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Archive for October, 2004

Dulce et decorum est

i did this for lit in sec 2… under Mr Ganesan.  my god… i’d forgotten about it.. until i just stumbled across it in e2.  bloody good imagery.

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys — An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime…
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,–
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

-Wilfred Owen, 1920

In other news, <a href=”http://fullashit.neverforever.net”>The Cynical Bastard</a> launches in 20 days!&nbsp; do drop by and leave a comment…. =)

So Good, You Can Even Shit It On Its Own!

someone mentioned that can 2 waffles make you want to go… so i just had to confirm that for myself… as i had never before noticed any consumption / post-consumption-toilet lovin’.

so got myself 2 peanut butter waffles last night…

yup.&nbsp; sure enough.

IPPT??!

Got an sms from mindef today.

“IPPT Test on 02 Oct 2004, 1500 hrs SAFRA TOA PAYOH&nbsp; transaction ID ******** Report 15 min b4 time.&nbsp; Bring NRIC or SAF Card.&nbsp; FFI and MC if applicable.”

Excuse me?!!

my japanese name is Ogawa Kaito. I bet yours means “huge phallic symbol” or something.

<p>My japanese name is <b>小川 Ogawa (small river) 海斗 Kaito (big dipper of the ocean)</b>.<br /><a href=”http://rumandmonkey.com/widgets/toys/namegen/969/”>Take your real japanese name generator! today!</a><br /><small>Created with <a href=”http://rumandmonkey.com/”>Rum and Monkey</a>’s <a href=”http://rumandmonkey.com/widgets/toys/namegen/”>Name Generator Generator</a>.</small></p>

Drinking someone else’s pee.

Caesar’s last piss had some 10^23 molecules of water (call it A, having m molecules. ).

What is the total numebr of water molecules on earth? 10^45 (N) (See http://pages.prodigy.net/jhonig/bignum/qaearth.htm l).

Now, I pick out sample B (a glass of water — 10^23 == m molcules).

What is the expected overlap between sample A and sample B?

Each molecule of B has a m/N chance of being from A. Total number of expected molecules from A is about m^2/N, which comes to around O(10)

So, expect O(10^(1+/- 10)) common molecules between any two avogadro molecules.. So, your next drink has about 10 molecules from Caesar’s last pee.

Next we calculate the number of expected molecules in the next glass of water I drink, that ever came from soemone peeing:

If a person lives 50 years (10^4 days) and pees 10 times a day, he peed 10^28 molecules. The number of people that have ever lives is 80 billion: 10^11, making it 10^39 molecules (M).

Thus, the expected number of pee molecules in your next glass of water is: mM/N = 10^17 — every glass of water has some billion billion molecules that came from some human’s pee.. We didn’t even include other animal’s pee and other dirty sources here…

Over your lifetime, you consume about 10^17 times 10^5 === 10^22, about ten thousand billion billion molecules that came from someone’s pee…

Also, over your lifetime, you consume about a million molecules from any given (ancient) person’s pee..

BTW, Of course, i assumed that his piss has had enough time to be distributed around rather evenly..

Alone Again (Naturally)

Two versions of the same song.&nbsp; which is sadder?&nbsp; you decide.
both sung to the same tune.

<lj-cut text=”Lyrics here”>

<b>Gilbert O’Sullivan</b>

In a little while from now,
If I’m not feeling any less sour
I promised myself to treat myself
And visit a nearby tower,
And climbing to the top,
Will throw myself off
In an effort to make it clear to who
Ever what it’s like when your shattered
Left standing in the lurch, at a church
Where people ‘re saying,
“My God that’s tough, she stood him up!
No point in us remaining.
May as well go home.”
As I did on my own,
Alone again, naturally

To think that only yesterday,
I was cheerful, bright and gay,
Looking forward to, but who wouldn’t do,
The role I was about to play
But as if to knock me down,
Reality came around
And without so much as a mere touch,
Cut me into little pieces
Leaving me to doubt,
All about God and His mercy
For if He really does exist
Why did He desert me
In my hour of need?
I truly am indeed,
Alone again, naturally

It seems to me that
There are more hearts
Broken in the world
That can’t be mended
Left unattended
What do we do? What do we do?

(instrumental break)

Now looking back over the years,
And what ever else that appears
I remember I cried when my father died
Never wishing to hide the tears
And at sixty-five years old,
My mother, God rest her soul,
Couldn’t understand, why the only man
She had ever loved had been taken
Leaving her to start with a heart
So badly broken
Despite encouragement from me
No words were ever spoken
And when she passed away
I cried and cried all day
Alone again, naturally
Alone again, naturally

<b>Nina Simone</b>

I remember this afternoon
When my sister came into the room
She refused to say how my father was
But I knew he’d be dying soon.

And I was oh so glad, and it was oh so sad
That I realized that I despised this man I once called father.
In his hanging on, with fingers clutching
His body now just eighty-eight pounds
Blinded eyes still searching
For some distant dream that had faded away at the seams.
Dying alone, naturally.

I was his favourite child, I had him a little while
Just as long as I could play the piano and smile a little smile
Just when I needed him most, he was already a ghost
And for all my life there where promises and they always have been broken

Leaving me alone with all my troubles
Not ever once touching me and saying
“Daugther, I’ll help you get over.”
Now he’s fadig away and I’m glad to say,
He’s dying at last. Naturally.

It’s a very sad thing to see that my mother with all her heart
Believes the words that the Bible said “Til death do us two part”.
For her that was forever and ay, he decided her night and day
How could some English words so small affect someone so strangely?

Taking her away from us, her soul included
She might es well be gone with him, all the children are excluded.
Loneliness is hell, I know so well,
For I’m alone. Naturally.

I waited three weeks for him to die
I waited three weeks for him to die
Every night he was calling on me
I wouldn’t go to him.
I waited three weeks for him to die
Three weeks for him to die.

And after he died, after he died
Every night I went out, every night I had a flight.
It didn’t matter who it was with
‘Cos I knew what it was about.
And if you could read between lines, my Dad and I close as flies.
I loved him then and I loved him still, that’s why my heart’s so broken.

Leaving me to doubt God in His Mercy
And if He really does exist then why does He desert me?
When he passed away I smoked and drank all day,
Alone. Again. Naturally.

</lj-cut>

running on empty

i had a grand total of 3.5 hours of sleep on wednesday night.&nbsp; it wasn’t intended, but it happened.&nbsp; so i woke bright and early thursday morning with the feeling in my bones that something wasn’t quite right.&nbsp; that i was even able to wake at all was a sure indication of something out of the ordinary.&nbsp; there was a buzz in my head which i attributed to andrenaline.&nbsp; well don’t get me wrong -&nbsp; there are good buzzes and there are bad buzzes.&nbsp; this one, however, was not unlike the shitty high you experience while trudging through the jungle in the wee hours of the morning cursing at the pack on your back, the helmet on your head, and the m16 in your clammy grip.

but i digress.

managed to make it for morning lecture, and survived throughout.&nbsp; found the library&nbsp; full by 1030am, so i headed back to hall for a snooze.

couldn’t.

frustrated, spent the entire morning configuring nucleus.

tried again just before dinnertime.

couldn’t.

my bones were aching.&nbsp; my eyelids drooping.&nbsp; i was, by all medical terms and definitions, “fatigued”.&nbsp; motor coordination sucked.&nbsp; tried reading notes, but nothing stuck.&nbsp; the buzz was even stronger now, like the feeling from drinking too much at zouk.&nbsp; shallow breathing, floppy limbs.&nbsp; brain screaming for air.

finally fell asleep at 4.30.

woke at 7.30.

dark rings beneath my eyes, spreading like a culture in a petri dish.&nbsp; the buzz driving me on.

i am posting this from the library.&nbsp; at a time wherein, given normal circumstances, i’d be still fast asleep in hall.

the first thing i had today was a mentos extra cool mint.

i shouldn’t be alive, yet i am.

RSS!

I spent hours today… HOURS getting the bloody RSS feeds to work.&nbsp; now they do.&nbsp; hoo-bloody-ray.

development of new site is going smoothly, though behind the curtain for now.

tired.

i am amazed.

i registered a domain name + hosting at around 8.30pm.

i received an email with my login info and everything set up at 12.28am.&nbsp; INCLUDING DNS propagation.

man, they sure as fuck weren’t lying when they said “rest assured we’ll set up your server as soon as possible.”

am amazed.

Aging

Found this on the web:

<i>Do you realize that the only time in our lives when we like to get old is when we’re kids? If you’re less than 10 years old, you’re so excited about aging that you think in fractions. How old are you?…. “I’m four and a half “….You’re never 36 and a half….you’re four and a half going on five!

That’s the key. You get into your teens, now they can’t hold you back. You jump to the next number. How old are you? “I’m gonna be 16.” You could be 12, but you’re gonna be 16.

And then the greatest day of your life happens….you become 21. Even the words sound like a ceremony….you BECOME 21…YES!!!

But then you turn 30….ooohhh what happened there? Makes you sound like bad milk….He TURNED, we had to throw him out. There’s no fun now.

What’s wrong?? What changed?? You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, then you’re PUSHING 40…..stay over there, it’s all slipping away……..

You BECOME 21, you TURN 30, you’re PUSHING 40, you REACH 50…..and your dreams are gone.

Then you MAKE IT to 60…..you didn’t think you’d make it!!!!

So you BECOME 21, you TURN 30, you’re PUSHING 40, you REACH 50, you MAKE IT to 60……then you build up so much speed you HIT 70!

After that, it’s a day by day thing. After that, you HIT Wednesday…. You get into your 80’s, you HIT lunch. You TURN 4:30, my grandmother won’t even buy green bananas….it’s an investment you know, and maybe a bad one.

And it doesn’t end there….into the 90’s you start going backwards…. I was JUST 92…

Then a strange thing happens. If you make it over 100, you become a little kid again…. “I’m 100 and a half!!!!”</i>

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