Tuesday 30 December 2008

Rant 254 / In The Land Of Gibber, All Men Speak Gibberish.

So I believe I witnessed a pair of shoplifters in action a few days ago. Pretty amateur but the shop lacked even basic deterrents like curved mirrors placed in the corners of the ceiling that no one bothers to look at.

When I entered the comic shop, they were probably already talking about doing it. From the little snippets I heard, one of them seemed to be persuading the other to help him with something. This other guy was surprised and spoke rather loudly for a moment. A few minutes later, one of them left the store. Less than a minute after that, the one in the store passed something that looked like one of those large, thin comics they sell in the store wrapped in a white plastic bag to the one outside, who quickly left. The one staying loitered in the store for a few more minutes before leaving.

All the while the store owner (or maybe just a cashier, I don't know) was talking with his friend right there next to the only entrance to the comic shop.

This seemed almost like one of those tricks taught at totse.com's Bad Ideas section, except without most of the complexities. It almost felt like they were trying to get caught.

Perfect hindsight ftw.






After about a week of playing Persona 4, one of the pieces of music, Aria of the Soul, has stuck in my mind. Like a parasite in my brain, I cannot stop replaying it from my memory, and listening to it doesn't help. Even now I'm playing it on my laptop as I type.

Tried to upload to my Google Page Creator but something is giving me problems. It cannot finish uploading even though I left my computer alone for hours. How long can it take to directly upload 57MB of data anyway??

So I am unable to put it on my blog right now. However, there are uploaded copies on Youtube.

Anyway it appears they use use the exact same copy of it for the Velvet Rooms of Persona 3 and 4. Listened to both on Youtube just now and couldn't find any difference.

I'm sure there must be some sort of significance to the repeating of the same music, thus doubling the length of the track. I just don't know enough to understand what it is.







Stopped reading Red Mars after reading about 3/4 of it. As good a book as it is, it does not have what I'm most interested in. Its problems are primarily derived from social issues, like whether or not the pioneers should terraform the planet. Destroy its natural state to provide a safe environment for further colonization or preserve the original beauty that is Mars.

On one hand, they need the space because Earth (in the story) is suffering from serious overpopulation. People on Earth also covet the many rare metals that Mars has.

On the other hand, many colonists on Mars see the planets as a chance to have a new beginning. They want to start a new world without the interference from Earth. A possible Utopia could be created using this blank slate and the knowledge that they have.

People on Earth knows about this and have resorted to twisting the laws to send more people to Mars as workers with no specific tasks. They are suspected by the Martians, as the pioneers have come to called themselves, as agents of the Earth governments sent to watch the Martians and protect the interests of the governments.

Lots of social and psychological issues in the book. But just not interesting enough.








So I abandoned it and went on to The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever.

Went through half the book in an afternoon. I was going to read for a short while before taking a nap but did not expect to stay awake because the book was so good.

It began with a man who was inflicted with a horrible disease. A leper living in our modern world where leprosy is still not well-understood, he was shunned by everyone. Even his wife left him and the people in his community would rather pay all his bills than to see him get out of his house. In short, he became a very cynical and bitter person.

Then all of a sudden he was teleported to another world. But he does not believe in the authenticity of this world where magic is the norm and mud can heal wounds on a leper. Throughout the half of the first book I've gone though, he believes he is dreaming and that everything isn't real. Thus the name "Unbeliever".

However, he is seen as a prophecised hero (or possibly, destroyer) in this new world. Everyone seems to be depending on him to save them for a great evil, everyone whom he believes is a figment of his imagination. He is cynical about everything and yet his blatant bitterness does nothing to stop everyone from seeing him as their only hope in the dark days to come.

The most ironic thing was his wedding ring, a symbol he kept to remind himself of everything he lost, which was the one object that made everyone believe he was the person described in the prophecies.

Though I've only bought the first trilogy of this series, I have a feeling I will be ordering the rest next time.

Monday 29 December 2008

Rant 253 / War. War Never Changes.

Here's a pretty simplified way to see where you are in your faith.


Whichever you are, now you can put a name to your identity in this aspect of life.








Here's an interesting read. Some guy tried to spend only 1USD on food per day for a month and succeeded. Start reading from the bottom up. Mainly survived on rice and instant noodles. He had to calculate the nutrition he needed and bought the right food at the lowest prices possible. Even managed to finally reduce the average price of his food per day to 93 cents.

This is even worse than being a Muslim during Ramadan. At least they are allowed to gorge themselves to death after dusk and before dawn. This guy ate only a meal a day and had to reject lots of free food from all the events he attended in order to maintain a $1/day standard.

It sounded quite possible to accomplish until I realized I would have to seriously watch my carbo intake or I'd damage my body. Losing hair due to malnutrition is no joke. Neither is falling unconscious due to fatigue. This guy was working and had something to take his mind off food for most of the day, I believe. However it is a real accomplishment to actually work normally during this month.

I did have a much milder form of it by surviving on mostly instant noodles and canned food for a couple of weeks. Made me realize how wonderful fresh home-cooked food is.









This IS happening. Right. Now.

Over 300 people have died as of last Saturday. 1/6 of them were civilians. Stop getting pissed at anti-Semitism because there is no longer anything wrong with such sentiments. The descendents of the Holocaust survivors are no better than the Nazis. The tragedies their ancestors suffered do not justify the events today.

One of them has to GTFO!

Either that or they find a way to live like they used to before the arrival of the British.

War. War never changes.

Sunday 28 December 2008

Rant 252 / Freedom Of Sleep

Israel is crazy. Operation Cast Lead is definitely more than just revenge or justice. Palestinians never killed over 200 Israelis in any of their attacks. This is now pretty much fucked up. Everyone who used to pity Israel for being a tiny Jewish state in the middle of all the Middle Eastern Arab nations are beginning to stop having sympathies for it.

This latest offensive is nothing short of madness. It's probably an attempt to stop future attacks by going too far. Way too far.







I just found out I'm not exactly a nihilist. I do believe there is no inherent meaning to life, but I do know that you can make your own meaning. Life is like a sandbox; you can do anything you want with it.

This is not pure nihilism, but existential nihilism. Pure nihilists believe there is no meaning to everything. Existential nihilists believe there is no meaning, but you can create your own. However, this is merely something to soothe the soul because in the end, there is no meaning no matter what you do.

This can be quite confusing because they are so similar.

Existential nihilists can become suicidal too, but I'm not one of those. Even though there is no objective meaning to life, a subjective meaning is still possible.

Everything eventually boils down to nothing. Everything that is done equates to zero, just like you cannot create something out of nothing. When you add 1 to both sides of an equation, the two values are still the same as each other. And don't forget Newton's 3rd law - for every action, there is an opposite reaction of an equal magnitude.

A simpler view can be when you look at the Universe as a whole - we are nothing, not even a miniscule speck in the sum of all existence. To say that a supreme being created us because he loved us is an insult. Compared to all of the Universe, he would have done nothing in creating us. The effort required would have been quite negligible.

Everything we do cannot even change the rotation of the Earth a tiny bit. We do not affect the Universe significantly in any way. It doesn't even matter if you die, live, kill 6 million people or save the Earth from global warming and Jack Neo's deadly lame humour.

In the end, the planets will spin around the Sun; the solar system will spin around the black hole; the galaxy will continue to zoom at a high velocity across the Universe and the Universe will keep on expanding until it runs out of kinetic energy. Nothing and no one outside of Earth will give a flying fuck if humanity becomes extinct. They won't even know about it.

It's a good thing people don't dwell on such stuff, or we'd have much less people around. Oh wait, is that such a bad thing?

In a way, I'm a hedonist, albeit a very mild sort. I don't care about saving people, helping the needy or creating a revolutionary idea. I only care about my satisfaction. If it takes effort to help people, then forget it. I'm always open to ideas that doesn't require much energy, like those websites that asks for click donations, eg Care2. Clicks are cheap, just like talk.

By the way, if lots of people die in a certain area and are buried and left untouched, someday we will have more oil from that area. Those people who use it will basically be desecrating many corpses. Heck, we're all doing that now by pumping up the black stuff that used to be living, walking dinosaurs. Black gold is death in more ways than one.

Anyway, I have no idea why my thoughts jumped to oil all of a sudden.

Humans are born with an instinct to preserve their own lives. Pure nihilists have to have more reason than just a lack of meaning in life to kill themselves. To commit suicide is to defy one's own instincts. It is possible but very hard.

Pure nihilists have no reason to live or die. Therefore, they should have no inherent motivation to kill themselves. However, they would be less resistant to the desire to die if it materializes in their minds.

Nihilism is a destination you would arrive at if you think about life long enough. I'm not sure if it is the final destination, but you will definitely arrive at this conclusion. It is impossible to miss the fact that everything cancels out each other, given enough time. This is why there is no such thing as a free lunch in this world. Everything has consequences that cancel out each other, and no action can have absolutely no consequence, whether you see them or not.

Tuesday 23 December 2008

Rant 251 / Do More By Doing Less

It feels strange this time that I am unable to make myself agree that the American car companies should declare bankruptcy simply by comparing this crisis with the airline industry bankruptcy a couple of years back. These two situations are quite different to me. It would be more apt to compare the airline industry with taxi companies, and the aircraft production industry with these car companies.

I feel that the opponents of the bailout, aka supporters of Chapter 11 bankruptcy, wants the car companies to feel the pain of their poor management. Well, actually I'm not so sure if poor management is the root either because it seems a large part of their problems seems to be derived from their old welfare policies made in the past. Too many retirees to feed.

On the other hand, they should have made themselves more profitable to support those old people and themselves, the way other companies did. Yet their cars suck. In 2006, all of the top 10 cars were made by Japanese companies, despite the fact that these Japanese companies pay lower wages than their American counterparts.

If money brings in talent, they should have more smart guys over in Detroit than in Japan. *Looks at Sg government*

So now this wage problem was blamed on the workers' union. Japanese companies are not affected by the union while American car producers are, causing the pay difference. But wait, screw that! The main problem here isn't that the union successfully demanded unsustainably high wages! The problem lies with why these car companies agreed to the terms and were unable to deal with it!

FFS, if higher pay = more brains, they should have plenty of smarts to come up with a strategy to deal with it.

The union, UAW, is making it seem like there is little difference in wages. I don't know, since all sorts of numbers are being thrown into the data sheet.










After finishing Fallout 3 for so long, I found out I never fully understood the purpose of VATS. In fact, I've never used it. It's supposed to be like changing the combat to turn-based mode. Oh well, my melee weapons and major left-mouse-button-spams was enough to kill everything throughout the game anyway.








So it's actually a known fact that you can see better in the dark if you don't focus on what is right in front of you, ie, if you're looking for something in the dark, use the corner of your eyes. I thought it was just a trick I know. Usually I'd move my eyes around because the action somehow makes everything slightly clearer for a moment.




To superheat water and create a watery explosion, use a clean mug/glass and pour distilled water into it. Then microwave for 10 mins. If it doesn't boil, then it has to be superheated. The slightest movement will cause an incredibly hot explosion of steam. However, if your oven has a rotating plate, this probably won't work.

Monday 22 December 2008

Rant 250 / Ingredients: Nonsense, Bullshit And Permitted Flavouring

I hate it when RPGs have monsters that cast instant death spells, especially when it's Game Over the moment my protagonist dies. Wtf? Even if it has a low probability of success, it is still unfair! Persona 4 should allow players to save at any time or it is incredibly frustrating sometimes.

Slightly annoyed now because I just died from an instant death spell that did not work on anyone except my main dude. Grr... I could feel that I was getting near the next save point and was planning to save and take a break. Now all my efforts have been wasted.

It is not fair because no available equipment protects me from such spells. It is pure blind luck at work here and it screws up my day when I die because of just one spell that I cannot be immune/protected from. Completely unavoidable. Only consolation is the small chance of success.

It's pretty screwed up if there is a constant chance of losing all your progress since your last save and you cannot prevent it. Damn the game designers.











In Soviet Russia, lesbians love men!








I am very glad that I'm using 2 antivirus programs and Firefox. I was tricked into clicking a very normal-looking link that turned out to be a website that makes me download a worm. It looked so legit! Fortunately Firefox stopped it and issued a warning that it was reported as a malicious website. My Nod32 also popped up a warning.

LOL! I feel fucking safe now. At least against dangerous websites and programs.







I just found out I couldn't spell "millennium". I thought it had a single "n" like "millenia". Fact is, both words have double "n". Been relying on dictonary.com for so long my spelling sucks now. Gah!






Rule 34 is almost an universal rule of the Internet. Rule 34 is "If it exists, there is porn of it."

There is almost nothing that doesn't have a porn parody. If you cannot find it, just request for it on 4chan. Someone posted a picture of a dog next to its dead owner who was covered by a white cloth, a very sad thing, and requested a Rule 34 of it. Someone shooped (slang for photoshopped) it into having the dog humping the head of the corpse.

Extremely obscene, but it exists. Therefore, it is almost a law, not just a rule.

Of course, there are exceptions. For example, ideas cannot have Rule 34's, like the idea of Communism. So I cannot say that it's a law. But it covers every single anime, famous person and etc quite completely.









I like to believe that my constant blogging helps me maintain, if not improve, my command of written English. I don't really care anymore whether you readers read everything I type. Seriously, I wouldn't read everything I type. I talk about so many games that are pretty obscure in Singapore, so I don't expect anyone who knows me to know most of the games that I rant about.

Same with books. I don't know many people irl (short for "in real life") who reads fantasy/sci-fi. It's like reading fiction is some sort of exotic hobby in Singapore, on par with mountain-climbing and butterfly-collecting. Goodness knows how many Singaporeans have actually heard of A Song of Ice and Fire, even though it's one of the best fantasy series out there right now.

The thing is, having a good writing style is not practical. The probability of me becoming a successful writer is very slim at best. I'm an engineering student, so writing well isn't exactly a very useful ability. I've seen people who couldn't write shit to save their lives do better than me in their exams.

Then again, I'm gradually losing confidence in "practicality". I figure that the reason people are practical is because they don't see the need to do more than necessary. Let's admit it, Singaporeans are a practical people, or else there would be many more people going for Arts courses. Or professional sports, for that matter. We'd be having a soccer school like the UK.

Therefore, I can say that Singaporeans see no reason to do anymore than necessary to survive. Success is a bonus and something that the government does for them. They don't care, as long as they live without trouble.

But let's take a look at "successful people". Generally, they're willing to go the extra mile in what they do, which accounts for their success. Yes, they're also very smart in their own ways, but Singaporeans are not stupid either. They have the smarts, it's the reason that is lacking.

Why don't we see big brand names created in Singapore other than Creative? No famous fashion designers? The only famous writer here is Catherine Lim. No really famous athletes but Fandi, and I'm stretching the truth a bit here. Just being small is no reason for not producing big things. Nepal is small, but their Gurkha soldiers are some of the best soldiers in mordern times. Rome started out as multiple small villages that eventually became the Roman Empire. Blizzard Entertainment was a tiny 3-man company that became successful with Diablo.

I believe Singaporeans should stop looking at life like it's a task that they need to complete. We should start teaching Philosophy in secondary school. A very general course that introduces the ancient philosophers from everywhere. Lao Zi, Descartes, etc. FFS (short for For Fuck's Sake), I bet 80% of all Singaporeans don't know where the quote, "Cogito ergo sum" came from, or even what it means. (Answer: René Descartes)

It'd help give more children a sense of purpose in life, other than the stereotypical Confucian stuff (for the Chinese, at least). The government want students to think, but they aren't giving them a good reason to. Telling them to do something doesn't exactly make a good motivation.

The children don't know what to do with their lives, other than what their parents tell them to, if at all. What's the use of thinking if we don't see any use for it? Learning philosophy may help them find their way through, opening doors they never knew were there. Once they know what they're doing and have a real goal, they may just see the point of thinking in life.

To succeed to is do more than just "enough", to go further than is "practical".

Of course, I have absolutely no basis for everything I say. I'm merely suggesting what is already done in other countries. I have no numbers or facts to prove that it would help. It does sound good though.

This is why I call all these, rants.






I'll end this with a pic I find extremely hilarious.

Saturday 20 December 2008

Rant 249 / Bam! Behold My Blog! Bursting With Bullshit and Filled To The Brim With Babble From A Brainless Bozo!

Persona 4 turned out to be a very different game from what I'd imagined. And better.

For one, it's quite bright and flashy with that "pop culture" feel to it. The music of SMT games have always been good. This is no different. Lot's of "pop" songs, probably translated from the Japanese versions. I'd prefer if they had left the songs alone and just translated the dialogues though.

It uses mainly bright colours for most of the menu stuff and doesn't have the gloom that seems to be a trademark of SMT games. I'm not sure if it's a specialty of the Persona spinoffs, but it doesn't make it look bad at all.

The monsters are different too. Instead of recruiting monsters or turning into them, Persona 4 turns the concept of the player's monsters into masks, aka "Personas". Every character has his own Persona except the protagonist who can change his Personas. Each persona has different stats and abilities which they use to fight monsters.

Monsters are separate creatures from the Personas. Personas are mostly recycled monsters from other SMT games (all SMT share a large "core" group of monsters) while the monsters they fight in P4 are new ones.

Also reused is the idea of having an extra turn when I hit the monster with an an attack that it is weak at. The monsters also get an extra turn when they exploit my weakness, but they don't have the intelligence to keep spamming attacks that my Personas are weak at. This does add an extra bit of strategy in the gameplay.

This isn't all though. This game is more than just level up and fight monsters and watch the story unfold. Social life is an important aspect of the game. Each friend you make with add a Social Link to this type of Persona he/she is. This is basically a bond of friendship, so the friendlier you are to the person, the higher the level of Social Link to that type of Persona.

Each level of SL gives you an additional exp bonus when you create a Persona of that type. However, it will take time to build a strong bond or have many friends. In addition, time is limited. To build bonds, the player has to go out with friends, join school clubs and join their practices and say the right things during conversations.

There are many other details but I'll just summarize that the game is a hybrid of the Japanese standard RPG and the Sims. And also has many anime CG movies so the game is pretty much an interactive anime movie.

Lastly, I'm playing on Expert mode, the hardest difficulty available. I had no idea it would be this hard. I died more over 6 times in just 6 hours of gameplay. Mostly because I underestimated the monsters/bosses.

The high difficulty is a slight turnoff (my fault :P) but the game itself is very good.








Greece, a boring land with an exciting history, now turned exciting again. Anarchy is rampant, with mad riots sparked by the death of a boy at the hands of a police officer. Though it wasn't the main cause of this chaos, it was the last straw that broke the camel's back. Poor economy and stuff has had the people frustrated a long time, kept bottled up until something dramatic happened. Now it has, so voila!

I'm beginning to see a pattern. People start out in an anarchic state, then saw the power of unity and all that they can achieve with that power. So they come together under one authority and become one for a while. Then the people at the top saw that certain things have to be suppressed to maintain the order. Enforced peace.

People chafe under the enforcement. After some time, they forget what it was like to live in anarchy, what they had become united for. All they can see is the surpression and what freedom they had lost. So they get angry. The unhappy sentiments build up. Sometimes it gets relieved, sometimes not. Until one day when it reaches a certain level and everything explodes like a champagne bottle shaken really hard.

Pop!







Watched V for Vendetta, the movie. It did try to follow most of the major plot elements but the end was a slight disappointment. I expected to see the train decorate beautifully like the one in the comic. I also wanted to see Natalie Portman becoming the new V and speaking to the masses.

Unfortunately, all these was cut from the script. Instead, V dies and it ended that way. I was glad that at least they didn't reveal V's face. That would have been a major turnoff.

All in all, it was a pretty nice movie if you had read the comic. Else many things may not make sense. Also, the atmosphere is very different in the movie. Not as dark and evil as the comic.









Just found a picture of how they eat fetuses in China. This picture shows a bowl of dark (likely herbal) soup with the fetus floating on it. Wondering if I should post it in my blog. On one hand, it's pretty enlightening; on the other hand, it may make you puke. On an unrelated note, here's the creepiest Spongebob I've ever seen.


Thursday 18 December 2008

Rant 248 / ABSOLUT BULLSHIT

I've been playing Empires v2.2 (Half Life 2 mod) so much I've actually become good at some parts of it. How can I tell? I'm now able to stay at the top 5 of my team's scoreboard for half the games. Top 5 out of 15-24 players. I always play in large servers like Empires 4 All and Nachos.

First, a re-introduction of the Empires mod. It is a first-person-shooter. It combines RTS and FPS in a similar but more complex way than Natural Selection. Maps are generally very big and contains many Resource Points where teams can build Refineries to gain Resources. These Res are then spent by each team's Commander (aka comm) to build Barracks (spawn points), Radar (research center), more Ref, Vehicle Factories (tank factories) and etc.

Each team begins with a Commander and everyone else. Everyone else is allowed to choose to be one of the 4 available roles: Engineer, Rifleman, Grenadier and Scout. Engineers can build stuff faster, build their own turrets, drop ammo boxes and take down enemy structures faster.

Riflemen kill people really well and can choose between 3 rifles that have their own specialties (close range combat, medium range and suppression fire).

Grenadiers are anti-tank units with bazookas, mortars and can even lay land mines.

Lastly, Scouts can snipe people, sabotage structures to either disable them or reduce their efficiency and most importantly, become invisible.

At the moment, I find Engineers too easy to use and Scouts are more exciting. Playing as a Scout quite often. Even though Scouts can turn invisible, he is not completely transparent. Each wall he touches increases his invisibility significantly. Without any walls, he is a very visible grey shade. 2 walls and he becomes virtually invisible if he doesn't move.

Several times I was able to slip past the frontlines to infiltrate the enemy bases. That was freakin exciting. There were several times when I thought I was screwed because I didn't know how invisible I was and some guy was running towards me.

I was sabotaging their Refs in order to lower their income and obviously their comm would tell some Engineers to go repair them. So an Engineer or two would patrol around to repair everything I laid my hands on.

It was like playing Metal Gear Solid in first person view. Each time I saw an enemy looking at my direction, I'd stop moving and pray he didn't see me. Half the times the enemies would, but the other half...

It can be quite exciting to build a Barracks behind their backs and call out to my team to spawn near the enemy base. Or just moving around behind enemy lines , screwing around with their economies.

I did play as a Rifleman a number of times. It gets quite boring because I like to rambo into my enemies. Everytime I see an player in the opposite team, I just fire my gun and run towards him. Of course, I also have the Damage Increase upgrade all the time. Usually I'd kill at least one before dying but this is not as satisfying as sneaking behind a whole group of enemies as a Scout and, while they're trying to shoot my teammates, rape their asses. That usually nets me at least 2 kills before they turn around and overwhelm me.

But when I'm a Scout, the joy isn't in the killing, but in the success of sneaking behind their backs. The best of times were when I stared at them while they scanned past me. Does not happen all the time.







Here's a very interesting quote.

"The discipline of colleges and universities is in general contrived, not for the benefit of the students, but for the interest, or more properly speaking, for the ease of the masters. Its object is, in all cases, to maintain the authority of the master, and whether he neglects or performs his duty, to oblige the students in all cases to behave to him, as if he performed it with the greatest diligence and ability. It seems to presume perfect wisdom and virtue in the one order, and the greatest weakness and folly in the other."

-- Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, Book 5, Chapter I, Part 3, Article II.





The problem with a multilingual society is the people generally aren't very proficient in all the languages. I was reminded of our standard of Chinese in Singapore when I found this flyer from YumCha in yesterday's newspapers. I've always been used to reading the flowery Chinese names in the restaurant menus in Hong Kong and I never bothered to visit local dimsum restaurants, so it was quite a surprise when all I saw were very bland names that merely described the food.

Apparently, it is the same in Taiwan.

I remember when Princess Diana passed away, my late father laughed at the headlines in the local Chinese morning paper, not at the death but because whoever wrote that wasn't very proficient in Chinese. The author phrased it too bluntly, making it sound crude. There are much better ways to describe death, I believe.

I'm not very good at Chinese, I cannot deny that. Both my command of Mandarin and Cantonese are merely passable. My meagre knowledge of Chinese idioms is due to my mum who likes to use Chinese idioms in her speech. I can remember and use some of the common ones, that's all.

However, it is actually very normal for a native speaker to use idioms and such in his normal speech. Compared to them, I suck at it. If I ever have children, it will definitely be much worse; they'll probably only know "diu" in Cantonese and think it's an obscene word in Mandarin, like some people I know online.







I just read that our cash is not exactly backed by what our country owns. It is more similar to IOUs than the numerical equivalent of any material goods. I am by no means an economist, but according to the article I read and by common sense, it means that money is debt. Every dollar you are holding is really a dollar's worth of something that the government owes you. Therefore, to increase the amount of cash in circulation is to increase the national debt.

Money is like complex numbers - they are all imaginary concepts. They do not really exist in reality but aids our lives in one way or another.








This is one of the best police stories ever. 3 plain-clothed police officers went to the wrong house to arrest 3 white women accused of being prostitutes. They saw an African-American 12-year-old girl and arrested her instead. When they said they were arresting her for being a prostitute, she screamed and struggled desperately while her father rushed out to save her because they didn't say they were the police. The police hit her face and throat in an effort to shut her up.

Now they're charging the girl and her father for assaulting a peace officer.

Shit makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time.

Wednesday 17 December 2008

Rant 247 / Ancient Egyptians May Have Been Used Electric Lights

Teenage girls are strutting their stuff in the revealing styles of their pop idols. But such rampant sexualisation is taking its toll on their mental health.



Feminism? Girls having control of their own sexuality? Or losing control? This is where everyone is heading in Asia when we talk about being more open-minded. Girls who haven't grown proper breasts yet and already taking pictures of themselves in their underwear or less and posting them on the Net. Hell, it's probably happening already in Singapore.

I'm not so sure it's such a good idea. They're all missing the point of revealing more skin, as I've already mentioned before.

So now they're blaming pop idols.

It is not a matter of good or bad. Things change. People become more liberal in their sex lives. People in the 1910s would never have imagined any women wearing the bikini. Everyone would have thought it scandalous to the extreme.

Yet here we are, with ladies wearing ultra-tiny bikinis that barely cover their nipples and labia but not the pubic hair, if it isn't shaved.

What now?

Let them be. If they want to be pedophile baits, whatever. Sooner or later, pedophilia is going to be legalized.

Then, the giant circular path we are taking will reveal itself. From child marriage to the outlawing of underaged sex to the legalization of child sex.

Everything comes full circle. This is no exception. Oh the irony!

Don't believe my prediction? Then imagine what people in the 19th century would have thought at the idea of thongs. Or the idea of flying in planes during the 15th century.






Apparently, I suck at typing. My self-taught style is only a measly 52wpms, making 2 mistakes in the paragraph of text I was tested with. I blame my long fingernails that make me press the wrong buttons so often I have to spam Backspace a lot of times.

Another website gave me 67.23 wpm with 10 mistakes (which I corrected and the time taken is counted in the calculation of this speed). I like this number better.








Sometimes I wish there is a recycle bin at my void deck. Ever since I left my hall, I realized I've gotten used to dumping more than half my trash in the recycling bins instead of the trash bins. Seriously, if you do it for a few months, you start to feel that you're doing something useful and meaningful when you're just throwing your rubbish. Now I find it such a waste whenever I throw rubbish down the chute at home, getting the feeling that I'm wasting stuff.

:(







Turned nocturnal since a few days ago. Right now I'm sleeping at 9am and waking at 5pm. Quite unhealthy for a human. I can't sleep well for some reason. Either my body is inherently able to rest better only at night or there are noises that wake me up in the day during my sleep that I can't remember. It is very, very convenient for me now because I can now use the TV in my living room to play my old PS2 games, those that I never managed to play before my last personal TV broke down. At the moment, just playing a decent RPG called Atelier Iris 3. Next on my list is Persona 4. Actually Persona 4 is the one I really want to play. Atelier Iris 3 is the sort that I am interested in but not quite willing to spend half my day on.

Persona 4 is strange in that it was recently released this year for PS2, even though everyone thought PS2 is a dead console. The Persona series is actually a successful spinoff of the Shin Megami Tensei series. Another notable spinoff, the Digital Devil Saga (2 games, a duology), are my favourite PS2 games. It's the only set that I have played thrice. Because of the replay bonus that allows me to keep my skills after a playthrough (but not the stats), I'll actually be quite close to godlike if I play the 2 games again.

I have no idea what the Persona games are like, other than it will be about one protaganist and a whole bunch of monsters I can fight or recruit. And it will most likely have that dark feel that most SMT games have.

Unfortunately due to unforeseen circumstances I am unable to play Persona 4 yet. Got to wait a couple more days.







Holy cow! Ancient Egyptians may have been using electric lights! Evidences from Iraq shows that they had the materials and possibly the knowledge to make primitive batteries. In fact, some of their pictures seem to depict light bulbs. How cow! Shall I use the idiom," come full circle", again?

I lament that the Romans were so eager to conquer the Egyptians that they destroyed all their culture and history, leaving us with so many questions unanswered. Damn the ancestors of the Italians! Their delicious pizzas can never offset the damage done.

Rant 246 / Boycott Youtube 19th Dec 2008

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2008/12/boy_killed_mom_and_shot_dad_ov.html

Boy shot parents, killing mom. They blame video games.

"Daniel was homebound for a year with nothing to do but watch television and play video games, Kersey said. It was during that time that he became fascinated with the Halo series and would play them for hours at friends' houses. His father forbade the games, saying that were too violent and sexually explicit."

That line gave people who aren't familiar with Halo the misconception that it contains sexually explicit content. Halo 3 is as sexually explicit as a Tibetan monastery. The only reason for its Mature ESRB rating is because of the blood and gore.

Games are not the sole cause of such an act of violence. It is merely a catalyst, the hand that opens the lid covering the pot filled with anger and frustration. Obviously Daniel had major problems, gaming being the least of it. The desire to kill is unavoidable, but having enough motivation to actually commit the act requires some strong emotions and reasons.

As a minister, his father was a failure. He is supposed to be an expert in spiritual matters, yet it is easy to tell that his son's having some problems in that area. If he is unable to help the people closest to him, I don't see why he should blame inanimate objects for this.

Games don't tell you to kill. Games don't tell you to kill someone and put the gun in the victim's hand. The Halo series merely shows humans fighting aliens. Most Hollywood movies are closer to Daniel's situation than this by showing humans killing humans with real guns and bombs.

Hell, it's be more logical to blame the CSI series, if he watches that.

Maybe he plays the GTA games. That would make more sense. But since they didn't mention it, then there is nothing I can say. It would be stupid to keep mentioning Halo in this article if any of the GTA games were in his collection. Except that a copy of Halo 3 was the last straw that broke the camel's back.

Blame video games all you want, but it is never the sole cause of violence. Remove TVs first before protesting against games, because TV shows are more violent and are watched by a lot more people than there are video game players.

In short, fuck you for trying to imply that video games made Daniel shoot his parents.







You know something is terribly wrong when... you laugh at a picture of the Reverse Goatse.






Apparently, the video mentioned in the following screenshot



is a clip taken from August Underground's Mordum. According to Wikipedia, it is one of the sickest movies ever. Watch at your own risk.








Boycott Youtube from 19th to 21st Dec 2008. Protest against the new policies that censor videos with profanities. Youtube is supposed to be about YOU! Not freakin Google! Censorship is antithetical to the concept of freedom of speech. Good thing I don't visit Youtube much in the first place...

If the spoken vulgarities really offend people so much, their view count shouldn't be too high anyway, right?

Tuesday 16 December 2008

Rant 245 / ***** Huge Spoiler Alert! *****

Oh noes! My books are being read too quickly! I finished the third (aka last) book of V for Vendetta plus Worldbinder in a day. Only 11 books to go. Red Mars, Green Mars Blue Mars, the three books of The Chronicles of Thomas Convenant the Unbeliever, the first three books of the Dune series, The Dosadi Experiment and Confessor. Currently placed Red Mars next to my bed, so it's the next book to be read. It's so small, I'm afraid it will be gone together with Green Mars in a day...

*****Spoiler Alert!*****

A spoiler is a literary device whose intended design function is to 'spoil' unfavorable air movement across an article. Spoilers are often fitted to rants, although they have become common on blogs, as well. Some spoilers are added to rants primarily for styling purposes and have either little aerodynamic benefit or even make the aerodynamics worse.

V for Vendetta had a really good plot. Even though I'm not actually used to reading comics, being deprived of such reading materials ever since I outgrew Archie Comics, it hooked me immediately with the mystery that shrouds V constantly. One of the main reasons I could hardly stop reading was to find out who V was before his experience in Room Five.

It was never revealed. He was, most likely, just an ordinary man and it would have ruined the whole atmosphere with the revelation.

Another reason I was hooked was that everyone else in the camp had physical mutations. So what changed in V? I suspect it was on his face because he wore his Guy Fawkes mask all the time.

Anyway, I wonder how many readers outside of the UK actually understood the significance of his mask.

It seems strange to me that the British would respect a terrorist so much that they would designate a day just for him. Even though Guy died for his beliefs, he was a failure and a criminal. I thought there would has to be someone better than that who'd also died for his beliefs. Someone who did it legally and succeeded. I'm not familar with British history, so I have no idea.






Worldbinder seems to be a whole new story altogether. By merging his world with another, Fallion now stands on a new world with few familiar features. It's basically like a new story using the old cast. Fantastic idea because it re-introduces the special feeling that readers get when they read a new book. All those new magics and creatures and etc.

He has managed to do 2 things at one shot without ruining the book - continuing the main plot and have a valid reason to throw in new stuff and remove old stuff, without ruining the plot! By having the people merge with their selves on the other world, David Farland can change his cast once without killing off anyone or using some crappy twists.

In addition, he can bring back to live some of the dead people, in a way. Like the Earth King, who died in the Fallion's world but is still alive in this new one. However, he will not have the same memory.

But this book is so tragic. Everyone is dying! There appears to be little hope for any humans in the world. In fact, humans have been losing constantly, with a few inconsequential victories at the end.

First, the Inkarrans knew more about forcibles than anyone else. Now that they have merged with their counterparts, the Wyrmlings, who are working with the Knights Eternal, one of which can actually read the runes, their advantage over the humans is approaching infinity. What can the humans actually do to beat a Runelord with the Will of multiple people and who knows what new runes they can come up with??

Second, the Earth King has been subverted, possessed by the Queen of Loci, no less!

Third, the Wyrmlings have captured Fallion.

The next book had better be thick, because the number of loose threads is now as huge as those in A Song of Ice and Fire. There are so many questions left unanswered! What happened to the Reavers? What happened to the people in the other continent? Are there any other Clans besides the Warrior Clans? Are there other magics in this new world? What will happen to the people after Daylan Hammer teleports them to the netherworld?

This series is now poised to become either one of the best ever or a great disappointment.

*****End of Spoiler*****








Seriously, is it wrong to masturbate to pictures of yourself when you were a child? I know I have discussed this before, but I'm still unable to decide if it really is wrong. For one, such an act hurts no one. If no one is harmed and no intention of harming anyone is present, is it still wrong? Yet this act is narcissistic, homosexual and pedophilic. The last is what makes it sound wrong.

Does it mean that pedophilia is not always wrong? That it is right only when you masturbate to your younger self?

No, I'm not doing it, nor do I view pedophilia in a positive light. In fact, I wholly support the notion that pedophilia should be a capital offense. There must be no mercy to those who would rape children!

Yet this makes me doubt that pedophilia is always wrong. What if there are other situations where pedophilia is acceptable that I am don't know yet? The world is not always black and white after all.

Friday 12 December 2008

Rant 244 / Stop Poverty. Euthanize The Poor.

Another mad Youtube vid. I can understand why the guy on the left wore a mask. As for the final words at the end, IT'S NOT COOL!! Faggotry is never cool. Never.






Here's a game. Watch this 40s video and don't even smile. I lost at 0:19. Your turn.








Watching the second season of 24. Began with season 3, then 4, followed by 1 and now 2. After the seventh episode of the second season, I realized there are a few things that always happen.

First, there is always someone betraying the trust of the President.

Second, Jack Bauer always breaks some rules.

Third, everything Kim Bauer does seems so annoying to me. I don't know, the writers probably hate her or something. Her role in the first season wasn't so bad because the whiny behaviour of Terry Bauer was even more irritating than hers. In the third season, she was definitely the character I wanted dead the most. Now it's the same in the second season.

It's a torture to watch everytime she's on screen. The only reason I can't skip her parts is because I would miss those parts of the plot. I was so glad she did not appear in the fourth season. In fact, it was the best season I've watched so far, just because of her absence.







Something's wrong with either my blank DVD-RWs or my DVD-writer. Backed up my files on 7 DVDs and 3 have been found faulty. The first disc was blank after writing. The second disc was full but contained no data. The 6th was the same as the second. Good thing I have new books to read while I burnt them.








Watched Tenchi Universe, while is basically a different story using the same cast from the previous 3 Tenchi Muyo OVAs. The plot's style is quite different. For one, the old ones spent most of the episodes on small plots, instead of one giant story spread over all the episodes. Another difference is that the first three OVAs contained quite a number of nude scenes. No different from softcore hentai, they would have turned me on if not for my dislike for the drawing style. Women in modern hentai are just way more voluptuous than the ladies in Tenchi Muyo. For example, Discipline just fucking pwns the nude scenes in Tenchi Muyo.








V for Vendetta is a very interesting comic. Tried to read as slowly as I could but I finished Book 1 and 2 (it was all 3 comics in one book) in a day. The story is about a fascist England, quite similar to the world described in Nineteen Eighty-Four. Instead of the poor guy who secretly hated the established ways of his dystopian society, we have V who is an anarchistic genius. Though the word "anarchistic" may give you the impression that V's goal is to sow chaos, he actually follows the concepts of political anarchy that are quite different from chaos. Thus, he only aims at harming the authorities.

Anarchy means the absence of a state, or in V's words, "without leaders". Without leaders, peace is still possible. The peace, however, would be entirely voluntary and not enforced against their will. Theoretically, it sounds good as this is as far as things can go where people can live in peace and be free at the same time.

In practice, this is quite impossible because everyone desires power. Our instincts to survive include the wish to be better than everyone else. Any creatures lacking that would be weeded out by natural selection over the millenia. Therefore, as long as there is a community, there will always be a leader.

I believe the world in Fallout 3 is an example of an anarchy. There is no one to enforce laws throughout the Wastes and order is possible only in towns. If anyone disobeys the established rules of each town, they are either removed or killed.

Anarchy is quite a misunderstood concept, especially after hearing it being used to describe chaos on TV and in films. As a word, it can mean chaos. But as a political concept, it has little to do with it.








After this, 9 more books to go! I hope I can stretch them for over a month. Good books are hard to come by these days. It's just like our natural resources. At first, it is easy to find all the best books because everyone recommends them. Just like the way they found so much oil in the last century. All those freakin humongous oil deposits in the Middle East are now history. These days, oil companies are settling for smaller and less cost-efficient deposits. Same with my books. Now I have to settle for books that a significant number of the recommended book lists on Amazon.com have in common.







I'd start another "Why is Africa such a shithole?" rant but I decided against repeating my rants. Still, I question the reason behind the fact that many things that should be happening in Africa aren't happening at all. Like taking care of the pirates in Somalia. Like stopping the war in Congo. Like establishing a new government in Zimbabwe. And etc etc. Why aren't they happening? Why do the Africans like to live in Hell so much?

Tuesday 9 December 2008

Rant 243 / Ridiculously Ridiculous

Check out this amazing vid from Youtube. No idea whether its stated sources are real, but some parts are hilarious. I don't understand the Korean, so I can't tell what those Korean words mean. But they have english subtitles.

According to this video, Koreans appeared out of nowhere and created several ancient civilizations. In fact, the ancient Egyptians, the Sumerians and even the Native Americans were originally Koreans.

It's definitely a joke.









Found this webcam page. Sad in a way, funny in another.

At first, I was like


Then I was like


In the end,







Some of the easiest topics for a noob troll to practise with is the question of "Atheism vs Christianity". Unfortunately, 4chan is filled with so many trolls people no longer respond to this. However, I'm sure if someone in real life were to mention this in a conversation, it would still spark a lively debate.









Rarely do I know people who agrees with my philosophies. Recently, I met another person who saw that our system is distorting the meaning of education. Not the definition of it, but the purpose. I'm not sure if anyone else feels anything about it but I know, like her, I feel that it's a lamentable occurence.

She has personal experience with children, since she's going to be a teacher. She was able to identify children who didn't have the spark in their eyes, and they are usually the better students. I know because I almost became that sort of student. Fortunately, (or unfortunately, depending on where you're looking at this from) I questioned the purpose of sacrificing my soul for grades.

Eventually I asked the big question, the meaning of life itself. Took a decade to become a full-blown case of nihilism.

Not everyone did that. So they became the good students, the ones who have no life but will probably grow up to be scholars.

I'm not sure that's a good path to take. Unfortunately, our system wants that sort of students. If you know any teachers, ask them if they like the sort of students who don't seem to do anything but study. They may not like it, but they cannot deny that it's easier to teach them than those who have poor discipline.

The purpose of our education is to produce great data processors.

Extreme it may be, but you should understand what I'm trying to state. The point of education was to let the curious sate their hunger for knowledge, let the intelligent understand and advance their fields. The point of education, now, is to produce better workers. Get good grades so that we can get better jobs.

What?

As I have mentioned before, no longer are we mugging to learn; we are mugging for better grades.

Grades. Grades are the ultimate purpose in life, for students. Nothing matters as long as we get good grades. Or would you sacrifice your studies for love? They say love is the ultimate power, the answer to everything. So would you?

I hate the fact that children can become zombies for the sake of "education". Children! What are our schools? Grinders that grind your souls to dust? Children who no longer know the meaning of fun are not children anymore.

Another reason why people shouldn't have children anymore. Life, in this aspect, has become disgusting.










Troy Dixon from PurePwnage passed away last Sat. T-Bag's gone! What will happen to the show?!?! Will there be another weird transformation again???

Saturday 6 December 2008

Rant 242 / Long Is The Wait

The side-quests in Sacred 2 are lame. The usual go-there-and-kill-a-few-monsters and the standard errand boy stuff. I'm quite sick of these, so I've stopped playing it. Installed The Witcher Enhanced Edition instead, but kinda expecting the same sort of quests, except more fun. The battle system is more exciting, at the very least. The sex conquests are also another draw. Gotta catch'em all!








Found this article of this parent who refuses to let her 14-year-old child have his computer in his own room.

First of all, it's weird - it's a laptop. Can't have it in his room? Can't really stop him, can you?

Second, I won't say it's wrong. I'd agree it's a very important thing to do, preventing a young teenager from having complete freedom to the net. Parental controls? I don't trust them. Anyone who goes to websites like 4chan and totse would know how to bypass anything. Anyway, those are precisely the websites I wouldn't want anyone to visit till they're 17 or 18. But 4chan is one of the most popular websites on the internet, there's little chance to avoid knowing about it, given enough time.

Third, it's not a waste of time to surf the net. It's more of a waste of time when you pray to God than to surf the net. At least there's a chance you'll learn something interesting when you lurk in forums. Praying to God is a one-way thing, there's no info going to you. If God replies, you better visit a shrink!

Fourth, computer games are better than soccer. You don't get injured playing Red Alert 3, except maybe carpal tunnel.

Fifth, Facebook is a waste of time. Every month I lose about 5 mins of my life to Facebook that I will never get back.

Sixth, this is going nowhere. I'm neither agreeing nor disagreeing.

Seventh, do we need an eighth?







The 6th episode of Tenchi Muyo! 3rd OVA was somewhat confusing in the beginning. It started in the middle of a battle that made me wonder if I was missing an episode.








So Naruto is going to released for free by VIZ. Legal and free. The only catch seems to be the week-long wait after the release, but that's not a problem. Wonder if they allow IPs from all over the world.








The Zimbabwean dollar is a joke. Literally. Its inflation rate is so crazy it's actually funny. The rate of inflation is actually inflating exponentially. LOL! After it revalued its currency in Aug this year, making its exchange rate to 1780ZWD to 1USD, it has risen to 13 quadrillon ZWD to 1USD on the 12th Nov 2008.

And you thought those Banana Notes were worthless during WWII. Hell, it's probably cheaper to burn their 10ZWD notes than charcoal. As of 14 Nov 2008, Zimbabwe's annual inflation rate is at 89.7 sextillion percent.

People, I have never seen the word "sextillion" before.

A quick check shows that this word is being used by Americans in the report, which means 21 zeroes (British sextillion has 36 zeroes). A billion has 9 zeroes. A trillion has 12.

89,700,000,000,000,000,000,000%

Damn, it's actually cheaper to wipe your ass with money than with toilet rolls in Zimbabwe. The paper itself is worthed more than any banknotes below a billion now, I think.

Prices there are estimated to rise by a factor of 175-200 per week. Means anything that costs 1ZWD today will cost about 175-200ZWD next week. Then at least 175^2ZWD the week after. Then 175^3, 175^4 and etc.

Why hasn't their government collapse yet???

Friday 5 December 2008

Rant 241 / Tiny Rant Because Time Is Short

That's no girl! That's a guy with a fucking pussy!











In Japan, gravure idols get to star in action films. Basically, it's just the same as gravure vids except with a script. Reon Kadena and Yuri Morishita, two of the best gravure idols I've ever seen were the main leads in this recent film called Wildcats in Strip Royale. Sounds like porn, but I know they don't do nude shots. So it's just two babes in skimpy outfits, or in normal clothes that eventually will be removed.

Damn I want to see that film, just for Reon. Yuri's face and cleavage look a little fake, so out of all those ladies in the film, Reon's the hottest. Plus I've known about her vids since she was 17. Underaged girls can legally do non-nudes. She did feature in a few nudes after she hit 18 but she got famous so fast she didn't need to after that. Shows how freakin hot she is. I'm surprised she hasn't spontaneously combusted yet.

Thursday 4 December 2008

Rant 240 / Fallout 3 Out; Sacred 2 In

Spending time at the largest forum on the net does have its advantages. Lot's of different people talking about all sorts of stuff. Learnt about this "Forer effect" just now which gives a name to the way horoscopes work. That very generalized style that has many positive details that you would either have a little of or, at the very least, want to have. Now I know it's called the Forer effect. Very interesting. By studying this, any Tom, Dick and Harry can be a freakin psychic. For a little description that's easy to understand, click here.






It's irritating, the advertisments in Windows Messenger v2008. It used to be that it will pop up only if you leave your mouse on it. Now it pops up whenever your mouse even swings over it and stays open till you touch it with your cursor again. I'm extremely annoyed by this new method of forcing users to see it. In fact, now I have another reason to NOT open Messenger. I simply hate how it pops up and distracts me whenever I click on a name on the list because I accidentally let my cursor come into contact with the damned ad box.

Fuck you, Microsoft!







Sacred 2 seems like a nice game. Despite using the classic (and cliche) style of action RPG popularized by Diablo I and II, the developers added some humour everywhere that sometimes breaks the fourth wall. It makes fighting enemies interesting where I am (at the beginning) because I kill enemies just to hear what they have to say.

The system is also different, but not exactly a breakthrough. Just changed from the stereotype.

Graphics are excellent. No comment about the music yet.

I'm playing on Silver mode, which I assume is the hard mode. It also offers the Hardcore mode in which your character dies permanently, but I did not choose that. I may be confident, but I know I make mistakes too. I'm only human. I don't want to ruin the game for myself on my first run.

The start for the female Mage or whatever the woman is called was quite ridiculous. All it took was a shot of fireball and a stab from my dagger to defeat the opponent, and voila! I graduated from the academy just like that! I was like, "WTF?" C'mon she studied all those years (according to the background story) to learn to shoot a lousy fireball? What?

I expected the usual mission to get some stuff from some noobie dungeon but this is retarded. If only exams in real life are that simple!

So I'm only at the first town. Have to go further to better understand the game.







Been forgetting to play the Trade Up game on Facebook. I checked yesterday and I saw that I'm back down to 4.7M... Fortunately I don't care anymore since I have better games to play.







Singaporeans in NTU seem to prefer to join sports clubs as their CCAs. All other clubs seems to be full of foreigners. Take the NTU Toastmasters Club, for example. Half the Exco positions are filled by non-locals. The members population is worse. It's like we're exclusive to Indonesians and Chinese mainlanders. A few Singaporeans and Malaysians thrown in the mix like a dash of salt in a pot of stew and we have my club.

I know, foreigners have a greater incentive to join clubs and get Exco positions because that's the only way they are guaranteed a room in our campus hostels. Failure to get those rooms means living in small HDB flats with higher rents and worse living conditions. Plus the need to pay for public transport everyday.

Still, for full-time students to refuse to join any club in order to "focus on studies" makes university sound like a chore. "Just get it over and done with." Hey, it's not like you will die if you don't do so well in university. The difference between a 2nd lower and 3rd class honours is only a hundred or two in the starting pay and it's not like you will definitely stay in your first job for long.

Of course, people should join a club because they're interested in the activities. With the wide range of clubs available in our universities, few things are actually unavailable. Therefore there has to be something for just about everyone. Unless they have no interest in anything but sex and drugs. That would be sad, because these are the only things that are not available in any CCA.

There are probably things that I still don't understand.








I've noticed what irks me the most about a rigid lifestyle - the necessity of waking up at a predetermined time. Worse are those times when I must wake up in the morning. I've always preferred to sleep at dawn, give or take an hour or 2. That's precisely what I do now during my holidays. Fuck sleeping at night! Night is the best time to work and play because it's so quiet! Maybe I'm a night person but I prefer to do everything at night after everyone is asleep.

What sucks is that I can't socialize at those hours, except for online games because the Americans and Europeans play at these times. But European servers tend to lag more than US servers for reasons I don't really understand. I've always thought Western Europe is closer to me than the American west coast. It's not like I live in Japan.

Anyway, sucks that I have to wake up later at 9am. It's 3.54am now but I don't care. Haven't slept this early for a few days already. I'm beginning to sleep at 7am now and will most likely continue to be later until it goes all the way back to the original 10pm after a few weeks if it's not interrupted.

To sleep at any time I want is probably one of the conditions of what I call living comfortably. I'm not the sort who can sleep once I fall onto the bed, unlike so many people I know. The last time I was able to do that, I had just left the army and was waiting for university. I had absolutely no worries then.

Those were the days.

The price of desire. How I hate paying!

If only I don't need to eat at all. If only I can survive by standing in the sun and absorbing sunlight! Oh wait, if humans could do that, I'd probably be wishing that I didn't need to even stand in the sun to survive.

Fuck that. Life has a price, but it's such a hassle to pay it. Living is a troublesome matter. Bleh!

Sometimes, you don't really have a choice, not if certain instincts are naturally imprinted in your psyche. For this case, it's the instinct to stay alive. It's like the BIOS in your computer, can't delete it. No human can choose to die without a strong reason to overcome this.

Since I have no other options, I might as well go along and see what happens. Maybe something might just happen, though I'd prefer if nothing does. If something happens, there's always that chance that something negative might happen.

Brings to mind those situations when people make bad choices at important crossroads in life without thinking much on it. When the consequences become visible and they become helpless to stop them, they'd say something like "I never expected this to happen!" If that happens in fiction, it usually turns me off. I'd want to turn off the TV, close the player in the computer or put down the book.







Will the USA ever annex Canada in the next 100 years? I think so. Singapore being annexed by another country in the near future is also something I find quite possible. Human history has never been quiet for long in any place at any time. Even the great Roman Empire was fill with uprisings, from which the word "decimated" is derived. The punishment for rebellions was to kill one of every ten men in the rebellious villages. Therefore, to decimate a group of people does not mean to kill most of them. Got that from the book Olympos by Dan Simmons. No it's not fiction, the story behind the word "decimate".

The Holy Roman Empire also didn't last forever. Imperial China was never known as China until the Europeans came along. Before that, they called themselves by the name of their dynasty. Like during the Ming dynasty, the land was called Ming, not China nor PRC. Therefore, it can be said that even China didn't stay as the same country for the whole 4000 years.

Strange that people always said China has 5000 years of history when its earliest records were from the Shang dynasty that began at about 1600 BC. There was also the Xia dynasty before that but there's no written record from that era, only indirect descriptions by later generations. Recent excavations have been connected to this dynasty which is estimated to exist in the year 2000 BC.

That only makes 4000 years of history as of 8 years ago.

Unless we count the years when humans settled in this land. But that occured in 7000 BC. Plus history only begins when there are written records on a certain time, that's why Xia is considered history even though no one has found any writings dating from that dynasty.

Anyway, the word "dynasty" has misled me for many years. I've always believed that the different dynasties were merely different kings/bloodlines for the same empire. In fact, those Chinese dynasties can be considered as different countries. At some points in Chinese history, there have been multiple dynasties coexisting at the same time. Therefore, laymen like me can say that "dynasty" here is synonymous with "country" or "kingdom".

So no country, kingdom nor empire in human history has ever lasted for more than a millenium. Most only last several centuries. If anything, history has taught me that the smaller the land, the shorter it will stay sovereign. Also, the so called "casus belli" of most wars were bullshit. I knew about it from the game Europa Universalis III and later read more from the Wikipedia articles on several wars.

Anyone can come up with a casus belli. Some of them were basically nonsensical, too whimsical for anyone to die for. Yet die they did, millions upon millions of people in human history. The real reason, usually greed or personal motives, is never the official cause of most wars. Take WWII for example. The casus belli was... tiny little Poland attacked a German radio station out of spite... And thus began a war that cut short countless lives. Oh the bullshit people can swallow! No wonder there are religious zealots.







"Spite" cannot be found in www.dictionary.com for unknown reasons. Holy cow!

Rant 239 / Cringe

Finally, people are more aware of light pollution! This month's edition of Nat Geo magazine has an article that discusses its effects. I've probably never mentioned it in my conversations and even rants here before because I thought no one in Singapore has even heard of this term. I did mention it once, but the conversation kinda died right when I said light pollution is the reason why Singapore's sky is so empty at night. It was awkward and revealed to me the extent of ignorance of even fellow undergrads on a very widespread phenomenon like this. I never once used this term ever again nor have I ever mentioned this topic.

Everyone seems to think that air pollution is the reason, including me some years ago. It was until I got curious about why large observatories are always built in isolated areas and googled that I learnt that those giant telescopes are very sensitive to light pollution and must be far away from any lights at night to see clearly. Of course there's also our atmosphere that affects the view, which is why the Hubble telescope was built.

Here are some jokes from 4chan /r9k/ (no worries about copyright woohoo!)

A man goes to the doctor.
"Doctor!" he says, "I don't know what's going on but my left testicle has been turning blue over the last few days!" The doctor is taken aback by his statement, since he's never seen anything like it. So he tells the patient to drop trou and takes a good look at it. He runs a few tests but everything seems normal. A few days later the man comes back and the thing has gotten worse. "This doesn't look good. I'm afraid we're going to have to amputate it before it spreads to the rest of your body!" The man is scared enough to just let the doctor do what he says without thinking about it too much. So he undergoes surgery, a bit bummed but confident the problem would subside. A few days later he comes back with a horrible look on his face. "Doctor, now my right testicle is turning blue! I'm really scared!" The doctor this time is a bit quicker in his diagnosis, and of course suggest they cut off the right testicle as well. They arrange the surgery and everything goes as planned again. The man leaves convinced that it'll be his last visit. But a few days later he reveals that now it's his penis that's turning blue! The doctor really is at a loss of words. So he takes a good look at it, and him, takes a long deep breath and says: "If I were you, I'd stop wearing jeans."

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A Texan buys a round of drinks for all in the bar because, he announces his wife has just produced "a typical Texas baby boy weighing 25 pounds," Congratulations shower him from all around, and many exclamations of "Wow!" is heard. A woman faints due to sympathy pains.

Two weeks later, he returns to the bar. The bartender says, Say, you're the father of the typical Texas baby that weighed 25 pounds at birth. How much does he weigh now?

The proud father answers, Seventeen pounds. The bartender is puzzled, concerned. Why? What happened? He already weighed 25 pounds at birth.

The Texas father takes a slow swig from his long neck Lone Star, wipes his lips on his shirtsleeve, leans into the bartender and proudly says, "Had him circumcised."

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A lady in her late 40s went to a plastic surgeon for a facelift. The doctor told her of a new procedure called "The Knob." This knob is planted on the back of a woman's head and can be turned to tighten up the skin to produce the effect of a brand new facelift forever. Of course, the woman wanted "The Knob." Fifteen years later the woman went back to the surgeon. "All these years everything's been working just fine. I've had to turn the knob on lots of occasions and I've loved the results. But now I've developed two annoying problems. First of all, I've got these terrible bags under my eyes and the knob won't get rid of them." The doctor looked at her and said, "Those aren't bags, those are your breasts." She replied, "Well, I guess that explains the goatee."

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I once visited a crematorium that gave a discount to burn victims.

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The best contraceptive for old people is nudity.

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Pastor David walks into a hotel.

he says to the clerk " I hope the porn in my room is disabled'.

The clerk says ' No, it's regular porn you sick bastard".

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A bro is walking on the beach like he does every morning. Off in the distance he sees somebody laying out.

As he gets closer he notices its a quadriplegic girl. As he passes her shes asks "sir, due to my condition i have never been close to somebody. Could you please hug me"

The guy decides why not and goes over picks her up, and puts her back down. and starts to walk away again.

Then again he hears her "Mister, mister due to my condition i have never been close to anybody, could you please kiss me"

The man is slightly annoyed but feels bad so he goes over and picks her up and kisses her. Again he walks away.

Then again she calls to him "Sir, due to my condition i have never had sex. Could you please fuck me?"

The man decides what the hell, goes over and picks her up. Then he tosses her into the ocean. "Pretty fucked now arn't you bitch."

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A chemist, a physicist and a biologist are walking along the beach. The physicist stops, looks out at the ocean and says "I just have to understand the motion of the waves better" and walks into the sea and never returns. The biologist looks out to the sea and says "I just have to understand the sea creatures better" and walks out into the ocean and never returns. The chemist pulls out a notebook and writes "Physicist and biologist both soluble."

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bozo the clown is at a bar
a buxom blonde comes in and sits next to him

"BOZO BOZO I'M YOU'RE BIGGEST FAN!
CAN YOU SHOW ME A CLOWN TRICK?"

bozo says, "no, sorry, i'm off duty."

she persists
BUT BOZOOOOOOOOOOO PLEEEEEEEEEASE (bats her eyelashes)

"ok fine, you want a clown trick you got it." bozo says begrudgingly

He then takes her to behind the bar.

"Pull your skirt up"

perplexed, she agrees and bozo gets directly behind her, then she feels something in her pooper

"you feel my thumb moving around in your asshole?" he asks

"OHHH YES" she exclaims

Bozo while still standing behind her holds up both his thumbs and proclaims TA-DAAAAAAAAAAAA

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Element name: WOMAN.
Symbol: WO.

Atomic weight: 'Don't even go there'.
Physical properties: Generally round in form. Boils at nothing and may freeze at any time. Melts whenever treated properly. Very bitter if not used well.

Chemical properties: Very active. Highly unstable. Possesses strong affinity to gold, silver, platinum,and precious gemstones. Violent when left alone. Able to absorb great amounts of exotic food. Turns
slightly green when placed next to a better specimen.

Usage: Highly ornamental. An extremely good catalyst for dispersion of wealth. Probably the most powerful income reducing agent known.

Caution: Highly explosive in inexperienced hands.


Element: MAN.
Symbol: XY.

Atomic weight: (180 +/- 50).

Physical properties: Solid at room temperature. Gets bent out of shape easily. Fairly dense and sometimes flaky. Difficult to find a pure sample. Due to age and rust, older samples are unable to conduct electricity as well as younger samples.

Chemical properties: Attempts to bond with WO any chance it can get. Also tends to form strong bonds with itself. Becomes explosive when mixed with Kd (child) for prolonged periods of time. Can be neutralised by saturating with alcohol.

Usage: None known. Possibly good methane source.

Caution: In the absence of WO, this element rapidly decomposes and begins to smell.

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It's the spring of 1957 and Bobby goes to pick up his date, Peggy Sue. Bobby's a pretty hip guy with his own car and a ducktail hairdo. When he goes to the front door, Peggy Sue's father answers and invites him in.

Peggy Sue's not ready yet, so why don't you have a seat?" he says.

"That's cool." says Bobby. Peggy Sue's father asks Bobby what they are planning to do. Bobby replies politely that they will probably just go to the malt shop or to a drive-in-movie.

Peggy Sue's father responds, "Why don't you kids go out and screw? I hear all of the kids are doing it."

Naturally this comes as quite a surprise to Bobby and he says "Whaaaat?"

"Yeah," says Peggy Sue's father, "Peggy Sue really likes to screw; she'll screw all night if we let her!"

Bobby's eyes light up and smiles from ear to ear. Immediately, he has revised the plans for the evening. A few minutes later, Peggy Sue comes downstairs in her little poodle skirt with her saddle shoes and announces that she's ready to go. Almost breathless with anticipation, Bobby escorts his date out the front door while Dad is saying, "Have a good evening kids," with a wink for Bobby.

About 20 minutes later, a thoroughly disheveled Peggy Sue rushes back into the house, slams the door behind her and screams at her father:

"DAMMIT DADDY! THE TWIST!!!!!! IT'S CALLED THE TWIST!!!!!"

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And some anti-jokes now. I find some anti-jokes better than actual jokes.

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Because chickens naturally wander, and there was nothing on the pavement for him to walk straight toward.

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A horse walks into a bar.

The barman gets upset and sends him out.

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How can you spot the blind guy at the nudist colony?

He will probably have a white cane, and he may also be wearing dark sunglasses, even on a cloudy day.

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A jew, a black man and an arab enter to a bar.

What a perfect example of tolerance between humans.

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This chap walks into a pub and to his astonishment, notices that there's a chap stood at the bar who has a huge orange for a head. Despite his curiousity, the chap decides not to pry and sits down quietly.

After a few drinks, curiosity has overcome the chap and he decides to enquire.

"Excuse me, mate, but I couldn't help noticing you have a big orange for a head. What happened?"

"Well," says the man with the big orange for a head, "I moved into a large old house not so long ago. One afternoon, I decided to explore the attic and found an old brass lamp in the corner. I rubbed the lamp and a Genie popped out, explained he had been trapped in there for two hundred years, and would grant me three wishes for releasing him."

"So what did you ask for first?" asks the curious chap.

"I asked for ten million pounds. The Genie clapped his hands, there was a flash of lightning, and he asked me to phone the bank, who confirmed my balance was now ten million pounds!"

"What did you ask for with your second wish?"

"Well, I asked if I could make love to the ten most beautiful women in the world. Again, the Genie clapped his hands, there was a flash of lightning, and the doorbell rang. Ten supermodels ran in, picked me up, carried me to bed, and ravished me all night!"

"Wow," says the curious chap, "What did you ask for with your third wish?"

"Well, I asked for a big orange for a head."

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What do you do when you see your TV floating in midair in the middle of the night?

Turn on the lights in hopes of comprehending the situation more fully.

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Your Mom is so fat that she sits in the house all day and cries. She also is at risk of numerous health complaints.

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