Along came the cleaning ninjas

This looks like sooo much fun.... if they'd told me about this at school, I'd be a window cleaner now.

It's kind of funny because they weren't just cleaning the windows, they were trying to do the whole building (or the bits they could reach), so we now have clean stripes down the walls....

Obamaday

I like this tribute to the obama-mantra..... (via BB)

Micromachines

Japanese engineers are damn damn cool

Cool fish tank

Totally cool, totally too expensive, totally unnecessary....still, I love these little creatures, first saw them at Underwater world in Singapore... amazing little angels...

I'm longing for a past age, the time of Sherlock Holmes, the time when opium was the opiate of the masses....

then I fed myself to th fish....

Went on a trip to a Fish Spa in Buggis Junction. Totally surreal experience.
You start of sitting around a small (in this case) pool (1x2m) full of doctor fish. You sit on the side, and even before you put your feet in, the fish start swarming, waiting for food. As soon as you put a toe in, a few fish latch on and start cleaning. It fells like being tickled with a rough brush. The more foot you put in, the more fish you get. Then its just a matter of sitting back for half an hour and let the fish clean your feet and eat off any dead skin. I'm not ticklish, so I quite enjoyed it, although the previous people who went were giggling lots. The fish are pretty thorough, the auntie who ran the place suggested I spread my toes a bit and immediately the fish started weaving between my toes. My feet feel very soft and pampered now, although it would probably take several hours to get rid of all of the hard skin on my heals and the balls of my feet.... Still, pretty good fun for S$15.

I want one...

I love this vintage push scooter, would totally kick ass coming to work on it...

wonders...

one of the random things I've seen on the interweb which I'd love to try and make, especially with my love for steampunk.
(from here)

there and back again

Am back, tired as hell, eyes burning, but slightly glad of the fact that just having gotten off a plane seems to excuse staring into space while people are talking to you....

OCD

As I'm back in Heidelberg and have some time on my hands I visited Star Coffee, an old haunt, where I've squandered many a morning in the past. I took the chance to pander to my OCD and have the same thing I've been having in there for years. Medium cappuccino, manchego cheese bagel and double chocolate cookie...

I'm not entirely sure why I develop these routines, I have a similar one in Singapore (Triple grande low-fat cappuccino and an oatmeal raisin cookie). Perhaps it just provides a little island of stability in my day/weekend, perhaps I just don't have much imagination, perhaps I just like these things a lot. Perhaps I'm just plain crazy....

Random thoughts...

I think a great idea for a website/collective/meme is a random activity group. The idea goes like this. You go to the website, where there is an activity listed for Saturday (or Sunday). It goes something like this:

Meet 11am Buona Vista MRT station.
Aprox Duration (inc Travel): 4 hours.
Cost: S$50
Dress for outdoors.
Max persons: 15
Leader will be holding a red umbrella.
Click here for inclusion/updates

The idea is that having a free afternoon and no plan, you text the number to register, you turn up at the station, with no idea what you're going to be doing. You then follow the leader, whoever decided to organise this particular day and do something. The great part of the idea is that you go end up doing something you wouldn't otherwise have thought of. It could be Clay-pigeon shooting, it could be basket weaving, it could be wandering in the jungle for a couple of hours. Perhaps a lecture on ancient Chinese ceramics. In principle once you've turned up, go along and do it whatever. You might love it, you might hate it, who cares, it will only take a few hours. You'll end up doing new things.

Think the site should be called 'Something for the weekend'

Embellishments: No-shows get lower priority for future events, option of waiting lists etc. Possibly include a vague catagory of event i.e. sport, culture, random.

sniffles....

Have manfluenza at the moment, so I'm sitting around at home, sniffing lots and using more tissues than a teenage boy who's just got cable porn....

Conditioning, habituation, reflex or something...

1 minute.

That's about the time between me putting my headphones into my ears at work and realising that there isn't any music playing.

Don't get old. It isn't fun.

Lab based fun....

This is my life.... in a game....

(from Mirana via Kat)

...and then we got hookers...

Just spent an intrigueing evening out with one of my (nameless) friends. Had a few drinks at various bars by the river, then ended up in the bar of a very reputable hotel. It was an interesting experience, not simply because it was the first passible mojito I'd had all night, but also because of the clientele. Most of the male patrons were somewhat older than me, and generally appeared to be alone. Most of the female customers where considerably younger and seemed to possess more silicon than my laptop....

In the end I felt somewhat like an anthropologist, studying a strange, foreign tribe. I also discovered that I'm not very good at not flirting with people when I look at them, and also that I'm much more easily embarresed that I thought....

As you may be able to deduce by the fact that I'm writing this on a Saturday night, my honour remains intact...

Things I've learned recently...

1. I don't have a tin opener
2. It is possible to open a can with an old knife (place point near the edge of the lid, hit handle hard with palm of hand to make a small cut in the lid, repeay in rough circle).
3. I can still make homous

Stupidest thing I've done for a while.....

Just accidentally washed my mobile phone (left in jeans pocket).... don't worry, I tumble dried it as well.... (didn't realise until later).
Net result: my tumble drier can remove the back, battery and SIM card from my phone... when re-assembled it still works!!! (although the screen light doesn't and it smells faintly of fabric softner). am off to buy a new one (at least I have a good excuse now)

senility is a terrible thing....
....or in the words of a great scientific quote "The subtle irony of neurotoxins like acrylamide is that you're the last one to realise you should have worn gloves."

The world is fucked....

If you are an evil dictator (as so many of my readers are), you can relax and go back to sleep. It doesn't matter what you do to your country, as long as you don't produce oil or nuclear weapons the rest of the world doesn't give a shit. Do what ever you like, rig the elections as blatantly as you want, starve your people once their houses have washed away, you won't get anything more than polite but firm warnings from the rest of the world. Ok, so you might not be invited to the next commonwealth games, but as long as you think your regime can deal with this powerful challenge to its power, relax... go back to bad.

No Oil, No Nukes, No Hassle

god, humanity depresses me.

Another night on the internet....

Life is beautiful and cruel.....

Life is beautiful, because sometimes you're sitting on the bus and the most hypnotically beautiful woman sits next to you.... and cruel, because that is invariably on the way home from training and you're sweaty as hell and smell like a corpse....