retreat photos

Back from the beautiful Terrigal, Central Coast. We lived in a very nice house just next to the beach. Pretty amazing if you ask me. Only $50 for the weekend.

View from the top of the street we were staying

Photos from my morning run with Peter

People who were unfortunate to not have a bed

Some scenic shots I took during sunset

Traffic Light

Peter and I relaxing

The Crew

"Thriller" - inmate style

Haha, couldn't pass the chance to post this after Rudy linked it to me. The chick dude puts the icing on the cake.




Alright, I gotta go pack!

retreat...!

Going away for the weekend for my church's youth leaders retreat to Terrigal. Should be good.

Been an unproductive week. ::sighs::

Later!

JavaScript Inheritance

Found some really useful tutorials on how to use inheritance in JavaScript. This is pretty new to me as I haven't learnt JavaScript formally but through the Internet. <3 Internet

Anyways, I'm working on an automated HTML generator using JavaScript since I don't have access to server side stuff. Gosh it gets complicated doing it all on client side!

http://www.cs.rit.edu/~atk/JavaScript/manuals/jsobj/

http://www.webreference.com/js/column79/index.html

Project Playlist

Newly added embedded music player at the bottom of the blog. Yeap, that's where the music's coming from. Decided not to put it at the top as it took too much space and I don't think there's a way to resize it.

Anyways, let me know if you have a playlist request and perhaps I'll write a JavaScript feature to select different playlists to play music from.

::sigh::

WoW maintenance :(

Battle

There's a battle within myself,
Lord help me to lose,
Through my loss, I will find myself,
I'd rather this than to lose you.

Am I just blind, am I a fool?
Why can't I see it and not perceive it?
Lord help me to understand,
Why your ways are so true.

So take this world from me,
The Christ it's you I seek,
Let me not forget,
The times you were there for me.

So there's this battle within myself,
This time I think I'll win,
Oh Lord, lead me to the battle,
Victorious I'll be.

So take this world from me,
The Christ it's you I seek,
May your name be glorified,
So others will see,
So others will see.

flip text

Some cool javascript I found on the web. Flips whatever text you give it upside-down and reversed!

Original:

Flipped:

Source code can be found here.

burn the muffin top!

I've been reading a lot of articles on men's health trying to figure out how do you loose 'muffin tops'. You know, the love handles or the beer gut. Whatever you want to call it.

You heard me right. I have a slight muffin top. My sister pokes it. Been going to the gym since the start of the year so I've been sorta sticking to my new year's resolution. But I don't want to call it that in case I jinx it. The reason why I want to get rid of it is because I've been doing abdominal workouts and I can see the top four pack forming, but the lower two are buried within the moat of prosperity. It'd be nice to see the fruits of my labour.

Every time I go to the gym, I just want to do weights and not cardio. Why don't I want to do cardio or am reluctant?

1. Boring. I don't have a tv in front of me or a mp3 player. Doing cardio while watching time incrementally is sheer boredom.
2. Running 30 minutes on a treadmill and burning a minute worth of calories doesn't appeal to me when I can spend 30 minutes on weights and see an immediate effective result.
3. Doing an effective cardio workout takes time. I don't have a lot of time.

I don't mind swimming but weather's getting cold so I guess that rules it out. Well the plan is to go running during my off gym days with my house mate. At least there's someone for company and to keep me motivated. Apparently there's a park nearby with workout bars which is cool because I can incorporate strength and cardio workouts with those.

According to a lot of men's health articles on loosing weight, a lot of it has to do with diet. Apparently you need a well balanced diet and have about 5 meals smaller meals a day to increase your metabolic rate. The problem is I don't have time to prepare 5 well balanced meals a day. I'm a uni student living out of home. If I'm hungry and I need a quick fix, I pop in a couple of indo mee's. Also I love food too much to sacrifice it for the sake of my abs. I do enjoy eating very much.

Over the past months, I've cut down significantly on fast food. Haven't touched fast food in a while now. I've also cut out soft drinks when my dentist told me soft drinks dissolve your teeth (yikes!). Hmm, I suppose those two factors have helped. Perhaps I need to have a massive lunch instead of a massive dinner. But I love dinner so much!

::tear::

:'(

argh!

Darn Optus networks. Crashed and burned couple of days ago. Had to call 'Mohammed' to figure why I couldn't connect to the internet and after 30 minutes on the phone that I realised it was a problem on their side, not on mine. I was halfway blogging this post as well! Oh btw, 'Mohammed' is just a name I use for Optus' telephone operators. Don't ask why.

So exams are over and I'm partying! Boy Friday's exam was tough even though I spent 5 days studying for it. I'm glad its finally over though. Woo! No more classes forever which means ZERO contact hours! I've finished all my subject components and only my thesis is left which I'll be working on next semester. I'll probably start working on it during my 3 week holiday (little of what I have).

So it has been a very interesting past few days ever since I finished my exams. Spent around 5 hours at my local pub with the engo boys after our exams. Here are some of the results of drinking.

[Disclaimer: I had no part in these, hehe.]

The boys having lunch and beer at the Royal.

Tony falling asleep after too much beer.

Raul taking a leak outside Manning Bar.

Now Raul is an interesting guy I had just met that day. Brought up in Dubai, with Bangadesh ethnicity, he's a 3rd year engineer. I think after having too many beers, I managed to sneakily take a recording of what he confessed. Here is what he confessed:

[Disclaimer: Contains a lot of swearing, inappropriate language, sexual reference but quite funny, hehe. Rated MA15+]

Went to Jian's 21st as well on Friday night. I must say, lots of alcohol there. So that concludes all of what happened on Friday. Come Saturday night was Mark's 21st party. The theme was 1920s. I must say I really dislike and suck at dress up parties. The reason is I don't have things to dress up with. All my clothes are normal. Nothing fancy or outrageous. I managed to borrow Tiff's pinstripe jacket and a bowler hat.

Here are some photos from the party.

More photos can be found here.

So that pretty much concludes my Friday and Saturday night. I watched Transformers on Sunday and I must say I'm very impressed by it. Wasn't expecting much to begin with, but it is a definite must see. "Toe thumbs up!".

I was also bored on Sunday so I decided to YouTube some photoshop tutorials to improve my Photoshop-ing skills. Here's a picture (my housemate Larrie) I photoshoped.

The left picture is the original. Middle I did some healing brushes, made the eyes smaller, made the pupils brighter, and added colour to her face. The right picture I made her lips more red, and wanted to create an "airbrush" effect to the overall picture but didn't work. Needed much more lighting. Anyways, more photoshop-ing to come when I have more time!

bored

Another three more days till my last exam. I'm so bored and tired from studying. Haven't been out of the house for a while now. Haven't done much really but write notes. I keep having all these ideas I'd like to do with my free time such as making my own website (with my own domain) and writing cool JavaScripts. You know, stuff like that. Or perhaps even play around with Photoshop to improve my graphic skills (or lack thereof).

I'd also like to go to the gym more and get fit. Perhaps get into my guitar again and learn some really cool plucking songs (or write my own). Maybe I'll fly away to a far away destination and laze around the white sandy shores, bathing beneath the brightly lit sun and sipping pina-coladas.

Was thinking of working full-time too during the holidays and earn some extra cash, but slaving away to money doesn't really appeal to me. I'd much rather work in moderate amounts and earn decent money. Besides, tax return is just around the corner. Hopefully the government will be good to me.

There's just so much to do.

Ok, enough of my mini-procrastination. Back to symmetric and asymmetric encryption/decryptions! Woopy-dee-doo!

pull up bar!

Yet another day where I procrastinate. Wake up at 11.15am thinking I'll get at least 4 hours of study on my security exam (last one) before I head out to my parent's place for dinner.

Went downstairs to the kitchen to grab breakfast and there was Karis & Larry cooking some awesome french toasts (had creme, nutmeg cinnamon, vanilla and other stuff in it). Then got dropped off at Broadway shopping centre because I wanted to buy some push-up bars. $30 at Rebel Sports. Bloody expensive! Couldn't find it elsewhere (tried Kmart and Target). Was thinking of buying a heater but couldn't bring myself to spending $35 for a heater when my computer already warms up my room (small room).

There's just this dissatisfaction I get whenever I go somewhere and I don't buy anything. Its not that I'm a shopping junkie, but when I put effort into going somewhere out of my way to get something, I have to get something. Else it'll seem like a waste of my time going out. Ventured back to Rebel again and spotted a pull-up bar for $35. Seemed more worth it than the push-up bar.

Installing it was a pain in the ass. Driving in screws through the raw wooden door frame really did take its toll on my right hand. Had to wear gloves when doing it. Couldn't get all the screws 100% in. Need an electric drill/screw thingy-ma-jig to do it. So after playing around it with and testing it, its like now 5.33pm and I gotta head out soon.

And thus a day's worth of procrastination.

Pictures courtesy of Rachel M. Gilmour (the house mate).

two down...

...one to go.

booyah!

nice guy

I came across these videos when I was youtube-ing (evil website). Three short ten minute clips about "nice guys" aka cuddle bitches aka "You're like a brother to me". Oh, they mentioned "Ladder Theory" as well. Check it.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

off to Malaysia...

...in another 6 months though. I've booked my ticket already when Jetstar went on a uber cheap ass flight to KL sale ($199 one-way)! Flying on the 25th of November, arriving at 5.55pm at KLIA according to my itinerary.

Looking forward to having my holiday at the end of the year when I graduate. Will be thinking of doing a bit of travelling. China is in my mind (its good to find out where my ancestors came from!). I know some people don't find China that appealing (with all the heavy populated and polluted pictures floating around the media), but with pictures like these I'd be crazy not to visit China!

I got these pictures from Hong Yi's mum's blog (yes, her mum blogs! Amazing huh when compared to my mum who has trouble using sms?)

I want to go to Africa as well, but it depends how much mula I have. Would be mad to go on the Safari's my sister went to. Ain't that cheap though :( I also might want to visit neighbouring south east asian countries such as Thailand, Fiji, Sabah etc. Oh wait, Sabah is part of Malaysia.

Haven't really set a date to go back to Sydney though. Was thinking of taking at least a 3 month break if possible. Depends on what graduate job I get and how late will they let me start. After 5 years in uni, I think I deserve a long break.

Anyways, enough procrastinating now. I've done my laundry, cleaned my room a bit and cooked and eaten lunch. I really should start studying. Ciao for now.

and...i'm done!

::phew:: Finally all my assessments and assignments are over. It's been a long 6 weeks or so. Feels good to come home and get into bed, not thinking about uni work. Guess I can sleep in tomorrow.

I'm nearly there. Three more exams (in two weeks), and my university classes will officially end for good. Just one more thesis to go then.

Ok, sleep time.

stupid bug

So I'm home now. Another 7 hours spent in the labs. One stupid bug took 4 hours to figure out. And it was so simple. Argh. Had to stop by Macca's for a pitt stop as all the other shops were closed.

I miss mamak :(

one down...

Another 12 hours in the lab today. Finally finished the j2ee project worth 30%. We had to create an e-commerce application using j2ee technology and mysql database. I'm pretty happy with the final product considering that we only spent 5 days on it, hacking away at the keyboard.

The graphics can be improved and perhaps the CSS as well, but I didn't have time to perfect it with Photoshop. Would've taken a while fiddling with it since I'm not very good with it.

Anyways, c++ assignment tomorrow. Yippy :S

more good news

Alright, just a quick update on some more cool news I've been getting.

Firstly, once again I've been granted my scholarship cheque for an academic year which is really amazing! God chooses to bless me even though I don't deserve it :D

Second, I got an email from QBE regarding my graduate application and they will be doing telephone interviews soon. ::phew:: I made it through the initial screening. Hopefully things will go well :)

Thirdly, not so great news but I'll just mention it anyway. Got an email from Accenture regarding another one of my graduate applications stating that my application as a technology consultant was unsuccessful. However, they will be holding onto my file if I'm suited to another role. ::shrugs:: Don't know if that's a kind rejection email or they genuinely mean it. Ah well, see how we go ay?

Oh, another thing that's irrelevant to the topic but I logged onto my email today and found 40+ new emails! Grrr @ Mark, Jacq & Shez. Email chatting! Lucky Gmail whacks it all into one conversation instead of a giant array of quoted texts. Oh yea, Google rejected my graduate application. Bleh!

camping

Alright, so I've been camping out at the SIT labs for the past week or so doing 10-20 hours worth of coding each day pretty much. Woke up about an hour ago after going home at 6.30am this morning. Spent 20 hours hacking away at J2EE. Assignment was due at 2pm today.

So let me share with you some pretty cool exciting stories that has happened recently:

1. At 12am, my lecturer sent an email saying we've got an extension till Sunday for the assignment. Schweet.
2. Our project is actually going pretty well I reckon. Things are coming together. Finally.
   
3. On Sunday I applied for a graduate position at Parson Brinckerhoff (engineering consulting firm) and yesterday I got a call from one of their HRs to ask me to attend a group workshop at their office next week. Schweet.

Time for me to get some breakfast now and then shoot off to the SIT labs once again. Think I'll have to start on my c++ assignment tonight.

New USB stick

So finally my 4gb Sandisk Cruzer usb stick arrived. Turns out that my university computer did actually zap both of my previous usb sticks. Found out the hard way though. Isabelle's usb got fried as well last week. After hearing about my previous experiences with fried usb sticks, I guess she immediately suspected it was a faulty usb port that's causing the damage. My suspicions were right after all when the lab dude confirmed it after inspection.

We both made our complaint to the university asking for a replacement and Isabelle got her 2gb Sandisk Cruzer Titanium while I got a 4gb one - titanium. I guess uni was on a budget with me. It's pretty sweet I must say as it has its own internal drivers and softwares which are pretty handy such as WinRAR, Skype, file encryption, anti-virus, photo viewing and so on. That means I can Skype from uni now which is pretty schweet!

Anyways, off to bed. Work and more assignments tomorrow. I'm starting to get a pimple :(