Dear Dreams – Page 193

Who has webcam?

[Friday, 24 November, 2006]

After waking up, the first thing I was so eager to do was to set up my webcam with the “new” system. Somehow, it took me hours but it never worked.

“usbccgp.sys” – this file was missing no matter how many times I tried to install the webcam’s driver. I surfed online for it and I assumed it was the USB port’s driver; it could be that I needed to install for it was “new” USB port on the “new” processor. Then, I tried to search for the driver online but failed after going through so many websites that required payment of around ten bucks. Out of desperate, I downloaded a driver which brought me Trojan.

As I was messaging Kachua for possible solution, he told me the file should be found inside my windows. I even tried using the windows XP installation CD, which gave me no assistance. He found the file and sent it to me and I thought the problem was fixed finally but another prompt window came out, asking for the file “usbaudio” and I was dejected. However, I got this idea that I went to my brother’s computer and searched through the “i386” folder inside “windows” folder and drag the files over to my computer through the network. Alas, I realized it was faster to drag the whole folder over instead of moving to transfer the required files one by one but an intrusion alert popped out by the Norton Antivirus and the whole internal network was blocked somehow.

Kachua arrived at my house to troubleshoot but there was nothing much he could do. After some minutes, the network regained and I was able to continue with the transfer of files between the computers. I was quite fortunate that it was the last file and finally the webcam worked!

I suspected that it was during the installation of Windows XP service pack 2, I chose not to save the files in order to reduce the hard disk space required and thus I was having the problem of the missing big folder.

Anyway, whoever has webcam, please let me know and we can start to act cute through MSN.

The Bad Volleyball Day

[Thursday, 23 November, 2006]

It was the same day I did the essay for Jielin until 5am, she sent me a message before 9am to thank me, but instead of making me feel good, I went back to sleep immediately with some cursing.

It was around 10am when my mum played me as well. It had been a trend that I would wake up late just for lunch but she offered to buy me breakfast and I had to finish the “Dou Hua” before it turned bad. I went to sleep immediately after eating.

Another weird thing was that she did not call back to take order for my lunch. The first good thing about the day was my cousin gave me her old computer finally for me to boost up my system a little. Then I went for volleyball at Clementi ITE in the small rain.

I was lifeless after starving and carrying the heavy old computer. There were a few unfamiliar faces making lots of noises and I did not join in the training. Then, as Kok Chiang was playing with two of the newbies, I joined in and he left suddenly. I was trying hard to save all the balls until one of them hit the ball at me when I was right in front of him and my spectacle was spoilt.

Weitat helped me to get two rubber bands from the administration room and I had a hard time trying to fix it temporary until my fingers hurt, yet proved no result. Then, I got superglue from Mingen’s car, which was a mini first aid container. The super glue flowed out before I pressed it or even knew it until my skin got so heated up. It was too late.

After the training when the net was set to more standard height, I was busy getting the dried superglue off my hands while others were practicing spiking. It irritated me for very long until the friendly match against the outsiders started.

Then, I realized there was no place for me to be inside the court. Mingfa, Mingen, Kok Chiang, Weitat and two of the new faces had the positions. Finally in that night, I saw to a greater disgusting fact of volleyball game that even when it was planned to be a game for friends, stronger players stood better chance of enjoyment.

I had to play as libero in the second game just to give Mingfa “face” and it was quite a redundant role actually. Until the third game, I managed to take over one of the strangers’ position. Then, I was kind of freaked out by the other stranger, wearing a Shuqun jersey. He showed his thumb for every good ball and held that position and even expression for as long as ten seconds. This friendly but noisy guy was shorter than me but played much better.

We had a break right after. I took off my shoes to see what was hurting me when I was taking off during the jumps and realized one of my toe nails had crack and there was blood. Mingfa’s nail clipper was the savior and he claimed that every volleyball coach would have one pair of it.

After that, the two outsiders left and we continued to play with Meijun joined in the team. It was fun at first until my left ankle failed me again. Then I remembered just a month ago I could not even bend it and yet I was forcing so much work on it upon recovery. I had kind of sprained it which led to lost of many chances to perform; I was given chances to spike down but the plain distracted me badly when I was in the air or perhaps I did not even jump to the normal height and lost control of myself. During the second game, I was almost disabled.

As we went to the washroom to clean up, I realized I had forgotten to bring my towel. Alas, my lunch was the nice chicken chop again at the “half chicken” shop at Clementi, which marked the second good thing of the bad day.

I have upgraded my computer!

The motherboard has increased from 733 MHz to 933 MHz, whereas the RAM has increased from 400+mb to 640mb.

I realize there are two USB ports in my old motherboard! They are well hidden.

I am using the new motherboard built in sound card instead of an extra one. My brother says it will reduce the requirements from the old power source. Currently, the sound is louder than before though I do not need it and I do not know the quality’s difference.

Yesterday just when I was about to leave my house for volleyball game at Clementi ITE, my brother sent me a message saying that my cousin’s old computer was ready for collection. She had just confirmed with her friend over it. However, since she was leaving for America today to further studies, I had to get the computer as soon as possible. I waited for her to finish her bathe before going over and thus I was very late for volleyball.

Even though the system is not very good, there is an improvement.

Brain Cells Are Dead

I was trying to get back to normal people’s sleep clock these days and I had tried so hard until this morning I failed.

It was for the sickly Thai nurse’s assignment, a thousand words essay, I stayed up till late hour without doing any of my own stuff. It denied me for a causal chat with Vivi before she went to sleep and also, it had taken up some of Irwin’s time as well.

It was for the friendship that I was doing so much. She was a kind girl and so far, the only person I knew who was so devoted to nursing not for the high pay. Since she had to submit her work in less than eight hour’s time, and the essay was still in chaos, I took up the job as a busybody.

My English was pretty bad already but Miss Jielin’s draft work was of a worse standard. There were obviously more grammatical mistakes than this article I had typed and similar points were flying all over the paragraphs. At least, I was able to use her existing points to branch out into more points.

I spent around two hours just to edit half of her seven hundred words. Then, I realized the other half was about a different topic somehow. I asked her for her title and she told me she had not thought about that. The good thing was that she could just write about anything about Singapore but the rest of the three hundreds words had to be redundant. Since she could not add anymore points to the essay, I told her to go to sleep first.

It would be an earlier night for me if either of Jenrine, Da Zhang or spambot was around to help me from start. Nevertheless, Irwin did go through my edited essay for further mistakes but he did not want to kill the flow of the essay by adding in more stuffs. I realized the fact that it was my style of writing that I adopted the most and that was why I felt so uneasy whenever any of my friends helped me to edit my articles.

This was a good chance to brush up on my English as well with Irwin’s guidance. I had never read through any of my blog entries so many times before. Then, I also realized that blogging was different from writing normal essay, and that was why I had problem with the latter.

I was slow and could only finish it at around five in the morning. It was just nice time for Irwin at Australia to go to bathe and go to his office; it was seven over Melbourne. Then, I sent an email to attach the file to Thai pig and also uploaded it to my server in case the email cocked up.

I concluded that she should treat Irwin, Vivi and I to maybe Swensen?

When the Prince Enters the Army

Some questions have being filling my mind for the past few months which seed around the topic when the king’s son is of a legal age to enter the army. To prove to his citizens that everyone receives the same treatment, his son has to abide to the law and go through the same process like every young man of the country.

But if you are a high ranked person in the army, will you treat this prince just like any other person?

Will you make sure the prince’s path is smooth throughout the entire two years and that his post in the army is well respectable? Then, will you send him to an ideal office where less strenuous work is required?

If you are in charge of the camp where he is posted to, will you upgrade all the facilities and welfare of the soldiers just to accommodate him? Will you upgrade the quality of the cookhouse’s food, the guardhouse’s living condition and even reduce the hours of the guard duty required? To the most exaggerating doubt, will you place some internet connected computers in the bunk when the prince is still a trainee?

All the special treatments are absolutely disgusting and they mark an era of unfairness.

However, in the aspect of just a normal young man serving the nation, putting aside these flattering to the prince, if you are someone who happens to be in the same place as him, will you be glad that you are able to enjoy the privileges of better life inclusive of food? After all, most of us stand to gain somehow, at least able to serve the country for less period of time.

I understand all the great men do not have many choices but to accept this society’s cruelty. The prince will eventually rise to power in years to come somehow to place everyone beneath his feet; the tragic of offending his boss is something which nobody would expect.

With the careful teaching of the well reputed family, this prince may not be the most able leader in future but at least of a certain standard. Hopefully all these well pampering would not do the country bad in future.

A Closer Contact with PHP

I have finally done a Contact Me page for my website using PHP. You do not need to log into your email account with that, in order to contact me.
Of course, due to the lack of practise, I had almost forgotten about how to even do a simple form using HTML. With some distractions from the television and help seekers, I took very long time to do it.
From yesterday afternoon till today’s very early morning, I had been trying my best to finish it. With some JavaScript form validation, I finally started into the actual PHP. Help from the second hand PHP book was very appreciated.
I got so excited upon success and was very confident that I could further my skill with all the basic PHP commands and strings.
Hereby, I have this request for my friends to give me testimonials through the Contact Me (gone with the wind!) page; the testimonials are for my own website and I will put up once I have a number of them but I might not include the name of the sender. Please give constructive feedback and use proper English. By the way, please identify yourself properly.

Unfair But It Is Better This Way

For the past few months I have been hearing about my ex colleague who are still in the army get their “birthday off”. For those who are new to it, “off” is just like “leave”, except that it is a privilege that can be cancelled by any superior and you have to go back to work anytime.

I am as usual the unluckiest of all my ex colleagues I suppose. Before my time, everyone got their birthday off to relax themselves for a day for free but when I got there, the system had changed because the new superiors were cold blooded. After my time, some fuckers have already left and Quek has been doing his best to give welfare to everyone while Shep seems to become softer; life is definitely much better.

This issue is nevertheless just one of the unfairness in the army. Maybe I should just blame it on my luck but on the brighter side, it is so much better; at least the disgusting and terrible mental torment days are gone. It gives me a peace of my mind as the future generations are well taken care of, though might not be forever; the welfare of them is always my main concern.

Visiting Auntie and Vivo City

[Sunday, 19 November, 2006]

My mum woke me up after 8am. Then, we took a cab down to my auntie’s house at Kim Tian Road. Both of them wanted to go to the temple and therefore I was asked to look after my sick uncle.

His brain was infected by virus years ago and had unfortunately lost his thinking. His illness had expelled all the savings after a long term of medication and used-to-be frequent hospitalisation. Till now, not much help from the government was awarded to them. My auntie had even pawned her jewellery and considered to sell the flat.

My mum’s younger brother who was just a few years younger than her, was putting up at the 3-room HDB flat with the unfortunate couple whose son, also my cousin, had passed away when I was very young due to unknown reason. This youngest uncle of mine had a bad temper and could never put up with his previous bosses and customers that he had changed many jobs.

He had been jobless for quite long and not looking for any. At the age of fifty plus, he continued to live off my auntie despite they were already having financial problems. He even brought his outside friends home, inclusive of married woman who was on the verge of divorce.

The day went as described. The freeloader, once being respected by me, was asleep all the while until my auntie and mum left the house. He woke up to find food in the kitchen and then chatted over the phone while I dozed off in the living room. Basically, he was doing everything to avoid talking to my auntie unless he needed money.

I was released at around noon after the ladies came back from the temple. Then, I left with my mum to go home.

Mingfa was leaving his house for his boys’ competition and he told me to confirm about the afternoon’s outing for him. However, I was not able to contact Weitat and it dragged until mid afternoon and by the time I went online to check for movie, seats were already selling fast.

I got Kok Chiang along and we met at Vivo City. My mum and younger brother were going there to walk around as well and we left together. I met up with Mingfa first and followed by Kok Chiang and Weitat who were both late.

The place was as crowded as the first time I went and it gave me some dizziness. I was still not able to memorise the location well. There were not many things four guys could do. I was in a worse state than any of them for I was lacking of sleep.

The lighting was very bad for phototaking without using flash

Food

We went to the Food Republic food court and the three of them got some food while I watched them; the digestion disorder had acted on me and I had no appetite at all. They complained the hokkien mee hoon was not very nice. We had dessert after that and they were more costly than normal food court, whereas the spoons were not very well cleaned.

Then, Mingfa got his knee guard at the Nike shop before I met up with my mum and brother to go home. After we got together at the Starhub shop, we finally saw a group of three babes; it was quite pathetic for the place was so crowded but the scenery was bad.

Second Volleyball Game

[Saturday, 18 November, 2006]

It was the second time I played volleyball after the operation. Mingfa was coaching his Clementi Town Secondary School (CTSS) boys at Clementi ITE and so I joined in.

I tried calling others the night before but only Kok Chiang was able to make it. Then on the day itself when I saw Ronald online, he responded well enough immediately. On the way, I tried calling others and realised I could have done it earlier instead of waiting for people to come online. This bad habit of me was unfortunately going to continue I supposed.

I wasted no time after Weitat called me and said he would be leaving soon, taking each step quick. I reached there at 4pm sharp and Ronald reached at the same time in his bike. Kok Chiang was taking his lunch then and we started playing causally soon. It was just a few minutes later, I was worn off.

At first I thought it was due to lack of exercise; then I realised it was the forced-in lunch I had two hours ago that gave the indigestion. I took longer breaks than playing. However, I had more “feeling” with the ball than usual.

Into free spiking, I had a nervous start for the previous time my left leg would be in pain when landing from each jump. The fear proved to be harmless but not the inadequate jumping timing. I was always either too fast or slow.

Into matches was better with Mingfa’s setting. We played with Mingfa’s CTSS B boys and later with the outsiders who Mingfa called them PAP group, consisting of many old people and some who were previously from Hwa Chong Alumni. Some of the opponents were very skilful despite their ages. We won all the matches except the last game when Weitat and was gone my legs were giving me troubles and the referee, Mingfa’s student, made a false accusation of us at a crucial point.

We went to a coffee shop near the NTUC for dinner. None of us knew the name but we called it “half chicken coffee shop” because the western food was quite nice. Then, I had a plate of chicken chop. Meijun joined us later and we left after 10pm.

The aching all over my body satisfied me.

Near but Not Near Enough

[Thursday, 16 November, 2006]

After sending Vivi home this night, I took bus 124 back. Just after I alighted at SGH bus-stop, I saw a figure waving at the back of the bus. I was not sure if he or she was waving to me or other people. My phone soon sounded and it was Yanzhen.

She was going back to her office at Jalan Besar to work overnight and she claimed that she was going to approach me but I had stood up before that.

We had not met each other for so many years ever since both of us had left the secondary school.

The moral of the story is I should be looking more at girls when I am outside in case I miss out my old friends again.