Busy.

On a bit of a hiatus here, with university exams and such, although admittedly, I've been fairly lazy with this blog of mine. I'm getting sloppy! (P.S. I'm probably posting this to a ghost audience too).

Anyhow, it is 3:30am, I was studying but I thought that in the 5-10 minutes of procrastination time I have, I'll write an update on this blog.

Here's the lowdown:

The exam period started on the 13th of October. It is now the 31st of October and I only had my first exam on the 28th. That, and half of my hall has already left, so the place is rather empty. My first exam was Critical Thinking (philosophy paper), which went fairly well, with my next two exams being on the 3rd (Psyc) and 8th (Marketing) of November.

On 8 November, I'll have my last exam in the morning, and have about 2-3 hours to pack luggage, before working from 2-9pm for the election, counting up votes and answering phone calls. After that, will be going out to town for one last night out in Otago and for a friend's birthday party, before flying home back to Auckland the following morning. Won't be hungover on the flight home though, that would be tragically scary.

Okay, back to studying now.

Seven Year Old Boy Wrecks Havoc at Zoo

News Article Here via BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7649876.stm

What the heck was going through that kid's head? First of all, he killed some rare lizards and threw some over a safety fence to a crocodile to feed on, and then attempted to climb over the fence to get to the crocodile. I could possibly understand the reckless killing spree if I view it from a sociopathic and abnormal psychology perspective, but climbing over a safety fence to meet a crocodile is just plain f***ing stupid and goes against common sense.

Where have I been?!

Woo. Haven't updated this in a very long time, but please forgive me, university and life has been intense for the last month with lots of internal assessments and assignments going on and just today, I finished part 1 of a 45% project for design. It has been hectic but I'm back now. :)

Summer is almost here now, and you know it is when there are random streakers running around from time to time (it's Otago, what else would ya expect?).

University exams are around the corner too. Exams start from the 13th of October, but I start on the 28th, and I end on the 8th of November, on the last day of exams! Arh! It also happens to be NZ election day on the 8th, so I'l have to cast my vote soon after my exam as I'll be leaving back for home soon after that.

The US elections are soon too. Obama v McCain, Biden v Palin. (On a sidenote, Palin is smoking hot VPILF). But if I was a US citizen, who would I vote for? Well..



This is a message we can all believe in. Vote Shatner and Hasselhoff. :)

Well, that is all for now. Will post more when I can :)

Garfield minus Garfield

I've stumbled upon an interesting webcomic - Garfield minus Garfield. This webcomic removes Garfield from select Garfield comic strips, and what results from that is a very twisted story about a guy called Jon who talks to himself a lot. It's very, very interesting and puts a whole new perspective to Garfield.

Here's one:

World Records

After watching Usain Bolt's incredible world-record breaking 100m sprint at the Olympics and Michael Phelps destroying Olympic records, I had a sudden interest in world records. I mentioned in a previous blog entry of sleep deprivation records in excess of 264 hours, and I just felt really interested and incredibly hopeful of setting my own world record, if possible.

My first thought was of the sleep deprivation record, but quickly realising what happened the last time I dismissed the idea. Also, I found the sleep deprivation is reportedly 502 hours and 6 minutes, almost 21 days or 3 weeks without sleep! In addition, the Guinness Book of World Records have "closed [dangerous world record attempts] from further entry as the current holders had performed beyond what are considered safe human tolerance levels". This includes sleep deprivation and alcohol records, but strangely enough, records such as sword swallowing and metal nail consumption are still present. On a side note, some records have been banned on ethical grounds - for example, the "world's heaviest cat" record was banned because stupid cat owners decided to shove their cats with food.

I continued doing further research into world records and found interesting things along the way. There are the typical factual records (such as world's poisonous plant, tallest persons, etc.) but there are some very unusual world records out there. The best unusual records from the list of top 100 greatest Guinness World Records are: most bubbles blown with tarantula in mouth, most cockroaches in a coffin, most watermelons smashed by a head, most bras unhooked in one minute, deepest scuba dive by a dog and my personal favourite, most chain saws juggled.

I also read about Ashrita Furman who reportedly has the record of having the most world records. What is interesting is that he has invented new world records such as most time spent juggling underwater, and "landrowing" records.

Personally, I don't think I can break any current world records, but perhaps I could create a new world record such as "longest distance travelled in pogo stilts" or "most number of boomerangs used while boomerang juggling", or even attempt something as ridiculous as "world's loudest fart". What I do know about breaking a world record though is that if I try to beat the 502 hour sleep deprivation record, I'll end up in a stray jacket at a secluded mental institute.

Insomniacs United!

It's 1:05am on a Tuesday morning, and I've been awake for about 19 hours now. In those last 19 hours, I've been to university, had a group project meeting with my group members, consumed approximately 5000 calories from food (which is 2.5 times my recommended daily intake, plus I was really hungry today), completed most of the drawing work for my current design project, watched "Thank You for Smoking" and "Children of Men", watched some Olympics, and a few countless other things. It's 1:05am on a Tuesday morning and I'm so bored that I actually feel the need to talk about it.

I can tell you right now, if you have nothing to do, insomnia is incredibly boring. What can be worse is that most of the time, you are the only one awake and you have nobody around to talk to, or hang out with. There should definitely be a group, association or organisation for insomniacs - something like "Insomniacs United". I'm aware that it sounds incredibly silly, but if a couple of insomniacs can't sleep and want to be around other non-sleepy people, then they can just txt each other and meet up.

Alternatively, watching a couple of hired movies can solve your boredom. Or if you're too poor to hire any movies, you can try and find them on YouTube. Personally, over the last two nights, I've watched Star Wars Episodes 3 and 4. However, it really sucks watching a movie by yourself. ... I need "Insomniacs United" I tell you!

University Hyperactivity

Two-thirds of my way through my first year of university, and I can already tell you that university is the best thing that has happened to me thus far. I can clearly see why there are perpetual students and why so many people have said it's the best time of their lives. Of course, like everything in life, university has it's ups and downs, its good things and bad things.

The Good Things:
- Independence
- Girls
- Higher learning
- Dormitory living
- Socialising

The Bad Things:
- Exams and the stress it creates
- Assignments and project deadlines will creep up on you easily
- The amount of work you have to do makes you procrastinate even more

What's also annoying is that university related work tends to pile up before the mid-semester break (which is from the 23 August to 31 August). I've got a total of 100% or so due before then, so I'm going to get working hard. Of course, this blog will continue to be updated whenever I get a burst of blogging magic. Don't worry, it appears to be happening a lot lately - I'm posting this at 3:30am on a Monday morning.

Dormitory Living

Dormitory living has it's benefits and its consequences. Mostly, it has benefits. But when you leave your door unlocked and vulnerable to the mischievous intentions of friends, this is what happens.



Thankfully, this was not my room, however, it is my friend's room. :)

O Lady Mondegreen

I discovered another new word today (I'm a bit too easily astounded by weird and interesting sounding words) - this time it's "mondegreen".

According to Wikipedia, "a mondegreen is the mishearing or misinterpretation of a phrase, typically a standardized phrase such as a line in a poem or a lyric in a song, due to near homophony." Basically, you'll hear a phrase or sentence, and you'll misinterpret it as something else rather than the original sentence or saying. For example, Elton John's song "Someone Saved My Life Tonight" can be misheard as "Someone Shaved My Wife Tonight".

The term "mondegreen" was coined by the American writer Sylvia Wright. "Mondegreen" was coined from Wright's misinterpretation of the poem, "The Bonnie Earl O' Murray." It began like this:


Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands,
Oh, where hae ye been?
They hae slain the Earl Amurray,
And Lady Mondegreen.


The actual fourth line is "And laid him on the green."

There's so many mondegreens out there -

For example - take the song "Love Generation" by Bob Sinclair. Here's an excerpt of the lyrics:


Just look to the rainbow you will see,
The sun will shine 'till eternity
I've got so much love in my heart
No one can tear it apart

Feel the love generation
Feel the love generation

Come on, come on, come on


Every time I listen to this song, when "Feel the love generation" is sung, I actually hear "Feel the love little asian". Lots of other people can hear that too. And I'm going to be honest, when this song was a big hit, I got a lot of random hugs, and I had absolutely no idea what was going on until someone pointed it out to me. Up until that point, I was thinking that everyone thought I had cancer or something and I didn't know about it!

If you've never heard this song before, or you just want to confirm my misinterpretation for laughs, you can listen and watch the music video to "Love Generation" here via YouTube.

Now, if anyone actually reads this blog, feel free to share your "mondegreens" by posting comments. :)

Storm Tree Revisited - 4x4

Most of you may have seen the news a while ago about a Nelson man's narrow escape from a falling tree, and the amateur footage of the drama.

Now, an Auckland advertising agency working for Jeep has created a digitally altered video for the United States vehicle brand.