A morning at Central Library

Can't believe I'm at the library at freaking 8.30am, before most of the other hardworking muggers are out of the house, or even out of bed, on this wet rainy morning that is drearier than most.

Feels strange being one of the first kiasu-muggers in the library, even though I'm not strictly mugging at this very moment. The reason for my supreme earliness is to lay claim to one of the much sought after outlets in the library in order to power my laptop that is kept running all day. A little later and the strategic seats will have been taken, and I would have to settle for one that facing the door/corridor (bustle of activity) or facing the window (intolerable glare). More importantly, I wouldn't have gotten the power outlet. Yes, perhaps I sometimes am a little demanding with regards my comfort. But I figured if I'm going to spend my entire day here, I might as well make certain that I have a desirable spot to do so.

Still, I probably needn't have hurried all that much. The library was almost empty (but for a few even earlier birds) for about 20 minutes after I arrived. It is 8.40am as I write and by now the people are trickling in in earnest, encroaching on the prime spots, buzzing irritatingly close to my little spot. Perhaps it was just as well I was early, even on this unencouraging, rain-sodden day.

I knew that it rained, early this morning. Since the previous rain-on-laptop scare, I seemed to have developed a certain hypersensitivity to the sound of rain at night. So without even really thinking about it, without even having to muster any will to yank myself from sound slumber, I bounced out of bed and shut the window at my table, being fully conscious of so doing. I then fell back into bed and passed out again.

Actually getting out of bed this morning was a lot harder than that. I woke from a slew of inexplicable dreams and found myself stuck in a limbo where you can't quite wake up and can't go back to sleep. Sat in a stupor for a while, telling myself it was too early to be productive and I was justified in wasting time stoning. Then my alarm rang, and I hauled myself out of bed and got a bite to eat to give my body notice that it was another day, begun anew.

For the love of cheesecake

The new law campus is really starting to look very nice now especially after they are done with all that messy renovation and have completed all the beautifying works. The whole campus looks just like the designer/architect would have promised it should look, classy, tranquil, and in some spots, positively otherworldly.

A new cafe just opened not too long ago, uninspiringly named 'The Thinking Corner @ BTC', but furnished with broad and comfy window seats, broad and comfy lounging chairs and with an air-conditioned interior in which students could lounge around and study all day. From one panel of the floor-to-ceiling glass windows one gets a view of the grassy lower quadrangle and the library. From another panel one sees grey-tiled sidewalks and beds of oval river stones. There is a huge tree that might have been there since the beginning of the campus back in the 1940s (if not the beginning of time), that overshadows half the compound with its sweeping shade and weeps dry leaves onto a passing breeze.

It's a sumptuous spot for a bit of romance, is it not, and in absence of which, well, I suppose studying would have to do. Of course, this observation was not intended to cast any aspersions on the preferred activities of any particular group of people.

The food however, wants much improvement and reduction in price. Just today I acquired a delectable-looking oreo cheesecake for what I thought was a reasonable price for a gourmet dessert. I found to my dismay that the cheese was fortified with gelatin and plumped up with air bubbles and really wasn't anything even remotely deserving of the honorable designation of 'Cheese Cake' at all.

It was ... cheese-flavoured rubber, incidentally occuring in the shape of a cake wedge and decorated as such before being ignominiously smuggled into a glass-fronted display case to lure unsuspecting epicureans into parting with a hard-earned $3.65. It was... dubiously edible foam. It is by itself an excellent reason why the existing manager of the BTC cafe should lose all his customers and sell out and freaking just leave. For the love of this misguided eating joint the Society of Culinary Control of Singapore should cordon off the area of that cafe until that travesty of a confection is isolated and removed from the sight of man.

We need to erase this stain from the fabric of our culinary history, so that no food vendor should ever be tempted to stoop so low (while charging so much) with such impunity again.

What the hack

I'm not quire sure what is the point of continuing a dota game with an opposing team that is cheating by using a program that gives them superior field of vision. Sure it seemed like an even line up and there were kills on both sides, but using MapHack on the sly just gives you an unfair advantage, and if I had wisened up earlier to what was going on I would have pushed to leave that stacked game. As it was the game was nearly balanced, and they only just won with a very narrow margin.

I was using Nerubian Assassin, which has an invis ability and a fantastic backstab damage when I come back out of invis. So there I was, happily thinking that I could slip in and out of windwalk (invis) and the players on the other team seemed to be able to see me all the time. I was thinking like, what the heck, no true seeing gems on that chap, so maybe they put down some wards on the path, so I went to get my own wards and stuck them down, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. I was rather confounded.

Later on I found out at my leisure about this curious program and was quite thoroughly disgusted with its use. I can't believe that there are actually people commenting on how effective MH is to hone your skills etc but the whole thing, especially when used on the sly, is just another way to cheat. People like that should just drop the entire game instead of resorting to some El-Cheapo way of playing it.