carbon made only wants to be unmade

As I was looking at Stephen Wiltshire's landscape drawings I can't help but felt slightly down by the art's current fortunes when compared against it's distant cousin, photography.

Back in the days between the two, drawing was the more accessible hobby simply for the fact that all you need is a pencil and a drawing block. Apart from the analog point-and-shoot cameras, the professional ones back then were expensive and requires film (which can hit you like your car petrol bill). It used to be quite common to see parents taking their kids to drawing classes, where you would see them rushing out to their parents at the end of the lesson, proudly displaying their Magnum opus to their bewildered parents (I was one of them). This was prior to the age of tuition classes and golf lessons for kids.

Now with the digital revolution of limitless shots (read: camwhor-ing with QC) and online photo albums, the art of photography has really overtaken the art of drawing, entering into the mainstream. Throw a brick from a window and you'll most likely hit someone with a SLR slinged over his/her neck.

But I think deep down it has probably got something to do with our lifestyle now, in which all things have to be swee swee and chop chop. Why take the time and effort to do a portrait or a mural when you can get instant beauty with a click?

the show must go on

Whenever I'm engaged in conversations about death, I've always stood by the "life itself is the most precious gift" side of the fence - particular when the suicide cases reported on the tabloids are usually due to a spur of the moment brought forth by an emotional combustion. While I admire their courage to end their life, I've always thought that for every tragic excuse to die there will must be a compensating reason to live.

But after researching into the whole concept of voluntary euthanasia, you discover that these are intelligent, (more or less) clear-headed individuals who have taken time to consider their decision. Most of them are elderly people who wanted to die because they are failing in health and are thus unable to enjoy what they love to do anymore i.e. the zest of life.

The zest of life. It all boils down to your passions in the end - sometimes I wonder how would I react if I would wake up one morning to be another Jean-Dominique Bauby. Would I take the plunge?

AWOL @ work

Kelvan: Eh, how come I can't auto-fill your email address when I type in your name?

Thomas: Should be able to - try "Thomas Li" or "Diwei Thomas"?

Sunil: You just type in "Thomas Li", then press DELETE and then F9.

(Kelvan fiddles with Lotus Notes for a while, before successfully finding the email.)

Kelvan: Oh, just type in the name and then press SPACE and then F9.

Sunil: Isn't that what I just say? It's the same thing when you press SPACE or DELETE.

Kelvan: But DELETE is more awkward - SPACE is more natural for the finger.

Kelvan: And its nearer to the F9 button.

Sunil: Oh is it? (Proceeds to take out a ruler and starts to compare the Euclidean distance between the F9 and the two oppositional buttons.)

Sunil: 6cm... 8cm...

Sunil: F9 and DELETE is nearer.

Kelvan: ...

16-bits tibits

As a kid during the 90s, entertainment was limited to traditional games like playing chapteh, marbles and erasers (a turn-based game where you try to flick your eraser onto your opponent's eraser using your thumb). But for those who can afford, it was the 16-bit video game systems from Sega and Nintendo with their exorbitant game cartridges.

In the current video game age where graphics and online play rule, it's always cool when someone makes the effort to recreate the times where we would fight king turtles and insult friends by fatalities. Way to go Ferry!

SpotThisGame

hip-pee

I had just finished a training session at The Arcade today when my attention turned to the toilet signs on the toilet entrances in the building.

I know The Arcade is one of the older buildings around Raffles Place, but when the stickman in the sign wears bell-bottoms I'm pretty sure it was constructed sometime between the 70's and the 80's.

Update: The building was completed in 1981. Woo hoo!