Oh!pEnions: January 2012

Petai

My wife and I love petai, which makes the both of us being the odd ones in the family. Its crunchy, and tastes best when cooked with sambal. Literally translated to Cantonese, it means 'smelly beans'. And I don't blame you for not eating them since its the 'after eating' part which the name becomes very significant.

You see, after eating those lovely crunchy petai, the moment you pee or do your poo-poo, you can smell the stink of the petai. And if you did not eat them, you can tell who did if the toilet in question has poor ventilation. And its even worse when it has very good ventilation...

This is the only cooking style I like for my petai

AFV's 1/35 M35A2 2½ Ton Truck

This is a 2½ Ton Truck. Why on earth did I get this 2½ Ton Truck? If you ask me, my answer would be, "I absolutely have no idea". Maybe its the tires that made me do it. Or maybe, its because the slimness of the box which I could not believe there was a 2½ Ton Truck inside. Whatever it was, I got it. Right in the middle of a Hobby HQ sale. Or maybe, to be more truthful, since everyone was buying stuff, I got desperate and bought a kit for the sake of buying a kit. Yeah, that would be it.

But then, why the Hell did I spend so much time choosing it? That's the problem with me. My mind was so occupied in trying to empty out the technical contents and trying to accept the new ones or, trying to flush all memories, I think I have become a nutcase instead. Everytime I was at Hobby HQ, my mind wanders, looking at model kits to and fro on each shelf, thinking of the kit-bashing possibilities (but in the end, you know as well as I do, they all end up in the to-do bin).

I think it was the number of parts for the given price that got me.

Or was this the real reason? The way the wheels were beautifully arranged.

OK, maybe it was the chassis that got to me. Either way, I bought it.

And so, after looking at the kit, it is very nice (this is me trying convince myself) but yes, its going to the 'to-do' bin once again. Seriously, with my worrying over the current customer, I am in no frame of mind to do anything else apart from worrying. Stupid but that's just me.

Mr. Loo is happy

OK, I know someone is trying to cheer me up but its not working because, I am still worried about the order which has yet to be resolved. time has run out and well, its rejects after rejects.

Still not resolved

Damn it. With the CNY Holidays, my problem was still not resolved. The staff did what they could, based on their last orders from the now absent Supervisors. I know there is no point in worrying but this is my nature and with the customer calling me almost everyday, is unbearable as this is the first time I have ever handled such situations which I could not control the outcome.

This is the reason why I am not enjoying the Chssitmas, New Year and now, CNY.

Our own Yee Sang!

We have been doing our own Yee Sang ever since we started buying/getting those DIY ones years ago. And so, every year, it was more or less the same but with the occasional extra ingredients such as pomelos or crackers. But what really made this more fun was that everyone in the Family contributed.

Yum-yum but unfortunately for me, no raw salmon. Still, the girls more than made up for it.

28012012 Chinese New Year Outpost Celebration

Finally, I arrived at Richard's Place for his CNY Open House. This is a good place to relax and unwind because, his place is full of figures, props and reference books, filled wall to wall. And in the middle of it all, a large screen to watch the DVDs and Blu-Rays. I am thankful that I was one of the lucky few that gets to be invited yearly and to tell you the truth, the food he dishes out, is, erm, much better than The Outpost (ahem). That is because, he cooks it himself...

There are a lot of books which I could camp out at his place for days but there is one particular book which I wanted to show you. No, not the Tron;Legacy nor the Star Trek Vault. Its the Hayne's Manual.

This is the very much sought after Hayne's manual. Originally, Hayne's only does real-world transports. Now, they have ventures into Sci-Fi.

Unfortunately, my excitement upon opening this book died. I think they tried to design the pictures in Hayne's style but man, this is the 21st Century. Stop with the black & white and newspaper dots!

Yawn... you can download this from the Internet

Although I do apprceiate them doing this book but the more pages I turned, its as if they joined the Star Trek bandwagon too late. As in decades too late.

Whoa.... colour all of a sudden. Were they reading the Deep Space Nine technical Manual?

I think, this is the only page worth y of the book. But since its not shown in the movies or TV series or even by Rick Sternback/Mike Okuda, it is not canon.

Richard preparing the Yee-Sang

Raw Salmon!

Tossing of the Yee-Sang. This is the best part. Another best part was, I got a lot of the raw salmon...

Later on, it was business as usual...

Darth Maul Chopsticks, both halves held together by magnets

Panoramic view of the place.

Microman MA-38 Chirico Curvie

On the way to Richard's Place, I picked up this Microman figure from a local eBay seller. He got this years ago and was displaying the figure on his monitor until he got bored because his friends/colleagues tend to play with it. Anyway, to cut the long story short, I bought it at a very good price because it was missing one grenade, which, to me, was petty since I was only interested in the figure and the gun.

And so, this Microrman is in my hands.... yeah!

Lots of hands for different 'scenarios'

Everything is there, minus the grenade

Looking through the 'catalogue' that came with it, its amazing that they even have a Scopedog for this Microman. Unless I am mistaken, that is.

And so, now I have a Chirico Cuvie Mircroman, I wonder if I am any closer to getting a Material force version? And I also wonder, with my current job and time, I wonder if I still have the time and patience to learn sculpting or will this be another wishful thinking which only after I retire, I would have all the time in the World to do them?

BY THAT TIME, I WOULD BE TOO FUCKING OLD AND SHAKING TO DO ANY OF THESE FUCKING THINGS! SO, FUCK YOU ALL WHO TELL ME TO PUT THESE AIDE AND CONCENTRATE ON THE THINGS AT HAND! FUCK YOU ALL! THIS IS MY LIFE!

YOU HEAR!?

THIS IS MY LIFE! NOT YOURS! FUCK YOU!

1/35 EFGF MS(G) Platoon Briefing Set

Ha ha ha ah aha! I got it! I got this 'rare' 1/35 Gundam kit! This was one of those kits which Bandai tried to attract 1/35 Armour modelers into the Gundam World. In fact, Bandai released a few kits and they're really sold out in Malaysia despite the higher price when compared to a 'normal' 1/35 equivalent.

It all started when Bandai's create the U.C Hardgraph series from their anmie shorts called MS Igloo which tells of stories of soldiers from both sides. These model kits concentrated more on transports, troops and well, parts of robots, which is perfect for dioramas. As I do not follow the 'main' Gundam series or any kind, these short stories are quite nice and tells you how size matters (and sometimes, does not)

And here are their model kits in detail so far, but I'll only highlight the important features (to me, that is) for each kit:

1. UCHG #1 Zion Mobile Scout Set

Some guy on a weird hover bike.

2. UCHG #2 Rambal ram Command Set

Zaku Head, one motorcycle, one fat guy

3. UCHG #3MS[G] Platoon Set

Big Hover truck, table, one fat guy

4. UCHG #4Anti MS squad set

Big MS hand, running figures, Bazooka

5. UCHG #5Zeon Cylops team set

Jeep, fat guy, Kid

6. UCHG #6 M61A5 Main Battle Tank

Tank with two cannons

7. UCHG #7 FF-X7 Core Fighter

Foldable boxy plane with female pilot.

This arrived in the office, and as usual, I picked it up pretty fast in case 'reporters' came. Yes, the Office has a Number One reporter which I totally hate.

The box on the outside looks good but when I opened it...

Anyway, the box is huge. This is why I had to remove it from the Office as fast as possible.

With normal kits, when there is a big box, it is usually just for parts but here, it is to house the big shell of the vehicle...

One day, I am going to build it and light it up too. Looking at the hover engines, I might want to convert them to truck tires and keep the beautiful engine instead... Right, off to the 'to-do' bin it goes, where it will be stored until the near future where I hope I have the time and peace to do it. And I also hope that its within my Lifetime as well.

1/32 Revell F-14 Tomcat

I got this from a SFTPMS member, Mig21 sometime ago and after doing a face-to-face, I even had to drive him to the nearest LRT.

This is the box that came with the kit.

And these are the contents of the kit that came inside the box.

OK, to me, 1/32 is a very big scale. If you want to know how big it is, look at your index finger. The first two notches from your fingernail to the second notch is about two inches, which represents the height of a 1/32 figure. Now, put that figure into a car, and the car is about 5 inches. Put him into a modern tank, its reaching almost to a feet. Now, imagine putting him into a F-14 Tomcat...

So, if I were to build this 1/32 kit, imagine the length....

OK, to be honest, bigger isn't better but for me, this is not important. This was because I did a 1/48 sometime ago, (OK, it was 24% completed), and the size was quite 'big'. I did not realise that there is a 1/32 scale from Revell. At the time, the only time it could be that big was from Tamiya and good luck buying one of them which costs about RM500. So, getting one from Revell seems to be the only compromise. Luckily, I was never one of those anal rivet counters or else I would have completely ignore this item for sale. to them, I would presume even the Tamiya kit would still be imperfect.

Anyway, I have the kit now, and I am so happy. But to the to-do bin it has to go, CNY mood or not. Seriously, even if I wanted to start on this right now, I do not have the proper tools nor an airbrush.

27012012 Dinner

Family dinner at THAT shop near Tesco in Old Klang Road. Yum yum. I forgot who 'discovered' it but this is the stall which causes traffic jams in the evening since its located on the side of the main Old Klang Road where everyone is coming back from their offices.

Bak Kut Teh and Steamed fish plus vege.

Panoramic shot of everyone there, and surroundings.

The Iron Repair Guy

I have less than an hour or so to repair this DVD player. And I basically know what the problem was. Its the 'Power' and the 'Eject' buttons which are causing the player to not functioning well. I know who caused them and I am not sure how they learn to do that. Maybe its because of the stiff lift buttons but whatever it is, dem button's broke.

Dem thing's broke. It just cannae eject, no. Ah no power ON or OFF for that matter too...

This is the Philips DVD player which we bought many years ago and it does play a lot of formats, particularly the DivX.

This is the defective power button which, if we were to send it to Philips, it would take a long time and also costs a lot of money.

I have opened up this before a few years ago and so, I know what I am doing. A quick desolder of the current switch and that's it. All done.

While I was repairing, the girls were observing too. The the cartoon came on...

Ta-daa! The defective switch.

With that out of the way, its now time for dinner...

27012012 Trip to Pasar Road

Don't know what I was thinking today, going to Pasar Road while the Chinese New Year period is still on. Then again, most of the customers are still on leave and rather than watching fungus grow, this was the only thing I could do.

Yeah, most of the shops are closed and today's not even Sunday.

Luckily, the ones that are close are the 'component' shops and not the generic ones. Nice surprise here, someone has finally brought in EL lights but unfortunately, its too late for any Tron costume.

This is what I was looking for. Third brake light using LEDs and not lightbulbs.

Just to be sure, I upgraded the LEDs to 1 watt since during traffic jams here, people tend to press on the brakes a lot. Everyone is too laxy to use the handbrakes. I don't blame them since the traffic jams are stop-go situations where the only benefit would be developing a muscular left arm. Note I also bought some micro push button switches for the DVD player.

Since I could not find the correct buzzer for Vee-Chai, this is the most I can do in the meantime.

What Chinese New Year means

To a foreign worker, this is what it means..

Few Ringgit in the pocket, enough for a meal and that's it. Who the F**k cares.

25012012 Chinese New Year Day 3

This is the day I am really looking forward to. No, not because its the Third day, but the venue which is at The Kee Palace. Also, this is the day where everyone gathered in one place. I just love company, watching them interact, catching up and doing the usual CNY financial exercises.