Lifestyle

January 18th, 2009 Uncategorized

Just before the running track next to the large very dry drain a few blocks away from mine, there is an ample field the size of a quarter of a football field with giant umbrella trees rooted here and there in a calculated haphazard manner, mimicking nature. The grass – weeds, really – is long and a moist dark green, disturbed by mowers once a month or less. Birds quarrel there unmolested – pale joggers and the elderly prefer to use the cement walkway towards the track. The inhabitants of the ground floor unit put their potted plants along the edge of the grass in a restrained, conservative manner – nothing more than a few pots (not counting those that are brown and dying). To have displays of rampant, interminably robust fertility would be a tad vulgar for an HDB estate since it’s public land and HDB might get upset. (So, best leave those to the homes with real gardens.) In short, it’s a nice, peaceful spot, which has unfulfilled picturesque potential if one is well skilled in the art of ignoring the grey train depot on the other side of the drain – if not, one could condemn it with a sharp ‘tsk’ and still be somewhat happy with the surroundings.

This false happiness is shattered after coming upon Nansen’s blog here and seeing that she has visits from deers!

I don’t know, however, if I could live deep into the country. It would be nice to live somewhat near a fairly cool city (say, 25 deg Celsius) to enjoy some of the perks (performances, airports) but far away enough to have a vast meadows of nothing, wild flowers, poisonous weeds, rabbits and colourful tiny birds. Oh, the green green grass of elsewhere!

Cooking for a Muslim during Chinese New Year

January 17th, 2009 Uncategorized

Serving a different set of food at the same table irritates me – I prefer a menu where guests (even those with dietary considerations) eat the same thing. It took me a whole lot of brainstorming to come up with a menu that I could cook without using pots – since all my pots are pork-tainted. Perhaps, because of my own eating habits – I feel that a Chinese New Year meal without pork is not really Chinese New Year meal. Z, being v considerate to my preferences, said it’ll be fine if I serve a small side dish of steamed dried sausages separately.

Newton’s idea of time

January 14th, 2009 popscience

Newton believed that time is absolute – there is a cosmic clock that sits outside the universe. Space was the stage which everything happened. The objects/things/particles/people they played out their drama on the stage with time ticking on outside. We have no control over time. We may have our own subjective view about time – passing fast or slow. Time, however is absolute.

Beautifully expressed on The Physics Of Time.

Money – can it buy happiness?

January 13th, 2009 Uncategorized

Why Money Doesn’t Buy Happiness in Oct 2007 but faced with possible recession in Apr 2008 NYT reports Maybe Money Does Buy Happiness After All

BTT: The Best?

January 11th, 2009 books

It’s a week or two later than you’d expect, and it may be almost a trite question, but…what were your favorite books from 2008?

The few books I recalled reading in 2008 were Taleb’s books – Fooled by Randomness and Black Swan – and Wodehouse’s Psmith series (which I read on the blackberry). I liked them all but none fell into my ‘best-loved’ list.

2008 was a year of abstinence – I hardly bought any books, persuaded myself not to attend plays, listened to radio programs, watched lots more television, read blogs. I’m not sure if this abstinence in the consumption of entertainment is something I can practice for the rest of my life.

10 more pounds

January 5th, 2009 Uncategorized

Tina Fey was about 150 and is 5′4″. Tina Fey lost 30 pounds. I’m going to do it too. And when I’m done, I’m going to have do the hard part: growing a wit.

New Year Resolutions (Booking Through Thursday)

January 4th, 2009 books

Happy New Year, everyone!

So…any Reading Resolutions? Say, specific books you plan to read? A plan to read more ___? Anything at all? Name me at least ONE thing you’re looking forward to reading this year!

I was going through GoodRead’s trivia the other day and when I couldn’t answer questions about the Umberto Ecos that I own, I realise I have to re-read all of them. (I haven’t been able to read much lately – I fall asleep quickly when I hit the pillow (a good thing).When I can’t sleep, I re-read old Enid Blytons (Malory Towers).) 2009, I want to attempt another Tolstoy. I just bought Simon Tan’s new novel called City of Small Blessings which I haven’t started and His Illegal Self, Carey’s new one. I hope to finish My Name Is Red – a book I started twice but couldn’t get through more than a third of it. Oh, and the other pop science books on my To-Read shelf. I’m trying to stay away from Graham Green Life in Letters as long as I can – is that even a resolution?

Art and Personality

January 4th, 2009 Uncategorized

I prefer Dutch Golden Age but that was not a choice on the menu.

Your favourite type of art is Northern Renaissance.

Northern Renaissance
The most famous Renaissance artists worked in Italy during the 15th and 16th centuries. Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael are household names. But the Renaissance, or the artistic rebirth, which followed the Middle Ages, also happened a little later in other parts of Europe.

Northern Renaissance painters of the 16th century had their own style and created works focused on morality, religion and human nature.

In the personality profile you had a high intellectualism score, which suggests you like to think about abstract ideas and have a creative imagination.

High intellectualism
People with high intellectualism scores are interested the abstract. They like thinking about things they can’t see and have creative imaginations, able to dream up whole new worlds. They like to feel they understand things and will probe deeply into a subject to get as good an insight as possible.

People who are the same age and sex as you are most likely to prefer Impressionism.

People who also score highly in your dominant personality trait are most likely to prefer Impressionism.

Impressionism
Impressionist paintings often appear on mugs, calendars and posters. However, they weren’t always so socially acceptable. Impressionist painters were initially criticized for attempting to capture the fleeting effects of light and colour found in nature.

Using daubs of pure colour, they painted landscapes, sunlight reflecting on water and flowers and rejected the traditional subjects and darker colours advocated by their teachers.

Intuitively, I can’t see how art has any connection with personality – I think art (specifically painting and music) helps to express the inexplicable, something hidden from others.

I do agree with what it says here on ‘Effects of Art Education’. It’s similar to (what I call) the reading-thick-books-syndrome. The greater the level of literacy and confidence in a language, the greater acceptance for unusual words, and less resistance to thick books (which has a greater chance for unusual words). The more art education one has, the more art becomes an aesthetic based consumption, the less it becomes a consumption for its balm-like quality – as education increases, there is lower resistance towards low realism in art forms. Try it yourself.