Love Is Blue

Blue, blue, my world is blue
Blue is my world now I'm without you

Good grief. The last time we heard that song was when dad had this 2-cassette compilation of oldies that we'd play in the car. And the last we remember playing those tapes were on a trip up to either Camland or Frasers (there's just something about getting carsick that does wonders for the memory). Oldies when we were a kid...while nowadays Light & Easy puts us fast asleep.

So the weekend took an interesting turn and we actually wonder, "Why?" But we guess the birthday card helped answer that.

But still, celebrations are for celebrating, hopefully there's been no collateral damage leaving anyone feeling blue.

So anyways. We've decided to give a try at doing just a word that reads differently instead of the usual ambigram.

Although, yes, you could join them up and make it an ambigram.

Counting down the days till Angels & Demons!

Mechanic Waltz Musical

Janvier
I work all night, I work all day, to pay the bills I have to pay
Ain't it sad?
And still there never seems to be a single penny left for me
That's too bad...¹

Mechanic
That would quite fit the bill
If she hadn't so often been ill
Little dear, cost us dear
Medicines are expensive, M'sieur...²

Janvier
A few questions that I need to know
How you could ever hurt me so
I need to know what I've done wrong
And how long it's been going on
Was it that I never paid enough attention?
Or did I not give enough affection?
Not only will your answers keep me safe
But I'll know never to make the same mistake again
You can tell it to my face
Or even on the phone
You can write it in a letter
Either way I have to know³

Mechanic
Gimme gimme more
Gimme more
Gimme gimme more
Gimme gimme more
Gimme more
Gimme gimme more⁴

Janvier
My heart's crippled by the vein
That I keep on closing
You cut me open and I

Keep bleeding
Keep, keep bleeding love
I keep bleeding
I keep, keep bleeding love
Keep bleeding
Keep, keep bleeding love
You cut me open⁵

Mechanic
Poor fool, he makes me laugh!
Hahahahaha! Haha haha haha haha haha haha haha haha⁶

Janvier
Out of reach
Couldn't see
We were never
Meant to be

So much hurt
So much pain
Takes a while
To regain
What is lost inside
And I hope that in time
You'll be out of my mind
And I'll be over you⁷

Mechanic
Cause you had a bad day
You're taking one down
You sing a sad song just to turn it around
You say you don't know
You tell me don't lie
You work at a smile and you go for a ride
You had a bad day
The camera don't lie
You're coming back down and you really don't mind
You had a bad day
You had a bad day⁸

Janvier
No more words. Here's your price.
Fifteen hundred for your sacrifice.
Come, Cosette, say goodbye
Let us seek out some friendlier sky.
Thank you both for Cosette
It won't take you too long to forget.²

Well we didn't haggle with our mechanic nor leave on bad graces. But the bill actually did come up to fifteen hundred to get the timing belt and some valves replaced.

¹ 'Money Money Money' - ABBA
² 'The Bargain' - The Waltz Of Treachery' - Les Miserables The Musical
³ 'Never Ever' - All Saints
⁴ 'Gimme More' - Britney Spears
⁵ 'Bleeding Love' - Leona Lewis
⁶ 'Poor Fool, He Makes Me Laugh' - Phantom Of The Opera Musical
⁷ 'Out Of Reach' - Gabrielle
⁸ 'Bad Day' - Daniel Powter

Schadenfreude

NICKY:
Oh, Schadenfreude, huh?
What's that, some kinda Nazi word?

GARY COLEMAN:
Yup! It's German for "happiness at the misfortune of others!"

So yes well there are times where we can be notably evil - especially at the expense of other people. But it's without spite! You go through life's little comedies without malice - it's funnier that way. That's how we can laugh at ourselves when we pokai so fairly recently.

Anyways. It so happened to be one of those rare occasions where we arrive home in time to eat together with the parents (take note people this is one of the shortcomings/advantages of going cardio classes at the gym, you tend to eat dinner late). Of course we tend to become rather tacit during dinner but somehow there was something to save the day.

American Idol auditions.

One of the few common interests the entire family has. Although we must admit that the last time we really sat down for American Idol must have been...er, if it was for the auditions, we think it was for Season 2, and for top 8/semi-finals/later episodes, Season 5. We never watched the finals or saw the results before for any season. We have stopped worshipping the telly for tv series or reality shows for a long time.

But since the auditions were showing, dinner went by quickly and everyone was soon in front having their jollies at the mercy of the terrible delusional poor singers (and sometimes Simon). This was the auditions in Texas and we must say we never really saw an authentic Southern feller fit the stereotype before. Has the drawl and looks and sealed the deal when during the interview he started chewing on a toothpick. Thought they don't exist no more. And there was a lovely looking lassie who did amazing impersonations.

Still. American Idol auditions is aaalllll about the...other people who didn't make it. And to see how they just didn't make it. Makes your day feel a bit better. Ok, we lie. It makes your day feel hell lots better.

Of course, it also happened that it was the only show the family has sat together to watch in a long time. :P Dad watches golf. Mum follows football. Both watch the Chinese Network that drives sis and us away. We still have our Dilbert DVD to finish watching.

Make it a record. Tonight also happens to be the first time we ever watched Grey's Anatomy. So now we know. And actually we might be interested in it too, but only if we are too free.

Back to the telly now that everyone's done with Astro. Time to wave the Wiimote.

Still Alive

Was going through VGCats's latest comic (which isn't a comic but a Flash video rather). Now we knows little to none about Portal but the Flash video was very cute. It didn't help that the music was rather chirpy and happy, which may mislead you to what GLaDOS is actually singing!

This was a triumph
I'm making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS
It's hard to overstate my satisfaction
Aperture Science
We do what we must
Because we can
For the good of all of us
Except the ones who are dead
But there's no sense crying over every mistake
You just keep on trying till you run out of cake
And the Science gets done
And you make a neat gun
For the people who are still alive
I'm not even angry
I'm being so sincere right now
Even though you broke my heart
And killed me
And tore me to pieces
And threw every piece into a fire
As they burned it hurt because I was so happy for you!
Now these points of data make a beautiful line
And we're out of beta
We're releasing on time
And I'm GLaD. I got burned
Think of all the things we learned
For the people who are still alive
Go ahead and leave me
I think I prefer to stay inside
Maybe you'll find someone else to help you
Maybe Black Mesa
THAT WAS A JOKE
HAHA. FAT CHANCE
Anyway, this cake great
It's so delicious and moist
Look at me still talking
When there's Science to do
When I look out there, it makes me GLaD I'm not you
I've experiments to run
There is research to be done
On the people who are still alive
And believe me I am still alive
I'm doing Science and I'm still alive
I feel FANTASTIC and I'm still alive
While you're dying I'll be still alive
And when you're dead I will be still alive
STILL ALIVE

Still, we likes the song, and Scott's video of it. Watch it!

This I Promise You

Just close your eyes
Each loving day
I know this feeling won't go away...

One of the songs that goes into our top list, that one. 7 years now and still very much alive on most of our playlists on the iPod.

Take my hand, only you can stop me shaking
We'll share forever, this I promise you

With Ronan Keating coming out with another song that shared the same name, we worried that he would be doing a cover of N'Sync's song. He did a cover of 'Iris' instead. Come on, he doesn't need to do covers any more, the best covers were still in the Boyzone days.

Anyways. In KIV there's this meme of promises. 10 self-promises, in other words, 10 resolutions.

In our entire life we've never really made any New Year's Resolutions, in fact this year was the first we actually made an actual one and never got along to finishing it. Now there's a meme to think of ten? But there's probably a way to look at this: short-term goals.

I don't want to run away, I want to stay forever, through Time and Time
No promises
I don't wanna run away, I don't wanna be alone
No promises

Hmmm. That doesn't make much sense hor? Promises being equated to goals. Or instead of goals let's just see what's a consistent habit that's done. Let us try...

We shall finish all the episodes on the Dilbert DVD that we bought. We just won't state when we'll finish. And watching the first three episodes already had us all in stitches, this series is unforgivingly funny!

We will only wrap our books in embossed wrappers. But then again we've always been doing this. Just that there's a specific embossed wrapper we've come to fancy but can't seem to find off the shelves. Don't know if they still make this nowadays, the last we'd known about it was 6 years ago.

We shall make sure our Scrabulous games with the sister are for sibling fun. What we mean here is that there shan't be any serious 'must maximize scoring using all the double/triple-letter/word squares' kiasu-ism going on. After all, the sis and us don't really play much together unless she's back and we co-op to play Mystery Case Files. Scrabulous so happens to be an awesome way for us to keep in touch - no sense going all competitive and ruining the fun.

Of course, playing a game with NJAPF, 3-Seconder and Jacz is a different story. NJAPF is trashing us, simply trashing us. And as for Henry, who's one of the Top 5 Scrabblers in Malaysia, we'll gladly play more Starcraft or TI:3 with you instead.

Don't go making all those promises
You know you cannot keep
There's a time to play a king a
Time to be the thief

We will try not to commit suicide by making people kill us. Yes, well, ethancya's kid brother was singing lines from Michael Buble's 'Everything' because the song was stuck in his head, which was fine. But then we found out that he too didn't like Britney's 'Gimme More'! Which meant there were times when he started singing 'Everything' we started 'Gimme More'.

That reminded us that we'd already custom-edit the 'Gimme More' song for use as either a ringtone or text alert tone (btw we're disappointed with her new album). So now whenever we receive a text, Britney's keeps asking us to give her more.

This is actually rather hazardous because lad also hates 'Gimme More' and we can expect physical violence from him, haha. But at least we've refrained from singing that song much around him. Just have to make sure we answer our mobile quickly in his presence.

We shall reread our books now and then. But depending on rereadability. Dahlah our Pratchetts and Christies have seen many rereadings, while Herbert's Dune must recharge a bit, and with Stephen King, after years of renting his books we have no shelf space now to really collect his books.

We will experiment 7-Up with more drinks. We've already mixed it with orange juice, pineapple juice, Ribena, Absolut Vanilla, and even with condensed milk (we had Ryan at Mage Cafe to do this for us since he had the ingredients then). But heck no way we're mixing Sprite with our coffee or tea!

We shall entertain the thought of getting a bottle of Absolut Vodka for an upcoming Christmas party. Although this move is risky. The number of actual drinkers can be counted on one hand, and if it turns out to be a sleepover party things may turn out very risky. Imagine Twister when your brain's on the twist, however!

We shall brush up on calligraphy. Hmmm. We ought to brush up on our own handwriting in the first place. Just that we're running short of font ideas for certain problematic areas among some current ambigrams.

We shall make the most out of our next Sporeland trip. Which is sometime next week. First would be another trip to HMV/That CD Shop, to look for Freemasons and Libera and Karl Jenkins. And psike's suppose to bring us to some tea shop. And Christmas shopping with the sister! Not to mention to see the Christmas lights on Orchard. It's just a bleedin' shame that it'll be another rush job trip as well.

Your promises have never been anything you make them seem
So what you gonna promise me this time
You're telling lies so plain to see
You're trying to make a fool of me
So what you gonna promise me this time

We shall not be bound to holding any promises. Because we haven't made any to keep. Nothing to be oath-bound about. Fingers crossed.

Busybodyfying Meme

We near forgot all about this meme. After the last spate of memes we needed a break from memes but now there's more memes coming in and we aren't keen on a backlog of memes to clear. Annnieeewaaaysss...the sampat meme.

1. Name one person who made you laugh last night?
Erm, Kate Monster! Singing 'Mix Tape'!

Sometimes when someone
Has a crush on you
They'll make you a mix tape
To give you a clue.
Let's see...
"You've Got A Friend"
"The Theme From 'Friends'"
"That's What Friends Are For"

Shit!
Oh, but look!

"A Whole New World"
"Kiss The Girl"
"My Cherie Amour"

Oh, Princeton! He does like me!

"I Am The Walrus"
"Fat Bottomed Girls"
"Yellow Submarine"
What does this mean?

2. What were you doing at 0800?
Snoozing in bed!

3. What were you doing 30 minutes ago?
Checking blogs and emails.

4. What happened to you in 2006?
This and that la. Change of job probably being the main event.

5. What was the last thing you said out loud?
"What does this mean?"

6. How many beverages did you have today?
Quite a fair bit...breakfast Earl Grey, morning Milo, iced Barley, afternoon Earl Grey, gym fountain water, 100 Plus mixed with Sprite, more water and goodness knows what for supper. Orange & Mango juice mix probably.

7. What colour is your hairbrush?
Skin-tone colour. That's because we use our hands to style our hair, and don't own a hairbrush or a comb.

8. What was the last thing you paid for?
The parking ticket at The Curve.

9. Where were you last night?
The Curve! Oh wait at Tony Romas Cineleisure too! Was meeting FeR and JoFo after we'd done with BJam and BCombat.

10. What colour is your front door?
The colour of wood. Now use your imagination.

11. Where do you keep your change?
In our wallet.

12. What's the weather like today?
It rained in the afternoon, which was lovely. But the rain caused bad traffic, which was unlovely.

13. What's the best ice-cream flavour?
Vanilla!

14. What excites you?
This is a toughie. A good upcoming holiday. The arrival of a long-awaited book or game. The prospect that someone's going to shower us with lots of money, and see to all our wants so that we could retire early without expecting anything from us will definitely excite us plenty too.

15. Do you want to cut your hair?
Oh yes actually. Probably a few days before Ethancya & Renzze's wedding.

16. Are you over the age of 25?
Hooooo-yeah. :s

17. Do you talk a lot?
Not the really.

18. Do you watch the O.C.?
No. Haven't been at the telly for ages.

19. Do you know anyone name Steven?
Yep.

20. Do you make up your own words?
Only when we need to describe how a doohickey is used together with the thingamajig when the watchamacallit doesn't fit. Oh well maybe sometimes.

21. Are you a jealous person?
We green! But not at everything. In fact we won't know what we're jeles of until we're jeles of it.

22. Name a friend whose name starts with the letter 'A'.
Aaron who doesn't want a book for Christmas.

23. Name a friend whose name starts with the letter 'K'.
Kenneth.

24. Who's the first person on your received call list?
Dad. And this was...Sunday.

25. What does the last text message you received say?
I'm already 26 for 23 hours and 55 minutes. Ha ha ha! :)

26. Do you chew on your straw?
No, but we do tend to use it as a makeshift toothpick when we can't get our hands on one.

27. Do you have curly hair?
Nada. Straight it be.

28. Where's the next place you're going to?
Sporeland.

29. Who's the rudest person in your life?
Some Indian customer in one of the Guardian branches last we remember.

30. What was the last thing you ate?
Jambu air. Juicy.

31. Will you get married in the future?
Erm. We is still keeping to bachelor-for-life.

32. What's the best movie you've seen in the past 2 weeks?
Stardust!

33. Is there anyone you like right now?
No.

34. When was the last time you did the dishes?
Just now, after dinner.

35. Are you currently depressed?
Not yet. Neurotransmitters masih cukup, and we've not come across anything emo enough yet to set us off.

36. Did you cry today?
Nope. Not out loud, not in pain, not in pleasure, not in frustration, not at all.

37. Why did you answer and post this?
Because the fingers wanted to exercise this way.

38. Tag 5 people who would do this survey.
Them who would, already have. But all are welcome to use do it!

Starcraft Sunday

Everyone's a little bit racist
Sometimes.
Doesn't mean we go
Around committing hate crimes.
Look around and you will find
No one's really color blind.
Maybe it's a fact
We all should face
Everyone makes judgments
Based on race.

It's not hate crimes when all parties go to WAR. And theaters of war in space are always magnificent, because everyone is living in interesting times.

5 factions unable to tolerate the mere existence of the others:
Heng Raynor and Arcturus Yap, Terrans;
Judicator Wong, Protoss; and
The Overmind Janvier and wolfx Kerrigan, Zergs.

Given the layout of the Systems Of Starcraft, the Protoss was first to settle down and build their base. How apt, as the Xel'Naga named them 'the First Born' after all. Unfortunately for the Protoss, their planet looked to be the center of all conflict. Just as well for the Protoss that the Judicator Assembly and Templar castes did not decide to take matters into their own hands and present a united Protoss front.

The Terrans found bases on planets with few entry points, and had little in terms of contact with each other. Trust Terrans to take racism to the limits, as they decided to jeer at the other races rather even when they're not talking to each other.

The Zergs weren't too bothered with racism. They would gladly assimilate all into the breed and make themselves stronger. Only, wolfx Kerrigan had severed psychic ties with the Overmind Janvier and leads his own forces. Still, both have the aim of consuming, assimilating and expanding.

The Overmind, following its prime directives, begin by sending transporter overlords to colonize the neighbouring planet and giving the Protoss some breathing space first (the Zerg needs to assimilate the psionic potential of the Terrans before they can take them on, dammit!). Unfortunately that bitch Kerrigan, after killing off all the Overmind's Cerebrates and taking off with some confused troops, decided to drop back and harrass the Overmind's mineral fields. That would need to be taken care of later.

Still, wolfx Kerrigan tend to run by emotions and found that his zergling rush tactic didn't pull off as intended. Kerrigan then started thwarting Arcturus Yap's Marines and Ghosts, to some degree of success. However, Kerrigan's decision to breed Queens were questionable as the Queens had yet to evolve to spawn broodlings or spew mucous to ensnare victims. Arcturus Yap, on the other hand, decided to show off the superiority of Terran technology of Vultures armed with Spider Mines - clearing off Kerrigan's Zerglings with deadly efficiency.

Heng Raynor, on the other side of space, was busy minding their own business. The quiet tactician did not display his warmongering flags for once.

Judicator Wong, seeing how the Overmind was still leading in terms of Conquest - decided that that needs correcting and sent a small force of Zealots to deal with the zerg hatchery on Torus - only to have the Zealots meet their doom at the hands of some well-placed Sunken Colonies. The Overmind was slightly wary now of the Protoss but could not prepare a force to deal with them as he was sending Scourges to take out Kerrigan's Queen. Also, he picked up psionic signals that Raynor troops had intentions on landing on Tarsonis where the expansionary hatchery was.

Kerrigan's loss of his Queen was the least of his worries. He lost his first Ultralisk in a battle with Arcturus' Vulture - must have been some faulty Zerg breeding there. The Overmind had began spawning Mutalisks and was regaining control of the homeworld Torus, purging it of Kerrigan's helpless Zerglings.

However, as The End Drew Near (aka midnight), Protoss Dragoons overrun the Overmind's hatchery on Torus while Raynor's Wraith and Firebats began conquest on Tarsonis. Things look bleak for the Overmind, who was second in line in terms of Conquest, while the Protoss was victorious.

We Are Going On A...Summer Holiday

We're all going on a summer holiday
No more working for a week or two
Fun and laughter on our summer holiday
No more worries for me or you
For a week or two...

Well if only lah we were going off for a week or more. With the long weekend coming up we is finally able to make it for a trip with the Klangites, this time to...*checks GMail*...Sg Sedim/Kulim for some whitewater rafting and suchlike. Not to mention a brief stop at Penang as well. This one's been in the works since the middle of May, not long after the Klangites last trip.

Whattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopackwhattopack...

We're taking the afternoon off today so that we don't have to stress ourselves with the necessary packing. As usual we've to make do with our hiking bag, and we always pray everything'll fit. Good thing about these kinda trips is that there's no need for anything but casual/rough wear so there's no need to keep things overly tidy. Still...

ChargethecamerachargethephoneforgetaboutbringingtheiPodheckitbringtheiPodbringthespeakers...
Toiletriesbagdon'tforgetOriginalSourceshowergeltoothbrushtoothpasteshavingbladecontactlens...
SandalswehavenosandalsdowewanttosacrificeourCrocsforwhitewaterraftingorfindapairofsandals...
Howmuchclothestobringhowmanyteeshowmanyshortsjeansorthreequartersorpants...
BringbookGunsGermsAndSteelmaybebutneedtowrapthatfirstbringNDSforgetaboutboardgames...
GotoFitnessFirstgetlotsofplasticlaundrybags...

It's bad enough that yesterday kept feeling like Friday already. Shall try not to dwell on it but focus on this month's Baskin Robbins: a quart of Espresso and Cream mixed with Rum and Raisin. Otousan told us that they're having the 31% offer from the 29th till the 31st for this month, which allowed us to get our quart last night (we thought we would be missing out this month).

We quite perasaan that we attracted attention as we were leaving The Curve yesterday. Rather obvious that people's heads turned to follow as we made our way to the car park. Felt a bit smug, we did. Because we had something they didn't. This.

Guys at BR packed this in super large paper bag that our humble quart looked like a tub.

Okays. We'll be back when the weekend's done. So have a good Independance day ya.

"Da Da Dadada Da Da Da Dadada Da"

Came across this from -C. Was fun racking our brains there because some lines were so recognizable and we were trying to place 'em.

Quiz time, and with an eclectic collection of music for us to sound from. So what we've done is told the iPod to 'Shuffle Songs', and we'll take the first 25 with lyrics and list the first line of the lyrics here.

First to name a song and artist gets credit for it. How many can you recognize?

1. "Gomen ne sunao janakute..." [Female]

2. "Tale as old as time..." [Male]

3. "'Mystery after gala night' it says 'Mystery of soprano's flight'..." [Male]

4. "Monday night, and I feel so low..." [Male]

5. "Chez moi les forets se balancent..." [Female]

6. "I've never seen you looking so lovely as you did tonight..." [Male]

7. "Hizashi no aizu ni kakete kuru..." [Female]

8. "Epona Epona soba ni oide..." [Female]

9. "Why does it feel like night today? Something in here's not right today..." [Male]

10. "Mother mother tell your children, that their time has just begun..." [Male]

11. "When the night has come and the land is dark..." [Male]

12. "I can't get out of bed today..." [Female]

13. "People always talk about all the things they're all about..." [Female]

14. "There's maybe a way I can tell you 'cos with everyday things continue..." [Male]

15. "Kokoro ni hane wo motte tsutate mune no sasayaki..." [Female]

16. "I met her but I never thought she'd belonged to me..." [Male]

17. "Adeste Fideles laeti triumphantes..." [Males]

18. "I can be an asshole of the grandest kind..." [Female]

19a. "One night...and the world is your oyster..." [Male]

19b. "Shot like an arrow going through my heart..." [Female]

20a. "Little castles in the air..." [Female]

20b. "Are the stars out tonight? I don't know if it's cloudy or bright..." [Male]

21. "When it's over that's the time I fall in love again..." [Male]

22. "One more day before you go, we'll stay up late for one more show..." [Male]

23. "So this is who I am and this is all I know..." [Female]

24. "The trees are spinning oxygen, they're the rockets we should fear..." [Male]

25. "If there were no words, no way to speak, I would still hear you..." [Female]

BONUS: "I will dedicate and sacrifice my everything for just a second's worth of how my story's ending..."

For 19 and 20, there's options (will explain later). Also threw in a bonus just for kicks. And we realise that just by doing this, we've a bit of spring cleaning to do on our iPod, clearing off songs we won't ever listen to.

Have fun!

Inama Nushif

We're an impulsive shopper, we won't deny it. So at times when we hear something we like, our ears prick up and we go, "Gotta have that."

Happened when we heard the 'Kyrie' from the Death Note anime. Hunted high and low for Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children OST just for the 'The Promised Land' track (haven't heard of the One-Winged Angel then). Happened with Gladiator (although we got the OST as a present from sis, we remember). Grabbed War Of The Worlds CDs because we liked the in-game music.

But nothing beats this so far. Our number one favvie. The 'Inama Nushif' from Frank Herbert's Children of Dune miniseries.

Trailer for the Television Critics Association

Westwood's Dune did a lot in terms of exposing the gamers of the nineties to Frank Herbert's work. We loved the Dune culture that David Lynch created - leather-clad fremen, black aba-robed Bene Gesserit, the Guild Steersmen in what looks like a trash bag, not to mention Baron Harkonnen installing heartplugs in everyone. Yeah, the show sucked a fair bit but it was dripping in flavour. We were definitely glad that Westwood followed the same style in the cutscenes when they made the later Dune games.

Trailer: Eternity

Then came Frank Herbert's Dune. Longer, fleshed out the show much better. But we complained as hell about a lot of other things, mostly regarding their attire. Shall not go there. That miniseries tried to be a fashion show. We did like Ian McNiece's portrayal of the Baron Harkonnen, though.

Trailer: Sins Of The Mother

Anyways - fast forward to 2002, in Glasgow. We think we saw it in an ad banner, that Children of Dune was coming soon. And it was pretty.

Jessica Brooks as Ghanima was pretty.

James McAvoy as Leto was pretty. Prettier than Mr Tumnus.

Daniela Amavia as Alia was very very pretty.

But what kept us enthralled wasn't the prettiness (nor the fashion show that still prevailed). It was the song. And we weren't the only victim, as many others were asking about it as well. Azam Ali and Brian Tyler had us when they used the Inama Nushif in the trailers. In fact, we remembered the week we got back from Glasgow, we hogged Astro because we found out Children of Dune was showing!

Well, gotta say we were thankful we had a debit card and access to Play.com when in UK - we ended up ordering the soundtrack online (one of our few online purchases!). The song fits many purposes: caraoke, zen and cave time, to reminding us of Glasgow. And it can never be overkilled.

The rest of the album turned out to be rather good too, head to Brain Tyler's site for a sampler. Initially we had the lyrics from The Lansdraad, but turns out that that's more of a phonetic guide. And it's another counterpointing song! Okay, enough.

Inama Nushif

Inama nushif (She is eternal)
Al ­asir hiy ayish (No malice can touch)

Lia-anni (Singular and ageless)
Zaratha zarati (Perpetually bound)

Hatt al-hudad (Through the tempest)
Al-maahn al-baiid (be it deluge or sand)
Ay-yah idare (A singular voice)
Adamm malum (speaks through the torrent)

Hatt al-hudad (Through the tempest)
Al-maahn al-baiid (be it deluge or sand)
Ay-yah idare (A singular voice)
Adamm malum (speaks through the torrent)

Inama nishuf al a sadarr (Forever her voice sings)
Eann zaratha zarati (through the ages eternally bound)

Kali bakka a tishuf ahatt (Sacrifice is her gift)
Al hudad alman dali (one that cannot be equaled)

Inama nishuf al a sadarr (Forever her voice sings)
Eann zaratha zarati (through the ages eternally bound)

Kali bakka a tishuf ahatt (Sacrifice is her gift)
Al hudad alman dali alia (that Alia will one day equal)

Inama nushif (She is eternal)
Al ­asir hiy ayish (No malice can touch)

Lia-anni (Singular and ageless)
Zaratha zarati (Perpetually bound)

"Tonight We Dine..."

...With 300 Spartans

We only knew that the 300 VCD was out last week. While randomly bouncing into shops at MV with Hyperion we saw that the DVD is finally out. And original DVD prices nowadays are RM59.90, much more reasonable compared to the RM149.90 initially. For 2 DVDs (1 movie and 1 special features disc) we consider it reasonable. Now, we're refraining from watching the movie yet because we think that we might be able to pull off a DVD Nite somehow. Which means Domino's Pizza's Extravaganzza and Chicken Supreme/Aloha Chicken, large thin crusts, at Buy 1 Free 1. Whoops, gotta renew the Gold Card first.

...On Peanut Butter/Nuttela Sandwiches And Sugared Water
We were just starting BodyJam today when we found our sports shoes were slowly disintergrating - the rubber soles were falling apart. There must be a correlation: jungle trekking kills our shoes. After all, 2 years of Combat/Jam/casual walking never did naught to the poor shoes, only after the Kiara trek our shoes suddenly shows signs of dying. The same thing happened to our earlier pair of shoes too! So now we have to start hunting for new shoes (thank goodness for sales), and while we're at it we might as well look for more gym tee and pants (we now sweat buckets and need Dri-Fit-like clothes), and socks as well...Sale can be a bad 4-letter word sometimes. Shop like this we'll have to ikat perut darn tight already. Oh yes, what kind of shoes are suitable for Jam/Combat?

...On Baskin Robbins
Oh, wait. 31% off is tomorrow. Oops.

...On IKEA Curry Puffs
While we were in that evil snare that is IKEA, we had to keep muttering to ourselves, "We're shopping for the Wee Wog, we're shopping for the Wee Wog...oh, and to get supper."

We noticed that Wee Wog's Ratta's tail was reaching 'breaking point' after a year of biting (we're rather impressed that Ratta survived this long without any serious damage actually), and so decided to go walk about in IKEA to see what's on sale...but only buy stuff for the Wee Wog. Oh, and to get half dozen curry puffs for supper (RM5.50 for half dozen is very worth it).

Her box now has a pillow and Blund Bear to keep Ratta company!

We're a bit disappointed that the Finlir picture frames are never discounted! Always RM49. We like these frames as we can keep changing photos when we feel like. Two still not enough for us :D

...On Spider Pig
Thankiu Great Alex for the song!!! We loves the a cappella version of Spider Pig and it's playing nonstop at the moment. While the Homer version is funny we totally hearts this a cappella version.

Spider Pig
Spider Pig
Does whatever a Spider Pig does
Can he swing from a web?
No he can't
He's a pig
Look Out!
He is a Spider Pig

If you have to ask what is a Spider Pig...ok, it's the song played during the end credits for The Simpsons Movie. Brain to tired to come up with a yarn to lead you on.

Town Tunes

Dang. Our head's rather messed up at the moment. While we know that it's empty words said in good jest, and all that fooling around is just, fooling around, nothing meant. But because it's capable of putting a smile on our face, we're letting it mess with our head. Damn flirt.

We have always enjoyed the soundtrack for the Heroes of Might and Magic series (and we know we're not the only one, just check the forums in any of the fansite). Credits to Rob King and Paul Romero, for while the game is sink-deep in fantastical elements, the music takes the game flavour a step deeper.

Heroes II: Sorceress Town

While we enjoys music from Heroes II, we still wonder what in the world made them choose to put opera music for the town themes. The music is good, but we don't really know how they fit in with the town philosophy thematically *shrugs*. Our personal favourites from Heroes II would be the Sorceress Town Theme, the Knight Town Theme and Battle 3. Oh, we hears that some town themes were changed in the expansion pack. Not too sure which version we have now.

Heroes III: Rampart Town

We enjoyed the music from Heroes III immensely. Each town theme suited perfectly, although in a rather stereotyped way. Most fans didn't enjoy the music much, crying foul for the loss of operatic music, but we just loved the orchestrated pieces, especially for the Stronghold (majestic), Fortress (creepy dark swamp), Rampart (peaceful and meditative nature) and Combat 4 (the strings, man, the strings!).

One of the good things we found with the music of Heroes III is that all the files are already in mp3 format (yay!) and we could replace them with our own mp3s! Sometimes the Tower town theme would be playing Canon in D while the Castle town theme has Sarah MacLachlan singing 'Arms Of An Angel'.

Heroes IV: Preserve Town

When Heroes IV came out the music floored us. Vocals came back, although it didn't sound like anything as operatic as II in our opinion we were captivated. The overall music was a mix with more obvious synthesized scores for combat and Celtic overtones for the world map. We loves all the town themes here except Haven's, and we loves the Dirt Land theme and the End Of Turn Theme too.

Heroes V: Sylvan Town

With Heroes V, we'll say that the music doesn't stand out as much as Heroes IV did. There were some good ones, like the Main Menu Theme (for both base and expansion), Haven town theme and Sylvan town theme. Still good but not as memorable as Heroes IV.

Yes, all town pictures were those that follow the nature theme.

So while we recognize Heroes V's vocals to be Latin, what we really were looking for was the lyrics (if any) to the vocals in Heroes IV - particularly for the Asylum and Preserve town themes. It's been tough scrounging for any details, and only recently had the clue that the lyrics were taken from works of Friedrich Nietzsche.

A bit more searching turned lyrics! Oh, happiness...wait, these are lyrics for Heroes II, not Heroes IV. Wah German some more. Drat. The search continues...Credits anyways to the people at The Heroes Round Table Forums for finding them.

Barbarian Town Theme

Oder gehst du jetzt selber
auf den Wegen
auf den Wegen
Oder gehst du jetzt auf den Wegen der Diebe, du Freund der Bösen?

Necromancer Town Theme

Deine wilden
wilden Hunde wollen in die Freiheit; sie bellen vor Lust in ihrem Keller,
wenn dein Geist alle Gefängnisse zu lösen trachtet.
sie bellen vor Lust

Deine wilden
wilden Hunde wollen in die Freiheit; sie bellen vor Lust
vor Lust

Warlock

Willst du heute dein Feuer in die Täler tragen?
Fürchtest du nicht
Fürchtest du nicht
Fürchtest du nicht des Brandstifters Strafen?

One day we'll find out what they're singing if we're bothered, but we still want actual lyrics (if any!) to Asylum and Preserve first!

Libera Chorus Angelorum

We admit to being one of them heavy Canon In D fans - our early collections stem from picking up the occasional classical compilation CD just for the Canon In D track they have, so long as it is a variation from what we already have (yes, we picks up albums just for one song sometimes). Mind you, it's variations that we're after, not the same piece by different orchestras only.

We do remember downloading one Canon variation - a 'techno' version that we found funny at first, because such a version did exist. Cynic just said, "Desecration." Then we got tired of it after a while, so it was Shift+Del. After all, the Canon isn't suppose to be a disco song.

Highlight for us came in the form of this CD:

The only CD that's comprised of 8 variations of the Canon In D, no other pieces, no Gigue In D.

Then we were introduced to high-speed internet connections in Glasgow, and ICQ Shared Folders as well. We've gotten (to date) the best two variations for the Canon In D here as well: one conducted by Raymond Leppard and the English Chamber Orchestra and a choral variation from a batchmate's ICQ Shared Folders (no knowing where she got it).

Now, it's the same song, by the same composer...best way to name this would be by the different conductors or orchestras, yes?

But there weren't any details for the choral variation. A bit of searching here and there didn't prove fruitful, and we were wondering if it was the Choir of King's College, Cambridge or the Vienna Boys' Choir wot sung it. Otherwise we thought it was composer Marvin Hamslich who'd did it for Ordinary People, but as we haven't any way to check it out we couldn't know for sure.

Searching via the lyrics proved impossible as we were more likely to come up with the lyrics to some requiem or mass instead.

So happens that we've finally found it, some 4 years later. Hurrah! Turns out they're the Libera Boys' Choir. Access to the lyrics confirmed that this song be theirs. And it's only found on one album - Libera. Soooo difficult to track down. You can follow the Wikipedia links or just go gaily forward here for it while it's still up for grabs now.

And here's our favvie Christmas e-card (which, of course, is Canon-related, only sometimes we wish there wasn't the other half of the song). Oh, and here's a blog paying tribute to videos that pay tribute to the Canon In D.

Anyways, gotta rename that track now.

Sanctus
Sanctus
Sanctus

Benedictus, benedictus
Qui venit in nomine benedictus
In nomine
Domine

Sanctus
Benedictus, benedictus
Qui venit in nomine benedictus
In nomine
Domine

Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria
Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleni sunt coeli gloria

Sanctus
Sanctus
Sanctus

Benedictus, benedictus
Qui venit in nomine benedictus
In nomine
Domine

Sanctus
Benedictus, benedictus
Qui venit in nomine benedictus
In nomine
Domine

Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth / Benedictus, benedictus
Pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria / Qui venit in nomine benedictus
Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth / In nomine
Pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria / Domine

Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria
Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth
Pleni sunt coeli gloria

Sanctus
Sanctus

Looking For Light?

We've been listening to the BTMV hymnal and the P&W songs back recently, probably brought on by fact that we haven't listened to them in quite a while as well as BWei's sudden invitation to her church when we paid her a visit.

We'll admit, it's been a long while since we've last been to church - and we've no feelings of guilt. Loss, maybe. But we're not too sure what is it we may have lost. As it is, we feel like a complete stranger when in church - whether it be because we don't have the conviction anymore, or because we've lost contact with most of the church folks that we were never too close to begin with, even our peer group.

Honestly, the few times we ever end up in church (because we've to fetch mum there) we try to avoid the rest of the congregation after service - by hiding in some corner while everyone else mingle in fellowship over tea, coffee and biscuits. We gets mighty uncomfortable with any peers we meet in church that we would be quite comfortable with if we'd known them outside church. And we're not talking zealous attitudes or such, it's your regular Joe really.

Antisocialism? Sociophobia? Self-outcasting? Or is our faith faltering then?

All we like sheep, have gone astray indeed. We have definitely strayed off the path a long time ago, even when we were still in church then. And we don't think we are able to go back to church yet, not till we've come to terms with ourselves. If we were to go back, we need a good reaffirmation of the faith - something we probably never had in the first place.

Be Thou my Vision, O Lord of my heart;
Naught be all else to me, save that Thou art.
Thou my best Thought, by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light.

Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Thou my great Father, I Thy true son;
Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one.

Be Thou my battle Shield, Sword for the fight;
Be Thou my Dignity, Thou my Delight;
Thou my soul’s Shelter, Thou my high Tower:
Raise Thou me heavenward, O Power of my power.

Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise,
Thou mine Inheritance, now and always:
Thou and Thou only, first in my heart,
High King of Heaven, my Treasure Thou art.

High King of Heaven, my victory won,
May I reach Heaven’s joys, O bright Heaven’s Sun!
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all.

Till we see God in everything.

Sumer Is Icumen In

Sumer is icumen in
Lhude sing cuccu
Groweth sed and bloweth med
And springth the wode nu
Sing cuccu
Awe bleteth after lomb
Lhouth after calve cu
Bulloc sterteth, bucke verteth
Murie sing cuccu
Cuccu, cuccu
Wel singes thu cuccu
Ne swik thu naver nu

No we don't mean the Eternal Summer (although it does remind us plenty of A Home At The End Of The World).

28 Weeks Later Shrek The Third Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End Mon Petit Doigt M'a Dit Hors de Prix Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer Transformers The Simpsons Movie Evan Almighty

What better way to bring in the summer movies? Damn Victoria Station for being within arms' reach - we've already picked up 3 albums: Linkin Park's Minutes To Midnight sometime back, and Maroon 5's It Won't Be Soon Before Long and Madonna's The Immaculate Collection (yay our iPod gets fatter and fatter) today. Our only gripe is with LP's Minutes To Midnight - after careful listening we heard the 'missing words'. Then we added our own 'missing words', because LP's album never had the 'Parental Advisory' label on the covers before.

Anyone wants to buy our copy? We'll sell it for RM30. 'Course, we suppose you'd want to get your own PA copy or would've already 'obtained' it online...and we'll also have to scrounge/wait for the explicit version to arrive (if ever).

Also itching to get a couple more linen clothings (goodness knows how our brain picks up this little itches) - to keep our GAP linen shirt company. This itch must be controlled - linen isn't as breezy to wear as we would like it to be and Malaysian weather just doesn't make it really worth it.

Oh dear, must catch By The Pricking Of My Thumbs tomorrow.

Movies At Our Second Home

We'd took the day off to get a few things done today, and since we were going to have dinner at 1U we thought to ourselves, it's been a while since we spent quality time at our second home (we've been spending loads of time at our third home, Curve). So yeah, we parked the car at Eneos for servicing and prowled the corridors as we once used to.

MPH proved to be evil - now that our MPH Card has expired, they'd gone and put up the lot of Agatha Christie books for sale at 15% off for MRC members while non-members have to make other purchases of a minimum of RM10 to be eligible for the discount. Gah. Don't need it. Don't need it. Don't need it...

...

We're now 1 book closer to completing the Jane Marple set - gotten us A Caribbean Mystery. Got 2 more greenback Penguin Classics to get the bloody 15% - The Importance of Being Ernest and Frankenstein. Just our luck they didn't have Wuthering Heights (we've been recommended that as a follow-up to Pride and Prejudice). Gah MPH be evil.

Oh yes, been breaking out the popcorn (Twisties, actually) as the summer brings in the slew of movies. Shrek 3 was good although not as satisfying as Shrek 2, but we guess that's because there wasn't much to parody about this time. Minor things we caught: the mural behind Shrek and Fiona when they were dressed in full royal togs featured an ogre as well; and Prince Charming used Danse Macabre as a song for his musical :s It was still funny, but not as funny as it used to be - we couldn't really pinpoint any particular 'highlight' joke (like Puss' cat-eye act from 2). And we thought Artie looked more like Doogie Houser than Justin Timberlake. Although you can never go wrong with Shrek :D

We broke our code of 'not watching anything with Nicolas Cage' for the fact that the movie was based on a Philip K. Dick novel (The Golden Man) and the premise of the story looked good. Next showed off Chris Johnson's ability to see 2 minutes into the future to good effect, but the ending felt...well, somewhat to the same effect as how Sunshine made us feel. Good buildup and then a twist to leave us hanging. Not memorable...except that during our first screening, there was a power failure throughout 1U, sometime 3ish to near 4ish.

Pirates of the Caribbean - At World's End. Now this is, so far, the movie of the summer. Has Johnny Depp ever failed us? Spider-Man 3, move over. It even had more laughs than Shrek 3. The only thing about the whole Pirates series is that in order to fully understand what's going on is to rewatch the earlier movies or be left wondering "Who's Captain Barbossa?" or "Who's that soldier in love with Elizabeth?" kinda thing. Also, the other pirate lords were really quite calefair characters, but it allowed for the focus to be where it is - on Cap'n Jack, Will, Elizabeth, Barbossa and Davey Jones. The final battle - very nice - although interestingly enough when Liz and Jack was rescued from the ocean they were very dry looking :s didn't they just fell into the ocean?

Pirates really put us in mind of Pride and Prejudice though - everytime we look at Tom Hollander all we can see is Mr Collins :s and Keira Knightley as Elizabeth. Prolly need to get that out of our system.

Oh. Take note. Shrek 3 we sat for quite a bit during the credits - even after the bit where the subs go 'Sarikata drpd...' and Puss waving goodbye. Then we gave up. STAY BACK FOR PIRATES. DON'T LEAVE.

Wild Hogs isn't gonna be memorable and so we shan't comment (although trying to remember what Dudley said that his Mac misinterpreted to 'Alternative Sex' tho'), and while Blades of Glory might look good we were told it isn't as funny as Wild Hogs. Waiting on Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Transformers and Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix (oh, hopefully the movie's better than the book) now.

Trailers that got us excited? Neil Gaiman's Stardust. And to think we just picked up the book at the just-recent Times Warehouse Sale. Fracture also looks intriguing - Anthony Hopkins at it again.

Now we've got the Sony Ericsson W880i jingle in our head, 'Want You To Know' by Freelance Hellraiser.

Want you to know, you make me happy
Want you to know, you make me sad
Want you to know, you make me happy
You are the best thing that I ever had

Want you to know, you make me happy
Want you to know, you make me happy

Vampire Blood

If there's one thing that's becoming a fact of life with us, it's this: given Wii don't have to work the following day (like when the weekend comes around) Wii have this amazing ability to stay awake the entire night - till the sun rises. As dawn breaks and light starts seeping through the curtains, Wii creep under our duvet and blast on the air-conditioning and table fan. If no family member is around to wake us up, Wii're quite capable of sleeping till evening - Wii do sleep like the dead. Then wash, rinse, repeat the following night. Wii must have some vampire blood in us.

Wii finds Wii get more alert mentally come past 2am - while everyone else who manages to stay up till this hour starts clocking in. And usually Wii'd call it a day night and try and get some shut-eye by after 3am ourselves if there's nothing (much) to do. If, and when, Wii do stay up until the following morning Wii run the risk of aggravating our sinus problem.

Such like this morning. And no amount of meds will stop it. Hopefully Wii won't run into dire need of tissues while on the bus...See y'all next week!

All our bags are packed, Wii're ready to go
Wii're dribbling here, unto the floor
Wii hate to get all up and wash our nose

But the dawn is breaking, it's early morn
The bus is waiting, he's blowing his horn
Already Wii're so tired, can Wii just doze?

Love Songs, Part 4...

...As the deer panteth for the waters
So my soul longeth after thee...

...You alone are my strength, my shield
To you alone may my spirit yield...

Love Songs, Part 3...

...You are my strength when I am weak
You are the treasure that I seek
You are my all in all
Seeking you like a precious jewel
Lord to give up I'd be a fool
You are my all in all...

Love Songs, Part 2...

...I feel like I'm falling
Over and over in love with you
It's not just a feeling
But I know that he is real...