The girls go shopping again... SKC "Hong Bao" Dog Show '06.

Q-tip stares at the shop sign and imagines the possibilities...

I'm jus' a l'il dawg. How d'ya expect me to make such decisions? 

Minister's pre-flag-off spiel. 

Every car has his accompanying race-queens. 

M2 gets his first taste of vinyl body artwork. 

My team, comprising June, me, M2, Vince and NBS.

Anthony and gang in the M3. 

Edit 01:
Saturday began early -- for the chance to win $10k "worth of prizes" in the TD car rally. Not sure if it was the dangling carrot that was our main motivation, but I'm certain that my team looked more forward to spending some quality time with each other, doing stuff we would not normally be doing.

There were 5 stations in all, scattered around the island. As each location represented a different aspect of Total Defence, there were 5 different kinds of activities for us to accomplish. There was a bonus activity: a scavenger hunt for various small articles that added to our overall total.

Station 1 was the NTUC in Marine Parade where we had to buy items for a personal emergency kit without exceeding the cost of the $20 voucher found in our clue package. Here, budget shoppers, June and NBS proved their mettle and we got everything on the list, plus the bonus items as well. Theme: Psychological Defence.

The URA Building was our next destination. Basically a scavenger hunt for information scattered around the numerous exhibits and displays on 3 floors dedicated to the organization's PR dept. We didn't do so well here, only completing about half the quiz paper before time ran out. We could have been better organized as a team, but the exercise was somewhat boring anyway. So much for Economic Defence.

The Civil Defence Training Centre was Station 3. Vince and June aced the CPR exercise, while NBS and I amazed our assessors by putting out the fire in our test pan almost at the instant they started their stopwatches. All I was thinking about was that I really needed to use the bathroom -- fast -- and that somehow translated into a more powerful jet from our extinguisher. Ha ha.

Vince and I were almost a complete washout at SAFTI, though. In the indoor electronic shooting range, he scored 2 out of 35 targets with his M16, while I, with a SAW, got absolute zip. I had always wanted to shoot a SAW ("Guns & Ammo" once billed it as the Best Light-Machine Gun in the World a long time ago) so I jumped at the chance. But looking through the apature immediately dried my eyes and my vision went foggy. So I just pointed the weapon at whatever seemed to be moving and randomly sprayed rounds hoping to hit something. Guess that didn't work. No wonder I'm no longer serving NS. Sigh.

The final station was back at the starting point, ECP. Here we, as a team, had to score as many goals as possible in 120 secs. against a lone defender from the junior squad of the SAF S-league soccer team. Despite the lack of experience amongst half our team members, we still managed to score 2 goals, which was ok, I suppose.

All through the route, we stopped to pick up all kinds of rubbish to complete the long list of side-quest items, but we didn't really put our heart and soul into trying to get every single thing on the list, like Anthony's team did. Learning point: photos or reasonable facsimiles of the objects on the list are just as acceptable as the actual objects themselves. Keep that in mind for next year.

No, we didn't win. But we got some nice souvenirs for participating, including a hydration backpack each. Could be useful for 'blading. Maybe if NBS doesn't want hers she can give it to JY?

Celebrated the end of a long day at Swensen's, J8. Phew.
----------------------------------

Woke up at 5am on the floor of the study. Had some pix to upload of Saturday's Total Defence ExplOrally (that's "Explo-rally," not "Expl-orally"), but the day's adventures must have taken quite a toll on me. A short rest to clear my head turned into a 6 hour delta-state affair, in which I had the most bizarre dreams.

Am now famished. Need breakfast. NOW. Pix will follow, perhaps later today.

Still hee hawing my way through. Stayed on campus till late, editing stories for the NY-X print edition with Vince and Amy until Auntie really, really had to lock up and go home. We broke for dinner at Cartel, Gardens, then off home for further editing, still keeping in contact with the two by MSN. And that was just last night!

After barely 2-3 hours sleep, we're back on campus rushing the final edits before submission to the printers.

This donkey is so lucky to have such willing assistance from two great pals and he is grateful.

We finished the final edits early this evening, and now the roughs are with the printer, ready for a more professional layout job, though I daresay we did a reasonably credible job struggling with MS Word as a layout programme. We've worked like mad, and there were lots of silly, frustrating obstacles throwing up unexpected panic moments, but we survived.

My only regret is that we didn't specify for some of our Journalism students to be attached to us as we worked so they'd see for themselves how many steps and processes their stories have to go through before it appears, as if by magic, on A3 newsprint.

The students have to learn to take over the job from us, leh. It is their paper, after all!

Well, NY conneXions issue #3 is up and running! Half the stories this week were written by our JC1 reporters so, hey, welcome aboard! As usual, I'll put a link here for easy reference.

If things go according to plan, we'll be migrating the site to a new server [and launching a new look too!] by 21 Feb, so this issue should be the last one with any ties to "The Red Pill" which shall be finally put to rest after a troubled existence.

Don't know what the originators of the Red Pill think of how their brainchild has morphed over the last few years, but I hope the spirit behind the concept still lives on in NY-X.

Since yesterday's online update, I've already started editing for next week's PRINT edition. Yup. Next week, NY-X gets a limited dead-tree run. Because of the complexities of printing, we're cramming to the tightest of deadlines. Stories to edit, stories to chase then edit, stories to prioritize, a photo-shoot to call... all done and confirmed by Friday morning so that the printer can help us with the layout, the final approval, the colour seps, the printing, cutting and delivery on the morning of Thursday next -- Launch Day.

Online publishing seems so much less complicated, but there's nothing like holding a piece of paper hot-off-the-press, getting heady with the scent of printers' ink coating the finger-tips black, and devouring the printed word that burns a hole through the conscience of the school *lightning flashes majestically and a hush descends as thunder prepares to make an entrance.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. There's the donkey work to be done first. Hee haw.

Rushing out the final edits to tomorrow's issue of NY Connexions. Everyone's been working so hard and under such tight schedules too.

And then, this close to deadline, Kaiser has to go and smash the porcelain vase of artificial flowers June bought to brighten up our house for CNY. Stress, man! Must go clean up before someone hurts HIMself on a shard. Grumble...

Took M2 back to the Mazda workshop for his 20k km servicing. Yup. Have already travelled the approximate equivalent of a road trip from Singapore to Luxembourg and back within the few days shy of a year from the time he began driving with me. [In case you want to know how I came up with this comparison, I used a distance-between-cities calculator, here.]

Amazing how many Mazdas show up at the workshop daily. It's like a clinic that starts filling up with patients when the doors open first thing in the morning. Some patients, like M2, are there for a routine physical. There are many others who are there for assorted scrapes, bumps and bruises, like the one in the parking bay next to mine, whose owner was a little grumpy and understandably so.

There was a newish-looking M3 that drove in whose rear end had caved in. It was probably a truck that left a long bumper-like indentation on it's rear fender. As it drove past me in the workshop, the trunk popped open on its own and flapped helplessly along as the driver sought a bay to put into. I could barely hold back my tears.

I inquired about repairing the scrape along M2's left rear door. The mech advised me that it wasn't worth the $400 to get it knocked back and resprayed as the scrape wasn't so deep that there was a risk of corrosion. So M2 will have to live with his scar. Guess it adds character. Hur.

JY and Thad 'bladed into Bish Park from Bishan to join June and me this morning. Well, actually me, 'cos June's resting her knee for the next x number of weeks. Incapacitated, June contented herself browsing through the latest Her World, and looked after Q-tip who got to go out to the park and hence, was the only one to gain from her accident.

Getting more daring, JY suggested we try out some other pathways in the park she hadn't taken before. Some steep downhill runs, and a couple with quite sharp turns too. Alarmingly, her courage got the better of her ability, and she took a few nasty spills. She now has a bruised knee in almost exactly the same place as June's. It's like they're Corsican Sisters or something.

JY's injuries don't seem as bad, though. But Thad and I had to be firm with her and insisted that she learn to brake properly before she becomes so adventurous again. She wasn't hard to convince. Sensible girl.

Will insist on the same condition once June recovers and wants to strap on her blades again.

Went with June to recce ECP as a possible blading venue. As long as we stay away from the central area where the McD's is, it's a long stretch of beach and it isn't as crowded as we thought, even on a Saturday morning. All along the way there are soft drink and ice-cream vendors, so as long as we bring some cash with us, we'll always be well provided for. A 100 Plus, btw, only costs $1.

There is one major snag, however. We encountered another slope (just 1 significant one), and for June, it was pretty much the same story. June + slope = disaster. My intention was to take the slope first to assess the risk factor for her, and I judged it to be unsuitable for her skill level. But when I turned to go back to advise her, I saw she was already on her decent and there was nothing to do but see how things played out.

Actually, she took the slope pretty well. She stayed on her feet all the way down, so the safest thing for her to do was to simply ride it out and slowly decelerate once she reached level ground. Instead, when it looked like she had arrived safely, she did an equivalent of jamming her brake. Given her velocity, the sudden stop was the very worst thing she could have done. She twisted herself around her injured knee and, well... She's hobbling around again.

I'm now quite convinced that for everybody, there are certain skills that we will never be able to learn beyond a certain level. For me, it's lower primary mathematics and pre-school conversational Mandarin. For June, it's confined-to-the-rink in-line skating.

Celebrated M-i-L's birthday at Jumbo, Gardens. Dumb Chinese seafood restaurant waiter joke of the day: "If you're in a hurry, you can order the Soon Hock. If you can take your time, you can order the Later Hock." Right.

The campus newspaper can be quite a painful balancing act. It's role is to be the platform for student voices to give their thoughts on things happening around them an airing. Yet, since the publication is also a reflection of the college that is accessible to all and sundry, we also have to be aware of our Admin's sensitivities and not air dirty linen in public view.

Our current feature story, based on the information our assigned reporters have amassed so far, put them in a difficult position. It looked like that there was a lot of negativity towards a major event that took place just recently. Our reporters had a dilemma: report "the truth" and face the cancellation of our fledgling news agency by a wrathful Admin; or embellish and pretty up the story and claim that it was an unqualified success, and lose all credibility with our readership who will view us as yet another "propaganda" tool of the powers-that-be.

We discussed the issue and came to the conclusion that neither was an acceptable option. Tracing further, we discovered that what our reporters took as "truth" was information provided from only one particular point of view. The issue hadn't been examined from sufficient counter-perspectives to be given a fair public hearing. So immediately one reporter took off to interview another source, who happened to be available, cooperative, forthcoming and honest in providing an alternative viewpoint.

For the last few weeks, we've been struggling with the identity of our 'paper. Should it be a sensational tabloid, a boring event-by-event scribe, a critical commentary, or what? After today's discussion, it looks like we're trying to make every opinion count. To see from multiple angles. To broaden perspectives on issues. To point out where improvement is needed. And to initiate dialogue that will facilitate such change for the better.

Noble words. Let's hope they aren't also famous last words.

Hmm... would this entry count as the NY Connexions manifesto?

Hmm(2)... I don't think every single story we write needs this level of nobility. That would also be nuts unrealistic. But when there is a need to take an editorial decision, then perhaps this should be our guide.

Our lunch circle seems to have expanded a little this year. Though we've lost Anthony due to staff movement, we're getting to see more of NBS, HP, Dee and Josh, and our culture of picking on one another over food still continues.

Today, we carried out our character assasinating, aspersion casting multilogue at Friends (how ironically ironic) at Gardens. Good food, good company.

Now back from a nice, long break over the CNY period. Apart from visitations to kin (though I must admit, not as many as I might have made), I've also been revisiting the worlds of KOTOR2 in a determined effort to make it as a Dark Side Force user for once. The story plays out differently depending on your avatar's alignment and I want to see the Dark Side version now.

Playing Dark is tough, well, for me, anyway. It's not that the game gets any harder -- in fact, some Dark powers are incredibly effective and spectacular to use -- but the choices one has to make in order to be Dark so rubs me the wrong way. For the moment I'm sort of playing mildly Dim (alignment, not IQ) because I can't stand to see people suffer without wanting to help them somehow, given the powers at my disposal. To be properly Dark though, you've got to abuse your powers as you take advantage of the situation, and if the suffering increases or you end up directly or indirectly causing the sufferer's death, well, them's the breaks, honey.

I'm such a lousy Dark Sider that I've been barred from a major plot juncture in the Shyrack Cave on Korriban. Apparently, only those strongly aligned either way can enter and experience further plot development; whereas those less committed to either cause might have to bypass this rewarding side quest and continue with the main story. I also lose out on character bonuses (special powers or attributes) simply because I'm so half-past-Sith. Where I am now in the plot, there doesn't seem to be any more opportunities to push my alignment any further as it seems to be almost an all-out straight fight to the finish from this point -- no need to make psychotic decisions anymore because "psychotic" will now be the automatic decision, regardless.

I like KOTOR because it allows me to explore my personal values. Yes, it's just a game, but precisely because it is a game that's why whatever decisions I make shouldn't matter, but they do. Even though my limited, virtual decisions affect only virtual puppets that follow a set of scripted responses, I still feel terrible when I steal from them, or cheat them, or hack them into little bits with my supercharged lightsabre just for some paltry personal gain -- some credits here, a useable item there, or some small increase in experience and/or Dark alignment points. If you had the power of the Force, what would YOU do with it?

And on a side note: after many, many attempts, I finally hunted down and captured Latios this evening. 'nuff said.

Heh. Posting pix while brain is still on vacation. This is Kaiser taking a break from all his naughtiness. 

And one for the Wong family album. Q-tip and I look like we're doing a Bart and Homer impression! 

A very happy and prosperous new year, everyone! Now, can somebody please help me off the sofa? 

Happy Lunar New Year!

After last year's MSG poisoning incident, and the near-altercation between Uncle and some pushy lady-patron of the year before, this year we decided to ring in the Year of the Dog with a home-cooked clan reunion dinner instead of a restaurant-do. After tonight, we all agree that we had the right idea. No fuss, no pressure, no MSG, no unwelcome guests at our table. Here, everyone is family and in this assurance we can rest easy.

The occasion didn't call for carol-singing, but we got out the trusty keyboard anyway, and with cousin Lyn thumping on the keys, we sang croaked through a selection of oldies (from the '20s!) to keep ourselves occupied until the final countdown.

In 3... 2... 1...

Had quite a decent time immediately after Friday's X-country run. For us, whenever we can manage the time, we like to lunch at Tomoko, Casuarina Road, on Friday afternoons because of their osakana special. We get a light set meal involving some form of fish. Usually for me, it's salmon sashimi. With miso and a couple of other side dishes thrown in, it's a pretty good buy for only $7.90.

This time, there were 12 of us in 4 cars -- a much larger group than what we're used to, but then, most of us were also there to catch Memoirs at Lido later.

On the way to the movie, I tailed Amy's Swift as closely as I could thinking she knew the best route into town, and possibly the best parking as well. Discovered she's not infalliable after all: we both took a wrong turn, making a wide detour Westwards. As a result, by the time we arrived, we very nearly missed the movie's opening. Guess it's time I learned to trust my own instincts and not rely on her so much for driving advice any more. Haha.

Memoirs was quite stylo. Lavish sets, costumes, quite eye-catching cinematography, rich in production values. But the storyline was disappointingly simplistic and predictable. Here, I was hoping Zhang Ziyi would turn into some psycho-ninja-warrior and end up kicking half of Tokyo's ass in increasingly creative ways for her childhood mistreatment, but it was more like a Cinderella story instead. I felt the conclusion was abrupt; grinding to a halt rather than ending with >ahem< a bang. Maybe I just have the wrong idea about Geisha?

After our group parted ways after the movie, June and I had dinner at Tonkatsu. Seemed appropriate ending to the day's All-Japan fest.

College annual x-country run. Participants form up at the starting line. 

Focused and determined, Dot keeps her eyes on the prize.

And they're off! With Dot leading the pack.

No stray goes hungry when June's around. 

HP and Shah practice posing for product endorsements after their award-winning run. 

The last stragglers get wheeled across the finish line. 

'Blading with us pays off for JY -- 2nd placing in the Staff Race (Women). 

We're behind all runners in spirit, honest! 

Congrats to HP and Shah, 2 more EL Dept staff who have a trophy to display on their desks. 

OMG. Sorted through a pile of mail sitting on the shoe-rack and discovered a number of unopened bills that totaled up to quite a horrifying figure. These are bills over and above those I've arranged to pay through monthly GIRO deductions...

and over and above the bill I had to pay today from the contractor who did my bathroom renovation months ago. This evening, he came to see us in person to collect -- though the fault for the delay in payment lay in his administrative inefficiency and not in our tardiness. Good thing June remembered that our agreed-upon amount was actually less that the remuneration he was convinced he needed to collect. We showed him our bathroom to remind him what kind of work he actually did for us, and eventually he agreed on the lower price, thus saving us over a hundred bucks. At this time, every penny counts.

Well, thankfully, these bills mostly came from annual expenses and not monthly disbursements. It was just that when you let them accrue for a while, then open them all up at once, you're just asking for a heart attack, lor.

The 2nd issue of NY Connexions is now online!

Still working on improving the design and layout of the site, and still considering whether to migrate (repatriate?) back to the campus server when the contract for our current commercial server expires, but at least we have some new content.

Be nice and leave some constructive comments for our budding journalists, ok?

Yay! Got June a non-crappy V-day gift for a change. I know it's too early for the occasion, but when she actually does look longingly at something for herself -- which isn't often -- and reaches for her wallet, you know it's a good bet that it's something that she really wants. Best to strike when the opportunity stares you in the face.

So now June has a brand new Sony discman CD player, which I know she'll be using every day to listen to her CD collection. Though I tried talking her into accepting an MP3 player, she decided on the more retro option instead. Rebel.

Edit 01:
Hmm... it's morning now and on reading this entry again, I notice that it may possibly be misconstrued that I've made June appear like an unappreciative person, but that wasn't my intention. I really am a buyer of crappy gifts (usually due to last-minute panic shopping), if anyone's lucky enough to get a gift from me at all. It's a warm feeling to match the recipient with the right gift, and this time I think I did good.

Received my car loan statement from the bank in the mail today. After nearly a year's continuous monthly deductions from my financial pool puddle, I can proudly claim that I have nearly paid off my interest and in a couple of months' time I can start chipping away at my principle. Ouch.

When I look at COE and car prices today, I think of what I could have bought at the amount I paid a year ago for M2. Today, I could buy a Mazda 3, or just save $5k or more on the same car. If I was financially rational, I would reason that having a car is just money down the drain in terms of taxes, insurance, service and maintenance, fuel, parking, and, uh... anything else I might have missed out; while its asset value continues to depreciate day after day. Oh, and parking and traffic violation fines too. Nuts.

But I don't really care about all that. The experience of owning a car over the last year alone is worth more than the money I would have saved without one. All the adventures, all the friendship bonds made and strengthened would not have been possible without a set of wheels to call my own. From beach jaunts with the dogs, to bowling with the Boyz, to never eating alone, to the odd shopping trip or two, to blading at Bishan, to the mad scavenger quest... I couldn't put a price tag on how radically my life changed because I decided to become a car owner in the last year.

More importantly, I got to see people on a social basis; not just as work colleagues but as friends, and that -- as MasterCard would say -- is priceless.

A small, manageable group went blading today: June and me, JY and Tonny; Chewy dropped in on us a little later just to say, "hi!" Chewy's giving her injured knee another 2 weeks to rest and then she'll join us proper again.

Today we made 7 orbits around the park (Tonny blading backwards for most of the way) and the girls would want me to note that neither fell even once today. The obligatory splat came from myself, thanks to a twig that got lodged in my wheels while I was going at speed. No damage to my person, though my wristguard did pick up a sizeable chunk of Bishan turf.

Jen might be annoyed that we parked within a few steps of her front door but we didn't visit her [so we won't tell her, right?]. We were actually on our way to buy CNY cookies from the auntie at Katong Antique House who has become good friends with June ever since the scavenger quest of last month. We even had to buy our pineapple tarts and I'm sure there'll be lots of disappointed people this year who were looking forward to June's homemade variety.

Lunched at Glory Cafe. June ordered so much -- lodeh, beef rendang, chicken curry, sambal kangkong, sambal sotong -- I couldn't believe we polished the lot off between the both of us. But I was grateful for the Bundaberg Peachee. I was thirsty.

Mimi's come over for the weekend. We took her and Kaizer to the vet yesterday for their shots. For an 11-year old, Mimi is in very good health, according to her blood test results. Except for her teeth which seriously need some treatment. Old lady's gonna need dentures soon or something. We'll fix an appointment for her after CNY.

Took both Mimi and Q-tip to Sentosa (this place seems like my regular weekend hangout, doesn't it?). This time, it was to snap some shots of our Art kids as they painted their hearts out over some Sentosa-sponsored art contest. The shots will be for the college newspaper, the latest issue we hope will be published by Tuesday.

I found it was difficult to take pix of artists as they paint. If you want to frame the painting, you get a brilliant view of the artist's butt. If you want the face, the artist has to pose but then you lose the candor of the moment. What to do? I still have a lot to learn about photography.

Vince bought June and me an early dinner at Sunset Bay. I had a pretty decent lamb stew, but June's mixed grill came from the Neanderthal School of Culinary Arts -- Burn. Meat. Regardless, thanks, Vince!

Parents' Night on campus. The annual ritual of calling in parents of current year 1 kids to see for themselves that we're a decent college and that we'll take good care of their kids should they decide to stay on after 1st term.

Staff instructions are to "mingle with the crowd and make 'em feel welcome." Uh huh. Me? Mingle? When I already have problems mingling with my own friends when I get invited to their parties?

Well, I tried. I patrolled up and down from the staff room and past the wall of orbs to LT4 and back several times looking for any parent that might want to have a chat. No one did. A couple of my students waved in my direction, though their parents were engaged elsewhere, so after a while I began to feel like campus security instead of faculty staff. Yellow plaid short-sleeve shirted, college tie wearing campus security on foot patrol. No wonder nobody wanted to talk to me.

I hung around during the panel discussion with the Heads just in case Boss Lady got asked something she couldn't respond to about my subject. Fortunately, the parents were sensible enough to ask only a couple of basic questions about KI, so Boss Lady didn't need my help to field them. Otherwise, with a cordless mike in my hand...

Still, after formal talks had ended, I found myself face-to-face with a couple of my more enthu KI kids and their moms whom I spent some time bringing up to speed about this esoteric new subject their daughters had decided to take. Nice folks, neither critical nor cynical, but genuinely interested people. Hope I didn't get carried away and promise the moon again.

A well-deserved prata supper with Amy and HP. Long day.

Thoughts wandering again. Came up with this nonsense that I won't insist on everyone reading. Read only if you want to induce a headache. Click.

3 weeks into the new year and already it feels like we've been on the job continuously without a break. It's pointless to reminisce how spontaneous we were last year, running off to snack or do silly things whenever we felt like it. This year, our schedules and disparate agenda make even maintaining group cohesion difficult enough; though I still believe that once we get used to our new routines we'll learn to adapt to each others' once again. Today, I put the brakes on attempting to schedule recreation time into a weekly appointment book. Having to organize my whole life -- including when I can have fun -- just feels so... wrong.

The furore over draft dodging since Melvyn Tan's slap on the wrist, and the subsequent proposal to stiffen laws and penalties shows once again that we would rather do the right thing to avoid punishment than do the right thing because it IS the right thing to do.

Seems that when Melvyn 'got away' with 'only' a $3000 fine for all the years he didn't serve his National Service, those of us who did our time became all indignant and upset that his sentence was so light. What? If we had known that dodging NS would only cost us $3k we would have gladly paid up and thumbed our noses at Uncle Seng? As if.

I'm not trying to defend Melvyn for what he did, nor decry the non-consequences of his naughtiness. What I'm worried about is the fact that NS men appear to feel more strongly against the lightness of one defaulter's punishment than for the value of their own contribution of service to the place they call 'home.'

If the sentiment is truly such, then the main reason behind our serving NS is the fear of being severely punished if we don't. This attitude suggests that when we consider NS, we see an option -- either serve, or be punished. Most of us choose the former to avoid the unpleasantness of the latter; nevertheless, the latter may still appear to some of us as a viable choice. But if we think there is a choice in the matter, we are dead wrong because there is really no option: either serve, or the consequences will be far more severe than what the courts can throw at us.

It's true. It's here. It's now. What NBS and I have been preparing for all last year has become a reality. Today we officially launched our KI tutorials with our 20 students, just the exact number that we agreed is our maximum limit.

After our introductory spiel, we had a Q&A session during which the kids wanted to assess our confidence levels in leading them in a pioneering direction, and what if they don't pass it this year? Typical.

Anyway, the Gutter Boyz and our, um, groupies celebrated the birthday of one of our own. Ate at the Manhattan Fish Market, Plaza Singapura. We ordered 3 sets of flaming seafood platters for 2 (for Anthony and Wendy, Yee and Amy, me and June) while Vince and NBS went ahead and ordered their own things. The seafood platter comes in a large saucepan and comprises some blowtorched (hence flaming) shrimp, calamari, oysters and a large chunk of battered fish on a thick layer garlic rice and fries. Made for good eating, but the portions were so large that we couldn't eat it all.

Finally presented Anthony with his farewell gift. Today seemed like a good opportunity since most of us who signed his bowling pin happened to be around for this occasion. Guess he won't be forgetting us in a hurry. Heh.

1st cross-dept "professional sharing" session. Reps from (L-R) PE, Arts, English, and Math Depts attend.


Chinese Dept and, um... Staff Welfare?


It may be the year of the dog, but I hope people will buy these pups for the right reasons.


A preview of Q-tip's CNY outfit.


Who could resist picking up this little furball and giving him a squeeze?

The report about the naked salesman in the papers is cause for a raised eyebrow at least. Not that the guy was in the buff but that his neighbours took the time and trouble to make a police report to get him arrested.

I mean, sure, the guy was nude, but he was in his own house where he should expect a modicum of privacy at least. After all, a man's home is his castle, or maybe it was while the Brits were still here. What exactly is he guilty of? If you look at the pix in the papers (which out of good taste I won't upload here), he's engaged in his morning ritual of shaving his whiskers. Hardly anything to be concerned about there. "But he's not wearing any clothes!" as a neighbour might complain. Sure, but how did you get to see so much detail? The pix undoubtedly came from a police or press camera with a TELEPHOTO lens, rigged to catch him in the act (of shaving). Now, that's an invasion of his privacy, period.

The poor sod's being held for psychiatric evaluation pending further punitive procedures. The guy plainly isn't nuts. He might have been naive and stupid but definitely not psycho. So why did he do what he did? Simple: He doesn't look into his neighbours' bedroom windows, but forgot that his neighbours might look into his. After all, there's no indication that he was even aware that he was being watched. He didn't jump up and down, or wave, or do anything else that might have suggested that he was attracting the attention of anyone, though if he had then it would have been a different matter altogether. He just went about doing what everyone else normally does in the privacy of one's house, albeit sans attire. That's a crime?

It's typical of Singaporeans to approach the authorities to solve a problem for them, rather than work it out amongst themselves. Things would have been much better if his neighbours had just talked to him first, but they opted to slap criminal charges on him instead. We don't live in a problem-solving culture, we live in a problem eradication culture. Unthinking and unsociable is the Singaporean mindset.

So now they've ruined the guy. Publicly tarnished his reputation, stigmatized him with a criminal record, questioned his sanity, deprived him of his freedom, and probably strained relations between him and his wife for good measure. All just so that they don't have to see a naked man any more. They didn't just get rid of the nudity; they got rid of the man too. My children feel so much safer now, thanks to their civic consciousness. Thanks a bunch.

If I were him, I'd go find a good lawyer and file a counter-suit: invasion of privacy, defamation, wrongful accusation, and for social and psychological damages for starters. With his back against the wall, it's his only recourse.

The sun has finally shown us some face after having disappeared behind rainclouds for more than a week. It would have been a great day for outdoor activities, but since June will be unable to bake her fab CNY cookies this year -- her new job's been keeping her too busy -- we went to buy some, like normal people.

Some TV programme June watched recommended Poh Guan Cake House (Blk 531 Upp. Cross St.) so we picked up our nian gao from them along with a tin of love letters. The floor above Poh Guan houses a food court that did very nicely as an alternative lunch venue to the more popular ones at Chinatown Complex and Maxwell Road Market. The Hokkien prawn noodle soup was tasty enough, and though I've tasted stronger, this one held its own quite well. There were long lines at other stalls too, so this place should be worth exploring further when we have the time.

Dropped in on Mr Leow. My contact lenses are way past a year old and my eyes are demanding new ones. Good to know that my eyesight is still stable, and Leow is even thinking of reducing the power a little. Says they'll be ready before the new year.

We acknowledged the sun closer to evening time. Dinner at ECP hawker centre where we got excellent beef noodles from the stall where you have to wait in line for about 20 minutes (or more? I occasionally fell asleep while waiting, so my sense of time is a bit screwed) before you even get to place your order. Then an after dinner stroll on the beach with Q-tip. We have so missed the sun.

June's gone shopping with S-i-L, so what's an old man gonna do on a Friday evening? Why, lots of things! After work I went straight to SAFRA for a little 'secret training,' but the lanes were packed out with screaming schoolchildren, so I took the wisest course of action and beat a hasty retreat. Didn't even stay long enough for my parking to cost anything.

Went home to feed the animals, then still feeling restless I decided to take the longest drive I could think of -- to Popeye's at Terminal 1 -- blasting the i-Pod along the way. Lunch had digested quickly, and I could almost taste that chicken.

Knew I had depleted my finances before leaving the house so a quick stop at the ATM at the airport and... no wallet!

I swear, Alzheimer's is out to get me early. I'd left the house without credit card, NETS card, ID card, Driving Licence; nothing but the clothes on my back. If Alzheimer's had struck then and became full-blown amnesia, I'd be wandering around on the runway before being picked up by the local authorities and kept in a "safe place" until someone thought to come and claim me sometime. Soon, hopefully.

Thankfully I still had my cash card so I could pay 42 cents for parking. Drove straight home to make sure I hadn't lost my wallet somewhere en route. I hadn't. It was simply a case of "left in my other pants." Now I'm just too lazy to go out anymore. Guess I wasn't meant to leave home tonight.

Maybe I can find some cup noodles in the pantry...

We have divided up our training workload between ourselves as of this morning. NBS will be the grown-up of our team and I, the rebel child. How professional.

Tweedledum to my Tweedledumber, really glad to have you on board! :)

There's so much going on right now, even pausing to take a breather is a bit of a luxury on campus these days. The work seems never-ending, with people from various quarters reminding me of things yet to be done, deadlines getting close and commitments yet to be fulfilled.

But it's also an exciting time because a lot of what I'm involved with seems really worthwhile, with positive benefits to look forward to in the long run. Apart from KI which is for the most part unexplored territory for everyone, starting up a campus newspaper -- for real, like the Planet, or the Bugle -- has been keeping me awake just thinking of the possibilities.

Yes, it's going to be an incredible slog to get things started. We need to establish our identity, our credibility, and work with a sense of purpose, urgency and responsibility, and our reward is in our increasing readership and in perhaps sparking off intelligent, purposeful debate amongst our students, staff and the community beyond. Wow. Bold, ambitious words coming from a sloth like myself. But there's nothing like getting in on the ground floor and pioneering something new that gives a guy a rush.

Gotta thank Amy who's taught me a lot from her own experience today, and the KI kids for their initial reviews of our news website. We've launched our first issue, but there's still a long way to go before we can even get the design, layout and content looking more professional. In this respect, since both staff advisors and student writers are all co-learners in the news publication business, progress may be slow but hopefully steady as well.

Hope our readers will be patient and not lose faith in us while we work on getting it right.

What used to be "The Red Pill" is now in the process of rebranding. Currently known as NY Connections (or ConneXions), the writers for the now defunct publication have now turned their attention towards more tabloid-style journalism with weekly updates and lots more focus on personalities and human interest stories particularly from within campus. Well, that's the plan, anyway.

We've already soft-launched the inaugural issue and hope to meet our most demanding publication schedule without fail. Let's hope the news coverage will also be relevant and popular with the student body, to keep our motivation (and readership) up. Else, it's gonna be a loooong year.

Finally caught Lion-Witch-Wardrobe, NBS making history with us again by staying up till past midnight. Must say it was doubly excellent of her to join us as she had watched LWW once already.

I dunno. Somehow, reading the Narnia series in my younger days may have been the more magical experience for me. Not that the movie didn't have exciting bits -- like the escape from the slowly unfreezing waterfall or the grand-scale battle sequences -- but the hand of deus ex machina seemed to be working too obviously, making escapes too convenient and victory too easy.

Even Aslan's supreme sacrifice didn't have all that much impact on me since the narration didn't bother to build his credentials much further than mythical being, talks a lot, shouts very loudly. His resurrection being due to a quirk in the interpretation of a pretty in-your-face and literally carved-in-stone clause in the law of Deep Magic was also a bit of a let-down. I expected more of Aslan than just counting on being released on a technicality.

OK. So Lewis wrote the story as a close parallel to the Gospel, but of course it isn't the Gospel else he'd have bred a whole new religious sect, the Narnites, or something. Still, by being so derivative, it only goes to show that potatoes really don't boil twice.

So much rain. Non-stop since this morning. Wonder if it affected the big civil defence exercise of this morning? Yes, the one announced a couple of weeks ago to be a surprise "attack" on our public transport system, though not TOO much of a surprise to prevent panic. I wasn't using public transport today, so I guess I missed out on the excitement. Well, apart from seeing a squad of Gurkhas armed with machine-guns and their culturally identifiable khukri emerging from City Hall MRT station. Anyone with a 1st-hand account of what was going on in the tunnels at Ground(s) Zero? Inquiring minds wanna know.

June and I were at Sunday service at 9am. It's the 1st time we've entered the new sanctuary since it opened in November. Wow. We haven't been to service in that long, huh? We have been naughty. Anyway, the space is hi-tech cool in design. Lots of glass and steel, with stone and laminated wood to keep things warm. Lots of sharp angles and hard edges, especially in the pews. After a while, I got tempted to use the nice, soft kneeler as a seat cushion instead, but propriety prevailed -- this time.

The cross forming the centrepiece suspended above the stone altar is a nice touch. Contrasting with the rest of the techno theme, the cross is a simple perpendicular arrangement of 2 hewn tree trunks which appear neither processed nor finished; but rather left in more or less their natural state.

And since the new sanctuary is built below-ground, it should be cool and well-shaded enough to be a great place for prayer and reflection during lunchtime downtown. But it's strictly BYOB -- bring-your-own-bible. Too bad I don't work downtown anymore.