Archive | April, 2005

I’m back

Posted April 29, 2005 at 3:55 am in General Nonsense

Yes I am, pretty busy, actually hectic catching up with work, it’s piling on, doesn’t help it’s a holiday on Monday either..

Back to menial stuff yesterday, paying bills, had awesome lunch/dinner at Fasta Pasta though..

Was supposed to go yum cha afte that, but was too tired, truly exhausted, so I let the ‘organiser’ know in due time, then she proceeded not to tell anyone else.

Apologies on her behalf for misleading you into thinking I’d be there, I’ll be around tonight and the weekend though 🙂

Saw a neat post just now, this guy is 3l33t!

https://www.totalillusions.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=328&st=0 .bitchchecker. tell me your network number man then you’re dead
.Elch. yes exactly that’s it: 127.0.0.1 I’m waiting for you great attack
.bitchchecker. in five minutes your hard drive is deleted
.Elch. Now I’m frightened
.bitchchecker. shut up you’ll be gone
.bitchchecker. i have a program where i enter your ip and you’re dead
.bitchchecker. say goodbye
* bitchchecker (~java@euirc-61a2169c.dip.t-dialin.net) Quit (Ping timeout#)

Dickwad nuked himself ROFL.

Will post the final pics and my summary of Sri Lanka over the weekend.

Saw another couple of interesting blog posts too, not that I usually help whore other people, I’m too buy pimping my own traffic..

But, do Matt Salleh’s have a right to nag in Malaysia?

And are all bloggers selfish?

Saw the most moving, artistic, sometimes twisted and interesting site I’ve seen in some time too:

PostSecret[/url]

Anyway will update over the weekend properly.

Missed you all!

Continue Reading · 8 Comments · General Nonsense

Random Stuff, Torrents and Dead Blogs

Posted April 22, 2005 at 11:35 pm in General Nonsense

Yeah it’s Saturday, and I’m working…and yes it sucks.

Oh well last day of the project, but have to go straight to India from here, will be first time over there.

It was a national holiday here yesterday..didn’t get up to anything though as I was finishing off the final report for today..

I NEVER WANT TO SEE ANOTHER REPORT…well not for quite some time anyway..

Some other stuff..

IF you use BitTorrent, found some interesting resources..

Wikipedia surprisingly has a list of sites..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bittorrent#Torrent_sites

There is also a useful site here which shows which are up and down:

https://www.orbdesign.net/bt/

Damn am sleepy…

Also there has been a spate of blogs dying recently..

First The Hustler[/url] proclaimed he was getting ‘hustled’ and someone claimed him to be a fake, perhaps a girl…perhaps just a story teller, then he got a hell of a lot of flak over it.

He’s even taken down all his old posts and changed his template to remove all links etc.

You can still find some of his cached posts HERE if you are quick..they are fast disappearing..

I don’t mind for one, he was entertaining when I first read him, some months ago, when I’d just started blogging myself.

He had an original style, wrote some shocking offensive stuff, but he was equal he offended everyone..

As he moved up in traffic status, he became less offensive, more tame, more pornographic and became a complete hit whore..

You’d see his comments everywhere “Nice post bro!” Or “Nice blog you have here”

Clearly he hadn’t read the post, he was whoring incoming links..

He did comment a couple of times properly though, I guess he’s still around, Hi Hustler 😀

The last couple of months his blog became kinda dull, who cares if it’s real or fake, as long as it’s entertaining right?

Look at Sweet Young Thing[/url] and Belle Du Jour[/url], could be complete fiction, but they are still good right?

Another saucy blog seems to have bitten the dust too, Sarong Party Girl[/url]..Another girl who wrote unashamedly about her own hedonistic lifestyle. She left too many clues as to her real identity though, perhaps something happened in reality that caused her to pull the plug. Everything seems to be gone, and no goodbye note.

Following these a personal friend of mine also stopped..the original ranter, FireAngel[/url], she redefined the useage of the work FUCK.

Before this was Buaya69 and mdmafia..

Maybe they will all come back in different forms…maybe they are all already back.

Anyway blogs are born, blogs evolve, some go stale and mouldy some become more beautiful and powderful, some die, some just fade away.

Those that burn bright too quickly are not stable, they burn out fast, remember that 🙂

Anyway have a good weekend, talk to you from India..

Continue Reading · 19 Comments · General Nonsense

The Bloggers Prayer – Amen

Posted April 20, 2005 at 4:22 am in General Nonsense, Internet & Tech, Weird/Humour

Our words, who art in notepad,
Blogging be thy Name.
Thy traffic come.
Thy ego will be done,
On wordpress as it is in xanga.
Give us this day our daily RSS feeds.
And forgive us our typos,
As we forgive those who flame against us.
And lead us not into blogwhoring,
But deliver us from self-importance.
For thine is the blogosphere,
and the hit counter,
and the sympathy vote,
for ever and ever.
Amen.

This is an original work by me…I know you can tell cos it sucks 😛

Feel free to repost, as long as you credit.

Continue Reading · 32 Comments · General Nonsense, Internet & Tech, Weird/Humour

Kandy, Sri Lanka – The Hill City

Posted April 19, 2005 at 2:20 am in Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

I’m stuck writing reports, more reports and more reports…argh save me..

Well I finally got out of the hotel for a change on Sunday, it was a nice clear day, which was good.

We headed up to Kandy, the hill city.

The main attraction I think is the Tooth Temple (Dalada Maligawa) and the cooler less humid climate due to the altitude. The place was packed as it’s a long holiday, Sinhalese new year fell on Wednesday and Thursday, so most people took Friday off and enjoyed a 5 day break.

It was a fairly long journey, around 3 hours, imagine a narrow winding road, not as steep and winding as the stretch to Genting, but pretty similar…but it lasts 3 hours, urgh.

whilst driving in Sri Lanka it’s quite normal to have regular near death experiences, look up and see a huge bus with bullbars storming at you..

Deafened by the sounds of horns, choking on the exhaust fumes, it’s lovely, really.

There is a lot of derelict shops around the place, a lot warn down facades and places that look like they are about to fall apart..

It’s a fairly scenic place, more grass than Malaysia and less densley farmed forests.

The trip was nice apart from the horrible Tamil music blaring from the self-inclosed 6×9 under my nose..

I’ve heard kids TV show theme tunes more musical than some of those songs…argh

Cricket is very much definately the national passtime, you see kids playing it everywhere.

So after lunch at a chinese resturant (food was ‘ok’), we headed to Tooth Temple..

One of the chief objects of interests in Kandy is the ‘Dalada Maligawa’ or Temple of the Sacred Tooth. This is the heart of Kandy, and the Tooth of Buddha is the heart of it. The relic came from India sixteen centuries ago, and moved from capital to capital always with the king. It is rarely shown and never leaves the temple. The temple and the ‘Pattirippuwa’, which is the octagonal building on the right of the main entrance, are enclosed by an ornamental stone wall and a moat. Upon entering, you pass through a small quadrangle and turn to the right, up a flight of stone steps, to the temple. The most striking features that attract one’s attention are the unusual carvings, brightly coloured frescoes representing torments for various classes of sinners, and many images of Lord Buddha. The flower-sellers are ranged on either side and the atmosphere is heavy with the perfume of the white blossoms. Yellow-robed priests flit here and there, whilst the music of the temple bells and the rhythmic beat of the tom-tom fill the air with strange melodies that harmonize with the nature of the city. At the entrance to the sanctuary which contains the Sacred Tooth is an elaborate door, inlaid with silver and ivory, with two pairs of elephants’ tusks on either side. Within this chamber is the huge silver-gilt, bell-shaped shrine that protects the Tooth. Inside this shrine are six inner shrines ornamented with precious stones of rare value.

It was heavily secured with metal detectors and two sets of guards before you reach the inner sanctum.

There was also a nice pictorial history in one room with dozens of golden statues..

As normal you had to remove your shoes too, but it was FUCKING HOT, I think my feet actually started smoking, the floor was like 6000 degrees.

After that we headed to a lake..

It was pretty and nice, but well it’s a lake, who hasn’t seen a lake before?

We headed up to the top of the hill and checked out the view of Kandy city..

Following that we headed to the botanical gardens, I didn’t take many pictures as it was a botanical garden, mostly trees and flowers and shit like that.

Also some bats, by some bats I mean like 30,000 bats geez they are noisy

The leaning trees were kinda cool though.

There was also a nice pond..

With some flowers and stuff..

I think I walked about 3 miles, that’s enough excercise for the rest of the decade.

Rest of the pictures are in the Gallery HERE.

It was a nice trip, was hell getting back though due to the long holiday and there were some kind of races going on up there..took us like 5+ hours, felt like I’d been shaken around in a peanut can for 5 hours when I got back to the hotel..ordered room service, watched some cheesy TV and knocked out.

Anyway glad to be back soon…kinda getting really really bored here…hope I don’t get shipped off again as soon as I land, that would suck..

Next assignment is supposed to be 2 months in UK, but I haven’t heard anything about it yet *sigh* I came to Malaysia because I wanted to live there…not spend 1 month out of 3 there. And being away sucks, can’t blog so regularly, my average daily traffic has gone from 450 to 230, oh well, at least it’ll keep my bandwidth down. I won’t blog some controversial crap just to get attention, then publically apologise to get more attention.

I blog for myself, I appreciate my posts, so there’s at least one 🙂 I just happen to be good at traffic whoring (without pissing people off)..

https://www.security-forums.com is the ultimate testament to that.

Anyway kinda off-topic, take care for now 🙂

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Continue Reading · 10 Comments · Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

Emotions..Depression, Anger?

Posted April 15, 2005 at 4:38 am in Deep Thoughts

Emotions are strange things are they not?

Do you ever get down for no reason? Well no conceivable reason, nothing you can put your finger on…nothing out of the ordinary, nothing negative or bad happening..

Does it feel like the reaper is following you around?

Everything is ideal as can be, but yet you are still in a pit of blackness. It happens to me from time to time, I try to understand, I deal with it, I have no choice..but I see it effect others aswell, when it’s those I care about it bothers me..having experience with it, I can often help them combat it. It’s a weird sensation, something like desolation, being alone although you are not, being sad although you shouldn’t be, feeling useless even though you are far from it.

I’ll perhaps reference them as I ramble through this post.

I’ve talked about Destiny and Fate[/url], what they mean and how they can effect you..

These often seem to cause bones of contention and depression, what is happening to me? where is my life going? what is the point of my existence? am I doing the right thing?

I rambled about how you should pull your shit together[/url] when you are at the bottom of the heap, people need to take care of themselves, stop worrying about what other people thing, stop taking instructions from people that don’t know anything and STOP blaming others for their failures. Life is there for the taking, you are in control, if you aren’t – you are doing something wrong.

I’ve written about personal devils, and how you should face them[/url], don’t run away, never run away, the pain and the depression just get’s worse. With things of the heart, as with anger, hiding it, pushing it away just intensifies it, resent grows, anger bubbles until it reaches boiling point if it’s not dealt with.

Depression spirals down…if it’s serious, it has a cause, a reasoning, unless it’s truly medical, then it’s mental, it’s of your own creation, perhaps something in earlier life, perhaps something you aren’t even conciously aware of triggered it.

2004[/url] was quite some year for me, eventful in many ways..I’ve always loved quotes from Nietzsche, one of the most emminently quotable folks to have ever walked the earth.

My favourite being “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”

This is true, truth lies in pain, hurt and deceit, I guess all but the most sheltered has experienced these things through their lives. Yin and Yang, it also makes you appreciate the good, without the bad there IS no good.

Life is not all about the good, character is shown by dealing with the the bad, the ugly, the uncomfortable and the inevitable.

Hmm what am I writing about actually? I really have no idea.

Perhaps the devolution of morals? Perhaps the increase of depression as society puts more pressure on people, expectation raise, stress increases..

Anger luckily unlike my asshole father is something I don’t suffer from, I have a very even temperament, perhaps I’ll blog one day about the 2 times in my entire life I recall losing my temper. Which is good, anger is bad, resolution is good.

As for arguments, it doesn’t make you right just because you can shout louder than me.

Some people can be horribly insensitive too, only thinking about themselves, I urge you to take control of your lives, just not at the detriment of others, you still have to think about the consequences your actions will create. Think before you speak, think twice before you act..look before you leap and all that 🙂

I’m still not sure exactly what I’m trying to say.

Perhaps nothing. I’ll leave it for now..

Continue Reading · 21 Comments · Deep Thoughts

Sunday walk down the beach in Colombo

Posted April 12, 2005 at 6:25 am in Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

So my camera screwed up on Saturday, no pictures 🙁

I formatted the memory card and put fresh batteries in and it seemed ok so I headed out for a walk along the beach after grabbing lunch in the hotel (Tandoori chicken sandwich).

Oops..forgot about writing this, got carried away clearing up my photos..taking up too much space 😀

Ok sorted them out to a reasonable degree, phew. Just dumped them into relevant folders though, still need to weed out the crappy ones..that’s a task for another day though as SOME PEOPLE[/url] keep bugging me every 5 minutes to update. (I have to work to do hmmkay)

So generally I sit in the hotel room…watching lousy movies on cable TV.

Hugging my ashtray..

Staring at my laptop, wondering why the hell THERE IS NO WIRELESS..

So after Saturday, I decided to take it out, just stroll out from the hotel and take a walk along the beach, it was a nice clear day, waited till it wasn’t *too* hot, around 3pm and headed out.

This is the hotel I’m staying at, literally across the street from the beach

It has it’s own roundabout with fountains..

On the other side of the roundabout, the old parliment building, which I’m not supposed to take pictures of..

The passtime for couples here…is sitting under and umbrella at the beach..cool eh?

The beach front is pretty typical, sadly no bars or decent resturants, just small booths selling snacks and drinks..and lots of couples under umbrellas

And loads of guys selling pineapple, I had some, man the pineapple over here is fantastic, succulent, sweet and juicy…hmm sounds good.

This is where I have lunch at the weekends, the hotel cafe facing the beach.

I say at the weekend as in the week I don’t usually bother with lunch, I just load up on the awesome buffet breakfast..and starve till dinner, apparently supposed to be healthy someone told me 0_0

Just made a script to batch resize with PaintShop Pro, pretty neat seen as though I don’t have ACDSee here.

It’s Sinhalese new year this week too, so tommorow and Thursday are national holidays, there was some celebrations and such at the weekend but I didn’t make it there..doing real work is kind of tiring, not much mood for travelling after.

The hotel is having some kind of celebration during the holiday though so that might be worth a few snaps..

I’ll try and get out somewhere next weekend, perhaps Kandy, supposed to be a good place to visit.

Have to go and eat now..laters

Continue Reading · 21 Comments · Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

A Saturday in Colombo

Posted April 11, 2005 at 1:27 am in Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

Ok so I crashed out Friday night after indulging in some more room service and watching some more crappy moves on HBO/Cinemax/Star Movies..

Those channels are nice for about a week, then after that you are stuck with the same movies you’ve already watched a few days previously..

Occasionally a new one springs up that’s worth watchin.

Saturday I headed out on a Journey into Colombo..

It was hot, no really it was SERIOUSLY HOT, I felt like I was in a sauna and was dripping like a skanky hoes underpants after a few minutes.

Majestic has a nightclub, casino and what I’ll losely describe as a Cinema..

I took my camera to take some shots, but sadly it developed a random ‘memory card error’ and wouldn’t save ANY of the pictures I took, which was somewhat annoying..

(To digress I managed to fix it by formatting the memory card)

So let me expand on the cinema…MGM/Majestic cinema seems to be the only Cinema in Colombo (perhaps in the country?) showing western movies, and it’s a joke.

They show 1 movie, 3 times a day.

Yes let me repeat that ONE LOUSY MOVIE

And what’s more…that one movie is Alexander[/url]..which is at least 6 months old..

‘Coming Soon‘ is Underworld[/url]…WTF, that’s more than a year old..if not two.

So you can see, it can barely be described as a cinema..

DVD piracy is rife here, and looking at the cinema, I can see why. The excuse in Malaysia is heavy censorship and some movies not being shown, here the excuse is you can’t even pay to the see the movies legitamately if you WANT to.

DVD’s cost around the same as Malaysia, 180rupees which is about 7RM.

Everything else here is pretty expensive though, food & drink wise, for a country I originally though was considered poorer than Malaysia, and from being here, it certainly ‘feels‘ poorer.

I couldn’t handle it out there too long, too hot, too croweded, reminiscent of those documentaries you see about India..

So I found a small supermarket, bought some snacks and headed back the hotel.

Watched some more crappy movies on cable and ate room service again 🙂 (Maryland chicken) It’s getting to be a convenient habit.

Some of the crappy movies I’ve sat through:

Sniper 2[/url]
She’s Having a Baby[/url]
2 Weeks Notice[/url]
My Little Eye[/url]
Marines[/url]
Darkman III[/url]
Double Impact[/url]
The Assassin[/url]
Mystery Men[/url]
Dracula: Dead & Loving It[/url]
Sgt. Bilko[/url]
Long Time Dead[/url]

Half decent movies I’ve seen there would be..

28 Days Later[/url]
Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story[/url]

As far as I remember that’s about it..my mind is a blur of B-grade movies.

Plus so many others I can’t even remember..

Yesterday I even watched the UCA Cheerleading finals, wtf?

I have some photos from yesterday, took a walk down the beach, will post when I’ve sorted them out.

Continue Reading · 15 Comments · Sri Lanka, Trips & Travel

Search Engine Stuff – Google Answers & Yagoohoogle

Posted April 8, 2005 at 1:06 am in Hacking & Infosec

Google has started providing factual answers..

For example if you type ‘population malaysia’ in the search box, it will no longer lead you to the pages that contain the info, it will actually give you the answer and the page it got the info from:

Malaysia
Population: 23,522,482 (July 2004 est.)
According to https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/fields/2119.html

Also works for other stuff like people, search ‘who is bruce lee’

Bruce Lee
Property: … is widely considered to be the greatest martial arts film actor of the 20th century.
According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Lee

It is however in early stages, but it looks like it will be a better alternative to AskJeeves[/url], which was based on this metho d of searching (actually posing the search engine a question).

I also stumbled upon another new toy, Yagoohoogle[/url], which seems to be down at the moment.

It’s a site split into 2 panes, so you chuck a search term in the first page it shows you both the Yahoo! and Google results. Pretty neat.

BTW has awesome lasagne from hotel room service last night, yum! See you all on Monday.

Continue Reading · 4 Comments · Hacking & Infosec

My Dating Profile – Is it you?

Posted April 6, 2005 at 11:11 pm in Stupid Me Mes
Your dating personality profile:

Outgoing – You can liven up any party. You’ve got a way with people and have little difficulty charming your dates.
Liberal – Politics matters to you, and you aren’t afraid to share your left-leaning views. You would never be caught voting for a conservative candidate.
Adventurous – Just sitting around the house is not something that appeals to you. You love to be out trying new things and really experiencing life.

 Your date match profile:

Athletic – You aren’t looking for a couch potato. You seek someone who is active and who keeps her body in top shape.
Practical – You are drawn to people who are sensible and smart. Flashy, materialistic people turn you off. You appreciate the simpler side of living.
Conservative – Forget liberals, you need a conservative match. Political discussions interest you, and a conservative will offer the viewpoint you need.
Your Top Ten Traits

1. Outgoing
2. Liberal
3. Adventurous
4. Stylish
5. Wealthy/Ambitious
6. Sensual
7. Big-Hearted
8. Athletic
9. Intellectual
10. Practical
Your Top Ten Match Traits

1. Athletic
2. Practical
3. Conservative
4. Outgoing
5. Sensual
6. Adventurous
7. Stylish
8. Big-Hearted
9. Intellectual
10. Wealthy/Ambitious

Take the Online Dating Personality Quiz at Dating Diversions

Are you the one for me? It’s pretty accurate actually, although personally I think I prefer a liberal than a conservative..but perhaps I like the spark that the differences would cause.

See you don’t need to be rich for me, just gotta be cool 🙂

Continue Reading · 13 Comments · Stupid Me Mes

Office Space – Life in a Cubicle..

Posted April 6, 2005 at 12:27 am in Movies
Ever spend eight hours in a “Productivity Bin”? Ever had worries about layoffs? Ever had the urge to demolish a temperamental printer or fax machine? Ever had to endure a smarmy, condescending boss? Then Office Space should hit pretty close to home for you. Peter (Ron Livingston) spends the day doing stupefyingly dull computer work in a cubicle. He goes home to an apartment sparsely furnished by IKEA and Target, then starts for a maddening commute to work again in the morning. His coworkers in the cube farm are an annoying lot, his boss is a snide, patronizing jerk, and his days are consumed with tedium.

Summary from Amazon.com

Office Space at IMDB[/url]

I’m guessing the geeks amongst you will have seen this movie, it’s probably the seminal geek flick along with other favourites from Kevin Smith[/url] (Mallrats[/url], Clerks[/url] etc.), those techie films like Hackers[/url], Wargames[/url], Sneakers[/url] and Swordfish[/url] and those other wierd movies like Pi[/url] and Donnie Darko[/url].

It really epitomises how you feel in the dull cubicle based corporate warground of a big company, especially a tech company..

It’s not a movie for everyone, but if you work in an office you should be ashamed if you haven’t seen this, if you work in I.T. in an office, you should be very ashamed..

If you haven’t started working yet, you should watch it anyway, especially if you’re studying I.T. as this is where you’ll be in a couple of years time..stuck in a cubicle next to a fat woman called Tina who answers the phone in a high-pitched tone with exactly the same phrase for 8-hours a day…

You’ll experience the annoying patronising boss, the memos, the paper-jams, the obscure error messages, the weirdos who are territorial about their stationary..

It reminds me about some of the jobs I’ve had…perhaps I’ll blog about my jobs one day, but that’d be a long post as I’ve been working since I was 13…and worked in pretty much every industry you can think of (unfortunately, not the adult entertainment industry..apart from a brief stint as a fluff boy..no I’M JOKING).

Stuck in a cubicle, staring at your monitor, doing just enough to get by, why do more I ask people? You don’t get incentives, there is no profit sharing, no stock options? What do bosses think? People work for fun? I see people over here, especially in Asia, working themselves to death at detriment of all else (their family, friends and partners), for what? The same salary they would get if they did half as much work, what’s the point? Does it make them feel good, perhaps for a while, yay I’m good at my job, I’ll give you a gold star.

My saying is work SMART not HARD.

Do what you do, do it well, enjoy it if possible and do it in a timely fashion, don’t rush things (then you make mistakes), but don’t procrastinate (you are getting paid for something after all)

Luckily the job I have no is in a line I enjoy, and I spend as little time in a cubicle as possible, but the CyberJaya office is actually cubicle hell…Hopefully will be back to Mon’t Kiara and I’ll be establishing a strong NO CUBICLE policy. We aren’t lab rats, why put us in little boxes?

Anyway enough rambling for today. Miss you.

Continue Reading · 11 Comments · Movies