The Perils of FB

Facebook is highly pervasive and because it allows users to make singular spurts of writing, there is very little need to develop the entire thought process into something credible or useful. This is not good if we intend to develop a thinking masses.

The ability to make a proposition and thereafter craft a sustained argument for or against the proposition is an important skill that people ought to develop. Social media like FB (and Twitter and any other simiar kinds) where a singular sentence or utterance is sufficient to pose as a response or entry is particularly disheartening.

Initially, the novelty of it all makes it chic to be a user of FB. Thereafter, one ends up being hooked to FB because it is there. There is almost no such thing as a writer's block on FB because one needs not always begin a conversation. One can easily make a comment on an existing conversation and be noted. In this regard, the attention given to the utterance is in fact a kind of reward to encourage repeated visits to make more of such entries.

By and large, one starts to prefer FB over other forms of social media requiring more writing and less instant gratification (of being noticed). Very soon, we will see arguments made that are of deteriorating quality. This is alarming but until the trend can be reversed or people can overcome their tendency to choose the lazy way out, society risk become stupider and less able to sustain an argument.

Madness

There is so much one can endure... and then some. Some people are suckers for punishment while others thrive doling out stupid requests.

Sweet sweet rainwater...

Singaporeans must be made of sugar and spice and everything nice.

That's why they fall apart in the rain.

They fall down, their cars skid, they get into road traffic accidents, they are scared to touch rain water...

Choices

What's wrong with choice? What's wrong with no choice?

No choice is sometimes easier.

This *has* to go out

This is probably my 5th attempt at publishing something since 2011 began.

Work is not that bad. It's hectic and random but I rather enjoy it because... because. I think it is good to enjoy work and I appreciate things better, especially when I'm in my post-retirement job.

I now understand Mary Poppins better, when she sings,

In every job that's to be done
There is an element of fun
You'll find the fun and snap the job's a game

In every task you undertake
Becomes a piece of cake
A lark, a spree
It's very easy to see...

- excerpt from "A Spoonful of Sugar"

Now, thank god I've not have to resort to the spoonful of sugar or I'll really expand exponentially (given the amount of work to be done).

Still when you are able to toss out career prospects and forget about promotions and ranking and so on and concentrate on getting the job done, you realise you can be in a position to negotiate things far better than before.

Maybe that's why people say we create our own cages. I've broken free and I stay happily free.

Oh yeah oh yeah oh yeah hey...

When I saw the running ticker on Channel News Asia last night about a ferry sinking accident in Mersing/Sibu where 3 Singaporeans died, I laughed out loud and then I cursed.

How bloody stupid, I said.

Then I heard the details in the news bulletin later. Sadly, the details confirmed my suspicions all along.

29 passengers and 2 crew members on a bumboat designed for 12 peeople.

No one donned life jackets.

The ferry sank less than 300 m from the jetty.

So clever lor, Singaporeans.

Aiyah, never mind lah... sunny weather, short distance (to shore). Let's just squeeze a bit. Can one lah.

So "mah fun" (troublesome). No need to wear lah. All of us good swimmers right?

Thank you you, you all lor. For your heroic acts, your insurance covers are all void. Yay...

Man, I'm still seething from their sheer stupidity that I'm not even coherent here.

El stupido Singaporeans. Stupid, dumb, kayu, bodoh, gila, jiak sai tua...

More

What don't go well together...

Christmas

Rebuilding hard disk data from back up system

Making 18 tiramsu

Playing Tap Fish, Tap Fish Exotic, Tap Ranch, Tap Resort Party, GodFinger All Stars, We Farm Safari, and Adventure Bay simultaneously on an iPhone

Planting broccoli on We Farm Safari

Having a mahjong game after a steamboat dinner

Sleeping till 10 am

Undone laundry

The day after Boxing Day.

What I really really want...

[This post is inspired by Quinsy. I had wanted to reply to her FB post but as I wrote, I decided defacing my own blog would be more appropriate than her FB account. So here goes.]

If I were a woman, what do I really really want?

Is it love?

No. I want three things: Money, sexual satisfaction, and companionship. What can a man provide? All three? Unlikely. So how?

Well, we call it "phases".

As with all critical events analysis, there is a tipping point or key lever that holds the entire picture together. Looking at the three things, what will that key lever be?

Let's begin with a few simple questions:

1. Can companionship get you money?

2. Can sexual satisfaction get you money?

3. Can money get you companionship?

Ok, these are not meant to be answered out loud. Supposing you can't get more than one thing, which one of the three will greatly help you towards the other two?

Again, I don't expect an answer.

My point is simple: identify the key lever, milk it for what it is worth, then pursue your other interests.

There was an article some time ago that said that modern man - sexist, I know - should have at least three marriages. One to help him in his career, one to get him his family, and one to see him into old age and death. The key idea is "phases", consecutive marriages. It's not concurrent. I've got to make this clear, lest I'll be stoned for promoting polygamy - I did not, I do not, and I will not.

So once one knows what one's priorities are, it'll become much easier.

No?

Email Repopulation

My hard disk crashed and I've lost all your email addresses.

If you wish to be back in my mailing list, please send me an empty message so I can restore your email addresses in my address book.

Many thanks.

Facebook

While I have set up an account yesterday, the account will remain largely dormant for a simple reason: My private life is not for all to see.

I will add you if you make a request.

I will use FB only be for staying abreast with information.

Wikileaks

Would you like it if the records of what you had spoken with another person were hacked and then exposed to the world?

I don't think you will like it very much. If you do, then why do you make such a big fuss if I read your diary or your phone messages?

And I am a singular audience. How would you like it if I told all my friends what the messages were about? Worse, if I get to selectively show to the world the worst of you to totally discredit you, would you embrace that?

If not, then why can Wikileaks be acceptable? How can there be blatant disregard of communicative engagement?

This entry is either preaching to the choir or drawing immediate resistance. Few people would understand the folly and maliciousness of these acts until they become victims themselves.

There is a place for secrets and the unspoken. There is an even larger place for privacy.

The only place to take a leak, to me, is the toilet.

Life on a Plate

Plate 1: Mound of rice with a single meat and vegetable dish.

Plate 2: Pile of rice with two meat and vegetable dishes.

Plate 3: Some rice with one meat dish, two meat and vegetable dishes, and one fish dish.

There are of course variations on what can go on the plate with its accompanying variable amount of rice. But one glance at the plate of each diner walking away from the rice stall in Thailand tells a story. A story of relative affluence mixed with absolute hunger.

Rich or poor, hunger treats everyone equally. But sadly, the poorer often have to go hungrier.

Genius is unparalled

As I had expected, it was not a B773 aircraft that was deployed on the service.

It was an oil guzzling B744. Narrowest seats in the wide body range. Workhorse of the industry, reliever of demand on busy routes, panacea of sorts.

Thank god for the two hour flight. The last time I was on an SQ B744 to JFK, I swear I was a hair's breadth away from mid air rage. Ok, maybe half a hair's breadth.

I've got an aisle seat this time. Let's see if this can get any worse.

Dark clouds overhang the skies at Changi Airport. Let the bumps begin.

Guess who's going on a holiday?

Momo.

Another Trip

Leisure trip to Bangkok this time. 8 to 12 Dec.

TG aircraft has not arrived yet; on paper it is supposed to be a B773. Big bird, and hopefully comfortable too. And I just realised Garuda Indonesia has a new livery on its planes.

Air Seychelles has two seagulls (?) painted on each side of its tail. Permanent bird strikes? :)

Let's have some air turbulence!

Example of an Imperialist Pighead

Given it two days but still could not let it go. Not because I am still angry - I'm not - or I had to vent - I don't. I just wanted to make a record of the day I successfully made good use of my size to jettison some white trash.

Stew Art Bow Ye (name changed to protect the innocent - me) was in the wrong plane seat. I know, since I had seen his boarding pass.

Ye was in the wrong plane seat. And nothing gets me goat more than an unwelcome passenger in a supposedly empty seat. And then it gets worse.

Ye was on his cell phone even after the crew told all passengers to turn off their cell phones and all transmitting equipment. Ye was a self-important, self-absorbed British boor who had no qualms speaking out loud about how people will make things happen if they deem the project important enough. He was sending text messages to no end. Even as the plane was finally taking off - after an hour-and-a-half of delay - he was checking his phone for text messages! Why? Was it so important if a message came in now? What difference would it have made, Ye? Were you simply going to reply to that message?

Ye was a dirty sod - that's the word - who had no qualms putting his lanky feet up against the panel at the plane's bulk head, high up! Never mind if infant bassinets were hung there if there were young'uns on board. Never mind if his moccasins were dirty and marking. Never mind if he had already stained the plastic frame of the 10-inch personal inflight entertainment personal that he had to rub off the stains with his thumbs. (Payback came rapidly as he ate peanuts off those crappy hands and washed them down with Tiger beer.)

While it took me a while to square how the airline actually left empty seats between each block of three seats but yet my block of three were fully occupied but the right hand block only had ONE passenger. Before I had that squared, I tolerated Ye. I shared the almost non-existent arm rest between us, never mind I had a full one on the aisle side.

Epiphany came not long after. His seat printed on the boarding pass is 31K. That meant Ye had not a chance of sitting in seat 31E. Knowing my trump card, I marched up to the galley where the attendants were and asked them if they could evict Ye from the seat not meant for him. I immediately knew they were painted into a corner by my request.

A senior male attendant immediately apologised for not being able to make him move and in a bid to pacify me asked if I could like a seat change. Ha! That rubbed me the wrong way. Why should I change my seat when I was in my rightful seat. I was not asking for a seat change. I was asking for a potential-murderer-in-practice to get out of my "elite uncaring face". Oh wait, it should be "elite concerned face".

So I turned the request on its head and asked to know if the flight manifest listed the seat as taken. If it were - see the use of tenses here - I would share my airspace and arm rest. If it was not, then I know my rights. And I walked back to my seat.

Man, I felt so goddamn righteously aggrieved, if there were this feeling. I did not give two (raised left middle finger) (raised right middle finger) expletive. Actually, knowledge is greatly empowering. And I was either too tired or too sure I was going to win this, I was hardly angry or perturbed. On my way back to my seat, I even joked to a friend seated a handful of rows behind me that I was taking back my flight information region (aka airspace). She asked why I would not change a seat and I replied matter-of-factly; because I did not have to.

I went back and I began with taking back more than half the arm rest. Thereafter, the female attendant whom I first spoke to came, bent over and said, "Mr Tan, that is not his seat." I thanked her.

Thereafter, I (I bet if Ye kept a blog or some social media thingy, he would have called me a Chinese Chauvinistic Pig, emphasis on pig, I believe) began the personal civil war that would have made America proud. Except I'm not American. But you get the drift.

Subtly but forcefully, I regained my airspace. He ceded and retreated, retracted and yielded but how much can you shrink into a cattle class seat when you are more than 6 feet tall? I began taking back my full arm rest and after dinner, I slept and leaned towards the middle seat. He slinked further inwards and I stretched further out. Before I knew it, the seat was empty.

Victory was mine! In the first place, Ye should have simply taken his own seat, or tried his luck taking the aisle seat on his side. Few people would take kindly to having some dope fill up the empty middle seat. I bet Ye's intention was to place his feet on the bulk head board. I think airlines should charge these people who intentionally do that cleaning charges. But that's for the airlines to decide. I just feel sorry for the babies who had to be near those boards.

Now, all these being said, if the flight were full, I would have played by the rules, shared and be nice to all arseholes on the flight who should have taken either the flight before or after.

Two things stand out in this episode:

1. Airlines should retain the right to make passengers return to their assigned seats.

2. Monitoring of use of cellphones and transmitting equipment should either be made obsolete (if deemed unnecessary) or stringently enforced. Why enforce a requirement with mere lip service?

Moral of the story: If you want to play punk, find someone your own size and IQ.

There are nine million...

... bicycles in Beijing.

So the song goes. But no. I think there are now nine gazillion cars in Beijing. Trust me. Nine million bicycles was so last millennium.

Anyway, I'll be in Beijing from 29 Nov to 3 Dec. Hopefully the last work trip for 2010.

One sign of being swamped

When you are planning an official work trip, you dread the trip to high heavens; when you are finally on that official trip, you dread the return to high heavens.

Common idea: High heavens.

Psychoanalytical equivalent: Too much work to handle, all stacked up.

At least that is what I think.

Walking on thin ice

Feels that way five days a week.

The incessant screaming and scolding, even if not meant for you, are unnerving.

And that's only the top molecule of the ice berg.

There are times when the heart decides it is best to turn into a hard little hailstone and attempt to destroy everything in its path until the sun rises to melt it.

Yet there are times when even as a hard little hailstone, the heart is no less fragile as a snowflake. Each little hailstone takes a unique shape, just like the snowflake, but each uglier than the one before.

All around, there is laughter, care and concern. Even if there is no (platonic) love, there is empathy and resonance. Yet there is one corner that such tenderness does not reach.

I am not feeling particularly happy and my body is telling me it is not particularly happy. I can cut through my stress with a knife but at no time is the stress from me. It is from around me.

And yet there is scant I can do...

Quantitative Easing Explained