Nov 30, 2010

Baby, I'm back.

Nov 4, 2010

Are you in debt?


Before you go thinking that this is another whinge about my student loan, it's not. I've been feeling less than energetic over the past few days and decided to do some research on 'sleep debt'. Apparently if you sleep less than 8 hours in one night, you will start to accumulate 'sleep debt' which will continue to have an effect on you until you pay back your debt by sleeping for longer than 8 hours in a night, but you can only pay back 1-2 hours at a time. One website I was on said that you can be in debt by a maximum of up to 20 hours and an all-nighter can quickly put you in debt of 8 hours.

For me, an all-nighter is just about every Saturday night and there's no way that I sleep for 9+ hours during the week to pay back my sleepless weekend. This must mean that I am perpetually in debt when it comes to sleep.

To me, the science behind this is a bit odd, because I know for a fact that the most restful sleep occurs during REM, and sleeping for longer doesn't necessarily increase the amount of REM you experience - for example, look up polyphasic sleeping. As for sleeping longer to pay off sleep debt, I've personally found that I feel more tired after oversleeping.

What do you think?

Nov 3, 2010

Oh the irony! Marion Cotillard's new boobs.

Looks like Hollywood has already started to rub off on French actress, Marion Cotillard, who's been recently been spotted looking a cup size or two larger.

A bit ironic considering that she recently featured in a Funny or Die skit about wearing fake boobs on your forehead to attract men's attention to your face rather than your chest.



Before anyone here thinks I'm considering breast implants - I'm not. I've been a C since the age of 14 and wouldn't want to go any larger or smaller. I'm just interested in what drives women to the point of stuffing their chests with crap to make their boobs look bigger.

Nov 2, 2010

Goddamn HECS Debt

So the Australian Government has this system called HECS, under which the Government pays 'part or all' (though very rarely 'all') of your University fees to your University. Once your income reaches the Australian Taxation Office's minimum threshold, you are required to start repaying your student loan.

Australian University students currently owe well over $10 billion under the HECS loan scheme, with the average student being in debt of around $12,000 to $14,000. Apparently one third of these students will not end up paying back their HECS debt in their lifetime.

I'm currently working at paying off a student loan for my Arts / Law degree of some $36,000. According to the Government, you don't pay interest on the loan, which is partially bullshit because they increase the student loan by CPI (inflation) each year. Yes, the Government does subsidise some of your University fees through this student loan scheme, but the amount is bugger all for many degrees. For example, Law students get less than 20% subsidy, while Medicine students get around 70%.

Apparently there were talks about allowing students to reduce their HECS debt by $10 for every hour of recognised community service work they do. Oh well, I guess picking beer cans off a beach somewhere for 10 bucks an hour beats slaving my arse off working under a sleazy barrister on a similar hourly rate of pay to repay my goddamn student loan. End rant.

Nov 1, 2010

My laser eye surgery dilemma.

When I was around 13 or 14 years old, my optometrist, for whatever reason, prescribed me glasses for my -0.5, -0.75 eyes. They were cute little acetate frames that gave off a geeky vibe. As the die-hard indie rocker that I was at the time, I loved them because they made me look hip and alternative. In my later teenage years I found myself participating in more and more activities which didn't particularly favour spectacle wearers, including swimming, hockey and volleyball. Nowadays I barely find myself wearing my expensive designer frames, even though guys often tell me that I look sexier in specs. Ugh, fetishists.

Now onto my laser eye surgery dilemma. My prescription is still more or less the same as it was when I was 14 years old. While I can see and drive just fine without glasses, the fact that I am not seeing the world in the clarity that I should be annoys me. Over the past few weeks I have been shopping around LASIK surgeons. It will cost me anywhere between $1,000 to $1,500 Australian dollars per eye. They assured me that the risks with LASIK are minimal, but I will experience dryness for quite some time afterwards. So what do you think? Is it worth the risk and temporary discomfort or should I continue putting up with seeing the world through a slightly vaseline-smeared lens?

Minecraft Halloween Costumes

Some evil genius thought it would be a good idea to dress up as Minecraft characters for Halloween. The result? Epic win.

Oct 27, 2010

Blake Lively's breast implants exposed

Sad but true, Blake Lively has breast implants. In the image to the right, you can clearly see her breast implant scar under her right breast. My guess is silicone under the muscle.

I always suspected that her perfectly perky breasts were fake as they seem to sit a little too high on her chest. Looks like a rhinoplasty, chin implant and breast implants are the way to go for young women looking to get ahead in Upper East Side Manhattan.

Blake Lively plays Serena Van Der Woodsen in the CW's Gossip Girl.

AI chat bot 'Suzette' wins the Loebner prize

So, just yesterday Bruce Wilcox's chatbot called 'Suzette' passed the Turing Test and fooled one judge into thinking it was human after a 25 minute textual chat session. You can click here to speak with Suzette yourself. I intend to run an Arnie soundboard or two past her to see how she'll respond.

Oh memories of using the ALICE chatbot plugin to troll my MSN / IRC / Trillian contacts...

D-1 グランプリ - Japanese Spa Prank


Probably my favourite Japanese prank of all time. If only society hadn't become so goddamn serious and litigious, maybe we could still have TV shows like this.

Oct 26, 2010

D-1 グランプリ - Japanese Toilet Prank

Now this is just hilarious. Trust comedian / Japanese yakuza cinema legend 'Beat' Takeshi Kitano to be behind all this.

The best yakiniku miso dip recipe (tare - タレ)

Let's face it - you can buy all kinds of yakiniku (Japanese grilled beef) marinades from Korean and Japanese grocery stores - some sweet, some spicy, but mostly all soy-based. However, no yakiniku dinner is complete without a proper yakiniku dip. Some yakiniku restaurants offer their own homemade miso dip for the meat, which is absolutely delicious.

Here's my own miso-dare recipe which you can use to dip your grilled wagyu steak into:
  • 2 tbsp red miso (the gritty kind, not the smooth kind)
  • 1 tbsp sesame oil
  • 1 tbsp sugar
  • 1/2 tbsp mirin
  • 1/2 tbsp cooking sake
  • 1 tbsp toasted thinly sliced garlic chips, crushed
  • 1 tbsp diced scallions / spring onions
  • 1 tsp toasted sesame seeds
The easiest thing to do is mix the sesame oil, sugar, mirin and sake together, then introduce the red miso, followed by the spring onions and sesame seeds. Do not over mix the dip - it is meant to be slightly gritty. I like to wrap the yakiniku beef in lettuce with a small dollop of miso-dare and a slice of green chilli pepper.

Tell me how you like my recipe!

If only he bought Tiffany instead...

maybe I would have said yes.

White iPhone 4 in Australia

So, I heard there's a new iPhone 4 model coming out before the end of the year. Apparently they've fixed the antenna problem, so the antenna configuration looks different to that shown in the photo above. The new version of the iPhone 4 will be available in Apple's famous toilet-bowl white.

Should I wait it out for the white iPhone 4? I have otherwise considered buying a Motorola Android phone or waiting for the Windows Phone, but the number of apps I've compulsively bought for my iPhone 3GS makes me feel like I should stick with Apple products, despite how evil Apple has become in recent years.

my guerlain lipstick. in your face?


I would love to do this to the guy who put talcum powder in my hairdryer.

amor caecus est .

the camera flashes and her eyes are blinded by infinity. they compliment and coo at her, wanting her to show them more, but when she hears the flash once again there’s only the blot of metallic silver floating where her vision once was. wherever her eyes venture. she’s captured.

she sways, unable to focus. it’s like the bright world around her is being blocked out momentarily, and wherever she tries to look there’s something between her and the beauty of life. for a few seconds it excites her, entertaining her interest and tickling her curiosity. yet the seconds turn into minutes, and then hours, and before she knows it a half a lifetime has passed away with pieces missing. even when she closes her eyes it’s there, omnipresent, stubborn, unrelenting. the only time she can escape it is in her dreams. and sometimes not even.

she lives knowing there is something wonderful behind it, but not able to see through. her ears can hear and her hands can touch, but the beauty of it all is lost without the ability to see, because sometimes seeing allows you to feel more than anything else ever could.

sometimes she sits and imagines the clouds that form different shapes in the sky, and longs for freedom from this curse. sometimes she forgets it’s there for a moment. and sometimes she talks to the old man named society, who lies and tells her that everything’s okay.

that it gets better. that you’re never meant to see through it completely. that it will always be there, lurking in the shadows. that even though it tips your balance you don’t have to stumble.

that if it goes away, you were never captivated, or captivating enough.

and that once you’re touched by such a powerful source of light, the correct terminology isn’t “blind,” it’s “whole.”