Confessions of a......

My sister is jealous, very jealous.... cos I get to buy branded stuff here in the states for a fraction of the cost!! Went shopping agin on sunday, damage = 3CK shirts for US$37, 1 nike berms for US$7, 1 no brand shirt for $5 plus one pair of pants for US$10. It's hard not to like shopping here, really can get lots of branded stuff here for a darn goot price when there's a sale going on. My 3 pairs of CK jeans averages about US$25 each and they usually retail for like 60-80 buckaroos! And so my evil sister on hearing my good buys has demanded that I get her a kate spade bag (US$300) but claims that she does not expect me to buy it. As if! Think I die die also gotta try n get her one, I'm ashamed to say I never did much for her most of my life so if i can make some extra cash I guess I'll get her one. No choice gotta buy the bag cos she got me a watch for $350 for my bd b4 I left.... I'll just count my lucky stars that she's not asking for LV or hermes.... Anyways, somehow we've gotten closer since I've come to the states and I guess it's cos she's like my liason with the family in a way... And also of course we share a common interest now and that's shopping(she's got 3 freaking wardrobes)! And I'm always reporting my goot buys to make her gian... it's really hard not to be a brand whore here in the states :P haha



Good mood today also, cos we're making chicken rice!! Hope everything turns out well, dammit 4 mths no chicken rice liao... si peh gian... woot!

It's snowing again. When you're holed up in a nice warm place, it's kinda nice to watch the snowflakes fall and the roofs of the houses in the neighbourhood slowly turn white... It could be nice to share that moment with someone else but what about all the other days when it doesn't snow or all during the other days when thing aren't so nice? Haha, I'm becoming a mega commitment phobe and super cynical. Hell, just enjoy the snow for now. Tomorrow is a goot new day!

It's back!

Time for Season 5 of American Idol!

Some friends have been telling me tales of how some singaporean skydiver got himself killed while skydiving and both his main plus reserve chutes failed. Well actually, I think I knew about the news before most of you because I try to keep myself up to date with the news. I know very well the dangers associated with doing something like that and I have had a couple of malfunctions/close shaves during my SL jumps in the army....

1. Encountered twists in the parachute on my first jump! Survived with a bad(real bad) bump on my butt that hurt for 3 weeks.
2. Reserve deployed whilst still on plane, good thing that I wasn't the first man or I probably would have to jump out no matter where I was and of course have a place in the papers.
3. Near canopy collision with a friend, did the necessary drills and came off without a scratch.

As you can see, I really know very well what I'm getting into and I won't fool around with my life... For those skeptics who thinks still it's crazy or a waste of $$$, well of course you could go play ping pong or something like that but I urge you to take a look at some of the videos from www.skydivingmovies.com. When you see how much fun some of these guys are having doing freefly, base jumps, etc... you'd be wondering what you've been missing out. Let's face it, we're all gonna die some day, and statistics (though not verified by me) says that one is more likely to die driving to a dropzone than actually skydiving. So if one has to go, at least I hope to be doing something that I like instead of awaiting my end on a deathbed... We only have one life, live it!

"I believe life is about action and passion, and you truly can't begin to live life until you overcome your fear of dying."

Jan Davis 1941-1999, died in a protest jump at Yosemite.

Some skydiving related webbies,

1. www.dropzone.com
2. US Parachute Association
3. Skydive Asia
4. http://www.skydive.tv/links.htm
5. Skydivingmovies.com
6. Nice flash videos
   

Basejumping, consider after you've clocked 200 jumps...

1. http://www.basejump.org/
2. http://www.afn.org/skydive/base/
3. http://www.blincmagazine.com/forum/index.php?
4. http://www.basicresearch.com/
5. http://www.vertical-visions.com/
6. World Base Fatality List
   

And a Glossary

Word of the day

From Cambridge

Serendipity:
the lucky tendency to find interesting or valuable things by chance

dictionary.com

The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident.

Word History: We are indebted to the English author Horace Walpole for the word serendipity, which he coined in one of the 3,000 or more letters on which his literary reputation primarily rests. In a letter of January 28, 1754, Walpole says that “this discovery, indeed, is almost of that kind which I call Serendipity, a very expressive word.” Walpole formed the word on an old name for Sri Lanka, Serendip. He explained that this name was part of the title of “a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip: as their highnesses traveled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of....”

Slightly different interpretation from merriam webster... cos it's essentially a british word
: the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for

Why the sudden interest in the word?

Watch the movie with the same title.

In the process of uploading 200 peektures now and that's for LA only, gawd still got San fran plus Vegas and a whole backlog of other places... I'm actually supposed to start selling more of the books I've acquired and brought over to the states, but this freaking processing of the pics is driving me nuts and taking way more time than I expected.

Here's some food for thought, have you ever wondered wat you'd be doing today if you don't need to hold down a job and support your family or be scrambling up the corporate ladder? Would you be a park ranger, travelling photographer, mountaineer,...??

Blue skies!

Alrighty, finally have my own internet connection and not borrowing some neighbour's one. :P So that leaves me no choice but to start uploading pictures, but the truth is I got so many on hand now it's probably gonna take me like a week or even more to upload them....
I've been doing some research about where to go skydiving in indiana, seems like http://www.skydiverichmond.com/ would be a decent choice, afterall the Richmond boogie is held there and it's the 2nd largest boogie in the states now. All this shit's gonna set me back by about US$2.3-2.5k but what has to be done has to be done, I'm NOT leaving the states without my skydiver A license. It's something that I've been wanting to do for a long long time... Hopefully, the weather can get warmer in march and I can start taking to the blue skies!! Airborne all the way!

Back!

Super stoned today, just came back last night past midnight and now back at work... Will update soon I took like more than 1 gig worth of pics of LA, SF, Vegas and the grand canyon, sigh wish I had more time for a longer vacation.