Tag: awesome

Posted in Simple Pleasures of Life

Simple Pleasures of Life #8

Posted on by Jinavie

Good Scotch and a good movie.

Finally finished weekend shifts. My god, two 8am~8:30pm back to back is inhumane >< But wait, there’s more!!! I have 7am~7pm delivery unit shift tomorrow, then 7:30am ward round on Tuesday where we get ripped to shreds. Fuck yes. On top of the piling notes that I’m failing to study due to crazy amounts of O&G. The only thing that makes it all better? Good Scotch and a good movie.

Just finished watching Now You See Me and I definitely loved it! 😀 I’ve always been a fan of magic and this movie explored the field relatively creatively. I particularly liked the magician fight scene hehe. And tbh I didn’t fully work out the twist so that was a pleasant surprise. Welp, time for me to get 5.5 hours of sleep before I have to go in to sit around and do nothing. Thank god for the simple pleasures of life that keep me going.

Posted in Simple Pleasures of Life

Simple Pleasures of Life #10

Posted on by Jinavie

Watching new episodes of your favourite shows and laughing so hard that all your worries and troubles melt away.

The new (and final) season of How I Met Your Mother started today!!! I’ve been so excited for this and the season premier (double episode) lived up to my expectations~ Had some good laughs hehe. I’m excited for what the rest of the season will bring, and I’m interested in the format of the season (won’t spoil anything). Also, there was a new episode of Adventure Time and that’s always welcome! 🙂

My good mood today is brought to you by what I said above, 9:30am finish from hospital, good nap, pumpkin soup (success!), nice salmon, new Magic cards (woo!), stormy weather and essentially no study. Daddy needed a break day after 34 hours of hospital over the weekends and Monday…

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Posted in Simple Pleasures of Life

Simple Pleasures of Life #24

Posted on by Jinavie

Drowning in a tsunami of nostalgia.

So recently a 4-episode anime special came out… called Pokemon The Origin. Yes, they finally made a Pokemon anime that stays true to the original Pokemon Red/Blue game!!! Well, Red/Green because it’s originally Japanese. Anyway, I watched all of it and love love loved it 😀 The anime itself was good quality and there were tons of references to the original game that I grew up with! Plus, Mega Charizard X what. Needless to say, it evoked powerful earthquakes of nostalgia within me.

It’s probably not an understatement to say that Pokemon was the single most awesome thing about my childhood. I was – I AM – obsessed about the series, whether it be the game, cartoon or trading card game. I still have happy memories playing the original games on my gameboy, and emulating it on my old school computer. Hell, used to have it all saved in floppy disks and shit. And the days new Pokemon games came out were like second Chistmases to me~

All that nostalgia I mentioned above could not be ignored. And despite the fact that I have a massive exam next Tuesday, I have…restarted Pokemon Red. OTL. Oh and what’s that? Pokemon X/Y comes out tomorrow? Well shit, good bye med school. But it’ll be totally worth it.

Time to catch ‘em all (unlike the STDs that I should be studying for exams).

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Posted in Science & Nature

Thuder And Lightning

Posted on by Jinavie

The best or worst part (depending on your preference) about a dark and stormy night are the majestic flashes of lightning and booming thunder. Most people confuse the two terms, typically using “thunder” to describe both, but technically thunder is the sound produced by lightning, which is the flash of light. Lightning occurs when dense clouds become electrically charged due to the collision of water molecules. As charge builds up, the cloud becomes negatively charged. The negative charge becomes so intense that it begins to push electrons towards the surface of the Earth, creating a positive charge. Electricity always flows from a negative charge to a positive charge through a medium. The intensity of charges causes the air to become ionized (plasma), making it suddenly conductive and allowing the electricity to flow from the cloud to the ground. This is seen as a flash of intense light. As the electricity travels through this channel of air, it superheats the air and causes a massive expansion of air, much like an explosion. This creates an intense shockwave burst, producing a sound that we call thunder.

Lightning is a deadly force of nature. It clocks a peak voltage of somewhere between 30 million to billions of volts – far exceeding the electricity that can be generated by humans. When a lightning bolt strikes a human, it has a mortality rate of between 10~30%. The two effects of lightning on the human body is electrical shock and heat. As lightning flashes over the skin to reach the ground, it leaves a striking pattern known as Lichtenberg figures (see below), showing the path of the electrical breakdown. The intense electrical burst can cause loss of consciousness, arrhythmia or sudden cardiac arrest. The heat generated by the electricity can cause severe burns both externally and internally. It can literally fry internal organs causing permanent damage to the heart, lungs and brain. Neurological symptoms such as amnesia, confusion, sleep disturbance and chronic pain have also been reported. Strangely, there are also reported cases of lightning curing ailments such as blindness, deafness and baldness.

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Because lightning is light and thunder is sound, one can calculate how far away lightning struck using the time between the lightning flash and the sound of thunder. Sound travels at 340m/s, so by multiplying the number of seconds between the lightning and thunder by 340, you can deduce the distance in metres. For example, if you see a lightning strike and then hear thunder after 7 seconds, the lightning must have struck 340m x 7s = 2380m = 2.38km away.

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Posted in Science & Nature

Pi

Posted on by Jinavie

Pi (π) a mathematical constant that is defined as the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. It is approximately equal to 3.14159, but since it is an irrational number (cannot be expressed as a ratio), the decimal places go on and on with no repeating segments. The history of pi extends back to almost 5000 years ago, as it plays such a crucial role in geometry, such as finding the area of a circle (A = π ²). It is not an understatement to say that pi is among the top five most important numbers discovered in history (0, 1, i and e being the others).

The interesting thing about pi is that it is an irrational number. As mentioned above, this means that pi has an infinite number of non-repeating decimal places, with numbers appearing in random sequence. For example, pi to a 30 decimal places is 3.141592653589793238462643383279… Because of this feature, pi contains all possible sequences and combinations of numbers at a certain point. The corollary to this fact is, if pi is converted into binary code (a number system of only 0 and 1, used by computers to encode information), somewhere in that infinite string of digits is every combination of digits, letters and symbols imaginable. The name of every person you will ever love. The date, time and manner of your death. Answers to all the great questions of the universe. All of this is encoded in one letter: π.

That, is the power of infinity.

Posted in History & Literature

Taegeukgi

Posted on by Jinavie

The Taegeukgi is the official flag of the Republic of Korea. It was chosen as the official flag of Joseon by Emperor Gojong in 1883 and has been used as the flag for South Korea since 1948. The Taegeukgi is an extremely symbolic flag that expresses the values and ideals of the Korean people while also containing the sorrow caused by the great tragedies in modern Korean history: the 36 years of Japanese colonisation and the Korean War. Even before Korea was founded, the flag was used in protest of the Japanese Empire and for the independence of Korea (especially in the famous March 1st movement). Much like Hangul (the Korean alphabet), the Taegeukgi, designed by Park Young-hyo and commissioned by Gojong, is a very scientific and mathematical flag. Let us analyse each part of the Taegeukgi.

The Taegeukgi is composed of a red and blue taegeuk symbol (“yin(eum)-yang symbol” is technically a misnomer) on a white background, surrounded by four black trigrams (4괘, sa-gwe). The white background symbolises brilliance and purity and the Korean people’s traditional love for peace. The taegeuk symbol symbolises the harmony of eum (blue) and yang (red), an imagery of the interaction between the two extremes and the natural rule of continuous generation and progress seen in the universe.

The trigrams in each of the four corners is called geun gon ri gam (건곤리감, 乾坤離坎) in order and each trigram symbolises a certain characteristic of everything in the universe.

Geun (three lines) symbolises the sky, spring, metal (geum, 금, 金) and humanity (yin, 인, 仁). Gon (six lines) symbolises the earth, summer, earth (toh, 토, 土) and righteousness (eui, 의, 義). Ri (four lines) symbolises the sun, autumn, fire (hwa, 화, 火) and courtesy (ye, 예, 禮). Gam (five lines) symbolises the moon, winter, water (su, 수, 水) and intelligence (ji, 지, 智). The taegeuk lies in the centre of the four extremes in each each corner to establish an infinite harmony and balance.

As you can see, the taegeuk is far more scientific and deeply philosophical than simpler flags such as those symbolising the Sun God (Japan), the number of states (USA) or a composite of three different flags (UK). It is the ultimate flag that prides the Korean people’s wisdom and advanced culture.

Posted in Life & Happiness

Slap Bet

Posted on by Jinavie

If you ever have a disagreement with a friend and would like to bet over who is right, make the ultimate wager: the slap bet. Basically, whoever is right gets to slap the other person in the face as hard as they possibly can. On the surface it appears to be simple and harmless. But in reality, it is a deadly and formidable wager. For example, if one ever makes the unfortunate mistake of making a slap bet with the condition that the slap can occur at any place at any time, then they must live in fear of a slap appearing out of the blue and leaving a glowing, red and rather painful hand print on your face.

Being such a pricey bet, it is always useful to appoint a Slap Bet Commissioner. The Commissioner is responsible for resolving any problems that may arise regarding the bet, such as making a ruling. They must remain completely unbiased and hold the integrity of the slap bet above all else. They must also enforce the sacred rules of the slap bet, such as no premature slapulation. If the rules are disobeyed, the Commissioner has the power to endow one player the right to slap the other player (with completely subjective judgement of how many slaps they can get).

The slap bet is also highly customisable, where the players can settle on the number of slaps and the manner in which they will be delivered. Will the loser receive ten slaps in a row? Or will they get five slaps that can occur from the moment they lose to infinity?

A slap bet is the ultimate bet that is so satisfying and cathartic for the winner, but for the loser it is… well, let’s just say it is a real slap in the face.

Posted in Life & Happiness

Clap

Posted on by Jinavie

It takes two hands to clap. No matter how great a plan you have, you cannot achieve anything by yourself. That is why we search so desperately for someone to slap our hand palm-to-palm. But this idiom has many meanings. Just as we cannot clap with one hand, when two hands miss or move away from each other, there is no clap. If two people want to achieve something then they must co-operate to produce synergy. But does that mean we can just carelessly clash our palms together?

If you clap with each hand as stiff as a board, it only hurts both people’s hands and produces a dull, bad sound. But if you loosen your hands a little and slap with a smooth motion, you get a clear, awesome sound. When two people act stubbornly and only stick to each other’s opinions and pride, they will achieve nothing and instead hurt their friendship, possibly even resulting in utter failure. To bend a little and give way to the other person – that is how two people can produce co-operation, understanding and connection. That is the secret to grasping the philosophy of 1 + 1 = 3.

1 + 1 = 3

(NB: The picture is from the basketball manga Slam Dunk where the two protagonists pull off one of the most epic high fives in fictional history. If you recognise it, you are awesome.)

Posted in Life & Happiness

Possimpible

Posted on by Jinavie

Have you ever had a moment when something so unbelievable, so improbable that you never would have imagined it would happen, happened? When something you could only dream of actually happened in real life? When something so impossible that you must have stepped into a parallel universe for that thing to happen? The feeling that such a moment brings is indescribable.

Success is not about money and power. Success is not a product of luck. To become successful, one must change their state of mind first. The most crucial thing to understand is that the only limit is that there are no limits. Only when you dare to go past what is possible will you attain anything worthwhile. “To the impossible?” you may ask. No, true success lies beyond the impossible. A place where the possible and the impossible meet to become: the possimpible. Only when you have become the master of the possimpible will you be able to confidently say that you have succeeded in life.

Nothing, and everything is possimpible. 


Posted in Life & Happiness

Tie

Posted on by Jinavie

One challenge a man faces as he grows up is tying a tie. A well-tied tie not only looks good, but also shows that you are a highly organised and proper man. The following instructions describe how to tie the Windsor knot.

  1. Drape the tie around your neck so that the wide end is on the right. Align it so the narrow end is shorter than the broad end.
  2. Cross the wide end over the front of the narrow end.
  3. Fold it behind the narrow end then push it up the hole (between the tie and your neck).
  4. Bring the wide end down (over the loop), then around the back of the narrow end.
  5. Tighten the loop made. This will make the right side of the triangle at the end.
  6. Fold the wide end over and around the loop. 
  7. Pull tight as you did in step 5. This is the left side of the triangle.
  8. Cross the wide end over the front of the triangle, under the loop, up the hole.
  9. Feed the broad end through the knot you made in front of the triangle. Pull down and tighten.
  10. Shape the knot into a symmetrical triangle as you tighten it. Now tighten the loop comfortably around your collar.

If the tie is too short or too long, repeat by adjusting how much narrow end you left at step 1. Practising these steps a few times will soon make you a master of ties – an essential skill for all suit-wearing gentlemen.