Thursday 31 May 2012

Rant 1001 / Palindromes




With over 6k dislikes and 3k likes, it's clear I'm not the only one doing mental facepalms watching this.


























Augmented reality (AR) should work with cabs. People waiting along the road would type their destinations into their mobile devices and taxi drivers will see a translucent virtual signboard above their heads stating whatever they typed in.

Maybe the AR display could be inserted into or onto the windscreen so that drivers won't have to put on any glasses or whatever.

The implementation could get problematic. I can already see a few problems with it that will need to be fixed.

For one, the virtual signs may block the important parts of the driver's view of the road, especially at the junctions.

Another thing is the number of signs when there are queues. If ten people are squeezing into a taxi stand on a rainy day, how can the signs be separated?

Third, how can the developers make sure the signs are only displayed when the users are actually waiting for a cab? For example, what if a user forgets to turn it off?

But if these can be solved, life will be much more convenient for both taxi drivers and their passengers.

I'm just saying because taxi drivers here tend to have a specific destination at certain hours when they change shifts. At most taxi stands, only a few at the front of the queue would be able to ask the driver if they are able to drive them to their destinations. No driver ever bothers to ask the entire queue or waits for everyone to ask.

AR would allow drivers to immediately pick their passengers without much hassle. This will require some form of two-way interaction in the programme though. Maybe the mobile device would ring or beep and it would display the taxi's plate number when the person is chosen.

Someone steal this idea please. It's really annoying to wait for cabs at around 4-6pm here in Singapore. During that part of the day, it's actually not abnormal to have 7-8 empty taxis pass by.

Hell, this programme can even allow people to share cabs with strangers. Dammit, this idea is getting more awesome by the minute.

AR can also replace road signs, allow driving despite bad visibility and even provide ad space when the car is not on the road.

Oh yes, and it can also replace rear view mirrors. In fact, with cameras being so cheap these days, you can easily fix enough of those on the car to give the driver a 360-degree view around the vehicle - on both the horizontal and vertical axes!

By the way, I don't think there's any point in looking directly up or downwards but it sounds cool.

The key to implementing this entire concept is the windscreen. Coming up with a cheap and easy way to display AR on a vehicle's windscreen is the biggest obstacle, but that's up to the engineers to solve.

I'm sure it's possible, just not cheap and easy at the moment.


























Do people really still wear perfume to cover their body odour?

Why not use deordorant instead?

Just noticed that my housekeeper wears perfume (and she's been working for us for years now) to work and doesn't shower before she leaves.

Used to assume they all do because the ones before her did, but I noticed she doesn't do so ever since I started waiting for her to finish to pay her before she leaves.

Hence my questions.

Before I was the one paying her, I used to close my door the entire day since she irons our clothes right outside the room. Never really watched them work.

It's the same with one of my staff who uses some pretty strong perfume.

Actually I'm not too sure if that's also her reason. Nevertheless the whole office is always filled with her perfume whenever I go to work in the morning.

I don't know if it's polite to ask either, and it's not important enough for me to risk it.

It's just weird. Nobody I know other than these two women wear that much perfume at all.

Moreoever, isn't deordorant cheaper and lasts longer?

Less feminine I guess but I don't see what purpose their feminity serves when they're at work.






















I don't know if this is really true but apparently some people are saying online that it's imperative that the colour of the belt must match the colour of the suede shoes. Preferably but not necessarily a suede belt, and the colour must be the same. The shade doesn't seem to matter though as long as they're close.

Time to get a new belt. Not exactly an issue because the one I'm wearing is pretty ugly when exposed. I say that because it's usually covered by my tucked-out shirt.

I've never been to anywhere formal enough to require tucking in after secondary school.

A new belt wouldn't hurt. My belt has lost most of its paint over the years and whatever's left are in the form of cracked flakes that continue to drop off gradually.

But it's not urgent and shall be placed on my list of things to get at the end of the year when all the major Christmas sales begin.

Thought about getting a suede belt but I don't think it's a good idea to have yet another suede item that requires extra attention. I'm just not that kind of guy. I'm already concerned about whether I'll care for the shoes enough in the long term.


















Fishcakes!

Bought some fishcakes on Sunday afternoon and the market was pretty empty. The seller was free enough to talk to me and give me tips on how to cook it.

I was planning to make some kind of soup noodles initially but she told me I could fry it a bit before cooking it with vegetables.

Tried it and she was right.

More variety!

Also bought 60 fishballs from her. Those things, like the fishcakes, are so versatile.





















Bought a Neoflam non-stick wok today at 40% off. Pretty awesome, the 40%, but the final price was still over S$80.

Someone recommend it to me and I was in need of a new non-stick wok. My current Tefal one has become very, very sticky and has a few scratches from my brother's and my early cooking mistakes.

Cooked today with the new wok. Felt so damn good.

It's supposed to have a ceramic coating known as "Ecolon" that doesn't have the PFOA stuff that other non-stick layers contain so I don't have to worry when it gets scratches or something other than about its non-stick feature.

The ceramic material also makes the coating more durable.

For $80, it better be.

The 30-cm wok is deeper than the Tefal wok of the same diameter I've been using but has a smaller bottom. Easier to cook in IMO.

Also got a voucher from the purchase for a free synthetic diamond or a free pearl.

Wasn't interested.

Since I have yet to find a use for the last free pearl I redeemed (and I've already forgotten where I kept it), they can keep their pearls and diamonds this time.

What can I do with a diamond anyway?

It's not like I need a glass cutter or something.

Neither was I interested in the S$25 voucher for the Renoma stuff they sell in the store. They don't sell belts and they don't have pants my size.
























Courts obviously is doing well with its Flexi plans but I do not have a positive opinion about it.

It's pretty much BS IMO, this instalment thing. 12-60 months? I can't imagine paying for any of my furnitures for 5 whole years!

If you can't afford to buy something with a single payment, you probably shouldn't buy it at all. Furthermore, defending yourself by citing your low income only makes it worse.

If you can afford paying a small fee regularly, you can start saving a bit of your income regularly.

If you can handle the latter, you could have paid less. In Court's case, 12% per annum less - minimum. And if you're taking the 60-month plan, that's a whopping 60% over the original price at least!

The other possible reason for going for the Flexi plan is that the customer might want to change his furnitures before all the payments are made.

Actually I'm not sure about this and Courts isn't very clear about the terms of such a contract on its website.

But theoretically speaking, if Courts merely takes back the furniture in the event that the customer stops paying before it's paid in full, this could be exploited.

On the other hand, it would make more sense that Courts would impose a heavier penalty for such a thing.

In any case, it still doesn't really make sense for people to go for its Flexi plans. They're almost like the furniture's equivalent of the home loan, except I don't expect the average guy to ever manage to save up enough money to buy a house before he needs one.























Played ME2 on Insanity a little. Reached Mordin's clinic but got a little bored.

I really should change my class. I've already played as the Sentinel before and it's kinda easy.

Maybe I'll take the Infiltrator this time. The skills sound fun.

So the next time I play, which is probably tomorrow night, I'll be restarting it with another class.























The UN proves to be another League of Nations by being completely incapable of handling the situation in Syria.

You can blame China and you can blame Russia, but back when you were considering letting them into the Security Council you should have seen that coming. Predicting the future, aka having foresight, is part of the jobscope of any leaders of any countries.

Tuesday 29 May 2012

Rant 1000 / A Kilorant Of Words

This feels kinda like the Internet - it was never expected to go this far.

Similar to the IPv4 system, I started with three digits for the number since my first post and thought it was more than enough.

One thousand posts.

Thought about doing something special but didn't see the need for that.























I didn't use to notice the benefit of having iced water when it's hot but now I do.

I was desperate since I'm too cheap to get my AC repaired and I needed a way to endure the hot weather.

It's 32 degrees right now.

It feels even hotter after meals.

So I got a large cup of iced water... and I stopped sweating for a while.

This is even better than the wet towel I used in the past.























It's high time I start working now. My anxiety has reached the point where I won't be able to sleep if I don't do anything about it.

I'm not eating tonight until I've done what I need to do - find some designs.

I don't even know why I procrastinate - I have practically nothing to lose and everything to gain!

...

3 hours spent on scanning through over 7000 jackets.

My mind is now numb.


...

Designs were chosen for the next phase.

Yay!

But more is required. Can't just do unisex.

But I don't have to give a feck about men's jackets anymore for the rest of this year.

























The Greeks are in denial. This is... just wow.

Solemn warnings from abroad that Athens cannot stay in the euro while rejecting the terms attached to the billions offered to pull Greece out of its financial hole are widely disbelieved in a land that considers itself the envy of foreigners.

Frankfurt and Brussels say it is impossible for Greece to have one without the other: no bailout means no euro and a return to the drachma - "drachmageddon", as some Greeks call it.

"Empty threats!" said Nikos Sokos, 29, who works in a cafe in central Athens. "There's no way they're going to kick us out. There won't be a euro zone if they do that."


They can and they will if nothing is done to plug the giant financial black hole that is their country. What choice will they have? From Germany's perspective, they would rather kill the euro (if that is the result at all) than let the entire Eurozone go bankrupt just because of them.




























You know SWTOR is dead when...




D:






















It's been getting harder to rinse shampoo off my hair these days. I'm not sure when this began but it's probably since last year.

At first it was just one patch of my hair but now it's the entire crown.

Basically after my hair dries, they stick together and become hard like there's dried shampoo inside.

Except I've been trying to rinse my hair pretty thoroughly recently and it's not working. And yes I've tried massaging my scalp and all that.

After some googling, it seems this is likely to be caused by a buildup of some chemicals in my shampoo.

No idea why it only happened now. Maybe it's this Pantene shampoo I've been using consistently ever since I began buying my own. It's cheap, only S$6.50 for 700ml in this budget store in my neighbourhood.

I think I may have to visit an actual hair salon or buy some clarifying shampoo, if applying vinegar/baking soda doesn't work.
























Oh fuck! The bank in Hong Kong requires the letter of administration to be resealed in Hong Kong.

Fuck!

I don't think there's enough money in that account to cover another lawyer's fees and a return air ticket there.

According to my lawyer the resealing of the letter of administration is going to be a repeat of the application process, ie I should avoid it if possible.

I'm now asking the bank to be lenient and just send me the money. If not, and if I'm right about the amount there, I'm going to just forget about it.




























The worst thing about it was the silence. The absolute silence.


























"There's a fine line between my ass."


























Went to the Philips Carnival Sale on the 26th. Initially planned to buy just the Airfloss and a steam iron but ended up with a nose trimmer too. It was cheaper than if I had used my points in its online store.

New toys!

The Airfloss requires an initial recharge of 24 hours before I can use it though :(

As a Philips Family Rewards member, I also got a set of iPad casing and screen protector for free.

It's kinda nice especially since my screen protector has yet to arrive after 2 months. I'm not in a hurry because the order isn't going anywhere and I'm already used to using the iPad without it. At worst I'll just ask them for a refund which will most likely be in the form of store credits.

As for the casing, it's made of a softer leather than the one I'm using. Not sure if it's better but it sure feels like it is.


























Tomorrow the reyclers come to get their green recycling bags.

I wonder if they will accept my old pots. Not because they're old but that they've been left in the open in the kitchen for so long a thick black greasy layer has formed on all of them.

And by "long" I mean years.

It's disgusting enough that I couldn't touch them with my bare hands.

























So apparently there was this shooting in a Finnish town on Friday. Now the interesting thing is that a Finnish guy told me a major newspaper in his country printed a map of the town center and explicitly explained how this man maximised his coverage with his rifle on the roof, almost as if its teaching readers how to do it.

I'm surprised they didn't tell everyone how to make bombs after all these terrorist attacks over the years.

The people have the right to know the truth!
























Just tried the Airfloss.

Nice gadget. This feels so much more convenient than using actual floss.

This thing has a tiny piston inside which I could feel compressing what I'm guessing to be a mix of air and water (could be just water, but that would take a pretty damn impressive pump inside) whenever I press the button.

More likely, it was just air and it works like a perfume spray.

Another nice unexpected effect was the lack of kick from the piston. I had half-expected some form of recoil when I heard the sound but I couldn't feel anything but a small sudden vibration.

When I floss, it's usually quite troublesome to get the floss between the teeth at the back. I'd have to twirl it around my fingers a few times to get a good grip for every gap, and the worst part is when the floss somehow catches onto something and untwines as I pull it out, leaving some tiny threads stuck between my teeth.

I solve that by flossing it with a new piece of thread but it's still very annoying.

With this machine, I won't have this problem.

The catch is that things that are very firmly stuck between the teeth, maybe like a piece of bone or just tartar like I have between a few of my teeth, won't be affected by the water spray. Good idea to have some floss around as backup.

Before this I was planning to revert to normal floss when this thing stops working but now, I may get a replacement when the time comes, depending on my income then.



















I'm now going to drink tea on each day that I'm not going out to see anyone.

Tea is like a weaker version of coffee to me, especially since I drink like 5 cups of it when I do.

The idea is to go cool turkey whenever possible so that the next cup of coffee gives a stronger kick when I need it.

Another reason for this is that I have no idea what to do with all this tea leaves my mum left behind. Despite the fact that most of them were vacuum-packed, there's only one of me and like several kilograms of them dried leaves.

I only need about half a tablespoon a day since I'm not into the hardcore thick stuff like my mum was.

At the current rate I'm going, some of them are bound to expire before I can get to them.

Too bad. None of my relatives like them. I don't particularly like that tea either because I'm more into a mix of tieguanyin and jasmine. She bought several types of leaves most of them tieguanyin and oolong and the stuff I'm using was from the large can she used to store her preferred mix.























I think the problem with internet discussions is that there is too little participation from the intelligent and the successful.

The result is that most internet discussions I see are made up of stupidity and ignorance.

I mean, since when has anyone been required to fork out 200k SGD as downpayment for a 300k HDB flat in Singapore?

That's not even the worst part. That distinction goes to the fact that almost nobody disagreed with the comment.

I strongly believe that more is required to correct misinformation and these festering boils of idiocy that are everywhere on the internet.

Apathy can kill.

Or am I one of the few people who are willing to do what must be done when a problem arises, while everyone else just waits for someone else to do it?

And I can't believe the number of Singaporeans who can spend all their time on the internet whining about how the government is making them "pay and pay".

If you have the time to whine online, you have the time to find out ways to make more money outside of your full-time job, like my accountant who's working full-time in the accounts department in some MNC, studies part-time in a university with course fees fully covered by the company, and does bookkeeping for us small businesses on the side.

That makes you more money; sitting around talking about how you have none doesn't.

I just cannot stand how the stupidity is allowed to grow on its own. Stupid people are fine but stupid people converting others to their religion of Stupidity are simply outrageous.

In addition, here in Singapore their misinformed whines and subconscious need for scapegoats for their own problems feed on each other till they become hateful morons who think everything can and must be blamed on the current ruling party of our government.

Can't get a good job and you have to pay your home loan for the rest of your working life with nothing left for a safety net? Blame the PAP.

An ex-bankrupt who can't get a loan and hence can't afford a home? Blame the PAP.

An ex-convict with the same problem? Blame the PAP.

Students dying from mysterious reasons? Blame the PAP.

Some dude killed his ex-lover? Blame the PAP.

Tampon not absorbent enough and blood is leaking from your panties? Blame the PAP.

There's a fly in your soup? Blame the PAP.

You've just wasted 5 minutes of your life reading my blog that you will never get back. Go blame the PAP for that too.

More of us need to get out there and correct their opinions. One or two of those may have been fine, but when there's enough of those voices, something called "mob mentality" kicks in. The resulting hate and idiocy can be greater than the sum of the individual parts.

Don't give me that bullshit about how everyone's entitled to their own opinions. That's only said by apathetic people who haven't seen enough. Moreover, it doesn't mean we should just let things be.

Because how about people who believe that drugs should be legalised? Not just weed but other stuff like Ecstasy and LSD.

Or mass suicide cults?

Or all those people who are now as good as bankrupts because they thought the end of the world was going to happen earlier this year?

Or people who worship serial killers?

More is needed to save the misguided from themselves. Even if we do not change their opinions, at least something should be done to correct the misconceptions of the uninformed.

A country is made up of its people. When the masses become idiots, the country is ruined and the fault lies in everyone who saw but did nothing to stem the tide of stupidity.

Case in point: Nazi Germany.
























And suddenly I feel like having Hamburgers from MCD. At S$1.50 on its delivery menu, I think it's kind of a good deal now that I think about it.

Then again, it can get pretty dry after a while.





















Bought a pair of casual suede shoes on Gilt.

Undeniably a hasty decision because I only spent about 10 minutes googling and thinking about it.

I don't know why but I just like that pair of suede shoes. Just a simple design yet not too plain.

Just a pair of suede derby shoes


Looking at it just gives me that excited feel that I don't get from looking at other shoes. As for the brand, TBH I've never heard of it. Eastland? Probably not big here in Singapore.

First of all, I need a pair of shoes like yesterday. My current pair is old and breaking apart. I've already glued it thrice now, first time with superglue meant for wood and plastics, the latter two times with shoe glue. As the result of my lack of dexterity in my hands, the shoes are now fcking ugly.

The right sole is currently not attached to the shoe at the toe tip and above the heel; it's only hanging on at the bottom. The left sole is also not attached at the toe tip.

This is the pair I've been wearing for everything including work, ie including to meet buyers.

Secondly, it's a pair of Columbia hiking shoes. Heavy and probably has more traction than I need, yet strangely it still slips on wet tiles. The sole isn't even that worn out yet, with no flat areas anywhere.

Initially I wanted to get another pair of such shoes but after a bit of reading up on footwear, I decided to get something less out-of-place and was thinking of getting walking shoes instead.

Then I saw suede shoes on sale on Gilt a few days ago and I just liked the look immediately.

Usually when I go shopping I don't bother even glancing at most shoes other than the sports shoes, so I've never noticed suede shoes here in Singapore.

In any case I managed to stop myself from buying any of it that day but not this time.

I am aware that it would be a better idea to get out tomorrow and find some suede shoes to get a general idea of the price range here, but I just wanted it. It's that urge, that feel in the gut that says," That's it! Look no further! That's what you've been looking for! Now get it!"

Things I took into consideration before I succumbed to tempation:

1) It is a terrible idea to buy something without comparing prices.

2) Shoes my size are hard to find, even on an American site such as Gilt. If I wait, it might get sold out. I can only reserve it for 10mins at a time.

The last, combined with that urge, was the most important factor for my purchase.

Of course I made sure it was my size before I bought it. I even checked my shoes before I clicked.

In the end, the final net price of this decision was S$136, well within my budget for my next pair of shoes (I was having a max limit of S$200).

The problem now is that suede shoes require extra attention because the material can get ruined more easily than all the other shoes I've ever worn in my entire life.

Before it arrives somewhere between the coming week and the next, I'm also going to need to buy a suede brush and a suede spray.

That's important because it MUST last. I've never had a pair that lasted less than two years and I don't want this to be the first.






I also need a few pairs of pants but Gilt has nothing I want. The ones I'm wearing are fading, a few quite visibly. I should have bought some earlier this year when there were sales but it's too late to think about it now.






If this doesn't work out, at least I'll learn something.

In the event that it does, I'm going to need some new pants to go with it other than my current pairs of cargo pants.

Tuesday 22 May 2012

Rant 999 / What Security?

Just realized that Procaster has a very unstable connection sometimes. Normally I close the window while I stream (it's invisible to viewers) but when I was recording my Mass Effect run, I left it open for a while and saw that it was disconnecting and reconnecting.

When I went into Procaster studio, the recording was split into like 20 videos that varied between 1 to 20mins.

What the heck?

So now I'm uploading the master copy from my PC. I'm just glad it records in both the Livestream server and my computer.


















Just watched 1911.

Realized that one unspoken important aspect of such a major revolution was that it also clears the debts of the previous government.

Well, most of it anyway. Britain still held Hong Kong, Portugal Macao and Shanghai remained kinda like a pizza split among everyone after the revolution.

Another thing I thought was that it would be nice to have a war movie that portrays both sides of the story.

Most movies are about the winning side. The people on this side are usually portrayed as heroes and the other side is full of dumb fucks.

That's not true.

If say, someone makes a movie about Napoleon's wars, he'd be the hero most of the time until Waterloo.

But Napoleon I was an ass from the start when he twisted the French Revolution for his personal ambitions. He betrayed his entire nation and was basically just like Yuan Shikai. In fact I thought Napoleon's story showed what China would have been if Yuan Shikai had managed to hold on to power.

Or maybe Stalin would have been a better example, since the weak military of China combined with its terrible political situation in those years would never have allowed Yuan Shikai to invade neighbouring countries successfully.

So as I was saying, the movie might have been more realistic if it could show more of what the Qing supporters were doing. Surely there was some good men among them, people who were as idealistic as Sun Yat-sen except they believed they could change the government from the inside and did all they could.

Just as there were assholes like Yuan Shikai on the Revolutionaries' side, I'm certain not all the high-ranking Qing officials were greedy bootlickers; people are never as uniformly conforming as that.

However, doing so would have changed the focus of the film from celebrating and commemorating the revolution to being anti-war.





















For some reason, my modem died this morning. The LED light for internet access went red on my gateway device (the technician described it as "a modem and router combined") and it's been like this since.

Restarting it doesn't work at all and the tech support hotline didn't know what to do either.

I'm now on my USB modem whose router is being recharged constantly by my PC so it gives me internet access but with crappy 3G bandwidth.

...

Okay it resurrected the following day. All is well again.





















I;ve just spent US$5 on this RPG called "Unemployment Quest".

WHAT HAVE I DONE??!

It's just a 2D RPG a la classic JRPGs about... unemployment.

I'm not spending anymore at this site from now on until I see something really good. This was a really hasty decision.

I've also backed Legends of Eisenwald with US$15 but that's a turn-based tactical RPG which I feel the PC platform sorely lacks these days.

On the other hand, it's US$15. I paid less for Fallout: New Vegas and Fallout 3.

Still, it's an indie developer with a good idea.

The last project I'm backing is Kitaru, which may or may not succeed. Most likely will, but who knows?

It's hit 72% of its funding goal with 14 days to go, so I'm not sure if it will succeed. Likely but nothing is certain.

It's also a RPG, albeit turn-based active time (think FF franchise) but the important thing here is that it's going to be on both the PC and iOS.

My iPad is like the PS3 right now - no gaems.

There's actually just one interesting game at the moment called "Castle Master 3D" which is a strategy game and action RPG combined.

Since it's a mobile app, the aspects of both genres have been greatly simplified from what it can be on the PC.

Since this game is about you saving the almost extinct humans from the monster invasion, the strategy comes in the form of retaking the castles which have been uniformly spread across the land.

You can only attack monster-controlled castles that are next to your own castle, and you begin with just one right at the southwestern corner in a rectangular map.

Castles generate income and train soldiers. Money is placed into a unified treasury but soldiers are garrisoned into the castles they were trained in. They can then be transferred manually and this process takes time, money and control points.

Control points can be recharged for free to max capacity of 150 points daily. More can be bought with real cash.

To provide a sense of scale, each invasion you attempt costs 5 points and each transfer, regardless of number of soldiers, cost 2 points.

Money is earned by the automatic tax collection that happens regularly (not sure how long). The amount is affected by your Intelligence, the number of citizens and their loyalty.

The number of citizens are gained gradually, usually through good random events and are limited only by level of the castle (there are three). Their loyalty decays gradually from a maximum of 120, although it can be raised by spending money or by good random events. There are bad random events that decrease both.

And that's that for the big picture.

Zooming in to the warfare, we have five kinds of soldiers: spearmen, scouts, warriors, gladiators and knights, arranged according to cost.

By the way there are no guides or wikis on this game, so everything here is either from the ingame tips or my own observations.

Anyways, spearmen are the most useless. They are multiple times as tanky as scouts but they do shit all damage.

Scouts, vice versa.

Warriors have the second best damage in the game and they're about twice as tough as scouts so they're the real damage dealers when money is not the issue.

Gladiators have insane HP compared to everyone else, or twice as tough as knights, so they appear to be the real tanks... except they do area damage with the whirlwind-like skill they use with their axes. So I'm thinking they're not tanks but damage dealers specialising in AoE damage.

Knights have the highest damage and second most HP in the game.

What I know for sure is that in desperate times, gladiators and knights are my best friends. Seriously, during the few times when everyone in my army is dead, only these two types of soldiers remain to help me defend my castles.

These guys actually last; everyone else is just support. With them around, I've won defensive battles against 150 enemies with just 60... and lost 10.

Furthermore, each type of soldiers can be individually upgraded. Each upgrade cost money and takes time and will apply to all soldiers of the type across the map.

Now to the micro scale, the RPG. As I have mentioned previously, you have Intelligence. Other than that, you have Strength and Constitution. Strength increases damage, Constitution increases HP and Intelligence increases the damage of your special skills and the taxes you collect.

Weapons come in three types - shield-and-sword, dual-wield shortswords (or daggers, whatever) and broadsword.

The first increases your toughness, have average movement speed and the first special skill is basically shield bash - cheap MP cost, quick recharge, does crap damage and pushes the target back.

The second gives you more damage, a fast movement speed and the first skill is just more damage with average cost and recharge speed.

The third has the most damage, slow movement speed and the first skill does AoE damage with high cost and slow recharge.

I'm only discussing the first skills because that's how far I've gotten.

Weapons and armours are all readily available at the shops but other than the prices, they have level requirements, forcing you to buy one set at a time every few levels.

The problem is, it's not completely necessary.

With high Int, I can raise more taxes, train better and more soldiers and just watch my men fight. Although they can't be controlled, when there are even 50 soldiers, micromanagement kinda becomes obsolete anyway unless you're Korean. Coincidentally, that's where the game's made. I guess the devs were kind enough to level the playing field for the international players.

Of course, the other way is by brute force and become a force of nature with high strength and/or constitution, therefore rendering your troops pointless.

Actually I'm not sure if this path is possible because you would have to kill really fast. Otherwise, enemies further from you may just ignore you and attack the castle gates which you have to defend.

In my first try I went for this path and lost because I lost everything but my first castle.

Right now I'm typing this because I just lost one fully upgraded castle due to my carelessness.

Which brings us to the point that this game is as hardcore as classic games.

It shows no mercy. If I accidentally let myself die by not watching my HP bar, my army automatically loses even if it vastly outnumbers the enemies.

So if I'm defending, the castle just get lost to enemy hands. Worse, it loses all its upgrades, so that even if I retake it I have to rebuild it from scratch.

Retaking is easy if I retaliate immediately before the AI has time to dig in (bring reinforcements, upgrade defenses), hence I keep large garrisons in every castle just in case.

Fortunately, I don't have to stay inactive like in Mount & Blade in which I'd be held as a POW for ransom, so I can act quick.

Speaking of defense upgrades, there is almost none, just a tougher gate and some damaging spikes near it.

Finally there is the time.

The game does not progress when it's closed like other games because time is an important aspect of the game.

Everything is in real-time, so enemies can invade at any moment. This can get particularly irritating when you have only a skeleton force in a castle because the AI would keep throwing everything it has against you thinking it had any chance of succeeding against my army of 30 gladiators and knights with its army of 100. At one point I barely had time to restock my potions before the next invasion countdown ended.

Of course I have to get in the fray myself. The game would be so boring if I just watch, although I risk exactly what happened to me just now when I fight. Moreover, with my army so badly outnumbered, I had to do everything I can to stop my soldiers from dying.

But usually, the AI only attacks once in a while, especially once I have a sufficiently large garrison in each castle.

As for the very beginning, I start with a small army and one castle and the enemy has never attacked me at all until I invade any of its castle.



Anyways, it's getting too annoying due to my carelessness. Also, can't reload because it's always autosave.























So the Trappist (a Roman Catholic Order) monastery in Hong Kong known as the "Trappist Haven Monastery" produces and sells milk, and it's called... "Priest Milk". It practically blew my mind with the amount of sense it made.

Actually it would be more accurate and less hilarious to call it "Priest brand milk". And maybe less "English" too.






















Diablo 3 is encountering a major security issue - what security?



A quick glance online shows multiple reports of Diablo 3 accounts being hacked, suggesting it is a growing issue. Players have seen the loss of items stored in character inventory and stash, and gold removed as their accounts are stripped bare. Blizzard has been working to "roll back" affected characters to a point before accounts were compromised, but some progress is lost.


This is pretty epic. Nobody really knows how they're doing it and Blizzard isn't saying anything. It's kinda like the start of most zombie flicks, before people realize they have to shoot them in the head.

Nobody knows how to prevent it. The current popular theory is that the hackers were hijacking session identifiers, a sort of temporary key that allows data exchange between the user and the server.

Official Blizzard advice isn't working either.

Blizzard offers an Authenticator designed to provide extra security to your account. Donlan did not have the authenticator before the hack, but reports suggest accounts have been compromised even with this enabled.

This is really bad. The authenticator is similar to those used by banks in that it provides a temporary code through a mobile device to be used to log in.

For local banks in Singapore, this is an almost obsolete technology in the form of the tiny device that shows a code based on an insanely complex time-related algorithm. Nowadays, the better banks like DBS use codes that are sent via instant messaging to our phones for online card transactions. Heck, even Google uses that (for this Blogger account, for example, I have to enter a code they send me every time I log in).

One bank I know that still uses only the authentication device is the Singapore branch of the Bank of China, although its internet banking is completely useless TBH so the security is pointless anyway. Even if someone steals my account, there isn't anything they can do with it. You can only transfer funds between accounts you own, and I only own a single account.

So in any case, if you own a legit copy of D3, it's probably for the best if you stop playing for a while until Blizzard fixes this.





In this video, the people moving around were hacked characters stripping and selling everything for gold in preparation for the release of the AH in the near future.

If you lose anything, there's no guarantee you're getting them back.

Saturday 19 May 2012

Rant 998 / Two Short For A Grand, Too Long For A Rant


It's a good thing I'm not an Indian. Think of how many mothers I cannot comment on!
























Except that's in the Old Covenant which Christians don't really follow. He'd be better off saying he can quote the Torah instead.






He has a point. Why do they care so much about what people do when they're together in private? "Nobody's being gay at you."









J. Edgar Hoover was a hipster fag. He was gay before it was mainstream.


























Diablo 3 won't be cracked for some time as far as I can tell because the game uses server-based AI scripts, meaning the codes for the behaviour of the monsters and NPCs are on the servers and not installed on the users' computers.

It's almost like a MMO in this aspect, so it's almost impossible to "crack" the game now.

To create a server emulator, AFAIK there are at least two possible methods:

1) create AI scripts similar to the legit ones.
2) hack into Blizzard and steal the codes.

Those are what MMORPG private servers usually use anyway.

Anyways, I believe D3 is setting an example for future big-budget games. The game has basically prevented piracy by storing half the game on its on servers, and now that most people have good broadband access, the always-online thing shouldn't be a problem.

Sucks for people with internet or power issues though.

























Oh wow they're now selling the exact same portable router I'm using on some discount site for... S$35 (U.P. $75).




Right.

I bought 2 for US$22.70 each from DX back then, so that was roughly S$29.50 each.

And the $35 was only for self-collection; delivery costs $5 more.

Even at S$140 for 4, that's still $35 ie free delivery for a single order of 4 of those.

That's stupid. For four pieces, I could activate bulk rate for my order on DX and get the "3 or more" price of US$21 each, ie S$26.25 using the current rate of S$1.25 = US$1.00.


And that's a good example of how non-PRC-based retailers in Asia, online and physical, should not take the "cheap" path - it's a dead end.

You just can't beat the retailers from the country of origin of everything you sell!

This didn't use to be true back in my father's day but now that the Chinese retailers are going online, the rules have changed for every country that has good internet access availability.

Here in Singapore, the story is no different from that of Hong Kong, where retailers and wholesalers have adapted through quality assurance. Since there's no way we can beat the prices offered by China-based stores, the easiest path is to build up a reputation of reliability by spending more effort on checking the goods. We make sure we don't give you shit as often as Chinese sellers do, and in return we charge you more.

In a way, you can say that part of our job is to absorb risks for the consumers. If anyone ever thinks that he gets a lot of defective goods from SG or HK sellers, that person probably has no idea how terrible they really are over in China.

It's kinda like luxury retailers and posh restaurants which spend a lot of money on appearance and hype. They must spend more than others on their own products but that alone cannot justify their charging what they must to cover their costs.

For example, jewellery stores need more security than other kinds of retail stores (in addition to other higher costs like special expertise), but you can't just charge customers for that, so they make pretty boxes and bags, and use ambiance to make everything look high class. Those don't actually cost a lot and technically, they're nowhere close to justifying the differences between the costs and the selling prices of their products, but the feel of buying something from them that the combination produces do.

Anyways DX is a HK-based company which has a warehouse right next to a postal office. Clearly you will likely be able to find the same products sold there even cheaper if you went to China yourself or find an actual China-based online store, but DX allows free exchange for defective products and will pay for the postage when you mail it back.

There - reliability.

If I were to try and compete with that, I will have to find a way to justify my even higher prices since the import taxes and shipping charges here in Singapore are much higher.

In other words, I will need something that can beat that free exchange policy (and other things that DX offers, like reward points) without increasing my costs too much.

Until then, no Singapore online store will be able to match DX and similar websites (and there are A LOT of those).

























Mankind is doomed! She has bred!























After overcoming a few challenges in Towns 0.46 I've got a town with a few heroes. It always felt like such a hassle to manually order my soldiers to explore the dungeons, so when the heroes arrived and automatically explored, killed the monsters and actually survive everything, the game felt so wonderful all over again.

The new challenge I'm facing is the lack of food partly caused by a complete absence of iron on the surface. I've fully explored the first level dungeon and all I've found is a lot of coal and copper deposits, yet not a single bit of iron.

Without iron, I can't make a stove. Without a stove, I can only keep making campfires to cook meat.

Anyways, my current solution is to build dining rooms in the further parts of the map that my people frequent together with a few barrels for storing prepared food and campfires so that there is an incentive to bring food to those dining rooms at all.

TBH this isn't really helping so I'm kinda out of ideas at the moment.

I have another idea which is to make a few plantations close to every entrance to the lower levels but that would take a lot of work. Trying to see if there are simpler solutions before I do that.

Meanwhile, my population has dropped from its peak of 41 to 13 due to sieges and starvation.


...


Ok it's been rising and dropping between 16-22 people. I'm not sure if hunger has been the issue since I haven't been checking on them while I was doing some other stuff but I've watched as a few of them were killed by dungeon mobs chasing injured heroes.

The residents are now wearing a mix of bone, iron, spiderite, goblinite and direrite equipment but most of them are still too weak to fight against a bunch of hobgoblin kaisers.


...


And it doesn't load my save after I restarted my PC.

D:

Oh well, I don't miss it anyway. Yes I have put in a lot of work but since I've never reached that far into this game before, most of the town was just an inelegant hodgepodge of temporary solutions.

This time, it's going to look nice.

























So it's not just Greece, but in several other western European countries people are transferring their bank savings elsewhere, although it is particularly serious in Greece.

Greece's banks have lost 72 billion euros in deposits since the start of 2010, or about 30 percent, according to data compiled by Thomson Reuters. Five of Greece's top banks saw 37 billion euros taken out last year, including 12 billion from EFG Eurobank (EFGr.AT) and 8-9 billion apiece at National Bank of Greece (NBGr.AT), Piraeus (BOPr.AT) and Alpha Bank (ACBr.AT).

More than 120 billion euros was taken from two banks in Belgium alone, including an exodus of customer deposits from Dexia (DEXI.BR) which had to be bailed out and restructured. KBC (KBC.BR) also saw a big outflow.

Some 90 billion euros was taken from France's banks, including around 30 billion each from Credit Agricole (CAGR.PA) and BNP Paribas (BNPP.PA).

Imagine if the Greeks reverted to their drachma. Dohoho!



























Why would I donate money to the family of the taxi driver who died in the recent accident with the speeding Ferrari when there are worthier causes to donate to that are featured in flyers I get together with my utility bill every month?

Even if the widowed wife is unskilled, the three children are aged 17, 19 and 21! All of them could take care of themselves, and surely the insurance will provide more than enough for the funeral and living expenses for at least a couple months.

The 17-year old could get a shitty part-time job, the 19-year-old should be going for NS which means SAF is going to provide for him for two years, and the 21-year-old is either working or studying at an university or poly soon, which means she's qualified for some better-paying part-time jobs.

Donating hundreds or even thousands of dollars to them does not make sense to me, especially since I know how well hospices do in Singapore.

I still remember that one time after the funeral when I called the nurse counter there and asked if they still wanted the unused adult diapers I got for my mother before she was hospitalised. I clearly stated that they were unused but the bags have been opened and they were a little dusty.

Frankly, I was taken aback by the sense of urgency she had in her voice when she exclaimed,"Yes! Yes! Yes! We want! We want!"

Whoa! Chill! Those were just diapers!

I didn't even bother to mention the cheque donation. Didn't want her to jump and scream or anything like that. Those patients there need the tranquility.

And if a hospice, a place which few Singaporeans ever visit (and many more don't even know what "hospices" are), can run on such a tight budget, then what about all these free clinics that SP Services are helping to advertise?

That family can take care of itself financially but these clinics are probably barely able to operate every day.

If I had the money to donate, that family would be the last group of people I'm giving it to. I'm not going to donate money just because someone died tragically. Let me put it this way: he died a quick death unlike my parents, so I have little sympathy for him, and only slightly more for his surviving family.

What they really need now is psychological and spiritual support, not financial.























I don't get why D3 is getting so much hate, but I believe it's because other game companies are behind it.

Would Blizzard really make such a bad game?























That feel when I'm sending an email in the cab and realize that my router died while I was typing it.

I really need to get into the habit of recharging it every night regardless of whether I'd only used it for 20mins the day before.

Or at the very least, take it out of my bag everyday and put it back in before I go to bed, just to force myself to think about whether it needs to be recharged.

It's annoying when I need to get that email out before office hours end and I won't be reaching home that soon.
























I turned on my phone's wifi the other day at about 5pm and left it on.

Nothing happened.

1am. New message on Whatsapp.

Message was sent 13 hours ago at 10am.

Oh Whatsapp, you so hilarious.



























It's funny because it's true.
























Right now I worry about the end of the year. I'm watching what videos I can find on fashion shows for autumn/winter 2012 but I can't see much.

I have no idea what to look out for.

I'm probably wasting my time.

But I need to get some designs out soon to order them in time for our winter season, and I haven't got any.

I'm not even going to release anything new for June and July, just reorders for old stocks. Kinda learnt something from the last few months. Shit doesn't move and just clog up my storage space.






















So the terahertz range is great for data transmission but it doesn't work over long distances.

Routers.
























I want to sell my TV but... I haven't finished my PS2 games.





















To me, the worst thing about witchhunts in medieval times was not that innocent people were killed but that there were witchhunters who killed them and yet lived for the rest of their lives believing they had never made a mistake and were even rewarded and respected for their deeds.

Which only goes to show that justice cannot be taken for granted.






















The poor does not like meritocracy. It is fair but unfair.

All these unhappy voices online, they are the victims of meritocracy. Pity the poor, they say. It is not always their doing, they say.

And I agree with the latter.

If not for what my parents left me, I would be struggling through life with a terrible job.

More importantly, I'd be one of those voices.

I'll do what I'm willing to do to give them more opportunities but never will I give the poor man a fish. Medicine, maybe, but no fish.

The question is: do the talentless and the unfortunate deserve sympathy?

Should we feed the useless just because they are human?

I agree the question was phrased harshly but the purpose is to exaggerate our differences.

That man who is strolling nonchalantly across the road when the green light is on for the cars, and then shouts vulgarities and gives the finger to the drivers who horn at him, are we equals?

Yes. Despite my disdain, I must say yes.

However, should we treat the talentless and the unfortunate the same?

If not, how do we differentiate between them?

And don't give me the nonsense that nobody is useless. Tell that to the blind beggar in the streets who has no legs, no education and only has working experience in some form of manual labour. Go ahead and tell him he is a useful and productive member of his society.



Or tell that to Kony.

























Thursday 17 May 2012

Rant 997 / D3 Simulator

A Diablo III simulator has been released online for free!

It's practically a D3 clone!





















Happy ending coming soon :3
















So I'm not cheap but frugal. There's a difference apparently. Cheap people only focus on the lowest prices possible; frugal people still go for cheap but the priority is on price vs value up to a certain point.

IMO my iPad is the latest example I can use to differentiate myself from cheap people. If I had wanted to save money, there are hundreds of off-brand tablets I could have chosen from.

In fact TBH I've been thinking about buying a tablet for months but that most reviews say that the displays of the current generation tablets then were poor due to the designers' focus on power efficiency to stretch the batteries' capacities.

Just before the new iPad was announced I was seriously considering the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1", also for its display. Somehow I just couldn't buy it after reviews said that its display was overcompensating for the relatively dim light by raising its contrast or something.

Then the iPad came out along with stellar reviews of its display. That, I believe, was the final straw.

It was a coincidence, really. Apple could have designed it some other way and made something else its main selling point, but it chose its Retina display. Meanwhile I was also looking for tablets with that factor in mind, and it came out as the perfect solution to my problem.

Along with my 12MP Nokia camera phone, I think, technologically speaking, I'm having one of the best combinations of gadgets I can possibly have for my line of work right now outside of getting a DSLR camera or something along those lines.

Value for money.





















How could Greece do this to the world?

Tuesday 15 May 2012

Rant 996 / Nonsensical Farcical Fraudulent Act

























Just another day in Skyrim.



















Watched Limitless. The plot had more holes than a sieve.

Nice movie, yes, but I couldn't stand the mistakes that the "supergenius" made.

For one, he didn't search nor create a source of those pills immediately?

What?

That's like getting the three wishes from the genie in the lamp and not wishing for an infinite number of wishes forever as the first wish!

Not to mention he didn't really try to make it a secret at all other than by not mentioning it.

Second, he saw everything but not his dwindling personal stash of pills nor that something was wrong the first time something happened?

Third, he didn't do anything about the murder.

And there were some other mistakes that were less annoying.

Other than his mistakes, Van Loon closing the lab instead of using it for himself was incredibly stupid for someone like him.

The worst problem was probably the fact that the entire movie was built upon these mistakes. If they didn't commit any of these, this movie wouldn't be worth crap.

Still it was a very entertaining film.


















Towns v0.46 feels like a much better game but the trees are a major issue.

They die too quickly.

It's easy to get an unending supply of trees but planted trees don't spawn bushes, leading to a map-wide bush extinction within months every time.

One major issue that still irks me is the absence of a town alert or something. There was once when I had a siege by only a few giant spiders that can be easily dispatched by the five soldiers I had.

Then they all went to sleep when the spiders arrived.

Awesome timing, seriously.

Better still, they all went back to the patrol point I set at the entrance when they got out of bed and ignored the great battle that my civilians were valiantly fighting in within the town.

When the spiders arrived, I had 8 civilians and 5 soldiers. By the time the spiders were dead, I had 3 civilians and 5 soldiers.

Good thing I armed every single one of my civilians with basic stone weapons at least.



Fortunately immigrants eventually arrived before another siege came, and I managed to grow the town to the 16 civilians and 5 soldiers I have now.

The game still moves slowly but I can handle this.

















I'm so glad I have a blog. I know I'm slowly going mad but not having this blog would have sped things up.

A lot of people say they are alone, but how many really are?

I, on the other hand, am truly alone. The person who cares about me the most now, other than my brother, is a buyer. Too much money between us for me to ever trust her till she's retired.

My brother, I cannot burden him with my problems. He's got enough of his own, surely. A newly graduated young man with a degree that's not popular among employers and a girlfriend who appears to be destined for a far better career than his, not to mention his own personal issues.

He's got his hands full as it is.

Among my relatives, I can only trust my maternal aunts who are now spread around the world, and the distantly related group living over in Malaysia.

Personally I think it's fucked up to know that it is impossible to trust my uncles, especially the one I used to like the most when I was small. As I grew up, I learnt that they are all greedy fools, though none of them are as bad as my paternal relatives, all of whom are no longer in contact with us.

And that's all the people I know whom I can put any degree of trust in, people who have shown sincerity through action during the last few months and not simply with that "If you need help just ask" BS that all my uncles gave me.

Speaking of my uncles, I think some of them wanted to know if I was doing well in my business like my mum did so that they could make money off me like they used to with her. Hopefully I ended this nonsense when I tried to make them feel guilty as fuck.

All I did was reveal the fact that the goods from one of them never got sold but my mum still gave him money telling him it was the profits from the sales, and that I have no idea if she did the same for the rest. In addition, I told the uncle who visited us that I'm now desperately trying to push those goods out at incredibly low prices in order to make space. Word should spread; they're brothers after all. I only hope they're human enough to feel guilt from this and stop trying to think of ways to get money from us.

Those problems, whether they like it or not, ended with my mother.



Anyways, hence my blog.

Contrary to what you may believe, I do put in 90% of my honesty here, except not all of it is visible and explicitly stated.

My blog will never help me in anything simply because I will never reveal my identity here, nor do I expect anyone to hire a private investigator just for that, which is theoretically the only way to accomplish this without my consent.

It does, however, allow me to rant on random subjects that nobody is really interested in without bothering anyone. Get things off my chest, y'know.

The problem with anonymity, other than the above, is that my words hold no weight by themselves. If they're good, nobody cares. If they're bad, same. It's something I've accepted long ago that I feel protects me from the consequences of making inflammatory remarks I tend to make once in a while when I'm particularly annoyed.

Bad rep usually clings on for far longer than good rep.

Sunday 13 May 2012

Rant 995 / It Just Keeps Getting Cheaper.

Expedia isn't the cheapest option I have.

I did a comparison of prices using the dates close to the ones I have in mind for my Shanghai trip and the result was that I could save S$100 by using two other websites.

From Expedia.com.sg:




From Cheaptickets.sg:




From Tingo.com:





Exact same flight, exact same hotel, exact same room type, breakfast not included in both Expedia and Tingo.

Price from Expedia: S$923.04

Total price from Cheaptickets and Tingo: S$522 + 4(S$71) = $806.00


EDIT: Tingo is using USD, so the price in SGD should be around $92 per night, raisng the total to S$890, which is still $33 cheaper.








































So if Greece leaves the EU, it's going to hurt itself a lot. Nobody is going to trust the currency the central bank issues in its current financial state, so the moment it does, the entire country is going to do a bank run on day one. I know I would if I were a Greek.

As for the rest of the EU, this is going to set a very bad precedent far too early. The EU was established only in 1993, making it just 19 years old, and the euro's issued in 1999 which means it's only 13 years old. For something that's meant to be permanent, 19 years might as well be just a blink of an eye.

The EU wasn't meant to be an union in which members can come and go as they please or when the economic situation is bad.

This is just one of those events that will either shape the EU into what it will become for a very long time, or break it.






















Just learnt that having the mouse set at max speed on Windows only makes me less accurate.

According to the Liquipedia article on mouse settings, for each unit length (as set in the mouse) moved by your hand, the cursor moves a single pixel when the speed is set at the 6th point out of the 11 on the mouse speed bar in the Mouse options in the Control Panel.

When I set it higher, the Windows simply skips pixels to increase the distance the cursor moves. For example at 7/11 the cursor would move 1.5 pixels, meaning it skips half a pixel for every mouse count.

Hopefully I can now shoot better. Every pixel counts when you're shooting things from afar.

Saturday 12 May 2012

Rant 994 / Porcine Dilemma

THU









Tried to stream Towns but can't. At first, the game's graphics went haywire when it loaded after Procaster (Livestream's broadcasting programme) was loaded.

Solved that by opening Procaster after Towns, but the stream looked horrible when I checked an hour into my stream.

Looks like that's impossible for now.


















My tax assessment notice from the tax collectors IRAS came with a negative 4-digit number. Yep, looks about right.

Speaking of low income, I ran out of rice today. Only had slightly more than a single cup so my bro went out for dinner with his gf. I didn't have enough food for three anyway, only a packet of fishcakes and a packet of chikuwa.

Had enough to make an anchovy and cabbage soup with those stuff.




Skipped the rice because this was enough for one. Still have another two soup bowls' worth of soup and a serving of fishcake and chikuwa.

Tomorrow I'm all out of food other than half a loaf of bread, some chicken franks and breakfast ham.

It's either wake up early to go to the market or visit Shop N Save, except I try to keep my visits at the latter on Saturdays when my Visa debit has 3% cashback for all transactions there.

I also have some pasta, a jar of pasta sauce, canned food and instant noodles, but I try to avoid the last two and for the first, I have nothing to add to the sauce.

Looks like if I ever visit the market this week, I'm going to need to bring the trolley.







Ok, I'll admit that the above was meant to be misleading. No lies, just incomplete truths.

























Some inspectors who claimed to be from the Ministry of Manpower visited my office today when I wasn't around. Apparently it was some sort of an advisory thing and I won't be penalised for any offence, so I let them do it. The guy on the phone mentioned he was going to take photos, so I had to make sure nothing was going to be made available to the public.

Thought it was fine, then I realized later in the evening that I didn't and couldn't check his credentials.

My workers couldn't anyway since they're illiterate.

That was a retarded mistake. Should have said no.

















FRI










Ugh. I left the soup to cool in the reusable plastic containers and then forgot to put them in the fridge later.

The uncovered one had a thin white layer on top. The rest tasted slightly off.

Strangely, they also tasted as if I didn't add any salt. Do those bacteria consume the salt?


















SAT






Went to the market and supermarket this morning at 7.30am. Both were pretty packed.

They weren't when we first arrived but the pork stall had a long queue. By the time I bought the pork and chicken the whole market was crowded.

Actually I could have chosen a stall with a shorter queue but it made sense to go for the stall with the longest queue when I knew nothing about any of the four.

Why would all the middle-aged women and their maids queue up for this particular one when there are three others with far shorter queues, sometimes even none?

Either it's cheap or it's fresh and trustworthy. From what I can tell, those are the two factors they focus on.

As for the chicken stall, there was no queue but that was because everyone was leaving after making their orders, then returning later to get them.

The vegetable stalls were packed as usual. Thought I could find some kangkong this time but it was nowhere to be seen. Also wanted to buy some eggs but they were too fragile and I thought we would barely be able to hold everything even without it.

My bro and I went together because we were buying rice. I always get him to go with me when I'm planning to buy that because these days, I only buy 10kg-packs.

Speaking of rice, I should probably stop buying Songhe exclusively and try another brand. Now that I'm getting used to the prices of rice, I realized that it is one of the most expensive brands around.

Today, it was S$28 for 10kg. Not really worth it especially when nobody here is a connoisseur or anything. I could have bought two 5kg-packs of the supermarket's own brand of rice for like $10 each. The other day I even saw New Moon's 10kg-packs going at $20.

So anyways, the pork was S$22 for 2kg of minced pork. I asked for half-lean half-fatty, ground once. I thought since I'm mostly doing stir-fry dishes I should get something with more texture or whatever that quality is called. If it's ground twice it becomes too smooth.

The chicken took some time but there was only one chicken stall in the market. The good thing was that I could tell them (it was operated by a couple) how I wanted them prepared. The two things are:

1) whether I wanted the bones removed, and if I wanted the bones at all.
2) whether I wanted the skins removed, and if I wanted the skins.

They sell the bones separately and once I saw someone asking for the bones of the chickens bought by the customer in front of her. Not sure how much it goes but for my order, it was $20 for 10 chickens' worth of deboned breasts with the skin still on, and the bones were packed separately. I wanted the bones for soup.

Speaking of soup, I'm going to have to buy a piece of pork for it. Soup made from nothing but bones (whether chicken or pig) tastes like it lacks something to me, and that something is the flavour of pork ( or beef or mutton, but pork is the cheapest).

Fish was simple since I know jack shit about all of them. I only bought a large piece of salmon fillet (near tail end) and a strip of this fish they use for fish soup outside. $20 for both. Asked him to slice the fish for me but the fishmonger doesn't provide this service for the salmon since all the fillets were pre-packed into little plastic bags.

Salmon's always easy, so much so it's just like convenience food to me. The only major difference between salmon fillets and instant noodles IMO is that salmon only lasts a week, maybe slightly more, in the freezer.

I only have three methods of preparing salmon. If it's fresh, sashimi. I rarely do that because I rarely have fresh salmon when I'm in the mood to cook. By "fresh" I mean the fish must be bought yesterday at most.

If it's not fresh, which is usually the case, I either bake (ie grill) or fry it.

Bake is the easiest. I rinse it, place it on a piece of aluminium foil with the skin facing down, sprinkle salt, pepper and chopped garlic, and wrap it up so that the splattering oil won't go everywhere. Next I can leave it to marinate in the fridge till I'm hungry or I could just put it on a grill and leave it in the oven at about 200 degrees Celsius for 20-30mins.

20mins if it's not too bad and it's already thawed to room temperature.

If the flesh is already coming apart before it's even cooked, it's not fresh (IIRC). I use 30mins if this happens or if it's still cold.

Next was vegetables. As I said, I wanted kangkong. I didn't have anything else in mind and thought I'd just see what they have. In the end, I got some mushrooms, two kinds of cabbages, a $2-box of butterhead lettuce and some spring onion.

Spring onion's hard to find later in the day, even in the 24-hour supermarket, and I need it for my fish dish using the other fish I bought.

It's easy to stir-fry that with ginger and spring onion, but usually I don't add enough ginger so it tastes as if I only cooked it with the spring onion. Did it like twice over the last few months before my bro mentioned it. Personally I didn't really need too much ginger, only enough to remove the fishy smell from the dish. More was fine, but I'm too cheap to use more ginger than was necessary.

And fish cooks so quickly that it doesn't take more than five minutes, excluding the chopping and rinsing of all the ingredients.


Also bought coffee. I think it was Indonesian beans, but I don't know. All I said was I wanted something to make black coffee with and I didn't want a mix because I don't know how. So she pointed at one and my mind was like "Whatever" and I said ok.

$13 per kg. I bought 800g, split into two bags. Not sure how long this will last me TBH. I use two tablespoon for each cup of coffee, but my ceramic cup is rather large.

While she was grinding it with her machine I went to the stall next to hers for some vermicilli, another convenient food.

Rice vermicilli is kinda tricky but still convenient. I have yet to find out how I can cook it without having it all sticking to the pan, other than by using a non-stick pan/wok.

It's convenient because all I have to do is soak it in warm water or boil it slightly, and then I can either put it in soup or stir-fry it with soy sauce.





Finally, I went to the supermarket. My bro waited outside with the full trolley while I shopped inside. Discovered that "calrose rice" isn't the kind that I normally eat and so I couldn't use the coupon I brought. In the end I just stuck with my usual Songhe rice, but like I said, I'll think about buying another brand next time.

Also bought some pasta sauce with a coupon. The tomato-based sauce should work with the minced pork I just bought... which reminds me that I had forgotten about tomatoes and onions.

Derp.

Maybe next time.

Also bought some milk and bread. Nett was about $50. Saved a total of $1.10 with the coupons, and a further 3% for using my debit card there on a Saturday. 3% of $50 is $1.50, so total savings would be $2.60. That's like 5% discount total.

I know it's a pittance but it's the feel, or the psychological effect, of saving money that matters. If saving money was really important I wouldn't have bought that brand of rice.

Now the receipt says I have almost 500 points, and the recent edition of the Passion newsletter announced that all those points are expiring by 30 June for all members.

Time to redeem. 150 points for a dollar, so that's $3 there, and I estimate that there will be about 100 points wasted.

And that's how such points, and even gift vouchers, work.

Of course that's not the end. I had to spend some time to split up the pork and chicken breasts I bought. In fact I asked both vendors to give me some of their little plastic bags just for this purpose.

It's not funny when you have 10, or even 5, chicken breasts frozen into one giant chunk. Takes forever to thaw. Fortunately the bones were already split into two bags, so that saved me some time.