User Bars?

I chanced upon this site which creates Userbars for people who frequent forums as part of their daily routine. These bars in a way reflect a little bit of our own personality in these so called forums which are always anonymous. Well here are my own userbars which I selected to display my own character and personality.

Ah one of my favourite TV series. Almost as good as CSI: Las Vegas though, almost.


I think you can never get bored watching friends.


Pity there was only 6 seasons of this cartoon.


The black car with the red LED lights moving left and right driving you crazy? Kit lives!


Now if only I can get my car to be pimped, I wouldn't mind a 42" plasma TV.


Best cartoon series ever!


Its so sad to know that all 6 episodes have been released. There is really nothing else to look forward to...


Futsal every Sunday!


I am a zombie without my morning coffee


I admit it, I am a computer addict. TV? Who needs them!


A nice cuppa anyone?


Everyone is a money user, unless you live in the jungle and survive on eating fruits.


Nero to burn my CDs and DVDs.


Ok, who of you still use the bush to do number 2?


Windows Media Player on both PC and PDA.


Windows XP, until Vista comes along.


My wonderful Motorola bluetooth headset keeps the police from fining me when I use the handphone while driving.


My mouse and keyboard serves me well!


My trusty Dell laptop still works after 4 years. Maybe I should use it for folding.


Who doesn't like Starcraft, Warcraft, and Diablo?


The good old days of college counter-strike!


Now this is ancient, a pentium I running this game lies somewhere in my locked up memory.


A huge change of pace compared to CS, a very slow and tactical game.


Ah the good old arcade days when I was too young to enter one. That never stopped me though.


When is version 2 coming out?


Can you say Ha-do-ken?


One of the best management game of the 90s.


A nice 500bhp C class would be nice :)


I use Adidas futsal shoes. Quite nice and comfy.


Why drink Coke when there is Coke Light?


Fanta orange is nice!


Nike has brainwashed me.....


Sony has brainwashed me too.....


I am using Firefox even now!


Google Mail, Google Earth, Google Adsense, Google Analytics, so many more...


My old ancient messenger...


I love to have two types of navigators.


Without MSN, I can't keep in touch with people!


The good old days of mIRC. Well gone are those days, I think...


Before Gmail, there was Yahoo mail. Before Google Search, there was Yahoo search.


Wikipedia, the source of all things!

Cravings

Update:
Darn it, the line was too long at the canteen and by the time it got to my turn they ran out of nasi lemak. So much for a brisk walk, I should start sprinting there the next time. That will really build an appetite.

Recently I had or still have a craving for nasi lemak. Every morning I would find myself drawn to the nasi lemak counter in my canteen and would be extremely sad if they ran out of it by the time I got there. Yes, my department is located rather far from the canteen but a quick brisk walk is always good before breakfast.


I really wonder if it is that anti-drug campaign I've been hearing on the radio that says instead of getting high on drugs, you can get high on nasi lemak. Anyhow, its almost breakfast time soon, can't wait to eat some nasi lemak. I'm getting a little hungry.

Also I came about a little clip recorded from a live radio show in the Lowyat Forums. Its rather funny at the same time pitiful for the related people. Well not the guy whose been cheating on both his wife and girlfriend though. Download it to listen to it.

For those of you who are interested in finding out more about great food nearby, check out this site.

Hot Teachers!

Ok, imagine you are a teenage boy/girl and you just passed puberty a couple of years back. Being all innocent, you sit in class and try to concentrate on schoolwork while trying to fight off images of the person sitting next to you showing you monkey faces. The next thing you know, a hot teacher comes into the classroom and you thought you died and went to heaven. Now the teacher is young, maybe a fresh graduate from some teaching university. Slowly, the more you stare at him/her, the more your hormones rage through your body.

Then you notice that you are becoming the teacher’s pet. Favours pour out more and more for him/her, you are willing to help carry books, collect homework assignments or even help him/her carry stuff to his/her car. More and more times the two of you have great conversations, you fall gaga over his/her eyes and you dream more and more of him/her. Sometimes you accidentally touched him/her and a tingling feeling fills your entire body.

One day, a simple chose such as staying back after class to have a “discussion” turns out to be something that changed your lives forever. The closed room created an atmosphere of pleasure and sin, in the end the two of you sleep together. You feel great because it was your first time and you want to continue doing it again. A month later, you have already done it with him/her in the classroom, broom closet, him/her house or anywhere for that matter. Remember, you are only a youth.

Now this may seem more and more common for a Western society but slowly this culture might seep into our own Asian culture. In fact, there are already a few cases of this happening right in our own schools, colleges, and universities. The reason why I am ranting on this topic is because of this news article I read today.

Honestly, I don’t think anyone would be dumb enough to believe that they couldn’t “control” themselves because of work stress. Of course this is just her plead for insanity. How much stress can you get from teaching high school kids? If that were the case then I think a lot of people would just blame it all on stress.

I think stress is such a powerful word; it can be used to express the state they are in as well as use it as a tool for blaming their mistakes on. Handling stress is something a lot of people can do; some complain that they are stressed out while others vent it out on alcohol, smoking or even drugs. Of course it never is easy to live a stress free life unless you are super rich and you have absolutely no responsibilities. In China, more and more university students are committing suicide due to study stress.

Time and time again I see our local education system as somewhat heading towards a direction where studying is the utmost importance. This causes more and more stress in our lives including our children. With their already busy day at school, what more to come home only to head out for tuition until late night and then start the cycle again. Where is the time for fun? Where is the time to build relationships and socialize? Where is the time for them to learn that in life, there are other things besides earning a lot of money?

It is our own mentality that induces stress at a young age. Of course we want the best for ourselves and children, but it will come at a very high cost.

The way to geekdom...

GameCon-1 is only 2 weeks away and I have yet to learn much about Acquire, Memoir'44, Carcassonnes and even Settlers of Catan. Man, have I got a mountain of tasks to complete including practicing up on my mandarin. So the best thing to do is to check out on more veteran board gamers and learn from them. Of course with some help my good buddy Seng.

Yesterday I was invited to a gaming session and man, was it fun. We played a game of Wallenstein. I can't really explain it to you because it's a German game and it was my second game. My play was extremely passive that I eventually ran out of units to place on the map because I hadn't lost any as I chose not to battle during any of my 3 seasons.


The next game was an auction game called Trimfabrik or something like that. I really suck at spelling out German games anyway. It was rather interesting and fun. The last game was the main attraction for me. Although we didn't manage to finish the game due to time constraints, Railroad Tycoon was the most fun game for me. I hadn't played the computer version of this game and according to Seng, the concept of the game was extremely similar to another game called "The Age of Steam". After playing about 3 rounds, I managed to learn that my first move was absolutely rubbish and that trying to make money from railroads is not as easy as it seems.

Another point, the board is huge!


Moving from one place of the board to the other is not easy. Darn, I got to get my fat ass off the chair and start placing my tracks on more lucrative routes!

Edit:

I just found out that as I wrote this post, I have turned into a fully fledged geek. The score on my sidebar should be increased to 90% and my glasses should be thicker and rounder. Why is that? Because I am sitting here in my office during my lunch hour and surfing the web for board game rules. How nerdy can that be? The ups and downs of my life, it really never ceases to amaze me. This revelation came as I was reading my own posts. Ok, right after GameCon-1, I'll have to do some cool stuff, or at least try doing something cool.

GameCon-1

Yes its here. GameCon-1 will be coming soon to the Midvalley Exhibition Hall from the 3rd to the 4th of December 2005. Note the "-1" meaning its the first games convention that is going to be held. Not too bad if I say so myself. Those of you who are interested in trading cards games, table top games, board games and designer board games should pop by the convention and sample the best and latest games available. I am sure everyone will enjoy themselves there. For more info, check out this site.

Now doesn't that sound like a great advert? Oh well, still I think its going to be fun and crazy, something different from the usual computer games. Think about it, this is one way parents will get their kids unstuck from the computer. If you are interested in purchasing some of the designer board games at an attractive price, visit this site. Check out games such as Settlers of Catan, Citadels, Puerto Rico, Ticket 2 Ride and others, and believe me, you will get hooked. These are all the new generation of board games. Say goodbye to monopoly and you can continue to keep your scrabble in your closets collecting dust. The new generation has emerged and are taking over the gaming scene.

As for me, I think a switch from the usual Dota session keeps me rather satisfied as I get to have a great time with my friends as well have a little competition amongst each other. But of course there are other card games which I love to play, such as Bang!. Right now, I need to learn how to play Acquire, Carcassonne, Memoirs 44 and brush up on my Settlers. I think I need to take about a week to learn them all. Hopefully I learn them well enough though.


Could we see a new dawn of era where cyberfaces dwindle down? Nah. Computer games still provide the heavy adrenaline rush games to us, so it won't die out. But there is a place and time for everthing. So how do you get the rush out of games such as Doom? Play the boardgame version of it, but I do not guarantee you get the same amount of excitement.

Note: All images have been obtained externally. Click on the links to find out more about these games

Never bored!

As one being rather far from the politicking of the blog world, I tend to find certain stories related to bloggers rather interesting and amusing. This recent article here showed everyone that bloggers can be famous and land contracts, while other bloggers can land themselves in deep shit by aggravating the handicapped and others.

Recently things have started to pick up again, more stories are pouring in and cyber fights are coming up faster than bush fires in Sumatra. More and more bloggers are getting disgruntled with other bloggers while some continue to lurk around in this huge community, sharing personal thoughts with friends and family. If one were to step out and be offered an amazing deal worth money, there will always be someone there ready to shoot them down.

The world of blogging never ceases to amaze me at all. You can check out Dawn Yang's site here.

Also, I finally started my Folding@Home project. I will write more about that later. I know it sounds boring, but hey, I am doing my part to help people. What are you doing instead?

Computing Hazards

I always felt that when it comes to computers, I am somewhat of a jinx because sometime in my computer's life cycle, one component would fail and affect the others. Recently with my computer of 4 years, my power supply, motherboard and graphics card was fried. At first my computer would have "hiccups" where it will constantly reset itself out of nowhere. I always thought that there was a connection problem between the power supply and my motherboard and last week when I checked the connection, I noticed that one of the pins were black for both the motherboard and power supply.

A quick trip to the local computer shop allowed me to change my motherboard, processor and power supply. Although I am an avid Lowyat supporter, this time, time was not on my hand and since I work from 8am to 6pm in Shah Alam, getting to KL would be too much of a hassle for me. This computer shop doesn't really specialize in what I would deem "cable management" for PCs. Since my casing has a window, I pride myself for having a neat PC inside but thanks to "superior" (sense the sarcasm) cable management, it looks like a tornado hit it. Also I am contemplating on turning off those darn CCFL lights which makes my PC glow at night. I just can't sleep with them turned on.


Well the picture was taken in Sheffield. Since then I added in two more CCFL lights. Hey, I thought it was cool then. I definitely do need to spend more time managing the cables as well as putting up cable sleeves for my power supply.

Actually I am rather thankful that computer prices has dropped drastically over the years. I am still short of a workable graphics card, my current one works but not for games. Maybe God is trying to tell me to stop playing Dota so much. But I am rather pleased with my new computer set up and hopefully it should last me for another 3-4 years.

Also National Chili Week is here. I always loved eating Chili, not our usual local ones such as curry or "sambal" but those enjoyed by westerners. Actually in true honesty, I loved the fusion between mexican style chili and a hint of Malaysian curry taste. I remember Ikea in 1Utama (a long while ago), they served these chili dogs which had that fusion of chili cum curry sauce over the hot dog. It was definitely mouth watering and extremely tasty. Too bad it is long gone now.



Man am I getting hungry now...

Image source:
-IBM
-Chefs.com