S and I had a rather adventurous jog yesterday. We did the 10.5km route around MacRitchie for the first time. We only started at 6:30pm (never never never again!) so by the time we were looping back, it was almost dark. We kept on jogging (in fear) until S tripped on a root and then we decided we were better off walking because of the dark. Luckily for us, we saw three guys walking in front of us and so we followed them until we got out to the road. At one point we could barely see 50m in front of us. *shiver*
I tell ya, adrenaline is the best way to keep from being tired. I carried my hp just in case, but at the point where we thought that we might have made a wrong turn and there was nobody in sight and it was already 710pm, my hp made a beep and it said, “No network." Boy did we run. We did it in 67mins, which was faster than what we did in Australia.
AND I get home and what does my dad tell me over my mee goreng dinner? That when he was a young man, his friend from the church youth group went jogging at MacRitchie and they couldn’t find his body for 7 days. In the end they found him in the water crouched in the fetal position. He was only 16, ended up getting 7As, but wasn’t alive to get his results. Sheesh. No wonder I couldn’t sleep last night.
Thursday, March 31, 2005
10.5km MacRitchie Loop
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
What does it all mean?
Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing
Singaporeans are very funny
We live on the 22nd floor near Bedok. At about 1215, I woke up because my bed was shaking! Even the door was swaying away. I felt like Linda Blair in Exorcist! I sms-ed my hubby (who was sleeping next door) to keep me company because I was too scared to leave the bed. ~ maunderlinAnd this:
i saw a SMS when i woke up and turn on my phone tis morning. it is from my bro who is sleeping just next to my room. it read: "bro! the whole fucking room is shaking! is tis an earthquake or someting? run or stay?" ~ jasonttyWah, very funny, cannot tahan. Read More!
Thoughts on the North Sumatra Earthquake
The influence of the media on our worldview is both subtle and powerful. The media is given over to disasters that are "of the minute", disasters that create a lot of terrible images. Consider this:
One African child dies of Malaria every minute.Ironically, I would not have known of these numbers without the publicity of the World Health Organisation either.
Globally, for every two people who die in traffic accidents, one mother and 20 children die from preventable and treatable causes.
1,400 mothers die every day from complications in pregnancy and childbirth. 70% of deaths are from just 5 causes: haemorrhage (24%), infection (15%), unsafe abortion (13%), high blood pressure (12%), and obstructed labour (8%).
More than 6 million children could be saved each year if they were reached by a small set of preventive and curative interventions.
I scan the news report for the casualty rate. I read, "1,000". I think, "Oh, okay, that's not too bad compared with the boxing day tsunami." Yet a father who loses his child in this recent earthquake experiences the same tragedy as a father who loses his child in the earlier one, no? Read More!
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Tip of the day
A widow for one year
I was mildly uncomfortable the first few chapters of the book. Irving has the knack of telling you what is going to happen before telling you how it happens. His books are never like horror movies with things jumping out at your from behind corners; instead, they are like peep show -- you know what you will eventually see, but the adventure is in the unrevealing. (Hmm, there must be a better analogy than a peep show!)
Anyway, I was mildly uncomfortable the first few chapters cos I knew what was going to happen and I didn't want to read about it. But I got through the parts I didn't want to read about, and as it unfolded, I felt increasingly drawn by the characters and their life story. It was refreshing having a female protagonist too, and at some points, the dysfunctional love between mother and daughter made me tear.
I liked this novel second only to The Cider House Rules. Even though I'm getting tired of Irving's repeating theme of sex (too much!) and over-anxious parents, it was funny, heartwarming, and chock-full of eccentric characters.
Saturday, March 26, 2005
the blue and green yellow eyed cat
Thursday, March 24, 2005
Terry Schiavo
The legal tussle for Terry Schiavo's life has dominated the front pages of US papers this week. Some words are very emotive, like "starving to death", and "no chance of recovery". To me, it boils down to these questions:
1. Is Terry Schiavo alive?
Yes. The only thing that differentiates Schiavo and me is that one, she is unable to feed herself, and two, she is incapable of responding or relating to the outside world. The first problem does not mean she is any less of a human being - if I get to 90 I may need help with my food too. About the second, I think the human consciousness is over-rated. I think it is part of what it means to be human, but it is not the ONLY gauge of homo sapien life. Aren't there people with down syndrome who seem incapable of communicating with the world, but yet are given the same rights as everyone else?
2. Does a feed tube constitute ordinary care?
Yes, I think so, as food and drink is somehow different from being on an apparatus that helps you breathe, or your heart to beat.
3. Do we have the right to die?
I'm not sure. Personally, I will not use this right, but that is because of my own beliefs. As I did not choose to be born, I will not choose to die. As to whether society should confer to us the right to die is a whole different kettle of fish. I don't see why not, frankly, but at least in Schiavo's case, it is not proven without doubt that she would have chosen to die. Also, what is stopping her from changing her mind now? Maybe being in a vegetative state is not as we "non-vegetative states" perceive it to be?
4. What are the alternatives?
Really, we all have to die from something or other. If Schiavo does not get her feeding tube re-inserted, she will die from lack of food and drink. Otherwise, it may be pneumonia, or an infection, or something else. The tragedy is not her dying -- it was what happened ten years ago -- and I feel very sorry for the family that it had to stretch out for so long.
If I were her gaurdian, I would choose to continue the feeding tube, but not have any further extraordinary care, such as resuscitation or antibiotics etc. But who am I, or the court, or the politicians to say?
I pray for God's mercy on her and her family, that they will have relief.
Wednesday, March 23, 2005
Benefits of working here
One of the benefits of working where I work is my colleagues. They are so nice. When they have two ham sandwiches, they will give me one; when they are out on an errand, they will get me lunch when the canteen is closed. This week I've had an excellent chocolate mousse cake from Tanglin Club, a bowl of sliced fish bee hoon, one tuna bun from bread talk for breakfast, a yummy Thai bah kwa on rice krispy snack and today, a ham sandwich, which I am munching on now. I am so blessed.
Read More!Friday, March 18, 2005
desert run
If you think people who run are crazy, wait till you read about this ultramarathon man. I quote:
But an ultramarathon - technically any distance longer than a 26.2-mile traditional marathon - is not really a race at all in the ordinary sense, Mr. Karnazes said. A day and a night of running, he said, is more like a melodrama than an athletic contest - full of euphoric highs and gloomy, dispiriting lows. The emotional climax - the Dostoyevskian moment of suffering - comes when exhaustion and despair loom up and smack you in the face and the finish line seems unattainable.
"That's exactly the moment I seek," he said. "To me, life is in the struggle, and I never feel more alive than when I'm struggling."
wow
Come, fly away with me
The sky from my office window as the sun sets. Awesome eh? One of the perks of working in a job that gives you more office space than money.
Read More!Thursday, March 17, 2005
blogging issues
Decided to play around with the layout of this blog and ended up with more problems than I started with. But I like the more "finished" look of this site for now, so I'm going to see if I can work through the bugs.
Installed the code to add a "read more!" button to truncate my longer posts. Internet is interactivity so you might as well fly with it.
The contents in the right column (viewed in IE) are pushed down way to the bottom. I read somewhere that it is a problem with my pictures and tables being too large. In IE, the container enlarges to fit its content, so if I put a picture that is too large in the main column of my blog, the container enlarges, bumping all the content down in the next column. Brilliant. So these are my proposed solutions:
1. Re-size all my pics manually. (What a bother!)
2. Increase main column width (But that affects the layout of the entire page)
3. Don't do anything about it. :)
I've started a flickr account. And I like it a bunch so far. :) It appears less cranky than hello, and it gives you cool features, like the "flickr stamp" you see in the column in the right (pushed way down of course, at least until I get it fixed.) My flickr stamp are of my running routes. But how do I limit the stamp's range to a particular group of pictures in flickr?
I'm considering taking my running log offline. Since end July last year, I've jogged 279 kilometers in 42 hours. It is so much easier to keep track in excel, and no one looks at my log anyway, and it is really a record just for me. But of course if I take it off, all my earlier links would be dead, but no one looks in the archives anyway.
I'm also considering taking onemillionpictures offline. I used this page primarily as a "holding place" for the pictures in Pencil Shavings, and now if my flickr use goes without a hitch, I may not need this blog anymore. I kinda like the name though.
see, you can read more!
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
What endorphins??
Running endorphins is a bunch of crap. I never feel high while running. I feel my heart, my lungs, my thigh muscles, the uphill, and my side stitches quite acutely, but never ever high. I feel high AFTER the jog, and AFTER a shower, and largely because of the feeling of being clean and having accomplished something.
Yesterday's jog, on the other hand, was fast, short, and poised to kill. I swear my heart was about to thump right out of my chest when I finally stopped. Later, I had a massive tricep cramp when I lowered myself in my first tripcep push-up. The things we submit our bodies to...
A bit of trivia - How do you know when you've drunk too much water before a run?read more! Read More!
Monday, March 14, 2005
Trying to Save Piggy Sneed
I finished another book by John Irving, this time a compilation of short stories titled Trying to Save Piggy Sneed. His short stories are interesting enough – I read the entire compilation over two days – but after reading four other full-length novels by him, his short stories are, well, too short. I’m usually left with the thought, “What! Is that it? What happens to so-and-so after his long drive to Iowa? What did that entire dinner conversation mean?” There were some stories where I didn't have a clue what Irving was trying to get at.
This compilation includes The Pension Grillparzer, previously found only in The World According to Garp. The title is derived from the first story of the compilation, Trying to Save Piggy Sneed. In a way, this story is an explanation of how and why Irving became a writer. It is a bit like jumping into cold water to suddenly have Irving as Irving address you – refreshing, different, intriguing. This was my favourite story of the compilation (not counting The Pension Grillparzer), and it starts thus:
“A fiction writer’s memory is an especially imperfect provider of detail; we can always imagine a better detail than the one we can remember. The correct detail is rarely exactly what happened; the most truthful detail is what could have happened, or what should have… Being a writer is a strenuous marriage between careful observation and just as carefully imagining the truth you haven’t the opportunity to see. The rest is the necessary strict toiling with the language…”
And he goes on to tell a fantastic and believable story.
In another strand of thought, remember what I said concerning dreams in The Fourth Hand? I was wrong in thinking that dreams and premonitions were a new theme in Irving’s latest novel because there is a story all about dreams in this compilation titled “Other People’s Dreams”. In this story, the main character has the gift (or curse?) of dreaming other people’s dreams when he sleeps in their bed. In the last two paragraphs, there is a hint of premonition as well, which is how dreams feature in The Fourth Hand. So there, mystery solved.
read more!
Friday, March 11, 2005
Create your own vidu
thanks, but no thanks
ST Interactive informed me today in a large pop-up window that I have "9 days of free access left" and if I would like to "Subscribe now!", have "More details!", or "Close this window". I closed the window. Being a kiasu Singaporean, I will read every single article at least 2 times over these 9 days and when they make it a paying site, I'll bring my non-paying customer self somewhere else. After which, I will add ST Interactive to my bag of gripes, which already has LTA and their blasted fare hikes, MacDonald and it's $2.50/hr pay for those over 55, etc. etc. etc.
Read More!Thursday, March 10, 2005
more kind than home, more large than earth
I stumbled upon this passage in my reading last night. Thomas Wolfe gave one of the finest modern visions of the kingdom to come in his last book, You Can't Go Home Again. It came to him before he knew of his fatal illness.
-----
Dear Fox, old friend, thus have we come to the end of the road that we were to go together... and so farewell.
But before I go, I have just one more thing to tell you.
Something has spoken in the night, burning the tapers of the waning year; something has spoken in the night, and told me I shall die. I know now where. Saying:
“To lose the earth you know, for greater knowing; to lose the life you have, for greater life; to leave the friends you loved, for greater loving; to find a land more kind than home, more large than earth –
– Whereon the pillars of this earth are founded, toward which the conscience of the world is tending – a wind is rising, and the rivers flow.”
-----
A land more kind than home, more large than earth... What a heartwarming vision! This phrase brought tears to my eyes. When I lie dying, I shall remember Christ; when I wake, I shall touch his face for the very first time.
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
Heart Rate and Exercise Goals
moi-carine has a new heart rate monitor. I found the info posted below from a webpage selling heart rate monitors in the US. It has pretty useful information. For example, my heart rate right now is 60 beats/min (after making and eating a toasted peanut butter sandwich with sliced banana and a cup of coffee with sugar and milk). My age adjusted maximum heart rate is 226 - (age) = 199. That means that after my glorious sprint on Monday (148 beats/min), I was only working at 74% of my max! Granted I didn't take my heart rate right after the run (I was bent over trying to breathe), but it also means I can work harder. But I knew that already. :)
Q: What is heart rate?
A: Heart rate is the number of heart beats per minute; the times per minute that the heart contracts.
Q: What is average heart rate?
A: The average of heart rates measured during an exercise period.
Q: What is recovery heart rate?
A: This is the heart rate that our body will decrease to after an exercise session. For example, you exercise for a 1/2 hour at 155. Two minutes after you stop exercising, your heart rate decreases to 95. The 95 would be your recovery heart rate. It is used to evaluate your fitness level after exercise. It is good to set a two minute time frame and see how many beats you recover in that time frame. Compare this recover heart rate between exercise sessions.
Q: What is resting heart rate?
A: Resting heart rate (Resting HR) is the number of beats in one minute when you are at complete rest. Your resting heart rate indicates your basic fitness level. The more well-conditioned your body, the less effort and fewer beats per minute it takes your heart to pump blood to your body at rest.
Q: How do I determine Morning Resting Heart Rate (MRH)?
A: Immediately after awakening and before you get out of bed, measure your heart rate using your heart rate monitor or from the palpitating pulse from artery, counting the beats for 15 seconds and multiplying by four. You can sleep with your heart rate monitor on and in the morning read it first thing. Be aware of the fact that, if your bladder is full in the morning, you didn't sleep well, or you're feeling stressed, you might have a slightly elevated resting heart rate. Take these measurements for five consecutive days and find the average. This average is your actual resting heart rate. Resting heart rate is dependent on your living habits and a number of factors such as quality of sleep, stress level, and eating habits.
Q: What is maximum heart rate?
A: Maximum Heart Rate (Max HR) is the highest number of times your heart can contract in one minute. Max HR is the most useful tool to be used in determining training intensities, because it can be individually measured or predicted.
Q: How to determine maximum heart rate?
A: You can define your maximum heart rate by
1) having it measured in an exercise test
2) using age-predicted maximum heart rate formulas.
1) Measured Max HR
The most accurate way of determining your individual maximum heart rate is to have it clinically tested (usually by treadmill stress testing) by a cardiologist or exercise physiologist. You can also measure it in field conditions supervised by an experienced coach. If you are over the age of 35, overweight, have been sedentary for several years, or have a history of heart disease in your family, clinical testing is recommended.
2) Predicted Maximum HR There is a mathematical formula that allows you to predict your Max HR with some accuracy. It is called the "age-adjusted formula". The age-adjusted Max HR formula can come in very handy when you're not prepared to pay for the physician-supervised stress test.
WOMEN: 226-your age = age-adjusted Max HRMEN: 220-your age = age-adjusted Max HR
If you are a 30-year-old woman, your age-adjusted maximum heart rate is 226- 30 years = 196 bpm (beats per minute).
These formulas apply only to adults. The generally accepted error in age-predicted formulas is + - 10-15 beats per minute, which is due to different inherited characteristics and exercise training.
You should remember that there may be some discrepancy when using the age-adjusted formula, especially for people who have been fit for many years or older people. The formula will give you a ballpark estimate to work from, but if you want to exercise/train at your most effective levels, your Max HR should be measured.
Q: What is the heart rate reserve?
A: Heart Rate Reserve is the difference between your Maximum Heart Rate and your Resting Heart Rate. If your maximum heart rate is 196 bpm (beats per minute) and your resting heart rate 63 bpm, your heart rate reserve is 196 bpm - 63 bpm = 133 bpm.
The greater the difference, the larger your heart rate reserve and the greater your range of potential training heart rate intensities.
Q: What is safety heart rate?
A: This is the heart rate that is prescribed for beginning exercises - whether a walker, runner, swimmer, snow shoer, or a participant in any aerobic activity. It is also the term used in some cardiac rehabilitation programs in which physicians prescribe moderate, supervised training for recovering heart attack patients. This range is usually 60% (or less) of the maximum heart rate and represents the least amount of stress you can place on your heart and still receive a beneficial exercise effect.
Q: What is Max VO2 heart rate?
A: This is the heart rate at which you hit your maximal oxygen uptake effort. On the average, you hit your Max VO2 HR at 95% of your Max HR.
Q: What is the anaerobic threshold?
A: The physiological point during exercise at which muscles start using up more oxygen than the body can transport, i.e. muscle work produces more lactic acid/lactate than the body can process.
Q: What is the target zone?
A: A target zone is a heart rate range that guides your workout by keeping your intensity level between an upper and lower heart rate limit. There are various target zones that are suggested for an individual to follow that correspond with a specific exercise goal. IE: Improved Fitness Zone 70-80% of Max Heart Rate.Heart Rate and Exercise Goals
Ideal For Benefit Desired Intensity Level Light Exercise Maintain Healthy Heart/ Get Fit 50% - 60% Weight Management Lose Weight/ Burn Fat 60% -70% Aerobic Base Building Increase Stamina Aerobic Endurance 70% - 80% Optimal Conditioning Maintain Excellent Fitness Condition 80% - 90% Elite Athlete Maintain Superb Athletic Condition 90% - 100%
Select which level of condition represents your current physical condition and locate the Lower and Upper Heart Rate Zones for your age from the Target Heart Rate Chart.
Read more!
Tuesday, March 08, 2005
brilliant fluid gold
I went jogging at MacRitchie yesterday evening. I had forgotten how therapeutic it is to run at the boardwalk there. I started the jog tense and jittery from having been at work all day; I ended relaxed, productive and contemplative.
We started the jog at 6:45pm, and ran at an average pace of 9.6km/h. At the end of the jog, my heart rate was beating 148 times a minute. I did 50 sit-ups, 50 push-ups, 50 tricep pushups, and a few lunges. I would have done more lunges except that I felt somewhat stupid-looking. Perhaps I will cycle instead to build up the quadriceps.
The light from the setting sun reflected off the still water, making the water look like brilliant, fluid gold. There was a strong headwind and many monkeys hanging out on the boardwalk. I’m always petrified of stepping on their tails. You know the saying, “Like a rocking chair in a roomful of long-tailed monkeys?” My buddy and I were two runners on a boardwalk full of long-tailed monkeys AND their babies.
I will have to go back soon.
Monday, March 07, 2005
The Fourth Hand
So I’ve finished my fourth book by Irving, The Fourth Hand. This is his latest novel (2001). Interestingly, I noted in his acknowledgements a mention of a few assistant writers. I wonder how much they actually write for him.
Anyway, back to the book, The Fourth Hand is full of sex. It is not like the sex in The Cider House Rules which is passionate, intense, and pivotal. This sex is farcical and in large amounts. It comes from having a handsome playboy as the main character. Patrick Wallingford, a news reporter who lost his hand to a lion, isn’t capable of saying no to women. He is described as physically irresistible, yet in the long run, forgettable. His ex-wife likened him to the flu – when you are down with it you feel like you will die, but when you are well again you forget he even exists. He is extremely attentive to women, but also so shallow that he is capable of “losing himself” in any woman at all.
So this novel is about how he rises from his self-created stereotype by falling in love for real, for once. It also involves four hands. Coincidentally, its content is similar to another book of Irving’s I read, The Water Method Man. Both feature a male protagonist; both characters are on journeys of self-discovery and formation. An illuminating difference though is that intrinsic to Patrick’s journey is a strong will to change, which Trumper in The Water Method Man does not exhibit.
This novel also touches briefly on premonition, dreams and destiny. This is the first time I’ve encountered this theme in his books (then again I’ve only read four) and it looks like an interesting development. In The Cider House Rules, The World According to Garp, and The Water Method Man, life is chaotic, hilarious, brilliant, tragic, completely human. In this novel, there is the barest hint of destiny. Long before Wallingford met Doris, he had already dreamt of the ending. While this destiny has to be worked for (Wallingford has to will himself not to sleep with the sexy make-up girl and the powerful colleague), the very fact that it exists is quite something as it runs contrary his earlier worldview. Perhaps Irving himself is changing?
fast work, constant output
I work fast. Which also means that sometimes, to create the illusion of my work being constant and methodical, I space out when I hand in my work. At the moment, I have two completed projects sitting on my desk which I won’t hand just yet. Effectively, I work on visible outputs only half a day at work and spend the rest of my time writing, thinking, and reading. Unless there is a large project of course.
Read More!Friday, March 04, 2005
tagging along
I have a fancy mancy dinner tonight at the Singapore Cricket Club at the Padang, in front of the Supreme Court. It is a dinner to thank my boss for his work these past four years, and I'm tagging along. I'll be youngest person there; I'll be the least experienced, the least useful, the least significant cretin. I think I'll be happier if they let me eat in the kitchen instead. From what I hear, the menu consists of chicken and soup. I'll try not to get anything on my outfit, which is the exact same ugly and old thing I interviewed in three and a half years ago, worn today due to a lack of new clothes and a laundry crisis. I'm also somewhat sweaty from having tagged along another work event this morning. I wonder why they don't fire me.
Read More!Manna and Maggots
Spotted this at the carpark, on the side of a van:
"Manna Pot Food Catering Service"
Now I will never call my catering service Manna Pot. You say "manna" and I think, okay the honey flakes in the desert, and when you say "pot" I immediately think of what the early Israelites said (it is afterall the same context as manna), "Did you bring us out to die in the desert? Have we not graves enough in Egypt? (what a brilliant line) In Egypt we sat around pots of flesh and ate all we wanted... etc."
In that passage, pot does not have good connotations. And besides, it's an oxymoron! Pot implies plenty, tasty meat; manna is only a day's supply of flake-like bread. And don't even think of collecting an entire potful of manna. It'll be full of maggots in the morning.
Thursday, March 03, 2005
Why target cigarettes and spare liquor?
Read this in The Straits Times Interactive today (Mar 3, 2005). 
These older residents, for whom smoking is one of their few pleasures, asked him if it was because ministers and MPs do not smoke but still enjoyed their drink, he said as colleagues chuckled.
The quick response from Acting Second Finance Minister Raymond Lim, also brought laughter in the House, including from Mr Ong.
'As Mr Ong has alluded to liquor duties, I would like to assure him that when we decide to raise duties, be it on tobacco or any other items, we always do so soberly.'
Wednesday, March 02, 2005
Wet toes Prelude
Today my toes got wet. I had forgotten to bring my EZ link card so I decided to take a longer walk instead of dropping another dollar coin for the bus. That was when my toes got wet. Not that it really matters, it is only the prelude for this:
Remember how I thought we bought the wrong shoes? I came across a review at Runner's World which says that the Supernova cushion shoes are "neutral-cushioned" shoes, recommended for effecient runners with "normal or high arches". Ha! I feel much better now. I've posted a jpeg below of the review. (btw, you can get your own Runner's World magazine at the National Library. It will give you more running trivia than you've ever cared to know.)
Adidas Supernova Cushion Review by Runner's World, March 2004
Tuesday, March 01, 2005
Jogging and Cycling
On Sunday I went for a jog starting from AMK central and ending at Lower Pierce. It was a 5.01km jog. I went jogging with my buddy S. It was one of those untalkative jogs, where our panting over-rided all possibility of conversation. We don't usually jog like this, but I think we were both up to pushing our limits that evening. I have to say though that we didn't push ourselves quite hard enough (if we want to do the half marathon at the end of the year), but it was a faster jog than usual. We caught up on our conversation on our 5km walk back to Central. It was a friendly, comfortable time. Took bus 851 to City Hall. 851 is now my bus of choice. :)
In the past two weeks, I also ran with my sister. We did three runs together, and one time we cycled. Two of the runs were on the treadmill - she beat me once and I beat her once. We are so competitive, it's hilarious! Not say cut-throat competitive, but sisterly type of competition. S and I are so not that way at all, although it is true that she jogs more when she isn't with me. The cycle at night was a great time. I missed her this past year, I miss her still, but I'm intensely grateful for things like MSN and SMS and phone lines that make this world that much smaller.
