Frustrated

The affairs of state in this country have left me despairing for its future.

Even if I were to criticize certain Government policies and offer suggestions to make it better, I would be labeled anti-Government and an Opposition supporter. In this stage of my life, such labels have a hazardous effect on my future; and as such I have to be content with keeping my thoughts and opinions underground for this first few years. However, the student years are also one of the best to gain experience in such matters. For this purpose I am thankful that I am enrolled in a private and not a public institution, where the crackdown is harsh and in most cases tyrannical.

Where to now? Maybe I should start writing articles and publish them anonymously on the Internet, perhaps in the style of johnleemk. Interweaving points with humour as walksi does is not my forte. You can see this for yourself from my dry blog posts.

It is my duty as a citizen of this country to see that the Government of the day serves the people, however idealistic that might sound. As of now, they serve the elite few who in turn is part of the Government itself. This leads to a highly charged situation where the people who are left out of the wealth grows discontented. And from Sunday’s rally, a huge discontent it is.

Where to, nerdrazor?

The Girl and Her Dad

I was loafing around the Charles Brooke Memorial looking for targets of opportunity when out of the corner of my eye, I saw a girl.

Alone.

After scanning the surrounding environs for traces of her parents, I found her father several meters away. He’s several steps up, the girl on the ground.

The father waited.

The girl climbed the stairs.

Life goes on.

The Waterfront

Continue reading ‘The Waterfront’

On HINDRAF

I do not agree with their demands. Seeking compensation from the UK government for bringing their ancestors to Malaysia gives the impression that they are still from India even though they were born and raised here. Even after a hundred and fifty years. I do, however, agree that they should be free to voice their demands, to submit the memorandum to the British High Commission and to assemble peacefully.

There were objections to the rally, stating that it is illegal. Based on this, a family outing of more than five people is an illegal gathering. A class trip is also an illegal gathering. Plenty more examples. What makes it illegal? The law. I really hate it when people justify it with ‘the law is the law’. If the law oppresses the people, then the law should be amended or cease to exist. After all, it is the people who make laws. Unfortunately, one cannot amend it without a majority in the Parliament – and the current party’s stand is if it is a proposal made by the Opposition, then the members must not vote for it. A very stark contrast with other nations where to vote for or against something is a decision to be made by the member himself, not the party. He can even vote against the party’s policy if he feels that the proposal will not bring any good to his constituents.

Checkup

The good doctor wrote:

>>also, this may sound silly, but whats full body checkup do? what do they check for?

>>A full body check up involves you bending over and the nurse put on gloves and then shove her fingers — just kidding. Doc can enlighten you better on this subject.

There’s no such thing as FULL body checkup. Otherwise all the blood in your body wouldn’t have sufficed. Not to mention it will cost you some rocket figures. Some simple test will cost several hundreds by itself, alone.

What they offer are usually called ‘general screening’ involving combinations of very simple and cheap tests to detect a certain abnormalities that may suggest something else.

A test that turns out normal does not necessary mean that you are entirely healthy. An abnormal result also may not mean that you are really sick. In order to interprete that, you will have to look at the person as a whole and take into consideration many other factors. There are very frequent false positives and false negatives that give people either a false sense of security or undue anxiety.

For example, higher uric acid level can be associated with high cholesterol level. And by controlling cholesterol level, the uric acid level may come back to normal by itself and it doesn’t mean that you have gout.

A proper health screen will involve going to a doctor and talk to him, answer his questions, get examined. After that he might give you a physical exam and if really necessary, order some tests. And these tests will be specially tailored for you taking into consideration of all the factors including your age, if you have just had your menses etc. I have female patient who went for a so called ‘full body checkup’ after her menses and came back with red blood cells in urine, full field. She was told she has kidney cancer.

A good doctor will likely to have a rough idea of what kind of result he will be getting and he just need the evidence to confirm it. Remember, just by talking to the patient, a good doctor can come to 80% of diagnosis. Another 10% by physical examination. And the last 10% by investigation (tests).

For a doctor, investigation is just a tool. It is meant to confirm what he suspects. It is not meant for him to forego his diagnostic skill and rely on the test result to tell him what you have – I can train a chimpanzee to do the same easily. But these days, some doctors have fallen slave to these tests. And they are now treating the test results instead of the patient.

Sadly also, the general public has been misled to believe that the test result means either ticket to eternal life or ticket to hell.

Patient A : “Doctor, is my cholesterol level normal?”

Doctor : “Yes.”

Patient B : “What about mine?”

Doctor : “Yours too.”

Patient B : “But mine is 4.9 and his 4.7.”

Doctor : “Yeah, both fall into normal range.”

Patient B : “But his is lower than mine!”

Patient A : “Buahahahahaha!”

Doctor : “Like I said, both are in normal range.”

Patient B : “I’m sure you can give me some medicine so that my cholesterol can be 4.7 or lower.”

Patient A : “Nyeh! Nyeh! Nyeh!”

Patient B : “Pretty puleeeezeeee! Doctor!” *bat bat eyelids*

Doctor : “Go get fucked!”

Patient A : “BUAARRRGHAGHAGHAGHAAA~~~”

White jacket, black stripes

Rule 34 strikes Clannad

I know of Rule 34 and pr0n out of animes, but this is FAST! And the hair… hilarious.

Will it have dango sex? How about starfish?

Fu-un Bakumatsuden 「風雲幕末伝」 on the PCSX2 0.9.4

I never owned any consoles or game systems throughout my entire childhood and teenage years. This means being left out of many game discussions, the Playstation being the dominant console in the early years. Even then, my first game system was a Game Boy Pocket – not much, but then… Understandably, the lack of consoles and the abundance of computers led me into the world of emulators.

My first contact with emulators, specifically for Playstation games came in 2001 with Bleem. Needless to say, the company crashed and burned due to a lawsuit. Some other emulators I tried was PCSX and Connectix VGS. The plugin system used by the PCSX made optimisation for a certain computer easy, but the emulator itself was not perfected. The VGS does not use a plugin system and the games usually ‘just run’ – but since it does not have plugins, increasing graphic performance, which is a priority for many could not be made.

Add a few more years and I settled myself on the ePSXe, which also uses plugins. It is the best – and still is – emulator for the Playstation, with others biting the dust. But enough of the past. Let me bring you to the current time.

A Playstation 2 emulator, PCSX2, is currently the only Playstation 2 emulator available. Licensed under the GNU General Public License
and currently at version 0.9.4, it has made many great leaps in emulating the system. The latest release brought tremendous improvements to a lot of games, and here is my experience with one of them.

Continue reading ‘Fu-un Bakumatsuden 「風雲幕末伝」 on the PCSX2 0.9.4′

Today’s haul – 19 November 2007

P/S: The green book is a gift for my mom.

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