Posted on 3 May 2008 @ 00:16 in Health, Rant, Tech Stuff
First off, I just wanna say I MISS MY WIN DESKTOP. It went belly-up a week or so ago, and I’ve been using my MacBook plugged into the external 17″ monitor.
Yes, I have both Windows and Apple machines at home. It’s always been that way ever since I started using computers. At college in San Diego, I had a DOS laptop (yes, in those days, it was DOS, pre-Windows), but the department used Macs. Then, when I came home and started at my second job, we had dinosaur Macs but later persuaded the department head that we needed proper PCs. Then I started hanging out with a group of Mac users, and decided to get me an Apple G4 PowerBook. It was mostly a fun machine while I continued using a Win desktop for serious work. I later replaced the PowerBook with a MacBook, mainly because it can run both Mac and Win OSs.
And I’d been toying with the idea of going 100% Mac, especially since I can use Win on it, too (some necessary apps still require the Win environment). The desktop was getting old, and I thought it was time to make the change.
So for the past week, I’ve been on a Mac environment. It’s quite fun actually but hell on my eyes. The 17″ monitor’s display is not proportionate to the Mac’s 13.3″ display. 1280 x 800 on the Mac became 1280 x 10something … oh, I forget. I’m currently not using the 17″ at the desk, but the “native” Mac on my lap. And suddenly I realised I’d been abusing my eyes with a disproportioned display all week. Not that I didn’t know - my eyes have been feeling tired more than usual, and one night, I even had shimmering images in front of both eyes.
Still thinking of a change to Mac? For the sake of my eyes, I don’t think so.
It is time for a computer upgrade, but not in the direction of a Mac. Instead, I’m staying with Windows. A completely new CPU with the latest components.
I’m planning to sell my MacBook (anyone local who’s interested, please email me chincm[AT]gmail dot com). And getting the new ASUS eeePC (see previous post), a 9″, < 2-pound ultraportable. Cuz I still need a mobile machine when I’m out and about.
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Posted on 9 July 2007 @ 18:23 in Rant
678, and especially with the word “error” in front. “Error 678″ . That’s why my Streamyx at home is down.
It took three TMNet customer service guys to help me figure it out (cuz the first two got disconnected thro my “blurness” ). And now my living room is littered with cables and modem and router … it’s complicated why it is, it just is.
So there’s more camping at Hoxe’s, at least for the next couple of working days, which is the minimum number of days required for TMNet technicians to figure out what’s wrong. What a time for the home connection to be down, when I need to be online for work, not play!
Yeah, things are rolling in.
BTW, big thanks to TMNet customer service for their patience and help.
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Posted on 3 September 2006 @ 09:11 in Personal, Rant
We had taken Greenie to the vet’s on Merdeka Day. She had been suffering from skin problems and I just felt we needed to do something for her. I’d called her regular vet and asked if perhaps we should have blood tests done on her. Since he’s a mobile vet, he said he wouldn’t be able to do it, and we’d have to take her to a regular vet.
I went to a vet clinic in the neighbourhood and found that they would be opened on Merdeka Day. So we took her there, and because it was her first time at a vet, she was restless, so the vet said she would have to give Greenie an injection to sedate her. Apparently the sedation would last 30 minutes.
Greenie continued to sleep even after we took her home. Before I left around 4ish, I went to look at her, she was trying to stand but still looking groggy.
By the next morning, she was dead. My nephew later told me he’d been in touch with the vet a few times from the previous evening till when they found her dead. The first time, at around 8 pm, he’d called to ask if it was okay to feed her, and the vet said yes. So he fed Greenie some water and food, but she refused the food. Around midnight, he called the vet again because Greenie was crying in pain and beginning to foam at the mouth. Apparently, the vet said to just leave it. The next morning, when my nephew called to say Greenie had died, the vet said she would come by around 10 a.m. to have a look.
But the vet never showed up. When we called her to ask what time she would come by, she said she had sent another vet. Well, we had two visitors who said they were from the clinic and told by the vet to come and collect the bag of food and two bottles of medicated shampoo that we’d bought the previous day. But they did not identify themselves as doctors. Later, they came again while I was out, but they merely repeated what the vet had said over the phone in the morning - that Greenie probably died from water in her lungs.
Huh? I checked with my nephew and he said Greenie did not choke when she drank the water. He said she was probably too groggy to know water had gone into her lungs. Huh? Is that possible?
It’s two days since Greenie died. I haven’t stopped feeling guilty for my part in her death. I was the one who’d decided on which vet to send her, even though it was a vet we’d never used. I based my decision on the fact that the vet clinic was in the neighbourhood and open on a public holiday.
I’ve been going through the event over and over in my head. At first, I thought it might be a combination of the anaesthetic the vet had injected her, and a heartworm prevention jab. Later, after reading up a bit more on it, I realised Greenie was probably allergic to the anaesthesia.
But what really upsets - no, angers - me more than anything is the vet’s irresponsible behaviour. To say she would come to the house to look at the body, but never did.
This vet has a cute web site with a picture of herself. There was an email address so I wrote to her. I ended my email by saying I would never recommend any of my friends to take their pets to her clinic.
When I sat down to write this entry, I was going to reveal the name of the clinic. But I won’t. Not yet anyway. However, if you’re reading this and you have pets, tell me if you want to know the name of the clinic so that you’ll know not to take your pets there for treatment. For now, all I’ll reveal is that it’s a shop along the same row as The Ship in Damansara Utama.
For some reason, I have no doubt the vet is a good vet, but for now, being a good vet does not mean anything if the follow-up - breaking a promise to come by the house to see the body - is so totally irresponsible.
And no, she never replied my email.
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Posted on 19 August 2006 @ 11:05 in Rant, Tech Stuff
I’d just finished uploading a picture to my Flickr account where I extolled “the marvels of 21st century technology” when the desktop computer froze on me and wouldn’t let me do anything, not even shut down to restart.
As I was having a good online chat with mellowbug in Toronto, I scrambled to wake up my PowerBook so I could start up MSN Messenger there and continue chatting with her. Alas, MSN Messenger on my PB said there is a newer version, did I want to install it? I clicked no, followed by sign-in, but the message appeared again. And again. It looked like I could only sign in if I agreed to installing the newer version, so I did but with great reluctance. The installing process got underway, while over at the desktop, the system was being checked for bugs, as it’d been shut down without going through the usual (read: proper) process.
I decided to see which would be faster - the desktop or the PB. The former won. I was back online, but mellowbug was not. 
The marvels of 21st century technology? My foot. 
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Posted on 20 March 2006 @ 21:11 in Rant
Last year, when I found I’d been given a place at Rowy’s UK Living Room Concert, I told myself the only way I could attend was if I could get a promotional fare at one of those travel fairs that seem to have become an annual event here.
Later, after checking the MATTA web site, I found that the next travel fair to be held in KL would be about 3 weeks before I have to leave for the LRC. It would been a bit too close to the departure date and I might not get a ticket. I considered just going ahead and getting a regular fare, but changed my mind after checking both MAS and SIA web sites.
Then, a month ago, MAS had its own travel fair, one that you didn’t have to go to the venue to queue and get your ticket, but could book online. When the fares were published, there seemed to be something wrong with the offer. Only one-way fares were shown. No return / round-trip fares. The airline’s explanation was that it allows people to fly into one city and return from another. Fair enough. But I was flying back from the same city, would the fare be cheaper? Nope, it would be two one-way fares (KL / London and London / KL) added together. I went ahead and booked my ticket, assured that I would at least be able to attend the UK LRC, see Janis perform “live” again, as well as meet the UK Rudies (including the other two honorary UK Rudies - Anna from Dublin and Marjan from the Netherlands).
Last weekend, MATTA held its travel fair and advertised return fares. As it turned out, the KL - LON - KL fare is about RM300/- cheaper than what I paid for. I am consoling myself that at least I didn’t have to go queue for the ticket, and that who knows, if I’d waited, I might not have gotten a ticket.
But RM300/- is still RM300/- and could’ve gone into my spending money there, or into the tip jar for the Pearl Foundation.
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