I've been working on a book in the past couple of months and amongst my responsibilities is selecting a cover and deciding on the general look of my book. Being artistically challenged, it's not exactly one of my favourite processes but I have to deal with it anyway.
This morning, my boss came up to me and told me: "We've decided on the color of your book!"
Now, normally I'm no happy camper when someone takes such decisions off my hands. Not in this case. When you're colour blind, it's not so much of a big deal!
Quite a while back, when people realised I had colour issues, I would claim I wasn't colour blind, but had Colour Identification
Deficiency Syndrome, or CIDS for short. I made it up because there's a lot of misconceptions about color blindness, the most common is that anyone who's colour blind sees the world in black and white (maybe with shades of gray).
Now while this can definitely happen (it's called Achromatopsia) but it's not the case for a majority of colour blind. For most of us it's a case of colour differentiation. I can see colours, it's just not as clear-cut as it is to others. I've always thought that the term colour blind was too much of a generalisation simply because I wasn't blind per se when it comes to colours. But when it comes to the following kind of test, well....
Apparently you can find either a dog, balloon, boat or an honest-to-goodness car in there!
As result, i don't do such terms as 'Navy blue' or 'Magenta'. Just the basics will do nicely thank you. And I don't give directions referencing building colour either. Where my career was concerned, I was forced to rule out early in my life such options as pilots and numerous types of cool scientific work. As of to date, there's no real cure for colour blindness.
Incidentally, all this while until recently I thought that women could never have these colour issues. Now I know it's possible, except that it's a lot rarer than men. Plus I always find it funny when people who aren't colour blind people have a dispute with regards to what colour something is.
My wife, Raudha continues to ask me questions like whether her scarf matches the rest of her outfit. I continue to answer. The answer is typically met with a "Yeah right" style of response. But she continues to ask me....
So I finally had my hair cut on Saturday, which in theory could help me in my Fun Run on Sunday (more on that shortly). I didn't go bald this time, I wanted to remain on speaking terms with my wife ha ha...
The best reaction came from my kid of course. Upon seeing me at Metrojaya, he said "Daddy, what happened? Big hair.. gone!"
So that's how he's seen it all this time.
Running Weekend
As mentioned in my previous post, I signed up for the Standard Chartered Fun Run which took place yesterday, Sunday 26 May 2013. I car-pooled with my colleague Sherry (being the gentleman I am, she drove) and parked at the park and ride which was in Precinct 7, and took the bus from there. I must say I really appreciate the shuttle bus service , hopefully they have something similar for the KL run in June.
We met a few other friends at the event site. While waiting, I took a bite out of a power bar. Throat got itchy so I drank some water, which of course ended up in me having to take a trip to one of the portable toilets. The queue took a while, and at one point I thought the race would take off without me!
It started about 15 minutes later than scheduled, something to do with waiting for some VIPs... duh... Naturally the runners started getting anxious. Anyway flag off was around 7:15am. And away we went!
All in all, the run was quite okay. My main objective was to get to 6 km and maintain a running stance, and then figure it out from there. Scenery was a bit dull, and the sun was blazing about halfway in. Fortunately I achieved my target, and
On a side note, since it was a fun-run, some came in fancy dress (not that many really) and one even ran bare-footed in pyjamas!
Had to cover the silver dude to be safe :p
I clocked at 8:39am which meant I'd ran for about one and a half hours. The cool bit was at the final stretch where music was blasting. As I approached the final stretch, GNR's Sweet Child of Mine came on. It was a sign for me to sprint to the finishing line, which I did with gusto!
The finishing line. Yay!
I celebrated by downing complimentary cups and cups of 100 Plus.
My current target is to get to 90 minutes for the Standard Chartered Kuala Lumpur. That's a month away, so I need to keep up with regular exercise.
Amy's Baking Company
On a totally unrelated note... Ok, so I'm late to the party with this one, but I thought I'd share this video anyway:
I don't run a business (yet) so what do I know? But seriously, I believe if you can't trust any of your staff to do the work they could and should be doing, either you find new staff or you shouldn't run a business involving other people.
Of course I'm sure there's some embellishment, it's a TV show after all, but there's only so much you can enhance. And for once, even Gordon Ramsey was defeated!
Ultimately, hope people can learn from these mistakes. I've shared it here for educational purposes instead of just pure entertainment.
I entered this run for the main purpose of gauging my current ability before the actual Standard Chartered proper run at the end of June.
I feel that I have regressed significantly in the past month and doing this run will hopefully give me a wake-up call to buck up!
It doesn't look so bad but from what experienced runners tell me, there's not much in terms of scenery :p Oh well, I'll have to find other ways to motivate myself.
Hope I do alright! Incidentally it coincides with National Youth Day celebrations so I might do some walkabout after.
Visited 1 Mont Kiara for the first time as we were attending a
relative’s birthday party. It was held at the Young Explorer Gym right at the
top floor. Here’s a link:
There’s a few components in this place, it has a Gymnastic Gym, a
Montessori Play Group and an Adventure Maze. The Adventure Maze which takes up
the most space is quite an amazing place. Lots of fun structures for kids to
explore and try out, from tunnels, rope bridges, sliding poles, climbing rungs,
etc. Zharif enjoyed it, but had trouble with some of the structures. He
definitely tried his darndest.
Turns out 3 years old is the minimum age for the Adventure Maze so I can see why it was
quite challenging.
The only problem for the Adventure Maze is that it feels very expensive
for a one-off visit. RM38 for 3 hours is really pricey, and even for members it’s
RM30.
I guess I’ll wait for the Groupon deal.
Mind Your Language revision
I don’t remember what bug I caught, but I’ve been watching numerous
Mind Your Language episodes on YouTube for the whole of last week. Some of the episodes
are downright hilarious and it’s nice to be able to go back to a time when political
correctness didn’t have a larger than life presence. The show was full of fun stereotypes,
which ironically, was what led to its eventual cancellation.
Here’s a favourite of mine (Look out for Giovanni’s national
costume!) :
BPL football season ends
On my Facebook status, 5 days ago I wrote this:
"With this morning's results, last day of the Premiership has shaped up to be the most boring last day that I can remember, with only 1 CL spot for contention..."
Well for the typical spectator like me, this may be so. However, for some of the
clubs, a good deal of money was at stake. Take Fulham for instance. If they had
lost in this last match, they would’ve ended up on 16th and received
about 3.8mill pounds. However, since they won, they finished on 12th
and received 6.8 million pounds instead. That’s 3mill more.
This may be chickenfeed to the Chelsea’s and Man City’s of this world,
but that’s a big deal for these smaller clubs. And if they can find acquire a key
player with that extra cash, it would be a massive boost.
Let's see who lands next season's Michu.
Flat tyres
I found out on
Friday at KLIA that sometimes a flat tyre won't budge even after I had removed
all the nuts. I've replaced a good fair share of tyres over my 13 years of
driving, but never had this problem. Apparently some car tyres over time tend
to stick so I needed to give them a good kicking to shake them loose. Took me 1
tour organiser, 4 security guards, 2 airport personnel and multiple phone calls
to figure this out.
It doesn't help
when the car's not yours either. I actually thought there was some additional lever/screw somewhere...
One of my readers wanted to know that being a Liverpool fan, how could I not include in my Weekend Bites the stellar performance of Liverpool against Fulham away without Luis Suarez AND Gerrard, and more specifically highlight the impressive work of Daniel Sturridge?
Well, what can I say?
Certainly it augurs well for the future, and it really looks like our team is clicking very nicely. Yet frankly speaking, our season is pretty much done. Can we perform against the bigger teams when it matters? Or are we just doing well because there's no more pressure and nothing is at stake? There are some good signs, but seriously the jury is still out.
I honestly genuinely like the way Liverpool are going at the moment, I believe in giving managers (in this case Rodgers) enough time to achieve success. Success is seldom instantaneous unless you go out and just buy a whole new squad, and even then... I always like to use Sir Alex Ferguson's early days at Manchester United as an excellent example.
We'll see how we do. One very crucial difference between the current season and the next is we will not be involved in the Europa Cup, which potentially involves a lot of long distance travelling and can get very exhausting. We will also not have Suarez for the first few matches of the season (assuming he's still around of course, I hope he will be). Hopefully we can get off to a good start and move on from there.
Anyway, here's a link to a cool picture of our very own Philippe Coutinho immortalised in LEGO.
Don't laugh. Yes, I finally watched it. I admit to being one of those fans who didn't see the need for it to be stretched to three parts, but it's no doubt a very beautiful movie. The only problem was throughout the show I kept imagining Bilbo Baggins on a journey not with 12 dwarves to regain their homeland, but with 4 other mates touring pubs across Middle-Earth. That's because Martin Freeman is in The World's End, of which I've already watched the trailer. Well, I only have myself to blame.
What? We're in the wrong movie?
Mom & Baby Expo at MidValley
So somehow I made it to this expo on Sunday after a pathetic attempt at weaseling myself out of going. I think Raudha saw right through me on this time around, but I guess it was Mother's Day so I relented.
As expected, the place was packed. Most of my energy was spent managing Zharif so he didn't get too attached to any of those display toys that the booth folk strategically placed within my kid's reach. Fortunately the only thing he got attached to was the free Enfa milk being given out. I believe he ended up downing 5 cups.
I still get uncomfortable standing around the booths while women around me are checking out nursing bras.
And of course, it's always fascinating to see that no matter how tired pregnant ladies might get, give them a reason to shop (especially involving their kids) and even the ones that could literally pop any time will be motoring along from stall to stall happily, lasting longer than the Energizer bunny.
The husbands, on the other hand, let's just say that at one point, I just sat on the floor to wait.
My dad on Facebook
Don't you find it disconcerting when you see your dad becoming more and more active on Facebook? I still do ha ha... Recently my dad became friends with someone called Bobo Sparklink. I was afraid of asking, but I did check online and I'm just relieved it's not the Bobo from that Sayang parody song, otherwise I'd be really worried....
Speaking of which, I hear he signed a contract with Metrowealth last week (Bobo that is, not my dad). Fair play and congratulations. I am curious to know what exactly he'll be doing, I'm sure you are too.
Richard Branson - Stewardess extraordinaire
So he finally honoured his bet. I'm quite impressed to be honest, I thought he might have wimped out. Oh well, the fun that rich people can do and get away with...
All the proceeds went to charity, so that's cool too.
I'm not posting any pictures due to copyright, but if you see what I've seen, do your best not to stab your eyes out ha ha... And Richard, don't give up your day job.
The day Manchester United fans have been dreading is finally upon them.
Sir Alex Ferguson will retire at the end of the 2012/2013 season in May.
Speaking as a Liverpool fan myself, Sir Alex Ferguson (SAF) has been a worthy adversary. Manchester United have been tremendous in his time there, success after success, and overtaking Liverpool's league record in the process. He is a living legend in his own right
However, for MU, life must go on, and apparently in the next few days they will announce his successor. Whoever that is (popular rumour says it's Moyes) will have big shoes to fill.
But that was always going to be the case for anyone replacing a successful manager. What makes it even worse for the incoming manager though is that SAF will remain on as a director and ambassador, which brings the question of whether the new guy will be able to handle both the pressure of replacing SAF as well as dealing with the fact that SAF will be there at Old Trafford, watching his every move closely. And even if immediate success does come his way, people will question whether it's really because of him or because of SAF pulling the strings in the background.
Whatever happens, Manchester United will miss SAF dearly. Will they be able to continue their success without him? We shall see....
I'm not sure how I managed to miss this in my movie post a few days ago, but I did, and the fanboy in me is finding it hard to forgive this slight. Apologies regardless! Coming out November 1st 2013:
Ender's Game
Despite it being one of my favourite Sci-Fi books of all
time, I must admit to being quite late to the party. I had read so many others,
Silverberg, Gibson, Phillip K Dick, Niven, Clarke and Herbert before arriving
at Orson Scott Card’s masterpiece. Better late than never, it was an amazing read.
This book is NOT easy to translate on to the big screen, and
I’m sure many fans would agree with me. The main focus of the book is on children,
and therein lies the risk, as the story is no more a children’s story than Dune
is. And, of course, it is inevitable that parallel lines will be drawn with
movies like the Harry Potter series. (God forbid!) In fact, the way I look at it, Ender’s Game
reads a lot more like a psychological thriller than a Sci-Fi book.
I hope they translate it well. I recommend that those of you
interested but have not read the book should read it first.
So we Malaysians had our national elections on Sunday. I’m no political scientist, so don’t expect
any deep, thought-provoking analysis. I did follow it quite a bit though so
here’s my own selected observations on
the event:
Great increase in voter turnout
I was very
proud to see Malaysia turn out in vast numbers to vote. Credit to all parties
from either side of the divide for working hard to bring them out. I hope we
get a similar turnout next time around
as well. I approached a few voters for their thoughts early in the day and they
were all happy to talk. Maybe wearing this t-shirt helped :p
Karim Raslan
shines at Astro Awani
As expected, most of the mainstream media supposed
‘political analysts’ were pretty much chickenshit in their commentary. One
fascinating exception was Mr Karim Raslan. A breath of fresh air, he praised
either side when he felt they deserved the praise, he was very forthright in
his criticism of EC, very forthright in his criticism of Awani itself for not
being up to date and being late at reporting results, especially those where
the opposition had won, when the results were streaming in from other media
channels. He also applauded Malaysia’s voters for rejecting some of the
extremists that contested, which brings me to:
Rejection of
Ibrahim Ali and Zulkifli Noordin
These two have been an embarrassment to most
of Malaysia as a whole, so I was thrilled and relieved to hear of their losses
in their respective constituency. For
me, this is the best election news I’ve heard. Feel free to disband Perkasa,
although I sadly know it’s not gonna happen. But thank you to the majority of
Shah Alam and Pasir Mas voters, I salute you! Having said that:
Racism is still alive and well, sadly
Malaysia still has a long way to go. I’ve
seen too many Facebook threads full of hateful racist remarks. Be Malaysian
first, people!
Gerakan
considered irrelevant?
A lot of news has focused on MCA’s failure,
but what about this BN component party? Teng, the BN Penang Chief has
rightfully resigned from all posts, assuming the responsibility for Gerakan’s
failure to perform, but after an even poorer performance than last time, does Gerakan have any real reason to continue existing?
I just don’t see it.
So much for the Independents
I mean seriously. There are candidates who
ended up with less than a 100. TWENTY ONE was the lowest I’ve seen. Were they
deluded? Or were they fooled by their followers into believing they had a
chance? It’s all well and good to want to represent your people but you need to
seriously find out whether there are enough people who want you. Sure you don’t
care about losing the money but what about your credibility as a person? Oh, for those leaving your party to run as an independent? Nice try. but no cigar. So there you have it. Make of it what you will. Life goes on... make it a good one!
of his lovely mummy
