who you are, they don't know your weak points. That is why, for newly promoted teams, the 2nd season is always the toughest.
They said that England "only" reached the quarter finals for 3 tournaments in a row. But somebody else pointed out, nobody else reached the quarter finals for those same 3 consecutive tournaments. He's really not as bad as they make him out to be. He may have done some really bad PR stuff, like affairs with mistresses, side businesses, ridiculous salaries. But is his trust in Beckham really as badly advised as some make it out to be? After all he had a hand in most of England's goals during the last World Cup, didn't he? Is it really his fault that Gerrard and Lampard can't play in the same midfield?
And now they're up against Man F-ing U. I was rooting for them to win last year because I was tired of Chelsea sweeping every thing up before Easter, but now they're the ones everybody thinks is going to win - splashed out big on Anderson, Nani, Hargreaves and Tevez. Plus they have Wayne F-ing Rooney. Cristiano F-ing Ronaldo. Paul F-ing Scholes. Nemanja F-ing Vidic. Rio F-ing Ferdinand. Edwin F-ing Van Der Sar. Whole lot can't play properly now, can't walk straight because they've been with too many HK ho's.
A lot of clubs have fat sugar daddies now, like Man City, Newcastle (always been rich but now have a decent manager for once), Tottenham, it's interesting to see if one of them could, for once, break into the top 4.
No wonder they've jacked up the prices for EPL subscription and stopped showing EPL highlights this year. But don't worry, there's still this, so even though some asshole's been going around taking EPL footage off youtube (check out the comments others have left for him), you can still go watch the goals anyway.
A lot of people have written Eriksson off as a manager. His finest moments were probably the early days as England, probably when he led them to thrash Germany 5-1. But I've been a local, and I've been a foreigner, and I can tell you that you're always willing to work harder when you're a foreigner. England does not have people playing in foreign leagues, which is why they're so shit. Except for Owen Hargreaves, who is playing in Germany, which is why he did so well in the World Cup.
When somebody who has had success at every level at the club game goes out and has the incredible privilege of assembling a first team from day 1, instead of taking what his predecessors have given him, it's a real opportunity. If a newly assembled team manages to gel from the get go, it is a tremendous advantage, just like Newcastle during the season when they led the table at christmas: nobody knows who you are, they don't know your weak points. That is why, for newly promoted teams, the 2nd season is always the toughest.
They said that England "only" reached the quarter finals for 3 tournaments in a row. But somebody else pointed out, nobody else reached the quarter finals for those same 3 consecutive tournaments. He's really not as bad as they make him out to be. He may have done some really bad PR stuff, like affairs with mistresses, side businesses, ridiculous salaries. But is his trust in Beckham really as badly advised as some make it out to be? After all he had a hand in most of England's goals during the last World Cup, didn't he? Is it really his fault that Gerrard and Lampard can't play in the same midfield?
And now they're up against Man F-ing U. I was rooting for them to win last year because I was tired of Chelsea sweeping every thing up before Easter, but now they're the ones everybody thinks is going to win - splashed out big on Anderson, Nani, Hargreaves and Tevez. Plus they have Wayne F-ing Rooney. Cristiano F-ing Ronaldo. Paul F-ing Scholes. Nemanja F-ing Vidic. Rio F-ing Ferdinand. Edwin F-ing Van Der Sar. Whole lot can't play properly now, can't walk straight because they've been with too many HK ho's.
A lot of clubs have fat sugar daddies now, like Man City, Newcastle (always been rich but now have a decent manager for once), Tottenham, it's interesting to see if one of them could, for once, break into the top 4.
No wonder they've jacked up the prices for EPL subscription and stopped showing EPL highlights this year. But don't worry, there's still this, so even though some asshole's been going around taking EPL footage off youtube (check out the comments others have left for him), you can still go watch the goals anyway.
Chewing Gum
Was at Bukit Timah Road when I heard 2 Americans talking. The Ang Moh one was saying something about the chewing gum ban. I thought that was old hat, but it still amuses people coming in here from time to time. And the other guy was an Asian American. I thought that was funny that you need an Ang Moh to tell an Asian American what Singapore is like, but I guess I'm reading a biography of Chiang Kai Shek that's written by an Angmoh so I guess that's not that weird.
Don't they have nicotine gum in the shops? I guess they do, said the Angmoh. But I think they only relaxed it so that they can show the world how liberal they are.
I wanted to tell them what the real reason that we're banning chewing gum. Which is that it's made of rubber, and we wanted to show the Malaysians, who are the world's leading rubber producer, that we can do without them. Of course I made them up, but it's very fun to tell all these foreigners things that aren't true, and watch them spread it around.
That's kinda strict, isn't it? Like Singapore is a really strict country, isn't it? Like do they chop off your hands for stealing in here? (I nearly jumped when I heard this question) No, I don't think they do. It's not like that.
Wow, I don't know what kind of reputation Singapore has. And I'd have thought that these guys were idiots who didn't know shit about our country, except that they were also going where I was going - to Adam Road hawker centre, where there was lots of good food. Gotta credit these Ang Mohs for knowing where the good stuff is.
Don't they have nicotine gum in the shops? I guess they do, said the Angmoh. But I think they only relaxed it so that they can show the world how liberal they are.
I wanted to tell them what the real reason that we're banning chewing gum. Which is that it's made of rubber, and we wanted to show the Malaysians, who are the world's leading rubber producer, that we can do without them. Of course I made them up, but it's very fun to tell all these foreigners things that aren't true, and watch them spread it around.
That's kinda strict, isn't it? Like Singapore is a really strict country, isn't it? Like do they chop off your hands for stealing in here? (I nearly jumped when I heard this question) No, I don't think they do. It's not like that.
Wow, I don't know what kind of reputation Singapore has. And I'd have thought that these guys were idiots who didn't know shit about our country, except that they were also going where I was going - to Adam Road hawker centre, where there was lots of good food. Gotta credit these Ang Mohs for knowing where the good stuff is.
Sunday, 19 August 2007
Seductive but wrong ideas
It’s a very seductive idea, being a funny guy, that you can get away with a whole lot of immature behaviour. It’s easier to not even try to be normal like everybody else. People see after a while that you are an unusual kind of fellow, and you get a little more license to indulge in your funky style. You know that you can get away with certain things few others can get away with because people can usually say “he’s numbernine”, and then they give you more leeway. That if you can make a comment funny enough, you can say anything no matter how cruel or wrong or obnoxious it is.
It’s seductive, but wrong. Everybody has to grow up sometime. Sometimes growing up is simply a matter of it being part of your instinctive nature to make the world a better place by not dumping shit on people.
It’s a very seductive idea, once you’ve experienced a cute chick who likes books, that all you have to do is just to read a lot of books and know a lot of stuff. There will be somebody who will come along who’s as erudite, and has an equally great ass and she will make your dreams come true.
It’s a seductive idea also that knowledge is power, that good things will come about once you understand the various principles that underlie the workings of the universe. That you will naturally have the upper hand in things and can also use that power for the greater good.
A seductive idea that because you have put in the work learning how to articulate your thoughts clearly (I was a science student and this didn’t come naturally to me) you can talk your way out of any situation.
A seductive idea that because you are good at all this bookish stuff, it automatically makes you a more interesting person. That just because it's your best trait, it's also one that others will like.
It’s seductive, but wrong. Real living is so much more than just books. Real knowledge is more than just books. There are cute chicks who just do not much more than read plenty of books but unfortunately they are easy to get bored of. So much of what passes as knowledge might just be homilies repeated over and over again until they become meaningless.
True understanding and mastery of the world also depends on your skill at being able to engage and interact with people. It’s fairly fun to be a geek, but the whole idea is that geeks aren’t fun to be around with for very long.
It’s a seductive idea, that given your current lifestyle (no house, no car, no girlfriend, a high savings rate) that you will never struggle to make ends meet. Earn little, but live little. That you don’t ever have to source for more income, or work too hard to manage your finances.
Seductive but wrong, as you will undoubtedly reflect when you’re old, inflation has eaten up all your savings, the house and car have eaten up everything, and you’re scrounging around.
It’s seductive, but wrong. Everybody has to grow up sometime. Sometimes growing up is simply a matter of it being part of your instinctive nature to make the world a better place by not dumping shit on people.
It’s a very seductive idea, once you’ve experienced a cute chick who likes books, that all you have to do is just to read a lot of books and know a lot of stuff. There will be somebody who will come along who’s as erudite, and has an equally great ass and she will make your dreams come true.
It’s a seductive idea also that knowledge is power, that good things will come about once you understand the various principles that underlie the workings of the universe. That you will naturally have the upper hand in things and can also use that power for the greater good.
A seductive idea that because you have put in the work learning how to articulate your thoughts clearly (I was a science student and this didn’t come naturally to me) you can talk your way out of any situation.
A seductive idea that because you are good at all this bookish stuff, it automatically makes you a more interesting person. That just because it's your best trait, it's also one that others will like.
It’s seductive, but wrong. Real living is so much more than just books. Real knowledge is more than just books. There are cute chicks who just do not much more than read plenty of books but unfortunately they are easy to get bored of. So much of what passes as knowledge might just be homilies repeated over and over again until they become meaningless.
True understanding and mastery of the world also depends on your skill at being able to engage and interact with people. It’s fairly fun to be a geek, but the whole idea is that geeks aren’t fun to be around with for very long.
It’s a seductive idea, that given your current lifestyle (no house, no car, no girlfriend, a high savings rate) that you will never struggle to make ends meet. Earn little, but live little. That you don’t ever have to source for more income, or work too hard to manage your finances.
Seductive but wrong, as you will undoubtedly reflect when you’re old, inflation has eaten up all your savings, the house and car have eaten up everything, and you’re scrounging around.
Saturday, 11 August 2007
Potter 7
Whole post is a spoiler.
Read it. A friend's wife read Potter 6 over 2 days, so I thought I'd do a little better and read Potter 6 in 1 day. Read Potter 7 over the weekend, wasn't in a rush, but I just couldn't put it down. Or at least I wanted to see how things panned out.
There's almost no Hogwarts in this book, which is just as well. There's no need to talk about Hogwarts under an evil regime because that has already been done in Potter 5. Hogwarts under Snape is not very interesting, because it will be Snape, as usual, pretending to be a bad guy because he's supposed to be a Death Eater.
Snape and Harry Potter make very interesting contrasts. Potter is a Griffindor with a bit of Slytherin in him. Snape is a Slytherin with a more than a bit of Griffindor in him. I don't think that Snape did what he did merely for Lily Potter. I think everybody on some level understands right and wrong. Harry Potter in the end calls Snape the bravest man that he has met, and when you look back upon the big picture it is not very clear who was braver. Harry Potter and Snape are Dumbledore's 2 most important lieutenants. My prediction that Snape will be killed is correct, although he didn't sacrifice himself to save Potter. Maybe that would have been too much.
It's suitable that Longbottom should be a hero in some way, that he should pull the sword of Griffindor out of a hat. I like that idea, because his parents were Aurors alongside James and Lily Potter, and because whatever happened to Potter could well have happened to him.
Death does hang over the Harry Potter books. But for some reason it's not Rowling's great strength to describe death scenes. Think about how Sirius, Dumbledore, Snape, Lupin, Mad Eye Moody and Tonks died. Yet again we can borrow that idea from Proust, that the real mourning doesn't happen immediately, or at the funeral, but takes place for the rest of your life.
I'm wondering if I should criticise the last book for being too much of a treasure hunt. Maybe not. But it does have a video game quality about it. "To get A, you must get B, to get B you must get C. You must do (blah blah blah) with C or else it will not work".
The climatic scene with Harry Potter and Voldemort was a bit of a letdown, because there was too much discussing of plot points. It's just not good practice for the author to us a character to speak directly to the reader.
"You know, Tom, you shouldn't have drunk my blood in book 4 because it's bad for you". etc etc etc.
People have criticised the fact that Harry himself is a Horcrux, but it should have been obvious as far back as book 1. The train station part is a little bit of a cop out. If you destroyed a living Horcrux, did you have to kill the container as well? Why did Potter live while Nagini had to die? Why did the only person to survive an Avada Kedavra live it twice?
Harry is shown in middle age in the Epilogue, sending his kids to school. He named one of his kids "Albus Severus", which is funny because while Severus was alive he was the one that Potter hated the most.
There is a parallel between Draco Malfoy and Snape. Just as Malfoy turned against Harry for rejecting his friendship, Snape turned against James because James didn't consider Snape part of the gang.
Harry Potter's great achievement is that it shows us that great classics in children's books need be written a hundred years ago, and need not be the exclusive domain of a bygone era before TVs, computers and airplanes were invented.
Alice in Wonderland may have portrayed a simpler and more innocent day and age. Harry Potter excels in great moral ambiguities. You could laugh at how Ginny Weasley became a pen pal of Voldemort's through the Tom Riddle diary, until Harry Potter found his own Half Blood Prince textbook. The feared criminal Sirius suddenly becomes a loving godfather. The evil potions teacher suddenly becomes a heroic martyr. The kindly headmaster suddenly becomes a Nazi youth.
You can imagine why the book has upset fundamentalists everywhere. There is no mention of a God or a supreme being in this book. If anything, all fundamentalists hate moral ambiguities because they are only comfortable with certainties.
A large part of the appeal of Harry Potter is how it has created a universe unto itself, and more interestingly still, one that is co-existent with ours. If they are wizards, it is only because in our day and age, computer geeks are on the ascendent. If there are death eaters, it is only because they reflect our obsession with terrorists. If there is Voldemort, it is only because we need to be reminded of Hitler.
Maybe people have criticised the book for a distinct lack of style. But for me the more important aspect is this intricate architecture of ideas and plot twists that Rowling more often than not manages to pull off.
Although there was a lot of plot that Rowling left very late. Rowena Ravenclaw's diedem was introduced and disposed of in only a matter of a few hundred pages, when it could have been dealt with in "Half Blood Prince" which was a little short on plot. Same for the Hufflepuff cup. Similarly all that stuff about the Deathly Hallows felt rushed and it seemed that the Elder wand was only a plot device to make sure that Harry the horcrux could die without Harry the human being dying.
A lot has been said about the epilogue at the end. Rowling mentioned that she knew from almost 10 years ago that the last sentence would have the word "scar" in it, and it is that last sentence which is the most important, and the whole point of the epilogue. Harry gets a break from having to fight evil for 19 years, and has a happy and normal life raising kids with Ginny Weasley. Which is very interesting. What sort of an adult is Harry Potter? It's like watching "400 Blows" and wondering what kind of adult Antoine Doinel is, and the answer is strange: Antoine Doinel as a boy seems to have had to grow up very quickly for his age, but he becomes damaged goods, and seems to be a man-child for the rest of his life.
Would Harry Potter be the Minister of Magic? Would he be Hogwarts headmaster? I don't really think you can repeat the Voldemort plot again. Rowling seems to be putting paid to the possibility that you could make an easy sequel to Potter. Maybe he could be a minor character in some other fantasy story, but it's difficult. The universe of Harry Potter was so centred around the Harry Potter - Voldemort axis. Even Snape and Dumbledore have to play minor fiddle to them.
A prequel is possible, but we know the hazards of writing a book for which the ending is already known. Think about Star Wars.
As for JK Rowling writing something else as big - I'm trying to imagine Proust writing something that's not "Remembrance of Things Past" or Cao Xueqin writing something that's not "Hong Lou Meng". She could be like Balzac, writing a lot of books which are about the same universe. The adventures of Durmstrang, anyone?
Read it. A friend's wife read Potter 6 over 2 days, so I thought I'd do a little better and read Potter 6 in 1 day. Read Potter 7 over the weekend, wasn't in a rush, but I just couldn't put it down. Or at least I wanted to see how things panned out.
There's almost no Hogwarts in this book, which is just as well. There's no need to talk about Hogwarts under an evil regime because that has already been done in Potter 5. Hogwarts under Snape is not very interesting, because it will be Snape, as usual, pretending to be a bad guy because he's supposed to be a Death Eater.
Snape and Harry Potter make very interesting contrasts. Potter is a Griffindor with a bit of Slytherin in him. Snape is a Slytherin with a more than a bit of Griffindor in him. I don't think that Snape did what he did merely for Lily Potter. I think everybody on some level understands right and wrong. Harry Potter in the end calls Snape the bravest man that he has met, and when you look back upon the big picture it is not very clear who was braver. Harry Potter and Snape are Dumbledore's 2 most important lieutenants. My prediction that Snape will be killed is correct, although he didn't sacrifice himself to save Potter. Maybe that would have been too much.
It's suitable that Longbottom should be a hero in some way, that he should pull the sword of Griffindor out of a hat. I like that idea, because his parents were Aurors alongside James and Lily Potter, and because whatever happened to Potter could well have happened to him.
Death does hang over the Harry Potter books. But for some reason it's not Rowling's great strength to describe death scenes. Think about how Sirius, Dumbledore, Snape, Lupin, Mad Eye Moody and Tonks died. Yet again we can borrow that idea from Proust, that the real mourning doesn't happen immediately, or at the funeral, but takes place for the rest of your life.
I'm wondering if I should criticise the last book for being too much of a treasure hunt. Maybe not. But it does have a video game quality about it. "To get A, you must get B, to get B you must get C. You must do (blah blah blah) with C or else it will not work".
The climatic scene with Harry Potter and Voldemort was a bit of a letdown, because there was too much discussing of plot points. It's just not good practice for the author to us a character to speak directly to the reader.
"You know, Tom, you shouldn't have drunk my blood in book 4 because it's bad for you". etc etc etc.
People have criticised the fact that Harry himself is a Horcrux, but it should have been obvious as far back as book 1. The train station part is a little bit of a cop out. If you destroyed a living Horcrux, did you have to kill the container as well? Why did Potter live while Nagini had to die? Why did the only person to survive an Avada Kedavra live it twice?
Harry is shown in middle age in the Epilogue, sending his kids to school. He named one of his kids "Albus Severus", which is funny because while Severus was alive he was the one that Potter hated the most.
There is a parallel between Draco Malfoy and Snape. Just as Malfoy turned against Harry for rejecting his friendship, Snape turned against James because James didn't consider Snape part of the gang.
Harry Potter's great achievement is that it shows us that great classics in children's books need be written a hundred years ago, and need not be the exclusive domain of a bygone era before TVs, computers and airplanes were invented.
Alice in Wonderland may have portrayed a simpler and more innocent day and age. Harry Potter excels in great moral ambiguities. You could laugh at how Ginny Weasley became a pen pal of Voldemort's through the Tom Riddle diary, until Harry Potter found his own Half Blood Prince textbook. The feared criminal Sirius suddenly becomes a loving godfather. The evil potions teacher suddenly becomes a heroic martyr. The kindly headmaster suddenly becomes a Nazi youth.
You can imagine why the book has upset fundamentalists everywhere. There is no mention of a God or a supreme being in this book. If anything, all fundamentalists hate moral ambiguities because they are only comfortable with certainties.
A large part of the appeal of Harry Potter is how it has created a universe unto itself, and more interestingly still, one that is co-existent with ours. If they are wizards, it is only because in our day and age, computer geeks are on the ascendent. If there are death eaters, it is only because they reflect our obsession with terrorists. If there is Voldemort, it is only because we need to be reminded of Hitler.
Maybe people have criticised the book for a distinct lack of style. But for me the more important aspect is this intricate architecture of ideas and plot twists that Rowling more often than not manages to pull off.
Although there was a lot of plot that Rowling left very late. Rowena Ravenclaw's diedem was introduced and disposed of in only a matter of a few hundred pages, when it could have been dealt with in "Half Blood Prince" which was a little short on plot. Same for the Hufflepuff cup. Similarly all that stuff about the Deathly Hallows felt rushed and it seemed that the Elder wand was only a plot device to make sure that Harry the horcrux could die without Harry the human being dying.
A lot has been said about the epilogue at the end. Rowling mentioned that she knew from almost 10 years ago that the last sentence would have the word "scar" in it, and it is that last sentence which is the most important, and the whole point of the epilogue. Harry gets a break from having to fight evil for 19 years, and has a happy and normal life raising kids with Ginny Weasley. Which is very interesting. What sort of an adult is Harry Potter? It's like watching "400 Blows" and wondering what kind of adult Antoine Doinel is, and the answer is strange: Antoine Doinel as a boy seems to have had to grow up very quickly for his age, but he becomes damaged goods, and seems to be a man-child for the rest of his life.
Would Harry Potter be the Minister of Magic? Would he be Hogwarts headmaster? I don't really think you can repeat the Voldemort plot again. Rowling seems to be putting paid to the possibility that you could make an easy sequel to Potter. Maybe he could be a minor character in some other fantasy story, but it's difficult. The universe of Harry Potter was so centred around the Harry Potter - Voldemort axis. Even Snape and Dumbledore have to play minor fiddle to them.
A prequel is possible, but we know the hazards of writing a book for which the ending is already known. Think about Star Wars.
As for JK Rowling writing something else as big - I'm trying to imagine Proust writing something that's not "Remembrance of Things Past" or Cao Xueqin writing something that's not "Hong Lou Meng". She could be like Balzac, writing a lot of books which are about the same universe. The adventures of Durmstrang, anyone?
Friday, 10 August 2007
Encounter
I was forced to go to work on time 1 week ago, and by chance I bumped into Water Girl again. After such a long time of not bumping into her.
I chatted her up and got her to tell me about the work she's doing. She blanched a bit and told me she was still half asleep.
Funnily enough when I told her that she looks so much less like a teenager these days she lit up and started to talk about how her hair is shorter now. I guess young women are always hiao.
I would always wonder if I could get her. Is it wrong to hit on someone when you're hitting on someone else? But I think I'd draw the line on hitting on other chicks when you've already got another one in the bag. So long as Shorty (as she will henceforth be known) is not in the bag yet...
When you're looking back on people you used to have a crush on, crushes always wear off over time. Then maybe they are less appealing to you. Yes, perhaps their flaws were visible to you from the very start, but you didn't know how things would play out. For example you might have this funny pain in your knee and you don't know how it would affect you when you're playing a football match.
She's very much of an introvert. Maybe too much so. A moody one. Hot but moody. Her whole family is moody. Is she too religious? Too serious? These things could have been attractive to me a long while back. But I may be looking for somebody sunnier now. Sunny people are more resilient.
I used to go for people who were broody / moody, but I'm not sure now. Will these people be too selfish to open themselves up more? Are they that way because they're unimaginative? How moody can a truly imaginative person be?
I used to go for people who were artistic and literary. But would they walk around with their heads up their arse too much for their own good? There is a character in an upcoming PIXAR film who's a bit like that. a food critic who started off loving food, but ended up with his head up in his ass.
I used to go for complex people but I think I only needed to understand complexity for the sake of gaining knowledge about people. There are people out there who just have this knack of making things simple and so much the better for them.
I chatted her up and got her to tell me about the work she's doing. She blanched a bit and told me she was still half asleep.
Funnily enough when I told her that she looks so much less like a teenager these days she lit up and started to talk about how her hair is shorter now. I guess young women are always hiao.
I would always wonder if I could get her. Is it wrong to hit on someone when you're hitting on someone else? But I think I'd draw the line on hitting on other chicks when you've already got another one in the bag. So long as Shorty (as she will henceforth be known) is not in the bag yet...
When you're looking back on people you used to have a crush on, crushes always wear off over time. Then maybe they are less appealing to you. Yes, perhaps their flaws were visible to you from the very start, but you didn't know how things would play out. For example you might have this funny pain in your knee and you don't know how it would affect you when you're playing a football match.
She's very much of an introvert. Maybe too much so. A moody one. Hot but moody. Her whole family is moody. Is she too religious? Too serious? These things could have been attractive to me a long while back. But I may be looking for somebody sunnier now. Sunny people are more resilient.
I used to go for people who were broody / moody, but I'm not sure now. Will these people be too selfish to open themselves up more? Are they that way because they're unimaginative? How moody can a truly imaginative person be?
I used to go for people who were artistic and literary. But would they walk around with their heads up their arse too much for their own good? There is a character in an upcoming PIXAR film who's a bit like that. a food critic who started off loving food, but ended up with his head up in his ass.
I used to go for complex people but I think I only needed to understand complexity for the sake of gaining knowledge about people. There are people out there who just have this knack of making things simple and so much the better for them.
Wednesday, 8 August 2007
Little Children
Every now and then you get a show which re-affirms your faith in movies. I'm trying to think of the really good movies I've watched over the past few years: only a handful I'd think. "l'Avventura", "8 1/2", "And Your Mother Too", "City of God", that's about it.
I think it's been a while since I liked a movie as much as I liked "Little Children". I had been hunting it down for a while now and I think it's not going to come out on VCD. I had been to Video Ezy and taken my customary 5, and imagine what a surprise when I found that they charge $25 for 5 instead of $15 like they used to. Luckily they threw in a free rental, so I used that voucher on "Little Children".
I took advantage of the fact that my parents were away for the weekend to get a whole pile of films that I've been waiting to come out on VCD rental:
Snakes on a Plane (watched it)
Breaking and Entering (watched it)
History Boys (watched it)
Little Children (watched it)
Miami Vice
Miss Potter (watched it)
Pan's Labyrinth
Last King of Scotland (watching it)
The Queen
The Fountain
I've always liked Kate Winslet. I always thought that she provided 3 out of 5 reasons why "Titanic" was such a big hit. (Those 5 reasons are herself, her 2 tits, Leonardo DiCaprio and a nice ship.) Strangely I liked all the sex scenes with her in it. Not only because it's porn, but there's a certain vulnerability and a not unattractive glow in her face because she's shagging this guy she's got a crush on. The scenes were great: you could feel the warm flush of a new love, but also that this was based on some mutual misconception. One a scholar, and another a jock: what sort of future could they have together?
I'm just wondering about "American Beauty", which were 1 of the 3 most important films made at the end of the 20th century (the other 2 are "Fight Club" and "The Matrix"). It was my favourite movie for around 3 months after I saw it. I remember staying up until 3 after I watched it, and thinking about all the ideas that lay behind it. I even wrote a lengthy review about it once and I'm glad I did it because if I didn't all those ideas that were running through my head would have been lost.
If there was a single message to "American Beauty", it was "stick it to the man, and live for yourself". If there is a message to "Little Children", it is "don't be a selfish asshole". Now considering that both movies are concerned with suburban anomie that's quite a contrast. I know suburbia well. I've lived in it for either a 3rd of my life, or most of my life, depending on whether you consider my current place a suburb or a HDB condo. (It's a bit of both.) They are nice but cold places.
Spoilers follow:
I loved it when you had Jennifer Connelly being able to detect that her husband and Kate Winslet were having an affair. I loved it when you had this tough guy waiting for Brad at the bar and muttering that he's too much of a loser when the tough guy was trying to make anybody and everybody the loser so that he'd not have to face up to himself being a loser. My favourite part was when Brad and Kate Winslet were about to elope, and he suddenly got distracted by a group of skateboarders, and decided to try some skateboarding stunts himself. Can you imagine, playing with a bunch of kids, when you're supposed to have a romantic elopement with your mistress?
I liked the part where she had a face off with one other person in the neighbourhood through a book club discussion of "Madam Bovary". It was a proxy argument: that other person knew that she was having an affair. She was taking the moralistic viewpoint that everything Madame Bovary did was wrong, and Kate Winslet insisted that she was heroic in trying to rebel against her straitened circumstances.
A very nice touch: they were trying to figure out the sexual allusions in the novel, and ended up concluding that one of the men had anal sex with Madame Bovary.
The end is not a happy ending, because there are a few fairly tragic outcomes. But there is a glimmer of hope for everyone, because everybody comes across a small epiphany where it's a potential starting point for them to realise what jerks they've been and hopefully make things better. But it's only a hope after all.
I think it's been a while since I liked a movie as much as I liked "Little Children". I had been hunting it down for a while now and I think it's not going to come out on VCD. I had been to Video Ezy and taken my customary 5, and imagine what a surprise when I found that they charge $25 for 5 instead of $15 like they used to. Luckily they threw in a free rental, so I used that voucher on "Little Children".
I took advantage of the fact that my parents were away for the weekend to get a whole pile of films that I've been waiting to come out on VCD rental:
Snakes on a Plane (watched it)
Breaking and Entering (watched it)
History Boys (watched it)
Little Children (watched it)
Miami Vice
Miss Potter (watched it)
Pan's Labyrinth
Last King of Scotland (watching it)
The Queen
The Fountain
I've always liked Kate Winslet. I always thought that she provided 3 out of 5 reasons why "Titanic" was such a big hit. (Those 5 reasons are herself, her 2 tits, Leonardo DiCaprio and a nice ship.) Strangely I liked all the sex scenes with her in it. Not only because it's porn, but there's a certain vulnerability and a not unattractive glow in her face because she's shagging this guy she's got a crush on. The scenes were great: you could feel the warm flush of a new love, but also that this was based on some mutual misconception. One a scholar, and another a jock: what sort of future could they have together?
I'm just wondering about "American Beauty", which were 1 of the 3 most important films made at the end of the 20th century (the other 2 are "Fight Club" and "The Matrix"). It was my favourite movie for around 3 months after I saw it. I remember staying up until 3 after I watched it, and thinking about all the ideas that lay behind it. I even wrote a lengthy review about it once and I'm glad I did it because if I didn't all those ideas that were running through my head would have been lost.
If there was a single message to "American Beauty", it was "stick it to the man, and live for yourself". If there is a message to "Little Children", it is "don't be a selfish asshole". Now considering that both movies are concerned with suburban anomie that's quite a contrast. I know suburbia well. I've lived in it for either a 3rd of my life, or most of my life, depending on whether you consider my current place a suburb or a HDB condo. (It's a bit of both.) They are nice but cold places.
Spoilers follow:
I loved it when you had Jennifer Connelly being able to detect that her husband and Kate Winslet were having an affair. I loved it when you had this tough guy waiting for Brad at the bar and muttering that he's too much of a loser when the tough guy was trying to make anybody and everybody the loser so that he'd not have to face up to himself being a loser. My favourite part was when Brad and Kate Winslet were about to elope, and he suddenly got distracted by a group of skateboarders, and decided to try some skateboarding stunts himself. Can you imagine, playing with a bunch of kids, when you're supposed to have a romantic elopement with your mistress?
I liked the part where she had a face off with one other person in the neighbourhood through a book club discussion of "Madam Bovary". It was a proxy argument: that other person knew that she was having an affair. She was taking the moralistic viewpoint that everything Madame Bovary did was wrong, and Kate Winslet insisted that she was heroic in trying to rebel against her straitened circumstances.
A very nice touch: they were trying to figure out the sexual allusions in the novel, and ended up concluding that one of the men had anal sex with Madame Bovary.
The end is not a happy ending, because there are a few fairly tragic outcomes. But there is a glimmer of hope for everyone, because everybody comes across a small epiphany where it's a potential starting point for them to realise what jerks they've been and hopefully make things better. But it's only a hope after all.
Monday, 6 August 2007
Go Iraq!!!
Sorry this is a few days late.
Congratulations to Iraq for winning the Asian Cup! I'd have wished for either Japan or South Korea to get through to the final, less boring than an all Arabian final, but kudos to Iraq and their fighting spirit!
Turns out that all these unexpected results are not so rare in football tournaments. Every now and then you get Greece winning a final (against Portugal, no less, meaning that it's a minnow upsetting a relatively minor footballing power). You get a Denmark, which didn't even qualify for Euro 92, winning the championship. you get Singapore winning the last 2 Tiger cups (except that only half the team are born and bred in Singapore).
For those people who think of Iraq as underdogs, they probably haven't been noticing Iraq's slow creep up the ladder. Last 4 at the last Olympics, Silver at the Asian games. They are not a traditional power but they are slowly getting there.
Some of you may remember that Man U and some other clubs kicked up a fuss when the Asian Football federation ask them to shift their playing dates so that they wouldn't clash with the group qualifiers. Absolutely correct decision, I'd say. Yes, they will get bigger crowds for the big club matches. But it's just not a real tournament, and not really that exciting. Isn't it cool to see Vietnam beat Oman? Or Iraq beat Australia? or Vietnam beat the UAE?
Australia's early exit was a surprise, but they also surprisingly only scraped through the qualifiers. The way some of them were talking, you'd have thought they'd sleepwalk to the title. Some Australian players were complaining that they weren't used to playing in hot and humid weather. I suppose that Saudi Arabia and Iraq are hot and humid countries. It's great for them to almost beat Italy at last year's World Cup, but they look a little softer now. OK, maybe they're a little unlucky to meet Japan so soon, but still...
Was mentioned somewhere that people of Arabian stock are almost ideally suited to play football. No wonder it's so difficult to play against them. Oh and Zidane's parents are Algerians, which means he's also a kind of Arab. Maybe he heatbutted Materazzi because he thought he was Japanese.
All these other regional tournaments are getting interesting: Copa America, African Cup of Nations, and now this.
Congratulations to Iraq for winning the Asian Cup! I'd have wished for either Japan or South Korea to get through to the final, less boring than an all Arabian final, but kudos to Iraq and their fighting spirit!
Turns out that all these unexpected results are not so rare in football tournaments. Every now and then you get Greece winning a final (against Portugal, no less, meaning that it's a minnow upsetting a relatively minor footballing power). You get a Denmark, which didn't even qualify for Euro 92, winning the championship. you get Singapore winning the last 2 Tiger cups (except that only half the team are born and bred in Singapore).
For those people who think of Iraq as underdogs, they probably haven't been noticing Iraq's slow creep up the ladder. Last 4 at the last Olympics, Silver at the Asian games. They are not a traditional power but they are slowly getting there.
Some of you may remember that Man U and some other clubs kicked up a fuss when the Asian Football federation ask them to shift their playing dates so that they wouldn't clash with the group qualifiers. Absolutely correct decision, I'd say. Yes, they will get bigger crowds for the big club matches. But it's just not a real tournament, and not really that exciting. Isn't it cool to see Vietnam beat Oman? Or Iraq beat Australia? or Vietnam beat the UAE?
Australia's early exit was a surprise, but they also surprisingly only scraped through the qualifiers. The way some of them were talking, you'd have thought they'd sleepwalk to the title. Some Australian players were complaining that they weren't used to playing in hot and humid weather. I suppose that Saudi Arabia and Iraq are hot and humid countries. It's great for them to almost beat Italy at last year's World Cup, but they look a little softer now. OK, maybe they're a little unlucky to meet Japan so soon, but still...
Was mentioned somewhere that people of Arabian stock are almost ideally suited to play football. No wonder it's so difficult to play against them. Oh and Zidane's parents are Algerians, which means he's also a kind of Arab. Maybe he heatbutted Materazzi because he thought he was Japanese.
All these other regional tournaments are getting interesting: Copa America, African Cup of Nations, and now this.
Saturday, 4 August 2007
Premature
It just slipped out of my mouth like that.
We were all in the lift, going from 4 to 8. Then the lift stopped at 6, and some of us got out. My boss, from whom I was taking a lift initially stepped outside to let people through, but when they had left the lift, he was still standing there blinking as though he thought we were on the right floor. A colleague beckoned him to come back into the lift, and the comment just slipped out of my mouth: "Not good to be premature."
I hadn't realised the outrageousness of that comment until 30 seconds later when it played back in my mind. And what was disturbing was that I didn't even remember it going through my head on its way to my mouth.
It's hard to button your lip when you're sleep deprived.
We were all in the lift, going from 4 to 8. Then the lift stopped at 6, and some of us got out. My boss, from whom I was taking a lift initially stepped outside to let people through, but when they had left the lift, he was still standing there blinking as though he thought we were on the right floor. A colleague beckoned him to come back into the lift, and the comment just slipped out of my mouth: "Not good to be premature."
I hadn't realised the outrageousness of that comment until 30 seconds later when it played back in my mind. And what was disturbing was that I didn't even remember it going through my head on its way to my mouth.
It's hard to button your lip when you're sleep deprived.
Postage labels
Very irritated. Woke up from uneasy dreams this morning (no, not turned into an insect) to realise 2 things: I have to be at the jogging place in 5 minutes, and that $10 worth of stamps are in the fucking laundry.
I found out that the auto car was taken, I'd have to take the manual car down. It was bad. Driving there was OK but when I had to parallel park on the slope it was a bit of a nightmare. Luckily there was a stretch where there weren't any cars, so it became real easy. But when I drove back I found myself unable to engage my clutch and take off on first gear at one busy junction. 1 minute of panic followed accompanied by a chorus of honking. My jogging friend said back in the car behind mine, quietly amused. Finally I was able to take off and my minute of hell was over.
Sister called up. If it's not enough to break up with your boyfriend in a strange land she told me about her nightmare medical student schedule of 21 hours X 6 days a week. Anybody still want your kids to be doctors?
I got to figure out what to do with my fucking postage labels. They're out now, I'm glad I got them out when they were still wet, and I could separate them. But I make the stupid error of putting them on my desk sticky side down. Luckily it was a varnished table and I could peel them off. But now all the ink on it is washed off and I need to put some value back onto the fucking labels. I could do the honest thing and put on what it was worth ($2) or I could jack the value up a bit. Are there any experienced counterfeiters who can help me with this? I thought that they did heat printing on these things and it couldn't be washed off. Goddamn it.
I found out that the auto car was taken, I'd have to take the manual car down. It was bad. Driving there was OK but when I had to parallel park on the slope it was a bit of a nightmare. Luckily there was a stretch where there weren't any cars, so it became real easy. But when I drove back I found myself unable to engage my clutch and take off on first gear at one busy junction. 1 minute of panic followed accompanied by a chorus of honking. My jogging friend said back in the car behind mine, quietly amused. Finally I was able to take off and my minute of hell was over.
Sister called up. If it's not enough to break up with your boyfriend in a strange land she told me about her nightmare medical student schedule of 21 hours X 6 days a week. Anybody still want your kids to be doctors?
I got to figure out what to do with my fucking postage labels. They're out now, I'm glad I got them out when they were still wet, and I could separate them. But I make the stupid error of putting them on my desk sticky side down. Luckily it was a varnished table and I could peel them off. But now all the ink on it is washed off and I need to put some value back onto the fucking labels. I could do the honest thing and put on what it was worth ($2) or I could jack the value up a bit. Are there any experienced counterfeiters who can help me with this? I thought that they did heat printing on these things and it couldn't be washed off. Goddamn it.
Wednesday, 1 August 2007
Today is my 'pah tor' day
Inspired by shingot:
(sung to the tune of "Today is my book out day", which is in turn sung to the tune of "Camptown Ladies sing this song".)
Today is my 'pah tor' day, Doo dah! Doo dah!
Today is my 'pah tor' day, Doo dah! Doo dah day!
No more jacking me!
No more PCC*!
No more late night porn TV, Doo dah! Doo dah day!
(*PCC = Pah Chwee Cheng, hokkien for ....)
(sung to the tune of "Today is my book out day", which is in turn sung to the tune of "Camptown Ladies sing this song".)
Today is my 'pah tor' day, Doo dah! Doo dah!
Today is my 'pah tor' day, Doo dah! Doo dah day!
No more jacking me!
No more PCC*!
No more late night porn TV, Doo dah! Doo dah day!
(*PCC = Pah Chwee Cheng, hokkien for ....)
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