Silent Night

Before I Forget

Yes yes, you *should* see my lovely NDSL that I've bought few weeks ago. It's now completed with a carry bag in black, a crystal clear protection case in orange, and screen protectors.

I've actually asked for opinions about the combination of my black NDSL with the hard case in orange. This again showed that personal visual preference is really really objective.

I love the combo, of course!

   

For those who are interested, I've invested RM775 in total on the toy: NDSL RM550, EDGE RM130, Carry Bag RM25, Orange Clear Case RM30, Screen Protector RM40. I also bought a 4GB microSD memory card from my sister, which you can easily find in Low Yat at around RM100 I think.

There are also friends of mine who wonder whether they should get NDSL or PSP. This is definitely a must-ask question, and you can get a lot of answers from google. According to the comparison posted by Chris Roper at IGN dot com, the following results are concluded.

	NDSL	PSP
Processing Power	-	WIN
Screen(s)	TIE	TIE
Battery Life	WIN	-
Controls	-	WIN
Load Times	WIN	-
Portability	WIN	-
Media	-	WIN
Wireless	TIE	TIE

 

But I personally did not go through the analysis until this level. To me the main point is about the game itself. Put it this way; If you like PS-style game, take PSP. If you don't, then NDSL might be what you are seeking for.

Cola

I believe that most of us would have at least tasted both of them once, and at least gone through this question before. Coke or Pepsi?

I personally prefer Pepsi because Neo chose the Red pill and he's dead. Nah, definitely not because of the color. But it's kinda objective to make a statement here about the two. So who care?

It's helpful lately I find that to have a soft drink in the afternoon at work, while I started feeling at the edge of exhausted, or bored. Human frequently seeks for something that he can rely on to get through the session. I can't recall how much Mr Potato I have digested in front of my pc through out my university time. I guess that's how Popoye gained his power from the can of spinach. Same theory applied!



Haa! I think now I understand why my teacher was so addicted to Coke when she was with us.

做人轻松点

这个星期工作状态比之前好多了。晚上睡觉也比较舒服一点，甚至连如厕也顺畅了许多。人生最畅快的事莫过于此。

转眼间在这家公司已经快半年了，时间不知不觉过得还真快。想想自工作以来，留给自己的时间很明显的减少。回到家后累得只想休息，连我最爱的康熙和大小爱吃每每都留到周末才提得起劲去看。答应教授的作业到现在一点进展都没有。现实啊，扭曲了多少人想要过的舒适生活？

人与人之间的关系真的很奇妙。相处之下发现每个人之间的相同点和差异性综合起来所迸出的火花有时候未必是让人赏心悦目的。兜兜转转发现到头来好像还是自己一 个人过得比较自在，难免欧尔会孤单寂寞甚至感到吃力。我想只好用爱理不理的态度去瞻望。说到这个，我倒觉得我还真在行呢。不理不理，得到的往往让人出乎意料。



早上开会的时候见到桌上有黑红Marker Pen各一支，顺手在记事本上画了眼睛嘴巴。回到座位后又用身边的材料给他画了头发耳朵和鼻子。我想，当这些充满了差异性的线条知道他们被组合在一起的时候竟然会变成一张笑脸，他们至少会觉得赏心悦目吧？



做人，还是该要轻松点啊。

Another Day, Another Toy

我生平用过了好几个usb thumb drive，也买过一部3.5"的 200GB external hdd。倒是不曾拥有过任何一部2.5"的external hdd。基于这个重大的因素，我只好下手买了一部。

这个星期五开始会有为期3天的电脑展。本来计划了要去那里物色，但是上天总是对我爱怜有余，让我机缘下买了这款Buffalo Ministation，160GB。听说这款external hdd从KLCC上掉下来，里面的资料都不会受到损伤。



好啦，我承认我说谎。其实我根本就没有听任何人这样说过。

公司的Admin收到这份包裹后拿给我的时候兴致勃勃地问我为什么天天都会收到礼物。恰好在这前一天，我收到了2个星期前订购的usb wireless adaptor。其一是为了看周遭有没有人忘了设密码，能让我闲时连接用用。其二，是为了让我的NDSL和N95时不时在网络的世界走走看看。这个年代，谁都在讲求自主自由。You know。



这还是在论坛上看到好些人的大力推荐。但是问题是到现在我都还没成功给他在我电脑上设定起来。或许是对Vista平台的软件还没完整的开发吧。别急，先别急……

=encrypted=

THE Weekend, not A Weekend

这个周末有点特别。因为自这个周末开始，我的人生告别了一个旧的玩伴，来了一个新的伴侣。走了的是陪了我大约4年的Nokia 7610，来了的就是N95。*羞怯

星期五放工了之后，就立即赶往Bukit Bintang和大哥和大姐聚会。我们到了Low Yat Plaza里面的Sushi King，吃了好一些餐点。可能是聊天的部分比较多一点，吃饱了埋单才发现吃了才将近90块。期间还发现Sushi King的2块钱优惠就在这个月7号到10号。我记得上一次的优惠期间我很幸运地人在云顶。中午期间到当地的Sushi King去吃午餐还真是会吃到偷笑。喜欢吃Unagi本来6块钱一碟的人，可以认真计划一下。

当晚我和大哥在Capital酒店过夜。早上起床后到Low Yat Plaza吃了一顿还算不错的早餐。唯一要挑的就是大家的开店时间都有点迟，大部分的店家都在11点左右才准备要开门做生意。过后，就不免俗地上楼逛逛。大哥突发奇想要买MP4。所幸他没有要求很高，我就给他挑了这款又便宜又大块的Storm。


 

 



操作界面有点过分简单，但是基于重点只是要拿来听歌的话，整体上还算可以。外形设计虽然很明显地有抄袭某著名商品的嫌疑，不过这一点因素对于我们这种程度的消费者不算是一个问题。当然一路上有看到超贵的Sony MP3。谁叫我们早已在金钱和品味之间做了一个选择。

他说他接下来想买Nokia E90。而我，首先有机会的话要先给我的N95换一个健全的外壳。

明天又是星期一了。想到连接不断的工作就立刻有了疲惫的感觉。但是那一定是和以往不一样的星期一。

因为明天的星期一，我已经有了N95。:D

半杯水的遗憾

最近的生活节奏有点让人感到疲惫。一肚子的牢骚找不到地方发泄，身影顿时缩小了不少。没有足够的时间好好地寻找哪一个角落到底是不是藏了哪个关心我的人，却很真实的感受到了很多年前的自己好像终于回来了。

我去了哪里？

半杯水的哲学我不喜欢。忍不住想要怀疑每每提起这个玩意儿的人到底抱着什么样的居心。我却也同时明白了生活中很多事情都没有办法理所当然地美好下去。免不了伤感。

免不了。

突然又想起她。不知道她闭上眼睛的时候有没有想再见我一眼。

Preparation for DS MoonShell Movies in DPG

NDSL is capable of playing movies with the homebrew applications developed for different types of clip formats. One of them is DPG, which is for MoonShell. Think back in previous time when I wanted to convert clips format to of different types, I used Super Convertor; it can transform among most of the common types, and most importantly, it is a freeware :) See their official website here.

However I find that the software (v2008.build.30 (Mar 22, 2008)) does not support Vista Home Premium at all. It turned my pc into a bluescreen with lots of words, and before I finished reading the first line, it reboot itself automatically. Perhaps anyone of you could share more information on this.

Since my current objective is to convert to MoonShell compatible clip format, someone actually recommended BatchDPG, a simple yet good tool for the only one type of transcoding.

 

Image linked from CitizenDeleted-Dot-Com

To use the software, you need to install AviSynth and MS .NET 1.1 prior to the installation of BatchDPG. You can find all the links in their website here.

DSLibris

All this while, I had been looking for an ebook reader for my NDSL with chinese encoding support. After a few attempts, I find that DSLibris is sort of what I am looking for.

 
PIC: EBook reading using DSLibris vertically (http://moonbooks.net)

The part that made me struggled the most is that DSLibris supports only *.xhtml and *.xht formats. I find myself not that talented in transforming my utf-8 *.txt files into xhtml with AbiWord and HTML Tidy and HTML-Kit. A little bit frustration pushed me towards to explore the manual that comes together with DSLbris in *.xht format. I notice that the structure of the content is rather easy to be implied on my *.txt files.

Let's make a simple and effective example. Say you want to have an ebook of title "Matt Is Cool", and the content of the book is as simple as "Yes we all do agree". What you need to do is,

1. Open up your notepad.
2. Key in below:

<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>

Matt Is Cool

</TITLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY>
<PRE>

Yes we all do agree

</PRE>
</BODY>
</HTML>

3. Say if you want the ebook has the name "Bravo", click File > SaveAs, in the filename text field, type "Bravo.xht" (including both ") and click save.
4. Copy the file, i.e. Bravo.xht, to the root of your microSD memory card for your flashcard. And you're done.

``````````````````````
I find that it takes quite a while for DSLibris to load my ebook, which has a few hundreds of pages. It'd be good if it does not take me 10 minutes for just loading.

``````````````````````
You might want to check these out:
http://moonbooks.net/moonbooks/
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ndslibris/

Hallo Nintendo

At last, I bought myself a real toy.

I went to Ikano again on 9th of March Sunday, visiting the gaming shop opposite the Popular bookstore. By seeing my sincerity and inner script saying "okay, you don't have to give too much discount but don't make me feel like i'm fooled", the boss is kind enough to offer me the ndsl in black at rm550. On the day, I brought back the ndsl and a black pouch at extra rm25.

My ndsl was far from being practically playable, it still needs its friends Miss Flashcard, Edge and Mr MicroSD, which I have both ordered online separately.

However, things went badly when the website I ordered Edge informed me that the card is out of stock unexpectedly, and I have to choose to either keep waiting, choose to get N5, another card from R4 family, or to get refunded. To not further waiting for the possibly long delivery, I chose to cancel the order. The procedure is rather simple, write them an email, and I saw the money in my account next day. I recommend this website (http://www.colorful-zone.com).

Then quickly, I google crazily in internet and lowyat forum and cari forum to seek if anyone can get me the card fast and cheap. Finally, I managed to get 3 people. RM130 for just the Edge card, I received Miss Flashcard on Wednesday night with the guy sending it to me himself, whom just stayed beside my block. Thanks god.

I knew my card will either come on Thursday or Friday. God treated me good enough. Right after the Thursday conference in the morning when I got back to my seat, a colleague of mine approached, and quickly I noticed him holding a *bling *bling envelope telling that our admin wanted him to pass me the stuff.

The story ends here. NDSL, Edge and MicroSD, they live a happy life onwards, awaiting for the arrivals of their cousins Orange Clear Case and Screen Protector next week. :)

*Claps

Treasure Hunt - NDSL

I cant really describe how long I have been dreaming of getting an NDSL. In fact, it appeared to be part of a leisure conversation with someone, then all of the sudden it grew up into a burning desire that pushed me towards the NDSL hunt on last Sunday in Ikano. (Don't ask me why Ikano. Thanks.)

First I approached the shop located at level2 right opposite the Popular book store. The place looked decent, and so did the boss and his nasi lemak. NDSL + R4 + 1gb memory card + screen protector + some free downloaded games, he offered it at rm800 after discount, or rm860 for the package with m3real + 2gb memory card. I expected to pay only rm750 max for the toy. But what's funny, I almost buy from the guy despite of the price :D

After taking lunch in RedBox, I then went to another shop in Cathay, which sells only console at rm560, and he doesn't sell any flashcard. The treasure hunt came to the real end after watching a movie, when I finally decided to leave the treasure for another week, so that I can get myself calmed and do further survey.

According to them who contributed a lot in telling me all these, rm560 is kind of reasonable considering the location of the shop, in relative to rm530 for Lowyat. And of course you can definitely find much cheaper price in Lowyat, but make sure you open your eyes as wide as possible against the hidden trap.

I was targeting on m3real previously, but some told me that DSTT and EDGE load games much faster than m3. This means the choice is between either of these with each card at around rm120~rm150. There are also quite a few of the websites that they recommended to order the card from. The best solution for me is probably to purchase the console myself at the shop, and order the card online. I think I'll go for EDGE for its better user interface. Any more contribution is all welcomed.

Review for DSTT: http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=69748
Review for EDGE: http://gbatemp.net/index.php?showtopic=74099

H-O-C-K

What does HOCK mean?
````````````````````
# Hock (wine), a type of wine
# Hock (zoology), part of an animal’s leg

I realized that this word refers to something so great to those who loves wine, and perhaps food. But I personally was led by god to FEEL the word the deepest with the bestest bestest way, by stepping on a broken glass within 1 minute after I woke up early in the morning on the first day of CNY.

Amen.

Hello Celcom Broadband

17th Feb 2008, Sunday
```````````````````
Been struggling for a while with Izzi broadband at my area. People said Kelana Jaya is a highly congested place, with the internet performance averagely below what you can get from other places. An average speed of 300kbps, which when during peak hours it’ll go extremely down to 10kbps (when it’s 0kbps, I persuade myself that someone is doing maintenance or upgrading, so it’s not counted), while the highest speed I’ve ever seen with Izzi is 500kbps, and it happens once is a whatever-color-moon. This brought me the thought of getting Celcom broadband. After a long period of self counseling, i finally registered a Celcom postpaid account for Celcom Broadband d98 package at The Curve BlueCube center on the day, and ordered a BlueCube modem from Johor, which is very expensive T_T

~Why Celcom instead of Maxis?~
Maxis provides 3.6Mbps as well as Celcom at the same price RM98. The difference is that at this price, Maxis included a modem for rental to the user, with the conditions of minimum subscription of 18 months. Celcom provides no modem, but no minimum subscription required.

19th Feb 2008, Tuesday
````````````````````
The modem was arrived at around 3pm to my office, delivered by NationWide courier service, who promised a 1 day delivery and they did. The modem is much more smaller than I have expected. It’s even smaller than my 7610, palm-size.

After setting up the device and plugging it in, the driver and software were installed automatically. I was shocked when I first connected to the network, I got a speed of around 10kbps with a GPRS connection. I soon realized that I can set the option to enforce the modem operates only in UMTS/HSDPA mode. Then the speed raised. The highest speed I got at the night is around 178kBps.

The more surprising figure is here. In the next day morning, I saw that it was running at 262kBps.

20th Feb 2008, Wednesday
``````````````````````
This is the part with the MOST surprising figure. It’s running at around 10~20kBps.

The End.

往事只能回味

人走了之后，很多曾经拥有的回忆会不断的涌现。
平日的点点滴滴，包括每一丝不屑的念头、厌恶，
或者是玩笑、鼓励，甚至是嘴角的牵动和那眼神，
不定时在梦中一幕一幕清晰地播映。

生死的距离原来足以跨越任何大小形式的鸿沟。
唯独这份思念与感激不知道能否依然让你知道。
别无选择地睡在热泪里。

另一个新的阶段

这一段日子以来纷扰不休，想当笑话讲也不知要从何说起。所幸终于毕业了，成绩也不至于让人失望。也算是对得起为我付出许多的他们。期间心情不是很好。我想也不是没有来由的。说是有些恐惧也是情有可言吧。人生还是不要有太多的变化才好。

好的变化总是要的。可以选择的，就要勇敢的踏出那一步。昨天，是我人生第一次的见工。

约好的时间为下午2点。大约11点左右就从家里出发到Kajang的Ktm Station。 也许是上天给的考验，里面的车位满了，新纪元的也满了。没有选择的余地，就只好到‘附近’food court的停车场去。真的很远。

之后，搭ktm转putra lrt再搭德士，大约1点到了那栋大厦。天气实在是热的很。吃了午餐，闲逛了一下，大约1点45分就走进那间公司去报道。

从秘书手上拿了一份厚厚的表格，花了将近40分钟来作答，完成了第一个考验。后来就在秘书的带领下，在一群办公空间穿梭，到了老大的房间面谈。又过了大约半个小时，终于老大带我到第三个考验的场所去，作答一份仅仅5题的试卷。限定时间是2个小时，但是时间过了一半不到，我就已经头昏脑胀，结果只好放弃。尽管作答了才大约一半，也无力再继续做下去了。

在人群挤压中回到了Kajang ktm，结果下起雨来。等了半个小时，不见雨势有停止的迹象，只好哭着撑伞跋涉。

开始忧郁。

偶尔从睡梦中惊醒，就这样到了第二天早晨，开始了心里无数的对话。慢慢地慢慢地到了傍晚，渐渐地把自己给说服了要勇敢地从新开始找工作。就在大约傍晚6点的时候，电话响了。

" ... I want to offer you the job ... "

轰隆……


＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊

诡异现象：电话后不久就下起了倾盆大雨，突然间家里电话连续响了大约10秒钟。不是“铃～铃～”一声一声地响，而是“铃～”这样长音持续了10秒。

Good-Bye Mary

That was the end of my holiday in my hometown, early in the morning around 5am, while I was about to leave to the airport. She woke up.

And I knew why she did.

Thanks...

另一个新的阶段

这一段日子以来纷扰不休，想当笑话讲也不知要从何说起。所幸终于毕业了，成绩也不至于让人失望。也算是对得起为我付出许多的他们。期间心情不是很好。我想也不是没有来由的。说是有些恐惧也是情有可言吧。人生还是不要有太多的变化才好。

好的变化总是要的。可以选择的，就要勇敢的踏出那一步。昨天，是我人生第一次的见工。

约好的时间为下午2点。大约11点左右就从家里出发到Kajang的Ktm Station。 也许是上天给的考验，里面的车位满了，新纪元的也满了。没有选择的余地，就只好到‘附近’food court的停车场去。真的很远。

之后，搭ktm转putra lrt再搭德士，大约1点到了那栋大厦。天气实在是热的很。吃了午餐，闲逛了一下，大约1点45分就走进那间公司去报道。

从秘书手上拿了一份厚厚的表格，花了将近40分钟来作答，完成了第一个考验。后来就在秘书的带领下，在一群办公空间穿梭，到了老大的房间面谈。又过了大约半个小时，终于老大带我到第三个考验的场所去，作答一份仅仅5题的试卷。限定时间是2个小时，但是时间过了一半不到，我就已经头昏脑胀，结果只好放弃。尽管作答了才大约一半，也无力再继续做下去了。

在人群挤压中回到了Kajang ktm，结果下起雨来。等了半个小时，不见雨势有停止的迹象，只好哭着撑伞跋涉。

开始忧郁。

偶尔从睡梦中惊醒，就这样到了第二天早晨，开始了心里无数的对话。慢慢地慢慢地到了傍晚，渐渐地把自己给说服了要勇敢地从新开始找工作。就在大约傍晚6点的时候，电话响了。

" ... I want to offer you the job ... "

轰隆……

＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊＊

诡异现象：电话后不久就下起了倾盆大雨，突然间家里电话连续响了大约10秒钟。不是“铃～铃～”一声一声地响，而是“铃～”这样长音持续了10秒。

蜥蜴风波

 

带着美丽的心情，我醒来迎接了一个美好的早上。

大约10点左右当我意识到我不得不进食後，我决定好好给我煮一碗蘑菇汤，补充精力。虽然那是罐头食品，可是我想，这就是所谓的都市生活吧。想到这里，嘴角禁不住微微地往上弯了一弯。其实最近因为要赶大量功课的关系，买了着实不少的方便食品，摆满了在楼下那客厅的桌上。

就在我三步做两地走到了桌旁，依稀眼角似乎看到了什么在墙角动了一下。心里登时紧了好几圈。

是老鼠吧？我想……同时，我把眼睛有多大张多大，往那个角落瞪。答案它并没有让我等太久，就依照它自己原来的脚步慢慢地走出来，却也让我立刻就看清了它的原貌。原来是那小四，阿四脚蛇啊，呵呵……

什么？四脚蛇？脑筋突然变很好，过去看过的电影里的恐怖画面全都似乎被调了出来一幕幕地上映在脑海里。恐龙掠杀人类的血盆利齿，巨蟒长大嘴巴飞奔在眼前，受伤的人类一边颤抖一边嚎哭，脸都黑了白沫都吐了也还顾不了停不住的血流，不得不紧绷着神经注意四周有可能又蹦出敌人的暗处……

于是我拔腿就跑，往楼上房间躲。想了一想，这样下去也不是办法，总得要把它给赶出去。于是，在士毛月，4月13号，上演了一出近代的人兽大战。

材料：
   木棍一支，长约150cm
   驱蚊油一罐
   纸箱若干

过程：

- 它其实不怎么好动，当它发现有人之后就会躲起来禁止不动，这时候就要赶快用纸箱把它的路线给封锁。因为这次行动的主旨是双赢的结局，所以只要把它请出屋子外就好了。纸箱围起来的路障要能引导它走出屋外。

- 路障设好後，就要逼它行动。只要在它近距离的旁边制造一些动静，就能驱使它迈开步伐寻找新的方向。如果不能确定它的危险性，远距离攻击武器会比较安全。这时候驱蚊油和木棍就可以派上用场。

当然，最后的结局不外是好人有好报，坏人终于落荒而逃。
否则，这个事件应该是出现在报纸上而不是这里……

奶茶

好不容易在昨天赶完了论文，想说和教授讨教讨教，所以今天特地往学校走了一趟。

一路上就感到疑惑，怎么平时泊满了汽车的路边今天会这么荒凉，停车场空得连闭着眼驾驶也无所谓。走进了教职员楼从第一间房间走到了尽头都只能听到自己的心跳声。心想说不得了了究竟发生了什么大事？


通过手机朋友冷静地告诉我原来今天是假期。无天无日地过日子以至于美好的星期五到了也不自觉。心里很不是滋味，这么炎热的天气还给他迢迢千里地去上演了不知道什么戏码。

唯一的收获就是路途中吃了的那一碗板面。当然我不会忘记那一杯奶茶，虽然有点太浓。

吃着面的时候突然来了好几位大姐姐，拿着一本文件夹一桌一桌地去征求募款。心里仆仆仆仆地边等边跳，终于来到我身边的时候我给了她斯文地摇摇头。看着她离去的背影，我似乎可以感觉到她的麻木。我甚至还可以感觉到我因为摇头而持续在颤动的刘海，久久无法平息。以至于脑海在涟漪之中突然浮出了一个男人的背影，和他唯一的一句对白。

话说多年以前还在中学的我，因为社团活动而必须在街上兜售门票。毕竟本人长得不怎么讨喜，卖得不多也罢，闭门姜倒是喝了不少。紧张和尴尬无论什么感觉当时都阻止不了必须继续前进的残酷。就在那错综复杂的感觉之下我走到那男人的身边依照惯例地开腔。

“先生你好，我们是……”

他没有给我把话说完的余地就有所行动。话开了头却没说完感觉不会很好受，不完美。尤其当自己或多或少有些许的陶醉在其中。可是他给了我一张十元钞票。

那只是一张票的价钱，给了我一寸的成就感。也给了我多走一尺的勇气

“谢谢你！谢谢你！先生要不要多买几张和家人小孩去看？……”

我终于说完了，终于在他面前说了一句完整的句子！可是我没有因为这次的突破而得到他的另外一张钞票。

他翻开钱包让我看，里面空荡得让我至今仍无法自己地回响在其中。

那是他身上唯一仅剩的钞票，而它却到了我的手中，换了一张他也许不会用到的门票。就在我依然错愕的时候，他转身走了，说了一句小声却又还能让我听到的话。

“我没有家人，一张就够了”

就在人海汹涌当中，他的背影离开了我的视线。


如果那是一场戏，我想他的出现不会是一个开始，也不会是一个结束。故事每天每日都持续地在上演，它在我们的身边，却未必在我们的眼里。我不喜欢无奈这两个字，可是现实就是这么一回事。纵然谁有怪谁的权利无非也只是闹剧一场。

就欣然接受吧，即在身边又在眼前那稍微浓了一点的奶茶。