MRT woes 1

I hate taking the train when it's crowded and overpacked. I find that it brings out the worst in me, I'm normally a docile, non- violent--- that might be an understatement, I adhor violence of any kind, NORMALLY. Place me in a crowded train and someone squeezes in too close, images of pushing and shoving come to mind and I've been on the verge of carrying out my thoughts.

Luckily, there's always things that are able to amuse or entertain me and thus, I've successfully avoided being thrown into prison for now.


Example for MRT woes 1: an MRT train is a magic box


Have u ever been in a train and squashed until u can't breath? There's not even a sliver of space to move, so much so that if ever fall asleep, u will never fall as there's ppl to cushion u on every angle?





So, why a magic box? At the next stop, one person walks out of this sardine can and five people come in!

MAGIC! There is no other explanation!!!

Flu in the H1n1 world...

I've just gotten sick. Sore throat, runny nose, blocked ear, fever... the whole sha-bang.

Naturally the first thought was... SWINE FLU! Then I dismissed it with the infallible reasoning.. that can't happen to me!

I went to the neighbourhood doctors' and found it fully packed with 15 people ahead of me in the queue. Being a lazy pig normally, couple that with being unwell, I found a seat and just planted my fat ass there.

An hour and a half later, I finally got my turn to talk to the elusive doctor.

So the doc did the usual, he checked my temp, he looked into my ear, he looked into my throat, he listened to my breathing, then he started scribbling on his notepad.

THEN, he crossed out a medicine he had written down and wrote another one down.
FOLLOWED BY, crossing out another medicine and writing a different one down.

By that time, I was severely perplexed.

Finally, he looked up and said,
"You have very. very slight wheezing in your right lung and that's a symptom of influenza, i.e. swine flu. So we need to be careful."

So much for my initial infallible reasoning.

Eventually, he let me go with some medicines and advised that I should return if I still had a fever in three days.

Well.. my fever cleared after taking the first tablets after lunch.... I THINK (see previous post).
Just kidding, I used my thermometer. I even read the instructions on where under my tongue I should place the thermometer.

But naturally, I sat down and thought about how many people I could have affected unknowingly if I really had swine flu:

• The people at home (who are all healthy at the moment)
• The people in my office, let's just limit it to the people on my floor.. so around 50?
• The people in my MRT carriage... I normally take it to work, so let's say, 100 per trip? So assuming 4 trips, 400.
• The people I pass when I go and buy lunch/walk home. Let's place that at a conservative 50.

That's at least 500 people.
These 500 people would meet other people.

Wah...

Then again, I hope people are aware that h1n1 is like any other flu and most people can recover from it without any medication.

Please don't ostracise me!

Feed a cold, Starve a Fever

Has anyone heard of that?

There's been scientific research that the old saying might be true.... due to various immune responses to fasting/eating.

What if you have a cold AND a fever?

Fever till you sizzle.... what a lovely way to burn

I spent the day touching my forehead, trying to figure out if I was having a fever or not. I have a thermometer.. but if I don't feel feverish, I didn't really see a point of sticking it into my mouth.
Then again, everytime I thought I had a fever and stuck it in my mouth, it read 36.9.... when i thought my fever had died down, it read 37.5....

Hmmm....

Like other issues in my life, I discussed it with my good friend(GdF) on MSN:
Me: You know, I've been thinking that I can't really tell if I have a fever
GdF: Cos you're not a thermometer.
Me: Ahh.. that's a good reason.


Now.. why didn't I think of that! Must be the fever...

FEVER! Fever started long ago....

Lights Out!

Singapore has been trying to get people to save the earth by participating in Earth Hour, organising contests whereby the contestants stay in a room for a day to compete who uses the least amount of electricity and not forgetting the usual way, whereby they place posters everywhere and advice its citizens on how to conserve electricity.

My question is: HAS IT WORKED?

I guess the best answer would be... MAYBE.

Young kids are definately being influenced by the various government campaigns - like all other campaigns that are being held by them. But how about the older generation? Personally, I think that the whole energy saving thing is missing out on one key area. For example, I have a couple of neighbours that leave their outdoor lights on throughout the night. (And yes, I know this cos its irritating me cos I can't sleep properly due to light shining into my eyes---- eh... it's important! there have been studies that people grow taller/ sleep better if they sleep in total darkness. Not to forget, if I can't fall asleep with my curtains slightly open, I won't be able to get woken up by sunlight streaming into my room!)

Thus, instead of advocating that people sleep without air-con or to switch their lights off for an hour during one day a year, perhaps the idea should be to advocate to turn off lights that don't affect how they live their lives. For example, if they switch off their outdoor lights, it doesn't affect how they live their daily lives at all AND it'll cut down their electricity bill. Not to mention, assuming that the lights are switch on between 11pm to 6am (a total of around 7 hours) and its being carried out 365 days a year, that's a total of 2555 hours. That's around 1,200 houses switching off their lights for an hour a year.

I think that's DEFINATELY an area that should be explored! Mainly for the basic reason, that its easier to convince people to give up something if it doesn't affect their daily lifestyle.

It's like telling a non-smoker to give up smoking... SURE! where do I sign up?

On a seperate note, I've been trying to figure out WHY someone would leave their outdoor lights on.

There are two conclusions that I arrived at:


1)They're leaving their lights on for their pets outside (but I think they don't have one)

Judging from Garfield and Snoopy, Pets sleep with their eyes closed too. Thus, why would they want lights shining in their eyes too?


2) They think leaving their lights on is a good burglar prevention tool.

Somehow, I keep imagining that leaving the lights OFF actually would be a better prevention tool due to the fact that, there would be no residual lights filtering in from the outside.

The burglar could stub his toe in the dark.

The lights from the torchlight he is using might accidentally alert someone.

If the burglar had infra-red googles, etc... then... I have nothing else to say.

But in short, I think you probably get my drift.

In conclusion....

SWITCH OFF YOUR OUTDOOR LIGHT SO I CAN SLEEP AND GROW!