Friday, December 21, 2007

Rainbow Connection

Why are there so many
Songs about rainbows
And what's on the other side
Rainbow's are visions
They're only illusions
And rainbows have nothing to hide

So we've been told and some chose to believe it
But I know they're wrong wait and see
Someday we'll find it
The Rainbow Connection
The lovers, the dreamers and me

Who said that every wish
Would be heard and answered
When wished on the morning star
Somebody thought of that
And someone believed it
And look what it's done so far

What's so amazing
That keeps us star gazing
What do we think we might see
Someday we'll find it
The Rainbow Connection
The lovers, the dreamers and me

Have you been half asleep
And have you heard voices
I've heard them calling my name
Are these the sweet sounds that called the young sailors
I think they're one and the same
I've heard it too many times to ignore it
There's something that I'm supposed to be

Someday we'll find it
The Rainbow Connection
The lovers, the dreamers and me

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Family Pic

Latest picture taken last weekend after dinner. She's really intent on eating stuff.

The 100th Post

There we are.. the 100th post, a milestone, a landmark event. What am I going to write about?

Wish I had my camera with me when I took off to Dubai. Finally managed to get in after about a 2.5 hour delay then another 4.5 hour wait for my hotel room. It felt like a long trip. However, since I was sans camera I can only describe the things I saw there and it really was a very beautiful city, quite clean and with heavy traffic typical of any metropolis.

The skyline of Dubai has been under construction for the past 15 years I guess and it still is. The changes have been staggering, they are accomplishing in 15 years what most cities took decades to pull off. Its amazing what money can do for you. The gem of the city was this enormous spire of the still-under-construction Burj Dubai Tower a massive skyscraper that seems to have been plucked straight out from the planet Coruscant (that's from Star Wars for you newbies). It's very sci fi...

The trip itself was a succession of meetings and conference papers one after another so nothing too interesting to write about. Several dinners and many hours of just talking. But I do think I'd like to go back to Dubai on holiday one of these days, it could be a very good vacation place although a bit expensive. The weather is very nice in December, as its winter temperatures stayed at about 20 degrees. But since it's also peak season, coming to Dubai in December mean 4 figure hotel rooms and traffic jams.

The last night of the trip a bunch of friends and I managed to sneak out to a local disco... the music sucked, but we were there just to look around anyway. Almost missed my flight since I was stuck in a bloody traffic jam outside of the airport for almost an hour, despite the flight being at 2.30 in the morning. Next time I fly SIA, at least theirs is during daylight hours.

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Stuck in Changi

Well there's a first time for everything. The last time I was stuck in the middle of the night at Changi airport I was a student on the way to US to finish my degree. Now however I'm just taking off to go to Dubai and seems the flight has been "retimed" to about 2 hours later.

Now I could go back and maybe sleep an hour or so, or more likely play a few rounds of computer games. But that would mean about $15 bucks each way to the taxi driver. Not feeling particularly generous today so decided to try and find something to eat and zzzz at the airport. For the record it is now 1.37 AM. I am normally trying to sleep at this time.

Changi at night is quite different from the day. There's far less people even though the duty free shops are still open and a handful of restaurants. Clearly most of these poor souls wandering like zombies through the nearly empty airport halls have similarly delayed flights or are in somekind of cruel and unusual transit in the middle of the morning, the same kind that I was in nearly 13 years ago.

Most are just trying to pass the time, watching the many TVs here, having drinks or food. I looked at the 24 hour food mart and only 1 stall was open, unfortunately I wasn't particularly feeling like any Shanghai Noodles so I bought some really bad pastry at Jack's had 3 bites and threw it away, gluped down my really expensive bottle of mineral water and decided to go look for a place to sleep before getting myself distracted by the free internet PCs here. Clearly the airport is infinitely more fun to hangout in than our own back home.

I hope I have time to rest in a bit. So we'll continue this next time.

Thursday, December 06, 2007

DR in da house!

Ho ho ho! A buddy of mine recently graduated with a PHD in Computer Engineering recently from University of Queensland... here's a pic... it's definitely worth a mention in my auspicious blog! hahaha...




Congrats man

The teddy is from his aunt, no it didn't come as a going away present from the uni. The wierd looking hat is the dresscode for PHD holders known as a bonnet... heheh yeah the same kind babies used to wear.

He's looking for a job now. So if anyone is looking for a briliant PHD grad for some computer engineering work, with excellent teaching records and some industrial experience as well. Give em a buzz... just comment on this post.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Girls...

The girls at home...

Oh by the way...

Oh if you need a reminder... her site is www.sophiameiyin.com

I'll put a link on the side bar...

Updates

Sophia's website has been updated with a bunch of new pictures, not that much but they are quite recent. She has changed quite a bit but still looks like a boy. Apparently her mom also was like that when she was a baby, so we know where that came from...

Still have so much to do with that website, want to move it to another location because the godaddy server is just too slow with the update tools. Things to do include:

1. Edit her videos! We've got 2.5 hours of tape on her, but I haven't gotten around to editing it.
2. Move the website to someplace easier to access and faster too. Wish I know html/xml then at least easier to build the website.

But easier said than done since most of my free time has been in crysis. Those in the know, know what I mean. I've got to end the crysis before I can do anything else without getting distracted.

Anyway, recently I bought a kickass PC - it's an Intel Quad Core, 2 GB ram, 2 hard drives including a super fast Raptor and an 8800GT video card. Also got a 22 inch flatron monitor... muahaha. It's huge but amazingly quiet. But I made the mistake of running Windows Vista.

To all who are contemplating to buy a new PC, do NOT, and I repeat DO NOT buy Windows Vista, it is the most useless piece of crap that has ever been produced by Microsoft... ok it's not as bad as Windows ME... but still pretty useless. I went and bought the Ultimate version... sigh.. waste of money seriously because I'm actually seriously thinking about stepping back to XP.

If you think Vista will be better after Service Pack 1, well think again, Microdicks have just announced the extension of XP until I think 31 Jan 2008 and releasing SP 3 for XP. What's worse is that beta tests of the two show that XP with SP3 still kicks Vista's fat ass even with SP1, so there... Don't buy Vista... at least not yet... wait until end of next year, at least...

I bought Vista for DX10- thinking I'd see some major differences. But noooo.. nada, almost the same as DX9c. In fact I games run slower on Vista. Stoopid...

Otherwise things have been okay, been going back to KL almost every weekend. I think I missed 1 or 2 only. Plus this coming weekend I'm not heading back so that makes it 3 times only. Not a bad record... it's tiring, but it's hard not to go back when you've got this face...

waiting for you...