. . Walkabout with my LX3 . .

Here are some photos taken with my LX3. Enjoy!!

. . View from Esplanade Bay *City Skyline* . .

. . Millenia Concave Ceiling . .

. . Vivocity . .

. . Vivocity . .

. . Tile Flooring @ Singapore Art Museum (SAM) . .

. . Water Fountain @ SAM . .

. . Unique Wall @ SAM . .

. . Park Bench @ ECP . .

Here's a special stitched * not cropped* photo of the fountain and the moon @ SAM.

. . Toying With Paper . .

Heh.. yeah, I know it's been a while since I last blog. Well, basically it's been the usual almost everyday. But hey! I've picked up a new hobby! Or well, something like that.

Recently, I bought a book on papertoys called Urban Paper.

Authored by Matt Hawkins, one of the many contributors for the book. Matt also contributes to a blog regarding all about papertoys here. Most of the designs/papertoys on the internet are free. You just need to download into your computer, print it out and start building!

Urban Paper is a book compiled with lots of creatively designed toys from many many artist! Basically the book itself contains the printed out designs. But also included with the book are softcopies of the designs within the Bonus DVD. The DVD includes some extra designs that are not already printed into the book. Also in the DVD are some blank designs * for our own customised designs*.

Been quite busy, after work and also on weekends building up on these papertoys. Although there are some that are quite hard to build, most are fairly easy to glue together.

*Papertoys on display on my shelf*

I've yet to finish building the all the toys that are in the book. Maybe not. There are some designs that I think are not successful as a papertoy. Some designs are hard to cut out *these design would have too many curves to cut!*. Some are quite intricate to glue. But then again, most are fairly easy.

Here are some of the design/toys I like!!!

Paperboy by Marshall Alexander

Thug by Filippo Perin

E440 by Ringo Krumbiegel

Rommy by Tetsuta Watabe

And on the DVD some bonus templates/designs from Marshall Alexander which I think all basics of papertoys should take note from. I especially like this TOXIC-MYK design as it is simple to cut, quite easy to glue together and the design has character. You can getMarshall Alexander's papertoys here.

TOXIC-MYK by Marshall Alexander.

Well, yup.. I haven't start on some of the designs that I've been wanting to do yet. Will post it up here as and when I'm done with a toy. I've also been toying around with the idea of creating my own paper toys!

Hehe.. been having some ideas swimming in my head..

. . New Spectacles . .

Oops.. It seems I've taken another full month break from blogging. Hehe..

Here's some recent updates! For the past 2 weeks had been busy at work. There was some local architectural competition and for most developers, they had come to us to create the artist's impressions. I even had to come to work last Sunday. Basically it was a rush work. May of us artists had to work overtime to get things done. But all is good. This time round, we didn't really faced to a fussy developers. I had once encounter a client that kept changing and updating the visuals that I finally made it out of the office at 2 am the next morning! Hah!

Another new recent update! I bought a new specs! It's not one of those popular branded one. But it does look like it. Heh!. It's from a brand RedH. Don't ask me.. I'm not sure I've heard it before too.

My normal specs, Oakley A Wire 2.0, broke a few weeks ago. Well, it didn't really broke, but the right side ehh.. thingy that connects to the err.. thingy.. well something came loose, ok. It can't really be fixed and so I had to go down to the service centre to get it replaced. To my disappointment, the model was out of production. So basically I had to get a new one.

My spare specs was really old. I had it longer than the Oakley and there were scratches on the lenses.

Here's some pics..

As you can see from the side.. It looks like an "O" logo. As in theOakley brand. But its not!! The "O" is just a design i guess.. Hah!. There's a small letter R initial in the "O" design. From a far, it looks like I'm wearing an Oakley Specs. Hehe. Well, this is going to be my spare specs. I think. I want to get another Oakley specs. But looking at my budget. Hmm.. Maybe I get one next month. Or the month after. Not right now.. We'll see.. Still have to choose a cool Oakley model.

Anyway, I was also thinking of getting a plastic frame specs. Maybe to wear it for sports/running. Saw one when I was picking up this new specs. But the frame only costs $70.

Hmm, maybe I take a look around first.

. . Absence . .

Oh gosh.. It's nearly been 2 months of my absence from this blog! Hah.. Well.. A lot has happened in this past 2 months. Both on a personal matter and also matters at work..

Since the beginning of the economic crisis, a lot of private companies, government jobs, almost everyone on this blue planet is somehow affected. So does the company I'm working for. Although The Company I'm working for is not directly affected, we were still hit by the ripple effect of the crisis. We were affected, 'cause our clients were affected.

How much damages we received was based on how much damages our clients received. I won't go into details. But The Company had to let go some people and adopted certain cost-cutting measures to cut down on the spending; ; like most of the companies out there.

Hasn't been the same since the day The Company had to let some people go. Morals had declined a lil' bit but we're still upholding our work standards. Somewhat we knew this was going to happened. Sooner or later.

We're just hoping that the economy pick up soon. So that our clients becomes more stabilized to hand out projects to us.

. . Reunion BBQ . .

Yay! Last Sunday, during the Lunar New Year's Eve, my family and relatives gathered on West Coast Park for a simple BBQ. Also for a feast since it's my birthday was just over a week ago.

Set up a few tents and a canopy (for fearing that it might rain, and which it did that day). Like last year's BBQ, it rained and we had to use umbrella to not let the fire out. Least this time round, when it rained, we just moved the canopy to where the pit is. Simple.

Here are some pictures taken!

Stayed til late before I made my way home. Was raining when I travel home. Which was good cause it had not rain for more than 2 weeks and the grass were dying. Hah!

. . Workdesk . .

Here is a quick shot of my desk at work. These few initial shots *including the ones in the previous post* are taken without me reading the manual. Heh. Didn't have time cause had charged the battery the night before and only use it in the morning just before I left for work.

Unedited but resized and reduced resolution.

Realized, after I got home, was that there's a lot of photo options for this camera. Still learning about the camera and slowly reading the manual, which is around 200+ pages.

. . Lumix LX3 . . .

Few days ago, on my birthday, I went out to get a new compact camera!! Hah! Been eyeing on a compact camera for quite some time but didn't really know what brand or type that I should get at that time. So I checked out dpreview.com and read their reviews. One of the best compact camera that they reviewed (and that I got for myself for my birthday) was a Panasonic Lumix LX3.

Jeng! Jeng! Jeng!

Together bundled with the camera are the camera casing and also a 4GB SDHC card. Altogether with a screen protector, I had to forked out almost $700! Hah! I guess it's a good investment. I think having a compact camera is better when you're on a casual outing. Rather than lugging my Canon 400D DSLR, I can have this LX3 packed into a small bag. Not that I don't like my DSLR, just that, sometimes, a small camera will do just fine. Heh!

Here are some few unedited pics that I took with my new Lumix LX3.

Along the alley where I usually parked my bike. 7.45pm

From my room window. 9.11 AM

From my room window. 8.22 PM

Hmm, not sure about how you see it. But I think the pictures come out quite sharp and the colours came out good. Even better than my DSLR. Hah. Or maybe I need to clean my DSLR again, or get a better lense. Heh.

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Other than that, I also got a new bag. Well, actually, it's from my sis and my elder brother. But, well, the story goes that my sis, who went out to get the back, got me a wrong bag. She got me the 4 Million Home bag; a camera bag. But what I wanted was a messenger bag.

Well, partly it's my fault for not describing exactly what I wanted. Eventually, I got the camera bag replaced with this messenger bag "Barney Rustle Blanket" Heh. Quite a strange name for a bag. Got it in this colour cause I've already have a slightly-bigger Crumpler backpack "Seedy Bar" in somewhat khaki.

Frecky said this messenger bag looks like those watermelons that's yellow on the inside.

. . Korean Biscuits . .

A colleague of mine, LMY, just came back from her 2 weeks holiday to Korea and she helped to buy for me 2 boxes of Korean Chocolate Biscuits!! Yay!

Ta-Dahh!

Ok, I don't know the name of this biscuit.. It's written in Korean.. Had initially asked her to help me buy these biscuits before she went for the holiday. How did I know about the biscuitss?? Well, she had been to Korea the year before *i think* and she had bought these biscuits and placed them at the office pantry to share. I had a bite and I was hooked!!!! It's damn nice!!!

The chocolate filling is appropriately sweet and not chocolatey thick; and the biscuit itself is quite soft and not hard or crunchy. Definitely one of the best chocolate biscuits I've ever had. Definitely.

Inside the box, minus 4 small packets.

I've even gave Im and Khai a packet each and they agree with me that the biscuits are good.... Heh. But that's all they're gonna get. A packet each. Sorry.

Anyway, today is my birthday! Hehe, had took a leave from work today to just slack around in the morning and enjoy the day. Went out in the late afternoon, to get something *yeah I buy my own birthday present* and had a quick dinner with Frecky at Ramen 10.

Will blog about what I've got for my birthday, some other time. Maybe tomorrow. Heh.

. . Lost my chocolates . .

This evening, when I got back home from work, I found that my stashed plastic bag of chocolates was gone except for a tin-pack of Lindt Swiss Hearts.

I got this (and some other chocolates) from Frecky from her recent family holiday/trip to Europe. Some other chocs that was in the said plastic bag were given as christmas gifts. I've ate some of them and the rest was kept tied up in the plastic bag. Tied-up! I was saving them cause I had sore throat and cough since Christmas and I didn't want to eat the chocs then.

Mom said that my sis-in-law had took the rest of my chocs and brought it to her friend's place to give it to their children. She said "The chocs were there for quite some time and nobody seems to eat it."

Haiz. It's mine. I tied it up.

This morning actually, I found my chocs out of the plastic bag and was put into a container in the fridge. Hmm, nevermind. I found a new plastic bag and put back my chocs into the new plastic bag and tied it up.

The chocs couldn't have been magically tied up back into a new plastic bag right??????

I'm feeling angry, cause now I can't have my Swiss chocolate bars.

Swiss chocolate bars le!!

Was so pissed I went out and bought some smokes. First few smokes this year.

. . Another $100 . .

Woohoo.. Got another $100 worth of CapitaVouchers today from the accountant. Hehe, my reward for coming in one of the 3rd prize winner for last month's Monthly Photoshop Submission.

d $ c $ b

Hmm, right now I'm really eyeing on something to get at Funan DigitaLife Mall, one of the shopping centres that accept the vouchers.

Hmmmmmm.......

. . Transporter 3 . .

Caught the movie "Transporter 3" last Friday, with Frecky. Actually thought of watching "Yes Man" but the the tickets were selling out fast and we didn't want to get those bad seats. Yeah, so we end up catching Jason Statham, once again starring as Frank Martin, in "Transporter 3"

The movie was great! There was a lot of action sequences; gun fires, car chases, extraordinary fights (fight choreography by Cory Yuen) and explosions! Hah! It's a guy movie I tell ya. I exceptionally like the fight scenes! It's so wonderfully shot and executed that the fights scene looks amazing. You'll feel (the pain) for those duds at the receiving end of Frank's punches.

one of the sorry fella

There's this one particular love scene between Jason and the female lead, Natalya Rudakova, that I didn't really like. Well, it's a stupid scene but I guess it's vital to the building up of the story, that eventually convinced the audiences, why Frank Martin would go all out and rescue her by the end of the story.

The old french Inspector, Francois Berleand as Inspector Tarconi, is back in this installment and his character injects comedy along the storyline.

Anyway it's a great action movie and if you love the first two movies, you'll love this third installment.

. . Watchmen & Flight . .

Finally, finished reading up the graphic novel "Watchmen" which I started some months back. Heh. Can't even remember when I bought the book.

Anyway, the story for "Watchmen" is great. Got to read it to appreciate it. Written by Alan Moore (The Leagues of Extraordinary Gentlemen, V for Vendetta), "Watchmen" is one of TIME magazine's 100 Best Novels.


Basically bought this novel when I read that Hollywood is making a movie based on this title. Kind of wanting to find out about the story beforehand and later on, see how they translate the story from comic book page to movie screen. Not sure why, but I kind of have some fascination on comic based movie. Heh. Can't wait for the movie to be out in March.

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This is my current read, well, yeah read. "Flight" is in it's fifth volume now ( I have all the previous volumes) . I love this series of graphic novel. "Flight" is a compilation of short stories and novels; mostly, the usual comic with narrations and others, the unique ones of just drawings to tell the story.


It's a great mix of stories and art. Great inspiration book for budding comic/webcomic artists. If I'm not wrong, earlier volumes of "Flight" are available at the public libraries for loan.

. . Birds Photos . .

Finally get to finish editing some of my photos from my trip to the Jurong Bird Park some months back. I put it off for so long, but still, I had to put it up.

Here are some of the photos.

Check out the rest of the photos here.

. . Happy 2009 . .

Happy New Year to all! If there is anyone reading this at all.. Hehe..

Anyway, it had been a long time since I had been blogging. My last post was in September. That was like 3 months ago. Hah! Looking back the past year had been quite a roller coaster ride in my life. And I started this blog to archive those ups and downs...

My initial intention for this blog was to do a very simple daily rantings of my life. A storybook-like kind of blog. But it looks like I had failed. Hah! Started out good with daily posts for quite a many months. There were even times if I was unable to blog for some days, I would come back and typed in the events for the days that I had missed.

Soon after half a year, I guess, I got lazy.. Then things started to get monotonous and there was nothing much to blog in anyway. Generally, that's one of the reasons that I had stopped posting any more entries.

But I like to keep a blog going. I feel that by keeping a blog, it keeps the people close to me informed of my life and I definitely don't want to throw this blog away. So this is how it's going to be. I'm going to revamp this blog! WOohoo!.. It will no longer be an anonymous blog! Well, if you don't know me, my name is Yusman! nrySmn is basically my full name but without the vowels. Hehe..

Anyway, I'd been thinking, I want to revamp this blog to something more cheery! Something less moody and angsty and dark. And for the past postings, which I had slammed some people and say bad things and all that.. Well, I'm going to go back and edit it all.. Just need to delete it away!*Ehhm this will take a few days though.* This is going to be a friendly blog where anyone can read about me. Hehe..

What is that? Why change? Why not?! I'm always thinking of changes and new ideas every time. And every new year especially. Achievements gained in the past year wasn't that transparent. I still haven't started to learn how to cook. Put off learning the sign language. This year though, I've already thought of new ideas. Hehe..

Sometimes I can be so fickle-minded.

So, for those people who already knew my old blog theme, what do you think of this change? Tell me! Drop a comment! Email me! Cbox me!

Do tell.

. . Fasting Month . .

Yeah, I know. I haven't been blogging for quite some time. Well, there's not much to blog about anyway. Most of the time its the same old stuffs. A quite from a friend " Same shit, different week".

It has been 5 days since the muslims started fasting this year and it seems like time is moving very fast. Already it's going to be a week and left with 3 more weeks. Anyway, it's still too early to feel the holiday mood. Hari Raya will be celebrated on the 1st of October, Wednesday, and I've already booked to take my leave the whole week. Hehe. In consideration of the half-day workday on the eve of Hari Raya, I'll be taking 3.5 days of leave for the whole week.

Hopefully The Boss would approve my leave form. It's not that I've been taking so many leaves from work. I still have a lot of leaves to clear for this year. Hehe.

Saturday today, and I don't really have any plans. It's the fasting month and I would rather stay at home than go out. I guess I'm too lazy in a sense.

Anyway, I was thinking of creating a new blog. A better blog with less anonymities and more colour! More into the stuffs that interests me. More into my life. And less like a storybook. Like it is right now. Still thinking about it. Thinking more into the approach and execution and also looking into other blogs. For some people, " I am not copying" anybody or anything. I just want to inject more purpose into a blog rather than just words and few pictures so that I can reach a wider audiences.

Hmm. Still thinking about it. What say you?

. . Forget! . .

Oh gosh! I forgot that I haven't blogged for a long time. I mean, I know I have a blog. Just that I kept forgetting to post! Hah!

Ever since the time my computer died on me, I'd stopped blogging. I did picked it back. But I guess it didn't last. Well, so many things had happened in the last couple of weeks.

Things like, 2 weeks ago, Syn came back from Dubai; we *me, Trixx and Syn* had dinner at Marina Food Loft before we head for chill out and satay at Glutton Bay next to the Esplanade. Bry dropped by and had a good catching up.

Hmm, other than that I don't really seems to fully recall. But today, I met up with Trixx at Downtown East and had some Korean style barbeque dinner. Was quite good, though Trixx thought it was just ok. *She didn't like the rice there though, right Trixx?* Hmm, maybe next time can bring Frecky there for dinner.

Downtown East new *eHub* mall was still having some major contructions in but some areas are fully done up. There's also a cinema there. But strangely, it felt like it was not fully utililse, or should I say, there were not many patrons there. Hmm, maybe it's a weekday night so not so packed. Or that it its still under constructions.

Wonder if the place going to be a flop.

. . Olympic . .

Didn't have anything much to do today, Monday, and also last weekend. Was an off day today from The Company in lieu of the public holiday on Saturday. Stayed at home and watched the Olympic Games on TV.

Saw the Games Opening Ceremony last Friday and was very proud for the Chinese People for an awesome/fantastic opening. Was really very, very good. The fireworks show was simple inspiring! I joked with my younger brother that the Chinese didn't had to import those fireworks 'cause they invented them! Hah! Most probably they bought those fireworks somewhere down the streets. Heh! If you didn't catch the ceremony, see if you can find it on YouTube or something. It's simply can't be missed.

Caught some of the Games in these few days and alreay lots of World Record had been broken. It's very inspiring to watch these finest atheletes fight it out in the sporting arena. It's not everyday to watch these kind of spectacular sports in action!

Maybe I'll pick up a sport. Like Archery! HAH!

. . New Computer . .

It has been nearly 3 weeks since my old computer died on me. Well, actually, I'm not sure yet which component of the hardware which failed on me. Anyway, I am on my new computer right now and I still have a few more programs that I had yet to install.

This is my new setup.

Intel Core 2 Duo E8200 2.66GHz 6MB 1333MHz LGA775
Gigabyte EP45-DS3 Intel P45 Chipsets mainboard
Asus GeForce 9600GT Black Pearl 512MB DDR3
Western Digital 400GB 16MB HDD SATA2
Corsair PC6400 800MHz 1GBx2 DDR2
Sony 20X DVD Writer SATA
Cooler Master eXtreme 550W PSU
Cooler Master Elite 330 Black version

I actually had this new computer delivered last Sunday. Yeah, delivered to my home as I bought it on a local online shop. But had some hardware problems with the new computer initially. My new PC kept having random crashes and bluescreens of death. Wasn't sure at that time what was the problem.

Told my colleague L10 about this and he offered to help check my computer out. He came over on Tuesday and tried to help search for the fault *if any* and also to help see if I did set up the computer properly. I am not a really knowledgable on this computer hardware stuffs and I needed help.

Went through a lot of different situations and steps to reinstall the operating system *OS* to the old harddisk. Long story short, we were not able to reinstall the OS and were facing frustating obstacle.

He also was stumped over what was wrong and didn't managed to find the fault. He was sure though, that it was a hardware problem. Myself, I wonder whether my old computer had a virus and had contaminated this new computer *as I had installed the old harddisk to the new computer*.

The next day, while at work, I was even considering of getting a new fresh harddisk to install but L10 advise me to consult the guy from the shop that I bought the computer from. I listened to his advice but decided to have one last installation trythat Wednesday night.

During work that day, I managed to researched on computer crashes and installation of OS. And that night, I tried some of the procedure that I read up on. I followed a simple basic setup for the computer and finally managed to installed the OS! Was so happy that night!! On closer inspection, one of the RAM that I took out from the motherboard was actually faulty. The RAM's cover *heatsink, I think* was not properly aligned to RAM itself the and I think this made the memory unstable when installed and thus the random crashes. This also prevented the OS from any proper installation. Called up the shop and going to have it replaced.

Anyway, it took me a few days and today to get my computer to what it was. Did managed to backed up my stuffs and data before the OS reinstallationbut had to reinstalled a lot of programmes *as I formatted all the harddisk during the reinstallation as we thought it was harddisk problem that causes the initial problems* . And it really took a while.

But it was worth it.

*Today, Saturday, is Singapore's 43rd National Day. Wishing all Singaporeans a Happy National Day! Have a great long weekend!*

. . F##ked Up Computer . .

Today is Sunday, and I'm using my younger brother's laptop right now as my long serving computer is down. Switched it on and there's nothing on the monitor. Think the harddisks is gone.

Was using the computer yesterday, Saturday, transfering my photos from my recent visit to the Jurong Bird Park on Friday. Completely transferred the photos, and when I plugged in my external Harddisk USB *for my back up copy* the computer suddenly freezed.

There was no keyboard and mouse response so I thought I had to hard reboot it. So the next moment when I restart the computer and it didn't response *nothing on the monitor screen*.

Fcuked up computer.

Lucky I copied the photos and not "cut & paste" the photos. And all that my other photos had been backed up. But there were some stuffs I think that were not backed up.

Hopefully the harddisk is not the problem *maybe the chip or the motherboard problem* which then I could still reuse the harddisk and back up my other stuffs.

But if it's the harddisk problem, then all my stuffs are gone. Haiz.. Another bad luck strucked.

What's happening to me?! I'm so frustatedly fcuked-up.

Think I need to wait til I get a new computer.

. . Jurong Bird Park . .

Today Friday, took leave from work. Woke up to a great sunny morning and had a tiring, but overall great day at the Jurong Bird Park (JBP).

Trixx had free passes to the JBP today and she invited me and Wei2 *thanks for the invite Trixx!*. I asked Frecky along too as she is not working today. Was wonderfully surprised at the JBP as it had been ages since my last visit.

Had been having thoughts that there is not much to see at the JBP. Only birds. But I was surprisingly wrong. There's a lot to see there! Well, a lot of birds, but there's a huge variety of birds there.

Reached the place a 'lil before 2.00 pm and met Wei2 at the entrance. Trixx was already there as she reached there earlier. Going clockwise through JBP, we came across owls, cranes, beautiful hornbills *my favourite!*, cute kingfishers, kookaburas, toucans, eagles, vultures, ducks, flamingos, the huge pelicans, the graceful swans, penguins etc etc.

Oh my gosh! It was such a great trip. Me and Frecky also went to the "Birds Of Prey" show at 4.00 pm and was greatly amazed. I especially like it how the Falconers made the eagles flew just a 'lil above our heads, at where we were seated. I forgot how beautiful these birds are. Seeing them on tv *like those wildlife shows and National Geographic channels* are so much different from seeing them up close.

And then there's this awesome, faboulous, fantastic, Lory Loft, where it's actually a huge, HUGE, HUGE bird cage that visitors can venture into and have a close experience with the Lory birds. There was like hundreds of them when we were there and they were feeding noisily. But then it's alright 'cause they're so cute!! *can't believe I'm saying this*. They were flying around pass us, some flew over my head and one actually flew and rested on Frecky's shoulder. Hah! What an experience!

There were some other cages that visitors can venture into also, but it wasn't as awesome as the Lory Loft. There's also this huge birdcage that has the tallest man-made waterfall. Hmm, wasn't as what I expected and not as exciting as the Lory Loft.

There was a glass exhibition for the penguins *but not as big as the ones at the Zoo*. There's also a small corner near the extrance, where they put up caged some macaws, cockatoos and also mynahs. These birds can talk! Hah! *Hello!? Ni Hao Mah?!* Hah! Had a great time trying to make them talk! But not as fun as at the Lory Loft.

I love the Lory Loft! Hah! Left the place all tired, sticky, dirty but definitely satisfied.

What a great day! ☺☺