Bulgemeister

My car’s windscreen was hit by a projectile, perhaps a stone, as I was driving along a highway not too long ago. I was not following too near to the car in front of me, but we were travelling in excess of 120km per hour. At the same time, there were some grass cutting activities on the roadside. All of a sudden, I heard that ‘click’ sound that seemed to come from the windscreen and I noticed a spot appeared towards the bottom right-hand corner of the windscreen. As soon as I arrived at my destination, I checked the windscreen and sure enough, there was a chipped spot of the windscreen.

Then yesterday, I sent the car for a carwash. Perhaps they must have rubbed too hard on the screen, or perhaps the cold-hot condition made it worse, I noticed a line of crack had propagated from the chipped spot. Somehow, as I was driving, the line got longer and I could actually heard some sound, which I was sure, came as the crack developed longer. Made a quick phone call to the car’s agent and managed to arrange for a replacement.

I got my windscreen covered under the car insurance. I am planning to get the whole charges (cost of the windscreen and the labour cost) reimbursed by the insurance company. However, that would mean I would lose my No Claim Bonus (NCB) when I want to re-new my car insurance. I would not want to pay almost BND1000 for the windscreen, even if I wanted to save my NCB and save probably BND300 for my next insurance coverage.

I am currently having another bout of eczema, which flared up after being put under control in the past month.

I first started having problems with eczema about two and a half months ago. I never had any problems with eczema ever before, so it came as a surprise when the skin doctor told me that I had eczema. Apparently, it could happen to just about anyone, even if you never had it before. It could be hereditary too; if someone in your family had it before, there was a good chance you might have it. Eczema could be also be triggered by the things that you eat or the place in which you work or live. Anyway, I was given some anti-histamine tablet and some steroid cream to contain the eczema outbreak. After a few visits, it did not seem to go away, but rather it looked the doctor was trying to control the outbreak from spreading further.

I do not know if this is related; last Friday I joined the company’s fun run outing at Bukit Shahbandar and I, and most other people, was bitten a lot by sandflies. As a result, my legs were covered by sandfly bites and they got itchy over the weekend. Then on Sunday, it got slightly worse. I met up with a friend who had a similar problem but got it under control after visiting a private clinic. She encouraged me to visit the clinic, which was exactly what I did this morning. I got some steroid pills, which provides higher dosage than the steroid cream. I also got this apparently ‘secret’ cream concocted by the physician at the clinic.

Now, I am trying to see if this treatment regime works. At the same time, I am switching my shower gel to something more potent, which cost me an arm and a leg. And it looks like that I will be covered with lotions as I was told that my skin is extra dry and I need to keep it constantly moisturised!

I wonder if it was because the feng shui was not right?

I am going to make a shopaholic’s confession ….

Went to watch the movie adaptation of Confessions of a Shopaholic, a book of similar title by Sophie Kinsella. It is a real chick flick, so if you wanna go and watch it, make sure you have some female companions to keep your masculinity in check! But it was a good, nice piece of movie, something to end a tiring week with. 

However, little could be said for the supposed new design of the away kit. As extracted from here, it says … “In stark contrast to the simple home design is this thing, which appears to be a mash-up between United’s 1992/3 shirt and 16th century peasant chic”.
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The website also offered these ratings, “Our rating: A for the retro one, B for the modern twist, and D for the horrible ‘80s New Romantic throwback”.

I am not too sure if I like any of these new designs. Too retro, too old, and too bland. They don’t seem to represent the current, and perhaps future, of Manchester United; a future of greater greatness, dominance and power!

Apparently, Liverpool and Arsenal are also changing their away kits next season.

And this is the supposedly new design of Chelsea’s home kit.

I subscribed to B-Mobile’s Zoom! mobile broadband service when it was first launched last year. At that time, subscribers would get the 3.5G modem, capable of downloading up to 3.6Mbps. DST then launched its Go! mobile broadband service, using modems that could download at a speed of up to 7.2Mbps and this started a mobile broadband war between these two telcos. After that, B-Mobile started to give away modem that was capable of downloading up to 7.2Mbps to new subscribers. In the many roadshows after that, I made inquiries about this 7.2Mbps-capable modems and was told that they would be exchanged for the 3.6Mbps modems. I was quite pleased with that and hoped that it would be done sooner rather than later.

A year on, nothing happened. Last Saturday, I went to B-Mobile’s Big Bang Carnival and asked about the 7.2Mbps modem. I was not too pleased when I was told that there was never a plan to exchange the 3.6Mbps ones to 7.2Mbps ones. The 7.2Mbps modems would only be offered to new subscribers. I argued that I was told the opposite during the roadshows but it seemed that it was not ever going to happen. If I were to get the 7.2Mbps, I would have to fork out B$300 for the modem. I was disappointed as I would have thought B-Mobile would not treat their customers differently. And to think that we were among the first ones to subscribe to it meant nothing to them. In fact, being the earlier subscribers meant you lot out on many things. You are stuck with the ‘slower’ modem. And you didn’t have any choice with the bundled laptop. We got the Dell Vostro laptops and the late subscribers were able to choose from a number of other laptops, including Macbook.

And, my 3.5G modem now does not work, as the USB connection came loose. I’ve passed the one-year warranty period and if I were to get a new one, I’d have to spend B$300! At the moment, I am using my niece’s Jet phone from B-mobile.

Does any one of you live along Jalan Jerudong and subscribe to B-Mobile’s Zoom! or DST’s Go! service? If you do, please let me know your experience with either. A friend of mine who lives along Jalan Jerudong is planning to subscribe to a mobile broadband service and wanted to know how these two fare in the area.

…. daylight Savings Time began as a joke by Benjamin Franklin, who proposed waking people earlier on bright summer mornings so they might work more during the day and thus save candles. It was introduced in the United Kingdom in 1917 — and then spread around the world.

…. Muhtar Kent, Coca-Cola’s chief executive, refuses to travel or sign documents on any Friday the 13th. He avoids hotel rooms located on the 13th floor. Recent Coke press releases avoid the dreaded number, saying “along with Coca-Cola, the company’s portfolio includes 12 other billion dollar brands.”

…. Britons were concerned when U.S. President Barack Obama ordered the return of a bust of Winston Churchill borrowed by President Bush and displayed in the Oval Office. President Obama also devoted 35 pages of his memoir, Dreams from My Father, to his grandfather’s claims of torture during British colonial rule in Kenya.

…. chicken feet cost two cents in the United States, but 55 cents in China. Tyson, the food company, makes a good profit shipping feet from the United States to China. In the process, it also subsidizes Americans and their penchant for chicken breast.

…. the word “bankrupt” originally comes from Italy, deriving from banca rotta, or broken bench. When a medieval moneylender could not pay his debts, his bench was broken in two, sometimes over his head.

During one of the sessions in the current sitting of the Legislative Council (LegCo), a question was asked on the halal-haram issue of meat being sold in the shops and markets. In his reply, the Minister of Religious Affairs said that the import of raw and unprocessed meat (beef, chicken or lamb) are closely controlled, but processed meat (canned or in other packages) are not currently actively monitored and being processed. He even advised Muslims to exercise caution when buying meat products as their ‘halalness’ could not be verified. He even mentioned that many shopkeepers, especially non-Muslims (no offence intended), do not really understand the whole halal-haram issue.

I understand what the Honourable Minister meant. Just go to any shop and take note of the items being listed under the ‘Not for consumption of Muslims’. Then go to another shop and check where the items that you have seen in the first shop are now located. In probably 7 out of 10 shops, these items are not segregated under the ‘Not for consumption of Muslims’. And it does not matter who owns the shops, be it a Muslim owner or not, you are bound to observe this point. At one point I remember that the control over the so-called dubious meat products were strict and they were separated. However, it seems that now there is no control at all. It is even worrying when this happens in a Muslim-owned shop. It is ok to make profits, but please look after the interest of your Muslim shoppers too. And to the shoppers, please be more careful as whatever you eat will ‘become a part of you’.

With Liverpool’s win over Aston Villa last night, Manchester United’s lead at the top of the Barclays Premier League is now cut down to one point, albeit having played one game less. The high-scoring last two games for Liverpool has practically wiped off the goal differences gap between the two teams. Now, the race to the finish line is going to be much tougher than expected and more slip-ups from the Champions could hand the Championship to Liverpool.

The remaining games for the top three side are:

Italics denote away games.