The Burning Crusade

Click here to buy TBC online for 65$

Heh. Puffy has a tablet laptop. Unfortunately, it has no BBO, MSN. Much less WoW.

Sigh.

And Her Reply

Hey lookie, Gid, someone replied to your post!

"Please, please partner, let me play the hand. I assure you that it's in your own interest." [Silverfish] says:
I feel loved
"Please, please partner, let me play the hand. I assure you that it's in your own interest." [Silverfish] says:
:)

Heehee. Are you happy now? =P.

You See Monkey Do?

Got this picture off The Gender Test.

What IS this monkey doing? I called it the "Flying Monkey" the first time I saw it, because I didn't bother to look too closely at the picture. It was like one of the last few questions in the test (where you had to pick which monkey you liked better, this one or some monkey that looked like it was carefully climbing on a branch). Why did I think it was flying? Well, it was before I saw the fur streaming out from the back of the monkey, and since the monkey appears to be facing downwards, I quite thought it was leaping off some from somewhere, and hence was, well, kind of flying. Angus agreed with me, in that he thought the monkey was flying.

Joel, however, said that the monkey was climbing upwards (see slope in the background). I didn't really agree with him, because I thought that the slope was merely part of the background, and in any case, the monkey's feet are not touching the slope. This, however, could be the case if the monkey were running up the slope.

The picture of the monkey on the site is saved as "jumper".

The question was: Who will win?

I picked this monkey, only because it looked cooler than the other monkey, which was brown in colour, didn't have fur streaming out from it's back, and well, definitely didn't look like it could hit this monkey with much of an impact (it was certainly didn't look like it had much momentum).

Have no idea how the question really relates to gender - picking the brown monkey means that you are careful and deliberate (reflected in the slow climb on the branch), and picking the black monkey means that you prefer to rush into action (shown by the leap?)?

I guess I am rather rash in my actions, but hey that's not really the reason why I picked that black monkey. Or is it? I did just randomly pick the one I thought looked cooler haha. It's just a Gender Test, something I didn't think I should spend much time deliberating on.

Oh and Puffy, although I'm not really sad, and I didn't feel abandoned (who knows whether I really was, I certainly didn't feel that way), I guess you may be right, because I have decided, well, put it behind me. But I'm not running back ya. As I've said before, I don't really hold grudges, but I don't forget either. So maybe I'll play with him again in the (distant) future. I doubt it though. HE holds grudges =P. Maybe exclusive for me, but well, I should feel special, not upset in that case *giggle*.

And no, I'm not going to be a Flying Monkey about it and jump back down to fall splat on the ground. It MAY be possible that I'd fall into some nasty pit he's dug for me in the future, but hey, I'm just too nice. Haha.

One Good Reason Why Ruichen Should Learn to Play Bridge

So she will finally have something to say back to me when I tell her that counting on her fingers to do Maths is not appropriate for a Primary 5 prefect-in-training who wants to make it to SCGS.

Light openings

I like light openings and strong 1C.

Personally, I feel that random interference to 1C against an experienced 1C pair is counter productive. I wouldn't really have much problems against such interferences with an experienced partner, provided we have discussed our defences beforehand. http://squeezingthedummy.blogspot.com/2006/01/interfering-over-strong-club.html


However, considering that I won't have much time to discuss defences against interference with most partners I play 1C with, I decide to go the polish way and include 2 additional meanings into 1C: 1) Any hand with 15+ hcp, 2) Any balanced 10-12 hcp( though it is not mandatory to open such hands), 3) Any distributional hand (10+) which wants to know partner's distribution- I'll be pretty happy if I meet opponents who uses destructive interference. Of course, if they don't, we have our nice perfect relays to get to the perfect game or slam. Actually, the strength of a light opening system is not in the 1C opening ( of course of we don't get interfered we will have a nice auction to the perfect game/slam), but rather in the extremely descriptive and limited 1D/1H/1S/1nT bids which allows partner to place the final contract with 1-2 bids. This has a huge advantage in competitive auctions.

Now why do I like light openings? I am a firm believer that any hand which is worth overcalling should be worth opening. For example, with 8 hcp, you would not overcall with a 4432 hand, but with 5431 or 5422 hand, most people would overcall or even preempt. With around 10 hcp, with 5332 non vul, some people would overcall at 1 level. I mean, if in a competitive auction, you were willing to introduce the suit at a 1 level, why should you wait for your opponents to open before introducing it? By communicating your hand as early as possible to your partner, it is possible for your partnership to make the right decisions before the opponents even get a chance to know of their fit. Of course, similarly, with 1o-12 hcp, balanced, vul, no sane person would overcall, and similarly, I feel such a hand should not be opened. The extremely offensive, quick nature of opening inbalanced hands light is what attracts me so fast.
Furthermore, the opening range is around 8/9-14, making it extremely limited. From the very first bid, the first question asked is, is your hand a shitty opening or a good opening? Thus it is possible to stop at 1nT with 11 hcp opposite 12 hcp. In fact, we will never be at 3 of a major voluntarily- which I think is a big advantage over 2/1 or SAYC, which requires you to invite at the 3 level. I think inviting at the 1 level or 2 level is much more efficient, and saves you those disgusting 3S-1 or 2nT-1 with 11 opposite 12 hcp. Another thing is the ability to stop at 1nT with 1 side holding 22 hcp and the other 1-2 hcp. Again, this is so much better than those disgusting 2nT-1 scores. Finally, game force is established very quickly, normally within the first 2 bids of the bidding, so you can either relay your entire hand at a low level(if you use relays) or cuebid at a very low level/ask aces and all that without even bypassing the 4 level. Again this is very efficient. Furthermore you would never be afraid of partner passing you below game level. One other advantage it has is the ability to jack up the bidding very quickly, ie 1S-3S or 1S-4S with neither side knowing whether your bid of 4S is to make or to preempt. It is possible to bid 4S with 13-14 hcp since you would know there is no possibility of a slam opposite a limited opener.

I have not really found much downsides to playing light opening system which uses incredibly descriptive 1 level opening bids, other than the incredible difficulty in finding partners to play'em with. Anyway here is a reference which is as good as any to start with light opening systems

The Plague

Today's hume and music lesson was actually productive- we covered an interesting story in Hume and I learnt about full notes, half notes seminotes and all that nonsense in music. Well, not exactly productive but at least something I understood.

In Hume today, we learnt about a plauge which struck the Athenians in the middle of a 27 year war. As their defence consisted of piling everybody into one central location behind thick walls, naturally in the event of a plague, the disease will spread rampantly(think Anthrax at Orchard road).

The interesting part about this story, is the question of human morality. According to Thucydides, the Athenians, seeing the 'rapid transitions produced by persons in prosperity suddenly dying', becamse resolved to 'spend quickly and enjoy themselves'. Furthermore they settled that 'present enjoyment, and all that contributed to it, was both honorable and useful.' Finally, 'fear of gods or law of man there was none to restraint them. As for the first, they judged it to be just the same whether they worshipped them or not, as they saw all alike perishing; and for the last, no one expected to live to be brought to trial for his offence, but each felt that a severer sentence had been already passed upon them all and hung each over their heads.'

In other words, in the society where they were more or less condemned to die, laws and morality broke down and humans reverted to basal human instincts of survival and lust.

This strangly reminds me of Lord of The Flies, where kids trapped on an island reverted to animal instincts. My Hume teacher when on to expound the possibility that, if there was a disease which caused the whole of the University to be quarantined and well, basically we would be left here to die, how would we react?

Confucius thinks that people are born to be good, but I think that what Thucydides wrote about is the real true nature of human. In the absence of laws and motivation to be good, people will tend naturally to be evil and selfish.

I really want to know what happens if a plauge hits the Shaolin temple in China.

Flair in Bridge?

Today at Tanglin, there was a pair who went to 6S when everyone else stopped in game. 6S and 6NT were both cold, because 3 finesses were onside, but otherwise, the slams would not make. My partner asked one of the pair why he went to 6. He said it was due to 'flair'.

I then told him what I thought 'flair' was.

Flair is not bidding over your opponent's 4S preempt, even though you have a 3-6-4 hand, have more than a maximum opening hand, know that your partner has points, are void in spades, and have yet to show additional length in your 1st bid suit. This ensures that partner will be the one playing the grand slam he induces his partner to bid by his bid. (This is very important - stress is not good for you =P.)

Flair is bidding a new suit at the 5 level, knowing that partner will spawn honours in that suit for you. (She always does, yah?) This flair is accentuated by the fact that you have only 8 points, none of which are in that suit.

Flair is dropping the offside singleton King of trumps to make the cold grand.

And, of course, flair is the ability to provide partner with the AQJx of the new suit he decides to bid at the 5 level.

Hand can be viewed here (Under Contract: 7 by south). There was no defiance involved. If I bid like that, I would also expect partner holding AQJx in my bid suit to raise me to the grand.

2 days without BBO and counting. I can feel the fingers twitching.

First day of lessons

One thing I don't like about U of C is the core requirement. Instead of focusing on my major and what I would like to do, we are forced to do courses which we might have very little interest in. This quarter, I have the misfortune of spending half my time in two such courses.

Firstly, I signed up for Music this quarter. I didn't really have to do music. However, it's a choice between drama, music and art. Sheesh. That's not much of a choice. I can't draw or comment on art pieces, and don't even start talking about plays. Maybe maybe if someone really good at art were here to help me I could probably survive the art course. But but.... Someone refused to be packed into a suitcase. Welleeee so out of those 3, I picked music. Now, music is not any better. We were greeted with a 'well, this course is trying to squeeze everything I learnt in 10 years into 1 quarter' by the instructor. We were introduced to the different elements of music, as well as given 4 different recordings of different time periods. The geogorian chant didn't even sound like God would have particularly enjoyed listening to it. It's like a monologue.

I'm also signed up for Greek thought literature, a carry over from last quarter. Admittingly, my teacher is rather interesting, knowledgable and good. But it's just me. I'm not interested in anything which doesn't follow pure logic. Actually, I love history and will probably enjoy the civ course later on, which I am planning to take on the history of China, Korea and Japanese. Maybe than I will find out why Korean and Japanese people seemed to be prettier and more handsome. Maybe they got the good genes.

Following those, I am in Econs 201 which is concerned with the supply side of microeconomics. I have a cute Thai teacher who is first time teaching(read: bullyable). However, she zoomed through like 5 pages of notes in about an hour. It probably would have taken 2-3 lessons in RJC to cover the material she covered. I dunno why I always end up in the Econs class with a grad student as a teacher. However, I rather enjoyed my previous teacher and I suspect I will like this teacher as well- particularly because we only have 3 pieces of homework in the whole quarter.

Finally, my favourite course, Mathematics. Interestingly, I hated mathematics a lot in JC and never planned to major in University. However, the Mathematics at U of C is really very interesting and they have impressive teachers. In fact, the only lesson I only look forward to now is Mathematics. For example, in the previous quarter I learnt about compact spaces and metric spaces; while this quarter I will be learning about lebesgue integrals and lebesgue measures. Lebesgue integrals is a really very interesting concept. The standard integration technique (Riemann integration) is practically useless since it requires really nice functions before the function is integratable, and this hardly happens in real life. Most of the functions we can use Riemann integration are continuous- and once again, continuous functions are very rare. As a simple example, how would you integrate a function which is 1 at every rational point and 0 otherwise using riemann integration? In fact, Lebesgue measure and integration is the foundation of modern probability theory, which is strongly related to what I will probably want to learn in my stats course. I particularly liked what my teacher said about grading: I want you guys to worry about lebesgue integration rather than your grades - as long as you are hardworking, you will do fine. I take the maximum combination possible (split between mid terms, finals and homework), but of course I can't spawn an A from nowhere.

I guess it is really important to take a course which I have an actual interest in otherwise it is easy to burn out.

Bought a new pair of earphones, http://www.headphone.com/products/headphones/in-ear-monitor/etymotic-er-4s.php

I love'em and highly recommend them. They are extremely sound proof and reproduce sound very well. My Tong Hua sounds even sadder with'em. Sigh. Anyway, I was really impressed that amazon.com got them shipped to me with 24 hours of my order and was surprised when I received the package the very next day.

Celine Dion

>

Take me back in the arms I love
Need me like you did before
Touch me once again
And remember when
There was no one that you wanted more

Don't go you know you will break my heart
She won't love you like I will
I'm the one who'll stay
When she walks away
And you know I'll be standing here still

I'll be waiting for you
Here inside my heart
I'm the one who wants to love you more
You will see I can give you
Everything you need
Let me be the one to love you more

See me as if you never knew
Hold me so you can't let go
Just believe in me
I will make you see
All the things that your heart needs to know

I'll be waiting for you
Here inside my heart
I'm the one who wants to love you more
You will see I can give you
Everything you need
Let me be the one to love you more

And some way all the love that we had can be saved
Whatever it takes we'll find a way

I'll be waiting for you
Here inside my heart
I'm the one who wants to love you more
You will see I can give you
Everything you need
Let me be the one to love you more

<All coming back to me>

There were nights when the wind was so cold
That my body froze in bed
If I just listened to it
Right outside the window

There were days when the sun was so cruel
That all the tears turned to dust
And I just knew my eyes were
Drying up forever

I finished crying in the instant that you left
And I can't remember where or when or how
And I banished every memory you and I had ever made

But when you touch me like this
And you hold me like that
I just have to admit
That it's all coming back to me
When I touch you like this
And I hold you like that
It's so hard to believe but
It's all coming back to me
(It's all coming back, it's all coming back to me now)

There were moments of gold
And there were flashes of light
There were things I'd never do again
But then they'd always seemed right
There were nights of endless pleasure
It was more than any laws allow
Baby Baby

If I kiss you like this
And if you whisper like that
It was lost long ago
But it's all coming back to me
If you want me like this
And if you need me like that
It was dead long ago
But it's all coming back to me
It's so hard to resist
And it's all coming back to me
I can barely recall
But it's all coming back to me now
But it's all coming back

There were those empty threats and hollow lies
And whenever you tried to hurt me
I just hurt you even worse
And so much deeper

There were hours that just went on for days
When alone at last we'd count up all the chances
That were lost to us forever

But you were history with the slamming of the door
And I made myself so strong again somehow
And I never wasted any of my time on you since then

But if I touch you like this
And if you kiss me like that
It was so long ago
But it's all coming back to me
If you touch me like this
And if I kiss you like that
It was gone with the wind
But it's all coming back to me
(It's all coming back, it's all coming back to me now)

There were moments of gold
And there were flashes of light
There were things we'd never do again
But then they'd always seemed right
There were nights of endless pleasure
It was more than all your laws allow
Baby, Baby, Baby

When you touch me like this
And when you hold me like that
It was gone with the wind
But it's all coming back to me
When you see me like this
And when I see you like that
Then we see what we want to see
All coming back to me
The flesh and the fantasies
All coming back to me
I can barely recall
But it's all coming back to me now

If you forgive me all this
If I forgive you all that
We forgive and forget
And it's all coming back to me
When you see me like this
And when I see you like that
We see just what we want to see
All coming back to me
The flesh and the fantasies
All coming back to me
I can barely recall but it's all coming back to me now

(It's all coming back to me now)
And when you kiss me like this
(It's all coming back to me now)
And when I touch you like that
(It's all coming back to me now)
If you do it like this
(It's all coming back to me now)
And if we, , ,

Singapore Dreaming

My New Year's night at Chicago was spent watching Singapore Dreaming along with 7 or 8 other Singaporeans.

The show is a rather distrubing show, and depicts a side of Singapore which appears very ugly. In the show, we see maids being abused, a boss abusing his secretary, who in turns abuses her maid and husband; we see the chase after the 5C's in Singapore and how ugly money issues can turn into. The creme da la creme though was this guy, who spent his girlfriend's money to goto America to study. However, he is a total jerk, and not only did he return without a degree, he also squandered his father's money and bought a nice car for himself without finding a job first. Furthermore, he lied to his girlfriend and shouted at her despite the girlfriend giving up so much money and her youth for him.

I feel so scared that I might end up like that guy. I'm not really so worried about not graduating. It's more of certain traits in me which seem to persist. I know that I am lazy, untidy and worst of all, I like to procrastinate.

I am going to try something new this quarter. Every day, before I sleep, I will create a list of things I have to do for the next day, and I will reflect on the good and bad things which I have done on that day, and record it all down(obviously not on this blog). Furthermore, I must try and ensure that I finish everything which I set out to accomplish on that day.

It has only been half a day back in the University of Chicago, and I am already getting back into the study mood which occupied 3/4 of last term. During the holidays, I entered the 'gamer' mood and played extremely hard, but within half a day, it appears that my mood has totally changed. I believe that the atmosphere here is really extremely intense, even though there is no one reading or studying, but just being in the university already places much academic stress on me. I am glad I did not bring any of my games over, and I have just deleted my bridge(reinstallation is just 1 click away though). Sigh, I know that I will find it hard to get over my addiction to bridge. What is interesting though, is that just six months ago, I was hardly playing any bridge. In fact, DOTA and WoW occupied the most part of my time. Somehow, in the past quarter, my passion for bridge was reignited. I believe it is mostly due to the fact that I have seriously no other way to entertain myself since I did not bring any of my games with me.

On a brighter note, I have been given permission to take Maths 208 this quarter. This, even though a small thing by itself, is perhaps the thing I am most proud of for the autumn quarter.
I guess this just means more and more hard work this quarter. If I was forced to drop out, I can probably enjoy a slack quarter this quarter as I will be relearning everything I learnt last quarter in Maths 203. Why do I want to take a harder maths course when I can choose not to? I do not know. Probably the desire to make my tuition money worth it. I mean, everyone pays the same amount, so I might as well make full use of the amount I pay.

I feel that God is guiding my life. Just yesterday, I was still pretty disappointed over housing issues, but today, I feel so happy after having found a house mate. Perhaps, this is God's will, just as in so other many things in my life previously I could not understand, but turned out very well? Despite this, I know that I can never look at them with the same innocence and friendliness again.