Unleash the power!

Little cartoon is from Applegeeks. It's basically been the main thought in my head these holidays, swirling around. We put up with 13 years of education to do another 5 to get a piece of paper. I've been thinking, why AM I doing this? I think about Darren who, besides loving his anime and has a HUGE amount of it, went for an apprenticeship after year 10 and is now working, while I'm still in school...I can't help but think of the incredible advantages he has over me. Sure there are disadvantages in the long term, but I really wonder whether I really want to go to Uni. There doesn't seem to be a course that really interests me. Sure, health and engineering all pique my interest, but I don't feel really connected to them. Maybe a little time will change my views.

So I've been crawling through work and study and the main thing one my mind is the English Advance oral. Why can't it be called a speech assessment? Oral can be used in the wrong context. Anyway, I've been throwing up mainly between Antony and Caesar. They are two of the three most obvious choices, and the two that I have the best chance to acting out solidly. Still the paper doesn't say who the characters are limited to. I had a brief idea that I would be one of those anonymous messengers or one of those minor characters in the beginning, like Philo. I'm leaning towards Antony on this one, but haven't really thought up of a speech. I want to use the quote I'm still Antony yet! in there somewhere, and make Antony like some emo mofo railling at Caesar, at Cleopatra and at himself for being such a weak-ass loser. Hmmmm, I may be on to something here.

On an entirely different note, year 12 concert is coming up and with my memories of the previous year 12 concerts being really good, more or less anyway, I've been trying to come up with some ideas. Haven't got anything substantial yet. Damn creative block. Although the little comic on to does raise some vague idea about students unleashing the power of their degrees to become like actual personifications of the degree. A person with a Physics degree could start manipulating or violating the laws of physics. Of course, it kinda smacks with the god-awful 2Unit skit in the Talent Quest. Well, not god-awful, just weird. And sucky. And...yeah...awful. So I can't sing, not very well anyway, so if anyone out there are thinking of a couple of skits, I'm more than happy to join. As long as it's not too stupid. Stupid is fine. But there's a line, just so you know.

Finally, I've noticed that whenever there is something on, yr12 concert or talent quest, the hosts always crack some jokes, some more lame than others. This year instead of jokes we could have lines out of stand-up comedy routines, even the ones we think up ourselves. For ideas, go Youtube, and search up Mitch Hedburg. He's so damn funny, and since his jokes are mostly one-liners they work perfectly. There's Dat Phan, a Viet comedian and considering how a sizeable amount of the school population is Asian, some of the lines will go down great. No Russel Peters. I think everyone has basically seen that. And dammit no Dave Chappelle. You can only say I'm Rick James, bitch! so many times before it gets lame. Lame, people!

And now a blast from the past. Who remembers The Adventures of Milo and Otis? 1 point for remembering and 2 points for liking it. I have discovered an old VHS copy and am now trying to transfer to my computer. Or maybe there's a torrent somewhere out there....

The Lack-of-Talent Quest

The Talent Quest has generally dropped in quality as time passes. That's not to say that there were good acts, it just becomes harder to find that gem of an act. Anyway, I've finally seen what the 2-Unit thing was all about. It was kind of embarrassing the whole act, although I do have to give them credit for having the guts to do a weird-ass skit.

In terms of pure eye-candy, the short-shorts group, Supercool Cheesy Ninjas(?) , easily won that one. I think Charles said it best, "If only all the acts were like that, then I could watch the Talent Quest for hours." This is one of the rare occassions that I wholeheartedly agree with him.

Now Rock'n'roll Man was definately an act. He spent most of the time screaming inaudible words, but he definately had what many acts lacked, energy and passion. Him standing there, screaming his lungs out, whacking his tambourine and slamming in a bit of piano, was awesome and outstanding. He was probably the most enthusiastic act ever.

Helen's and Land's was cool. Round of applause to them for getting out there and representing the year 12s in the Talent Quest. Great work!

Holidays...holidays...holidays...just say that a couple of times. It may be a study break, filled with work, but remember to have some fun people. And let's get some ideas for year 12 concert.

The Lackhouse

There was a time where I went through a kind of phase. I started to watch Korean movies, for some inexplicable reason. Still, it was an enjoyable phase. One of the movies that I really liked was "Il Mare", about this guy and girl who live 2 years apart and fall in love with each other, communicating through the use of a letterbox. "The Lakehouse" is basically the American version, posted above, with Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves. Could this be a movie where Reeves doesn't suck? Quite possibly.

The fact that "Il Mare" was a romance is a bit strange. They don't really work for me. I usually tune out, if I'm forced to watch. But "Il Mare" kept me watching, so I probably started going soft then. The trailer certainly looks good, and I'm definately going to watch this.

By the way, the trailer music is "Somewhere Only We Know" by Keane.

Feverish

So the end of another week. Another week to go and school ends, and the two-week holidays begin. Just had my 3U test and I severly regret watching the match between Australia and Croatia. I felt sleepy and muddled and during the test, I got stuck with some relatively easy questions. I hoping for a pass here. Damn World Cup! Why must it be on now? At least the World Cup final is during the holidays. I don't think it will interupt things.

Of course, the match was spectacular and nerve-wracking, even in the final minutes. The referee was alright, but near the end, he didn't seem to be in control and his whistling to signal the end of the match was so unclear, I thought it was going to be a penalty kick. It would have been nice if Australia got the goal and won the match, but this thing a draw was enough. There is this one thing. Hiddink was impassive as a rock. He kept standing there, leaning against the dugout and his emotion was only really visible when Australia scored a goal. He mainly pumped his fist. The Croatian coach, Zlatko Kranjcar kept leaping onto his assistant coach, in a move my brother tentatively called "riding-the-cock."
Comments anybody? Thoughts are welcome.

Schoolpolitik

I like going to school. The mix of people of different races, genders, backgrounds, intelligence and morality makes interesting events and are absolutely fun to watch. Now apparently, Serena told Jack she didn't like Manno very much. Fair enough, we like some teachers more than others. Then Jack went off and told Manno what Serena thought of her. So, Serena was not happy. That's probably a bit understated. In English adv, Serena started going off at Jack for revealing her personal thoughts. Jack was defending himself saying it wasn't a big deal. Serena called him gay and Jack countered saying Serena discussed stuff about him with David. By the time, they calmed down I was laughing, though I hope I hid it well enough. Serena started throwing dirty looks at Jack. Jack just laughed it off. Now I hope this happens more often so I can have a laugh like this. It's probably bad of me to laugh at people's arguments, but it was funny and definately made my day, despite the hammering rain.

There were a whole bunch of essay questions we were going to have to write up, but it was located on the school computers. No one wanted to go on the school computers to get it. Too much hassle. And 10 cents printing per page. So we choose Jack to copy the questions and post it on his blog. I think this is the first time anything education-related is going to be blog posted. We've sent emails, MSN transfers, scans of prac results, but this is going to be cool. In a way.

Land was away to day. Which is strange, as she usually shows up to school, often late. Very dedicated and enthusiastic. So I'm thinking she's sick. Must be one hell of a cold. Charles was late yesterday, but he had to help translate for his mother's blood test. Must be one hell of a blood test.

Superhero

As I was browsing the net, procrastinating rather than doing my English related text analysis, I stumbled upon a website that generates a superhero identity from your name. It's humour based but a lot of fun.
Link is here.
Here's what I got:

Your Superhero Identity Is:

Name: Duke Lad

Secret Identity: Steven Nguyen

Special Power: Flight

Transportation: Wonder Horse

Weapon: Electron Lasso

Costume: Lead Gauntlets

Sidekick: Mary Anne

Nemesis: Melvin the Yodeller

Tragic Flaw: Fear of flying

Favorite Food: Twinkies

The Last Detective

If there ever was a show that I regretted missing the first ten minutes of, its The Last Detective. New series that started showing tonight on ABC. It follows Detective Constable "Dangerous Davies".

Davies is a low-ranked CID officer in the London borough of Williesden. He is nicknamed Dangerous ironically because he is the member of the department least likely to get into a dangerous situation. In the novels and TV series he is called The Last Detective from his superior's assessment of him as the last detective you'd ever send out on a case. Despite this, Davies is by no means a poor detective, and although he can take longer than his colleagues, and is dogged by bad luck, he does usually get his man in the end.
from Wikipedia

tThis is a series that I definately don't want to miss. Peter Davison (who played the fifth Doctor in Doctor Who) is absolutely amazing as Davies as the nice guy trying to do his job. He's in the middle of a divorce, considered useless by fellow colleagues and unlucky in love. He is the physical embodiment that nice guys come last, well, most of the time. Instead of being a gruesome police drama, with blood, gore and angry characters, The Last Detective is slower, more subtle. The solution doesn't come straight away, but fits nicely into the overall plot. The DVD for series one is out on Amazon.com, but no word on series two and three.

Screw liquid nitrogen, I have to get all these episodes taped. Now I'm pissed that I missed the first ten minutes of the opening episode. Hopefully, they'll do an encore or repeat.

Push the fader, gifted animator...

So, the last athletics carnival I'll hopefully ever have to attend is over. It was pretty good anyway, but despite the fun I had, I couldn't help but think I'd rather have an ordinary school day.

So the day started at 7:30am, waking up, shower, brushing teeth, breakfast, and so on. Prefects were probably already at Jensen Oval setting up. Well, sucks to be them. By the time I got to Jensen Oval, the sky was blue and the sun beginning to shine feebly at the horizon. The name marking was slightly better organised this time round. I spent the first couple of minutes wandering aimlessly because I missed the first announcements and didn't know where to go. There were no 18-years this year for some reason...so I had to join the 17 years. 100m sprints were up first, and probably the only event that I can do decently. I came first in 13.75 seconds, but since it was a non-serious attempt, I didn't move into the heats or finals. Just as well anyway, as the finals had some serious racers.

I drifted from event to event, participating in some, sitting out in others. Damien had brought his PSP and loaded some tennis game into it. So I could safely say that most of the morning and afternoon were well spent on trying to beat Federer on Hard mode. Lunch came and of course that meant the sausage sizzle. Honestly, I didn't buy any, for two reasons. I had my own lunch and the food was a rip. I mean, the buns were bought from some Viet bakery at what, 20, 30 cents per bun. And they were flogging them for $3. Still, thumbs up for the perfects for such a business venture.

Most of lunch was spent playing soccer. The field was small, there were no outs and only goal kicks. It was quite a challenge as Yehson, Khoa, Ji Bin, Ray D and Paul N formed the core of the opposing team. Still our team, with me, Dexter, Andy, TJ, Ru Yang and Hao managed to pull off a 4-2 win. The day ended with the finals for 100m sprints. Richard did badly, but at least he didn't come last. Strangly, Jessica N was in the finals but didn't appear at the end. I wonder, whether she screwed up her start to badly to even consider even finishing. Still, it was some fun.

I spent most of today busy. Routine blood test in morning, then haircut, lunch with aunt, then off to ARC to buy a new graphics card. Throughout the day, I was listening to the radio and this song would come up. I love that song, but I never got its title or artist. I managed to track it down anyway. Dani California by the Redi Hot Chili Peppers. It's a great little track.

Curse you, quantum flux!

You know those days where everything seems to go wrong and it feels like the whole world is against you? I had one of those days yesterday and like half of those days today. It's one of those days where religion is nice, at least you can say God (or gods and/or goddesses) have a plan for you and you can blame them for it. It would take a pretty brave and committed atheist to say "damn-you-random-quantum-fluctuations-of-space-time-continuum!!!". To be honest, I don't know anyone who says that at all.

Anyway, long story short, my computer decided to die, resurrect itself and then die again. Repeatedly. The video card has been making a loud whining sound for some time now and yesterday the computer decided to freeze, switch the monitor off and die, or, well, go into a coma. It's fustrating when you're trying to do something and the computer goes comatose. I've given it a few whacks but it dies without "percussive maintenance" anyway.

Doctor Who season 2 is out! Actually it's been out since April, but I keep forgetting. That is this is the newest series of Doctor Who, restarted in 2005 and now continuing in 2006. Look it up in Wikipedia, if you're missing out. It's one of the best things to come out of British popular culture. Besides Monty Python and other comedies [I want my Sketch Show!]

Funny. I've just remembered. Serena was saying that science was crap in maths. Within 15 mins or so, she started going how science rules. Yes, we're made of atoms, which are possibly reused. Look on the bright side though, it only took like 2-3 years to sink in how science is cool.

Now to set the timer recording on our new DVD recorder. My mum and dad bought it in a kind of spur of the moment thing. I actually kind have wished that they did some research before deciding just to buy whatever of the shelf.

Later, readers. World Cup Fever! Why does the World Cup have be on now? I'll never get any homework done....

Ever been integrated?

Yipee! 2U Maths test is over! It was much easier than I feared, though I'm sure I'll get a couple of questions wrong. Still, I'm quietly confident that I'm going to do well. I did some serious studying and asked serious questions.

Now the 3U exam is up next and its definately going to be tougher to score better marks. A lot of the 4U people will ace this and I'm not terribly confident about getting decent marks.

English analysis on related text for powerplay is due tomorrow. I reckon I should get started soon. I always estimate like 2 hours to do it, but procrastination rears its ugly head and I usually end up taking 3 to 4 hours.

So long weekend coming up. Can't wait.

FIFA WORLD CUP MONDAY 12th JUNE!

Friendly Fired

It's been a while hasn't it folks? The days are getting harder, with more work to be done and assignments to hand in. But, it will be all good in the end. Two main events to be noted today.

Reports. Now I got a fairly decent report, but my brother got a really crap one. I won't go into exact numbers, but the marks for all subjects were below average and under 50%. This report could possibly attributed to the obscene amount of time he spends playing games. Obviously, he's been more stringently banned from playing, but I've been caught in the web as well, even though I play less hours and have a better report. So that throws I few things out of whack, but I think I'm alright with it. It could have been worse.

Next up, the Physics excursion to the University of Sydney. We took the train to Redfern and spent most of our time doing the crosswords and listening to music. The walk was short and the uni was HUGE. We spent quite a bit of time to get to where we were supposed to go. The classes was divided into two group and we did the same things but in a different order. I got stuck in Fearnside's group. We attended the lecture first. It went for an hour or so and was on binary and variable stars, and how they are used in astronomy. It was quite interesting, but became a bit boring during the middle part. Still, the end was quite fascinating with several exotic types of binary stars and these cool animations.

We then had a two hour break. Eating was going to be on the agenda, but firstly we visited the Macleay Musuem of Natural History. It was an interesting collection of stuff, ranging from beetles to butterflies to Aboriginal instruments. If you ever visit USyd, a quick visit to Macleay should be on your agenda. We had lunch at the Manning Bar. Well not actually at the bar, because they were serving alcoholic drinks, so we were stuck on the two lower levels. They had a bunch of decent food, but it was expensive and a rip as far as we were concerned. Charles bought these sandwiches with beef, lettuce and stuff and it was immensely satisfying to the stomach, but a pain in the hip pocket at $4. The Uni has a whole bunch of activities going on as part of Life Week, some excuse to do silly stuff. One little diversion was to throw a rubber chicken up 2-3 metres into a crate. If you did get it in, then you were in the running to win an iPod shuffle. Several Seftoners tried, but none were successful. Also there were a whole bunch of stress balls in the image of cricket balls beening given away for free. Land and Phuong were the first to strike, and quickly set off a chain reaction of Seftoners running to get some free stuff.

After all this fun, and suitably refilled and refreshed, when went back again to the School of Physics to attend some lab work sessions. Just before entering, we were told that they weren't ready for us yet, so we had some fun on the nearby oval. Most people were throwing the stress balls, but a whole bunch of us started to play shuttlecock, drawing a few stares from the Uni students.

The lab work was quite cool. It was basically what we had done in class, but with much superior equipment, that a University can afford. We didn't finish all of the activities as we were pressed for time, but we did managed to do the superconducting one, and our 2nd year students-guides were joking around with the liquid nitrogen. Liquid nitrogen is so cool. They had their own supply in a giant tower outside. Man, I gotta get liquid nitrogen. My greatest disappointment was that I didn't bring a thermos flask to leech some liquid nitrogen.

Still it was great fun. On the way back to Sefton, a whole bunch of people had early leavers. Still 23 people were supposed to be back on Sefton station and there were only 12 students. Hmmm, looks like some people just decided to leave. Don't know whether Fearnside will follow it up though. Nah, probably not...

Laughter in Physics

Scene : In a physics classroom. Several students are huddled around a book, gathering answers for physics questions.

Phuong : Determine the velocity of Uranus...

Charles : ...and the momentum of gas ejected...

(laughter)

End scene

This actually happened. Hilarious.

Ideally Speaking of course...

All this english adv homework caught up with me last night and I couldn't blog yesterday as I had planned. This is important following a revelation in Biology. Microwaving food with gladwrap still on can cause demasculation. Armitage revealed that apparently glad wrap has a chemical that is similar to estrogen, the female hormone. So microwaving food, still wrapped in gladwrap causes this chemical to be released and into the food. So bad news for guys. Charles was like "WTF?!" as he has been doing exactly that. What was hilariously funny, but not everyone probably heard, was that Land turned around and said "This explains everything Jimmy!" Yeah it sure does.

Usually I raid the fridge to eat leftovers for breakfast, because at this moment, I just despise cereals. I don't seem to get any energy out of them. Then again, I may be buying the wrong brand of cereal. So what I usually have is chicken coujons, ham and cheese. The coujons are basically a small stick of chicken with crumbly stuff on the outside. Ham is like the ham between sandwiches and cheese...is cheese. Maybe a weird combo for breakfast, but it gets me through the morning without much cooking.

I was going to stay back and do some work in the library, you know, make us of my study period. Instead, I left early to pick up a ball that had gone over the otherside, whilst playing cricket. So I waltzed back to the school, changed my mind and continued to the corner shop to buy a Coke and a hamburger for lunch. That was a good decision.

Can't wait til the weekends. I'm beginning to feel dead tired.

It's now the Witching Hour

To procrastinate while I'm supposed to be doing work, and thanks to the high-speed nature of broadband, I browse a few webcomics. It's quick and usually hilarious. Well, I was recently reading a comic called Questionable Content, and the author/artist is a bit of a music junkie. He has a recommended list of music albums. One of these was an album called Witching Hour by a band called Ladytron. Here is his description:

If Ellen Allien's amazing Berlinette is the sonic equivalent of a sexy German assasin-cyborg, Witching Hour is the equivalent of an aloof, ironic (and sexy) London murder-droid. Gritty like damaged data, aloof like a girl too hot to associate with the likes of mortal man, melancholy like fog at night. Excellent electro-sex neu-wave rock sneering. Okay I'll stop now, this is getting pretentious.

So seeing that I haven't really updated my music collection, I got my hands on this little album and it turns out that its not to bad at all. It's kind of like electronic meets rock. It's a little weird, but I like it.

Year 11s on camp tomorrow. So we'll have plenty of space at school.

Rushing through chemistry practicals and doing some biology homework. I'll probably wake up early tomorrow to finish off the pracs.

Went to hockey training today, and no one was there. I was dogged. Woodbridge was a little fustrated that no one showed up. Lazy buggers. We're going to lose this year, I know it.

That's Poker, baby

Mae West: Is poker a game of chance?
W.C. Fields: Not the way I play it.

Arrgh, gotta do all this stupid stuff for careers meeting. And there is science prac. Is this careers thing necessary?

My Miracle Drug

Excursions are cool. That's a fact. But it's also true that some are cooler than others. Take this latest Biology to UNSW Muesuem of Disease. It was a great excursion. I pity the people who don't do Biology.

So we leave school and end up at UNSW with a few hours to kill. We go to this lecture hall for a physics demonstration. We were supposed to go to Randwick Children's Hospital, but they kicked us out at the last minute. Bastards. Anyway, the guy starts to demonstrate these little experiments, playing around with electricity and explaining things like voltage, current and electromagnetic induction. One cool demo was the Van der Graff generator, which generates static electricity. If a person with long hair stands on an insulated block and touches the generator, their hair starts to rise. So the guy asks for a volunteer with long hair to touch the generator. Who goes up? Land, obviously. For the simple reason that she has the longest hair. This guy isn't Fearnside, so he didn't want to choose a volunteer, but we pressure Land into doing it. The demo guy kept calling Land "Meriweather". Too bad no one took a photo, because it was absolutely hilarious when Land's hair started to rise. Another really cool demo was passing an electric current through a long chain of people. I was sitting in the third row, so I missed out on getting shocked. Charles had gone through it before at some Open day and described it as "like getting a cramp every second."

The demo ended early because there was a scheduling error and uni students entered for a lecture. Anyway, it was great fun. As usual, it wouldn't be a proper science demo without liquid nitrogen entering the mix. I got to find out how to get some. Liquid nitrogen is just so cool.

After that, we head to the cafeteria for lunch. I say cafeteria, but it was really a food court, with sections selling different types of food; Chinese, fish and ships, sushi, just to name a few. Most of us finished lunch quickly and headed to the UNSW bookshop. What was it like? Heaven. The sheer amount of books on interesting subjects was staggering and I just wanted to pick up a bunch of books and buy them. But they were hella expensive, price ranged from a mere $8 up to $120. Since the good ones were beyond my budget of $20, I had to pass. Land an Kathy discovered a little gem called "Why Do Men have nipples?" which answered a heap of questions in a hilarious manner, including the title question. Land initially didn't want to buy it. It wasn't an issue with the money. both Kathy and I offered to lend money, but Land was more concerned about the actual buying process. A girl buying a book called "Why do men have nipples?" disturbed her. But she bought it anyway, using Kathy as a proxy. They were chuckling on the bus all the way back.

The actual Museum of Disease was very interesting, and had not only actual preserved examples of disease. but also a digital collection of photos, some more disturbing than others. There was a very gruesome picture of a spine that had compressed too much, and it was from the point of view of a surgeon. It had a lot of red flesh and the spine standing out clearly. Some stomachs were turned, but during our free time, Yang, Khoa and Yehson started to search for imades of diseased testes and penises. The results were...intense. That's all I can really say. We spent the rest of the afternoon filling out a worksheet and looking at real specimens, a kidney that had a tumour, the black lungs of a coal miner, and a gall stone the size of an avocado seed.

This excursion had a strong root in medicine, and while I've always been squeamish with the sort of detail and gross things that you'll see in a career in health, I couldn't help but be absolutely fascinated with everthing. Its playing a torturous game in my head about my future carreer. Anyway, a fascinating little trip worth every damn minute.

Heaven Knows What...

Just came back from tutoring. This guy was doing planning on doing Chem but after choosing it, decided to drop it and choose Art. My tutor's reaction was priceless. But why art? He's a very decent maths and science guy, why the change of art? When the lesson ended, he made a quick exit, so I couldn't ask him.

And Koreans singers on Paris By Night?!? I come home and my dad is watching it, not that enthused since it's Korean. But I guess that after 80 something PBN events, what else are you going to do?

Whiplashed

Arrgh, was it just me but I could not physically stay awake? All those days of waking up late, and now having to wake up early to catch the bus put a dent in me. I felt like I was punched in the face, and then kicked in the face for good measure. Ironically, I woke up to U2's Beautiful Day. It was a beautiful day alright, but the spirit and the body weren't willing to appreciate it.

I guess the only reason I managed to maintain some semblance of consciousness was the fear the Fearnside who ask me something and I would be dead asleep. Maths was probably the worst though. I asked Gough if there was any work due, and he responded in the affirmative, with 5 pracs and 5th dot point summaries. The dot spoint summaries I couldn't care about. But 5 pracs?!?! So I did what I could and copied done the main points of the pracs, totally ignoring what Sharp was talking about. So by the end of the lesson I scratched down some notes on the board and then determined to hand the Chem pracs tomorrow.

It turns out that there were no pracs due today, only the dot point summaries, which are due tomorrow. I was seriously pissed off at Gough for scaring the crap outta me. Still, no pracs are due until at least Monday next week, so I've still got time. What I'm worried about is Bio pracs. Charles has indicated that they are due tomorrow, but Albert and Land didn't confirm (A & L have finished it though). So bio pracs will take an hour or two, with the dot-point summaries taking maybe an hour. So, back to business people!

Doctors and Concierges

TV is such a powerful medium. You watch shows, or commercials, and you can be inspired, good or bad. Seeing as the HSC is coming, and we will be entering Uni to study for our careers, it begs the question, what do you want to be?

I have been see-sawing for quite some time. When I read Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time the ideas and concepts were way beyond me (I was 13 when I first read it) and even now I can only get ~90% of what's going on. So at that time, I really wanted to be an astrophysicist. Study the workings of the universe, theorise a few hypothesises and maybe discover something that puts me on the map, like Einstein. Then I kind of fell out with the astrophysicist idea. It felt boring. That just propelled me onto another track.

Enter House. The drama of the rascally Doctor House hit a nerve. He was like a modern day Sherlock Holmes, and the way he solved his cases with logic really intrigued me. His views and often rude way he solved his cases were hilarious. And for a time, I wanted to be a diagnostician. Like astrophysics, it was a logic thing, but potentially more exciting, if you could call it like that. Life and death in the balance. It comes down to a split-second decision, with the patient's life in your hands. But medical school is something completely different. Just check here. And the blood and gore turn me off. Still, after rewatching season one, I'm not sure. It still intrigues me.

And, not amazingly, another TV show has caught my attention. I'm talking about Hotel Babylon. I', probably not up for the job of manager, but a concierge is mysteriously exciting. Setting up deals, scams to get more money and sourcing everything a discreet guest may require. Hmmm, I'm thinking about that too.

Still Hotel Babylon is still a bit away from the middle of the series, but does it look good? Oh yeah, it does. So now I waiting whether another TV series can offer me another job idea.

Whip it up

Only 11 guys at cricket. The year 12s..I mean...Uni dudes were off at Uni, so we couldn't have a team-vs-team match. So instead we decided that the winners would be the team that got the highest partnership of 8 overs ie 48 balls. Richard and Charles were the winning team, getting 68. Lesley and I managed 42, which was quite respectable. I took first hit of the day. Alwin bowled a speedy ball and it hit just under my kneecap. It hurt.

The drive to KFC for lunch was cool. Bill and Kevin both brought their cars. It was uncomfortable in Kevin's car. Michael, me, Richard and Harry were crammed in the back seat. Considering that both Michael and I are big people, it was squashed. Still the turns hurt Richard and Harry more than me and Michael.

By the time we got back it was too hot to play anything and we were too full anyway.We mucked around a bit, playing in the nets, a bit of soccer, this and that. But the coolest activity was our mini-golf. The objective was to use the cricket bats to hit tennis balls to hit a water bottle in the least number of shots. I know Kevin tooks some shots and record a short video. It was funny, with Alwin ending up as the undisputed champion, navigating the hastily laid-down obstacles to beat several challengers in a row.

Great fun all around. Maybe another time.

Tone it down

Pardon the long abscence. Half-yearlys, of course. I think I might be doing well this time. Except for 3-unit maths. I probably didn't do that well.

So a 3-week holiday. Not sure what I'm going to do. Maybe some revision , but I don't plan on all-out study. My room is a sheer mess, with books, papers and stuff all over the place. I'm always grumbling about the mess, but I don't really have the spirit or willpower to clean it up. It can wait.

Cricket tomorrow. Nothing better than a little sport to get rid of all that stress. And the exercise and fresh air won't hurt me either.

Confessions of an ex-Drama Student

I look at my timetable. Maths 3U, English Adv, Physics, Chemistry and Biology. All these subjects are interesting. I mean, I really like Physics and Chemistry, although Chem could be way better. But there are times when doing the "full science" can get to be a bit of a grind, especially when exams pop up. So I think to myself, haven't I done any subject that was fun? Computer Studies was a bludge. Sit down, turn on computer, zone out. But there is a subject that I enjoyed. Drama. It was fun, I met people whom I would never have met and could act without worrying about other people laughing at me. The drama classes were pretty segregated. I knew what was going on with the other class, but we never actually meet up and talk.

Anyway, the unique aspect of my Drama class was that there was only 3 guys, me, Bill and Lesley. The "trio", although there was a nasty joke, calling us "the threesome". We usually stuck together, and in my opinion worked the best together. Although we did tended split towards the end of the first year, some of our best works were when we worked together. A favourite act of mine was when in Drama, we were learning about miming, acting withour words, and we had to put together an act. Our act basically had Bill and Lesley as theives checking out this place to steal and me as a cop/interrogater/guard. Bill and Lesley were stealing stuff then I came on. Cue some fast-paced jazz, and I was chasing after them. Lesley got away with most of the goods and I caught Bill. Then I was interrogating Bill, pointing my finger, glaring at him, acting in a pissed-off and scary manner (which incidently, was my best act, more on that later). I locked him up, then Lesley came in, tricked me into looking away and then knocked me out, stealing the keys and freeing Bill. They walk off, celebrating with a drink, until I catch them again and throw them both in jail. It was pretty good, and that would be my defining memory of Drama.

Drama exams were relatively easy, except for the first one, constructing a mini-stage. I screwed that up. But the rest were alright, and I got decent marks for most of them. Mostly, the exams would be putting on an act as a group and then receiving individual marks. Another act that I really liked was the "Warren" act. If memory serves me right, me, Bill, Lesley, Sabrina and Phuong were in that and we bascially bullied Lesley, who was "Warren", to the point of suicide. The scene that stands the most clearly, was after Bill and I had finished pummelling Lesley to the ground and Lesley cried out "Why do you do this?" and I replied "Cos it's fun!".

Another time we had to act out a scene from a play and Lesley and I chose this play called "Whose Life is it anyway?" by Brian Clark. It is about a quadraplegic, Ken Harrision whose wanted to end his life, but the hospital prevented it claiming he was depressed, and it went to court and he won. I really wish I kept a copy of the script. But as a component to this project, we had to have a poster advertising the play. This was the first time I actuallyused Photoshop and it was pretty crappy. But it worked well and is now displayed in the Drama room. I believe it's still there on the wall to the right of the entry. And...here it is:
I was the judge presiding over the case and Lesley was Ken. Originally I was going to throw in a window with some light coming in for dramatic effect, but my Photoshop skillz was, and still is, crappy. I remembered that there was nurse who pitied the guy and I threw Phuong in there for emotion. She looks likes she crying or something, but she just covered her face, because she didn't want her picture taken. I made my eye red, as I was playing around with the settings and thought it was cool.

Dammit, I miss Drama. It was so free and secretive. You could do stuff that you know wouldn't spread throughout the school. The rule was "whatever happens in the Drama room, stays in the Drama room." And there were a few funny and embarrassing moments. Near the end of the course (this was the year 9-10 electives year), we wrote our names on paper and we passed it around for people to write stuff about. I notched up as "Most scary actor", due to the amounts of time I acted angry and I could raise my voice loud enough to jolt people.

That was cool. So back to full science revision.

*sigh*

Game of the Year

Nothing more to say I think. Credit goes to SomethingAwful.com

For those who are ignorant of the Grand Theft Auto series, click here.

Garbage In, Garbage Out

So how goes life my friends? Here we are approaching the midway point of our high school life. Can you imagine it? 13 years of education are over, with say 4 years of Uni afterwards, then our jobs (or careers, if you believe that crap). So that's what? 17 years minimum of education. We would be approximately 22 years old when we enter the workforce. What dreams will we accomplish and how will we change? It only seems like yesterday that I was in the final throes of year 6 and eagerly looking forward to high school and the distan HSC. Now I'm in the death throes of high school, with the HSC becoming alarmingly tangible.

Success, failure, the future and obstacles. All these things weave in and out through my mind. Some issues rush through like a fast-flowing stream, while others are dull and sluggish. The possibilities of success and failure are beginning to haunt me.

Besides all that, there comes about thinking what are YOU going to do? What course will you study? What job do you want to aim for? Those questions are supremely hard for me to answer. I like Chemistry and Physics. I could have moderate success in the workforce, especially Chemistry. I'm interested in Biology, especially after we watched "Prescription for Survival". Medicine floats through my head, mainly du to "House". I flirt with the idea of being a diagnostician. There are always little fragments about being a teacher. But all that marking?

There are only hard paths. If only there was a shortcut. Or two.

To the limit with another crisis

So I'm fixing up my notes for the Chemistry assessment tomorrow and what happens? I find something to take my attention away from this important work. In the online game I play, there's a market, where one can buy and sell players. Naturally I wanted to make my team better, so I found a splendid player that would have cost me $50k. But this player was quite good and so a bidding war began. Now I really wanted this player and since the bid ended at around 10:30pm, I decided to throw caution into the wind and go all the way to get this player, even if it meant risking bankruptcy.

In the end, I failed. I simply did not have enough funds to compete. I know Charles has paid in excess over $150k to get a player, but I simply did not have the money. Damn it! I was so close.
Take a look at the screenshot.

So now I have to try my luck at another, slightly crapper player. And finish up organising my Chem notes.

sUPrise!

I received a pleasant suprise yesterday. No, not another car accident. My mother bought me an iPod nano. My brother wanted one, and she brought two so it would be fair. Thanks, mom!

I know some people don't really like the iPod, saying that it lacks useful or convienient features. That's probably a fair point, but I think it's popular because it's stylish and easy to use. The click-wheel makes everything so simple that I can't imagine an mp3 player without it. It stores music, files and photos very well. I had some trouble installing it and it took almost all of yesterday to get it working properly, but, well, that's in the past now. So some photos:

Let's tip the bloody thing!

So I was lying in bed, half asleep. I was trying to take a nap but not fall into a dark sleep. Anyway, I hear this massive crash and rush out to the kitchen to see what happened. It turns out that this van had tipped over onto its side. Two young Arabs jumped out of the van and bolted away. They either had stolen the van or didn't have a licence and couldn't drive properly. Cops and ambos showed up like 5 minutes later. Ambos weren't needed as there was no one heut. The fire brigade showed up later and they worked on tipping the car back over.

I didn't completely lose my mind. I whipped out the digital camera and snapped off two shots. Here they are.

Dig Deep

I have a topic test on log and exponentials tomorrow, but most of my time is taken up with physics homework. Fearnside is alright, but his homework sets require some deep thought. The pissy thing is that there is no answer for you, either in your notes or textbook. It's more like playing connect-the-dots. Like when the Bush Administration played connect-the-dots to determine Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and ended up with a jumble of lines. I spent 1 hour to answer 3 questions. And I'm not sure that they are right. Strangely, Google is no realy help. I know the result, but not the why, and the combined, collective knowledge of Google and Wikipedia were unable to explain why.

The only good thing that came from it what that I worked and concentrated like mad to find the stupid answers. I swear the house could have caught on fire, a hurricane could have hit the house outside, or the Day of Judgement could have arrived and I would have sat there tearing my hair, screaming why the hell does the photocurrent depend on light intensity and why does the electron's max kinetic energy depends on the frequency of light.

I have answers, but they are long-winded, messy and uncertain. I'm hoping that there right, if simply for the fact that I would be pissed if I went through all that work just to be wrong by one word, which screws up the entire answer, because of that one word.

*sigh*

As for the earlier failed scam, I'll be doing it again, but much safer and using lower prices. The admins fined me $190k to "even it out", so I'm down to only $123k from $359k. So I'm going to try again. Unless I fail multiple times, and if I did I'd just give up. No use looking like a damned fool.

Okay...time for round two...

Previously, I mentioned that I was bending the rules for this scam. In short, it worked, but failed. Details? Well, not too much then.

It is an online text-based simulation game. In this game, I create my main account and put a crap person up for sale. No, it's not some weird prostitution game or anything. Then I created a 2nd account to buy the person. It worked and I was a lot richer. But. There's always a but, eh? Well, I thought I got away, but in my rush to complete the scam I didn't hide myself properly, and the huge amount of money paid for such a crap player drew attention. So I sent some emails, blaming it all on my brother and his selfish ways. I explained away his 2nd account and him buying my crap player to trick me. And I notified them that he possibly attempted to create a 2nd account and for them to delete it. I didn't mention anything about the extra cash or about any possible punishment. Hopefully, they will see me as innocent and won't take action to delete my main account.

This does shatter my plans, as now my next scam is permantly put on hold as I wonder what to do. I can put a crap player up, but buying him straight away for a large sum of money draws attention. I know that they found my 2nd account as I didn't take precautions to hide it properly, but it's still possible that simply hiding won't be enough. I need to think that out more carefully. I could create two accounts and enter in a bidding war over an average player, but that's on hold until I make a decision. Main problem is that there is only a small amount of players and things take time which makes it harder to slip by. Damn, I might have to play by the rules.

Of course, one may ask why try to cheat in the first place. I think that it's natural to find a way to gain an advantage over other people, especially if the method is perceived to be easy with little risk. It all crosses our minds, but not all of us cheat simply because either we lack the means to do so, there is too much risk or it's just not practical. So I'll wait and see. At least I have an idea of what they're capable of.

A thing worth having is a thing worth cheating for.
-W.C. Fields (1880-1946)

Such a despicable time...

So here I am, it's past 11pm, and I'm making sure a little scam of mine is going to work. I assure you it's nothing illegal, merely...bending the rules a bit.

So what to do to past the time? Study? Nah. Chat on MSN? Not me. Read Wild Swans? Hell no! So instead I opened up my friends' blogs and read them. It strange in a way. To me, most of them seemed a bit like mine. A bit of personal life, what's going on and the odd rant against the world and its injustice. The others are more like cries of anguish and pain, wondering if where is light at the end of the tunnel and even if it exists at all. A different person, with less knowledge of modern school life, may be wondering if the said bloggers are considering suicide. But I know the feeling, if briefly. The feeling that you're out of control, that events control you rather than the other way around. The dark dank despair that gushes up and flickers across your vision, making things murky, making it hard to distinguish between friend and foe.

For me, I seem to have adopted a devil-may-care attitude to the future. In one sense, I'm digging my own grave unless I really start doing something to get decent marks. But I do feel less stressed, less despair. Problems come and go, and I flow with them. Obviously I try my best to avoid getting stuck in problems, but if I'm caught by the storm, then the only thing I can do, or anyone can do for that matter, is to ride out the storm and hope you remain in one piece at the end. But in a situation where time is running out, and there are dark times ahead, can I really afford to be so carefree? Possibly not.

But I really believe that a balance must be achieved in some way. To stress and despair about life is bad for your health in general. Questions are asked that cannot be answered. Going with the flow rather than paddling against the tide seems a much better alternative. Of course that's just me speaking. I hate conflict. It really gets on my nerves and gets in the way of things. That's why, to this day, I have never had a full-blown argument with my parents. I accept my fate as passively as possible. One may think that such passiveness is not such a good characteristic. One needs some fight, some mongrel, in them. To rise up when life pushes us down. Sometimes I dream of what have been if I had been a bit more assertive, a bit more aggressive and a lot less cautious.

But those days are gone. I am who I am. I cannot force myself to be someone else. So I do things my way, avoiding attention, attracting obscurity. Thank god for Wikipedia. It can be such a distracting thing against the flow and ebb of life.

Another brick on an overloaded truck

Need to get my new bus pass. The driver busted me for having the old one, but I just told him, the new passes haven't arrived until tomorrow and I still got a ride home. Must pick it up tomorrow, recess, yeah.

I stayed all of lunch and took the bus home. Right now, my mother and brother are stuck, since the car has a flat tyre. Dunno what they will do, but I'm safe at home, so there isn't much I can do except act as support. Maybe I'll get to skip tutor!?!

Science assessments are beginning to pile. That's what happens when you go full science. I'll start physics research on the weekends.

All these things to worry about. *sigh*

The Procrastinator's Creed

1. I believe that if anything is worth doing, it would have been done already.

2. I shall never move quickly, except to avoid more work or find excuses.

3. I will never rush into a job without a lifetime of consideration.

4. I shall meet all of my deadlines directly in proportion to the amount of bodily injury I could expect to receive from missing them.

5. I firmly believe that tomorrow holds the possibility for new technologies, astounding discoveries, and a reprieve from my obligations.

6. I truly believe that all deadlines are unreasonable regardless of the amount of time given.

7. I shall never forget that the probability of a miracle, though infinitesmally small, is not exactly zero.

8. If at first I don't succeed, there is always next year.

9. I shall always decide not to decide, unless of course I decide to change my mind.

10. I shall always begin, start, initiate, take the first step, and/or write the first word, when I get around to it.

11. I obey the law of inverse excuses which demands that the greater the task to be done, the more insignificant the work that must be done prior to beginning the greater task.

12. I know that the work cycle is not plan/start/finish, but is wait/plan/plan.

13. I will never put off until tomorrow, what I can forget about forever.

14. I will become a member of the ancient Order of Two-Headed Turtles (the Procrastinator's Society) if they ever get it organized.

Follow this creed and we shall become great procrastinators.

Break something

A bit late in posting this, but I needed time to cool off. Doing things when emotions race around my head has never appealed to me, and it's probably going to lead me to do something stupid later on. Just imagine. Wait...no don't.

Anger. Sheer, white-hot anger. There have been many times in my life when I have been driven to fury. Most of it came from the usual parent-child conflict. Me wanting something, only for it to be denied. But lately, another incident made me mad. It was a tiny incident, in retrospect, with some unreasonable behaviour thrown in...but, what suprised me what some angry and fustrated I felt. It took me a few days to calm down and even now I'm suprised that my anger could burn for so long on so little.

The incident started when we were playing cricket. It wasn't serious, some little fun as we had no bat and we used one of Tom's books as bat. Cheap, yes, but it was fun and brought about some hilarious moments. Then Long just stands up and starts yelling in a mix of Chinese and English, going on about this wasn't the proper place to play and he started to drag the bin around. I was suprised by his bout of unreasonable behaviour and simply put it down that he just could hack some fun around him. But at home, I just felt so angry at his actions. Not the proper place to play? I could list a littany of things that he's doing that's not proper.

Regardless, I have been reminded of other times I have been furious about something. But what stands out for me, is that I never really lashed out, never properly released my pent-up anger. I guess that's just me. I'd rather not get into emotionally-charged arguments, I seek to avoid them. If that means I have to lose the argument, so be it. Also, I never really found an outlet for my anger. I would just sit and sulk for a while, and then get on with life. Of course, this begs the question, would it be different if I had? Would life be different if I hadn't backed down? Would I be different if I was more firm? My only conclusion would be that I would be different. I would probably have ended up more ill-tempered and grouchy.

As I type this up, I've been reading Land's blog. She too states she can get angry, though to be honest I can't visualise Land being angry. Nevertheless I don't think I'll ever try to get her angry. Who know? The results could be...intimidating.

For me, my anger seems to verge to the knife's edge to action. Every time I get angry, I feel pumped up, I'm ready to do something, like punch something, anything. Instead, I force my self to sit down and get on with it. Is it some subtle influence through my life that I force myself to take a rational approach to life? Certainly, it's not healthy. Ah, such decisions and deep thoughts.

Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
-T.S. Eliot

Hmmm...upgrades.

My Doctor Who poster fell down again. I think it's just the combination of cheap tape and the heat. It's like 40 degrees Celcius outside. Dammit, why can't they make some kind of tape that keeps sticking? On the other hand, removing it would be a bitch.

Personally, I love to frame the poster, but it's a poster! You don't frame a poster, unless it's a rare one or you own a museum's worth of posters. Sticky tape was creating a huge mess. Is there an answer to my problem?

Yes! Blu-tack! I've stuck my poster back on using Blu-tack. I'm not sure what happens if the temperature decides to jump, but I think the blu-tack would be able to handle it. The only niggle is that the poster is slightly crooked. Doh! Stupid me! But I'm too lazy to fix properly. Maybe if it falls down again...which I doubt it.

The Greatest View

Whew! The third week has passed and I'm finally beginning to get into the groove. It always takes me a while to get myself fine tuned for school, though I actually don't have that long left of year 12, if you think about it.

Anyway, I came to school at 7:35am with my brother. He had to go on an excursion and I had to had in my homework to Armitage. See, I didn't do my Bio homework yesterday and it was caught in a suprise homework check. Damn! But Armitage said to bring it before 8:30am and no letter. So I read Emma for a while for going to the Science staff room at 8am. I manage to catch Armitage just stepping out of the doorway, as the excursion was actually leaving at 8-ish. So I was safe. Charles ran into Armitage in the school grounds and was pulling his book out (he hadn't done his work either) but Armitage waved him off saying he'll take Charles' word for it. Cool.

We played cricket until 8:20am. Then Charles smashed the Swingking right into the trees and it didn't fall down. Doh! Now he has to compensate me. Either $5 or another Swingking.

I had a study period for first period and spent the entire 80 minutes reading Robin Hobb's Farseer Trilogy: Assassin's Quest. Which is a really cool read. Great fantasy novel. This time I was completely absorbed into reading. I didn't take notice of anything else, except occassional glances at the clock. When it was 10:08, I jerked out of my reading trance. Which was difficult. I had to fire up my brain, making and redirecting connections to get out of "reading mode". I felt really stiff and sore, probably due to not moving while reading. I had a drink and I felt better. I usually slip into this kind of trance when reading a book, but since it had been awhile since I actually read a book (Emma doesn't count) I guess my mind and body wasn't ready for it yet. Still, it was cool book and probably helped to zone out anyway. Hmmm...gotta get Book 2.

During lunch, a year 7 kid started to play handball with us. Some girls from our year, who will remained nameless, tried to get the kid's name and/or number, depending on who they got to ask the kid. This starts the question "how big can the age gap get?" How many years difference before the love/lust starts turning pedo? 10? 15?

Lately, the song "Shakedown" by theSTART has been popping up on my playlist. It's such a cool song for me. Why is it in my head? Why can't I get it out? Is there an album? Such depth to the questions plagueing my mind.

Anyway, jump for joy as the weekends are here. Don't get killed out there.

And then...I was disappointed...

Let me say right now that this was not a planned trip, in a real sense. My parents happened to see the Wollongong New Year Festival advertised in one of the Viet papers and decided to go. They did not tell me that we were going until 1 hour of the time to leave. Needless to say, I scrambled to get some music for the trip.
Now let me say furthur, that it is nothing like the Warwick Farm New Year Festival. It is my understanding that the Warwick Farm one is kind of like an open market. You go there, buy stuff, ride the rides and have some semblance of fun. I haven't been there yet, but it sounds good. So we thought "well the Wollongong one would be same, except smaller right?" It wasn't. It was more like a concert, where people sat down and enjoyed entertainment on stage. There was a small kitchen, selling food and drinks. For the Viet readers, just think of the Wollongong Festival as a cheap Paris-by-Night wannabe and you have a good idea of what the festival was like. Anyway...

We left home at like 4pm with a couple of friends and we got to the place at around 5-ish pm. It was being held in a hall or something and it had not opened yet, so we waited outside. Since the festival didn't start until 7pm, we were the first there. I went to KFC for some food while we waited. Eventually, people started to trickle in and we followed. The festival started with dragon dancing outside. It was done competently by some Aussies from some martial arts school. Of course, some might wonder if this was culturally acceptable, but the Wollongong Vietnamese community numbers at under a thousand, at best, so it was no biggie. So we got inside, and the speakers began to introduce some important people. We even got a mention! As visitors from the Vietnamese community of Sydney, who had been here since 5pm. Woot! But the number of Sydney visitors numbered at best under 15. One dude also thought it was like a market or something and he had a backpack ready to carry his essential items as trekked around the place. Well, shit.

So with the introductions over, the students at the local Viet school sang this song, "Bé chúc Tết", but it was just really bad lip-syncing. There were some dancing pieces and karaoke singing, before there was this competition between girls wearing the Viet dress, "aó dài". They were all under 12, but the 3-7 year old category had some adorably cute girls. Wait a minute. Did I just use "adorably cute" in a sentence? Damn. Anyway, we left just as the competition ended and the judges were adding up the scores. The festival was planned to end at 11pm but it was running like 30 minutes late, so we made an early exit.

It was nothing like what I expected, but I have to admit that they definately had spirit in that festival. I spent most of the time with my brother, since we didn't know any other kids of our age. There were a bunch of teenage Viet kids, but it was hard to tell, especially the girls. It's not that they were all ugly, there were quite a few that were good-looking, but you couldn't tell whether they were 12 or 17 or 19 or married. Most of them had little kids or siblings in tow and you couldn't make the decision whether they were with the kid brothers/sisters or that they were married. Age is such a deceptive thing, especially among Viets and other Asians, I guess. I'm regularly confused as much older that I really am. That why the older men keep offering me beers.

Well, it was alright. It wasn't spectacular but it wasn't completely bad. I enjoyed it and so did the rest of my family and friends. Except my brother. He thought it was crap.

Tripping...delays to be expected

Spur of the moment travel thing. We're going to the Chinese New Year Markets in Wollongong. Shit. That's all I can say.

Deviously Shifty

So the weekends are here, and so ends the second week of year 12. It's been a bit of a slog, but, I guess it's time to really up my game if I want something decent out of it.

Funny story time! Well, depending on your views, I guess.
Thurdsay, we were playing cricket at the nets and Richard was batting. He smashed my Swingking over next door. I say next door, but it was just outside the back gates in a driveway. So the usual rule is that if you lose a ball, you pay the ball's owner $4 or get a new ball. Since this is a Swingking, that cost $10, the payment was upped to $5, nevermind the fact that I got it free from KFC. So Richard plans on waiting until school ends and to rush out to grab the ball and give it back to me, so he doesn't have to pay the fine. He's in F-block, so he really needed to haul ass to get the ball and I didn't trust him. I then realised that 4th period I had Biology in A4 and that I was much closer. So Charles and I schemed to get the ball before Richard, make him pay the money and then split in 50/50. It worked. Richard thought the ball was gone and payed up $2 and NZ$1, with the rest to come later.
Of course, Richard was notified on Friday, and he wanted the money back. I acted as if I had no idea just to rub it in and agreed to give the money back, as I didn't have the money on me.

Hopefully though, he'll forget through the weekends.

News to gamers: Halo 2 will be available ONLY on Windows Vista, Microsoft's next-gen OS that will replace XP. And that just sucks. I hope there's a way to get to work on XP. Bloody Microsoft.

Getting my fix

There's going to be a scheduled outage and I'm thinking that PST stands for Pacific Time or something in the US, so instead of checking on Google, I'm just going to make this quick post.

Vietnamese music is getting stagnant. (Or is already stagnant, depending on your view)

So many songs are about lost and/or unrequited love that it's getting kind of boring. So what do I do to bypass these crappy songs and find more songs? Benxua.com

When Vietnamese music works, it's actually pretty good, and there are a crap load of songs here. Unlike Japanese songs, which I have little or no idea of the lyrics, my Viet is just good enough to get some enjoyment out of Viet songs.

So if you're Viet or just want a taste of what Viet music is like, hop over to that website and you can stream Viet music over the net. It says to create an account but you don't need to. That's for creating playlists and forum posting.

Run to be displaced...

I went on a little trip to the city, anything to get out of doing my Chemistry practicals and other homework. My dad is planning to become a taxi driver and so my mother and I tagged along to help him do the practical course, which basically consists to driving certain routes and answering some questions. My brother stayed at home.

While doing the course, we stopped at the Rocks Market. They are held every Saturday and Sunday, starting at 10am, at a section of Georges Road (or street?) near the Harbour Bridge.
I bought this little statue made out of wires. Its a cool looking killer robot, pulling out a massive sword. It was like $55, but we got it for $50. The seller was an Asian, so he probably thought we haggled too much, we would eventually leave. My parents also bought a tea pot set, with 4 cups. Around $48 for that.

I also finally managed to put up my Dalek poster. I bought it at MovieWorld but I haven't put it up till now. It's so cool. On another note, we had KFC for my dad's birthday and I convinced my mother to buy the Backyard Bucket, just so I could get the free Swingking. The food's alright, but KFC loses points for no coleslaw or potato and gravy.

Poster of a Dalek from the new series of Doctor Who.

Swingking on the left, with statue on right.

Clocks...Cheese...Public Transport...the Swiss way

I really like public transport, when it works of course. I can grab a train, fling myself to various parts of NSW and not be bothered about stopping for pedestrians. And then the buses can get me with spitting distance of EXACTLY where I need to be. Of course, this is when it works.

But when it doesn't...it's horrible. Trains are "delayed" by hours and buses become so slow. Slower than Lesley's dad's driving. And he is slow.

On the odd occasion that I do need to take the bus, I usually grab the 910 than stops near my house between 8:28 to 8:35am. The closer it is to 8:28am, the greater the chance I'll get to school on time. The closer it is to 8:35am, the more stressed I become and the greater the chance than I'll be late. Some people might say "so what? just get a late note" But the hassle! Showing up to the deputy and then having to get all your teachers to sign it off...

This country needs alot of fixing and tweaking. If there's one thing that they can fix it's the public transport system. Fuck, the Swiss have PERFECTED the public transport system. There trains and buses don't arrive on time, they arrive EARLY.

Bloody hell...

On the movies front, Jarhead looks so damn cool. Gotta get....

Once more unto the breach...

The first day of school. Despite this being the 13th time, the joy of coming back to school never seems to disappear. Then you realise that all the work you were supposed to do during the holidays haven't been done and panic ensures. Right now, I'm up to chapter 24-ish of the 50 or so Emma study questions and I've just taken a one hour break. I'm not sure whether I should keep going or just leave it there. It's been quite easy though, so I guess I'll push on, get as many done as possible. Our new physics teacher Mr Fearnside is kinda cool in a way. I'm guessing he will be one of the stricter teachers but the way he drops a few jokes here and there, I guess he'll be alright.

One of the funnier things that happened on the first day of school occured during Chemistry. Ms Singh was passing out sheets. I took two sheets for me and Hao, and there was one one sheet remaining, but there was still Deborah, Land and Shuai. So I tapped Land on the shoulder and passed the sheet, saying "You're two short." Now say that again to yourself a few times. Yep, that's right. I didn't realise it until Hao started to laugh. Now Land is short. That's a fact. What I said sounded like "You're too short." I started laughing and Land and friends quickly caught on to the joke. We all know how sensitive Land is about her height. So sorry about that, but damn, that was funny.

When will the jokes and laughter end for me? This is why I love going to school. The hilarity and humour.

Procrastination Nirvana

I've done. I have achieved mastery of procrastination of the higest level and caliber. Which is why I'm TOTALLY FREAKING OUT!

WTF WAS OUR HOLIDAY HOMEWORK?!!?

SHIT!

Master of Procrastination

Right now, I'm dabbling in a little game called Stronghold 2, holding off till probably the last minute to do all that holiday work. Chem prac is due 2nd week, but I haven't touched it and don't know whether I even have the sheets. There's a bunch of English questions I have to do, like 40-ish, all about Emma. I have Physics work and that's all I know, damned if I know exactly what I have to do.

Procrastination...on the eve of diving into year 12...is that smart, you reckon?

The Hitsorcist or Hitxorcist?

If the Australia Day Party is to end all parties, then why do we still have parties afterwards anyway?

And how the hell do you spell Hitsxorcist?

Radial Dreamers

I know have a, more or less, clearer understanding of my washing machine. It's probably that I'm more awake right now. I took a look at it just now, And I was probably overexaggerating the difficulty of operation. Still, I was groggy that morning and that made things worse.

Pretty self-explanatory, really. Still haven't figured out what is drip-dry.

The infamous radial dial.

Actually, I was planning on watching the entire cricket on channel 9, except my aunt came over and we decided to eat out. We went to a buffet and it just reminds me how buffets are cool. You get to choose what to eat and how much. Of course, it's partly an illusion of choice. You can only eat whats on offer and you tend to eat a bit more than usual, as not to waste the entrance fee. Still, buffets are cool.

Just a bit of time reading TIME magazine, when I could be doing school work, but that's what Monday night is for! At least Chem prac is due 2nd week and that'll give me time to organise. So, President Bush admits that he spied on American citizens illegally, and that as President, he fairly used his 'supreme power' to protect Americans from the dangers of terrorism. With all the scandal affecting him now, I don't see how the Bush administration reasserting its power anytime soon. Still, when Bush gets out, I hope we get a half-decent President. It kind of sucks that the US is the only world superpower and policeman. It's done a shitty job of late, but I still reckon it could be worse. I would like to see China rise up as a world power (it's doing so right now). A little war between the straits is what we need.

Complex Machinations

This is probably going to sound stupid, and the girls are going to laugh, but I going to say this.

I have no idea how to operate my washing machine.

There I said it, it's out in the open.

So while it does seem kind of dumb of me that I can't operate a washing machine, it's the truth. I wake up one holiday morning, groggy and a strange sharp ringing tone in my ears and find that my parents have left for Flemington markets to buy bulk supplies of veggies and fruit, since it's cheaper in bulk. So I find written on the whiteboard, in Vietnamese of course, orders to hang out the washing. Easily done, except, the washing had not been done. So it was my duty to hang out the washing, but to do that I needed to do the washing. So I dumped the clothes into the washing machine, and then stared blankly at it. It's an older machine, but there's just some much stuff on the radial dial.

You have pre-wash settings, half of it is for 'normal cycle', the other for 'gentle cycle'. Not to mention the myriad of settings for permenant press, delicates and special woollens. And what the fuck is 'drip dry'? I did managed to get the water flowing and the machine working in the end. I'll probably post a pic of the dash of the washing machine.

On to a completely different topic, I was just wondering around of the net checking out message boards, blogs and whatnot. And I came upon some words, which basically say the feminist thing, ummm, what was is...something along the lines of "women are being discrimnated...women can do stuff just as well as men' yadda yadda yadda. That little paragraph pulled out an old primary school memory. Our year 6 teacher, Ms Ward, was the coach of the junior and senior netball teams. Thus, often our class would play netball for fun and sport. Now my class had 21 guys to 9 girls. Now netball is quite clearly a girl's sport for some reason. In competitions, no guys are allowed to play netball. So while feminists say they're being deprived, what about us guys? We had lots of sporty guys in our class and, for some vague and indistinct reason, we challenged the senior girl's netball team. The result? We thrashed them like 100 points to 10. Well, maybe not, but the point gap was huge. So our teacher is like 'fine, rematch' and we take on the junior girl's team and thrash them. We then gave the senior girl's team a chance to redeem themselves and they got thrashed.
This little incident clearly shows that guys can play netball with very good results. Feminists keep saying that guys are afraid of what 'capable, independant women' can do. It probably spins the other way. Feminists are afraid of what a bunch of guys can do to.

By the way, I don't know about others, but when you answer the phone or whatever, do you get confused with someone else? Whenever I pick up the phone, my parents' friends always, always, confuse me with my dad. It's a bit pissy, but, hell, my voice does sounds quite different on the phone.

Now that's hot.

One word. Well, several words.

Victoria's Secret Fashion Show.

Good decision, channel 10!

They're big and they're cheesy!

WTF? Fat Pizza is on Channel 10 now? I thought only SBS carried the ethnic programs...
Anyway, I'm not sure if it restarted from the beginning but there was this cool little set piece. Sleek gets pulled over by this Aussie cop, who fines him for not completely stopping at a stop sign. Sleek is like he slowed down and that's good enough because he's "a top driver, bro." The cop punches him, pulls him out of the car and starts bashing him with the baton. And the cops says, as he's smashing Sleek, "Would you like me to slow down or come to a complete stop?!?"

Fat Pizza...I gotta get a DVD of this stuff.

Woman in White

Supernatural...rocks. The only thing better than it would be House.

Just a little note. Memoirs of a Geisha...looks interesting, but why is the character of the Japanese geisha played by Zhang Ziyi, a Chinese? Thoughts?

Heatness

Had a bbq yesterday arvo with family and relatives. It was pushing like 35 and I had to set the bbq up and get the fire going. Damn.

Finished Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. For all the gamers out there, the starforce protection was a bitch, but breakable. Thank you Daemon Tools 4 and SFNightmare.

New Coca-Cola Zero. No sugar. WTF? Didn't really like the taste, but the black design on the can is cool.

Emma done. Trying to summon up the discipline of start Wild Swans. I can finish it, but damn I feel lazy trying to read that. And there's still english homework. And Chem prac. The horror!

I'm wondering when MiG's WoW server will be back up. Still quiet there. If it ain't up in a couple of days, I'm ditching WoW. There, I said it.

Spent a hour, going through my computer cleaning up junk. I have a 190gig hard drive and I've somehow used up 113 gigs. Damn it, I only have like 80-ish gigs left.

Summer of Cricket! One-dayers are cool. Sri Lanka didn't look so cool against Australia. But must have been Freaky Friday cos Simmons hit the ball, bounced of Clarke and was caught out. Damn.

Blue Skies and Grey Seas

I'm just going to tell a couple of stories of my holidays. They are quite funny now, although at the time, it was much more pissy and fustrating.

On the 2nd day at Yamba, a whole bunch of us rented this...pontoon, I think is the word. It was like a platform floating on 2 cylindrical floats and it had railings, a roof (wow!) and a portable toilet. There were 11 of us on it, mainly women and teenagers, with the rest of our group out fishing separately. Now we were all pumped up to get this out into the rivers, maybe find a beach to stop buy to swim and have dinner. Back to port at around 8pm. Easy, right? Right...
So we're cruising away and we quickly get stuck in a shallow area of the river. So most of us (the guys, duh) get and push the boat back on course. We stopped at a beach and went swimming. One of the guys was trying his luck at fishing. I just stole his net and tried to net one of the flying seagulls. They were hovering quite low, but I was unsuccessful. During that time, our pontoon drifted slightly and ended up wedged on the beach. This time most of us did get out and push the boat, but too well, because it started drifting away before 4 of us could get back on. I hadn't intended on swimming but I got wet anyway. Now that sucked. But wait...
We started heading back, because the sky was getting dark and the wind was picking up. We were making our way back to shore and to have dinner on solid land. Except we got stuck in this really muddy area with seaweed. The motor couldn't turn properly because of the shallowy muddy waters and the seaweed. The seaweed literally wound itself around the motor. We tried pushing, but the ground was so muddy, we were sinking to our knees and thw wind and waves kept pushing us back to even shallower waters. And the weather was getting worse all the time.
Even managed to call the other group on our CBs (read: walkie talkies) and they came and began pulling us, while we pushed the boat. Eventually, we made it to deeper water, but the ride was harrowing as the wind and waves kept pushing us off course to shallow water. But we managed to fight our way to shore. It was a hilarious moment, now that I look back. But at the time I was more pissed off and fustrated. And a little bit scared, I admit. It's a nice memory though.

Another quickie, is when we reached Surfer's Paradise and were bring stuff up to our room. My brother, my cousin and I had loaded the elevator and pressed the floor 13 button. But the elevator doors didn't close and nothing happened. So I decided to dash back out and reenter the key code, which was 2580#. The moment I stepped out, the elevator doors closed and bam! I was stuck. I tried the stairs but the door to them was locked due to "security concerns". So I had to wait for an elevator to come down before I could get back up. Damn, eh?

Whew! Quite a long post, but those were two stories that really stood out as being memorable. I hoping everyone else is having an enjoyable holiday. If not, well, sucks to be you then.

Movement at the Station

Photo time! Just a few snapshots of my holidays to Yamba and Surfer's Paradise.

Mantaray thingy we managed to catch. We're still noobs at fishing. :(
Got attacked by this snake in my bunk bed.
Little message found on a tree in Byron Bay.
View of the beach from my hotel room.
Watching TV with my brother and cousins.
The Superman Escape rollercoaster

Back from the Dead

I got back from Queensland yesterday, and I'm just posting to let you know that I have managed to arrive home safely.

It was a really cool trip. Don't worry, I'll be posting photos up later. In short, we spent three nights at Yamba and three nights at Surfer's Paradise. Yamba was a sleepy little town, but had really nice people. We must have been the only Asians there, and I looked damn hard for some other Asians tourists, but no go. Fishing was great, except we were still noobs and the really big fish, we lost. Damn! But we caught this manta ray thingy, so it wasn't a total waste. Surfer's Paradise was...well...a paradise. This was the the sixth time I stayed there and I felt right at home. The beaches, the shops, the nightlife...it never brings you down. On a side note, they only had a 5 person room, but our group had 10 people. So what did we do? What Asians would do. Cram 10 people into a 5 person room. I got lucky this time and slept on the couch. More on that later.

Chrono Symphonic Remix Project
This came out on the 3rd of January, while I was away on holidays. So right now I'm online just to get this soundtrack. Chrono Trigger is a SNES game, created by Squaresoft of Final Fantasy fame. This little RPG was a little gem and quickly became a cult hit, even after the SNES days were long gone. Despite the flashy graphics of systems like XBox or Playstation 2, the game focused on the important things, a intriguing storyline, innovative gameplay and a wonderful musical track that complemented the game. With its quirky and interesting characters, it still remains as a must-play in today's super-high-resolution graphics games. Andrew Lee Triplett wrote a screenplay for the Chrono Trigger movie. Obviously, the movie was never going to get off the ground, but Triplett instead moved on to the soundtrack, where he collaborated with some of the best remixers at OCRemix to create an orchestral movie soundtrack to complement the script. So do a favour and visit this site and download a couple of tracks, or the whole soundtrack if you like.

Boredom - The Revolution

So bored. You always fantasise about all the things you are going to do in the holidays and it, incredibly, turns out that you have nothing to do. I mean, there's reading Emma and Wild Swans, and the occasional brush-up on maths because you failed it hardcore, but there is nothing exciting. Nothing to get the adrenaline pumping hard and fast.

My holidays so far has been boring. I did go to the beach at Kurnell and relatives and all. It was actually alright, as my cousins bought this boat, with a proper steering wheel and handgear, so I was cruising away, putting my land-based driving experience to the open seas. The open seas, woo! Honestly, screw getting a car! I want to get a boating licence and a fast boat. Something that can tear up the waterways and let me go fishing occasionally.

Right now, I'm waiting for Monday 2nd of January 2006. I am going up to Iluka/Yamba in Queensland to indulge in some fishing and then a quick trip to the Gold Coast for some fun in the sun. It will be a week, so no posting on this blog for that time.

Right now, I am trying to find something to keep me occupied until then. I am capped for cable so I can't download stuff. Lucky for me, Bleach isn't coming out until the 10th of something, so I'm safe there. I might start building up my music collection, so I can have a stack of CDs to listen to during the trip, to complement my MP3 player. I wonder if OverClocked Remix has something. Maybe Anime Remix or VGMix...

On a side note, I finally have a bigger fan. Sporting a 40cm diameter, 3 levels of power and a nifty remote, I no longer have to sweat out those hot summer nights with my measly 25cm-something fan. And screw you if you have air-con in your room.

Cricketing

Just came back from cricket and I'm so hammered. I almost feel asleep, but a nice cold shower woke me up in no time. It was sunny, with some clouds in the sky, perfect day for cricket. It was year 12s vs year 11, but we got so smashed. Year 12s made it up to 150+ and when I left, we still needed 100 runs or so too match. It was dismal batting on our side. Maybe it was after lunch and having stuffed ourselves with KFC. Either way, we sucked bad. I got out for a golden duck. *sob*

It was still cool though. Getting together, playing cricket, the sun and the fun. It's hard to explain, but it feels good to get together and play cricket. Obviously there will be people asking "what's so fun about cricket? Such and such is much better" I would answer "well, what's so fun about such and such?" People will have differing opinions but I love cricket and we had a blast. Mi Zhou (Goatboy) even came, but he'd shaved his goat whiskers.

Another cricket match is in the works, but this time, I might bring an esky and fill it up with Coke and ice...lots of ice. A drinks trolley is a must for these summer conditions.

Linkage, Hilter-style

I'm reading one of my friend's blog and it's all nice and stuff, then I come along to a post. It's the results of one of those personality tests. Now I'm not really into them, but I was intrigued to learn it is a "What Famous Leader are You?" test. So I do the 45 questions to get the most accurate answer. I not expecting much, it's one of those "non-serious" tests. What do I get?

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Go figure.

Jap Happy Music

For a long time, well, a relatively long time, I've wondered why on earth people with absolutely no knowledge, or very little knowledge, of the Japanese language would listen to Japanese music. This also applies to Korean music. I can readily understand that many J-Pop and K-pop (Japanese/Korean populat music) singers, whether male or female, are very good looking. That is probably a reason for listening to J/K-pop. Sure they're hot, but you can't understand what they are saying! These people are just listening to the sounds, with maybe a faint idea of what the lyrics say, thanks to translations.

Confession time! On this matter, I'm a fucking hypocrite.

Yes.

I, too, listen to Jap music with only a very vague understanding of what the artist is singing, since I use translations.

Yes, what the fuck indeed.

To make it worse, I didn't realise that I was a hypocrite on this matter, until a few days ago, when I got my hands on the Neon Genesis Evangelion 10th Anniversary DECADE soundtrack.
This fact was furthur made clear, when I took out the Birthday of Ayanami Rei soundtrack.

So I soon sat down, horribly shocked that I was hypocrite. Never mind the fact that it was only on this matter. I was fucking hypocritical.

So what did I do to remedy this situation?

I got some lyrics translations and indulged in both soundtracks.

Well, shit.

It's no more!

MiG's World of Warcraft server just went down! Damn it! Why does have to die, right fucking now when I'm addicted to it?
Hopefully, a new test server will be up. Fuck, a Friday night wasted. Still, MTV European Music Awards...

Lost in the Cross

I wanted to post this earlier but again I didn't have time. Anyway, more important news. A couple of days ago, I did it. That's right I did it. Did what, I hear you ask? What I did was...I...skipped the canteen line.

....

No I'm serious. And it's a big thing for me.

....

Ok, maybe no that big but it's something.

WTF?!?!

Ok, so it's probably sounds kinda bad and lame, but I'm a believer that queues are the best way to get what you want. If there was no queue, there would be anarchy dammit! So despite that many friends became prefects, I never really felt right about skipping the line, bypassing all the blueshirts. Sure I got my prefect friends to buy for me, but it was sometimes and usually, it was a bottle of water. A lot of white shirts bypass the lines, so much that they just walk up say hi and step right through. Why? Because it's fucking addictive. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Imagine you are in a queue for whatever. Imagine, walking to the front of the queue, barge in and them get served. Bloody hell, I could get used to that. But it feels kinda wrong for me and so I haven't done it again...yet. Gotta control myself. Dammit, why can Nicorette make a patch or lolly for it?

Still, if you want to bypass the line, here are a few guidelines that you should abide by.

1. Watch out for teachers. They can pop out from anywhere and if they don't see a prefect badge, you're screwed.
2. It's best that you have another prefect skip the line and you follow closely. This maintains the illusion that you are important to the blueshirts. If you do know the monitoring prefects well, then walk on through.
3. As a non-prefect, you should at least say a greeting to the prefects, by their first name or whatever if possible. A simple "Hey, guys" or "How's it going?" or "Hi, Susie" will suffice.
4. During the act of skipping the line, it should be done as quickly and smoothly as possible. Remember Rule #3.
5. Don't skip regularly. It becomes a habit and you may forget basic guidelines, especially #1.
6. It helps if most of the prefects voted are your friends. Vote of them and get other people to vote for them. If you can't, be very good friends with them.

There a basic survival guide to skipping the canteen line. Of course, every school is different and rules may be different, but this is just a broad, overall guide. So start skipping.

Another Week

Arrgh...so much for my plans. What? What plans you say? To take over the world, of course! Now if only I can find those AAA batteries...

That was basically my week in a nutshell. Destined for great things but always pulled back because I forgot or lost something. Still, it could be worse.

This happened at assembly several days ago, although it's old news to most. I just want to remember this. So we had assembly in the school hall, since exams and everything were over. So it's plodding along and I'm dumping those thin Listerine thingys on my tongue to stay awake. Tripoloni was talking about the Science Olympiads and he mentioned that Yang got a HD in the Chem section. Yang was revising for our English exam later that day, so on hearing his name, immediately jumped up and walked up onto the stage. But the thing is that he already got his awards and this was just some lip service. So he got on stage and Trip was like "WTF? There's no award." So Yang had to step down and walk back to his seat, in front of the entire school. Hilarious? Absolutely, my friends. Ah school, can it get any better?

Of course, it was sprinkling this entire week and it was frickin' cold. I believe the term is "cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey." Never heard of it? Neither did I until a day ago. So a lot of people had the sniffles and I worried about catching the cold off other people. I hadn't been sick in ages and I didn't want to fall to the common cold. Nevertheless, I was well prepared and dressed warmly. It caught my attention on one day, it was so damn cold, and there were still girls wearing skirts. They were were stockings but still wouldn't it be really cold on your legs? Do you refuse to wear trousers cos of fashion...etc or what?

Still downloading Bleach 1-25 but I'm at 80%, it'll be finished tonight for sure. Bleach 25-50, look out!