Eve........

Christmas is tomorrow! It has been cloudy, cool and wet leading up to Christmas eve, the closest anyone in Malaysia has to a white christmas. I'm watching Star Wars Episode II : Attack Of The Clones for the millionth time now, if this entry seems slightly hard to understand, do forgive me. Seriously, why can't Anakin just do what Obi-Wan tells him and stop suggesting that they find Zam. And why does Zam has to die? A wonderful character she is. Darth Maul too......sigh.

My dinner was close to disaster...almost nothing came up as planned, but like all serials, the ending turned out well. The chocolate cheese cake nearly failed. It ended up super good. The meat loaf too. It was as dry as a bone. I do not want continue further, i wanna watch Star Wars....i'll leave you with photos.

The bone dry meat loaf

Mom made some spiced sauce for it. Simmered the meat in it and made it edible.

Coleslaw.

You see the meatloaves, tempura fish, baked potato wedges and some fried vegetarian rice noodles from noon.

Baked potato wedges with salt and pepper. Tasted ok for something i made for the first time.

Tempura fish.

Marble Cheese Cake. Chocolate cheese.....a near disaster....turned out well, thankfully.

A close up. Named marble for a reason...very nicely layered cheese and chocolate.

Yay...fat boy with a soft champange substitute, papa looking on, diyang and mom scooping ice cubes and a guest! My aunt, mom's eldest sister, thought my cake was good! She had the most helping. Grateful.

My plate.

TsingTao Beer...the nice Chinese beer which is cheaper than water in the mainland. Tasted normal...but i like it. Leftovers in my fridge!

Was watching a Discovery Channel special earlier about the first emperor of China. Emperor Chin Shi Huang Di. If Emperor is Huang Di, does that not make the prefix Emperor redundant? So it is either Emperor Chin Shi or Chin Shi Huang Di. Just wanted to clarify that......heh..... More photos of the tree later...and presents! Can't wait to open them tomorrow morning....Star Wars!

Sad Days

About 2 weeks ago, CNet Senior Editor James Kim went missing on his way back to San Francisco from Oregon for Thanksgiving. With him were his wife, Kati Kim and his 2 daughters (aged 4 years and 7 months respectively). They made a reservation for a room in a motel 5 hours from where there were when they realised they would not make San Francisco in time. They never arrived. When he failed to show up for work and appointment on the 28th of November, co-workers got worried and knew something went terribly wrong. It was found later that they went missing on a route they took in some of the worst weather conditions. They disappeared with their Saab station wagon.

When the news broke, i felt sick and sad. I do not know James Kim personally, but it felt like i have known him for a very long time, from his days at TechTV. I had a weird feeling that he would not survive, but still, i prayed for the best and his well-return to family and friends. 11 days later, Kati Kim and her 2 daughters were found by a rescue chopper. It was good. They were in good condition, exhausted but perfectly fine. I expected James to be with them, but he was not. He had set off in search for help but never returned. They managed to survive the cold by small rations of food and warmth from the car's heater. When petrol ran dry, they burnt tyres for heat. The news was great and the sheriff mentioned that James was a remarkable man. His resourcefulness was the only reason they survived that long in the rugged wilderness in the middle of a bitterly cold winter. Apparently, he set off with a lighter, snowshoes and some random things. I knew they would find him alive. He has done so much and gone so far to survive, he will be found alive.

Yesterday, right before the national guards were called into the fray, they found James, deceased. According to reports, he became either disoriented or lost his way during his last moments in the thick snow, because he was going around in circles. It was so close......so very close. When the rest of his family was found, i had nothing but optimistic thoughts that he would be back home soon. That all my sick gut feeling earlier was borne of plain paranoia. I expected to see him back at work with his colleagues doing the CRAVE podcast, happily chirping about the Zune or watch him do another of his gadget reviews like he was born to do them. I expected......

I never knew him personally, but it felt like i did. How could someone so charming, a father so dedicated, someone who would do anything to keep his family alive while he searched for help, someone who could keep his cool anytime, someone who's smile could make anyone's day, someone so soft-spoken.....
We can look up now, and be reminded that someone so perfect lived. You may not be with us anymore, but you were once among us. That makes the thought of still being here while you're far away in paradise more bearable. You were here.....you left a mark amazingly indelible. You lived. And now, your daughters will continue to do so knowing a person like you were their father. Rest in peace, James Kim. You will be sorely missed.

I do not want to proof read the post. You may see his work at CNet, or read similar articles at CNet News. Alternatively visit Veronica Belmont, Tom Merritt and Molly Wood's blogs to see what his colleagues think of him. Also, go to James And Kati that was made pleading for help from people in the search for them, it's a memoriam now.

Also, in the Asian Games held in Doha, Qatar, Korean Kim Hyung-chil died immediately after being crushed by his horse that failed to clear a hurdle and went flipping to the dirt during an Equestrian event. Imagine yourself being that brave man's parents. Watching your proud son competing in a world event on tv and having to witness the horrific incident live. Unbearable. Rest in peace.

Tangent Universe!!!

Am i updating enough?
Wait, Jason told me to blog about my birthday and i am going to do just that. I hope it is not too disappointing to read that i got neither a navel piercing nor drunk. I got something even more incredible! I got sick. It was an eventful 21st birthday indeed. I laid in bed the entire day, getting up for bathroom intervals and playing games on my DS. I had been sneezing my brain out the day before and i expected myself to fall sick the next day. If that was not enough, i went dancing in the rain with my brother because i needed to pick up my formal attire for my tuesday business plan presentation from my cousin in KL. I skipped school the next day because i woke up feeling like i did not sleep.
My DS Lite was paid for by my dad. He told me that when i was unboxing and my heart skipped so many beats i should have died but thought it would be very rude of me die and not thank him properly so i came around and did. Then i filmed my unboxing to tease my brother left alone in KL and let him watch during dinner, all the while giggling and had noodles slither back out from his rabbit-tooth mouth. Slurp. So, thank you again, dad!
The results for my previous trimester came out on the day i skipped school to stay in bed. Apparently, people cried when they got theirs. I was only allowed to receive mine on a Saturday because i missed the session, so i was in school for the rest of the week amongst glum faces. I finally got mine on the second session and thought i do not deserve the results i received. Some should have been better. Read "should have" not "could have". Lecturer-student-grudge. I love glutinous rice.
A couple of weeks, or months, ago, i joined a book review competition after much begging from my english lecturer. I realised later i was shortlisted and attended an interview. When they say interview, you know it would be an interrogation instead. They were eliminating plagiarisers. I was drilled pretty thoroughly. I was very annoyed when they thought i bought my book the day before the interview. They thought the book looked new and asked if i just bought it for the interview. I answered dryly that i love my books. I was not keen on winning at all. At the same time, i do not want to lose. I was about to blog about it when they failed to contact me to inform me if i was among the final 10 shortlisted for a prize after a month. Until, the day after my birthday that i got a call from the Extra-Mural Studies Department informing me about the prize-giving ceremony on the 27th of November (tomorrow). I asked if i was receiving a consolation prize but she told me that i was among the top-10 prize winners. I asked her again if it was a consolation and she said "You are in the top-10." and giggled. Let's see how it turns out tomorrow.
There's a charity walk for Breast Cancer Awareness. Check your newspapers. If you are going to buy a Product(RED) iPod Nano or any Product(RED) product..............at all, save it and donate to an AIDS Awareness in Africa Fund instead!
I write like crap, therefore i should stop.

Update

Here's an update before the month ends. Before the Breast Cancer Awareness Month ends. I found a wonderful site called Keep A Breast Foundation containing ample information on the condition. On it includes an auction to raise money for the foundation, but had just ended. Take a look....

Audrey Kawasaki had this on her blog a while ago and i saw it again on Drawn! So, i think i should put it up for all to watch. It's really amazing. The entire mural was done and redone in a one week span, all of them breathtaking.




Autistic people always amaze me. Here's one on Stephen "The Human Camera" Wiltshire who could accurately draw entire cities from memory after a single 45-minute helicopter ride - right down to the correct number of windows on each building.

Do You Have A Cause This Month?

Do you have a cause this month? It is International Breast Cancer Awareness Month...for the whole of October. I will leave this post up for the entire month in support of the awareness. And please do take the Pink Ribbon above and place it in your blogs as well. Let us educate the people around us about it and how we can prevent death by early detection. You may copy and alter it however you want but please do not hotlink it, it hurts bandwith.

edit : here's a link to a pink ribbon on white background!

Alternatively, stop by at the Breast Cancer Foundation of Singapore, The American Breast Cancer Foundation and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. It's bloody annoying that i could not find a similar foundation website in Malaysia. Either i did not search well enough but it exists or it does not at all, which is tragic at this age.

Breast cancer is unpredictable and deadly. In the words of Susan G. Komen Foundation, it knows no boundaries. It does not discriminate and kills regardless of age, race, religion, socioeconomic status or geography. More than 203,000 women is diagnosed in the United States alone this year, and 40,000 will die. Let us help to reduce this number and make a difference in the lives of the women behind the numbers.

Please spread the word and donate if you are able to at the respective foundations. Help out at local hospitals. Provide psychological support to those suffering. You can make a world of difference, ....and this is sounding like one of those forwarded mails.

If you happen to be at this blog, spread the message. At least do what you can this month..... but it will remain a lifelong struggle. Play a part......

Will be back soon, and i just ordered my Nintendo DS Lite....WOOT!

Weeeeeeeee

Audrey Kawasaki had a show with assorted artists the other day at Thinkspace. I still think her works are divine, and James Jean's too. And Kenichi Hoshine and Tsutomu Nihei. This is the 3rd batch of SourHarvest's Harvest shows. The earlier shows were lovely too. Head over here for photos of the show. Many more here, here and here. But you could just drop over at Audrey's official site or her blog here.

Then there was a write up on the show on the LA Times and reading it made me tingle.

"It's hard to put a moniker on the nascent Los Angeles art scene that is being fueled by an influx of young artists who show their works at galleries and warehouse parties alike"

I don't think i've mentioned my take on how you choose what you want to do this life and what your decisions were during your previous one. Of course, i have never really believed in reincarnations and I just make things up to justify certain actions. I'll leave that for another time.

Calculus paper just ended and i would be lucky to not fail it. Let's see what happens. But honestly, even if the results do come out bad, i don't think that justifies what i have done for it. It's out of my control now.

Running Back

Was back for a couple of days. Having my 5-day study break, and i'm hardly making any progress. I did read a few chapters of Ecology and Biodiversity and slacked off most of the time. ("-_- ) I don't reckon i would do as well as i did last semester. But anyways, time's doing a sprint event on me. Good thing is my exams could be over before i know it and my trimester break begins. And then it would be over as soon as it starts.

The sky was pretty like that for one moment....

....and turned into this the next

It was wet...

...very wet & cold

Perfect time for piping hot coffee...

...with barbequed pork buns...

...especially when it oozes out like that

Made myself pancake for breakfast the next day. It was another cold and damp day...

...anytime is a good time for pancakes.

Weekend

Back for the weekend..... Took some super grainy photos of breakfast with my camera phone, because the camera was nowhere to be found.

Had Japanese omelette with nori sprinkled on top. Had black coffee too! The photo looks like a crumpled Ringgit note.


Green apple and orange smoothie.


And a couple of weeks ago, i broke this mug. It didn't seem too happy with me.

Pretty hectic couple of weeks. By the way, i actually scored an aggregate grade of 4.0 last semester. Shocking...! Now i'm going to reward myself. This looks good. Could be getting one this month. Nothing much to write...my head is blank with all the sneezing. Drawn! has a really good line up this week. Check out Kenichi Hoshine. Gotta catch the England-Portugal match soon. Later.

The Monty Hall Problem

I am back in Kuala Lumpur again. Pfah! Went to KLCC with my mom and brother yesterday and sampled more than enough fragrances to cause severe nose-block. Dad's birthday is coming up and besides taking him out to dinner, we decided to get him the Calvin Klein Eternity for men too. Mom wanted to get him something from Gucci, but it smelled more pungent than an insect repellant. My brother thought the same thing too. Ran into Kino before it closed. Brother wanted to get the new BLAME! manga and i hung out at the usual Selected Titles section. I should control myself everytime i happen to be in Times Square or KLCC. I just need to take a look in Borders and Kino and end up buying something. It was the same last night. Bought The Curious Incident Of The Dog In The Night-Time by Mark Haddon. 1/3 into it already and it's really good. I kind of like The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards too. Ehem.... I definitely wouldn't mind getting it as a gift...?

Christopher Boone is a genius with autism. Sounds ironic, does it not? Anyways, he explained the Monty Hall Problem. Imagine this:

You are on a game show on television. On this game show, the idea is to win a car as a prize. The game show host shows you three doors. He says that there is a car behind one of the doors and there are goats behind the other two doors. He asks you to pick a door. You pick a door but the door is not opened. Then the game show hosts opens one of the doors you didn't pick to show a goat (because he knows what is behind the doors). Then he says you have one final chance to change your mind before the doors are opened and you get the car or a goat. So he asks you if you want to change your mind and pick the other unopened door instead. What should you do?

What would you do? Should you change your decision or stick to it? If you decide that your chances are 50:50, you are wrong. Instead, if you decide to change your decision and pick the other door, your chances of winning the car is 2 out of 3. That's 66.6667% compared to 50%. Sounds weird? Try to figure it out. The solution is very easy.

Let's Begin

I think i'll start blogging again. I'll continue to fix the template when i feel like doing it. At the moment, this will have to do. It looks pretty.

I have decided to not archive my entries from my previous blog and just let the past be. There are entries i would very much love to archive. But let's see if i actually come to doing that. Meet the greatest procrastinator of this century.

Here, i will not be talking about my daily life (i might end up doing that, but i will try to avoid), or coin my 2 cents' worth on anything at all. This will be a place for me to post links to great art sites, post photos of pre consumed food (this being one of my passions, eating!), posts of my sketchbook pages (if i am not too lazy to scan them) and updates from Gizmodo and Gamespot.

With all that said, nothing might happen. This site might just stay stagnant and be forgotten like my previous one. We'll see. For now, let's just celebrate a new beginning. The World Cup is soon, and let us all cheer for South Korea and Japan! It would be nice to see England win it though, but i want to see Brazil win it too.

More posts to come, if i am not too lazy............

Testing This Out

It has to be georgia after all, doesn't it? Testing this out. If this works, i'll complete the rest of this odd looking template. Keeping fingers crossed........voila?