Sunday, February 28, 2010

Well, they always say that cheating bastards are stupid

Now it's proven.

According to the evolutionary psychologist from the London School of Economics and Political Science, Dr Kanazawa, men who cheat are likely to have lower IQs. His theory is based on the assertion that men have always been mildly polygamous through evolutionary history. Though, this has changed, he says, as men are now evolving into monogamy. As intelligent people are more likely to adopt new practices, i.e. evolve themselves, he concluded that more intelligent men would be more likely to value sexual exclusivity than less intelligent men.

Read more: Daily Mail

Actually, I find this test rather inconclusive. I mean what is the "now" Dr Kanazawa looking at? 21st century? Or this new millennium (which is only into its first decade)? If his "now" takes reference from 1900 onwards, Albert Einstein wasn't exactly a faithful man. Neither was "my wife gassed herself and so did my mistress" Ted Hughes. Yet they were brilliant in their own fields. On top of that, looking at the recent spat of cheating sportsmen, I think it would appear that ultimately, we all are stupider to pay a bunch of "stupid" men so much money to run around a football field or totter around a golf course.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Der Bär umzieht Haus

I bought the longer wooden frame some years ago, together with a shorter one to hold the dried and paper rose bouquet I made for the Town Mouse. The bear was a MacDonald's Happy Meal gift and the rest of the furniture I bought during some sale.

It was way past time for the bear to move in.

Sigh, I threw out the cans of varnish I got for another craft (and never used) while spring cleaning some years ago. So I had to buy some new varnish, this time a water-based varnish from Daiso, as well as some other materials.


The new house now has a rice wallpaper, boarded floor, and a framed picture. Nett, nicht wahr? I wonder if people pay for this kind of stuff? Seriously, how much would you pay for this?

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Theme of this mind-boggling shot - "Pointless"

If I were one of those ants, I would have flung myself off the shoelace and committed glorious suicide. Do not even begin to ask me why was a shoelace stuck to a bus stop sign. I can't even imagine how it got there in the first place, though I am fairly intrigued.

Disclaimer: I keep flipping through my camera's images. I do a lot of loner stuff (I have long concluded that if it weren't for the other third of the BB team, this BB will probably die alone, just like how my favourite characters in The Big Bang Theory often predicted their own miserable end) it seems, and not much gets uploaded, because I rapidly lose interest or deem said stuff as too stupid to be of interest. In other cases, I don't even recall whether I have uploaded them before *haha*. If you see repeated entries or images, please inform me. Much appreciated.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Coropata for Dummies - Level 22 Solution

The Reality of the Singaporean Utopia

林语堂先生原话:“世界大同的理想生活,就是住在英国的乡村,屋子里安装着美国的水电煤气等管子,有个中国厨子,娶个日本太太,再找个法国情人.”

(Translation:) The famous Chinese inventor and literary figure, Lim Yutang, once said "The universal utopia of life would be, to live in an English home furnished with American conveniences and gadgetry, a Chinese chef, while marrying a Japanese wife with a French mistress on the side.

The Singaporean man's reality?

Nibblezware states: "A Japanese apartment furnished with Korean conveniences and gadgetry, American fast food downstairs, a Vietnamese bride, with a Chinese mistress on the side."

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Saturday Munchies 18 - Hot Sour Salmon

I apparently made this sometime ago. I can't remember if I uploaded this before?

Hmm, should have removed the skin before I cooked. Looks like a slab of snake... yikes.

Anyway I buried it under julienned ginger, onion and garlic bits, before dousing the pile liberally with chili padi and fish sauce, ala Thai Mode. It burnt like mad, that I can remember, and was accompanied with the tame eggs fried with tomatoes and edamame.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Oracle PL/SQL queries 3 - How to see invalid view or other objects in the database

To find invalid view, table, java class, procedure, etc in a table, use 'select * from all_objects where object_type = 'invalid';

Best Job in the World

In case you are wondering, it's not Paradise Island Caretaker.

I came across this while reading oddee.com. Listed as No.4 on the 10 of the World's Best jobs, Professional Prostitute Tester Director of Quality Control has to be the best job a man can have. Read about it here. 70 nubile early 20s girls a year. It really boggles the mind.


[source: guanabee.com]

I like being Questionable.

Click on this url if you dare, and tell me what you see =P

http://5z8.info/warez_w5y8_bomb-plans

You can thank shadyurl for this creative, yet vaguely ayashi link.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Oracle PL/SQL queries 2 - How to see list of tables in your database?

Since some programming languages' command for desc is !== database command for desc, you cannot use 'desc <table>' to see a database table's columns when coding.

Instead you should use, select * from user_tables;

If you need the column/size of a specific table:

select * from user_tab_columns where table_name = <table name>

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

The Legend of Twelve dishes and the Teochew Gourmands

Note: Super backdated post. We ate this last year, somewhere in July?

Damn. It's been more than half a year, and I have been procrastinating because I forgot to take a photo of the shopfront and wanted to post only after I have done so. Which was a pity, because for once, I did not have anything bad to say. Since the food was quite memorable, I should think Fragrant Garden should still be around. haha. Besides since when did I become so selfless as to make sure you guys know where to locate it*winks*?

We wanted to do something big for mother's birthday last year. So we gathered all our aunties to celebrate their beloved sister's big occasion at a Teochew restaurant. Hungrygowhere provided something useful for a change, the Fragrant Garden in Upper Serangoon.

When the boss, who is a very chatty and friendly pehpeh, found out we were celebrating my mother's birthday (kudos to mother and aunties who tried to ingratiate with him in Teochew, notti notti) , he brought out steamed baby longevity buns 寿桃. "For free", he declared(and this was before I took out my camera and vicious pen) "my gift to the birthday girl".

Wasn't he sweet? Six months later, I still remember.

Those 寿桃 were made with 莲蓉 (Lotus seed paste, Google Translator tells me when my vocab fails me) and were just nice, not cloyingly sweet. Tiny, pink and cute, like young American teenage nipples, I was telling my deviant brother. Haha.

To reward the uncle for his kindness as well as properly commemorate our very sacrificing mother (not many women can create reprobates as bad as us, it took much effort, trust me), we ordered an astonishing eleven dishes. Fortunately there were 9 of us, amongst them four pure Teochew tummies and one particularly demanding palate, to help polish them off,

We ordered eh, steamed prawns *roll eyes*, braised duck *roll eyes again*, oyster omelette, 冷盘 (literally cold dish), sweet and sour pork, suchai, noodles, yam basket *yeah!*, sliced fish fried with baby bokchoy, braised chicken with chestnuts, and yam paste. Let me see, the prawns were overcooked, I was told. The duck was nice, I was told. The oyster omelette was unusual, heaped with local chilli paste, so I doubt that is a pure Teochew dish. I found the 冷盘 very unusual, yes, the usual suspects were there, but the preparation for the octopus was very unique in that it was sour. The jellyfish was also different yet nice, but six months later, I cannot remember why? Sorry. Haha.

The suchai, vegetables and noodles were ok, nothing to write home to mother about (esp since she was sitting there already). I liked the yam basket, but I always do. The sweet and sour pork was one of the highlights of the meal. The braised chicken with chestnuts was quite good, the sauce was just nice, not too salty nor thick. The nuts were infused with the delicious flavour as well. However the Pièce de résistance of the entire meal has to be the Yam Paste. Served with the gingko nuts, pumpkin and water chestnuts (I think???) and doused liberally with sweet syrup, we were told by the pehpeh that this was the real traditional Teochew preparation. Not the usual coconut syrup we serve, he expounded, cheap stuff which we have to use to keep catering costs down.

We nodded solemnly. The uncle was really quite friendly, practically dancing with excitement at our table almost the entire time (it was a lazy Saturday afternoon). He did not charge us GST or service charge and even gave us a discount. Still it was S$210 something after discount.












Ok, not all the dishes available at the Fragrant Garden were pure Teochew, but everyone enjoyed themselves. Which at the end of the day, is the most important, isn't it? It was worth not going to Shangri la to celebrate.

Updated! Fragrant Garden has moved to the dodgy-looking shopping mall across the road (with the giant House of Seafood red sign), Upper Serangoon Shopping Center! It's on the first floor. We had it for my mom's birthday this year again! Note: if you like yam paste like we do, get the S$4 per bowl instead of the S$20 medium bowl if you have 6 persons. S$4 bowl is full to the brim! I had instant regret when I saw how miserable my portion was after sharing out the S$20 bowl. Now I understood why the uncle said we should get the individual portions instead...

Die Armen machen ihre Ausstattungspapier

Youtube Junkies 6 - Meiji's Carl

Sunday, February 14, 2010

I'' be There (Jackson 5 version) Violin Score



[source: 中国小提琴网]
Damn. I was looking for the Escape Club version. If anyone finds it, please comment here. Thanks!

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Friday, February 12, 2010

RIP Nodar Kumaritashvili from Georgia

Handsome luge boy Nodar Kumaritashvili died during a training run hours before the Winter Olympics 2010 opening ceremony. RIP poor baby. And to his family and country, sorry for your loss.

Deli Vege - The Ugly Side of Hunger

Yesterday we went to celebrate a favourite colleague's farewell. Just three days ago, I just congratulated my vendor with a mini farewell celebration before we went for our meeting. Maybe the economy is improving, after all.

Due his dietary considerations, we decided to celebrate at Deli Vege, a rather hip looking vegetarian restaurant at South Bridge Road. I once walked past the place with Town Mouse and was intrigued enough to take a look at the menu. So lucky, that I finally get a chance to try, I was thinking last evening as I entered the restaurant.

As we were waiting for everyone to arrive, the lady waitress said rather ominously as she passed out the special Chinese New Year menu, "... by the way my boss says the prices have changed." *tremble*

We split into two tables, nine and eight persons respectively. You may wonder why I bothered to report on the number of persons sitting at the tables. But you will see why later.

We agreed to let our colleague do the ordering since he had been here before. Probably out of consideration for our pockets, he chose four dishes and advised us to order rice to fill our bellies. Wise words, indeed.

Since I was the hapless victim of a terrible company luncheon only that afternoon, I refused to eat E-Fu noodles again, so he ordered Shilin "Chicken", Hongkong Mee, Brocoli with Mushrooms, and "Sharks Fin" soup for both tables. We waited very long, warmed up by poking fun at one another before the food came.

They arrived in the order, as shown below:

The "Shilin" chicken was indubitably the nicest of the dishes that night. Literally, tasted like chicken. We asked for rice.


We all fought for the veggies, our ravenous hunger rearing its ugly head. Didn't even bother to spin the Lazy Susan. Ok, can taste the shrooms. Some may say it is delicately flavoured, others may say "what the fuck? Did the Dead Sea dry up?"

Only after we finished the veggies, did the rice arrive. My colleague insisted the rice was undercooked, while another colleague felt it was overcooked. I thought, it's 锅巴饭. We started fighting for the leftover gravy from the shrooms, in a vain attempt to make the rice edible. I tried to shed a tear to add a salty flavour to my naked rice.


Terrible. It tasted worse on the rice.


When the Hongkong mee arrived, three letters crossed my head. WTF? It looks more like E-Fu noodles, but tasted like crap. The noodles looks soaked in the photo right? But, I managed to taste uncooked bits. Gross. All of us made faces when we tried. We actually went downstairs to grab green chili to camouflage the nasty smell of the noodle itself.

I turned to the guest of honor and said, "you can believe how much we love you, to stomach this terrible food". (Yes, I was starting to behave very badly.) He knew, because he was quite a worried host, often walking to the stairs to intercept the waitress and check if our dishes were coming. He felt guilty for our unhappiness, the poor man. Meanwhile the usually vocal Teletubby was starved into submission, and silently, reverently appreciated every single kernel of rice in his bowl.

We all decided as a body that the food was simply not enough. So we ordered two additional dishes per table. The other table of 9 ordered mango salad prawns, and hot plate tofu. My colleague asked me if I wanted to order the same, but I didn't want to. I felt it was wrong to eat "prawns" since I refuse to eat prawns. So we ordered Homeland (Security!!!) tofu and monkey head mushrooms.

As I am typing this, I am grateful that only 17 of us came. Imagine if a full table of 10 sat down to that horrible meal? I think I would have had to upgrade my double cheeseburger to that prosperity burger McDonald's is selling (I ate at Macs later).

We started fantasizing about McDonald's chicken McNuggets, and we wondered if we could order a takeaway from Macs to the restaurant. keke. We were all behaving badly at this point. Ribald and lame jokes were dealt out to keep team morale up. At one point, I said to my colleagues, "I used to be an omnivore, but eating here has turned me into a carnivore".

The other table called me over and told me this joke in Mandarin.

"A little boy walks along a river and sees an old man pissing into it. He asks the old man, why is your weener so small?

The old man replies "(只要功夫深) 铁棒磨成针"."

The entire phrase came from an encounter between the famous Chinese poet Li Bai and an old lady grinding a needle out of iron by the river when he was a child. Since it was so difficult and took incredible effort, it inspired Li Bai to strive hard to become a famous poet. The morale is "一个人无论作任何的事情,都要花费一番心血。只有经过无数血汗、苦泪和功夫磨砺后,你才能成为一个成功的人物. (A person must spend his entire heart and effort in whatever he does. Only after he has experienced much blood, tears, sorrow and effort, can he become a successful person."

But I digress. Last night, I just stood there and gaped. I didn't get it. Was the joke that old man had a wizened weener? Or that the boy doesn't recognise one when he is supposed to have one himself? The boys were aghast that I did not get it. They explained that the joke was that the old man had much sex that his weener became small like a needle. Oh. Personally I belatedly feel that if the boys have added the front part of the line, it would have been much funnier and dirtier. They thought it was because my Mandarin was that bad.

Our table's dishes came first, one hour later, almost half an hour apart. Yea! High Five, we made the right choices. Ironically the boys at the other table had ordered Hot Plate Tofu, which was easier to cook. When it finally came, it was just two tofu squares plonked on the hot plate straight from the package and heaped with a dark sauce.


This homeland tofu is shockingly expensive. Two pieces a person @ S$1.50 a piece. Spicy, hot and scary. I reached for the remaining rice from my colleague's bowl. My colleague encouraged the youngest boy at our table to excrete throes of orgasmic pleasure as he was eating, ala those crazy babes on 综艺大哥大 (some Taiwanese variety shown in Singapore), for the pleasure of our hovering colleagues from the other table.


Monkey Head mushrooms cooked 宫宝 (Literally translated, Gongbao. Spicy black sauce) style. Edible. Not bad. I liked the texture of the shrooms, but suddenly the chef remembered that there was salt in the kitchen after all.

The boys' dishes came about fifteen minutes after we finished. Their Mango salad "prawns" was actually deep fried "prawns" drenched in mango sauce. The boys were forgiving and magnanimous enough to offer me one of the "prawns" but I refused to touch them. Their hot plate tofu was a no-brainer.

Service wise. Slow. We got a guy on his first day. Can't blame them, because the place was quite crowded and we ordered again. But the portions were SHIT for the prices we paid. They heard us singing a birthday song for the guest of honor, whose birthday it was next week as well, and brought over one bowl of ice-cream drenched in mango sauce for him. I wonder now if it was the same mango sauce on the "prawns" just now? Must ask my colleagues.

The meal? S$394.
The wait? Forever. (3 hours for six dishes)
The fun we had, despite the meal? Priceless.

Coropata for Dummies - Level 19 Solution

So illogical, it defied poor Town Mouse's reasoning when I showed him the answer. Lukpus, please explain to us, how two baseballs can carry a crate in real life? Perhaps if the crate has a width of a LCD TV screen...

Haha.

Coropata for Dummies - Level 21 Solution

Vater's Munchies 2 - Kueh Lapis

Mein Vater immer Kueh Lapis Kuchen für Chinesin Neujahr machen.

Nett, nicht wahr? Duriangeschmack, keke.

Coropata for Dummies - Level 23 Solution

Why you should not eat sashimi at Waraku

A few weeks ago, I was talking about my friend who complained a lot about the service at Waraku (the Central branch) and how funnily the vouchers already came pre-printed with the apology for bad service (my friend's girlfriend still owes me the pic).

So last Sunday, after the free Ruan performance at the Esplanade (oh crap, I forgot to blog about that), the two mice wandered to the original Waraku branch at Marina Square. The greedier one (of course, me) chose this swordfish sashimi special @ S$4.80, since I recently developed quite a taste for it.

I must state here that I can be extremely fussy about my food. The more expensive the establishment, the more I scrutinize, food, service and ambience. I seldom eat sashimi at a restaurant unless it is frequented by Japanese expats (I use them as my quality benchmark). This means that so far, I only eat at Sun and Moon, and my fav places at Cuppage Plaza (which I am not stupid enough to say the names here).

Guess what? Service at Waraku was tolerable but slow, even though we ate before the dinner crowd, and they sat the guests at nearby tables. They are polite, but they don't look you in the eyes when they exclaim their appreciation of your patronage. I noticed because I was smiling at them.

But the food? Just look at the sashimi. Mushy and gummy...straight from the freezer to the fridge before dying again on my plate.



TGIF Specials 14: Pedobear goes to the Winter Olympics

It's old news really, but we must celebrate the lameness of others.

Japanese Drama 《零秒出手》 Buzzer Beat's 《彼女の夏》 Violin Score


Thursday, February 11, 2010

My own Top Ten Male Anime Characters

I strongly disagree with the largely gay-looking characters in SankakuComplex's Top 10 Male Characters of the Decade, and counter with my own Top Ten Nicest Male Characters of the Decade.

1. Yuki Eiri from Gravitation
Yes I know he is a yaoi character. But that show's OST remains my especial favourite, even so many years after it ended.

[source: nanoda.com]

2. [Ninja] Shinobu Morita from Hachimitsu no Clover
Hate his hair. Love his personality, intelligence and creativity.

[source: murasakiperiodista.blogspot.com]

3. Chiaki Shinichi from Nodame Cantabile

[source: minitokyo.com]

4. Tsukimori Len from Kin-iro no Corda ~primo passo~

[source:asianpopcorn.com]

5. Kyouya Ootori from Ouran High School Host Club

[source: sodahead.com]

6. Shouta Kazehaya from Kimi Ni Todoke

[source: fanpop.com]

7. Hitomonji Kobayashi from Cheeky Angel)

8. Takashi "Mori" Morinozuka from Ouran High School Host Club

9. Sawamura Seiji from Midori Days

10. [Sebastian] Minoru Shiraishi from Lucky Star

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