Boxing Day Painting

On the next day, it was time to complete the first coat of that white undercoat. Since I have never properly painted a wall before, I think I have used more stuff than calculated. The big can was enough for the four sides of the gate and also, the separation wall (not in the photos).

By the end of the day, I am starting to hate white

Once the pain subsides, I decided to get rid of the 'extra' fingernails as it would be accident waiting to happen or in other words, more ouchie-wa-wa time. I do not know the term for this but maybe it has something to do with the word torn and very close to Japanese torture methods.

Boxing Day Gas

The next thing on the list was getting some cooking gas for the kitchen. This is so that we can cook some simple stuff instead of going out to eat whenever we were here. Although its a no brainer to get this set up, you really need to follow some instructions. And as it was my first time, I forgot to RTFM....

Anyway, to get this done, we have to gather a few things:

1. A good LPG regulator

2. A good rubber hose

3 A sharp cutter, and

4. A good sized screwdriver which does not wear on the screws

When I said 'good', I mean safety approved products. Trust me on this, sometimes, there are things you cannot save money on. So, don't scrooge on this at the cost of other people's lives.

OK, I decided to go Ah Beng mode with this and got a regulator which has a pressure meter. In the end, since the LPG cannister was hidden in a corner, it was pretty useless to read the meter... haiya.

Disney Store Exclusive Tron Legacy Lightcycle

With some extra time left, I would like to elaborate more on this toy of mine.

First of all, this is the Tron 12" Lightcycle from the 2011 movie Tron:Legacy. And this is the most frustrating toy ever in my life. Its not about the quality or the price or even its accuracy. Its about its availability. The closest example I can relate to, are the regional DVD discs. For example, if you have a Region 1 DVD, you cannot play it in a Region 2 country and the only consolation were the different DVD Covers. And so like the regional problem, different countries were given different Tron products. In the UK, you had these huge Tron Lightcycles while in the US, you have the three different variations of the identity Discs. And each country has their own version collection of die-cast toys and action figures. Which is still good because over here, in the land of tree-houses and located above Singapore, we have.... leftovers. The only way to get them were from the toy importers from a very well known weekend bazaar and, you are expected to shell out a very high price for them too.

But lets take open the can a little bit more. Most of the Tron Toys, such as the Identity Discs and the die-casts are from Spin Masters while the coveted 12" Lightcycle is actually a UK Disney Store Exclusive and they would not ship beyond the British shores. Which explains why no one has the whole 'collection'. Now, being a ordinary Joe, I have no inkling of what went behind the scenes of toy distribution but it really irks me when the toy I wanted was really out of my reach. Blame it on the Internet or point-and-click culture or whatever name they call it nowadays, I wanted the toy, yesterday, and as cheap as possible. I won't tell you how I got it but trust me on this, it was a real bargain.

All these just for a pull-bak toy. But the real reason why I liked this 12" version was because of its lighting possibilities. The first time I opened the box, the toy's impressive size was very hard to dismiss. And once you have controlled yourself and landed back on Earth, you would have realised a few niggling things, namely:

1. The rider's helmet is from early drawing concept and is not movie accurate.
2. The switch inside the wheel is very sensitive. You will experience a lot of annoying sounds when it is picked up, touched or even when it feels you are looking at it.
3. You actually want to take it apart, examine the toy and start designing LEDs into it.

OK, the third part was just me. But I have yet to open it up and after watching the race-grid sequence a few times, there are a lot of modifications that needs to be done before it is 'acceptable'. Or, I can just whiz-bang the lights and distract everyone from the inaccuracies. Anyway, keep a look out for this blog because once I have the time, I am going to share the experience with you.

I tell you, the more I look at it, the more I want to get rid of the helmet and also remove the cover for the rear wheels.