Sentiments

Kok Hoong and Man Yee are such lovely couple I am honoured to be invited to their wedding. It warms my heart knowing about relationship that worked out.

Anyway, I don't intend to write about the wedding lunch. It's what happened after that that I want to share.

I left the lunch deeply sentimental. This is nothing new, I tend to be sentimental after a gathering, especially a joyous one. Probably only my wife knows about this since she is the only one who is with me after everyone has gone their seperate ways.

But my wife is not with me today, so no one to talk me out of that sentimental state, and my mind wandered. Unfortunately, when I am left alone in this state of mind with no one to talk to, I have the tendency to turn melancholy.

I had such desire to talk to someone, there are a lot of feelings I want to express, or perhaps unburden is a more appropriate word.

I tried to think of someone who I could call up and unload all these sentiments, who wouldn't mind me babbling away and yet understand and could empathise.

I thought about my wife, knowing she was probably watching Transformer 2 at that very moment, and would be occupied by His Royal Highness King Baby Hsiang until late evening. Besides, I am not sure if she could still resonate with me, Hsiang is taking up all her time and energy.

I tried to find a candidate within my colleagues, some of whom I consider my friends. After all, I was just among many of them a while ago. However, I couldn't think of anyone that I could just call and talk without constraints. No, none of my colleagues truely knows me. Sad, but true.

I searched in my mind among my old friends, while one or two of them used to be close enough and understood me enough for me to do so, we have distanced since I went overseas. This saddens me.

This feeling of... emptiness? Something missing? This void, is also the reason I named the first site where I expressed and shared online as Solitude.

I am surrounded by people, yet I feel so alone.

Home Alone

Those who are sharp eye and observant may notice that the posting time of this entry is in the morning, on a Friday...

Hooor! CK is skiving and finally broke his "no blogging while working" habit! Go tell his boss!

It's true that I am skiving, and it's also true that I am blogging on a Friday morning, but hor, I am on leave ler!

I may be the slacker extraordinaire who skives off once in a while to play foosball or to check on the well being of colleagues or to chit chat, but I am also a responsible employee.

Best no elaborate on that as it will hurt my slacker extraordinaire reputation. Already aware of two colleagues who want to steal that title.

Anyway, took a few days off work since I have already reached a saturated state and cannot take it anymore. I have to get away from work, a break so I can recharge before I throw myself into work again.

With family member all away these few days, I have the house to myself. While I do miss my wife and my son, I rather enjoy being alone since I can walk around naked. The peace and quiet.

It may be mind-numbing to others but boring person like me is content to stay at home, read a couple of books, watch a few movies, sing a tune or two, play some computer games. That to me, is a nice break.

Oh ya, and I can blog in the morning on a weekday without feeling guilty! =)

On a unrelated note:

May you rest in peace and be remembered for your songs and great dance moves, Michael Jackson.

Karaoke is the Bestest!

To me, singing my lungs out (more like shouting really) in a confined room where my noise making action that I try to pass as singing would only embarrass me in front of those limited to the room, has got to be one of the most effective stress reliefs.

Thanks to a bunch of friends who willingly submitted themselves to be tortured by my out-of-tune banshee wailing, I got a much needed relief today.

Oh boy how I needed that.

I feel much better now, thank you so veli the much! =)

*pffft...*

Last month...

Last week...

Yesterday...

It's high time for me to take a break from work.

Fall Guy.inc

A fall guy is a person who takes the blame or being punished on something he or she did not do, in other words, the scapegoat.

Despite me being decent, considerate and generally nice to my colleagues (I think I hear the sound of vomiting...), I find myself being used as the fall guy way too often. So often that nowadays most colleagues will automatically associate me with any pranks, jokes or nasty stuff that happened in the office.

"Who wrapped that cubicle in newspaper?"

"CK lor"

"Who sent that prank-mail?"

"CK lor"

"Who's fault was it?"

"CK lor"

"Who wrapped CK's car in newspaper?"

"CK lor"

...

And you know what? People actually believe it's real.

Why oh why? >_<

Me is so veli the innocent!

Oh well, since I can't change how my colleagues perceived me, misguided as it is, I may as well make the most of the situation.

So I am annoucing Fall Guy.inc, my scapegoat service. I will take the fall for you for a reasonable, pre-arranged, highly negotiable price!

The cost of my service will vary according to the magnitude of the fall you want me to take on your behalf and the size and significance of the target audience of your wrong-doing. Cash only service and payment to be made before service is rendered.

I provide customised response to fit your specific need, from a simple "yes, it's all my fault" to elaborate make believe story of the highest quality.*

Satisfactory guaranteed or your money back!**

Do note that as I have started this service, any use of me as a scapegoat without prior agreement will automatically authorise me to charge whatever payment I deemed fit. Consider yourself warned.

* premium service incurs premium charge

** only 60% will be returned as 40% of the agreed upon payment will be charged for trying

Seriously, stop associating me with all the pranks and jokes ler, I veli the nice one!

Reading is Good (May 09)

Read three books in May. Initially I wanted to write this review at the start of June... Yes yes, my procrastination skill is pretty high, it comes with being the slacker extraordinare, *ehem*.

=P

-----

Silencer by Campbell Armstrong is not a bad read. The story is about the disappearance of people in the US Federal Witness Protection Program, many of whom ended up being found dead.

image source

The former state prosecutor named Amanda Scholes, who sent a few of her witnesses to the Program, started asking difficult question and probing about the Witness Protection Program. Things like whether of not the Program was being penetrated? Whether or not corruption was in play?

The storyline unfolds in dynamic and gripping pace, however towards the middle of it it got ridiculous for me, since almost all named character end up dead. It's like, if some character was named and given a short background history of, then you can pretty much say bye bye to him or her, that person is gonna die.

That said, it's a good story nevertheless.

Quote from the novel:

"Kinda proper, kinda aloof. But hot in the sack."

-----

I reread Digital Fortress by Dan Brown due to two reasons:

(1) I wrote this, in which I talked about wax, which in turn reminded me about the "without wax" code, with which I signed off that entry in

(2) Angels & Demons was showing on cinemas during that time, which put Dan Brown to the front of my mind

image source

The story still enthralled me and made me turned the pages non-stop even when it was my second time through.

The story revolves around a USD1.9 billion, three million processors working in parallel super computer (Intel inside?) called TRANSLTR that breaks encryption by sheer brute force attack. That is, the super computer (Intel inside!) simply guesses and uses trial-and-error method to break codes.

The US government used TRANSLTR so they could read encrypted e-mails and messages sent by the terrorists. Of course they could read personal e-mails of anyone as well hence there was a strong protest aginst TRANSLTR.

Digital Fortress is about a catching story of all these, and more. In typical Dan Brown style, there are many twists and turns, hidden agendas, assasinations, secrets...

And of course, there is this code: without wax. =)

Fantastic read, in fact, all four Dan Brown's novels are fantastic reads, go grab a copy now!

Quotes from the novel:

"Everything is possible. The impossible just takes longer."

"Regardless of the country, it seems there was one universal truth when it came to offices: Nobody could stand the sound of an unanswered phone."

"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" (who will guard the guards?)"

-----

The Cobra Event by Richard Preston is scary, but great!

I couldn't find an exact image of the cover of the book I have, mine is red in colour but I simply couldn't find it so I picked this white colour version instead.

image source

The Cobra Event is about a devastating biological weapon that has been released in New York and the containment, detective work, investigation and tracking that led to the final take down of the criminal.

The storyline is very gripping and the description graphical which leaves vivid images in the reader's mind, the effect of the lethal biological weapon was described in such horrifying details it's totally believable. Everything was written with such authenticity it makes the story scaringly real.

Superb novel, go read!

I Will Haunt You!

If I ever died due to work related causes like stress, heart attack, busting a blood vessel, et cetera, I would sacrifice my place at the heaven (yea, nice people like me go to heaven one) and choose to be a ghost so I could haunt these people...

I would haunt Mr Memory for being the pain in the arse empty bucket who excelled in saying the obvious (loudly no less) until he finally produces a simulation job fitting his self-proclaimed expert skill and until he actually does an honest work duration and load that earns him three times my salary. Empty bucket makes the most noise indeed, and I am sick of it!

I would also haunt Mr Chicken Shit for the crime that landed us with Mr Memory and for his kiasi attitude of flinging his shits at others expecting the others to pull his weight while he rakes in the credits. I would haunt him until he becomes responsible and accountable for all his shits and not using the others to take the fall for him. In other words, I would haunt him until he grows some balls.

Lastly, I would also haunt The Pink Master for all the woes and griefs and head-meets-wall moments he induces. Actually I would just haunt him for the sake of it because I know he would do the same to me given the chance. I would haunt him until... I don't know, until it's no longer fun to haunt him. =P





Yea, I had a bad day.

Not only was I unable to fulfil my plan of enjoying the free movie screening in the second half of the day, I worked till 20:00 hours on a freaking Friday, things went down the drain no thanks to the incompetency of the other.

Burning Out

I think I am at the brink of burning out.

Today when colleagues asked whether I was ready to go home and I said "yes, wait for me", they were surprised. Since for the past few months, my reply had always been the same:

"You all go first lar, I still have work to do."

Today, it's not that I didn't have work still to do, I was in fact half way post-processing a model results, but I simply couldn't take it anymore. So in a very uncharacteristic move I left the work half done, shut down, and cabut.

The long working hours and rushes of work had finally taken their toll, I am constantly tired recently and I perceived a decline in my efficiency.

Me think, it's high time for a break.

After all, I have a slacker reputation to maintain.

On a funnier note, a colleague said I was motivating people going from one cubicle to the next...

Me motivating people when I lepak around because I needed a break from my work?!?!??

I found that ridiculous so I laughed. On hindsight I should probably feel flattered and be smug. =P

Seriously I don't know how some of my colleagues perceived me. Come on lar, don't say it like it's real ler! =P

小天使

嘿，小天使

爸爸是该昨天和你聊聊的

但是爸爸健忘老糊涂啦

今天才惊觉已逾期了

你不会怪爸爸吧？

爸爸会尽量提醒自己

每年的这一天和你谈谈天

告诉你我们没有忘了你

你也该知道

你一直都在爸妈的心中

你在天使云集的地方过得好好吧？

有没有常常瞭望远方的我们？

妈妈怀着第二个宝宝啦

还不知道是个弟弟或妹妹

你会看顾着它吧？

喂，小天使

当爸爸妈妈终于和你团聚时

你要记得给我们个热情的拥抱

和带我们去遨游天堂喔！

乖乖了，我的小天使

pause work GO play

Department is making a t-shirt for the up-coming teambuilding event and if all went as planned, we should see something similar to the following.

Ideally, the catch phrase will look something like this:

For those who don't get it, it reads: "pause work GO play", and remember, you see it here first! =P

It's the result of a sudden brain wave that hit me when I was driving home yesterday thinking that I got to do something about the t-shirt design.

No disrespect to the other t-shirt designers but the original design of stick figures holding hands is just a tad too cute, bordering on childish, for my taste.

Please don't hate me. =(

The catch phrase design went through a few iterations before settling into this one. At the very beginning the word "work" didn't exist, in its place I drew a laptop, but I cannot draw a laptop well and a single "GO" word seems a bit odd. So it ended with this one.

Also, a stop button instead of pause was considered but I decided to stick with pause since I don't want my colleagues to throw away their works, I just want them to take a break for the teambuilding event.

Else boss will fire my arse for sending the wrong message! =P

A few pictures of leisure to represent great place to work were drawn, out of those I picked five. These will go on the back of the shirt. I dropped a few pictures like balloon, kite, playstation.

Hopefully we will see something similar to these on the department t-shirt soon. =)

Oh, and if you see someone with no respect of intellectual property plagiarising these images and this fantastic catch phrase *ehem*, feel free to collect royalty on my behalf.

Just remember to give me my cut! =P

Talking to Oneself is the First Sign of Insanity

(and I talk to myself all the time)

I have quite a few things in mind that I want to write about, but brain refused to engage in anything "heavy" so I am just going to blurt out this new thought that popped up in my mind.

Therefore, instead of doing a review on the three novels I read in April, or a rant on how disgraced I felt when I read that KL has been ranked 5th in the most dangerous/risky city in the world, or talk about how my baby hates me so much that he is trying to suffocate me with pillow, I am going to write about the thing I do best...

...make fun of myself! =D (oi, give face and laugh ler!)

There are a lot of people that simply can't admit they are in anyway less than the others. You know, some people are just so full of themselves it's rather funny. *cough*egomaniac*cough*

Me? I have no problem admitting I am ugly, bald, boring, lousy, slow, have goldfish memory, and crazy. Plus other things that slipped off my mind at the moment, goldfish memory, remember?

No problem admitting all that (and more), since it's true.

Not accepting the truth is recipe for unhappiness, and meh! My life's too short to be wasted in unhappiness.

Ugly? Yup! Wife said I am ugly and on a few occasions, VERY ugly. Since only her opinion counts in this as far as I am concerned, so I am ugly. What? You think everyone is Tom Cruise meh? Ugly mar ugly lor, wife pretty and baby cute can already, make other people even more jealous! =P

Bald? Yea, hairline wants to recede, hair wants to drop, what to do? Not everybody is a movie star who has lots of money to throw into keeping up their appearance one. Not bad what, no need to spend time combing hair every morning and hair cut is a swift and practically free affair as we have invested in a hair clipper.

Boring? I don't follow any sports, or motor race, or any particular music. I don't touch politics even with a ten feet pole, I am not really into gadgets (since I am poor), I shop only when I have something to buy, I have no fashion sense whatsoever (and am proud of it). Seriously, I am a boring person.

Lousy? Just name one thing I am good at, I am sure I can tell you at least three people who can do it better (there are obviously more than three who are better than I am, just that my goldfish memory can remember three, at best). I have no problem acknowledging people with better skill than I do. My ego doesn't require me to be the top of anything, I have no problem being average and crappier than the pro.

Slow? Just... observe... me... more... and... you... will... know... this... is... undeniable.

Goldfish memory? What's did I want to put in this liao huh? Hmm...

Crazy? Wuahahaha! Depression is a psychological illness, a mental problem. I suffer depression from time to time, so I am truely mentally imbalanced, or in another word, I am insane!

Okay, here's the punchline, or what I think is the punchline since technically punchline should be something funny but I don't think mine is funny at all, more like thought provoking.

Anyway...

It's said that only those who are secure about themselves can make fun of themselves and laugh with the others while doing so. Either that, or they are crazy.

Yea, I am crazy. =P