mrbrown.com

Creative Zen Micros sold out at San Jose Fry's

Scoble reports that Creative Zen Micros are sold out at Fry's in San Jose.

Jolly good show, Creative!

Excerpt:

While there, I overheard a customer ask for the Zen Micro. "Sorry, we're sold out of that," Steve answered.

When I got my turn I asked him the hard question: "why should I buy a Zen Micro instead of an iPod?"

He pulled one off of his belt. "You can replace the battery, you can't do that on our competitors." (He never used the iPod name again, just positioned it as "our competitor"). He continued: "Ours comes with an FM radio receiver so you can listen to radio as well as play music files from your computer.

Surprising Punggol: Singapore also got bed-and-breakfast

Fresh from discovering the mussels and the kangkong of Punggol, our resident Ambassador of Punggol, Faith-T, does it again, and unearths a B&B "nestled on the 17th storey of an apartment in the heartland of Singapore".

The B&B is known as "The Swallow Corner" (swallow as in the bird, not the verb). It is on the 17th floor and offers city views. As a housing agent would say, High Floor, No Block.

And yes, The Swallow Corner got cable, ok? Unlike some parts of Punggol.

At the rate this is going, they may have to rename Punggol 21 to "Surprising Punggol".

"Eh, why my flat in Punggol one year already still no cable ah?" "SURPRISE!"

"Eh, what happened to the world class LRT?" "SURPRISE!"

Excerpt:

Let’s say you’re visiting Singapore, and you want to have a taste of the local life. Afterall, it can get quite tiring running after tiny men with big rings. What better way than to live in an HDB apartment – quintessential Singaporean living!

Guess what? From US$59 - US$99, you can stay at The Swallow Corner.

Fish tank today, swimming pool tomorrow

This is the fish tank we bought from that other story, sitting on its new cabinet. They never tell you that, while the tank only cost $80 — because your older 2-foot tank equipment don't fit no more — getting a new cabinet, filter and light will add up to a lot more moolah. Just like buying a bigger HDB flat and having to sell your children to pay the contractor.

The tank is undergoing run-in for the next 24 hours. Then I will start to look for a nice picture to paste behind the tank to hide the ugly tubes, and maybe some plants. My two discus and the lone Black Ghost will enjoy the new space to swim. Some lovely Super Red Melons would be nice too.

Then I will have to figure out how to make sure my son does not play with the filter cables and tubes, and prevent my daughter from climbing into the tank and treating it like her private swimming pool. Faith is a huge fan of swimming, and no body of water is safe from her enthusiasm.

I will now lie down to rest my aching back from setting up the tank, filling it with water, and loading the new filter with filter medium.

Grace's husband, Ton, drops by

Ton de Vries, Grace Chow's husband, writes in and provides us with his personal insight into Grace's motivations and feelings, especially with regards to her family.

We are honoured by his visit.

From Ton:

This is Grace's husband, Ton. Just found this discussion on Grace and wanted to explain that you should see the 'mediocre' thing in a broader perspective.

Grace wrote in her book about her life in Singapore, about moving to Netherlands and adjusting to Dutch society, about her illness, Dutch health care but also about music, politics, love, freedom. She found freedom in the Netherlands and wrote about the differences in freedom between her life in Singapore and her life in Netherlands.

She found the political climate in the Netherlands liberating, there is much more diversity in opinions and more opportunity to speak out. In the book there is a World Press Freedom Ranking of countries in which Netherlands is number 1 and Singapore 144 (out of 166), even below Sudan, Uganda and Congo!

She also found more personal freedom and more emotional support than she had experienced in Singapore. My parents for instance are much less strict in their opinions, listened to her instead of saying what she should do, encouraging her to develop herself instead of telling her what to do (she usually heard in Singapore: stick to what everybody does, take the road most taken, look for material things). The emotional support she lacked in Singapore and found in the Netherlands made her use her qualities and gave her, despite the illness, the enrgy to write her book and her blog. This is not to so that her parents are bad people, they are not. People are the way they are, you should not judge them, but except them as they are. You can however realize how the way people who are often most close to you, your parents, behave influence your life. And that influence was in general more negative than positive.

So do not take the 'mediocre' as an insult or as a reason not to be interested in her or the book. See it as a way to express the difference between her Singapore life and her life in the Netherlands. She realized that her family and Singapore as a whole prevented her from being happy, from fullfilling her deepest wishes.

If you read the book, you may differ of opinion with Grace. But I'm sure you will find the way she writes about these issues, will appeal to you too.

Hope this explained it all a bit.

Ton

The Singapore roads of Death

The Straits Times reported that a few days ago, there were four motorcycle accident deaths in 24 hours, resulting in three riders and one road worker dead. The 24 hour cycle started at 6.30am on Sunday with a rider dead on the AYE, and ended at 2.30am on Monday at Bras Basah Road with a road worker dead .

My brother, a rider himself, pointed out that many of these accidents seem to happen with smaller bikes of 125cc or less.

Here's another accident that did not show up in the papers. On Sunday morning, a group of cycling enthusiasts tried to signal to make a bus slow down and give way. The bus driver not only ignored their pleas, and refused to slow down, he GAVE THEM THE FINGER.

The bus ended up ploughing into one of the cyclists, my wife's former colleague, and half of his body ended up under the bus. He shattered his pelvic bones, had neck injuries, and worse of all, is now in a coma in the CCU. When the missus went to see him with her colleagues, they cried because they could not recognise him from the injuries. The doctor said he is effectively brain dead but his family is hoping he will wake up.

One callous asshole of a driver ruining a thirtysomething life just like that, plus the lives of the cyclist's wife and family. The guy just started a promising new job at a new company too. And now he is fighting for his life.

Punggol: The Dark Lord Sauron's other lair

Faith-T (the big one, not my little girl) writes about the charms of Punggol (better known as The Forgotten Lands) and gets a call from a research writer for a TV show. Not bad what.

In their little love-trip to the backwaters of Punggol (no, not the NTUC Fairprice supermarket), her husband (her "hunka-hunka.." *shudder*) tries to fish but catches nothing, and claims the fish were hiding. Of course they were.

Faith-T proves that there is always some redeeming value in an estate that was meant for greater things (you know this because the Government put a "21" after its name), but ended up with empty flats and large pockets of residences where the Starhub cable network is still not switched on yet. (Waits for flames from Punggolites)

Hey, at least there will always be the mussels and the kangkong (water spinach).


Excerpt:

Does this mean the property prices in Punggol will go up?

Will some decision maker in URA finally build that swimming pool/sports complex that according to the map I got from HDB, is supposed to be across my street?

Can the LRT finally take passengers, instead of taunting me by going round and round in circles - testing? testing?! - while I wait patiently for the bus?

Will my friend finally stop calling the view from her Punggol flat “Mordor"?

Will I stop gushing?

Limpehshootjitliaphorliseeeee

Mr Miyagi, who brought us the delightful catchphrase of 2004, "Bungalee See Futt", shows us why Singapore reservists should probably not be involved in hostage negotiations. Warning: strong language.

"Limpehshootjitliaphorliseeeee" should be taught to all soldiers as part of all future NS training. The US Marines have "Semper Fi", we will have "Limpehshootjitliaphorliseeeee". It will strike fear in the hearts of our enemies. I plan to use it on Halo 2 tonight, and also in casual conversation.

(For our international readers, "Limpehshootjitliaphorliseeeee"= "Your father shoot a big one to kill you till you die from it" "Me your father, shoot a big fat one and kill you until you dieeeeee", a better translation found at mrs budak's.)

Incidentally, voting for Asia Blog Awards is still on, and you can vote daily. Exercise your vote, or you may kena GRC/walkover next year. Wow, looking at my Monday stats, a lot of you are on leave, I see. Either that, or you have all left me for some sexier blog.

Excerpt:

Tired and frustrated from climbing the stairs, and perhaps also from having problems at home, the 'hostage negotiations' were opened by a member of the section and it went something like this:

What the f*** you want, n***b**ch**b** motherf*****?

I want an airline ticket!

Airline ticket?? Ch**b**! Simi airline?!

Emirates!

Ch**b**! Emirates?! Ki tolo?! (go where?)

Anywhere!

F*** you! K*****b*chowch**b**motherf*****! Limpehshootjitliaphorliseeeee!

A moment of silence to mourn the death of a good friend, Suprnova

Suprnova.org is dead, long live Suprnova.org.

It had to happen one day. Ah well, there will be others to take its place. I wonder how much of it was the result of MPAA's civil suits against the operators of BitTorrent trackers.

Excerpt from Suprnova's owners:

Greetings everybody,

As you have probably noticed, we have often had downtimes. This was because it was so hard to keep this site up!

But now we are sorry to inform you all, that SuprNova is closing down for good in the way that we all know it.

We do not know if SuprNova is going to return, but it is certainly not going to be hosting any more torrent links.

We are very sorry for this, but there was no other way, we have tried everything.

Thank you all that helped us, by donating mirrors or something else, by uploading and seeding files, by helping people out on IRC and on forum, by spreading the word about SuprNova.org.

It is a sad day for all of us!

Please visit SuprNova.org every once in a while to get the latest news on what is happening and if there is anything new to report on.

As we wish to maintain the nice community that we created, we are keeping the forums and irc servers open.

Thank you all and Goodbye!
sloncek & the rest of the SuprNova Team

My Cafe spotted in Yangon

CQ found this Mr Brown Cafe in Yangon, Myanmar. Maybe they teach Myanmar National Education there. If you happen to go there, tell me how the food is, ok? Just don't kena house arrest or anything.

Music shuffle

Please don't show the Britney Spears, please don't show the Britney Spears, please don't show the Britney Spears...

Aaaaarrrgggh! Not the Justin Timberlake!

1. Open up the music player on your computer.
2. Set it to play your entire music collection.
3. Hit the “shuffle” command.
4. Tell us the title of the next ten songs that show up (with their musicians), no matter how embarrassing. That’s right, no skipping that Carpenters tune that will totally destroy your hip credibility. It’s time for total musical honesty.
5. Write it up in your blog or journal and link back to at least a couple of the other sites where you saw this.
6. If you get the same artist twice, you may skip the second (or third, or etc.) occurances. You don’t have to, but since randomness could mean you end up with a list of ten song with five artists, you can if you’d like.

And so mr brown's iPod played:

001. TerminalHead - Head Down
from the album, Hyper Fractured (Dislocated)

002. Nightwish - Dead Boy's Poem
from the album, Tales from the Elvenpath

003. Corrine May - Stay On The Road
from the album, Fly Away

004. Ryan Adams - The Rescue Blues
from the album, Gold

005. REM - It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)
from the album, MTV Unplugged: The Best of 3

006. Ashley Judd And Tayler Hamilton - True Love
from the album, De-Lovely OST

007. 孙燕姿 - 我要的幸福
from the album, The Moment

008. Justin Timberlake - Cry Me A River
from the album, Justified

009. Tori Amos - God
from the album, Tales Of A Librarian: A Tori Amos Collection

010. Song+Nation - Get Into You Suddenly ft. BALANCe
from the album, Various Artists Featuring Song+Nation

via Indian Stallion

Ngee Ann Poly blogger discovers NP full of Ah Lians

Also, his take on "sporadic instances of really terribly english".

For our International (read: Ang Mo) readers, from Talkingcock's Coxford Singlish Dictionary:

AH LIAN
A pet-name which literally means, "lotus flower". The female equivalent of an Ah Beng - an unsophisticated Chinese girl. Stereotypically dresses in neon colours, wears a huge ribbon perched on the top of her head, and carries a tiny basket.

Excerpt:

I was at NP's Lifestyle Library, where people go there to lounge around, chit chat with friends, observe the opposite (or sometimes, same) sex, or flip through glossy magazines. I, on the other hand, was there reading serious stuff, like Wired Magazine. Trying to read, that is, amidst all the distraction.

Then it struck me. Just about every other girl around me was an Ah Lian.

You know something is not right when a library is infested with Ah Lians. Maybe they don't have a better place to hang out in Ngee Ann, since we don't have discos or pubs or KTV lounges.

Anyway, if you have been scrutinising my blogroll, you would have noticed that I've actually linked to an Ah Lian's blog. A real Ah Lian - she even declares it publicly: "I am actually a simple Chao Ah Lian".

Why cyclists wear black

All I can say is, "Ewww"!

TODAY:We're dreaming of a mr brown Christmas

Latest TODAY column: We're dreaming of a mr brown Christmas

Excerpt:

My wife and I were thinking of getting a Christmas tree this year, but with our son Isaac's reputation for wanton destruction, we decided to spare a tree the horror. He would have pulled the whole tree down, lights and all, just to see how it falls. Repeatedly, like it was some kind of science experiment. Furthermore, wires with electricity and lights are not compatible with curious baby boys.

Families Against the Casino Threat petition

Families Against the Casino Threat in Singapore, or FACT, has a petition running for people who want to express their opposition to the building of a casino in Singapore, and to "petition our President and urge him to advise our government to reject any plan allowing a casino in Singapore". Go ahead and vote if you agree with them (although, why must it be Families? Individuals not counted ah?)

They have collected 6271 signatures so far, but looking at the list of signatures, I think they may need to reduce the final count a little, before they present this petition to the President. These don't look like legit signatories:

61. Crayola
234. Casino King
219. Ornate Ghost
260. Myopic idiots
475. Lee Kuan Yew
547. LEE BO LIAO!!!
561. President Saddam Hussien
576. John Rambo
588. Gimme a Casino!
1116. I love MAMA 1314
1136. Batam Casino Owner
1178. vrev
1179. vrev
1180. vrev
1182. vrev
1183. vrev
1184. vrev
1278. ALLOW Gambling
1515. Star Cruises
1517. I am against too much FT
1526. Royal Flush
1531. which horse win
1539. can escape reservist?
1544. how to keng?
1545. NS is too long
1559. LKY
1566. GCT
1574. LHL
1580. Ass loong
1585. Al Capone
1772. F**kernaden
1863. Skynet88
2064. Pope John Paul II
2462. Satay the stupid SPUGer
3410. I Love Casino
3572. GuitarFreak (actually, I may know who this guy is)
4983. XXX
5558. http://www.livejournal.com/use
5835. Good Money Anything Also Can

I don't know, I am not sure a petition is going to help change the Government's mind. It is usually quite firm once its mind is made up. As far as I know, the only way to effect real change is at the ballot box. We make our choices, and we have to live with them, I suppose.

Asia Blog Awards 2004 voting begins

Simon World is hosting the Asia Blog Awards 2004 this year (think of it as an Asian Blog Idol but without the recording contract), and nominations are closed.

Voting has begun and will last till 31 Dec 2004. You can vote once per day in each category. There are no walkovers, GRC blogs, redrawing of blog boundaries, or threats of withdrawing upgrading. Nominees will not need to flee to neighbouring countries or go on glucose-only hunger strikes. Your vote is toll-free and no telco or TV station will make obscene amounts of money from it.

So why not? Go vote, or at least check out the fine selection of Asian blogs there. I am in the Best Singapore Blog and also the Funniest Blog categories.

I promise to continue writing and upgrading this blog with lifts that stop on every floor, even if you don't vote for me. That's the kind of sweet guy that I am.

Getting my Halo 2 ass kicked and loving it

This is the blister I got from playing Halo 2 last night against three very good players, probably Singapore's top Halo 2 players. They are about half my age. My mates and I were getting our asses kicked all over the place by dcosta, TidusSG and FarCue85 (rhymes with a naughty word), and loved every minute of it.

I was told that TidusSG is the World Cyber Games champion of Singapore. I told them I was World Cyber Games champion of my house. What I didn't say was that I was the ONLY gamer in my house.

At one point, we decided to play 6 against 3 because it was getting obvious that if we played in equal sized teams (or even every-man-for-himself), it would be a major bloodbath. So we played the remaining games with us against three of them, and the games became more managable, like a major bloodshower.

These three young men obviously had the talent. Having the reflexes of youth and time to game — they were students— didn't hurt either (at least, that will be our official excuse).

What made it fun was that they were getting the practice they wanted for an upcoming tourney, and was having a fairly good challenge fighting off a team superior in numbers. And we weekend warriors got to learn a few tricks just watching them play, and watching them function as a team. Plus, we ourselves actually got better as a team. Nothing like the risk of being mowed down by an Army of One to force us guys to stick together.

In many ways, it is like the future of Singapore (insert National Song here). Sure, we all like to do our own thing. But if we know that running out into the open on our own will get us killed, we are more likely to stay together and figure out how to work together to minimise our own demise, while maximising our kills.

Ok, forget maximising our kills, we were just happy to Not Die. Our team motto was "Die Less".

Things learned (and all this stuff is common sense but easy to forget in the heat of battle):

-Against a superior enemy, there is no shame in four of you shooting at one of them

-It takes four of you to kill one of them, and even then, three of you will die

-Deny deny deny. Do not let them get any key weapons, like the Sword, Rocket Launcher or Shotgun. Do not let them get any weapons at all if possible. Let the buggers fight you with their fists

-One of them with a shotgun on the third floor and all of you taking the lift up = many dead yous. Think Elevator Turkey Shoot

-Listen to your teammates if they tell you, "Don't go up! He has a shotgun!"

-Always tell your teammates where the enemy is coming from (and shouting "enemy is coming up the slope!" is meaningless when the whole map consists of slopes)

-He has two SMGs, you have two SMGs, but he can shoot at your head while jumping around and moving, while you can only spray your bullets in his general direction and die horribly

-It is good to assign one or two members of your team as snipers while the rest of you do the close-quarters hunting. But make sure someone covers the back of the sniper too. Snipers need backside protection

-A grenade can be thrown really far and accurately. Snipers can die from well-thrown grenades

-Do not wander out into the open without your buddy. Do not even go to the toilet in the game map without your buddy

-Stay together but loose enough that you don't all die at once when one of the enemy gets hold of a rocket launcher. Tell your team mates if you spot the enemy with a launcher, then run like mad away from your team mates like they have body odour or something

-A Warthog with a gunner turns your team into Armoured Infantry, until the enemy locks on to you like a big fat target and blows you up. Or your stupid driver crashes the two of you into a wall, killing you both

-In the heat of battle, your driver will shout to you, the Warthog gunner, to drive! drive! drive!

-It is an honour to have died by the guns of Singapore's best player

-It is even more shiok to have killed him once or twice, while he was busy fighting with three of your teammates

-It is easy to say "Hey, meet my friends Mr Plasma Pistol and Mr Magnum, and eat THIS!" to Singapore's best player when you have five of your teammates behind you spraying bullets at him

My favourite game in that set was the Magnum-and-pistols-only game on the Midship map. We were like Chow Yuen Fatt firing our dual pistols, but without the trenchcoats.

Oh, and the three of them didn't trashtalk us too much or gloat about their wins, which was also nice. I always appreciate polite and skillful killers. And they were humble enough to admit that they were getting their asses kicked by other overseas experts.

I may be dying like flies in the face of insecticide assault now, but just you wait. When my son grows up to be their age, and they reach my age, I will transfer all my Shaolin kung-fu skills to him so that he can kick their asses. All my hopes rest in my son now.

Another letter from the Insider

The drama continues between Pranay Gupte and the ST.

How to spurn friends, alienate professionals, and not give a damn
by Pranay Gupte.

Excerpt:

What explains The Straits Times' conduct?

Dear Eric:

I am in receipt of your letter of December 1, 2004, and a cheque for S$20,332.71.

You are giving me two pieces of news that are truly astonishing:

(1) That I walked out of our November 16 meeting. As you very well know, I did no such thing. Please do not add insult to injury and engage in such nonsense. It is my clear recollection that our meeting ended amicably. It simply doesn't behoove a senior official of SPH to spout falsehoods, especially about a senior international writer such as myself who has served The Straits Times loyally and productively since April 2004.

(2) That I declined your cheque of S$20,000 during our meeting of November 16, when you handed me the termination letter. I was never informed that such a cheque was ready. You only referred to the amount. I responded that I would need to consult my lawyer before agreeing to the clauses spelled out in your November 16 letter.

Stallions aplenty on Ladies' Night at the Turf Club

Reader Terence spotted this gem from the Turf Club, promoting their Ladies' Night at the club. Makes you wonder what kind of horseplay goes on at those evenings.

Inappropriate use of this hairdryer is prohibited

I am never ever using a hairdryer in any public toilet ever again. Ewwww. Not after reading this (see the May 18th entry) at the botakgorrilla.

Excerpt:

You wouldn't believe this but there was this once, I saw this old, wrinkled and extremely pruney looking indian ah pek strut out stark naked from the shower area.

Now as if it wasn't sickening enough for me to have to catch him naked, he grabbed the hairdrier, spread his legs apart and bent his knees slightly.

Then he directed the nozzle at his asshole and turned the hairdrier on.

Return of the Return of the King

I am a very excited kid. Just picked up my The Return of the King (Platinum Series Special Extended Edition) at Borders last night and the wife and I started watching it. I reckon we will do this over a few nights because we are unlikely to get the luxury of four straight hours to watch it all at one go. Ask any young parent.

I picked up the cheaper DVDs-only set, because I didn't want to pay $150 for the Collector's Gift Set that comes with an extra disc, plus what someone called "The Ashtray of Minas Tirith". At least it is better than that ugly Gollum figure that came with the Two Towers' Collector's Gift Set. That is why I only own the tasteful "Bookends of Argonath" that came with the FOTR Collector's Gift Set. It was the only collector's item that didn't suck, I feel.

The good thing is that the missus finds the whole movie fresh and new, because when we first watched it, we were seated in the second row in Lido (yes, second from the front), at the special Visa premiere of ROTK. Hey, they were complimentary tix, ok? And we got to watch it before anyone else in Singapore. What's a little neck pain for true fans?

So now Ginny can see the whole screen in the comfort of our home, instead of looking up the nostrils of Aragorn's nose. And I get to provide her with interesting and intriguing tidbits about this extended version of the movie, like which scenes were added in this DVD, and which bits were extended parts.

Oh, since we are on trivia, this is the first post I am making on my PC which involves an image. I usually do all my posting from the Powerbook, but the new Logitech Cordless MX Duo I just bought is making the PC almost useable. It is a sweet pair of input devices. I almost want to take both the keyboard and Duo MX700 mouse back to the office and use it with my G4 Powerbook there.

The only thing that keeps this cordless combo from getting a full five stars is the fact that the keyboard extras do not really work with Firefox (Logitech, what were you thinking?). Aside from this, the cordless Elite keyboard is one of the best keyboards I have ever used. The keys feel right, there is a nice arm rest, and the extra features are really handy, like the iNav and media buttons. The MX700 Duo mouse that comes with this package is also a great wireless optical mouse, with 800dpi sensitivity.

I know, waxing lyrical about input devices is borderline totally geek. But when you type and mouse as much as I do, for work, for play and for writing, decent input devices matter almost as much as a high-end graphics card. I will now go and think of more typing and mousing activities to do, so that I have an excuse to use my MX Duo more.