It's Been a Long While

After much observation, I have come to a conclusion that I am getting lazy and that the blog has not seen activity in a long time. Spending countless seconds mulling over it, I have come to another conclusion that it was true and that I wasn't really paying attention to my readers and my blog. For that I apologize. Well, I hope this will be a long post that would satisfy all of you in the mean time. Note: This is a long post, and hopefully you have the patience and that your eyes can stay in their sockets.

Let's all begin with the unexciting start of the holidays. It was a wonderful thing that holiday has finally descended after the horror that is the year end exam. Now that homework was a thing of the past (for now, I regrettably add), I have been camping unhealthily in front of the computer. I could be spending time playing with the basketball or reading some of my form 5 notes, but such thoughts were unappealing when one is in the thralls of a holiday fever.

Fortunately, I have been digesting books at a fast pace during the holidays, and till this date I have already finished five books, which all proved to be delightful reads. Two of them were Warcraft books, the rest of other sources, including famous authors like Jack Higgins and Darren Shan. The latter's book, The Thin Executioner, proved to be a very, very satisfying read, and I was surprised as I was not much a fan of his previous books. The Thin Executioner gave me mixed emotions and I was quite saddened by the tragic death and fascinated by the tale told by the characters of the book, and I would recommend all to read it (The book is a little detailed on the gruesome parts though. After all, he is the "Number One Master of Horror").

Note the ugly, malefic mountain. And the skulls.

Well, I did not stay at home every single day, alright? I do go out, rarely, mind you. I just went back to my hometown at the start of the holidays, and most of the time was spent on a book my friend borrowed me, and a little time spent listening to songs and counting how many spiders had woven their webs before dying of hunger at the corner of the room as I wait for the computer to start. Yes, that computer. You know, speaking of my hate and dislike towards the computer had seemed like a parody on my blog now. Damn that @#$% machinery!

In other news, I went to Midvalley with a friend of mine to take a look at a PC fair. Or sorta. There's a different name for it I guess. After some blunder, I had to watch Tower Heist with my mum while he waited in line to buy a 500 GB portable harddisk for only RM 139. Yes, RM 139. I am not joking, it is cheap, and as much as I wanted it, I prefer the movie more, and I don't really have a use for a new hard disk. Tower Heist was one of the best comedies I have ever watched, and it made me laugh from the start till the end. At least it has a decent plot with quite a few twists.

The RM 139 treasure. NO JAMS!

I also have taken the time to watch with my cousin The Warrior's Way, and being an action movie, it lacked rather much action and was instead replaced by mild comedy and the gore and blood that was almost everywhere in the movie. Everywhere Jang Dong Gun went, somebody died, either it is through a pair of chopsticks or a frozen miniature sword fish. No, I am not joking about the sword fish. Conclusion, the movie wasn't as good as I expected, the animations were poor and the main character emotionless, even till the kissing part (which somehow irritates me). The story was also bland and the plot predictable. I would recommend a look at it, but it probably isn't worth your money to watch it in the cinema or buy it as a DVD.

As I said, it is funny. The start and end of the video might brighten your day. Shunpo, anyone?

I also watched several other movies recently. On one outing, we went watching In time. The show was epic. The plot and details put into the movie was extremely good, leaving out little or no detail, and arousing very little questions in the audience. Justin Timberlake's acting was better than I expected, and the action scenes were superb, and the show constantly left suspense to gnaw at the audience. The story had a very interesting plot and I paid for the movie happy and contented.

About to eat.

Food is coming!

Those cooks must be slacking.

We also visited Secret Garden at the roof of One Utama (Not so secret, actually. Ironic isn't it? Mmm, yes). There were many types of plants, some never before seen, some only heard of or read in books, and some entirely unexpected. We had a long tour of the gardens above and that trip ended with us getting slightly wet from all the sprinklers in the garden.

We enter to our doom.

A palm tree. Must be a real "handful".

Gourds are a rare sight.

Cacti.

If you notice, the water is actually sludge.

A new species of plant. Jokes aside, he's a good friend of mine.

I'm a real "fan" of these plants.

Roses are red, and so is this too!

A species of orchid.

For those who can't tell, it's a droplet of water on a leaf.

I have no idea what is this.

Some kind of plant that looks absolutely normal.

Passion fruit?

Blood orchid. Wonder if there are any anacondas around?

Padi!

Rice!

Porridge! Wait, no some kind of plant.

Purpley purple!

Like something out of a swamp.

A man-made waterfall!

The sludge.

It looks like a... candle. Yes, just a candle.

I was looking at the cacti.

This doesn't even look like a plant.

Next, I went out with another bunch of friends to karaoke and shoot a few arrows. Yes, arrows. Not those real, armor-piercing ones. Just a few that one can practice for archery.

There wasn't much to say; most of us sang till our throats were sore, and archery was fun but sort of a let down (no surprise... since Bryan was the only one who knew how to play!) because we can't go skating due to a condition of my friend. It's not her fault though, and I don't blame her! I was happy enough already. And speaking of skating, you should know that we are at Sunway Pyramid! Red Box and archery and a little shopping ended our fun day there...

Yes, the six of us.

Guess what song is this?

Bryan doing add maths. Actually no, he's ordering food.

Must be my song. Nobody sings my song :'(

And speaking of Sunway Pyramid, there was another outing at the very same place! It was around a week later though, and this time, we got to skate! Ice-skating was more fun than I imagined, although starting was a complete nightmare where standing straight up was near impossible. Note that I did not actually skate for more than a few inches at a time on each foot, and it was fortunate that I did not fall down, although they say falling down is the fun part. Tried falling down once. It only felt cold... and wet...

The receipt for the ice-skating.

I also watched Breaking Dawn, which was surprising. I never liked Twilight in any way, and I got extremely disinterested after the first movie (B-O-R-I-N-G, no offense of course, just my opinion), but after watching Breaking Dawn, I can say the fighting part excited me and I fell in love with giant wolves ever since. Well, not the actors, but the wolves. I just like wolves. Needless to say, the plot was rather interesting and I can't wait for part 2, even though I barely know the story of the Twilight series.

We took the bus back to KJ LRT station.

Besides that, my MSN just died on me the other day. I couldn't login, and the entire computer would freeze after the error message appeared. I tried searching for solutions, reinstalling it, and even downloading Windows Live all over again. My friend, who I believe wishes to be anonymous, told me to "Live with it." (You know who you are...). I tried to, really, but I didn't last for 2.33 hours. And so, I had to delete my computer account, and create a new one.

It was a tiring job, and if you have over 60 bookmarks at websites to remember, both for Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox, I recommend you to not do it. It took me a lot of time an eternity, and when I was finished, I just realized, hey there are some programs, files, songs and data that I also need to move to my new account! I went to sleep while waiting for the files to transfer.

So, now I am using my new account, and is in fact typing this post with it, and I am pleased that it was much faster than the previous one (less crap in it). Unfortunately, there are several things that will be missed, such as the Remembered Passwords and Username for my Chrome... And of course, getting youtube when I type 'y' in the address bar for Chrome. Darn thing keeps popping out the website for my blog instead.

All in all, I guess changing once in a while is a good thing. I should be grateful that MSN works on a different computer account, albeit I deleted MSN Plus just to be on the safe side. Now, the computer goes much smoother and Skyrim is now much, much faster! Quote: I used to be an adventurer like you, then I took an arrow to the knee. Darn game.

As I write this, I am listening to an amazing piano play by a recently-discovered youtuber called Animenzzz, and his videos are amazing. He makes transcriptions of anime songs and plays them out emotionally and beautifully on the piano, and some of them are so nice that I was at a loss for words.

He has one hell of a talent. Just to give you a taste:

You can visit his blog by clicking here.

My best friend will be coming back to Malaysia soon, and for a whopping 2 months! That's right, folks! Two. Freaking. Months! I hope he would be able to come with me to KL during the next 2 weeks, and that we can have loads of fun in the meantime! Think of all the things we can do!

We can like, eat and sleep, and watch TV, and play games, and walk, and like, eat and sleep, and eat, and eat, and eat, and eat. Did I mention we were eating?

Dr. Who marathon, anyone?

YC, signing out.

Exams Are Over... For Now...

Finally, after what seemed a month of pure horror and torture (note that I am exaggerating, exams was kinda fun), it has ended! No more studying until late at night, waking up early (to study) and then dying of boredom after finishing English papers.

Reflecting on myself, I haven't really thought about how I did for the exams. I just sort of sprinted through it, wanting to reach the end before looking at how far I have gotten myself, like an Olympic runner running without stopping, even though he had long crossed the finishing line.

The day after exams was like a wave that had reared so high finally come crashing down. There was a mixture of feelings for me; relief, peacefulness, a little boredom, and of course, the anxiety of what waits in store for me. I hope it is not what I think it is.

In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy myself doing things that most teenagers would do, including going out, and spending my life in front of the computer. Oh, and don't forget basketball too! It is a fun game where you dribble a ball and toss it in a hoop to score. If the ball gets in you get points, simple as that.

And today, at school, we had a dodgeball competition. I got hit four times. End of story. I am not in a mood to blog now, when there are so many... delicacies around, so if I may, I shall bid myself goodbye. Oh, and here's a little video for you if you find this dull. I'm sorry, but I'm just too moody now.

YC, signing out.

Here I Am, Once Again

Finally, it's the holidays! After the pressuring exam, where I am forced to sleep late and wake up early, I can now sleep late and wake up late. It's a win-win strategy for both the morning (or afternoon) me and my night (or midnight) me! Hoorah! Best of all, I have an entire week (most probably less due to procrastination) to study biology paper 3, physics paper 3 and chemistry paper 1, 2 and 3. Which sucks. Oh, and Chinese. Which sorta is useless since we took the main exam already, and our teacher said this was more like an "exercise".

Ah, and for the first three days of the holiday and I am stuck at my 'kampung' already. You know what that means right? Bring out the drumroll, it's... the suck-ass computer of uselessness. Okay, fine, it's not entirely useless. At least there's the internet (even though I can't do much besides downloading things and reading articles), the Microsoft Word's working, and my cousin lets me watch some of his anime in Chinese sub.
 

 

Wait, didn't I destroy you before?

I will reach home in due time, and it just shows how grateful I am towards my computer. Actually, it doesn't, but who am I to argue with the little perfect identity I created myself that stays locked up somewhere inside me?

I also browsed a lot of youtube videos in the lpast few hours/days. Anybody heard of a recent movie called "The Thing" which is a sequel but is actually a prequel of the movie "The Thing". Sounds confusing? It is. Basically, both movies are titled the same, one made in 1982, one made this year in 2011. The movie in 2011, which is supposedly a sequel, is actually the prequel of the 1982 movie. Somehow the alien in the movie gets lower quality textures upon reaching the 1982 movie.

While the movie is quick and a little fast paced, the storyline isn't too bad. A few scientists in Antarctica discovered a spaceship and an alien life form trapped within an iceberg for God knows how many centuries. The scientists then decide to take a tissue sample and make a discovery that will "make them rich and famous", though what it means is actually rather vague.

The alien itself is merely called The Thing, hence the title. It has the ability to replicate the cells of its prey (basically it copies what it eats) and imitate the person to get close to other food sources. In a group of paranoid scientists, this creature does fairly well in causing chaos.

A parody of the movie by Smosh. What a cute little Pokemon.

In other news, I am rather excited for the upcoming Heart of the Swarm, an expansion for the Starcraft 2 Wings of Liberty campaign. New units will be introduced, and the campaign will feature my favorite race, the infamous Zerg.

In addition, a new game will be introduced by Blizzard, titled Blizzard DOTA. Yes, you guessed it, another spinoff! But don't worry, the graphics are amazing, the heroes quite interesting (ranging from various Blizzard games) and hopefully it is a custom game for SC2.

 Sweet, eh?

That's all I guess, for now. I don't think I can continue to use this computer; the keyboards are snapping and biting at my fingers. They are harder than rocks, I say. I'll probably do a post on an anime review, a short one, mind you. I'll also probably post a short story that you guys might be interested (or not) in reading. Basically it takes place in the universe of my own creation, where magic exists and the world is made much more scarier that way. Till we meet again.

YC, signing out.

A New Makeover, and An Endless Nightmare?

As the majority of you readers might have noticed, my blog has undergone a big change, just after around 2 weeks of no updates. A huge change. A total renovation, if you will, and all because of some stupid blogspot advertisement that said, "Hi, we have a new template for you!" And I was like "Oh kay, let's see what's so good."

The thing was, I forgotten my old blog template and had pressed the button without much of a second thought. And so, a new shitty version of my blog appeared. Most of the things were out of order, and the color of words had undergone some changes until you can barely see them on the black background. My fishies are squished into a small spot and the archive corner is pulled so long that Jormungand (Norse mythology, Google it) would be ashamed of itself.

The bad thing was, I couldn't figure out what my old template was. There wasn't an undo button (not that I am aware of) that I could just use to return everything to normal. So I went through their many list of examples and templates to change my blog once again. In addition to taking up more space and having huge gaps between them, there have been a slight change to font and font size. Title is now above the picture as well as white in color.

I also added a section of blogs that I visit once in a while, most of them belonging to anime blogs. There are a few from my friend that I recommend reading. You may find it enjoyable. I also added 3 slideshows just above my fishes, one on anime, on on the beauty of nature and one of games and misc. It was sort of a do-it-in-a-pinch kind of thing, and I hope you would enjoy them. In addition, I added some websites which I use and find resources from.

Also, the reason for my absence in the past few weeks was because of my time spent on games, chatting with friends, facebook and writing stories (in the favor of H.P Lovecraft and his creations, especially Cthulhu). Then there was also my friend Jarren. He just came back from Australia to spend 2 weeks in Malaysia for his holidays. It was fun there, which included a swimming pool, a hair salon, Weeping Angels and Dr. Who. It was a really enjoyable time with him, and he's safely back at Australia now. I hope to see him the next time he comes back! On a side note, do not take your eyes off angels made of stone that moves towards you with their hands outstretched everytime you looked away. For more information, watch Dr. Who Series 5 or Google for more information on the Weeping Angels. You may also refer to the video below.

Go on, I dare you to blink.

THEY WILL COME OUT OF THIS VIDEO!!

On to my next topic, I am currently taking my final exams. Yes, the dreaded, horrible, exams filled with enigmatic and horrible questions, waiting to rend your flesh, feast on your bones and steal your soul. It is not that bad. I make it sound bad. Which means that I am bad.

Pressure, pressure...! So many subjects to study, all before the 10 day holiday (which I plan on focusing Chemistry) and each one the day after the other. Tension's building up, everybody's studying and I'm trying my best. I really do hope I can score. P.S: No RKA day!

Of course, anime for the fall season had to come out at this time. Spending restless time downloading Hunter X Hunter, Shakugan no Shana III, Persona 4, Guilty Crown, Boku wa Tomodachi wa Sukunai, Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon, Mirai Nikki, C Cube, Working Season 2, and last but never ever least, Fate/Zero!

Since when did Caster...

...Became this?

I have been waiting and waiting for that anime since the beginning of the month after getting a whiff of rumor of the anime. Although I have downloaded them, I have not watched them, lest they get stuck in my head and suddenly appear in a subjective question. It might doom me forever!

And lastly, due to exams and all that crap, I'm going to be on hiatus for a short week, and will probably only update it during the holidays or weekends. That's it folks.

Here's a little video for you to keep you through hard times. WARNING: Random alert ahead!

YC, signing out.

Back to Civilization

Sorry, my faithful readers, for I have been on hiatus for the last few days. Or last few weeks, to be more accurate. Yes, I admit that I have been slightly neglecting this blog for a time now, and I am terribly regretful of that.

So, let's start at the very beginning of the list. The coming year-end exam is giving me a headache. So far, I'm not so worried about Additional Maths now, but more of Chemistry and Physics. Those two subjects are giving me hell at the moment. And then I look at the Form 3s and I envy them. My facebook is piled with statuses upon statuses of Form 3s talking about PMR. I mean, compared to Form 4, PMR may seemed like a kindergartener's work. The level is completely different between the two. Trust me, you will miss objective questions once you come to this Form. Form 4's objective are evil, abusive and evil.

In other news, I went back to my 'kampung' in Johor, which is Muar, on the 16th of September. The motive of this trip back to my hometown is because my cousin who has studied in France for 5-10 years (somewhere in between, wasn't really bothered to remember) came back and my uncle is celebrating by inviting most of my relatives over for dinner. It was fun and all, especially with my cousin's daughter and my uncle's son. But my main topic about this is the COMPUTER THERE SUCKS.

First I was like this...

I know, I know. You guys must be saying like, I'm suppose to enjoy being with my family since that is the purpose of that trip. I know that too well, and I do feel a little guilty, but I am a person who has entertainment needs. So, any of you remember the post where I complained about the computer which sucked? Well, guess what? It decided to take the word 'suck' to a whole new level.

In addition to being slow, laggy, prone to hangs and unresponsiveness, the computer decided to add certificate errors to its list of problems. Now I am unable to login to Facebook, go to my Gmail, or even log in msn. Then of course, I couldn't even download anything because Megaupload and Fileserve were unusable. The only 3 download sites which work were Zomgupload, Uploaded and Hotfile, and they weren't the best. At least I get to use eBuddy and chat with several people, so it wasn't all that bad. Ok, fine, it was that bad.

...Then I was like this.

Now, on to the latest news. My best friend has just touch down today, just in the wee hours of the morning! He will be staying here for 2 weeks and I am sure it'll be fun. The sad thing is, my exam starts next month, so I will be a little torn about studying and enjoying time with him. But swimming is definitely in the equation. HOORAH!

Oh yeah, I nearly forgotten to mention. Some dumb barber cut my hair wrong and now it looks like crap. The end.

I laughed so hard.

YC, signing out.