mrbrown.com

Prata with Egg, please... bwahahahaha

Tym looks for bright spots in our Darkest Hour of the Great Singapore Egg Shortage. In moments like these, I am glad I am not an egg fan (the yolk makes me gag, so only omelettes for me).

Excerpt:

-Wahj got laughed at point-blank when he tried to order egg prata at Jalan Kayu a few weeks ago.

-We had olua (oyster omelette) a couple of weeks ago and the egg portion was so measly that the oysters were readily visible for a change.

-I squealed with delight earlier this week when the Malay food stall in the work cafeteria had hard-boiled eggs drenched in chilli, and waved my finger at them excitedly till the bemused stallholder scooped one into my packet of food.

-umami notes the tacky behaviour of a young couple at a local buffet who shamelessly ate their way through 16 eggs (among other food) last week.

Mini ipod and mini speakers

A little setup my wife put together so that she could listen to music while she cleaned up her messy dressing table. Sure the sound is tinny and low-fi, but everything looks so cute! Plus the powered-speakers only cost $16. iPod Mini standing up courtesy of Speck Products Mini FlipStand for the iPod Mini, which I happen to think is the best $59 I ever spent on a case.

Do you think we’ll be flying on a propeller plane? Or one of the newer jets?

Via metastasis, what if "all stories were written like science fiction stories".

Excerpt:

He logged onto the central network using his personal computer, and waited while the system verified his identity. With a few keystrokes he entered an electronic ticketing system, and entered the codes for his point of departure and his destination. In moments the computer displayed a list of possible flights, and he picked the earliest one. Dollars were automatically deducted from his personal account to pay for the transaction.

The planes left from the city airport, which they reached using the city bi-rail. Ann had changed into her travelling outfit, which consisted of a light shirt in polycarbon-derived artificial fabric, which showed off her pert figure, without genetic enhancements, and dark blue pants made of textiles. Her attractive brown hair was uncovered.

At the airport Roger presented their identification cards to a representative of the airline company, who used her own computer system to check his identity and retrieve his itinerary. She entered a confirmation number, and gave him two passes which gave them access to the boarding area. They now underwent a security inspection, which was required for all airline flights. They handed their luggage to another representative; it would be transported in a separate, unpressurized chamber on the aircraft.

“Do you think we’ll be flying on a propeller plane? Or one of the newer jets?” asked Ann.

“I’m sure it will be a jet,” said Roger. “Propeller planes are almost entirely out of date, after all. On the other hand, rocket engines are still experimental. It’s said that when they’re in general use, trips like this will take an hour at most. This one will take up to four hours.”

We are a family place, thank you

For those of you who don't read Chinese, and former ACS boys, the phrase says "Family Karaoke". Don't be fooled by the dark glass windows. Captured by me with a 1.3 megapixel, 3G-ready, Nokia 6630.

SNE Part 101

Singapore National Education Part 101 -- by mr brown
Weeks of 15 July 2004 to 28 Sept 2004

From little red dot to piece of nose shit

Satay sends me her in-depth analysis of Singapore's recent spat with Taiwan, the one where we get called a piece of pi-sai (booger) and got accused of carrying China's balls. Satay is a former child swimming prodigy and national treasure, who has this skill for "farcical first time meetings with public officials".

The Straits Times states that Foreign Minister Mark Chen "accused Singapore of sucking up to China, using a graphic expletive in Taiwanese dialect to make the point."

As part of this site's public service to Singapore, you may wish to know that the expletive he used was "l*mpar". Yes, a Taiwan Foreign Minister used the word "l*mpar" in official foreign matters. Classy, right?

I bet the folk at Ministry of Foreign Affairs, especially former NS men, had to control themselves from responding in kind ("Lim ah, please make sure we use the phrase 'Resorting to intemperate language cannot assuage these concerns', instead of the original Hokkien sentence you composed, ok?").

Never mind, I help to craft the unofficial Singapore response for them, using a "vernacular" too.

"N*bei, this kind of ch**bye l*ncheow thing also can say. Want to make we all t*lan issit?"

Excerpt:

Well, well, if it isn't this, it's something else. Singapore always seems to find new ways to piss people off. But that's not the problem here, it's how we get slammed in response ... and with such colorful language. If there is anything Singaporeans should be insulted by, is Taiwan's complete violation of our hygiene standards.

SO! Taiwan Foreign minister Chen Tan-sun went ape-shit over comments made by Singapore's foreign minister, George Yeo, who recently used a speech to the UN's General Assembly to warn about the risks of China-Taiwan tensions and warned that Taiwan could drag in other countries if it continued to pursue independence.

No more JCs named after roads, let's make up a word

Wait, wait! I know what it is short for!

They ran out of ideas when they named this one. Sounds like a retired Russian porn star (presenting... Innova LaPleasure!).

Lucky they didn't choose a similar word like "Original". Or your JC would have been named Origina Junior College ("Origina? Like that orange drink?")

Is this a new trend? Are we forsaking our first love "-polis" for names ending with "-a"? Say it isn't so!

-A-sta Junior College ("We love grades")
-Ovula Junior College (School of Obstetrics & Gynaecology)
-Percola Junior Collge (study to be a barista here)
-Gangsta Junior College (Ah Beng high school)

Excerpt:

"The Ministry of Education will start a new junior college (JC) in Jan 2005.

The new JC, which has been named Innova JC, will welcome students at its campus located at 21 Champions Way, when the new school year begins next Jan."

via Terz

800 planes almost langga because some newbie never reboot Windows properly

Southern California air traffic control swtiched from stable Unix systems to Windows. Mix in an "improperly trained" newbie technician who never reboot the system properly, some Windows design integration issues, and you get a close shave involving 800 planes in the air.

The funny thing was that when I read this report, it was on the same page as a Microsoft Windows Server banner campaign (screen shots provided in case banners change).

The copy of one of the banners read:

"First he was 'the new guy.'"
"Then he was 'Ben in IT.'"
"Now he is Mr. '25% Lower TCO on Dealer Infrastructure Management.'"
"What will they call you?"
"Make a name for yourself with Windows Server System."

So now that "new guy" technician is called "Mr. Almost Caused 800 Planes to Crash."?

Make a name for yourself indeed.


Excerpt:

Microsoft server crash nearly causes 800-plane pile-up

Failure to restart system caused data overload.
By Matthew Broersma, Techworld

A major breakdown in Southern California's air traffic control system last week was partly due to a "design anomaly" in the way Microsoft Windows servers were integrated into the system, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

The radio system shutdown, which lasted more than three hours, left 800 planes in the air without contact to air traffic control, and led to at least five cases where planes came too close to one another, according to comments by the Federal Aviation Administration reported in the LA Times and The New York Times. Air traffic controllers were reduced to using personal mobile phones to pass on warnings to controllers at other facilities, and watched close calls without being able to alert pilots, according to the LA Times report.

The failure was ultimately down to a combination of human error and a design glitch in the Windows servers brought in over the past three years to replace the radio system's original Unix servers, according to the FAA.

But ours is not Spam, what

Got this spam in my mailbox yesterday. The last line was a work of art, full of pathos and dripping with bittersweet irony.

Subject: information of press

dear sir,

We are a reputed offset printers with over 30 years of experience in printing.

During our career, we have handled all assignment with a sense of responsibility and commitment to deliver positive and timely results. we have strong knowledge of and exposure to working on numerous graphic packages and digital photography.

To tell you more about our self and present our credentials, I request you to pass these information to concern person. You can contact me on the mentioned phone no. or email me. I assure you of a prompt reply.

Thanking you in anticipation.

Sincerely yours.

Mr. (deleted)
(deleted) Pvt. Ltd.
(deleted),
(deleted). Mumbai . INDIA.
Tel :- (deleted)
Fax :- (deleted)
Email :- (deleted)

NEVER SEND SPAM. IT IS BAD.

Anwar interviewed by CNN but Malaysians see program only once

Anwar is interviewed by Lorraine Hahn in CNN's Talk Asia, and the program airs one time in Malaysia via Astro, while it is repeated several times on CNN in other countries, like Singapore and Hongkong. The locals smell a rat.

GCSE Exam answers that will confirm get you 9 A*s

Supposedly real answers given by 16-year-old British students doing their GCSE Exams last year. (via estpl6 from SPUG forums)

I liked the answer to "In a democratic society, how important are elections?" (A: "Very important. Sex can only happen when a male gets an election.") No wonder Singaporeans are not making enough babies, we never get a chance to vote.

Geography

Q. Name the four seasons?
A. Salt, pepper, mustard and vinegar.

Q Explain the processes by which water can be made safe to drink?
A. Flirtation makes water safe to drink because it removes large pollutants like grit, sand, dead sheep and canoeists.

Q. How is dew formed?
A. The sun shines down on the leaves and makes them perspire.

Q. What is a planet?
A. A body of earth surrounded by sky

Q. What causes the tides in the ocean?
A. The tides are a fight between the Earth and the Moon. All water tends to flow towards the Moon, because there is no water on the moon, and nature abhors a vacuum. I forget where the sun joins in this fight.

Sociology

What guarantees may a mortgage company insist on?
If you are buying a house, they will insist you are well endowed.

In a democratic society, how important are elections?
Very important. Sex can only happen when a male gets an election.

What are steroids?
Things for keeping carpets still on the stairs.

Biology

What happens to your body when you age?
When you get old, so do your bowels and you get intercontinental.

What happens to a boy when he reaches puberty?
He says goodbye to his boyhood and looks forward to his adultery.

Name a major disease associated with cigarettes?
Premature death.

What is artificial insemination?
When the farmer does it to the bull instead of the cow.

How can you delay milk turning sour?
Keep it in the cow (He got an A)

How are the main parts of the body categorised? (e.g. abdomen)
The body is consisted into three parts - the brainium, the borax, the
abdominal cavity. The brainium contains the brain, the borax contains the heart and lungs, and the abdominal cavity contains the five bowls, A,E,I,O and U.

What is the Fibula?
A small lie

What does "varicose" mean?
Nearby

What is the most common form of birth control?
Most people prevent contraception by wearing a condominium.

Give the meaning of the term "Caesarean Section"?
The caesarean section is a district in Rome.

What is a seizure?
A Roman emperor

What is a terminal illness?
When you are sick at the airport

Give an example of a fungus. What is a characteristic feature?
Mushrooms. They always grow in damp places and they look like umbrellas.

English

Use the word "judicious" in a sentence to show you understand its meaning.
Hands that judicious can be soft as your face. (For overseas readers this refers to an advert for Fairy Liquid washing up soap - the strap line goes 'hands that do dishes can be soft as your face')

What does the word "benign" mean?
Benign is what you will be after you be eight.

They let kids buy this kind of candy?

Is it just me or am I the only one disturbed by the fact that this kind of candy is being sold to kids and heavily advertised on TV during cartoons?

Excerpt:

One of our readers came up with a new kind of candy: Fr-ooze Pop.

On the airport of Singapore, where she had to wait for a connecting flight, she wanted to buy something sweet. She bought Fr-ooze Pop because it was advertised all over the place as the ultimate candy experience. Licking it she suddenly realized that she had a dildo in her mouth. The feeling it gave her was a mix of embarrassment and excitement. She took some pictures and sent them to this magazine. And assured us that it was for real and not a joke.

Xbox Trojan in Star Wars DVD set

According to Xbox Scene, that bonus disc in the StarWars Trilogy DVD set, with the Preview Demo of the new Star Wars: Battlefront Xbox game will update your dashboard and write over key pieces of firmware, without warning.

So if you are playing this disc in a modded Xbox, you will be a victim of LucasArts' sneaky little anti-piracy move.

Excerpt:

The 'StarWars Trilogy DVD' (video/movie DVD) has an 'Extra Special Features Disc'. If you try to launch this on your Xbox it will automaticly update your dashboard ... NO confirmation will be asked. The bonus disc has extra features including a documentary on the star wars saga, footage from the making of all three films and a preview demo of the new 'StarWars Battlefront' Xbox game (that's why there's a default.xbe, dashupdate.xbe and update.xbe on the disc).

via boingboing

Why you must get "Star Wars: Battlefront"

Why you must get the game "Star Wars: Battlefront"...

TODAY: Don't study, you'll end up in service industry

Latest TODAY column: Don't study, you'll end up in service industry

Excerpt:

I was at the bank during lunch hour, queueing up to cancel my credit line because the yearly subscription was up; I didn't need any credit; and the bank had no free gift for me for renewing.

The nice lady at the counter told me it would take about four to eight weeks to terminate the credit line.

Have you ever noticed that if you sign up for a credit line (complete with free gift and the first year free), it will be activated even before the ink of your signature dries and even before the courier the bank sent to your house to get your signature has returned to the office?

But when you want to terminate the line, you have to go down to the bank in person with your identity card, or you have to write a pain-in-the-backside letter (yes, that is on paper, email does not qualify). And oh — it takes six to eight weeks for it to happen.

Update 1: Also commented on by The Singapore Commentator.

Update 2: In the Monday Sept 27 edition of TODAY, a letter from a TODAY reader.

New RSS Comments feed added

RSS fans, rejoice. I have added an RSS feed for the comments that readers leave here. On Mandrake's request, so you can thank him for nudging me to do it (time from request email read to request fulfilled: 15 minutes. A record).

As I told him, I reckon that sometimes, the comments left by you readers can be more interesting than my posts (except the gay porn comment spam). Testament to the quality of the readers and community here, I think. So instead of the comments being hidden under a link beneath a post, you can read all of them at one go in an RSS feed.

For those of you not using RSS, you do not know what you're missing. This site also has an RSS feed for full posts (updated with new Feedburner URL).

The logos and links for RSS can be found in the left sidebar. Stylo milo, right?

My only request is that you guys set your RSS readers to check the feed at reasonable intervals. Every five minutes will only eat up my already stretched bandwidth.

Enjoy.


From ESPN's syndication FAQ:

What is a news feed?

A news feed (also known as an RSS feed) is a listing of a website's content. It is updated whenever new content is published to the site. News readers "subscribe" to news feeds, which means they download lists of stories at an interval that you specify (every 30 minutes, for example), and present them to you in your news reader. A news feed might contain a list of story headlines, a list of excerpts from the stories, or a list containing each story from the website (ESPN's news feeds contain story excerpts). All news feeds will have a link back to the website, so if you see a headline / excerpt / story you like, you can click on the link for that piece of content and will be taken to the website to read it.

The computer industry confesses

The truth is finally out. The computer industry confesses to deception. And thank goodness for it.

Excerpt:

We lied to you. In the golden 80s and 90s we told you micropayments and content protection would work; that you would be able to charge minuscule amounts of money whenever someone listened to your music or watched your movie. We told you untruths which we well knew would never work - after all, we would've never used them ourselves. Instead, we wrote things like Kazaa and Gnutella, and all other evil P2P applications to get the stuff free.

We told you these things so that you would finance the things we really wanted to build, not the things that you wanted to be built. We knew all along that DRM schemes do not work, and we knew that whatever we create can be broken by us. We don't care anymore, because your money made us bigger than you.

via Boing Boing

600 Mac dual-processor G5s clean up Star Wars galaxy

Owners of the new Star Wars Trilogy DVDs will probably wonder how come the picture quality is so startlingly clean and clear. In fact, you probably don't recall them looking so good even at the first screening of the first day back in May 1977, when you were six years old.

Well, you have to thank Lowry Digital and their 600 dual-processor G5 Macintoshes for the cleanup.

Excerpt:

When Lucasfilm began to prepare the trilogy for a digital release, they called upon John Lowry and Lowry Digital Images to step in to save the day. In the past four years, Lowry Digital has been hired to use their patented custom software processes to digitally clean and restore hundreds of films, including high-profile efforts on Snow White, Citizen Kane and last year's acclaimed Indiana Jones Trilogy DVD set.

At the Lowry Digital Images facility, over 600 Macintosh dual-processor G5 computers utilizing over 2400 gigabytes of RAM and 478 terabytes (over 478 million megabytes) of hard drive space processed each of the classic Star Wars films for over 30 break-neck days to create the stunning new versions fans will see in the Star Wars Trilogy DVD set.

Would you get rich blogging revisited

Wow, what a nice bunch of responses!

Ok, first off, I have tried Movable Type and the like, but don't like the idea of maintaining a server. I ran mrbrown.com on MT for a while (on the sly in a beta site) and it ate up my time. I found that I spent more time doing maintenance than writing.

Typepad frees me from the technical support role, and also they have some nice features like integrated Photo Albums and Moblogging. I am a founder member, so I get a discount. But yes, it is somewhat expensive compared to S$60 per year for simple hosting.

As for ads. No. I made a conscious decision to not take ads in my site because 1) they look ugly, and 2) most of the time, you don't really make much cash for your trouble.

For now, I don't need donations (but I won't say "never will", heheh). I might do something like Daring Fireball's membership drive (I have a t-shirt for my donation). I like his idea of making a living from "personal journalism", so I supported him with my US$35.

And I have been toying with the idea of merchandise but I want to decide what it should be before I commit the mrbrown brand to it. I'd hate to be selling cheap trinklets with my name on it. There is also the problem of getting the right supplier (no, Cafepress costs way too much, and the shipping will kill most Singaporeans). I also need to find a means of fulfillment (by that I mean getting the merchandise to you, not the warm and fuzzy feeling I get doing this site).

We'll see. It is heartening to know there are supporters out there who are willing to part with their hard-earned cash to support my little corner of the web.

I may not get rich from blogging but I know I will be poorer without your readership.

Would you get rich blogging? Probably not

Jeff Ooi reckons that most of us bloggers will not make any money, let alone get rich from blogging.

That's true. I pay for all the hosting and domain fees for this site, and while it used to be free at the old site (hosted by more than one kind soul), the current site is hosted by Typepad and costs a fair bit a year. And judging from the bandwidth I am racking up a month (I am starting to cross the bandwidth limit that comes with my package), I am going to be paying for that as well.

But hey, that is the price of success, right? Heheh.

And I have not even costed for my time. But then, I love you all, and as long as I can do this, I will. Sniff.