Sigghhh...

I'm finding it hard to sleep, but I have to sleep, despite the results.

It is a sickening feeling to watch your team lose despite doing their best. Nevertheless, it was good football and a great start for the new Wembley stadium.

Anyway, I believe the boys did well despite the pressure and being a rather young side still. I believe they will only get better and better. As I have said in my other post, we still need to shore up our defences, straighten up our frontline in order to get more goals in the next season.

Well, congrats Chelsea for winning the FA Cup.

However, my hats off to our boys in red, the Reds Go Marching On!!

When Will We Ever Learn...

It was a rainy Wednesday morning here in Kuala Lumpur. ('_')

I woke up to a nice "light and sound" show at about 5:30am. I thought to myself, "Oh heck!!! The roads are going to be clogged"... and I promptly went back to sleep. (^^)

Anyway, no matter how good or bad the weather gets, we have to move our butts off our bed and drag our tired and unwilling (or willing for some of you passionate folks out there) bodies to work. I decided to wait out the rain a bit before venturing out.

Eventually, I found myself on the NKVE (New Klang Valley Expressway), which led me from Subang Jaya all the way to KL (Jalan Duta to be precise).

Halfway through my journey, I attracted a visitor at my car's tail - a brown Waja, tailing me closely at about 100kmph despite the rain and slippery roads on the fast lane. I usually ignore the guy, looking for a chance to safely manoeuvre out of the way so that he could pass. However, I got a bit cheeky. I decided to speed up a little to see if he could "catch up".

He did not tail me so closely but then, after the Bukit Lanjan turnoff, I decided to stay on the middle lane because I wanted a safe drive. I thought to myself, "Nasty bugger...@#@$@@!$#@#$! Heavy rain still want to speed..."

Just before the Jalan Duta toll, I decided to switch back to the fast lane and just then, the cars decided to stop abruptly. I managed to stop in time since I wasn't following the cars closely. However, cars behind me had to do some emergency manoeuvre so that they don't hit the cars in front of them. Wow.. It sure was a close call. (o_0)

Anyway, there was a nasty jam and so, I cut out to the middle lane and while driving by, I noticed the brown Waja again. He was the one who caused us to stop abruptly as he failed to stop in time. He had hit a gold-coloured Vios. It was a nasty accident as his front bonnet was bent out of shape and the Vios's bumper was dented inwards.

***Phew*** That is karma at work.

When will we learn? We are not F1 drivers whose cars are equipped with dry/wet tyres suited for all road conditions. Besides that, didn't that driver learn about the 3-second rule while following another car?

For those of you who took a "kopi license" (*ahem* paid a bribe to get your driver's license), the 3 second rule states that while following a car, you must be at least 3 seconds away. That means, you try to count a static object by the roadside as the car in front of you passes it. Once the car in front of you pass that object, you start counting down - "One Mississippi, Two Mississippi..." until you pass that same object yourself. If you can't count pass Two Mississippi, you're tailing too close to the car in front of you.

Oh well, this incident has taught me a lesson - don't drive too fast while on the NKVE. After all, reaching your destination safely is more important than reaching there fast.

It's Here!!! Minutes to Midnight...

It has been an agonizing 6 weeks. Not that I'm on a diet or anything, but I have been waiting for the launch of Linkin Park's latest album - Minutes to Midnight.

Anyway, for all those who have been wondering about my IM status message, I was counting down to the day I could pick up my CD. So, when I got to work this morning, the first thing I did was to grab this CD.

I can now declare that I have been following this band ever since I heard their first song - "Crawling". Sure, it was edgy and that was my feeling then. I can't comment on this album yet but the guys have matured in their music - even Mike Shinoda has branched on out his own personal project with Fort Minor.

Anyway, I'll definitely take my time to enjoy this CD. Woo hoo!!!

LP ROCKZZZ!!!!

[Update - 4:02pm]
I've just finished listening to the CD (multiple times) and the CD is less edgier than the last one. More so because the band has announced that this album allows them to experiment with a few things to express their creativity.

The songs which I find very good are:

• Track 2 - Given Up (good way to destress)
• Track 3 - Leave Out All The Rest (nice!!!!)
  
• Track 6 - What I've Done (launched as single 6 weeks back)
• Track 10 - In Between (vocal + base line only... really cool!)

Anyway, enjoy the album. It is another good one from the boys. ;)

Do You Code Like This? - The Answer

If you recall my last post, I posed a question like so,

System.out.println(true?false:true==true?false:true);

Anyway, this is a small Java code. If you are ensure about the notation, it is a shorthand for "if...else" statement.

The ?: notation is explained as follows,

( [boolean-expression] ? [true-part] : [false-part] )

An example of the use of the "?:" notation is as follows,

int i = 5;
System.out.println((i < 10)? true: false);

The result should print out "true".

This notation certainly saves a bit of time but it tends to make code very difficult to read.

If we return to the question I posed, if we were to rewrite that statement, we would get the following:

if (true) {
false;
} else {
if (true == true) { false; } else { true; }
}

Was this flow-control what the developer wanted to execute? I apologize for putting the next if statement in a single line but it was to differentiate the nested-if statement.

So, what is the answer?

If you were smart, you would have taken this code and pasted it in a class, compiled and executed it. (^^)

The answer was.... "false". LOL!!!! Obvious, right?

Remember that you can not have a variable named after a Java reserved keyword, so, there was no way that "true" or "false" were variables. ;)

I do advocate the use of the "?:" notation, but only when it is very clear. I would not condone using the "?:" notation when there is a big chunk of code in between each true or false parts.

Do You Code Like This?

Just the other day, a friend posed a quick "Java Puzzler" just for the heck of it.

Here's the code...

System.out.println(true?false:true==true?false:true);

What does this print out?

Have a thought. Comment your answer and I'll let you know if you're right or not? ;)

EV's Pet...

As you can tell from the title, you are bound to know that this is going to be funny. I can't hide that, because my conversations with EV always end up being funny somehow. (^^)

** Mobile phone rings **

Me: Aiya... That woman is calling...

** Picks up phone **

Me: Harrrlooo???
EV: Why you pick up phone so slow???!!!
Me: Eh.. My phone is not sticking to my body...
EV: Hahaah.. It should! You're so slow!!!!
Me: Hahaah.. So, what you want??

** After some "meaningful" conversation **

Snoopy: Woof!! Woof!!
Me: Wait-ar...
EV: Why??
Me: My dog wants to come in.
EV: Your dog???
Snoopy: Woof!! Woof!! Woof!!
EV: sighhh.. You go and entertain your dog-la...

** After some licks from Snoopy later **

Me: Ok.. She's gone.
EV: Hmmmmppphhh!!! Looks like you really love your dog.
Me: Yeah, I am sure you love your cats last time.
EV: Yalo... She was very good. Know where to pee/poo in the toilet. Cats are so much smarter than dogs.
Me: Yeala.. Only your cat!! So, you plan to have cats later?
EV: I think my cat will die of starvation.
Me: Leave some food out-la. The cat know how to survive one. Like this black cat last time, come and steal fish which is on the table in the kitchen. This is before Snoopy came.
EV: Wahh.. So smart!
Me: Aiyoo.. So terrible-la. You don't have that problem meh??
EV: My house? I "keep" a rat-lor...
Me: ?????
EV: Yahh... I have a Milo rat.
Me: ?????????? (0____o)

** I couldn't help but laugh.. After 2 mins... **
Me: *ahem*!! Why you have a Milo rat?
EV: Ohhh.. This particular rat likes Milo. It is sooo smart! It knows how to open the Milo tin.
Me: ???? How you know?
EV: Sometimes, can see the paw mark in the Milo. And the tin is open in the morning.
Me: WAAAAHHHH!!!!!! I thought rats like rice and stuff.
EV: Yalo!! Dunno-la...
Me: Didn't you put it in a plastic box or something?
EV: Yeah, we did... But the feler bite through the plastic box...
Me: So, how you catch the rat?
EV: At first, we used fish in the trap but then, not laku. The feler (rat) didn't want to come.
Me: And then?
EV: So, my mom said to use Milo-lo...
Me: Don't tell me.. You actually made a "Milo ball" and stuck it in the trap.
EV: Hahahaa.. Yalo! But first, it wasn't good, the ball fell out and we couldn't catch it. Then, we made the ball bigger and caught the rat. My goodness!! It was so fat!!
Me: HAHAHAAHHAHHAHHHAHAA... There you have it! Milo... Sihat dan Kuat!! (Healthy and Strong!)

(^ ^)... I can't help but laugh when I think of this story. Frankly, I think after a few meals of Milo, this rat got very smart and was able to open tins and such. I think it's probably due to the Vit B in Milo which helps improve brain function. Hahahaa.. But then again, I could be wrong. Animals are intelligent, we just don't give them enough credit.

Anyway, just a note. A Milo Ball is just water and Milo. You basically take a small spoonful of hot water and drop it in a bowl of Milo to make a small glob. After that, just roll the glob until you get a ball of Milo.

I did not know that you can take Milo in that manner. I've used it as chocolate powder and hot drink, but not to eat it "raw". (*___*)

BTW, eating Milo ball is EV's favourite snack... Go figure...

EV Ages!!! (Yes.. Though hers is the slow-aging kind...)

- POST EDITED: CONVERSATION REMOVED AS REQUESTED -

I did not bother to post an announcement, but the Evil has decided to pay me a visit.

Every year, she happily declares that the whole of M'sia is celebrating her b'day TODAY (May 1st), although, she was born on May 2nd...

Yes, when I told her that she shared the same b'day with David Beckham, her reply was "Is it?". I went (o_0)

The next question she asked was, "Who is he?"

My jaw dropped wide open. I may have swallowed a few flies in the process.

Anyway, since she was down for a visit (and a quick bloodsuckvisit), I decided to entertain her. Although, I'm bracing myself for more torture tomorrow, errr... later today.

Conversations with EV has gotten more exciting. Because, we seem to be talking more nonsense than usual... (^^)

For one, we seem to be having discussions about hair...



After more talk about hair...


EV: See!! I bring the customers in.
Me: Yea, right!
EV: No!! Serious!! When we first came in, there was nobody. Now, got a lot of people coming in.
Me: So, Baskin Robbins should pay you some $$$-la.
EV: Yealo! Should charge them!

Hahaahhahaha....

Anyway, Happy B'day David Beckham.

Anyway, Happy B'day my dear friend!! My life certainly is a lot more colourful when you're around. Here's to many more years of fun and joy. God Bless!!!

How to Be Happy/Positive

Note: I have to admit that today, I got a little too emotional, felt a bit blue because I could not do something technically simple such as presenting a topic for discussion today. Of late, I am finding myself to be quite incompetent and wonder if I deserve my position. Frankly, it is just a simple matter of faith in one's self but when it comes to dealing with others and gaining that respect, faith in one's self is not enough. Anyway, I shall try to find it in myself to talk about this topic and hence, make me feel good about myself again.

My previous posts were a bit too "technical" but I needed to find a place to put up the "tips" on how to setup Ubuntu properly. Anyway, with the latest release, configuring and customizing a Ubuntu box would have gotten easier.

Anyway, my last post on "staying positive" got me thinking, how do I get to be happy/positive in the first place?

Let's get ONE thing straight - A happy person still has problems, and disappointments but despite it all, is able to handle both the joys and sorrows of life in a well-adjusted manner.

Also note this, we also learn to be happy. Why do we need to learn how to be happy? Isn't this something that we're born with?

Remember, we are born with very little skills. At birth, we are absolutely dependent on our parents; so frail, we are not able to fend for ourselves. At a very early age, we learn by observing our environment. Hence, our knowledge about happiness and how we adjust to it depends on what we have absorbed. Scary thought, isn't it?

However, all is not lost. We are a learning species. We still can learn to be happy. (^^)

I've been listening to some motivational talk (trying to drum it in my head) by Dr. Murray Banks, a psychiatrist who came up with some interesting audio tapes. I got this from my sister's boyfriend who's also into motivational subjects.

So, listening to "Just In Case You Think You're Normal", there are 9 ingredients of a well-adjusted person.

1. Do you know how to make the most of what you got?
- Happiness is not about what you want, but what you've got. We are never happy with what we have, for example. haven't we yearned to be taller, thinner, smarter, more beautiful and etc? Certainly, we are not happy with ourselves but what happens if we are born deaf and blind? Why can't we learn to be contented with what we have?

2. Do you know how to stay forever young?
- Our consumer-based society today worships the young. Everywhere you look, the latest and greatest in trends and fashions are targeted towards the young. So, as we outgrow a certain age group, we start to feel alienated and "old". Age should not be measured by the calendar, it is measured by how "old" or young we feel. We should not be shackled in by the notion of our age. In fact, the older we get, the younger we should feel. Our minds are only going to get better.

3. Do you setup new, interesting goals in life?
- Once you have setup a goal & achieved it, it is natural to setup new challenges. Why? All for the feeling of accomplishment and praise. We humans also like a bit of variety in life, for it motivates us to improve ourselves. However, if you do encounter setbacks, remember that it is only temporary and we should have faith in ourselves to over come it. When we do overcome it, we will feel great because we have accomplished something.

4. Do you know how to live each day to the fullest?
- Saving a day in the hope of "cashing in" for the future is foolish. For we do not know when we shall leave this earth, it is best to live it as if it were our last. So, we should not let the small worries of our life eat us for it certainly wastes our time. Why want to waste precious time of needless worrying?

5. Do you know how to make the most of a bad situation?
- When life hands you lemons, make lemonade. Your happiness does not depend on how the world does to you, but it is of your attitude towards it. It also means that we should try to turn our setbacks into new opportunities as well.

6. Do you know how to live with yourself?
- This is not about living by yourself. This is about being able to be honest with yourself and the ability to enjoy life. If we can't live with ourselves, how could we expect other people to live with us?

7. Do you try to please everyone? Trying to satisfy everyone is a near impossible feat. It is possible, but at what cost? Have a little faith and confidence in yourself and understand that you cannot satisfy everyone. There will always be someone who think critically of you. However, there will be others who appreciate you.

8. Do you know how to laugh at life?
- Life should not be taken too seriously. Certainly, laughter is the best medicine. Of course, sometimes, it can be difficult to laugh at life, but life is short, we should not stay sad or depressed for too long.

9. Do you care for your fellow Man?
- This means being able to bring happiness to another person; say something pleasant about the person instead of something hurtful or deceitful. This also means that you are also able to view the other person's point of view.

These are just some points. In my honest opinion, we must also project happy thoughts in order to influence our outlook on life. For, if we do not think about how to be happy, how could we become happy?

Sausage & Bacon Tomato Fusilli

It has been a while since I've posted something about food. Anyway, I decided to cook a very simple pasta for lunch since my Mom and I were fed up of eating some of our local hawker fare. Since my Dad wasn't around, we could experiment on new stuff too. (^^)

The recipe is very simple, the ingredients are as follows:

1. Pasta Fusilli (spiral pasta) - portion for 2
2. 2 chicken frankfurters chopped
3. 4 pieces of back Bacon diced
   
4. 2 garlic cloves chopped
   
5. 1/2 red onion chopped
   
6. Salt & pepper to taste
7. Oregano (optional)
8. Chopped parsley (optional)
   
9. Presto's Tomato & Mushroom Sauce
10. Olive oil - A Must!!!
    

Now, back bacon is not the streaky bacon which people cook for breakfast but the slightly more "meatier" bacon for people who are health conscious. Now, the back bacon does come with some fat and so, best to remove the top layer of fat if you have health issues. If you like a bit of greasy taste, just leave a bit on. :)

The steps are as follows:

1. Boil some water with salt. Once the water comes to a boil, drop your pasta in.
   
2. In a hot pan of medium heat, pour the olive oil and fry up the chopped garlic and onions.
   
3. When the garlic and onions start to brown, stir in the chopped bacon and sausages.
4. When the ingredients have been cooked well, pour in the sauce and stir well. Let it simmer for a while before adding crushed black pepper, oregano(optional) and salt to taste. I usually do not add in extra salt since my pasta has been cooked in salted boiling water and that should have enough flavour.
   
5. Once the pasta is cooked, drain and add to the sauce.
6. Stir well and serve with Parmesan cheese and some chopped parsley.
   

Easy, right? Anyway, this should be a good recipe for a quick dinner. (^^)

Variations could include adding a touch of cream or Cream of Chicken Soup from Campbell, shave on some cheese and putting it into the oven to make it a pasta bake.

Anyway, here's a look of the yummy stuff I cooked this afternoon. (^.^)

Kekeke, by the way, the yellow stuff on top is the Parmesan cheese. I would recommend getting the better stuff other than usual Kraft Parmesan cheese as it doesn't smell as bad but tastes great!!

After Ubuntu, what else?

It is a known fact that when you start using Linux as a desktop, you have a lot of stuff to do, i.e. you have to setup more stuff, tweak more configurations than your average Win* user.

However, once all the tweaking is done, the Linux "ride" is a whole lot more smoother, i.e. you don't have to worry about a lot of viruses or adware (**touch wood!!**), since quite a number of viruses are written to run on Win* machines. I won't say that Linux boxes have NO viruses, it is just probably less.

When Ubuntu was installed, most of my work was cut out for me. I had OpenOffice, Gaim (renamed to Pidgin), Firefox and even some other utilities which the team thought most users would require. Anyway, it occurred to me after my quick setup, that I needed to do a number of things to "pimp my ride". (^^)

Here's my list:

1. Install improved NVIDIA graphic drivers
My graphics is a little choppy and when I try to view videos on YouTube, it is very choppy. Sure, Ubuntu recognized my driver but nothing beats having the real deal from the manufacturer. For this, I'm relying on a little app named "Envy".

2. Install NTFS support
I'm still running the not-so-current Ubuntu Edgy Eft version and that means I don't get NTFS support off the bat. (-_-) So, I need to do some tweaking and etc, I've been Googling a bit and found out some utils like ntfs-config and ntfs-3g, which will allow me to mount/umount, read/write NTFS drives. This is because I have an external HDD which I keep some data larger than what my thumbdrive can hold.
TAKE NOTE: Most USB thumbdrives are FAT32 and so, would not have any issue. The only problem comes when you have an external HDD which is in NTFS, i.e. formatted using Win XP.

3. Install S/W Dev Tools
This means, I need Java, Eclipse and perhaps a little appserver like JBoss or Tomcat. If you require some Microsoft-based tools, chances are you need to run it off WINE or VMWare.

Ubuntu has their own version of Java installed at first but if you prefer to use Sun's JDK, you may get a copy of it and install it on your own. Just remember to add the entry where the JDK is installed in the "etc/jvm" file.

Installing JBoss or Tomcat is a cinch as all you need is to unzip the contents of the JBoss or Tomcat zip file into a directory, editing some config files and running the shellscripts to start up the server. If you want to get Tomcat or JBoss running from the time your machine boots up, you can drop a simple scriptfile in the /etc/init.d directory. (^^)

4. Install VMWare Player
I usually tend to run my stuff on more than 1 type of O/S and hence, I have to run VMWare to "play" another O/S virtually on my machine. This is an optional install which you can get straight off Ubuntu, and so, there is no need to download this.

If VMWare is not your cup of tea, Ubuntu also provides WINE.

5. Install Picasa
Yes, Picasa is supported on Linux. Head down to http://picasaweb.google.com and download a copy. Choose the debian package so that the Package Manager can install it for you. Easy Peasy!!!

6. Install a proper CD/DVD-Writing software
This is a gray area for me as my current setup is so old that it only has a CD-ROM drive. However, I believe that this could be one of the big issues why some people are not interested in installing Linux is because such software are not readily available - unlike Windows. However, there is a little software called "K3b" which can do the job of burning stuff to CD/DVD. By the way, Ubuntu also ships with CD-writing software too. It isn't as fancy as Nero or Roxio, but it works. (^^)

7. Install Media Players to watch my videos
Yes, there is other media players out there other than Windows Media Player. ;)
I like VLC and this is shipped with Ubuntu! Now, the only thing is to get the codecs necessary to play certain videos like XVID or DivX, as well as the popular MPEG-4 format files. However, when you need to play files in MKV or OGM as some Anime comes packaged in, you'll need some extra codecs. Don't worry, there is a codec available for RMV (Real Media Video) files as well.

8. Other Themes & Window Managers?
Back in the day when X-windows ruled, there were very few people very keen to customize the look and feel of a desktop other than putting up a new wallpaper and adding a few widgets here and there. If you were fortunate to work on a X-windows platform, you knew that you could write some nifty X-windows widgets to grace your desktop. Anyway, since we're on the *nix world, we are free to chose different window managers and themes as well such as KDE, Gnome (default install by Linux), Sawfish and IceWM, just to name a few.

9. Other Language Support - especially Asian languages...
Now, this is a step which even Windows expect you to perform AFTER you have installed Windows, unless you have chosen to use a non-English locale in the first place. Same goes with Linux. If you choose to have English as the default language, you may want to have an IME (Input Method) for non-English languages. For Ubuntu, this is easily solved by two things - 1) SCIM and 2) Additional Language Support.

10. Antivirus, Anti-Spyware, Firewall?? (~.~)
This is another gray area for me. Although a lot of viruses were written for the Windows platform, a lot of people say that *nix platforms would not be affected. That is half the truth. Sometimes, you may get some annoying messages on the system log indicating some file was trying to execute some non-existing *.exe file on your Linux box. Besides that, if you run a mail server, chances are you'll need a spam filter in order to sift through the garbage. Not only that, Linux boxes can also be "carriers" of viruses too. At the end of the day, it is still best to install these.. just in case!

I do agree with installing personal firewalls as this is a necessity in these modern times when hackers try to exploit every single hole made available.

As I said earlier, some of these softwares are made available as an optional install.

*Phew!!* I thought this post will never end!! Anyway, this post was inspired by this post which I found when I was surfing the web for tips on how to get my NTFS external HDD to work.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, since once your o/s is up, chances are you'll be installing software useful for you and also, try to customize it to your liking.

Happy Ubuntu-ing!!! (^___^)

Going Ubuntu's Way - The WiFi Edition

As promised, I got the resources for setting up a WiFi card to connect to an AP. However, this is just a brief overview of what needs to be done in order to get a WiFi card working on Ubuntu Linux.

The first thing to do is to check if your WiFi card is natively supported by Linux. What I mean by "natively supported", means that the manufacturer of the card already has an existing driver for you to use. Anyway, head over to this site --> http://linux-wless.passys.nl/ to check.

If your card is listed, you're lucky and you'll just need to follow the steps outlined by the manufacturer to get started.

For the rest of us, we'll need to do a little bit of work. However, thank goodness for this little utility called "ndiswrapper". (^^)

By default, this utility is not installed, but is an optional software, which means you'll need the Ubuntu CD close by. Besides that, also keep the original CD of your WiFi card close by as well.

What ndiswrapper does is to create a Windows kernel for which the WiFi card's driver can be loaded and thus used in the Linux environment.

1. Installing ndiswrapper

- Follow the steps as listed here http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Edgy#How_to_install_Windows_Wireless_Drivers_.28Ndiswrapper.29
- Ensure that you have your WiFi's Windows driver handy.

2. Setup the WiFi card
- There are a variety of ways to setup the WiFi card, one of which is to enable via the Networking Tools. However, in my humble opinion, I'll always go for text-based configuration... Just to be sure. (^^)

(0) Open the "/etc/network/interfaces" file using a text editor. Remember to "sudo" in order to be able to write, i.e. if you're not "root" user. (**I know.... I know... Setting up networking stuff via configuration files can be a pain in the *ss, but I'm just a die-hard console-based administrator, ok??)

(1) Add the following lines to the file:

auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
pre-up wpa_supplicant -Bw -Dwext -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
postdown -killall -q wpa_supplicant

NOTE 1: If your network is setup as DHCP, just specify as dhcp, if it is static, then, the following lines should be used instead:

auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet static
address [your-ip-address]
netmask [netmask]
gateway [network-gateway-ip-address]
pre-up wpa_supplicant -Bw -Dwext -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
postdown -killall -q wpa_supplicant

NOTE 2: The command listed is using "wpa_supplicant" where if your WiFi AP uses WPA as an encryption, you will have to use this in order to get your WiFi working with WPA. For more information about other forms of encryption, please refer to the list of resources below, or Google.

(2) Save the file. (Obviously-la...)

(3) If your WiFi uses WPA as a form of security, you will need to configure the "wpa_supplicant" application prior to restarting the network services.

(3.1) Create a file called "wpa_supplicant.conf" under the "/etc" folder.

(3.2) Add the following lines to the file:

ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
network={
ssid=[your-wifi-ssid]
psk=[your-pre-shared-key]
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
proto=WPA
pairwise=TKIP
}

NOTE: The values for [your-wifi-ssid] and [your-pre-shared-key] should be enclosed in double-quotes (").

(3.3) Save the file. (DUH!!!)

(4) Restart the network interfaces by issuing the following command:

sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

(5) If all goes well, issue the following command to view the list of network interfaces configured on your system:

ifconfig -a wlan0

The output should tell you about the status of the WiFi card, where the IP address should be obtained (if using DHCP) or configured (if static). However, the important line to look out for is this:

UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

This indicates that the card is up and running. If you open up your Networking Tools, you should be able to see if the WiFi card is enabled or not.

(6 - optional) If you want to test the network interface, use the "nslookup" or "ping" commands to see that the WiFi card is setup properly. If all goes well, you may very well use the WiFi card to surf the net or setup Gaim or any messaging software of your choice... supported by Ubuntu, that is... (^^)

For more information on setting up Ubuntu or WiFi, go to:

• http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Edgy
• https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/WiFiHowTo

Hope that all goes well. When in doubt, Google it!

Staying Positive

I have been trying to write this post for a while, but did not have the time to collect my thoughts.

I am sure that many people has ask you this question before, "Are you happy?"

Certainly, we all joke, "Yes! Very!!" or "If you don't see me stick a gun to my head today, I should be happy-la..."

Anyway, in my humble opinion, this notion of happiness is only relative. This is because while we may seem happy at what we have, but when we start to compare with others, we may end up not being very happy after all.

I would prefer to be asked, "are you feeling positive today?". This is because, a happy person may look happy on the outside, but inside, would be very negative about the world. I am sure everyone is like this at some point or another, due to the circumstances we face everyday.

Frankly, I'll have to admit that I'm a negative/pessimistic person, by default. This is strange because a lot of people say I'm a jovial and bubbly character. However, when things go south, my negative "beast" tends to rear its very ugly head. I guess that this is me being reactive instead of taking a step back to adjust properly towards the situation at hand.

The symptoms I've noticed is that I tend to complain alot about things to the point some people say that I'm whining. Besides that, some people said that I tend to mention a lot of negative things too and that demotivate others.

Remember the saying that "Misery attracts company"? I believe my negative actions have also caused like-minded people to come to me and together, we stew in our negative, toxic soup. At first, the other person is looking for sympathy and understanding from like-minded people who are undergoing some sort of rough spot at work or at a personal level. However, after a while, the negative, toxic stew takes a toll on our energies and we end up feeling drained and depressed. Sure, it is ok to b*tch about things but best not to take it too far.

So, the issue here is taking some action on stopping this negative toxicity I tend to manufacture from time to time. In short, I'm trying to find out why I tend to be so whinny and b*tch a lot about things, when it goes wrong/bad.

One of the manners is finding out the root cause of why I'm so negative. I notice that I tend to go off like a "broken record" when I complain and so, that is one way in which I may spiral out of control and be totally negative and whinny. Sure, it is ok to complain but I've got to learn to know how to stop.

So, to address this, I am starting to think very carefully when I want to complain about things. Of course, this does not mean bottling up emotions and etc., but finding another positive outlet to rechannel my energies. However, this does not mean that I'm going to turn into a pussycat, not willing to stand up for my rights and etc. We all need to release our frustrations in one way or another, the important thing is not to let it go too far.

I find that by taking a step back, and trying to think the positive side of things, the negative thoughts go away. Of course, being a bit hot-headed and a pessimist by default, this is a very hard thing to do. Although, it is hard, it is not entirely impossible.

I've been reading/listening/watching a lot of motivational material and to stay positive, it all boils down to a few key items:

• Nobody can make you happy but yourself
• Don't let worry eat you inside out
• Laugh often (have a sense of humour)
• Visualize and project positive thoughts
  

It is all about having a proper mental adjustment towards the situation at hand.

I still remember a good video of the famous "Bus Uncle" in HK, who said, "你有 压力, 我有 压力!!" which literally translated to "You have pressure, I have pressure!".

I'll write more about those 4 points in the future, but for now, just think positive thoughts.

If you have watched the "Pursuit of Happyness", you'll know what I mean. It is an uplifting film, and it has certainly opened my eyes. If you thought that it was a comedy of sorts, you are dead wrong. It is about being positive in our pursuit of "happyness" and to each person, it is different.

Think positive, stay positive. (^_^)

Going Ubuntu's Way

I have used a number of Linux distros in my day, but none has impressed me as much as Ubuntu does.

I have been a firm advocate of RedHat or CentOS for servers for its reliability and ease of use. However, for the desktop, I did not find a good substitute for Win* other than Lindows or Mandrake (now, known as Mandriva).

When I got some interns to do a bit of research on using the GSM Modem on Linux, they came across Ubuntu. It was still at beta during those days and from the screenshots, it looked promising as a Win* replacement for those going the Open Source way.

Anyway, I decided to install Ubuntu on my aging P3 800Mhz Intel box which still had some life left. This old box was previously running Centos 4.3 but after it displayed a "kernel panic" message for some odd reason and so, I decided it was time to change distros... (^_^)

The problem I had with this machine is that it is situated in my room, quite far away from my Router/WiFi AP and so, I had to use a wireless USB device in order to get access to the Internet. Now, the fun part begins... that is, because my wireless USB device has not been certified to be supported by Ubuntu yet. (o_0)

However, after a little bit of Googling (I love Google!), I found out about this little application called "ndiswrapper". This little utility is an open source network driver which implements a Windows kernel to dynamically link NDIS APIs with the network driver. In layman's terms, it helps use the Windows drivers you get with your wireless network card to work in a Linux environment.

Now, Ubuntu's installation did not take very long, it was well under an hour (far shorter than Win XP's installation) and it didn't ask many questions. Primarily, it asked me the following:

• Who I was
• What was the current time/timezone I was in.

That was it.

Shocking, right?? (o_0)

Anyway, here is a screenshot of my Ubuntu machine...


It did not take me very long to get my Wireless USB device to work, although it did involve a little bit of command-line work but what are a few command lines when you're in the *nix world. ;)

Frankly, I think Ubuntu is just great. It is a good start for those who want to have an alternative solution to Win* due to hardware or $$$ issues. However, if you do want user friendliness because you're not a very savvy computer user, go Win*.

If you can't keep yourself away from Win* for whatever reason, there are a few emulators out there like WINE (WINdows Emulator) and VMWare which can emulate Win* on a *Nix environment.

I should be posting up some resources on how to get your USB Wireless Adapter on Ubuntu soon, which is a gist of what I've discovered when I setup my machine this afternoon.

Edited: 12:26am
P/S: I only had to reboot Ubuntu once, and that was when the installation completed. After that, you could use Ubuntu right away. (^.^)

Why Easter Is More Important Than Christmas

Christmas makes me sentimental. There is no doubt about it.

Due to its commercialism, I get very sentimental around Christmas time especially when I hear the first Christmas Carol over the radio or see the first Christmas decorations around the many malls around KL.

Sure, due to this commercialism, Christmas makes everyone sentimental or... greedy.

However, Easter brings about a different feeling.

Sure, it is not very commercial here because we don't see Easter bunnies and eggs as it does not bring about that "oomph" feeling, making consumers want to fork out more during this time of year, i.e. March/April.

However, in other countries, i.e. Western ones, Easter is getting to be quite commercial. Everywhere you go, you'll find pictures of bunnies, flowers, eggs all around. Besides that, there is also the big chocolate sales where people give chocolate bunnies or eggs to friends/family.

In both celebrations, the most important person is forgotten, i.e. Jesus Christ.

When you ask a young child, be they Christian or non-Christian, what they think about Christmas and they think of two things - 1) Santa Claus and 2) presents. When you ask them about Easter, most non-Christians in Malaysia would not know the significance of it. In Western countries, the child may answer 1) Bunnies and 2) Chocolate.

Some Christians feel that Christmas is a bigger celebration because it is when Christ comes into our world, small and helpless, like us. Certainly, we all identify with Christ during Christmas because during this time, He is small, helpless and we feel drawn to Him in His small, helpless form.

Easter, in fact should be a bigger celebration because it is during this time, Christ risen from death, has conquered sin and Death, thus freeing us from these shackles. It is also during this time, the Church is born because He has left us a message to perform the Eucharist as a Remembrance of Him. (Luke 22:17-19)

And from that moment, the Church which Christ has founded began and has continued to this very day. Isn't that more important than Christmas?

During Christmas, we are reminded that Christ, humbled Himself to be born a human, to live, suffer and ultimately die for us. However, during Easter or on Good Friday, Christ made the ultimate sacrifice by dying for us to set us free from our sins.

So, surely, Easter is a greater celebration than Christmas because He triumphed over Death and by doing so, brought us closer to God through a new covenant. (Romans 6:4, 1 Peter 3:18)

Anyway, all being said, I would like to wish everyone a Blessed Easter. May the Easter Joy make your souls dance for joy and hearts sing out loud, praising God!

Amen!!

New Template!!!

After Blogger went non-BETA, a lot of new features were introduced, making Blogger more attractive to the average blogger or n00bs who wants an intro to the blogging world. ^_^

Anyway, I have just sent about 1.5 hrs converting my old blog template to the new one, which incorporate the concepts of "widgets" rather than static HTML "div" sections to segregate content. It is a nifty idea and there are loads of new widgets to use, but I am a control freak and so, I stuck to the HTML/JavaScript widget.

After getting countless "not well-formed XML errors", I have discovered that the new templates are being parsed by an XML parser and so, all the tags need to be well-formed. **confused**

This means that if you have a HTML attribute called "noshade", you will need to assign a value to it, rather than leaving it as an empty attribute. Besides that, the tag <br>(break) will need to be well-formed; i.e. notated as "<br/>" or else you are going to get a lot of strange "unclosed tag <div> errors". **more confused**

Oh well, I am still tweaking with my new template and if you find some strange errors, please do notify me. It will take me a while to get it all working right again. Nevertheless, if you're a n00b, you will enjoy the new template layouts, or else, if you are a tweaker like me, be prepared for some eye-squinting, head-scratching time trying to normalize HTML to be well-formed XML. (0___o)

Subversion With Windows, Anyone?

I would have to admit that I have not been a hardcore developer for a very long time as I have started to move towards becoming a competent software architect. Nevertheless, even being an architect, you can not get away from coding altogether. In fact, it should be mandatory that being an architect, the code craft should be more refined. But that's another topic for another day.

Anyway, there are things which I can not live without, and that is having my code "sit" in a proper home, i.e. a code repository. The code repository is not only used to store code but also to provide version control to ensure that codes are managed properly.

Having used a little bit of RCS (from Uni days), Microsoft Visual SourceSafe (VSS), CVS and more recently, Subversion; I have come to love Subversion for its ease of use. Not only that SVN is gaining popularity amongst the developer community but I find it to be a good introduction to new developers who needs an introduction into managing software configuration and quality. Unless you have taken a course in Software Quality Management, many developers are not aware about the issues involved when sharing code between two or more developers.

Enough said, I spent a good two hours today, (including download and installation time), getting my Subversion installed and configured for my use. (^_^)

I was able to get Subversion 1.4.2 installed on my Windows XP Pro laptop, configured to use Apache Web Server 2.0.59 as a means to allow developers to access the repository via the web. I have tried to use the latest version of Subversion, version 1.4.3 but found that there were some problems after I modified the Apache Web Server's httpd.conf file and could not get it to start. (-__-)

Anyway, I was able to install Subversion using steps from this series of blog entries by Aaron West, on setting up Subversion.

The following links should also prove useful as a start:

• Subversion - http://subversion.tigris.org
• Subversion Book - http://svnbook.red-bean.com/
  
• TortoiseSVN (GUI Subversion Client) - http://tortoisesvn.tigris.org
• Apache Web Server - http://httpd.apache.org/
  

Hope this would help you out in setting up Subversion for your development use! (^_^)

Need Hardware Lists from Lowyat?

I'd guess by now, everybody knows that Lowyat is the "heaven" for us geeks - from M'sia and abroad.
(OMG... It even has an entry on Wikipedia!!)

I've got colleagues in UK who are dying to drop by M'sia just to visit this place. LOL!!

Anyway, for all of you out there who recall that back in the day, the Lowyat.net site used to host price-lists from most of the big shops, including those which were "scanned" from hardcopy. However, these scanned price-lists were removed after a while and I'm not sure why it was done so.

So, if you're looking for the big price-list, this site has it --> http://www.hardwarezone.com.my/priceguide/

Have fun salivating over what your next purchase would be!!

BTW, PC Fair is coming to KL in April.. BE PREPARED!!!

Amazing Story...

This is an amazing story about my friend's cat and dog.

Over the weekend, I had to meet up with this friend because we needed to visit another friend who had her baby last year. I did not have time to visit during the CNY holidays because of the various activities which occurred then.

Anyway, my friend mentioned that her cat had been missing for a few days since Thursday night. Her cat is very special, it only has one eye. He was rescued when my friend found him in Bangsar as a kitten, wandering around the place with a very badly injured eye. Through the goodness of her heart, she took him to a vet to get his eye fixed but unfortunately, the eye had to be removed.

Cornelius

He was aptly named Cornelius and I often joked that he's named after the wise and curious character from the movie "Planet of the Apes".

My friend, being very distraught that Saturday morning said that she was worried that he had been stolen or something. I thought that he might have gotten lost. He was let out a few times before but always came back in the morning, "meowing" to let people know that he had returned home.

I tried to reassure her that he'll eventually come back. Probably he is lost and does not know the way home or hopefully, someone has picked him up and taken care of him.

Anyway, just a few moments ago, my friend messaged me on MSN...

Friend: ANGIE!! THE CAT'S BACK!!!!

That was certainly good news! (^___^)

However, the most amazing part of it is that it was the DOG who brought the cat home!!!

My friend has another dog, named Rusky and she's a sweet girl. She did growl at Cornelius for a while when he first arrived but since then, she has accepted him as part of the family/pack.

Rusky

Anyway, Rusky was let loose to go wander around and when she got back, Cornelius followed her back as well!! My friend heard the "meowing" and found Cornelius back home. The poor cat was dirty and hungry after being lost for so long. My guess is that Rusky used her doggy instincts to bring Cornelius back home.

What a sweet end to an amazing story!!

This reminds me that even though Cats and Dogs are sworn enemies, but in the end, it is stories like these which inspire to think about how we all could learn to live with one another and help each other out in our time of need. Wouldn't it be better if we all got along a little better?

Note: The pictures of both Rusky and Cornelius were provided by my friend. ;)

EV Bites...

A lot of people ask me why I call my friend - "EV".

Here are some reasons:
1. EV stands for "Emotion Vampire"
- Do not underestimate EV's ability to suck the life out of you by talking about her emotions and just being "emo"... After a "Emotion Suck" session with her, it is best to replenish your energy by taking loads of "healthy" products - think alcohol.

2. She really is a Vampire
- I have some photos of EV baring her teeth and yes, her canines are longer than most people, hence, the vampire-ish look.

3. She bites...
- I am not joking about this. She really does bite using teeth and all. I don't recall how it all started but I'm guessing it had to do with food and her being very hungry.

** FLASH BACK **
- 1997, Somewhere in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia...

EV: I'm hungry.
Me: You're always hungry. Eh, Why those ppl so late-wan??
Friend: Dunno. I'm getting kind of hungry too.
EV: I'm hungry.
Me: We know.
Friend: Yeah, "tahan" a bit... They won't be long.
EV: I'm very very hungry-le...
Me: Sorry, I got nothing to feed you. Can "tahan" a bit or not...
EV: I don't care!!! I'm hungry-la.. Going to get "gastric" soon... (-____-)
Friend: Hahaah!! OK, OK, Nah... Have this-la ** Offers left-arm **
EV: OOOOooooooo... Nice..

** NGGGIAAAAMMMM **

Friend: AAAAAHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! WHY YOU BITE MY ARM???!!!!

EV: Yum, yum... Very nice - taste like sausage...
Me: **speechless** (o___o)

Friend: Aiyooo.... Pain!! **Sniff Sniff** **Strokes arm**
Me: **looks at arm** Doesn't look so bad-le
Friend: WHAT NOT BAD!! Look!!! Got teeth marks!! ** points to arm **
Me: What have you got to say for yourself??
EV: Ehhh... It taste like chicken??

Friend & Me: ** SHOCKED BEYOND WORDS - Mata Terbeliak **

Ever since that day, both of us have avoided EV whenever she announces that she is hungry. I think whenever EV does show her teeth, my friend remembers about that day when EV bit her arm.

Sick...

Note: This happened about a couple of weeks back during the final days of the CNY holidays. Since then, I've gotten sick again.... *sweat*

It has been a while since I've fallen sick.

Anyway, I had to wait at the clinic for over an hour because the doctor came in late. The clinic was opened early but the doctor came in only at 9:15am.. (-___-)

I actually saw him walking from his really nice Merz, parked opposite the clinic. I believe it to be a SLK but I didn't bother as I was really sick as a dog.

After all that hassle, I went home with all my medicine to rest. Prior to that, the night before, I called EV to kacau her about something...

Me: where are u?
EV: at home-la!
Me: what u doing?
EV: having sore throat, fever, bodyache and runny nose.
Me: WAHAHAHAAHA.... U-la, eat too much CNY stuff...
EV: what???!!!! i like ma!
Me: kekeke... i'm starting to feel sick too, how-lar?
EV: ehhhh... take mc-lo!
Me: ceeehhhhh...

Anyway, after my visit to the doctor, I called back and this is what happened...

Me: Harrrrlllooooo... (soft voice)
EV: wahhhh... What happened??
Me: sick-lo...
EV: ahhh.. like that how?
Me: mai take mc-lo...
EV: ohhhh...
Me: eh, can u torture me less today?
EV: cannot!! I got questions to ask u!!!!
Me: .... (天啊啊....) *Translated as "HEAVEN-ARRHHH"

EV has been pondering over a few life changing questions for the past few weeks. Anyway, after much haggling and when she noticed that my voice was going off, she decided to say, "Bye-Bye" and left me alone... to suffer...

This is one thing which I don't like about CNY, if I don't take enough water, the weather and food will affect me. Needless to say, I did a bad job in controlling my food intake, which caused me to not only gain weight, but fall sick too!

Guess that in the next couple of months, I've got to seriously detox and lose all that weight!!

The months of suffering are to come... I need to motivate myself... *chuckle*

Food, More Food

It's already the 10th day of CNY and already, I'm starting to feel the aftereffects of it.

So much food.... I'm just bursting...

年三十晚 feast

Monday, 26th February 2007 was the traditional "Hokkien" Chinese New Year. Legend has it that during the Japanese Occupation of Malaya, the Chinese Hokkien celebrated CNY on the 9th day after hiding in fields of sugar cane for 8 days. When they emerged from the fields, they realized that 9 days had passed. So, during this day, it is a special time for the Chinese Hokkien in Malaysia.

So, during this day, the lowly sugar cane is taken and placed in the house to remind us of how this plant had saved our ancestors during those trying times.

I'm not sure if this is true or not but that was what I was told-la. (^_^)

If I'm not right, please correct me-la. Kekekeke...

Anyway, this year's CNY has been all about the food! I have a few other photos of food but am rather lazy to showcase them here. Hehe.. That has been the hallmark of my CNY this year.

It was fun to meet up with my cousins and relatives who are a year older and so, being more mature, they are alot more interesting to chat with. The young kids had a lot of fun with Snoopy who is exhausted from all the CNY fun. :P

狗年结束，猪年开始...

猪打狗... hehehe...

It is that time of year again. So quickly time passes by...

Yes, it is the time to start stuffing your faces with oranges, cookies and "龙肉" (long yuk), peanuts, cashew nuts and other kinds of goodies.

Yes, you can forget about your hard work you did in January as part of your 2007 resolution. It is going out the window in the next few days. (^_^)

Frankly, every year I either enjoy or tear my hair out during this time of year because I have to face something horrible.... my relatives...

They will always ask the following questions:

1. What are you working as now?
2. How much are you making?
3. Where are you working?
   
4. Are you still studying?? (Doesn't make sense, to them, you are always either in Form 5 or Uni)
   
5. Got bf/gf?
6. If answer to last question was "Yes", when are you getting married?
7. If answer to last question was "No", WHY???? (followed by long narrative about continuing the "Tan" bloodline)

Anyway, I don't blame my relatives for asking such questions because I only see them once or twice a year. We don't usually visit them most of the time because of our busy schedule and so, I tolerate these questions.

Other closer relatives would be asking about how my work is and whether I'm attached or not. I think they may have given up hope that I'll continue any bloodline from me. Hehehee.. Frankly, I'm happier with my single life but who knows maybe one day I'll settle down? :P Only time and God will tell. ;)

However, some friends I know said that CNY is the time when all the "ammo" comes out, i.e. GOLD jewelery. I have one particular friend, whose mom always buys a bit of gold so that she can "show off" her status to her relatives during CNY. Hehehehe... I'm lucky that my mom doesn't like gold so much. My poor friend has to "donate" part of her $alary to get her mom some gold... ;)

Anyway, as the "年三十晚" approaches, I wish everyone a Happy Year of Pig! May it bring more prosperity and joy to all!!! (^_^)

祝大家新年快乐！！ 恭喜发财！！！

Mind over Heart?

As my clock counts down to my departure from UK, I'm looking back to reflect to see what I had done wrong and how I can best improve my attitude from here.

Like an athlete who constantly wants to improve, I often take time to reflect on my performance after I've completed a particular task. I benchmark myself against my past performance, as well as compare myself with other people's performance in the same category. Of course, I must not let other people's performance demotivate me, but rather, I should us that as a goal to aspire to. If you keep thinking that you are the best and not improve, you are only limiting yourself to your past performance. The world is changing very quickly, what is done in the past, is the past. It can be used as fuel to push us to move forward, but we should not rest on our laurels.

A very good example is Tiger Woods, one of the great golf players of our time; comparable to the great Jack Nicklaus. After taking time out to improve his swing, he fumbled for a while, not doing very well for a while. However, after he got hold of it, he began to win more tournaments than ever before. The reason why he changed his swing? He figured that his old swing was not only limiting him but also may cause problems in the near future. Now, he's at the top of his game but he's not satisfied. He's improving other aspects of his game.

So, the same goes for me. I'm not fully satisfied with my performance and attitude this time around. I've been a big whine and wimp, complaining to others about my predicament and etc. I realized that when I started to sound like a broken record, I suddenly decided to stop this whining attitude. I decided that I needed to find solutions to my problems. It is OK to complain a little, for we being unsatisfied can only find a few methods to express our disatisfaction, - to express, to keep it all inside or just completely ignore it.

I realized that I had been very reactive. I should have been more proactive about things. I didn't do a pre-emptive strike. Why so? I was involved too much by my heart - sad, depressed, homesick... I didn't use my head enough. It is hard to push away emotions since I'm a person with emotions, not a robot.

I had been affected by my surroundings and I did not let my logical mind to take over. I let my emotions dictate my mood for the day, which is not good because it did not motivate me to do my best.

However, realizing this, I try to change my surroundings by being more cheerful and spreading happiness all around. I did this for a while, but I was affected by the mood of my colleague, who, not only being quiet and reserved, suddenly changed his mood from being robotic to moody and dark. I have suddenly become negative because I was influenced by this.

I got plenty of advice to just ignore this guy and try to be cheerful, but it is hard to do so, when you are sharing a house with a colleague whose mood is affecting you. So, what can I do? I have tried to cheer this guy up but it is not doing any good. Any decent conversation I try to strike up, has become into a shouting match.

So, I have come to the conclusion that in this situation, I should have just kept quiet and let him be. He is not a sociable guy and hence, does not want the pleasure of my company. So, in the future, should I meet a person like him again, I know what to do and spare myself the suffering agony and waste of time trying to be this guy's friend.

The article which sparked this blog entry is here, entitled "Angry/negative people can be bad for your brain".

I was thinking to myself what I can do to improve my attitude and in the process make myself a little happier, and then I realized that I could have let my brain be sucked into being influenced by the things and people around me.

Looking back, I have come to realize that I may not fit a particular organization because I find myself changing from being very pro-active to being a little slow and reactive to situations. This is not me. I am a person who is on the move and likes to do things quick and efficient.

So, in short, has my mind being overshadowed by my heart? :)

The answer is yes. I have failed and let my emotions get the better of me. I guess it is good to just step back and look at things from a different perspective and just move on.

Let this be a lesson to me and that is it.

Another Day, Another Blog Gets Older...

This blog turns 1 today (Snoopy's b'day cake - borrow 1st arr...)

Happy Birthday to 'Chasing Tails'....

It is another year, this blog has officially turned 1 year old. It only has about 79 posts and growing... (^_^)

I still remember I just started this blog when I still had my other one running at MSNSpaces (now, Livespaces). I decided to give Blogger a shot again since it had some of the features I wanted. Between all the hang-ups while it was still at beta and now, with the introduction of some new features, I feel that I should still stick with Blogger although I'm tempted by Wordpress. Pssstt... I also have a link at Wordpress but it links back to this site. (^_^)

I still have a lot to learn about blogging. I'm looking into using Technorati as well as look into posting up my RSS so that you can subscribe to my blog. Besides that I've got to work on my 2007/2008 layout too!!

So much to do, I envision 2007 will be another busy year for this blogger!

I wish to thank everyone for their support. I'll try to post more useful stuff on this blog but for now, I can only do quick updates since I don't have Internet connection at home while in the UK. I should be able to do more when I'm back home.

For more, I would like to say, 谢谢! Thank You, Terima Kasih, Danke, 너를 감사하십시요, Grazie, and last but not least... ありがとう

It's Snowing!!!!

The car doesn't need a wash... BTW, I wrote this in the snow with my hands....

It has snowed again. We were expecting heavy snowfall in the wee hours of the morning but it turned out that the snowfall began late at our area. The expected snowfall is to be as thick as 10cm. This prompted some schools to close.

The car is covered with snow!! Can you see the little snowflakes flying around? (Click image to zoom)

Anyway, I woke up at about 6am and found that there wasn't any snow yet but looked like there was frost. Frost on the windscreen is not good because it is a layer of ice and you'll have to de-ice the windscreen first before you can work the wipers. (-_-)

The neighbourhood covered in white stuff.. Very powderful-le...

My colleague agreed that we should get to work earlier or else we'll be stuck on the roads due to the snow. Our route to work now has changed ever since we moved house and so, we use part of the A52 roadway to get to the office. On the way there, there is a queue as cars head towards the city centre and so, since it is a snow day, it can be quite congested.

Driving in snow is like driving in the rain, it can get slippery as the roads are slick with ice. The council will get people to de-ice the road by putting salt and that melts the ice. So, what you're left with is a wet road with puddles. Some smaller roads may still have snow and so, that can get slippery too. So, have to be careful-la.. :sweat:

Anyway, the snow is melting away liao. It might snow again on Saturday and if it does, I'll take more photos with my better camera. ;)

Note: These photos were taken using my SE K750i. Not bad-le.. (^_^)