It's a Quiet Sunday

It was AMK as usual on Saturday. There weren't much to do; no one wanted to draft or hold a little tourney or anything. I had dinner at Pizza Hut with the rest since it has been a while since we had a good meal.

At night, my Starhub MaxOnline went crazy and it was so laggy that IE won't load any pages. I vaguely remembered experiencing such a thing last weekend, too. I wonder if all Starhub users run into this sort of thing on busy Saturday nights. Fortunately, I still had my SingNet to tide me over or else I would have melted.

I had just bought Metal Gear Acid 2 to play on my PSP. I hope it will be able to keep me occupied for the upcoming week. I had been playing MGA1 (rented) and got hooked by its highly intriguing story and refreshing gameplay. I made it a point to finish it first before opening MGA2. And so, I spent most of Sunday playing my PSP, surfing the net and downloading comics. I also managed to catch the Bourne Identity on TV. I am glad I watched it; it was very interesting and I was glued to the TV instead of my laptop monitor.

I Didn't Realize it's Thursday Already

This week has passed by pretty quickly because I have been busy at work and going home at the 'normal' time of 5-6 pm. Once I get home, I do my usual net-surfing and playing videogames.

Benedict actually called me out for dinner today while I was at work. He wanted to eat at Kuishimbo at Suntec. I turned him down when he said that it costed $35 per person (it's way over my usual budget). Now I kinda regret it as I realized I have not had a big meal for quite a while. Oh, well. I ordered pizza at night.

I recently realized that there is now a 7-Eleven at Pasir Ris MRT conveniently located on the way to the bus interchange. This is great. Now I can buy snacks & junk food on my way home.

Monday Blues

*Sigh* MSN is down for me at the moment. Even Web Messenger doesn't work. I checked the HWZ forums and it seems that it cannot work for a lot of people, too. I was so bored that I created a new MSN account to try out and strangely, I was able to log it on that. I guess the problem lies with the user IDs.

Monday is the start of a new week and marks the beginning of a new school life for most of our poly friends. hehe. I wonder how are Maggie, Mango and Darius doing.

Today, Benedict accompanied me to work since he had a talk with my mother the day before. He is also job-hunting and thought my mother might have something for him to do. I think he was quite excited at first but I think he ended up quite disappointed. I told him that people should not have high expectations for my mother; if she could offer good jobs in the first place, then I wouldn't need to keep going for job interviews. hehe. Anyway, my boss, Sunny, seemed to have fired his office boy/mechanic person. Maybe I can try to 'upgrade' my position.

I spent the rest of my day at home playing games and surfing the net as usual. Chris has flown off to Japan with Michael. I had wanted to go but after much consideration, I realize that I have not many things to buy there to make my trip worth it. Chris was quite unlucky cos' on the day before his flight, his store was broken into. The thieves mainly took away his PSP sets, games and accessories. I feel that it is quite sickening that people would rob a videogame shop but I guess gaming is quite a big thing now. I hope the thieves will get caught even though chances are low (local police are just too lazy).

A Day Out in Town

I had an unsuccessful job interview on Thursday. I wanted to apply to be an admin assistant at Prudential but the manager said that I was over-qualified and they mainly wanted females. She then offered me a post as a financial advisor but I felt that I wasn't the persuasive or outgoing sort and turned her down. It looks like I will be sticking with my current job a while longer.

Anyway, I am very grateful to Nash for helping me to set up the interview. Before that, we had dinner at Amara with his girlfriend, Rena, and her colleague, Sarah. They are all such fun-loving people. I wish to thank them very much for their help and for spending the day with me.

After I left Tanjong Pagar, I was planning to go home but I dropped by at Bugis to see if anyone was there. I played a bit in the arcade and had dinner at Yoshinoya. I bought some Corochan Corokke before I left. When I reached Pasir Ris MRT station, I saw a lot of people in army uniform and thought I might see Akira. But it seems that he was still in camp. Too bad cos' I thought I could offer to share one of my corokke with him.

Small Small World

Recently, I got to know some DS online gamers from the Hardware Zone forum. I added two of them to my MSN. Strangely, one of them had a photo as his potrait and I saw Miya in it! I was quite surprised but on closer examination, I found his Hotmail ID quite familiar ('nash'). I asked Miya about it and realized that the person was who I thought he was. It was Nash, one of Miya's friends whom I have met at Chriz's shop several times before. Since then, we have been chatting on MSN and playing Bleach DS online on a regular basis.

I am also quite glad that my wireless has been working fine though I still get paranoid whenever there are hiccups in my net-surfing. Anyway, with everything going pretty smoothly recently, I decided that I may want to concentrate on improving other aspects of my life. One is to try and clean up my room and get some new furniture, and the other is to probably find another job. I have been with my current job for three months and I am quite pleased with it but it is really slack and I don't like idling at home with nothing to do. Maybe it is time to get a real full-time job.

VS PCQ - April 2006 (Marvel Modern)

I arrived at Suntec on the dot at 12:55 pm today. There was only five minutes left to registration but I felt lazy to join since I have not written my decklist. Danny told me that I could play the first round and be granted some time to write my decklist later but I felt lazy. Besides, I didn't have much confidence with my Hellfire Club deck. CKTeacher and Jess were both in Sealed. Most of the rest played in the Modern Age Constructed.

Here is the breakdown for 26 Constructed players:
10 Squadron Supreme, 4 X-Mental, 3 Avengers Reservist, 3 Brotherhood Reservist
2 X-Faces, 2 Hellfire Club, 1 Morlocks, 1 Thunderbolts/Avengers

From the sheer number of Squadron decks, I feel that if I had joined the PCQ, I would be in for a really rough time. I went around to check out the different matches; I was mainly interested to see how Hellfire Club was doing and I was quite sad that they all lost their games against Squadron (strangely, they both managed to top-8).

There was one particular match (Morlocks vs. Hellfire Club) that was very intense. It was turn 7 and the Hellfire Club player had stolen the initiative with Power Play. He had his early drops plus Sebastian Shaw, Donald Pierce and a sick-looking Shinobi Shaw with 6 tokens that garnered a lot of attention. The Morlocks player, Michael Chew, had Storm, Marrow & Callisto plus 4 other weenies. Anyway, Chew managed to stun-back Shinobi Shadow with a Shrapnel Blast, Sebastian Shaw with Retribution and eventually held back Donald Pierce with a Good Samaritan recovering Callisto. Everyone applauded at the remarkable turnabout when the match was over.

All our friends were doing well (JingYong, Himura, Edward) with their early wins and it looked like they would be in the finals. It was real nice to see everyone make it in.

The top 8 consisted of the following matches and results:
- Squadron (Jingyong) def. Avengers Reservist (Edward)
- Hellfire Club (Yuan Grey) def. Morlocks (Michael Chew)
- Squadron (CCK guy) def. X-Mental (Yap JY)
- Squadron (Himura) def. Hellfire Club (Friend of the Hokuto no Ken player)

The top 4 are the players to the left (def. means defeated by the way). Edward, Himura & his CCK friend (all 3 Squadron players) wanted to negotiate for a prize split with Grey and he refused (much to everyone's amazement). Needless to say, the Hellfire Club deck had a extremely very difficult time against Squadron and lost. The finalists then split prizes after that. I kinda wished I joined today to support the Hellfire Club.

Remodeling

Yesterday, I went to have steamboat with Darrell and the rest at Bugis. I was quite surprised when he called me in the early afternoon while I was at work. I seldom eat Chinese food; it's nothing bad but it is what I eat every day at home. Overall, it was quite a fun gathering since it is a change from my usual eating habits.

The Starhub people came to install cable points for the TV in my home today. There was a slight problem that made things almost a repeat of Tuesday. I threw a tantrum after they left. Childish, I know, but if you have gotten something that you've been wanting very badly for six months and see a threat that it might be taken away, then you'd be like that, too. Thankfully, everything was fine after they left. I now have a workable TV in my room.

It feels almost as if my room is being remodeled. After the wireless and TV, all that's left to solve is the leaky airconditioner (I hate the buckets in my room) and changing the age-old furniture (I have outgrown my bed ages ago). Time to toss out the junk one of these days when I am free.

Starhub MaxOnline at Last!

Today was the big day. The Starhub person came to install my wireless for me. He recommended placing the router in the living room since it was the only available cable point in the house. He had to disconnect some power unit in order to make way for the router so it looks like there will only be one workable TV in the house for the next few days (all but one of our TV points were damaged by retarded contractors a few years back). My Mum was advised to make arrangements for Starhub contractors to install more cable points. In the meantime, we can only watch TV in the living room.

After he plugged in the modem/router and turned them on, he told me that the wireless was ready to be used. That was easier than I thought. I got very excited and immediately tried out my DS/PSP. I was very delighted that they were both able to connect to my wireless! But a few minutes later, I was horrified when my DS/PSP weren't able to connect anymore. The guy had been in my brother's room configuring his laptop for the wireless network. I got a little panicky and asked (make that begged) him to undo whatever he just did. He refused and we argued for a while. He insisted that he did nothing wrong and it was I who did not know how to configure my DS/PSP. He also added that all those were none of Starhub's concern. I got angry and told him off, saying that my portables were THE reason for my signing with Starhub and I very well knew how to configure them. Stupid stuck-up technician/engineer; just because they graduated with some diploma/degree, they think all their customers are retards. Anyway, I just tried it one more time and all of a sudden, it worked again; I guess it took some time for the changes he made to refresh for the DS/PSP to detect. After that, I just sent him off; at least I was sporting and shook his hand. I don't care who was wrong; I just didn't like his attitude.

After the guy left, I went to check out my brother's laptop. It has some little problems (the kind that would make me cry if I had to solve them myself) but heck, he is happy with being able to surf and that is all I needed to know. I tried to connect my laptop to my MaxOnline and I was surprised how easy it was. I decided that I would try MaxOnline for a few months or so, and if everything works fine, I'll just cancel my SingNet plan.

I spent the rest of the day surfing the net and trying out all my DS/PSP games online (or you could say I was forced to because I cannot watch TV in my room anymore). It was a lot of fun, though I was still recovering from being all panicky and tense for the past few days. I even got a chance to play Untold Legends II with Orchi at night for an hour. I am still quite amazed that I finally have my own wireless at home; it's really a dream come true. Now I hope everything will be fine and nothing bad happens to me and my new-found happiness.

Worried about Wireless

I have been staying home and playing my PSP all week. My birthday was on Friday but I didn't have any plans to celebrate it this year. Perhaps I shall have a proper meal next time to make up for it.

At long last, I will finally be getting my Starhub MaxOnline wireless on Tuesday. I have also picked a new laptop for my brother. I am actually both excited and terrified about it. So far, I have had a very unlucky streak with computers. God knows how much tears I have shed worrying over all the computers that I have touched. I fear that something will go wrong on Tuesday. So far, all the things that have gone wrong with my computers are just plain ridiculous so I have learnt to expect the unexpected.

But if all else goes well, I can play all my portable gaming systems without any complaints and I'll be a very happy man.

Untold Legends: The Warrior's Code (PSP)

I recently bought Untold Legend: The Warrior's Code for my PSP. I like dungeon RPGs. Sure they are very repetitive but I love character-building and mindless hack-and-slash fun.

I understand that the first UL was quite disappointing. I never played it but the sequel supposedly corrected most of its flaws and the game is vastly improved overall. It's still a very standard dungeon-crawling game but I found myself addicted. I have been playing it non-stop since I got it on Monday and today, I restarted my character after much experimenting. I hope more people play the game. I am playing as a Mercenary (normally I'd play the male melee class but the Mercenary looks hot).

I still remember the first UL during the early days of the PSP's release. A lot of PSP owners looked forward to it. A few people, including Michael, showed up at FunZ on its release date to pick it up. I was almost tempted to get a PSP for it. Anyway, I am one year late but I bought my PSP just in time for its sequel.

I have started quite a discussion about the game at the FunZ Centre forum. Drop by if you'd like to talk about the game.

Annual IPPT Again

Grr, Sunday is the day of my annual IPPT. Every year, I will always make it a habit to complain about it. I will always be thinking how I can attend it but not do anything (so far, I haven't been brave enough to do so). For me, it is a waste of time and I spend two hours losing face.

Anyway, I am no longer under the protection of NUS, so it means that I will have to go for Remedial Training when I fail my IPPT this year. It is going to be torturous. I still remember 5 years ago when I accidentally attended an RT session without knowing that I didn't have to (after that, I went to defer). RT is a nightmarish 3-times-a-week affair lasting 4-hours each and it takes place after office hours (like 7 pm to 11 pm) to accomodate working people. And all the army camps in Singapore are so far from the residential districts...

On Sunday, I am just going to go to SAFRA and tolerate the few hours. Then I am going to enjoy myself until I am called up for RT.

Metroid DS Dizziness

I bought Metroid Prime: Hunters for DS recently. It's a first person shooting game that utilizes the touchscreen like a mouse for aiming. It's an excellent game which reminds me of Quake. The strange thing was that I felt a bit giddy & nauseous after playing the game for several hours straight. This has never happened before when I played FPS on a console/PC! I guess it is probably due to more concentration needed to focus on a smaller screen.

Anyway, I actually wasn't planning on getting this game cos' I knew its awesome online multiplayer would only make me depressed. I guess if there was a time I really needed wireless at home, that time would be now. *goes to read up about Starhub MaxOnline*