World War Z

I can now say that the book is so much more enjoyable that the movie.

Written by Max Brooks, this book is absolutely riveting!

I almost feel abit worried that the Zombie War will happen at some stage of my lifetime.

My Weirdest Acupuncture Experience Yet

So I needed to see a Chinese physician to fix my knee.

My regular guy isn't open, so he was nice enough to refer to another physician just down the street.

I got there abit too early so he was still closed. But sitting outside was some weirdo who claimed he'd help me queue up. He then asked me for $2 for breakfast. No big deal, I thought, and gave him some money.

Physician finally opened. Some lady was ahead of me because weirdo queuer was off buying food I thought. 

Anyway when it was my turn I went into the physician's room. That's how things got weird. He spent a chunk of time trying to sell me the following ideas (I kid you not):

- his acupuncture skills were given by God

- he is the best (and he means it) nose acupuncturist (Sinusitis) in the world 

- he cannot tell this to the world because the Singapore government would then 'fix him'

- Lee Kuan Yew is greater than God (he was dead serious)

- its the reason why he hasn't died yet

- this is proven by the fact that LKY is a recipient of the GCMG (go Google it)

- he claims GCMG stands for God Calls Me God

- he makes all his successful patients take a picture holding a board with the words 笨医生医好的, which he stores in his computer

- he is in the midst of creating a FaceBook page describing his accolades and success stories because the mainstream media won't cover him

- that's because if the government gets wind of him, they would once again 'fix him'

After all that brainwashing, he proceeds to ask me if I could help him cancel his Diners credit cards for him, because my English is more powerful. I, of course, help him.

Then he asked about the effectiveness of Giro. And wanted my to cancel his Giro order with DBS. I was ok helping him but he subsequently changed his mind as I was dialing halfway.

For my help, he gave me a discount (I don't really know what he would have charged otherwise but the first lady paid $250), and charged me 'only' $20. Which was my normal rate at my regular physician.

That was first and last time I will see him I guess.

Oh! And my knee! All he did was rub an old bruise on my kneecap with his green koyok throughout the consultation.

As I walked to the MRT station, I saw that weirdo drinking a can of Anchor beer.

Metallica Live In Singapore

Cannot. Miss. This.

End Of Cheap Credit

In the clearest of signals yet, Ben Bernanke has signaled that QE will be over soon.

Get ready for the rise in USD.

Short Gold, EM currencies, DJI

Long USDJPY, USDSGD, Interest Rates

Haze 2013

The haze in Singapore is so bad, that today it hit a high of 371!!!

That's 29 PSI points away from hazardous levels!

Stay home and turn the air conditioners on guys!

Survivorship Bias

This is a very, very good post.

It may be a little long, but it is enlightening. Well worth the effort reading it through and bearing some bits and pieces in mind.

Essentially, the reason why we have such a difficult time knowing what we don't know is because of survivorship bias. This means we only get information from the survivors, not those who perished and vanished from the records.

This was recently covered by ZeroHedge as well.

In it, we also learn from one of Donald Rumsfeld's utterances:

There are known knowns; there are things we know that we know.

There are known unknowns; that is to say, there are things that we now know we don't know.

But there are also unknown unknowns – there are things we do not know we don’t know.

I love being mind-fucked like that.

Even more so when it teaches me not to learn so much from the success of others, rather to learn more from the failures of others.

Trading Ban

Imposing a trading ban on myself for the next 12 days.

Due to losses all round.

Blame it on all that USDJPY volatility. 

Sometimes we just need to know when to stop.

:(

Hello Kitty Keropi Mash-up

This one has been the most popular release of the latest collection by far.

Released for sale today, sold out island-wide today.

Discuss Disqus

Added the Disqus widget to my blog!

This way, we can have even more discussions on the blog!

The lousy part are the ads though!

But let's try it for awhile and see how things work out.

That's Too Much Gel

A few year ago we had this corporate etiquette class for me and all my colleagues at Au Petit Salut restaurant.

We hired an etiquette coach to guide and teach us about behaviour among the finer things in life.

When it was time for Q&A, someone threw up the following question,

"When is it too much gel on the hair for men?".

At this point the middle-aged elegantly dressed etiquette coach quickly surveyed the room, and pointer right at the top of my head and said,

"That's too much gel!".

Was funny then.

Still funny now when the old birds recount it to the rest of the world.

True Fitness Session IX This Season

Clocked my 9th visit.

Not bad by my standards.

BodyCombat again.

Need more exercise.

Too bad no hot chicks.

Quoridor Junior

Bought this game today intending to teach it to my boy.

Alas, it's too complicated for a child who's not even 3 yet, to understand the full mechanics of the game. No wonder it says five and up!

For us, it's just a simple boardgame with endless strategies.

In the end, he found more fun 'trapping' the mice!

But I'm hopeful he'll pick it up soon!

Singapore Car COE Prices

Are really off the roof right now.

For the same Toyota Corolla Altis model that I bought 5yrs ago, it's now going at $120,000. No thanks to the COE's phenomenal rise in the last few years.

Same 1.6L car, just a different price.

I totally support the call to revise the COE structure to levy a higher tax on 2nd car buyers while making it more affordable for single car buyers. Maybe even allow a sharp reduction in price for COE extensions beyond the requisite 10yrs a cheaper option.

We are, afterall, using our car more as a need than a want.

Else this is simply ridiculous.

It's like that funny article where my car can buy a BMW 3 series in Europe right now. Where's the logic?

Hello Kitty

Got my 3rd Hello Kitty, 3 more to go to complete the set!

True Fitness Session VIII This Season

Clocked yet another good session.

20min run plus upper body workout.

Shiok!

Frozen Shoulder

What is Frozen Shoulder?

Does anyone have a recommended cure for it?

Dunno how this came about, but it started with a persistent neckache for about 2 weeks. Then 3 days ago it when down to my shoulder. 

The pain started like a muscular type of pain at first but it got sharper and sharper.

The symptoms are akin to Frozen Shoulder that I've read about so far. Hopefully it's not Gout on the shoulder (it's rare but still possible).

Now have to see a Chinese physician, hopefully can have it looked at and solved pronto.

It also means I should cut down on alcohol intake (just in case), exercise a whole lot more, and drink much more water (as if I don't already!).

Sigh.