First if you could recollect just some time ago when the Government increased the petrol prices, via reducing the subsidies, tell presented it to you as a cost saving move that will generate saving. Savings that will go back to us rakyat in various suggested methods!

Now fast forward to the present. All the so called ‘savings’ are more than just practically wiped out!

Yes the government passed the buck to us rakyat with empty promises – then conveniently sold us down the river with the various public funds wastages, bailouts and oh my personal favourite good old corruption!

First there was …

Case 1
We all know the biggest bailout case of the year, the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal will will be costing us RM4.6 billion!

and then there was…

Case2
The ballooned budget for the Youth and Sports Ministry, for the IKBN project,  from the original estimated price tag of RM399.67mil way, way  up to RM767.98mil in the end.

So the normal Malaysian public would normally not bother twice when the allocation increases. Heck some would probably say it’s for our own benefit….!

But what really eats at me is that the increase in expenditure was done in order to facilitate the following purchasing:

1.  RM 224 for 4 set screwdrivers when the going market price is RM 40 – A price difference of more than 5 times!
2. RM10,700 for a 10 title technical books series – must be one hell of damn good book series.
3. RM8,254 for a 3.1 megapixel digital camera – wow does it come with x-ray vision features or something?

I’m no expert at economics, nor can I claim to have a good understanding of how it all fits together and how the above 2 cases will affect the economy and in turn us rakyat! But it’s obviously a no brainner for me – a simple Joe Public – to say that this is in no way at all good for the country.

And at the end of the day all the hard work of yours that gets contributed to the government coffers in term of taxation – all of it is NOT coming back to you. Zero, Zilch, Nadd, …, absolutely nothing!

Forget the promises of the government, they blew it big time and this is not the first time too (ala Britney Spears’s ‘Opps I did It Again’).

What is a undeniable fact is this – As usual it is we the rakyat who will be footing the bill!

Thats what you end up with when you actually succumb to and given in to sit down and watch the Merdeka Eve celebrations. You naively assume that this Merdeka you should at least make an attempt to watch the live telecast of the Merdeka Eve celebration held a the Dataran Merdeka. And if all you’ve got on hand is local television channels – then thats all you more or less can expect to watch.

So to the root of my frustration.

First there was this one hosts of the 8TV Quickie, Belinda Chee is the name I googled up, who by the end of the night was way up there on the extremely annoying TV host list. She may have started off OK in the begining but as the time approached midnight she totally went overboard with her annoying antics. She was clearly over-hyped and she kept cutting in on the other hosts while the they were still talking. One would think she wanted to be the only one to talk! Looking past the reason that this is the first time she doing a Merdeka Eve live hosting, which she stated quite a few time, I found her overall effect to be JUST TOO ANNOYING.

Then to put the proverbial icing on the cake, when all is said and done as the Merdeka chant and the national anthem ‘Negaraku’ had been sung – instead of lighting up the heavens with the promised and much tauted fireworks and laser display INSTEAD we get to suffer through not only a boring speech by Mr. Rais but also through the propoganda and much politic-laden speech by Mr. Badawi. And a long, long , long speech it most certainly was. The premier also saw fit to lecture us on matters past, present and future all the while insinuating blatantly that there couldn’t be anything without BN! I think not Mr. Prime Minister but I do thank you most sincerely for further ruining my night!

And then after all that suffering what do I get for my troubles…. not a single sight of any firework nor any laser display. Yup the local TV stations screwed me real good on this one.

However as a concession 8TV – who was the only English channel that was showcasing the event – overall, with the one exception in the form of Belinda Chee, were in great form.

For an easier time reading the document, this is the translation:

” I work for you. You’re paranoid.

You want me to update a document, but you’re terrified I will “steal” the information in that document somehow.

You secured your data against someone copying the contents. You don’t want it printed, so you’ve taken away my printer.

You’ve disabled the CD-Writer and the Floppy Disk drive.

You block USB pen-drives from being installed.

I’ve just taken a photograph of my screen, with your secret document open on the desktop.

Your move. “

Chuckles!!! This sums up the ever present threat from a security point of view.

For now interested players can sign up for an account and experience a 7 day free trial before they will be prompted to choose to continue playing (of course after payment).

Head up though, the article at Kotaku quotes the press statement stating:

” Turbine, Inc. has launched the official 7-day free trial of The Lord of the Rings Online(TM): Shadows of Angmar(TM) (LOTRO). Beginning today, fans in North America, Australia, and New Zealand can play the best online game for free by visiting http://trial.lotro.com. “

So interested players not in North America, Australia, and New Zealand will have to test the waters first to see if they can get in of the free trials.

Covers Art , front and back, of Lord Of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar :

(front)

(back)

Remember, all it takes is for ‘1 ring to rule them all‘!

. . .

. . .

Leave to to McFarlane (of Spawn fame) to take a once seemingly classic story and re-conceptualize it into his own version of of the story.

The Armchair Empire dubs it as ‘The Twisted Land of Oz‘, and I quote:

In McFarlane’s version, Dorothy is the innocent school girl with a not-so-innocent Victorian bondage fetish. In a cool addition, McFarlane has included a six-part story on the card back of each figure. It’s not until the last “Chapter” — included with the Wizard — that any of the figures make sense. The first part of the story gives a quick snippet into Dorothy’s persona as it might exist in 2003, and not the Dustbowl of 1930’s Kansas.

I admit, from my oh so very little knowledge of McFarlane’s genius, that as far as initial reactions go most people, myself included, might find this adaption to be offensive. Just imagine one of our childhood stories made into this:

However, when taken with a pinch of salt, you do have to admit from a certain artistic point of view, again my own opinion, this adaption is indeed quite well executed – if a bit on the scary/bondage side of things. Yes folks, Dorothy and the entire series is definitely not for the squeamish nor the easily offended, but it does highlight the genius and creativity that has been the driving success behind Spawn

What’s the angle? Why Fame and Fortune baby, Fame (i.e great marketing for the show & the DJ’s) and Fortune (i.e. the chance at RM 50,000)! Nuff Said!

Anyhow I heard about this gal called Ivory who’s a participant and she has put up a blog – aptly named ‘Living with Ika, Serena C and Pietro‘ – to chronicle her journey to a possible RM 50,000 cash prize.

This is a very smart move if I may say so myself. A quick glance at her blog show a daily update on her activities with the promotion of the standup at various locations. And boy has this gal been active. I just gotta wonder where she finds time to go about everywhere. Then again RM 50,000 is quite a strong incentive so to say.

Thus far Ivory has made appearance at the Twin Towers, 1Utama, Batu Caves and various other major landmarks in the KL area. Whats more it now seems that she will be taking a trip to Down Under Australia and surprise, surprise (imagine Gomer Pile) the cardboard standup gets to go along – envying a cardboard is so unbecoming, sighhh.

So to Ivory, I sincerely wish you all the best of luck and hope you continue to have as much fun as possible whilst in the contest.

For more fun updates on contestants, do tune in to the Mix.fm Morning Show from 6am-10am and catch the entertaining trio of Ika, Serena C & Pietro doing that things they do oh so well. And since I’m on the subject just a little shoutout:

“Serena you so fine girl, mmmhhhh…..”

and ….

“Pietro, I comiserate with your hardship and sincerely appreciate your standing up for us guys”

One long time dream for the Star Wars most definitely has to be for a real space mission incorporating some ‘aspect‘ of Star Wars. Though actually putting a Star Wars character up in real space, might still be a little bit too much to ask, it would seem that sending up the original Luke Skywalker original Jedi Lightsaber is now a reality.

That’s right you Star Wars fans, old Luke’s saber will be going up to space for a 6 million mile trip to the International Space Station before it’s return trip to Earth. According to StarWarsBlog:

Luke Skywalker’s original Jedi lightsaber makes its way into space (for real) with NASA astronauts on the space shuttle Discovery in October. To commemorate the historic event, Star Wars characters visited the Oakland International Airport where Chewbacca handed the lightsaber over to NASA’s Space Center Houston during a special ceremony on Aug. 28, 2007.

Check out the blog for more details and head on to the Official Star Wars Flicker Blog for pictures galore.

My favourite picture is the one with the 2 Stormtroopers have a ride on the golf-cart-thing-a-magi. Guess their ‘Speeder Bikes’ must be in the Imperial garage for the annual maintainance.

But better still is that via a lookup on Project Aon – a fan group on the Lone Wolf series, I am now finally able to continue reading this great series.

The good people at Project Aon, with the blessing of Joe Dever, the author, and other principle parties have made available online an extensive lineup of the Lone Wolf series.

According to the FAQ, the book in the series that are published online are as listed below:

• Kai series (Lone Wolf books 1-5)
• Magnakai series (Lone Wolf books 6-12)
• Grand Master series (unabridged, Lone Wolf books 13-20)
• New Order series (Lone Wolf books 21-28)
• World of Lone Wolf (Grey Star) series
• The Magnamund Companion
• The Skull of Agarash graphic novel
• The Lone Wolf Poster Painting Book
• The Lone Wolf Club Newsletters
• Freeway Warrior series
• Combat Heroes series

whilst the following will not be published:

• Legends of Lone Wolf series

Me being the consummate fan that was ever denied access to the complete series after Book , this find has been a culmination of 12 years of patience and waiting. Now as I finally have access to the series proper, I can once again make the journey with Lone Wolf and maybe recapture some of the memories of my childhood.

I’m off to explore these great blessings and start myself once more on the path of the Lone Wolf.

So what’s new in my previously peaceful life?

Well my housemates and I are helping out a friend to doggy-sit her two little dogs for the week while she’s away on vacation. These two are absolutely super cute and a thrill to play with. I can’t recall their breeds, the both of them are mixed breed, but they go by the names of Rika & Ruby. Pictures will be forthcoming.

Unfortunately when playtime is over these little doggies then tun out to be a bloody nightmare. One I have nicknamed as ‘The Yapper‘ – since she can’t for the love of god shut-the-hell-up. Seriously! Whether it’s early in the morning or late in the night and I mean late in the night she still continues to bark. Seriously!

The other cute little beast, after yesterday’s fiasco, I now refer to as ‘The Pooper‘. I am astounded that such a small dog as her can produce such a super-dupe-toxic-waste level doggie poop. I’m talking about dog poop that’s sure to win worst smelling poop of the year hands down – that kinda poop!

3 days down, 4 more to go… sighhhh

The next major distraction is due to a botched attempt of experiencing the joy’s of Halo 2 the PC version of the best selling XBox console game. Of course since the PC version is not out yet, I somehow stumbled upon and conveniently mistook a PC-console emulation of the game for the real and that unfortunately was flawed. Still I managed to experience 3 levels of the game before the troubles started appearing and before long brought me to a complete stop in my enjoyment.

From my brief flirtation with the game here is what I have summarized:

1. Halo 2 rocks!
2. My graphics card, a GeForce 5700 – somewhat of a relic and wont cut it for Halo 2. Time to upgrade.
3. I’m suffering from console addiction.
4. Due to the addition I’m deliberating on the possibilities of getting an XBox. My fellow console fan is however tempting me with the possibilities of the PS3 instead.
5. I’m not rich enough to be able to afford the price of a console! Sighhhhh

And lastly …

Moving on to more ominous matters, 3 days on from Merdeka (Independence Day) I am astounded to hear our country’s No 1, Mr Badawi, proclaim that Malaysia is not a secular state, as provided in our constitution, but an Islamic state.

Talk about a slap in the face!