Jeffirean Stories
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Nowadays, the blogs seem to revolve around losing weight, lol! However, let me reiterate that most of Jeffire's buddies and friends (Yingzie, Joycezie, Serenezie, you are highlighted here) do not need to lose any weight! You people (inclusive of all) are doing pretty fine, so don't worry too much. Jeffire needs to lose weight because it is being advocated by the doctor. So please, if you think you need to lose weight, ask your doctor (or at least your parents), ok?
Nonetheless, today let Jeffire brag about his Excel sheet which is part of a weight losing plan that he managed to invent instantly upon a question from his brother Jinki. *grinz*. Yet, before that, let's just recall the events that have past by. Some could be of interest to you.
Saturday was a ktv day together with the Music Interactive Club (MIC, a CCA for pop singing). We had a pretty difficult game where you need to do an action for yourself before you forward the turn to the next person. Man, Jeffire was really dumb at recalling actions associating with people and was the first person to be struck out with 3 mistakes made. The penalty was to sing a duet with the next person to be struck out, which coincidentally was the Events Director, Justin. So we had to sing a duet after the 'singer imitation' competition. Now most of Jeffire's friends would agree he would have been able to get at least a vote for imitating singers (he has experience of imitating F.I.R, S.H.E, Stefanie Sun, Karen Mok, Jeff Chang, Panda Xiong, Wu Bai, and perhaps Fei Yu-ching) but ZERO was the big fat result in the end. So what did Jeffire sing? He sang a Wu Bai song instead of an originally decided Karen Mok tune.. hmm... not too good choices aren't they?
This is what you called 'overconfidence'. Yeah, Jeffire is ALWAYS like that. So the winner was a guy who sang a Jeff Chang tune...Do you think he should had took out his best shot and went for the direct clash?
On Sunday, it was pretty a lifeless day in the day until Jeffire got out of the home and stepped in the G2000 boutique of Suntec City. Man, this is where the hard parts of a guy's day - buying clothes. Ok, maybe nowadays guys are very fashionable, and shopping for clothes is just like eating to some guys, but for POOR people like Jeffire, he doesn't go shopping for clothes unless....
1. Chinese New Year and forced by parents to go and buy clothes with them (end up buying shareable clothes... not too enticing to you right?)
2. Birthday present for close friends. (cannot buy for not-close friends in case get the size wrong!)
3. Nothing to wear at home anymore! (sometimes washing machine is busy, sometimes weather sucks, or sometimes all the clothes seem to have disappeared - in the basket waiting to be sorted)
4. Some extraordinary event that calls for decent dressing (not that Jeffire doesn't dress decently, but you cannot always wear your father's clothes..)
So there was an interview test on Monday and the wardrobe seem to have run out of combinations to carry to the office, this qualifies for point 4, isn't it? Yeah, so to continue the story, Jeffire spent an entire ONE HOUR at G2000 picking clothes and waiting for the sales assistants to help. He certainly feels that wardrobe refilling is a meddlesome chore which weird people like to do despite it being a drain on the pocket.
Yet he spent $49 on a tie and the same amount on 2 standard shirts, a pink and black one... now now, they don't seem to be pretty appropriate for interviews? Oh well, Jeffire wore the pink one and the $49 tie for the interview test. It was fantastic! My peers complimented on the tie which was very nice (though somehow it goes against the instructor's teachings..). Unfortunately there are no photos to show.. haha. Maybe next time.
After the shopping it was a last-minute dinner with Pius (too bad our dear Mr J-Ling couldn't join us). It was pretty much a one-way vocal traffic, unfortunately, as usual. Nonetheless it was very much an interesting update about our lives and a visit to his home again gave some inspirations for my new room decor. Then when Jeffire was leaving, it poured but Pius was a kind soul to lend him an umbrella for him to walk to Jinki's place. So he walked over in the pretty short duration rain.
Being the courteous guy (sounds self-praising again), Jeffire dialled over to Jinki's home to enquire if he was back. Unluckily, he wasn't, but Jeffire had already made plans to go to his home at that moment with no other place that he could detour to. As Jeffire walked along the path, he was trying to recall the name of Jinki's sister, who was the only person at home... 1 step, 2 steps, by the 50th step, he finally got it. But in the end, all the conversations never mentioned a name at all. It was that weird. Hahaha. (Okie, Jinki, please let your sister read this in case she thinks I'm lacking some personal touch there.)
So the long wait was filled with 3 activities - 1. fish watching 2. dog watching 3. reading of Stratech's annual performance report (which was used as a dog dish platform!?). The funny thing is that everyone in the Tan family thought the dog would bite, but come on, Jeffire's a frequent guest and the dog knows. Lucky, great job! (Now he guesses the dog won't be able to read this.. haha.. too bad ah.)
Eventually Jinki returned with his parents. They had a good time as Jinki's mother described the trip and the sights in Genting. (Jeffire has never been to Genting!) After that, she had plenty of unpacking to do while Jinki spared some time to chat with me. Then, tau sar mini-balls were offered (that is a must-buy when you go Malaysia) to Jeffire yet he had to reject on the basis of 'no budget for anymore intake'. Okie, so finally this post will be ending with the plan Perhaps you people can help to comment on it.
Aim: To reach max 55kg before CNY 06 and maintain
Current Weight: 61kg (i think, anyone with weighing machine to borrow?)
Goal: To lose at least 1kg each month. (Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb)
Methodology: Through diet and exercising regularly and calorie counting
Tools: weighing machine (maybe buying on pay day), HPB website for caloric information (food for intake and sports for output), nutrition labels on food packaging and a recording excel sheet.
Diet
----
Jeffire has set the maximum calorie intake per day at 1500 CAL. Now, to get that number, we need to check out what's our typical daily needs (check
HPB's website). Jeffire's research on the net has studies reporting that taking 30-40% lesser than the typical needs will bring about a longer lifespan. So given the typical daily need at 2250 (estimated), 1500 CAL is 66% of the typical requirement. Another reason for capping is to prevent under-eating. Once you know the upper limit is 1500, feel free to eat up to that limit. Of course, this limit is extended if the day consists of some additional energy output. So by sticking to that cap, at least you lose 700 CAL each day. If you control your diet and lifestyle well, it may equate to losing 78g of fats everyday because the aim is not just to lose weight but to lose away the fats in order to look lean and slim. Sum that up for a month is translate to 2.34kg. Of course that is certainly overboard for those who are not as healthy as Jeffire (remember no MC for 4yrs..) Hopefully the diet consist of less fats and carbohydrates and less meat protein. If you are active, go for high carbo, low fat, medium protein. If you are not so active, so for low carbo, low fat, high protein. (Say the first case would be 50-20-30, while the second could be 40-10-50) High protein yet low fat food usually are beans stuff, like soya bean. So look around at nutrition labels!
One good postive thing about this plan is you are free to eat as long as you keep your calorie intake at your desired cap, and also within the carbo-fat-protein combination. Of course feel free to indulge somedays by switching the combination, but still stick to the cap to refrain from over-indulgence!
Exercise
--------
All diet without exercise usually leads to losing of muscles (or bone mass, if you eat the wrong stuff). There are two types of exercises. The first one we called it aerobic exercising. Aerobic exercising involves 2 main concepts, breathing, and repeating actions. For example, swimming is one great way to do aerobic exercising. The second one would be anaerobic exercising. Anaerobic exercising involves doing weights and more static exercises. Of course every exercise is a combination of both although ratios may differ aplenty, especially when execution methods are different. The key point is to acknowledge that we need to maintain a certain level of metabolism (which is the process the body uses energy for living uses, ie energy you use just to breathe, eat, sleep, sit) If metabolism rate is high, even sitting down uses plenty of energy. Note here that high metabolism rate is usually associated with plenty of eating and exercising. See that body builders have high metabolism rate because they simply have more muscle mass which expends more energy per kg of bodyweight compared to tiny-weeny Jeffire. Anaerobic exercises increase metabolism directly, since it increases muscle mass. But you can't show off your muscles if they are covered by fat, so a fair share of aerobic exercises, which burns fat directly, is required. In short, we need a combination of both type of exercises to see what sort of body shape you desire. For Jeffire, it's more important to lose fat now because of health reasons, so he goes for more aerobic exercises. Also, take note of the time taken to do the exercise so that you can calculate the correct level of energy output for the day. Then for that day, you may decide to eat slightly more to compensate for your extra output.
If you need more explanation, feel free to catch Jeffire! Will put up the results probably in the next post as Jeffire is just 1 week into the program but it looks encouraging... hehe.
Go go go!
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
2:58 PM
Friday, September 23, 2005
Woo. It's Friday and Jeffire really had some good and bad moments today (uh, it's only mid-day though...)
Jeffire had a silly dream in the morning, not going into details as it's reminiscent of sibling rivalry and then interdepedence. After the end of the great chase-and-run, Jeffire felt it was time to wake up. It was 845am already, so he proceeded to wash up and gathered the stuff to go, yeah, swimming!
At the pool, Jeffire was again irritated by a swimming class of perhaps 20 kids. Ah. Nonetheless, he did his laps until the 24th, he decided to stop and try swimming freestyle. This is where the bad moments were. Jeffire was being stared by guys in the pool despite completing the lap successfully. Arghz. He ignored the stares and went on to repeat 5 breastroke-out--freestyle-in laps. This means five of the below:
Start ------------> Breaststroke -------------> Touch
End <------------ Freestyle <-------------- Go
So in total in 1.5hrs he did 34 laps, which was very tiring because of the 5 freestyle laps. But overall the feeling was great.
Until he was leaving the pool.
Some girls perched and chatting at a corner of the pool were making demeaning noises while Jeffire walked past them. It was so irritating.
Now, looking back, Jeffire seems to be quite childish...hmm..was he too sensitive?
On the train to work, there were 2 Malay kids (boy and girl) making a fool of themselves, playing wild and making noises to an otherwise peaceful ride. Nobody bothered to say something despite staring at the kids who were nonchalantly indulged in their own idiotic role-playing. The mother was powerless as she had to restrain an equally hyperactive little girl toddler. The 2 kids I presume were primary school students, fat and totally had no regards for the other commuters. Running in and out of the cabin, 'pole dancing', lying on the floor, and touching each other. My goodness. When the guy was lying on the floor just a step away from yours truly, he was thinking if he should kick him away. What irritated him was that the 2 kids were quite dumb to play on the train. What if the train suddenly braked and they fell? What if someone was so irritated by them and decided to give some ass-kicking? At one point, an elderly Malay lady got so irritated that she complained to the mother, yet the mother had nothing to say. The kids were also lectured by her, but to no effect.
Jeffire supposed these kids needed something to compensate for their day because judging from their alighting stop (Novena), they must have had to go to the hospital to visit somebody on a supposedly 'play-downstairs-day'. Jeffire understands the feeling... it means 'sianzzzzzzzzz'..man...how will kids like us (yeah, Jeffire's a kid too) understand nobody likes visiting the hospital...
Hmm...to be frank, actually, the great-o-Jeffire wanted to say "Stop rolling on the floor, you two fatsos!" It reminded of his brother who makes the house floor oily, by sweating and then lying on the floor 80% of the time to watch tv or to play games. (This shows how uncomfortable his home is!) Oh no. Jeffire's now making himself liable for a lawsuit on discrimination. Wait, an intention without any action nor preparation cannot make him liable.. If so, Jeffire wants to sue the girls at the swimming pool. (damn, that's saying he's just as fat...)
That leads to Jeffire's greatest desire as of now - to shift home as soon as possible. Of course shifting home is a difficult and ardous task. Yet the feeling of starting everything afresh means seizing control of how the home is managed. As you see, Jeffire wants to take control of more of the things at home, like, his own room decor, his own laundry(to curb sharing of clothes and to get a new wardrobe, which has already been planned long in advance), his sleeping needs (sharing room now means inconvenience to his brother, who is on long term MC at home while serving NS - what a great way to spend your NS!), weekly jogs to the beach, and a trillion other nitty gritty stuff, from fengshui to kitchenware to toilet inventory, Jeffire wants to take control of them so that the family can progress in terms of 'behaviour'. We cannot be living with third-world habits in a first-world country.
Look forward to opening the letter (everyday Jeffire prays for HDB's letter when he opens the letterbox) that says "You can collect your keys by xx-xx-200x". Maybe meanwhile he should consider renting some room to live elsewhere.
"HDB!! Faster la, gimme my new keys quick!!", Jeffire demands.
A typical Singaporean
Ah-Jeff-fire (damn, that's what so many people calls me)
Acknowledged my existence at
1:01 PM
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
Jeffire.blogspot.com has travelled a journey that has finally reached its 199th step over a period of nearly 2 years. Looking back, the blog originally detailed my life in camp and my footballing experiences, but now it details my life in school and occasionally my thoughts about living. No doubt this 199th post is of significance to me. How long more will this go on? Perhaps in the future, when we lose contact, when we do not have the luxury of time to sit down for a cup of tea, when we decided we should just forget about connecting with the people who were once in your life, jeffire.blogspot.com will still be the place you can find, who else but, Jeffire.
Frustrations are aplenty when you know there are certain things to do but lack the resources to even start the ball rolling. Of course I had already mentioned most of them, and in fact, by the end of this week, I would have tackled that issue. It's actually more on my CCAs, the other set of responsibilities that I hold outside my schoolwork. I understand that I am nearly invisible to the people in my CCAs due to the nature of my work and lifestyle. However I believe I have been constantly doing my best to overcome the time constraints and still be contributable so as to fulfil the basics of my responsibilities. They can be counted and shown. However, the support I receive has always been half-hearted despite contributing substantially to the ways things are run.
During my army days, Charles had always commented that I was very demanding of others, especially when they couldn't fulfil what I needed them to do. I had always retorted that many people only put in effort when FORCED to. If desperation drives productivity, then I will drive everyone to desperation. Yet people don't like to be forced, and certainly not to the brink of desperation. And definitely my hardline methods aren't anyway popularly received and hence many people do not like working for me (many people love to work with me, since I always take the bulk of the work). Add that to my poor communication skills plus a very 'act cool' attitude, it sums up to a recipe for disaster.
Putting the unhappy stuff aside, these days I have been planning on a schedule that targeted at losing weight based on regular and varied activities. Unfortunately (this sounds like an excuse) time is absolutely a premium with me having to juggle so many responsibilities. I had allocated 2hrs for swimming on Tue, 1 hr for running on Friday, and 3hrs for football on Sun. I still feel it's grossly inadequate. Firstly, Tue morning is usually substituted by project meetings. Friday morning is a day when I want to sleep after a tiring school week and football is dependent on whether khakis are available. In fact I would prefer to play tennis on Friday morning, but I have no khaki for that. If I had the money to learn golf, I would do so. Haha. Too bad I don't. Moreover, I feel that these aren't enough for me to lose the 5kg I have targeted. If 1 month lose 1kg, 5 months means I will take till next CNY. It's easy to gain 5kg in one month (CNY is a real killer for that) but incredibly difficult to lose 5kg in 5 months. Now people will say "why do you need to lose weight? you look pretty fine..."
Firstly, if I looked fine, I wouldn't have bothered, but in reality I don't. Like I mentioned to my friends that my brother and I always joke around saying each other's stomachs are big. Of course there is some truth to that sort of joke, so I will relentlessly pursue the weight losing goal until one day my brother finds no reason to joke with me on my stomach.
Secondly, I believe that if I was better looking, I can obtain help much more easily because I can garner attention more easily. I am sure being neither being the heavyweight nor the lightweight causes me to be out of sight easily. Losing weight will give my face shape a lift, and is one way to deal with my sagging face (think it's due to my static expression whole day long, which in fact I think it's due to a fact I read when I was young - frowning uses more muscles than smiling - so I frown whole day long in a bid to use more muscles. I say I was real stupid so now I'm in this whole deep shit I need to struggle to climb out from.
Thirdly, I suppose losing weight will add speed to my feet and that makes my footballing much better. I thrive on running into space. If I can run faster into space, I'm sure it will be easier to spot the passing route to my feet. I know many people cannot determine that route as fast as I can think, but I'm sure if I moved faster, they would have more time to determine that route.
Fourthly, I think being single for 22yrs has got something to do with a lack of confidence. You roll back to the second consideration and realise that I'm am actually not lacking in confidence for most things except this thing called 'impressions'. Basically to me, everyone only wants to stick with the best looking people around (my past has confirmed that umpteen times, especially in a boys' school). My acquaintances with female further strengthens my beliefes. Aesthetically blessed girls are with the good looking or capable or rich guys; the talented girls have also been taken up; the ugly and incapable girls offering themselves to the playboys or rich guys; the sexuality-confused girls wants to stick with other girls only, so what's left? You tell me....
The fifth compelling reason for me to lose weight is one way to defy traditional thoughts in the family. My mother is one woman who says she wants to lose weight but always have tons of excuses when it comes to exercising and eating. My mother thinks that people will think that she never take good care of us because we look thin. Tell me if your mother thinks so too... My parents are pretty lowly educated, but my mother is totally uneducatable - she is pretty single-minded and demanding (I inherited these traits from her), therefore no matter how many health lessons you impart to her, the time goes to the waste-meter. Well, on the flip side, I say she's just a very capable cook.....hmm... and I have this belief that we shouldn't waste food - another disaster recipe. Should I manage to break free from my maternal ties and live independently, I will definitely have been a different person...
There are 1000 reasons I can tell you but sitting in front of the laptop for 2hrs after sitting in front of the PC for 10hrs doesn't make good sense to me. I mean, come on, why would you want to bother if I want to lose weight for whatever silly reasons, it's MY decision. I am definitely not as okay as you think, and this is a desire I will harbour always until one day you see me taking a photo of myself.... that means I'm ready to face the world..
By the way, I'm only switching back to first person prose because this is the 199th post. I still prefer the third person's way of writing. It's much more self-centred that way and I like that. This blog is about me, me and me. That's why it's called jeffire.blogspot.com, right?
If you are irritated, please go write 199 posts about yourself and see if anyone can stand you. Ah well, the art of being egocentric.
Undefinable
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
12:30 AM
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
First thing Jeffire needs to report is that he hasn't been missing in action. It's just that his life online starts with the moment he is in the office and ends with the moment he's getting out of office. The PC at home has yet to be repaired. He is not sure whether he can coerce his father to buy him a laptop for use in school and home.
Well, in all, Jeffire thinks that this world is really 'no money no talk'. Rather than to kpkb about being poor, he knows that working his way up is the only way to go. Soon he will start to acquire assets and then hopefully this assets are revenue generating so that passive income will flow in. Jeffire will then work less and go to school more often... (yah right).
Anyway the week has been pretty horrendous as outflow of vitamin M (stealing Ms F^Jinx's terminalogy) was huge. Bought a present for Mother and then her sister as we had a siblings' birthday celebration last Saturday (Jeffire's eldest aunt (Aunt Angie), mother(Mrs Catherine Yeo), and their brother a.k.a Jeffire's uncle (Uncle Albert)) Jeffire bought a stylo-milo Emporio Armani shades for Aunt Angie (actually was instructed by mother to buy a present around the $100 range) and then a Sovil Titus watch for mother. Two swipes of his Visa Mini and there goes quite a lot of money. Although mother offered to share the present for Aunt Angie, but Jeffire declined. Apart from Saturday, the huge expenditure went to some textbook acquisition ($37+ for two), stationery ($18) and other stuff like food, presents for colleague and toiletries.
Hopefully the closing of Winning-with-Jeffire does help to earn some cash back as jeffire re-opened the punt account for this month at $100. Took some $75 out to invest on Saturday's matches and was spot-on for the Boro-Arsenal match. Now Jeffire's guess is that NONE of you bought Boro to win. Hahaha. Anyway the next day there was some losses so although overall the punt account is in the black, the double-digit didn't compensate for the triple-digit outflow for the presents...Oh by the way, Jeffire closed the shop of Winning-with-Jeffire as he realised that no point giving people wrong information (wahaha). Well, his strategy is investment oriented and not gambling so it really doesn't sell to the masses who are speculators and gamblers.
Recently Singapore has been besieged with dengue attacks. Oh my. The number of people reporting to the hospitals are alarming. Hopefully everyone will work together and deal with the irritating mosquitoes. A good thing is that we have learnt to respond quickly when it comes to big problems like this so everyone will be checking on their homes frequently to ensure they don't keep mosquitoes as pets. And well, Jeffire lives in a high-hit area (Yishun) so please help to pray for his safety (Jeffire is reaching a 4 yr no MC record... yeah). Jeffire will also pray for you guys too by burning more joss sticks on your behalf (in a bid to fend off mosquitoes from his home..hehe)
You can see that on the sidebars Jeffire puts "Looking at good-looking people" as one of his preferred activities. Certainly EVERYONE looks at good looking people, but do we actually look at bad-looking people as well. YES, I say. Bad-looking people are like sore thumbs sticking out. And by the way, bad looking people are not really bad looking as in they have crooked teeth or extremely big mouths or what. Rather, they are people who simply have no dress sense, or who had never thought of going for some aesthetical improvement like moderate eating and exercising (you get me?)
The first kind of people are either lazy, or unequipped with the know-how to look good. In fact I always maintained that most of the people I see outside look good, and comparing to 10years ago, I say we have this proportion of people on a surge. There are many many guys with better skin now (Jeffire is very jealous of that), more striking outfits and attractive hairstyles. Girls dress up with more variety(yum~), and are much attractive to look at than before. This observation is backed by rise in sales of cosmetics, skincare, and beauty centres. So in fact this little group of people are most likely people who don't bother much about how they look. Jeffire thinks looking good can be cheap also. Wooo...(some self-praise coming in) Jeffire's quite good at cheap dressing (especially since Jeffire looks as ugly as usual EVEN after expensive dressing, lol~that's some self-criticisim to balance out)
The second group of people are people who certainly need to be reminded that the society doesn't like looking at big mobile stores of fat. Okie you call Jeffire discriminating, but tell him what is the most oft reason people become fat? Big eating, small exercise. Your big eating stimulates demand for good, and causes prices to go up (since we mostly import our food, so supply is never controllable). Secondly, big eating equals to less food going to the people who need it. If you don't need that much food, Jeffire is quite sure the food will go somewhere that will be much more productive. Thirdly, bingeing wastes plenty of other resources. There are tons of examples of that. So please leave Jeffire out of buffets... (last Saturday's at Miramar was absolutely treacherous and feels sinful..eeww but someone else was paying, so just go lor...)
The other part regarding inadequate exercising is actually easily solvable. Burning of fat stores requires your heart running at above 70% of its maximum power for 20mins continuously. It is easy to reach 70%. Just simple quick paced walking will do. How do we make it 20mins continously since we don't have time? One suggestion is to budget your time for 1 hour of such time for each week. It could come on Monday evening when you try your best to go home earlier to clear your Monday blues, Wednesday afternoon when you perhaps can drink your lunch after your work (ie don't eat a meal for lunch) and Sunday morning before you go for breakfast. Of course if you can take time out to go for a morning walk everyday it will be better... Jeffire will do that once he moves to Punggol, a much more scenic place to walk around..
Oh man, Jeffire wrote so much for this particular group of people. You see, Jeffire likes to make people feel good, and feel good for what they have ACHIEVED. Jeffire thinks that there should be much more good looking people on the street so that he can enjoy his hobby more...hehe.
Finally, to reveal a little naughty bit of Jeffire, he says he likes girls in tennis skirts. Woo. And one word for the guys, you are good looking if you have good skin, either very fair or tanned and have less hair... (that's Jeffire's idea of good looking guys.. no offence to hairy chaps...)
If you have an EBay account please tell Jeffire because he wants to bid for a Snorlex toy overseas for himself. This is Snorlex. Snorlex says he wants to hug me!! Jeffire wants a hug~~~(but no bearhug please!)

Cute right?
Actually Jeffire wants a Snorlex, a hug and a Maria Sharapova poster.... (or even better, a hug from Maria Sharapova without Snorlex also can...lol!)
Dreaming of Maria Sharapova..
AC Jeffire
*AC = act-cute
Acknowledged my existence at
7:56 PM
Thursday, September 08, 2005
These days Jeffire has been trying to cut costs with the impending repairs to be done to his PC, most probably an overheated CPU - time to visit Sim Lim again. Yet if any of you can offer to help do him a favour, take a look at his PC, help to repair it (Jeffire will pay for the parts, of course), it will be great. Jeffire doesn't like to go Sim Lim because being at Sim Lim always mean bloodshed between the "pocket, heart and brain". "Pocket" becomes dented, or even gaping with a hole, "Heart" feels pain, and "Brain" says 'it's okay, we need the PC'. Hey, but upon a flip of the history book of the PC, the following doesn't seem too necessary, in terms of CPU usage:
80% - 'Sampling' the various shows and anime from the net. (note the term in quotes)
10% - Information gathering - bus routes, sports news, bank transfers, etc
10% - MSN
Apparently as Jeffire have always been immersed in work after school, and also being affirmed to the old (but trustworthy) PCs in school (which did not make the shift to the city campus, or at least, never to where Jeffire usually goes), there has been a policy at home - email checking - yes, work and study - no. Jeffire doesn't like to work at home and has no intention to. Home is where he prepares to go out for school and work, watch football, tv and eat, where he returns after school, play and work to watch football, tv and eat (and bath then sleep, of course). The truth behind this mindset is the absence of MS Office in the home pc; a circular idea as well. No MS Office -> cannot do work is equivalent to No work -> don't need MS Office.
So should Jeffire resurrect the PC at the cost of shedding blood?
Anyway, apart from that, Jeffire FINALLY had his first meal at Kopitiam @ SMU Concourse. Previously in BT campus you can really count the number of times he ate at the food courts (note: we never had canteens) with your finges and toes and this continues at the city campus. It's week 3, day 4 and finally the first meal I had. Oh what did I eat the inaugural meal? Indian naan ($1.60) and dao suan ($1.20. Jeffire is very sure now you will understand he rather go hungry and wait for a chance to eat at Amoy St / Home rather than at SMU.
That finishes the Brunch segment of this entry.
Sep 6, 5 days before the anniversary of terrorism in America and the forthcoming Lower House elections in Japan, was a great day to remember. A crunch day! Boss was back and therefore that equals to plenty of work. Then to add to the woe, 2 assignments were due the next day and Jeffire didn't even have the questions on hand to do them. Adding somemore to the woe was that the assignments required the use of the computer (and printer). Moreover the home PC was down (anyway, it doesn't do any work for Jeffire, just for entertainment purpose only) so Jeffire was in the office clearing all the work, and then finally clearing his assignments. He finished them pretty promptly, 2hrs for resume writing (1hr to cut my lengthy resume,man) and 2.5hrs for the excel assignment.
BUT
This excel assigment had a very difficult question which Jeffire took 4hrs to try and solve! FISH! You see 4hrs is quite okie, but 4hrs from 2am - 6am, in the office, doesn't seem too okie, hor? FISH^1000. In the end even after consulting the future PhD in Maths future-Dr Liu, from Canada, also cannot solve the problem. So Jeffire went back home in the morning 6am to wash up and then went straight to school from 830am - 645pm and then back to work from 7pm - 9pm...like to quote a very interesting motto from last time one of the star in WWE(word wrestling entertainment):
CAN YOU TAKE IT, SUCKERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
That concludes the Crunch part.
WAH!Northern Ireland beat England ah. Hahahahaha. Too bad Jeffire was being 'crunched' so didn't manage to make a killing. FISH!
Another WAH! event is Jeffire meeting Ms F^Jinx again after a FIVE-year hiatus. Met her to borrow an accounting textbook. Wow. She now very cute ah.. haha, especially her voice. So sweet (but doesn't fit into her fearsome image...=p)
That concludes the Stun part.
Oh, Jeffire has on-hand a very useful monthly budget and expenditure excel sheet (but not very visually appealing at the moment) that you may like to use. It has kept his toes on his expenditure very well as Jeffire tries to stick to the budgets.
So guys, where are we slated to meet for our Manchester Derby!! FISH youuuuu! (*JOWL backhand move*) Throw your books away for one Saturday night la!
Cheers!
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
1:24 PM
Sunday, September 04, 2005
Jeffire has been blogsurfing, from the famous Singapore writers like Mr Brown, Mr Miyagi, who are columnists at the newspapers TODAY, and a couple of others like Limbueytor but not the almighty Xiaxue because most likely everyone else is reading it (needs no more recommendation). Interestingly blogging is now considered trendy, unlike the time when I picked it up in 2003, after following my friend SR. Personally Jeffire thinks his original intention was to update his friends on his (miserable) life without having to make calls and MSN (save time save money,haha). Jeffire realised that blogging is actually a kind of communication channel. Sometimes you have things to talk about but others may not necessary want to listen, so you blog. Or sometimes you have things you want to record down, so blogging enables you to do that easily(provided your server doesn't go down and you don't server-hop). Anyway, Jeffire tries to read every friend's blog so that he gets updated on their lives regularly. It's easier and sometimes gives him a good opportunity to talk to them.
On the other hand, some non-bloggers feel that blogging is a waste of time. These people tend to be very busy and have no time to stay glued to their computers for at least 10mins. Others feel that blogging allows others to infiltrate their lives (isn't that the purpose?). Moreover it doesn't serve them well enough because they have to hold back what they write (you know, there's always the policing around and we cannot criticise any friend even if they screwed it up, ahhh...) Well, Jeffire has to agree to some extent, because even as Jeffire proclaims to be very direct and straightforward, there are still some instances Jeffire has to stuff away in the trashcan. For example Jeffire might just write about an unmemorable experience but skip the whole part regarding the whos and whats. Those parts are the juciest! (but for the sake of not making the silly mistake again as 3 months ago, Jeffire shall *zip!*) And perhaps one thing to note is to have your own style of writing! That makes blogging more attractive as you seek distinction from others. Hopefully there will be more bloggers around. Jeffire is not too keen on compiling a list of blogs he reads because personally Jeffire feels that it will be good if you obtain permission first. But you are free to sell your blog addresses here if you are trying to garner more attention. ha! (try all you want) By the way, Jeffire found an interesting blogger who goes online on IRC to catch sex predators..here.. Hee.
Sunday being a boring day, after an unsuccessful hunt at Bras Basah Complex (still 0 textbooks to read), Jeffire was at home watching documentaries of Chinese Opera, then subsequently a show called "The Road to the Republic" (of China). Jeffire wonders if Jinki still has the vcd set but he really wants to rewatch the part where the Qing dynasty started crumbling. Jeffire watched one episode previously in which Empress Dowager Cixi finally conceded defeat to the foreign aggressors and gave up parcels of land to them. Today's episode was on how General Yuan Shikai became the President of China from betraying the Qing Dynasty.
Jeffire had been reading the History of China starting from the Qin dynasty on wikipedia and realised how interesting history could be. Unfortunately, Jeffire didn't study history because of the way the exams were structured. Having knowledge of the past gives you an insight on how things have changed, and perhaps you will be much more appreciative of the present. Some decisions made in the past haunts us till today, given the deep impact of it.
Jeffire went to the computer exhibition COMEX 05 at Suntec City on Sat with Dominic, Winston and subsequently Jiaxing. The crowd was overwhelming and the jam was so long that Jeffire was relieved that he took public transport from work. There was a gourmet exhibition too which caused the crowd to double, but more likely, like Kenneth say, Singaporeans have nowhere to go but to visit exhibitions for a fresh change. Jeffire says most of them refuse to go Funan or Sim Lim on any normal day because
a. we have an impression that it's cheaper during the exhibitions
b. we don't know which shop will be good to buy from
c. we don't really know what we want to buy
d. the service in the exhibitions are slighly better than those bumming in the shops (since most are youngsters on short term contracts)
e. most importantly, we are now free to touch whatever is on exhibit and try out before buying (since the service level is better.. we don't feel intimidated at all)
Of course pt a is debatable because some stuff are indeed cheaper, but most stuff are just overpriced. Especially for those little items like DVD media, ink catridges..
Overall we had an enjoyable time shopping around (the first time Jeffire really went to touch the products, thanks to Winston who really intends to buy something) and a great catch-up at Shaw Tower's food court. Very long never sit down and chit-chat (but never 'lim kopi' cos Winston says food court beverages are overpriced~
Looking forward to the next computer exhibition and maybe Jeffire can finally lay his hand on the PDA he wants so badly and maybe other stuff like digital cameras (then can try snapping pictures of babes like Soo KS) Jeffire also wants to go shop for clothes! (think not enough office wear to provide some variety for all sorts of moods) Must find the holiday slot to catch some fashionable dudes to join my team of consultants!
Say no to mugging
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
10:57 PM
Friday, September 02, 2005
This week has been peaceful..
With that I shall end this post. Hahaha.
Okie wait wait, Project Superstar ended with Kelvin winning a contract with Play Music and Kelly snagging one with Universal. Funny right? Kelvin is the overall winner.. how come he is going to Play Music (which I remember had no budget for the awesome Joi Chua..) Hmm...
Other than that, the world hasn't got really good things to talk about.. rising oil prices, Hurricane Katherina, stampede in Iraq...hope the survivors are coping well..
Topic to comment:
Looks or survivality, which is more worthwhile for a stead?
Reality Escapade
Jeffire
Acknowledged my existence at
7:01 PM