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Wet new year’s eve

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It had been raining continuously for days now. I remembered the last time I saw sun shining brightly on mon, then its wet wet wet. Guess I have to cancel or push some my exercise regiment for the week.. especially a run yesterday. so disappointing… Hope it would be a sunny January!

& so its the eve of new year, mum made reservation at singlap inn steamboat restaurant & I guess I would be dropping by esplanade or so if permits for the midnight countdown. This would be my last post for 2004, come 2005 a great year ahead!

Take care!

Digital Cable

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💡 The cable guy came by to install the new digital set-top box this evening as my sis wanted some new additional animax cable channel, only supported by digital cable. So starhub offered to swap our old cable box for a digital one. Spotting a contemporary silver/black look in place of our old cable set top box, which had been with the family loyally for almost god know when! 7 years or so? Its the 1st generation Texas instrument cable box spotting a black blocky shape with only a 2 digit red LCD screen showing the selected channel, no clock or so! even the SCV logo is still on. Old yet reliable, sad to see it being swapped for.. eww new technology…

I didn’t really got into the hype of digital cable yet, but it looks loaded compared to old analog cable. Compable to that of computers. Some features include allow real time viewing & selection of 16 channels at once, a more user friendly program guide, a games network, chat & messaging area & a niffy ability to remind you of favorite programs starting based on your saved prefs. It can even get filmware updates automatically from the network! cool.

I have a dental appointment on for my wisdom tooth tomorrow morning, hope I don’t need an extraction like last time…

Make your Tidal wave help donations

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😥 Looks like this particular part of the world is mourning for the victims & families devastated by the tidal wave disaster few days ago, with endless drizzle & now pouring of rain here since morning. So what the least we can do to help the victims, well maybe in a monetary aid or so, that whats possible. Dropped by the Red Cross, Singapore building to make a donation towards the appeal for help & aid & I guess you can do the same too.

Graffiti to go, & hey its boxing not earthquake day…

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😐 It boxing day & it would be a perfect day if it won’t for the the earthquake disaster around asia the fifth-largest earthquake since 1900, Originating from the indian ocean area. With many lives & property lost. For those in trouble, be positive & stay strong. May god bless.

🙂 On a lighter note, had dinner at home today as mum was having her vege-curry special for the family! She always never fail to amaze with her dishes… yummy! not to mention healthy too. Other than that, got a new banana boat dark tanning oil for tomorrow’s swim. Hope the sun would be up tomorrow. Spent most of today scanning & colouring the artpiece for my straits times classified graffiti competition. Though uncompleted, its starting to look pretty good. Now all I have to do is to get some glossy paper to print it on for submission when done. On my 2nd project for the week, started brainstorming on the design for my battalion logo. Currently I have ideas set for an armoured horse (armour) on a shield with tank track marks.

😈 Finally got a reputable mouse working on my computer again, this time after fixing my old logitech mouseman dual optical. It had some right-clicking problems which very much solved by inserting small pieces of tape & plastic to raise the circuit for the buttons. I think I could do that on my microsoft intellimouse (if I can find a way to actually open it up in the 1st place!) which had been giving me problems lately, not to mention squeaky problems & the hassle of using an inferior substitute balled-mouse. Now it back to the good old dual-optical, not to mention precision, now all I have to do is the get new gaming mouse feet. No more jerky crosshairs in games or lines in photoshop for now!

Ending this entry with some news from cresene about her our interview article which was actually, intended to be published on the voices magazine but wasn’t approved by the editor in the end. Sad, it was a good one. You can check the article out at her site here.

Its Christmas

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I guess a new resolution for me next year is to post much shorter, concise posts like this one.

😀 And so, christmas is the time of giving, or say the joy of giving, having say spent at least $250 on presents for my family & friends, guess it just the spirit of giving (& spending), the spirit of Christmas. haha!

Had dinner at AV the famous Rong Guang bbq seafood resturant before dropping by cousin gordon’s place to pass some goodies to his family. Headed to granny’s for the night, & I get to drove home thereafter.

🙄 Finished with the line art for my Straits Time classified graffti art competition, would be scanning it in for colour tomorrow or so. If you think of entering the competition, better don’t cos.. am gonna beat ya all! *blechz!*

Merry Christmas everyone.

Mariner Restaurant Christmas eve dinner

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🙂 Well its about 1/2hr to Christmas day & man is orchard road packed with people tonight, its so crowded to get even within 2 km within the vicinity, traffic is just to conjested with shoppers and those ever growing Christmas toys kiosks. Anyway its dad’s turn to drive as I think I already had enough of driving for the week, I even got to pick him up from work before dinner!

Mariner Restaurant
This year, Christmas eve dinner with my family was at the Mariner’s restaurant. Specializing in seafood and steaks, its the 2nd Christmas eve we had dinner there but they are going for towards fine dining now, with little portions of steak here & there its barely sufficient for me in portions, though my dish had 2 full lobsters in it. Ordered an additional NZ tenderloin steak on top of the main dish. Didn’t order the usual escargots as we didn’t feel like it. Partly because of the free flow of salad from the salad bar which kept most of us munching the healthy greens.. and yes dad as always, can’t get enough of thousand island just as much kept telling him…

😀 Its the eve, Merry Christmas everyone!

Driving freedom

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😎 Drove into camp last sunday as mum & dad were overseas for a vaction, so that very much leaves the car for me to use. Having a car very much added to speed & convience for me, considering its the first time dad actually allowed me to drive on my own around. Driving alone have its thrills, not to mention being very independanT (& a lighter car!). Journeys worth noting for the week includes a nights off on tuesday where I got to park at a HDB multistorey car park for the 1st time near the jurong point area with john for some chill out.

😯 The highlight for the week is largely the midweek outfield event which involves testing out some movement techniques & us riding around. I was the section commander, thats pretty muchof the work, lucky for me theres not much dismounted roles. If it is not just riding around in our M113s jumping into mud, eating monsterous clouds of dust of area D, throw thunderflashes of a speeding vehicle, shitting out in the wilderness, sleeping in the freezing night or get bug fested by mositioes. Man we can call that fun…

Its christmas eve & the block leaves starts today for the wing, so that would be till jan 3rd next year. (yea) with an excpetional dental appointment on the 30th this month. Done with sending all the OVM stores at the end of training yesterday, with some exceptional lost stores here & there which we kinda settled or kept in control. Looks everything’s all set for christmas tomorrow!

Projects for this week’s blockleave:

  • Classifieds art competition
  • Company & battalion logo

Singa inn

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With respect to all my previous posts, I guess I did better start posting.. erm shorter blogs? or maybe use the “more feature” so as not to make things appear so lengthy.

😛 Dinner was at singa inn at along east coast road yesterday, mum saw this offer for $15++ per head for a full steamboat seafood buffet. The range while I helped myself mostly to the yong tao hu & lettuces, the meat & drunkard prawns which don’t seem to be able to keep themselves down, till we umm put ’em into the steamboat?

The spread is ok, the food though not very fresh but otherwise still within a passable/bearable area. The place is reasonably filled with people but not too crowded on a saturday night. The ambient is warm & otherwise cooling on the occasional seaside winds, the restaurant is built around a fresh water pond with a “boat, kampung” like feel. This open air restaurant also is built upon non other than atap leaves, which gives the rather traditional look but otherwise, how the elements off quite well too though its frail looks. Maybe we are too dependent on concrete for shelter!

😉 There’s a driving range beside the restaurant too & dad conked out that hey, why not play some golf during my block leave? (which so would be on the week after next) I don’t know about that as I usually don’t golf just as much as my dad does, but I guess I can go dig my up dusty golf bag & give it a try maybe.

Visits to granny’s before heading home, man am I full.

Double Degree?

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😳 Woke up at 11.30am today where mum had breakfast waiting for me. Obviously she had been waiting for me to wake up as we could check out the Australia university options there. Caught a cab from home to the center & before we know it we are already at the RELC building 1pm. Wendy was this nice counselor whom attended to us this non-profit organization known as the idp & was set up by the Australian education board providing for Singaporean students intending to study aboard. After some recommendations & brochures from universities in Melbourne, a generally good vicinity downunder. We manages to zero down to few engineering courses offered by Uni of Melbourne, Uni of New South Wales (UNSW) & Monash University. I always wanted to do a course which blends all my interests together- engineering mechanical, drawing/design & computers. Uni of Melbourne & UNSW both offer only either undergrad courses engineering OR design as seperate degrees with direct honours. Dang! Till we came about a double degree offer by Monash college- The Bachelor of Engineering/Bachelor of Design (Industrial Design). PERFECT! I would be consiering that, with a dip for 19months before starting undergrad studies. But total tuition fees cum accomdation would costs a gross $50k a month… drag.. well mroe research yet to come.

Had lunch at the building’s 2nd floor restaurant. It too small to be called a full restaurant, very much like a coffee house, offering set lunches for 6.50 very much a small family business, quite OK I say. Caught a cab to novena where I dropped mum off the MRT station due to the rain in the immediate area. Had the cab drop me off the skin center for my medical appointment. Both cab trips costs $5 each.. so saying the distance from home to RELC & RELC to novena is the same distance?

➡ Took MRT from novena to orchard, wisma to collect my DVD player from the Sony service center. The players play fine now, but the damaged buttons are still kinda hard to press. But otherwise not much of a hinder. Window shopped around the area when it started raining. There are lots of DBS black card people offering umbrella sheltering for shoppers point to point arcoss the paragon juntion area in the rain. I won’t be amused if they ferry you to the DBS card kiosk & leave you stranded there with their promoting & branging. Got a shark wrist support & dolphin handphone holder from a sale in action city. PK is having tribes vengence with men of valour going for $49.90, thats 2-for-1 dudes.

😛 Mum & dad brought back hongkong noodle for supper. yea!

CPR certified!

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➡ Yesterday.. was a typical day where I could wake up get dressed in SBO & make my way to the SOC to cover safety in the morning for the platoon without consciously knowing it, just like sleepwalking or just say on “auto mode” where no brain power is needed to execute anything at all… even before my coffee at ATC. Evo is a new addition to our bunk now, a young 1 week old puppy who just learnt to walk. John found him around wing line & everyone in the platoon was a mystified & charmed by its cuteness & so they decided to keep it as a platoon pet. Les do they know that he’s such a good for nothing furball who yip yeps all the way into the night, very much allowing me to catch a glimpse of my alarm clock up to 4 times at regular intervals throughout the last night, cursing at each interval. We came to conclusion to stop him from sleeping too much in the day so that we would, at night & instead of Evo being a nocturnal yipper. Afternoon saw the night of nee soon camp, where our CPR course is held. We were taught on the steps of CPR & given situations to tackle. We were also taught how to save people from chokes using the Heimlich maneuver & chest thrusts. Practice & tests followed suit on Annie the dummy & we were all certifiled CPR trained, we even have a lifesavers card to keep. The platoon booked out from nee soon straight after the course, kinda one of the few moments where you can book out & head home in uniform. Razzy!

😛 Heres some basic steps for anyone who wishes to learn about CPR, who knows anyone may encounter a situation when such a procedure is needed:

Shaun’s CPR 101
Upon approaching the victim, try to check his level of consciousnesses, if unconscious do the ABCs after calling for help/ambulance. Here are the 3 basic steps of ABC:

Airway must be clear!
1) Use thumb jaw lift (clear foreign objects from mouth)
2) Head tilt chin lift to clear airway (tongue may fall back)
Substeps (confirmation, shouldn’t take longer than 15 secs):
3) Look, listen, feel for breathing.
4) Give a ventilation (see breathing steps 2-4 below) to check for clear airway chest should rise, give 2nd ventilation to confirm airway clear.

If chest don’t rise, go back & start from step 2. If chest still don’t rise after 2nd try give 15 chest compressons (see circulation for steps & position below) 4-5cm deep above the sternum to force choked object out of airway proceed to step 1 to clear foreign object.

Breathing. Is there oxygen circulation?
1) Look, listen, feel for breathing.
2) Pinch victim’s nose & put a tight seal around mouth
3) Give a long deep blow (400-1000ml of air) into the mouth, chest should rise.
4) Release nose victim’s chest should deflate.
5) Do 2 sets (steps 2-3).

Circulation. Is there a pulse?
1) Check for circulation by placing your index & middle finger near the victim’s neck ridge/Adam apple at the side towards you to feel for the carotid pulse.
2) Place heel of one hand on lower part of victim’s sternum. With your other hand directly on top of first hand, interlock.
3) Compress downwards with arms straight, don’t bend, bounce
4) Compressions must go at 100bpm following, saying 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 5 & 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 10 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & 15 to keep in the pace.

15 compressions should be done followed by 2 ventialtions thats considered 1 set, do 4 sets.

Situations, notes:
If theres pulse but no breathing, perform Rescue Breathing similar Breathing step 2-4. But the procedures should not take longer than 5secs each. Perform 12 sets, lasting 1min in total, check pulse thereafter.
If theres no pulse, start CPR again with the 4x(15 compressions: 2 ventilation) cycles, check breathing & pulse thereafter & remedy accordingly.
If need arises continue until recuse personnel arises.
If both circulation & breathing is present, put victim in supine/recovery position. Monitor breathing & circulation until help arrives.
Perform CPR on a hard flat surface, move victim if necessary otherwise compression won’t be effective.
One life saved!

Phoenix hotel cafe garden high tea

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Its time again where Mum couldn’t just start planning for the next family big feast, this time she’ve managed to redeem free Phoenix hotel high tea buffet entry coupons from the singtel reward points dad’s accumulated. So… what more than a free buffet feast at 3.30pm in the day? All in hand we all woke up late after staying up late on saturday, around 2am to be excat so we kinda had a late breakfast at around 11am so we can skip lunch at the usual 1pm timing & head straight for the buffet high tea at round 3pm- just as smartly planned.

➡ The garden cafe is located at the basement of the hotel, quite isolated I say, but otherwise the place is quite well themed & decorated. The crowd would be just right if it weren’t for the valueair company function held concurrently on, bringing in sudden & unexpected masses of people, leading to magical disappearance of food just like how you would encounter with Taiwanese tourists around. But the kitchen always kept up with the demand. Overall the food variety span over the many cuisines- Chinese, western, indian & local favorites but otherwise quite limited, not much as we can expect, as its a high tea anyway, not a full fledged buffet lunch. Heh bet they didn’t see us coming around & treating it as lunch.. & even dinner!

😯 Crossed over to orchard plaza to checkout some hobby store at the 3rd floor in response to a 20% discount off all items opportunity from the chevrons club members discount booklet. Orchard plaza is damn creepy, not to mention very empty with many stores closed down. Didn’t know of such a shopping center along orchard, very shocking indeed. Found the store after a short search, only to find out that it turned into a TAILOR SHOP! which too, was closed down… rats…. guess that discount booklet I was holding was kinda hem.. pretty old? Continued along orchard to the Sony service center at Wisma to collect my DVD player which to my dismay, was not ready yet. The service personnel said that they would call me when the player’s repaired, but wasn’t it told to me last week that it would be ready in 1 week’s time? & man wasn’t I told about the call informing thingie! Dropped by the orchard hello shop to check out the nokia 6260 which I was quite interested in, in terms of features from their site, but its tad quite big for a flip phone a great drawback. Guess I would be saving my cash for my Dell x50v next year then. Zipped down heeren with sis where she went bonkers over some cute badges at Burlington greetings & yes I had to pay for em cos she forgot her wallet, otherwise quite a good trip thereafter to PK computers, annex & action city. After all that shopping, we were all still full from the buffet! & its already 8pm!

😉 So thats about it played some NFS Underground 2 before getting ready to book into camp for another week of erm… work? otherwise its should be quite a slack week too. With our CPR course on on thurs & a medical appointment on fri, heh.. it should be a fast week too!

Midnight coffee.. or so was it?

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😎 Ah, its the time of the ahemm year again? when I get to do camp guard duty as part of wing regiment duties. & so how was duty as guard 3 I/C yesterday? well Shoik! thats the first time I can ever say this short 2 hour gate shifts from 6-8pm. Then rest then 11.30pm to 1.30am then SLEEP till 5am to collect breakfast. The luxury of the duty was largely attributed to the immediate personel involved such as the guard commander who was an avid “ok if everything is ok why turn out?” kind of person otherwise a nice chap to chat to on his experience as a regular 2nd SGT in 46. The guard 2I/C was a complete idiot in guard duty, which puts me second on the I/C hierarchy based on duties & experience. He not a very lucky guy either, as a thunderstorm started immediately after I swapped gate duty with him.. poor guy, even with the rain jacket hes drenched head to toes with “puddles” in his boots, & yes did I mention his socks as “wingable dry” The last person to determine the mood of the guards would be lastly the DO, who was fortunately a big blurry LTA from HQ. Due to the storm he even told us to bring all the relavant books for him to sign all the way from guard room to HQ, which is good as this mean the lack of an overwatching person in the guardhouse when he drops by, IOW there would also be no turn out either no one to “find fault” or be questioned by like what most DOs would do if they drop by. This one was relaxingly exceptional.

😈 The last attributing factor would go solely to the force of mothernature herself who called upon the storm to bring across everlasting CAT 1 status over our sectors. Something definitely the prowlers would like (btw the troopers are from the same 46 “S” coy sct troopers who I’ve worked with my last GD itself, coincidence! I bet I could occasionally hear their prayers in the guard room to prolong the rain). Therefore no guard turnout, staff parade either! Not to mention no guard mounting! I love this GD, esp the feeling of drinking a nice ice nescafe coffee in the drizzle at the gate, soft rain pattering down the shelter in the shrill quietness of the night while listening to Bon Jovi on my music player. Unreal!

Oh well thats all for the duty today… Oh yea talking bout guard, congrats to Lester for passing out from MP school.