Monday Blues

It's strange how I am feeling the Monday blues.
It's supposed to be a 1 day week this semester, but I've been going to school so much more.
Really treasuring my weekends.
But even then, I'm bogged down by thesis writing.

Went to Mervyn's ROM at Sembawang Park 2 weekends ago.
It was a really nice place to have his solemnization, except that it was terribly windy, and there were too many campers and anglers around.

The only "group photo" we took. Not everyone was in it, heck even the bride and groom wasn't in it (That photo is still pending I suppose). But oh well, the photo with the most of us in it - except for the guy on the far right. Wahaha

Caught Vantage Point and Horton over this weekend.
Both very short movies.

Vantage Point started out very promising.
The anarchy which resulted from the assassination of the president and the ensuring terrorist bombing, following the excitement from the secret service agents trying to apprehend the perpetrators...all these from the first 20 minutes of the movie...
I was kept at the edge of my seat.
But then they had to decide to tell the story from the perspectives of more than 5 different people, and so the movie-goer had to sit through the same bombings and assassination scenes for a total of about 6 times (if I remember correctly).

Granted, the perspective from each character revealed the twists and turns of the movie, and I feel, was actually overall quite interesting to watch. However, knowing that the events in the movie never really take off, and that I was stuck in a sort of a limbo really kind of took its toll. Moreover, because the movie switches to the different stories of each character, I felt the the characters couldn't really grow onto me. Each had a side story - the secret service agent with the traumatised past, the guy who helped the terrorists because his brother was kidnapped, the video cam guy with his family problems - all these just didn't seem very important in the end, and most of these stories didn't seem to serve any purpose at all.
Besides, it had quite a lame ending.

Horton, on the other hand, I enjoyed immensely.
Was very funny and really interesting.
Although all my friends did said that it was more of a movie for children.
Well, I guess I am a little child at heart then.

Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Just watched it.
Very Tim burton-y
Was okay at the beginning, until the killings started.
Then all I can say is,
The blood must be free.

Now I am a little disturbed.
Hah.

Crack!

So something broke into two.
You'd ask what happened.
The normal man in the streets will probably tell you that it broke because it could not support the load it was carrying.
And if you would ask him for further analysis of the failure,
the normal man will probably still say that it broke because it could not support the load it was carrying - go get a tougher material.

But if you ask a material scientist.
He'd ask,
"Did that material exhibit elastic or elastic-plastic behaviour?"
"Depending on its behaviour, the material probably failed because G>Gc, K>Kc or J>Jc"
"What was the mode of failure? KI, KII or KIII?"
And if you would ask him for a further analysis of the failure, the material scientist will ask,
"Have you an idea of the geometry or the configuration of the flaw present in the material?"
And he will proceed to carry out a plethora of calculations, considering the rp, rys, SSY or CTOD, etc etc of the material."
And at the end of the day, he will probably say he will have to bring that failed material back to the lab for some mechanical testing and further analysis.

Good grief.

But that's just us.
To us material scientists, life's too simple.
We love making simple things complicated, and already complicated ideas more complex.
A crack is not just a crack.
It will be simply blasphemous to think of a crack as just a crack.
Noooo. It is so much more.
We'd see a crack, and proceed to write up hundreds of journals on it, come up with thousands of complex equations, and then hope to change the way the world sees a crack.

And then funnily, someone by the name of Daniel will come along, and tell us to "Think simple".

Stop interjecting Japanese words into your conversations, onegaishimasu.

Met up with some friends today to shop for clothes.
Anyway, tried out the Waraku Pasta restaurant at Marina square.

Firstly, I'd like to say that I think the pasta at Shokudou @ city link tastes much better. Although Waraku has a wider selection.
Secondly, and I was quite irritated by this, all the waiters were mixing Japanese into their sentences.

It was the usual irrashaimase when we came in. But then, when we told them we were looking for a table for 3, that guy said to another waiter, table for 3, ONEGAISHIMASU.
And this went on.
"Table no. 12, onegaishimasu"
"Your order? Onegaishimasu"
"(English sentence), onegaishimasu"
They even attached the -san suffix when the waiters were addressing each other.
Sigh...all these pseudo Japanese wannabe people...
And they weren't even playing Japanese music in the restaurant.
Why can't they speak fully in English? What is their purpose for adding these Japanese words in?
If you want to speak Japanese, at least try to do it as a whole sentence. Just interjecting Japanese words anyhow-ly, as and when you like...well, I think its just an insult to both the English and the Japanese language.

Damn Scammer

Yes.
I almost got scammed.

So here's what happened.
I was in lab one fine day, using the SEM when I received a "withheld" number on my mobile.
Over the other line was a lady who claimed some shit about her company running a market survey or whatever nonsense, and my handphone number was apparently chosen randomly to attend an event.

Usually when I receive such calls asking me to attend some random event, my first reaction would be to ignore that person, and forget entirely about going anywhere. Which I did.
So she went on talking, and I just kept hmm-ing in reply.
"So you will be there?"
"Hm."
"Okay. See you there."
"Hm."

So Sunday came about, which was supposedly the day of the event.
I was writing my thesis when I received a call from, I think, from the same person.
She asked if I was at the event, I said no.
She said that I actually won a prize in their lucky draw.
Now, usually I can't be bothered about this because if a prize is involved like that, there is usually some gimmick or a catch behind it.
Hence, I ignored.
Oh, forgot to mention she was speaking in Mandarin. Had that PRC tone too.
My Mandarin basically sucked, so it made ignoring her easier.
She mumbled, I hm'ed again.

Then came this morning, I was on my way to lab. (If you hadn't noticed, my life has been taken over already by my FYP)
On my way to lab, I recieved the same call, from I think, the same person again.
So she said I had won a prize money of...what? 10K? Didn't catch it, I was still in a state of ignoring her.

And then she started talking, alot.
Trying to convince me about the prize money, about their company, about how they got my number.
I wanted to just hang up, but on the other hand, a part of me just wanted to listen on.
"What if this is true?" I wondered.
So I started listening.
And then she said she needed my particulars.

AND WAH LAU.
HER ENGLISH CANNOT MAKE IT
SHE NEEDED MY NAME
TOLD ME TO SPELL OVER THE PHONE
MY NAME = IVAN
SHE KEPT SAYING, I-B-A-N? I-P-A-N? I-V-A-M?
4 LETTERS.
WHAT HAPPENED IF I HAD A LONGER NAME LIKE ALEXANDER? OR CHRISTOPHER?
VOMIT BLOOD.

So I said, in exasperation, why not I email my particulars to you.
To which she replied that I can't, because we should not submit our information so openly over the internet like that, that her company prefers that I tell her over the phone, yadda, yadda, yadda...
At this time, something smelt fishy (Which could be my lab - see post below).

Anyway, she asked for my bank account number, which I had with me at that time. But then, I was being suspicious, so I told her I don't have it.
So she ask for me to find it out, and she'll get back to me.
She also gave me her office phone, as well as her company's website (www.hdfhk.com)...
Told me to check it out, still trying to convince me that she was the real deal, that the names of the winners will be on the morning chinese papers next Monday...

Now, while I was on my way home, she called again, asking me for my bank account number.
I thought, wow, she sure is efficient, which rang another alarm bell.
Because I've worked before, and I know, (and this is because working people all love to procrastinate and generally have no efficiency) usually when they say they will get back to you, they will do so the next day, or even later.
Anyway, I told her I was still outside. I wanted to look at the website first.

So I came home, and checked the website, seems okay at first glance.
But then, I realised some pages were missing or couldn't load.
And when I tried to register...
It actually accepted my login and password as:
Login name : qwert
Password: 123456
ZZzzz.......
I wanted to laugh. But I needed further evidence.

Then I realised the Internet is my best friend.
So I googled hdfhk.
And sure enough, I got this:
http://richmond.ca/safety/police/news/releases/1207-phonescam.htm

Case closed.

Like my friend said, no such thing as a free lunch.

She'll call me up again tomorrow, I guess, to get my bank account number.
I am contemplating if I should play around.

This smells like love

On the contrary.

Every visit to my lab is an assault on my olfactory senses.

At first it was the smell of stale machine oil. It was bad.
Then it went away, and I was happy.
But that happiness is short lived. 2 days later I opened the door to my lab.
And what greeted me was a smell worse than stale machine oil.
Now my lab smells of dead fish.
Really. What the hell.

It smells so wrong.

Anyway, my friend's ROM is next Saturday. He suggested for us to wear light colours. So now I have no clothes to wear. Been spending a lot this semester actually. Got these urges nowadays to go buy clothes. Don't know why...

Anyway, on the topic of love,
I've always wonder why some people who get together can actually start planning for their future so quickly. One week since they get together, and they would be talking about marriage, opening a joint account, etc...

I mean, you just got together...why can people be so certain they are the one for each other?

Granted, I am a little pessimistic about love, however, that doesn't mean I don't believe in it. But I just don't understand how can people talk about the future so quickly and surely...

Anyway, they did this research on love. They got this group of people who are already attached and showed them a photo of an attractive person.

What the researchers found out was:
When this group of people start to have sexually inclined thoughts, more often they would be thinking about that attractive person in the picture.
However, when they were told to think about romantic thoughts, this group of people tend to think more about their other half, than that person in the picture.

Anyway, the gist is - it is the thought of romance, rather than lust, that keeps 2 people together.

So I've got a theory. Maybe that is the reason why many people are inclined to stray if they are together with someone for too long. For one, it's probably because the relationship becomes dull and is taken for granted. The other contributing factor, I guess, is that as 2 people stay together for too long, they lose the spark and the romance in their relationship, and this causes them to become unfaithful and uncommitted to their other half.

Its always important to keep that spark and romance in your relationship. At least, that is how I feel.

So go do something romantic for your other half ya. Surprise him or her every now and then. Don't take some things for granted. It isn't always easy for two people to come together, so treasure it well.

Okay. I'm turning into Dr. Phil.