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2010-05-08T13:32:00.004+10:00

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2010-05-08T13:31:00.011+10:00

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The One Where It All Comes Crashing Down...

2009-10-13T22:09:00.003+11:00

Semester 4. 2009. Without a doubt the worst semester I am enduring. After narrowly escaping rock bottom with two 50 gradings and being the recipient of an unjustly academic caution for plagiarism last semester, you'd think there wouldn't be a worse semester to follow. Well ladies and gentleman, this is it. All semester my devotion to study has been at an all-time low, similar to that of an 8th grader destined to drop out of high school before reaching their school certificate. To add insult to injury, the shifts at work have been piling up and my hunger to pump iron is off the charts. Recovery starts now.

... all that aside, I'm still as happy as a pig in mud.

I know it's been around two weeks since the NRL Grand Final, but congratulations to Melbourne for winning the 2009 Premiership. I watching 500 Days of Summer whilst the grand final was being played, however I checked the grand final score straight after watching the movie, and I was the happiest man alive. For a team to be in 4 straight grand finals and win three straight minor premierships, for them to lose would have been the most heartbreaking feeling, even for me, to experience. But the fact is they won, and life is fantastic. Some people hate seeing teams dominate for long periods. I on the other hand love seeing one team own all. Go Melbourne. Now if only those Rooster's could get their football back on track ...

Last Wednesday was Timothy's surprise party at the IT lounge. Happy Birthday Timothy. I hope you enjoyed the occasion. You're one of the greatest blokes I know and I hope the surprise contributed to a true birthday to remember. I'd like to give an acknowledgement to Noorjan, Jasmine, and everyone else for their input. While I had no real part to play in the preparation, I had fun witnessing and being a part of the aftermath. Was I the first person to greet you Tim via text? I hope I was because I pride myself strongly on that. Every time I think back to Timothy's surprise, I am reminded of Jasmine's godly cupcakes. You know the famous question of 'what food would you take with you if you were stuck on an island forever?'. Right now it would be spring rolls, however I think that's all about to change. OMG I WANT SOME NOW. ROAR. I was glad to see Timothy's inner child present, with his desire to play the classic party games like Duck Duck Goose and Musical Chairs. That was too fun.

Last Thursday was the Megadeth and Slayer concert at Hordern Pavillion with Jin, Toby, Werra and Chip. We got there 5 hours early to get parking and to give ourselves a chance of getting a spot at the front. Funnily enough there were people already lining up, with one of those people having been there since 10am. What. The. Fuck. To kill time we played taboo using my phone which got really serious towards the end. Overall it was a brutally awesome night with a bunch of my favorite songs being played from both bands. Megadeth's new guitarist Chris Broderick was definitely welcomed with open arms and Slayer's performance at an old age showed no signs of slowing down.

Warning: The following paragraph is emo.

90's R&B music. I love it. If I'm not headbanging to death metal, then I'm relaxing to old school R&B. Listening to this stuff just takes me back to a time where life was great. It allows me to revisit a time where I thought my life was invincible. I'll never have friends like the ones I had back in those days, friends like Nicole, Patrick, Paolo, Timothy and Julienne. I swear on my life, these 5 kids were the greatest thing to ever happen to me. It was these 5 kids that got me excited about each weekend, because it was a certainty that I'd see them and have the best time. I miss you people terribly and I hate that we can't relive those days ever again. Our families were inseparable. Whilst I still see Julienne and Timothy from time to time, I've lost all contact with the others since they're living in the Philippines now. You moving there was just so unexpected, and I regret that we all didn't make the most of the remaining time we had together. One day we're all playing Nintendo until 4am in the morning, the next day you're moving to the Philippines. If I could make one wish, it would be to spend a whole day with these 5 kids. But yes, 90's R&B will never escape me.

The other day I received a copy of the key to our new house. EXCITEMENT MUCH? Well actually it wasn't a key, it was a remote control. I plan to sleep there after uni tomorrow so that I can sleep in and still get to work on time the next morning. So yes, feel free to keep me company tomorrow night as I'll be all alone in a brand new, empty house.

The One Fully Sick Post Brah.

2009-09-30T20:57:00.003+10:00

I hate being sick. Really, it's the worst. I just don't have the life in me to do anything except blog about it. Right now I'm struck down with a cold, but there's something else more frightening ...

Nose bleeds. As of now, I've had 4 nose bleeds in 2 days. Around maybe three weeks ago when I was really REALLY sick, I had 7 nose bleeds in 7 days, and that is not an exaggeration either. If this continues I will no doubt consult a doctor, however right now I'd like to think my nasal blood vessels are just really weak. Something I find really interesting is that my nose bleeds all occur at a convenient time. They never occur in public. I was at Castle Towers today, and after seriously failing to find anything, I returned to my car. As soon as I got into the car, my nose started to bleed then, rather than when I was still inside shopping. I've also had nose bleeds at work, however luckily they have all occurred during the closing procedure where by then no customers are around.

Onto something less disgusting, it's grand final week this week for the NRL. Once again the Storm manage to make the grand final, and I'm proud of them. 4 grand final appearances in a row is an achievement all should be impressed by. While I'll be rooting for the Storm as always, I definitely won't be unhappy should Parramatta win. Guys like Hindmarsh, Burt and Cayless definitely deserve to get their hands on a premiership ring before they hang the boots. If anything, I am really glad that Brisbane or Manly won't be playing in this year's grand final. I hate both teams with a passion and I was deeply satisfied to see both teams hammered by the Storm.

Something I've come across in recent times are Pandora bracelets. Shirley bought me a bracelet for my birthday, but it only just came to my attention as to how widespread of a fashion accessory they really are. I've started wearing the bracelet, however it feels kind of empty with just the one bead. I do want to buy more beads, and I think it would be fun trying to look for beads that are symbolically representative of me. Obviously I'm not going to buy random beads for the sake of having filling up the bracelet. However before I can put turn this passion into action, I need to know if doing this would be too girly? Would I still keep my manliness if I were to completely occupy the bracelet with beads? Or should I just only buy a few more beads? Or should I just stick with the one bead? Feedback would be appreciated people. I can already sense the negative feedback.

Yesterday I visited the new house and for the first time I was actually able to go inside. It really was an exciting exploration as I walked back and forth repeatedly in each room and opened and closed every door over and over again. The problem I face is deciding on which room I should occupy. There are three rooms at my disposal. I can either occupy the biggest room but be completely adjacent to my parents meaning I have to be completely cautious towards the noise I make, or I can pick one of two smaller rooms and not be next to my parents and make as much noise as I please. Or I can choose secret option C and occupy my parents room and they can have one of the smaller rooms. Yes, I think we'll go with option C. While a lot of people have warned me of the difficulties involved in moving all your stuff to the new house, I honestly expect to have a lot of fun.

Another delightful occurrence yesterday was the viewing of the movie 'Up' with Tim, Jasmine and Adrian. Earlier that day, I had a somewhat funny conversation with my dad.

Dad: What are you watching today son?
Me: Up.
Dad: How do you spell that?
Me: Uhm ... u, p ?
Dad: What's that?
Me: It's this animated movie ... you know like Finding Nemo?
Dad: Ahh shit you're wasting your money. How much are you spending?
Me: $10
Dad: Jesus, you could buy 7 briefs for $10.

He always finds some way of making me think I'm wasting my money, but I'm used to it. It was a great movie !

Today I caught up with Shirley and once again she has dyed her hair, but already she is talking about dying it again. How her hair manages to stay in good shape after all these dyes, I'll never know. We had our mandatory game of bowling. Results? Won one game each, and drew the third game. Sort of a happy ending for both of us. Between you and me, we'll just pretend that I purposely decided to draw the third game because I'm a gentleman.

The other day I received two awards from work. One of them was for my good service to the company, and the other award was for achieving 100% in my mystery shopper assessment. For those who don't know, mystery shoppers are those undercover customers who assess your service based on criteria designed by the head office. These mystery shoppers come to the center once every three months, so I was happy to not let the company down. Anyways, with each award I receive from AMF, I accumulate points which can be saved up and used to obtain prizes which includes pretty much anything from electronics to holidays, gym equipment to musical instruments. I think I'll save up and get that LCD TV ... only need 100,000 points more to go ...

Next week I see thrash metal legends Megadeth and Slayer ! Remind me not to make the same mistake I did last time I saw Megadeth. Last time after the concert, some hobo outside the venue was selling shirts of Megadeth, however I only realized after buying it that the shirts were fake as it had 'MegaDEATH' written on them. Man I'm stupid. Anyways, I'm particularly stoked for this concert because Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine has hinted that they will be play 'Five Magics', which is my favorite Megadeth song. Seldom do they play this song. In fact, no videos of them playing it live can be found, so to be able to see it live for myself will be an amazing experience. Obviously Megadeth is the sole reason for my attendance, however I will appreciate Slayer just as much. While their new material has gone down hill, the appreciation is no doubt still present.

My god this sickness is driving me nuts. I hate it when you're sick and you have the hardest time getting to sleep. In the worst cases, you just wish you were dead. Last night I was getting up every 10 seconds just to blow my nose. By morning, my whole face was dry and I had no motivation to do anything but to lie there. My illness has got me so frustrated, I think I'm going to play some electric guitar and dish out some brutal death metal riffs to vent.

The One With Uhm .. Well .. Lemme See .. Uhh .. Hmmm .. Err .. Pshhh ...Fuck.

2009-09-26T01:08:00.005+10:00

I turned on my mother's laptop, opened up Mozilla Firefox, made my way to blogger.com on a capped connection, with the very intention of writing up one heck of a blog entry to make up for my extended blogging absence, but now that I'm actually here typing away, I don't know what to fucking write. Fuck. Hopefully as I go along, things will just come to mind. Here goes ...

Back from an overnight's shift of work. Had to serve an endless amount of alcohol to a corporate function consisting of 40 nobody's. The bottle opener we have at work is always disappearing because people never return it to its rightful place (lazy mofos), but luckily I had my own bottle opener from Jamaica. Unfortunately I had opened so many bottles that the Jamaican emblem came off, so instead of me owning a Jamaican bottle opener ... now it's just a ... bottle opener. How crap is that!?

I love it when you set your media player to play your music files on random, and you hear a great song that you never knew existed on your hard drive. A song called 'Coed - Been Around Town' randomly played. I was like 'HOLY CRAP. WHY HAVEN'T I HEARD THIS SONG BEFORE!? NFW ! OH SHIT LIFE JUST GOT BETTER!'. Okay, the all-caps sentence suggests an over-dramatic reaction, but you's get the jist of things.

Wednesday 23rd September, 3:15pm @ Ripples Gym - the most beautiful girl I ever laid eyes on. She's just ... well she's indescribable. While I was doing the military shoulder press, she came and started using the leg extension machine next to me, which obviously kicked my ego into gear and forced me to start lifting even heavier. But damn, she is fit.

Shit, I can't think of anything else to write about. That's it, I'm going to do some tricep extensions. Yes that's right, tricep extensions at 2am. Wow, maybe Gordon was right. Maybe working out does make you dumber. Or am I dumb for even believing such an absurdity. OMG, I'M DUMB EITHER WAY. THERE'S NO ESCAPE.

What a waste of a blog entry.

The One With Relief.

2009-09-05T00:11:00.003+10:00

Like every other Friday morning, I had my routine 9am game of bowling with the St Marys boys. Today was a special occasion however as I racked up a new high score of 187, including my first ever 4-bager (4 strikes in a row) although that really should have been 6 strikes. After that, we had a game of air hockey, and Werra and I absolutely destroyed the opposition.

In more relation to the blog title ... I FUCKING PASSED BUSINESS STATISTICS. After visiting MyStudentAdmin on an hourly basis, the university has finally released my result for Business Statistics. Now, when I say I passed, I am placing extra emphasis on the word pass, in that I got exactly a grade of 50. In other words, I got 30/50 in the final exam. If I had done any worse than that, then the penalty I received would have dragged my result down to a fail.

While this whole journey of injustice has been a long one, I can only feel nothing but relief. While I feel my peers and I have been unfairly punished, this saga has gone on for far too long that I honestly didn't care if I had to repeat or not. While my employment future is hanging in the balance with this plagiarism issue permanent on my academic transcript, I am definitely relieved for now.

The One Game Poisoning My Life.

2009-09-01T22:14:00.003+10:00

There's a particular gaming application on Facebook making my life miserable. Not since the days of Counter Strike 1.6 have I felt the need to play every time I turn on the computer. Not since the days of Drift City have I felt the need to play every 5 minutes. Not since the days of Timesplitters 2 would I actually swear at the television (or the laptop in this case) for denying me success when I know I should have got it. Stupid fucking game is killing my life.

Curse the people who brought this game upon me. I have made far too many sacrifices for this game. I have put off way too many things just to play this game. I have lost so much sleep over this game. What's worse than that is that the game is not even that fun. It's just the addiction of being fast that drives me to play further and further. Speed kills.

On to someone that actually keeps me sane, I miss my friend Adri. That is all.

The One Greatest Day.

2009-08-27T23:29:00.003+10:00

D.O.B - 27/08/89.

Today was the day I commemorated my day of birth, this year being the 20th occasion. While it's difficult for me to accept, I must say goodbye to my teenage years, and enter a new era of adulthood. Okay, so I'm making it seem more dramatic than it really is, but you get the picture.

Similar to last year, it took some form of encouragement from a certain trio of friends who I consider very dear to me, to actually not waste the day and do something. If it weren't for them ... I might have been working tonight, which I'm glad never happened because then I would have never experienced the greatest day.

Okay, so my birthday started off with the usual text messages just after midnight, which I promptly replied to. I made it my mission this year to reply to everyone's greetings with a personalized message. Eventually I was woken up by Gloria's message at around 3am, and then from there it was just back and forth texting since the two of us couldn't sleep. Eventually I got to sleep at around 4:30.

My 'real' start to the day began at 9:00. I was woken up by Yen's phone call, but that's fine because it was a great chance to catch up. I left the house to pick up Adrian and then we caught the train to Wynyard where we met Jasmine. I can't stress enough how much I appreciate you making the sacrifices you did to be there for me Jas. :) And thank you Adrian for shouting us the train ticket ! We then walked outside the station where we met up with working Tim (same goes for you ! :)), and then we headed to the Shangri-La hotel for lunch. The restaurant is usually on Level 4, but due to renovations being made, the restaurant was moved to Level 36, which I think was for the better because the view is just awesome as you overlook Sydney harbor.

Towards the end of our lunch I was handed over an unexpected gift from the lovely trio, which I will definitlely wear a lot provided the weather warrants it of course. Thanks you three. See Adrian? I said 'you three', not 'you's'. Even more unexpectedly, the staff of the restaurant came out of no where to sing happy birthday, bringing me two cupcakes and some lollies. Thank you ! :)

After lunch, we walked over to the Botanical Gardens to relax, and what a relaxation it was. Along the way however, Adrian just had to make the most uncalled for remark you could ever make, but out of respect for him, I will leave it alone. *shivers*. When we got to the park, I hogged Jasmine's camera and started taking pictures, and while the following may appear conceited, I think the pictures I took of everyone were pure beauty. The picture of Tim looking down on the grass, the picture of Jasmine lying on the grass looking like she's dreaming, that's the stuff. :)

Since Tim had to leave for his tutorial class, Adrian and myself headed back to Jasmine's house, where we taste tested some of Jasmine's lovely strawberry cheesecake that she made for me. I always knew it was going to taste heavenly, and she proved me right. Thanks so much Jasmine ! :)

After leaving Jasmine's place, I dropped off Adrian and drove back home to put the cheesecake in the fridge. After that I paid a visit to Adriana and had a long and pleasant conversation about almost everything. Thanks again for the CD mix ! At the last minute, we both decided to visit work and have a game of bowling, which turned into two games and a game of air hockey. :) Unexpectedly, during my game of air hockey, my workmates started singing happy birthday and brought me a cake and a large bowl of fries. I love you guys ! :)

After the two closest games of bowling ever, I drove back to Blacktown and met up with Shirley where we had our traditional tutti frutti dish at Max Brenner. Thank you Shirley for the bracelet and shirt ! And thanks also for the card that talks to you when you open it. You're the best ! :)

After following Shirley home, I drove back to St. Clair and paid a visit to Yen to cap off the night. Great seeing you mingz !! :):) All the stuff we had to tell each other indicates how long it's been !

I'd like to end this blog by thanking everyone that was involved with today. All your contributions made it the greatest day ever and I can't thank you enough.

The One Just For The Sake Of Blogging.

2009-08-21T12:58:00.004+10:00

To kick things into gear, I would like to acknowledge the birthdays of Brent De Vega (21) and Miguel Alvarez (26?). Hope you boys are celebrating in style, unlike me who has been quite apathetic and lethargic when it comes to celebrating the birthday.

Progress on the new house?
On my way to work yesterday, I passed by my new house-to-be and I cannot wait to move. The garage door is finally installed. From the outside, everything looks complete, so I guess they're just putting in the finishing touches in the interior. From the numerous amount of times I've drove through my new street, I've observed many young families and their children going on about their daily activities. I always see young kids riding their bicycles equipped with training wheels and mother's taking their baby's for a stroll in the pram. I guess I've built this perception that this neighborhood carries the same kind of atmosphere as a peaceful retirement village. Where I'm living now, I'm always hearing cars doing burnouts and all that dangerous crap at 3am in the morning, so obviously I am eagerly awaiting the moving date ! What's even cooler is that once the council hands over the keys to our new house, my parents want me to stay at our new place by myself for one night. House party?

Bowling?
Earlier this morning I attended my weekly bowling session with Jinno, Ryan and Mon at Mt. Druitt AMF. I think we are getting to the stage where we should consider joining a bowling league or competition of some sort. Even though I may not be 'league' material, I would enjoy the idea of bowling weekly with friend's and the funny seniors who I witness every Friday. I've also noticed a few younger kids who have just joined the league, showcasing that league is open for people of all ages. But before this contemplation turns into a reality, I really need to acquire some sort of consistency with my bowling. At the end of the day, me joining a league won't cost a cent, since I'm staff. :)

Uni?
4 weeks into it. Thoughts? I can honestly say that I only enjoy 1/4 of my subjects, which is an all time low. That one lucky subject would be Finance. All my other subjects are just there because they have to be done. Sad but true. Oh yeah, and I have to repeat Business Statistics. It's going to be a sad summer this year.

Boy bands?
Okay seriously, I enjoy boy bands. There's no need for me to hide my fascination with boy bands, particularly those of the 90's. I am sucker for the old hits of the Backstreet Boys, Five and N'Sync. The other week I was going through my sister's CD collection, and I came across this gem which took me way back.

I still remember the day my sister picked up this album from Mt. Druitt, where 98 Degrees themselves were performing. Yes, the actual band was at Mt. Druitt. I couldn't believe it either back then. I remember she and her friend's were going nuts, one of them screaming "will you marry me?", and Nick Lachey replying "Aww that's sweet". HAHAHA. Favorite songs would be Because Of You, Still, Invisible Man, Heat It ... screw it, the whole album is great. I love this record !

Gym?
Went to Ripples Gym last Wednesday where I took Adrian under my wing. I had a pretty good workout. I saw Travis there, an employee of the gym who also went to my old school in the grade below. It's always pleasing when someone whom you haven't seen in more than 3 years, who you barely know, remembers your name. Even more kudos to him, as he got amazingly bigger since I last saw him all those years ago.

I need to head to work soon, but before that I'm going to take a nap.

The One With The White Rabbit.

2009-08-11T09:18:00.004+10:00

This blog will be something short, something sweet I suppose. I'm currently sitting in the labs of Building 10, trying to drain the clock until my Business Law and Ethics lecture starts. For some reason I've arrived here an hour early. I really need to start planning my morning departure, instead of winging it all the time ...

This morning before I left the house, I saw a white rabbit outside my door. Now I have the greatest liking for little furry animals, so the presence of this cute and little furry creature was a great start to my day. I yelled to my dad "PAPA, THERE'S A RABBIT AT OUR DOOR". With that said, I'm hoping to run into a kangaroo on the streets some day. There's been plenty of sightings of kangaroos at the bike jumps just up the road, those of which I've seen myself. See, I live on the outskirts of St. Clair, and beyond that boundary is pretty much rural.

While this encounter with the white rabbit was such a delight, it was also weird because I had been listening to this album at the time:

Well I thought it was cool.

The One With Progress.

2009-08-09T22:41:00.002+10:00

Three days ago I received another letter from UTS, and as usual my father opened it and read everything before I could lay any hands on it. Come to think of it, any mail I receive pertaining to university or finance, they open it before me. Don't get me started with my St. George banking statements. Once they catch a glimpse of my statements, I am immediately a victim of how I could 'better' be spending my money.

Anyways, the letter. My latest love letter to be received from UTS outlines the punishment I could be facing as a result of this plagiarism incident I have been involved with. Those who studied 26134 Business Statistics with me will understand the following. The Faculty Conduct Commitee recommended to the Dean that I:

Receive a 0 or fail grading for Parts B and C of the assignment (which then means I fail the subject)
Receive a formal caution.

They have given me an opportunity to appeal the case by sending a written representation to the Business Dean, which I have grabbed with both hands. I sent the Dean my appeal last night and received a reply from him today. He actually thanked me for my appeal and that he would read it accordingly, which is always nice and reassuring.

All I do now is wait ...

The One With The Miserable Evening.

2009-08-05T20:38:00.003+10:00

To get things underway, I shall make a special mention to my favorite co-worker, Adriana, because she's like the greatest person ever, and also due to the fact that she asked to be in my blog. Okay but seriously, she's da bomb. Don't forget that we owe ourselves a game of bowling. ILY :)

On to more relevant issues pertaining the title of this blog, I had one heck of a journey home.

First moment of misery. The train ride home.
After my finance lecture, I went to the Glasshouse and played Time Crisis 2. I actually finished the whole game without dieing and plenty of lives left. Usually I lose all my lives at the helicopter boss. Okay fine, that has no connection to the story I'm trying to tell. I just felt like bragging about my gaming accomplishments. Anyways ... I walked to the station with Ivan and Adrian and we caught the express which went to Redfern, Parramatta and Penrith. Obviously with Adrian and myself needing to get off at Doonside and St Marys respectively, we were forced to get off at Parramatta station and wait for a train that would take us to our rightful destinations.

When our train arrived, we got on and started conversing about potential holiday destinations with the uni bunch. After like 15 minutes or so, I looked out the window noticed something not right ...

Me: Hey Adrian, isn't that Rooty Hill RSL we just went past?
Adrian: Let me see. *observes* What the heck ...
Me: Wait, if we just went past Rooty Hill RSL, then we must not have stopped at Doonside.
Adrian: Shit, we're on the Penrith express aren't we.

Turns out we were on the Penrith express which goes from Parramatta straight to Penrith, which is pretty much the same train we were on previously. How we did not notice that is beyond me. As soon as we arrived at Penrith, we caught the train back to St Marys and Doonside.

Second moment of misery. The toilet.
After arriving at St Marys station, I drove home to get Veronica's economics textbook so that I could drive over and return it. Since I was at home, I thought I might as well pee. So I went to the toilet, closed the door, did my business and flushed. When I tried turning the door knob, I noticed that handle was turning, but the door still wasn't opening. I thought, "wtf". I tried twisting and turning the handle in different angles, until finally, the fucking handle came off. So here I am, stuck inside my own toilet with a broken door handle. I had to call my aunty to come from the outside and open the door. You can imagine the look on her face when I called her and said "can you please come to the toilet and get me out?".

Third moment of misery. The petrol station.
Okay, so I told you I went home to get Veronica's textbook so that I could return it. After getting myself free from the toilet, I drove off to Veronica's house. But before that, I decided to stop by the petrol station to refill. Since I'm so poor and never have cash on me, I'm always using my key card to pay for petrol. After putting in around $50 dollars worth of petrol, I walked to the counter and attempted to pay with my key card as usual. The transaction was taking longer than expected, and then the clerk tells me that my EFTPOS limit has been exceeded. Nothing is worse than pumping a full tank of gas and not being able to pay for it.

When you're in this situation, you're required to fill out a form where you record you personal details and your driver's liscence details, which is what I did. You then have 24 hours to pay. While I was filling out this application, around 10 customers had accumulated behind me, waiting to pay for their petrol, probably in cash. I'm thinking 'oh fuck, look at this long line I've caused'. By the time the clerk was done processing my application, the line had reached the fucking door. I didn't even have the courage to look behind me knowing that I've created this long line of impatience.

The One Great Saturday Night. (At Work).

2009-08-02T01:39:00.003+10:00

Wow. I seem to be on a blogging rampage at the moment. I've just come back from a great night at work, and not even the fact that it's a Saturday night can overshadow the greatness of such a shift. Saturday night's are usually busy, but today was really dead and did not require much effort, allowing me to be lazy and bludge to a certain extent.

Tonight I was working with one of the new girls named Kristina. A great girl. Graduated from Baulkham Hills High School, and currently attends University of Sydney doing a course I have since forgotten the name of, but something along the lines of International something. Her dedication at the workplace makes me smile. :)

We had a birthday function of 32 people to cater for, which was simple enough. The father of the celebrant was so generous and his wife was smoking hot. :) :) The father gave us a $68 dollar tip which I halved with Kristina. At first I refused to accept such a tip, but he kept insisting that I take it so I put it in the till temporarily. 10 minutes later I tried returning his money, but he told me he would be insulted if I refused to accept it so I took it like the scab I am and split it with Kristina. To follow along with our good fortunes, the wife left us a box of ice cream cake which we ate during our closing procedure. It was a well designed ice-cream cake with M&M's and Oreo's and all this other decorative stuff. Yummy.

I have work again in the morning, so I'll blog you later !

The One Possibly Saddest Thing On The Internet.

2009-08-01T10:44:00.006+10:00

After seeing a skinned bat inside yesterday's issue of MX, I was reminded of this feature article. I have all the affection in the world for domesticated animals, and it saddens me to see this. Obviously I'm unaware of the circumstances surrounding these pictures, but for the pictures being what they are, I find it strongly abhorrent.

Warning: this is very graphic.

Comments? Thoughts?

On a more positive note, it's Gloria's birthday today. And while she has disappeared around university, presumed MIA, I wish her a great weekend of celebration and a long period of happiness with her newly equipped braces.

The One With The Pending Decision.

2009-07-31T13:34:00.003+10:00

In my previous entry, I wrote about how I was due for a meeting with the Faculty Student Committee for a hearing regarding an allegation of 'supposed' misconduct towards my group assignment for Business Statistics.

My group and another group were present at this meeting to discuss the issue of plagiarism towards our assignments. Prior to the meeting I was incredibly pumped to defend Derek and myself. I was pumped to prove that we did not copy other people's work. I was so pumped, if you had asked me to do something daring, like punch Tim in the face, I would have.

To reinforce my innocence, I brought along Adrian for some extra defence, and Derek brought in Darren. I was so optimistic that this whole situation would be sorted in one meeting, but unfortunately, the lack of evidence to prove that Derek and myself did not plagiarize was insufficient. I really wish I had said more things to the panel to truly convince them.

If there's one thing to be positive about, it's that Derek nor myself are facing expulsion or any time away from uni. Unfortunately, while we did not plagiarize, we may still endure a penalty of some sort. How this works is that the committee recommends a penalty to the Dean of the Business faculty, and then that person then reads their report and makes the final decision. The penalty that the committee has recommended is that Derek and myself receive a 0 grading for Parts B and C of the assignment. If that's the case, there's no way in hell I will pass this subject. I could not be more disappointed because none of this was our fault.

The only thing I can do now is send email to the Dean after he receives the recommendation and make an appeal.

Group assignment's can die. They really can.

The One Where It's Make Or Break.

2009-07-31T00:28:00.002+10:00

I've just returned from a very quiet, yet enjoyable evening at work. The lack of customer's at work prompted Mary-Jane and myself to make some deep fried magnum ice-creams. When you work in a cafe that's lacking any financial activity, you kind of feel the need to conjure up something exciting to do. Prior to placing the battered magnum's in the deep fryer, I had all the confidence in the world that the experiment would fail, and that I would need to spend a heap of time cleaning out all the gunk from the fryer's as a result of the magnum's breaking down. To the benefit of our tummies, the cooking procedure was a success ! And yummy at that.

Later today I'm expected to present myself at a boardroom meeting at UTS Haymarkets to discuss this allegation of misconduct against my Business Statistics group members from last semester. For those who don't know, my group and myself have been accused of plagiarising another group's assignment. I received a copy of both our assignments which had the 'plagiarised' sections highlighted, and boy do they have a case. I was quite furious as to how similiar or 'exact' our assignments were, considering Derek and myself were up late many nights working on our respective contributions.

At the end of the day however, I know I did not plagiarise, or make any contact with the other group, so I am hoping my grade will not be affected in any way. More serious than that, I hope I do not face the expulsion card. I'll let you know what happens.

The One After The First Day Back.

2009-07-29T23:09:00.008+10:00

9:30am start today. The smart thing to do would have been to sleep early the night before, but instead I was an internet whore and slept at 3 in the morning. I paid the ultimate price the next day. First class was my Business Law and Ethics tutorial which wasn't as bad as I originally expected. My tutor is quite easy going and does not grill you if you don't contribute, which works well for me. Interestingly enough, I'm the only second year student in the class, and am the only one from the FEIT faculty.

Next class was Business Requirements Modeling. No criticisms here. Here we formed our groups for the assignment, which is officially comprised of Jasmine, Tim, Nam, Gordon and myself. Looking forward to it. The lecturer is one part of the subject that really stands out. I'm sure the way in which the lecturer speaks is perfectly natural, but as a listener it really seems like he's yelling at you, which is great because your attention is immediately placed on him, and not the hot girl sitting across from you in the same row. Oh wait.

After my BRM class, I had my Finance lecture. This is where my lack of sleep from the night before came back to bite me. The first hour of the lecture consisted of me listening for 5 seconds, then slowly falling asleep for 10 seconds, then waking up realizing I should be listening, then repeat. I hate it when that happens. You really don't want to fall asleep, but you do so anyway because you can't help it. Again, we formed our groups for the assignment. My group for this one will be Andrew, Joseph, CJ and myself.

After my last class I met up with Adrian, Ivan and Xander and had a cheap dinner at Maccas and then went to the Glasshouse to play some pool.

And that's my life story today.

Now that I'm blogging, I'd like to make a special mention to a great band I recently came across, a band known as 'Dance Gavin Dance'. Yes, the fact that I'm even blogging about them should indicate how much I enjoy their music. Describing the style of music they play is tough. If I had to specific, I would label them as Experimental Post-Hardcore? I had heard about these guys before but never bothered to browse their catalog, simply because of their band name. I know, stupid reason not to check a band out. I finally came to my senses and decided to see what they have to offer ...

Don't let the fat guy in the middle fool you Tim. He's lost a lot of weight since then. :)

Starting with their myspace, I obviously listened to the songs with the highest play counts, them being 'And I Told Them I Invented Times New Roman' and 'Lemon Miringue Tie'. Upon hearing these tracks, the first thing that caught my attention was the singer's voice. It's just so ... beautiful. After being impressed with the songs, I checked out their 'Downtown Battle Mountain' album.

Such a great album. The singing is just so catchy and is probably the highlight. While there isn't loads of singing, when it does occur it's a great listening experience. As for the instruments, these musicians know their instruments really well. Some weird and complicated structures are something that caught my attention straight away. So many great guitar leads in this album too.

Recommended songs are:

The One Hundredth.

2009-07-28T16:05:00.003+10:00

Wow. 100 blog posts. Quite a milestone in the online world even if I say so myself. Next milestone: 500 blog posts.

No more holidays ! I didn't really have much of a holiday anyway to be honest. Not in the fact that I was mostly working, but I really didn't get up to much outside of work. I guess I had a more conservative break from university. Also, my illness didn't help too much either !

Semester 2 of 2009 started today ! Well for me anyway. I slept super-duper early last night to avoid any chances of excessive sleep the next morning. I woke up at 6:30 and caught the 8:24 train for a 10am start ! :)

I got to my first lecture which was Business Law and Ethics. Unfortunately I could not get into any rhythm with this subject. There were interesting parts here and there, but I could not stay focused on the lecturer for the whole hour and a half. You know you're not completely interested in the subject if the only memorable part was the lecturer doing a voice impersonation of Homer and Marge from the Simpsons. Oh no ... it could be another repeat of Database Fundamentals where the lecturer bored me so much, I wanted to jump out of my skin to have something else to do.

After the lecture I headed to the union food court to eat some Butter Chicken from the Indian shop. While lining up, I spotted Denise sitting across the food court. You know those situations where you're waving vigorously at someone but they can't see you? Sometimes they even look at you, but they just don't notice you're waving. Well that's exactly what happened. Her friend's noticed me waving like a weirdo, and I finally got her attention.

Apart from Business Law and Ethics, I had my first taste of Applications Programming. The lecturer seems to be more appealing and attention grabbing and I hope that will help me succeed in this subject. If there's one thing I'm sure of, it's that he does not resemble a priest, as thought by Jasmine. Silly girl.

Okay, so that's my day of university. Just the two lectures !

After being capped on my internet a half month early, I am uncapped as of today and am going nuts on the downloads !!

The One With The Movies.

2009-07-15T02:10:00.001+10:00

In one of my previous entries, I mentioned how I would become a coach potato these holidays and catch up on a bunch of movies. Here's what I watched (so far). More to come.

The Bank Job (2008)
Cast: Jason Statham
Probably one of the more favored and enjoyed films I've watched these holidays. As you may have guessed from the title, the movie is about a group of amateurs who strive to rob a bank. Sounds straightforward, however the plot thickens when they realize that some of the safe deposit boxes they've stolen contain dirty contents wanted by an outside force of corruption and violence. Many secrets are uncovered as a result of their robbery, and Terry (Jason Statham) and his gang must put the pieces together to get themselves out of the hole they've dug. This film will definitely keep you on the edge of your seat and once again Jason Statham demonstrates how badass he is. For a Jason Statham film, The Bank Job has a lot more substance than your typical bank robbery film. Highly recommended. 5/5

Broken Arrow (1996)
Cast: Christian Slater, John Travolta
I always saw bits and pieces of this movie on TV, but I never had the chance to watch it in whole. My opinion? Waste of space on my hard drive. Fail acting, fail direction, fail everything. I could be a lenient guy and just say that this movie is just good for simple entertainment, but even Broken Arrow fails at that. There are so many things that don't make sense in this movie, and one of them is how Christian Slater landed a role in this movie. 1/5

A Bronx Tale (1993)
Cast: Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Chazz Palminteri, Taral Hickcs
My my ... it's been a long time since I've seen anything from De Niro's catalog. After watching this, I am reminded of what a great person the guy is. What we have here is De Niro's debut as a director. The film is set in the 1960's in the Bronx and follows the life of a young kid named Calogero, otherwise known as 'C'. One day C meets a highly respected local crime boss and as their relationship extends, C's father (played by Robert De Niro) becomes worried. Before watching this I was expecting your straightforward action movie with endless gun and bar fights. I was wrong. This movie is much more special than your average 'gangster' and 'all guns blazing' type of movie. There are many values and lessons to be realized and morals to be observed from this movie, and we observe those as C is pushed closer and away from his two father figures. Something that totally tripped me out was Jane, the black girl C dates. I can't believe she's played by Taral Hicks ! For those who don't know what I'm talking about, Taral Hicks is an R&B artist I enjoyed back in the 90's. Anyways, I really wished the movie explored further into the relationship between C and Jane. I wonder how their relationship went on to be ... nevertheless, a pleasure to watch. 4/5

The Great Debators (2007)
Cast: Denzel Washington, Forest Whitaker
My my, what the heck did I just watch? A fantastic film, that's what. What we have here is Denzel Washington's visual adaptation on the true story of Melvin B. Tolson, a professor of Wiley College, who in 1935 inspired the school's first debate team to challenge Harvard in the national championships. Right from the outset I was hooked onto every scene. The chemistry between the three main debaters really showed thanks to impeccable acting, which allowed me to really appreciate their journey and run on to the national finals. Personally I had no idea about the existence of significance of Wiley College in the 1930's, and while the film may not be completely authentic, I was able to take away a considerable amount of knowledge from this film. I'm certain this film would be a major inspiration to any debater out there. I'm very familiar with Denzel's work as an actor, but as a director I'm quite foreign. I can only hope that he makes more films like this. 5/5

I Want Someone To Eat Cheese With (2006)
Cast: Jeff Garlin
This movie was quite an interesting one. It revolves around a 39 year old actor who is fat and lonely and still living with his parents. To add insult to injury, he is having trouble with his job and finding it difficult to find a real relationship. The movie does mess with your head in that the message that the movie is trying to convey isn't really clear. I mean I thought the protagonist would find successful love with either one of the two main girls in the movie, but instead the movie suddenly ends, leaving the audience with nothing to take away. A line I found quite funny and random was "nothing hotter than an elder angry Filipino woman, nothing hotter". 3/5

Into The Wild (2007)
Cast: Emile Hirsche, Catherine Keener
Wow, what a great transformation movie. This film would have done wonders as my material for my Area of Study in English for the HSC. Based on the late years of Christopher McCandless, the movie follows the journey of a graduate named Chris (Emile Hirsche), fresh out of college who ditches his material possessions to hitchhike into the Alaskan wilderness. The movie is comprised of chapters in which we see Chris grow as a result of the people he meets throughout his journey of simply living life. This is a noticeably artistically driven film which makes Chris' journey more intriguing for the viewer. Watching this, I was really attached to Chris' adventure, and it made me realize how much life there is to be breathed out in the wild, away from our technologically and money driven society. As he delves deeper and deeper towards his destination, you really start to appreciate the purpose of his journey and you realize that he's not crazy, but rather he just wants to live. Excellent cinematography. 4/5

Moving McAllister (2007)
A law intern must complete a special task for the boss of his firm in time before he must sit his bar exam, in which his life hangs in the balance over. I won't even bother explaining the rest because you would be wasting your own time reading this, let alone watching the movie. The movie went so slow, and there were many occasions where I'd be thinking to myself "where is this movie going?". Bad acting is the sole reason why I got bored with this movie, and because of it, I was unable to care about any of the characters. I kept persisting with the movie, trying as best as I could not to fast forward, but after watching the whole duration, I wished I hadn't watched this at all. The only possible way you could like this crap movie, is if you like crap movies. 1/5.

Next (2007)
Cast: Nicholas Cage, Julianne Moore, Jessica Biel
What we have here, in my opinion of course, is a great and original idea gone sideways because of a bad script. Next features Nicholas Cage as a Las Vegas magician born with the ability to see into the future and know all possible outcomes. The FBI wishes to utilize these abilities to prevent a nuclear terrorist attack. After watching the casino scene at the start with Cage evading casino security, I thought to myself, wow this movie is going to own. Sadly, this would be the last moment of satisfaction I'd take away from this movie. Throughout the movie I kept thinking to myself, how could a girl as hot as Jessica Biel's character be nice and attracted to a psycho-looking character as played by Nicholas Cage. Whatever, a movie is a movie. The villains in the movie weren't anywhere as near evil or menacing as they should be, which is the same drawback Quantam of Solace experienced. Towards the end I was so fed up, I didn't care whether the villains got their way or not. NEXT ! 2/5

Role Models (2008)
Cast: Paul Rudd, Sean William Scott
I love Paul Rudd. I don't know what it is about him, but I just love him. Ever since I saw him briefly as a guest on Friends, I've been a big fan of his. Putting my attraction to Mr. Rudd aside, Role Models is a hilarious film that looks at two male adults (Paul Rudd and Sean William Scott) who, after a series of offenses, must rack up 150 hours of community service by sitting out a Big Brother program. The film is more centered on Rudd's character as he tries to turn around his directionless life, and it is through his participation in the Big Brother program that allows him to do so. I don't want to try and make the film sound too serious, as it is a very entertaining film for the family and friends. 3/5

Sex Drive (2008)
Cast: Josh Zuckerman, Amanda Crew, Clark Duke, James Marsden
Finally, a movie I actually enjoyed and rarely paused. Not only was this movie funny, but it opened the door to some up and coming talents. The three main teens in this movie were all excellent in the movie, and while some of their roles were questionable in this movie, their performances really did make it an enjoyable watch for a teenager like myself. Before watching this, I had never seen or heard of the three main actors but they gave a great first impression. Even more better, the movie includes the sexy Katrina Bowden from the 30 Rock series. Something I still can't figure out is how a guy like Lance can be so likable as he seems to me in this movie. Putting my problems aside, this actually is a character driven movie. From the get-go, you think the movie is all about a guy meeting up with some girl from the internet, and then he gets laid, happy ending. Towards the end, you start to realize differently. There aren't many movies I've seen these holidays that I would get a second viewing from me, but this one definitely would. 4/5

The Hangover (2009)
Cast: Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms
How this is up on IMDB's Top 250 movies as voted by users is beyond me. Don't let my harshness tell the story though. The Hangover is a somewhat entertaining film, but aside from the fresh cinematography and story, it really didn't do much for me. I still appreciate it for what it is though. A very generous 3/5

Transformers: Revenge of the something... (2009)
Cast: Shia Lebouf, Megan Fox
I didn't like the first Transformers. I didn't like this one. Boo me all you want. 2/5

The One With The Avoidable Embarrassment.

2009-07-05T23:03:00.003+10:00

Short post tonight (this morning). On my way to work this yesterday morning, I received a phone call from my colleague asking me to pass by Coles to buy some much needed stock. Since I hadn't arrived at work yet, I was forced to use my own money. Since these purchases were for work, I would be able to claim my money back as long as I returned the receipt given to me from the purchase. After buying 20 bags of hamburger rolls at Coles whilst at the same time catching the attention of randoms because of my would be peculiar purchase, I quickly ran back to the car and continued driving to work in a hurry because I knew it would be busy.

To my relief, it was pretty quiet at work, so I calmly placed the stock I had purchased in their respectful shelfs. I then realized that I didn't have my receipt with me, meaning I wouldn't be able to claim my money back for buying items for work. At the time, I was thinking "I must have thrown the receipt in the bin !". Not wanting to be a victim of stupidity (which later on is unavoidable anyway), I quickly drove back to Coles. I then ran to the checkout girl whom had handled my purchase from before, kindly asking for a duplicate receipt. She said she wasn't sure if she could do such a thing, so she kindly asked her manager, but unfortunately for me, they could not give me a second receipt. Considering how broke I am at the moment, I made it my mission to look for the receipt. I needed that money back ! I was fairly certain I threw it in the bin after buying those buns (because I always throw receipts in the nearest bin after a purchase). Reluctantly I walked to the bin nearest and searched it's contents. I felt so desperate and low in front of these Kellyville bystanders. After failing to find the receipt, I continued on to the next 3 bins, searching them through its entirety. Again, I'm sure I must have caught the attention of people dining in at Gloria Jeans or Donut King. They must have been thinking "wtf is this guy doing".

I could see people observing me in my peripherals, and before I got any redder I put my head down and walked straight back to my car. It sucked knowing I wouldn't be able to get my money back, but I quickly got over it, because I know there's worser 'FML' situations out there. Anyways, when I returned to work, I grabbed a piece of chewing gum from my pocket (yes I chew gum even though you're not meant to), and at the same time I felt a thin piece of paper. Having the faintest hope of it being the receipt, I took this mysterious piece of folded paper out of my pocket. Turns out I had the receipt the whole time. Oh well, I got my money back. That's what matters.

The One With The Musical Interrogation.

2009-07-03T18:02:00.004+10:00

Anyone remember Goldeneye 007 for the Nintendo 64? One of the better games for the N64 and I think one of the innovators of what the FPS genre is today. Anyways, after a moment of pure boredom today, I decided to connect the N64 and play some 007. Now here's the funny thing. I only intended to play like two levels and then hopefully think of something else to do, but the controller didn't seem to want to leave my grasp, so instead I started a completely new file and knocked up around 4 hours of gameplay. I managed to unlock the Aztec level which you get my beating all levels on Secret Agent. I only need to beat 3 more levels to unlock the Egyptian level, but I don't think I'll be touching the game anymore.

Remember those cheats you can unlock by beating a level in a certain amount of time? I managed get most of them this time round, which I find amazing since I couldn't even come close to unlocking them when I used to whore this game more than a decade ago. The 'Invisibility' cheat was a pain to get but I got excited when I finally got it. Archives 00 Agent in 1:16 baby. Man I need to get out more. I NEED MONEY !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ONLY LIKE TEH BEST GAME EVER !!!!11111

Alright. Focusing more on the title of this blog, I decided to do one of those online quizzes because they're always fun and interesting to do. I completed a quiz based on Last.fm, which is a site that collects data on the music you listen and summarizes them into two tables. One table contains all the artists you listen to the most, and another table containing the songs you listen to the most. I really urge you to be cool like Adrian, Timothy and myself and create an account ! Here's my last.fm profile !

Below are my results

Top 10 Artists:

Name your top 10 artists on your Last.fm profile page.

Acceptance
A Day To Remember
Agalloch
akissforjersey
Drive Like Carson
Disfiguring The Goddess
A Day Away
Boyz II Men
Brain Drill
Last Winter

The Questions

Now answer the questions according to the numbers.

What was the first song you ever heard by #6 (Disfiguring The Goddess)?
It was 'Teeth Of Emultion' on their myspace. A very crushing, very brutal song that will tear your speakers apart. Listen with headphones and prepare to have your ears grinded.

What is your favorite album from #2 (A Day To Remember)?
At the moment, it's really difficult for me to determine my favorite album since I still consider myself a new fan, however if I had to decide, it would be 'Homesick' because it's the album that contains most of my favorite songs. Do check it out for fans of Pop Punk/Hardcore !

What is your favorite lyric that #5 (Drive Like Carson) has sung?

if i could only find a way
to save you from all your mistakes
numbed by my inability
to change your angle
"Drive Like Carson - Change Your Angle"

How many times have you seen #4 (akissforjersey) live?
So many times !!!

on youtube.

What is your favorite song by #7 (A Day Away)?
It's so hard to decide ! They honestly have so many great songs. At the moment, it would be 'Dressed To Thrill', however a song of theirs I've loved for a long time is 'Her And Me'.

What is a good memory you have involving the music of #10 (Last Winter)?
Misinterpretation of lyrics of the song 'Our Summer In Illinois' while listening to it on the train with Adrian. The intro goes "Have you seen the milky way from Illinois", but we thought it was "I've seen num num from Illinois". It honestly sounds like that.

Is there a song of #3 (Agalloch) that makes you sad?
Not at all. Their music is simply beautiful, but not beautiful in a way that it would warrant sad emotions.

What is your favorite lyric that #2 (A Day To Remember) has sung?

Definitely the chorus to "Colder than my heart, if you can imagine"

"Let's leave the light
I'm still singing "Whoa"
(Whoaa)
Don't say you won't let it go
'Cause you'll never know
(You'll never know)
I'm still singing "Whoa"
(Whoaa)
Don't say you won't let it go
'Cause you'll never know"

What is your favorite song by #9 (Brain Drill)?
Favorite song would have to be 'Forcefed Human Shit', both musically and lyrically. Obviously any person ignorant to death metal will assume this is just another song about the grotesque natures of humanity, but really, this song is about how the media force feeds us, the public, an endless amount of lies.

How did you get into #3 (Agalloch)?
I got into this fabulous band when I wanted to expand my musical tastes in the metal scene. After having countless death metal bands in my playlist, I decided to explore some Atmospheric stuff, and Agalloch seemed to be recommended by everyone in a certain forum. These guys make really beautiful music. I recommend 'The Hawthorne Passage'.

What was the first song you heard by #1 (Acceptance)?
'So Contagious' and they still are ever since Audrey introduced me to them.

What is your favorite song by #4 (akissforjersey)?
Definitely 'The Lungs That Impress Eternal'. That outro is just .. nice.

How many time have you seen #9 (Brain Drill) live?
Never!

What is a good memory you have involving #2 (A Day To Remember)?
Hearing 'You Had Me at Hello' for the first time and thinking, holy crap, why did Timothy or Adri not recommend me this song before.

Is there a song of #8 (Boys II Men) that makes you sad?
The entire 'II' album makes me sad because it reminds me of my childhood which sadly, is the period in my life that I've had the most fun. I'll seriously never have the same friends I had when I was a child.

What is your favorite album of #5 (Drive Like Carson)?
They only have one album called 'Livin Big' and it's splendid.

What is your favorite lyric that #3 (Agalloch) has sung?
I honestly don't know what the lyric means or symbolizes, but it gets me on every listen.

Here I gaze at a pantheon of oak, a citadel of stone
If this grand panorama before me is what you call God. . .
Then God is not dead
Agalloch, "In The Shadow of Our Pale Companion"

What is your favorite song of #1 (Acceptance)?
'Permanent' is my favorite. It just puts me in a happy mood every time I listen to it. If I were to listen to it on a rainy day, listening to it would make me think the sun was out.

What is your favorite song of #10 (Last Winter)?
"Chasing Lights".

How many times have you seen #8 (Boyz II Men) live?
Sadly never.

What is your favorite album of #1 (Acceptance)?
They only have on full length (Phantoms) , and it's the best. It's sad when great bands break up.

What is a great memory you have considering #9 (Brain Drill)?
Not a great memory, but the lead guitarist wrote up a blog on the band's myspace, explaining in graphic detail how they were on the road and got caught for possession of illegal substances, and how he had his "but cheeks spread apart" to be checked for possession of marijuana.

What was the first song you heard by #8 (Boyz II Men)?
It would have to be 'Jezzebel'. Just thinking about it makes me want to travel back and relive my childhood.

What is your favorite cover by #2 (A Day To Remember)?
I know they have covers, but I'm yet to hear them !

The One With The St Marys Kids

2009-06-29T13:44:00.009+10:00

Last night I returned from one of the greatest weekends ever with the St Marys Kids. Together with 25 other former students of St Marys Senior High, we headed off to Perisher Blue for the weekend. Despite the fact that my bank account has a zero balance, the snow trip was definitely worth every dollar.

On Friday night, we all met up at Nichol's place in Rooty Hill to get picked up by the coach. It was a bit past midnight and freezing ! Suddenly, I noticed two random blokes with beer bottles walking towards our group. I got the feeling that they were going to walk towards us and cause some trouble because they were obviously wasted. As a joke, I walked slightly towards them as if something was really going to happen. Sure enough, they actually stopped and walked towards me. In my head I was laughing, thinking to myself, okay, let's see where this goes. To my benefit, they were quite friendly drunks, asking stupid questions like 'have you seen my sister? 'are you filipino?'. 'fucking cold aye'?. When the coach finally arrived, one of them actually hopped onto the bus thinking he was coming to the snow with us. Hilarious.

We got to our accommodation at 7am on Saturday morning. To my surprise, we went straight for the slopes instead of getting some sleep. We grabbed our gear, our snowboards and skis, and from then on it was 8 hours of awesomeness. Now I hadn't been snowboarding since Year 6, so just to build some confidence, I limited myself to snowboarding on the lowest slope. After that, I headed for the lifts which took me to the very top of the mountain, and from then on it was pure awesomeness.

That night, there really wasn't much to do back at the cabins. After exhausting my change on pool and daytona, we had shots of Southern Comfort over pretty much 100 games of Uno. I went back to my own cabin at a random time around 2am and slept in my nudie jeans. Funnily enough, when I woke up, my jeans were off and I was only in boxer shorts. Bizarre much?

Day 2 at the snow was another great day. Today, me and some of the other boys ditched our skis and snowboards and decided to have an ultra epic snowball fight. We walked towards the church where no one was to be found. We decided to make it ultra epic by carving out our own bases and fortresses. Seeing as I was only a one-man team, I worked as fast as I could to build the most secure snow base. After we had finished working on our snow bases, it was 3 hours of snowball madness.

We headed back home Sunday night at 6pm and played some more Uno on the bus. Eventually I started getting motion sickness so I put the aside the cards and took a nap. We arrived at McDonalds on the M7 and bought myself an epic dinner consisting of a 10 nuggets, a cheeseburger meal, a strawberry sundae, a jam donut and a large cappuccino. *burp* Overall, the snow trip was a big success and it is all thanks to Krista who did all the planning. Thanks again Krista !

Anyways, the snow trip has left me pretty much broke right now, so I really don't have any money to go out, which is okay because it gives me a chance to be a computer whore and watch all these new movies and TV series on my hard drive. I plan to watch as many movies as I can and write up a blog doing a small review on each one. I have work in an hour, so I'm going to take a quick nap ! Cya !

The One About Petrol Money.

2009-06-26T21:22:00.005+10:00

I have a good hour until I get picked up, so I think the time-killing task for this situation will be to blog. Tonight I'm heading off to the snow, and funnily enough, I have no idea where our destination is. Heck, I bet half the kids attending don't know where we're going. Us St. Marys kids are all just excited to go away together. Should be great fun ! A big thank you goes to Krista who did the majority of the planning. Thank you so much Krista for your time and effort in organizing this outing. I'm giving her a big rap because she did us many favors, especially me by giving me free hire (since I was first to pay) and putting in $90 for my snowboard. It's just too bad you won't be joining us, so once again I'd like to give you my deepest condolences for your family and your tragic loss.

I visited Xander's place during the week and using my new 1TB external hard drive, snagged some more goodies from his computer. I managed to get the complete 007 package, which I should get through these holidays. I also grabbed Season 5 of Entourage which I've been meaning to watch since last year. As of now I have watched the 5th season and am eagerly awaiting Season 6. I also got all seasons of 'How I Met your Mother' and today, I started watching the series for the first time. Up to now I've watched the first six episodes, and I can honestly say that I'm hooked ! I hope to get through more episodes throughout the holidays.

During the week I watched The Hangover and Transformers: Revenge of the blablabla. Both movies were good, but not great. I almost fell asleep in Transformers because it was too damn long. I thought that battle in the forest was going to be the ending, but the movie went on for a friggin hour more.

I'd like to include a mini rant in this blog. I can't remember the last time I ever blog-ranted before. I think the last time I did that, I was ranting about people who leave rubbish in people's cars. I find that the best way to avoid such rude behavior is to not give people lifts. Anyways, I'd like to talk about the concept of 'petty-money', otherwise money awarded to the driver for their generosity and sacrifice.

You'll never find me asking for petrol money. Then again, I really respect those who offer me petrol money. You people are great and considerate. I like to believe I am generous at times, and giving lifts to those in 'serious' need is one of those things. Obviously, under severe circumstances, the concept of petrol money might come into play, for example, me driving someone to another country, however instead of me asking for petrol money, I just wouldn't drive you at all. Cmon, you know my Camry won't get that far. But yes, if I'm ever driving someone somewhere, I'm not looking for monetary rewards in return, all I'm looking for is just recognition and a smile !

Okay, so that's not really ranting, but I will now. I am not a fan of giving out petrol money either. Seriously guys, friends do favors all the time. Obviously there's a fine line between driving the same lazy person everywhere (which in that case you should be man enough to tell them to get lost and get their own lift) and someone who just needs this one lift and will probably never ask you for a lift again (which in this case, does not warrant and petrol money for mine). If it's the latter case, as a driver, be generous and help someone in need ! Don't be a greedy bastard and actually ask for $5 just to drive them to the station which really does not consume that much petrol. I mean fine, if they don't say thanks, then that's fair enough; just run them over as soon as they get off. That's what I do. :) Whatever happened to the days where friends would do favors for friends without seeking an award ! Don't get me wrong though. I'm definitely no saint myself.

Now assuming you just skim read through all that, basically I don't like accepting petrol money, nor do I like having to give petrol money. Anyways, my lift is coming soon, so laters ! Here I come snowies !

The One With The Dream.

2009-06-21T20:26:00.002+10:00

I had a dream last night. It featured myself and three others, them being Tim, Jasmine and Ivan. The four of us went grocery shopping at Coles in teams of two, one duo being Jasmine and Tim, and the other obviously being Ivan and myself. Tim and Jasmine went off to do their own thing, whilst Ivan and myself started at the cereal section. I grabbed a large box of Fruit loops, and from then on the dream just started getting way too peculiar. I was sitting on a wagon and Ivan started dragging me through the isles. Then all of a sudden, we hear on the P.A, "could the two asian boys with the wagon please shop sensibly. Please see us outside after you finish shopping". WTF right there. My dream then fast forwarded to Ivan and myself sitting outside on a table with two milfs who worked at Coles, whilst Tim and Jasmine were waiting for us by the car with their groceries waiting to go home.

The end.

The One With Appreciation For Teeth.

2009-05-22T10:00:00.006+10:00

This morning I had my final appointment with my orthodontist, Dr. Gary Clark. After 4 years of his great services, I am now a free man. I do however say this with complete sadness. Okay, well not total sadness, but I will definitely miss the good man. His mother must have raised him perfectly, because he is without a doubt one of the nicest blokes I've ever been affiliated with.

I actually did not know until the end of my appointment that it would be my last. Once I got out of the patient's chair, I asked him "when should I come back?" because if you've been going to the orthodontist for more than 4 years, you kind of get into the habit of asking that at the end of every appointment. Expecting a precise date, he said "That's it Lenny. You're a free man". I was like "What!? Are you serious?". Anyways, I shook his hand with the greatest of appreciation and drove off home reflecting upon my transition from crooked teeth to straighter teeth.

But yes, Mr. Clark, after 4 years of going to your Penrith clinic, thank you for taking the greatest care for my teeth. If anyone needs an orthodontist, I highly recommend my guy !

In other news, a busy week ahead. I have my make or break Networking written exam next Tuesday, then my group assignments for Business Statistics and Databases Fundamentals due on Thursday, and then two weeks after, finals exams. And then once that's over, I'm off to snowies with the St Marys kids ! AND THEN after that, I'm going to hit the gym over the holidays like no tomorrow.

The One With All The Negativity.

2009-05-02T00:20:00.002+10:00

WOAH ! A whole month has elapsed since I last blogged. Perhaps the cessation of this blog is approaching? You know how it works. You do something, and after a while you gradually slow down until BAM ! You finally stop. I guess my motivation to blog my mind isn't as high as it was before.

I just came back from bowling at this place called 'Seven 10 Split' which is this alley up at Fairfield. I managed to win myself a shirt because I am too cool. I met this one asian who spin's the ball invertedly which is something I found pretty cool. I managed to rack up a score of 174 last week, but didn't even come close to matching it tonight.

My job continues to drive me nuts. This semester at university is by far my least academically sucesssful, and it hasnt even finished yet. I wish I could blame my poor performance on the amount of hours I work and spend at the gym, but really the truth is that I'm not made for uni. Only reason I got into the course I'm doing now is because I was granted bonus points for my Band 6 in IPT. Otherwise I'd probably just be a couch potato all day. I've failed Business Statistics and I've just barely passed Accounting. I don't know what's going on. I know that my time at the library has definitely decreased by large amount. Seriously guys, how do you do it?

The One Post In A While.

2009-03-28T10:11:00.002+11:00

Hello non-existent readers ! Long time no blog ! A number of you may have got the impression that the running of this blog has ceased, but that is definitely not the case. Honestly I just haven't had the time to write or keep you readers updated, especially with university and work keeping my plate full. Even if I did have the time to blog, none of it would be interesting. Then again, when are my blogs interesting?

As I wait for my parents to get ready so that I can be driven to the station, I thought I would write to you this very blog. Today I have to head to Blake Library to meet up with my Business Statistics group to try and complete the first two questions. Since we all run a tight schedule, today is realistically the only day we can meet up.

On a completely unrelated, but highly important matter, something truly shocking occurred last Thursday. Running late to my Accounting lecture as usual, I was on the 9:05 express when I realized we had stopped at Ashfield, which was unusual because we never stop at Ashfield. Then out of no where, I hear an announcement from the train driver telling us "This train will terminate at Ashfield. For those travelling to Central, please get off and switch to Platform 3. There has been a fatality".

A fatality I wonder? Everybody started getting off the train in a hurry, however I was texting a friend at the time so I allowed myself to get off the train last. Once I had gotten off the train, I noticed that several CityRail employees were looking underneath the tracks as if there a dead body stuck on the tracks. As usual, curiousity got the best of me so I looked underneath as well. All I managed to see were puddles of blood, but no actual body. As of now, I haven't been able to find any article relating to this alleged fatality at Ashfield, so perhaps it was something else? If anyone else knows any details, please let me know.

Most of you know that I'll be moving houses later down the track. In fact, I may have told you I was moving in last year. Oh how that came to fruition. For those who don't know, I'll be moving to Beaumont Hills which is right next to Rouse Hill. Well last Thursday one of the residents of Sanctuary Drive (one of the mains roads of Beaumont Hills) was shot twice as he got out of his car on the driveway. He is currently in hospital fighting for his life. Thankfully he is still alive and his family are safe. It's just scary to think that I'll be moving right where the incident happened. Beaumont Hills is known for resembling a quiet retirement village where nothing dramatic occurs.

Next week is definitely a week I'm dreading. My manager has given me a total of 32 hours to work next week. I have no idea how I'm going to handle that combined with university commitments, but I guess we'll see won't we?

The One With The Road Concern.

2009-03-13T14:33:00.007+11:00

Dear whatever Council governs the roads of Berkshire Park and Windsor Downs,

To god, please attach a set of traffic lights at the end of St Marys Road where it intersects with Richmond Road. If you're the unfortunate driver who has to turn right INTO Richmond Rd from St Marys Rd during peak hour, then you might as well bring a Harry Potter novel with you to read, or something else that will keep you occupied for hours, because that's how long it will take you until you can find a safe gap to turn right.

No joke, you would most likely count up to 100+ cars coming both from both left and right before you have the balls to press that accelerator flat on the ground and turn right without getting hit or beeped at. In fact, that's exactly what you have to do if you're turning right.

For those who don't know what I'm talking about, there is a certain death point at the end of St Marys Road where you must either turn left or right into Richmond Road. Keep in mind, this is only during peak hour. If you're turning left, then obviously all you have to worry about are the cars coming from the right. But even so, armies of cars come from that direction and they come in 20 car intervals.

But what about if you're turning right into Richmond Road? Well that's a completely different story. Not only do you have to worry about cars coming from the right, but you also have to watch the cars coming from the left, whether they're continuing onto Richmond Road, or they're right into St Marys Road. Eventually when you find that the amount of cars coming from the right has lightened down, you still need to make sure there are no cars waiting to turn right into the road you're already on, and believe me, by the time they have turned, the cars coming from the right will have already started swarming again.

Anyways, there actually is something being done about it. There will be a traffic light put into place, but that won't be done until Mid-09.

The One Blog About Random Stuff.

2009-03-03T00:02:00.002+11:00

Notice the colorful logo on the left? That would be the band logo of Chon. What is the meaning of Chon? I wouldn't have a clue, but what I do know is that they make great instrumental progressive music with elements of shred and metal. What makes these guys worth blogging about? Well firstly, the music is great. Secondly, they're still very young, and surprisingly at their age, surpass a lot of bands in terms of musicianship and technical skill. The lead guitarists are 16, the bassist is 12, and the drummer is 11. I wonder who their teachers are ...

Anyways, I've checked out the live videos to see if these kids are the real deal and boy are they tight. Here's a song called 'Elliptical Illuminations'. The arpeggio's at the end make me smile. This music reminds me of the stuff you'd hear in a Street Fighter game or a car racing game by Namco. Haha.

In other news, I stumbled upon this webpage containing several photographs of an oil pump incident in Oklahoma City. These two kids somehow managed to activate the machine and one of the kids got caught by the twisting mechanism and had his arm ripped apart. Check it out at the link below. Warning: contains gory images.

http://www.ehowa.com/features/kidsarmvsoilpump.shtml

The One Abusive, Yet Funny Customer.

2009-02-22T15:05:00.004+11:00

Location: 8pm on a busy Saturday night at work at the cafe, and we are dangerously low on inventory.

Customer: Could I please have a classic burger?
Me: Sorry mate, we're all out of burger patties. No burgers tonight.
Customer: Ahh serious ... how about a chicken schnitzel dog?
Me: Oh we ran out of those lastnight. Perhaps a sandwhich? Keep in mind we're out of lettuce.
Customer: *bemused* Okay, I'll have a Ham, Cheese and Tomato Toastie.
Me: I'd do that, but we're out out of tomatoes. How about a ham and cheese sandwhich?
Customer: What the!? Okay fine I'll have that !
Customer: Wait wait wait .. don't tell me, you're also out of bread! Am I right!?

One of the more funnier moments of customer abuse I've experienced at work. I make him sound like a dickhead, but it was actually pretty hilarious. All smiles at the end.

The One Long Day.

2009-02-16T19:22:00.002+11:00

I'm currently at uni sitting in the computer labs of Building 1 Level 5 trying to recharge my legs after a long day of orientation which consisted of more mingling with students and ushering for assemblies and walking all over the campus helping lost students find their destinations and bla bla bla ... but really you meet a shitload of people fulfilling these duties of a UTS peer networker and its really satisfying knowing you're making life easier for these new students.

Anyways it's now almost 8pm and I've been here since 8am. Now I know the life of Engineering students. I don't think I'll be leaving to go home anytime soon because I really can't be bothered walking to Central Station. There's gotta be some couches nearby that I can sleep on...

The One Single British Unusuality.

2009-02-15T12:16:00.002+11:00

British Boy Alfie Patten, 13, becomes a father. Mum is 15.

News header explains it all. Here's a picture of the lovely couple. Is it me, or does the father look eight years old and the mother look 20 years old? God damn. Whatever. The kid's shown that he's taken his child's birth very seriously so that's a thumbs up from me.

Going bowling tonight. Woo.

The One With The Little Silver Sticker.

2009-02-12T22:43:00.003+11:00

Today was the actual orientation for new students of Kuring-Gai, and I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed it more than the orientation at the City Campus; probably because this time round us newies (term for new peer networkers) had a more involved and independant role that required more leadership.

I woke up at 5 today, but then I said to myself "just 5 more minutes". Sure enough I wake up an hour later. Don't you just hate that. Anyways a last minute errand forced me to delay my travels, and thus I missed the bus to Kuring-gai, therefore I had to wait for the 9:30 shuttle bus. Now I have no experience in catching shuttle buses in the city. In fact I didn't even know if they were free or not. I made my way to the security office in Building 1 to grab a timetable for the shuttle buses and I must say, these UTS timetables could go for a major revamp. Seriously the timetables don't even have maps, nor are the locations for the passenger pickups even slightly detailed.

For example, it says "Bus stop for Markets : outside coffee shop". Outside coffee shop? WTF? I mean come on ! Seriously? Could the location be anymore vague? There could be 100 coffee shops in the markets for all I know. Anyways, I must have been standing in the wrong location because the shuttle bus drove right past me, despite the fact that I was signalling for it to stop, and thus I had to wait another hour and a half for the next one.

To kill time I went to Ultimo TAFE and picked up HCT bagel, which I must say was too damn delicious. Afterwards I went to Building 10 and picked up concession sticker which is a nice silver sticker that they stick on for you. I was hoping for a new photo altogether but oh well. Kind of funny how students have to travel all the way (depending on where you live) to uni just for a little silver sticker.

I then met up with Toby who happened to be passing by and I showed him around Building 10. I took him to the IT lounge and we had a cuppa noodles which I had been archiving in my locker since last year. Don't worry, they're still good to eat !

After that I went outside Building 10 and waited for the 10:40 shuttle bus to Kuring-gai. I tried standing in a different bus stop hoping to be spotted and picked up. Indeed my plans proved to be a success, however the bus driver told me I was standing in the wrong spot. *sigh*. Even he admitted however that the bus stop locations were all dodgy and aren't made clear on the timetable sheet. It was a good 25 minute ride with me talking to the driver the whole time about rugby league and scabbing chewing gum.

Once I arrived at the Kuring-gai campus (2 hours late) I kicked straight into gear. A BIG THANKS TO ANGELA FOR FILLING IN FOR ME DURING MY ABSENCE!. One of the things I enjoyed doing was the campus tour for the Nursing Students, despite the fact that the campus was still very much foreign to me. Luckily I had remembered all the campus information from training day ! I met people from pretty much all over Sydney again, including this couple who I regularly see bowling at work.

After the campus tour, we took the students to a class room and made them do a scavenger hunt activity. Once they had finished, we talked to them about student life and the important rules and breaches of conduct that they should be aware about. It was like teaching a class ! I'm just thankful we were allocated to a great bunch of kids instead of a bunch of dickheads who couldn't care less. =)

The One At Kuring-Gai.

2009-02-10T20:09:00.003+11:00

In preparation for Thursday's orientation, I got the chance to visit our other UTS campus, the Kuring-Gai campus ! For those who don't know, UTS is comprised of two campuses. There's one in Broadway (tall building that can be seen from Central), and there's Kuring-gai. My thoughts on the campus? While it may be in the middle of no where, it is in fact a lovely, serene campus. I love the green carpet they have throughout the main buildings; it's like a golf course ! The atmosphere there kind of reminds you of a retreat since it's surrounded by a lot of flora, but that just means the campus looks fantastic during the summer weather.

Such a shame that there will be major changes done to the campus. For those who are incognizant to the situation, the Federal Government states that a university must operate sustainably or implement strategies that ensure sustainability in the long-term. Unfortunately for the Kuring-gai campus, it is no longer recognized as sustainable and thus changes will be made. What changes do I speak of? From what I know, there are plans to rezone the land to other businesses.

Enrollments in the Kuring-gai campus have in fact been declicing due to students preferring a more centralized location pertaining to the CBD. Don't fret though if you're going to be studying at Kuring-gai. (Pfft .. yeah like any Kuring-gai students would be reading this). If you start your course at Kuring-gai, you WILL finish your course at Kuring-gai.

Moreso there are major differences that separate Kuring-gai from the City campus, and these differences are why I think the rezoning application was sent to the Federal Government in the first place. A major difference is the services provided to students. Kuring-gai offers less services; it has no doctor, no IT support center, no wireless internet, and other stuff which I have since forgotten.

On the same token, Kuring-gai has stuff that the city campus does not carry. It has an actual soccer field, indoor basketball court, tennis court and large training facility. Now that I think about it, Kuring-gai has a lot more sporting facilities than the city campus. They should just keep Kuring-gai the way it is, and turn it into the UTS sport campus !

If I had one complaint about the Kuring-gai campus, it would be the lack of escalators. Correct me if I'm wrong people, but in my time there I didn't see one escalator. We all got tired easily by the amount of stairs we had to walk. Then again we did do a lot of touring and hunting throughout the campus.

The One With The Mingling.

2009-02-09T22:04:00.005+11:00

First day of orientation at UTS commenced today. As a peer networker, it was my duty to provide guidance to the new students, both local and international, around the grounds and ensure they attended all the necessary meetings and sessions pertaining to their programme. The first part of the orientation was to mingle with the new students; meaning to start up random conversations with total strangers. What? Ok stop there.

Those who know me would be aware that I have a thing for distancing myself from the crowd. I'm a lone-wolf! Well for that moment I had to throw my lonesomeness out the window and replace it with a totally artificial attitude of excitement and exuberance. Don't get me wrong, I was glad to be at orientation, but for me to make an impression on these new students, I had to turn it up a notch.

So you could imagine there were many "HEY GUYS HOWZ IT GOIN!?!?!" from me. In fact my routine for talking to the new students was:

Overexaggerated smile.
"HEY CHAMP, HOWS IT GOING? DO YOU HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT ORIENTATION?"
Answer questions to best of ability.
Maintain overexaggerated smile.
"WHAT COURSE YOU DOING?" ... "OH YEAH THAT'S AN INTERESTING COURSE".
"ARE YOU A LOCAL STUDENT? WHAT SCHOOL DID YOU GO TO? OH YEAHHH I KNOW THAT SCHOOL!!!!!!!!!"
"ARE YOU AN INTERNATIONAL STUDENT? WHAT COUNTRY HAVE YOU FLOWN IN FROM? DO YOU HAVE ACCOMODATION? SICK!!!!!!!!".
Talk about random stuff and then stop talking if conversation is dieing.
"NICE MEETING YOU MATE. I'LL SEE YOU ROUND. IF YOU HAVE ANYMORE QUESTIONS, DON'T HESITATE TO ASK !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Stop smiling and scout next unfortunate student. :)

After all the mingling, I got the opportunity to take some international students to lunch at Marigold Yum cha. I got to try cows lung for the first time which was surprisingly tasty ! Unfortunately, the names of the people I met were much too foreign for me to retain in my head, therefore I'd just like to say it was nice meeting you Chinese, Austrian and Bangladesh students !

On the subject of mingling, more of that was done at the gym today, which is unusual considering I don't talk to anyone while working out. This guy who I regularly see at the gym decided to come up to me out of no where and break the ice. What I learnt? He's a bodybuilder of 9 years. Born in Holland to a Scottish father and Malaysian mother and raised in Australia. What a mix.

Then there were these two bodybuilders who got my attention by saying "hey don't you work at AMF in Castle Hill?". Apparantly I served them on Saturday night. Isn't it nice when strangers recognize you or recall past events associated with you that only lasted for briefs amount of time? Anyways, it turned out that they were also students in the grade above me at my old school Emmaus.

Well I have to wake up at 6 tomorrow and head to the Kuring-gai campus for training ! Blog you later! In the mean time, I'm going to enjoy a nice glass of milk.

Cheers.

The One Hottest Day.

2009-02-05T22:50:00.005+11:00

The scorching temperatures lately have been bloody ridiculous. Crickey ! This afternoon after work I decided to take a nap, but that was made impossible thanks to my room which resembled a furnace. Even with the electric fan turned up to maximum, I just kept turning over and over, and don't even get me started with the sweat. Definitely time to change my pillow cases.

Unfortunately these temperatures are just something we'll all have to adapt too, with the bureau predicting much warmer temperatures soon. That's there is the scary thing. I mean already, there's been so many victims of heat stroke and other heat-related incidents, not to mention all the trees that have collapsed on our roads and houses, and damn ... can't forget about the 100+ fires. If temperatures really do rise, I guess the worst is yet to come.

If only we could all be as cool as the great Thich Quang Duc.

I'll end this post with something random. On the way home from work, I encountered an intersection where the traffic lights on all 4 sides had been blinking yellow. As we all know, a blinking yellow lights means you have to proceed through with caution. Kind of hard to do so when there's cars coming from all 4 sides.

The One With Self-Promotion.

2009-02-03T19:04:00.006+11:00

To evade the scorching temperatures in Western Sydney, I went to the Royal Botanic Gardens to lie in the cool breeze. Other than that, we celebrated the return of Jasmine (Cairns) and the departure of Adrian (Hawaii). The day also involved climbing trees and getting told off by park rangers.

I could just sleep there for hours.

Today I had to go to uni for Training Day 2 of Peer Support. Thankfully I didn't have to mingle too much as I recognized some of the people I met from Training Day 1, but at the same time met some great people. Anyways we signed up for the orientation tasks we would participate in, therefore for those of you who are attending the UTS orientation, look out for me ! I'll be providing you a tour of our city and Kuring-gai campuses plus other stuff !

Other than that, I ran into Rheanne today in the Tower Building. It's always funny when people you haven't seen in a long time just pop in your face out of no where. Thanks for telling me you got into UTS woman. Sheesh.

The One With The Day That Turned Out To Be Not So Bad.

2009-01-26T23:30:00.003+11:00

I hope you all had a fantastic and enjoyable Australia Day. Mine could have been more celebratory, but it sufficed. My Australia Day consisted of a 10 hour shift starting from 8:30am to 6:30pm. My shift really should have only been 8 hours long, but someone from work just had to chuck a sickie. (Hope you're better Kassie). Staying back the extra 2 hours wasn't actually bad though because I got to work with Adrianna, who is like one of the coolest people at work, at least now I know she is. I mean, someone who comes in on Australia Day to cover someone's shift, and work in an area of the store that they're completely foreign too, you gotta give them respect points. Other than that, a great person to talk to.

After I finished work, probably one of the most discouraging things happened to me. Since I had to open the cafe this morning, I had to use the store key to unlock all the storage cabinets., fridges, freezers, etc. After unlocking everything, I left the key in my pocket, with the intent of eventually putting it back in the safe box where it should be. Sure enough, I leave work with the store keys still in my pocket, despite the fact that the person working that evening needs them to lock the store. I had to drive all the bloody way back to work and return the keys.

It wasn't a complete waste of petrol though I guess because I ended up having some games of bowling with Adrian and Jeaneline. I also realized that Castle Hill stocks Size 15 bowling balls, which is hardcore. I've gone bowling so much the past couple of weeks and I still can't win a game. Fail.

The One With The Unlikely Encounter.

2009-01-21T21:16:00.003+11:00

Short entry tonight. I ran over a turtle today; of all things to run over, I wheel over a bloody turtle. I was driving on Doonside Rd this afternoon in the rain and I noticed a rocky item crossing the road further ahead. As soon as I got up close to it, I realized it was a turtle crossing the road, but the wet surface prevented me from swerving and evading. Not too sure if me running over the turtle was fatal - I'm hoping its hard shell was enough protection.

This random occurence was just something I had to blog.

The One With The Easy Course.

2009-01-19T18:10:00.005+11:00

Just a random thought, or realization rather, and most of you are aware of this too. Isn't it amazing how many great songs you can discover on your hard drive that you never knew you had in the first place, all by configuring your media player to shuffle mode? I've come across like 10 or so great songs that either I never knew I had, or never gave a chance but later realized how great they were.

Here's some notable mentions, not that I expect you to go chase them up or anything.

The Getaway Plan - Transmission - someone give this vocalist a medal for being so perfect. THIS IS NOT THE OFFICIAL VIDEO EITHER.
Sick City - City Lights - the piano parts at the beginning got me thinking "hey this song is pretty cool, let's not skip this".
Breaking Point - Reality Show - this song came up while I was browsing 'Unusual Deaths' on wikipedia.
Brand Nubian - Maybe One Day - I really liked the music in this; I also noticed Common's voice the moment I heard him.
DJ Quik - Safe & Sound - I didn't even know I had a DJ Quik album on my hard drive. Then again, I have like 50GB of Hip-hop I haven't fully listened to, courtesy of Blake.

Okay, in more relation to the blog title, my boss made me apply for an RSA certificate because not many of us at work have them, which is a problem since a lot of people purchase from our bar. Being the great employee I am, I went through a 5-hour course at the 'Alex Beaumont Hospitality Training College'. I must say, Alex Beaumont is a fucking funny man. His humour made it comfortably easy to retain information, however remembering information was not an imperetive since we were all allowed to talk to each other and swap answers during the final exam. If there was one memorable thing from the course, it was his impersonation of drinking a 'blowjob'. Funny shit.

Now that I've got my RSA, I should go for my RCG.

The One That Makes No Sense?

2009-01-10T17:33:00.006+11:00

So around 12am this morning on the way home from work, I'm driving along Hambledon Road which is a back-way road going through the acres of Quakers Hill and Rouse Hill. It's a fairly quiet street with usually no other cars. Anyways, I'm driving straight though feeling kind of sleepy, but at the same time looking at my surroundings. All of a sudden I find myself running through a mailbox and a sign post and into a jagged ditch, damaging much of the right side of the car.

Seriously guys, I'm like a magnet for car incidents. Apart from yelling the F word in my head the whole way home, I was anticipating the reactions of my parents who have always had to cover the costs for my on-road stupidity. I didn't want to wait the next morning to tell my parents because I wouldn't be able to sleep. Anyways, both my parents were pretty calm about the whole situation ...

And yes ... I mean CALM. If this situation were in a sit-com, their lines would be "another car accident? Oh what a surprise...". Seriously, their reactions made no sense to me. It's got to be the age. They definitely would have mutilated me if I were still 17 and on my red P's.

You know what's cool though, but makes no sense? I have a brand new iPod Classic courtesy of $350 worth of Harvey Norman vouchers my mom got from a work colleague. Seriously, if I were in her shoes, using a $350 gift voucher on my son's iPod is the last thing I would do, especially when they've just caused $2000 worth of damage to the car. I actually judge my parents very harshly for not kicking me out sooner.

The One Where I Blabber, And You Skim Through..

2009-01-07T23:37:00.004+11:00

So I'm back from an interesting evening at work. My shift should have been a no-sweat and free-flowing shift with hardly any bowlers on the premises, but thanks to the black-outs affecting many of the households in Castle Hill and its neighboring suberbs, we were swamped with customers looking for a great time. At one point Kassie and myself had to handle 15 orders at the one time, and as we tried finishing up the orders, more customers just kept coming...

Yesterday I hit up a totally empty UltraFit gym and did some bench press and bicep and shoulder exercises. Can't believe so many dollars were wasted last year on my former gym at Ripples when I could have saved $50 a month with a membership at my current gym.

Later in the evening I picked up Adrian and we drove to a random house in Acacia Gardens to pick up Jeaneline. Getting there was the biggest challenge and makes me question my map reading skills and if I'll ever be able to sucessfully navigate on long road trips. After the biggest waste of petrol finding the house, we drove back to Jeaneline's place to grab some beach and camp chairs, then we picked up Jasmine and we were off to the drive-in cinemas.

When we arrived at the drive-in cinema, I made it clear that we would find one spot and one spot only. On the previous occasion, we ended up going from spot to spot to spot to spot and back to the spot we started with. Stupid indecisive passengers. The movies we watched were Yes Man and Four Holidays. At one point I accidentally made dented a can of Pepsi Max and sprayed it on Jeaneline. Sorry about that.

During the intermission, we played Taboo which is like the best game ever invented, however the only thing I achieved from this game last night was knowing that Jasmine is way out of my league.

Another thing I realized is that if you are to thoroughly enjoy your time at the drive-in cinemas, you must prepare well and load up on inventory. That means, bring all luxurious items you can that will make you feel comfortable, and all the food and drinks that you can. On the previous two occasions, I was too lazy to bring stuff like chairs and pillows, so last night I brought all those things and had a great time.

I'll finish this blog with like one of the best songs of the 90's.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=_xf5ZlTlrgw

The One On New Years Day.

2009-01-01T00:52:00.003+11:00

Happy 09' everybody ! Can't believe it's 2009 already. It's as if 2008 lasted for only a couple of weeks. Time just warps by the older you get I suppose. Anyways I'm back from spending the night at my cousins' place in which I tanked up on a ridiculous amount of BBQ pork skewers. Dammit somebody buddy up with me for the gym.

Other than that, there's a few things for me to look forward to this year, including:

Moving houses (although judging from past delays in construction, failure to move in this year would not surprise me ... )
Obtaining my less restricted, but complete drivers license.
Going into my second year of uni, while balancing study with work and gym.
Turning 20, and out of my teens.

I really just wanted to wish everyone a happy new year, and I hope you all kick off 09' by doing something enjoyable. Unfortunately for me, I have to get up for work later, so I'll blog you later.

...And AMF = (Always More Fun)

2008-12-17T08:31:00.002+11:00

To fight my concerns about how I haven't bought any new clothes in a while, I decided to head down to the riff yesterday to cure that problem. With our one-of-kind summer here, I'm not looking for anything too fancy, so I bought a couple of plain tee's. I also tried to stop by Toby's work for a chat, but his work had way too much selling to do with a never ending supply of customers, and it was only 11am in the morning.

Later that day I watched Twilight with AJ (Adrian+Jasmine) and my thoughts you ask? It definitely didn't live up to all the hype, but still a good watch. Some awkward moments here and there that seemed unfitting, but whatever.

After the movie I went bowling with AJ and Tim and got $3 games courtesy of Jasmine's brother and myself. We made a bet that whoever came last in the first game would be recognised as a "teeny bopper for life". I hope you enjoy your crown Tim.

In other news, uni results are out. Since I'm capped for another 2 weeks, I got Geoff to check my results for me. Here's what he returned:

2008 Spring Semester 24108 Marketing Foundations 72 C Credit 6
2008 Spring Semester 25115 Economics for Business 68 C Credit 6
2008 Spring Semester 31267 Programming Fundamentals 72 C Credit 6
2008 Spring Semester 31268 Web Systems 70 C Credit 6

Originally I was upset that I missed out on opportunities to get Distinctions, but it's all water under the bridge.

...And As Age Ascends, Appearances Are Angelic

2008-12-12T00:15:00.003+11:00

Happy birthday mother. Thanks for everything and I wish you a great day. I greeted you before at 12am on the dot just in time before you went to bed, but I thought I'd write it on my blog too despite the fact that you probably won't come across this.

Super Mario Cake !

...And Airy Appetites Are Administered

2008-12-11T13:37:00.006+11:00

To accommodate the needs of my swelling mouth and slowly recovering gums which both require a soft diet, I drove to Woolworth's a little while ago to do some grocery shopping. The only difference this time round was that I was scouting goods for myself rather than for the family. In a selfish journey through the isles of Woolworths, I looked for anything soft and painlessly edible.

I obviously picked up bottle of milk because I drink that stuff non-stop as if it's water. I also picked up 3 packets of aeroplane jelly including Blueberry, Raspberry and Port Wine, a 6-pack of chocolate yogo yoghurt, a 6-pack of Ski Berry Basket and a 6-pack of strawberry flavored Up & Go breakfast drinks. That's a fair bit of 6-packs, though contrastingly, I will get fat. I should have picked up some ice-cream too, but on the same token, my freezer is overcrowded with spring rolls and nuggets.

In the meantime, I have a bowl of Blueberry Jelly resting in the fridge, which should be nice and firm in 4 hours time. Plus I also have a home-made mango soothie cooling down, and some cheese cake in the freezer. With all those things to be consumed later, I've got the ball rolling by eating some latina fresh pasta. Damn, I really will get fat over these holidays.

...And Articulative Agony Augments

2008-12-10T19:35:00.003+11:00

Just a heads up people. I'm going to discontinue these alliteration blog titles once 2009 commences, and I'll implement a new titling theme. I guess the theme/pattern will change as each year passes by, if this blog even lasts that long.

Today I got my two lower wisdom teeth extracted, and while the extraction process was completely forgettable and unmemorable thanks to the injection, the post-operation condition could be better. Pain is existent but minimal. I just wish I could recover overnight and get back to living a healthy normal life. This means I'll have to cancel my blood donation tomorrow which is a shame because I was looking forward to stuffing my face at the hospital again.

In other news, I've been listening to a lot of Deathcore music. This was once a genre of music I promised myself I would never listen to back when I was a metal purist, but after taking the time to check out some recommendations, I'm hooked. Evident from my last.fm, I've been listening to a lot of Carnifex, Suicide Silence, Burning the Masses and All Shall Perish. While most of the music is generic, those bands make unique music.

Just to finish off, Mark has a new blog out which looks win, and is just as insightful as any column from the New York Times. Check it out here!

...And Adeiu Actions Arranged

2008-12-06T19:05:00.007+11:00

So almost a week of holidays have passed and I am just dead-set relieved that these holidays will last until late February to early March. Apart from the nervous anticipations of my uni results, everything else is sweet. On that note, I do have the results for one of my subjects already. I guess the faculty was nice enough to release our results prematurely. I got a 69. Funnily enough, this blog post is my 69th. One pass out of four so far.

During the week I got together with my 'band mates' to record a farewell video for our dearest friend Gloria who left this morning for Hong Kong. She'll be there for a month. How sad. What's even more depressing is that she'll be discontinuing her studies at UTS next year. Anyways, the recording process took place at Jasmine's house and in the fields of Woodcroft using my trusty digicam. Our ever-reliable video editor Adrian put in the finishing touches to make it look something else ...

On Wednesday evening I drove to Baulkham Hills and picked up Tim and we were off to Fitness First at Norwest. That evening would be Tim's debut workout. It was fun showing him the ropes. Unfortunately for me, I can no longer bench the same amount of weights I used to when I practically whored the gym during the HSC year. On the bright side, we managed to score a free entry pass for the next time we visit which is great.

On Thursday we officially gave our farewells to Gloria by having a day out in the city, which comprised of Adrian and myself following Gloria and Jasmine around the city while they shopped, and watching 'Four Christmases'. A partially funny movie, but overnall not an enjoyable watch. Bye Gloria !

Here's a band photo !

Anyways there's a bunch of steaks resting on the kitchen bench just waiting to be seared. Bye.

...And All-Done.

2008-11-25T20:01:00.004+11:00

First year of university.
Complete.

So what to do with the free time on my hands? I've started by whoring Seasons 5, 6 and 7 of Friends courtesy of Yen. I should have watched these along time ago, but I'm making up for lost time now.

Anyone want to hit up the gym?

...And AMF Allowances Acquired

2008-11-12T14:50:00.003+11:00

This morning I had my first exam of four, which was for Marketing Foundations. It's always good to start the exam period with an easy subject since obviously it gives you a larger window to study for the harder subjects. I can now use this whole day, and most of tomorrow to study for my Economics exam at 6pm tomorrow ... (knowing me, I most probably will not take advantage of the time).

So what's with the blog title? I finally received my first payment from AMF Bowling, and it's about time too. I think a gym membership is on the table ...

But yeah ... on the subject of bowling, Jasmine wants to go bowling. That can definitely be arranged, but I believe more priority should be placed on Adrian's christmas party ...

Well that's it for now. See you after Eco !

...And Acceptance Activates Alleviation

2008-11-02T03:20:00.006+11:00

*yawn* 3am. Who cares about sleep? Let's blog. It's been a long time coming, and boy do I have nothing constructive to talk about, therefore I'll blabber about my boring life like any other post. But before you read on, I've uploaded new pictures on Flickr. Check them out! http://www.flickr.com/photos/31331028@N06/

The past couple of days have been psychologically absurd for me. I recently watched the 5th installment of the Saw series, and certain images and scenes from that movie continue to stick with me. I shall refrain from talking about certain scenes to prevent any spoilage, but the unfortunate ending haunts me. It's quite frightening to put yourselves into the shoes of these unfortunate prisoners who have to contest for their lives in a harsh and perpetually agonizing environment. I keep placing myself in the shoes of the person in the final trap of Saw 5, and I think to myself "life's a bitch". Apart from the lingering ending, I enjoyed this movie because it was a wonderfully character driven piece rather than a generic gore-fest.

Now onto other things ...

I guess the main aspect of this post is 'acceptance'. Now by using that word, I feel I may have already established a serious tone to this post, but seldom do I ever discuss topics of a meaningful or serious nature, so sorry to disappoint you.

Last week I had a group interview at uni to join the Peer Networking Program, which is basically a program containing current students who's objectives are to assist the new students coming through and helping them adjust to university life. The group interview was really enjoyable, in fact the first task we had to do was to write down qualities or characteristics that describe us, however the qualities had to begin with each letter in our first name. It didn't have to be totally spot-on; a lot of it was about having fun. Here's what I was able to conjure up:

Left-Handed
Exuberant
Open-Minded
New-Things
Active
Responsive
Damaging

After reading out that last quality, the interviewers kept making jokes at me about trying not to break or damage anything until the end of the interview. Anyways a week has passed since the interview and I have finally got an e-mail yesterday informing me that my application got accepted and that I would be a Peer Networker for 2009 which I am stoked about. Some of you may be wondering why I would want to participate in such a program, and there are many factors that influenced my decision. One of the main reasons was to obtain a sense of involvement with the university, and without trying to sound like a Private, I'd like to serve the university that serves me. Throughout my secondary education, I never really took the iniative to involve myself with the extra-curricular activites and programs that the school had on offer, therefore I believe this Peer Networking Program at uni is a great opportunity to start getting myself involved. A lot of self-achievement and satisfaction can be obtained from this program by helping new students, both domestic and international, find their way through tertiary life.

Still on the topic of 'acceptance', I've also got myself a job ... like finally. After giving myself high hopes for Myer, and even higher hopes for the night-fill job at the local grocery store, I got myself a job at an AMF Bowling Center as a Guest Services Attendant. I had my first shift lastnight at 7pm till close and boy was it busy. If it wasn't for my ever so leniant and perseverant supervisor and my asian partner in crime Christian, I would have failed miserably. The customers were also friendly and very comforting which made it much easier. I hope it's like that for every shift.

What else ... ah yes exams.

Marketing - 12/11 - I currently sit on 47% for my overall assessment, however I still need to pass the final exam to adhere to the 40% exam guideline in the subject outline.
Economics - 13/11 - Depending on my results for my media assessment, I can slightly cruise through this final exam, or I may have to go nuts and bolts.
Programming - 21/11 - A mark of at least 40% must be obtained, or else a failure in the course will result, despite results in other assessments.
Web Systems - 25/11 - I have no idea what's going on in web systems. But I think I'll pass.

...And Altered Appearances Actuate and Allure

2008-10-13T00:43:00.007+11:00

So it is currently 1 in the morning and I should be acquiring some much needed sleep but I think a blog post is in order. I'm actually in the middle of watching a documentary called 'Some Kind of Monster' which is based on the studio recording experience of Metallica's St. Anger album. Why am I watching it? I have no idea.

I have to wake up later or fairly soon and drive up to Beaumont Hills to check on a few things and then quickly head back to St Marys station and catch a train in time to uni for my Economics lecture. It's been a great 2 week absence from Economics but now its time to return to the lecture in which I'm most likely to fall asleep.

Some few months have passed since the handy acquisition of my Canon Ixus digital camera and within that period I have taken the time to thoroughly familiarize myself with the different settings and modes. In that time I've also taken a lot of pictures however there is no doubt in my mind that I am still a noob and am always experimenting. Regardless, I've recently registered at flickr which is an image hosting site. I've uploaded various photo's in which I've added some cool effects with the aid of photoshop. To be honest, my weekend was comprised of two things: marketing plan and photoshopping. One could say I've whored and abused my photoshop software. Either way, check out my flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31331028@N06/

In other news it was Tim's birthday recently (8/10) and he was nice enough to perform a bunch of songs for us UTS students at the alumni green. At the same time he was also nice enough to almost get us killed while crossing the streets of Market City, getting in the way of speeding truck driver. Plenty of pictures are on Facebook, so check them out ! Still speaking of the same day, a good return to fitness was endured, doing 5 pushups everytime a fuckup occured in a game of hacky sack.

Just lastly, my web systems lecturer played this video on last Friday's lecture and I found it amazing. Basically it is a video of a math-a-magician acting like a human calculator. Check it out for yourself !

...And Algorithmic Agony Arrives

2008-10-09T23:24:00.002+11:00

*/

\run program>/
...

\objective: PROGRAMMING ASSESSMENT #2
...

...

system check ..............................
system UNSTABLE.

*/

...And Another Account Amongst Amigos

2008-10-03T19:18:00.010+10:00

It's okay everyone. I am alive. I can't imagine how terribly worried all of you must have been about my where-abouts, but fret no longer for I am still active. But in all seriousness, this blog is back with a different look because sometimes change is for the best ... and besides I was getting sick of the yellow. You feeling me?

Right now I am currently in the middle of Student Vacation which unfortunately goes for a time span of 1 week, unlike those MAC students who get an additional week ... those bastards. I thought there would be a balance of studying and social life, unfortunately the latter has outweighed the former significantly, which is why today I decided to stay home all day and catch up on academic objectives instead of being at the beach. Oh, and to eat ice-cream, people.

These past couple of days have been really great, specifically because of the uni results that have come out. Whilst I was unable to pwn any assessments or exams, I didn't fail any either, which is great for me because I really thought I would have.

Such is life:

Monday: Had the best Monday morning, because as you all should know, I just love being woken up by Jeaneline and Adrian to talk on the phone at 7am in the morning. Keep it up guys. In all seriousness, we had a discussion on what movie we would be watching and what time. We all agreed to watch Wall-E. I opted for an evening time slot, however we had no choice but to watch in the afternoon if Jeaneline was to make it to her mom's birthday dinner.

In the end, due to my lateness, we were heaps late to the movie (half an hour late) so we ended up just bumming at Rouse Hill with Ivan and Lawrence talking about a million things in the deserted food court. Afterwards we crashed Jeaneline's house in Kellyville which is freakin huge. When I pulled up on her driveway, we were like 'damnnnn'. You'd think Mariah Carey lived in that joint.

At around 6 we went back to Rouse Hill to pick up Tim, and then drove back the other way up to Castle Towers to have dinner at Hog's Breath. I should get a prize or some form of recognition for being the only noble person on my table to eat everything on the plate.

Tuesday: Since we were unable to watch Wall-E the day before, Adrian, Jeaneline and myself watched it today. My thoughts of the movie? While I thought it was really original, smart and entertaining, it's not something I'd watch again on my own accord. A good movie none the less. After the movie, we ate some churros because no visit to Rouse Hill is complete without the consumption of these spanish treats.

Afterwards I rushed back to St Marys soccer fields and met up with Jinno and Toby for a game of headache and more.

Wednesday: I made my way to Blacktown Library in the morning to study economics. I anticipated that the library would be packed full of HSC'ers, but to my surprise vacant tables came in plenty. While studying in the quiet room, the girl on my table sneezed right in front of me, so I politely said 'bless you' in a tone that I'm sure could be heard by anyone within 5 metres. I looked at her for a couple of seconds expecting her to say 'thank you', but what do I get? Nothing. She continued on studying as if I didn't say anything. How embarassing for me.

I also ran into Kirill and Angel (who scared the heck out of me) at the computers labs and then eventually met up with Jeaneline to go on an unplanned adventure around the world.

It's amazing how hard it is to find a place to eat. Actually, it's not 'finding' the place that is hard, it's more the process of 'thinking' of a place to eat. After almost a half hour of thinking where to eat, we decided to get a large pizza from the Pizza Hut at Glenwood (good timing too for their lunch special). We took the pizza to the park with the flying fox and talked about a million things.

We then went up to Kellyville to randomly crash Scarlett's place who I had only just met that day. Cheers for the chewy. After that we went joy-riding looking at pretty houses until we finally tried crashing Julienne's place. She wouldn't pick up her phone so we assumed she was uni. We also tried crashing Kevin's place but he was at work. So we went back to Blacktown and picked up Shirley and hung at Westpoint. Cheers for the easy-way ... even though you left your rubbish in my car.

Thursday: Woke up at 10, picked up Adrian and headed off to Jasmine's place for another movie marathon and bike riding. We watched:

The Devil Wears Prada - Not the best movie out there, but still an enjoyable watch.
Battle Royale - We watched this for the sake of entertainment despite the fact we had all seen this. Funny moments were spawned, including the 'over-exaggerated death' of one of the girls. Frankly I cannot concur with that observation.
The Butterfly Effect- I hadn't seen this movie before, so obviously I was in strong agreeance with watching this. I never really thought much of Ashton Kutcher as an actor, but after watching this I like him more. A great movie despite all the questions I was asking throughout.
Zathura - This was another movie I hadn't seen. It was pretty good overall but not overly spectacular.

We also went bike riding over Woodcroft, going back to the park and through the forest where we found a terrorist sitting on slab of rock discussing some sort of instructions to his leader. And to think I asked him for directions to the M7...

Friday: The one full day I commited myself to uni work and it was boring. The only highlight of my day was getting a call from Yen from work and talking about stuff. Thank you for saving me from going madly insane.

...And Anagrams Are Abounding Again

2008-09-22T00:11:00.003+10:00

Okay so half an hour ago I came home from Kirill's place only to discover that Romel has beaten my Word Challenge score just like he promised he would. Credit to him for surpassing me fairly quickly and by surprise. Anyways, I decided to play just one game before calling it a night...

While I may be wasting my life on a facebook game, there's another kind of a game that I'm attached too. It's a game called Taboo which most of you will have already played at a friends house. Basically you are given a card containing a specific word that your team mates must guess by the clues you give them.

We had 5 or so games at Kirill's house and it was great fun, especially when Kirill made reference to that 'industry superfunds' advertisement. Freakish guesses from Toby came in plenty as well. One of the words on the cards was 'Ecaudor' and of all counties to name, he named the right one. Overall I was part of 3 losing teams and only 1 winning team. Oh well.

Apart from facebooking, I have my two mid semester exams this week, including Marketing on Tuesday and Economics on Wednesday. I'm not too fussed about Economics since it's comprised of 35 multiple choice question's only and I'm expecting the questions to be similar to the questions we answer on the weekly online quizzes. The marketing exam on the other hand will be such a drag ...

Anyways Yen set an alarm on my phone and I want to be able to acquire a sufficient amount of sleep before I'm woken by it. Au revoir !

...And Anagrams Are Abounding

2008-09-21T12:36:00.003+10:00

How good was the Storm and Broncos game last night? As much as I feel sorry for the Broncos, I am so happy for Melbourne to be one game away from the big one. If it were up to me, I'd want a Melbourne and Manly rematch, however I'd be just as content if the Sharks were to win the grand final. In fact they're yet to win a grand final in over 40 years of existence.

Anyhow, I played a game of Word Challenge during half-time and managed to conjure up this score. I dedicate this score to Jasmine (yeah eat that), however this video goes out to the haters. I only uploaded half of the video because it would have been around about 20 minutes and total and almost 2GB !

Yen killed any form of happiness I gained from this score after blatantly telling me how Jade has over 150k.

...And An Airing #4

2008-09-20T08:31:00.002+10:00

New camera. New vlog.

At uni on our way to programming - trying Adrian's epic fail shortcut.

I'd write a blog about the week so far, but Adrian has pretty much summed it up in his blog.

...And Amazing Applications Are Adored

2008-09-10T15:57:00.005+10:00

At the moment, Jason is playing Tetris, Lenny is doing Programming, Adrian is being weak and Jasmine is blogging for Lenny. We are in the computer labs, being very happy about Programming because of the united feeling that is "screwed-ness".

But onto better things. Today we all bought cup noodles to eat for lunch at the I.T. lounge. It wasn't very filling so we had to resort to microwaving microwave popcorn. It still didn't suffice. Carribbean. Consumption. Hello Lenny.

Now for a bit of Programming. I will now create a script that will enable Adrian to stop being weak.

import Jasmine's.Strength.*;

public class Homo
{
private double guiltTrip;
private double weakness;
private double tears;

public void gainStrength(double strength)
{
if (guiltTrip < weakness)
gainStrength() = strength;
else
return tears;
}
}

Jasmine out :)

-------------------------
Today during programming time, a guy with a really weird haircut walked in. At the moment we are pigging out on Maltesers and Lenny's fave, Milky Bar. Jason told us he has AIDS, and is lactose intolerant, but is allergic to the malt in Maltesers. ............... But he was lying, as usual. So if he happens to have a random seizure and is squirming on the floor, we'll know what to do.... stand there and watch. :)

Now for some programming:

import awesomely.amazing.Adrian;

public class teamAwesome; //consisting of: Adrian. That is all. (edit: I'M IN IT TOO, I'M AWESOME - Lenny)
{
private boolean racist;
private boolean guiltTrip;
string truth = ("I am trash monster");

if (racist != true)
System.out.println(truth);
else
System.out.println("FUCK THIS PROGRAMMING. I LIKE FAT ARMS :)))) I'm kidding. They're not fat. Just muscles. :)");

}

Adrian out.
End.
kthxbye

...And Aquatic Appetites Answered

2008-09-06T15:42:00.008+10:00

I went to the fish market today with the fam-bam. Went to Trixie's place first to pick up my birthday present and then we were off to the fish market in the city. I had never been there before and I wasn't expecting anything special but it was pretty good. I must have ate like 15 baby octupus' and an excessive amount of sashimi plus a whole heap of other unknown sea foods.

After hitting up the markets, I walked around aimlessly in Town Hall looking for potential clothing purchases that I should save for, until eventually heading home. Since there was train trackwork, I had to catch a bus from Granville all the way to St. Mary's. It had been so long since I had caught a bus that when I sat down, I actually tried reaching for a seat belt that wasn't there. And in other news ...

Go the chooks ! After missing the finals series for 3 years in a row, the Roosters have returned to finals football, beating the Dragons 10-0 in an ugly affair at the Sydney Football Stadium. It's also the first time they have kept a team scoreless since 2004 when they thrashed the Tigers 56-0. Now that they've booked 4th spot on the ladder, the Roosters now have a home semi-final against the Broncos next Friday. I'm pumped.

Right, so I am very well aware not every one is a fan of rugby league. If someone talks league, I tend to get carried away therefore I'll stop babbling on here.

What else to talk about? Only a select few of you will care about the following, but the the new Metallica album leaked a couple days ago. The album Death Magnetic is their 9th studio album and the sound steers clear of the atrocity that was St. Anger (their previous album). While I don't enjoy the whole album, there are some songs that are really listenable such as That Was Just Your Life, All Nightmare Long, The Judas Kiss and The Day That Never Comes. Their thrash prowess returns to the mix in this album and so do Kirk's WAH WAH solos.

Oh and Mark, if you are reading this, I am a man of my word, so either keep reading or skip all the way to the end of this blog to find the goodies.

So how's life?

Monday: Woke up earlier than usual to pick Nikki up and go to uni. I went to the library and studied Economics for a while and then met up with Adrian. We killed time doing stuff I have since forgotten, and then I was off to my economics lecture. It's 6 weeks into the semester and I think I can say that its my favorite subject so far. After the lecture, I met with CJ and we were off to our tutorial where she showed me her pro web systems assignment.

Tuesday: A perfect start to the morning, which had me waking up at almost 11. I left the Marketing lecture after 20 minutes to do my own catch-up study on the subject. I eventually made my way to the computer labs where I saw Adrian and Jasmine who had also left early. For the rest of the night up until the tutorial, Adrian and myself played the typing speed application on Facebook. Competitiveness really gets you going.

Wednesday: I resisted the opportunity to have an extended sleep this morning in order to meet Adrian and Jasmine at Westpoint to catch a film. We walked around Westpoint for a while, leading up to me buying a table tennis paddle at Rebel, and then each of us buying lollies for the movie because we are too cool for popcorn. I saw Shirley and Jono at Zero who eventually decided to tag along. The movie we watched was The Strangers which was not bad. It reminded me of the movie Vacancy, but was much better and exciting. That closet scene got me by surprise, and I'm sure it got Jasmine by surprise who was still walking up the stairs returning to her seat during the scene. Funny stuff.

After the movie we headed off to our Programming lecture where we learnt about ... uhmm ... ah yes of course, as usual I have forgotten anything that was even mentioned in the lecture. The only thing I achieved in that lecture was solving all of Jasmine's word jumbles. On the way home, we confronted Adrian about why he takes so long to reply on MSN and the rudeness behind such behavior.

Thursday: I woke up early today to head to Town Hall to attend my Myer group interview session, which to my delight turned out pretty well. I was already switched and confident prior to the interview thanks to Yen's words of wisdom. Believe it or not, it was my first group interview but I had a lot of fun meeting new people despite the fact I'd never see them again. I'm not expecting to make it through the next round, but I've taken a lot out of these recruitment processes.

After the interview I walked randomly throughout the city until I eventually met up with Yen and followed closely in her search of a summer dress. I want an iTouch now.

Friday: Woke up early to attend my Web Systems lecture, however instead of going to the actual lecture, I went straight to my lab to just study the lecture notes. I had my multiple choice quiz and then a bunch of us all went to Pizza Hut for the buffet. Had my programming tutorial and lab at 5pm and then finishing at 7pm.

Saturday: Had nothing to do on Saturday until Jin decided to have a get-together at his place. Didn't get there until 10pm though because I had to teach my mom and her girlfriends' how to play the wii sport games, and then I had to do my weekly economic quiz which wasn't too difficult. I got to Jin's and I played Metal Slug until 2:30 in the morning. 15 minute repetitive boss battles ftw.

Why is Mark Kemp good?
For those of you don't know, Mark and myself held a bet a couple of weeks ago based on the Roosters and Sharks game. Since the Roosters drowned 20-0, it is time to honor our bet.

So why is Mark Kemp so good?

If you ever met this bloke, it would not take long to realize what a legend this guy is. If you're one to judge, you honestly wouldn't imagine him being the person he really is just by his appearance. Once you meet this person, you will be amazed by his intelligence and his knowledge and concern for global matters. Just take a read of his blogs and observe his appreciation for the small things in life. You'd think this guy would one day be Prime Minister. Yet outside this layer of intelligence lies a drunken pothead who studies under the influence and apparently shows up to uni baked.

Rest in peace.

...And Aborning Anniversaries Appreciated

2008-08-28T17:37:00.004+10:00

So it's currently Thursday afternoon and my weekly economics quiz results have just been released. In all honesty, the results I retrieve from my economics quiz every Thursday are one of the many determinants of whether the following week will be good or not. I'm sure most of you live off particular results or outcomes that have have an influence on the times or moods that follow. Actually scrap that. I'm known for being weird like that, so I'll just assume it's just me. But getting deeper into this philosophy, I'll give you an example. The chances of me wanting to have a good time this weekend will depend on whether the Roosters win their Friday Night clash with the Rabbits. Or how about this. My mood for the latter half of tomorrow all depends if I finish Chapter 7 of LinuxGym in my Web Systems lab tomorrow. (EDIT: Oh man there's an exam tomorrow)

Sunday: Week 5 of university has been a memorable week so far and I hope it continues to. On Sunday, after dropping Nikki off to work, I watched The Edge of Love with Shirley and Christine. I should have known watching a love story film was always going to happen with these girls. Funnily enough there were only 2 other people in the cinema watching it with us. So what's the verdict? BORING. I forced myself to understand as much as I could though, but I felt the movie never really went anywhere. It really failed to eventuate to something big.

Monday: I left for university earlier than usual. I walked to Goulbourn St and met up with Yen to do lunch in which she stubbornly shouted me. I learned a great deal about etiquette let me tell you that. After a delightful consumption of carbs, I headed off to the Building 10 labs to make further, yet uncessary progress on my LinuxGym e-book. Fellow classmates of mine who do Web Systems with me, you may find the following statement hard to believe, sad, even offensive. Completing those LinuxGym chapters are fun. There I said it. I later had my Economics lecture at 4, followed by a tutorial, and then me heading home at 7pm.

Tuesday: I headed off to university early again to attempt further chapters of LinuxGym. After struggling with Chapter 7, I went back to Chapter 5 and made some progress with assistance from Adrian. We then met up with some friends at the UTS food court where I scabbed some of Jasmine's soaky pasta. After that a bunch of us went to Market City for some reason. Adrian and I arrived halfway through the Marketing Lecture, followed by our tutorial, finishing at 9pm. Our iWatch proposal also got approved which was great. Now that I've brought it up, I still haven't allocated tasks to my group members. I'll get to it eventually.

Wednesday: I'd like to mention that this is one of the more memorable and enjoyable birthdays I've had and I thank everyone who was apart of it. It was a great 19th because my friends wanted to celebrate it, despite the fact that I myself wasn't planning to celebrate. In fact, I was originally going to spend the whole day at the library studying programming. If you seen my recent video blog, I highlighted that I wasn't really keen on celebrating my 19th, however after some encouragement and brainstorming from a bunch of very special programming-jigging friends of mine, we made a day of it.

I started the day by going shopping with Adrian and Jasmine at Rouse Hill Shopping Town Center. It was the first time I saw either of their houses and it seems they are very well accommodated in terms of living. It was a rocky ride finding Jasmine's house, after scanning the wrong part of Woodcroft but we eventually got there. We went to General Pants with each of us spending a considerable amount of times in the change rooms (or maybe it was just me). I ended up buying two plain v-necks for the summer, however I couldn't decide on what colors to pick so I got the trustworthey Jasmine to decide. Afterwards we had a round of churros.

After a very convincing (I think?), yet bollox conversation with Ivan on the phone, we decided to chill at Jasmine's place and watch a movie. We ended up watching Zoolander which I had never seen before. I always used to hear my friends recite lines from this movie and I always wondered what on earth they were going about. This movie is ridiculously funny and all of it makes sense now. Afterwards we watched one episode of Seinfeld and then we headed off to Blacktown Workers Club.

After arriving at Workers, we waited at the gambling section for the first lot of the birthday raffle draws. Those fortunate enough to win would be recipients of $1000. It was a shocking sight watching the winners collect their cash, not because I was disappointed, but because of their reactions to winning. They were inanimate beings showing absolutely zero emotion to winning $1000 each. If it were me who won, I'd be doing headspins over the damn tables.

After more friends of mine arrived at the club, we made our way to the buffet area and commenced our long and filling dinner. When the night hit 9pm, we made our way downstairs for the final birthday raffle draws, however me winning on my birthday was not to be. There's no problems there because I had such a great birthday anyway. When I got home, I replied to 30+ facebook greetings because I am so nice. Thanks to those who were a part of my birthday, and were able to come out for dinner even though it was short notice. Appreciate it. And thank you Shirley for the shirt you high roller. Seriously.

Top: Ivan, Jasmine, Adrian
Bottom: Brent, Nikki, Toby, Tim, Veronica, Salih, Jinno, Lenny, Jono, Shirley.

I would like to say that for those of you are wondering "where was my invite?", everything was a spur of the moment kind of thing with hope that word would eventually get around so don't feel left out !

Until next time, good afternoon, good evening and goodnight.

...And Arguably Asleep, Advantageous, and Astute

2008-08-13T23:42:00.012+10:00

For those of you who bother to read or even just drop by my blog once in a blue moon, you'll have noticed the alliterated blog titles I include for every post. A friend from school seems to doubt my ability to conjure up further alliterated titles, believing that I won't last until the end of the year. Little does he know of the genius circulating around this brain. Thesaurus much?

This morning, like every other morning, I slept in because I can, and it feels great. To add further insight to this post's blog title, most people laugh or question my choice to have evening classes for university, though their criticism is mainly limited to the dangers of travelling, followed by no futher arguement. Well for you evening timetable critics, I laugh right back at you. Have fun waking up early. Have fun standing on the train from Central to wherever. Have fun getting home, and instead of studying, you have an afternoon nap that eventually escalates into oversleeping. Have fun arriving at uni, realizing you forgot to bring an item of great importance all because you were in a rush. Have fun catching a later train all because you missed yours by a few seconds. In all honesty, 3/4 of my lectures are stationed in the evening and intervention was impossible. I confidently selected the latest tutorials to simply compliment the timing of my lectures. I would rather have quality study in a single 4-5 hour break, than to study in three lots of 1 hour gaps situated throughout the day.

Right, so the main purpose of this particular blog is to promote my new video blog, but now that I am blogging, I might as well recount my day. Before going to university, I passed by Blacktown and I met up with Adrian and Hilary and her friend whose name I have since forgotten, and we had pizza at the food court. After a great lunch and falsely accusing Hilary of spilling her drink in front of the cleaner, Adrian and I thought a good way to kill time would be to hang out at Blacktown Workers. We were hoping to get the underage Hilary to come inside the RSL, but the customer service staff saw right through our lies, especially when Hilary claimed she was 18, followed by her saying "I forgot my wallet". On the same token, it was me who told them we would only be eating at the buffet, even though we were an hour early until opening. Getting rejected is so awkward, so embarrassing. This situation proves just how important planning is before execution. There's no such thing as a bad plan, it's just a lack of will by man to execute. Unfortunately for us, we had neither.

After a failed attempt to infiltrate the RSL, the three of us sat down in a particular section of Blacktown, which I like to refer as the 'serene' part of Blacktown. After some minutes we met up with Lawrence in some random car park and conversed for a bit, and then it was off to university for my 6pm lecture.

Ok, so below is another attempt at a video blog. Enjoy.

...And Adipose Alimentaries Absorbed

2008-08-08T23:05:00.003+10:00

As of today, my university timetable is comprised of 4 days, all of those days concluding past 7pm. On Mondays I finish at 7, Tuesdays at 9, Wednesdays at 8, and as of now, Fridays at 7. Originally on Fridays, I had my Programming classes at 3-5pm, but now I've been voluntarily moved to 5-7pm. Today during my Programming laboratory class, without even thinking, I volunteered to switch to a later class all because one of the other students desperately needed a class within the 3-5pm range. So me, being a nice guy and all, volunteered to take part in the swap at the expense of coming home in time to watch Friday night football. This also means that I have a 5 hour break in the middle of the day, which is a good thing as it warrants for a productive study session in the library. There is a downside though. I can no longer be spoon-fed programming advice by Adrian, meaning my progress in programming will slide downhill dramatically.

In other news, though still uni related, for the first time ever I tried a McDonald's pounder burger. With invasive influence from Tim and the other boys, we all bought pounder burgers and raced to see who could consume their burger the fastest. Eventually it was Jimmy who finished his first, followed by Simon, Gordon, Ivan, myself, Adrian, Tim and then Jason. Never again will I attempt to eat that burger. Maybe.

...And An Accidental Articulation

2008-08-05T23:33:00.005+10:00

I realize my blogging activity has been a bit scarce in recent times. Looking back at the first few months of when this blog originally began (January, February, March), I realize how much of an eager beaver I was towards blogging. Most of my posts back then were almost 3 days apart from each other, if not, purely days. I guess the fascination I carried towards blogging back then led to the high volumes of posts. Nowadays my blogging activity has steadily declined from daily posts to simply weekly posts.

The desire to blog is still in existence, though the regularity to carry out those activities has obviously dropped. Time is not an issue, it's just a lack of priority and substance. I have a very routine life at the moment. A typical day of mine would be to sleep in until 10am, study at Blacktown library until 5pm, start uni at 6pm and then repeat the next day. If you put this life of mine into consideration, you really would not see any dimensions of excitement to write about.

So what's new? I added three new blogs to the link section. They are all mates from uni so be sure to check them out when you get the chance. The blogging craze is really catching on despite how Year 8-ish it may seem.

Tim W. - http://moviescriptlife.wordpress.com/
Ivan C. - http://ice-van.blogspot.com/
Adrian C. - http://its-adrian.blogspot.com/

What else? Nothing new on my side. Just living the life of a nocturnal university student. Study by day. Learn by night.

Today was a good day I suppose. I got dropped off at the station midday to catch a train to Blacktown Library and accumulate some much needed study for marketing. When I was on the platform, I noticed what looked like a gothic girl on the opposite platform with her back towards me. When she turned out and looked at me, I realized it was Angel. Sorry friend.

I got to the library and I met up with Jeaneline and Adrian. In my time there, Adrian and I managed to get through a chapter of marketing, though the study was not sufficient as we had to get through an additional two chapters. Nevertheless, the study we achieved was much better than that of Jeaneline who managed to write only one word in her book plus a few random notes aimed at us. Seriously woman. STUDY.

I left Blacktown at 4:50 and headed to univeristy for my 6pm class. After the two-hour lecture (which consisted of Veronica's loudness throughout, plus my row doing the 'pass it on' game) I went to my Marketing Tutorial, which I must say is the most intimidating class I've participated in. My class is full of cadets and interns and everyone seems to be socially, politically and economically aware. Sheesh. After the tutorial I met up with the kids from the west and headed off home.

My day today will be repeated tomorrow, however tomorrow I finish at 8pm instead of 9.
Well that's the end of that boring chapter. Until next time.

...And Academic Anthropical Atavism

2008-07-28T22:31:00.003+10:00

Back to school. Back to school, to prove to Dad that I'm not a fool. I got my lunch packed up, my boots tied tight, I hope I don't get in a fight. Ohhhh, back to school. Back to school. Back to school. Well, here goes nothing.

I had a great first day back at school. Apart from the excessively cold weather, it was a good return. I got to sleep extensively this morning which is always a pleasure. In fact, I slept from 9pm the previous day through to 9am this morning. My early nap last night was a result from a messed up body clock caused by Nikki's party on Saturday night. Anyways a 12 hour nap combined with not having to be at school until 4pm is a great first day in my book.

I started the day with a mega breakfast comprised of two home made meat pies and strawberry jam toast. Sadly, this would be my last meal in a while, for the rest of the day I consumed just two muesli bars and a pack of chewing gum until my arrival back home at 7:30pm.

My arrival at school was an hour early since I'm not one to take any risks of late embarrassing arrivals. I hate being more than 5 minutes late to church (when I used to go), let alone late to the first lecture of school. Anyways when I approached the hallway to the lecture room, I went from my casual frowny look to an instant smile as I saw all my friends from last semester. A great relief because originally I thought I would be a lone wolf in my economics classes.

After 2 hours of economics, I already feel like I'm going to fail the subject. Apparently its a harder subject then Accounting, but I've got enough experience of school to have an awareness of the correct way to handle this subject.

Thankfully I get to sleep in tomorrow, considering I don't start until 6pm.

...And Actors and Actresses Assessed

2008-07-23T12:03:00.004+10:00

So I watched The Dark Knight last night. My desire to watch the movie really took care of itself. You're talking about a movie that surpassed Spider Man 3 at the box office in a million categories, surpassed The Godfather to be the #1 film on imdb.com and currently boasts a 94% on rotten tomatoes. When all these factors come into play, you really have no reason not to watch it, unless of course you're a *bleeping* idiot.

Bale was outstanding as usual. When you have Bale in a film, it's a definite given that the film will kick ass. I also think it's safe to say that Heath Ledger left with a bang, and I'm happy for him and the movie. His performance in terms of creepiness is right up there with Ed Harris in Just Cause and Jack Nicholson in The Shining. Obviously his role warranted a more versatile performance and I'm certain he nailed it. To highlight the passion he incorporates into this character, put it this way. If you were to watch The Dark Knight without knowing the cast and then later find out it was Heath Ledger playing the Joker, you'd think 'no way'.

While I'm on the subject of films, I figured I'd compile a list of my Top 10 films. I must say however that my Top 10 is always changing, so here is the current list. You'll notice that my list is missing foreign flavor, simply because I haven't had the opportunity to see any good foreign films. Either way, I encourage you to watch the accompanying youtube clips to get an insight to the films if you haven't already seen them.

My Top 10 films:

10. The Deer Hunter (1978) - Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, Meryl Streep.
A brilliant psychological film that focuses on how the Vietnam War affects the lifestyles of a group of industrial workers and their families. While this is a war movie, the movie emphasizes emotional stability rather than action. I repeat, it is not a shoot-em-up, but more a character driven piece. On initial viewing I thought the pre-war section was quite long, but eventually I realized it was important in establishing the build-up to what would become post-war or the 'result'.

Check out this clip showing 'part of' the Russian Roulette scene. Perhaps the most intense scene of the film.

9. American History X (1998) - Edward Norton, Edward Furlong
With the exception of his small role in The Italian Job, this film was my first exposure to Edward Norton and safe to say, he left me with a great 'second' impression. The film looks at a former neo-nazi skinhead's attempt to prevent his younger brother from going down the same path.

While I have all the respect in the world for Norton, I don't believe his later performances have matched the intensity and passion put into this film. His only other performance that comes close to his role in the film is his role as the alter boy in Primal Fear back in '96. Back on track, the movie provides the audience with a philosophical insight to the world of black and white. If there was one thing I disliked about the movie, it would be the ending, but for all the wrong reasons if you know what I mean.

8. Before Sunrise (1995) / Before Sunset (2004) - Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy
Yes that's right people, I'm a fan of romantic dramas as well. If you don't like it, then you can go to hell. I put these two films together as one because they are basically one whole film if you combine them. Before Sunrise shows how a young man named Jesse (Hawke) meets a young woman (Delpy) in Europe. They end up spending the night together, forming a very special bond, unfortunately they both realize it may be their only night together. Before Sunset is set 9 years later in which the couple meet again on Jesse's book tour of France. Like the first film, this one day may be their only chance together.

The film does a great job of capturing a couple's adventure that has endured an 8 year gap. It shows how strong a couple can stand against the test of time. I must give props to both lead actors and their acting ability since the film features various one-take scenes that durate over 5 minutes. In fact, the average shot length is 10.1 minutes.

Why do I like this movie so much? It's simple. I'm attracted to the characters, to the extent that to this day I still carry hope that they're going to make a 3rd film.

7. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) - Gene Wilder
This film perhaps pretty much sums up my whole childhood. It's been years since I last watched this film, but I remember it as if I watched it only an hour ago. In fact I must have watched it at least 30 times up to now, it's that good. Watching it all those years ago, I was green with envy of those kids that got to be surrounded by all that candy even if it only a film.

6. American Psycho (2000) - Christian Bale, William Dafoe.
While I haven't read the book, and I doubt I ever will, I thoroughly enjoyed this film, particularly Bale's performance. Bale plays a wealthy New York banking executive named Patrick Bateman who secretly carries a psychopathic alter-ego, eventually unveiling this alternate ego upon his co-workers and friends. Bale's talent is clearly evident in this film, with his artificial yet accurate American accent despite being from Wales, as well as his ability to demonstrate different personalities. Defoe is also great as the cop who is investigating whether Bateman was behind the murders or not.

One of my favorite scenes:

5. Police Story (1985) - Jackie Chan, Maggie Cheung
This would have to be pinned down as my favorite Jackie Chan film, and its a shame his later movies are unparalled to the genius of this film. Jackie Chan shows us his versaility in this film by not being the lead, but also the director. I'll be honest though, I'm guilty of watching Jackie Chan films for only the action. Police Story however contains a great script, and magnificent acting of a Spielberg or Scorcese standard. The scene where Chan is about to be arrested by his own police force is the single most intense acting I have seen from Chan. The film has been an inspiration for other action movies as well. For example, the scene in Bad Boys II where they drive through the shack village was taken from Police Story.

Check out one of the greatest fight sequences ever. They eventually nick-named this movie 'Glass Story' because of so much glass used.

4. Die Hard (1988) - Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman
Over the decades we have been blessed with many entertaining action flicks, including Predator, Under Siege and Hard Target, but this film definitely takes the cake.

3. Memento (2000) - Guy Pearce, Carrie-Ann Moss
This is the film that truly exposed director Christopher Nolan to the film industry. Since then, he has gone on to direct Batman Begins, The Prestige and The Dark Knight, which most would consider to be as brilliant. Director Nolan was also responsible for the screenplay of this film.

Guy Pearce plays Leonard Shelby, a man suffering from short-term memory loss. Under his condition, he uses notes and tattoos to find out the people who murdered his wife. This movie is confusing upon first viewing. At first I was trying to figure out whether Teddy was a good guy or bad guy, but after a couple more watches, I understand everything now.

For a low budget film, this film truly is fantastic. Original as well.

2. The Cure (1995) - Brad Renfo (R.I.P)
This is another one of those films I watched many times as a kid. The film looks at Dexter, an 11 year old with AIDS who befriends his older and much bigger neighbor Eric. The pair become best friends and go on an adventure to look for a cure for Dexter's illness.

I don't care how much of a man you are when you watch this film. If you don't at least shed a little tear at the end of the film, there's truly something wrong with you.

Here is the first 9 minutes of the film. The whole movie is available on youtube.

... now for my number one film that has always been my number one

...

... number one by a longshot

...

... I based my first ever HSC assessment task on this movie, and I FAILED with a mark of 7/15.

...

... BUT it's still my favorite film of all time.

...

... It is ...

...

...

...

1. Stand By Me (1986) - Jerry O'Connel, River Pheonix (R.I.P)
This film really needs no introduction. I don't care how old it is, you should have at least seen it at one point in your life. If not, shame on you and keep reading.

I first watched this film when I was 3 or 4 years old. I eventually bought the VHS and I still enjoy it on every viewing. Everything about this movie is perfect. Story, casting, acting, heck even the soundtrack is ace. Great performances from such a young bunch of actors including a young Jerry O'Connel, River Pheonix, Keifer Sutherland and John Cusack.

The film centres on a man's reflection of his boyhood, particularly a journey he undertook with 3 other friends in a quest to find a missing body. Within minutes, we are engaged in his reflection as we follow the footsteps from home all the way to the discovery of the missing body. The train dodge scene will go down as one of my favorite scenes in a film.

I've seen this film too many times, enough to be able to recite all dialogue.

Here are the first few minutes of the film.

Thanks for reading ! I encourage you to see these films if you have not already done so.

...And An Assuasive Arrangement

2008-07-22T00:26:00.005+10:00

Ok. Let's see.

Uni starts in a week.
I have no car until Thursday.
Wanting to watch The Dark Knight because Bale is God.
In urgent need of a Programming textbook. Any givers?
I can no longer write insightful blog posts.

It's 12:30 in the morning and I'm in no mood to write up a long post, so rather I will share with you a list of songs that I found very calming. I could name trillions of songs, but I'll mention the 10 that come to mind.

Final Fantasy X Piano Collection - Besaid Island - A great piece that I underestimated when I first heard it years ago. I only started listening to it again this year, and I realize what great melodies the piece contains.

Final Fantasy X Piano Collection - Via Purifico - I fell in love with this piece on initial listen, enough to attempt to learn a few bars on piano.

Zero 7 - Destiny - I first heard this song one night on Channel V's Night Shift segment back in Year 9. Come to think of it, that was the last time Channel V was ever great. A very calming song with amazing female leads. The video clip is a piece of art too.

Kenny G - By The Time This Night Is Over - Don't hate on this man people. An undeniably talented musician. His 1992 album 'Breathless' is probably the best thing in my house at the moment. Not only that, but he looks hell of a lot like former Megadeth guitarist Marty Friedman.

Massive Attack - Teardrop - No need for an explanation. You should already know this song.

Mista - Blackberry Molasses - While this same came out while I was still in Kindergarten, I only came across this song a couple years ago, and its slowly risen to become one of my favorites. It features a young Bobby Valentino on lead with very laid back beats. Check it.

Floetry - Getting Late - I don't know how I came across this song, but dammit I'm glad I did. This is real music.

A Tribe Called Quest - Bonita Applebum - Ok most ATCQ songs are calming and have the best laid back beats, but this one takes the cake. Electric Relaxation is probably their most recognized song, but it has nothing on this. Long live the tribe.

Donkey Kong Country - Aquatic Ambience - Before I explain this song, I just want to say that Donkey Kong Country for the Super Nintendo is without a doubt the best game I've ever played. I used to play this game 24/7 with my older sister before I was even in school. As for the song itself, this is the the theme used for water levels. It is just atmospheric and beautiful.

And last but not least...

Agalloch - Falling Snow - To be honest, all Agalloch songs are calming, despite the compelling dark atmosphere that they carry. This song however is the cream of the crop. In the video, 7:27 and onwards is probably the most beautiful tune I have heard in my life. This song is just epic greatness.

...And Accounting Abortive

2008-07-14T23:42:00.004+10:00

What up people. Life hasn't changed one bit since the last blog entry. I'm still my inactive jobless self with messy hair.

Ok so uni results came out today. No holding back. All will be revealed.

Managing People and Organisations - Credit - 71%
Accounting for Business - Fail - 35%
Communications for IT - Distinction - 81%
Information Systems - Credit - 69%.

Give it to me.

Meanwhile, I've managed to watch 4 seasons of Entourage in 6 days. Great series. Can't wait until Season 5.

...And Absent-Mindedness Appears

2008-07-07T15:09:00.006+10:00

Throughout the weekend I watched the entire first season of 30 Rock. While it's not entirely the most entertaining show, at least not as much as Two and a Half Men or Friends, it still has its moments. I'm currently a few episodes into the second season, and thankfully they are shooting a 3rd season which is scheduled to premiere later in October. I could easily give you many reasons to watch 30 Rock, but realistically I only need two. Number one, Alec Baldwin. Number two, Katrina Bowden. Have a taste of 30 Rock.

Today I unecessarily woke up at 6am to prepare for what I imagined would be a long day in the city. I headed off to uni courtesy of Brent for transport which I am greatful for, especially now that petrol prices are totally bollox, so bollox that I haven't bothered to refill in over 3 weeks. After dropping Nikki off to her marketing exam, Brent and I walked down to Capital Square post office so that I could post off an overdue eBay item.

I then paid a visit to Building 10 to apply for a student ID replacement which I happily received within a matter of seconds upon applying. No more paying extra for public transport now. While I was at Building 10, I retrieved my recently marked Communications assignment, just barely scraping into the High Distinction zone with a mark of 85%.

After getting my assignment, we still had an hour to kill until Nikki finished her exam, so Brent and I played ping-pong at UTS. We played a total of 6 games, the two of us winning 3 each. Eventually Nikki met up with us and then we bought some goods from the bakery and then we finally went off home.

Unfortunately for me, it is at this point where I lost my newly marked assignment I talked about earlier in this blog. I lost it in similar fashion to my mobile phone, where I put it on top of a surface, later leaving it there without realizing. In this case, on our way back to Brents car, I put my assignment on top of his car so that I could have a drink of Apple Juice, and then we left the carpark, forgotting that I had placed my assignment on his car. Right now my assignment is lieing somewhere in Market City carpark.

On the way home we passed by Plumpton shops for a much needed toilet break, and then passed by Det's for a little bit, until Brent finally dropped me home. I used the afternoon to spray paint a pair of yellow shoes that I had lying around to a wearable white-cream color. It's resting as I speak.

Before I end this post, I'd just like point out a music video I stumbled upon on youtube. It is one of the weirdest songs + videos I have ever laid eyes on. It is right up there with Aphex Twin's 'Windowlicker'.

It's a song called 'Tastes Like Kevin Bacon' by a band called 'IWRESTLEDABEARONCE'. They are an experimental grindcore band featuring a female vocalist who has great singing range from piercing screams to hardcore to the singing reminiscent of the girl from Evanescence. I was wtf at 0:17 and and 2:22.

...And Automotive Ammunition Abates

2008-07-05T00:36:00.006+10:00

I have a lot of things I want to talk about in this blog entry, but I'm not going to talk about them. Uhmmm ... what? Basically, I say a lot of things that I say I'll do, but I don't end up doing them. Prominent Example. I promised myself this week that I would take it extremely easy on the petrol consumption, but sure enough I've managed to spoil the balance.

Today I spent the whole day with Kevin. He was given a day off work, and I don't even work, so when you add those two terms into the equation, you're given one great day. Our rendezvous was Mounty Westfield since he had to buy a DS Lite, and I had to cash in a cheque from Zinifex shares. Our stay at Mt. Druitt was limited because of my own selfishness, spawned by the absolute emptiness of a cesspool of a shopping center. I decided to quickly visit ShopSmart to see if Irregular Jeans Warehouse was still in business, but disappointingly its operations had ceased. Since Donut King was there, I decided to buy a donut dinosaur. I bought one with green icing. Now when you buy a treat with bright green icing, you expect it to taste out of this world. You expect a surprise. I was definitely surprised. I was surprised as to awful it was. The flavors were an offence to my taste buds. I might as well have ate mangled animal carcus, I can tell you that much. Worst $2.20 I've spent in quite some time.

After sharing my graphic review to the public, we decided to drive up to Blacktown to catch a movie. On the way there, Kevin used his phone to check what screening times were available. I seriously didn't know you could get your phone to do that. What will they think of next? We ended up watching Kung-Fu Panda, which I must say was better than expected. I couldn't imagine anyone else but Jack Black doing the voice of Po. Now that I've seen Kung-Fu Panda, I am now looking forward to Wall-E. Despite how recent it is, it is already #9 on the Top 250 films of imdb.com.

At around 2pm, we decided to drive up to Rouse Hill to get some churros. Since I shouted for the movies, Kevin shouted for the churros. We bought cinnamon churros with caramel dipping sauce which was bloody ownage. After Rouse Hill, we drove up to Kellyville to make a pit stop at Kevin's house so that I could borrow his can of white spray-paint for reasons to extreme to disclose. While I was there, I had a chat with Kevin's parents who I must say are the coolest parents out. They fill you with food and drinks like you've just come back from the Sahara.

After exhausting the capacity of my stomach, we went back to St. Clair where eventually Brent came over and told me about his new high-tech PC setup. Hopefully I'll get to see his new gear tomorrow ... rich bastard. At around 6pm, I picked Ana up and we went to John Paul's house for our youth meeting, which was very vocal and informative. Lots of ideas were exchanged which made for a very constructive meeting. We then had pizza thanks to JP's private chef. If I had my own chef that could cook as good as that, I'd never have to eat out.

...And An All-Round Account

2008-07-03T22:42:00.005+10:00

Just jumped fresh out of the shower, therefore I thought I'd write up another blog entry as a way of occupying myself while I wait for my hair to dry. I guess I'll use this blog as a way of summarising events that occured in the past 72 hours ... not that there's really anything exciting to recount on.

Last week was Det's 18th - while a great party it turned out to be, at the same time it was also a reunion for the St Marys people. I managed to enjoyed myself even though I was sitting in front of the outdoor heater playing with fire and blocks of coal for the majority of the evening. Apologies to Salih for immaturely pulling back his chair, resulting in him falling. The damage was returned when he pushed me and I broke one of Det's chairs.

On Tuesday I drove up to Parramatta to look for a certain pair of Lacoste shoes at Zero, but unfortunately they didn't have my size, so instead I drove back to Blacktown and bought it from the Zero there. I don't know why I didn't just buy it there in the first place. Later that day I went to Blacktown Workers Club with Shirley to play a much needed table tennis match. She completely dominated me. *eye rolling*. But yes, I intend on making an impact at the UTS ping-pong tables once the Spring semester commences. Using my membership card, I was able to get free drinks off the vending machines located on the gambling floor. The membership actually permits you to receive three free drinks per day. I opted for 3 hot chocolates.

Last night was the decider of the State of Origin series. I feel very sorry for Danny Buderus who was playing his final game for the blues. Not entirely the best way to leave the arena, but I'm sure his career will continue to blossom over in Englad. Like he said, there really wasn't much between the two sides, only the brilliance of Johnathan Thurston in the final quarter.

Today was a great day weather-wise. Actually, the whole week has delivered us great weather. Cold and sunny is the way I like it. Had a morning session of kicks with St. Clair boys and then a short game of 2 on 2 soccer, and then hung out at Jinno's after. Later in the evening I caught the train to Parra to meet up with Shirley, Veronica and Carmen to go shopping. In the end, everyone bought a piece of clothing except me. The only thing my money went to towards was dinner at Pho Pasteur, which is my 3rd dining there in as many weeks. I decided to order combination vegetable with beef and rice noodles. If it wasn't for the high amounts of sauce they put, the meal would have been good, but instead I was left with a soggy plate. On the bright side, I saw Michelle eating there as well, whom I haven't seen in a long time.

Tomorrow I believe I am hanging out with Kevin at Mounty County and maybe catch a movie. Feel free to invite yourself if you're reading. If not then I guess I can start watching the 30 Rock seasons I got from Jinno. Katrina Bowden = WIN.

Well my hair is dry so I guess its time for bed.

...And An All-Day Adventure

2008-06-26T22:39:00.003+10:00

Misinterpretation is a funny thing. Not long ago, my ears were victim to a piercingly loud television set located in the other room that happened to be airing the Filipino Channel. My mother was watching a particular program belonging to the drama genre and I could clearly hear a girl crying, if not, a moaning sound of some sort. From where I was (my room), it sounded like a porno. You'd think the same. I 'almost' wanted to investigate.

Today I visited a couple of places, though not by choice. My mother recently took a months absence of leave from work. Considering the amount of free time she currently has, you could imagine her desire to visit many places. Due to her incapability to operate an automobile, I was forced to transport her to these places.

Our first destination was a certain solicitor's office in Parramatta. While my mother was at her appointment, I decided to drive nearby to Westfield and search for potential clothing purchases. My search wasn't too expansive, for I only visited Myer and David Jones. I eventually came across a sweet pair of Lost Highway skinny jeans in an acid grey color. Hopefully that size 30 will still be there when I return.

Next destination was Rouse Hill Town Center. It's always a delight visiting this place, though the concept of an out-door shopping environment finally displayed its disadvantages thanks to the extreme winds circling about. We didn't spend too much time here, in fact the only reason we visited Rouse Hill was so I could buy me a pack of churros. I got so greedy, I bought myself two lots of them.

When you dip these babies in chocolate, it tastes too damn good. I'm glad to see a cafe in Sydney that focuses on these Spanish treats. The people that work at this cafe are a friendly bunch too. I remember many months ago, I bought myself a pack of churros and ice-cream covered with hundreds and thousands. When the lady walked over to hand me my food, she wittingly asked "are you the little baby who ordered this"?

Our next destination was Windsor. My mother wanted to visit my old man at his work to give him some documents that required his signature. I didn't mind driving all the way to Windsor because not only would I be able to drive by the pretty houses in Windsor Downs, but for the first time I'd be seeing where my dad works. Finding his work was annoyingly difficult which consisted of extremely slow driving and unclear directions over the phone. I eventually dropped my mother off while I devoured the churros I had bought from Rouse Hill.

The final destination was actually the place I currently reside. St. Clair yo. I had to visit the Post Office to post out some shirts I had sold on eBay. You know what they say; there's no harm selling a bunch of shirts that have become obsolete to you. Okay fine, I don't actually know anyone who says that, but I think you see where I'm coming from.

Well I'm going to log off now, but before that I'd just like to say Happy Birthday Det !

...And An Analysis Around Action

2008-06-24T09:48:00.026+10:00

Thought I'd use this bright and sunny Tuesday morning to publish a blog entry, especially with this blog encompassing such a desolate atmosphere (for my standards anyway). I spent the weekend at my sisters place in the city while she and her boyfriend were on holidays in Mauritius and Seychelles. While I was making myself home in their apartment, I managed to raid their DVD collection. Unfortunately I didn't have the time to watch them all, but I managed to watch a select few. One of those movies watched was the original Die Hard made in 1988, also the first movie I intentionally browsed for. This was probably the 20th time watching this fabulous gem.

I'm going to use this opportunity to discuss the Die Hard movies through the comparing and constrasting of several areas. I must warn you; spoilers may be contained in the following paragraphs.

There are currently 4 Die Hard movies:

Die Hard
Die Hard 2: Die Harder
Die Hard: With a Veangeance
Die Hard 4.0

These are the Die Hard movies in order of personal favoritism:

Die Hard (by a long stretch)
Die Hard 4.0
Die Hard: With a Veangeance
Die Hard 2: Die Harder

Evidence of the first Die Hard's superiority lies simply in personal observation in that other 3 movies don't come anywhere close. Don't get me wrong, I love the 3 Die Hard movies that proceed the first one, but they fall short of the standard set by John McTiernan and his team in 1988.

Die Hard is most definitely unmatched in terms of action, dialogue and characters and is a movie that set the benchmark for many proceeding action movies even up to now. Die Hard has been one of the most influential action movies and is up there with The Matrix and T2.

For those of you who have not seen the movie (and if there are, please watch immediately), the story is simple. Detective John McClane (Bruce Willis) visits Nakatomi Plaza on Christmas day to visit his wife, however their Christmas celebrations don't go to fruition, as the building is eventually taken over by Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) and his men. While everyone is held hostage, McClane happens to escape to one of the building's higher floors as he attempts to figure out what is going on. From then on, it's non-stop action as its McClane vs Hans + 20 terrorists.

The one important characteristic this movie had over the other Die Hard movies was the fluidity of chemistry among characters. It was easy for the audience to attach themselves to characters on both sides of the spectrum, including both the good guys and the terrorists. I thoroughly enjoyed the inclusion of McClane's limosuine driver young Argyle who delivers a humorous dimension. Then there's the 2 terrorist brothers Tony and Karl who have a very sharp rivalry, not to mention the main villain Hans Gruber, who delivers a strikingly elegant performance.

One set of characters I thought were the heart and soul of this film was the blind relationship between McClane and Sgt. Al Powell that durates through the entire movie - a great example of trust and loyalty. Without even knowing each other before hand, McClane must communicate with Powell who is on the outside via walkie-talkie. The difficult part is on Powell. Since he is communicating to McClane through radio, he cannot see what McClane looks like, therefore he must make the decision whether to believe that McClane is really who he says he, or a terrorist himself. When these two character's finally see each other face to face in the end, it's a chilling feeling. Throughout the movie, you can really observe how the communication on the radio between these two characters really changed each other. McClane realized how important his wife was, and Powell was able to overcome his personal demons of shooting by saving McClane's life in the end.

Action sequences is another area in this movie that dominates the other films. Most of the action is basically an exchange of muzzle flash, therefore it's not as expansive as the 3rd and 4th Die Hard films. What makes the action in this movie just as good is the the manner of execution. Every action scene is direct and straight to the point - no scenes are carried out overly long which can be frustrating for some. No one wants to see an exchange of pointless fire for 20 minutes.

Now I'm not trying to establish myself as a fanboy. Far from that. This is definitely not the best action movie I've seen, but is one that should be recognized and commended. The film is currently #122 on imdb.com's Top 250 movies, and is also 96% on Rotten Tomatoes. Don't use these statistics though, judge it for yourself.

Die Hard 2 was a major disappointment, perhaps the worst of the trilogy. It was always going to be a challenge for this film to live up to the standards set by the previous film, especially with a new director and all. On the same token, the movie is not bad. The movie is basically about terrorists siezing control of an airport and threatening to cause plane crashes if the authorities fail to meet their demands.

Unfortunately the characters that McClane communicates with do not seem to be equipped with the same chemistry shown in the first movie, resulting in one-dimensional characters that are flat and ordinary, leaving the viewer not even caring about anyone else but McClane. I thoroughly liked the airport shootout between McClane and the airport terrorists. I was susprised to see Robert Patrick being cast as one of the terrorists. For those of you who don't know, Robert Patrick played T-1000 in Terminator 2. Another great action scene was McClane vs a bunch of terrorists on snow mobiles. The frantic blizzard-like weather made it very suspenseful.

Overall this movie has failed to incorporate the substances of the first movie that made it work. Instead we have a film with appalling dialogue and rushed direction. If you're simply watching this for the action, disregarding any form of directional art, then you will not be disappointed, but even on those terms, the action is still lacking. Just watch the ending, and you'll see what I mean. A lot of missed opportunities on this film.

Die Hard 3 would have to be my second favorite movie of the series. This would be the reunion of Bruce Willis and Samuel L Jackson, only one year after their appearances together in Pulp Fiction. The duo would then go on to star in Unbreakable in 2002. The story in this movie is about a guy named Simon who deliberately calls for John McClane to play a game called 'Simon Says'. For each task that McClane fails to complete, Simon will blow off a bomb hidden somehwere in the city. Throughout this game, McClane teams up with Zeus to run all over New York City completing these deadly tasks.

The action here is definitely more expansive than the first movie containing car chases, bomb defusals, lateral riddle solving all over New York City. I liked the part where McClane and Zeus takes a detour through the park endangering the lives of many civillians. Why do I find that funny? I don't know. There's even a part where McClane is up against a gang of Harlem brovaz' on the street. This whole journey of trickery and deceit during the Simon Says segments make for an interesting build-up to the ending.

Another characteristic that makes a return is the relationships among characters. The connection established between McClane and Simon is much more prominent than the villain relationships established in other Die Hard films. While they are fighting on opposite sides of the law, we see glimpses of friendship and the sharing of laughter, showing that villains can still have charm over malevolance. I really wish the female villain they casted had a more dominant role. A female villain is something we haven't seen in the two previous Die Hard films, therefore expanding her role would have given the film another original edge.

While the ending of Die Hard 2 was atrocious in its own right, the ending of Die Hard 3 is no better. There was definitely the opportunity for the directors to incorporate some sort of action-packed sequence, but what we've been left with is a lacklustre filler sequence. If you've seen this on DVD, you'll have noticed the alternate ending they put on there. I really wish they had used that ending instead. It would have made it the best ending out of all the Die Hard films.

Die Hard 4.0 is the first film of the series to utilize the services of several high-profile actors including Justin Long, Timothy Olyphant and Maggie Q. The movie also broke a 12 year gap between the last Die Hard movie made back in 1995. If I had to give an award to the Die Hard movie with the best plot, this movie would receive it without question. In this film, John McClane must fight a group of terrorists who carry out their operations in a more unorthdoxed manner. McClane and Matt Farrell team up to stop a group of internet-based terrorists slowly shutting down the United States.

The action sequences featured are very gripping and entertaining, leaving the audience excited and hungry for more. A lot of original ideas were implemented, including the helicopter chase and the tunnel blackout. This movie comes extremely close to matching the superiority of the Die Hard, but its inconsistency brought it down in the end. The scene where John is up against the air fighter near the end was a really dragging scene, heck the movie would have been better without it. In fact, this scene runs longer than the actual ending itself. There were also stupid segments thrown in, such as McClane driving a car up a toll booth into a helicopter, and McClane shooting himself in the end which in turn killed the villain. All these little things did not help the movie's cause.

I was disappointed in Olyphant's performance as the villain. In fact, he would have to be the worst villain of the series. He just seemed like another lonely hacker, not carrying any qualities of a terrorist group leader. No hints of evil in him whatsoever. McClane even managed to make him crack after the death of Maggie Q's character. Pathetic.

Overall
The Die Hard movies have a nack for containing really short endings. Obviously one's ending has to be really significant and memorable, for its one of the segments that really dominates the audience's overall impression of the movie, unless of course the director wanted to make an ending open to view interpretation, but even then that's a pain the ass.

While all the Die Hard endings were short, I feel the ending of the first Die Hard was the ending that made the most of its screen time. The way McClane killed the last 2 terrorists with only 2 shots was intense.

Overall, I think I've made it fairly clear as to why the first Die Hard will always be superior to the other films. It simply contains the whole package executed at a higher level - acting, action, character development and humor.

...And Abysmal Absurdity Associates Asphalt

2008-06-15T15:29:00.009+10:00

It is currently Sunday afternoon, though the feeling of an 'arvo' is nowhere to be felt I'm afraid. Instead mother nature has given us this bleak atrocity of a skyline. It is this type of weather that puts me into a state of lethargy, though it dosn't seem to be too detrimental to my blogging ability.

Last Thursday was my final exam, which I must stress, was genuinely the easiest final exam I have ever endured. Fellow students who sat through the same exam would agree with me in a heartbeat. Basic 411. I had 2 hours to answer 40 multiple choice questions. I finished in 1/6th of the allocated time. Putting aside any conceitedness or arrogance you may have suspected from the aforementioned verdict, it was just too easy. Other students would agree in a heartbeat.

That however is not the subject of this blog. I wanted to speak of a much more serious issue. Burnouts.

People of Sydney, surely you are aware of the stupidity of such acts. I woke up this morning, feeling much better from the illness I had been carrying all week. As I went outside, I noticed this just outside my driveway.

The driveways you see in both pictures are of mine. Safe to say, the people who do these burnouts on the road are definitely the 'don't give a fuck' group of society. To think this is happening just outside my house is a frightening thought.

Now I do have a faint idea of the people doing this, in fact I remember a couple months ago, a blue Ford outside my house was in position to do a burnout, however the driver aborted as I pulled into my driveway. 5 minutes later, I heard a loud screeching noise, and sure enough, it was the same blue Ford. Some oughta' give him/her the little pinky gesture.

From time to time, I wake up in the middle of the night hearing the same damn noise, and my parents get pissed off as well. I mean, if they were speeding, sure enough they have an excuse to be doing so, such as "I'm running late" or "my wife is pregnant". However they're not speeding. They're doing fucking burnouts outside my house that serves no purpose. If their purpose is to kill themselves, then they're not far away from getting the job done.

...And Afflictive Asinine Actions Admitted

2008-06-09T12:47:00.009+10:00

I am nearing the commencement of total freedom. Just one more exam left on the table, and then I need not have to worry about school for another 6 weeks or so. My last exam is on Wednesday for Managing People and Organisations which I am not worried about in the least. Not quite the attitude one should be equipped with at university level, but I am just too excited about the holidays. Also, the fact that this final exam is 2 hours with only 40 multiple choice questions makes it all the better. For other students who still have exams left, I wish you all the best.

Game 2 of State of Origin will be played on Wednesday night at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane. I believe Suzanne will be flying up there to watch the game, the lucky bastard. On the other hand, she now has the unpleasant duty of being surrounded by 50,000 redneck Maroon fans. A victory to NSW would be a perfect start to my unproductive holiday. Then of course, there is Friday Night Football to watch with the Roosters playing the Panthers. A good chance for the Bondi Junction to rectify there abysmal performance against Manly yesterday afternoon. With 4 of their top sqaud backing up from Origin, it should be a grinding game.

On a totally unrelated note, yet the highlight of the blog title, I have a rather unattractive burn bubble on my right hand, ignited by my stupidity of holding a candle cyclinder for as long as possible. I'm tempted to pop the bugger, but I've been informed to leave it to disintegrate. I don't know why I execute absurd actions like this. Even more stupid, I drove home from the city this morning extremely tired. I felt a deep sleep coming on around the Cumberland Hwy overpass of the M4, but I just wanted to get home right away. I usually play death metal in situations like this to maintain my road awareness, but unfortunately I had no CD's in the car.

...And An Airing #2

2008-06-08T01:49:00.003+10:00

It is currently 2am in the morning. Besides munching on a box of Arnott's Pizza Shapes, I am uploading my second video blog, which will be the last for a while. Like I said, its still something I am experimenting with. It won't be a regular thing for obvious reasons - it's very weird to talk to no one while driving. Anyways, yeah I had my accounting exam yesterday, and then I caught the train back to Xander's place to just hang out and play some Burnout and 1 on 1 Dead or Alive with Angelo on the Xbox 360, which is actually my first time playing the console. Below is Vlog 2 !

Apart from vlogging, it is Audrey's birthday today, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY AUDREY. As part of the newly found trend of celebrating birthday's in advance, we went bowling at Blacktown AMF. Bowling is fun, but seeing old school mates is an even bigger delight. I hadn't been bowling since Year 4 so I didn't want to embarass myself too much. I did just the opposite because I started out with 2 gutter balls ! It's all good though, I was able to build up some momentum to pull off some fluky shots.

After a good night of bowling, I headed off to Blacktown Workers Club, which consisted of:

me almost killing Arzlan and myself by reversing into an incoming car.
long and tedious game of snooker (highlight: Karel attempting to hit the ball, but instead dropping the snooker cue on the ground)
free hot chocolate drinks with the aid of membership card.
watching Krista gamble her life away over Blackjack.

Dancing tomorrow.
Peace.

...And An Airing #1

2008-06-03T23:09:00.003+10:00

First blog of the month. Nothing much to say. Been pretty busy with uni work. Oh yeah, I'm repeating Accounting next semester. I haven't officially failed the course, but I know I'm going to so I might as well tell the world that I'll be repeating it.

Other than that, here's a video blog. I'm still experimenting with the concept. Maybe there'll be more to come, or maybe this is a one-off. Who knows. Enjoy.

EDIT: Use earphones while watching to make it easier to hear what I'm saying.

...And Another Average Afternoon

2008-05-26T20:20:00.003+10:00

Credit to Jasmine for the blog title. To be honest, it's probably the one title I've used that makes the most sense without being overly technical. Upon hearing her suggestion, I really didn't think I'd ever encounter a suitable time to capitilize on such a simple piece of alliteration, but I think it fits well into this post. As the title suggests, this afternoon was quite average in terms of productivity, but I'll talk about that further down the track.

After a weekend of nothing but pure laziness, I had absolutely zero desire to even leave the house for university this morning. I treated the weekend like the holidays had already started. I did nothing but watch movies on my laptop the whole weekend, including Balls of Fury, Evan Almighty, Orange County, Superbad, Vacancy and half of The Heartbreak Kid. Quite a risky move to execute considering how close the exams are. Very reminiscent of my preparations weeks before the HSC period. Moving on now ...

My first class of the day was my Communications seminar from 10am to 1pm. I thoroughly enjoyed the presentations that were given by this week's nominated students; the content provided was really interesting and thought provoking. The first bloke to present, who I must point out, has a strong resemblance to Ben Foster (look him up in google if you don't know who he is) gave a presentation on lie detectors and how they are beginning to implement such devices into the workplace. Basically, if you're striving to avoid going in to work by chucking a sickie, your employer will most likely make you go through a lie detector to see if you really are sick.

After my class, I had a 5 hour gap until my Accounting lecture. At that point in time, I really couldn't be bothered waiting that long in the city for my next class so I decided to go straight home and finish off my CITP Report. As I made my way up the stairs of Platform 18, I ran into Serene. Very unexpected, but a delight. It's always healthy riding the train home with someone, especially when you're coming from the city. As you converse with that person, you block out the annoying longevity of the train ride, thus mentally you arrive at your destination faster. I'm sure most of you would agree.

Anyways, as soon as I arrived home I sure enough jumped straight into bed. I woke up at 7 on the dot. 4 hour nap ! So much for studying. I have a day off tomorrow, so I'll be sure to make some use of it.

...And Assurances Are Ample

2008-05-22T23:37:00.006+10:00

It's currently 11:41pm on Thursday night. I must say, each night that elapses just gets colder and colder. Before I go to bed each night, I now have to resort to using the thick expensive fury blanket - man that thing really keeps you warm. Anyways, I have a day off school tomorrow so I'm free to stay up all night and what better way to do so than to blog.

Something to smile about is the fact that a lot of pressure from school is slowly diminishing and from there pure satisfaction starts to spawn. Like most of you who are currently studying at university, you would have been ambushed with countless assessments 4-5 weeks ago. I'm currently at the period of the semester where we are either getting the last of our assessments out of the way, or we're being informed of our assessment marks.

On Wednesday, my group had their IT Bookstore Presentation, which I can safely say was executed better than expected. When it comes to group assessments, I'm not too fond of presenting first. I have this belief that irrespective of the circumstances, it is always best to present second and only second. I don't enjoy presenting last, or even late for that matter, simply because I'm the kind of person who builds up an enormous amount of nervousness the longer I have to wait.

The cons of being an eager beaver for presenting are that your mind is too focused on establishing the standards and setting the bar for the upcoming groups. A lot of pressure is usually placed on the first group because that's when everyone's ears are all tuned in. If your group ends up doing an outstanding presentation, well you're in the clear and you can thrive off that confidence for the rest of the lesson. On the other hand, if you end up presenting poorly, then you've basically invited the other groups to make themselves look much superior, denting your confidence drastically. At least when you present second, you can learn from the first group and determine where they went right or wrong and use these factors to your advantage. Presenting first just opens way too many variables for concern and it does take its toll mentally.

In the end, my group was the first to present and while it wasn't in my best interests, I couldn't allow my selfish desires to clash with the best interests of my group. Prior to the presentation, we all exchanged words of nervousness, but honestly I think we did a killer job in the end. You could tell we were feeding off each other's confidence throughout the presentation. After reading all this, you probably have a detailed idea as to how stressful this assignment was and you're probably wondering, 'why all the fuss'? Put simply, our IS teacher is one badass critic. No matter what, she'll find a way to criticize you somehow even if you don't agree.

With that said, that's the last of my group assignments for the semester and I'm glad. Out of the four group assignments I've had this semester, I'd say that bookstore presentation I was just ranting about was the most enjoyable and satisfying. It's unfortunate that this is the last time I'll be seeing those blokes since they're doing the single IT degree, but I wish them all the best for next semester.

On the topic of assessments, today my MPO group received a HD for our presentation on 'Innovation and Change'. Initially, I didn't think our mark of 17.5/20 would equal a HD, but I did the calculation and it did, so that's great. Good work team.

Well that's about it for tonight. Before I conclude, I just want to wish a happy birthday to Ainna. Enjoy your outing tomorrow night. Apologies for not being able to attend.

Over.

...And Agile Activity Activates Alterness

2008-05-20T19:24:00.003+10:00

The last couple of days have been positive so far. I'm nearing the last of my assessments and I got a HD for my most recent assessment, so I'm over the moon at the moment, though it's all been ruined by the speeding penalty I received in the mail from the RTA today. The letter said that I was travelling 51 in a 40 zone on May 2nd at 3:03pm.

Initially those details weren't all that familiar, but looking back at the corresponding entries in the blog, I now recall what happened on that day. It's unfortunate that this situation had to occur, but I must put it behind me for I have an important presentation tomorrow. I'm not looking forward to this particular presentation; I just know the teacher will question every idea or sentence our group puts out.

I guess one thing to look forward to is Game 1 of Origin football. Go NSW !

...And Abductees are Abducted

2008-05-18T08:41:00.005+10:00

Thought I would write up a post before I head off to the library. With that said, I don't even know what library I should go to. I'm leaning towards UTS library, though it only promotes an opportunity to go shopping. I could also go to Blacktown library, but something inside me will take over and force me to pay a visit to PlayTime. If anything I'd like to pay a visit to UWS Library Parramatta Campus since it is amazingly quiet and the chances of me being distracted there are essentially non-existent.

Woah, didn't realize I was this picky, and over a damn library. Let's get my week over and done with.

Monday: Caught the 9:05 train and managed to make it to my first class with a minute to spare. It was important that I wasn't late to this class since I was supposed to be giving my 20 minute presentation on spam. Prior to the presentation I was trying to rehearse my speech on the train, but I didn't last until Blacktown as my palm cards were soon replaced with my PSP.

So how did my presentation go? Well there were 2 parts to the presentation. 10 minutes of presenting the material, and then 10 minutes of talking. I think I covered everything I needed to, though I had hoped for a longer discussion. I get my marks back tomorrow, but I don't think I did too bad.

At around 2:30 I met up with my group members to do much needed work on the bookshop assignment. At around 4 I went to the ping-pong tables and played until the accounting lecture.

Tuesday: No recollection of any events. One could only assume I wasted the day.

Wednesday: Perhaps the luckiest day of my week. As I explained in my previous post, our group managed to get out of presenting our assignment. A much needed evasion.

After my Info Systems tut I was kidnapped by Jeanette, Brent and Nikki to go to Parramatta Westfield at the expense of my MPO lecture. Basically Jeanette, Brent and myself walked around Westfield while Nikki got her nails done. Why go to an important MPO lecture when you can just walk around pointlessly in Westfield...

Thursday: Went with Nikki to Parra to visit Brent and the gang. I then went to Blacktown and studied MPO for a couple of hours and then met up with Adrian where he showed me a part of Westfield that I hadn't seen before. I was acting like the biggest noob seriously. I never knew Westpoint had Franklins and all those other stores on that side.

Afterwards I met up with Shirley, Veronica, Solly and Martha whom I hadn't seen in a long time. Last time I saw her was when she yelled at me from Strathfield Station platform while I was on the train. Anyways, Veronica shouted me KFC and then we all went to PlayTime to play the Tekken machines. Should have seen Martha playing. Her hands were going hard-out. I managed to record it all on my phone. Funny stuff.

Friday: I drove to Shirley's house and took her with me to Silverwater. We had to visit some guy's apartment to pick up Veronica's cabinet she bought off eBay. After heaps a long search that included lots of stair-climbing, we eventually found Room 89. The bloke we retrieved the cabinet from seemed like a nice guy.

We then went to Castle Towers to do some shopping, and then we quickly went to Rouse Hill so I could look for a flanno. I ended up seeing Mel Mel at work and the Pattie Boys at General Pants. Quite a random day.

Later that night I was again kidnapped by Nikki and Brent to go to the city. Our intention was to have dinner for Angelo's birthday but we were an hour late so we ate elsewhere with Jeanie and Megan.

Saturday: Not much going on for a Saturday. Played kicks with Jinno at the fields and then went home to watch more episodes of Two and a Half men. I've now seen all episodes up to Season 5. If you have any Season 5 episodes, please contact me immediately.

...And An Assessment Avoided

2008-05-14T21:00:00.006+10:00

I'm quite bored, plainly. Therefore, now I blog. I could consider today my luckiest day of university. My group was supposed to present our Information Systems Bookshop Report today, but thanks to the wonders of time, we got out of presenting. In fact, we don't have to present until next Wednesday. Some of you may be thinking, 'wouldn't you rather get it over and done with', but that's just not the case this time. If we had presented today, it would have been rushed and unorganized. I think I can speak for all members of my group as to how relieved we are.

Other than assessement evasion, I received my Info Systems exam back. I achieved a Distinction grading. You know what this means? I've achieved each grade of the system, yes including a fail. I've now achieved an F, Pass, Credit, Distinction and High Distinction. Here's to picky achievements !

Oh yeah, check out my summer timetable by clicking the image below. Next semester I'll be doing:

Economics
Marketing Fundamentals
Programming Fundamentals
Web Systems

So if you're a UTS student doing any of those subject, check out my timetable by clicking the image below and get into my classes !

...And Appetites Awaken (A+)

2008-05-10T20:11:00.009+10:00

As you may have realized, my blogging activity has been quite frequent, so why stop now? I'm kind of surprised that I allow myself to blog through a busy period of university. In fact, I should be progressing on my IT presentation due on Monday, especially since I have commitments tomorrow, but what can you do...

This morning my mother told me that we would be having lunch in the city at a place called 'Tetsuya's'. The place sounded very familiar on first hearing so I looked it up on google. After browsing the official website, I realized it was the very expensive restaurant Christine told me of a while ago. That was when I really got excited. For those who are wondering, the occasion was my dad's birthday. To be honest, I don't know how old he is.

We got there at around 12 and by then I was already starving. Since I have such a small stomach capacity, I usually starve myself if I'm dining anywhere so that no money is wasted.

For those who are wondering, 'Tetsuya's' is a Japanese restaurant located in Town Hall. From what I've been told, it's in the Top 5 restaurants around the world, and is the Number 1 restaurant in Australasia. After hearing those impressive rankings, I really started to get excited about this place.

VERDICT? It is light years ahead of any restaurant I've ever dined in. Every single dish out of the 12 course meal was a breath of fresh air. To give an idea, those oysters at the start were unlike anything ever consumed. The salmon dishes were fairdinkum top notch. Each dish had me eating until the plate was totally spotless. There are no dishes I can single out as a favorite because they were all honestly delicious. The staff were also professional about their duties, each giving an attractive description of the dish as they arrived. The way the waiters and waitresses descrbed the dishes just made me even more hungry. For the first time, I left a restaurant without being overly full or under-fed. It was just right.

To provide an idea as to how good this restaurant 'seems' to be, all two-person tables are booked until July of next year. I almost spat at my water when I heard that.

Do check it out if you haven't yet already.
http://www.tetsuyas.com/index.html

...And Awful Accidents Arise

2008-05-07T21:59:00.004+10:00

2 blog entries in one day. I'm on a roll. What could there possibly be left to blog about you ask? Nothing of any interest to you as the reader, just more jibber-jabber about my life. This morning before arriving at school, I passed by Parra Westfield to buy an Industrie Checkered shirt as inspired by Shirley. That's one more piece of clothing to cross off the list. Also today, I yet again spent several hours at the ping-pong tables at school. I think I'm getting better each time I play there. Like they say, practice makes perfect.

So far I've established that I went out of my way to buy a piece of clothing at the expense of potentially missing an important lecture, and that I've spent my free study time by playing ping-pong instead. Can thing get positive from here? They do actually.

Today I attended my MPO lecture for the first time in a long time. Evidently I'm not the only one who's been missing that lecture. When I walked in, I was surprised to see so many idle seats. I managed to write a few notes, though I ended up just talking to Jasmine for the majority of the duration. She made the lecture less boring actually. We got into an arguement about the movie 'The Devil Wears Prada' but that story can be told another time.

After the lecture, I spent some time at the Building 2 labs whoring imdb.com and then I went home with Veronica and Hazel. Surprisingly on my way home from St Marys Station I was lead to a police checkpoint where I was breath tested. I was even more surprised when I arrived home to see a Ford Falcon parked in my driveway rather than the usual Honda CRV that my parents own.

Apparently the Ford was a temporary replacement for my father as he was involved in a car accident earlier with some lady who dosn't know the function of a 'Give Way' sign. He's fine though because he's a tank. It's the car that needs worrying about, considering it's our only car with a functioning radio. Kind of funny for my dad to get involved in an accident considering his birthday was just on Tuesday. Life is unfair. What can do you do though.

I'm getting dangerously sleepy. I better end it here before I drop dead on the laptop keypad.

...And An Anxious Acquisition

2008-05-07T12:27:00.006+10:00

I'm currently at the UTS library just browsing the net before I start heading off to my Info Systems exam. I've left my bag at one of the tables which is just slightly within my peripherals. My sister's bag was stolen in the library back when she was still a student. Hopefully there's no family curse in that regard.

May is going to be rigorous month containing many due assessments and horrible final exams. I'm quite in a pickle at the moment in my business subjects, especially Accounting. If I'm any chance of passing the course, I'll need to obtain at least a Distinction in the final exam. The MPO final exam has me the least worried considering it's all multiple choice and no ridiculously long theory questoning.

Next week I have my seminar presentation on 'SPAM' due which I haven't exactly finished, but I hope to complete it by Friday. Then there's the Info Systems book assignment that needs to be completed.

While all the aforementioned tasks are important, I must focus on the Info Systems quiz I have in 20 minutes. I'm kind of getting sick of turning my head to my 9 every five seconds just to see if my bag is still there, so I better logout.

EDIT: Since I've completed the quiz quite early, I decided to blog again to kill time; though I'm typing very slowly and quietly so that I don't disturb the other's still taking the quiz.

Verdict? The quiz wasn't too hard, then again nor was it easy. I had to guess the video-related questions since I wasn't at the lecture, but I'm confident of a pass. Distinction is out of the question.

...And Alterations Are Apparent #2

2008-05-06T13:47:00.004+10:00

Today is Tuesday; the day I always look forward to considering it's 1 of 2 days off from school.
Tomorrow is Wednesday; the day I always wish to evade considering it's 1 of 2 days containing boring, insanity-inducing business lectures.

Well today I should have utilized my free time by studying for the Information Systems multiple choice quiz taking place tomorrow, but then I thought to myself "who cares about passing Information Systems. I'm already going to fail accounting. I might as just give up, put my hard hours of work placed on the HSC in vein, and work on my blogspot for several hours".

Ok so perhaps in reality I wasn't that cynical, but I think you've got a good indication of my position. I decided to ditch the evil black theme for a lighter and more welcoming theme. The page still consists of three columns but some of the widgets are missing.

Update: I've added Nicole's blog on the links section. Definitely check it out. She gives regular updates and her posts are an interesting read, as are all the blogs I've linked.

That's done. Guess I should go back to studying.

...And Autonomous Around Anxiety

2008-05-04T13:38:00.000+10:00

Sunday morning.
Routine morning reflective blog post.
You get the drift.

My parents just left for Auburn, so now's a perfect time to take a break from household chores and what better way to utilize my free time than to log on the internet and start blogging. Am I the most interesting bloke on the planet or what?

This morning I've had a few people contact me on the phone saying they saw me on television on TFC. Wish I could have shared the same experience as them but unfortunately I don't have TFC. But for those who are wondering, I was interviewed a while ago to share a few words about the Penrith Filipino Community.

Well that's my 2 seconds of fame. Let's go through my week.

Monday: Finished my Communications report at 3am and handed it later that morning. It's fairly obvious my study and assessment approach hasn't modified much since high school. After my communications, I had to conjure up another plan to occupy my unrelenting 5 hour gap until the next class. I made my way to the Ping Pong tables hoping someone I knew would be there, and fortunately I saw Zhen and Avi playing so I joined them. I haven't reached the intensity levels of those blokes, but I'm slowly making my mark.

After enough Ping Pong, I met up with Mark and Alexander and we had a drink at the UTS bar to kill some more time before the Accounting lecture.

Tuesday: Not much to Tuesdays.

Stayed home.
Finalized my MPO speech.
Watched 10 consecutive episodes of Two and a Half Men
Too boring of a day to remember the fine details.

Wednesday: A relieving day for me as most of my assessment marks were revealed. As explained in one of the previous posts, I received my Info Systems marks as well as my MPO marks. Nothing to be too thrilled about. At around 3:30 I went to the library and met up with my MPO group to finalize our speeches for the presentation that was to be conducted the next day. I then met up with Veronica and took the Penrith express. I couldn't be bothered waiting at Blacktown, so I went to Penrith but unfortunately my train was still half an hour to depart. I ended up seeing Nathan and had a catch-up talk with him from across the train tracks.

Thursday: The day of my group's MPO presentation. I think we did heaps good. After the presentation, I had a 4-player Daytona Race with Xander, Tash and Chloe and then I spent the next 2 hours at the Ping Pong tables. I went home around 6pm and then met up with Veronica and Shirley at Blacktown Workers Club where we played a LONG game of snooker. We then grabbed a pizza at Dominos and bummed at one of the parks in Glenwood in the dark where we could have easily been abducted.

Friday: Went to Xander's place early in the morning to grab my MPO stuff, and then went shopping with Shirley at Parra Westfield. I ended up buying 2 Industrie Plain V-Neck shirts; one black and one white. We then went to Blacktown Workers Club where we played some ping-pong and then I took her home.

Saturday: Went to St Marys early in the morning for Tagalog School and to my surprise, I saw Trixie there. In the afternoon I went to the soccer fields and had a kicking session with Jin and Toby and then met up with them later at church for the bingo night, which is the first time I've played in an extremely long time. Verdict? No wins. Afterwards, Kirill, Toby and Jin went back to my place for the night.

Uni tomorrow. No assessments due for another week.
I'M FREE.
Mah bonus.

...And Aggrevating Actions Assessed

2008-04-30T18:51:00.000+10:00

So it's now 6:51pm and I just left my last ever group meeting for Managing People and Organizations. Since I have to wait another 45 minutes for Veronica to finish her Marketing tutorial, I thought I'd kill some time by writing up another blog at the B2 Labs.

Today's topic. Passengers.

Passengers to drivers are the equivalent of leechers to seeders in torrent files. They leech and leech your fuel, but as soon as their destination is complete, they log off and you never get anything back.

So a shout out to Toby for all the times I've leeched off him. Yes I'm attacking myself.

... Ok but this isn't what this blog is about. I wanted to focus on a more niche group of passengers, the ones who treat your car like a rubbish bin, or in my case, a wardrobe.

Where to begin, where to begin...

Veronica sent me a text message a couple of days ago informing me that her assignment notes were in my car. Now I'm not one to complain, but you can't blame me if this isn't the first time she has left her stuff in my car. I hope you're reading this. First you left your high waisted belt in my car, which took 2 weeks for me to return. You then left one of your shoes and a bunch of economic notes in my car. Then you left your container of spaghetti or whatever you ate. And guess what? You've managed to yet again leave something in there.

So this morning as I put my bag in my car as I was ready to leave, I spot a Country Road T-Shirt lying on the car floor, still in the Myer bag it came in. Veronica ! If I wanted a size small ladies Country Road shirt, I would have asked.

But wait there's other people.

Underneath the front passenger was someone's maroon umbrella. Eventually I realized it was Jono's umbrella because I picked him up from BattleZone when it was raining. I only met him recently and he seems like a cool bloke, so I'll let him off the hook this time. Besides, he could kill me. He's that asian.

One of the more irritating situations are when you drop someone home, then they call you 5 minutes later after you've already started driving home to tell you that they've left something in your car, which then you are forced to drive back to return it. Not mentioning names.

Let's just make an establishment. For the record, I am not in any way angry. There are no hard feelings (none that you guys will ever know of anyway).

Vent closed.

In other news, I got some uni results back today. I got a Pass mark for my Information Systems Quiz, a Credit Mark for my Managing People and Organisations assignment, and a High Distinction for my Information Systems assignment.

Not too thrilled. The only form of gratification I received was beating Nikki in the quiz and Info Systems assignment.

Well Veronica's class is finishing soon.
Better start logging off.

...And Atypical Arrangements Amuse

2008-04-29T21:20:00.000+10:00

For some strange reason I had the sudden urge to read over the first couple of blog entries I ever wrote and boy did I laugh, especially at my first blog. Here's an amusing quote.

"Facebook was never really my cup of tea anyway; at least blogspot is much more personal."

That quote is just so wrong on many levels, and yes I'm aware that I'm the victim. Perhaps that quote had its element of authenticity back in January when it was written, which would then of course render this post futile and obsolete, but the thought of even applying that quote to the present day is amusing. I can definitely reveal that I'm a Facebook 'bum' despite how application-free my profile may appear. At least I'm not as addicted as I was with myspace where I would spend 3 hours straight on Adobe Photoshop designing technical layouts for the sake of standing out. Facebook wins baby, honey's get all over that.

Well that's the end of that chapter.
Let's vent.

Lately I've been doing the random and uncharacteristic. Apart from refusing to wear a jacket/jumper to uni when I know I'll be there until night time in the freezing cold, for some sudden reason I'm really into the 80's pop music such as Madonna, Belinda Carlisle and Taylor Dayne. I've had a very flexible musical journey throughout my life I can tell you that much.
Let's review.

Year 6 - Nu-metal; Limp Bizkit, Korn, Slipknot, etc.
Year 7-8 - Gangsta Rap; Bone Thugs N Harmony, E-40, 2pac, Gangsta Pat, etc
Year 9 - Metal; Metallica, Slayer, Sepultura, Pantera, Nevermore, etc.
Year 10 - Death Metal; Morbid Angel, Cannibal Corpse, Cryptopsy, Death, etc.
Year 11 - Tech-Death Metal; Necrophagist, Martyr, Arsis, Anata, Origin, etc.
Year 12 - Mixed

As you can see, Years 9 through to 12 was artistically and musically one dimensional. I really don't remember what spawned the change from Gangsta Rap to Metal but I carry no regrets. The great thing about Metal is the diversity; there are so many genres to listen to. One day I'd be listening to the old school heavyness of Dismember and Morbid Angel, another day I'd be listening to the arthritis-inducing riffs of Necrophagist and Origin.

One of the benefits to being a metalhead are the faces that people pull off when they ask you what music you're into.

Person: So Lenny bro, what kind of music you into? Rap?
Lenny: I'm into Death Metal.
Person: WTF. *pulls off the "I've just seen a ghost' face".* But you're asian.

Nowdays I am really really flexible to what I listen to. I feel it is necessary to give credit where it's due. One of the driving forces that iniated my breakthough was when Audrey introduced me to a band called Acceptance. I really wasn't into the whole pop-rock thing at the time, but this band alone grew on me, especially before the HSC saga. Listening to Acceptance taught me that's it's no crime to like two extremely contrasting genres. Musical taste is something that comes with age I guess. But yes, ever since Year 12 I'm open to pretty much everything. Heck even that new Souljah Boy song is a charm.

Ok that last part was a lie.

Perhaps the most prominent genre that I've glued my ears to since Primary School would be Old School R&B. We're talking late 80's to early 90's material like Boyz II Men, Intro, Changing Faces, Jade, SWV, Jodeci, Hi-Five, Brownstone, etc. Even during my death metal phase, I would listen to these artists from time to time. They don't make pure R&B like the 90's anymore. Nowdays our television sets are dominated by uninspired garbage featuring plastic females.

A man's musical journey can no doubt turn 180 degrees, but his roots can never be forgotten.

...And Alive, Active and Afraid...

2008-04-27T09:39:00.000+10:00

The next couple of weeks that lie ahead are ones I really wish I could fast forward. This week I have a group presentation due for Managing People and Organisations which is easily the worst and most boring subject I will ever endure, no contest. This is then accompanied by a seminar presentation about spam. (not the food).

It's Sunday morning and I refuse to let these daunting tasks interfere with my day of rest, even though I cannot afford any at the moment. Whatever, let me reflect over Week 8.

Monday: Picked up Nikki and drove to Xander's place in Strathfield to get some work done on the group assignment. Getting there took only 20 minutes, but getting back home took forever. Since I had no coins for the toll, I foolishly went around the world by driving through Victoria Rd instead of just entering Parramatta Rd. Before arriving home, I stopped by Edwin's in St. Marys to get a much needed haircut.

Tuesday: After two consecutive weeks of having no recollection of the Tuesday, at last I know what happened in this week's Tuesday.

I drove back to Strathfield to visit Xander and get a bit more work done on the group assignment, though the primary reason for my visit was to leech his movies and music from his external hard drive. I managed to get over 80GB of movies and tv shows which should be enough to occupy me for the whole year.

I went back home at around 3 and picked up Adrian from St Marys so we could make our video for the youth group. Ana and JP came over after and helped with the video. We filmed video interviews of each other which turned out to be pretty good. This whole video project kept us awake until 1am.

Wednesday: Slept over/piss up at Jinno's place with the rest of the St. Clair boys. Continued onto Thursday.

Thursday: Woke up at Jinno's and played Metal Slug on the wii with Mon who didn't even sleep. Left at 9 and went back home to eat and clean up. I then dropped Francis off and made my way to Blacktown Library to do my report for Communications. I met up with Geoff and then Shirley came later to distract me some more. Just kidding.

At around 5, I left the library with Shirley and we met up with Jono at Blacktown Workers Club where we played snooker and ping pong. After 4 or so games of ping pong we picked up Veronica and went back to the worker's club to have dinner and boy did we eat heaps.

At around 10, the four of us went back to Westpoint and wasted more money at Playtime. I watched Jono dance on the DDR machine and man he attracted a crowd. Afterwards I versed Shirley and Veronica on the Tekken machines which was a painful experience, not because I lost but because those girls make too much damn noise !

Saturday: Had a movie night at my place with the youth group which turned out better than I thought. We started off the night with 40 Year Old Virgin and then we watched this filipino movie called Magnifico. We then ended the night with a scary film called 'The Abandoned'.

Over.

...And Alliterations Are Arduous

2008-04-20T19:52:00.000+10:00

These alliterated blog headings are becoming more and more difficult to assemble. People have asked me about my blogs and they seem to think I can conjure up an alliterated heading at the click of a finger. That belief was formerly the case, but each blog written just becomes harder and harder to alliterate. I don't know whether that's something that comes with age or whether its my habit of never being inspired but I'd feel filthy to cease the trend.

No, this post isn't just about blog titles, I actually did plan to recount Week 7. Let's do it.

Monday: Scariest day of the week for most. Just another day for me. Today was the mid-semester exam for Accounting worth 40%. Had to wake up at 6 which is not an easy task for me, believe me. I grabbed my chunky accounting textbook and read every page I could on the train ride to uni. I met up randomly with Kristine and watched as she furiously went through her notes last minute. I tried reassuring her with cliche words of encouragement, but her superior standard for achievement and sense of modesty didn't seem to give in.

I was well aware that a failing mark would jeopardize my GPA and chances of passing the course itself, but for some reason I was unable to feel any sort of pressure from this exam. Don't get me wrong; in no way am I confident of passing this exam and a lot of others are in the same boat, however I think that's their way of being modest. I'm just happy my exam was conducted at Building 1 with all the other students whose surnames started with A, B or C. Beats walking all the way to Wentworth Park which is what the D-Z students had to do. Exam marks aren't released until next month so there's a fair bit of waiting involved unfortunately.

After the exam I met up with Angelo, Joy and Jasmine and took the train home together. When we got to Blacktown, I insisted that I stay on the train since I had to get off at St Marys, however I was unaware that the train went to Richmond and Joy kindly warned me to get off, though she later realized she should have just left me on the train anyway.

Tuesday: I don't know what's going on. I have no recollection of this week's Tuesday or last week's Tuesday. One can only assume that my day was boring and unproductive since Tuesday's are my day off.

Wednesday: Caught the 9:30 train or something like that with Denise and Cheryll to uni. Walked Denise to her class because she told me there was a shortcut from her class to Building 10, which there wasn't. Thanks for nothing.

Anyways, I went to building 10 and met up with my group for my Info Systems assignment. We went up to the Keno Bookstore in Town Hall to ask questions about our assignment. Afterwards I went with Derek and Darren to Allan's Music Store and played some of the guitars. I got to play the Joe Satriani signature guitar and some pink Hello Kitty guitar.

After almost a half hour of trying out guitars with no intention of purchasing, I left the boys and went to the UTS gym. This was my first time trying out the university gym and I was quite impressed. The gym is tri-levelled, with cardio machines on one level, weight machines on another, and workout rooms on the other. There's also enough machines to keep you occupied until the next year.

Thursday: Woke up at 6 and met up with Denise to catch the train to uni. We were supposed to catch the 7:44, but because someone was late, we caught a later train. I went to the library and did some much needed reading for Managing People and Organisations. Eventually the huge slabs of text started to bore me, and I made my way to Town Hall in search of a cardigan. I looked around in Myer but couldn't seem to find a good cardigan that I could afford. I went to Utech in the TGV building and found a nice dark blue cardigan.

After doing enough walking to replicate a 10 mile walkathon, I returned to the library to get Denise so she could get her books binded. It was funny because her book was so thick, it gave the staff a run for their money. After getting her books binded finally, we quickly passed by my sister's place to drop off her mail. Never have I seen someone so amazed at apartments and alternate routes.

Friday: Took my mom to the doctors at 10am and got myself a flu vaccination. Afterwards I headed off to uni and met up with Denise yet again. We had a bite to eat at the UTS foodcourt and met up with Billy and Ralph at Galaxy World. We had 2 races of Daytona, both of which I won and then played the basketball shootout game which I got massacred in.

I caught the train and got off at Blacktown where I met up with Shirley. We went to Playtime for a bit and played Time Crisis 2. Afterwards we bummed outside Yumcha. The funniest thing happened. Shirley spotted a $10 note lying on the floor outside Mozart's and sure enough I ran as fast as I could to pick it up before anyone else did. We rewarded ourselves with a large bag of hot chips and some vanilla biscuit things from a Korean store. I don't know what those biscuit things are called, but they are fairdinkum tasty. I'm definitely going to return and buy some more.

We later met up with Veronica outside Westpoint in the blistering cold. No cold weather could overshadow the horrible act I witnessed of a lady picking up chips off the floor and feeding it to her kids. The fact that the lady was so casual made it even more disgusting. Perhaps the most 'WTF' moment of the week.

Saturday: Study time hard. Went to Blacktown library at 12 and made a start on my seminar presentation on SPAM. Veronica visited me but left to go to UTS the dogg. Eventually Denise and her boyfriend Adrian arrived and seemed to hit the books hard which is to be admired. Those guys seemed to be in the zone, rather than distract each other all day. I'd most likely get distracted if my girlfriend were with me at the library, like that will ever happen anyway.

After the library I met up with Shirley and Veronica and we went to Blacktown Workers Club. We had a long, and I mean loooooooooong game of snooker and then we had dinner at the buffet. Thanks for the shout Veronica. Quite filling meal, you would know. Haha.

After dinner, I took Shirley home and Veronica and I were off to Prayas' 18th down at Glenmore Park. I picked Toby and Kirill up on the way. Sorry for the lateness boys. It was a great party simply because I saw a lot of people I hadn't seen since the HSC. Ease down on the red cruiser's Veronica. Anymore of those and your lips will look like permanant lipstick.

Sunday: This is the day I've been waiting for, however it ended up being a disappointing day, for me anyways. Today was the day my friend Suzanne and I travelled to the Central Coast to watch the Roosters and Knights game. Thankfully there was no rain, as I heard it was raining all day in the Western suberbs. I happened to see Joey from university who happened to be sitting in the same row as me. Out of all rows, seriously. Major coincidence there. Roosters ended up losing 20-34 or something like that. Great experience nonetheless.

I better end it there. Week 9 commences as of tomorrow.
Peace.

...And As Academic Adversity Abates, Ataraxia and Animated Assemblages Ascends

2008-04-12T07:55:00.000+10:00

Saturday morning, weather looking splendid. Just thought I would pin down another blog entry before heading to the library. I'm going to Blacktown library later, but I actually have to visit the much further Rouse Hill library to return some books. Apart from wasting petrol, I have an accounting exam on Monday, which I'm certain of failing seeing as I'm three chapters behind. Let's hope my much needed study today can turn things around.

Onto something totally unrelated, I've noticed my ability to recall things from the past, especially current events, is slowly diminishing. 3-4 years ago, if someone asked me about my weekend, I'd comfortably tell them. Nowadays I have the biggest difficulty recalling things. Guess it's something that comes with age.

Let's reflect over Week 6 shall we ....

Monday: Today was the due date for my group's presentation on Web Developer's. Well it wasn't actually a group presentation, considering only one person out of the group was permitted to present. That lucky person was CJ ! Her attitude prior to the presentation spelt out nervousness and a sense of disbelief that she would actually pull it off, but she was fairdinkum one of the best presenters in the class. I just hope the group report I compiled is just as good.

I was supposed to attend the accounting lecture later in the day, but instead I went to Blacktown in search of a memory card for my new phone. I actually spent an hour at Parramatta before arriving at Blacktown, trying to find a memory card. I was about to buy a 4GB card until the sales consultant warned me that my phone wouldn't be able to handle it. Lucky. Eventually I got a 2GB card from Big W.

Tuesday: Perhaps my favorite day of the week now, since its my day off. Like I said previously, my ability to recount previous events is slowly diminishing. I cannot remember anything from Tuesday. All I can assume is that I did some study.... nope, even I doubt that.

Wednesday: I had my first exam of the semester, though it was worth only 8%. Or was it 7%? See that's how lost I am at university. It was an Informaton Systems exam, consisting of 24 multiple choice questions. I was confident my knowledge from IPT would help me excel in this exam, and it did. I don't understand what all the hype was all about. It was pretty easy even for university standards. That's enough cockyness for a Wednesday; moving on now ...

I spent some time at the UTS ping-pong area with the usual people that are there, and got to meet many more people. I only just realized that my friend James was a fan of Metallica. We eventually ditched the ping pong paddles in place of his guitar, where we traded off various songs and riffs from Metallica songs. Good stuff.

At around 7pm, I headed to the UTS library in the evening to prepare my biblography for one of my many assignments. I think this is the first assignment I've done where I've completed the bibliography before the actual assignment itself. I eventually met up with Veronica and Hazel and had a relaxing train ride home. Someone should really get that 8:05 express to stop at St. Marys. Seriously.

Thursday: Perhaps the most relieving day of the week. It was the due date for my Managing People and Organisations report. 2000 rushed words submitted. Major monkey off my shoulders.

After my MPO tutorial, I went to yumcha for lunch with Xander and Chloe. You would too if your friend was shouting. Thanks again Xander. Next time Chloe HAS to eat chicken feet. It's like, so good. Afterwards, Xander and myself spent some time at Galaxy World. Played some Time Crisis 2, Time Crisis 3 and House of the Dead 4. Waste of money? Yes. Entertaining? Hell yes.

At around 4pm, I met up with Adrian and we had our 100th one-on-one race of Daytona at the UTS glasshouse arcade. Definitely our best race so far. It contained many elements of a good race: lead exchanges, tons of overtaking, clean drifting and a close race ! While Adrian had the lead for the majority of the race, I eventually overtook him on the very last turn to win by 5 milliseconds.

At 6:30 I headed off to Blacktown to pick up Solly, Shirley and Veronica to go shopping at Rouse Hill Town Center. Never in my life have I seen a bunch of girls scream at my driving. I don't brake THAT late do I? Their noise in the car is the equivalent of the noise you hear from girls on a rollercoaster. ARGGGHHHAHAHAH (repeat for 20 minutes). I think you get the picture.

I took Shirley to General Pants where she helped me pick out a pair of Havainas. You're probably thinking, how hard is it to pick out a pair of thongs? Not hard, but I couldn't say no to her one of a kind enthusiasm. You better get the job at Glue, seriously. After shopping we replenished our stomachs at the food court. Now I'm a really slow eater, but I think this occasion is the slowest I've ate. I dead-set spent 20 minutes on a chicken kebab. No harm done, as the girls were still in awe about how MADDD the Rouse Hill food court looks. Personally, I think it's a rip-off the food court at Liverpool Westfield.

Friday: Another day off. Not really much to talk about here. I went to a family party in Rooty Hill, though it wasn't really a party for me. It was more of a 'do nothing but watch the Friday night footy'.

Saturday: It's Saturday now, and I believe I'm watching the Panthers vs Roosters game later tonight with Toby and company.

I guess I'll end it here. I really need to start heading to the library. Au revoir.

...And An Assessment Atrocity Abates

2008-04-06T22:34:00.000+10:00

Half an hour before midnight. Thought I'd share the rest of my week in detail before the new week commences.

Friday: Feeling unsatisfied with the amount of non-internet resources occupied for my Managing People and Organisations assignment, I drove to the recently built Rouse Hill Town Center and visited the library for more books. First impressions? It could be bigger. I don't know whether that's the library's final design, or there's still more to be built, but for a library that's located in the heart of shopping center that's supposed to be Sydney's biggest, it definitely seemed small. After pinning down a session of study, I visited the Churros Cafe and consumed a bag of delicious American-style churros ! Getting back to my car was the biggest hassle ever as I managed to forget where I parked. I was walking around the Orange and Green car parks for ages.

Later that night I headed to Blacktown Workers Club with Salih to watch the Friday Night Footy between the Roosters (WOO!) and the Bulldogs (BOO!). I watched this game with the expectation that it would be a close game, possibly a Bulldogs victory but to my surprise, the Roosters dominated. In your face Alexa.

My night ended with my writing up MC notes until 4am the next morning for the youth forum on Saturday.

Saturday: With youth week being the occasion, my youth network hosted a youth forum at St Marys Senior Citizens Centre featuring an all-star cast of guests and speakers and most importantly, youth ! Our forum included the likes of Penrith Mayor Greg Davies, Member of Parliament David Bradbury, Philippine Consulate General Maria Lazaro and various university graduates voicing their opinions.

It was definitely a great experience for me not only because I was MC for the event, but I learnt a great deal from the various speakers about youth culture and leadership. It was most definitely a great event.

Sunday: I was hoping today would be my chance to sleep in but that was not to be. My mom woke me up and made me go to Dick Smith Powerhouse to buy a phone. I really didn't want one, but she paid for it, so I'm not complaining.

Later in the day I monitored my eBay profile and noticed one user hadn't paid off an item despite the auction ending weeks ago. I eventually reported that user to eBay, so hopefully something works out.

As of now, I've completed my group's IT Careers Report based on Web Design. Communication with each of the members could have been better, but I guess that's partially my fault for not having a phone.

...And Addictions Accumulate - Assignments Ameliorate.

2008-04-02T21:25:00.000+11:00

I was actually in the middle of writing this very post lastnight at UTS library, but I eventually ditched the keyboard to have dinner with some friends. But I'm here now so let's get on with it shall we.

I don't know whether this is out of pure boredom, or whether its an addiction in the making, but I have fairdinkum dead-set spent at least $30 on Daytona alone this week. That's 15 races of Daytona in a span of 4 days. Only benefits I see spending so much time in the glasshouse arcade is that I've met so many randoms. I think I frightened them though with the ferocious force I apply on the gearstick. Oh well, life's too short to worry about someone you're never going to see again.

Now onto the other aspect of the blog title - assignments ! Progress into each assignment is slowly improving, though there's no room for complacency. Yesterday I received my results for my group assignment in Info Systems and I'm content with the mark considering the preparation for it was rushed. As for Communications, everyone is doing their part. All that's left is for me to finalize the report and for CJ to make the slideshow presentation. I'm still in the process of finding an IT related article for my Communications seminar presentation. Luckily that's not due for another month.

Really though, these assginments I've described so far pale in comparison to my Managing People and Organisations assignment. My assignment requires 10 non-internet acadamic information sources, which is a blow considering I usually get all my information from the world-wide-web. No matter though as I've just about exhausted every book shelf from the UTS and Blacktown libraries in getting my sources !

Enough about assignments now. Let's talk briefly about the week thus far. Monday consisted of a high-tension game of table tennis with Angelo at uni. It was a good game, ending at 23-21 my way. I then played against this Chinese bloke named Henry. While I got massacred, it was good while it lasted. That guy has one crazy serve.

Tuesday was supposed to be my opportunity to make much needed progress on my assignments, but unfortunately no progress was made. I spent the first half of the day getting the old' Camry repaired. Second half of the day was spent at the city celebrating my sister's birthday. Happy Birthday again !

Wednesday was a tiring day. After uni I made my way to the library and did some much needed research up until 9:30. Afterwards I met up with Veronica, Shirley and her friend Jono and had a filling dinner ! Ended up getting home at 1 the next morning because of the stupid trains.

Well it's Thursday night now and I'm too lazy to describe my day, so I'll end it here !

...And Anticipated Action Approaches

2008-03-27T23:44:00.000+11:00

Hello readers (if there are any) long time no blog. I'm aware its only been a week since my last post, but being a person of major eccentricity, my conception of the word 'long' is different from yours.

I just thought I'd take the time to write up a quick post before I went to bed. I've recently finished one of my assignments (Information Systems), one which I expected to take longer to complete, but now that it's out of the way I can have a more relaxing weekend. The job's not finished though. Closing in are the mid semester exams, most importantly Accounting. Considering I'm 2 weeks behind the homework for that subject, I don't think a relaxing weekend is on the table anymore.

I really haven't had any life outside university really. The only form of social activity I've had all week is going to the gym with Shirley. You left your friggin water bottle in my car again. People my car is not a rubbish bin. On the subject of working out, my membership at Ripples Leisure Centre is going to expire in a week's time. It's just too unfortunate that I won't be able to utilize the remaining days I have left since I'm so drowned in uni work.

There is some light at the end of the tunnel however. Ralph's 18th 'Orgy' is approaching. Let's see how that pans out shall we. Also approaching is Neisy's 18th which I hope to make it to. Oh and my sister's birthday is coming up on April Fools. Sick.

To everyone else with upcoming assessments and exams; goodluck ! That's about it from me. Thank you for reading and goodnight.

...And An Article About Attainment

2008-03-20T23:39:00.000+11:00

The long easter holiday has commenced (for me anyway) No school for me until next Thursday; a whole week without university is definitely the break I've been waiting for, I can tell you that much.

Well I got back from Parramatta not too long ago and my feet are in excruciating pain. Who would have thought superfluous amounts of shopping would deliver unrelenting compassionless pain. Ok well it dosn't take a rocket scientist to realize I'm exaggerating, but just sitting down for 2 seconds releases a whole void of relaxation.

Similar to the Thursday two weeks back, I spent my Thursday night with Veronica and Shirley walking around all the clothing stores in Parra Westfield. These girls are the epitome of fashion - especially Shirley who always keeps me up to date with 'essentials' and 'in-seasons'. She showed me a great piece of Wrangler clothing at DJ which I'll purchase as soon as my cash from PayPal finishes transferring. I also managed to run into Karel at Glue and do a little bit of catching up which was good. On that note, a lot of catching up was done this week but I'll talk about that later.

Apart from shopping, we had dinner at Pho Pasteur which was amazingly filling. Though I do regret committing to Shirley's dare of consuming chilli flakes prior to meal consumption, the dinner was splendid. Afterwards, the three of us headed down to Blacktown Westpoint to waste money at PlayTime because that's what kids do. I also ran into an old friend of mine who I haven't seen in a long time, despite the fact that she lives ridiculously close to me. Nice seeing you Katie !

Afterwards I went back to St Marys with Veronica. Not that anyone in the would care, but today on the way home Veronica borrowed my PSP and 'accidentally' erased all my hard work and efforts on Ridge Racer. So if you're reading this Veronica, I would like to thankyou for your 'kind' acts. I told you I would mention you on my blog, so here it is.

Well that's my Thursday night. Let's backtrack a little and reflect over Week 4 of university. Monday was the usual start of the week with my Communications seminar and then a 5 hour gap leading to my Accounting lecture. At the moment, my mind is so preoccupied with upcoming assessments and exams that my mind refuses to reiterate the many events that happened during the week.

Wednesday was a great day of bonding with my group members for my Managing People and Organisations assignment. We had our first group meeting in the library and a lot of jokes and laughs were exchanged. Great stuff. With that said, I'd like to apologize guys for not showing up to the meeting we held today. I thought our meeting was at 11:30 and that our tutorial started at 12, hence me showing up late to class with a half-consumed hotdog and a carton of milk.

With Wednesday being a great day, Thursday could only be better. I've pretty much written a recount of Thursday at the start of this post talking about my day with Veronica and Shirley, but the highlight of the day would have to be me randomly bumping into my dear old friend Alyce at the UTS food court. Never in a trillion years did I expect to ever see her again, let alone in my university, but I'm glad I did.

I'm content with the week that has elapsed. A lot of old faces have renewed themselves and it only makes me look forward to seeing them again knowing that they're so close. I'll end it here because I have an imminent threat - that is my face falling on the keyboard at any given moment.

Actually just before I conclude, I'd like to thank Shirley for taking me to karaoke today. I sing Backstreet Boys to myself all the time, but I didn't think I'd be singing it in front of other people. Nice meeting your friends too.

...And Auctions Administer Abrupt Amounts

2008-03-12T20:12:00.000+11:00

Not many are aware, but I am quite the fan of the eBay website. In the past I've sold and bought several clothing items and have purchased quite a bit of DVD's, though I still consider myself an inexperienced eBay user. Well yesterday I decided to register some items for auction. It is now 8pm the day after and all of a sudden some people have placed some bids. Items I'm selling include a Pokemon Card of Charizard which is selling for $5.50 and 3 Super Nintendo games for $41.00. I really didn't expect these items to attract any bidders, but I guess you just have to expect the unexpected. I'm not complaining. There's still a few days until the auctions terminate so hopefully the prices will rise.

Apart from making money in the cyber-world, I'm also enjoying university a bit more. Today I bumped into my old Hospitality friend Lauren at the station. She reminds me so much of Eva Longoria. On my way to the uni library, I came across my friend Qwayne. We had a good half hour conversation just catching up and arguing about USYD vs UTS. If you read this Qwayne, you're going to own at debating for sure. To polish off the day, my friend Shirley visited and came to one of my business lectures and showed me a magazine of the latest fashion.

To be evil, I'm going to end this blog on a bad note. On Monday, I lost my phone in the Market City toilets. I was stupid enough to put my phone on top of the toilet where the flush is and then walk off and forget about it. That piece of crap was breaking apart anyway. All I know is that I won't have a phone for many many months.

...And Apprehension Assembles Around Alarming Academic Assignments ... AAAARGH!

2008-03-08T21:23:00.000+11:00

My apologizes for such a lackluster alliterated post title, but a week has elapsed without a single blog post and thus I believe its imperative that I start writing on the double. But incase you're wondering, the obscure alliteration does spark a whole heap of meaning.

The reason for such an absence on the blog is due to the rigorous nature of University. I'm not one to complain so I won't. No forget that last sentence, I will complain. The amount of responsibility and independance required as opposed to high school is aplenty. The workload and amount of assignments that have been distributed is preposterous. I've been directed by my lecturers to spend 9 hours a week studying each subject. I'd be lieing if I told you I was spending even half that amount on my subjects. I'd also be lieing if I told you I haven't felt like dropping out.

That last action described though is definitely forbidden. I won't be throwing out my goals out the window just like that. But to make my point crystal clear, university life has definitely been keeping me busy but at the same time has also made me more social. Each day at uni allows me to see lots and lots of old friends, which I'm greatful for. Thursday night in particular was great. I went to Blacktown Westpoint for the first time in a LONG time and got to bum with Veronica, Solly and Shirley. Thanks for the fashion tips girls. HAH. Other than that, I had my weekly Daytona race with Adrian, though no victories for me at all thus far. Plenty more to talk about, though lazyness has consumed the better side of me so I'll conclude it here.

...And Another Amazing Adventure

2008-03-02T10:24:00.000+11:00

Well it's Sunday morning and I should be doing my long due accounting homework, but I thought I'd write up another post to start off the month of March.

Yesterday our youth group had their second outing. Previously we had a beach outing at Coggee - this time we took a trip down South to Jamberoo. Now the experiences you are going to read will sound devilishly noobish but I haven't been to Jamberoo since the early 90's, possibly 93' or 94' so I like to consider this my first time at Jamberoo.

Anyways since everyone absolutely loves my house, we all met up at my place and waited for the mini-bus to pick us up. A big thankyou to the bus driver we hired who refused to accept any form of payment for taking us all that way. We left around 8:30 and for the next 2 hours I enjoyed the atmospheric scenery.

We arrived at approximately 10:30, and from then on it was non-stop action packed mayhem. First thing first - mountain tobagganing. Being the amateur I am, the amateur lane was my preference. After that, we went on the go-karts. Despite the excruciating waiting times involved, I enjoyed the 4 lap race between Benno, Ron, Kirill and myself.

It was then over with the dry activities, and on with the wet activities. Kirill, Ron, JC and myself went on the Splash-out slides which was great fun. We then went to the Taipan and had 4 turns, though I would have liked to have had way more. I'd come back to Jamberoo anyday just for this ride. We tried many different positions on the Taipan and as wrong as that sounds, I'd like to try way more. Actually, I'd like to just slide down without the float. I bet so many people have already.

After the Taipan, we caught up with the rest of the boys on the 'Rapid River' where you use rubber rafts to navigate through the river. After 3 or 4 laps of racing each other, we had another turn at the toboggans. The experienced lane is so much better !

At around 4, it was time to head back home. We all met up at the entrance and took some last minute photos and then it was back to my place.

...And Anticipations Arrive Acutely

2008-02-28T20:47:00.000+11:00

After reading Relgin's most informative essay of a blog entry it inspired me to write up another post, though I'll never be as catchy and entertaining as Sir James. I usually write my blog titles prior to writing the actual post and as untraditional and unorthodox as that may seem, it works for me. This time however, my mind is running blank at the moment so instead I'll write the post before I create the title. Like you pathetic people care anyway.

Well one week of uni has elapsed considering I have no uni on Fridays. My thoughts?

I'm enjoying it thus far. Obviously the amount of assignments and homework spat at us by the lecturors and tutors is an almighty atrocity, but that's life and life sucks. Whinging aside, I'm enjoying the commuter's life. Actually, 'enjoying' may not be the most appropriate word. Perhaps 'adapting' is a more suitable term. The routine of waking up early and driving to St Marys in time to catch the 8:30 train every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday was the life I didn't eagerly anticipate, but to my surprise I'm tolerant about it.

Think about it. I'm sure sitting on a train 45 minutes or so minutes twice a day isn't everyone's cup of tea. I cursed at the prospect of having to sit on a train for 90 minutes each uni day all year, but it's not too bad. I'm aware that only a week has passed, but as long as you have an mp3 player combined with a train buddy, the world still revolves joyously. If one thing must be admired, it's the approachability of my fellow students. Everyone seems very relaxed and in the mood for a chat. I'm yet to see any 'scene-makers' or people looking to cause unwanted attention.

New addiction readers. Daytona USA ! Most of you will be familiar with this great racing game from Galaxy World or any other good arcade. Seeing as that I'm in the city quite a bit now, it only makes sense to spend some time at the arcade and thankfully, UTS has an underground arcade ! I usually play Daytona with my friend Adrian who I am yet to beat. We must have had 10 races by now. We've had many exciting races, particularly yesterday in which I almost had him until I fucked up the last drift and he won by 2 milliseconds.

Overall, this week of university has been very pleaseant. If you subtract the boring 5 hour gap I have on Mondays from the picture, university is great. Since there is so much more to blog about, I'll just list some highlights of the week at uni:

train ride home with the boys and watching those two Japanese girls slap each other
running in the rain countless times, especially on Wednesday.
lecture for 'Introduction to Information Systems' - who the heck pronounces Google as 'GOOGOLL'?
the many daytona races with Adrian and losing by a hair length
getting owned by Nikki at almost everything, and getting owned by Ivan whenever I talk about 'Queer Space'
meeting up with my old friend Jessica and catching up
catching up with Shirley - here's to being unemployed !
meeting randoms at the co-op bookstore
freakishly running into Denise right after I txted her
30 minute crash course of Unix with my old mate Simon (thanks again man!)
witnessing all the babes in my business subjects. DAMN !

I'll conclude it here folks !
Do keep reading in future !

...And (Perpetual.Torment.Commence)

2008-02-25T21:52:00.000+11:00

Like most of my friends, today was my first day at university.

I actually had trouble sleeping lastnight. I don't know whether it was my nervousness towards a fresh start or my irritating illness driving me insane, but luckily enough I was able to wake up early today in time to meet up with Nikki and catch the 8am train. I started the day with a lecture at 10am for 'Communications for IT Professionals'. In this lecture we had to read an article about the dying music industry and then write a summary about what we read. Personally I wrote 120-150 words which was what we were asked to do, but some people weren't obviously content with such an amount. Instead they had to write a bloody essay *cough*. I saw this one Japanese girl who covered her entire page with writing - not a hint of white was to be seen on the paper. Was I intimidated? Heck no. I actually like to follow instructions.

After my first lecture, I had a whopping 5 hours to kill before my next class. I spent 2 or so hours with some friends at Market City eating lunch and checking out chick jeans (HAH!) and then I went off on my own for the next 3 hours. The amount of boredness I was experiencing drove me insane to a point where I started calling randoms on my phone. Particularly I talked to Shirley for a good 20 minutes which was a great catch up seeing as I hadn't talked to her in ages.

I still had a rough 2 hours to consume, so I made my way to Building 4 to check where my next class would be. For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to send a text message to my friend Denise to see if she was around (keep in mind that I had no idea whether she was at uni or not). Freakishly right after I txted her, she came walking out the lecture room that I was outside of. Major coincidence right there.

Finally at 6pm, my business lecture for accounting commenced. I met up with my friend John who fortunately has the same timetable as me. My lecturer left me the ultimate first impression. I think I can speak for all students who attended that lecture that he is one hilarious bloke. I'm glad to see lecturers with a great sense of humor.

Anyways, that's it for today. I'm feeling very ill at the moment; thankfully there's no uni tomorrow.