The way I see it

i have connected to a mobile connection in hkia and now all the web pages default to chinese.... unfortunately i only know bad words and  not even the characters.... sigh

travelling always makes me realise why I hate travelling.  I have always maintained that people aee dumb and the more of is there are in one place the dumber we collectively get. Take for example today. people are simply not organised and people can't seem to follow rules efficiently or effectively.  I observed so many people trying to bring liquids on board in carry on luggage and there are signs everywhere.  one woman had actually drank approximately 400ml of her 500ml water and argued she should be able to keep it...  amatuers

I decided to make some odd christmas cookies the other night - snowballs. I am really not sure how famous this cookie is or even how many variations there may be, but what can you do? First things first... create a standard sugar cookie dough then crush some candy canes and mix them thorughly into the dough.  Form the dough into a ball, stare at its majesty and take a picture. Using WASHED HANDS(you just took a picture) rip pieces of the large dough ball and roll them into balls. put the balls on a lightly greased cookie sheet. Space your balls about an inch apart - no one likes sticky balls! If two of them clump together don't panic, although if you' ve got more than three you may want to seek help. Bake your cookies for about 10 minutes at 190 C or until your balls are golden and lightly browning on the edges. Give the balls a minute or two to cool, then sprinkle with powdered sugar. Congratulations we have snowball cookies! Tune in next time for 'baste m...

I found this great app it's one part baseball game and one part card collecting game. The action is pretty simple. You are given a stack of your favourite team's cards to start and from there you can play the game to earn points to get better cards. It may seem quite juvenile but the sports part of the game is very strong.  The designers of the game smartly omitted what would likely be the hardest part on a mobile device: running and fielding.  one of the things I don't like is that your leveling up of a card can fail. This can be very annoyingas you will have to keep paying out more and more of your precious points! overall a great app for android. pros: good baseball action, fast paced, free cons: card collecting is slow and too random, power ups can be annoying

I enjoy the comic 'The Walking Dead' So when the TV show came out I was all over it like a zombie on brains. There have been quite a few changes to the story but for the most part the story, or at least the spirit of the story, has remained true to form. One of the more interesting additions is  Daryl who has proved so popular that he will beadded to the comics (or has been... its hard to keep current in Malaysia). Daryl is the kind of bad-ass character that is often popular if treated right. He's got a heart, as seen in his sort of romance, but he can still kick ass on a regular basis. Put all of these elements together with the fact that he rides a motorcycle and you have basically got a recipe for coolness that is fonzian in its scope! So there you have it, my two cents.  Anyone else got a favourite?

In my many travels to find imported food I have picked up my share of bad food. Today's post however, is not about green tea oreo cakes or fermented bean paste it is about rotten chicken. Chicken generally is not one of my favourite things to buy as I am extremely finnicky about it. So thos weekend I thought I would roast a whole chicken I was at KLCC and thought I would buy a whole bird at the 'cold stoage'. Big mistake. The chicken itself according to he packaging was 100% grain fed and anti-biotic free... trust me when I say it could have used some anti-biotics... or at least deodorant! It was in a sealed bag that was then wrapped in cellophane.... needless to say it smelled fine and the date? Why it was packaged on Saturday... not a bad deal! When i got home i opened the bag and released a horrible ungodly stench. The rank stank was so awful the only thing i could do is get the thing out of my condo. Thankfully, I was able to do that quickly. So let this be a warn...

So, the other day i went to 'Esquire Kitchen' which is a local chain restaurant(look it up if you don't know) with locations throughout the KL area and beyond.  Feeling particularly healthy I ordered my favourite 'hong kong gai lan' and when I was about half-way through I found a largeish piece of red plastic from a bag. I imagine they had ripped the bag open and that piece went through the proverbial rinse. I was agast and appalled and various other negativities starting with 'a' and quickly brought the matter to the waitstaff's attention. Remarkably, based on every other experience, they were also appalled and immediately took away the food and erased the dish from my bill.  I was shocked because when I have seen bugs in food or wrong orders if I had even looked at the food I was likely paying for it. These ladies had no problem scrapping the dish and keeping the standard high. Bravo Esquire, kudos and kudos again.... you have earned the right ...

So I've been watching the latest season of The Xfactor (the singing competition) and realised that having a brutally honest judge like Simon Cowell is pretty much the best thing about the show. I know what you are thinking 'Adam, you are about a dozen years late in this revelation he was on a little show called American Idol.' Well I know and I am just getting warmed up. Nowadays the airways are full of shows with these blunt Brits speaking their minds and crushing the spirts of those left in their collective wakes. I think Simon Cowell is possibly the most endearing of the lot as he has had quite a bit of staying power thus far on Idol and the Xfactor. Thinking about 'talent shows' I have to bring up Piers Morgan who was on numerous 'reality' shows a few years ago and now hosts a show on CNN.  Morgan was arrogant in his 'reality show' persona which I think worked very well: he is a snob and we are all benwath him. Next up is Gordon Ramsay celebri...

Today I was reading about Oxford's 'word of the year' and apparently there are many words of the year out there. First fishy thing is that it seems to be up in the air whether or not Oxford dictionaries actually endorses this word.  The LA Times reported it was from Oxford, while wikipedia says the Oxford list isn't from Oxford but from an employee! Strange to say the least, but I don't care I trust Oxford so I'm only gonna focus on them official or not! There are also two different words of the year: one American and one British.  Do we really need two versions of the latest hip word or phrase. Apparently we do. Onto the American word: GIF. WTF is this actually a word?  Well sort of.  It seems that people have started to use this word as a verb ass in "I'm gonna GIF that freak out Adam just had."  personally I have never seen this usage, Hell I never really heard anyone talking about GIFs in years so what do I know.  According to the article ...

well today, as some of you malaysians may know, starbucks was giving out free drinks today between 12 and 2pm.  it was a mystery frapp with no whipped cream (for shame) with red beans or tea jelly depending how lucky(or unlucky) you were. I wasn't really bothered one way or the other because  the love of my life    my favourite barrista was there. In true, giving out free crap fashion the line had to have about 50 people in it and took the better part of 30minutes to get through.  I had once on a whim calculated how much I get paid per minute of life... let me tell you... my free frapp cost me in that equation... lucky we don' count life that way or else we would never find the joy in free coffee.

Feng shui is a weird thing. I am by no means an expert but is basically involves putting objects in certain areas of a building in order to have some beneficial effect. While playing pool(billiards) near the pool(swimming) it started raining and also flooding.  Since the Heritage was built with some feng shui principles I can only assume the leaks were a water feature of some sort! I definitely felt something auspicous as I played... oh wait that was a wet sock from the huge puddle caused. It's a Waterfall: Good Feng Shui! Speaking of rain the river has almost flooded and I for one am excited. unfortunately I see flooding as an impossibility but I can always dream can't I? The River is Almost Flooded!

Something curious is happening these days bands we have all kind of forgotten,who were huge in the 90s are back. Last year saw the reformation of Bush and the release of 'The Sea of Memories,'  their first album in about a decade. For those who do not know Bush were the answer to the need for a British Nirvana clone to make it big in America. And they were huge... For a while. Regardless of.anything else it is good to see Bush back and surprisingly better than before. Next up is Smashing Pumpkins. I love the pumpkins.. I always have. For that reason I am gonna say I am biased as Hell. Billy Corgan, the band's singer and chief songwriter, has not really left the music scene since the Smashing Pumpkins original break up in 2000. He has had song writing and appearances with other artists as well as a supergroup called Zwan. Then about 5 years ago Billy got the band together... Well sort of... They released Zeitgeist and had a song on the transformers soundtrack... Shortly af...

Well we've finally about finished with our renovation and move here at the school; unfortunately there is no internet here... so i am blog-less!

Don't let the subject fool you... I have no info about the Dr Who TV programme other than to say it is awesome! My post is about a funny (and awesome) roll of tape I saw at work.  The tape in question is pictured below.. Dr Who Packing tape!?!?!  Who knew? The cool thing about this tape is that the roll is bigger on the inside than the outside.

Well in case you couldn't tell I am a big guy, naturally, you can assume I like to eat and I enjoy hunting for imported food. Shopping in Asia is usually fun, but for me nothing beats discovering some food item I haven't had in years at a Malaysia grocery store. Imported food in Malaysia is a real mixed bag.  A large portion of the 'western food' you find is from Australia, which makes perfect sense geographically.  You also find tons from Asia (both East and Middle) and a moderate amount from Europe.  British imports are also quite numerous and are perhaps equal to what you find from North America. The curious thing about a lot of imported food in Malaysia is that it is primarily convenience food (especially if frozen) or junk (chips, biscuits, candies, etc).  I think that's not too bad though especially since it is usually the junky foods that I find I am craving (like cheetos).  Cereal chimes in a a strange import good.  I saw strange because you can...

The Box Art Child of Eden is a visually interesting, though not particularly stunning game. The premise is fairly simple: Shoot crap. It's a rail shooter, which means you are stuck in one linear place moving back and forth shooting crap.  The interesting part is that when you shoot things it has a drum beat, that drum beat accents the game's own music at times which adds a cool dimension to playing. The game makes use (on the PS3 release) of the PS move motion controller. I only used the move controls as I thought they would allow for the most fun experience.  The move provides a decent level of control although at times I felt them to be sluggish and a bit of an impediment... then again I may have simply been too close to the screen. The story is kind of a bit weird. There is a girl named 'Lumi' who apparently needs to be saved so we have to shoot strange geometric shapes in Space in order to uh... rescue her?  Ok so I am not really very sure on that one. Th...

At the Heritage there is a group of statues depicting the Chinese Zodiac.  For those of you who don't know the Chinese Zodiac consists of twelve animals that have some influence or other on your life (just like the western zodiac). I am a monkey which apparently has something to do with my playfulness, guile, and penchant for bananas. I have noticed that there is a huge rat that hangs out at the heritage... not mutatedly huge but it is a sizable rat none the less. Now I know what you are all collectively saying... 'Who cares?' or 'Why is this possibly blog-worthy' well I will tell you.  The big ass rat has a nest and its nest is under the statue of... THE RAT.  How cool is that?  The rat has its own place under proportionally a giant rat.  Imagine you lived in a house with a giant person on top... pretty cool...  Picture to come soon.  I can never seem to get my phone out in time to a picture of the rat... it seems like it may become some kind of urba...

I was reading some album reviews on the net and a reviewer was mentioning that a certain album would be difficult to listen through for the average listener. This got me thinking: how easy is it to listen through a CD without skipping tracks?  It turns out it is harder than it seems. There are many deciding factors in this challenge; general interest in the artist, free time to spend listening, and like-ability of the songs.  I have found that more experimental or concept albums are very hit and miss for this experiment as they are either coherent (successful concept) or just plain wrong (unsuccessful concept). I think these days people are not really interested in sitting and listening to a whole CD. We just grab the tracks we like (the singles most likely), bop them on our Iphone/android/mp3/etc and listen to only those songs... after all they are the best: right? I want to buck the trend. I want to listen to it all and I'll only put full albums on my mobile device! Yest...

I appear to have suffered from blogger's block which i am assuming is a distant cousin of writer's block...  basically I didn't have any idea what to blog about that would be appropriately interesting.  I suppose these things do happen to the best of us. When I took creative writing the teacher told us when we have writer's block we should simply write the first thing that pops into our head and go from there; even if it is stream of consciousness. For a blog that would be quite annoying and unreadable so I have saved the cyber-world and simply wrote about the process. Now on to bigger and better things...

The Grill House has opened its doors here at the Heritage and that should be good news to those residents that like change.  The restaurant is located at the previous site of the Glen Doman centre(which I think moved upstairs to Critterland). When you enter the establishment you are often greeted by the husband or wife who own the place. They are polite, hospitable and generally make you feel welcomed. The food is a bit of a mixed bag. There are plenty of grilled options: steak, lamb, chicken. Each grilled platter comes with steamed vegetables and a baked potato. Its healthy but hearty.  The burger section is extensive. Although, there is not a huge amount of variation there is more than enough to curb ur hunger. There is also an assortment of Persian flavoured dishes like his fine grilled kebabs.  the odd ball on the menu is pizza. The pizza is good but it kind of sits off as its not grilled. Today I am having the double cheeseburger. It is great.

Well it's official. The dream is dead. Sorry to be the one to tell you but it's my job... Not only did I get NOTHING on a day out in KL but my beloved 3ds died. Dead. Very sad. Just when I thought things could not get any worse I told my mom I would flee Malaysia and she reminded me that I can't do that as I have a financial commitment with a chair I purchased.  A damn chair!!!! Some days you just can't win.

So apparently there is a blogger app for android and apparently I am testing it right now... Well it may brag about its 'on the go uses' but I predict I will only use it when I am too lazy to boot up my laptop. Isn't technology grand?

In my travels around South East Asia I have seen some really odd food.  People here eat a variety of strange things which is great as it allows me to explore a different culture and gives more flavour (haha) to living abroad. Would you eat a Jawa? Yesterday I found a very very disturbing food item on a local menu and I would like to start a petition banning the senseless slaughter of the elegant and noble creatures used to make this 'delicacy.'  Now I know what you are thinking shark fin right?  Hells to the no.  Dolphin?  no way Jose!  I am talking about the merciless harvesting of Jawas to make JAWA FRIED RICE!!! These little cloaked guys are great for the environment... I mean they salvaged every scrap of space crap that fell on that planet in Star Wars and they served for one heck of a plot point to coincidentally put Luke together with C3PO and R2D2.  Yeah I think we need a telethon for this... Another thing does bother me though...

Dynasty Warriors is a decade old video game franchise from the good people at now Tecmo-Koei, which loosely follows the plot of the historical Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms . The game is a fairly simple one and it is generally a crowd-pleaser for multi-play, with much button mashing and very little in the way of cerebral notions. It is a hack and slash game in the truest sense: that is literally what you do.  I'm a fan of the game that is no secret and the game got me interested in 'Three Kingdoms' stuff. A good friend of mine bought me the 2 volume set when I moved to Asia and I ingested that tome. For those of you unfamiliar (with the book not the game) Three Kingdoms is in many ways a political book and a mythological book than an action packed page turner; it has epic battles, intrigue, and larger than life characters.  When reading about the exploits of Lu Bu, or Guan Yu thoughts spring to mind of the Illiad and its set of epic heroes. Dynasty Warriors ...

I'm picky about food service. I bled, sweat, and suffered in the food service industry back when I was young and handsome so I do have knowledge on certain industry standards. Because of my experience, my training, and my expectations I tend to have a zero tolerance approach to all things service oriented.  I also have tried to maintain a zero second chances policy with food service no-nos, unfortunately if I did that I think I would never eat out again! The first place in Malaysia to raise my fury was 'Johnny's Steamboat Restaurant' a family steamboat restaurant with many locations (at that time) around the city.  My issue was first quality followed shortly after but customer service and finally managerial. The long and short of it was that my fried rice had insects in it, not an insect, INSECTS - plural. I kinda did one of those things where my mouth hung open and the food fell out; it was gross.  This kind of thing can and does happen everywhere, so I don't f...

I have unbelievable luck sometimes. I went out last night to meet an old friend and along the way I was going to drop by one of the premier shopping malls, KLCC, and visit the bookshop there.  The store was closed.  I believe it was a 'company dinner.'  I might be ignorant or crazy but I don't recall this being a very common occurrence back home in Canada. I actually think this is the first time I heard of was here in Malaysia and actually now only recently. I don't understand the point in closing your entire retail operation for one night for a dinner.  Wouldn't the loss of revenue be of some concern?  I begin to wonder if some smaller shops are using this 'corporate dinner' as an excuse for closing shop for the night.  I have noticed in a shopping mall near my condo here that a few smaller electronic shops have had 2-3 annual dinners this year.  Perhaps it has been a particularly long year... I mean there is one more day ...

My first experience with the Avengers was when I was  about 9 years old I was at the local convenience store (we actually still had some of those) and a comic cover caught my eye.  The issue was number 305 and it was, I thought, a really cool cover.  The Avengers are basically being swarmed by 'lavamen' (whatever they are) and are more or less completely surrounded. The funny thing about it is that I never bothered to get issue 306 or 307 which I gather should be related as there was a cliffhanger at the end.  I was a kid so I'm sure the scourge of that day was pocket money, but I digress. With this happy childhood memory it was with great relish and glee that I saw the Avengers movie. The movie is actually really good.  As with a lot of these 'comic book' movies the film seems to set us up mainly for a big battle at the end and of course a sequel. I think this is a very standard format for this type of film, not good or bad... just expected. The plot follows ...

Drudging through work once again and wondering about some fundamental aspects of management: evaluation and feedback.  Feedback during my evaluations falls into this handy blanket term of 'constructive criticism.' Constructive criticism is an odd topic. In the most basic terms this feedback is given when you see something that is not working and you make a small comment with the intention of correction or at least acceptance of said defect.  The constructive portion of this comes from the understood caveat that this negative is going to build into or comes packaged with a positive. The danger here is that if you are too 'constructive' the problem is overlooked and if too 'criticismy' you end up looking... well... 'douchey.' So I begin to wonder... when does criticism cease to be criticism and start being just 'douchey.'  To start with constructive criticism should not be about entirely changing how someone does something; it should be a catal...

Well I am knee-deep in work but I am trying hard to get my 10,000 steps in daily. How am I counting?  glad you asked nobody. I am using the pedometer on my nintendo 3ds, although I am not sure how accurate it is... this week I appear to be averaging just under 10K per day... but it's hard. I kept the 3DS in my pocket the whole day basically and track steps in my daily working life. You would NOT be amazed how little I walk during my working hours as it's almost nothing.  I supposed that can only be expected from a desk job. So basically every evening I have to find an excuse to go walking for a while on some errand or another so I can build up my steps... it's 8:45am and I have just over a thousand steps. It is a good start but a very long way to go

So I discovered this great little movie studio, called 'The Asylum,' which specializes in 'Mockbusters' and other such homages to big budget films.  The studio has had some recent outputs of sort of blockbusters a look at their releases includes 'Transmorphers' 'Almighty Thor' and numerous throw-backs to those cheesy 'American Pie' type movies '18 year old virgin,' 'Celebrity sex tape.' Now some of these films might seem like blatant rip-offs of the Hollywood films but they aren't, well not exactly anyways.  In my experience of watching these 'bad' films they might take the premise of the original story or film and then go in a different direction. The first film I saw from 'The Asylum' was a western (I think their only western) and it was called '6 Guns.'  Now I think this movie is supposed to be something like 'True Grit' mixed with a little 'Red Dead Redemption' but maybe I am missi...

Yesterday I wrote a list of things that would deter me from hiring a person, but why was I so negative?  I think it is a lot more entertaining to see 'worst of' lists but it is really not so encouraging.  In this frame of mind I thought I would write 5 things that would make me want to hire a person and add a few notes for each one.  So without further ado a detailed list of five things that make me WANT to hire you 5. Be confident This might seem like an obvious thing but you would be surprised how many interviewees I have had come in with little to no confidence in themselves or their ability.  It is tragic to me that some of the best potential employees, I have met with, lost out on a job because they did not wake up, look in the mirror and say 'I can do this.' On the flip side or the dark side there is arrogance.  Please be careful with your confidence. Telling the person interviewing you that you can do their job and their boss' job better...

Top Ten lists are everywhere... travel websites, David Letterman's show, year-end movie lists the list (UGH) goes on.  So I thought in honour of top ten lists everywhere I would do my own! I'm knee-deep in recruitment and I am not seeing much that is good but I am seeing a whole lot of what I don't like at all.  It seems that some people have no concept on how to get a job and their entire interview turns into one spiralling train wreck of mistakes. Agree or disagree I thought I would vent some of my frustration with this fun list... yes it is just for fun and yes it does have some truth in it. So here goes the Top Ten Things that make me NOT want to hire you. 10. You have no concept of English despite applying for a job in that field. 9.  Yu cuhn't spel tu sahve yore lyfe. 8.  You were 20 minutes late for the interview. 7. You didn't show up for the interview. 6. You make ethnic slurs or generalisations. 5.  You are more handsome tha...

I can never express how important it is to read... and I'm not just talking about my blog here.  Reading is critical for some many reasons! As an educator it is an absolute chore to get any student to read.  Why you ask?  Glad you asked that... it is really quite simple. People are lazy.  People are lazy and don't want to take the time to invest a couple hours in reading.  Reading is a multi-faceted exercise we learn from it consciously and unconsciously, it helps with our lexicon, it helps with our compositions and it fosters our imagination.  It can also help you learn cool words.. like 'lexicon'.  I read a lot and I read a bit of everything.  Right now I am reading textbooks which is not so much fun but I can still figure out a lot of interesting things from them me getting paid to do it is just a plus I guess.  So far I've gone through the two lowest levels of books and I am on to the 'pre-intermediate' level.  I've alr...

Yeah I know Sunday isn't necessarily the seventh day of the week but I wanted a catchy title. Sue me.  Today has been a lazy day.  I'm having trouble sleeping so I have been up for a looooooong time.  Shelf one I am a collector.  It has been suggested to me that I should write a post about one of my collections so what the heck it is Sunday so why not.  Today I will be talking to you about my kotobukiya statue collection.  For those of you not hip to the kotobukiya jive they are a Japanese toy manufacturer that focuses on mature collectibles... no no I'm not talking about anything obscene I mean they're for an adult collector.  Shelf two So anyways Kotobukiya has released a series (or rather a few series) of these statue/figures based on a few different licenses. Currently I have some of the Marvel and DC comic lines and now i have the first in their 'Tekken' video game line.  They are quite nice; however, they are mor...

For those of you out there in Cyberville who are uninformed Nintendo has a 3D handheld console called the '3DS.'  The 3DS has glasses free 3D effects for its games which is changable depending on your desired level of viewing. Anyways back to the purpose of my post.  There is an interesting function of the system which is called 'street pass.'  This function allows you to communicate with other 3DS users while your system is in standby mode and you are walking around or standing somewhere where other users might walk by.  There is a catch, which is that you need to find other users!!!! So far I have 'met' some 20 odd users who all chill out in your 'plaza' which is a virtual platform for you to view your aquintances and play some built in games. The street pass screen along with my 'mii' avatar I know what you are asking yourself 'What is the point?'  well the point is that you can play the games only if you have these 'friends...

Today I'm supposed to be giving some interviews.  So while I wait for my candidates to arrive I thought I would share my thoughts on the interviewing world. Interviewing people for a job is a lot harder than you might think. There are some people who interview very poorly but are very good employees and on the flip side there are those fun people who interview fantastically and you regret hiring after about 12 seconds.  In the end it is like most things in the world an imprecise science of gauging a hundred different variables and then hoping for the best. I've had some funny interviews in the past... I've had people come in looking like they are on the way to the beach, some looking like they are going to the pasar (market) later, some looking business ready, and I've even seen some come in club ready.  There have even been some people who were not proficient in English coming in...  By far my favourite interviews have been the ones where the interviewee says so...

One of the many wonders of living in Malaysia has been figuring out the taxes. As a foreigner who hasn't been able to grasp anything close to the basics of Malay (Satu Lagi!) I have to use an English language form to figure out what I am doing then cross reference back to the official Malay form.  It's not too bad actually you just kind of do your rough work on the English one then use the Malay one as your final draft. At this point I think I can do taxes here better than some of the Malaysians i know! So it looks like a banner year here as I may just get a couple hundred back in rebate...  just enough to buy a couple XBOX or PS3 games! It's good no matter how you look at it...

So yesterday I did my usual thing of bringing work home.  Different syllabus material but syllabussy none the less.  Basically  I'm just reading some textbooks at the moment and trying to break down the text into a workable context for the school.  It's tedious work but it needs to be done. I took my break and played 'Skyrim.'  For those of you who are not hip to nerdy things Skyrim is a massive role-playing game on multiple platforms where you... well... OK i am not sure the actual plot of the game.  You kind of go off on adventures, save damsels, slay dragons, wander around aimlessly, etc. So I decided to start some quest where i explode a dungeon with some big burly dude (not my first choice for partners but it's the game so what can you do?). After finishing my exploration I discovered that I had actually been playing for some 3 hours and it was pretty much time to call it a night... How the hell did that happen? The thing I really wond...

Well here we are in my first blog post... actually my first blog post on 'blogger.com' and I am not really sure what to do from here or where exactly to go...  I guess I should talk about my life. At this precise moment I am taking a break from my syllabus writing as my eyes are about to fall out of their sockets and I have the distinct feeling that my brain is going to ooze out of my head if I don't step away from it.  So here I am stepping away from it or more precisely, here I am minimising a word document and using IE. The writing is actually not difficult nor is the material it is the monotony that is a killer.  You see there is a feeling of being Oz when creating this kind of document as you are planning everything for a year.  A year of learning.  A year of objectives. Being the man behind the curtain is, however, quite tedious as you are building a series of layers (of learning) that are taking place year after year in one document after a...