27/12/12 Matlab workshop



Decided in a wimp yesterday to join this Matlab workshop that is organized by IEEE of MMU. I saw this last week, but was clever enough to ignore it. I don't know why I went to see it again and then decide to join in. It cost me RM50 for this 5 hours workshop.
The workshop promises to cover:
  • Introduction to MATLAB 
  • Matrix Operations 
  • Graphical User Interface 
  • Image Processing 
  • Simulink *bluff me, don't have this*
  • Miscellaneous Functions *???*
By far, the introduction to MATLAB, I can actually learn it online in my own pace. I went to google matlab and then discovered www.mathworks.com. Clicked some tutorials in the academia section. I learned a lot in just 30 mins by myself. And I find it easier to understand from the online site better than in the workshop, as the website uses interactive video so it's more interesting and the explanation are way better. And they use perfect English, not in Malaysian slang/grammar, so it's much more easier to digest and understand.

First of all, the computer sucks. With only 1GB of RAM, it's super slow. MMU should upgrade the old computers plus there's only a few labs which have Matlab in them. Plus the Matlab version is not even the new one. How disappointing!

There's two lecturers who came to teach. The first one teaches intro, matrix, and the GUI. Honestly, I didn't really paid attention to him because his powerpoint slides did all the necessary explanations. The second one teaches image processing. The first one is okay but the second one is really bad at explaining. And he is suppose to be my Digital Signal Processing lecturer but then I went to another section instead of his. He skipped most of the explaining, maybe it's due to the time constraint, but this doesn't help the students to better understand at all. So, basically, they just give some example coding and then we have to teach ourselves what those coding does by observing the output and listening to the little information given from the lecturer. I guess this is how university level students learn things. We can't be spoon-fed anymore, have to find out the answer ourselves. But it's okay, Mr. Google helps a lot. 

Dinner was at 9pm, they provided us some Burger King's burger. IMHO, the portion is too small, even for me. It's not really that fulling at all plus the timing of dinner time was too late. I would be starving if I didn't went for teatime with Alex. 

In the end, I think I wasted some of my money and time in there. But maybe I wouldn't have learn anything if I didn't went to that workshop. Maybe I'm just buying a push that I needed to make me learn something new. 
I think I'm not going to participate in these anymore if I knew I can learn this by myself with Prof. Internet. 
I'm beat. I'm going to sleep now. Goodnight.

The start of 20


Thank you my friends and family who came to celebrate with me and who wished me Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas that day even when there is no facebook notifications on their wall. People rely too much on social media nowadays to remember all the important dates. I too forget my friend's birthday actually. :X But of course I won't forget those close to me. <3 I'm sorry I didn't go all out to enjoy with you guys on that day. But I don't feel like getting wasted on a day like this. HAHA! I'm just a bit different from other people or maybe I'm just too lazy.

I can't believe I'm 20 now. The big TWO in front of my age. I can't fool around anymore like a kid, I can't wander aimlessly now. I have to strive for the better and plan out my life. I'm in need of a big change. I will do my best and do what I can now. New Year is coming, maybe I'll have to do a resolution again for next year. I didn't have any this year, because I always fail to achieve each and every one of them, so it's a bit disappointing really. All I can blame is myself for not doing things. I get scolded a lot lately -.- but at least somebody make me realize what kind of person I am. Apparently, I'm really a hardcore pessimist. And a very anti-social person. What's happening to me?

Finals is just around the corner. Gah! Must start being hardworking too. Good night! Sleep tight!

First shooting range visit




First time seeing a real gun yesterday and the first time handling and firing a real gun today! It was too exciting since these things are usually seen in the movies but not in real life. It seemed intimidating and it still is, since a gun can kill a person in a split second. :S 

The City Square Shooting range is situated in TKS building at the 9th floor. I have an uncle who works for the police force so he introduced us to one of his friends to give a short course and then bring us to the firing range to get down to business. 


Seeing back this picture, I guess I have forgotten about "the stance" where I have to stand with my leg wide enough (that looks very weird, so I ignored it) and my arms looked so weird. *cries and laugh* Or maybe I just think that way because I received comment that I was holding it wrongly. I don't know, but my coach said my posture was correct. I guess anything will work if you're comfortable with it. I'm defensive that way when people say I'm doing something wrongly but since I'm not a pro at this, what can I say? 

My 5m result
My brother's 5m result
He sucked big time. Hahaha! BURN! But according to the statistics, females and younger people can aim more accurately (not every, but most). It was proven once again today. My mum did a pretty spot-on job too, but her results wasn't taken down for her, so I didn't have a chance to snap it down. Uncle Alvin on the other hand, was having problem too. Haha.

My 15m result. Yay! All in black! 6 of 10 bullets were near the number 5 circle! :D 
I found my hidden talent! LOL!
I guess we were using the agent's pistol so we were only  given the choice of shooting with a Walther P99 or a Glock. Both semi-auto and can reload 10 bullets for every magazine. If you ask me, I'll prefer the Walther to Glock because the trigger is easier to handle. But both the recoils still stung my hand for awhile every time I shoot, cause I didn't grip it tight enough at first. Then again, I was weak from the start. So, be sure to grip tightly!

My brother's greatest achievement that day.
Misfired. Holy crap. It's official, he's only good at firing in games but not in reality. XD

I forgot to bring my contact lenses with me. It's pretty uncomfortable actually to wear double. 



It costs us RM1300 for a group of 4 persons (cheaper since we have more people). He gave us unlimited bullets and we can shoot for an hour. I heard that normally it's supposed to be at least RM350 per person for a short course(only need to go for once) and they would charge you differently for rental of gun of your choice and how many bullets you used. But in our case, since we dealt with our friendly "agent", we were charged differently. 

You can also apply for membership at the shooting range if you're a hardcore one. Apparently, people come here to train most of the time for competition. About the price, you can ask the friendly staff there. Their facebook page info.

If you're interested, you can pm me for his phone number. He will brief you and guide you in the shooting too. :)

13/12/12 Old School


There's a new restaurant in town! Went for a try upon Soon En's invitation. It's been a long time since I saw Eric too! Finally can eat with him today. Working people are so busy busy busy!
The deco are pretty simple for the place and it's pretty interesting. The menu is adorable! but humongous with a lot of food choices. There's a page for lunch and another for dinner, I guess they serve different foods at different time. The waitress are all... very short actually. I wonder if they hire short people on purpose. So that they can look like school kids. Like for instance, the one with the school uniform in the picture above. Yes, that's the waiter and the boss and the school uniform is their working uniform! Funny but unique. 

I ordered the steak with brown sauce. The portion is kinda small considering it cost me RM19.90. They gave me many potato wedges though. The taste is not bad, but not very tasty. Just normal. The cabonara spaghetti has nothing special to describe too. I guess it's just so-so. They also sell charcoal burgers and hotdogs, no comment on the taste though. :P

It's interesting but I don't think I've have a second go at this, considering the price and the quality and flavor. Maybe it's just me, but bleh.


Silly me! I forgot to take pictures of myself! Oh nevermind.
P/S, Soon En, you look like a kid with that haircut! It's very funny! HAHAHA!


Birthday Wish List 2012

So it's the time of the year again! Christmas is almost here, and I can't wait for it! And like every year (except last year, I wonder why?), I would post a list of things I would like to get for my birthday. I would/would not get these items, but at least if people really wanna buy stuffs for me, they won't have to crack their brains out to think and they won't get things that I won't use either. :P ehehehehe 

But normally, I don't get much presents. So... WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Joey's Wanted List
  1. White/Blue/Yellow Instax Mini! (Preferable Mini 8). To be honest, I checked this out today, I thought of buying it for myself but it ain't cheap as I thought. I expect it to be around RM200 (it is for a 7 but I like 8 better. Cause I don't want shitty pics for collections. Demand demand.) I found the cheapest to be RM305 including one box of film here. Okay, I'll buy it in the future. Maybe after Chinese New Year. XP
    Anyone wants to sell their second hand Instax mini?? Please pm me! I'm seriously interested!
  2. Yarns and books for crocheting. Honestly I don't have any idea where to start to do something from this. Please inspire me?
  3. Ukulele. Somebody is buying this for me already. Eheh! 
  4. A trip to anywhere. I don't care. Anywhere, nowhere fancy is acceptable too. Beach? Casino? House party? Poolside? Picnic by the park? Go crazy. Applicable for all year round not only christmas.
  5. Food. Any food, that are not bought of course. But made from all your love. LOL

  6. Time. Because I don't have much of it. Give me yours instead. :3
  7. Care. Find me and talk to me. It doesn't cost a dime and I would appreciate it alot, as I know somebody out there cares for other people. Doesn't matter if we are close friends, or just some random stranger.
I think my list still have some things that I wished to have on my 2010 christmas list. LOL! and a Polaroid is in there! AHAHA! No kick for me to buy even after 2 years. XP But I learned a lot already, not only items can make me happy. Some times, true happiness can be given in a much easier way. Just needs effort. :)

Money also acceptable. You can give me money as presents. LOL!!

10/12/12 Big Bad Wolf bookfair


Went for a look at The Mines there for this popular book sale/fair. Apparently, there's this huge book sale event every year, but somehow, I manage to only hear the gist of it this year. I wonder why they call it "The Big Bad Wolf" but the mascot is quite cute, despite being a bad wolf. There's TONS of books there and it's really really cheap. I managed to buy 2 books which costs me RM16 in total, I guess it's really a steal. Apparently, they have "The Secret" too, but it's all sold out now. Geez, the book really have an undying reputation. They have loads of book but I don't seem to know which corner have which kind of book unless I try seeing all the available titles on the tables. It's really dizzying, I just wish they had more indicator on the tables so I can know what book is on the table. *sigh*
I used to read everyday last time, but I guess my habit is dying now. I always said I have no time, but once I start reading, I can't stop to put the book down (if it's interesting enough). I still remember how hooked I was on the twilight book series. Haha!

 Anyway, for you book-lovers out there, be sure to stop buy and stock some books up for your bookshelves and your brain. There's this banner they put up that says "If the world ends, at least we'll be together, 20-21 Dec". I was like LOL, okay, a very good joke.

Dessert at Tong Pak Fu
The Mines really have a big variety of food-selling shops, I ate so much. DX I even bought 18 durian puffs back! Shilin's chicken taste to good. T.T and this Tong Pak Fu too. Oh, guilty pleasure. I'm gaining 1-2kg already for the past 2 weeks because of midterm. :( I want badminton, but my labs session are always get the way when my family goes to badminton! ACK!

8/12/12 Not a good day

Finally, it's the long awaited weekend. It felt like aeons since I have a perfectly lazy weekend for myself. Well, not really, it's exactly 2 weeks ago in human time. And it's not really a "lazy" weekend since I had to wake up earlier today to get myself ready and packed up my things and drove back to SA to meet my family. We went for lunch and a movie at The Paradigm Mall.

I was half-absent although my feet are on the mall's ground. My mind was flying off to somewhere. Let's just put it this way...

I was not in the mood to eat, hear, talk or whatever.

 

At least this movie cheered up a little of my day. 
And honestly, this is way much better than Life of Pi in my honest opinion. I was captivated at every moment, not boring for me at all. Hey, I know it's a "cartoon" film so I think many people will choose not to watch this, but it's truly entertaining. Maybe I'm still a kid at heart.
I'll rate this 9.5/10
Jack Frost is good-looking for a 3D character and Easter Bunny is so tribal-ishly awesome.




It's true that I express myself better in text rather in real-life-talking. 
But that's just me. I'm intimidated by talking itself. 
When I'm writing, I can think thoroughly before putting it into words. 
But when talking, I might say something stupid or make no sense at all.
I have no problem talking things out with friends. 
But when it comes to lover's quarrel, fuck me. 
I'm not good at dealing with these kind of things, 
so much fear, so insecure,  and very cowardly of me. 
And I tend to think too much, it's seriously not good for my brain or well-being. 
I don't like being "tested". What in the world were you thinking? 
Does that mean I'm not qualified to be a girlfriend?
Maybe I should do the same to you next time!
YES, I'M STILL FURIOUS ABOUT THIS. I DIDN'T SPEAK A WORD OF IT BUT I STILL AM.
My true feelings still likes to convey via type-written ways. *Sigh*
And I tend to blab too much too when I'm ranting.

6/12/12 ....GAHHHHHHHHHHH

I'm so stressed out right now.

Dear friends, if you are reading this and if you're a university student. Please, don't do last minute studying if you don't want to suffer from being in an unstable state. I'm so emotional right now. I can burst out crying right now if I wanted to.

But this cycle will never end. I've been through this and yet I'm doing it again. I told myself not to be like this last semester and also the last last semester and.. well, you know the drill.

I was single back then, it was all easier. Now I'm not, I have to take care of my other half's feeling too.  Not enough time to give attention. When I'm free, he's not. When he's free, I'm not. Now, he's gone into his disappearing act after saying I didn't allocate a time for him because I was busy showering and driving me and my housemates to dinner. =.= I don't know what the hell he's doing. He's making me worried. He doesn't even want to bother telling me where he has gone to or reply me. *POOF* He's gone. He's gonna get a wallop from me very soon.

I HAVE A LAB AND A MIDTERM TOMORROW. OH GOD HELP ME!

So, it's like I haven't have the time to de-stress. Stress is now running on dual-core. *sobs*

5/12/12 Life of Pi

Cute Dr Tan Ai Hui
Woke up in time for my 8am class this morning even after yesterday's zombie night. Then went for lab session. Luckily, it wasn't that hard and the Computer Org lab is still understandable, not like the ones of Physical Electronics. 0.0 Truth is, some times some course-mates makes me mad. The instructions are already very clear to be read and understand(Well, this case doesn't happen all the time for all the labs, only SOME have really clear procedures like this one).They just need to follow the instructions on it. But some still manage to "don't know what to do" and question people some more. Are they too lazy to read or something? I annoyed actually. Especially to the ones that depend on me to do all the stuffs and takes all the work from me. "You do all, okay? I just take from you.". Walao, siao siao. You talk like that to me, you don't paiseh meh? At least you sit there and really try do it and then politely ask me to send a copy for your reference lah. Sounds much more tolerable, and I also will not be so irritated by it. Zzz.

After the lab, went to SK for brunch and Soon Fatt then invited us to catch a night movie, Life of Pi at Setia Walk . Rare for him to invite us so we agreed.
I slept for 3 hours though, once I got back home and did some of my report. Recovered back my last night's sleeping hours. I skipped my classes for that of course. Oh, sue me.


The movie is quite enchanting overall. One word to describe it. Beautiful. 
I've heard lots of recommendation for this movie, in my opinion, it's worth the money to go and watch it at the cinema. Since the animations and the scenery are really well done. It's a little bit boring, except for the bits of animal and nature part, because I'm awe-struck by how beautiful they are. 
I think the only thing that I was disappointed with is it's trailer, it doesn't really do much justice to the whole movie, because it didn't seem very appealing to me. Makes me not want to watch it. 
This movie was a 8 out of 10 for me. 

Sleep time. Goodnight.

Of Aliens and Mayans


Do you guys believe in aliens/the extraterrestrial/UFO?
I would like to say it's only a myth and it's just crazy imaginations from some random guy from how many donkey years ago. But I think I can't deny their existence anymore. 
First of all, why is alien described as some creature with a big bald slimy head, big black eyes and no nose?  There must be some kind of reason. Is it that some people have seen them before? Why some proclaim they have seen UFO flying? Or was it NASA that had created alien technology without telling the whole world? Why is Bermuda Triangle forbidden? Why is the Stonehenge created? Why are there Moai statues on the Easter Island? Why why why why why? So many unanswered mysterious.

So today, my friend started to ask me these questions suddenly during our breakfast together. He asked me if I believe in doomsday and the Mayan. He even said that maybe there's a connection between the doomsday and aliens or maybe the Gods. Maybe on that particular day, judgement will be made by the Gods aka Aliens. LOL. He told me that alien doodles actually existed since old times. Like on the cave walls and on the pyramids. 



Here are some pictures that I got from google.
I never knew that it has begun since the old days. The sightings and/or the interaction between humans and some unidentified beings. Maybe they live among us, but we don't know. Just like the "paranormal world". That is another mystery.


By the way,


According to the Mayan calendar, we're suppose to only have 18 days left to live through before "The end of the world". There's even a rumor saying that on the 21st December, there would be no Sun for three days and three nights and electricity would fail because of some alignment of The Sun, the Blackhole and The Earth. Then NASA came out and says it's a hoax. 
Honestly, I don't know the location of the Black Hole. But is it possible that the Black Hole can be between The Sun and The Earth!? Isn't Black Hole like really really big??? How can it come between the Earth and The Sun? What about the other planets? har? I don't get it. I didn't do my research before asking this also actually, so I'm just asking and blabbering without facts, excuse me. 

In my honest opinion, I don't think the Earth would have a blackout for the whole 72 hours. Even if it does, I think everyone wouldn't die....? Wait a minute, oxygen would deplete and then the trees would not take in carbon dioxide if it's dark out there. Is the oxygen sufficient for the whole human population to survive on for 72 hours?!? Plus the animals and the plants. :O Let's just hope it doesn't happen until then. I still want to get married, have babies, travel around the world and eat like a King.

My friend even think of stopping his revision for midterm right now because he wants to live his life to the fullest before doomsday comes. =.=" If it doesn't come, he would suffer a lot. Wish him best of luck in his bet. Lol. If nothing happens and I am still alive on the 1st of January year 2013, I will join in the crowd to laugh at the Mayan's joke. 

Okay, back to studying

3/12/12

My head, it swirls around so many things, it hurts. Seriously.
It's the "emo period" ady. Feel so stress and confused now. It feels like suffocation.

One midterm down, 4 to go. Assignments and lab report keeps pilling up. :(

Fear


We're afraid of things we do not know. 



1/12/12

It's December! Finally. But the weather isn't that cloudy as last year. I miss that.
Looking forward to the next few weeks. ^^ Really looking forward.

Only to you, I will show my weakness and strength. 
Only those with permission may truly love and hurt me. 
Do not come near me if you don't intend to stay at my side. 
Do not step into this circle if you intend to take something from me. 
Do not face me unless you really wish for the best of me, 
or you may lie to me till death and make sure that I will never find out about it.

Someone is in a poetic mood.

Since when am i a crybaby. I've been tearing myself even when I'm happy or sad. Pathetic. Haha.