experts

where do they come from? what defines the vocation? what makes them the experts in any particular field?

winning a widely-publicised argument? exposure to the masses who happen to agree with the idea? collective acknowledgment? inferred knowledge? accumulated experience? a biased mentor? or just the ability to hiong through exams?

when i watch discovery channel shows i see people introduced as 'experts' in such and such a field, trying to explain the fallout that would develop when a jellybean is touched by an m&m.

da vinci's works are famous because of.... what, exactly?
einstein's relativity has gained nothing but curses from students.
edison's light bulb. all we need to know is how to make the bulb, not how many watts go through the fucking thing at any given instant (i've an engineering diploma, i went through it).
and we certainly don't need to know the probability of heads turning up from flipping a coin 26 times (i'm after a management degree and it's part of it).

the world is so pathetic, in so many ways.

i hate that word because it says everything and nothing at the same time (maybe only to me). but it seems a lot of people like being called an expert on something because it boosts their ego. just remember, pride goeth before the fall.

i'm not an expert in anything, and i prefer not to be. i'd rather know a little about everything and not pretend to know things i don't. for example, i just need to know how to drive properly, not how to kill myself trying to emulate a paid actor; and how to ride a motorcycle, not how to stunt it.

pussy? nay, i just value life in a way you'll never understand. but you can call me whatever you like if it makes you feel more important.

management accounting is fun

in preparation for next week's test shoulderpads went through a few questions with us. she's called shoulderpads because, well, in this time and age....
....yes.

Q: describe the difference between a direct cost and an indirect cost where the cost object is a responsibility centre (department).
include in your answer an example of a cost that would be classified as a direct cost if the cost object is a department but an indirect cost if the cost object is a product.

A: my box of condoms is a direct cost to me because i paid for it and an indirect cost to you because you didn't, but if you like i could arrange for your sponsorship and make you the responsibility centre.

disclaimer: only that part of the lesson was fun, the rest was boring shit. i'm not rabid enough to feign fondness for this subject. shit.

watched role models. well i wanted to link a trailer video here, but none of those on youtube did the show any justice.
if you've watched it i needn't explain, if you haven't i can't begin to.

global recession?

many companies and market analysts claim things won't start looking good until at least the end of next year, so the big ones are carrying out closure of plants or massive retrenchments.

but what exactly caused it?

nay, not that crap about the big five financial loan sharks having their fins cut. it's all in the mind.

it's easy, just look at it this way.
economic 'experts' adopt this doom and gloom syndrome and claim the worst ain't over yet. then the firms listen to their words of wisdom and start cutting costs and retrenching people. so the people start fearing the red letter, golden handshake, or whatever it's called now, and cut their expenditures and start attending night schools to talentise themselves. and then the 'experts' gather data from shopping malls and surveys from wherever, and then claim that armageddon's coming because sales are down.
the economy grinds to a thundering halt.

see? it's a darwinian evolution. everybody's afraid that they'll be eliminated, so they take steps to ensure they won't, and in the process doom others in the workplace, market, industry, field, whatever.

the newspapers. it's like reading the same thing day after day with the same key words: lend, cut, stimulus, bailouts, slumps, suicides, etc.

maybe i'm wrong. maybe i assimilate this in too simple a way. maybe i can't read. maybe i'm stupid.

but if i'm right, then there's only one way to solve this. people, get off your asses and start spending some. right now the economy's like a whale thrashing in shallow waters, trying to get back into the deep end. if everybody just gave it a nudge it'd be over in no time.

it's only a recession if you think it is.

moi? nay, i can't spend my moolahs just yet.
cuz this gold be fer the fighter in the street, argh! or per'aps the magic numbers. savvy?

what the future holds

today i watched a small part of ufo hunters on the history channel. my enthralling saturday lifestyle. ...yeah. anyway something on the show caught my attention. they claimed a ufo crashed somewhere in the seventies and they're searching for the fragments with metal detectors.

how bloody arrogant do we humans have to be? we're assuming those guys use metal for building materials, just like us. must they use metal? who the bloody hell came up with that linear line of thought? can't they invent a plastic that's tougher than anything we have on earth? who's to say that they have the same technologies as we do? and who's to say that the metals they use can even be found on our periodic table, thereby making it detectable at all? fucking tunnel-visioned arrogant freaks. the moment i saw that metal detector thing i switched off the tv.

which brings me to another thing. with my fabulous lack of interest and seriously short attention span in basically everything, what job can i seriously be taking up in the future when i finally join the workforce? i have to grow up some day too, right?
shit, that's worrying.

maybe i'll do children, like a kindergarten teacher or toy firm. or something.

oh, and i watched benjamin button. it's not a curious case, it's a fucking sad case alright? uber depressing man. but beautiful it was. yeah, beautiful.

caught this trailer. love it. anybody wanna watch it with me? dial me dude.

love that alien/dog thing with the whip-tongue.

note to self

when in doubt, read out loud:

you do not want a vespa.
you do not want a runner.
you do not want a dna.
you do not want a tw.
you do not want an xr4.
you do not want a ktm.
you do not want a husqvarna.
you do not want a monster.

you are not turned on by any of them. they do not interest you because they are inconsequential. they are nothing compared to what you really want, and there are only two things you really want.

you want a Ducati Streetfighter Version S.
you want a Ducati Eleven-ninety-eight Version S.
end of wishlist (subject to model updates).

you only want these two because they be the baddest motherfuckers in the valley of the shadow of death, and they don't fear no motherfucking evil at all.

so stay focused and don't be distracted. do not bitch to your mates about not being able to ride now. you'll ride soon enough. and when you do, you will love every single super-torqued nanosecond of it.

when the banshee screams between your legs, that will be the sound of sex. aural sex. your mind will melt like hot fudge in a wok. your eyes will glow red with burst vessels. your nuts will overflow. and once you master it you will make a 'sports' car look like a locomotive in slow motion. hurs. sports cars are for bitchboys.

oh yes, you want it. you know you do.
the only question that remains is which one you will take first.

patience, lad.
for now, enjoy these.

and when the time comes, let no one dissuade you, you dumbass.

dreams and mysteries

i first saw this in my secondary school days. it was at the end of a pirated armageddon vcd i snagged from a friend. yeah.

it was of shitty quality though. all i could see clearly were the little room and the black wall full of holes that light passed through. it was enough to inspire me to stick some glow-in-the-dark stars and planets on my bedroom ceiling, à la sleeping under the milky way. didn't work out too well though; it only impressed me for two weeks out of the 3 or 4 years.

once during my poly days i wanted to pimp my room. i wanted to fill it up with those little plastic balls so when i came home i could dive straight in. i even built the barriers to keep the balls from rolling out of my room when i opened the door. hur hur. but then i should have checked out the prices and calculated the volume needed before engaging in my little carpentry project. a box of 40 cost $20, and i needed about 50 boxes. so i dropped the idea and threw the barriers out. and my folks weren't too enthusiastic about the idea of their twentysomething son having plastic balls in his room either.

which brings me to the question of the day. how come all my dreams and desires never quite work out the way i envisioned them? did i set too high a standard? did i really? is it just me or does everyone feel the same once in a while?

the older i grow, the tinier my dreams become. before i reached 10, i wanted to be an astronaut. before 20, i wanted to be a pilot. now as 30 approaches i'll be happy to land a job which can sustain my bikes.

anyway here's the video. really love it.

if i had to think of a movie that fits this song, it'll be the first underworld.

aptly named

back in july when i came back to this shithole i thought i could slowly post all the pics i took until december when i could go again. i figured one whole month's worth of pictures would be more than enough to sustain this blog. but then the december trip didn't turn out so well. in fact it never happened.

so i went walking in sydney again. cause i wanted to capture all i could while i was there. one day i was flipping through the street directory when my eyes zoomed in on this street.

cool name

i thought i must have this in my imagecaptor, so i planned the whole day around said event. once i finish breakfast i'll walk right to this street, and when i'm done with the pics i'll walk on to that roundabout right there, then move on to maroubra beach. all on foot. ha ha, that'll be awesome!

on the map the journey to coward street looked simple enough, the trot to the roundabout looked a little longer, and from there to maroubra beach would have been quite a distance. no problem, i've all day to do it. for the sake of insurance i decided to take the directory with me. the little book wasn't all that heavy.

and off i went.

080612
coward street

********

check this ute out

see that cover in the back? ainnit cool?

nice town-style chowhouse

my polariser screwed up on me. actually i screwed it up.

woot! i'm here! yay!! ok, get a few shots first.

so once i was done i happily flipped open the not-so-little-now-is-it? and not-so-light-either-eh? directory to acquire my next direction of travel. aha, here we are! okay, so it's this way...

and my finger went off the map. i flipped the page and my finger went off that map . then i flipped forward to maroubra beach and discovered it was five pages away. and to reach coward street i'd taken 2 hours and walked half a fucking page! guess i never really appreciated the importance of map scales. all of a sudden my rented apartment felt like gravity. yes, let's head back this way please. your couch's waiting for you, and it's looking real sexy now. uber. i didn't take long to convince myself.

halfway back i wondered if my decision didn't have any relevance to the pictures in my cam. heh, i grunted. who gives a shit?

crap, these people are rich..

all kinds of funny ideas ran through my head, probably due to dehydration. i wanted to live at the beach. i wanted to live in an apartment. i wanted to live on a private property. and this one looked real good cause it was far from the main road so it'd be peaceful and quiet at night.

as i was taking this picture a tuned sports car whizzed past and jarred tears from my eyes.

i ended up going to maroubra beach in the car at a later date. it was far. it's in one of the previous posts cause i don't bother posting them in chronological order.

phobias

sometimes i have problems pronouncing words starting with 'th', cause they sound like 'f' with a little twist. for example, 'three' sounds like 'free', except when you say 'three', you have to stick your tongue out partially and bite it with your teeth. most of the time i am able to do just that, but when i screw it up it ends up as 'thlee', and i become an uneducated retard. it really doesn't help that my id number has three of them.

i also have a small fear of sitting in planes. not the actual flying, cause i like the rush of take-offs and landings. the fear i have is somewhat more specific. i hate sitting at the rear end of planes because that's the first thing to go in most crashes. i figure the safest place to be is right behind the cockpit in the first class section (because the pilots will save themselves first and foremost, unless you believe all the bullshit they feed us). but my financial structure is too frail to support it so that's out of the question. the next safest part is right at the wings (because you can't steer shit without them, so that'll be the pilots' second highest priority). the section in between the cockpit and wings isn't that safe either cause it's not structurally sound and plane crashes sometimes start there too. otherwise it's all cool. hmm. does that make sense? i blame air crash investigations on the national geographic channel for that.

frankly a boat's a much better bet if you have the time. the reasoning is simple: you stand a much higher chance of surviving a 3-10 storey hop due to pirates and misplaced icebergs than a 30,000ft plunge due to pigeons and defective rivets, and you'll know without a doubt you'd be landing in water.

the more one learneth, the wussier one becometh.