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Status after Round 3: $254.40/$400 - Just as well I hedged a little something on the Pool-Chelsea draw, even though that came about by uninsured Act of Referee. Round 4 of the EPL, Saturday 25 August 2007: 1. Sunderland vs. Liverpool 2. West Ham vs. Wigan 3. Bolton vs. Reading 4. Chelsea vs. Portsmouth 5. Arsenal vs. Man City 6. Aston Villa vs. Fulham 7. Derby vs. Birmingham 8. Everton vs. Blackburn Sunderland vs. Liverpool Can't see Sunderland nicking this one, after their bubble was burst in spectacular fashion versus Wigan. They face a Liverpool side whom were robbed of an important result against Chelsea, which would have put them in the driving seat for the first time in a decade. 1.40 looks very decent, and the 0-2 looks likely. West Ham vs. Wigan Wigan are on a high - can they scalp the Hammers too for a yummy 3.85 return? Beats me. Random guess - 1-1 draw. Bolton vs. Reading Reading have come good against Bolton in recent times and are at 2.80 for the win. Bolton are floundering, but are they really that bad? Possibly not, but their key man Anelka has seen better and is hardly the guy you want in troubled times. I call it 1-2 to Reading. Chelsea vs. Portsmouth At Stamford Bridge, Pompey shouldn't be worth a look, and the 1.23 odds for the Blues reflect that. For once though, the -1.5 option for Chelsea appears interesting. 3-1. Arsenal vs. Man City The bumbling Lehmann may be dropped, which is bad news for a City side looking down from the top of the table. 1-1 worth a look, as surely City can't continue in this vein forever. Aston Villa vs. Fulham Haven't watched much of either team at all, but home advantage should count here. 1-0 Villa. Derby vs. Birmingham Finally, a good price for going against Derby! For good reason, as Birmingham aren't the sharpest of nails either. At 2.70 though, they could be worth backing for the away win. Derby will see this as one of their best chances to take a few points, but it may be beyond them. 1-2 Birmingham. Everton vs. Blackburn All six New Paper tipsters called Everton to win this one, and frankly I'm unsure why they are so confident about it - Blackburn are a rather good side, as admitted by a high 2.05 for an Everton win. Perhaps their expertise should be trusted on this one. 1-0 Everton. So... pulling an extra $50 from the virtual biscuit tin... $90 on Liverpool to beat Sunderland (at 1.40) $20 on Chelsea (-1.5) vs. Portsmouth (1.95) $20 on Aston Villa to beat Fulham (1.70) $20 on Birmingham to beat Derby (2.70)
Update for the week so far: Brought some of my old textbooks to Buyback Asia for sale on Monday, like last year. I don't particularly like to sell my books, at least not unless I have a digital copy conveniently at hand. Hurry up, Google Book Search Library Project's successor! The books not covered in last year's list are: [PC1144] University Physics with Modern Physics 11th Edition by Young & Freedman (almost totally unused) [CS2105] Computer Networking (3rd Edition) by Kurose & Ross [PH1101E] Reason & Persuasion by Holbo [PL1101] Psychology by Ciccarelli & Meyer Psychology, which was my favourite university text so far, was immediately sold as a "popular" title. Darn. Tuesday saw me having four hours between one lecture and the next, so I packed my swimming stuff and had a dip in the SRC pool. Surprisingly there were maybe two dozen people who had the same idea despite it being 1 p.m. Mindful of the risk of getting sunburnt, I didn't dally. The 4 p.m. lecture ended up cancelled (should have suspected something when the prof organized an extra session last week), but there was some unexpected cheer back home as I received an email informing me that my NUS scholarship application was approved, essentially a tuition waiver for this semester. Must thank edchong for this, I didn't realise such a thing actually existed. Hmmm, I feel slightly more obligated to study somehow. Should be a good thing. Wednesday saw my timetable confirmed after my attempts to swap my MNO1001 tutorial timeslot were in vain. Not completely what I had hoped for, but quite ideal nonetheless:  The Monday free day is very useful when it comes to late Super Sunday EPL matches. The three-hour break on Tuesday is the only disappointing feature, though I guess I can utilize it for a weekly swim. The tutorials are sited quite nicely, so I skip home early if there happens to be no tutorial scheduled for the week, instead of having to wait on campus because they were sandwiched between lectures. The lack of an 8 a.m. lecture is also a welcome first - waking up at 5:30 a.m. is a royal pain. Thursday saw coincidental participation in NUS Breakers, after I missed last year's event due to a lecture. Slotted in as part of a paper crane-folding assembly line, and did some 15-20 of folds 9-13 as shown on this page. The free wasabi ice-cream after that wasn't appetizing, unfortunately. Give me free iced Milo anytime.
- + epl tales -
Panic animated GIF from Red Cafe forums.
- academics - Ran through the MNO textbook, and boy was it interdisciplinary as it admitted. From Psych alone there was the MBTI, stereotyping, attribution errors, self-fulfilling prophecies, primacy/recency effects, halo effects, projection bias, reinforcement learning, cognitive models, Maslow's need hierarchy, stressors etc etc. From Computing, I recognized Brooks' Law and some software engineering examples, and the reading materials included a piece on decision-making traps. Some of the cultural intelligence stuff was already covered in Business and Technical Communication. Ah, and there's Dilbert, though the otherwise very likeable professor says he hates it. Maybe it's harder to take humour when it intrudes into your specialty. Came across two "creative" puzzles for the first time in the MNO textbook: 1. Given two lengths of rope which take one hour to burn fully, but do not burn uniformly (i.e. one rope may take 10 minutes for half its length to be burnt, then 50 minutes for the other half), measure a period of 45 minutes. Answer. The solution struck me only after a night. 2. Draw a circle within a circle as shown below, without lifting your pen.  Answer. Didn't get this one. Mmmmm... some relaxing button-mashing before the football ranting. My sentiments exactly. Derby floundered as expected, but Boro somehow came back from a goal down, Newcastle huffed and puffed and spluttered out against Villa, while Wigan whipped Sunderland 3-0 and Portsmouth did Bolton in 3-1. I forget which forum it was where I read that football is a game of small margins, but now I can fully appreciate that. Teeny instances can and do affect the whole game. Maybe it's just glorified roulette with a larger ball and without the spinning disc. It goes without saying that I would be far more pissed if I had ever really put any cash on my predictions. A $59.60 deficit three rounds into the season can't be said to herald squeaking bums by any means, but my gut's singing out at me to take some desperate measures, beginning with the Manchester derby. Blackburn vs. Arsenal and Liverpool vs. Chelsea are both close to unbettable, but things get a bit different with the club you support. I may be falling prey to confirmation bias here, since City have historically raised their game against their (better) red halves. Having said that, I wonder how schooled Sven and his new imports are in the cauldron of derby games, and United have not so much been lacking a cutting edge as a pointy tip - they slice through with regularity, but keep failing to apply that final touch. So I invoke the dip-into-reserves rule here, and boldly put the farm on the Devils. The balls are cast. $80 on Man Utd to beat Man City (at 1.78) $20 on Liverpool to draw Chelsea (2.95)
- academics - Preparatory paperwork is just about complete, after lugging home two 500-sheet reams of A4 paper from the co-op. Didn't manage to get PH2110/GEM2006 Logic due to the bleeping MC overload rule that kept me from bidding for it until Round 3A, so I went for MNO1001 Management and Organisation instead. The module does have entertaining readings at least, so entertaining that I got them comb-bound (extreme right in the photo below): 
"All good to go?" "Yes, sir! Aye aye, sir!" Round 2 yielded a small positive return ($111.50/$100) even as United were held again. City did just enough to overcome Derby, who do still have six teams below them in the table. I'll be supporting United against City come Sunday, though probably not backing them with my punts - there is simply better value to be taken from the other games, and United are often underpriced. Status after Round 2: $195.40/$200. Round 3 of the EPL, Saturday 18 August 2007: 1. Portsmouth vs. Bolton 2. Birmingham vs. West Ham 3. Wigan vs. Sunderland 4. Fulham vs. Middlesbrough 5. Reading vs. Everton 6. Tottenham vs. Derby 7. Newcastle vs. Aston Villa Portsmouth vs. Bolton Pompey are moderately heavy favourites, but they weren't that good against United, and didn't manage to beat Derby either. Bolton have lost to Newcastle and Fulham, but Diouf was a bright spark and they have had the beating of Pompey in recent times, with 3 wins and 2 draws in their last five EPL matches against them. The draw at 3.25 is appealing. 1-1. Birmingham vs. West Ham Birmingham have been involved in a couple of high-scoring matches, scoring twice in each of their matchups so far. They have let in five, though. The Hammers meanwhile appear to be disappointed at the lack of fireworks at their club, and have recruited Dyer in an effort to rekindle his... combustible partnership with Bowyer. 2.30 for the home 'Hams to prevail looks quite good, with 2-1 the exact score. Wigan vs. Sunderland Sunderland are quite something, as Keano seems to have taken United's power to steal games at the death with him when he left the club - Two late, late goals see them sitting pretty on four points instead of one. Wigan's JJB Stadium doesn't exactly strike much fear into visitors, and I see Keane making a triumphant return to Manchester. An eminently backable 2.70 return at that. 0-1 to the Sunderland. Fulham vs. Middlesbrough Boro vs. Blackburn was the plum pick of Round 1, and I will confess that it often seems easier to pick the losers rather than the winners. Fulham's home form isn't stellar, but Boro are hopeless travellers and in Southgate they may have perhaps the most sat-upon manager in the entire league. A Fulham win is far from certain, but looks a fair bit more likely than the 2.10 odds for that may indicate. Another 2-1 in the making. Reading vs. Everton The toss-up of the week. Everton sit atop the table after good wins against Spurs and Wigan, but Reading have gone toe-to-toe with United and Chelsea and gave a good reckoning of themselves. One-all. Spurs vs. Derby Remember that part about picking losers? Spurs may be bottom, but they have not become relegation candidates overnight. A friend recently dismissed the Fink Tank's next-to-bottom ranking of England's No. 1 Paul Robinson among all players in the EPL, believing that it referred to another Paul Robinson with the same name, but a quick check reveals that the national teamer is indeed the one. They shouldn't be defending too much at home, however, and I can't see them messing up three times in a row. Berbatov is out, though, and the 1.40 on the win seems awfully thin. 2-0 doesn't look out of place. Newcastle vs. Aston Villa I'm not too hot on betting on Newcastle, who seem to blow hot and cold, but Allardyce appears to be the right tonic for the inconsistent club. A single, if convincing, win against Bolton probably doesn't show the whole picture, but it was achieved playing away and I suppose the support at St. James' can't hurt. 2-0 to the Magpies. There are quite a lot of decent options available, and Blackburn vs. Arsenal, the Manchester derby and Liverpool vs. Chelsea tomorrow all have the keep-away label on them, so I'll be using the full $100 inflow for the week today: $30 on Newcastle to beat Villa (1.75) $30 on Fulham to beat Boro (2.10) $20 on Spurs (-1.5) vs. Derby (2.25) $10 on Sunderland to beat Wigan (2.70) $10 on Pompey to draw Bolton (3.25)
- changelog - Cute Overload! is heavy on quality, but there comes a time when a picture just screams out to be disseminated. This is one of those: 
Stirred, not shaken changelog v1.07b --------------- * Added a not wholly descriptive share link at the bottom of all entries, which simplifies the process of submitting entries to community/social websites like Digg and reddit, or bookmarking services like Google's and Yahoo's. Note: This functionality is not currently implemented in the older Atalanta skin, which will conveniently serve as a precedent that new functionalities are not guaranteed to be available in all skins. You have been forewarned. * Discovered a minor bug in the blog's counter code which does not affect the accuracy of the hit counter, but annoyingly necessitates manual adjustment every so often. Current status: Procrastinated away. The new academic semester is upon me again - tis the time to download and print copious amounts of lecture notes, e-readings, past year papers and the like in the full flush of early-semester optimism. The disillusionment and last-minute rushing of tutorials will doubtless sink in later, but I'm enjoying it for now. Ran out of A4 paper though, which was a bit of a downer. The very first lecture, CS5340 Uncertainty Modelling in AI, was to my relief familiar-looking. Didn't expect the seminar room to be close to full with some thirty to fifty students when only seven undergrads were officially registered in the class roster, but from previous experience I don't mind Masters students at all - they no longer have Honours to chase, heh. Come to think of it, Bayesian networks are quite intuitive after all, and I suppose that most people use its principles unknowingly in the same way as they can catch thrown objects without a formal education in differential equations. More on this next time, but if this piques your interest, give the free GeNIe software a try. Gave my keyboard a full cleaning too, after I began to get uncomfortable with seeing strands of hair, snack remains and general grime peeking out at me from between the keys. I was never too big on daily maintenance, which was a bit of a problem in the army, but I can't stand too much sloppiness either. 
(After) Black is beautiful - Harder to see the dirt A good guide for removing keys with a screwdriver (or other similar rigid thin thing) can be found here. The "Before" photo was deemed unpublishable, due to the effect it may have on weak stomachs.
No penalties in run-of-the-mill league matches, sadly, as United were held 0-0 by Reading. Didn't see that coming. 
Don't you lot have anything better to do? As it turns out, I should have cut and run in my punting challenge after Saturday. Chelsea suddenly opened up like Brazil, and Arsenal needed two late goals to overcome a total howler by Lehmann. I suppose I'm not the only one who got burnt by Sunday's games, at least. But that's all over, and the midweek games are upon us. Everton already smacked sorry Spurs 3-1 in the Tuesday one, so here are the remaining six: 2. Portsmouth vs. Man Utd 3. Birmingham vs. Sunderland 4. Man City vs. Derby 5. Fulham vs. Bolton 6. Wigan vs. Middlesbrough 7. Reading vs. Chelsea Portsmouth vs. Man Utd Dangerously for the Red Devils, Pompey are known to be strong at home, but looking at the way Reading used a 9-1-0 at Old Trafford, United may be glad to actually have space to attack; Another draw might not be a disaster yet, but it would certainly give the pretenders extra confidence. The 1.55 for a simple win looks just about right, if not especially good value with the Tevez-Rooney swop a huge unknown factor. I'll be optimistic and say 0-2 to United. Birmingham vs. Sunderland They know each other well from last season's meetings in the Championship, and both clubs should see this as a chance to grab some early points and build a buffer. Birmingham were not bad at all at Stamford Bridge where they might well have gotten something with better goalkeeping, and we all know how Sunderland shocked Spurs. It could go either way. 1-1 draw? Man City vs. Derby City looked good against the Hammers, and 1.48 for the home win looks reasonable. 2-0 City is where I'll lay most of my hopes. Fulham vs. Bolton, Wigan vs. Boro I dunno. Pure guesses: Fulham 1 Bolton 0, Wigan 1 Boro 1. Staying well away. Reading vs. Chelsea If Reading camp with nine men in their own half again, another goalless draw is not beyond them. Whether being at home will induce them to go for it is another matter altogether. Sadly, my head tells me that the Russian Blues will nick this one somehow. 0-1 Chelsea. So the official punts for Round 2 are: $25 on Man Utd to beat Pompey (at 1.55) $25 on Chelsea to beat Reading (1.50) $50 on Man City to beat Derby (1.48)
- sport - À la carte buffet at HarbourFront's Dragon Gate Restaurant, bowled three 100+ games (131-11?-131), then logged on to Hattrick and discovered that I had lost 0-2 despite playing a counter-attacking strategy in a theoretically correct situation. Bleah. Win some, lose some. On to a quick recap of Imaginary Punting Day 0.5: $10 on Aston Villa (+1.5) vs. Liverpool (at 1.30) [STRIKE] - Villa 1, Liverpool 2, fair reflection $10 on one goal in the above match (4.20) [MISS] - was right on the mark until the 85th minute. Could have made a clean sweep. $10 on Everton to beat Wigan (1.55) [STRIKE] - 2-1, just as well I didn't take the -1.5 option. $20 on Blackburn to beat Boro (2.77) [STRIKE] - 2-1 coming from behind. Slightly lucky. Current status: $83.90 from $50. Interestingly, just about all my predictions that I didn't officially back were wrong. Sunderland surprised Spurs in a predictably close match (predicted Spurs win or score draw), Derby saved a draw against Pompey (predicted Pompey win), Newcastle mauled Bolton (predicted draw) and City gave the woeful Hammers something to chew on (predicted Hammers win). Hopefully this means that I have an idea of what I am clueless about - a magnificently useful skill to possess. So I've just got to take $17.10 from the remaining $50 to break even. I could conceivably fold now and sit pretty on $133.90/$100, but it's hardly the time to play defensively. However, the odds offered by Singapore Pools as printed in The New Paper are... conservative to say the least. They are giving just $1.50 to the dollar for a H-H in the Man Utd vs. Reading game, for instance, just a turn of the page from a British pundit's advice to grab the same bet at $2.30 from bet365. That is quite simply a huge difference. Moral of the story - if you have to bet, don't do it with our local bookmaker. The three matches coming up are: 8. Arsenal vs. Fulham 9. Chelsea vs. Birmingham 10. Man Utd vs. Reading That's three of the top four sides in the EPL at home against three mid-table-at-best clubs, no disrespect intended. Fulham flirted with relegation last term, ending up 16th, and don't seem to have improved much; Birmingham are newly promoted, while Reading frankly outdid themselves by bursting into the top half. Verdict: Three home wins, and if I could make a multiplier out of them, I would do so without hesitation. Now the sad part - Arsenal are at 1.27 for the win, and that's the longest of the trio. Chelsea are on 1.19, while United sit on 1.15. I might be tempted to throw a bit on the underdogs, since all of them offer a tenfold return at least, but I honestly can't see any of them coming out on top. The odds for a win by two goals or more aren't much tastier, at 2.00 for Arsenal, 1.67 for Chelsea and 1.58 for United. I say Arsenal might be worth a look at that price, given Fulham's uncommonly sucky away record. Chelsea not so much since they may well perform their Saturday shopkeeper act and close up after taking the lead, and United have found Reading tough customers last season. However, Reading will be without Leroy Lita, who might be in for some sniggers in the dressing room after injuring himself in bed (heh, heh). Steve Sidwell has also bailed out to Chelsea, and I rated him as one of Reading's biggest contributors. Meanwhile, United have largely impressed in the pre-season, so I'll stick my neck out this time. $10 on two goals in Chelsea vs. Birmingham (at 3.40) $20 on Arsenal (-1.5) vs. Fulham (2.00) $20 on Man Utd (-1.5) vs. Reading (1.58)
- sport - I'll be carrying on my personal virtual $100 Challenge, with the following modification as announced in last season's wrap-up post - $100 in capital each week, but I will allow myself an outlay of anywhere from $0 to $200 (if the monies are available). The objective is to garner as much in returns as possible, but breaking even would be welcome for a start. Half of the first week's stakes will be reserved for Super Sunday and very likely a hat-trick of opening victories for Arsenal, Chelsea and my beloved Man Utd. Putting all eggs in one basket, or in this case three baskets, still doesn't hold an appeal to me though, and the other sides surely deserve a look-in. Here goes nothing: $10 on Aston Villa (+1.5) vs. Liverpool (at 1.30) $10 on one goal in the above match (4.20) $10 on Everton to beat Wigan (1.55) $20 on Blackburn to beat Boro (2.77) As I've promised to try and let sentiment out of it, an explanation of how I came out with these should be in order. There will be seven matches on opening day, namely: 1. Sunderland vs. Tottenham 2. Everton vs. Wigan 3. Derby vs. Portsmouth 4. Bolton vs. Newcastle 5. West Ham vs. Man City 6. Middlesbrough vs. Blackburn 7. Aston Villa vs. Liverpool as listed in The New Paper. Ah, might as well have some words on all of them, no? Sunderland vs. Tottenham I'll be rooting for Sunderland due to Keane, but it's too dicey for me. Interestingly, the odds are a paltry 1.18 for Sunderland to win, draw or lose by a single goal, and a two-goal (or more) win by Spurs is worth four times one's original bet. Much as I support the plausible future United manager, I have a nagging suspicion that the media are shooing in Sunderland to survive without breaking a sweat quite prematurely. 
But why not? (Source) Taking a club from almost rock-bottom to the very top in a single season demonstrates how effective an old-fashioned blood-and-guts hairdryer treatment can be. Or does it? Sunderland were a Premiership side the season before that, though admittedly an absolutely crappy one. On that alone, ping-ponging back into the big time wasn't exactly unexpected, since it seems to get trickier the longer a side lingers, e.g. Q.P.R., Leicester, Palace, etc. Even the Fink Tank seems to support this view with their sophisticated analysis, though, as they give Sunderland a roughly two-thirds chance of finishing above the bottom quartile, and even a one per cent chance of ending up fifth. Now that would be something. If pressed, I would still go for Spurs pushing their far more convincing case to join the Big Five with a tight away win, maybe through the classy Berbatov. Smells like 0-1 or 1-1 to me. Everton vs. Wigan Everton are the better side, Everton are at home, and Everton have relatively good payoffs for a win. Everton, I choose you! Oh, and Wigan signed Bramble. For that alone, they deserve a lesson. I would go for 2-0, but despite the generous 2.65 for Everton (-1.5), I'll settle for the vanilla victory. Derby vs. Portsmouth Derby have been cast as the new whipping boys before a ball has been kicked, and the Fink Tank obligingly gives them a 73% chance of relegation. More tellingly, they are also presented with a 43% chance of finishing dead last, with the second most likely candidates, Wigan, granted a distant 13%. So the consensus appears to be that the other sides would love to play them every week. Portsmouth haven't been a model of consistency, though, and they have won just three away games out of 19 last season. Couple that with a total ignorance about how much heart Derby might bring into their first EPL match in five years, and I see a clash to keep well clear of. If pressed, I would say Portsmouth, by two, but I wouldn't put anything on it. Bolton vs. Newcastle This is all about manager Sam Allardyce, who jumped from the former to the latter in the close season. Surely a recent ex-manager is the best person to have at the helm, but the barcodes have a long injury list including some of their best. Bolton are no mugs, and it seems drawish. West Ham vs. Man City These two sides should be relieved to get back onto the grass, after their boardroom troubles with Tevez and Thaksin respectively. Then again, it could get nasty on the pitch for the Hammers as well, after adding the extremely combustible Bowyer and Bellamy. City have what appears to be a spanking new team, assembled by ladies' man Sven. I'll be the first to admit that I can't make head or tail of this fixture, but somehow I see the home team edging this. Middlesbrough vs. Blackburn Blackburn have won the last five editions of this matchup, and are, I daresay, an outside bet for Europe. McCarthy looks a solid buy, and Viduka a bad sell. That said, Boro are somehow the favourites, and 2.77 for the Blackburn win looks awfully generous. I'll take it. Aston Villa vs. Liverpool Benitez has finally gotten his cash, and Liverpool are running out of excuses, so the papers say. However, while the purchase of Torres is clearly aimed towards fixing their errant attack, offensive partnerships seem to take time to gel, time which Liverpool may not have if they want some domestic glory for a change. I can't see them suddenly overhauling their (staid) style and sweeping through Villa, especially away from Anfield, though they probably have enough to take the points. A solitary goal should decide this. 1-0 to Pool or 0-0.
- + sim lim square - So I made good my promise to myself to pump up my desktop rig à la Barry Bonds (who coincidentally became Major League Baseball's all-time homerun record holder today), and took the MRT to Bugis and Sim Lim Square for new sticks of DDR2-533 RAM. As usual, I had done my homework at Hardwarezone.com. As I mentioned a week earlier, prices appeared to be hovering just below the S$70 mark for a 1GB stick, and I copied the names of several stores which advertised their wares around that region in the price guides. A certain outlet caught my eye with a S$56 quote, S$10 less than any other shop. This may not seem outrageous, but at the wafer-thin margins that Sim Lim Square tenants supposedly live on due to cutthroat competition, I was intrigued. It was not as if RAM lent itself well to product differentiation, either. But if they were willing to sell it low, they could count on consumers like me to snap it up. And so I made a beeline to their outlet, hoping to conclude my business quickly and take the RAM where it belongs. The salesman was kind enough to ask if I needed assistance the moment I stepped in, and upon hearing that I was interested in DDR2-533 RAM pointed them out to me. I then asked about the price, and he went over to a computer on the counter to check it out. This in itself wasn't odd since computer products are often repriced, making physical price tags somewhat of a luxury, but I wasn't expecting a reply of over S$100 from him. "Erm, there seems to be a mistake..." I began, and indeed he seemed to recognize it as such. He conferred with a fellow employee, then was all smiles when he declared. "S$92". The sales guy helpfully explained that "RAM prices are volatile" (RAM itself is, however) and when confronted with the rather wide disparity in price (they had helpfully laminated a copy of their price guide which did show S$56), he pointed out that the sheet was printed a week ago and "The prices change like the stock market, usually highest in the weekends, Monday to Friday it depends on your luck", then held out a sheaf of price guides from other stores and claimed that they follow their prices (as petrol stations do). I was understandably doubtful, and excused myself saying I wanted to look around first. I then went to the next shop on my list and lo and behold, S$67 for 1GB. Makes the first store's claim of following prices seem rather incongruous - seeing as they probably have the same supplier and are selling exactly the same thing, I can't see how a S$25 markup might be justified, but I can see the appeal for the sellers of boosting their unit profit by 500% or more - why toil to sell five sticks and earn S$5 from each, when one can cream S$25 off a single fool? Pity the fellas who are too nice/lazy to check out the competition. Then again, it would be their own fault. In Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, a study by Ian Ayres reveals that black people in the USA pay quite a bit more than whites for cars, due to the different quotations they get from salespeople. Ayres sent matched testers into auto show rooms where they found that car dealers gave the lowest initial offers to white men, followed by white women, black women, and finally black men. Even after 40 minutes of negotiating, the black guy shoppers were still being offered prices nearly $800 higher than the initial offer made to the white guys. But that's not the part I want to emphasize here. The thing that struck me was that the salespeople don't have any respect for the "nice" people who don't bargain down their hopeful initial orders, and talk about them as idiots during their breaks. Considering that they likely pocket much if not all of the "extras", that's adding insult to injury. Come to think of it, such huge purchases are exactly where buyers should squeeze as much as they can - it doesn't make sense to quibble over ten cents with the wet market aunties when even the slightest cut goes into the hundreds or thousands of dollars when getting a car or a house. Must remind myself of a brilliant piece of advice from a financial planning book I once read: "It is better to haggle like a rug merchant than become the seller's best pal by paying him more than he ever thought he could get." Yes, it's nice to be friendly and all, but there's a time and place for it, and being seated across a negotiating table isn't it.
The Days of Dreams... Urgh. Planned to continue programming an RTS experimental framework for my UROP today after stripping the Fouiero source code apart to get a code skeleton yesterday, then just didn't feel like it. Well, I've procrastinated on that for the whole of the holidays, so why not another day? The cause this time was the desire to produce one truly professional drawing, the sort that people take one look at and assume that the guy who did it does it for a living; So far, I've been kind of sloppy (e.g. the blog skin illustrations), and I haven't taken the time to learn how to colour properly. No way I'm gonna manage Random Personal Achievement #614 - Get one's work on a Magic: The Gathering card in greyscale. Well, it ain't happening soon. But it's fun to draw. It's fun to dream too, and rarely I'm fortunate enough to remember them after I wake. Very recently there was one of an immense building which was large enough to contain terraced houses within it, far larger even than the monolithic city-blocks of Judge Dredd, I suppose. However, even that's nothing compared to this old fave of mine: 
Welcome to my world. (Click to enlarge) That's the merest corner of a worldship being constructed from the inside out, never to be actually complete - cities are raised on its "frontier" surface, and simultaneously enclosed by construction craft. When (or more usually before) a new "world" is ready and supplied with its atmosphere, the process continues on its roofs and walls. In the above illustration, a huge rift is being busily closed, with a temporary tube transport connection jury-rigged together at the tailend. When I'm retired, I may get around to inking and colouring this. Tailing Tracks of Time... There just isn't enough. Time, that is. And I finally can admit to myself just why this is so. It is simple, really. I just have the habit of finding stuff for myself to do. While I hope to get my Kingdom of Loathing allotment down to around 20 minutes a day soon with one-click gym training for the Level 30 trophies, I am downright expert at distracting myself. Scrolling through my recent Wikipedia history alone shows up entries of dubious value such as the 180 kickflip, 33 Thomas Street, Algal bloom, An Experiment on A Bird in the Air Pump, Artur Friedenreich and Awari, and that's not going beyond A yet. Recall that damned if you do, damned if you don't interview question on one's biggest weakness? This is what I would say if by some chance I didn't prepare beforehand for it - mine is not knowing when to let go, or rather just not letting go, since the right time to let go is never; Eventually it will be achieved. It always has been this way. This may be slightly problematic since I like to clean my slate before going on to my next life goal, and some (like that web MMORTS) have stuck around for like forever already. Easier to move mountains than one's personality, sadly. The only consolation I know is that its time will come. Something about Wikipedia before I forget - I get that feeling that academic society as a whole looks down upon it as a reference, and I could feel one History lecturer sniffing at it when she warned us students off using it as a source. Okay, it's compiled by unpaid volunteers and any loony can edit it at his whim, but overall it doesn't fare badly at all against such olden goldies as the Encyclopedia Britannica (says Nature). The biggest strike against it would be that it is too obvious and easy - no research skills needed. If any rank outsider just googles the topic, chances are that he'll get to the predigested Wikipedia article on it in no time anyway. But does obvious and easy mean worthless? I don't know, but when I happen to use stuff direct from Wikipedia I try to quote the secondary references on the bottom of the Wikipedia page, and everyone's happy. And I should seriously cut back on the DotA. Approximately five hours a week may not be much, but five hours is still five hours. It's the competition against other humans that draws me, but too often I can see how the game will go after everyone has selected their heroes. The frustration when one's team is saddled with a feeder who insists on sticking around the creeps with 50hp instead of going back to heal is also bad for one's heart. I had one such champion on my side yesterday. And a Game Before starting on game theory, it might be fashionable in a clichéd journalism-school way to ease in with an anecdote about a game. Basketball it will be, then. Now, basketball has always firmly been second behind soccer in my choice of recreation, and not just because I happen to like the latter more. To that I can add at least three more reasons. Firstly, I have never been sure exactly how much force is considered legal, both in driving towards the basket and in the defending underneath it. Being a friendly throwabout and all, it seems bad to press in harder than might be allowed due to the customary hesitancy to call fouls in a casual setting, or to barge in strongly for that matter - Yea, getting caught for charging may be meat and potatoes for the professionals, but it just doesn't seem good among weekend warriors. Secondly, my finger joints frequently get punished. Once during NS, the fourth finger on my right hand took the full impact of a hard pass, and I remember not being able to bend it painlessly for a year or more - I was still performing my own brand of physio on it during the first semester of university. More minor irritants have come and gone, but with them being inevitably inflicted on my right hand, the hand that is engaged in the bulk of typing and writing, it might be understood how this may be regarded as a necessary tradeoff with basketball. Legs aren't all that critical to scholarly pursuits, after all. Thirdly, football seems to me a more... egalitarian game. Height is useful, of course, but even at the very pinnacle of the sport, relative shorties (say, around 1.65m or less) are well represented. Think Messi, Zola, Wright-Philips, Carlos, Saviola and Romario, to name a few contemporary stars. Maradona, who is considered by many as the greatest, topped out at 1.66m. Many others not in that category still happen to be shorter than me - Pelé, Owen, Tevez and Scholes to start the list, and they are by no means uncommon. In contrast, success in basketball seems contingent, though of course not fully dependent on, very uncommon height. The average NBA pro measures in the region of 6' 7" (2 metres) tall, whereas the average American male is 1.77m tall. According to the 2004 NBA survey, just two participants in the entire league were below that height. This is a consequence of the objective of the game itself, and very seldom surmountable by talent or effort alone, unless one has immense energy like Muggsy Bogues (shortest ever NBA player at 1.60m), or an unbelievable leap like Spud Webb (1.69m and once-NBA Slam Dunk contest winner). Still, they were novelties then and now, just because contributing is just that much harder when just about anyone else can post one up in defence; Good luck for a normal slum kid trying to go rags-to-riches and make it in the big leagues - he'll need it. But that's just me talking.
- + epl tales - Got all the modules I wanted, but Money and Banking I cost in excess of 900 points. :/ Bring on Logic! 
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