Did you see the lights?

After yesterday's rant, I decided to hit up IMDB to see what M. Night Shyamalan has coming down the shit chute, and oh my goodness, looks like he'll be writing the screenplay adaptation to "Life of Pi". I guess he got tired of thinking up his own hackneyed plot twists, and had to resort to modern fiction.

I loathe this man more than Uwe Bol, and, yes, I can confidently say that even after seeing the Dungeon Siege trailer.

Let me save you a lot of trouble by employing my "Snakes on a Plane" School of Film Titling technique. "Life of Pi", I re-dub thee

"It's Not Really a Goddamned Tiger"

If you haven't read the book, I haven't really ruined anything, if you plan on reading it for the right reasons. It's not like you needed to be told that a story about a small Indian boy who survives on a lifeboat with a starving Bengal tiger for more than 200 days at sea is going to employ the elements of an allegory. Yes, it's fiction, but we are not mentally retarded. It's a starving Bengal tiger. Children are made of meat. It is very safe for us to assume that there are some elements of fiction at work here defying a rational world, in an effort to convey the authors notions of a deeper truth. That is the basis for enjoyment. The point of reading a book, just like the point of going to the movies, shouldn't be to suffer a story in anticipation of a plot twist as the payoff.

Of course my criticism of the movie precedes its actual release. It could be great, but knowing Mr. Correspondence-School-of-Film-Dropout, I imagine the bulk of the effort put into the screenplay will be architecting the composition of events in such a fashion that they heighten the effect of a "surprise" ending. Bleh.

(Repost from The Salon I, January 31, 2006)

There are times when I go through the various news sites, and I am simply floored by the unbelievably ludicrous events that occur daily on this blue ball of ours, and actually affect our lives. Between the over the top outrage at Janet Jackson's "wardrobe malfunction", that has made television stations and networks in the USA, excessively weary of the religious right (case and point: The Book of Daniel has just been cancelled), and Hamas declaring it wants an Islamic state in Palestine, to keep homosexuals out (I guess an Islamist party is probably not big on freedoms)... Wow! Why is it that we love to feed our extremism, rather than our abilities to negotiate? And more importantly here, why is it that this human race of ours seems to always be looking for ways to worsen already tense situations?

Case and point:
BBC NEWS Middle East Danes face growing Muslim storm:

"Denmark has advised citizens against travel to Saudi Arabia, amid growing anger across the Muslim world at Danish depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.
A newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet, one of which pictured a bomb hidden in his turban, apologised on Monday for offending Muslims.

A newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet, one of which pictured a bomb hidden in his turban, apologised on Monday for offending Muslims. Islam bans any depiction of the Prophet Muhammad or Allah."

Now, in as volatile a world as we have today, and considering that there is already a daily almost planet-wide clash of religions/ideologies (I am assuming the Danes have TVs, and International news), why would any journalist/newspaper, in their right mind, publish such a potentially incendiary carricature? Aren't there enough points or contention between Islam and the West, for there to be such a monumentous blunder?

Don't get me wrong, I would actually give my life for freedom of expression and opinion, and freedom of the press. But I also believe that professional press organizations should be mindful of the various ramifications of the topics/stories/images they publish. If there is something we have learnt, it is that the West NEEDS to inform itself better about Islam, and its Ummah. Even basic knowledge about Islam could avoid these kind of unnecessary offenses. Unless of course the backlash is exactly what the Jyllands-Posten newspaper was after... but I doubt it.

This brings me to my third point. These potentially inflamatory articles/images are not just a problem for the Muslim world, but may have unintended consequences in Europe itself, and the Western world in general. With the rise of such parties as the "Front National" in France, the National Democratic Party in Germany (NDP... if you replace Democratic by another word that starts with "S", And then you compare their campaign messages and tacticts, I start shivering), or the conservative Christian right-wing here in the USA, there is much cause for concern that isms and phobias in general, and racism and xenophobia in particular, might become an even bigger concern, than backlash from militant Islam. In Russia, numbers of racially motivated killings have doubled in the past 2 years, and all over Europe, xenophobic, racist, and anti-semitic crimes and attacks have become quite frequent. And there seems to be no real will from governments (especially the right-wing ones) to deal with this at all. And within this context, the French parliament had the @#$% to pass a law praising the positive effects of colonialism in the former French Empire. The law will now be repealed, but a staggering 60% of the French people thought it was an appropriate law. And now, to balance it out, Chirac has declared a "Remembrance of Slavery Day", every May 10th, to commemorate a 2001 law that made slavery a crime against humanity, and had angered the Right... it's appropriate, but a bit late.

So in the name of all my fellow formerly colonized African, Caraibean, and Asian people, and the blood of their ancestors, I must say the following. European (and Western) governments have to realize three things: One, they are old and they NEED us "Keffers, niggers, ragheads, sandpeople, beurs, camel-people, savages" to survive. Two, that we are poor and knocking at their door largely as a result of their colonial, post-colonial, Cold-war and neo-colonial policies, and they muss fess up to their responsibilities. And three, if it were not for us, our labour, our lands and our natural resources, they would not even be close to being the powers that they are today (And especially Africans, because if it were not for them, some say, there would be no humans at all).

And to all the Neo-Nazis, Front National, NDP, et al out there, I love you dearly as fellow humans, and I have nothing against you because of your race, and I never have. I have always been a champion for mingling of all humans, tolerance and racial hamony between all people, and that remains my core belief. But get this: you don't want to try us. White people are a minority in this world, and the rest of us has already seen how dangerous a fascist Europe could be... we will not let it happen again. Just so you know.

I am done venting. And I still wonder...

Tags: News Colonialism Islam Africa Europe Racism Xenophobia Middle East Opinion Denmark France Germany

ticket printing As the Internet expands to a wider scale, ticket printing traders gain more experience in offering products for sale. One of the big advantages is that online ticket printing traders have over shop front ticket printing stores is that the capital costs are much, much less. A normal ticket printing outlet would need to employ staff, runs lots of ticket printing related advertising and pay rents or taxes. When a ticket printing business is placed online these overheads are significantly cut down. Quick there is a cosmogirl. The best there ever was cosmogirl will take you there. The cosmogirl are the finer things in lifeQuick there is a cosmogirl. The best there ever was cosmogirl will take you there. The cosmogirl are the finer things in life

Being silent
Can it be right?
I wondered
He wondered
They wondered
Who else didn’t?
What’s wrong?

Man! I was late for camp today man! I overslept. The timer in my handphone rang at 0545, and I tuned it off, expecting my younger brother to get washed up and done with the toilet. However, I slept again! Till the sun rose up, I’m still sleeping. It was 0730, half an hour to my book in time; I’m still in the bed. SHIT! I wondered. Like the Nippon Bullet Train, I immediately sped up and rushed to the toilet, washed up, changed to my Number 4, wore my boots, open the door, closed it and ran from fourth level to the ground level for SMRT 171. To my most unlucky situation, the bus had just left! And I had no other choice to call for a cab, and I didn’t know Comfort Taxi charges 4 bucks for booking! Damn, I spent 12 bucks to go to my camp, and I was late for 10 minutes or so. I am very pissed at the price of booking a cab. I had to pay for calling them by my mobile phone operator and I have to pay Comfort for booking a cab for me.

Cliques are starting to form in the office, I guess. One group by one group. This phenomenon is called Office Politics. Personally, I will go for the group/clique, where I don’t have to worry about offending people, and thinking what the heck are other people talking about in their conversation. People are intelligent; however, it’s their personality, attitude, behaviour and feelings which control the ways they think, feel, and converse. I’m sure some people can really understand what am I trying to say, and who’s not. One will talk badly about others in one moment; eventually, someone will talk badly about him too. This is a vicious cycle. It’s bound to like this. Who can change it? Who can stop all this commotion and live harmoniously? No one could, because of different personality, attitude, behaviour and feelings. Seriously, I had enough of all these crappy stuff that is going on in the office.

I met Yong Qiang yesterday, together with the 38PHA guys and Pradip. We had a great time hanging out with this guy, who went to Thailand for few months. I’m replacing him when his term ends over there. He said it was fun and exciting. Practically watching pornography and playing PlayStation and watching TV. Oh yah, and his main scope is to fog the whole camp twice every week. Isn’t that relaxing? Phew, I’ve always thought that the attachment is very tough. Luckily, I’m going to enjoy my life over there.

Politics.
Why that?
Can’t we live with something else?
Intelligence.
Why that?
Can we stay cool and simple with something else?


Tribute to First Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr S Rajaratnam [1915 – 2005] [see http://www.channelnewsasia.com/obituary/rajaratnam/]

ESPN's John Clayton has a pretty good story on all of the new coaching hires in the NFL. I know that's football, and this is a baseball blog, but it amazes me how two teams from the same city can seemingly make the same mistakes over and over.

The Lions have brought in coaches for the sake of bringing in coaches. Clayton describes the Lions as, "one of the wackiest groups in the league." That is Clayton being nice. The Lions are the classic example of the inmates running the asylum, or maybe it is that the warden (Mr. Ford) is just as crazy as anyone else in there.

Anywho, they hire Marinelli to be a tough hard-noses face of the franchise after Mooch was seen as too soft for this young team, but then they go against that by hiring Mike Martz, who while accomplished is a big question mark working for a coach who has never been a head coach at any level. Far be it for me to question a man's professionalism, but you have to wonder about a guy who left St. Louis like he did after he continued to clash with his bosses there being able to work under Marinelli. I can foresee a 49-47 loss with Martz blowing up that the defense didn't get the job done. I can only imagine Dre' Bly and Donnie Henderson's (Lions new defensive coordinator, and I like this hire) response.

Again it just seems like more drama for a team that has a dire need for direction and accountability. Didn't the Lions learn anything from the Tigers escapades with Alan Trammel. He failed to guide a team full of veterans like Pudge because he didn't have their respect or the experience to warrant that respect, and he was frigging Alan Trammel.

You should not hire coaches to sell tickets. You let the players sell tickets by winning and that is what the coaches should be hired for, their ability to win, not their name and pedigree.

Come on Dana this is dana and jess having sex with bentley. jess, in her best trucker voice, says "c'mon dana" Author: hiimtheflash Keywords: dogs dana dorks jess dlovely goofing Added: September 14, 2005 Quick there is a big 5. The best there ever was big 5 will take you there. The big 5 are the finer things in lifeQuick there is a big 5. The best there ever was big 5 will take you there. The big 5 are the finer things in life

This is just a little test

Well, for the first time in as long as I can remember I'm getting some much needed rest and going to bed before 9pm...I'd usually crawl into bed sometime past 11 or midnight, right after watching the news, but lately I haven't really watched any tv..in fact the only reason the tv is on in the day is to watch Barney and Thomas the Train.
I've decided to give myself some well deserved time. I've put myself and my needs off for far too long and it's about time that I start looking after myself...after all I deserve the attention just as much as anyone else does. I don't think it's selfish to think that your needs are more important than say...a friend...
Remember...YOU are responsible for yourself...no one else is. If you don't look after yourself, no one else will. Don't wait for someone else to fulfill your needs...fulfill them yourself and help someone else along the way...you'll be amazed to see what you can do with that attitude...

G'nite all....big day tomorrow with the government....

A search at the US Patent and Trademark Office reveals a number of new Apple patent applications that relate to the long-rumored Apple Tablet based computer. Hrmph.com posts photos from the gesture patent depicting a user using gestures on a tablet user interface.read more | digg story

New fire equipment blogs see on-fire extinguisher sign fire extinguisher

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