Wednesday, August 30, 2006

How Chelsea won the League



Starring Didier Drogba, Arjen Robben, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Asier del Horno, ... wait a minute, it's the whole squad!

Tuesday, August 29, 2006

Casio thermometer watch

Jasmine got me a Casio for a year-end present. My goodness it tells the temperature! Thanks, dear. =]

Cbox 360

My old TagBoard was targeted by spammers so I'm now using Cbox on recommendation from Teck Seng. Enjoy! =]

Saturday, August 26, 2006

O2 Xda Atom


I bought an O2 Xda Atom for SGD820. This one is chockful of features and has basically everything I need for the next five years.

Dr. Phil's Test

Try this; I got a 50.

Below is Dr Phil's test.(Dr. Phil scored 55; he did this test on Oprah-she got a 38.) Some folks pay a lot of money to find this stuff out. Read on, this is very interesting!

Don't be overly sensitive! The following is pretty accurate and it only takes 2 minutes. Take this test for yourself and send it to your friends.

The person who sent it placed their score in the subject box.
Please do the same before forwarding to your friends. (send it back to the person who sent it to you) Don't peek but begin the test as you scroll down and answer.
Answers are for who you are now, not who you were in the past. Have pen or pencil and paper ready. This is a real test given by the Human Relations Dept at many of the major corporations today. It helps them get better insight concerning their employees and prospective employees. It's only 10 simple questions, so grab a pencil and paper, keeping track of your letter answers to each question. Make sure to change the subject of the e-mail to read YOUR total. When you are finished, forward this to friends/family, and also send it to the person who sent this to you. Make sure to put YOUR score in the subject box. Ready?


Begin.

1. When do you feel your best?
a) in the morning
b) during the afternoon & and early evening
c) late at night

2. You usually walk...
a) fairly fast, with long steps
b) fairly fast, with little steps
c) less fast head up, looking the world in the face
d) less fast, head down

e) very slowly

3. When talking to people you..
a) stand with your arms folded
b) have your hands clasped
c) have one or both your hands on your hips
d) touch or push the person to whom you are talking
e) play with your ear, touch your chin, or smooth your hair

4. When relaxing, you sit with..
a) your knees bent with your legs
neatly side by side
b) your legs crossed
c) your legs stretched out or straight
d) one leg curled under you

5. When something really amuses you, you react with...
a) big appreciated laugh
b) a laugh, but not a loud one
c) a quiet chuckle
d) a sheepish smile

6. When you go to a party or social gathering you...
a) make a loud entrance so everyone notices you
b) make a quiet entrance, looking around for
someone you know
c) make the quietest entrance, trying to stay unnoticed

7. You're working very hard, concentrating hard, and
you're interrupted......
a) welcome the break
b) feel extremely irritated
c) vary between these two extremes

8. Which of the following colors do you like most
?
a) Red or orange
b) black
c) yellow or light blue
d) green
e) dark blue or purple
f) white
g) brown or gray

9. When you are in bed at night, in those last few
moments before going to sleep you are....
a) stretched out on your back
b) stretched out face down on your stomach
c) on your side, slightly curled
d) with your head on one arm
e) with your head under the covers

10. You often dream that you are...
a) falling
b) fighting or struggling
c) searching for something or somebody
d) flying or floating
e) you usually have dreamless sleep
f) your dreams are always pleasant

POINTS:
1. (a) 2 (b) 4 (c) 6
2 . (a) 6 (b) 4 (c) 7 (d) 2 (e) 1
3. (a) 4 (b) 2 (c) 5 (d) 7 (e) 6
4. (a) 4 (b) 6 (c) 2 (d) 1
5. (a) 6 (b) 4 (c) 3 (d) 5 (e) 2
6. (a) 6 (b) 4 (c) 2
7. (a) 6 (b) 2 (c) 4
8. (a) 6 (b) 7 (c) 5 (d) 4 (e) 3 (f) 2 (g) 1
9. (a) 7 (b) 6 (c) 4 (d) 2 (e) 1
10. (a) 4 (b) 2 (c) 3 (d) 5 (e) 6 (f) 1

Now add up the total number of points.

OVER 60 POINTS:Others see you as someone they should "handle with care." You're seen as vain, self-centered, and who is extremely dominant. Others may admire you, wishing they could be more like you, but don't always trust you, hesitating to become too deeply involved with you.

51 TO 60 POINTS: Others see you as an exciting, highly volatile, rather impulsive personality; a natural leader, who's quick to make decisions, though not always the right ones.They see you as bold and adventuresome, someone who will try anything once; someone who takes chances and enjoys an adventure. They enjoy being in your company because of the excitement you radiate.

41 TO 50 POINTS: Others see you as fresh, lively, charming, amusing, practical, and always interesting; someone who's constantly in the center of attention, but sufficiently well-balanced not to let it go to their head.They also see you as kind, considerate, and understanding; someone who'll always cheer them up and help them out.

31 TO 40 POINTS: Others see you as sensible, cautious, careful & practical.They see you as clever, gifted, or talented, but modest. Not a person who makes friends too quickly or easily, but someone who's extremely loyal to friends you do make and who expects the same loyalty in return. Those who really get to know you realize it takes a lot to shake your trust in your friends, but equally that it takes you a long time to get over it if that trust is ever broken.

21 TO 30 POINTS: Your friends see you as painstaking and fussy. They see you as very cautious, extremely careful, a slow and steady plodder. It would really surprise them if you ever did something impulsively or on the spur of the moment, expecting you to examine everything carefully from every angle and then, usually decide against it. They think this reaction is caused partly by your careful nature.

UNDER 21 POINTS:People think you are shy, nervous, and indecisive, someone who needs looking after, who always wants someone else to make the decisions & who doesn't want to get involved with anyone or anything! They see you as a worrier who always sees problems that don't exist. Some people think you're boring. Only those who know you well know that you aren't.

Now forward this to others, and put your score in the subject box as "Dr.Phil's Test, I'm a _____"

Thursday, August 24, 2006

EPL Week 1

(TT)vaches de chier
Andriy Shevchenko (0.0 [MAC] + 15.0 [@MID] = 15.0)
Bargain of the season? Thought so. But more like expensive flop so far. One big konok.
Scored what looked to be the winner until Boro intervened, but I can live with that.

*Louis Saha (13.5 [FUL] + 19.5 [@CHA] = 33.0)
Looks to be flying after being given the responsibility in van Nistelrooy and Rooney's absence.
I thought I'd seen the best of Saha against Fulham but he proves he belongs in the starting lineup with another potent performance.

Dimitar Berbatov (5.0 [@BOL] + 20.5 [SHE] = 25.5)
Got him because of his pre-season form, but now I know we shouldn't use that as a reliable indicator. Meite kept him in his pocket.
Repays the debt with a more convincing display against Sheffield with a goal and assist.

Ryan Giggs (3.5 [FUL] + 8.0 [@CHA] = 11.5)
Now United's vital midfield cog in the absence of Scholes and Carrick. His incisive passing kept Fulham on the back foot throughout. Unfortunate not to get a higher score as he was more of a provider.
Crosses galore as proved a perfect foil to Ronaldo.

Steve Sidwell (12.5 [MID] + 3.5 [@AST] = 16.0)
An impulsive buy, but one well and truly justified. Looks to be the Jimmy Bullard of this season. A great start.
Should've added to his tally, but a good performance for a new player.

Tim Cahill (-0.5 [WAT] + 10.5 [@BLA] = 10.0)
A toss-up between him and Arteta. Guessed wrong this time. A little unlucky and just lacked the opportunity to get SOTs.
Didn't even start. Lucky to get the equaliser.

*Cristiano Ronaldo (21.0 [FUL] + 3.5 [@CHA] = 24.5)
United's outstanding wide player. Linked up brilliantly with Rooney and put their World Cup impasse firmly behind them with a devastating display of incisive passing. Scored with a beautiful half-volley and has shown maturity in his play, even when United were coasting.
Lively throughout but unlucky not to score more points. Deserved Fergie's praise.

Benoit Assou-Ekotto (3.5 [@BOL] + 9.0 [SHE] = 12.5)
Big things were expected of him when he replaced Stalteri, but attacking fullbacks can only get forward when his team are attacking. Spurs didn't do enough of that so there was little he could do.
Benefitted as Spurs' attack caught fire.

Nicky Shorey (9.0 [MID] + 1.0 [@AST] = 10.0)
Reading's set-piece taker likes to get forward and whip in crosses. This season's Neil Clement? If Reading can tighten their ship, big points beckon.
Has room for improvement.

Matthew Taylor (15.5 [BLA] + 8.5 [@MAC] = 24.0)
Last season's revelation continues where he left off with another imperious attacking display.
He's described as a midfield player in Soccernet. Tells you all you need to know.

Edwin van der Sar (11.0 [FUL] + 9.0 [@CHA] = 20.0)
A competent display from the Dutchman would have been better rewarded if not for Helguson's fortuitous effort.
Other keepers have done better this week, but others have fared worse as well. I'm keeping with his pair of safe hands.

----------

The Group of Death III

Well done all!

Week 1 has just passed.

Aaron (202 pts) secures 1st place with the highest score of 202 pts, thanks to Louis Saha, Dimitar Berbatov, Cristiano Ronaldo and Matthew Taylor.

The gap is now 30.5 pts as Andrew (171.5 pts) gets 2nd place with the 2nd-highest score of 171.5 pts and is 8.5 pts ahead of Ben, thanks to Saha, Berbatov, Ronaldo, Tim Howard and John Terry.

Ben (163 pts) gets 3rd place with the 3rd-highest score of 163 pts, thanks to Saha, Berbatov, Frank Lampard and Terry.

Jasmine (111 pts) gets 10th place with 111 pts, only 8 points behind Zikai, thanks to Saha, Edwin van der Sar and Andriy Shevchenko.

At the other end, Kimjin Saiful and spunkmyer17 (0 pts) prop up the table as they started a week late!

See you next week!

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Giraffe

Had my doubts about a restaurant called Giraffe but its exotic locale swayed me: smack in the middle of Istana Park where B.Boss used to be, with al fresco and dining areas upstairs and a bar downstairs. Be-yoo-tiful. If the ambience was good, the food was even better. But I'll leave it to gurst editor Jasmine to talk about. If she doesn't do it justice then I'll take over from there. =]

Tuesday, August 22, 2006

Bettering RAM

I finally for some RAM to improve my computer's performance. Just 512MB of DDR266 RAM tripled my computer's processing speed and now it hums along with such efficiency. Why didn't I do it earlier?

O2 Xda Atom

On account of my Sony-Ericsson k500i almost conking out because of the malfuntioning joystick, I've decided to cash in 6 months early and get the O2 Xda Atom. It's an above-average PDA phone and I hope it'll be the phone I buy for a while. It's gonna cost me about $900 but can go some way to standing it for my lack of a laptop. The price includes trading in my spoilt phone and incurring a $100 penalty for early cash-in. Oh well.
Gotta start downloading my contacts and calendar details then, unless I don't trade it in at all. $50 doesn't sound worth it, and you always need an emergency backup.

Hijack!

Hmmm, someone seems to have hijacked my TagBoard and I'm unable even to logon to delete the unwanted comments. Might need to get a new one. I'll wait for the reply from the administrators first. Damn irritating.

Monday, August 21, 2006

Ipanema slippers

On impulse, bought a pair of Brazilian rubber slippers for $14.90 from RSH. Need a pair after the failure of Beach Road army slippers to provide a feasible long-term solution.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

EXTREME penny-pinching!!!

Now seriously we all need to lighten up guys. You read how Doug Ellis of Aston Villa made a big joke of his club with stingy practices like not watering the grass and things like that. Similarly, lighten up with your pockets. I know cos I used to be like that, and maybe a bit of that still remains. But don't hem and haw over 20 cents for goodness sake! Why? Well, for starters, it's only 20 cents. So if it makes people's lives easier, just say, "It's alright" or stuff like that. This is why buskers are going bust. Now I know what a turn-off what I used to do was. It is better to give than receive says the Bible, but do we do it? I still keep score in my head, and it's a struggle to completely give up calculativeness (that's what it is), but we have to balance between being spend-thrift and stingy. I'd like to think I'm getting there.
It's not something people point out to you as it's a little embarrassing for both parties, so if someone does, it's purty bad. It's simple give and take really.

Tennis

Had a decent game today. The best part of the lesson, ironically, was the little doubles game we had right at the end. For the record Ben/Aaron beat Yew Hock/Bob 2-1.
Got a few serves in and double-faulted but it was really fun. Ben almost single-handedly lost us the match with over-exuberant forehands. Like we say, it's a percentage game. You only go for winners when you're good enough, and we ain't there yet.
But we do need to have a nice quiet game by ourselves just to consolidate what we've learnt. After that we need to learn court movement, lobbing and the sliced backhand. Did I miss anything out? Oh yeah: humility. =]

Saturday, August 19, 2006

5km!

Who cares about 8km? I ran 5 km last night in about 25 min, which translates to an average speed of about 12km/h, something I can be proud of. Probably contracted the jogging bug from Chee Weng, who got up at 430am to run. Me? I ran on a balmy evening, and considering I haven't run in a million years, did pretty well. =] Btw going by this information, 2.4km is NOTHING. Not that it matters to me.

What's brown and sticky?

A stick.

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Karaoke

I had such a great time singing karaoke (in English of course) with Edgar, Jiahui, Shawn, Regina, Theophane, Chloe and Jasmine. It was Edgar's birthday celebration and it was really great just to see him enjoying himself so much. We had a Japanese buffet at Ikoi at Miramar Hotel, then went on to Party World at Tanjong Pagar.

What fun! Singing all the evergreen classics and listening to Shawn's fantastic voice crooning those ballads. Me? I stuck to MLTR, Air Supply, Eagles staples. =]

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Teacher's Day

Teacher's Day celebrations are supposed to be on Aug 31, but that coincides with a Learning Festival in NIE. Of course I'd rather be at Punggol Primary with my kids, but hope they can NIE lessons in lieu of the Festical, leaving me free to be in Hougang. The Learning Festical programme IS interesting, but blame it on poor timing. I know where I'd rather be. =]

Thursday, August 10, 2006

Smart ways to say someone's stoopid

He's missing a few buttons on the remote control
If he had another brain, it would be lonely
Doesn't have all his dogs on one leash
Fell out of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down
Couldn't pour water out of a boot with the instructions on the heel
All foam, no beer
The wheel's spinning but the hamster's dead

David Marshall speaks

The following is an excerpt from a 1994 interview with David Marshall, the first Chief Minister of Singapore and one of Singapore’s finest legal minds. The interviewer was Dharmendra Yadav, 28, Legal Counsel of NTUC Income Insurance Cooperative Ltd. Mr Marshall died in 1995, and the interviewer keeps a promise made to him to publish the interview in full. 12 years later, the promise is kept.

DO YOU HAVE ANY MESSAGE IN GENERAL?

Recognise there is a lot of satisfaction in public service, foreign service, judicial service. A great deal of satisfaction in public service, even honorary public service in committees.

[If] you are totally engrossed in self-promotion, at the end of the day, you’ll find it’s dead seafood.

Try and give up yourselves to others.

I am so alien to this worship of the Golden Calf and the draconian attitude; the brutal attitude towards our fellow citizens. Here I ask people and, no doubt, if I ask you, “We’re all in favour so long as it’s not me having my bottoms cut! Yes, whip ‘em!”

Try to put yourself in the other man’s shoes.

And, of course, what have I got to say?

You, the young – you’ve got a fantastic, absolutely fantastic potential before you; economic expansion, heroic plans that the government has for the future not only the present. You are so lucky! No unemployment! Great potential even beyond your capacity to fulfill.

It’s an exciting country, Singapore. It’s a lovely country. And you have to make your own space for your own spiritual and intellectual needs and have the courage. Have the courage to serve your fellow men with integrity.

I’ll put it in one nutshell: have the courage to live, don’t be afraid!

You know, I’m told I’m fool-hardy and always criticising, although I have such a gracious life. But fool-hardy or no, this is me; I am prepared to take what you give.

------------

You can find the full interview here.

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

NDP 06

Watched a bit of NDP on the telly and periodically ran to my kitchen to watch the fireworks live. Then watched Singapore Idol for the first time. Hady and Mathilda look pretty good, but please get rid of Paul Toothhill and Joking Gomez.

Monday, August 07, 2006

Liberating limericks

God's plan made for a hopeful beginning
But Man spoiled his chances by sinning
We trust that the story
Will end in God's glory
But at present the other side's winning

---------------

St Augustine thought he had found
The sin by which mankind is bound
'It was not,' so said he,
'The fruit on the tree
But the lust of the pair on the ground.'

Thursday, August 03, 2006

My timetable

Wah I already don't like the way NIE plans things.
Firstly, it appears the timetable is incomplete even though they claim it is. We're missing one lecture and tutorial.
Secondly, they've given us a Maths tutorial on Fri at 0830hrs, and that's our ONLY class for that day.
Thirdly, there's an educational psychology makeup class planned for aforementioned Friday, at 1630hrs to 1830hrs.
Can you believe it?!?! Whee!
0830-0930: Class
7-hour break!
1630-1830: Class
Who in the right mind will plan this?

On top of all that, I'm STILL unable to access Forums/Marketplace, which is essential for sourcing for transport, textbooks, tennis kakis etc. Their reply? "Our account can leh, how come yours cannot?" Wah lau, I ask you, you shoot me back. If I know I ask you meh?

I have low tolerance for administrative deficiencies, especially when they're PAID to do it well. Screwed up lah.