Sunday 23 April 2006

Drunk-Driving

Life is really unfair...especially when you're the passenger of a drunk driver. A while ago there was a bad car accident near my place. Just to give you an idea of how bad, the car was totally crushed, the roof of the car was several metres away from the wreck and parts of the engine were scattered in several directions away from the wreck. Of course everyone was stopping to look at the wreck up from the flyover which overlooks the road where the accident occurred. People parked along the side of the road to get out and look.

From all appearances, the driver was as good as dead in that wreck. However, miraculously, the driver escaped with very minor injuries. His passengers, 2 18 year old girls, on the other hand entered the hospital in critical condition. Turns out the driver was drunk and was showing off by speeding and then lost control of the car and hit the divider. What's really unfair is that he got off 'unpunished' while his passengers were badly hurt. He practically killed the 2 of them with his irresponsibility! It's disgusting drunk-driving and injuring others because of your irresponsibility...I reckon he should be charged for man-slaughter at the very least. Kinda scary how ridiculously dumb people can get...

Wednesday 12 April 2006

Interesting Read

While waiting for my sister on campus a couple of days ago, I wandered around the management section in the library and happened to chance across a really interesting book by Wayne Lotherington. It's entitled "Flick your Creative Switch - Developing Brighter Ideas for Business". It's a really interesting book, a guide to creative thinking which has too often been stifled by the rules and regulations we face in everyday life.

Just something I read in the book that I was inspired to share:

Who am I? I am your constant companion.
I am your greatest helper or heaviest burden.
I will push you onwards or drag you down to failure.
I am completely at your command.

Half of the things you do you might just as well turn
over to me and I will do them quickly and correctly.
I am esily managed, you must merely be firm with me.

Show me exactly how you want something done and
after a few lessons I will do it automatically.
I am the servant of all great men and women and,
alas, of all failures as well.

Those who are great, I have made great.
Those who are failures, I have made failures.
I am not machine, though I work with the precision
of a machine, plus the intelligence of a person.

You may run me for profit or run me for ruin,
it makes no difference to me.
Take me, train me, be firm with me,
and I will place the world at your feet.

Be easy with me and I will destroy you.

Who am I? I am Habit.


- Gary Kroehnert

Saturday 8 April 2006

End of Term

Jazz class ended for the term yesterday 8(. For a last class, it was pretty vigorous and poor unfit me is now aching from the stuff we did. Still, jazz classes have been pretty fun and I'm pretty certain I'd be continuing with it and probably so will my sister and flatmate.

Jazz isn't the only thing that has (or is going to) end for the term...so are classes!!! 4 days to go till Good Friday and Easter break. I can't wait. Although it's not that I'll have much of a break, seeing as to how I've lotsa work and catch-up reading to do... It's the idea of a break and of course not having to go down to campus for classes that rocks. Lol

Speaking of end of term, students at Unicol, one of the residential colleges on campus, are likely not gonna have a pleasant break. The university sent out an email to everyone to tell them that Unicol has been quarantined due to an outbreak of gastroenteritis there. Gastroenteritis is the irritation and inflammation of the digestive tract. Certainly not a good way to spend the end of term down with the infection...you'd be seeing more of the inside of a bathroom than anywhere else. Ugh!

Tuesday 4 April 2006

Online Shopping

eBay is a celebration and a curse. There's an unbelievable amount of stuff you can get there for unbelievably low prices...or at least much cheaper than what you pay for at retail stores in NZ. Plus the virtual world has no boundaries so international shopping is possible...as long as the seller is willing to ship to wherever you are.

The curse of it is that it's pretty addictive. Yes I admit I'm an eBay shopping addict. You can easily spend hours just surfing around ebay looking for stuff. It's unending coz every few minutes, someone is selling something new! It's much like a gigantic mall really, but ever-changing. Bidding is addictive too with auctions and when you aren't on ebay, you're thinking about your auctions or wondering if the seller in the auction you lost might restock and hold another auction. You'd have to be vigilant to get good deals too. I can recall quite a couple of times where I was kicking myself for not being quicker to bid. Quite recently I missed out on bidding on a 1GB SD card from the US. Postage included, it was really really cheap. I only saw it when the auction was about to close....like a minute before, but internet service here is so awful that by the time the page loaded to put in my bid the auction was over. The card sold for US$7.50. Argh! Even if I counted in postage costs and currency convertion costs a 1GB SD card for US$7.50 is dirt cheap compared to what NZ retailers are selling and even on NZ's version of eBay - Trade Me, where it sells for at least NZ$90.

Still, what I really like about eBay is receiving your item. The anticipation is killing of course much like knowing you have a present and can't open it yet. The best part as I've mentioned is receiving the item. It's basically like Chirstmas or your birthday every time and you conveniently forget that you've paid for it. I'm sure those of you who have shopped online before understand the joy of ripping open the package and getting to feel the item after seeing only pictures of it online. While sometimes there are a couple of glitches in purchasing stuff online, especially where clothes are concerned, most of the time if you're a careful shopper you don't make many mistakes i.e. you ask heaps of questions before purchase. I think I've only gotten a bad sizing for an item once. Still, I suppose I could always resell it.

While shopping on eBay brings back the happy moments of Christmas and birthdays, I must say that the horrific side of eBay ultimately shows itself....in the form of my credit card bill. Ouch! Definitely I feel the hole in my pocket after payment catches up with me, but then it brings me back to the point where I did get the stuff at bargain prices.... Oh yeah...