May Contain Bolts

Have you ever been in an argument with someone over an issue where you know they are wrong, and yet they continue to insist they are right? And I’m not talking about things of personal opinion (because in subjective conflict, there is a lot of fact ‘bending’), but rather things of objectivity (where the facts are there, and opinion should have no part whatsoever).

Basically, I was arguing with someone over whether my monitor was glare or non-glare. I mean, seriously. For those that have no clue what I’m going on about, there’s 2 types of LCD montiors: glare (aka. glossy, because it appears to be reflective like glass – most MacBooks are glossy) and non-glare (aka. matte, because it has a surface that seems to be like frosted glass, which scatters light – most desktop LCD monitors are matte). This person kept insisting (and attempted to backup their argument with words from a ‘technician’) that my monitor was glare, even though it was completely obvious that it was non-glare. (demonstration below)

Which brings me to a few key points.

What do you want me to do? LEAVE? Then they'll keep being wrong!

In arguments, there have been times where I’ve been convinced that I’m right through whatever vague memory of reading something or whatever, and ended up being wrong, and I accept that. What I have a problem with is people who continue to insist that they’re right (to you), even when all the evidence contradicts what they’re saying. That just tells me that you’re extremely stubborn or extremely ignorant.

But it always feels sooooo good when you win.

Diverging now, I can’t believe it’s Thursday, Week 2. Wow. I’ve spent the whole 2 weeks doing nothing apart from sleeping to 12, driving and procrastinating.

Oh, yeah, backtracking a bit, Monday was the day that a bunch of us went to watch Harry Potter 6 at George St VMax. (Aryan’s summary, which I agree with completely XD) I don’t know, but I found it hard to empathize with Dumbledore’s death for some reason – it just didn’t seem to pull on any of the heart strings. In retrospect, the whole movie also seemed rather forgettable too, although it was definitely worth a few laughs.

And a heads up: The final prefect news is coming in Week 2. (although you’re going to be blown away by what the new prefects have installed…damn their massive production budget )

The first song released off Muse’s new album, The Resistance. (coming 14th September 2009) I love it. A little bit of Queen and arabian styling. Plus some of Chopin’s Nocturnes Op. 9.

Download MP3 (13.3MB) | Official download | Official site

Lyrics (via MuseWiki):

You and me are the same
We don’t know or care who’s to blame
But we know that whoever holds the reins
Nothing will change
Our cause has gone insane

And these wars, they can’t be won
And these wars, they can’t be won
And do you want them to go on
And on and on
Why split these states
When there can be only one?

And must we do as we’re told?
Must we do as we’re told?

You and me fall in line
To be punished for unproven crimes!
And we know that there is no one we can trust;
Our ancient heroes, they are turning to dust!

And these wars, they can’t be won
Does anyone know or care how they begun?
They just promise to go on
And on and on
But soon we will see
There can be only one

United States!
United States!
Of…

Eurasia!
…sia!
…sia!
…sia!

Eurasia!
…sia!
…sia!
…sia!

Eurasia!
…sia!
…sia!
…sia!

Also, according to station Colossus, they’re doing something with this PDF/image, this Flickr group and this YouTube group.

So WordPress supports poll embedding now. (check your dashboard folks) Awesome.

Watched the MasterClass on Friday. Eh, was interesting enough, and will be watching the final tonight.

So in light of my 7 workless days, I have decided to write this post about focus and motivation. Something that I’ve been having a problem with for a LONG time.

It’s the reason we go tutoring. We pay other people to motivate us, because reading a textbook is just that boring. I mean, if we were all motivated to study for ourselves, all the tutoring colleges would be out of business, right?

Which brings me to a thought. Why isn’t there one easy solution to the problem? A pill, a syrup, some sort of miracule cure that will magically align the synapses in the mind. I mean, it’s not rocket science.

People have told me that you need a ‘goal’. I guess for most of you, that’s med or law. For me, I have no idea where I’m going. I say that I’m going to go into computer science/IT, but to be honest I really don’t know if it’s really where I want to go. I mean, yeah, I’ve grown up as a computer geek and I love technology, but I’ve never really known what I want to do. Heck, thoughts of  doing arts, digital media, journalism, accounting, law have all run though my mind at some point as crazy as that might sound.

Going to the library would be a good idea…if I could actually be bothered. But often I just find myself sitting there staring blankly at the sheets of paper in front of me. Then the head hits the desk, the pen drops and…

Anyway, to close off I’d like to say that I’m pumped for Muse’s new album. They’ve been releasing parts of their new song Ununited States of Eurasia via an alternate reality game. You can hear the latest portion of the song here (if you want the whole thing, wait till it reaches part 6 which should be in a week or so tomorrow) .

And a quick update on the gaming world. Rock Band letting music makers make their own charts and upload them (maybe we can get some Insylum? ). Modern Warfare 2 ‘Prestige Edition’ to come with nightvision goggles. communitychannel plays Xbox (score!).

EDIT (Post-Masterchef): It was…underwhelming. The show wasn’t that great (‘Masterchef’? Really?), and the outcome was disappointing (yet fairly predictable). The commerical cutaways were quite annoying. Glee, on the other hand, was actually not bad. Looks like September will be an interesting month (Muse!).

I’d like to say that I haven’t been blogging because I’ve been spending my time more productively on things such as study…

But I can’t.

Laptop has been in warranty twice for a dodgy monitor this week (first a dodgy backlight – this is the second time, first was last term; second for a stuck pixel), so I’ve been mostly browsing via my E71. I’ve been sick too since somewhere between Friday night and Saturday morning, which has sucked (lotta coughing and tissues…and tissues).

Pokéball anyone?

I’m using Google Chrome at the moment, and it feels a lot snappier that Mozilla Firefox 3.5. (and if you’re wondering why FF3.5 seems take so bloody long to load on startup, THIS is why) The only thing stopping me from switching permanently is the lack of AdBlock. And the fact that Shift+Enter doesn’t do what it is supposed to do. (oh, and I like my ‘Reopen closed tab’ option to be on ANYWHERE in the tab bar I click, not in that puny blank area next to the New Tab button) (Google, if you’re reading this, I still love you, I swear!)

Windows 7 is also about to RTM (Release to Manufacturing – for all you non computer nerds out there, it basically means that Microsoft are saying ‘yep, we’re ready to go’ and all the hardware and software companies are meant to make their drivers/software work with this version, because it’s the one that will be on store shelves come October 22). Then I will finally be able to purge my computer of the horror that is pre-loaded manufacturer-bloated OEM Windows Vista. (it comes with a version of Norton Internet Security that is so old, it doesn’t actually say what year it is!)

Office 2010 Technical Preview is also out to a select few. (or unselect many, hardy har har) I’m still trying to figure out what exactly is new though…from what I can see, PowerPoint can now do widescreen presentations, and seems to be able to compete slightly better with iWork’s Keynote? The ribbons are now customizable too. And apparently it’s more ‘role-based‘ (what does that even mean? Is Office 2010 and RPG?) Anyway, here’s the awesome trailer:

I can’t believe I’m still watching anime 4 weeks out from trials. Oh well.

Fullmetal Alchemist has diverged from the original series (14 eps in), and is still going just as awesomely as it was before. Either I totally forgot some points in my 4-ish year gap from watching the original (such as King Bradley…) or this is new plot that I haven’t seen before, either way, it’s brilliant. And in 720p too.

The Melancholy of Haruhi Season 2…what can I say about you? I really don’t know. What can I say about you? I really don’t know. What can I say about you? I really…ok this has to end soon right? Right? Guys?

Listened to the Triple J Hottest 100 of All Time on Sunday. I can’t say that I was surprised by the Top 20, but a few that I hadn’t heard of before (‘Aw, Snap!’!? I’ll ‘Aw, Snap!’ you Google Chrome!) – Love Will Tear Us Apart, The Last Goodbye. The Nosebleed Section did not deserve to be the highest ranked Australian song though. #17? Really? Also very surprised that Muse only made it in once (with KoC). And U2 and The Ramones made it in 0 times.

What’s the deal with MasterChef? I hear it’s all the rage. I’m afraid to say that I haven’t actually caught onto the hype yet, and haven’t actually watched a full episode yet. I feel compelled to now – no, pressured. Facebook. They even got #Chris and #Poh trending on Twitter. Isn’t Poh the name of one of the Teletubbies? (all the strange memories of that really weird vacuum cleaner Noo-noo are flooding back…*slurpslurp*)

Twitter. I am using it now. Not really for the purpose of Twittering though. (yay! 140 character limit! NEGATIVE CHARACTERS LEFT) I’m on there because I’m cheap. And I want to win stuff. Like a Wii (and you can too!). (full T&C) Panasonic are giving 2 away tomorrow, and 2 every weekday until Friday 31st July via small challenges on their Twitter and Facebook pages. I’m sure at least one of you has the intellectual cunning and prowess to take home one of these babies.

The title of this blog is dedicated to none other than our own, KRudd. I’ll leave you with a clip from last night’s Chaser (the song starts at 1:30 for those short on time. 2 weeks to go, and here’s the full ep for all you origin followers).

EDIT: And yes, would like to see HP6 at some point. And is probably one of the few who is yet to see Transformers 2…

EDIT2: Oh LOL, posted at 12am on the dot.

The following was typed on my phone on the train trip home after a prefect assembly rehearsal. I’d like to thank Peter again for the lift to Epping. A shoutout to Carol, Bosco and Swami too.

So, i’m on the train back home from school on this Thursday afternoon. It’s 5:30, all traces of the sun are almost gone and dim glow of the artificial lamps light the way. It’s the day before our exeunt – the big prefect finale assembly, and we’ve been practicing long and hard on our songs and dances (much credit to Nicole for her awesome work on choreography), hoping to leave an impression that is at least better than last year’s.

It seems that we as prefects have been cursed. Ever since last year when Prat dropped the flame in the torch, we’ve been tortured with the rumbling grey clouds of misery at every event that we’ve had. Daffodil day, games day, 3on3. The gods do not smile on us unfortunately.

The others standing around scramble to the newly freed seats as I lean on the central pole. A flood of people enter at Rhodes, refilling the area with conversation and strange glances at my erroneous tapping on my phone. For some reason, I never feel compelled to sit on the empty seats which are next to the people who sit on the 3-seaters. I’d rather stand – maybe because I’m scared. Why? I mean, they’re not going to say no (unless you’re really unlucky and get some douche). I guess it’s a self confidence thing. No, not even that. Lower?

Heh, the doors in front of take forever to open at North Strathfield. The woman waiting paitiently in front of me, holding her groceries in one hand and an umbrella in another is probably getting angry. I don’t know whether I’ve talked about this before, but patience is something that seems to be wearing thin these days. We want everything now. That web page to load. That train to come. The HSC to be over. The saying ‘good things come to those who wait’ springs to mind, but I can’t actually think of an example where that has held true.

It’s 5:48, and the train literally empties at Strathfield. Like droves of sheep parading out of the carriage. Yet even then, the train remains relatively packed. I grab a seat downstairs, and people give me ‘wtf?’ stares as I take a picture out of the window.

Public transport seems to have got more reliable. And yes, ’seems’ is being used very loosely here (Hamlet). I haven’t had a look at the new proposed timetables, but apparently they’re up at 131500.info. I remember back in year 7 when I caught the Parramatta bus – the North Sydney would ALWAYS be delayed. In fact, you could be guaranteed that it would come late more often than it would be on time. And then once you reached Redfern…the Illawarra trains were always messed up. Us little ignorant, carefree minions would run for platform 12, and occasionally we’d be able to catch (or if we were unlucky, catch a glimpse of) the shiny new millennium train Cronulla service.

Heh, so many crazy things went on back then. One time when there was a suspected gas leak at Town Hall or something, we were all stranded at Redfern – all the trains literally came to Redfern snd just…stopped. This was back when I was on pre-paid, and many calls that day were made to 131500 just to hear an automated message drone the same thing as I passed the phone around us Hurstvillites.

6:02 – 1 min on the screen at the top of Redfern. A feeling of adrenaline as I make a mad dash for the Cronulla train. Dodging. Weaving. Running. Escalator.

What an anti-climax. The train’s not even here yet.

6:10 and it’s Sydenham. Someone’s got their iPod blasting so loudly that I can hear The Pussycat Dolls totally butcher Jai Ho. How can you even listen to music that loud? Are you deaf yet? What? I can’t hear you.

I feel really hungry right now. I managed to sneak eating my lunch everytime the teached looked away during chem, as Pvh made us come back during recess (where after having Bal explain his section which only took 2 mins, failed to show up until a minute before the bell, and made us come back at lunch) and lunch (aside from phys, dance practice. Gah, I was so lost after missing 1.5 sessions >.<).

Oh crap. I just realised I ran for and got on the all stops (or a misleadingly labelled ‘limited stops’). Ah well, same time as the next train anyway. Lousy misleading ‘Waterfall’ (usually a fast train).

I don’t actually remember what foods I love anymore. Chicken is in the like pile, as is ham. I think it was this dish called Bak Kuh Teh in Malaysia that I love. I think it literally translates to beef bone leg or soup or something.

I seem to not be able to remember what I’ve blogged about before…I apologize if I’m repeating myself. Anyway, 6:22 and the train’s at Kogarah. Got a lot of things to work on tonight before tomorrow. I hope you guys enjoy what we have planned.

So Saturday was the first aid course run by Surf Lifesaving Australia. I stayed up till about 2:30AM trying to finish the lousy book thing (even with the great assistance of James – ty ), and then in the end the instructor just skimmed through the whole book anyway :/

Started at 9, finished at 3:30ish. Basically running through the basics, scenarios, and doing CPR on plastic dolls. Their chests are meant to inflate when you blow into their mouths, but I think mine was leaking or something because I couldn’t see it move :/ And mine didn’t make the awesome chest clicking sound on the compressions either.

The test was really really dodgy (not that I’m complaining though ). 47 multiple choice questions, and everyone was given a ‘lifeline’ where they could ask the teacher for a hint to a question (which practically gave away the answer). I guess it wasn’t really a ‘test’ either, since everyone was talking anyway. Nobody failed in our class, but apparently the people that did in the other just got talked to individually, and then were able to pass (lol).

Anyway, back to today. Muck-up day was quite interesting. I’m impressed with the amount of time and effort that everyone put into their costumes. It makes me seem extremely lazy in comparison Everyone’s costumes were amazing, and it makes me wish that I’d spent a bit more time on mine. (if it hadn’t been for eco, I probably would have – lousy 4:30AM assignment…)

Quick backstory though: I went looking for a giant lollipop at the candy shop in Epping on Friday, but when I got there the shopkeeper was like “Sorry, I sold my last one 5 minutes ago” D: Then I spent Sunday looking for a white shirt after realising that I didn’t actually have a plain one. (and still looking for a giant lollipop) After trying Go-Lo, Big W, Franklins, FoodWorks and various other stores, I gave up. Ended up getting a white shirt from Lowes ($12.95), which is decent, and since I’ve been needing a new long sleeve shirt for sometime, works out well.

Anyway, here’s my mediocre rendition of L from Death Note. Big thanks to Benny for the hair gel stuff and help with the hair, and Tanya for the help with the eyeliner. Now to catch up on some sleep…