Old Socks

One recent weekend morning, I was struck by an unnerving, yet eerily accurate thought. I've got old socks.

Back when I was a teen, I was always running out of socks. So much so, I tended to 'reuse' socks more often that I should have (but that's a story for another day).

Once, during a significant sock shortage, I remember heading towards my dad's sock drawer in the hope that some of my socks had ended up with his, by mistake. Sadly, the first glance at his sock drawer quickly dashed my hopes. All of my socks were white, all of my dad's socks were black or navy blue.

Now, it didn't really occur to me as a teen, but the aforementioned thought went along these lines - the older you get, the less 'young socks' you have.

See, socks fall into two ages - Young socks used to be generally thick, white crew (polyester or cotton) and sports-ish related with some kind of logo embossed at the side. Old socks were more work related (black, brown or navy), more specific to needs (wool, padded soles) and seldom indicative of brands unless the brand was really worth showing.

So as you may have guessed, approximately 15% of my current sock inventory consists of young socks and even then, 33% of those consist of dark-coloured sports socks. I expect that by the time I'm old and infirmed, the young sock to old sock ratio will be a fraction of a fraction.

(At the risk of spinning off another story, some of my young socks didn't even start out as mine to begin with! But lets leave it at that and focus on my coming to terms with my general aging.)

(image swiped from here)

In an incident that can only be described as...

PHWOAH!



And wait till you read the story behind it!

HT: DB

This sums it up

Be warned, this might spoil the ending for you.

Six. Long. Years.

I'm about 1,000 seconds away from tying up the loose ends that have unravelled faster than a shoelace with no aglet - that someone went and put in a blender.

Yes. Lost has reached its conclusion at last.

I'm telling you. The hours I've invested in this show (very easy to count) better pay off. Otherwise, I'm sending JJ Abrams a photo of ginger's poo.

But wait! Before I email it to him, I'm going to encrypt it with the stupidest password possible, and then relish at the joy of him never knowing what the picture was.

And if he ever worked it out.. It would be terribly disappointing.

Just like I hope this last episode isn't.

Let's see.

And pray there's no poo involved.

I'm not one who usually believes in 'destiny'

But if ever there was a clear cut case, this would be it:

Jim Beam Found Drunk In Public

It'd be hilarious if Gwyneth's daughter ended up owning a pie business, or PoshBecks son became mayor of new york, or if TomKat's offspring ended up being err.. just weird.. I guess...

Listen to the rhythm of the falling rain..

Oh wait. that's not rain.. it's hail! Yes. We had some serious rain over the weekend. How serious? It was hailing INDOORS.

Also, catching up on 'old' news - For the first time in 6 years, I had tuan nian fan with my dad.

Despite it being rainy, being in a cabin, on a mountain, in Tasmania, being probably the only Asian people in a fairly large radius, surrounded by Valentine's day couples, and being served cold soup, we had a pretty nice time.

As I alluded to earlier:

1) My dad was visiting
2) We went to Tasmania for a holiday over CNY
3) CNY doesn't really have the same feel when you're staying in a place called the "wilderness resort" on Valentine's day

And while we're on the subject of doing things different, we tried out the Spirit of Tasmania/ferry for the first time. Despite a few hiccups getting there, we managed to bunker down into our four bedder cabin after only an hour of exploring the upper deck, pokies machines and the bar.

Long story short, I felt like I was falling out of the bed. There were moments where fleeting thoughts of the Titanic floated through my head. This was particularly poignant given that I've never watched the James Cameron epic on the grounds that I'd seen enough of the MTV clips and assorted bits of pop culture, that I'd already seen the 'good bits'. Anyway, I was mentally rehearsing putting on a life jacket.

Thankfully the sleep-monster got the better of me and dragged me promptly back to la-la-land.

Speaking of James Cameron's epics. We saw Avatar (Shirz saw it twice) in IMAX 3D. This was particularly significant because due to the large availabiliy of content at home, we haven't, in recent history, run out of things to watch on the 'small screen'.

Anyway, my Avatar plot summary is as follows:

*phbbtt*
(if you've watched it yourself, try making that sound and you'll see what I mean)

In other words, don't watch it for the story. It's lame. The effects however, are a whole different kettle of fish. Watch it in IMAX 3D and you'll clearly see the fish is blue fin tuna.

Till the next blog post..

There's different good, and different not so good..

I confess that I'm not a huge tennis fan but watching Lleyton Hewitt breeze through the opening round of the Australian Open was entertaining nonetheless.

Having read the media coverage of fan violence, I was pleasantly surprised by the very different atmosphere at centre court where spectators, it appeared, had planned sketches and prepared cheers for the Aussie players in the tournament.

At one point, there was a tribute to Susan Boyle by a cross-dressing baritone, an "adopt a ball boy" campaign and surprisingly, a 'Where's Wally' hunt across the stadium (they managed to find 16 people dressed up as Wally scattered all around the stadium). I was expecting a thrilling sporting spectacle, but ended the day throughly amused by my fellow audience members instead.

Sadly, in the other Aussie challenge, Alicia Molik wasn't roused up enough to defeat her french opponent. Apparently in a post-match interview, she admitted there were times where she 'spaced out' and lost her concentration.

Speaking of losing concentration, I didn't seem to notice much fanfare in the opening of the IR at Sentosa (or maybe I'm just not in the loop enough?).

What I did find amusing though, was the unconventionally named Hotel Michael. I mean, there're quite a few Michaels around so it surprised me to learn that it was named after an architect named Michael Graves. Not Jackson, J Fox, or Jordan, or even Bolton.

At last count, there are SEVEN michaels working in my office. I mean, I hope this architect guy won a naming contest or something, because I would've thought it was fairly risky to name a luxury hotel after the dude that inspired the designs. Does that mean this guy has to oversee the renovation as well?

In the little blurb on their webpage, it states "a stay at Hotel Michael is for those who see beauty in design and dare to be different."

Oooohhh.. "dare to be different", such a unique phrase that it garners only 13.4 million hits on google.

Champion

Trucker pulled over with cardboard windscreen

He admitted to police that he had driven with the temporary cardboard windscreen for an incredible 400 miles.

"When there were a lot of vehicles I would drive with my head out of the window," he told police.

That's the best part... When there weren't a lot of vehicles, he was driving with his toes while eating cup noodles and watching korean dramas off his portable DVD player.

File this under the "and then how?" category

"Police shoot man 'attempting self-harm'"

Police today shot a man in a confrontation at a house in Sydney's south-west.

The officers responded to calls and found the 35-year-old man "attempting self harm" in Wangee Road, Lakemba, just before 9am, police said.

So judging by the apparent policy, if someone is threatening to jump off the building, the police would push him?

What's with the unicycles?

I'm surprised that people couldn't organise to buy two wheels instead of one, have organised themselves into some form of pseudo-sporting body!

In the last couple of weeks, I've seen three different unicyclists in action, on the streets of Melbourne, peddling their awkward, inertia-unfriendly, yet still wheel-based machine.

A 'mountain unicycle' costs above 1k.

NEW PRICE With ultra-durable components including the strongest 700c rim available, the KH29 rolls smoothly over bumps and is a faster choice for cross-country or combination on/offroad riding. Brake not included.

Isn't it hard enough that you are attempting to 'climb a mountain' that you have to try and do it with ONE WHEEL and NO BRAKE?! If that's not a plan to weed out the silliest people with the most money, I don't know what is.

The Kottke 500

This Flickr set is a fantastic way to waste 10 mins!
(It helps if you're a Star Wars fan)

This one's probably one of my favourites.


Also along the Star Wars theme was this very important picture:

(Important because it extends the storyline of this saga!

Now that I've dispensed with the frivolities, on to more important things.

I picked up a safety pin off the floor this morning and I was hesitant to discard it - this annoyed me because on one hand, I get more safety pins every time my suits come back from the dry cleaners. And on the other hand, I feel bad discarding a perfectly good safety pin.

What's more, have you ever thought about what it takes to make a safety pin?

Think about it this way. Say you're on a deserted island that happens to be rich in natural resources. How would you go about making a safety pin? (Forget for one minute that the need for a safety pin is somewhat moot if you're on a deserted island.)

You'd need iron ore, a smelting pot, a seriously hot fire, some kind of hammering object, a stone to sharpen the piercing tip, etc etc.

All that for a safety pin.

Now try increasing the complexity to a pencil.

'Once in the pencil factory—$4,000,000 in machinery and building, all capital accumulated by thrifty and saving parents of mine—each slat is given eight grooves by a complex machine, after which another machine lays leads in every other slat, applies glue, and places another slat atop—a lead sandwich, so to speak. Seven brothers and I are mechanically carved from this “wood-clinched” sandwich."

Wow. Think about it this way. If the world suddenly stopped producing pencils. And all the pencil making factories fell into a pile of rubble. And you really, REALLY needed ONE pencil.

It'd effectively cost you $4m/8 or about half a mil for one batch of eight pencils. My entire house isn't worth that one pencil.

Insane thought isn't it?

On a related note,Christien Meindertsma managed to trace 185 products made from contributed parts originating from one single pig.

"Amongst some of the more unexpected results were: Ammunition, medicine, photo paper, heart valves, brakes, chewing gum, porcelain, cosmetics, cigarettes, conditioner and even bio diesel."

When I stop to think about how technology has affected so many aspects of our lives, it really dwarves what I think I know about the world.

Oh, by the way, pretty much all the topics in this particular blog post were inspired directly or indirectly by recent readings of kottke.org.

Also, happy 500th blog post to Joecities! Hope you've enjoyed the ride!

The fate of the planet

It was hard not to smirk when I walked by a sign earlier today, loudly proclaiming:
Carbon Trading is Hitler Style Genocide

Wow.

Big call.

I didn't want to stop and hear them out because I figured laughing out loud would be rude, so I googled them at the privacy of my desk.

The founder of the movement, Lyndon LaRouche, has allegedly been called "the greatest American Economist" by some sources, dubious at best.

Interestingly enough, the article (I won't link to it in case it drives more traffic to them) uses this as the crux of the argument justifying the headline:

"When inmates at the German chemical giant I.G. Farben’s Auschwitz concentration camp were provided barely 800 calories of food per day, it killed them as surely as the gas chambers and firing squads.

The world condemned it as genocide.

By the same measure, environmental policies that suppress energy consumption, and deny populations the normal economic development to generate sufficient sources of energy, are equally genocide.

Take Africa, for instance. Ninety per cent of people in sub-Saharan Africa lack electricity, running water, proper sanitation and decent housing, and therefore die, in the millions, from malaria, malnutrition, TB, HIV/AIDS, and intestinal diseases."

Yeah.. now that you mention it.. [sarcasm]Intentionally gassing millions of people systematically segregated by their religious beliefs is a lot like maintaining a sustainable level of environmental degredation for many future generations of humans (and animals alike) to come.[/sarcasm]

I also noticed a pattern of linking pretty much anyone who wasn't Lyndon Larouche to either Hitler, or being Nazi. This list includes Al Gore, Charles Darwin and Jacques "Save the Whales" Cousteau.

Having said all that, it did reignite a train of thought that I'd been considering for some time now. Let me share this burden of questioning with you.

We know a few things:

1) The Earth has finite land and resources
2) The human population is continuously growing
3) There are no natural predators to humans

Apply 2 to 1 and like it or not, at some point, maybe 20,000 years down the track, we're going to have more people per sqm than the planet can sustain.

What happens then? Assuming there's no 'end of dinosaurs' or SARS-Ebola-Swine-WestNile-Aids virus that significantly takes a chunk of human population out of the equation (thus extending the 20,000 year timeframe for another 20,000 years).

The only plausible scenarios I can think of are:

a) We colonise other resource rich planets (ala Mars in 'Total Recall')
b) We 'manage' population growth (ala Genetic manipulation in 'Gattaca')
c) A natural predator arises (ala virus in '12 Monkeys', giant bugs in 'Starship Troopers')

So the obvious question is...

"What did I have for lunch?"

Tempura Udon.

(ok.. ok .. I think I'm partial towards a mix of a) & b), but I have a feeling c) without the bugs will emerge as the likely scenario.)

ST Online: Most Popular

Whaddya reckon ST readers are most interested in reading about?


(image from ST)

:D

Car Sins Safety

I briefly heard a mention of child car seats on the radio and it suddenly occured to me..

Where were the car seats when I was growing up!?

When I wasn't hanging off the interior handles of my dad's Datsun, I was either clamouring onto the backs of my parents seats, or wedging myself in between the rear car window and the top of the boot compartment. I even remember there being enough space to wedge both myself, and Cindy, my childhood daschund companion there - much to Cindy's amusement.


image from Getty images

Thinking back, and applying today's safety-concious context, I was probably living dangerously. Having a child in the back without a child seat now would be like eating a black angus beef steak at a Make Poverty History concert - totally un-acceptable.

What's really disturbing is that I can actually relate to Britney who protested that driving with a baby on her lap was how (and I paraphrase here) 'they did things in the south'. Back in the day, kids who talked back got a firm five fingered reprimand, and when we fell down after climbing a tree when we were told not to, we got smacked some more to make sure the pain was evenly distributed.

But if I were a parent today, I guess I'd want to take as little risks as possible to ensure the survival of my spawn. At the same time, how much fond memories would your kids have of simple things like taking a ride in the car?

Ahh.. the demise of the 'good old days'.. oops.. no wonder. I wore my grumpy old man pants today.

Edit: Also, my assistant was doing some of my work last night, and I've delegated some work again this morning. I have some free time. Can you tell ? :)

Men of the Planet, Unite!

First, we were being made redundant. Then they replaced our swimmers with engineered supplicants.

Face it boys. We're doomed.

Thankfully, I'm not going to be around to see MANkind die out, but it did get me thinking though.

Imagine a scenario, a hundred generations into the future. Men have been shipped off to the moon in an elaborate prank involving a space elevator, some chewing gum and a frat-boy as president of earth. Womenkind are thriving on earth, peace and harmony runs rampant and there is finally an answer to the long-held puzzle "Why can't we all just get along?"

The protaganist of this scenario, hoping to qualify as the first man being allowed back to earth.

Intervieweress: So Mr Agyrle, it says here you'd like to be considered for a position.

Manpplicant: Yes Ma'am, I'm a hard worker and willing to learn.

I: So it says on your application you were in manufacturing ?

M: Yes Ma'am. When I wasn't making up excuses for not taking out the trash, I was usually converting the raw inputs of alcohol and doritos, processing them with "Buffy"-flavoured radiation from the TV, and producing copios copious* amounts of flatulence, pee and poop.

I: Uh huh. I see. And what transferrable skills do you think you can bring to our community on earth ?

M: Well. I was reading up about the ninth world war, specifically the battle for the last donut, and I thought to myself, "Surely it's time for an upgrade - World War X ?". I told myself. it's time to dream big.. Nuclear fallout of interplanetary proportions.

I: Right..

M: Look, I'll be honest. My testosterone levels were running low and I heard your labs were developing some synthetic swimmer serum. I'd be happy to work for it in trade.

I: Ok. Thank you for your time Mr Agryle, we'll review your application and get back to you. In the meantime, feel free to visit our herbarium colonies for some naturopathic remedies for your problem.

YUP. Doomed I tell you. Clearly I need to start sucking up to my overlord wife. AFTER I maximise that golf membership of course.

*EDIT: Big Sister is Watching. Shirley corrected my mispelling. I reiterate my Doomed-ded-ness.

WHa ?

Just clearing out the backlog of pictures I wanted to blog about. We bought a couple of new mats for the house a couple of months ago. Just before we washed them, I read the instructions... just to be sure.

And sure enough, I was utterly befuddled.



Also, most of you won't get this one, but I thought the people who did, would find it funny. (It's a strange pairing of two friends' names and a profession quite unlike them)

Okay. Backlog cleared. Back to my irregular blog posting schedule.

Ski-nior Citizens

While we were hurtling ourselves down the side of a hill skiing last weekend, we took the prudent approach of staying on the green slopes. Aside from that, we took fairly frequent breaks for meals, coffee and 'jamban-ing'.

Our laid back approach worked out well as we returned with less bruising then before, and generally had a more relaxed, enjoyable trip.

Carrying on the theme from my last post of "getting old", I figured I'd pen some thoughts about how we're getting along.

So just prefix these sentences with "you know you're getting old when"

1) Your hips and joints are hurting and you haven't even packed the car yet, let alone set off on the trip
2) You don't bother with the helmet because you know you're not going to go fast enough to really get hurt
3) On the lift ride up, you're enjoying the scenery of the ride, more than anticipating the next slide down
4) You're much more willing to take short, frequent breaks even though each minute on the mountain is costing about 27c
5) You've even worked out that each minute is costing 27c

Also, in case you've got the ocular range of a baby bat, Shirley decided to dust off her twitter account. I literally laughed out loud at the Swine Flu tweet. :D

Also pt2, I just noticed there was an option to add ads to the blog. I figured I'd try it just to see what sort of ads come up. :D

I is got a stupid foot..

I got this from Shirz.

It's annoying but I can't seem to get around it.

HOW SMART IS YOUR RIGHT FOOT?

1. Sit on a chair, lift your right foot off the floor and make clockwise circles.

2. Now, while doing this, draw the number '6' in the air with your right hand.

Your foot will change direction.

Try it and feel free to let me know if you can beat it!

In other news.. This is sooo typical..

Ultra-Rare Shark Found, Eaten

Asians eat ANYTHING EVERYTHING!

When being funny is inappropriate...

Got in the lift after work, and was heading down to the carpark.

In steps two guys. Guy A, and Guy B, also called Army dude. Army dude was wearing a full combat uniform. That's how I knew he was an Army dude.

Guy A and Army dude look at the lift buttons, undecided about which button to press.

Guy A murmurs "I can't quite recall where we parked"

Army dude replies "Let's just get off at the next floor and see if it looks familiar"

My mind started formulating witty remarks

"Tanks are only allowed to park at B1 so that's where you'd be"

"Still looking for Bin Laden are we?"

"Found those WMDs yet ?"

"Geez. No wonder Iraq's such a mess"

Thankfully the brain-to-mouth filter was working at that particular moment.

Or I might have had to perform some unarmed combat - As in he'd rip off my arms and I'd try to kick him in the shin, miss and fall over bleeding to death.

Where's Wall-E?

Wall-E was clearly a script conceived during the writers strike in Hollywood because for the bulk of the movie, the dialogue was made up of various intonations of the title (and its character).

"Wall-E."

"Wall-E?"

"Wall-E!"

"Wall-E?!"

Don't get me wrong. The animation was spectacular. The plotline with the unsubtle anti-consumerism undertones was well presented. I even liked the sparing use of pop-culture references (e.g. Mac Start-up sound)

But seriously, we know the robot’s name. We don’t need it repeated 14.7 kagillion times! If you haven’t already seen it, you can already guess by the multiple mentions that it involves a lot of hide and seeking of Wall-E and his girlfriend, EVE (who also gets a squillion mentions)

Speaking of movies, we’ve been watching a lot of the little screen lately. It’s day 3 of the heatwave. The temperature has been above 40 (43 today!) for the past 3 days and the whole state has been having blackouts due to everyone running their air conditioners at max. I only just managed to walk the dogs this morning before it started heating up again.

So while we’re sheltering from the heat, Shirley’s been stuck into her favourite OCD (D in this case stands for Detective) Monk and I’ve had my hands full with Mad Men, Lost and 24. I’ve actually been quite impressed with Mad Men. I didn’t expect that after the first few episodes, I would be so drawn into a drama involving:

#1 advertising (I left the industry on purpose)
#2 the 60s (I’m at the tail end of Gen-X, so no memory lane moments for me)
#3 no conspiracy or action (ala Jacks Shephard and Bauer)
#4 enough smoking to qualify for a surgeon general’s warning to be tattooed on each of the characters foreheads (which are apparently fake by the way)

In Mad Men the classiness of the setting and dialogue is very uncheesy, the script and dialogue is well thought out, and thoroughly engaging. It’s good to know a show doesn’t have to blow things up or double-cross every man and his dog in every other episode.

Now for Wall-E 2, let’s hire the Mad Men writers shall we ?