neverforeverdotnet

They decided it would be funny to do this to my niece. And it was.

Gary :: Aug.31.2006 :: Funny, A thousand words, General :: No Comments »

Is the rainy season here already?

Woke this morning to a curtain of rain outside my window. From 29 floors up, it’s all silent and everything just looks blanketed in a thick grey fog. No doubt there’ll be reports later of fallen trees and flash flooding all over the island.

How’s one supposed to get to work in this? I think Jack Johnson got it right when he suggested staying in bed with banana pancakes, but I can’t… I’m an SQL slave.

Gary :: Aug.31.2006 :: General :: 3 Comments »

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30 Aug 06 @ 2042Hrs: Updated with a pdf of the comments on Fark so far. Download.

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I was on my way to work this afternoon (yes, I know it’s a Sunday) when I chanced upon a strange thing lying on the grass verge lining the footpath leading to my office.

It was a little piece of A4-sized cardboard, with what seemed to be some code scribbled on it. When I first saw it, it took every bit of willpower I could muster to resist picking it up, but apparently it wasn’t enough, and 50m down the path I gave in and did a quick about-turn to retrieve it.

Here it is:

The fact that this was scrawled on a piece of cardboard then carelessly discarded beside a busy footpath rather than sealed in a vault on triple-redundant hard disks leads me gently to the assumption that it - if a code - is probably some form of simple monoalphabetic substitution cipher. Polyalphabetic at most.

Here’s what I gather upon initial inspection:

• The spaces look natural I’ve changed my mind. There seems to be too many five-letter words.
• Some “words” don’t have vowels, lowering the chance of this being some transposition scheme. Besides, what sort of word is “CCBA”?
• The handwriting looks shaky and uncertain, but is consistent. The work of a child? Maybe. Kinda rules out 256-bit AES.

The bottom line is that my gut feeling tells me this is breakable, if it’s anything at all. I shall give it a go one of these days and let you folks know what happens. In the meantime, any of you want to have a go at it programmatically, here’s the text for your convenience:

CCBA DAHIJ EFGABI
BICGHG BACHEFG CBA
HCIBCG FECAB BBCEG
AIBG DE GGJC BEGD
GFHABA JCGEF BCDEF
IIGHCA ECCFG DEJJJ
HICEF ICBCA AAFFG CJ
EGA BCADD BBAI DJJ

UPDATE: Alex pointed out that the chinese words scribbled in blue at the top, “Xian Xin Liang Ku” (闲心良苦) could well be a taunt. It’s a take on a common Chinese phrase “Yong Xin Liang Ku” (用心良苦) which loosely means that someone has given a lot of thought or put a lot of effort into something. “Xian Xin” here means “an idle heart / mind”.

UPDATE: Whamdangler from TotalFark pointed out that the second word is “JIHAD” spelt backwards. Coincidence?
Also, he sez “2210 30789 456018 182676 1027456 210 728126 54201 11246 0816 34 6692 1463 657010 92645 12345 886720 42256 34999 78245 82120 00556 29 460 12033 1108 399

That’s the code in numbers, if anyone cares. Note, it’s 0-9 instead of 1-10″

UPDATE: I_C_Weener from TotalFark figures, “My guess is its a substitution cipher, but after each substitution, you rotate to the next letter.
So, the first time, J = A, and the second time you see J, it = B. That is how you have words with 2 or 3 of the same letter.
But, if I deciphered it for you, where would be the fun.
Here is a hint: The first line is ‘For a good time call….’”

UPDATE: Micheal Slater has kindly recommended this frequency-analysis tool. I’ll give it a shot and see if anything turns up.

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In other news:

On my way home from work, I alighted at Outram Park and crossed the road via the overhead bridge in order to catch a bus home. On the stairs leading down from the bridge was this woman dressed in a pink spag-strap top and really short, thin shorts. She was… erm… oversized. She was also desparately grabbing at her arse in an effort to remove a wad of panty-cloth which had become stuck between those huge cheeks. She dug and yanked all the way down the stairs, her lopsided waddle imparting unto her thighs secondary motion usually only associated with pachyderms or various porcine beasts.

She dug and yanked all the way to the bus stop.

If they made a documentary about her it could be titled Cellulite on Celluloid, but they’d need IMAX film to do it.

Pass the eye bleach please.

Gary :: Aug.27.2006 :: Bitchin', All the news that's fit to print, w00t!, Crypto :: 6 Comments »

Gary :: Aug.27.2006 :: Entertainment, WTF :: No Comments »

I have just started work, coding at Singtel for at least the next year. Naturally there will be a noticable decrease in updates but hey, I haven’t left. =)

Bear with me yeah? Will try my best to at least link to some interesting shit from time to time…

Love you folks.
XOXO

Gary :: Aug.23.2006 :: General :: No Comments »

This woman does nothing but the “bare” minimum when it comes to magic. Which goes to show you can get away with anything - it’s all in the presentation…

Not. Safe. For. Work.

Gary :: Aug.23.2006 :: WTF :: No Comments »

This guy is phenomenal! Enjoy…

Gary :: Aug.19.2006 :: Music, 1337, General, w00t! :: No Comments »

The ASUS WL700gE comes with - check this -

• 128-bit WPA2
• built-in iTunes server (making your music collection readily available across the LAN)
• embedded bittorent client
• embedded ftp server
• embedded http server
• 160 GB harddisk (in other words, your router can download shit for you)
• USB 2.0 port for expandable storage - thumbdrives, portable HDDs and the like
• RAID capability
• internal power adaptor
• and more…

Before this, I guess the only way to get something like that would be to set up a linux box with multiple network adaptors running smoothwall or something…

This makes me wanna sell off my WRT54G… Check it out here.

Gary :: Aug.15.2006 :: 1337, Tech, w00t! :: No Comments »

The most awesome cover you’ll hear today. I guarantee it.

Hey Ya - originally by Outkast - redone by Mat Weddle of Obadiah Parker.

The starting’s got this whole slick John Mayer / Jason Mraz-type feel to it, and things only get better from there. Clear acoustics, great voice, great arrangement. If this guy had a single I’d mail order it.

Gary :: Aug.13.2006 :: Entertainment, Music, 1337 :: 2 Comments »

…this Wikipedia article used to be titled exactly that, until some PC idiot recently changed its title to Heavy Metal in Muslim Majority Countries.

Since getting itself listed on Fark, the title of the article is not all that has seen a few changes in the past few hours. For example, just a while back, someone changed this:

“The government believes the music causes teens to become disrespectful to parents and elderly, as well as lowering their respect for religion.”

To this:

“The government believes the music causes teens to not have sex with camels and become disrespectful to parents and elderly, as well as lowering their respect for religion.”

Which later became this:

(Click for full)

then this:

(Click for full)

Heh. After a brief edit-war, the article is now locked.

Why am I telling you this? Because it’s my blog, and I’ll post any damn thing I want.

Gary :: Aug.12.2006 :: Bitchin', Funny, Good readin', pwned :: 1 Comment »