Tardiness.com

At the encouragement of dearest dumbo, I have decided to post an update on what has been going on thus far since May.
The semester has been going well so far, and I am (for better, or for worse), starting to get a hang of living in the small town that is Bloomington, Indiana. Life has been zooming past as a frantic pace, from career fairs to school work, social obligations to fishing trips (both sedentary and pretty extreme). Fortunately, I now have a chariot that gets me from place to place, and I think its a beaut. The massive 3.5 V6 allows for effortless overtaking on both the small roads of Bloomie and the gorgeous traffic-heavy pass that is Lakeshore Drive. Unfortunately, the baby here runs on average at 15mpg, which is not optimal on the wallet.

In other news, I am in my I-Core semester this fall, and the mid-terms just ended! We had a brilliant idea to celebrate the end of examinations by going to fish at night, in the rain, on a muddy slippery rock-strewn slope, which almost ended up in a couple of head-bashing deaths. However, it was well worth it. I caught a half meter long catfish! The pictures are in my blackberry, which i can't seem to get to work, so they'll just have to wait. The monster was huuge though, too big for both the pail and the sink.

Till next time!

Latest(or not) from theonion.

Classic.

My One Emo Post

Pride and confidence. Sincerity and Leverage. Being above it all and Being inherently stuck in the middle of it all. Self-awareness and Delusion. Knowledge and The beginning of ignorance. Reasoning and realizing that it always requires more. More knowledge, which begets more ignorance. Greater self-awareness, only to be caught in self-delusion. A higher view, from which you end up feeling more implicated with the imperfection you see. More veracity, to reach duplicitous ends. Is there truly a place of perfect completeness?

Dance Off

The following was played just before my corporate strategy class. Hilarious stuff.

TED

It's a week to my finals, but i'm incredibly distracted. My only consolation is that in my distraction, I hope that I'm enriching other aspects of my life as well. Let me introduce you to ted.com.

"We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we're building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other." - ted.com



It's not just the case for Africa. Ayittey's controlled outburst towards the incumbents of the continent powerfully and incisively analyzes and deconstructs the corrupted co-dependence of poverty, the abuse of power and despot authoritarianism that is evident in many of our neighbours as well. More than that, he pleads, nay, yells for change in the generation that is to come. This is the future of development. Consultants, offer expertise to governments and state-owned enterprises that define such developing economies. Bankers, create monetary systems that provide locals opportunities to rise above their poverty. The advancement of the nations would spell out an immense amount of wealth for the private sector as well.

Do your part. If not now, then in time to come.

The Latest Addiction

Can I just say, trading is truly fun stuff. Monitoring markets and making moves in response to the state of the market, information and certain intuitions gives me a kick like no other, for now. Now, if only I had access to the 64,510 dollars required to buy a single lot of crude.

Evil

Looking at Adam and Eve as a case study. If Eve consumed the fruit without knowledge and understanding the notion of obedience, how then do we define original evil? Is evil an entity that in paradise was separate from humankind? Or does evil stem from the choices we make, regardless of whether we have the knowledge of right and wrong? If the serpent is seen as an the personification of evil that lingered on from primordial chaos, could the serpent not have tempted Adam and Eve to sin in other ways apart from consuming the forbidden fruit?

Simple enough, one might think. They lived in innocence before the fall, with no concept of right and wrong or good and evil. They only sinned when they disobeyed God's one single commandment! Let's reconsider that. Since innocence and ignorance absolved them from guilt in the garden, wouldn't innocence have then absolved them from the sin of lust(for the fruit) as well? After all, the concept of obedience can only be understood when placed next to the notion of disobedience, and disobedience did not exist, intellectually as a sin, for they were ignorant of good and evil as they had not consumed of the fruit. One can only exist with the coexistence or absence but foreknowledge of the other. True goodness only exists with the knowledge of evil, darkness only exists in the absence of light, obedience is only obedience when there is the deliberate denial of disobedience.

What then, if we view the serpent as an externalisation of our implicit desires, instead of the temptress and the instigator of evil? Is there then a way to give ourselves an explanation that might allow us to have a clearer picture of what sin truly is?

Consider.

Why We Love the Irish

I was walking down Fisherman's wharf today and saw this letter hanging at the window of an Irish gift shop. Hilarious much =)




Dear Son,

Just a few lines to let you know I'm still alive. I'm writing this letter slowly because I know you can't read fast. We are all doing very well.

You won't recognise the house when you get home - we have moved. Your dad read in the newspaper that most accidents happen within 20 miles from your home, so we moved. I won't be able to send you the address because the last Irish family that lived here took the house numbers when they moved so that they wouldn't have to change their address.

This place is really nice. It even has a washing machine. I'm not sure it works so well though: last week I put a load in and pulled the chain and haven't seen them since.

Your father's got a really good job now. He's got 500 men under him. He's cutting the grass at the cemetery.

Your sister Mary had a baby this morning but I haven't found out if it's a boy or a girl, so I don't know whether you are an auntie or an uncle.

Your brother Tom is still in the army. He's only been there a short while and they've already made him a court martial!

Your Uncle Patrick drowned last week in a vat of whiskey in the Dublin Brewery. Some of his workmates tried to save him but he fought them off bravely. They cremated him and it took three days to put out the fire.

I'm sorry to say that your cousin Seamus was arrested while riding his bicycle last week. They are charging him with dope peddling.

I went to the doctor on Thursday and your father went with me. The doctor put a small tube in my mouth and told me not to talk for ten minutes. Your father offered to buy it from him.

The weather isn't bad here. It only rained twice this week, first for three days and then for four days. Monday was so windy one of the chickens laid the same egg four times.

We had a letter from the under-taker. He said if the last payment on your Grandmother's plot wasn't paid in seven days, up she comes.

About that coat you wanted me to send you, your Uncle Stanley said it would be too heavy to send in the mail with the buttons on, so we cut them off and put them in the pockets.

John locked his keys in the car yesterday. We were really worried because it took him two hours to get me and your father out.

Three of your friends went off a bridge in a pick-up truck. Ralph was driving. He rolled down the window and swam to safety. Your other two friends were in back. They drowned because they couldn't get the tailgate down.

There isn't much more news at this time. Nothing much has happened.

Your loving Mum

P.S. I was going to send you some money but I had already sealed the envelope.

Secret Asian Man

No Better Way

With the activities, parties and multiple last minute errands that have to be run before I leave piling up, one hardly has any time to breathe. Anyhoos, I've decided to put up some pictures from the crazyy weekend that was last Saturday and Sunday!


















As I'm sure you can tell, Widjaja's pre-21st and farewell was an absolute blast.




On top of that, Sunday was the last trip to Keyaki that I'll be making in a while. Emo-ness.

Good-bye to my favourite Japanese restaurant for the next 3 months(hopefully) or 9 months, if I'm not so fortunate.=(







Signing off with a picture that perhaps best describes my last days here in Singapore,

Ernest R. Xue

When Marijuana is Less Harmful than Tobacco

Dutch smoking ban to cover coffee shops
Fri Jun 8, 2007 9:22pm BST

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A Dutch smoking ban will come into force in July next year for all restaurants and cafes - including coffee shops where cannabis is the top attraction, the government decided on Friday.
"Coffee shops will be treated in the same manner as other catering businesses. They will be smoke-free," Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende told NOS television.
"It would have been wrong to move towards a smoke-free catering industry and then make an exception for coffee shops. People would not have understood that."
Establishments will not in fact have to be completely smoke-free. Proprietors will be allowed to set up a separate room or glass partition behind which people can smoke, but customers will not be served there to protect staff.
"Employees should not have to work in an environment were they are constantly exposed to the harmful effects of smoking," Balkenende said after the cabinet's decision on Friday.
Amsterdam's renowned coffee shops, where marijuana can be smoked openly in a relaxed atmosphere, are one of the city's big draws for tourists.
Coffee shop owners argue that the ban only applies to tobacco and is unlikely to hit them hard.
Whilst commonly mixed with tobacco, marijuana can also be smoked on its own, especially in pipes, vaporizers and other contraptions.
Soft drugs are officially banned in the Netherlands but under a policy of tolerance, buyers are allowed to have less than 5 grams of cannabis in their possession.

Well and good you say. In a survey conducted by Cancer Council Victoria, 4 out of 10 smokers admitted that smoke-free venues helped them in their decision to ditch the habit. Let me however, draw your attention to the line that has been typed out in green. Smoking tobacco is banned in eating places, but smoking weed is still allowed.

"Marijuana side effects from an overdose include toxic psychosis including hallucinations, delusions and a loss of self-identification."

"Marijuana side effects include physical problems like breathing difficulties and deteriorating physical abilities. Despite a popular belief, marijuana side effects speed up the heart, blood and breathing rate. The body is taxed more and this speeds up the aging process just like methamphetamines do. The marijuana side effects from this extra exertion on the body include a higher risk for lung cancer, heart attacks and strokes."

Fine, fine, argue what you will about the ban being instituted for the benefit of potential 2nd-hand smokers, that it is about the protection of the innocent, that those who indulge in such habits make a conscious decision to bring destruction onto their own body and the government has no right to interfere apart by managing externalities such as, and that which results from the pollution that such persons wreck on those around them. To me, it is a parallel situation to one where the government does away with cars and big vehicles due to their heavy emissions, allowing only motorcyclists on the roads.

According to the National Center for Statistics and Analysis (NCSA), the fatality rate per 100,000 registered motorcycles was 64.88 while the number of fatalities per 100,000 registered passenger cars was only 15.72. Now do the math. Those on motorcycles are essentially accidents waiting to happen. In the same way, the country, although having tried to control the extent of external harm that smoking tobacco creates, continues to advocate both the physical and social ills that come with the consumption of the drug. Above that, by constitution, it acts as a potential agent of destruction to other countries as well, given that many who frequent Amsterdam are tourists who picked up the usage of the drug there.

Now, I am truly thankful that my lungs are safe from second-hand smoke, but unfortunately, my son might end up a psycho-motor moron who lacks entirely in the cognitive department as well.

Without Which We Have No Hope

Most glorious Lord of life, that on this day,

Didst make Thy triumph over death and sin,

And, having harrowed hell, didst bring away

Captivity thence captive, us to win.

-Edmund Spencer "Easter Morning"

Periphescence

One rarely comes across something that is both this asthetically pleasing and functional, no, not just functional, but downright aggressive at the same time. I have never been a great fan of Alfa Romeos. If one were to plot a chart showing the number of times an alfa would have gotten you to your destination vs. the number of times your alfa would have broken down attempting to get you to your destination, it would look something like this:

We're talking about percentage figures of course. HOWEVER, before we get carried away by highly biased and inaccurate statistics, let me draw your attention once more, to the picture of the Alfa Romeo 8C Competezione which begins this entry. If this lovingly crafted sculpture of metal(fine, carbon fibre) and leather fails to get you into a state of periphescence, i don't know what will. With a monstrous 4.7 litre, 450 horsepower furnace that propels you from 0 to the 60 in under 4 seconds, Alfisti* all over the world are heralding the advent of the new chosen one that will once again reinstate the pride that came with the glorious racing days of old.


*Alfisti-a term denoting the fanatical followers of the Italian marque

Of Water and Uncanny Common Sense

Now, this is something that everyone should have a look at. It might look like something that you made mum and dad throw out of the house the moment you turned eight in favour for a REAL bicycle that would make you look like one of the big kids instead of mumsie's little boy that you actually were(and that we all still are to some extent), but the IDEO aquaduct seems fully capable of bringing salvation to those who need freshwater the most.

With the help of a peristaltic pump that is ingeniously connected to the pedals, the bike( with the help of a pedalling rider of course), draws water from a storage tank and pumps it through a filtration system. Newly cleansed water is further propelled forward and into the tank down the front! The filtration system and bigger storage tank obviously, account for the shapely behind of the tricycle. Now, find me a derriere that looks as inviting while being able to save entire populations from malnourishment and poor sanitation at the same time. http://www.ideo.com/