Pkchukiss - Reality Wine

Dad’s computer seems to be running a little funny, and it hasn’t anything to do with Wife 1.0. Rather, it concerns Son 2.0, installed 5 years after 1.0 was installed.

Son 2.0 is supposed to be entering the tertiary development phase soon, and even though enrolment does not start until February, the software has declined the initiation of work processes to generate some useful cash inflows and valuable experience logs that Son 1.0 has haphazardly bumped around. It has something to do with Son 1.0’s provision of a free cellular communications device, and Friend-of-Son 2.0’s console gaming device; having been provided with all the resources required, Son 2.0 has no desire to leave the safety of the Homepage, and go out into the working world.

“You shouldn’t have given him a handphone for free!” Mother reprimanded. She feels that I have essentially stifled his desire to fight for the things that he want in life.

I scratched my head and shrugged. Aquarius-signs are always lazy, and I being an ardent believer in self-determination, I feel that he should be able to decide on his next course of action. After all, it is his life! I probably don’t make a really good host computer; it is therefore with great gratitude that I do not have Girlfriend 1.0, since I probably would ruin any child processes that would come along with Wife 1.0

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Rarely do I read fiction these days, since I tangled myself with the World Wide Web. I enjoy snooping on other people’s lives, especially when they post photographs on their blogs. Along with a normal working hours like the rest of the world, there isn’t much time for me to hit the books after work.

Therefore, I was piqued when I found a sci-fi newsletter featured on Boing Boing: I usually skip the recommendations for books and anything longer than one browser-screen’s length, but the title caught my eye.

“How Lonesome a Life Without Nerve Gas”

How creepy, clamouring for a live with nerve gas. Scientific fictional novels stretch the bounds of the human imagination, and the title was gnawing at my curiosity. I clicked through, and was deeply captured by the tantalising introduction:

The first thing I remember is my master, Mickey Halstrom, picking me up from the heap of other smart-helms. I activated at the first touch of human skin and imprinted within seconds to his genetic signature. A rough voice barked out a series of commands and Mickey pulled me over his head. I expanded to meet the shape of his skull and tightened my pads over the base of his neck. My filters hung like a beard over his chest.

Finally, active duty. A soldier who breathes is a soldier who lives, and it was my job to keep Mickey breathing no matter what foul toxins those spineless Martian rebels put in his way. Oh, the children of the empire are marching. . . .

I won’t spoil the rest of the novel; if you are into amateur science fiction, the story presents a compelling read: I couldn’t stop reading even way past bedtime. The plot promises a wonderful twist near the ending as the irony hits home.

Read - “How Lonesome a Life Without Nerve Gas“

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This morning, I woke up stifling a yawn. The air was still in the room since we had the fans switched off the night before. I know that 28 degrees (celcius!) is an uncomfortably warm weather for the temperate-acclimatised, but I enjoyed curling up with my bolster in the relief from the usually harsh tropical sun.

Reluctant to get up, I scratched at some non-public hair, and came away with a disturbing clump. I bolted up straight, and stared at the unkempt bunch I had in my hands. I seriously considered screaming despite there being no pain, but decided not to wake up the house, since it was such a cozy Saturday. There was no sign of hair on the pillow, and I heaved a sigh of relief. I don’t really mind losing some of the discomfort down below, since they get itchy once in while. Shaving it off would at least postpone the irritation, if not remove it. A camp mate whom I shared a bunk with did once introduce me to his epilator - a device that pulls hair out of the unsightly parts of the body.

“Pull it all out, and get the satisfaction of getting rid of the itch!”

“Does it hurt?” I quizzed.

“OF COURSE IT DOES! I screamed the first time I used it!”

I prefer the blade approach better, thank you very much. The dark mass atop my head was very much intact, though it looked like unkempt grass. The front curled disturbingly; I spent a few years trying to get the front to straighten like the rest of my hair, but the natural remedies were all spent: every time I look in a mirror, the curls up front mocked my attempts to tame the wild beast on Monday mornings.

Time to break out the ingenuity of humanity: re-bonding! Though I am not sure what it entails, the expensive treatment promises to make hair toe a line so straight, they look like a broom. It is hard to understand how I withstood all those years with unprofessional hair, I had a relatively dented ego back from my secondary school days when my classmates would ridicule me for my unusual crop - even if rebonding doesn’t cure the problem, I hope that it will at least bring me better confidence.

I want to thank my friends for having accepted me for what I am, not judging me by my appearance. Even though I don’t look very ugly with the curl, it looks a little disconcerting, but they have looked past the defect and kept me through the darkest age of my school and army life. Not only did they ignore the fact that I was too fat to have a friend, they kept me in the circle whereas others kept me for bully fodder.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

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It took me the better part of the night, but finally it is up and running like a smooth engine. If you start leaving comments from now onwards, you will be able to see a live preview of your comment right in the box above the input text. Not that it helps me get more comments, because the few lurkers spying on me will maintain their silence.

You might want to test it out anyway; I promise that I didn’t code the comment box to post before you click “Submit”. Then again, I probably should

In the Content department, which has been producing nothing original for the past 2 weeks, a new project promises to keep things more stagnant than they already are, but rest assured: the CEO will ensure that everybody plays his role, whether he likes it or not. There is always the pinch whenever the company reserves fall below the psychological threshold. Telecommunications and gadgets are responsible for the inflated cash out-flow for the start of the financial year, though the Goods, Service Tax has been a primary factor.

The CEO promises to whip everything into shape to generate a steady maintainence of the company through the dry-spell: scheduled to commence in April 2007 through 2009.

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I wrestled with the earphone cables on my mobile phone after they failed to hitch properly, and caused my music to be totally monophonic in a stereo-fashion.

The sound came through the left earpiece the first second, and then the right earpiece the next moment. I jiggled the connector, and both sides went dead.

Curious, I pulled the entire connector out, and the music blasted through the external speaker on the phone itself, startling half of the train cabin. If my embarrassment were measured by rulers, it would have been stretched back home; I plugged the connector back in, and the sound started to alternate again.

I ended up perching the phone precariously inside my pocket, trying to keep the connector hitched onto the sweet spot. Though it was a lot better, I still had the occasional squeaks, just like a cassette player mowing a run-down tape.

My conclusion: Nokia’s proprietary connectors can cause you a lot of trouble and embarrassment when they are worn out.

The usual suspects were lurking as usual outside the train doors at the platform. Their eyes lit up when the train pulled into the station: some of them were planted right at the centre of the door-gap, which would be where passengers normally alight from.

When the door opened, I walked straight into them, causing them to stumble backwards, confounded and bewildered by the roller that just steam-rolled their plans to surge into the train. Without looking back, I strolled to the escalator. I have already given up swimming against the tide. It has become a local culture to muscle one’s way into the train before alighting passengers could exit the cabin. Where barbarians are concerned, they only understand force.

And that is what I would do: walk right into them. There is no use getting all worked up and testy because of a couple of people whom are inconsiderate. The resultant anger bounces off their thick hide without any adverse effect, so we might as well save the talking, and simply bulldoze through the obstacles. We get on with our lives, and maybe someday, the clueless will start to reflect on the reason why they are run-over at every train station.

I know that is impossible, but we humans can only hope, can’t we?

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While you might have a rather traditional view of society in Asian cultures, you might wonder how is it that the Japanese can come up with things like these, and get away without any fallout:

My friends and I have tried something similar to this back in 2001 in a shopping mall. Imagine taking a stroll through Suntec City in the artic air-conditioning when you see 5 teenagers staring and pointing at the ceiling, all the while fanning themselves as if hot air was blowing through the air-conditioning ducts, when everybody is shivering in cold.

Too bad that we did not have any cameras with us to film their reactions, and a blog for this to be uploaded to back then.

If you have spotted me and my friends back then, don’t hesitate to comment; I would definitely love to hear about your reactions

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I wondered what is happening to the family clinic that I go to, because when I went there again this morning, there again was a new doctor on duty. Previously when I had problems with a persistent flu, it was Dr. O who saw me, and drew my blood for the tests.

Just last week, when I went to the clinic for my sleeping problems, there was a new doctor sitting in the practitioner chair. Dr. L was working in her pregnancy, which made me wonder whether she was covering for Dr. O. This sometimes happens when male doctors are summoned back by their National Service unit. I didn’t dwell too much on it, since I was more concerned about my out-of-whack body clock.

However, today, there was a petite lady in her mid-40s in the doctor’s office. Dr. T dressed conservatively, as if she was attending a board meeting. She wore a normal floral-print dress with a black unzipped jacket. That didn’t matter, I liked it that she was able to converse in Chinese, since I feel awkward speaking in English with strangers. (Don’t mistake my fluency with familiarity!)

It turned out that on my first visit with Dr. L, I was prescribed with placebos to trick my mind into falling asleep. While I am comforted that I could fall asleep with the help of fake medicine, now she has told me about it, there is no way the same medicine was going to work again, so Dr. T decided to put me on Diazepam. If you have played the popular PS game Metal Gear Solid, you would know Diazepam features in the game as a barbiturate to help Snake aim his sniper rifle at his targets. I pondered over the irony for a while before I realised that I had managed to recognise the medicine straight off the label - my very first! Kudos to game developers; who ever said that you don’t gain anything from playing computer games must have been a really unstimulated person to be unaffected.

I got back the lab report for my blood test taken in September 2006, which essentially gave me a breakdown on the components of my blood. Other than Haemoglobin, I was totally lost at Polymorphs, Lymphocytes, Monocytes, Eosinophils, etc. Well, as long as the composition isn’t anything out of the reference range, I think there isn’t much to be worried about (I still have to worry about sleeping, remember?).

When I reached home, I struggled against the temptation to fall asleep right in the mid-day, which was mind-numbing. It feels like I had just stayed up the night before. In the end, I had to sleep some just to relieve myself.

P.S. I have no idea why I decided to post this, since it looks really boring after I have read it twice. Here’s hoping that I regain my sleep hygiene, and write about something else other than my inability to fall asleep at the appropriate time! It is 11:49pm, and I’ve just swallowed half a tablet of the pill. If what Wikipedia says about the drug is correct, I’ll be asleep by 12:15am. Good morning!

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[MEDIA=1]

Ever wondered how corny videos of the 1980s looked like? Geeky Microsoft shows you the ropes.

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