Got this from a forwarded email. Thought it was quite cute. 
Boss Reaction During Recession
In the beginning…
Boss: Be good, you will be fine.
After a week…
Must Work Hard k?
After a month…
Must Work Hard for “Lim Peh” you know!
After a Quarter…
Can you hear me? You must work hard!!!
The blurb for this drink says:
“Egg Nog Desire
Inhale the aroma of traditional Egg Nog with a unique remix of liqueur coffee. tcc’s special creation just for you!”
I’m trying out this drink at tcc (The Coffee Connoisseur? TOP Coffee Connoisseur? Tantalising Caffeine Concoctions?) Suntec City right now. Don’t you think it looks pretty nice?
The coffee is good. The warm liqueur taste is quite strong, while the bitterness of the coffee is complemented by the sweetness of the chocolate rice. Mix that with eggnog, made of milk, cream, sugar, beaten eggs, and you get the perfect drink for the festive season.
A single-shot goes for $13.80++, while a double-shot one (pictured above) goes for another $1.20.
Ever wanted to irritate the hell out of people you are supposed to send an email to?
Simple.
Just write a simple email, attach a document, and send.
And then, realize that you made a typo error, change that error, and send again.
Then, discover that you shouldn’t put the words “Thank you.” on a line on its own, fix it, and then send again.
Go to your office, and well, just to be sure, send the email again.
And then be wary that the email system may have gobbled up your email, and send again.
Then make sure the email system really gives you an error (even though the email is already sent), and send again.
While you’re at it, let’s send the email one more time.
(Click for a larger view)
Irritating… BTW, this is the second time it happened.
Time dilation is a phenomenon where an observer feels that another clock ticks at a slower rate compared to their own clock.
According to Einstein’s theory of relativity, clocks that are moving relative to an inertial system of observation are measured to be running slower. To put it in other words, a clock on a moving object seems to be running slower than one on a stationary object. The dilation is related to the speed, in that the faster the object moves, the slower the clock is.
One popular manifestation of this effect is in the story where one side of a pair of twins go on a journey on a space craft. The other twin, on the other hand, stays on earth. Ten years later on earth, the adjourning twin returns to earth. Although the twin that stays on earth has aged 10 years, the one that went on the space journey has barely aged one year.
Those who know the story of Planet of the Apes may find this phenomenon familiar. In the novel, the protagonist travels a few centuries into the future while on a space ship. From his point of view, he feels as if he is away only for several years on the space ship.
This phenomenon can probably be exploited in other ways. Remember that time dilation states that as you move faster, your clock will seem to move slower to others.
This brings a solution to a problem where an office worker feels bored while in the office, and is waiting for end of office hours to come. All he needs to do is to move as fast as possible, and the one minute that he feels may be ten minutes as felt by others (who for the sake of argument are assumed to be stationary here). From his point of view, he only needs to wait for one minute instead of ten. This brings a brilliant solution, one that will put an end to all office boredom.
The only problem he has to solve now is to figure out how he can move at such a speed (close to the speed of light), while at the same time staying intact and not broken up as he moves through air (and other objects).
I first heard of Olivia Ong on DK’s blog back in March. I dismissed Olivia Ong as just another Singaporean artist.
That was until one fine day when I was doing my final year project (FYP), I was bored and started looking for songs to accompany me all the way through the night. I immediately got hooked to two of her songs: Make It Mutual and Make It Together.
There was something about her voice that is pretty much addictive, not to mention that she is pretty too. For days on end, I would repeat the two songs over and over again, even with the sucky sound quality. In fact, it was exactly the two songs that I put on repeat as I was finalizing my FYP report and paper. On hindsight, I probably should have mentioned her name in the acknowledgments section of the report.
Since then, I’ve been listening to Olivia’s songs on IMEEM (hey, I didn’t have so much money to spend on actual CDs as a student 
). It didn’t matter that many of her songs on IMEEM were just one-minute samples. I even bookmarked two of her playlists as favourites, and I would play the two playlists (again on repeat) as I completed my FYP.
Many months passed and I started working. Gradually, I stopped listening to her songs.
Another fine day, Daphne SMSed me to tell me that she got hold of Olivia’s album entitled Best of Olivia Ong. Old flames flared again I screamed (in the SMS) in jealousy, and being nice, she shared the album later. 
I got hooked all over again, and a couple of weeks later when I got my pay, I rewarded myself with another album: precious stones (yup it’s all in lowercase). I wasn’t exaggerating when I said that for at least the next one month, my playlist at work consisted of the songs from the two albums (I seem to have a thing with the number two and Olivia Ong), and nothing else.
Here’s another song from precious stones that I’ve been, and still am hooked to now.
Hooked,
hendri
If you watched WALL-E, did you remember the scene where Eve and WALL-E were dancing around in space, and then enter the spaceship through a door which shut, leaving the welder robot outside?
Here’s a story about that welder robot, called BURN-E (Basic Utility Repair Nano Engineer). If you like WALL-E, you’re definitely going to like the short (just 07:35 in length) movie.
Let’s have a quick look at my spending on dining out the past week:
| 7 Dec | Beef hor fun at Geylang after the Slingers game | $9 |
| 8 Dec | Pastamania and tcc after Bloggers’ Calendar photoshoot | $18.20 |
| 9 Dec | KFC for dinner with Theresia, Melda and Wahyu | $8.80 |
| 10 Dec | Mad Pizza for dinner with Sylv | $17.70 |
| 11 Dec | Subway for dinner | $9 |
| 12 Dec | Ajisen for team member farewell lunch | $16.15 |
| 13 Dec | Ayam penyet for Jenny’s farewell lunch | $12 |
| 13 Dec | Ichiban Boshi for dinner with Theresia, Daphne and Darran | $11.60 |
Total damage: $102.45.
No wonder I feel like I’m 5 months pregnant, on top of being so broke now. Got to eat less good food from now on till the next pay day!
The good news is, the next pay day is also bonus pay day. Yay!
5-month pregnant,
hendri
I’m sure that most of us are familiar with the company called Sony. Over the years, Sony has come up with various consumer products.
For some products, they have been so successful that people will know what the product is upon hearing the name, such as Discman, Walkman, or Cyber-shot. Others have names which are more… unique, such as the robot dog AIBO (which means “Love No” in a combination of Mandarin and Hokkien is homonymous with the word “pal” in Japanese), or the TV BRAVIA (where is the bra and where is the way? an acronym of “Best Resolution Audio Visual Integrated Architecture”).
But have you heard of another two, more obscure products such as PaSoRi and FeliCa?
The PaSoRi is a contactless card reader that you can use to read smart cards, such as the EZ-Link card. Supposedly, the user will be able to make payments online using their EZ-Link card, and top up their EZ-Link cards online.
How about the other product, FeliCa?
Here’s a hint: Most studying and working Singaporeans use it on a daily basis.
Need another hint? Here’s how FeliCa looks like:
And here’s another look at it:
Yup, FeliCa is a contactless RFID smart card, primarily for money cards. The name is a short form for Felicity Card. EZ-Link is just one of the many implementations of FeliCa. FeliCa is also used in the transport systems in Hong Kong, China, UAE, Netherlands, India, Thailand, USA, and Japan.
Pa, sorry,
hendri
Colleague: Hey Hendri, how was your weekend?
Me: It was great!
C: Cool, what did you do?
M: Nothing!
Friend: You know, I really thought that Singapore Flyer was close to the Esplanade and the Kamasutra* place!
Friend: So what sort of thing do you do in your current company?
Me: I’m doing a lot of low-level programming…
Friend: Eh, but programming is not a low level work!
* A note for non-Singaporean readers: This is what my friend was actually referring to.
There is something different about today.
I woke up happy, and I jumped to my feet and went to shower as if I was really looking forward to work. I put on my best T-shirt and jeans. Fridays are dress-down day, so there was no need to wear anything to work formal shirt and pants.
Everything seemed beautiful. When I walked out of the house and entered the lift, I smiled to the neighbour who was in the same lift. I got out of the lift with the sound of the birds singing in the trees. The air was fresh, and the weather was perfect.
When I went to KFC and had the most expensive breakfast ever, I didn’t feel guilty at all. And when I walked to the bus stop to embark on the 40-minute journey I take everyday, I felt like there is spring in my feet.
There is definitely something different about today.
Maybe, it’s the one-day leave that I took on Thursday.
Or perhaps, it’s the good deed I performed; helping out my friend with her tuition grant arrangement.
But most likely, it’s the sound of ka-ching in my bank account.
Happy because it’s pay day,
hendri
Edit: “This entry was posted on November 21, 2008 at 10:59 am and is filed under life and work.” Now who said life and work can’t go together?
