iBook saves the day (my freshwater crab talk)

I moaned and groaned (internally) about my freshwater crab talk for some reason, probably because my engine was running low after the activity of the past two weeks. By 10.30am (last Saturday morning) I finally dragged my self out of bed to get going and raced to create a Keynote out my outline.

I hammered out a text draft of the talk painfully amidst a blazing headache the previous day - that outline was enough for a two hour talk. So that Saturday morning I trimmed and revised some content, added images, section headings and transitions. I also did some reading up to confirm certain ideas.

My museum kakis Swee Hee and Heok Hui had dug out some fine looking images which clearly illustrated the six freshwater crab species from Singapore. A second batch from Choy Heng Wah was relayed by Swee Hee that same morning and I even printed out some photos. I was looking forward to sharing the gorgeous photos with an audience that had dragged themselves to the Botanic Gardens on a Saturday afternoon.

In the last 15 mins before I left, Keynote refused to accept the images! Huh? I decided to cut my losses and Graphic Converter’s slideshow. Then the video adaptor for the MacBook Pro went MIA [I later found it artfully hanging from my wall, right under my nose!] So I fired up my 14.1″ iBook - with its five hour battery, I used my 8GB Imation thumbdrive to transfer all the files from the MacBook Pro to the iBook in the taxi on the way to the venue. This even as coordinator Wei Ling calls to check if I am “on the way”.

In the theatrette, it took mere seconds to plug and play in the incomparable style of an iBook - and what you see is what you get, none of that mirroring nonsense! Some dramatic transitions were unable to render on an iBook, but otherwise things were okay - the Keyspan wireless was accepted without complaint and no power cables would get in the way either.

I struggled with the start of the talk but picked up after the early bird Urban Legend I offered them with. The few whom I later asked said it was okay and that’s usually means it was good enough. Dinesh then gave me a lift to Hup Leong to recover my bicycle and gave me a ride home. I was grateful for the lift and wondered aloud at my tiredness. An hour later in bed I realise I had caught the flu once again from that miserable student (ORY) of mine! Fever, body aches and raspy throat - how could I miss the symptoms?! No wonder I had been so reluctant to do the talk and was sleeping instead of working on the keynote on Saturday morning!

I pulled out of a 80km Sunday bike ride on Sunday and had to miss SAJC’s valiant efforts against a much better ACS (I) rugby team in the ‘A’ Division Police Cup finals at the Padang on Monday. I hate the flu!

After three additional hours of work the previous night and one the next morning, I presented a trimmed-down and more geographical version of the talk to the Freshwater Crab Symposium in NUS on Thursday morning. This time it was a much smoother talk and Keynote accepted all images once again - even threw in an an old map I had just photographed.

So why had Keynote been sulking?

Ahhh…rain!

Rain upon us, finally?!

After frustrated twitterings over thundering clouds but no rain during the many scorching hot days, darks clouds form with greater credibility this morning. Lekowala, out on the shore with his students for the Biophilia programme, calls for a storm warning over Sentosa.

So I checked NEA’s webapge for him and this time it seems, it seems like its almost upon them.

Nowcast predicts rain all over Singapore in the next three hours. [Nowcast Weather for Singapore for the next 3 hours from 08:25 AM to 11:25 AM 10-05-2008:]

Aid for Burmese cyclone victims

Tropical Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar last Friday and the damage appears to be far in excess of the 2004 cyclone and may even exceed the impact on the country of the 2004 December Indian Ocean Tsunami. The numbers are up to 22,000 killed, 41,000 missing and up to 200,000 homeless. These are early figures. Sadly again the loss of mangrove forest as a buffer heightened the impact of the cyclone.

To donate towards relief, see: Mercy Relief [phone, bank transfer etc] and Singapore Red Cross [cheque, cash walk in donations].

News: Mercy Relief blog - BBC - CNA - singeo: Google Earth layer - Google News - Yahoo News.

The big red circles are flooded population centres with 100,000-200,000 people.
2005 population estimates in flooded areas = 1.73million - UNOSAT.
Click to download complete pdf.

Singapore Animal Welfare Symposium

I’m a panelist for Session 3: Wildlife protection

• What is the extent of the illegal wildlife trade in Singapore?
• What steps can we, the public, take to wipe out this trade?
• What more can be done to tackle the illegal wildlife trade here in Singapore, and in the region?

A personal blog by members of the Cat Welfare Society Singapore

Members of the Cat Welfare Society’s committee are blogging at catwelfaresg.wordpress.com - “the Unofficial Cat Welfare Society Diary.” Like Dawn’s before, “it is entirely personal, and does not reflect the opinions of the society.”

So we will continue to get to peek into their thoughts and experiences and readers will offer up support and suggestions as they have before.

In a recent post, Sarah says,

“As usual, we don’t know how Dawn managed it.

Ah well, the best way to get it done is to get started. “

Ah, brave heart.

Discomfiture at Hanabi Japanese Restaurant

I usually get impatient when dining at a particular restaurant turns out to be the primary objective of an outing. But earlier this evening, I was dragged out of my bout of exam-marking reclusiveness by a post-exam celebrant. I waived decision-making since I was in the presence of two Japanese cuisine enthusiasts. So we ended up at Hanabi Japanese Restaurant at King’s Arcade off Bukit Timah Road.

The enthusiastic pair ordered the buffet (what the place is apparently famous for) while I decided to pay for the chair I was occupying. Unlike my company, it took some effort to order something vaguely promising off the a la carte menu. A fan I am not, but the waiter smiled and withdrew.

That was an exchange with a senior waitress in the background somewhere. A short while later, a large sign was plonked on the table by said waitress. Orientated accusingly towards me, she faded away into the empty restaurant while I peered at it with my veery worn eyes in considerable surprise. It had been a tough week and now I was confronted by this sign, cast on my table, in a restaurant I had unenthusiastically entered. And it identified me as a non-buffet-eating diner, sitting amongst buffet-eating diners.

I felt like a dangerous animal.

No, I mean I actually managed to feel insulted at that point. That usually takes considerable effort and I have, in my long and undistinguished career, deflected barbs about race, religion, nationality, competence and the like with much aplomb. Much likee how the m.o.s deflects non-kryptonite bullets harmlessly off his, erm, steely chest (I know some of you are particular, hence the k word).

Anyhow the dangerous animal bit was because I actually felt like the Incredible Hulk was about to explode out of me. And yes, it does appear that I have read too many comics in my youth.

So, in one quick gesture, Hanabi Japanese Restaurant managed to make me feel insulted. Was it the lack of sleep (I’ve had worse), or that more marking beckoned (only a small pile left, really), or the sweltering heat (and it has been scorching too). Perhaps I was already impatient with myself for having ended up an an indulgent place amidst inane chatter about food. I know its sacrilegious and all but surely just once in a few years I should express some true feelings to alleviate the highly impersonal tone of this personal blog of mine.

However, I was there to cheer on the celebrant’s indulgence (objective you must never lose sight of, my young padawan). So I directed my thousand yard stare at the hapless decor and edged the conversation on to something real that I could sink my teeth into. The point of self-implosion passed and Bruce Banner returned.

However, another waitress came long and she tells me to eat my food which I had not touched. I looked up, and to the left, and saw that sign again, the bane of the evening, leering down at me.

Rationality or ambivalence usually intervenes at this point but tonight they struggled. I did wonder, but only mildly, if enough thieves masquerading as patrons were sneaking portions from their conspiring (and just as evil) buffet-eating friends. Well, something had made enough of an impact for Hanabi to treat customers so suspiciously be default. Rising food prices?

Perhaps I looked ravenous instead of well-fed, as I usually am accused of being. Or maybe my two friends and I fit the restaurant’s profile of evil, conspiring diners and perhaps the waitress thought she heard us say, “fair is foul and foul is fair”.

But the evening’s objective beckoned once again and I encouraged my unsuspecting (or perhaps, by now, mildly suspecting) friends to recount some other recent experience in their miserable lives. Suffice to say it distracted me yet again for I am, as you may realise by now, easily distracted.

So when the third waitress announced the bill after a long wait with a resounding “hello?!” it didn’t register a blip on the radar. She was just regular folk and quickly offered to have the food packed unasked. My friends nodded but I left. I simply didn’t have an appetite any longer.

I think it was discomfiture.

95 drive-bys outside University Hall

The absence of the SBS bus No. 95 is a bother on most days. After exam invigilation, its tiring. Students pour out of exam halls and the buses are few and far between. By the time it reaches University Hall, the buses are so full they just drive by.

I had reached department by 7.30pm after script verification, dumped everything and grabbed my new load of scripts and high-tailed it out of there. I was actually eager to get back to recapture my momentum of the morning’s marking. After 20 mins, I was drenched in perspiration from the humidity of the still air and left with the ominous feeling that the situation was not going to improve. So I SMSed Ladybug for SBS’ IRIS data. The reply said “7 mins more.” And 7 minutes later, I watched yet another student-filled 95 breeze by.

At 8pm, some admin staff emerged from University Hall. They’ve probably seen it all before and immediately started calling for cabs. But most cabs in the vicinity were already booked. Labour Day eve compounded the usual problem. So everyone waited, although I am sure most felt the next 95 would be a drive-by too.

So I gave in and called for rescue - Ladybug came before the bus in a borrowed car. We grabbed three others from the bus stop - one lady in particular had been waiting far longer than me, for more than an hour. She looked pretty far gone, and I found out she had been spring cleaning all day today. She’s from my department.

I felt guilty about the rest we had abandoned but wished on them an empty 95.

I went home and cooked. Will resume marking tomorrow.

Facility certification post-MSK

Everyone has weighed in over Mas Selamat Kastari’s (MSK) escape. That ST’s crime desk did not take the lead in favour of political scribes had me reluctant to rely on their news. But there has been no shortage of alternative news. However, even when skimming, I have encountered enough faulty assumptions to realise this requires some dedicated attention which I haven’t invested in. So conversations with friends kicks in as the best pointer to worthy information.

As I floated above the buzz, I must admit I initially thought the noise about ISD’s incompetence was overhyped. So I was indeed shocked by the story behind the sawn-off window handle and the picture depicting the lack of clearance for the perimeter wall. Yes it will certainly take a while before this is lived down. Had we late night shows, the fodder this provides will probably rank in popularity of use to Cheney’s shooting incident amongst US talk shows. Most know the basic facts so even mild allusions would work. With everyone’s renovation contractor woes, they can all appreciate the size of the problem that even the dreaded even ISD can’t get a grille installed even when they try. Or maybe it was really about the price of steel. You get an inkling of the private conversations.

So now Home Affairs will probably ask the relevant people in Prisons to certify any detention facility that ISD has set up and get involved in the planning phase of new facilities. And then have an independent company certify and audit the premises. We will need facilities fit for the detention of a higher grade of criminal that we seem to be acquiring, post 9-11. These boys aren’t just hungering for hawker fare.

The biology labs we maintain in campus these days are subject to something similar. A lab’s safety level classification depends on the sort of germ (or chemical, etc) they deal with. The premises and occupants have to be certified fit to cope with this and are also audited for their ability to safely cope with their threatening occupants.

As I chatted with a rueful friend from the police a many weeks ago, I did argue that the escape was not without its advantages. The perpetual problem of maintaining alertness and vigilance over an extended incident-free period just got a boost - even in areas like safety and fire response. It no longer seems alarmist to take what are actually just adequate steps. Even the exam invigilation announcement I sent out on Monday had suitable MSK innuendoes. Everyone came really early to my satisfaction and prepared themselves with the contingency plans.

And as the discussion about the MSK escape rages on, other issues are being exposed and many are being attended to. I just hope we will not need to pay too high a cost eventually. Meanwhile, I too wonder where he is - the forest or safely encased in a supporter’s house observing all our reactions on tv and the internet?

“Cats and Dogs living together”

Photos from Sue are coming in, heh-heh.