Saved by my Palm

This happened last Saturday. Whilst waiting at the lights past Merdeka Square, a proton with three arseholes in it decided to ignore the double lines and tried to squeeze into my lane. A quick toot with my horn to voice my displeasure, gained a rather unpleasant result. Whilst they were right by my drivers side window, they strated hurling insults and were very angry. Their mothers must have not b-reast fed them when they were babies, resulting in the sort of uncouth behaviour fit for neanderthals!

Anyways, the lights changed, and they proceeded to continue to try and cut me off. So I decided to speed up. Blew them away travelling down past Jalan Bangsar past the old train station. However, as my intended destination was Brickfields, I was attending a funeral of all things, I was again caught up in traffic turning left into Brickfields. They stop right behind me, and one of them got out, walked to my car and continued urging me out of the car, hurling abuses, and also hitting my passenger side window. No real damage, but was rather unpleasant. Lights had changed, so I pressed on.. whilst they followed.

They managed to get in front of me, as I was making calls to my friends who were also attending the funeral. We got caught up at another set of traffic lights, and they were threathening to reverse into my car. One of them, practically had his whole scrawny body sticking out of the rear window, continuing to hurl abuses at me and telling me to pull over.

Then it dawned on me.. I had a palm with a camera attached. Why not take their pictures? At least i would have some photographic eveidence if this turned uglier! When the idiot who had his head poking out of the window realised that I was taking his picture.. he ducked right back in.

Suddenly, they did not seem so confrontational anymore! Another one of the arses came out with his camera phone to also take picture, as if to say.. we have a camera too! When the lights turned green, they sped off!


They drive a PROTON WIRA - JEB 5313!

If any of you are a cop or a person with any authority, please help put these specimens back into the pit they crawled out of.

My first Voice Over

You know how you say.. "those radio voice-overs.. always the same people.. (like Joe Hasham and company..) can't they find newer talent?" No? hahaha.. oh well..

I did my first Voice Over work last Wednesday. It all started innocently enough when I was at a studio for a Christmas jingle recording for Ritz Carlton. We had to sing or rather hum "I'll be home for Christmas" which was easy enough. Did a multitrack, which made 4 of us sound like a much much bigger choir. We even improvised extra parts. Just when I thought we were finished, the Creative Director and the Client asked me if I would like to try out for the Voice Over bit? Me.. me? But it says Joe Hasham on the script!

Well I did it.. so hear out for it over Light and Easy these coming weeks... and tell me what you think.. but be gentle.

Feeling Crabby

Funny how you don't eat something for a long time, and then all of a sudden all you seem to do is eating it all the time. Grin.. It all started in Semporna, where we had a sumptious seafood dinner there, with crabs as the highlight. It was good, getting your hands dirty again. Then wham! We have crabs again a few weeks later in Klang, then more crab at home, and then this weekend we were introduced to a restaurant in Jalan Imbi.

When we first arrived, every neuron in my brain shouted, "GET OUT!" Why? Well, the place was totally empty, and we all know the rules... the more patrons.. the better the food. I am very very glad we did not make a run for it, because, they served up the most excellent crab dish I have had in eons! Complete with dry toated bread to soak up the spicy crab sauce.. They should really bottle the stuff! It would make excellent dip. Thank you very much Chris! Next time we go there.. the meals on me.

New Blog Alert

My Cousin Andrew has started his own blog. He lives in Seattle. Go check his site out. The link is on the sidebar.

Wet Wet Wet

This is the most rain i have encountered in recent memory. It has been raining without fail for weeks! The worse part of rain is it makes my car really dirty! And washing it is just a perverse way of wasting money. But like any good car owner, I continue to keep it clean. I even sent my car for a thorough clean on Monday. Had the guys at my regular car grooming shop give it a good polish and a wax job, as well as to clean the upholstery. Sigh.. I did not even get a chance to enjoy my gleaming, almost new looking car, because it started raining cats and dogs before they finished! Oh well.. I console myself by saying it is good thing i had waxed the car, because it will extend its paint life. Yeah... right!

We had a great seafood lunch today with Lisa, Kok Loon, Nigel, Allan, Chris and Chui today in Klang. What an adventure, meeting at the side of the highway to convoy to a restaurant somewhere in Klang. Why an adventure you might ask? Well.. none of us knew exactly where we were going. The blind leading the blind. However, we are proud to annouce that we made it there for a great meal. The crab dish was excellent! We then proceeded back to Bumpsar for ice-cream, Thanks, Allan and Nigel for the treat! Off course, on the way back from Klang, it rained.

Sing Song and Virgin Vibes

My son called me up the other day at 6am his local time, making his half asleep mother dial the numbers and all. He was very excited as he had learnt a new song. Now, my son has until recently been half deaf due to damage to his ear drums caused by a serious illness a few years ago. He had recently undergone surgery to repair his damaged ear drums and has since recovered most of his hearing. He has been not exactly a lark learning to pray, I was worried for a while that he had gotten his mother's singing genes. Well.. he called and said "Dad, I learnt a new song!" And he proceeded to sing. I was very pleasantly surprised that he sang the whole song, lyrics and all in tune and in the same key!! I was so happy to learn of his new found vocal prowess, I could not even remember the name of the song that he sang, only that it was a Christmas song. Cool! There is hope.

Cousin Jade and her boyfriend were walking down the street in Brisbane, when they spotted Richard Branson. Jade whispered to her boyfriend.. look its Richard Branson, to whom he replied; who?? Hmmm.. he needs to read more papers..

Anyways, she goes "its Richard Branson of Virgin!", to which he very loudly replied, "He is a 50 some VIRGIN??" And this was within earshot of the fellow! Nyuk nyuk.. Poor sod.

The Trilogy of Mumbo Jumbo

Either the Waichowski brothers operate on a higher plane or they simply cannot resolve their own mumbo jumbo, that is the Matrix universe.

I expected resolve from the final instalment of the Matrix trilogy, but I was sorely disappointed as many questions remain unanswered and in fact, they introduced even more unanswered questions into the mix, such as Agent Smith calling the Oracle "Mother" suggesting that the Oracle was in fact the creator of Agent Smith. And after scouring the net for better enlightenment, I can come to only one conclusion.

They intend to do more Matrix movies. They have intentionally left enough questions unanswered to merit another movie. Sigh.. The only thing which is answered, is GREED. Make more movies.. make more money.

Microgooglesoft??

Arghhh.. I just read that Google and Microsoft are planning to merge! All I can say is this.. ITS THE END of another era.

i can see it now..

Announcing Microgooglesoft

A super duper enhanced search engine forund directly on your Windows XP and its free! Get up to 10 searched items a day. You wanna go deeper?

Register today for the enhanced version Microgooglesoft XP for only $29.99 and enjoy unlimited searches!

Sigh....

Pains in the Neck!

The dreadful feeling started early yesterday morning. I felt it.. and experience told me that it was the start of a full blown stiff neck. Pain number one. My darling gave me a back rub last night, but helped little in abating the pain in the neck I feel right now. My actions have become robotic again, only 3 to 4 days after recovering from my last back ache! Looks like another visit to my suddenly rich masseuse (Chui and I have already spent RM150 this month alone for relief). Looks like another RM50 gone!

Pain in the Neck Two. My favourite Client, decided late last Thursday evening to run a tribute ad to our out going PM in a local newspaper supplement with the material deadline set at 5pm Monday. Aiks! What? Are they mad? Okay.. no need to panic. We have been down this road before. Just give us a brief, let us know what you want, and we can work over the weekend to meet the deadline. But... no! It is already too late in the evening (this is still thursday), to give you a brief.. we will meet Monday (since Friday is a public holiday and being a long weekend we don't want to work) morning amongst ourselves, and decide a direction to take. WHAT?!

Monday morning comes.. precious time ticks away... and finally at about 11 am, we get the brief. Make us 4 new ads, for us to choose from! Hmm.. what was wrong with the ad that we had already done much earlier for a cancelled supplement in the AWSJ? Nope.. the committee decided that we want another ad. Okay.. So we get our direction, and we go make some ads. Luckily, this was one time where we got a rather clear route from them to take. We had the ads done by 1.30pm, and they were sent to the clients for clearing.

Time ticks away again...

At about 4pm.. they call. "We want the original ad afterall!" "That is the one which we will use". Ok. Cool. Lets get the film makers in. They have less than 1 hour to get the films done and delivered! Those in the know, will tell you that it is quite impossible to do. Afterall, it still takes time for travelling through and fro and so on. Many calls are made to plea for an extension in deadline.

FA is done, film makers have collected the CD containing the masters and they are off at 4.30pm. Hmm.. Phew.. it will be late.. but at least its done. Right?

WRONG!

We got call after call from the clients to make changes.. not big huge changes mind you, but rather small, insipid and idiotic changes that frankly, would have made no difference to the ad! For example. "Make logo bigger!" OK.. fine.. typical request.. So.. how much bigger? 10% bigger? No.. that will be too much.. "make it 2% bigger!" What? 2%? Sheesssh.. What kind of difference is that going to make?

Off course.. all these changes have to be made remotely. My colour separator has to make these changes on the master on his side. There is simply no more time available to make another commute to collect fresh FAs! They must have made at least 3 sets of redundant materials before the stupid need to make changes abated at about 5.30! Jeeez.. What else can possibly go wrong?!

Never ask for you may receive! Pain in the Neck Number Three!

PM leaves office on the 31st. DPM takes over on the 1st. We cannot have a tribute to the outgoing PM without a welcome to the new? Uhuh!!!

"We need another ad guys!" We cannot brief you till tomorrow.. Its already to late this evening to do it, besides.. its ramadan, we need to go break fast! And by the way.. the material deadline is Wednesday at 5pm....

ITS A NIGHTMARE! Actually no.. ITS PAINs IN THE NECK!

Bangsar?

I propose a new name for Bangsar. As I was driving down Bangsar today, I noticed that they have just constructed three new speed breakers along my favorite route. This is on top of the 500 breakers found here. As though the many road irregularities and the constant road work scars are not enough to make a rather unpleasant journey into and out of bangsar, they have to put up more of these really badly engineered mountains that test the best suspension systems on the best cars. Maybe its got to do with the proliferation of SUVs on the roads today. Hmm.. I wonder which came first.. the SUV of the road mountains? Maybe it is a conspiracy. Who knows..

Alll I do know, is that Bangsar shall be forever be renamed Bumpsar from now on, at least in my books!

The Joys of iChat AV

Just spent 20 minutes catching up with another cousin of mine who resides in Seattle using Apple's incredible iChat AV. Pity I did not have iSight (av cam) but we still managed to do a voice chat. The quality was excellent, we both had no problems hearing each other. I must say it sounded almost as good as a normal telephone call. Great thing about this set-up? Its FREE!

Now.. I will make it my next project to get Asha and Ben hooked up as well. This way.. we should be able to have voice chats at the very least. South Africa is actually very far behind the internet curve as they still have no infrastructure for iDSL or any other broadband service which is required for video chats.

Council of Cousins

Allan and Nigel hosted the inaugaral meeting of the cousins. We have family meets/dinners/parties all the time but we have never had one that was just for the "next generation". It was actually really nice, as it was a lot more comfortable for all of us to speak our minds and chit chat about stuff that would be taboo if the adults were around. We must do this again.

Nigel cooked up a storm, serving us nasi dagang, with a pork curry, char siew and a stewy vegetable dish. Thanks bro!

My back is still killing me. Its not as bad to be sure as it was on Sunday, but its still bugging me. Still walking around like I have something stuck up my arse. Highly irritating.

Just got me self a spanking new Hard Drive and spent the better part of yesterday evening moving files and old documents and backing them up. Maybe its just me.. but my computer seems to work a little faster after the move. Grin.. Was trying to convince my partners for me to get my number one object of lust, the new 15inch Powerbook, but he has persuaded me to wait a while for what would definately top it.. A G5 Powerbook! Yummy.. Unfortunately, I will have a bit of a wait as Steve Jobs reckons they will only get the G5 chipset into a Powerbook late next year.

Can't wait!

Growing Old

Played Footsal on Saturday. Was invited to this rather last minute game by my uncle who arranged a friendly match between some very old farts versus some friends of his young son. I remember the time when i was younger, and how we had trashed the hell out of our older uncles in soccer. I know know exactly how my uncles must have felt to be run around in circles by the younger set!

To my dismay, I threw my back out playing. The pain was horrible, so much so, I could not walk for practicaly the whole weekend. I could not even sleep that night! Sigh...

Ramblings

Its been a while since my last post. Many many things have happened since. We went Diving in Mabul/Sipadan. I caught the flu bug. Michael Schumacher became World Champion for the 6th time! England scraped through a scrappy match against Turkey.

Sipadan was wonderful. The resort that we were staying at was first class, with all the amenities any diver would ask for. The service was excellent also and the people there very friendly. Go check out some pictures that I managed to take with a housed Canon IXUS400, at http://homepage.mac.com/dyap38/PhotoAlbum2.html

The camera fared better than I had expected underwater, giving quite good results. The instant feedback was also very beneficial. Only drawback to the set-up was that the lens was prone to fogging, due to the excessive heat generated from the camera itself.

Most of the people who went on the trip has become more enthusiastic about diving than before they went, wich is a good thing. Trips are already being planned next year!

Scarlet Fever

Liverpool lost to Charlton. Sigh..

But.. The Ferrari in the capable hands of Michael Schumacher won a thrilling race in Indianapolis, in a wet then dry then wet again race which saw Montoya lose the championship race. At least Kimi is still in it finishing second, but will need a minor miracle to secure his first drivers crown, as Schumi only needs one more point to become the most successful F1 Driver of all time!

Walking miles chasing a little white ball!

Just finished playing a round of golf! First time I played a round since 2001! It was fun. Wish I had a better tee off, otherwise I would have played to a much lower score. I beat Freddie though.. which was cool, since he plays all the time and is much more consistant.. hmm.. maybe it was the handicap (he gave me a stroke a hole except par 3s). Hahaha.. guess I will lose strokes the next time I play with him. Even managed ONE par! Not too bad considering I teed off like a idiot. Put it this way.. i was a fringe player, as in my ball ended up on the fringes of the course all the way.. Till next time.. FORE!!!

Objects of Lust

Not the regular curvy kind mind you, though it cannot be said that I do not like the feminine touches, like any red blooded man.

Just launched is the Apple Powerbook G4 15" Aluminiumbook! Ma-ma mia.. its fully loaded and I declare it my latest object of lust, right next to my desire to bed Rachel Weisz. Go check it out for yourselves at www.apple.com. Question is now what do I do with my former biggest-object-of-lust, my kinda aging Titanium Powerbook. Any takers out there?

Now, if Apple will only debut a new iPOD with built in recording before Christmas. Yum.

Monkeys off my Back

Had a presentation to do today. A pitch for an advertising campaign for a new housing development which I have been working all week on. Cannot really say if I will get the account or not as we were competing against 3 other agencies. Here is to hoping. Will be good for next years bottomline.

Also completed printing the KLSE Market Review document. This was a rather painful exercise taking too much time and to much blood and sweat and tears. To be honest, it is not something I relish doing again. Just a case of taking too long.

Looking forward to a great weekend.

Difficult Times

My son who has been back for the past 4 weeks will be going back to South Africa with his mother tomorrow night. He has grown and matured so much since he was last in KL a year ago. I will miss him dearly. I have not spent as much time as I would have liked to while he was in KL due to many reasons, some work, and others personal.

Let me tell you that it is extremely difficult to understand the goings on in my own heart (I cannot understand it either). On one hand, I would have liked to have spent every minute I could have with him. On the other hand, my heart breaks everytime he leaves, and this has caused me, to in a small way distance myself. It is a sad state of affairs. I know it is silly, but it is the way I feel. I cannot help it.

Benjamin is 6. He lives with his mother who is lives with her new mate in Johannesburg. To be honest, I am very glad that Ben has had this opportunity to live abroad, to learn and experience life otherwise alien to him if he was stuck here in KL. The tradeoff is that I do not get to see him very often. I missed his first bike ride, his first swim without his floaters and much more. It hurts to think that I missed these fatherly duties, but remain proud, as any father would, that he has grown. Kudos to Martin and Asha! He is trully a remarkable kid. Polite and well behaved. Eats all his vegetables to! Sigh.. how I will miss the little tyke.

The goodnews is; Asha plans to visit again during Christmas. I hope it all goes well and as planned.

I love him. And he will always remain in my heart.

HELLO GECKO

Heh heh... blog expert am I --- NOT!

Just Added Comments

Whats the point of just reading when you can post your comments. Its human nature afterall to have opinions. So, by all means, comment away! It will be great to hear from you.

Darn. Just tried watching the film. Guess what. Its a pay site! Not that I am totally adverse to paying or anything, but I have to be a citizen of the UK. And unfortunately, being a Mac user, unable to view the film anyway as I need to be on a WINTEL platform. Sigh.. To bad.

Whilst many potray me correctly or in-correctly as a tech savvy person, I am indeed not. I love toys and such, many of which are quite high tech. However, when it comes to things like this blog for instance, I am but a infant in a strange world. Luckily for me this blogging is quite easy.

Chui, my girlfriend, has just alerted me to http://www.thisisnotalovesong.co.uk/ an online film developed for the internet. Just watched the trailer, and to be honest, I haven't the faintest clue as to what the movie was all about. The production values are pretty decent however and the camera and editing work is very gritty. Pretty cool. Will probably spawn a thousand independant film makers to use this route to get their films aired and viewed no doubt. Some films will probably even be future Cairnes winners.

Will go download the whole movie soon and I shall be back with a full review.

Blogging? What's this? Why bother?

I have always wanted to keep a diary of the goings on in my life. Maybe this is the avenue I have been looking for. I guess doing so will keep friends and relatives far and near updated. Something I am desperately lousy at doing and hope I will be able to keep this up.