Thursday Mumble

T'is been a while, hasn't it? Long week, longer weekend... so much to do. I've hardly had much time to myself to figure out social issues to comment on here any more. But anyway, here I am once more, and let's see what I have in store?

So by a series of unhappy coincidences, it turns out that there is a non-trivial number of people that I know who are leaving their respective PhD programmes. It's kind of a sad thing to see them go, partly because of the comradeship I had with them as fellow PhD students, partly because they all have that world-weary look about them when they conveyed their final decision to leave the programme. It's quite sad actually, to see people leaving with that ``I'm really sick of this shit'' look about them; sometimes it makes me second guess myself about the choices that I have made in life thus far. But really, at the end of the day, everyone has their own goals in life, and just because some folks have decided that the PhD programme isn't for them doesn't mean that it isn't for me---that kind of thinking is the recipe of disaster. I'm pretty sure that there is a psychological term relating to that line of thought, but I can't seem to recall it for the moment.

This semester has been progressing like a really bad roller coaster ride. Taking courses has never been much of a problem for me, but if we compound that with the need to actually be cognitively attuned to do research, I realised that my ways of maxing out abilities for the classes just don't work that well. There's a difference between doing what is necessary to pass a class and actually having to do deep thought---the first one can be done mostly in a semi-conscious way only because the material is well-structured, which facilitates good absorption, but the second one can only be done in a fully conscious manner. Maintaining higher order thinking abilities is of paramount importance just to survive the PhD programme's research component, and to do that, I cannot be stressed out nor can I be running on little sleep. Talk about a picky situation. But enough of the depressing stuff.

Recently I relented and finally forked out some money to get an iPod Classic (160GiB). No, I have not changed my stance of disliking iTunes immensely due to the way it bowdlerises the music to fit into the ``grand'' architecture of things and how it tries to take over your computer, but I must agree that the build quality of an Apple product is pretty good, though a tad pricey. So why the plonking down of hard cash for this device then? One word: Rockbox. I've been eyeing the Rockbox project for quite a while already, and have planned to get one of 'em hard drive based iPods due to their large capacity. So when the latest release of Rockbox showed better than dismal support for the iPod Classic, I knew it was time to get one, and so I did. I'm really enjoying the much better quality of the music, since I no longer have to downsample anything just to fit them into a smaller capacity device. I might devote a post specially on how to Rockbox the iPod classic a little in the future when I have more time.

Till next time.

8 days have passed?!

Wow. One blink of an eye, and... another week has passed. I'm not really sure if this is a good thing or bad, but damn time passes quickly.

Anyway, some quick ``bullets'' because I'm too lazy to write a full post today:

• I've experimentally confirmed that I definitely need 7 hours of sleep at the very least to maintain cognitive abilities beyond mere ``programming''.
• I can actually run fast---I just need to push myself more.
• There are several things that I need to adjust ``in my head'' before I can truly shine; I just hope it doesn't take too long to get these adjustments in.
• In spite of trying to be a hermit, it turns out that I'm much more susceptible to company than I dare to admit.
• Peanuts are awesome snack food.

And that's all I have for now. Sorry for the cop-out.

Till next time.

又是一篇无聊的文章

你好。不，我不打算完全用中文来编写这些博客文章。说来也有点奇怪，最近总觉得中文比英文更有亲切感，仿佛是多年不见的老朋友似的。想当年因为某某中文老师的因素而对此语言残生恐惧，我觉得有点遗憾。可能是我开始老了，有点儿成熟了，所以会对母语残生新一轮的兴趣。

当然，我人在美国，能用中文的机会也不多。即使周围的中国籍学生都很多，我其实不大爱在公共场合里里用中文来沟通。我不知道这是否是自己害怕被歧视的反应，或者是别的因素而导致的。其实我也不管这么多，多学个语言往往是个好事。

可能有些中国籍同学无意中发现我这微薄的博客，看了这几篇文章，会因为我的用词不当与简单的表达方式而笑破大牙。对这些读者，我只能说请见谅小弟我超烂的中文水准。

罗嗦了老半天，该会去干活儿了。后会有期。

Every Breath You Take

Ah, something a little different.

Every Breath You Take------The Police

Every breath you take
Every move you make
Every bond you break
Every step you take
I'll be watching you

Every single day
Every word you say
Every game you play
Every night you stay
I'll be watching you

O can't you see
You belong to me
How my poor heart aches with every step you take

Every move you make
Every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
I'll be watching you

Since you've gone I been lost without a trace
I dream at night I can only see your face
I look around but it's you I can't replace
I feel so cold and I long for your embrace
I keep crying baby, baby please

Every move you make
Every vow you break
Every smile you fake
Every claim you stake
I'll be watching you

Lyrics courtesy AZLyrics.com.

Funereal #3

Ahem.

In a dark corner of the room, I lay there in a cheap plywood coffin that some kind soul finally decided to donate. It was a strange place to be, the hidden corner of the crematorium where the destitute dead were temporarily kept before being cremated during the off-hours of the crematorium by the State in one last act of kindness to its citizens. But I suppose it cannot be helped, considering everything. While I was still alive, it was always an uphill battle trying to be what I was to be. But that incident not too long ago, it just took away all that I had. My name, my reputation, my money, my family, my life. But it is all moot now; I am already dead, and just waiting to be finally returned, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

嘿

嘿。最近心情总是不太好，感觉上好像少了些什么。或许是压力，也可能是天气，或者是二月的关系，每天醒来的我总是有点无精打采。有时我怀疑自己可能患上了忧郁症之类的怪病，但由于自尊关系的缘故，我不敢找个专家来诊断是否真的患上了什么怪心理病。

研究工作其实是蛮好玩的，不过不知道是自己太顽固或愚蠢，每当开会时都会觉得自己好像做得不够似的。当然开会的结果谁也能够想象的出来。可能是因为工作了太久了，被赚钱的诱惑给迷上了，头脑也变得笨拙了，也就因此导致这样的结局。

嘿。

再难也得熬下去。路是我选的，再难走也得走下去。若是失败，至少能给自己一个交代。但失败从来不在我的想象范围之内：这经历只能成功，不许失败。

读者，若您是信仰什么宗教的话，请为我祈祷，让我风风光光的走出一个春天来。

Oh?

You know how people keep telling you that life is meaningful and that you should always cherish it as much as you can and all that feel-good stuff?

Sometimes it is really hard to remember that. Really, it is hard.

I have a confession to make.

Gurer'f n ernfba jul V'z nyjnlf fb qrcerffrq, fb fpnerq, fb svyyrq jvgu nakvrgl. Ab, vg'f abg orpnhfr V'z vapbzcrgrag. V uvtuyl qbhog gung V nz gung hfryrff jura vg pbzrf gb erfrnepu, ohg ernyyl, gurer ner whfg fb znal... fvtaf gung znxr zr srry qrcerffrq. Vs lbh'q xabj zr, lbh'yy haqrefgnaq gung V nz n zvk bs gjb znva glcrf bs raretl, obgu vagebirefvba naq rkgenirefvba (ZOGV zrnavatf orvat hfrq urer). Bs gur gjb, V unir n fyvtugyl zber graqrapl gbjneqf rkgenirefvba, fb V yvxr pbzcnal, ohg abg gb gur cbvag gung gurer'f n uhtr pebjq---V pnaabg gnxr gung bar ng nyy.

Naljnl, onpx gb zl nakvrgvrf. V xrrc frrvat znal guvatf nf fvtaf---bar ol bar gur crbcyr gung V xabj ner tvivat zr gung ``lrnu qbvat tenq fpubby vf whfg gbb zhpu sbe zr; V pna'g gnxr gnxvat lrg nabgure pynff'' be gung gurl ner univat gebhoyrf qrnyvat jvgu gurve fhcreivfbef naq gur yvxr; vg trgf gb zr. Vg ernyyl qbrf trg gb zr. V xabj gung jung unccraf gb bguref unir abguvat gb qb jvgu zr, ohg vg vf uneq gb funxr bss gung qvfpbzsbeg. Ernyyl. Naq gung'f bar bs gur ernfbaf jul V xrrc srryvat engure qrcerffrq naq nakvbhf.

Vg'f dhvgr onq npghnyyl, abg greev-onq, ohg fgvyy onq abarguryrff. Abjnqnlf, ncneg sebz fyrrcvat, rngvat (naq bayl orpnhfr V'z whfg gbb uhatel), tbvat gb pynffrf, ehaavat/genvavat va whwvgfh, nyzbfg nyy gur erznvavat gvzr vf fcrag ba erfrnepu. Naq vg sehfgengrf naq fpnerf zr rnpu gvzr V jnyx vagb bar bs gur guerr zrrgvatf rnpu jrrx srryvat nf gubhtu V unq qbar nofbyhgryl abguvat jura gur erirefr vf gehr. V ab ybatre fbpvnyvfr (abg gung V qvq zhpu gb ortva jvgu), naq gur byq ``jbnu V fubhyq trg n tveysevraq be V'yy or sberire nybar'' abafrafr gung cynthrq zr zbfg bs zl haqretenq lrnef unf fcnerq zr pbzcyrgryl abj. Fher, gurer ner n srj avpr tveyf jubz V'q yvxr gb unat bhg zber bsgra, ohg gurl vagrerfg zr bayl gung gurl ner avpr tveyf gung V'q yvxr gb unat bhg jvgu---gur vqrn bs qngvat arire ernyyl pebffrq zl zvaq.

Gnyx nobhg n pbzcyrgryl fperjrq hc yvsr.

V qba'g trg gb cynl zl syhgr gung zhpu gurfr qnlf. Gur svatref ner fgnegvat gb or n yvggyr fgvss, ohg gunaxshyyl V unir gb glcr fb zhpu naljnl gung gurl qba'g ernyyl ybfr gurve qrkgrevgl. Gur rzobhpuer vf fgvyy ubyqvat, ohg nyernql V srry sng-yvccrq. Lrg V fgvyy fbyqvre ba. V yvxr jung V'z qbvat, V whfg arrq gb xabj ubj gb qb vg orggre, be ng yrnfg, pbzzhavpngr vg orggre. Xabjyrqtr gung vf va gur urnq vf hfryrff nf n fpvragvfg orpnhfr ab bar pna inyvqngr jung lbh ner guvaxvat.

V'ir nfxrq zlfrys guvf dhrfgvba znal gvzrf. Jul vf vg V qrpvqrq gb trg vagb guvf cebtenzzr? Jul vf vg V nyjnlf jnyx vagb n jrrxyl zrrgvat gb trg zl nff xvpxrq, bayl gb cvpx zlfrys hc fbzrubj naq gel ntnva sbe lrg nabgure nff xvpxvat gur arkg jrrx? Jul? Jul obgure ng nyy? Lrf, vg trgf nyy qrcerffvat gurer.

Ng svefg V gubhtug nobhg vg va gur frafr bs zr abg jnagvat gb qb gur zhaqnar. Gung fgvyy znxrf frafr, ernyyl, ohg vg vf abg rabhtu. Gura V ernyvfrq nf V ernq naq gevrq gb frr gur cnggreaf naq gur geraqf gung V npghnyyl yvxrq qbvat guvf. V whfg qvqa'g xabj gur cebcre fxvyyf gb fubj jung V unir orra qbvat nyy jrrx orpnhfr jryy, V onfvpnyyl xvyyrq zlfrys va grezf bs gvzr ol orvat fb jbeevrq naq sbphfrq nobhg fubjvat fbzr qrygn-punatr npebff gur guerr qvssrerag zrrgvatf npebff gur jrrx gung V xrcg chggvat hc unys-nffrq fghss ng rnpu zrrgvat. Gnyx nobhg fghcvqvgl. Gung onfvpnyyl zrnag V unq bayl sbhe qnlf gb guvax nobhg guvatf orsber V senagvpnyyl chg hc unys-nffrq svefg-qensg fyvqrf gung V qvqa'g znantr gb ybbx guebhtu naq nygre nppbeqvatyl, guhf yrnqvat gb gur nff-xvpxvat. Guvf jnf gehr sbe gur jubyr gvzr gung V nz abj jbexvat njnl sebz rirelbar.

That's quite a lot for one confession, but hey, I'm not counting. I guess I feel a little better for putting this out here to the few people who actually still drop by to read what I have to say, not counting those from that weird spam site (yes you, I know who you are), and those folks who came by from searching for ``hanging stick figure'' on image search (you guys are sick).

Anyway, till next time I suppose.

February Fantasy

Hello February, you have arrived rather quickly this year. I wonder why.

Will you treat me fine? Will you treat me well? Will you be kind enough to let me survive and succeed?

Or will you let me down?

33 Day Look-back

I know that this entry is definitely too late compared to the usual time that I put this up, but bear with me. This time period has been quite difficult. The year that just past me was one that was fraught with many difficult decisions that needed to be made, and really, I am still in many ways trying to get to come to grips with all that I have to deal with.

But as always, I think that I have diverged greatly from the intention of this post. This was supposed to be a celebration, not a rant, and so here it is.

Just a couple of days ago was yet another birthday anniversary of mine. It was a decent day where I allowed myself to take a little break for once and just do things that I liked doing as a way of pampering myself. I mean, I'm not really that big a fan of drawing a huge bunch of attention towards myself on a day like that, but really, sometimes it was just a nice thing to treat oneself to some of the simpler pleasures in life. I played a little flute in the morning, messing about with some Chinese New Year-themed pieces all from memory before settling down with a nice Korean-styled spicy instant noodles. John grabbed me for some light geocaching in the early afternoon before we joined up with 3 of my other good friends over here in UIUC for a special dinner over at Mandarin Wok.

The funny thing about it all is that my birthday happened to co-occur with the Chinese New Year's eve celebration, and thus it was, in many ways, a dual celebration of sorts. Unlike the time when I was back in CMU, I'm not really that close to the local chapter of the Singapore Students' Association, which meant that if they had some kind of reunion dinner event, I wasn't really in the know for it. Taking matters into my own hands of course, I just organised a strange one for myself.

I think that overall, it was a nicely organised dinner, even though I wasn't really the kind of guy who hosted events like this on any extended manner. We splurged a little, ordering nice foods like braised sea cucumber and even fresh steamed sea bass, a rarity for this part of the world considering that we are really fairly landlocked here in Champaign-Urbana.

So, what are my thoughts about having reached yet another milestone in life? Not much, really. I'll be happy to just obtain my license to research and move on to doing great things with it, and at the same time, attempt to live and love life while it still lasts. Funny how I don't really have that much expectation now; I wonder if I'm just getting a little too old that my cynicism was starting to get in the way.

YT actually sent me an early birthday gift some time back, thinly hidden with the excuse of using my size estimate for a ``friend who was roughly the same size''. It was a T-shirt from Cafepress with an 8-bit compass and the cute epithet of ``old school GPS''. That was pretty awesome.

RX had gotten me Batman: Arkham's Asylum over Steam for my birthday. In the first incarnation of this post, I've almost forgotten to write about it here! Arkham's Asylum is a fun game, and I managed to put a couple of hours into it, but well, time is starting to go a little crazy here, so the next playthrough will be a while.

As for my traditional gift to myself, I got myself a nice nyan cat perler. Why a nyan cat perler of all things? Mostly because it is cute and lively looking. I put up the perler on the wall directly in front of me at home, and it serves as a nice colourful motivation to help me relax a little, acting in many ways like the role that the soy bean plushie that my other sister gave me on my previous birthday.

All in all, the celebrations were of a more tight and simple setting, just the way that I like it. Never was really a fan of elaborate procedures and stuff, so the get-together and the gifts of YT and myself were a good enough conclusion to the one day in this year that I can really and honestly take a day off just because I can.

Fading into the Darkness

I think... that time has never been on my side. I have known this for a while now, but I think I have been living in denial for a little too long. Running, hiding, trying to escape the inevitable.

The time to confront it is now.

The time for change... is now.

It's time to discard that fake-happy side of me and sink back to that morose persona that had served me pretty well for quite a long time, until that weird day that I decided that I was better off being happy.

If ignorance truly is bliss, then let me be as melancholic as possible so that I remain un-ignorant. It is when we realise that we don't know anything, have a looming deadline to get things done, and the realisation that life will never ever be the same again that we step out of that safe zone and get things done.

In view of what I just said, it means that my overall web presence is going to shrink significantly. No, I'm not suicidal, I'm not going crazy [yet]. I think that I have to forgo what is effectively a normal life to succeed at this---there is no other way.

Wish me luck and skill, and hopefully I will prevail.

To the few who still care about me, keep in touch with email. That ancient technology works wonders since it allows a batch processing and doesn't demand any instantaneous response, qualities that I think are most apt at this point. Hell, even leaving a comment or two on my blog entries will work too, since their existence is made known to me via email anyway.

Alright, enough of drivel. Time to hit the grindstone. Hard.

No pain, no gain.

Pre-sleep Rambles

Alright, now that I am feeling sufficiently light-headed from reaching that partially awake/asleep state, it is time for another round of automatic writing where I end up ranting whatever that comes to mind without actually trying to preprocess of censor it [much].

It has been a strange fortnight. Even though there are no classes, there's always research to be done, where I spent my time reading up papers, trying to think, writing down my thoughts on the papers, writing down thoughts on what I have seen, wondering about the problem we are solving, wondering about its relevance, wondering about how I can get some tangible results as opposed to a lot of theoretical idea slinging, wondering if I have been working too hard but not smart enough, wondering about my own abilities as a research apprentice. So many ponderings, it is no wonder that I end up in this semi-zombified state where I just sleep late, wake up early, and am generally having a helluva screwed up sleep schedule, among other things.

Geocaching has been fun, cathartic in fact, more so since there hasn't been any jujitsu training for a while due to the horrible hours of the gyms that we go to to train in, and partly because, well, this being the US, the time period from Dec 23 to Jan 02 are traditionally time periods where people would go for their extended holidays or something. Geocaching allows me to get some of the rather limited sunlight, and of course, makes me use all those muscles, from my core down to the calf muscles from all the hiking and climbing that inevitably comes with these.

It's kinda odd to realise that in another two weeks, the next semester would have begun, and the entire rat race cycle will begin all over again. I am uncertain if... well I zoned out there and lost the train of thought. This probably shoes how sleep-deprived I am feeling heheh.

Alright, enough of the autowriting---it's starting to make less sense now that my cognition of the events are clearly starting to be dissociate from the general sleepiness I am experiencing.

Quick Summary

So, a quick summary of what I had written in 2011:

1. 70 poems posted here
2. 79 essays/rants posted here
3. 6 prose/stories posted here
4. 1 NaNoWriMo winning entry available here

And thus the grand total here is 156 articles, down from the 214 articles in 2010.

That's an average of 0.43 pieces of writing a day, compared to 0.59 last year. Again, we see a general downward trend in the amount of leisurely writing I do, partly because I have been writing so much daily for my work/studies. Every day I write anything from 400 to 1000 words about the research work that I am doing, and really, at the end of it all, I just don't feel the need nor energy to write even more things.

Compared to last year, I have almost no emotional roller coasters. Things that had happened in the past stay in the past without any further ramifications, and I have been so work-oriented that I have almost no time to mull about all those odd and interesting relationship issues.

I don't interact with a whole bunch of people any more; mostly interacting with the few who are actively involved in geocaching, aikido/jujitsu, and more recently, the NaNoWriMo crowd in Champaign-Urbana. 2011 is a bumper crop year for Geocaching for me, having gotten a grand total of 300 finds by the last day of 2011, which is quite cool, considering that I had never thought of going for more than a couple of caches every few months. I suppose one of the best things that I had done was to introduce YT to geocaching, and to get involved with a small local group of new-ish geocachers. So many adventures all over Singapore, and in the last few months, all over the cities of Champaign-Urbana, Normal-Bloomington and Peoria. I think geocaching is more therapeutic on my psyche than anything else that I had done, partly because it required me to go out there and take a walk/hike through interesting terrain.

2011 was also a rather tumultous time for me, when my general jadedness was starting to feature a little too strongly, almost completely masking what was essentially the me I fondly remembered before all the cynicism got to me back in 2009 and reduced me to a husk of ``dumb adult-hood''. I have been too disillusioned for a little too long that I have started to lose heart. Well, like all things in life, it will change, and in this case, the change is now. Hopefully this change from ``dumb adult-hood'' back to ``inventor fun!'' will be fast enough that nothing terrible will happen. I really don't want to lose this rather hard-earned fight that I have been doing for the last couple of years.

Something rather random though... over the last three days (including today), I had visited at least three different cemeteries in the day time. I've never really walked through a cemetery much, let alone three, but all in the name of geocaching I suppose. Anyway, those cemeteries invoked a strong sense of respect in me---there lay many of those who walked the earth ealier than I. I never knew how their lives were, but what I know is that the world today, for better or worse, was consequent of their actions, directly or not. It reminds me in some sense that whatever I do now will affect the world, for better or worse, directly or not. A very sombering thought. And of my own mortality---life is really short, can't really waste it over trivialities.

I think I've side tracked much from my original intent of this post. Maybe next time.

Anyway, onwards through 2012, a better year than the last.

I am a Rolling Stone [Gathering No Moss]

``A rolling stone gathers no moss.''

I suppose that's why I am the way I am now. While many might be happy with the lot of life they are given, I'm never one to accept my fate as is, always wanting to fight upwards and onwards, even if this means that I have to leave behind communities of people just to take on the next step of my journey. Maybe I'm more mercenary than I thought, maybe I'm more introverted than I care to actually confess to be; while I lament about how old friends no longer keep in touch with me because of how life turns out, sometimes I too forget how I drop contact with some of the people who are no longer that relevant to me.

Clearly I have been ruminating too much about things. That's hardly new, considering that I had not stepped out of the house for 2 days now. Unsecretly, the starting quote for this entry is also the reason why I am still not in a committed relationship---I still have unfinished business and cannot settle down just yet. Maybe I'm not as ambitious as those entrepreneurs with their start-ups, but I still have some goals in life that I need to achieve, and at this point, that seems much more compelling than the whole ``get settled down and have children'' bit. But who knows what the future might bring?

Okay, enough of random rambling. Back to work.

Inspiration for NaNoWriMo 2011

Alright, the inspiration for NaNoWriMo 2011. Unlike the previous two stories (A Slice of Life with a Twist of Lemon and Towards Cacophony) that formed a series on their own, this one is of a completely new flavour. The major difference here is that there is only one very obvious protagonist, as opposed to the two different people (Heng Kar and Kah Hao) of the previous novels. I have kept the first/third-person narrative styles like before, only to add some variety to the story, giving first-person perspectives on story parts that are less action based and third-person for the action-y stuff.

Anyway, here's the dramatis personae (wow it has been a while since I used that term) for Modern Office Warrior as gotten from my idea file:

Duo-zhuo

Duo-zhuo's the one true protagonist of this novel, and everything that we are talking about is about him in this story. There are still interleaving storylines at play here, but there is no separation between them with regards to what he is doing. The name ``Duo-zhuo'' was designed with a pun in mind; it shares an almost similar phonetic spelling for 多做, which is Mandarin for ``doing a lot''. I wanted to evoke this notion of how Duo-zhuo is doing a lot of things, yet not really having much of an outcome. His life story is pretty much the ``corporate warrior'', doing thinsg within the company and loathing how his psychotic boss keeps causing havoc for him. Of course, this story is about how he found an outlet for that to make life more bearable...

Jimmy Zhan

Not much of a main character, really. Jimmy is more of the ``adventure man'' that I wanted to introduce to give Duo-zhuo a reason to get his ass out of his office and dreary life and get out there to do stuff. And the stuff I've chosen for them to do is Geocaching.

Dan

Not much is known about Dan, since some time after the first third of the novel, he gets fired for doing some rather questionable things. Dan represents the overachieving recent graduate who will stop at nothing just to be the best that can be, from the best ``team player'' to the ``best performing employee''. Not necessarily a bad thing, but given the way things turned out, yeah.

FunnyBoy and FunnyGal

Minor role characters that feature in the first major Geocaching adventure, they are an amalgamation of a few real life geocaching people that I know. I put them there mostly to make the first Geocaching activity that Duo-zhuo takes part in less awkward.

And as usual, there are quite a few minor characters here and there that help advance the story and provide hooks that I will not go into detail.

As for locations, I drew inspiration of the layout of my old office for the corporate scenes, embellishing where necessary, while the outdoor stuff is based on several real-life locations that I had been to on some of the most crazy and insanely fun Geocaching trips that I had done. The whole ``oh no walk into mud'' theme features strongly in the second extended Geocaching adventure in the story because I found it funny to just put Duo-zhuo and Jimmy into situations that I hope to never have to deal with in Geocaching. Also, the extended adventure is completely fabricated---it is technically impossible to design such a Geocache within the current rule set for the real game.

So, why Modern Office Warrior, why isn't it some corporate work-centric story? I believe that ``warrior'' here is meant to evoke a more general feeling of taking on life and all the complications surrounding it, as opposed to ``fighting'' the bureaucracy that is within the corporate environment.

Alright, I think that's enough of an insight to the inspiration for this year's NaNoWriMo entry. I'm still not sure if I can or should do NaNoWriMo next year, but we will see how that goes.

Duo-decade December

It feels like a while since I wrote anything here, and so here I am now.

This month is strange, in the sense that in the beginning of the first half of the month, I was rather existential, wondering about a lot of things regarding why I was here and all the usual things that being existential entailed. Then when things seem Worst, a light shone upon the path that I should take, and now here I am, taking that path.

I think I'm starting to appreciate the type of freedom that I am getting, now that the ``honeymoon'' first semester is over, where, to my utter regret, I probably spent more time trying to get used to the place and notion that I was in graduate school as opposed to being in undergraduate classes. Now that that is over and done with, I can finally focus myself on the things that matter the most.

But enough of the depressing stuff! November was NaNoWriMo, and I think I'm a little obliged to shed some light on the inspiration behind this year's novel, which can be gotten from here, like where all the other novels are. I will do so in the next post just to not mar it with my own rantings.

This month marks the continuation of my geocaching adventure, and completed my first 5/5 cache (The Journal) with my caching buddy here johnayuen. That one was a little nasty; it took us three trips (including the one that he took nearly a year ago) and lots and lots of hiking to get through in order to get to the final location. I will probably put that tale up some time later, so keep your eyes peeled.

Meanwhile, let me write up the inspiration for NaNoWriMo 2011 first. =P

Trapped

Funny how when I'm ``trapped'' in my apartment/room I actually have so much to talk about on my blogs. Actually, come to think of it, it isn't really funny but quite sad, and is probably systematic in terms of what it entails. It is not that I don't want to be in the office/lab to get stuff done---it's cold out, I'm running out of clothes because of a lack of laundry time and I have a nice set up at home that allows me to work from the relative comfort of the apartment. The only caveat is that I don't really get to exercise my vocal cords nor social skills, but it is a small price to pay compared to having to dress up and cycling in the cold towards the office/lab.

My place suffered a drop in power yesterday, which promptly knocked out Elyse since I didn't load a battery in her. Eileen worked fine only because her battery is always inside, so I can't do what I usually do with batteries---take them out so that they don't ``overcharge'' (note: lithium batteries cannot overcharge because of the protective circuitry in place). So now, as a type of UPS, I stuff Elyse with the bay battery when she's on. Weird that such a thing happens though.

With the shortening of the daylight hours and the relatively horrible positioning of the dinner table/work table with respect to the only light in the living room, I'm so glad I bought a desk lamp. Now I can actually be up and do things and hopefully make progress.

Anyway, sleepy time. Till the next rant.

粉雪

It has begun:

粉雪------レミオロメン

粉雪舞う季節はいつもすれ違い
人ごみに紛れても同じ空見てるのに
風に吹かれて似たように凍えるのに

僕は君のすべてなど知ってはいないだろう
それでも一億人から君を見つけたよ
根拠はないけど本気で思ってるんだ

些細な言い合いもなくて同じ時間を生きてなどいけない
素直になれないなら喜びも悲しみも空しいだけ

僕は君の心に耳を押し当てて
その声のする方へすっと深くまで
降りてゆきたいそこでもう一度会おう

分かり合いたいなんて
上辺を撫でていた（なでていた）のは僕のほう
君の悴んだ（かじかんだ）手も握り閉めることだけで繋がってたのに

粉雪ねえ永遠を前にあまりに脆く
ざらつくアスファルトの上染みになってゆくよ

粉雪ねえ時に頼りなく心は揺れる
それでも僕は君のこと守り続けたい

粉雪ねえ心まで白く染められたなら
２人の孤独を包んで空に返すから

Lyrics courtesy Anime Lyrics. And the translation:

Konayuki (Powder Snow)------Remioromen

Season of snow powder always come
Although we are mixed up with a mass of people
we are looking on the same sky
Blown by the wind, and we are chilled by it

I may not know everything about you
Nevertheless, I've found you among 100 million of people
There's no proof but I'm very serious of it

It's impossible to live in the same time with no single quarrel
If we can't be honest, happiness and sadness are just meaningless

If the snow powder may whiten deep to our heart
Could we both share our loneliness?

I would press my ear near to your heart
And go down deep into the place where I hear that voice and meet you once again

We want to understand each other
It's me who softly brush the surface
Just by tightly gripping your numb and cold hand
We are tied to each other

Snow powder is too fragile
In front of us, keep on leaving stains on the rough asphalt forever

Snow powder does not rely on time, moving our heart
Nevertheless, I'd still like to keep on protecting you

If the snow powder may whiten deep to our heart
It will cover both our loneliness and return it to the sky...

Translation courtesy Anime Lyrics.

You don't really need to know the translation to be affected by the meaning of the song. Feels a little apt in view of winter that has just arrived.

English Assessment...?

What a week of self-doubt. I can never understand why I am such a walking paradox---on the one hand I have a pretty good idea of what I want to accomplish, yet on the other hand I find myself seemingly faltering and failing at every opportunity. So awkward and weird.

At times I start wondering, am I really as smart and as hardworking as I think myself to be? Are the methods that I'm employing actually efficient enough to allow me to push forwards with minimal wastage? It almost feels as though I'm just trying to tread water at the edge of the abyss, which itself is quite deep to begin with. So contrary...

Anyway, something amusing. I went for an oral English assessment test recently as a part of my research group's effort to strengthen everyone's presentation and conversational skills. It has been a good long time since I took any sort of oral test like this (probably a decade by my estimate), so the thought of undergoing an oral English assessment just tickled me to no end. If you had known me before, you would know that I was among those who were particular about enunciation, never scoring less than an `A' for any oral examination. So, when I met up with the examiner and read a passage out loud for an exam for the first time in a decade, she was quite surprised at how well I sounded. Heheheh... we didn't really have to continue much after that, preferring to have a nice chat about some of the issues that non-native speakers of English face when confronted with the reality of using their second language to converse with American native-speakers. It was an interesting discussion, inconsequential of course since it reinforced what I already knew from my own dabblement in linguistics myself. If not for the fact that it was recorded, I would probably troll the examiner a little by starting with a faux non-native speaker accent before changing into something more appropriate in the most abrupt manner possible.

That's all the amusing stuff for this week. Winter has finally made her presence felt, with consistent sub-zero temperatures since Tuesday. There was a small snow shower sometime yesterday morning, but it thawed out when midday came along. My apartment thermostat is set to a not-so-toasty 60°F (around 15°C), but so far, the heater hasn't been triggered yet because the apparent ambient temperature is nearer 64°F (about 18°C), thanks to what I suspect is a much higher thermostat setting from my neighbours---thank you thermodynamic laws. Why set it at 60°F? Gas is expensive, with 1 unit costing nearly USD0.618, and last month, I used 16 units of it as compared to the 6 previously from the water heating. Besides, it feels more cosy throwing fleece blankets all over myself to stay warm than to heat the whole apartment up when I'm using only a really small part of it at any time---one doesn't need to heat the whole apartment to stay warm, one just needs to keep oneself warm to stay warm. I would set the thermostat lower to 50°F, but a circular suggested a minimum of 60°F to prevent pipes from freezing and breaking.

Okay, enough idle talk for now. There are things that I need to do. Till the next update I suppose.

And I Become Awesome Instead

Of course history's patterns are starting to reveal unto themselves once more. Maybe I'm too cynical, maybe it is an early onset of SAD, but whatever it is, I am somewhat rudely reminded about things that happened here and there.

Today was a nice day out, I met up with the Champaign-Urbana group of NaNoWriMo-ers for lunch at a nice TGIO party before heading for Jujitsu training for the belt test. Things like these always put me in a good mood.

Then of course contrasting this with waht I saw in the evening, when I looked at the pictures taken for the TGIO in Singapore for the NaNoWriMo-ers there, I get rudely reminded about some of the events that happened a few years back. And also the fleeting types of friendship that I seem to be good at cultivating.

In almost all of these cases, I have not really managed to maintain any form of long-lasting friendship with anyone. Somehow the ``out of sight, out of mind'' action is in place, in spite of the presence of technology that would, in theory, allow us to connect with others better.

So lonely walking down this path. I'm not really depressed about it yet, but sometimes when I stop to think about it, it does bear down on me a little. I wonder some times if I were some kind of rolling stone of sorts, always moving from place to place, finding new things, meeting new people, that I don't really ``gather any moss''---accumulating a core group of really close friends. Maybe this is part of growing up, maybe this is part of being a man (you know, the dangerous loner type). Or maybe I'm just plain doing something wrong. In any case, it is quite hard to tell, really.

Sometimes when I sit around alone in the empty room, I wonder if I have been making the right choices. Then I realise that it is not correctness of the choices that matter, it is how I roll that will make the difference between me being happy in my state against me being sad for no damn reason.

And so, I become Awesome instead.

Blankets and Slankets/Snuggies

Ah the cold. Having previously lived in Morewood Gardens the last time I was in the US, the internal temperature had always been kept at a toasty 75 degrees Fahrenheit (~23 degrees Celsius). Now that I'm living on my own, the cost of the heater is starting to sink in. At the current rate, the cost is roughly 0.618 per thermal unit, and for the last month, when the external temperature is keeping at around 0 to 10 degrees Celsius, I've kept the heater running and holding at around 20 to 22 degrees Celsius, it consumed 16 thermal units.

Hell, gas is more expensive than electricity here.

So I'm switching tactics here. Instead of relying on the gas heater, I'm just slapping on more blankets even for working at the desk. Saves gas because all I need to do is to keep myself warm and not heat up the damn room. There, problem solved! An added bonus is that the blankets are all soooo soft and comfy, so heheh good times.

Okay, enough senseless mumblings for now. Gotta get some other stuff done before I unwind due to it being Friday.

Free from NaNoWriMo

Ah. Now that the tyranny that is NaNoWriMo is finally done for me for this year, it is time to relieve a little stress from it all by bitching a little bit more about life here.

So, what has happened in November other than NaNoWriMo? Lots of things. I came to several realisations about my own nature, and have come to terms about some of these rather startling properties. Being the curious l'il reader you are, let me fill you in on some of these startling properties.

Many times in the past I had bemoaned the fact that I was a nice guy and that all the girls didn't like me because I was a nice guy and other random crap like that. Man, that was belly-aching, quite nauseating when I looked back upon what I had written. Here's the thing---upon reflection on who I truly am, I realised that I am no nice guy. No way, not by any degree. If anything, I'm quite bad actually, considering the things I have done, the things I have thought about, the things I have thought of doing, well you get the idea. And no, bad does not mean evil; as far as I'm concerned, there's a distinction. One can be bad and good or even nice and evil---I blame such semantic problems upon the overloading of the term ``good'' and ``bad''. But what I mean to say is that I'm a badass, one who does not take shit from others, willing to hold my ground and fight for the end, though usually I eschew the whole violence aspect and go into 後の先 mode, where I will react when something happens. I think this is what it means to find oneself when one is in one's twenties.

I think I value my independence and freedom a lot. It is not that I dislike human company (that is utter bullshit because I have tried going in isolation---I went quite mad), but that I am more comfortable with me running my own life away from distractions that are not effected by me. Living in an apartment alone with only my brain, my computer, the Internet and various books about seems to be enough to keep me happy---that's good enough for me, really. I crave intellectual stimulation, and most times, am a little more happy with taking part in things actively than to sit around in a passive way.

How do all these factor into this whole person that is me? So far, I don't have a complete answer yet, partly because it is late and I am in need of sleep (I've been up all day), and partly because I do not have an answer yet. Some say that going into research is a way of coming up with new ideas that can benefit mankind, I say that going deep into research has been a getting to know myself better exercise as I figure out the optimal way of expending my energy, effort and work habits to improve the overall efficiency in the way I think. That is the objective function I'm trying to optimise, and that will be the major goal of my life. Everything else is just to make sure my body stays fit enough to support my brain which does all the thinking I want to do.

Alright, I'm starting to ramble again. Also, Blogger is starting to act up, with random 503s appearing all over their website. I hope that it is not something completely terrible that will make me lose this writing. If it did make me lose stuff, I would be exceedingly annoyed.

Till next time.

NaNoWriMo 2011! Official Winner!

65,502 words later, I am done. Had a good momentum doing it this year though personally I think the story line might be a little bland. As usual, grab the manuscript from my domain. I'll fill in more details here some time in the future when I have a little more time on my hands.

One Busted Knee, It Was Busted

At the risk of sounding like a Luddite, I realise that sometimes, it is not about how powerful a device you have, but how you actually use it.

I was thinking about this from several perspectives for a while now. Slide rules were of a different power class than electronic calculators, and lots of good work have come out of those (remember the space race? That was fought with slide rules). In a more modern context, ``older'' GPS receivers that still support all the most important functions of a GPS receiver (good satellite locking, accurate multi-lateral computations, good battery life) are still worth as much as any of the new-fangled versions of the same devices. All that colour mapping, touch screen nonsense, ability to wirelessly communicate with other GPS receivers are just flavourings over the basic functionality.

I had been debating internally for a while whether I should get a new GPS receiver with all the new-fangled stuff---larger memory is always a good thing, and coloured screens mean that I have better access to the additional information that may be conveyed by the colour. After walking through a medium-sized nature park for the Journal, bashing through weird terrain, climbing up steep gradient hills and sliding down others, losing my ear muffs and possibly over straining my right knee, I realise that my current Garmin eTrex Vista H is still as tough and as useful as it was when I first bought it. It kept its pace with the satellites above, it never lost track of where we were, it held its signal faithfully even under dense-ish tree cover. In short, it was a Damn Good Device.

After so many adventures with my eTrex Vista H, I feel kind of bad to even consider finding a replacement for it.

Anyway, yes. I went with a fellow geocacher-turning-fast-into-friend to tackle that 5/5 cache. Man, it was as hellish as doing any of the major jungle-bashing caches in Singapore, but it was a different kind of hell. At least in Singapore, the paths we took through the forest/jungle didn't involve climbing really steep gradient slopes and walking through streams/creeks. But yesterday when I was out doing that cache gethering all the clues (there were many of them... we don't even know how deep the rabbit-hole goes), I ended up climbing really steep hills with a full-pack, combat boots. They were so steep that I was effectively doing some weird mountain climbing movements---of course it didn't really help that I was heavier than my buddy and that I was carrying way more stuff than him. I thank my Jujitsu Sensei for all the Taiso that we have been doing---those crazy conditioning exercises we did built enough core strength for me that when I started slipping down the damn soft-ground slope, I could arrest the descent through pure core muscle. Heheheh... you've probably gotta try it out some time to understand exactly what I mean.

So, we hiked about the region for nearly 6 hours, stopping here and there for a break or two, and having lunch atop a rather odd hill. Lunch was a Big Mac and fries, the only ``fresh food'' that I knew would keep really well and still taste similar to when you first bought it without having to reheat the damn thing---draw your own conclusions there. Yet, in spite of all that crazy walking (covering at least 6 miles based on my GPS receiver's reckoning), we still didn't complete the cache. We're going to head back soon to finish the job; we think we are really close, but the failing light (shortened days of Winter) made the going quite suicidal. Also, since the place is forest-y, it's ideal to do it now as opposed to when the temperature is higher, since low temperatures mean that those pesky insects are knocked out cold, i.e. no ticks and mosquitoes. Oh and no poison ivy, of course, which is a great thing.

If this cache type is considered 5/5, maybe we can build something like that for Singapore. But the permanence of the field puzzles will be a major issue, considering that the façade of Singapore changes ever so often---what was a nice jungle trail now can become a tourist-wimp friendly board walk, and what could have been a cool jungle can become a new condominium. Quite scary actually.

Anyway, enough chit-chat. Time to do some meaningful work before finishing up the story for NaNoWriMo.

Piecewise Functions

Suppose that you are writing a piece-wise function in LaTeX. How do you go about doing it? The trick is to make use of the \begin{cases} ... \end{cases} environment within Math mode. This particular environment acts like a n-row by 2-column array generating a big `{' on the left side for the grouping of the piece-wise function parts. Since this environment acts like an array, don't forget to separate each column with `&' and end each line with `\\'.

Mumbles

To the few folks who still ardently follow this little blog of mine, I humbly apologise for the general lack of updates in a while. You see, this is the month of November, and traditionally (for the last two to three years at least) it is the time where I go on that suicide mission known as NaNoWriMo. Some of the more astute among you will probably ask the question that I sometimes ask myself: why? Why do I subject myself to such pain that is completely extra-curricular?

I suppose the answer to this question is the same as the one regarding why do I like training in martial arts, be it Aikido or Jujitsu, or even why I like playing my various woodwind instruments, or better yet why I am in graduate school. It all boils down to interest and love I think.

Once you hit the wrong side of twenty-five and realise that if this were the medieval ages, you would be nearly half-way through your life if you were lucky. Under such circumstances then it becomes a little more clear that we are always running a race against time. There're always new things to try, new things to do, and many many things to keep oneself occupied. But then there's always that time budget that one needs to be aware of. But of course, I'm starting to digress from what I was trying to say, namely because time is short, one should do all that one loves to make sure that the short time we have on this Earth is well used.

Time is a strange thing. When you were really young, you just couldn't wait to grow up and be one of those adults. Then once you get out of college/university and face the real world on your own for the first time without the seemingly invincible protection from your parents, you just wish at times that times were like they were before when you were merely a child. Oh and the whole nostalgic feeling about a simpler past---these things are starting to hit me now, considering that very soon I will hit my three-cubed birthday.

On a random note, I stumbled upon a nice list of common English errors, text file available here and the main page can be seen here. Should make an interesting supplemental reading.

Speaking of reading, I'm currently finding time to digest The Psychology of Invention in the Mathematical Field by Jacques Hadamard. I might write a review on this later on when I have the chance to digest it; should prove to be useful to those who would want to do Mathematics for fun and/or a living.

Okay, that's all that I can spare for now---need to reserve my word budget for my daily 2k for NaNoWriMo. Till the next update.

EPS-ify Images with ImageMagick

I first talked about ImageMagick some time back here, but I think it is cool to talk about it once more.

So I'm currently using LaTeX as a means of keeping an electronic research journal. I like using LaTeX because of two advantages:

1. Everything is text, so I can make use of a version control system to track changes.
2. I have the full expression of equations and the what-not in the same manner as I would use to write actual papers, thus saving time.

(I might release the set of tools I've written to do this later.) But anyway, in spite of the great system I've worked out, there's this problem of including things like scanned drawings that I just don't want to spend time to vectorise using Inkscape (another great tool) only because it is only a rough drawing. LaTeX uses EPS files for graphics, and scanned stuff are usually not that. So what can we do?

Enter ImageMagick. Assume for the sake of demonstration our scanned file is image.png. Then the following commands will convert it to a [relatively small] EPS file:

1. convert -quality 75 image.png image.jpg
2. convert image.jpg eps3:image.eps

That's it. No need to have the GIMP or even Adobe Photoshop installed to do the conversion. The best part is, this set of commands achieves a nice compression for the final EPS file, which is great since a normal non-PS-level-3 image file is quite big.

That's enough technical talk for now.

NaNoWriMo 2011: Modern Office Warrior

Apparently I have a penchant of dealing myself really really hard hands and running with it. This comes from the decision to take part in this year's NaNoWriMo. Due to their site change, you can track my progress here instead. I'll update the widget counter when it is available.

It's going to be yet another slice-of-life with a little bit more action than the last two novels. I think I will take this opportunity to point out some uh interesting phenomena that I have observed while being in the work force for the last couple of years. Obviously this is fiction, so take everything that will be written as such.

Oops look at the time. Gotta get some work done here. Till next time.

L'il Kids

So let's see. I've been in the US since Aug 13, 2011, and for all practical purposes and intents, I haven't really been mingling with the local Singapore populace. I suppose being a graduate student means that one's priorities are different as compared to when one was still an undergraduate. That and the fact that as a graduate student, I have an office to spend the day in to get some thinking/research done, while as an undergraduate one was ``doomed'' to roaming the corridors and the campus in between classes, which helps in the whole ``socialise with your fellow students bit''.

I think it'll be really funny/awkward the day that I join the SSA's activities. Heheheheh... but I suppose I'm used to that. Must remember that I am geeky and that it is completely normal to treat the undergraduate folks as l'il kids who haven't seen the world. Yes, it is very evil, but fully justified, considering that I am a good 4 years older than most of them?

Anyway, enough of random ranting, back to work I go. I'm starting to love this...

NaNoWriMo 2011?

November is coming, and I'm still debating with myself whether I should take part in this year's NaNoWriMo, considering everything. I mean, I have Eiko with me now, and should serve as an incentive to help push things forward, but somehow I am scared that I might just run out of time to get all things that need to be done while doing NaNoWriMo.

Oh choices, choices.

I do have a story to tell for NaNoWriMo, but the caveat is that I have at least 2 to 3 other ``big'' writing assignments that need attention. So putting aside that one hour per day to write my 2000 words to hit the magical 50k words within the month sounds a little... painful. Anyway, I have around 5 to 6 days to make a decision. We'll see how this goes.

Broken symbol.ttf on Ubuntu

Having weird ``infinity'' symbols for bullets when opening some PDF on some flavour of Ubuntu? It turns out it has to do with a bug with the symbol.ttf font. Here's how to rectify it (as gotten from here).

1. If you don't have fontforge, install it first with

   sudo apt-get install fontforge

2. Open up symbol.ttf in fontforge. On my system, it is located at /usr/share/fonts/truetype/ttf-symbol-replacement/symbol-replacement.ttf/symbol.ttf
3. In fontforge, apply Encoding->Force Encoding->Symbol, followed by Encoding->Macintosh Latin, and then File->Generate Fonts... (set to Truetype), ignoring warnings and save.
4. Remove the old symbol.ttf and copy the new version back into the same location, probably as root.
5. Run the following command:

   sudo fc-cache -v

At this point, the mapping of the glyphs for symbol.ttf should be correct and all the weird display bugs should be gone.

家

在美国的读书生涯中，我几乎从来没有特别想家的感觉。不过在这两个星期内，我不禁回想着家。或许是生活太复杂吧，还是最近的种种错则而导致我出现想家的念头。

家是个很奇怪的一个组织：当你和家人在一起时，有时会出现种种默察，而这会导致你觉得你的家人似乎在整你。不过，一旦你离开了家，不久后你就会产生想家的念头。可能是人生常情吧，每个人都需要有一种归属感，而家就是能产生个人归属感的一个东西。当你最需要人关怀的时候，你就会想起家。

或许在这深造的生活方式太紧张了吧，也可能是因为我最近又受了伤之类的，所以我会想起家。以前的我简直不把家的重要性放在眼里，如今我觉得除了家以外就再也没有设么重要的东西了。有个家的归属感的感觉最好。

好了，我累了，错别字好像有要重出江湖了。我看我因该去休息一下，这么一来我就有精力来挑战未来。

Funereal #2

Ahem.

I lay there within my half-opened casket, serene as a man can ever be. Right there next to my glass-covered top, my aged but still lovely wife weeps to herself. Oh the sorrow, the pain! Yet she maintains her dignified poise, melancholy notwithstanding. Comforting her with an arm around her shoulders is my eldest daughter, lovely, tall and dressed in the deepest black that one could think of. She has always been my pride and joy, for being first-born meant she was the child I held the longest and watched over the most. Her husband stands quietly near her---it is not his place to be in deep mourning; his role is mostly supportive. My other daughter flanks my wife on the other side, silently sobbing to herself; she's not as tough as my eldest, but still she has her strong moments, but now was not the time. My son stands in front of my portrait, his head bowed, face unsmiling, tearless, serious---I have brought him up well, it seems, for stoicness was one thing I thought every male should have about him, to never look emotional in front of others other than those close by.

The monk finally finishes the prayer that he was chanting to free my soul of my earthly shackles. Already I feel a little lighter. My wife's weeping intensified, and if I weren't already dead I would have leapt up to her and hold her and tell her once more how much I love her and don't really want to go. With a solemn bow, the monk steps away from his position and the pallbearers stepped up. The lead pallbearer gave a final bow to me, before closing the lid of my coffin. With a silent one-two, the pallbearers lift my casket upon their shoulders and walked solemnly into the antechamber behind the curtains. The small cortege behind me filed out of the main area and shuffled up to the viewing room on the second floor.

There, they got to see the funeral home workers lift up my casket and slowly bring it to the conveyor belt that fed into the gaping door of the furnace of the crematorium. My wife, stoically strong thus far, finally wails audibly, dignity be damned, while my daughters try their best to comfort her while stifling their own tears with little effect. Confronted with the final inevitability, even my son's eyes were tearing.

The funereal home workers gently pushed my casket onto the conveyer belt and stepped back, their heads bowed in respect. My casket rolls gently down the conveyer into the furnace, where I get consumed by the flames for the last time. While I know that I am dead, I leave knowing that my son and daughters will carry on with life, and that they will take care of my lover till the day comes that she joins me for true eternal bliss.

It's Saturday Already?

It's yet another Saturday morning, and again I'm sitting at my study desk next to the window, the only time that I can get decent illumination from this desk. That corneal abrasion episode took away a good chunk of my time as I shuttled to and fro doctors, instilled eyedrops like clockwork, worrying about how scary the final bill will be, worrying about how all these down time is affecting my already burgeoning workload.

It's not easy living life without support, especially a life where everything needs to be pre-planned and time-managed from start to end. In the bid to obtain a life where I have a slightly less mundane existence, I find myself in a life that requires inordinate amounts of self-discipline just to pull things off. Such is the irony of life. And just when I thought I could put all those years of self-discipline behind me too.

I think at this point, the one big thing I can say about the PhD programme is that it is one long struggle between doing things and finding enough time to deal with the whole life aspect of things. Life has a strange way of creeping up on you when you are not really noticing, and what happens after that is usually quite complicated, since in life, you have to deal with more than just yourself; there's always someone or something else in the equation that you need to look out for.

Okay, no real mood to wax lyrical. Need to get some stuff done so that I can... work on other stuff. Till next time.

Clean Bill of Health?

The nightmare of 2+ weeks is just reaching the end, and none too soon I might add.

A day-long travel out to Bloomington, Illinois is nothing to scoff at, considering that it is a 60-mile journey one-way from Champaign-Urbana. Factoring in the fear of the unknown meant that I added a generous buffer to the overall time that I was willing to spend out here in Bloomington before hopping on the long-haul bus back home.

That last 1%---finally there is some closure. The expert has spoken; there is no medical risk of the epithelial ingrowth colonising the entirety of my cornea, and that any procedure that would be done will be done so under my own comfort level. The gist of it is that the corneal flap has folded back slightly, and it is under the ophthamologist's opinion that it wouldn't post a problem unless I feel discomfort from it, i.e. things like having ridiculously dry eyes for extended periods of times, sudden change in astigmatism, or random feelings of foreign bodies within the eye itself. In short, that 1% isn't going to matter unless it is actually affecting me, then I can always go back to her to have her lift the flap and scrape of those epithelial cells, all under local anaesthesia of course.

Probably the best bit of news I have heard in a while.

Right now, I'm in no rush to get back into Jujitsu training---still need to alter my gi a little (damn thing is still too damn long in spite my ``best fit'' sizing). Also, while that 1% is declared medically insignificant, I want to give it just a little more time to recuperate, and until I can get hold of some of those protective goggles. Calling those things protective goggles is kind of strange, when in reality there are really spectacles with particularly sturdy frames. Might as well, considering that I have been thinking of updating my prescription for a while now for long-range work like driving. I asked the doctor if it were normal of me to not use my glasses when working on the computer, and her reply was that my eyes were lazy; since I was already myopic to begin with, the eye just refuses to use the eye muscles to accomodate for the nearer vision given the correction. This happens only because the level of myopia that I have now is sufficiently low that objects placed just at arm's length distance away just happens to be sitting within the comfort zone of my eyes' focal length. Well I suppose I'm going to keep doing this as I don't really see a need to fix anything---worst case I'll see if I can get a greatly reduced power for close range work, mostly to fight the astigmatism that can distort things.

I was feeling quite listless over the past fortnight, considering that I couldn't really do any of the physical activities stuff that I liked doing due to my corneal abrasion (Jujitsu and geocaching). But today, I think I had my share of venting out these frustrated energies through the long walk to and fro the ophthamologist's office from the long haul bus stop. The Google Maps' estimated distance for the route along the main roads was estimated to be around 2.4 miles, and I walked both directions, plus a mile here and there when I slipped off to pick up some geocaches along the way. All in all, I think I walked about 10 kilometres today, not counting the daily 7 kilometres of cycling I do to get to office and back. I bet I don't even get to clock such mileage back in Singapore heheheheh... yet I find myself willing to take walking as a valid mode of transport here. For fun, I used my GPSr to track how fast I was walking, and it turned out to be, on average, 3.7 miles per hour, which is roughly 5.9 kilometres per hour. Not super fast, but fast enough to make the time quoted for walking on Google Maps irrelevant.

And so, my Thursday is almost done, spent in a different town getting expert advice on my eyes because the town that I am based in had no such experts. Such is the strangeness of life. Now the only thing left to do for this episode is to wait for the medical bill and see just how much 20% of it really is, and then figure out how to pay for it without using up all of my allowances. I am hoping that the cost isn't too drastic, but I can't be sure only because no one seems to publish the consultation rate. According to Mangesh, my colleague/labmate, those rates are hardly published because they change according to the health insurance provider. Talk about stratified sampling for sales. I just hope that the part I need to pay is reasonable enough.

Alright, enough of ranting. I should probably start to walk towards the pick up point and wait for the bus. Hanging out in another university's student centre is a little weird and disconcerting, particularly when it's evening and there's no one about. I must be missing something here I suppose.

Till the next update.

But I'm Only a Student...

There are some days in my life that I wish I were dead or non-existent, and it seems that today is the day.

I went back to the optometrist today expecting good news. Well in some senses, I did, as the wound is healed at 99%. Except that 1%, that lousy last 1%. Something wrong with that 1%---it wasn't healing fast enough; that 1% was at the periphery of my corneal flap. Maybe some epithelial cells have made their way past the flap from the initial injury, causing it to possibly be the start of an ingrowth. Possibly. Prognosis is good though, but it means I have to go elsewhere to get this checked out by someone more qualified than what we are having at the local hospital/clinic.

Except this somewhere is a good hour's drive away. In the US, this means at least 60 miles, or around 97 kilometres. 97 kilometres. Bye bye busy day.

And of course, I have tons of things that are due this week. Thankfully, I've gotten enough of them done, so I'm left with one major item to clear, not counting this cross-country doctor's visit. And now I have to coordinate with a kind soul who will take half the day off to drive me all the way out there and back.

This is starting to be a really costly (opportunity cost) incident...

Corneal Conundrum

Break my arm and I can still work with the other one, albeit slowly.

Break my leg and I just limp about, working mostly unimpaired, though I probably need to watch my weight from lack of activity.

But bust my eye and my spirit is broken, having neither the will nor the ability to actually see what I'm doing and thus get things done in a smooth fashion.

That last statement is basically how I have been feeling for the last fortnight---the inability to see clearly is always annoying and makes it really difficult to concentrate. Indeed, calling humans visual creatures is a most apt description.

It is not that my right corneal abrasion isn't healing; it is doing better each day compared to the last. It is the fact that it is healing too slowly relative to the norm that is making my attending optometrist worried. Such is the complication that comes with a general predisposition towards inflammation, and the fact that my cornea itself has undergone some structural changes via LASIK.

Do I regret having LASIK done then? No, I don't. It just isn't safe to be traipsing all around the world with an effective eyesight that required -15.00 dioptres of correction. I think the expensive take-home lesson here is that I should be careful with what kinds of sports that I am doing. A year of Aikido didn't increase the risk of anything happening to my eye---most of the stuff we do involves mostly the hands and twisting the body into interesting positions so as to throw someone. But Jujitsu, it's different; the take downs are many and highly varied. I should be more careful with this sport than I did with Aikido, since the integrity of my cornea has been breached twice by now, and we all know that structural integrity takes a long time to recover, particularly for something that begins as fragile as the cornea.

Anyway, that's all the time I have for random ranting. Maybe another post will be up on Friday or something... I don't know. Currently having to juggle too many things at once means that I have little to no time to myself to do reflections and other ``personal development'' things like writing journal entries or even stories or poems.

Musings on a Saturday

In the office/lab on a Saturday morning---not my kind of weekend morning, but it suffices given the situation that I'm in. I'm kind of delayed by a few days of work this week because I had to deal with the pressing issue of a right corneal abrasion that I think I sustained from a rather vigorous training session on Monday evening.

It's funny how one doesn't really care about something before anything bad happens, and then when some strange occurrence happens, one is suddenly made aware of body parts, medical histories and physiologies that we never really paid much attention to.

Suffice to say, this condition is currently under medical supervision, and all that I can do is really to wait it out and let my body do its thing about healing the abrasion over. The medication provided is mostly prophylactic in nature, and in some senses to improve the conditions in which the wound has to encourage healing. This of course includes the properties of the reduction of the inflammatory response (via steroid eyedrops), and a general relaxation of the ``twitch'' muscles (via mydriasis and cycloplegia inducing eyedrops). Of course this leaves my right eye in a somewhat ``zombified'' state where I cannot really use it to focus on anything of importance, and this includes reading as well as other important near vision work like looking at the computer screen. Thankfully, my left eye is still doing a superb job in keeping my overall eyesight serviceable, and I am really grateful for the general adaptability of my body in general.

So, what's new in my world? Well, for some reason I find myself thinking about how life would be like to have a couple of sons or daughters about, living with them, growing up with them, and generally experiencing the joys and pains of fatherhood. It's a funny type of warm and fuzzy feeling---I have no idea how to explain this, maybe real-life fathers will know what I'm trying to convey here. Anyway, this bout of emotions and wishful thinking came about when I read this article by Regina Brett (same person who wrote the 45/50 life lessons column). It does seem like one is missing out on a lot of things in life when one does not settle down with a child or two (or more!). Some time back, my parents did mention how they never regretted having us children, even though it meant that my mum had to stop work and take care of us full-time---they never regretted it even though we were trying at times, me particularly due to my general abnormality of having skin that reacted to everything with inflammations. They never regretted it. They never regretted it.

It makes me cry when I think about what they said.

I suppose as I get older, my perspective shifts away from what I can do to improve my personal self towards something a little more... humanising, if there's a term for that. Like the random team-building events that I had gone through with various people from different stages of life, they placed family above everything else, while silly l'il me was still thinking big thoughts about meeting great people and being great in general.

When I was young, I knew about mortality, but didn't really care much about it, since when one was fourteen for instance, dying was among the last things that would come to mind. But as I grow older and reaching my one-third mark of my expected natural lifespan, the reality of mortality is starting to hit me very soon. It is hard to accept that my parents are growing old---in my eyes, they never seemed to have aged since twenty odd years ago when I was first sentient. Yet now as each day passes, I fear for their eventual infirmity, I fear for their eventual mortality. And then it makes me sad to realise that I'm probably not spending much time with them now that I'm ``all grown up'' and have a life to lead on my own. Yet when I am with them, it is hard to say anything else other than what we might usually say each day; too macho or too repressed as a culture, perhaps?

I suppose it's becoming easier and easier to understand what pains our parents went through the older we get, and it is only after some time of being away and pondering about the past and the future that makes one realise how important it is to love them now when they are still here with us.

A Bicycle Built for... Me

While on the one hand I'm really glad to have gotten my driver's licence in Singapore, I'm still tardying a little with regards to getting the state licence in Illinois. Well, I technically still have around 60 days to get it, but that's not a major problem---it's not a problem at all. Driving is of course a most useful skill, but the maintenance and usage of the car is something that needs to be taken into consideration. Considering that Champaign-Urbana is very friendly to cycling in general, I have taken up cycling as my primary mode of transport.

So I got myself outfitted for a bicycle, a hybrid one specifically. A hybrid bicycle is a cross between the gripping power of the rugged mountain bicycle and the light-weighted speed of the road bicycle; a nice mix of the rough and the smooth, the kind of bicycle that is well suited for urban travel. The one thing that feels different riding in the US is that I need to signal with my left hand. That is a little unnerving and disorienting because I'm too used to steering with my left hand and signalling with my right---this switch of hands just takes a little getting used to. And I have now grown to love the fact that my bicycle has a mirror attached to it to look behind without having to turn all the way around, though I still look over my shoulder to check my blind spots should I have to filter left to turn left.

I'm going to build up my stamina and power to make my bicycle a most useful mode of transport, building up to the point that I can easily cover 50+km in a single day (roughly 25km out, and 25km back). I think that will help my overall goal of being stronger when I return.

Okay, enough of the cycling talk---sleeping time.

Undoing Font Hiding in Windows

If you are on Windows 7, and after performing some update, suddenly realise that you cannot see any of your non-Latin characters in your applications when you once could, try this out. Use Win+F2 and type "C:\Windows\Fonts" and press enter. Under "Font settings", make sure that the option "Hide fonts based on language settings" is unchecked. Then, reboot. Things should work okay after that, if not well, erm, you're on your own.

Quick Evaluation

Phew, the first week of classes are finally done. I really wanted to write this entry a couple of days back, but somehow things always cropped up and I find myself having to abandon the various attempts on writing a decent entry here. Of course, I have Q10 handy for the ``just write'' type of writing that I seek, so this entry gets done that way.

The first thing that one notices when one is in graduate school is the notion that no one really gives a damn about what you do. No one gives a damn about what you do, be it your advisor, your fellow colleagues, or any one else. No one except yourself, of course. The curriculum is tailor-made for you, and you have to take charge (with the assistance of a committee of course) of what you want to/need to take in order to fulfill your academic course requirements. And then there is the whole issue of intellectual discovery---it is up to you and you alone to decide how you might want to run your research. Of course if you have a slightly more caring advisor, he/she will actually attempt to make sure that you do something along the way, but other than that, you are on your own. I sort of knew this was going to be the case prior to entering graduate school, but having witnessed it first hand makes the stories that I have heard more concrete and real.

Of course, this being the first week of the semester, things are progressing a little on the slow side, but things are not as slow as it seems. Okay, compared to CMU, things are sort of slow now (usually we would have the first round of homework assigned by the end of the week), but it is really hard to tell if this is going to be the pace that things will be running at; for all I know, this is merely the first week syndrome where things are deliberately released at a reduced pace just to ensure that any last-minute class enrolment won't lose out too much, though to be fair, it doesn't seem to be the culture here to have ``last-minute enrolments''---there doesn't seem to exist a wait list from which people can queue on while waiting to be enrolled into a class.

Living conditions-wise it has been pretty peaceful. My dorm space is really a one-room apartment on the southern outskirts of the main campus, so it tends to be much more tranquil here than say the residence halls where the undergraduates might be living in. There are of course pros and cons of this set up---it means that when I finally get myself completely at ease with this place, I will have an excellent distraction-free environment to get cracking, and not have to get into my office just to get work done. The main disadvantage is that because I live on the southern outskirts of the main campus, the daily commute to my office up in the computer science department building (Siebel Centre) can be pretty brutal. I have to take a bus up north every morning; the bus comes in 12-minute intervals between 0700hrs to 0800hrs, subsequently it runs on 20-minute intervals instead. It takes the bus around 13 to 17 minutes to arrive at the bus stop nearest to Siebel Centre, and from there, a 750-feet walk awaits me. For now, things are quite dandy because the weather is still conducive for walking, but I'm really not very sure how this is going to work out once winter sets in. And yes, I have switched to the imperial system (at least for distances) for now because the dimension of ``500 feet'' is a natural length for all the block distances that dot the landscape of the campus grounds.

The ``500 feet'' comment comes from the manner in which I have been navigating around the campus with---throughout the last fortnight or so I have been walking around with my Garmin eTrex GPS receiver in tow. It is pretty nifty the moment I got the Champaign-Urbana base map loaded into the device; by knowing which road intersections I have passed, and having a working memory of the local map made walking around campus relatively fuss-free. Considering the fact that I'm a graduate student who doesn't have the benefit of living in close quarters with other like-minded individuals, it is a really fast way to get the lay of the land on the back of my hand. I think I have geocaching to thank for this though---the months spent walking all over Singapore armed with nothing more than a GPS receiver and some local maps have indeed honed my geospatial reasoning skills, making navigation a much easier exercise than thought possible.

Anyway, not sure if I had said this in an earlier post (not checking only because I'm using Q10 to write up this entry), but the campus here feels very different. For one, since the department buildings are fairly far from each other, one is more likely to run into people in the same programme than anything else. This is different from CMU because, well, CMU's campus is so small that it is hard to not run into people from different schools. For two, because I keep running into the engineering/computer science folks, I do end up running into a lot of PRC students. It feels a little weird when one is in the US and end up hearing more mandarin spoken than english, but it is not something to be worried about I suppose; it is only when they start gathering in groups and being generally obnoxious that things start to get annoying, and even then that action is not limited to the PRC students alone. So far I've not managed to break into that little cocoon that many of them are stuck in, so I suppose I will have to take a little effort to make friends with some of them and see what things we can share and learn along the way.

Food here is still manageable---I have a full kitchen to work with. Well, almost full, since I have a refrigerator/freezer, an electric stove and oven, a saucepan and two different types of spatula. I just don't have enough of the other amenities required for cooking, like knives, cutting boards, flat plans, condiments and the like. And of course a microwave, the single most useful electrical appliance that one can have within an apartment, since it makes heating and reheating food stuffs that much easier. But all these things will have to come eventually when I start to see the need to actually cook, and when my allowance comes in; money is starting to get a little tight as I deal with the price of the text books that are needed for class and the overall need for survival through sustenance.

The bus system here is very good---there's at least one bus that will take one to anywhere that one might want to go on and off campus. More importantly, the bus system is quite efficient; there are different routes for the week day day time, week day evening and weekend. The routes are colour coded by the general service locations, and the numbers identify the route directly, with the weekend and evening versions having numbers ten times that of the usual week day day time ones. The general direction of the bus route is also encoded, so one can unambiguously state which bus it is they want to take, like the 120W Teal route or the 50E Green route. The buses also have an integrated system that tracks their movement, and the provided expected time of arrival at each bus stop is accurate to within five minutes, which is really useful. The buses are also handicap friendly since they can all ``kneel''---hydraulically lower the front of the bus so that the ramp can be deployed for those in need of them. All buses also have attached bicycle racks in front of them that can take up to two bicycles, which is a great thing to support cycling within the city. A pity that the Singapore transport system, in all its glory, don't even have such useful facilities without involving a lot of bureaucratic wrangling to get working. The bus schedule guide is also freely available on all buses, and that makes looking out for the various bus timings and locations that much easier for folks who don't have the Android phone application that polls the mass transit department's web site for such information.

So far I'm not really homesick yet, so I would think that things are going pretty smooth on my end. Many of my friends who live on the US east coast are terrified at the prospect of having to deal with Hurricane Irene that I do feel for their safely. Anyway, that's all I have for now, so till next time.

In UIUC

So, okay, while it may not be obvious at all here, I am actually in UIUC right now. That's right, my PhD journey has finally started officially, and I am now settling into my apartment and getting back the whole groove of studying once more. A PhD programme is different from that of the BSc---the whole purpose is to emerge from the programme being a much better researcher than what I once was, and to hone my skills in sniffing out and solving problems in acceptable manners. Class hasn't started yet, but I'm starting to feel the immense pressure upon myself. I think I'm mentally prepared for this, and given my current domicile location and office, I think it makes things easier to actually concentrate and get the work done.

So some people ask me here and there why did I want to go for a PhD programme instead of working my way up some corporate ladder and earning big bucks. I think the answer is simply that I like challenging myself. Yes, I'm a sucker for that kind of pain, and get easily bored by the mundane work that most people engage in. I may not have an overriding IQ, but I know that I can think up interesting and workable solutions when I put my mind to things. Of course, the flip side is that I need to work on the whole social aspect side of research and go around talking to people to learn more about what is going on, but that is a work in progress. I may not have what it takes to be a full-time academic in a university, but at the very least, I want to make that difference by contributing my know-how and ingenuity for the forces of good. Very idealistic, I know, but what is the world without some idealism? Besides, it's my neck on the line and not the rest of the people, so why should anyone else care?

Actually no one else cares, as a general rule of thumb. Those close to us might want to care, but there will come a point in time where the life paths have diverged so much that it becomes quite impossible to play catch up and care as much as one might want to. I suppose that's why people get into relationships with each other, each trying to find some middle ground with which they can share their need of love and to love with each other to unlock that hidden side of being human. I'm not gutsy enough to claim that I am past that stage now, but I think I'll manage without having this relationship business. Somehow the social side and the intellectual side grow at different rates, and there is always a time (and place) for everything. As a lady friend once said, men are like wine, for the older they get, the more desirable they become due to the appreciation of their value, whereas women just fade away as time goes by. Quite a sexist statement for sure, but I suppose that's how most of the world's population is wired up.

Ah, Champaign-Urbana. A lovely place even on the waning days of summer. My domicile is a pretty peaceful place: sheltered by trees, quiet neighbourhood, lovely chirping of the cicadas and crickets in the evening, the sound of children playing in the day time from the families that live in the same set of apartments as I. State university does have a much different perspective as compared to a private university (CMU is a private university)---the sense of anonymity is much higher, and due to that it is much easier to just get ``lost'' in the moment and not have to worry about people judging you or remembering what you had done. Of course, this also meant that the whole place is much bigger and really nasty for foot traversal (I clocked 18km of walking just to settle a few administrative procedures prior to getting my university ID which gave free bus rides), but I think eventually it will work out fine. I think what is important is to quickly get into the groove and hit the tarmac running.

Now, more so than ever, time is not on my side.

30 Days of Driving

Ah driving. It is a very liberating feeling to finally have the license to operate a motor vehicle. Having had my license about a month ago, I took the opportunity to rent a car for about a month to drive around and get used to the road experience. And this entry chronicles the sights, sounds and experiences that I had from that little foray.

Driving in Singapore is a rather mixed bag of emotions; more often than not, the primary dominating emotion is that of anger. That's right, it is anger; not mine, but that of the other drivers. Armed with probational plates as a part of the law regarding newly minted qualified driver license holders, it simultaneously becomes a safe way of indicating the inexperience of the driver as well as an invitation for the more aggressive drivers to ``bully'' the new driver through intimidation techniques. I wasn't really fazed by their intimidation attempts, though it is rather unnerving when an aggressive driver keeps tailgating the car that I was driving. The speed limits of the roads were not something that most people seem to adhere to---each time I was travelling at the speed limit, every other car seems to just speed off in front of me, with excess speeds ranging from 10km/h or more. In fact, many drivers who wre following behind my car got so frustrated that I wasn't busting the speed limit that they ended up tailgating me for a while before dodging off to the left or right in an attempt to overtake me.

Drivers aside, the roads of Singapore are not very forgiving either. Granted that there are few tricky intersections to worry about, there are still many oddities of the roads that make driving a less-than-desirable experience. Extreme heavy traffic is one classic example of this. The arterial roads of Singapore are often full of traffic during the peak hours, and the mean speed of such roads drop from the standard of 70km/h to something along the lines of 40km/h, assuming that it is merely a heavy traffic condition and not some traffic jam, in which case the mean speed can fall to as low as 20km/h, uphill.

But I suppose that the best way to go about driving in Singapore is to be really comfortable with oneself and to understand that not all drivers are law-abiding---the most important thing about driving is to avoid causing or being in an accident, and I suppose that if that is met, it will guarantee one's survival on the road. Of course the law just provides a more stringent measure of what safety means, and more often than not, it is a good idea to follow it. But of course one needs to be flexible and adapt to the circumstance.

SMS Musing #6

Earlier on Saturday, while waiting for some friends for geocaching:

The mere fact that there are multiple entries under this SMS musings tag should be an indication that I'm spending a lot of time waiting for people to arrive. What I mean is that the only reason why I write these entries is merely to pass the time a little faster during the wait, so that I don't get too bored to the point that I start to think too much nonsense.

Anyway, another day and I'll be flying. But an all nighter awaits me as I scramble to finish up that draft before I head off into the sunset. Flying off this time feels more serene than the last---it might be that I sort of know what to expect? But in spite of it all, there's still that little uncertainty over various things that are out of my direct control; I suppose I just need to hang in there and see what happens. As they say, it ain't the end till it is the end, and the end ain't here yet. The small setbacks just turn me ever stronger by helping me realise that one needs a certain level of thick-skinnedness to live well in the world.

SMS Musing #5

While waiting outside a building...

Sometimes one cannot help but feel helpless in the face of things, especially when it all seems ready to overwhelm oneself. There is just too many variables that we have no control over, yet somehow life must still go on. Even the few things that we seemingly have control over turns out to be mostly a sham. If all of us do not really have true power over our destinies, then what is it that moves everything forward?

Illusionary they may be, I suppose there is still some truth amid all the lies. We probably have more power over our destiny than we realise, though much less than what we would have liked. Perhaps that is what life truly is about---to discover just how far our control is over our destiny. Maybe this can explain away all that we are seeing.

SMS Musing #4

While at Zirca earlier today for an exhibition:

It is kinda strange to be sitting on the top floor of a club and penning this down as a heavy beat is going on from the dance floor below. I suppose it would be a little odd to claim that the music is putting me to sleep, but it is true. The only reason I'm even still awake is all thanks to ConnectBot on the Android, which allows me to connect via SSH to other boxes that have things to keep me occupied.

But then again, the whole club scene is something that I don't really dig into; I'm not into the whole shallow social thing that dominates this whole scene. But of course the question to ask is, why am I even here in the first place? Mostly as a support role for one of my sister's exhibits at the exhibition, and that's about it. I seriously doubt if anyone cares though, since I've pretty much ended up sitting up here on my own. More than 2 years since I've come out of my shell and I'm still sitting om the sidelines: what a great ``progress'' there.

Anyway, it is fast reaching the time for me to make a sneaky getaway, the only type of exit I'm willing to put up with---not a fan of being a centre of attraction. Makes me wonder how the hell I can square this with my kob requirements of establishing reputation and street cred.

This is getting a little too long for an SMS Musing, so I'm going to stop here now and make my getaway.

I suppose there ought to be a limit on how long an ``SMS Musing'' counts as its namesake.

SMS Musing #3

While waiting at the carpark of Venus Drive prior to a MacRitchie Reservoir Park hike/geocaching trip:

At the risk of jinxing myself, what was supposed to be an easy 25-minute drive became an hour of horror as I kept making one wrong turn after another to the point that it was fucktardly stupid. How the blazes did I screw up so badly in spite of having read the gorram map multiple times? I think I have sunk to a new low this time. This is really so stupid---I've just wasted everyone's precious time. I feel like a failure now.

Funereal #1

I'm starting a new series of articles labelled ``funereal''. It sounds morbid, but really it is one of those ``start with the end goal in sight'' kind of things. Each time an article is tagged with the ``funereal'' tag, it represents my vision of what happens at my funeral at that point in time. Might prove to be an interesting psychological experiment.

Ahem.

There was muted silence all about as the candles flickered in the night time breeze. I lie dead in that coffin out in the centre of the funeral parlour, surrounded by strangers. It's a hush-hush affair; there was no priest nor reverend nor any religious figure officiating the austere setting---I had lived my life with a much stronger belief towards empirical science than religious followings. Of course there would be no one else there that I know; I have broke contact with most of them a long long time ago, once they all started to get married and have children and thus need to care more about their families than some crockety old man who was still clinging on to the old ideals of geekiness.

The grandfather clock chimed and there was a rustling sound as the pallbearers shifted my coffin towards the cremation chamber. The strangers present muttered their own words of farewell to a man they hardly knew as my coffin enters the hop into the chamber itself. Within a few short minutes, I made it into the furnace and was cremated into an urnful of fine white ash.

As per my instructions, they took my urn of ashes and brought it out to sea, commending my remains forever into the ocean, to travel around the world in the ocean currents and to seek knowledge wherever I may be.

SMS Musing #2

While on the train, I just had that inclination to write something that occurred recently, and so here it is:

You would think that by now I would be used to the whole idea of going it alone, but I suppose I'm still human after all. These few days I have been interacting with one too many couples and it has a somewhat negative effect on me. I find myself a tad more anxious than usual, and somewhat more importantly, seemingly losing my ability to stay calm. I think I need to get back into the groove of not giving too much of a damn; must remember that when people are in a relationship, it has nothing to do with me, even if they choose to act all lovey dovey in front of me. That's the least that I can do for myself to do myself justice and avoid all these strange emotions. At the end of the day, those couples only have eyes for each other and don't really care about the people around them, no matter how close they are in friendship.

Tired?

Funny how things end up. Here I am about to embark on another leg of my life's journey, and instead of feeling excited, I feel tired.

Tired! For goodness sake, why am I feeling tired? This makes as much sense as the cow that refuses to eat grass, or the eagle that doesn't fly, or... well you get the idea.

Maybe it's the cubicle I'm in. It's too restrictive, too cramped. Or it could be the office environment, or that I don't really see a plausible and clear-cut shifting of one phase to the next---everything is an amorphous blob of blobbiness. Mostly likely the latter. I mean, even till now, nearly three days before I am at my last day, I'm still working on projects.

Maybe I'm no longer that great a workaholic as I think myself out to be. Perhaps that's a good thing.

I mean, I am liking the outdoors now. How much more strange/weird can it get?

Till the next rant.