Monthly Archive for March, 2008

The beginning of the Singapore Slingers’ mighty comeback!!

Published on March 29, 2008 in Usual Ramblings. 10 Comments Tags: , basketball, darren ng, NBL, singapore slingers.

As the season for the Singapore Slingers closed earlier this year on a lackluster note, it is not surprising to note that fans and analysts may wonder how the team’s future would be.

Their situation seemed to be in hot waters and future rather bleak. At the end of the season, the Slingers’ 6-24 win-loss record resulted in a ‘wooden spoon award’ at the 2nd bottom of the ladder, spectatorship has never improved leaving the stadium empty most if not all the time, its financial situation might have shown signs of collapse (although I could be wrong) and Singapore’s basketball’s presence has never been the top of its citizen’s sports priority.

Adding to the slew of woes already plaguing the team and its future only a miracle can revive, a recent Straits Times report (you would need to have an account to read) noted National Basketball League chief executive Chuck Harmison’s hint on dropping the Slingers in their revamp. Times have been bad for the young team, much like the US economy as it struggles to stay alive.

Although such signs may suggest a potential demise of the Singapore’s Slingers and the country’s first professional basketball team, its hunger to stay alive fueled by the passion of its management and players prove otherwise. Amidst much negativity going on for the team, taking such multiple punches only seemed to make them stronger.

As a fan and friend of the Singapore Slingers, I am humbled and honoured to have the privilege of knowing some first hand information that may defend why I think the team is far from gone…at least at an early stage. Our journey began about a couple of weeks after the season closed as the Slingers’ management met up with some bloggers to brainstorm on how we can revive the team. During the meet, they shared their game plan for the year allowing us bloggers to contribute. I won’t go into detail about what went wrong since Len has written two out of a three parter on it. You can find it here, here and and I am waiting for its final installment.

To cut the long story short, the Slingers’ efforts has borne fruits with a number of good news. After the Straits Times story I mentioned earlier on a potential Slingers’ axe, the team’s reply led by its chairman and AirAsia Group’s chief executive officer Tony Fernandes, “confirmed that the team were going ‘full steam ahead for a solid off-season’ and will play the 2008-09 season, which begins in September.” The report (yeap, you would also require an account to read this one) was also carried out by the Straits Times. Nic has more low down of the situation here. Now that we got some mainstream media news out of the way. Here are some more juicy news which I believe they have not gotten hold of yet.

If you would to read my last article on the Slingers’ loss against the Adelaide 36ers, I did mention a 36er starting line-up player by the name of Darren Ng. Donning a #8 jersey, Darren’s heavy defence and fierce offensive prowess played a huge role in their win which left us wondering if it would be better if he played for our team instead. I guess we can really find out now since the Slingers have recently signed him on. I can’t tell you how pleasantly surprised we are.

Darren guarding his future team mate Shane McDonald

Just a little background on our up and coming local hero, the 1.91m guard averaged 13.3 points in his last season with the 36ers. Mean game aside, the dude has smarts too. Darren is in his final years of studying to become a medical Doctor and will continue his residency in Adelaide during the off-season. His presence will add a local flavour to the team as he has family members in Singapore and Malaysia. He will be joining the Slingers in July and we sure are excited to meet him. Other Slinger players like captain Ben Knight, Shane McDonald, John Fitzgerald, Blagov Janev, Rod Grizzard are also highly likely to return with the first two confirming their decision.

Already with title sponsor CLSA leading the pack with some much needed finances together with a huge team of other sponsors (I can’t name them all), the Singapore Slingers have also received good news from Jobstreet.com CEO and founder Mark Chang in his bid to assist in the planning and guidance of the Slingers to head the team in the right strategic direction. With such successful entrepreneurs like Tony and Mark believing in the Slingers, it goes to show that the team is not in far from dire straits.

As the Singapore Slingers prepares itself to conquer the hard wood in the NBL in six months time, its management are not in anyway popping the champagne nor resting on their laurels with the current good news. There is much work to be done and the good news as a result of their hard work can only spur them to do even more to ensure that Singapore will get to see another Slinger season (or more) after the coming 2008-2009 games.

You can read Len’s article on the Slingers’ current situation here. Until more good news….GOOOOOOOOOO SLINGERS!!

Watch out NBL, we’re coming to get you!!

I’m not dead..really…

Published on March 28, 2008 in Usual Ramblings. 6 Comments

Guess I have been blog bumming for some days now. Heck, the last time I wrote something was about 10 days ago (fuel hasn’t gone down by the way). But before you start blaming me for slacking off, I wasn’t (kinda)..I just didn’t have the time or the mood.

Work seemed to increase a little along with my social life, which can be viewed both good and bad from different angles. Although there is so much to write about, I didn’t even have the time to check my blog which resulted in a number of comments not replied. I did plan on writing something last weekend, but had to fulfill my responsibility as a very loving (yet sexy ) boyfriend by helping Lyn (my boo) with her move taking up two whole days (my pleasure ).

Adding to that, his week was a real downer as more and more work related bad news keep popping up leading to think if there is really any love left in my current organisation. Its one of those moments that you feel so low (work wise), you feel that quitting is the best option. Sure I would love to share it here, but some things are just too private and writing about it on my personal blog is a real no-no. Yeah..its that bad.

As the work week ends, I could really use the weekends to rest and ponder about where I should go on in life…both work and personal related. In spite of the bad joo-joos going on right now, I guess I should really head back to the ‘ol jBlog and fire away. Much thanks to my sister, Giinbolaya, Len and a few other friends/readers on asking where the heck I have been for the past few days.

So with that, this parting statement taken from Kenya West’s song, Stronger, best suggest how I am taking the recent negative punches “n-n-now-th-that don’t kill me, Can only make me stronger”.

Fuel prices continues to rise

Published on March 18, 2008 in This I like and Usual Ramblings. 12 Comments Tags: increase, oil prices.

Exactly two weeks after my previous entry on the rising cost of fuel, our local media has once again reported that all four petrol companies have jacked up the price again leaving us wondering if it is better to just leave our cars at home.

All four petrol companies in S’pore raise pump prices – taken from Channel NewsAsia

SINGAPORE: Pump prices have risen again.

All four petrol companies in Singapore – Caltex, Esso, Shell and Singapore Petroleum Company – have increased their pump prices by four cents for petrol and five cents for diesel.

Before a discount, the 92-octane unleaded petrol is priced at S$2.053 per litre, the 95-octane unleaded costs S$2.086 a litre and the 98-octane grade petrol is now S$2.16 a litre.

The price of diesel now stands at S$1.613 a litre.

This is the second time in a month that pump prices have seen an increase and is the eighth since July 2007.

The price of oil hit a new record high of above US$111 a barrel in Asian trade on Monday. – CNA/vm

Honestly, I am not gloating when I say I’m glad I own an Off Peak Car, but hey, I do feel the pinch too (though not that hard). I have friends out there who not only drive normal peak cars but fuel guzzling ones to boot, and are already at the stage of beyond pissed. Heck, if it escalates even further, I’m sure some drivers out there are will perhaps convert their cars into an expensive paper weights.

Anyhoo to my dear fuel guzzling driving friends, let me do the driving this time round if we plan to go out eh? Dun say I buay gao friend .

China blocks YouTube

Published on March 18, 2008 in Things that suck and Usual Ramblings. 5 Comments Tags: ban, censorship, china, tibet, youtube.

Just doing a follow up on my previous entry on no blogging love in Shenzhen (China), I got this article from our beloved Rambling Librarian, Ivan Chew, noting that China has blocked YouTube amid the on going protest/violence in Tibet. Yeap, another censorship act going on with much resemblance to Myanmar’s case some months ago.

China Blocks YouTube After Videos of Tibet Protests Are Posted – Taken from The Associated Press via New York Times

BEIJING (AP) — Internet users in China were blocked from seeing YouTube.com on Sunday after dozens of videos about protests in Tibet appeared on the popular American video Web site.

The blocking added to the Communist government’s efforts to control what the public saw and heard about protests that erupted Friday in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, against Chinese rule.

Access to YouTube.com, usually readily available in China, was blocked after videos appeared on the site Saturday showing foreign news reports about the Lhasa demonstrations, montages of photos and scenes from Tibet-related protests abroad.

There were no protest scenes posted on China-based video Web sites like as 56.com, youku.com and tudou.com.

The Chinese government has not commented on its move to prevent access to YouTube. Internet users trying to call up the Web site were presented with a blank screen.

Chinese leaders encourage Internet use for education and business but use online filters to block access to material considered subversive or pornographic.

Foreign Web sites run by news organizations and human rights groups are regularly blocked if they carry disapproved information. Operators of China-based online bulletin boards are required to monitor their content and enforce censorship.

China has at least 210 million Internet users, according to the government, and is expected to overtake the United States soon to have the biggest population of Web users.

Beijing tightened controls on online video with rules that took effect Jan. 30 and limited video-sharing to state-owned companies.

Regulators backtracked a week later, apparently worried they might disrupt a growing industry, and said private companies that were already operating legally could continue. They said any new competitors would be bound by the more stringent restrictions.

I am no censorship expert but a quick check at the ‘ol Wikipedia showed that China is already in the list of Pervasive Censorship. According to them, it means that “such nations often censor political content and may retaliate against citizens who violate the censorship with measures such as imprisonment.” Singapore on the other hand practices Nominal Censorship.

Don’t know about you but I am sure glad we here in Singapore have the freedom to surf around the ‘ol WWW to check out stuffs. That is perhaps one of the few things I appreciate in this country. As for the rest, well…similar to the other local sentiments…I am rather pissed. But that is another story .

One heck of a cross cultural wedding

Published on March 17, 2008 in This I like and Usual Ramblings. 10 Comments Tags: wedding.

Having reached the big 30 (+ 1), I guess it is not surprising to say that I have attended enough wedding dinners and receptions which could well afford me a number of expensive golf sets. Its one of those periods in your life where your friends start getting married off leaving you still alone and single wondering what the heck went on during the past 10 years (and then some) of courtship practices.

Don’t get me wrong, I am happy where I am right now and in the midst of a wonderful relationship with Lyn (my boo). But its just that it really scares me to see that I am one of the few out there (among my peers) who has not accessorise his ring finger. I guess I will get into doing something soon, but until then, allow me to stay happily single and enjoy all that bachelorhood has to offer.

Since I have nicely brought you into the topic of weddings, my colleagues and I popped over to Orchid Country Club on Saturday to witness a wedding we all have been waiting for. Zetti who used to be in our division, left us some time last year to be with her then fiance, Macen in Germany. They got married a few months later in Aachen, Germany and as cross cultural weddings go, they need to come back to Singapore to seek blessings from her family.

I guess what makes their wedding so unique is perhaps her father’s influence in the government sector. Security was tight as we understood that a certain VIP will be attending the dinner. There were a number of police officers, Personal Security Officers (PSOs) and country club security staffs stationed all over the area, not allowing anyone to enter unless with an invitation. There as I stood arms up at the metal detector with a PSO searching me thoroughly (short of a cavity search), my fellow colleagues stood aside and giggled away only to be courteously told not to loiter around after the security check and ushered them to the ballroom.

There as we sat at a nicely located table (yes she very gave us face), we noticed a number of top civil servants and politicians entering the ballroom and taking their seat. Shortly after, we knew that the said VIP has arrived as a horde of PSOs hurried into the main area clearing the way and making last checks on the surrounding. Our beloved Prime Minister has entered the ballroom .

Security, VIPs and body checks aside, I must say we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. The North Indian menu was wonderful as I targeted at the papadums (thin Indian wafers), the chicken and the wonderful curry. As weddings go, merry making relatives, friends, colleagues and associates mingled around filling the ballroom with much laughter and joy.

As Zetti and Meson entered the ballroom, we stood there and saw the lovely couple donning their traditional Malay costume. Not too sure if Meson, a German/Kurdish, has ever worn something like this before, but seeing an ‘Ang Mo’ wearing something like that is very deserving of some slight giggles (especially from me ).

As the dinner progresses, my colleagues and I can’t help but got into our cam whore moments and fired away. To add to our list of weird activities at the dinner table, we took some photos of the couple’s meet up with the VIP. I guess photographing the VIP was quite easy, since we were located about a table away from him. Yeah, did I say Zetti and family really gave us face when planning our tables?

Left: Cam whore moment with HS aka Slave | Right: The couple and VIP

As the dinner ended, we popped over to Zetti and Meson’s couch for a farewell and last photography session. Remembering photos of her and her beau pinned in her cubicle back in her working days, we were honoured to finally see the man in person. The chemistry, love and affection (amongst others) for each other witnessed in reality, finally gave us a glimpse of how their love story might have begun and have been all these years. As she heads back to her new found home in Germany, we wish them a wonderful life ahead together and take advantage of the German food available (cheaply) there. Congrats guys .

I love the mood in this final photo

Stroke your ego with the Bitchcruiser [NSFW]

Published on March 13, 2008 in This I like and Usual Ramblings. 6 Comments Tags: bitchcruiser, ebay.

I have never posted anything that is not safe for work (NSFW) before and honestly have absolutely no intention of trying get into Ping.sg’s 24 hour popular post, but I felt I really need to write something about this. Its one of those opportunity you can’t miss.

Seems that some dude from Germany (or somewhere in Europe) has invented a type of bike called the Bitchcruiser. Basically its your everday bike but with a mannequin in her birthday suit mounted on the frame. Adding to the naughty list, the mannequin is positioned in a manner which would look like you are taking her to heaven and back from behind…all that while riding the bike. The Bitchcruiser also allows you play kinky dress up with the mannequin (call it zhng’ing if you want). I would love to write more about it but hey, I’m sure you folks out there are interested to see the photos first.

Not too sure why they fellow invented something like this though. Perhaps reason being that he was jilted or abused by a female friend (enemy?) and wanted to tend to his mojo while on his daily commute. I’m sure this manual piece of vehicle is a guaranteed head turner and would probably give the rider (pun intended) an occasional egg pelting experience or slaps (or both).

Think you are up to a piece of the action? Why not check it out on eBay and bid away? Yes it actually is for sale. But you have to hurry though, bidding ends in just three days away and there are no takers so far. So if you have at least US $2,322.70 lying around somewhere you think you can splurge on and need that mojo booster, the Bitchcruiser is waiting for her owner . More photos from Gizmodo.

Taken from Gizmodo and Random Good Stuff.

Nike One Concept: Not hitting the F1 tracks anytime soon

Published on March 13, 2008 in This I like and Usual Ramblings. 2 Comments Tags: car, nike, Nike One Concept, shoes.

As an ex-collector/admirer of all things Nike back in the days of yonder, I would always venture out to eBay or other shoe collector stores at Far East Plaza, sourcing and haggling for good limited edition deals. Now years have passed and my collection dwindled due to the humidity and heat in our country (an unforgiving environment for shoe collectors), I do see myself keeping away from such places, perhaps a result of moving on to other commitments.

The new Nike series somehow look weird and I often ask myself what happened to the old skool shoe designers of way back. These people really put their heart and soul (sole?) in creating a legendary shoe. Now all we see is a bunch of crap stitched into a bigger crap and selling for $250 a pair.

But before I digress further, allow me to get back to the subject matter. As an athlete company, Nike has progressed in leaps and bounds since its early days. I do remember their earlier shoes (if not the first), where the Waffle Trainer was put together in 1974 in which the sole of the shoe was made by the pattern of an waffle iron (hence the term Waffle Trainer). Moving on in the athlete industry, they have invested in the snowboarding industry (which I think was a flop) and succeeded in the golfing arena with world no. 1 Tiger Woods donning their apparels with his own logo. Heck he even uses Nike’s Sasquatch Driver.

Going forward, the people at Nike and the makers of Gran Tourismo 4 have developed an aerodynamically drooling fictional car. As Auto Motto puts it, “The dramatic and futuristic design of the Nike ONE with its athlete focus, stretched surfaces and less-is-more philosophy is directly inspired from the principles of Nike founder Bill Bowerman. The company went to great lengths to understand what a Nike car should be before coming up with this absolutely mind boggling concept. As Nike is an athletic company, there had to be more to the concept than just another fast car. In case of the ‘One’, the athlete is the critical part of this vehicle. The vehicle has been designed taking inspiration from the human body, its dynamics and its functioning and response to its environment.” Don’t you just love positioning statements?

Of course as concept cars go, the Nike One will not appear anytime soon on the roads or the rack, let alone F1 tracks. But if there is one thing for sure, I guess the company has made another milestone in their quest for sporting greatness. Since we are in the subject of Nike, I guess its timely I go hit the ‘ol eBay and pick up a shoe or two for old time sake.

Source from Auto Motto via Carformance.

Canine seizure

Published on March 11, 2008 in Things that suck and Usual Ramblings. 20 Comments Tags: Canine Epileptoid Cramping Syndrome, canine seizures, CECS.

Lyn (my boo) and I got a call early last Wednesday at 4am about our pet Maltese, Milky. It seems he was in some kind of a seizure, causing him to tremble violently perhaps a symptom of muscle contraction. We immediately drove over to her home only to find out that he was fine and running about happily upon our arrival.

Our beloved Milky

What worries us is that it was the second time we know of Milky’s sudden seizure-like episode. The first time was a few months ago when we were driving home after Omu’s (our other pet Maltese) vet appointment, where Lyn saw Milky trembling and curling up like a prune. So with what little knowledge we had, we did a quick check on the ‘ol web and learnt that it is rather common for dogs to have such seizures.

The term we learnt is called Canine Epileptoid Cramping Syndrome (CECS), a deliberating canine disorder. Apparently, other symptoms include staggering, dizziness to falling over with the inability to rise. The average age of dogs having such episodes is around 2 to 6 years old with them getting it from once to twice in their life time or even several times a week. I won’t go into detail about CECS since the information at their website can explain it better than I can.

Coming back to the subject proper, we took Milky to Namly Animal Clinic on Saturday, to visit our favourite veterinarian Dr. Julia. It seemed that he had yet another episode the day before totaling his seizure count to three. At the vet, Dr Juila explained the details of such episodes and how what we could do if it happens again. It is interesting to note that dogs can’t swallow their own tongue, so we need not stuff something in his mouth if it happens again.

She also provided us with a syringe filled with some medication of some sort which relaxes him in the event he is hit with one of those episodes again. Unfortunately, the delivery method is suppository style. I don’t know about you but one of the last things I would want you to do if I am ever caught in a seizure is to shove something up my bum. Save it for the sick porn fetishes the Japanese and German adult industries are filming by the thousands.

Thankfully, it has been about four days since our visit to the vet and he seemed pretty okay. We did blame ourselves for not taking the dogs out often as it is exam time and Lyn has been studying furiously at my home. But we did promise that once her exams are over, which is around the end of March, we will probably take out out more frequently. Yeah I know, we are bad owners.

So any dog owners out there know of such episodes and any advice? Let us know yeah?

Web 2.0 leaving a huge carbon footprint?

Published on March 8, 2008 in Usual Ramblings. 4 Comments

Coming from a person who works in an environment-related ‘industry’, I must admit I am quite ashamed to say I have not thought of it earlier, until reading the article below. To cut the long story short, as the world advance towards the Web 2.0 platform with much advantages, our computer usage increases, which would lead to more electricity consumption, resulting in a huge carbon footprint left behind.

However, it is comforting to know that tech companies out there are recognising the effects of the climate change consequences and pushing us towards greener pastures by showcasing their environmentally-friendly technologies. So with that in mind, this year’s CeBit in Germany sees the dawn if not the continuous efforts of such companies in their efforts to save the earth.

Second Life avatars and Brazilians: the same carbon footprint – taken from AFP via Google News

HANOVER, Germany (AFP) — What do an avatar on Second Life and the average inhabitant of Brazil in the real world have in common? Incredibly, they both use the same amount of electricity.

It is perhaps not a fair example as the average virtual being in the online community is not active all the time, but the statistic does show that all that time the rich world spends online has an impact on the environment.

And how. Providing energy to work the Internet needs the equivalent of 14 power stations, which in turn cough out the same amount of harmful carbon dioxide emissions as the airline industry, research has estimated.

This does not even include all the emissions created by making PCs, mobile phones and PDAs and shipping them around the planet. If you add the energy required to recycle them — not that that many are recycled — the industry has quite a footprint.

It is with this in focus that CeBIT, the world’s largest technology fair, opened its doors this week in Hanover, Germany with 5,500 exhibitors showing off the smartest, coolest — and this year the greenest — gadgets.

With oil and gas prices pushing up energy bills, a main motivation is also cutting down the costs for consumers and businesses.

IBM, for example, devoted large parts of its stand at CeBIT, which runs to March 9, to showing how its new servers use less energy.

Vast farms of servers made by IBM and others are used to power the Internet, and it is these gas-guzzling data centres of immense size and energy consumption that drive Second Life and indeed the entire Internet.

Siegfried Behrendt, a researcher at Berlin’s IZT institute, calculates that downloading his daily newspaper uses the same amount of electricity as running a washing machine.

German IT firm Strato, meanwhile, reckons that looking for something on Internet search engine Google requires as much energy as an energy-efficient light-bulb uses in an hour.

This won’t show up on your monthly electricity bill though, because most of the energy required for these actions takes place in a server somewhere on a data farm.

And consumption is growing. A study commissioned by US microchip maker AMD at Stanford University in the United States calculated that between 2000 and 2004 data farms’ energy use doubled.

At this rate, in less than a quarter century the Internet will consume as much energy as the whole of humanity does today, Gerhard Fettweis from Dresden University in Germany believes.

Between now and 2010, "everything is possible. Either nothing changes, and the consumption of data centres grows 50 percent. Or real efforts are made, and a lowering of 50 percent is conceivable," Fettweis told AFP.

Real efforts were on show at CeBIT, raising hopes that innovation will find a way to lessen the IT industry’s environmental impact.

Data centres produce a huge amount of heat but the rooms they are in also have to be kept cool to avoid overheating.

IBM — which also operates server farms on behalf of other firms — wants to capture that heat and use it to power air conditioning to keep things cool.

And software giant Microsoft has a data centre near Quincy in the United States — right next to a hydro-electric plant, providing its servers with renewable energy.

Another solution is so-called virtualisation of servers, a technique whereby special software turns spare capacity on the server to function as multiple computers.

Padding for Pommies

Published on March 6, 2008 in This I like and Usual Ramblings. 4 Comments Tags: , lamppost, padding.

Never thought this day will come but it seems that the Pommies are testing out a new scheme by padding lampposts to protect fellow Pommies from ramming into it while checking out their phones. I guess it ain’t all that bad. It could perhaps also protect those gawking at others while walking down the street straight into a lamppost eh? Something I believe we have one way or another experienced?

Padding to protect pedestrians – taken from Yahoo! News UK

Padded lampposts are being trialled in a London street to protect inattentive pedestrians.

A pilot scheme has been launched in Brick Lane after it was found to have the highest number of ‘walking and texting’ injuries in the country.

A study carried out by 118 118 found one in ten people has hurt themselves while focused on their mobile phone screen.

The charity Living Streets is so concerned that it has teamed up with the directory enquiries service to test a scheme to wrap up the nation’s lampposts.

A poll will be carried out on Brick Lane to gauge the response of locals.

If successful, the concept will be rolled out in Birmingham, Manchester, and Liverpool.