Monthly Archive for October, 2003

Taman Linkin!

linkinparktick-small.jpgAh, what a beautiful week this is. First of all, my cuzzies Hemlocke and ichaya came up to visit and I so love it when they do! Secondly, they came to see Linkin Park, and we all did and had a blast!

This concert being my first, I had no idea what to expect. I’d seen one of LP’s concert clips, and it wasn’t exactly the greatest. But that had probably been a fluke due to sore throats or something, because last night they just BLEW EVERYONE AWAY!

When the show finally got started despite a few false starts (as well as Too Phat’s over-extended opening act), things went on flawlessly! The choreographic arrangement was excellent; the more familiar high-powered songs were alternated with the subtle ones, and every spotlight seemed to move in rhythm. Chester and Mike were excellent at wooing the crowd, shouting “Malaysia Boleh!” besides the usual PR quotes. But let’s not forget the rest of the band, who were equally entertaining and pleasant.

The show kicked off at 8:30, with a full half hour of Too Phat (and gang). Sure, they’re a very decent group, but unfortunately they lacked something for such an event. What exactly it is, I can’t say since I’m not in showbiz, but from my POV their presentation was rather messy, having no coordination between the singing and the breakdancing (which was cool, btw). Plus the sound-system didn’t really help, drowning their voices in the thunderous bass beats. If someone gave me a quiz on comprehension, I’d fail. The restless crowd didn’t help either, cuz time was-a-tickin’, and we’d been counting since 6:30. Synchronised shouts of “Linkin Park” would pretty much tell you what we wanted. Well, better luck next time guys!

After they were done, it took another half hour to get the stage set up for the main event. People were getting edgy, so screams were echoing through the stadium whenever a speaker twitched. As I’ve explained earlier, things were just sweet when LP finally made their appearance. All the fatigue just disappeared and everywhere people were in rhythm with the music. Most of us knew the lyrics by heart, so it was virtually an awesome karaoke session as well!

After approximately an hour, LP seemed to close shop with “In The End”. But the mob wasn’t satisfied. We wanted more! Everyone just stayed on and cheered them back onto the stage. The encore was sweet, but too short. Another two great songs were delivered, and then they left. It was then that I probably realised that this’ll probably be the last live LP performance I’ll see. But Chester said they’ll be back, so I’m just going to hold on to that promise.

Well, it’s now Thursday night. Listenin’ to the Meteora CD I just purchased over and over again. There’s a pile of clothes that need to be ironed, and I’m trying hard to remember what my job specification was. It’s amazing how reality just swallows you back in one big gulp. Can’t stay in there forever though, and I’m looking forward to the next big concert in these parts. Concerts are fun! Like clubbing in open air. And open air is good, cuz I think I might be claustrophobic (clubbing makes me fall ill). Practice makes perfect? Not at my age. But I’m good for concerts. :) Next time I’ll be more prepared in the ticket-grabbing department. Stage-side is where it’s AT!

Turn my VALVE!

After a quick defragment of my main HDD, Steam now works almost flawlessly. My lil bro and I have been taking turns having a go at DoD, and we’ve been having a real blast! It’s so much different playing with 32 people rather than the usual 6. Unfortunately the Steam version has reduced the scope zoom speed of the sniper rifles by quite a bit, so I can’t quite terrorize the entire enemy squad. Nevertheless, MRC is still not on Steam yet so I still have some time left to whack people up. Hur hur.

Steam also offers the usual Half-Life mods, like CS (I still suck at it), and also the original Half-Life multiplayer. Having not played HL MP after so long, it’s really fun! A shout-out to all cybercafes: Get Steam now! They even have a cybercafe version out. Cheap too.

Problem with this Steam business is that my mom doesn’t approve. Add that to my frequent Shaman King marathons and you get non-stop nag all night long. Well, hopefully my bro stays off the PC at night (I just gave him the privilege of playing in the afternoon).. and hopefully he won’t look so stoned when *I* play.

Oh, and I also just found out that my consultant’s boss has 3 extra Grand Stand tickets to LP. Grr~ and right next to the stage too. The whole office practically knows I’m mad for Grand Stand tickets, but none of them bother to tell me. Sigh~ So bad… so sad..

Barang bagus!

Yes, Shin Chan said that in one of the Malay-dubbed episodes. Pretty much what’s running through my head right now. Yay to Merv, I now have an infrared port for my PC, which I use to pirate operator logos and ringtones. Hurrah for POTC! Hurrah for pirates in general!

Next on our lineup of cool stuff is the new BitTorrent client. Version 3.3 promises to be, well, more stable.

As for the events of the day, I went to work as usual, although nothing much was happening since few consultants were around to whip us. After 1pm, a few of us decided to watch Ringu 2 using a projector in the meeting room. :D But due to problems with the lighting, we couldn’t achieve our targeted level of terror.

While I was bz wasting time, the LP tix have finally arrived! Hmm, did I mention this before? Oh, that was somewhere else.. nevermind. So yes, they’ve arrived, and I feel sooo relieved to have them in hand. Hopefully they don’t disappear somewhere into some dark corner of the house… Speaking of LP, I’ve still much of Shaman King to watch! Argh, and only 3 more days!!!

In the afternoon, I lazed abt switching between transferring stuff to/from my handphone and trying to play Day of Defeat off Steam. Gave the Waja a much-needed wash near sunset.

The family went to Uptown for dinner. Tried some “famous” Fish Head Curry (kinda wished I’d pay more attention in Biology). The rest of the night was spent at Tesco grocery shopping. Well, I kinda wandered off somewhere else to check out the range of DVD players. Since my mom MAY join the legion of Korean drama-lovers, I might as well get a VCD player at least.
tesco

Free Food!

Yay! Another week of workshops in Bangi. Free breakfast, lunch and tea! Yummie. Most of the Blueprint has been signed, and the Project Team has but a few days to catch a breather before we go into the next Phase.

Only a few days left till LP. Was getting worried that the tix were not in hand, so I called up the ticketmaster and they say they were just shipped yesterday. Tsk. At least my leave application is settled, so it’s “sit back and relax” time! Oo, gotta get bus tickets for ichaya and Hemlocke so that they can return home, otherwise they’d be stuck here with me a lil’ longer. But hey, that’s not a bad thing, is it? :)

Gonna have dinner with Auntie Ruby, the wife of my former sailing coach the late Jimmy Chang (may he rest in peace), tonight. Been a while since I’ve met her, and also the other sailors from my era. It should be fun, I think. :)

solemn air; stilled breath

Feeling a lil under the weather tonight… don’t know whether it was the rain, or the mad airconditioning. Maybe it was both, plus the mad gaming experience last night. *shrug*

Nothing much happened over the weekend. Breezed through the 2nd book of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials. Drove my mom all over Selangor while she did her usual Presidential stuff.

Towards the eve of Sunday night, we stopped by at the club to grab some dinner. But instead of the usual cheerful ardour, everyone had a serious mask on. A man was lost at sea.

On the Playlist: Kuon-killer to Nami no Kioku from FF X-2.