The Urbаn Prophet™ 5.0

I have a confession to make.

There have been times in my life that i haven't been entirely honest and have made decisions that were poorly thought out. I have made every mistake imaginable, and have been careless with the affection and good-will of others. I've never truly back-stabbed though I have felt pangs of four letter words swell up and subside over an individual or two. Yes true-believers, yours truly has been selfish and nasty.

Well, to give myself some credit, I've not been all bad and have been steadily trying to improve myself. Either way, I'm not a total green-eyed monster and actually I am quite normal. It's just in my nature to feel the heavy hand of guilt quite readily on my shoulders which leads me to the point of this little soiree of letters and sentences; Feeling Guilt Over Things Done In The Past.

I have this tendency, of replaying little incidents from the past in my head, of things that I've done or said, felt or experienced and mentally beat myself up over it. I've felt guilt over things I did when I was six well up and left me practically depressed. Guilt is a strong emotion, to those that feel it. It's a potent learning experience and helps you stop repeating otherwise damaging overt anti-social behaviour if continued would definitely lead to ostracism, or worse.

Usually the case is you do something, figure out that what you did was pretty, a) stupid b) unethical c) immoral d) unthinking etc etc, and feel bad about it afterwards. Sometimes guilt is built in and reinforced from a young age via numerous social pressures such as religion. This form of guilt springs up even at the merest thought of doing an action that would be contra to your current belief structure. Bottom line is that guilt makes you crappy and ad about being crappy.

In my younger years, a close friend asked me how I could I have such a hedonistic devil may care attitude towards life and people in general (I'm much better now honest!). I replied, "It's not that I don't have a conscience, I just choose not to listen to it sometimes." What I should have added was, "Then I let it beat me up afterwards." Fair enough, everyone feels bad about the mistakes of the past. Everybody regrets. I suppose when you are younger and don't have as deep an understanding of that there are repercussions to your actions that will affect others or yourself, if not now that most definitely later. Guilt is the realisation that such repercussions could have been avoided only if you hadn't screwed about half as much.

Realisation is such a strong word, which I belive many do not exhibit or experience enough in this world. People have a tendency to act and not care, not realise that they could have hurt someone or in fact just did. This realisation if taken positively, builds the foundation of supporting experiences necessary to live a happier life removed from avoidable bad experiences, because, well, you learned to avoid them by not doing them in the first place. If taken negatively though, excessive guilt can seriously f*** you up. So it's important to have a good sense of balance over these things. Hey, I'm learning how to handle it to, if i figure it out before any of you do I'd be sure to tell you so long as you do like-wise.

A wise man once said, that an honest man with a good sense of right and wrong, sleeps better than some one who isn't. Why? Because he doesn't have to worry or feel upset over the actions that he did. Personally, I do feel a heckuva lotta guilt over some of the crap I've comitted in my life. Trust me, I've not been a good boy, I am now or at least I'm trying my best to be. I appologise if I've ever hurt or offended any of you in blogger-land, intentionally or unintentionally (though if it was intentionally I'm sure i had a good reason at the time!). Regardless i do feel bad about it. Anyway, enough of my blabbering, see you guys around...

And I find I kind of funny,
I find it kind of sad,
The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had.
I find it hard to tell you,
I find it hard to take,
When people run in circles its a very very,
Mad world,
Mad world...

And I find I kind of funny,
I find it kind of sad,
The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had.
I find it hard to tell you,
I find it hard to take,
When people run in circles its a very very,
Mad world,
Mad world...

Enlarging your world.
Mad world........................

Eek!

They've found a bunch of chickens in Selangor, 40 in all, infected with with H5N1 virus. They culled them all of course but still... What makes matters worse is that the chickens were found in my home state of Selangor, almost right outside my door. Scary stuff, 'specially after watching the repeat of Oprah the other day. What makes matters worse is I ate chicken for dinner today! Ah well, I also ate beef in the UK during the height of the BSE scare AND the Foot & Mouth debacle so chances are I'm gonna catch the flu soon, start slobbering at the mouth while limping and have my IQ drop to minus 100.

Empty cages are left outside a residence at Danau Kota in Kuala Lumpur February 21, 2006 after the birds have been culled last night. Malaysia on Monday reported its first case of H5N1 bird flu since November 2004, with the death of 40 chickens in central Selangor state last week.
REUTERS/BAZUKI MUHAMMAD

Their are two urban monstrosities in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. One being Pudu Jail, a prison that was built back in the day when the Brits were still at large in the then called Malaya. So far, since it was pretty much unseemly (and unwise) to have a maximum security jail in the heart of the city, so they decommissioned it. They brought it back as a museum for awhile, but people don't usually like to see the history of a prison so they closed it again, then after awhile they turned it back into a minimum security correctional facility for women. That being interesting all in all, it still isn't what I want to write about tonight.

What I want to write about is Pudu Bus Station, or at least an experience I had there a couple of days ago. To give a bit of a background to Pudu bus station, it is a station (duh!) that was built and put into operation way back when KL was a small city and not that many people wanted to go there. Thus, it's facilities are somewhat limited and very, very dated. My office is just across the street from the station and I can actually see it from my window on the 38th floor. Since KL has grown almost exponentially since Pudu was first put into operation, the station has had to cope with an excessive influx of busses, tourists and travelers to the point where it literally spills out into the streets. I'm not joking, busses line up right in front of my office and park on a main road because they have no other place to go. Since it is a literal cross-roads for travelers, all manner of savoury and unsavoury characters stroll in and out and hang about outside and it's the unsavoury ones (hmm, does that make them sweet?) that are give reasons to worry.

Anyway, the other day I went down stairs for a smoke and walked all the way down to the front of my office building as I needed to get away whilst I light up my and unwind. It was just passed sun-down and the streets were pretty dark if not empty. I was standing there, puffing away, minding my own business when I noticed a gritty looking chap, with greasy long hair under a lamp post just staring at me all grim looking. I kinda shuffled away thinking, well he's just bored maybe someone else will catch his attention. But no, I had his undivided attention. The guy was just straight out eye-balling. Then, as if he'd made his mind up, he pushed himself off the lamp post and slowly sauntered towards my general direction. I tried to look unconcerned and non-chalant but his slow progress towards my vicinity was kinda intimidating. When he finally reached me he leaned real close and whispered...

"Mahu pergi Hatyai?", do you want to go to Hatyai (Thailand). I was like ,what? "Mahu pergi Hatyai? Ipoh, Pinang?" he prattled on a few more destinations at me while I just stood there with a dumb look on my face. It finally dawned on me that he was trying to sell me bus ticket. I was like what? No no I don't want to go to Hatyai, or Pinang or where ever. Even after I said that he just continued on trying to impress upon me that his ticket fares were dirt cheap and his bus could get me there in record time and I'd be a fool if I didn't take him up on his offer. No, no, I don't want to go anywhere, I said. "Tapi ticket murah bang." But my tickets are cheap, he then asserted.

I'm thinking what person in his right mind, would succumb to this? I mean I've heard of impulse buying, but impulse traveling? It was pretty obvious I didn't want to go to any of those places but he still insisted I did. I mean, I didn't even have any luggage with me. It makes me wonder if his tactics have ever worked before, I mean it must have if this was his way of getting travelers. Does this mean that there is someone out there who actually during his lunch break suddenly decide to go to Thailand because the tickets were cheap? Well, I suppose it takes all sorts to make up this world.

You would never have to own more than one outfit in your entire life. Unless you come from the South Asia, thenyou'd change your clothing ten times on the way to post office while everyone else sings and dances around you.

I'm the kind of guy who talks to himself.

I freely admit it, if you wanna label me a nutjob go ahead, do it. Thing is, I just can't help myself, I get stressed, upset, I start mumbling. When I'm deep i thought pondering some question that's been nagging at the edge of my thoughts, it sometimes just spills out into the real world. This can be quite embarassing at times, as I'm sure you can imagine.

Maybe it's because I think too much, or because I'm quite the lone wold, used to being by myself most of the time that I forget when people are aound that it's quite socially unacceptable to be babbling to yourself. Or it could also be that I'm quite soft spoken so sometimes when I'm talking to someone, they don't notice and I just continue on.

I read somewhere that talking to yourself is a good form of self-therapy. You kinda bring up issues you have without yourself, and talk it out until you find some kind of resolution. I have conversations with myself all the time, it's a throw-back from when i was a kid and didn't have that many playmates living near me. I'd go off into some imaginary romp complete with sound track and affects much to the consternation of my parents. "He has a healthy imagination you see...."

Even into my adulthood I still play little mind games with myself. I imagine myself in a movie and everything I do and say is just following the script. Or sometimes I tell myself little stories with me cast as the main protagonist. Sometimes these little fantasies escape into the real world and I blurt out a word. Usually, this happens when I'm alone or stuck somewhere with nothing else to do like if I was on the bus or the train. It does help with my writing though, half the stuff I write down is from these little ponderings.

"That is what all poets do: they talk to themselves out loud; and the world overhears them. But it's horribly lonely not to hear someone else talk sometimes."
George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), Anglo-Irish playwright, critic

I do tend to find it easier to solve problems when i talk to myself. It's as if verbalising a question makes it 'real' enough for me to see all of its aspects until I can come up with a solution. Also, since I write as a hobby, I find that if I speak what i write out aloud it helps me form my thoughts better. The act of physically saying the words seems to add more weight and depth to my sentences, especially when it comes to my poems. I won't realise that it sounds like crap until I read it out.

Maybe I got deep rooted problems that are plaguing my psyche to the point where thoughts are hard to keep in my head and just have to get out somehow. Yeah I could be going nuts, or maybe even, I'm already nuts. Well, I leave it to you, true-believers, to decide, 'specially since you've been loyally reading my crap anyway. Passing thought, do thoughts become words only when you say them, or are they already words when they're still in your head?

I recently watched Puteri Gunung Ledang: The Musical, at Istana Budaya; KL's local theatre, and was rather impressed by it. Especially when it touched on Majapahit, one of the super powers in this part of the world back in the day. Anyways, it got me interested enough to look up old Javanese stories etc to learn more about them. What I came across were old stories about Panji Dewa which were simply quite enthralling. It turned out that stories about Panji were quite rampant in the region that it has got to be said to be one of the most popular and enduring of Indonesia's great works of literature.

Unlike many other works of Indonesian literature, the Panji tales are a product of indigenous inspiration, rather than the reworking of themes borrowed from elsewhere. The story originated in Java, but became popular over a wide area of western Indonesia, Borneo and as far north as Thailand. There are a large number of tales in the Panji story cycle, and the genre's wide distribution and frequent appearance in old manuscripts provide strong evidence of their former popularity.

The stories are set in ancient Java, and involve the relationships between four kingdoms. The basis of the tales is Panji's search for his lost love, which leads him into battle against hostile kings, as he conquers many obstacles. After many twists and turns, the lovers are reunited and married, and Panji returns home to succeed his father as king of Kunipan.

The stories are set in the second half of the 11th century, but it was probably not until the Majapahit period (13th-15th centuries) that they became popular, and began to be regarded as a recognised literary form. The kingdom of Majapahit was, by this time, prosperous and powerful, and Javanese culture, along with the Panji tales, spread to the nearby islands.

Bali was the first place where the story was developed, and was recorded on palm leaf manuscripts (lontar). The story was expanded, reaching its longest form in the 18th century poem, Malat. The Panji tales were also carried to the Malay-speaking areas of southern Kalimantan, south Sumatra, and to the east coast of the Malay Peninsula, to Kelantan where they were written as hikayat, a Malay prose form intended for recitation to an audience by a storyteller. In Java they exist in Middle Javanese in a form called kidung, which has been preserved in Bali; and in classical Modern Javanese, the macapat verse form.

Panji literature also finds expression in various dramatic forms, where episodes are performed; the shadow play (wayang kulit); dance drama (wayang wong); and classic drama of Bali, the gambuh, for example. Scenes are depicted artistically in the wayang beber and on temple reliefs. Many of the manuscripts in which the Panji stories are written are also beautifully illustrated.

I've always been a bit of a loner.

I mean, I'm no total introvert that won't leave his house for fear of having to actually talk to people, but I've never really liked big crowds and always felt a little bit uncomfortable at parties and such. I'm fine if it's one on one or even if there's a handful of people, but if there's more than 10 people i tend to clam up and keep to myself. I'm the type of guy who at a party prefers not to be the centre of attention. Even if I'm amongst close friends, the more people there are the less i talk especially if i'm in an unfamiliar environment. The reason I'm bringing this up is that recently i went to a social gathering and found myself tongue-tied. Yes I was amongst my closer friends at the party but it was peripheral acquaintance's kid's birthday do and the only reason i went was that someone very dear to me wanted me there.

I had my usual panic attack and more or less sat in the corner and didn't speak much, even to people that did try to strike up a conversation with me. I think i hurt my partners' feelings because i wasn't really socialising i do feel sorry about that. It truly is my personal pet horror, to be in a room full of people.

I grew up not being part of any clique, or group. The friends that i had only numbered in the handful at any given time so i guess i never really had the chance to develop my social skills in a group setting. I was the guy who sat alone during art class and wandered around the playing field alone during recess. I wasn't the kid who got invited to many birthday parties, and eventhough i do have a large extended family we lived in another city so i only ever saw my cousins once a year. So as a child, my only playmates were my sister and my imagination. To this day it's more or less the same, it's hard for me to feel comfortable in a large group as i'm not used to it. I never had the chance to get used to it.

I suppose what i really want this piece to do is to tell my other half that I'm sorry for being such a dick at times. I don't want to be quiet, but hey, you are what you are. I promise her i will try to be more receptive when it comes to these occasions. I just hope she understands that I'm trying the best that i can, and find it in her to accept this wee little loner that i am....

Then you could run through a hail of bullets and kill an entire army with a butter knife, so long as a member of your family or close friend was murdered unceremoniously. The exception to this rule is if a beautiful woman is nearby, then you'll get shot but it'll only be a flesh wound and girl will fall in love with you afterwards.

Heh-heh, this was one of my all time favourite movies: Full Metal Jacket. This sarcastic, sadistic, blood thirsty Kubrik masterpiece of the Vietnam War was absolutely riddled with excellent one-liners, monologues and general verbal abuse throughout the movie. Who could forget the helicopter gunner's reply to Joker (the main protagonist), when asked how he could gun down women and children at random; "Easy, you don't lead them as much! (laughs)" or how Gunnery Sgt. "You Better Unfuck Yourself Private Or I'll Unscrew Your Head And Shit Down Your Neck!" Hartman berated and emasculated every single recruit, or pukes as he reffered to them, under his care. A little bit of interesting trivia concerning Gunnery Seargent Hartman was that the actor playing the role was an actual U.S. Marine Corp Drill Instructor, a Gunnery Sgt. R. Lee Ermie (retired). Anyway, I came across one of the many sites containing wav files from the movie and this has got to be one of the more complete ones:-

I just paid my first 10% to my new house.

I truly can't believe I'm finally climbing up the property ladder. I took me awhile to find the right place, after looking and looking I came across a sweet little condo that had a great package attached to it, no interest until they hand over the keys, they gave me a free video camera + I can choose between free kitchen cabinets or 6 months free installments. Heh-heh, though i have to say once i start paying my mortgage things are gonna be a bit tight. Well, all an all, an investments an investment...

Every time a beautiful woman is attending to man's bullet wound, she'll instantly fall in love with him the minute he winces in pain and curses.

Why is it that people write blogs?

For some, they use the blogging art as an avenue to vent inner frustrations and disgruntlements, I suppose to find solace in the minds of strangers. You can see that happening in most blogs; "My boss did this to me today, the fucking bastard." or "I can't stand that guy from Admin, the fucking loser.". The blogger may find themselves revealing an embarrassing little secret which they'd never tell a soul in person, but find the idea of broadcasting it to the entire world anonymously exhilarating. The idea that a stranger just might relate to your everyday problems seems to be an opiate to many. It turns into an addiction of sorts, blogging. A sort of electro-interactive panacea for the soul. As they say confessions are always made easier, if it is to a stranger.

For others, blogs start to become like a sort of on-line, personal diary. A textual exposition of ones life complete with baby pictures and real-life experiences, where their day to day mundania is regurgitated out as if by doing this it'll make you a more interesting person.

Sometimes it's a mental masturbation of self-congratulatory, self-emoliating inner-talk. Other times, issues are concentrated upon the individuals perception of the world and what interests them about it. All in all this is done in the hopes that their grandiose prose entertains or impresses or both, the people who are just passing through. A stranger's opinion of yourself suddenly becomes your raison d'etre, your reason for existence to loosely translate. This is by no means a bad thing though. Current events have shown that this form of voyeuristic storytelling to be truly entertaining. The taste of another mans trouble is as bread and butter to some. An eclectic mix of real life reality TV, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, take your pick, everybody's on-line and on show.

I wrote this piece as reply to friend of mine's entry on his blog which I have to say was a good one. It got me thinking; why do so many people write so many entries every day? I suppose the conclusion is that it's more of a blend of all these reasons rather than just one. At the end of it all, you may as well ask; why do people talk so much? It's because every one has something to say, and to everyone, the story they have to tell is the most important one. There are people who don't blog, but then again, there are people who don't talk. Who's to say that one form of communication is better than another. It's just that this one, blogging, gives the opportunity for everyone to say, what they have to say and if it goes against the grain of what you believe, than hell, just move along, there's always somebody else out there who you can agree with.

It seems like since they confirmed me over at the bank, they've been piling up extra work on my desk. It appears that an entire forest was chopped down just in order to populate my desk with mounds of papers. In this day and age, paper isn't necessary to do work with. Everything is electronic. All the working 'papers' I write, reports etc etc are all done on my trusty snail of a desktop. However, since files in electronic format are easily altered, our audit dept requires that everything is to be printed out into hard-copy and filed. So now I have memos, e-mails, you name all nicely stored away under my desk so that I can refer to it at a later date. Right...

The Pile under my desk is starting to get a wee bit troublesome though. Day by day it grows larger and larger. Soon it'll grow and engulf me, my desk and my work-mates just like that scene from that old movie, the Blob. It feels like soon it'll develop a personality, much like that bowl of old pasta sauce at the back of my fridge, and I doubt it'll be happy. These things never are. At night, I swear I can feel it's presence watching me from afar. Watching. Waiting......

It's pretty cool if you like video games and are old enough to remember the first time Mario Brothers was popular.

The site boasts a whole bunch of ancient classics such as Elite, Ultima & Populus to name a few. All (well most) of the games are freeware an you can download them quickly since, well, their old games so most of them are barely 5 mb's in size apart from the odd one or two.

I'm currently going through Eye of the Beholder 1, 2 & 3 and boy is it sweet. Brings back memories of biscuits and tea, with a few mates over. I still can remember my dad banging at the door going, "Oi, it's 11pm! Go to bed you got school tomorrow!" Heh-heh, those were the days... Anyway, if you're curious to check it out the site is

Check it out....

The other day i got a call from Cleo magazine, a Malaysian Ladies mag, and was told that someone had nominated me as a Cleo Bachelour. Basically, this means that I stand the chance of winning the esteemed title of most eligible bachelour of the year. Wow.

I went for the photo-shoot on Sunday, and it was pretty interesting. A lotta guys stood around waiting to get their photos taken whilst answering a questionnaire set up by Cleo. I made it through the second round so me and 80 other blokes now are in the running. In the 3rd round, only 50 will make it through, and these chaps'll be the ones featured in the magazine. Then it'll be up to Cleo's readership to vote via sms, e-mail, phone calls etc etc.

Well, it's still pretty uncertain but wish me luck, i think i'm gonna make it through cuz as far as i can tell, i was the only one who could answer the last question, namely, what is an antimacassar.

Damn it, it's Sunday already, evening too...

1 week of sod-all to do. 1 week of waking up 12 in the afternoon, naps at 5pm. Going to the gym while the sun was still up was a definite plus. Now all that is over and done with.... *sigh*

Well at least i got one item of the stuff on my to do list done... Service My Car...

Finally serviced my car on Saturday so it's running as smoothly as ever. The whole experience felt like making a new passport. The system Proton Edar has set up truly apes government beuracracy. First you have to call up to make a reservation. Once the reservation has been made they'l check to see if they're free that day. Then when all's confirmed you turn up on the day and a guy at the gate will hand you a number. You park your car at a predesignated spot, then walk into the office an have a sit-down. When your numbers called, a clerk will then key in all the required information slowly into his computer. Then you pass him your keys, he passes a chit and then informing you of your car number and time it'll be done. This whole process took about 20-25mins..

When you get back, you wait again then see one of the clerks to pass your chit to him. He then keys in more stuff into his computer, without saying a word, eventually he prints out a receipt with which you go to the payment counter to pay (in my case i used a coupon) and you get your keys back. This also took about 20-25mins to finish. Now this whole system seems nice, clean and straight forward but i still had to wait for almost an hour, not including the time it took them to service my car. With my old car, when i serviced it, i drove over to my mechanic, toss him my keys and he'll tell me how much it'll cost and how long it'll take before its done. All in all, about 10 mins not including service time.

So my question is, which system is better?

I just had my birthday a few weeks back.

It was quiet an interesting event. My significant other rallied all off those whom are closest and dearest and still in the same country as me, to gather on the same day at my house without my knowledge of it, thus showing she has much greater skill than I when it comes to organisation. Seriously I'd have problems my way out of a wet paper bag. It was amazing, I had no idea what was going on and was still so surprised when I was cutting my birthday cake that I didn't notice that it only had 8 candles on it.

It makes you think though, birthdays. You start thinking, what have achieved in the past year that is of any merit and worth while enough for your continued existence on this planet. This past year I feel, I've accomplished much... Well much more than the previous one anyhow. I've bought a house, bought a car, got my self a decent job that I can stick to.

The only sigh I supposed I can breathe is at the fact, that yes, I am older now. In my early twenties, another year was a good thing, further openings of opportunities and experiences dawned upon me. Now in the twilight years before the big 3-0, things aren't as fresh and vibrant as they used to be, more stale and blah. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, rode the donkey etc etc. Maybe I'm approaching a mid-life crisis of sorts, but looking at the longevity in my family, I should only be experiencing that when I'm forty-forty five.

Dunno, maybe I'm just thinking too much. My colleagues at the office would say I'm over analysing things, but hey, it's part of my job description to over-analyse things. Anyway, found this cartoon on the net recently that I think describes my feelings. Found it on gapingvoid.com. Great stuff.

As I sit here sipping my overly priced green tea at a trendy coffee house (not to be confused with the Coffee houses of Amsterdam) I take a moment to reflect on the week that's past.

Here in KL we had a most fortunate occasion where three (not two, but three) public holidays fell consecutively one after another, the first one fell on a sunday so was carried forward all the way 'til thursday. What this ment was i had one full week of bliss and quiet, away from the hassles of office life. Btw, the holidays were Chinese New Year, Federal Territory Day and some religious holiday which i can't remember the name of. So i took that solitary friday off and voila, 1 week of nothing!

Anyway, all i did this week was piss about and pretend to put my house in order. Most of the stuff that was on my list of things to do; change the fused light bulbs in the house, do my Mt Everest sized pile of laundry, service the car, change a leaky faucet etc etc etc. So far I've done some of my laundry, I've tried to send my car for servicing and I've bought the wrong light bulbs (damn...)..

What can i say, I really let it all hang out this week. Stayed in, slept, went to th gym, slept, surfed the net 'til the wee hours of the morning, slept... Sleeping in my opinion, is the most inexpensive form of entertainment and there is no restriction whom can do it. Anyway, I've just finished my last bit of terribly expensive tea and my baby should be finished with her kick-boxing lessons... Grrrr, easy tiger! ;-)

A friend of mine told me to start a logging all the cigarettes i smoke every day as a way to help cut down. Apparently if you know how much you smoked in a day you can set goal points and targets. Today I smoked, erm... 1,2, er.. 5,14, eh, carry the four, erm....
....
....
I'm still a smoker....

Went to the gym today...

Loads of fun as usual... It's a painful thing, weight training. I advise it only for those of you with a slightly masochistic streak about you. You have to truly love pain, or at least feel slightly attracted to it before it'll do you any good. Me, I suppose you could say I like hurting myself some of the time. Keeps you on edge, makes you feel alive and all that....

There's a certain type of zen in weight training... It's all about focus, concentration, doing simple repetetive tasks, all in all attempting to make the motion as perfect as possible and through that, attaining euphoric enlightenment. Zen Buddhist monks find this euphoria from simple tasks such as sweeping leaves or arranging rocks into pleasing patterns, gym enthusiasts have the Arnold press. ==>

I find exercise a good way to release a lot of pent up aggression and as an escape from the world. Also, since so long as you do it correctly you continuously improve. You just get stronger and you do see improvements in a relatively short span of time. So there is that certain degree of accomplishment one feels at the end of every session. Yes, you may only be lifting 10 lbs per arm, but that is still 3 lbs. more than the last time. Eitherways, it's a good way to waste a few hours doing something healthy.

As I sit here smoking these crappy menthol ciggaretes (haven't been out of the house today so am smoking my cousin's stash; blech!), my girl-friend is outside mopping my living room floor.

It's not that i don't want to help, but i tend to knock things over or get severely distracted by the cat that she feels it's better that i stay in my room on the computer while she gets things done. I do help though, everytime something heavy needs to be moved or lifted, or there's something excessively disgusting that needs to be cleared up; Yo, I'm the daddy...

It's not that I'm a dirty person, it's just that I'm messy and forgetful. There is a difference, a messy person will forget to take the trash out until flies invade his kitchen, then he'll take it out. A dirty person would just not take out his trash and expect the flies to help digest it down until it dissappears. Whatever it is, to paraphrase a friend; if you have flies it means one thing, you are disgusting.

Anyway, to give myself some credit. The house does not have flies, mice have not taken up residence in my store-room, things are not growing out of my toilet and i can still see the surface of most of my tables/desks/chairs. Eitherways, I love my sweetheart very much for all that she's doing (whispers: she's looking over my shoulder right now!)....

I just watched Gladiator again on VCD today.

An excellent, excellent movie in my opinion. I would go as far to say the quality of the acting, story and script goes as far as to nullify its historical inconsistencies and inaccuracies. Call me a history buff if you must, but I do feel that movies should at least stick to the right era when it comes to props, backdrops and military maneuvers. Gladiators main historical boo-boo was the fact that the Roman army in the beginning of the movie didn't maintain the proper formation of their line, the Quincunx formation, during the opening scene of the movie. If you wanna know more about it , just click here. They were all-out-into-the-fray almost as much as the Gauls which was a big no-no.

Formations aside, the movie was excellent. I think this must have been the 20th time I've watched it, and I think I still could watch it again. My favorite scene just has to be the final fight scene between the Emperor and Maximus. Brother against Adopted Brother, friend turned to foe, the climactic end to a great general and a tear jerking death of a martyr. Who could ask for more out of a movie, triumphs, friendship, drama, death and war with a sprinkling of back-stabbing intrigue ruthless bloody-mindedness. A great movie of which i see becoming a classic if it hasn't already done so (seeing that it came out 6 years ago!).

Nos morituri te salutamus....