A shot and more

Working in a fun-filled place, a few of us (CF, fangers, WYee and i) signed up for a non-scientific seminar—whisky appreciation and tasting. Yeah~~ I’m not an alcoholic.. but I just wanted to go have fun. Hee. A pity, that CF fell sick and couldn’t make it last minute. Fangers and I were late due to work, and arrived just in time to hear the speaker give his closing line. That means DRINKING TIME!! ^_^

I tried 1 shot each of 3 different kinds of whisky (Sullivan’s Cove), from 40% to 60%. Whoaa.. it was all so strong.. esp the 60% ones, can feel it burning! Haha.. luckily, being scientific pple, we knew to take in fats like cheese and chocolates to prevent ourselves from getting drunk (we had to get back to work after tt!) I think my favourite was the 4^th and final one, a whisky cream! I didn’t know that such a thing exists.. and it tasted really good! Like icecream.. like rum n raisin with extra extra rum. Haha.

After the whole event, with everyone happy and satisfied with the high-ness of alcohol/cheese/choc, there was a lucky draw. Sponsored by Lexus, a whole wine set! And… CF won!! BUT, since she wasn’t around, the prize was given to the next name drawn.. Ahboon. Bleah. We went to ‘confront’ Ahboon.. and he actually offered to give the prize to CF! So nice.. haha. That was also the first time I talked to Ahboon since I left the company for a long holiday. It feels weird talking to him this time. Too much resemblance.. I wonder if he has a long lost brother who’s 1 year his junior..

Fruity Spas

It's Nut Spas day in Russia today (29th aug). I vaguely remember an Apple Spas day some time ago, also from Russia. I wonder what this hoo-ha is, about Fruits n nuts and Spas.. and so i checked it out..

The August, the last month of the summer season, when the harvest is sown, is usually celebrated by three holidays called "Spas" in Russia.
The first "Spas" is called Honey Spas (August 14);
The second "Spas" is called Apple Spas (August 19);
The third one is called Nut Spas (August 29).
Spas brings cold dew to lands and meadows. After the first Spas honey is collected, the second Spas brings fresh fruit and the third one, nuts.

The above information was obtained from here.

Ah. And i thought they meant bathing in apples, then in nuts.. XD

I want a holiday~

I know it's still early in the semester, too soon after my 3 month long holiday break, to say that i want a holiday. But sometimes.. as i think of how few days i have a year to myself, i really don't know how i should spend them!! 10 days a year, means there's a limit to what i can do! The only way is to make use of conference holidays, and extend my days from there! haha.. thus looking at feasible conferences on the calender, i foresee myself getting holidays in australia, US and maybe europe! haha.. of course, tt's just me dreaming. I guess i should always start small (and near), such as Australia? Just as well.. a place that i've yet to visit ^_^

Just happened to be surfing (no i'm not THAT free, but we do need rest sometimes), and i found a really cool thing called DialAFlight, where we can CALL to book our flights to Australia, as well as customize our entire holiday! Well i simply love the fact that it can be customized simply by TELLING the person on the other line, with no need to do all the surfing and planning at all. Imagine telling the person "hi, i want to visit Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide and Gold Coast, all within 10 days. Please plan everything for me. Thanks!" That's it! Perfect holiday to australia coming right up! ^_^

it’s just a passing remark

Was just having a chat with bong. And we started talking about how sometimes people say things without knowing that we really hate hearing those things. It’s not their fault, coz they may either be insensitive, or it may simply be a normal passing remark that means nothing more to others. Who’d know which particular phrase you’re more sensitive to? And who has the right to tell them not to make certain comments, simply coz you’re more sensitive to it? It’s just like I don’t like hearing vulgarities around me, but who am I to tell everyone around me to refrain from using them? Yeah, I may have been wronged in some cases.. but it’s not like it’s a huge misunderstanding.. it’s just tt the passing remark doesn’t apply to me, but the person making it doesn’t know. A harmless mistake, does it really require rectification? Bong thinks I am abit in denial.. but I am just.. lazy. Lol. Life still goes on anyway~

Holiday season coming up again!

It's almost september.. and the whole FSC is talking about the festive season, how we celebrated it last year, how we hope it to be this year! First there's Mooncake festival coming up.. i wonder if we'll have free mooncakes again! (That was the first time i had a few group shots with them, i remember). THen.. there's thanksgiving! woohoo~ thanksgiving last year was the first official meeting of the FSC, and sure did we stuff ourselves with 'TURKEY' and other homemade food!! Last but not least, to end the year, we have Christmas~~

Christmas is definitely more than just gifts, for it is the day Christ was born. Yet, i will still not forget that i grew up with presents under our family Christmas tree.. which kinda stopped in recent years. Guess my mum n my sis are the only ones who still continue this tradition. I wonder what i will get for my family, if i ever do? hmm...

dad: i really dunno what to get. maybe something useful for his frequent traveling.. from travelocity coupons~
mum: music vcds, maybe hokkien OST of the newest craze 881!!
sis: maybe tonnes of shopping vouchers.. maybe some brands she seldom frequent.. like AmericanEagleOutifitters deals (which i like too~)
bro: a loop machine.. or whatever he calls that. it costs hundreds of dollars, for something the size of a calculator! >.< promo codes!!! ^_^

Goodfellas, Ivy’s Vendetta

I didn’t realize, that it’s been almost 2 years since I last met Tong. That was when he gave me a farewell treat, before I left to study in the States.

Things have changed so much in these 2 years. From the hall-boy who is always playing, wakes up late and skips all lessons, Tong now wakes up at 5+ in the morning and can even skip soccer games just to do work. Amazing. I am now the one who is unable to wake up properly before 9am to attend my classes. >.<

After a nice, healthy dinner at Sushi Don, we made our way to Timbre to chillout. Bong happened to be there with a friend too! It’s been exactly one month since I last went there, and still not a Friday, thus no timmy. >.<>

First up on stage, was Ivy’s Vendetta. Disappointing, I’d say. The singer was totally unable to build the atmosphere. After a short while, the band left and the regular Saturday band, The Goodfellas, was up. I’ve heard a lot about this band, and had high hopes. Indeed, the band was quite cute, and was very energetic. They were way better than Ivy’s Vendetta lah. But.. I still didn’t enjoy myself that much. For one, the music was not what I was looking for. The songs.. weren’t that nice. Friends commented that it’s too “teen punk”. Haha. Another thing was, the ambience. They are good at raring up the audience, getting everyone to dance. But, unfortunately, this crowd at timbre was mainly there to chillout, not to dance and be high. Thus, I felt it was a good band in the wrong place.

All in all, all 4 of us didn’t really like the experience yesterday. Too loud, wrong music.. Bong and I both feel that they’d like timmy more, just like we do. Miss timmy.. It’s been more than 3 months since we last heard timmy. Boohoohoo…

As usual, I exit from my supervisor’s office all excited. It was a discussion about my advisory committee, and the people we’ve decided to recruit, are top internationally recognized people! And I always think back, on how I ended up in this lab.. which dates back to 4 years ago, before I even entered university! That’s how God’s plan is. Detailed to the very last bit, and we may not know what each event means until many years later. ^_^

***

How quickly certain events can dampen my spirits. A discussion of Catholicism vs Christianity. So coincidental, to follow what Lin and I were discussing yesterday about different denominations. I don’t deny that outer beauty has been getting more and more important to people nowadays, but organizing beauty pageants within a church, is simply overdoing it! And to dismiss people dressing scantily to church as ‘westernization’ of the church, is simply unacceptable! What is this westernization, where the most ‘scantily’ clad people I see in American churches (at least to those I’ve been to) are people wearing T-shirts? So where is this ‘western’ group of people that dress scantily to church, that churches in Singapore have to follow suit?

***

Is this, spiritual warfare? I can’t wait to start that bible study topic with my cg, half a year later. As I thought about these issues, I thought of the Armor of God, which I discovered later on, SO VERY COINCIDENTALLY, was my quiet time material for today!!

The Armor of God

10Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. 12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. 18And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints. Ephesians 6:10-18

Do you have Consciousness?

I love the optical illisions offered at the end.. ^_^ (i did those before in Penn.. and got paid! hehe~)

Philosopher Dan Dennett makes a compelling argument that not only don't we understand our own consciousness, but that half the time our brains are actively fooling us. As he puts it, our bodies are made up of 100 trillion little robots, none of them with an individual consciousness. So what makes us feel we have one? Or that we're in control of it? Dennett's hope is to show his audience that "Your consciousness is not quite as marvelous as you may have thought it is." He uses thought experiments and optical illusions to demonstrate to the TED audience that even very big brains are capable of playing tricks on their owners. taken from TedTalks

Toys that make Worlds

Check this out! really cool... to those who play SIMS, it's OUT!!!! the new game is SPORE.

In a friendly, high-speed presentation, Will Wright demos his newest game, Spore, which promises to dazzle users even more than his previous masterpieces. Here Wright encourages users to create not households, as in The Sims, or cities, as in SimCity, but the entire universe, from single-celled life forms to galactic physics. While guiding us through his mesmerizing beta, Wright shares his thoughts on Montessori schools, Darwinian theory and long-term thinking, emphasizing, throughout, that Spore is not so much a game as an opportunity for discovery -- "an imagination amplifier." taken from Ted Talks

Atrophy of entire body

So exhausted. I can’t believe the 2.5 months of wasting away really caused my body to deteriorate so much! I was following a colleague around yesterday (learning new skills), standing and watching her do her experiments from 9am-6pm. And guess what? I was so tired out simply by watching her, that I concussed at 930pm last night and only woke up at 830am this morning! I totally cannot believe myself.. to think that during my peak last year I could actually do experiments for 16 hours in a row (from 7am to 11pm)!!!! I’d better start training up my body again.. both physically and mentally.. it sure is tiring to be just thinking of experiments the whole day!! >.<

DONE!

Today marks the day I finish my first grad module. It has been a really happy process, of getting to know PeckYean, who introduced me to Jasmine, and the rest (Mayyin, Ben, ZhiAng) whom I was to do my term presentation with. Surprisingly, one of the group members was Adrian, whom I met 2 years ago during an internship! The world is so small. ^_^ I had a really great time doing project discussions and filming videos with this bunch of people. Totally hilarious! So proud of them all.. well done for the presentation today guys! Looking forward to seeing you all again for Research Ethics Part2~~ ^_^

Welcome back

I happened to read a post 3 months back, on 31^st may. On farewells. And I remember my boss holding a farewell party for me, together with my welcomeback party. Yes, I am finally back. And it feels SO GOOD to be back! ^_^ There were still weird “first day at work” kind of feeling.. but I was assured of a good working environment and pleasant colleagues. Even the 4-hour safety briefing seemed more fun than ever. And best of all, I am back to my old desk!! Whoahaha.. last week they dismantled it, but today it’s back to normal! They must have finally realized tt my new office table is not ready yet, thus they built me back my old table. So all’s back to normal.. Hee~

Motivation

I chanced upon Sandee’s blog a couple of months ago, from bong’s blog (and later linked it to my own as Days Without Rain). Today, I went to read it again. And as I read the story of this strong woman battling cancer, I am reminded of why I have chosen this career path, and I am all the more motivated to do my part well. Work starts tomorrow. Work on Breast Cancer. I am sorry that I cannot do much. And I know, that world-shattering discoveries may not come from me in the near future, but I know that with all the little pieces of the puzzle we each contribute, we’ll manage to improve the lives of many cancer patients by the day. This is all I can do to help.. press on..

Fill us..

We’re like glasses.. Christ’s love is like water.. He fills us with His love, up to the brim, and yet not ending. This love overflows, and saturates everything around us. However, if we, as glasses, do not allow to be filled with water, and yet desire to spread the love without being filled, we will only wear ourselves out, just like hinges that have not been oiled. Hence, we have to take time to sit down, rest in the Lord, let Him fill us with his love, before we can spread His love. Be in His love, before we can love. ^_^

12 layers...

Arzhou tagged me.. he said he felt like he was making some cake.. as i read on.. i finally understand why.. LOL

Layer 1: On The Outside
Name:
Birth Date:
Current Status: Single
Eye Colour: Black
Hair Colour: Jack black

Layer 2: On The Inside
My Heritage: mix of Hakka and Hokkien
My Fears: lots.. all creepy crawlies..
My Weaknesses: always bound by time..
My Perfect Pizza: thin crust, lots of cheese, tonnes of every topping i can find.. pepperoni, tomatoes, mushrooms.. i love pineapples on my pizza too!!

Layer 3: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
My First Thoughts of waking Up: what day is it today? what time am i supposed to wake up?
My Bed Time: before midnight
My Most Missed Memories: traveling overseas.. the weather, the culture, the freedom from time

Layer 4: My Pick
Pepsi or Coke: Neither…. i don't like soft drinks
McDonalds or Burger King: both! haha. these 2 happens to be my 2 fav fast food restaurants
Single or Group Dates: ah... no preference
Adidas or Nike: used to be nike, now is ADIDAS!! ^_^
Tea or Nestea: Tea
Chocolate or Vanilla: CHOC!
Cappuccino or Coffee: neither. not a coffee person

Layer 5: Do You…
Smoke: NO! it makes ur lungs turn black, it gives u mouth/lung/stomach cancer etcetcetc
Curse: no! and i dun like hearing pple do so either
Take A Shower: Of course! (except when i was in tibet, tt is)
Have A Crush: have.. means at the moment.. no
Go To School: yea~
Want To Get Married: haha yes
Believe In Yourself: yeah~
Think You’re A Health Freak: haha...err.. i analyse things.. but whether i do them or not, is another matter. i used to be one.. no longer.. life's too short to be too into these things >.<

Layer 6: In The Past
Drink Alcohol: Social Drinker
Gone to the Mall: how long in the past? i hated shopping when i was a kid
Been on Stage: Yes. millions of times, in fact
Eaten Sushi: love it
Dyed Your Hair: Not once in my life…. black is the unique color now

Layer 7: Have You Ever…
Played A Stripping Game: nope
Changed Who You Were To Fit In: nope, I pretty much like who i am

Layer 8: Are You Hoping To…
Get Married: yes. (isn't this a repeat question?)

Layer 9: In A Guy
Best Eye Colour: Anything
Best Hair Colour: Anything
Short or Long Hair: short lah. dun like long haired guys

Layer 10: What You Were Doing
A Minute Ago: chatting with fangers on our upcoming conference!! ^_^
Hour Ago: Wii with my bro~
Four And A Half Hours Ago: completing my 12-hr exam paper today
A Month Ago: traveling around taiwan
A Year Ago: working in GIS.. with all my might.. and living in oblivion

Layer 11:
I Love: my current life
I Hate: vulgarities
I Hide: my secrets
I Miss: traveling
I Need: more wisdom

Layer 12: Tag 5 People

Bongbong
Vivien (sis)
Guobin
Jueqi
Plhu

God’s blessings

Today was the day that my CG arranged to meet for an outing. We haven’t had an outing in ages, and this time round, we decided that Ben should open up his house and cook a fantastic meal for us!! And so it was fixed…

Unfortunately, last week in school, I was outvoted and thus my first grad school exam was arranged to be today as well!! Being a 12 hour paper from 9am-9pm, I couldn’t possibly make it for lunch outing with my cg anymore!!

BUT.. God always has his way of working. Today’s exam question… was the very topic that my group chose to do a presentation on!! How coincidental could that be? The lecturers know that we chose this topic for the presentation (which is next week), but I am not sure why they still put this as an exam question. Anyway, the brain-wrecking discussion I had with my group a couple of days back really did pay off!! I managed to jot down most of the main arguments in point form within 2 hrs, and made it to CG outing!! It was a very good afternoon spent together in fellowship.. and I made it back home to finish up the essay in less than half an hour! Praise the Lord!! ^_^ (which was 2 hrs before the submission deadline, thus I even had time to watch my Taiwan tv serial AND play wii with my bro~~~~)

(din make it for Lin’s church production tho. At least.. it went well. Congrats gal ^_^)

boredd...

It's 2 hours into my exam now. I still have 10 hours to go. But i am soooo bored!! I need a break. So looking forward to the CG meeting cum lunch outing later. ^_^

to make things short..

I managed to get my way simply by DEH-ing, even though it was to a girl!! Muahahaha.. I think my deh-ing powers have improved tremendously!! So proud of myself!! heez.. I convinced the company to let me start work on Monday, even though I haven’t gotten the approval letter!! Made them bend the rules a little, and summore at 530pm on a Friday evening, when everyone was already packing up to go home!! >.<

Thanks to L, who finally succumbed to my deh-ing. I have my reasons for wanting to go back this Monday.. I will remember your kindness.. ^_^

I signed up for PPP!

Heard about payperpost from Arzhou a couple of months back. I had noticed that his blogs have an extra phrase "this is a sponsored post" below many of his entries. He later so kindly introduced it to me, as one of his many ways to "conveniently" make money. Him being quite a trustable source (in my opinion), i decided to give it try. Alas, one of PayPerPost's requirements was not met by my blog--blog age. Though i started blogging in 2003, i had recently changed blog address (due to weird things happening to my prevous blog template that couldn't seem to be solved), and that made my blog less than 90 days old!! I've waited soooo long for my blog to turn 90 days, before I finally got it approved. NOW, i can start earning some extra tea-time money! Being a student means we're not that rich, thus the need for extra income in ways like that. YAY~ Now i can start going out more often for afternoon tea or a cup of coffee when i'm free!! It's so convenient! Not like I am going all the way out to do something that makes my life difficult. I am just blogging as usual. Why not try it too? blog network rocks!!~~ ^_^

Hotelreservations.com

Since i haven't yet started work, i was surfing around to find some good traveling deals, in preparation of my next (but not-so-soon) trip.. hopefully to Alaska or Egypt! ^_^ Anyway, i came across this website, Hotel Reservations. It is one of the more user-friendly travel websites, where it covers all services ranging from hotels, motels, flights, cars, to whole vacation packages.

Since the first thing you need to travel out of the country, is the flight (duh), i checked out the airline prices.. since i had recently flown to quite a few countries AND booked these flights myself, i decided to check out the range of airlines this webby covers, and the price range it offers. I tried a whole range of countries, from various states in the United States, to Taipei, Shanghai (pudong), and even Tibet. The results from the search... showed that the range of airlines covered by this website, is comparable to many other travel websites. However, the price range is only average, being comparable to most websites, but not providing the best promotion rates.

Then.. i decided to skip directly.. to 'vacation packages'!! haha.. the easy way out eh. And i must say.. i was truly amazed at the wide range of holiday destinations these webby covers!! The whole list of cities/countries.. took me so long to scroll and decide what place i wanted to check out! And the hotel list given.. is as extensive as the country list! whoahaha... this is really quite good.. and it's ultra user friendly, with pictures of all hotels provided! i love it manz... it's really like a one-stop travel planner! With regards to the prices, they're quite normal. Nothing too exaggerating, but at the same time no ultra cheap prices that are too good to be true. But since the prices are average, and the hotel/country list is so extensive, i pretty much like this site now!! ^_^ Strongly recommended for anyone who's planning a holiday! ^_^ Doesn't matter which place you're heading to.. they have it! (At first i thought that the website would be more established for common travel destinations like US and Europe only.. but i discovered that it had some really exotic places.. more than 1410 destinations!)

19th month anniversary

Yesterday (6th aug 2007) marks the 19th month since the birth of the Chestnutties, the 6 people who coincidentally met in a foreign land and ended up under one roof at 4007 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA.

Well, a few of us kinda celebrated our 18th month at Timbre. Pacey, however, wrote a blog post on us this month. Really wonderful memories.. miss you all too! (guys AND gal ^_^)

Sit up straight

A couple of days back, I arrived at school not in the best of moods after receiving some bad news. As I sat at the bus stop waiting for the NUS shuttle bus, my mind was a blank. From the side of my eye, I saw a guy wearing a bright yellow t-shirt (and thus attracting a lot of attention) walk towards me and squeezed in between me and the gal sitting beside me. He looked a lot like a friend of mine, but a lot younger. I just continued staring at my feet. But I couldn’t help noticing that he suddenly sat up really straight. Like, you know, trying to look taller. LOL. Such a small little action, and nobody else’s business. But it reminded me of someone who did that before too. Hahaha. Happy memories. And I was instantly cheered up. By an intention-less action, coming from a random stranger. Things happen in weird ways, don’t they? ^_^

The 'Experience Machine'

“Suppose there was a machine that would give you any experience you desired. Superduper neuropsychologists could stimulate your brain so that you would think and feel you were writing a great novel, or making a friend, or reading an interesting book. [Or even doing fantastic science for which you receive a Nobel Prize.] All the time you would be floating in a tank, with electrodes attached to your brain. Should you plug into this machine for life, preprogramming your life experiences? If you are worried about missing out on desirable experiences, we can suppose that business enterprises have researched thoroughly, the lives of many others. You can pick and choose from their large library or smorgasbord of such experiences, selecting your life’s experiences for, say, the next two years. Of course, while in the tank you won’t know that you are in there; you’ll think it’s all actually happening. Others can also plug in to have the experiences they want, so there’s no need to stay unplugged to serve them.”

(Robert Nozick, in J. Glover, ed., Utilitarianism and Its Critics, p. 58)

Would you hook up to this machine? Why, or why not?