Category: Observing Life

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I See I Write

American Idol Final 3

American Idol Final 3 episode is probably the best episode to watch. Though I have a personal preference to Katherine McPhee, watching the performance from Elliot Yamin, Taylor Hicks, and Katherine herself, it is kind of hard to tell which one is the best. They are all so good in their own way. Elliot, the underdog, whom I believe he has the best male vocal and all the wonderful riffs best suit in singing blue songs which I love a lot. Taylor, with his soothing and effortless singing and his so loosen-up, so totally enjoy himself when he is on stage. And Katherine, probably the most charming of all, with her stage presence and wonderful range that many may not get to appreciate the difficulties in the songs (midway key switch and all). I hate to see any one of them going home.

From the performance last night, I gather that most probably Katherine would be safe. Between Taylor and Eliot, Taylor has the more electrifying performance in the end. Not sure how true are the voting figures when the show flashed them on the big screen, the differences between each three of them were within less than 1%. That is pretty darn close.

It is not until Elliot get voted out did I realized that how much I actually like that guy – his love to his family and his passion in life. If he ever comes up with a record (blue music please), I will definitely buy it (I said no to Cynthia last time and by the way, I think Cynthia will be much devastated when she learns that Elliot is out).

PS1. I still don’t think I will buy Taylor’s album should he releases one.
PS2. Why Elliot?! Why not Taylor?! Sigh.
PS3. Well, good news! For sure, Cynthia and I will be voting for the same person next week … that is Katherine of course … Duh?!

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I See I Write

Oh Dear Katherine …

How time flies. This is the third week I am blogging on American Idol and I can’t believe that Katherine McPhee has made me worried once and again. Well, since there are four left – 3 guys and 1 girl – if she doesn’t screw up at all, she can easily get to the final. Alright, we shall see. Personally, I thought her 2nd song Can’t Help Falling In Love moves me.

I am a geek, I am not a geek, I am a geek, I am not a geek. I don’t know. I reckon not to stress myself up and learn what my new phone can offer (catching up on 6 years of mobile phone technology as a couple of days ago, I still lived in 2000). Yesterday was on how to transfer media files using USB cable. Today, I tried using my home wireless network. I was so surprised that my mobile phone can “talk” to my computer after 101 steps of configuration. The WEP key itself felt like 101 characters.

Anyway, I am pleased with my new phone. Very pleased. I do recommend N80. Go get it!

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Everyday News

Singapore General Election 2006

All along, I thought I belonged to the Yio Chu Kang Single Member Constituency (YCK SMC) because I am closer to YCK MRT (Mass Railway Transit) than anywhere else. I took my “On Government Service” voting card to Andersen Primary School at late afternoon (voting time was from 8am to 8pm) and surprisingly it was pretty empty. I literally walked straight through into the counter A2 whereby they ticked my name and gave me a voting slip. On it, it said Ang Mo Kio GRC (Group Representative Constituency). I was so happy because I would love to be in the same ward as the Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Hsien Loong. His father, the founder of Singapore, was the reason why I migrated to Singapore and I got to vote for him!

At 10pm, I turned on my TV and watched the result coming out on live. I was so excited that Cynthia was calling me a patriot in a nice way. I was logged onto an online game and I was so surprised that there were may PAP supporters within the online community.

Overall, I am very happy with the election result of government party PAP wining 66.6% (what’s up with this 6-6-6 thing and Cynthia’s birthday will be on 6-6-06) and PAP has won 82 seats in the Parliament out of 84 seats. A status quo …

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I See I Write

American Idol, Hooters, 6 Figures, and Power

Alright. The above was taken when Katherine performed last week in American Idol. Remember last week I was sort of upset that she was misjudged (and Simon did an apology on the result day). This week, she sort of messed up on the first song. Hope the second song saves her.

Met up with RC for lunch at Hooters – his beloved restaurant. Seriously, the standard of the waitresses have gone down real bad. While RC was still mesmerised from one of the DVD Chinese series (and he will lend to me while my wife Cynthia will be gone overseas next week), I was jaw dropped by his 6 figures leave encashment when he switched job and his ex-company paid him a performance bonus (or commission so as to say) in another 6 figures. Wow … that is a lot of money!

I was sharing with him how I have upgraded my PC and that I am considering getting a Plama TV. Our discussion went wild and if I am to upgrade my PC’s power supply (as a matter of time) and if I am to use my Hi-Fi and Plasma TV to play game … the power consumption would be … my PC (600W), Plasma TV (350W), and Hi-Fi (200W) … a total of closed to 1,200W of power! Well, to help you imagine, when the iron is on, it consumes 1,200W of power and the iron will go off once it is hot enough. My new entertainment system won’t.

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Everyday News

Outrages News on Rape

Headline news – Man Raped 5 Daughters with Help from His Wives. What is more than outrages is the defender’s lawyer’s reply.

An Islamic man with multiple wives has repeatedly raped his five teenage girls over a period of 18 months. This man even managed to convince his wives that he had ownership over his children, which included having sex with them. Two later became pregnant and had abortion.

Now, check out the laywer’s replies –

A. Mr Harold Seet denied that his client had been motivated by lust.

B. He said the patriarch, who ran his own firm, was stressed out by having to provide for his large family. To add to these worries, he learnt that the girls were behaving inappropriate with boys.

C. He concluded that having sex with his daughters to “satisfy” them, so they would be less likely to go with others, was the lesser of the two evils, said the lawyer.

Unbelievable counter-arguement … just unbelievable.

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I See I Write

I saw Stefanie Sun in HMV Orchard!

It has been a long and hard day for me so I was in need of some destress. Retail therapy I did. After I made payment at HMV Orchard, I sensed that a lot of people were looking at my direction. I looked around and saw someone resembled Stefanie Sun. After some careful observation, it was her.

I texted my friends about this exciting discovery. Some of them wished to be there. Some of them asked me if I have bought a CD of hers and asked for an autograph (duh? why didn’t I?). Some of them asked me how she looked like.

Well, she is short, her skin is as what some may have already know – not that good, but she is sweetly adorable. I did a search at Yahoo! and found that she is even featured at an Encyclopedia.

And by the way, someone has told me that gold colour is the “in-thing”. Stefanie Sun was indeed carrying a big golden coloured handbag.

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I See I Write

Realplayer For Real?!

I came across an album by Miho Karasawa and wish to check out her materials in the Internet. Turned out that I needed to install a Realplayer. After launching the Realplayer, I was greeted with many interesting movie titles such as: Love for Sale, My Sister the Geisha, Favourite Body Parts, Why Men Pay For It.

I clicked onto Love For Sale – L.A. Story and watched the trailer (to play the video, I will need a pass). Dialogue as follows:

Interviewee (girl) – “Women should be coming in no more than {paused} seven minutes. If you’re longer than seven minutes, you need my help. You need to come to me {pause}, ya. ”

Interviewer (girl) – “Where do you get seven minutes from?”

Interviewee – “That is about the point when you start to getting frustrated. If I am doing it, and I can’t come in a {paused}, I am usually like a two or three minutes girl. But if I can’t come in like seven minutes, for the first one, then I will get really frustrated. So I would {pause} say that, using me as the model, if I can, you know, if it takes you fourteen minutes to come, I can show you techniques that can cut that time in half.”

Now, I wonder what that technique is.

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I See I Write

Where Not to Buy Musical Equipment

Shop name: Sinamex
Address: Parklane Shopping Mall

Recently my wife and I have experienced some electric shock with our bass and electric guitar and after some first level troubleshooting, I suspected that it was the mixer that gave me the problem. Called Sinamex and the technical support asked me to bring the set back for diagnosis. Fine. I was so happy that the support was so helpful.

Bad luck for me, the support guy was not in. The boss was so totally cocky. After a very simplistic diagnosis and could not replicate the problem, here was some of the dialogues.

Poor Customer: (long explanation why I think it could due to a faulty mixer)
Cocky Boss: This is X-file.
Poor Customer: (felt like punching him on his face) X-file doesn’t exist man …
Cocky Boss: You bring it back and most likely it will be fine
Poor Customer: (tried once more to reason with him)
Cocky Boss: Do you play in church?
Poor Customer: (huh? does it matter?) No.

Poor Customer: Don’t you have some more sophisticated tools to diagnose the circuitary?
Cocky Boss: We have a set of diagnostic steps but I don’t see the problem.
Poor Customer: (ah, he is referring to the troubleshooting section in the manul … so much for their help) But I am really feeling the shock man …
Cocky Boss: It is impossible (giving me another X-file look)

And I walked away.

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I See I Write

Jap Restaurant + Rome (HBO)

I lived by inspiration and when it strikes, there is no stopping me from doing it. Just like that, I have braved the super traffic jam of Orchard to my destination at Taka. Well, before I go on, I must say the road planning in Singapore sucks. God knows how many cars travel from CBD to Taka and the number of vehicles changing lanes on that route is phenomenon. And you need to pay ERP somemore. Great brains we have in Singapore.

Anyway, Taka carpark was full so we, again, braved the traffic jam and parked at Wheelock Place. What did I want from Taka? No idea. My inspiration didn’t say. So we spent 75 mins on the road and had no idea what we were supposed to do.

We ended up in the same Japanese restaurant that TK has took us to a while back. Atmosphere was great with dim lighting and Japan-ish images projected onto white walls. The waitresses are efficient and … pretty. And the food quality is good. It is a fusion type. Worth a try. Price-wise, the menu has something relatively cheep (like S$11 for a bowl of chicken rice – Japanese style of course) to something I can’t afford. The Sake is pretty bad though by the way.

Restaurant Name: Sun with Moon
Tel: 6733-6636

Rushed home for the HBO original series ROME. Now, that is a great show. Half way through the show (each episode is 50 mins and we are onto the 6th-ish one), I said to my wife: hey, this show is less about Caesar and his war. And my wife – an avid reader of Life!, OK!, People! – told me that what so original about this movie is that it is presented from the commoners’ perspective.

The dialogue is very funny. Like a guy said to his fellow solder: my wife doesn’t couple with me anymore. Or … this one is the best … the mother asked her son: Son, have you penetrated anyone yet? Her son hesitated and replied: No. And the mother sent a solder to take the son to a whore house. How I wish I had a mother like that …

Kidding.

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Everyday News

I Support the New Singapore Integrated Resorts

Many Singaporeans are against the Integrated Resorts (IR) proposal because IR comes with a casino. In fact, none of my Singaporean friends I have talked to support the idea of having a casino here in Singapore. They feel that it is not necessary and casino will spell social issues.

Granted, gambling is a vice on its own, and so is alcoholism (heavily taxed) and prostitution (legalised and regulated). In my opinion, casual gambling is closer to alcoholism than prostitution. I don’t gamble but I do know that people here in Singapore do gamble one way or another. Lottery is gambling, playing mahjong is gambling, horse racing beting is gambling, visiting casino in Genting, Malaysia is gambling … How will a casino harm our society when there are so many regulated gambling spots inside and near Singapore? Answer is no, people don’t suddenly pick up or get addicted to gambling because there is a new casino. Serious gamblers gamble anyway, with or without a casino.

Coming from Hong Kong, I do welcome this Integrated Resort idea. This will make Singapore more vibrant. It is time to give back the people the freedom of choice that the Singaporeans are so deprived of.