Last Saturday

It was the HELP Battle Of The Bands. It was a while back, so pardon my bad recollection. I waited at Bangsar PUTRA LRT for the bus to Pusat Bandar Damansara. Apparently, so was this other girl, as I ran out to the main road to see if that Triton bus was the right one. She ran out too. The correct bus came, and we both got on. She received a phone call and went, “What? It started already?” I got off when she did, and we both ran about, lost. I wanted to ask if she knew where it was, but she was on the phone, trying to get directions. We found Block E after a while.

Pretty, pretty lights. Too bad the sound wasn’t anywhere as good.

Few bands knew how to sound good; this 3rd place winner sang in tune.


Married To Guns was fun to watch, with the vocalist/guitarist doing his dancy The Darkness – I Believe In A Thing Called Love cover as well as Survivor – Eye Of The Tiger. They even ended with the solo bit of Metallica – Nothing Else Matters!

Alda of Cosmic Funk Express looked superbly funky that night.

We then went to Hartamas Square, where we had free beer on the winners, Cosmic Funk Express.

Wednesday

Shaz, JJM and I were supposed to break fast at Kelana Jaya, where Shaz would pick up his ride. Problem was, his ride wasn’t ready for him to shoot off to Cyberjaya to hand in his assignment, and so JJM became chaffeur. He introduced me to the mechanic, and I was to collect his Mercedes Benz when it was done.

I didn’t want to sit around Syed’s any longer, being bloated, so I called Dustyhawk, knowing he lived nearby. I got instructions to his house, and called again.

“Dude! Is your road SS5A/18?”
“No it’s not, you ASS. You overshot, you ASS. ‘FOO.”

I turned around and spotted him waiting outside his road, where he continued with his verbal assault.

It wasn’t till I got in that his momma showed him who was boss. She was.

She continuously expressed her love and concern (“aiyo I tell you this Lionel useless host one!“). I shall not go into details, but his room is sparkling clean for a guy. I got online on Lionel’s monitor (which read AS5S hence his continuous tribute to it). Shaz called, asking me to get back there to wait for the car with Maman. Lionel’s mom made him drive me there.

When we got there, Maman was there, and he lit a cigarette. Lionel borrowed one, as well as the lighter. We got the drift that his mom didn’t know that her son was smoking.

Shaz and JJM returned a bit too soon, so I didn’t get to test his new seats. Lionel, Shaz and I sat at Syed’s again, thinking of the original plan – to go watch Latte at 8 at Sunway Pyramid’s Starbucks at midnight. We went to visit Lionel’s mom again to get her permission.

“I hope she doesn’t give me more bags of starfruits, man.” – Shaz

She went on about his underwear and how angry she was walking from Pudu STAR LRT station to Bintang Walk due to her son’s misdirection. She went all out to humiliate Lionel in the most funny way possible.

“Aunty, can we take your son to see Latte at 8 at midnight at Sunway Pyramid?”
“Sure, can! As long as he doesn’t hisap rokok then can.”

I laughed my loudest then.

We went, and got major prime position seats. It wasn’t too close to the stage, and yet, we could see everything.

Close up.

Adam Carruthers and Marion Caunter of 8TV Quickie with some girl who should’ve won the Nokia 3200 at the HELP Battle Of The Bands. Yes, this was the first time I’d ever seen Marion after hearing so much about her cuteness.

Zahid of Disagree sports a new glittery Gibson Les Paul, with Hamka on percussion

In one of the secret tunnels out, we found the Bus Channel (Lionel poses)

Oh, and I was at a guitar shop in Sunway Pyramid. There was a guy testing a guitar and I was happy for once, because usually when someone tests a guitar, they probably know what to play. He was just playing very sloppily, very average – like me. 🙂

P.S. Welcome Evening Drama to the links in my About Me! page.

Saturday

I headed to the KLue 4th Anniversary at Asian Heritage Row. Those observant would’ve noticed that the second and third anniversaries weren’t celebrated. (The first was at Grappa Soho.) Funny thing about Asian Heritage Row was that the only thing really Asian restaurant among those fancily named bistros was La Senja. There, I had an excellent vanilla-tainted teh tarik with one of the many celebrities:

The event was a no-event; or rather, we’d make our own event. A power outage delayed Seven Collar T-shirt’s album launch at Bar Blonde (Asians, blonde, other than Russians?) I bumped into members of Prana and asked if they were performing. “Oh we’re going to perform at One Utama at 10:30pm.”

That explained the small crowd; everybody was at the ICOM gig there!

I originally went hoping to WAZZAAAP people there. I did bump into celebrities, yes, but minor ones at that. When I did see four chicks walking past, I wondered if they used RentACrowd as featured in their magazine. Then again, if you can get minor celebrities to come on their own money, why not?

Sunday

I hung out at Subang.

Monday

Is there much to say about a Monday?

Tuesday

I headed to Long Black Cafe (under Mahogany, SS2) for Camp EA 2004. I pre-registered online, but I didn’t expect a sticker saying “Albert Ng, Astro/Xfresh”, with press kits and all. I thought I was going as a nosy gamer, not a journalist. They showcased final builds of FIFA 2005, Armies Of Exigo and personally-anticipated Need For Speed: Underground 2.

The Malaysian FIFA champions for World Cybergames 2003 and 2004 duke it out in FIFA 2005.

Need For Speed: Underground 2 was cool. While the game engine looked the same, there were more options; you could have a neat bonnet view:

You could customize more things, like the color of your speedometer dial, the color of the dots, and even the inlay of the gauge!

While I didn’t have time to explore all the menus, I found the one great option:

Oh, and it rains sometimes. The rain dropping on the window made a cool warping effect, refracting the surroundings realistically.

It took quite a while to find the eagerly awaited Free Run mode – you could just drive around the streets leisurely. If you saw another car, you could engage in a race by kissing its bumper. Then, he’d try to outrun you. The path for this impromptu race would not be set; the objective was to get as far and out of your sight. The car in the lead would get to choose the route.

After work, I headed to Bangkok Bank to get my bus home; however, the bus was half-hour late, and took another half-hour to crawl to Sultan Ismail. Traffic was unusually bad that day, and so I got off the bus and took the STAR LRT to PWTC, where I took a cab home. Alas, he too was not spared from the day’s particularly massive traffic. He then relayed stories of the pitiful life of a taxi driver. Once, he was a minibus driver (those death-trap kings of the road!) He then became a PUTRA feeder bus driver at Taman Jaya. There, it was the life – medical benefits, a booth to hang out and read newspapers at, a decent pay (what a fresh degree holder would get!), being able to take leave, doing the relatively jam-free Taman Jaya area; he got bored after a couple of years and moved to a much more challenging job – Klang Valley cabbie. Once he paid off the cab, he’d go back to being a bus driver though.

Wednesday

Oh hey since you probably noticed the unexcited, lethargic delivery of the previous days, there is an explanation.

Sometime last semester, I came late to class and there were questions written on the board. I copied them down, as the lecturer said it was the assignment. I enhanced my eyebags to hand it on time. However, one week before the final exam, she went “Eh Albert you know ah you failed your assignment? You didn’t do Part 1.”

As far as I remembered, I did everything, and even took out the paper where I copied the questions to. Apparently what she copied was just Part 2 as she needed to explain them; all the assignment questions were online.

Dammit, she could’ve told me earlier that I failed. Okay so it was my fault for not checking, but couldn’t she give me a chance? She knew that if I knew there was a Part 1, I would do it well and pass.

About a month after the exam, I checked my results online; I found out that my login didn’t work anymore, so I went to college to ask them to reset my password. I wrote my email address, student ID, and phone number on a piece of paper, and they said they’d take care of it.

I tried again at the office, and it still didn’t work; so, I headed to college to ask again. I gave them my student ID, and they went, “oh we sent you an email already what!” They even printed it out, with my new password. Problem was, the email was addressed to albnole@hotmail.com. Okay I shall remember to write my K’s properly.

Frustrated, I went to a cybercafe in Ampang Park to check my results with my new password. Fail/Refer, it said. Take the exam again, it meant.

I went to KLCC to get superglue for my Rubik’s Cube project. I finally figured out how to repair the oversized ones (article will come later) and so, I sat outside Isetan KLCC on a bench, screwing a center piece back on. I then warmed it up, but it popped again! So I screwed it in again, messed it up, and it popped off again. This time, since the cube was already messed up, I had to take everything apart. As I reassembled it, a balding white guy walked past, saying, “hey that’s cheating!” I showed him the center piece, going, “but this part came out! It usually doesn’t come out!” Without slowing down, he walked off into Isetan, going “hey that’s cheating!”

After all that misfortune, this was something I could laugh at.

Since I was on a roll of bad luck, I decided to take a cab and not risk waiting for/in an Intrakota. All was fine till I found out I had no money! Out came ancient 1 Ringgit notes from the secret reserves.

How was your day?