In Other Words: August 2004

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

from A political to Anti Bush

So even Graydon Carter is getting involved in Politics this election. If you don’t know who Graydon Carter is think ‘Vanity Fair’, then add the words ‘editor of’ in front and the words ‘for the last 12 years’ behind.

Yeah, that doesn’t mean terribly much to me either, but he’s a big wig. I mean, I don’t know much about magazines, but I do know that Vanity Fair is a magazine (though my knowledge ends about there). Anyway, he’s been an A political editor of one of the biggest Fashion and Celebrity magazines for twelve years that has chosen to remain uninvolved, as much as possible.

He’s just finished an anti Bush book entitled ‘What We've Lost: How the Bush Administration Has Curtailed Freedoms, Ravaged the Environment and Damaged America and the World’, which is basically a list of all the things Bush has done so far that have hurt America. It’s not so much a book as a loosely collected bundle of facts with a title.

I think the bit that got to me most was this, "We had meetings on the research every couple of days; we went through 30,000 reports - it was daunting, what the Bush administration had done," he says. "I went into this thinking I knew maybe a 10th of it; I didn't know the 1,000th of it. (If you’re wondering where I got that quote from, it’s from an article in the guardian). This was when he had already decided to buy a book, a guy who had not been involved in politics for 12 years finds something that makes him pick up his pen again and start getting involved while he only knew a thousandth of what happened.

I wonder how long it will be before we know the true extent of the damage done by the Bush administration. A lot longer, I imagine, if he gets another four years. Why does anybody support him? Where is the evidence that he’s a good leader? I think I need to actively go look for it, find what the conservatives hold as a good reason for Bush.

I’ll come back with that, as soon as possible.

Quick Cash

Was talking about a friend’s financial problems and I was reminded of something one of my teachers told me when I was still young, hip, carefree and sober (yeah, time sure flies, doesn’t it?). Anyways, this teacher type (actually, it might have been a professor) had this brilliant idea ‘how to get rich quick’ scheme, though apparently it was illegal. (Though that should hardly concern us, right? As long as we don’t get arrested).

We’re going to simplify things just a little bit, as I really don’t want to make this into a dissertation. I realise the world is a little more complex than this, but people are stupid, so it’s all right.

Ok, start off by looking at the stock exchange and finding a stock with a really dodgy future one that will either go up drastically, or down drastically. (for this example we’re going to assume that the stock will not stay the same). Ok, proceed to print 5,000 letters that give economic (and religious, scientific, whatever) evidence that the stock will go up and a short excerpt of your brilliant staff and company that will predict all stock fluctuations. Then print 5,000 similar letters that reverse that evidence and predict the stock going down. Send all over the world to different addresses (making sure you’ve got what letter goes where).

Wait

When the stock has gone what ever way it went ignore the group that you sent the wrong advice to and send a new letter to those 5,000 that you got it right with asking for a buck for another news letter (we’re going to assume they all say yes). Now, do the same thing as before 2,500 up, 2,500 down.

Ignore the group that you got it wrong with, charge 10 dollars for your new ‘expectation booklet’. 1250 goes up, 1250 goes down. Ignore the group that you got it wrong with, charge 100 dollars for your ‘sure fire book to reading the stock market’ (hey, you got it ‘right’ twice already). 625 goes up 625 goes down. Thousand dollars, 312 312, ten thousand. Run like hell. You get away and leave the 150 or so lucky people that became millionaires, because of your suggestions, to defend you in the public arena. While you go and hide in Bermuda with your fortune of nearly four million (cigar anyone).

5000 X 1
2500 X 10
1250 X 100
625 X 1000
321 X 10,000
= 3,990,000

10,000 gullible people aren’t that hard to find. Hell, fifty million people are voting Republican, you can start there.

Enemy of my enemy?

Andrew Sullivan came back from a month’s vacation in Europe and I think his stay in more liberal climates has effected him. His previous middle of the road semi-conservative stance of previous months seems to have a turn for the well, other side. Or maybe his opinions about what he believes haven’t changed, but his perception about who shares his beliefs has changed.

If you want to know what I’m talking about read this recent essay by him. It should give you a decent idea of how a man that tried to be middle of the road for the longest time (and was in fact pro-bush) has voiced what looks to be a condemnation of the current Administration.

I imagine he will get a lot of flack for that, especially considering moderate and even serious conservative Republicans read his site. Bad for him, good for those who believe that Bush shouldn’t have another term, as the conservatives refuse to read the liberal sites. At least this way they get to hear some of the arguments.

Something that struck me as interesting was the fact that Andrew hat tipped Joshua Marshall’s Blog Talking Points Memo not only that, but Joshua tipped right back for something else. For those of you that don’t follow these two blogs that will mean very little, but let me try to explain. These two had some animosity towards each other. The few times they did interact they would cut down the other on their own blog what the other had said on their Blog. This was because Joshua was a critical liberal while Andrew was a critical conservative. They rarely agreed.

Now, however, it seems that they have started to share more of the same views (or at least, if not views, the same objectives). So maybe we’ll see a potent ‘alliance’ between these two blogs that together get more hits than the vast majority of newspapers. That would be good as the Washington Post’s Poll suggests that Bush is ahead, alive and kicking Kerry’s ass. Lets hope that manages to even itself out. It might, the Kerry campaign has announced that it’s no hold barrels now, after the Swift Boat smear campaign.

About time. Lets hope that the Democrats can dig up a nice tid bit of dirt on the Bushies & Co.

Monday, August 30, 2004

AVP and the Bourne Supremacy

Ok, lets do some movie reviews. I saw two movies recently and since I really don’t want to talk about politics, religion or the environment at this moment (just don’t have the energy) I thought I would discuss them. For those that haven’t noticed, I love movies in all shapes in sizes. Some I love to watch and some I love to slash down and rubbish with my friends.

I’ve always enjoyed stories, fictional or fact, of all shapes and sizes. I guess that comes with the territory, me being a dreamer and all. Anyway, I dragged Liana to two movies recently, AVP and the Bourne Supremacy. (Yes, I really should let her choose the next movie.) Both, in my opinion, were quite enjoyable, though for different reasons. Lets start with AVP.

If you want to see a movie with exceptional acting, great stars and genius scripts, don’t go see AVP. The acting is absolutely terrible, the people featured in the movie are pretty B rated (except for the actor of Spud from Train Spotting, he rocks) and the script is restricted to one liners and instinctive leaps of ‘genius’ that make you wonder why archaeology takes so damn long (you’ll understand if you see the movie).

The effects, on the other hand, are pretty nifty and both alien species have been, still are and will be very spiffy. Dark horse comics (the guys that got the rights to both the species and realised that they would work well together) did a great job of working out their universe and adding in new elements to make even a few ideas from the original movies appear in a different light (i.e. the scalping in predator). The fights between the two species took some good programming and will entertain action/fantasy/sci-fi lovers.

The only real problem, really, is that this just won’t do for a movie, unless you have some really good scriptwriters. I think I would advise that somebody, somewhere, suggests that it be written as series with lots of cash, lots of good script writers and lots more sci-i ideas. (half the reason why Alien was so good was the claustrophobic ship tunnels and clunky ‘advanced’ technology). They should have taken their cue from AVP the computer game, me thinks. There the three species were all well done and very interesting. Anyways, enough AVP, next movie.

The Bourne Supremacy was actually surprisingly good. The shaking camera (I don’t know who developed that idea originally, but you can see it in too many movies right now) during action scenes was a bit excessive and made Liana feel sick, though it added to the overall excitement of the movie (and made it hard to see what was actually happening). The methods used by Bourne to discover the information he needed were well thought out (and seemed very plausible).

What I liked about it was that even though it was the same old story (super super agent goes against the machine) they managed to put it in a new jacket and gave it some interesting twists and turns. The way that the Bourne character managed to retain quite a lot of control over what was happening was a nice touch, different from all those annoying movies where the main character constantly survives through luck and chance (and after a while you just wish they wouldn’t).

Yeah, I enjoyed both of them. Not top of the line, but they shouldn’t disappoint as long as you don’t go in expecting too much. I would give them a seven and an eight respectively, that is if you remember to what category they belong.

Mondays are a horrible way to spend one seventh of your life -Garfield

I just spilled tea all over myself. White shirt, first hour in the office, tea all over myself. Brilliant. Great way to start my Monday. I guess its better then spilling acid all over myself, or molten metal, or cum. Those would be more embarrassing, though I grant you that I probably wouldn’t stick around long enough in any of those three cases to find out how embarrassed people think I should be.

Interesting weekend. Went out on Friday night, new bar, music, friends, fun, came back home on Saturday afternoon. Had managed to sleep a little bit, but still couldn’t get myself out of bed till late on Sunday (not too surprising, is it?). Wondered around Toa Payoh to shop for silly products for our doll’s house. Spent the first night sleeping there, without aircon and with one fan (we had two, but one sounded like it was drilling for oil, so we decided that a little bit of extra warmth was ok compared to a whole lot less noise.

Did read the news a whole lot lately, didn’t know what to say about it. Looks like Bush is finally ahead in the polls. Lets hope it doesn’t stay that way for long. I have, however, started thinking about the repercussions of another four years of Bush. I think it will be a matter of putting our heads down and just trying to survive (or maybe an assassination attempt, though Chenney as president would probably be an even worse idea).

I think the world might survive it, though four years of Bush will probably herald the end of America as the sole super power (Bush does not have the economic, militaristic or political clout to contain and help shape China). We would probably head into another twenty to forty years of one-upmanship between those two countries if Bush is reelected.

That reminds me of a question somebody asked me six months ago ‘would you rather America or China were more powerful and held ‘control’ over your part of the world?’ At the time I said America, without a moment’s hesitation. I would probably still say America, despite the religious overtones that have crept all over the country’s words and deeds.

I wonder if that’s all because of propaganda? Probably has something to do with it. Though I would like to think that I would almost always choose between a democracy and a totalitarian state. I don’t know, I think I’ll mull over that for a while and give you a real opinion a bit later today.

Friday, August 27, 2004

A book's cover

I’m sure all of you have thought about this at one point, but I think it is something that should be raised again now that the elections in America are going on. Its something that has bothered me about Democracy right from the moment I understood what it was all about. It was part of the very reason why the Greeks (who had the very first democracy oh so many years before 1 AD) used a lottery as part of the way some positions were filled.

Lets talk about Charm. Charm is essential in Democracy, it is something that gets you elected, or doesn’t get you elected. Your ability to connect with the people, make people like you, emotionally evoke responses, say what needs to be said, etc. are all dependent on Charm. Charm, in many ways, is the most important natural trait that a politician should possess.

Charm, of course, comes in many forms. Some people (like John Edwards) are very good at putting complicated things forth clearly and easily. Others, (Like Bush) manage to appeal through a down to earth, simple ‘I’m just like you’ feeling. Some people have it naturally, other people will never get it, but what ever you want to say it is essential to have some form of Charm if you want to have any sort of political life at all.

It plays a far more important role then most people realise. At one point there were elections for some small time official in England. There were the usual posters and TV debates between two people who both coveted the title. Eventually there was a vote and one won, the other lost (54% to 42%). A group of scientists then took all the posters, fliers, TV shows etc. and went to India. There they found a village where nobody spoke English (still possible even today) and they reran the entire campaign. They showed the people the fliers, the posters and the TV material.

Of course to the Indian people it made very little sense, but these men in white coats wanted it and the villagers were getting something out of it, so what the hey. Finally the Indians were allowed to vote as well. The difference? 1.5% from the first vote. That’s how much difference understanding to not understanding made.

Deciding who your leader is going to based on Charm is like deciding who your surgeon is going to be based on his Piano playing skill. It doesn’t make a hell of a lot of sense.

Yes, a good Piano player might have very flexible fingers, which is a very useful skill for a surgeon, but that is far from the only thing that really matters. Why have we made a Leader’s ability to orate so important? Why do we think that people that can’t talk speak all that well can’t lead our country to success?

Its like deciding a student goes through to the next class based on only one course grade (I don’t care that he’s excellent in English, biology, theatre and French, he failed his math course so he’s going to have to do the year again! Those are the rules). I imagine I’ve given enough examples.

There should really be a better way to do things. A pretty face is something that is important for models, it shouldn’t matter for a future leader.

Remember Hitler was a great orator, that certainly didn’t make him a good person. Steven Hawkins, on the other hand, can only be understood by his nurse, yet he’s done massive amounts of good for all mankind.

Don’t judge a book by its cover, don’t judge a leader by his charm.

the Stupid factor

Ah, an article in the guardian on Bush’s intelligence. I don’t know how many of you are interested in this kind of stuff and it does wind and twist a bit, but have the feeling that it does cover some of the important points about the Stupidity of Bush. What it also does well, I might add, is discuss the inability of the Kerry camp to capitalise on it.

The article points out that basically Kerry is too intelligent for his own good. Kerry understands that the world is immensely complicated and made up of a thousand grades of grey. Kerry understands that everything is nuanced and the world is in the grip of Chaos theory. What he doesn’t understand is that the American public doesn’t want to hear about. His mind is great for a president, but terrible for someone aspiring to become president.

Bush is an idiot. The problem is that many Americans like idiots. They can understand an idiot. They can grasp what an idiot is trying to do. John Kerry, on the other hand, is too intelligent. He confronts the world as it is, rather than as he would want it to be. American voters don’t want that, they want their president to wear rose tinted glasses and to tell them that everything is great. Many American voters actually consider it a bad thing for a politician to be too ‘European’ (i.e. nuanced and cultured).

Of course I’m generalising terribly here. There is a good 50% of the population that doesn’t want this. The intellectuals, the liberals, etc. These people understand the danger of Bush. Karl Rove (that’s Bush’s campaign coordinator) probably said it best when he said that as people grew wealthier they were more likely to vote Republican, that is unless they were too well educated.

That probably explains why the Republican party is more keen on having money spent on bombs then on schools. They’re well aware that if they over educated the American people, they will lose their voter base. (Look at Europe, the most educated countries are almost always the most liberal and socialist). No, don’t educated, indoctrinate. Don’t solve problems, pray. Don’t turn the tide of anti Americanism, shoot those rag headed bastards, instead. What does it matter if we’re wrong? We’ll just change the history books a couple of decades from now and make the intellectuals responsible.

Interesting fact: 10% of Singaporean women and 5% of Singaporean men can’t read.

Thursday, August 26, 2004

Overseas vote 2004

Make an American living abroad vote! Only the American citizens living abroad have a true understanding of the harm done by Bush outside of the US. Only by making them vote can we exert any direct influence over this election. Put the link on your Blog, pass it to your American friends, make any American you know that can vote, vote!

Get your war on

Some humour to lighten an otherwise heavy day. Be warned, it’s political and contains a lot of swear words. If you can deal with that, it’s quite good.

Introvert

So I’ve been struggling these last couple of days with internal thoughts. Think that largely happened because of the injured finger. Couldn’t just spit out words onto the screen, which is normally quite therapeutic. Got thinking about my own life and, especially, about my own personality. It’s important to do that every so often, I find.

Concentrating on my inability to shut up, this time. That’s fine when you’re writing, but a bit of a pain to the people around you when their trying to talk and you wont let them. I was provoked into this train of thought by a number of muttered comments on Sunday that cut me right deep.

The really interesting thing about it is that I didn’t used to actually talk all that much. There was always people around me that talked a whole lot more. It is a relatively new acquisition (read the last few years). Now I find that I have serious trouble trying to keep quiet, which is really a bother because I find the best way to learn is to listen. People talk and I respond. Even before I’ve actually thought about it in anyway. I seem to have trained myself into saying almost everything that comes to mind that I think might even be remotely interesting.

Where did I get the arrogance from to think that people actually want to listen to what I have to say? I think that’s the real thing I’m trying to understand right now. I’m relatively self-assured, I’ve known that for a while, but when did arrogance creep into my personality? Arrogance is a terrible trait that keeps an individual from growing (if you don’t listen, you don’t learn).

So I haven’t quite figured out what I want to do about it yet. I think realisation helps, already, but that’s not enough. A problem doesn’t go away simply because its recognised.

Some serious thought needs to go into how I want to be, versus how I am. Seem serious contemplation into how I think people see me and how people actually see me.

What I also need to understand is why people have trouble confronting me with the problems they have with me. This is a much stronger trait in general out here in Asia and I still have trouble understanding it. How am I meant to improve myself if people don’t tell me what is wrong with me? Yeah, it hurts but in the long run isn’t honesty the best policy with your friends? As a matter of fact, I don’t think I would consider somebody a friend if they were not consistently honest with me.

What use is a friend who builds you up on false premonitions that nobody else agrees with? To me that type of friend is only setting you up to get knocked down again.

Am I making it more difficult for people to approach me? Does my attempt at witticisms make people feel like I wouldn’t appreciate the truth?

Enough questions to keep me going for a while.

Don’t worry, I’ll return to my regular rants soon enough. After all, I still can’t keep quiet.

Interesting fact: Because heat expands the metal, the Eiffel Tower always leans away from the sun.

Wednesday, August 25, 2004

An intelligent man can get him self out of problems that a wise man would never have gotten himself into.

When I studied my small bit of philosophy, I was told that the trick to finding the right answers was in asking the right questions. If nobody asks the right questions, then nobody will end up getting the right answers and thus, we are left without progress. After all, progress depends on us answering questions. That is what science is all about.

In normal society, it is the people who find the answers that get celebrated. The people that discover the cure, the people that make the gadgets. When you get inside the group that makes these discoveries, however, you often find that our heroes' heroes were the people that managed to start people on the road to finding that cure and that discovery. Those are the real geniuses, especially if those people managed to foresee the problem before it truly became a problem.

Of course the average person on the street couldn't care less that one person helped make something not become a problem. The problem hasn’t cropped up in their lives, so for them it is unimportant. It is only when the problem has hit them and dragged them down that the problem solver is hailed as a hero.

Bugger the men and women who avoided major wars by finding peaceful solutions. Laud instead those people who then go about guns blazing, winning the wars that could not be avoided. Never mind that the first saved more lives then the second could ever end. Never mind that the first managed to preserve peace while the second only committed murder.

As a species, we constantly get ourselves into situation where we then have to work damn hard to get back out again. We’re mighty intelligent, but our wisdom is severely lacking. It’s because we ignore the right questions until it’s almost too late, until they can no longer safely be ignored.

Look at our environment, look at our oil dependency, look at the growing poverty gaps between rich and poor.

Here’s a question for you: Why do we have so many more famous basketball stars than famous philosophers? Philosophy has been around for millennia, while basketball has only been around for a few decades or centuries. The first tries to answer the fundamental questions of our existence, while the later boils down to putting a piece of rubber through a metal hoop again and again.

It’s a combination of mass apathy and overall short-sightedness that blinds those of us that could find the answers, channeling their cleverness into money making pursuits, rather than finding the right questions. Their skills end up being channelled into building another resource consuming gadget we don’t really need, rather than the less profitable gadgets we really do need.

It’s a situation where governments are so opaque that even if we do care and really do want to know, we can’t (and shouldn’t) understand. It’s a situation where institutions don’t want criticism and debate, for fear of being wrong. It’s a situation where the schools aren’t trying to teach scepticism, but agreeability. Where teacher are expected to teach obedience, not doubt, where learning by rote is awarded higher marks than imagination is.

We’ve jumped off a cliff and we’re flapping our arms, certain that the wind rushing by our ears means we’re flying. We’re too short sighted to realise that what’s rushing towards us is hard and solid. Like addicts, we’re too confident that we can change our ways before its too late. Like the alcoholic in the corner bar we’re almost comical, except for the hairline cracks of desperation all over our brazen loud-mouthed disbelief.

How much longer do we have before Mother Nature puts on that ‘closing time’ song that we’re all secretly dreading to hear? What will we do when the bar closes and we realise that beyond the front door is nothing but an abyss? Will our children hate us when they look back at our society and how it was driven purely by consumption and waste?

Will our children be able to even have children?

Almost OK

My finger seems to be doing a bit better today, though it still hurts some to type (enough to be a bother, not enough for me not to try). These last couple of days have made me realise how much effort people waste when they can’t blind type. I’ve decided that it cuts so much time off my work to blind type that if I couldn’t do it yet I would force myself to learn, despite the effort that would go into it.

Not only does blind typing increase your speed four or five fold, it also makes it so much easier to write complete sentences (rather than words, which seems to be what you do when you type with only a few fingers) and to retain an idea of where you are trying to go. Not being able to type blind feels to me like trying to write a letter with your wrong hand (if you can’t blind type try that, to know how much easier blind typing is).

Anyways though I’m still struggling a bit, I feel I need to say something on here, even if it’s a whole lot less than normal. There is a whole heap of things I want to mention and that I will try to expand on in the next couple of days.

First off there is the new PM’s ‘increased liberty’ bit, which was covered by a whole heap of newspapers, including the Today and the Straits Times. They both reported on the increased freedom that Singaporeans have now received, but they both said things just a little bit differently (they actually contradicted each other on a number of points). Here is the Today paper article and here is the one from the Straits Times. Which one to believe? Probably neither, but that is something I’ll discuss at a later date.

Then there is AVP, which will certainly get a better examination, but for now suffice it to say that it’s good as long as you don’t actually expect any real acting.

I’ve also started an ‘idea book’, which consists of a hard copy hand written booklet of ideas I’ve gathered over the years. Most of them won’t make their way up here, but some of them might be worth mentioning (just have to make sure nobody steals ‘em, you bastards).

Lastly I want to gear up and get some viewpoints in about the presidential elections in the US and the GOP convention in NY. So enough to talk about (and that just from missing three days) so check back regularly in the next few days. (I probably missed something of importance, but I’m sure I’ll stumble back across it as I get on my soap box about these other affairs).

Oh yeah, and of course I’ll be doing some catch up work on my sil… uh… interesting facts.

Interesting fact: If you’re ‘typical’, you can guess someone’s sex with 95% accuracy just by smelling their breath.

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

Bush's Medals

All right a really short post. I don’t know if any of you have been paying attention to the current debate in the media about john Kerry’s medals, but here is an interesting post about Bush’s Medals (which he wore in a number of pictures, but never received. Look at this link for more information. This will probably become an interesting topic over the next few days.

Second day, no go.

Alright my finger is a little better (it just looks like a sausage now, rather than a pregnant buffalo), but it still hurts to type, so hopefully I’ll be able to do something when I get back home. If not then the only option is tomorrow. I hope that’s not too much of a problem for all you rabid fans. (yes, I do have a vivid imagination, why do you ask?)

Monday, August 23, 2004

Twisted Finger

I won’t be able to write much over the next couple of days, as I twisted my finger and its all swollen, thereby making it impossible for me to blind type, as I usually do. I’m finding it exceptionally difficult to type any other way. Give it a day or two and I should be back to normal (though I imagine I might have to spend some considerable time catching up on work).

Yes, that means both myself and Liana managed to hurt ourselves this weekend and we both did it doing stupid things (I tried to jump off a rope bridge rather than walk all the way to the end as normal people would have done.)

Saturday, August 21, 2004

Cocaine ad

Al right, here’s an ad from Kontraband that I found very well done. Mind you, it is a bit graphic in its imagery, so its not exactly for the faint of heart. Go here to watch it.

I think I mentioned it before, this is that add that convinced me that ads can indeed tell a full on story in just under thirty seconds.

Liana is a Silly Goat

Last night Liana demonstrated, once again, that she’s a silly goat. We were out about town, near the Hard Rock café with a large group scattered about the area, four of us were standing outside and while three of us decided where we were going to go, Liana decided to entertain herself by sliding down the railing on a staircase. Of course she had concocted this mad plan while she was, well, lets not mince our words, drunk as a skunk.

She didn’t just try once (which went poorly, as her balance was off and her skirt was riding up) or twice, no she tried a grand total of five times, nearly falling each time, squeaking like a little girl in a playground. I myself was a little bit too preoccupied with trying to decide where to drink our night cap to finish the evening. (after which we would have had to have a second night cap, to help the first one find its way to our stomach. Of course, that one would doubtlessly have gotten lost and needed a third friend. Then, just to be certain the first three were ok, we would need to do a fourth and a fifth in quick succession, so that they could hold each other’s hands as they helped the first three along).
Suddenly a see Liana topple and hear her squeal turn from pure enjoyment to one of fear and pain. She had successfully managed to fall off the railing and smash her head on the stone steps.

The blood, wow. There was a lot of blood. She managed to bleed enough to turn the sleeve of one white shirt solid red, while her own shirt ended up spattered with ‘artistic blotches’.

Head wounds always bleed a lot and the three of us quickly established that the cut in her head wasn’t actually that big. We pressed ice to the cut and quickly fled to Shazam’s place, nearby. There we monitored the situation carefully (muttering such phrases as ‘damn’ and ‘that’s a lot of blood’ ‘we need to disinfect!’ and ‘no more alcohol for her! Give it to me instead’)

The bleeding stopped within about ten minutes and she said her head wasn’t hurting, she wasn’t seeing spots, she didn’t feel like she had to throw up or any of the other tell tale signs of a concussion. So we established, together, that a clinic visit was not necessary.

I took her home, gave her a pain killer, just in case and decided, at that time, that she truly was a silly goat.

At least she’s a silly goat that always manages to keep the evenings exciting and stimulating, intended or not. At least she’s my silly goat.
Cheers to that.

Interesting fact: Ketchup was sold in the 1830s as medicine.

Friday, August 20, 2004

Failed Foreign Policy

Excerpt from an article in the Washington Post:

"There is a total collapse of trust in American intentions and it's only gotten far worse over the past year," Telhami said. "When people hate or resent the United States far more than they dislike bin Laden, how can you succeed? That's the bottom line."

Funny, that’s what I was saying for the last year. I said that before the Americans attacked Iraq, I was saying that right after 9/11.

You know what the American I talked to then said? Bomb them. Attack, destroy and burn. Let God sort them out.

I said then that the only way to stop the terrorists was to cut them off from their greatest resource, the Muslim people. How every attack that killed a terrorist would in all likelihood create half a dozen more, as family, friends and loved ones rose up to take their brother’s place. I pointed to Corsica as an example. In Corsica blood feuds have been raging for going for generations, with nobody even certain who started them anymore. Machiavelli said something to the effect of if you can’t completely annihilate your enemy, then don’t go after them. Just hurting them and leaving them the power to strike back will almost certainly inspire them to hit back.

Now they agree. That while they have already turned the entire population of the Middle East against them, as polls showed.

American failed policy has successfully reduced the world’s freedom and safety. For once, I hate being right.

The value of advertising

I have been truly impressed with something that is normally truly bothersome. What has got my attention sparked? Adverts. Yes, those annoying things in between the meat and potatoes that make watching TV such a bother. I, myself, never watch TV. Mainly its because I’m not too impressed with the average stuff they show on the tube but another important aspect of why I don’t watch is that adverts annoy the piss out of me.

Recently, however, I’ve gone to the site Kontraband and discovered that there is some very, and I mean very impressive adds out there. All the rest of the material is also good, but the advertisements they collect are absolutely excellent. You do need sound and a good broadband connection to truly view these, but if you do have those and you have an interest in humour, story telling or bringing across a message, then go and watch a couple of these adds.

This way of watching advertising is way more preferable then watching them on TV, as here you get to watch only the good, weird and funny ones, without having to sit through the other 95% of what is advertising.

To get to the adverts click on the link and then click on the image marked ‘TV ads’ under the ‘Kontraband pick of the day’.

I think one of them (one about cocaine fcukin’ up your brain, you’ll recognise it when you see it) convinced me that ads aren’t only annoying, they are a full on storytelling medium.

Singapore's environment

Lets talk about Singapore in relation to the environment. It’s not often that these words are used together. Thats probably because they don't really like each other. Lets be honest about it, Singaporeans are about as environmentally friendly as they are politically free. Granted, it all looks pretty and beautiful, but scrape at the surface and (in both cases) things are discovered that some people would prefer hidden and most Singaporeans don’t even really want to think about.

Lets start with the stats, Singapore is:
-The 10th biggest producer of CO2 per capita in the world.
-Even if we look at Singapore’s CO2 emissions overall, in comparison to all the other countries in the world, this one city still ranks in the top 50.
-Singapore consume the most oil per capita in the world at more than 1.5 barrels of oil per day per person.
-Singapore is the second biggest creator of solid waste per capita in Asia, (first is Japan).

I could find more statistics, but I think you get the idea. I’ve always thought that Singaporean are very environmentally unfriendly and now I have some statistics to prove it. Do these figures surprise any of you? Probably not. We all know it, somewhere, but we don't do much about it.

Example: Couple walks into seven eleven, buy a couple of nuts bars (with plastic wrappers), two cans of coke (metal) and a sandwich (plastic wrapper). Each of these, in turn, gets wrapped in a plastic bag (you wouldn’t want your sandwich wrapping getting cold and wet from the can, would you?) and then, for their convenience, all of these bags get wrapped in yet another plastic bag. That’s four plastic bags for a total of three different items. Couple walks outside, to a bench, finish their food in five minutes and, this is the best part, throw all the plastic bags into a garbage can insight of the seven eleven. 'What you expect loh? I no going to walk around with them!'

Cold storage uses ten bags to wrap eight items, most people then just throw these bags away ‘I have enough bag at home, already! I no need no more, leh’ People all over the world are slowly realising that the environment isn’t doing all that well, that everything isn’t going as well as originally thought. The head of Shell recently admitted that global warming was a more important problem then terrorism (Shell, that’s an oil company. They have a stake in keeping up oil consumption) and the reaction in Singapore? ‘It doesn't affect us, our streets are clean!’.

The only thing Singapore does do is recycle it's water and the only reason it does that is not because it wants to help the environment, but because of strategic reasons. National defense, yes, world environment, they can worry about that outside of our bubble world. If push comes to shove and everything does go to sheet? Well, then we'll just build a dome over the island and tax our citizens for the clean air! That wont be that hard, we've already got a working dome model at the Esplanade!

Do something for the environment, refuse the plastic bags, print on both sides of the paper, turn of the aircon when you're not in the room and make other Singaporeans aware that clean streets does not necessarily mean clean conscience.

Interesting fact: In an expected forty years the glaciers that feed the Ganges will disappear and, as a result, the Ganges will dry up. The fertile fields that depend on the Ganges to feed all of India will then, obviously enough, not be so fertile anymore. That’s within our lifetime, people.

Thursday, August 19, 2004

Blogging as a talking point

Alright, another post about blogging. Its funny how when you write about something you often find more about that subject. So now I found an essay entitled ‘Transparency Begets Trust in the Ever-Expanding Blogosphere’ an essay about how Blogs are competing with and sometimes more trusted than major news organisations.

It’s talks about how the honesty of bloggers, even if it is more biased than news organisation, makes them trustworthier than major news sources. How the bloggers concentrate on specific themes and ideas that people want to read about and how bloggers, unlike news organisations, are generally more willing to admit mistakes.

The truly interesting thing, however, is this graph which demonstrates the number of links blogs make to specific sites. The top five sites in order, are The New York Times, CNN, BBC news, The Washington Post and Slashdot: news for nerds, stuff that matters. (With The Guardian unlimited, where I got the article from, sixth.). The interesting thing was that the fifth is a Blog, as are many others in the top 40. A number of well-known sites, like FOX news are being outperformed by one man blogging shows.

True, these link sites are taken from Blogs (so its what blogs link to that matters for this show) which means that the scale is seriously skewed in favour of blogging (blogs talk about blogs, I hope that doesn’t surprise anybody) but still, major news organisations are being out performed, in many instances, by Blogs.

Some pretty big newspapers don’t even show up at all in the Top 40, as they aren’t trusted or referred to as much as Blogs. What am I trying to say? I’m not sure, really, I guess I’m just trying to point out the growing importance of blogs, even if this article is a bit skewed. It seems to me that Blogs are not a passing fad, but are here to stay. A useful news source that will have to be watched closely for interesting titbits. The trick, I believe, is finding ways to separate the diamonds from the rough. More on techniques for that as soon as I find them.

Self Analysis

Since Blogspot has installed that bar at the top of the page (found by scrolling to the top, Liana) my hits have risen sharply. Suddenly from just three or four hits a day my counter has risen to seven! Yes, seven. I’m now getting seven hits a day, on average. I hope some day in the future I’ll be able to look back on it and go ‘wow, seven hits, and I was impressed with that?’ (allow me my illusions of grandeur).

That rise has provoked me to write another post about the nature of my blogging. Why? Because it entertains me, I guess, and because it shies away from all the politics, opinions and links that I’ve been posting so much off these last couple of days (er, weeks).

I’ve noticed that the nature of my Blog seems to have changed considerably. Gone are the mindless rantings off the first couple of weeks. It’s all still typed in one quick go, but each post seems to have congealed into only discussing one topic. I think that’s a good change, it means that the title gives most people a good idea whether they want to read the post coming up. It’s not a bad thing, necessarily, to post several times a day, though it is more demanding, naturally enough.

I think I’m also getting the size of my posts under control. Though they might be a tad too long for first timers. It’s useful to try to stick to only one A4 page at font twelve. Its gives you a frame work. Of course there is the risk of not examining the point your trying to make enough and therefore leaving out or missing an important point, but that’s what you have multiple posts for, right?

I still don’t really have a hook (though I like looking up the interesting facts thing). My Blog is far too much all over the place for that. It’s not my plan to change that, however. I couldn’t stand trying to write about one topic only. I want to be able to write what ever I find interesting at that moment in time. Hell, that’s what a diary is all about, right? Writing about the things that keep you busy and involved.

What I have noticed and I’m very happy with is that my writing is improving (ok, so you don’t agree, see if I care! Go read somebody else’s blog, you bastard.) what they say is true, write every day and you improve as a writer (Ok, ok, or your confidence increases and you think you’re a better writer).

The absurd, bizarre attempts at humour have taken a back seat to the opinionated ranting. In the beginning that was my main focus, but since I’ve moved offices across the road that seems to have changed (purple veined throbbing floppy dildo with speed stripes). It’s funny how just your location can alter your writing so much. That’s not truly surprising, of course, after all writing is largely a subconscious thing. The words that you type out on the page might come from your conscious mind, but they are doubtlessly influenced by your subconscious state of mind.

I still haven’t started reading back the thousands upon thousands of characters I’ve typed onto this blog. I should, I might just be able to find the inspiration to write the articles I still need to write. Themes, concepts, ideas a plenty in here, maybe even one or two worth using.

Passive racism

Lets talk about America. Again. (Just a couple more weeks, people, then the elections will be over and I’ll have to find a new subject to rave and rant about. That is, of course, if Kerry wins. (Yet another reason to vote Kerry)).

Lets talk about the world’s good will towards America. Something that was never as high as after 9/11 and never so low as it is now. Lets consider that, lets see how that creeps up, unexpected, in all walks of life, everywhere.

It was my mother that got me thinking about this, yet again. She said that when she watches the Olympics and follows the sports, she notices an undercurrent of Schadenfruede in the commentators, when ever the American Athletes didn’t manage to make their way to gold. This wasn’t just the British or Aussies (who do a large amount of the commentating on cable sports channel), but even the Singaporean accented presenters had a subtle hint of secret joy in their reporting.

Now Sports Channel presenters are not exactly the model of unbiased reporting, yet they do have responsibility to maintain their objectivity as you never know who’s watching. So the fact that this slight tonal inflection was present spoke volumes about these people’s true opinions. These people are pleased at the failure of all Americans everywhere due to one man and his administration.

How much is the current Administration’s mishandling of world opinion costing the average American? A lot more than those average Americans realise, I imagine. Passive discrimination has crept into world opinion, everywhere. It’s not vocalised (often), but it is present and influencing matters against American business, American tourism and American objectives. All things being the same between two companies, one being American and the other being German or Japanese, which one would now be the preferred choice of most people?

Sixty years ago everybody hated the Germans and the Japanese. The amount of damage done is very difficult to measure, as it often works on a subconscious scale, but almost every American who lives abroad has felt it. That’s why Its become a pretty regular occurrence to meet Americans who greet you with the now almost cliché ‘I’m American and I’m sorry’ or ‘I’m American, but I hate Bush’ response.

The problem is that we can do so little about it, because those Americans that count (i.e. the ardent Bush supporters) see this as a good quality in their president. They love the fact that Bush is basically standing astride of the American Continent fists raised and flashing his middle fingers to the rest of the world. ‘Stick it to ‘em’ they shout, ‘Who’s the man!’ They don’t realise that its not just the rest of the world that is suffering, but it will be them in ten years, as their welfare takes a hit from the waves of anti Americanism that are rolling around the world, a wave that will only grow if Bush is re-elected. (If he gets re-elected it will no longer be possible for us to say ‘its alright, they just made a mistake’ then we have to accept that they want to be ruled be a religious extremist with the intelligence of doorknob, that they want to live under the thumb of a man who wants to limit choice and rule through the application of perpetual fear).

Why is the world’s future always in the hands of the least intelligent people?

Interesting fact: Only 13% of young Americans can find Iraq on a map. What’s more, only 38% can find Britain, their closest political ally, on a map. ‘War! The only way for American’s to learn Geography… sometimes’

Wednesday, August 18, 2004

Eric Schwartz's page

If you have the time to watch a very funny politically motivated music video go to Eric Schwartz’s page and download his song entitled ‘Keep Your Jesus Off My Penis’. I know the title isn’t brilliant, but the text is. Its ten megs, it’s a bit crude, but I’m very impressed! (and I don’t use exclamation marks often)

Warning, contains content that might be insulting to religious types who think the joke 'Jesus walks into a hotel, puts a couple of nails on the counter and asks the bartender if he can put him up for the night' is sacrilegious.

A reason to debate

Today Alvin and Huiling, two of the people that I shared an office with across the road from here (in my former contract), came by to invite us for lunch. The reason was to celebrate Alvin’s scholar ship. He had been attempting to get one for the entire three months that we were in an office together.

He said that we deserved lunch because in part we helped him get the scholarship. How did we (unbeknown to us) help him get a scholarship you ask? Read further and yea shall be enlightened. When Alvin managed to get himself to the last round of the scholarship award, getting up there through good marks and extra curricular activities, he was confronted with a number of other ‘contestants’ and then asked ‘what are your thoughts about the new Prime Minister of Singapore’.

We take a trip back in time to when we spent three months together in a office far far away from the rest of Human Resources to find that we spent hours upon hours debating the pros and cons of Singapore. Krist, Alvin, myself and (infrequently) Huiling would engage in ‘friendly’ debates about what did and what didn’t work in Singapore’s political landscape.

I would spew out my (by now well known) liberal dogma and they would react with proper Singaporean trained conservatism (though they could hardly agree on a thing themselves). The result was interesting round and round discussions, with (often) them against me, or (occasionally) one of them the victim of a joint front.

Jeseph Joubert said "It is better to debate a question without settling it than to settle a question without debating it." And in this case that was very true, because inevitably we would not come to any agreement, but the debate still led to something.

In this case it contributed to a jelling of ideas in Alvin’s mind that allowed him to realise the folly of the other’s arguments and clinch the debate as a ‘winner’ for himself.

Of course I’m undoubtedly claiming far too much credit, but sometimes its necessary to over exaggerate our own role in matters, especially if nobody else is willing to praise us into the heavens.

Three ‘hurrahs’ for Alvin and his Scholarship, that his extra cash in hand might contribute to a great number of my lunches.

Cloning

There’s a good piece on the cloning debate in the economist, though admittedly it is pro leaning in its orientation, despite its attempt to be objective. Nonetheless, it does seem to cover the bases found in the argument. Another plus point is, of course, that I agree with it (that’s always a strong indicator of how ‘good’ an article is). The fact that it’s an economist article can be taken as a good indicator that it is not absolute hogwash.

I’m also going to include an extract about what embryonic cloning actually entails, so that the I might help fight the common misconceptions about it, even if it is only for the handful of readers that grace this Blog.

“In November 2001, scientists from Advanced Cell Technologies (ACT), a biotechnology company in Massachusetts, announced that they had cloned the first human embryos for the purpose of advancing therapeutic research. To do this, they collected eggs from women's ovaries and then removed the genetic material from these eggs with a needle less than 2/10,000th of an inch wide. A skin cell was inserted inside the enucleated egg to serve as a new nucleus. The egg began to divide after it was stimulated with a chemical called ionomycin. The results were limited in success. Although this process was carried out with eight eggs, only three began dividing, and only one was able to divide into six cells before stopping.” –Cloning Fact Sheet

That’s a life? That’s what anti cloning people are so afraid to ‘kill’?

Creating Crime

So now there is an article in the Strait Times about entrapment. A truly frightening business, law in Singapore (both meaning intended). The police can go out, provoke you into doing crime and then throw you in jail for it. The example proposed in the article was of a man who had an ecstasy pill lying around for months, that he wasn’t taking and was then provoked into selling it for 140 dollars to an undercover cop (four times the market price, according to the article). The possession of the one ecstasy pill might just have resulted in him being fined (though a small amount of jail time might have been involved) while the minimum punishment for trafficking is five years and five cane strokes.

That is cop provoked crime and highly morally questionable. If the police officer wouldn’t have offered such a ridiculous price and let the man walk away (as he was doing) then the only crime would have been possession. Now granted, he should not have had drugs, as that’s against the law, but the police should not be permitted to create crime. Provoke, maybe, but create, no.

Fine line in terms of law enforcement, I admit. But a line that makes a whole lot of difference morally. Though it could be argued that if police could create crime then somebody else would be able to create crime as well, we will never know that. ‘Could be’ does not a good argument for law make (that’s just praying on our natural fears and prejudices). That was the entire point of the movie ‘Minority Report’ to draw on some ‘mass media philosophy’.

Let me try throwing it in another light. A man is hungry and dirt poor. He sees a baker put out a load of loafs, but manages to contain himself to only looking at them in desperate hunger. A man comes along, looking all business like and nice and, seeing the hungry man, says ‘don’t worry, its alright, just take some’ the hungry man hesitates, but gets prompted again. Then, when he does he gets arrested by the business looking man saying ‘actually its not alright and your going to jail, ha ha! Got you’

Probably not the best example, but my brain is only on half power at this time of the day. Yes, the hungry man did commit a crime, but only at the prompting of the businessman. The businessman, as a matter of fact, could be held partially responsible for the actions of the poor man, as he provoked them. Of course the Singapore police force has explicitly told the judges that they should not criticize or meddle in their affairs (who needs checks and balances? This is a democracy for god’s sake!) and they will do what ever they blood well please to catch the criminals, including creating them.

Interesting fact: Singapore has the highest number of executions per capita in the world. Beating Iran, Africa, North America, South America, etc. (that while large swaths of the world abhor capital punishment and believe nothing validates killing another person ‘in the name of justice’.)

Tuesday, August 17, 2004

A good point

Even though I really don’t like Bush and I want him to lose, so as to preserve the world for just a few more years, this article does have a good point to make. Somebody should indeed find out why idiots and deeply uninspiring men keep on getting nominated in the US. Maybe its because the two party system doesn’t work? (Better than the one party system, mind you, but that’s a given).
When there is only one true position of power (like the president) elected directly by the people then there is generally only really room for two parties. Yet the two party system in the US has shown to be too easy to corrupt. I think I’ll have to think more on this matter.

A reply to the essay 'An analysis of political apathy in Singapore using game theory'

Alright and now something in response to the essay An analysis of political apathy in Singapore using game theory.

Game theory can indeed by applied to political activism. Not just in Singapore, but everywhere. In fact, I might say, that the essay would benefit from a broadening of its horizons. Almost everywhere it is better for the individual to accept what the government says and does, without complaint. Political activism and obstructing the powers that by (in game theory by not ratting out your friend, outside of game theory by speaking out against the established order) always puts the individual at risk. This is a subconscious given to the average mind. It has to be, as otherwise societies would not function.

After all, if everybody would disagree continuously with the government in power, then nothing would get done. Only if the masses accept the ruling government’s decisions, whether they like them or not, can a society manage to keep itself moving in more or less the same direction.

The reason that I think the bigger picture should be viewed is because then the difference between Singapore and more open countries can be seen. In my view this difference is not necessarily Singaporean apathy (though that is certainly present), but the high cost of political dissent. I think Singaporean apathy is more of a symptom, then the actual cause of the lack of political freedom. In the normal prisoner’s dilemma the costs are as followed:

10-10 / 0-20
20-0 / 1,1

in the Singaporean model, it seems to me that the cost of dissenting are raised, while the cost of agreeing are lowered (after all, Singaporean government has created quite acceptable living conditions). So the matrix would look more like this:

4-4 / 0-30
30-0 / 0-0

Suddenly everything becomes a whole lot clearer (I believe). Yes, apathy might hurt (it limits innovation and freedom of speech) and everybody voicing their political dissent would be good (things would change), but voicing your dissent alone, or in small groups, is far and far more painful. (you get kicked out of the country, or thrown in jail).

Apathy would, quite naturally, result. The fear of prosecution for speaking out against the government outweighs the small chance of changing things. What’s more, the clear and obvious choice made by most to choose the agreeable route makes it even harder for political dissent to begin.

In other countries the matrix might tilt towards political dissent not being punished so extremely. Thus more people feel free to voice their opinions, as they are willing to take the (minor) consequences. In yet other countries not dissenting might just be too expensive (twice a hundred, for instance) as the government might be very corrupt or just plain incompetent, then the people will rise up, simply because the alternative is not acceptable.

So what can we draw out of that (very jumbled) text? If my model is correct then Singaporean apathy is not the cause, but just a symptom. It would be reversed by A) lowering the perceived costs of social dissent or B) raising the perceived costs of maintaining the status quo.

I think both are already taking place, A) because the government can’t control all the mediums (like the internet) and is slowly accepting more from its people and B) because the Singaporean ‘youth’ finds a lack of freedom more and more unacceptable, as they travel around more and become more educated.

I realise this essay was a bit of a mix up of thoughts and ideas, but I hope it gives you an idea of some of my earliest (unedited) thoughts, I’ll try to write more on the matter soon.

Morning madness

So they finally gave me a machine to play with at work. Two as a matter of fact, both DVD players. I have to admit, it isn’t half as much fun as I thought it would be. On hindsight, it’s hard to imagine why I would have thought it was fun. Simply because I get to play with the machines doesn’t mean I get to watch movies (I’m sitting in the middle of a giant hall with approximately a hundred other people around me in their cubicle work stations.) All I get to do is scroll through the limited menus available inside the machine and look at small snippets of bad DVDs.

I’m supposed to write the technical manual for this new model DVD that has just arrived. That means scrolling through the menus available and adjusting an old manual so that it represents this new machine. Of course they don’t give me a soft copy of the old menu, no that would be far to practical, instead I get a hard copy of the old manual and I’m supposed to write up a soft copy of the new manual.

In other words, large swaths of the old manual will have to be manually copied back into the PC. I imagine 30 to 40% of the manual wont change, so that will be straight out, drone like, retyping.

That’s ok though, because I can blind type at a pretty mean clip and it means that I can just sit here and type away at other things without anybody noticing (just make sure the right documents are proceeding at a good pace and hit ALT + TAB at the right moments).

I could not imagine doing this for years on end. Technical manuals are not the way for me. Oh well, at least I have a definite date ahead when its all over and I can switch to something else. The challenge will be to make sure I have something more exciting to switch to. Hopefully that will not be too difficult. Maybe they need some people to watch the grass grow at the old folks homes.

Oh well, it won’t be terribly useful for me to start worrying about it now, just keep working and keep improving my book. That reminds me, the back page of expat. Still haven’t done that and still haven’t figured out what I want to write about, that and the insider’s guide.

An opinion piece should be about one of my opinions, but I have so many! Which one do I choose?

Interesting fact: Carrots were originally white and purple (them being roots and all) they became orange when farmers in the Netherlands buggered around with them and got them to imitate the Dutch royal house’s colours. Its funny how we think so many things man made are ‘perfectly natural’.

Monday, August 16, 2004

Shocking news article

Look at this article I found.

“She lived in filth, so large she couldn't move from her sofa, even to use the bathroom.
Early Wednesday, still fused to the couch, Gayle Laverne Grinds died following a six-hour effort by rescue workers who struggled to lift the 480-pound woman and get her to a Martin County hospital.
Unable to separate the skin of the 39-year-old woman from her sofa, 12 Martin County Fire-Rescue workers slid both onto a trailer and hauled her behind a pickup to Martin Memorial Hospital South. She died a short time later.”

That’s not even the worst of it, it’s just a nice summary of general bits. If this story is true, well, then I don’t know what to say about the human condition. Its getting pretty bad.

Seriously, its not a very long article, read it.

Free game list

Alright, I know most of you don’t play computer games, but I’m still going to include a link that is considered by many one of the best lists of free games on the internet to date. Its always a good idea to ‘broaden’ your horizons.

I haven’t tried the list yet, so I don’t know if its any good, but other people seem to think so. In other words, I’m just jumping on the bandwagon here.

It was mark twain who said "Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect." So listen to that, children.

No, I have no idea what I’m talking about, why do you ask?

Wierd Weekend

So this last weekend was probably the weirdest in a while. Or rather, it was one that left me feeling pretty darned weird. Truth be told 12 hours of sleep might have something to do with that. (Initially the intention was only one hour, but then we didn’t wake up). I should know myself better by now, but I don’t. That’s not all that bad, however, as that at least leaves some mystery in life.

It all went to Sheet on Saturday morning, when I came downstairs to play my newly bought Doom 3 game (I would be a computer geek, but I don’t have enough time). I arrived downstairs to find my father in front of my computer screen. I asked him if he had managed to screw it all up for me and my dad said yes.

Now normally I expect a ‘no’ answer to the screw up answer. Especially from my father, seeing as his sense of humour doesn’t run that way. So I asked what was wrong and it turns out that he had decided that it would be a good idea to move around hard disk space from one partition to another, without backing anything up.

It was all ok though, as it was just a partition I hardly used and didn’t have anything of real importance on it. At this moment a cold dread was slowly crawling up my back (using my spinal column as a ladder) and I asked which partition. He then told me and I said ‘are you sure that isn’t the one with my unfinished book on it’ (admittedly this isn’t exactly how it went, but I’m using my dramatic licence).

So I went looking through the partitions that were still left, hoping that it was one of them, but my hopes soon sank. Finally I opened up a partition and in big letters it said ‘book’ I’m like ‘phew, its still here.’ To which he had to say ‘well, that’s the partition that I screwed up’. I’m not exactly sure what I did then, I might have schreeched, I might have sunk into a chair, I might have wailed and lamented to the gods, I might just have chased my father down with an axe. What I do remember is realising that 120 A4 pages of fictional prose (largely edited by myself) had been turned into 120 A4 pages of gibrish and meaningless symbols.

Not, mind you, that that would have made a noticable difference to most readers, but it made a hell of a difference to me. Liana did have some of the chapters, but they turned out to be early drafts and unedited. I imagine I lost approximately three of the six months of work that I did on that book. True, I admit that I hadn’t worked on it in a bit over six months, but the question of whether I would have started up again on it has now turned moot.

Then (it gets worse), in an attempt to fix the situation my dad launched a program called ‘fix it’ which could theoretically bring the entire file back. Unfortunately the chances of this were tiny and it occupied my computer for the rest of the weekend, so I couldn’t even dive into the virtual world of Doom 3 and kill hell creatures with big guns, so as to vent some of my frustrations. (This morning, when I left the house, the program was still busy, not having done anything noticeable, except for eat up 100% of the processor speed the entire weekend. The program actually maintained that it had successfully completed about 10% of ‘scanning the directory structure’ for this entire time).

So all of this left me naturally flustered and bothered (read extremely annoyed and irritable), which then contributed to me being in a very odd mood that left me arguing with Liana, talking continuously (worse than usual) and sleeping at 7:30 on a Sunday, drunk as a doorbell.

Interesting fact: In the early 20th century a patent clerk in Germany closed his patent office, saying that everything worth inventing had already been invented, so there was no longer any use for him to continue in the job of patent clerk. (I think this bloke was actually quite famous, but I can’t remember who it was, nor can I be bothered to look it up).

Interesting fact 2: This is my 100th entry

Saturday, August 14, 2004

Pack rat

Alright, this one was sent to me by Sofea and I thought it was certainly worth the effort of putting it up here. Click on this link to be amazed by what some people can get up to. (Shocking, but not disgusting. Though I would have to admit you could certainly put these pictures in the ‘disturbing’ category.)

Mixed nuts

Went out to drink last night. It’s been a while since I could drink properly. My stomach has been a bit of a bitch these last couple of weeks, wanting to throw everything back out again, especially alcohol. I think I figured out why, yesterday. It seems that it has something to do with these sour candies I eat at work sometimes to keep me going (that part of it works). I think I’ve been eating so many that my stomach has actually started rebelling against them.

Anyways, yesterday I hadn’t had any of that candy for a while so I was able to go on a bit of a bender with Liana and Hooker. Judging by how I feel this morning it’s probably better for me to continue eating these candies, just so that I can keep my drinking under control. It might be fun to stagger down the street, screaming incoherently, but it sure hurts the next morning.

Not too bad now, just one of those dull, low headaches that will go away in a few hours (or after a few beers), but when I tried waking up for the first time at nine I seriously considered if I would feel better after trying to put my head through a door. I decided against it, but only because experience had taught me that it didn’t. My entire body was screaming it would (especially, as you might guess, my head).

If you come by the Today paper today, pick it up and have a look at the front page article and a letter entitled something like ‘Singaporeans know the difference between good and bad’ or something like that. The first one shows that there is a movement within Singapore towards more political freedom (with 54% saying that it was important and 18% saying that it was a top priority), while the second letter is a scathing attack on the government for taking the two DJs off the air for rude comments.

I agree with the letter. Though it is up to the DJs to retain a certain amount of tact and decorum, it should be the job of the radio station and the public to criticise them for their behaviour, not the governments. When the government restricts what is said on the airwaves that is called censorship and censorship is possibly one of the worst things for a growing society.

Without the freedom to express and voice what people are thinking there will be little to no true intellectual growth, especially in the political field. Singaporeans will remain ‘children’ for as long as the government continues to treat them as such.

That is the problem with an unopposed one party system.

Interesting fact: If you shake a can of mixed nuts, the larger ones go to the top. (Double meaning intended)

Friday, August 13, 2004

Essay about Singaporean apathy

"Repression, Sir is a habit that grows. I am told it is like making love-it is always easier the second time! The first time there may be pangs of conscience, a sense of guilt. But once embarked on this course with constant repetition you get more and more brazen in the attack. All you have to do is to dissolve organizations and societies and banish and detain the key political workers in these societies. Then miraculously everything is tranquil on the surface. Then an intimidated press and the government-controlled radio together can regularly sing your praises, and slowly and steadily the people are made to forget the evil things that have already been done, or if these things are referred to again they're conveniently distorted and distorted with impunity, because there will be no opposition to contradict." (Lee Kuan Yew as an opposition PAP member during 1956 speaking to David Marshall)

From the essay An analysis of political apathy in Singapore using game theory as supplied by Jeff Lim

The essay itself is quite interesting with its ideas (though it has horrible grammar and its writer could do with a dictionary, as he misuses a number of words), but I do not have enough time to comment on it fully today. That’s probably a good thing, I think I’ll let it sit in my mind for a while, more on the topic of Singaporean apathy on a later date.

Superstition

Its Friday the 13th. That doesn’t mean terribly much to Asian people, but us white farts have a bit of a thing with the number thirteen. Comes back to us from olden times. It was when witches danced around naked, which was really dangerous, seeing as they were old, ugly and might just give you a heart attack.

So if you see any naked dancing witches, run. If they happen to be bitches, take pictures and send them to me (yes, that was lame).

We white farts actually have a lot of interesting superstitions. Probably all born from perfectly healthy normal everyday things. Like we don’t like to walk under ladders. That’s probably a good idea, as otherwise people might throw paint on you, or you might get crushed when the ladder slips away and the painter falls on top of you.

Then there is that superstition about black cats, which is also completely comprehensible, because we should hate everything that is black, that is the way god ordained it. (I’m not racist, I just happen to have an incredible dislike for all black people).

The one about spilling the salt is logical to. When you spill the salt you should pick some up and throw it over your left shoulder. The logic behind that is, of course, completely obvious. The person standing behind you probably bumped into your arm, making you spill the salt, therefore by throwing salt over your shoulder you’ll get them in the eyes. (Vengeance is served.)

The horseshoe over the door is, quite logically, for people that slam doors too hard (that will teach ‘em!) and not standing on cracks comes straight from Bangkok, where time and again we have been shown that anything cracked will probably break, if you stand on it. (there was a lot of commerce between medieval Europe and Bangkok, after all prostitution is the world’s second oldest profession).

Its funny how superstitions are different all over the world. You would think that the spirit world (and Satan and all that lot) would work the same way the world over, so you would expect the same superstitions would spring up. Silver bullets on werewolves and garlic on vampires doesn’t seem to work in Asia. Here you’re supposed to show your forehead and your tits to vampires (I’ve thought about dressing myself up as one, just to see if it works. Though the pretty chicks might be a little bit surprised if I come charging after them, slobbering and groping).

I guess if you could find superstitions that seem to be the same the world over, they might be the ones that actually work. (like wearing charms, charms is big in pretty much every superstition). I’ve also often wondered at the questions 'why do we no longer really see ghosts in Europe, but here in Asia people still talk about them all the time?' 'Do the European superstitions work better?' 'Or have we created some kind of ‘wall’ against the supernatural?' 'Or are Asians just more susceptible to mass hallucinations?'

Interesting fact: In years of bad harvests during the middle ages a black mold used to grow on grain in Europe. This mold causes severe hallucinations (not nice ones). A group of scientists decided to see if there was any correlation between this mold and the witch hunts. They found, interestingly enough, that peaks in witch burnings and accusations were almost inevitably years of bad harvest, when this mold would grow. Gives a new definition to the words ‘drug victim’ doesn’t it?

Linking things

I’ve decided that one of the ideas from one of my old blogs was a good one and that I should implement it here. The reason for that is that I still go to my old blog sometimes to use it. What is this idea I’m talking about? It’s not an all that original one, it’s just a ‘links’ section. Still, cool links should be kept, so in the next few days you’ll hopefully be seeing links to interesting places showing up on the right. If you have any links of your own to include, send them on over (as comments, chat posts or spitballs shot from other cubicles).

I’ll create such interesting categories as ‘humour’, ‘politics’, ‘enviroment’, ‘articles’ etc. Though I’ll probably create so many sub categories again that it will be hard for me to decide what will go where. That is, of course, is my problem. I think I’ll write a longer poster later today.

Thursday, August 12, 2004

Checking facts

I don’t see why any of you would be interested in this link, but I’m going to put it up here nonetheless. It’s a link to an American website that debunks the lies that the two political camps are hurling at each other. I find it interesting because it shows me how many lies go into day to day politics and why the American people are so confused about this upcoming election.

Its just incredible how much the Internet seems to have added to partisanship. If you want you can go online and find somebody that supports your position exactly, with worked out lies and all. That’s an interesting side effect of the ‘free flow of information’. I guess free flowing information isn’t all the useful if you don’t have an easy way to glide through it and get what you need (not want). Of course that’s becoming easier and easier nowadays and non-partisan groups are springing up to fill the words to information gap. Still, there is a long way to go.

There is also a desperate need for groups and organisations to scan the Internet and rate what they find. Not ban or censor, but rate. So that the average consumer would be able to say ‘ah, most of this stuff has been debunked’ or ‘hey, this site scores pretty high’. In that way people would have an easier time telling deceptive lies from revealing truth. What I wonder at is who’s got the resources to actually start something like that up and keep it going.

Fact check goes part of the way, but only monitors one specific element. Everything should be monitored and examined as best as possible through one or two entities, rather than thousands. Otherwise you would get exactly the same problem with the checking groups as we now have with the internet.

Of course then the check up people could end up becoming partisan, or tainted and then we would be back to square one.

The truth is damn hard to handle.

New York Uprising

So New York looks to be interesting at the end of this month. 250,000 protesters are to be expected at the Republican Party’s convention. Not totally unexpected, considering that NY is a bastion of the Democratic Party. It’s the first time in 150 years that the Republicans are holding their convention in NY.

The interesting thing is that most of the protestors that are convening on the city won’t be welcome. Mayer Bloomberg, a republican, has made it exceedingly hard for protestors to voice their discontent by refusing permits for marches, restricting where people can march, etc. 50 million dollars have been spent on preparing the police for the upcoming convention and nearly 18 million of that has been spent on new riot gear. The police seems to be preparing for a war.

So are the demonstrators. Sites like ““RNC Not Welcome in New York” have formed to try and disrupt the convention as much as possible, others are talking about civil disobedience and even violent resistance. It almost sounds like preparation for a war.

It also sounds like the brilliant manipulations of the Republican Party. By causing the democrats in New York to rise up against the President in violent protest they might just be able to paint him off as a moderate Middle American man, who should be supported against this type of violence.

It seems that the reaction of the ‘ordinary American’ will largely depend on the brutality practiced by the police. If the police are caught brutally putting down the normal population the people might turn against Bush. If, on the other hand, the protestors are too violent and go too far then the people will turn against them instead.

A razor’s edge.

They will start on the 31st of August; at 11 am Eastern Time (New York) and they are calling on the rest of the world to join in. I don’t know whether we can actually do anything, but even a token gesture would help. Can we do something? Is there some way that we can stop them out here? I know its rather hard for people to assemble in Singapore in anyway, but has anybody started anything?

If the protestors in New York look to have world support then it’s just that little bit more likely that they will be seen in a good light. Which brings us just a step closer to being liberated of the unilateral peace destroying policies of Bush and his administration. 11 am over there would be evening over here, 11 pm to be exact. How can we scream ‘no!’?

Interesting fact: The New York police department has 36,000 officers and is therefore larger than most country’s armies.

Wednesday, August 11, 2004

The French American thing

Look, some Americans do understand!

Courtesy of Hamncheez

Japanese Script

Alright, so lets mumble about something incoherent. Shazam recently gave me an assignment, where he wanted me to write a script for a possible short story that he is keen on doing. He gave me three pages of incomplete sentences and concepts, including the introduction to the Japanese constitution, which is quite a decent read.

I asked him ‘that’s it?’ and he said ‘yes’ and I said ‘that’s not much’ and he said ‘well, that’s what I’m hiring you for, isn’t it?’

So there we go.

I’ve started in on putting together some ideas and concepts (though I have admittedly not put a pen on paper) even though I haven’t even quoted him a price. Truth be told, I don’t know what price to quote. The basic problem is that I’m looking at a script of thirty pages, but I don’t know how much work will go into that. It seems a bit strange to quote a per word basis, so I’m left a bit perplexed as to what I should do.

How much do scriptwriters get paid for a short story script? Nothing, normally, I imagine. Normally people write short story scripts so as to get people to think they are worthy of being paid for long story scripts.

I’m anticipating that this would be about a month’s steady work, so should I ask for a month’s pay? I truly have no real idea. I guess I’ll have to do some research in that department.

I’ll also have to do some research on Japan. True, the mangaesque (a new word) feeling that he wants to the piece is familiar to me, but I don’t speak a word of Japanese. Do I even want to use Japanese? Where will I find somebody who speaks good English, good Japanese and has a flare for movie scripts (without paying buckets of money)? How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck would chuck wood? When does he want the script anyway? What is the underlying message he wants conveyed?

I don’t know, but I imagine in the next couple of months I’ll find out.

Some presidential race updates

Sorry to have to bring this subject up again, but lets talk about the American elections. Or rather, I talk in a monotone and you fall asleep at your desks, in far away places, as I waste precious minutes of your break you should have used to go to the bathroom, (or you stop reading and actually go to the bathroom).

Been reading up a bit on the election again, in the hope of finding some valuable nugget of information that will put my heart at ease and tell me ‘phew, the destroyer of worlds is gone’. Didn’t find it yet, though truth be told the news does seem to be relatively positive.

Just list out what the news is talking about in recent days, so that you have an idea what I’m talking about. Turns out that the economy might turn out to be a more important question in the upcoming elections then expect. This is easy to explain, the economy isn’t doing quite as well as expected. Approximately 250k new jobs were expected and only approximately 50k were created. That’s a shortfall of 200 thousand that has torn interests away from the war on terrorism and focused them very specifically back on the economy.

An economy that is doing badly, even while the rest of the world seems to be on a stronger road to recovery (except for Europe, Europe is doing shit at 1% growth). Here in Singapore we’re experiencing a projected 9% economic growth, according to the morning paper. That while Singapore’s main export market, the US, is floundering.

Then there is that entire thing about the Palme affair nippin’ at Bush’s heels. For those unaware of that, a man critical of the WMD claim made by Bush before the war in Iraq had his wife’s CIA status revealed by people in the White House. He saw this as retaliation for his anti administration stance and several judges agreed and said that if this was proven true somebody would have to go to jail for ten years.

So an investigation was started and now one journalist is threatened with jail time and another has agreed to admit who told him about the Palme’s wife being a CIA agent. So we’ll probably soon know who spilled the beans. Who ever that be, its going to look bad for Bush as the gossip mongers were a part of his administration.

Then there is that bit about the terror alert being announced in a number of cities just after the democratic convention, based on newly obtained data that was all close to three years old (I talked about that before). A lot of people are suggesting (or loudly claiming) that the only reason the administration did that was to draw attention away from the democratic convention (something I’m inclined to agree with). This seems to have backfired drastically. Not surprising, really, seeing as more and more people no longer trust Bush’s honesty and would expect him to fudge around with anything to gain in the polls.

So there is hope, though one commentator said it well, when he said that Bush still has a lot of cards up his sleeve, we just have to hope somebody catches him when he starts using them. After all, cheating will get him into even more hot water.

Oh yeah, after the debacle in the 2000 elections the US state department has approached a foreign body to monitor the US elections. That would be the first time in US history. I guess they've realised that even in America people are willing to undermine democracy, in order to win (the shock, the horror).

Interesting fact: The Dutch are, on average, the tallest people in the world (at about 183cm, thats about 10cm taller then the British).

Tuesday, August 10, 2004

What if they are wrong?

Been sitting here, editing through some technical manual, getting bored till my eyes tear and trying to entertain myself with news and internet gossip. Found a decent (though not great) article on global change, one of my ‘favorite’ topics and found some ultra conservative websites by chance as well. Then I got to wondering about how people can deny Global Warming and the dangers of the changing climate. How, though there is less and less people who dare dispute that it isn’t happening, there still are more than enough to slow the fight against Global Warming down to a crawl.

I thought to myself ‘what if they are wrong’. I mean I know I think they are wrong, but what I’m thinking about was how to convince these people into fighting the global warming threat. The best argument I could come up with was ‘can you afford being wrong’. Quite simple, really. There is a lot of people in this world who say Global Warming is a reality and posses very real and present dangers. Then there is those that oppose global warming and call it hog wash. This second group should really consider whether it is worth being wrong.

I used to think that conservatives were the ‘better safe than sorry’ group, but their opinion on global warming seems to show this belief as false. Yes, if the Global Warming does turn out to be hog wash then we will have ‘wasted’ trillions of dollars on cleaning up our factories, cars, garbage dumps, fossil fuel consumption and consumer oriented society. In other words, basically improving our standard of living. If, on the other hand, we don’t spend the money and we do have Global Warming going on, then what happens?

Millions upon millions displaced (and forced to migrate into already overpopulated regions) our most productive food production regions turned to so much dust, nine out of ten of our biggest cities rendered uninhabitable (with the resulting economic damage) unpredictable weather patterns that will make farming (and food) far more expensive then it is now. Famine, war over more limited resources (including water), religious zeal as living conditions decline, etc.

How can they afford to be wrong? Is there no doubt in their hearts that they might be and have they realised the consequences if they are? Is money really so important that the biggest polluters can’t bring themselves to start cleaning up their act, despite the extra costs? What will individual wealth be worth when society lies is shambles?

Why can’t governments accept the threat of Global Warming, termed as a more serious threat to world civilizations then terrorism recently? What’s in it for the big money people? Do they have a secret escape route meaning they don’t have to live on this planet anymore in case it does get screwed up?

Is it really worth the risk?

Interesting fact: the amount carbon dioxide in the atmosphere right now has not been seen for over 500,000 years. That, by the way, was the time when the polar icecaps didn’t exist.

Monday, August 09, 2004

Now I’ve got an interesting link without doing anything for it, sweet. Some Frenchy hit my site via a site that calls itself Technorati: Searching the world wide web looking for the search phrase www.rummagine.org and found a link to me, Patricea, who mentioned it, and Jeff! Lim who put the address in his links. Apparently, aside from us, nobody of ‘worth’ was really pointed out as mentioning it, so that’s all cool.

Anyways, so this Technorati thing is a search engine that directly searches blogs for what your looking for, so you can look up your own addy, for instance, and find out where its mentioned (kewl!). So I look up myself and I found out that I’m mentioned on a grand total of six blogs. One Liana, one Patricea and the rest all Liana’s family. Wow, I’m really making ripples in the blogging world, aren’t I?

Anyway, you should all try it out (just to give these people more hits, for one thing, cause it’s a neat idea) and post it up on your own blogs (and mention me, so that I get more attention!). This way we’ll have an easier time of finding each other and finding out who finds us more interesting, what ever that’s worth.

One more interesting fact: When praying mantises copulate, the female rips off the male’s head, as otherwise he can’t cum. I guess some men are willing to sacrifice everything for a lay, huh?

Support Tyranny Day

Ah, the enjoyment of an extra free day. Its great sitting around not wearing underwear or pants when you would normally be at work, don’t you agree? Naked butt cheeks to the air, winds ruffling your ass hair, as you stink up the air and make everybody flee the premises. Brilliant! Shame they don’t let you sit around in the company without any pants on. I mean, after all your pants only hold in part of the stink and a good pair of pants are more expensive then a new chair. Alright, I’ll admit that sitting in a brown stained chair does take away from you comfort level slightly, but then so does sitting around with dirty underwear on, or with shit dribbling down your leg and into your shoe.

I hope that conjured a wonderful mental image for all of you. Something that will stick with you throughout the day as you try to enjoy that extra bit of freedom granted to you by this one party democracy. As we sit around here and celebrate the 39th birthday of the Singaporean city-state I’m reminded of two years ago, when prime Minster Goh raised a bottle of NeWater together and basically asked the Singaporean populace to drink shit with him.

Of course that wasn’t much of a problem, seeing as the government often asks the Singaporean populace to take shit from them, so at least this time the Prime Minister was doing it with them, right? ‘Hell, we have to live with government jokes like speaker’s corner, democracy and racial equality, at least this time nobody’s quite sure who the joke is on.’

A Singaporean guy asked me whether it was true that the National day parade was a bit sedated in comparison to other people’s parties. I mumbled something along the lines of ‘well in most countries the government doesn’t actually have to give the people their flags to wave’. I thought of a much better example a couple of days later, though. The best way to measure how good a national party is, is by looking at how many people come from other countries to be there for it.

Mardi Grass draws millions upon millions of people. Queen’s day in Holland draws a good half million at least (probably more). Songkran in Thailand means all the hotels booked while national day in Singapore draws on last count, well, two (and they barely count, as they were deaf, blind, dumb and American). In fact National day sees a major outflux of people into Malaysia ‘Yeah! Our countries another year older! Let’s go to another country, that doesn’t really like ours, to celebrate.’
Nuts.

Interesting fact: We each use about 12,000 gallons of water every year 1/3 of all water is used to flush the toilet (a possible new use for NeWater?)

Saturday, August 07, 2004

Back to normal (kind of)

Spent today moving stuff about. Moved Liana’s stuff from her old room to her new doll’s house. My doll’s house to, I might point out. The place is already starting to look pretty good, though no internet connection, no computer, no aircon and no Television connection. We do have a working DVD player and a TV though, so its not all bad. Might just resort back to pen and paper, if I have to.

Getting more excited about moving there, now. It was just nice seeing things take shape. Still a lot to do, don’t get me wrong, but it might be nice doing it (ah! Me looking forward to work? That’s terrible! Don’t any of you dare tell my old friends!).

We need a couch. A house isn’t complete without a couch. Without a couch it isn’t a house, it’s a place to sleep. You need a couch to lie on, to sleep on and to watch TV on. Watching TV from a chair (however comfortable) just isn’t the same. For one thing you can’t really fit several people into a chair unless you like each other a hell of a lot. Even then it would be tough for everybody to watch TV (and I bet you that if you get that close together and like each other that much TV isn’t really the thing on your mind.)

Much cooler, on the other hand, is the fact that Expat has asked if I want to write their opinion column at the end of the magazine. The one where I just blab about my own views, ideas and opinions and then they publish it.

Of course its at the back of the magazine, where it can do the least harm, but I will be taking that over from a renown comic writer who’s name I forget (that’s why he’s only renown and not famous). So then people will not only be exposed to my opinions on the internet, but even in printed magazines that they pay for (sometimes).

I wonder if I’m even supposed to be writing about that up here. I imagine it cant do too much harm (except to my ego, when they tell me I suck and that they aren’t going to publish my stuff and I have to come back here and tell you all about it).

Loobz wrote up a comment saying I’m trying [too] hard. He’s probably right. I rather enjoy musing texts like this where I just bullox about and talk about my own life. Or rather, the thoughts about my own life. Talking about my own life isn’t all that exciting, after all I’m already living it, but talking about what I think about that (a bit convoluted, but still a valid sentence) is pretty nifty.

Its also what writers workshops advise. ‘Write every day and be specific’. I’m about just as good at being specific as I am at shutting up (even when they yell it at me). For some odd reason I seem to think other people seem to think that what I have to say is interesting (yes, the same words used twice in the same sentence, yet they mean something different both times (shut up!)).

At least this post was wonderfully pointless again. I think it has a lot to do with how I’m feeling. Feeling very relaxed and happy today. Not like how I feel when I’m at work.

Interesting fact: The Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland was a symbolic character for the hat makers in towns in the late 19th century. The large felt hats of the day had supports made out of lead. The lead caused an organic form of psychosis (brain damage) to develop in the hat makers, causing them to be declared crazy.

In Other Words