Nah, nothing too sophisticated or anything. Just that I came across this and thought that it’s worth sharing. What is it? Death by kissing! Read this here and you’ll get what I mean.
So for those with allergies, you better be careful what your ‘other half’ have been eating prior to making close contact! =P
What is that, I hear you people ask. Well, I’m sure you’re more familiar with its shortened name H5N1. No recognition? How about avian (bird) flu? Comprehende? =) Yeah, I’m back crapping about serious stuff after the week long hiatus.
Let’s see, where to start from eh? Ok, for those of you that read newspapers you’ll know that it’s supposedly the next pandemic disease that’s out to wipe at least 50 million people off the face of the planet and sicken about 1,800 million people (30% of the global population). At the moment, we are at Stage 3 (of 6) of the WHO Pandemic Alert system. Based on the current level of global preparedness, we would be in deep trouble if the crap hits the fan anytime in the next 3 years. Currently, the death toll seems very low (but it has a high mortality rate, so please avoid close, prolonged contact with birds people!) but according to this, it’s much higher than reported if it’s true! BTW, eating well cooked chicken wouldn’t make you sick with H5N1, so all of you can rest easy!
SciAm has a special report here, which would be very helpful for all those who are interested to know more. It’s a good place to start, IMHO. It is basically an update on the current situation (up till late October ’05 I think). It also contains all sorts of information from possible avenues of treatment under research, new vaccine technology, adjuvant (vaccine boosters), etc etc etc. I think you get my point.
In response to the special report, some experts gave their own comments, which actually sparked off a blog fight! Seriously, I never imagined that professionals would slug it out like that. But then, when people start calling you names, I guess politeness is the first thing that flies out the window.
Here is what happened. John Rennie, the Editor-in-Chief of SciAm happened to blog about an article by Wendy Orent, an anthropologist who argued that the entire H5N1 issue is over hyped here. Mr. Rennie thinks that prudence is the best course of action at the moment for organisations such as CDC and WHO to take. Ms. Orent then issued a rebuttal here, and here is a piece from Paul Ewald, an epidemiologist who also took issue with the points raised by the Editors of Effect Measure. The editors used the pseudonym Revere (the immortalised messenger in the Independence War), who describe themselves as "senior public health scientists and practitioners" whose names "would be immediately recognizable to many in the public health community." Revere argued that H5N1 could be a cause for concern. Ms. Orent & Mr. Ewald think that H5N1 will not mutate into something scary unless the conditions of the Western Front (during WW I in 1918) was replicated. That essentially means that without the trenches of WW I in Europe, the Spanish Flu would never have come into being. As Ms. Orent and Mr. Ewald were taking potshots at Revere, it naturally prompted a long acrimonious rebuttal here. It is a 4 part blog, and its quite in depth so be prepared if you want to delve into it. It’s nothing to difficult to understand if you have a good basic understanding of Biology, just that it can get a little tedious at times.
While the debate was going on, a co-author of the abovementioned special report dropped a line reminding that there are still plenty of uncertainties surrounding H5N1 here. To quote Ruben Donis, head of molecular biology at CDC, she said that ‘full-time flu research has been limited to such a small handful of people worldwide that a lot of questions they would love to have answered haven’t yet been addressed’. That would mean that the debate is essentially redundant since nobody knows enough to make a definite conclusion about the threat H5N1 poses to us.
I wouldn’t be going into any further details, since it would make my blog extremely lengthy if I do. But if you take your time going through the sites given here, I’m pretty sure that you’ll be far better informed than the average guy on the street and would be able to make far better decisions based on what is available here. =)
BTW, I’ve read something about seroprevalency and I don’t quite grasp the terminology. If any of you that reads this could, please help me out will ya?
For more updates on the H5N1, you can always go over here. That’s NewScientist’s site for their bird flu Special Report.
Heh, you people seem so sentimental la. Come on, college is over and another chapter is over but the journey of life has yet to end. Course, that’s if you do not meet a premature end (heaven forbid!). Yea, the sad part is we won’t be able to go back to Taylors and hang out for weekdays anymore since we’re all going back to our respective homes, and that also means that no more KL meetings kua. But do not fret…there’s always the Internet! =)
Haha, that’s right! Come on, not as good as meeting in person but much much cheaper than using SMS or call plus we can all meet in groups! Nobody can kacau summore (except those ppl in your rooms kua). So, miss us all? No problem, just go get MSN Messenger and add us all into your contacts. Then, sit back and watch our friends crap it all out in the chatrooms! ;P Now, I’m starting to get sick of you all ler, been chatting practically every night since exams are over up till 2 a.m.!
So, those without MSN, go download! And those with MSN without us in the contact get our mail addresses! Those with MSN and our contacts, please! I beseech you, please have our chats earlier so we can end earlier too and have decent sleep times! hehehe.
P.S. : Why does everyone think I’m a whiz kid? I only know how to talk crap la. =) The brain at the top is actually empty! Aiya, if I knew that you ppl are gonna leave me with the Class Fund, I should have asked for more money at the begining of the semester! Now all I can do is buy myself a big box of sweets. =(
Yeah, went there with a friend (you know who you are, hehe) at 2130, came back at 0220. Got what seems to be a good book as a present (Thanks!) along the way there. I’ll tell you later if it’s interesing. Hmm, agenda there? Sat down with a drink and surfed Internet there using TMNet Hotspot. Finally I got to make use of my free 2 year access that comes with my Streamyx registration. 
While we’re there, the lights went out twice at AsiaCafe. Luckily, we didn’t get to play while we’re there (or else we might have caused some serious damage with the cues). What did we suffer? Some minor interruption with the WiFi. The best part was using both of our MSNs to cause havoc. For Mich and Mintos, dun get angry ar? Just playing around only. No harm done right? Except the one called cockroach! 
Next time, must bring more gadgets there and longer battery cables so we can sit nearer the WiFi access point.
Got bored, so snapped this while I was there:
Oh, the time was off by 6 hrs (forgot to reset until just now). A bit tired to blog more at the moment, hence the truncated text.
I guess I would be one of the first to blog on the event, in just 8 hrs after it ends. For all those who din know what it is all abt, its Taylors’ College Cambridge A-Levels Prom Night at the Victorian Ballroom, Holliday Villa Subang Jaya. Well, I went to the library in the evening in a futile attempt to burn down their laser printer while waiting for Chester to pick Eugene, Kee Ping, Krish, Thinesh and myself to go there.
Well, we planned to end up there by 1830, but ended up being slightly late (traffic as usual…). And once we hit the ground and started moving, the beeline was for the washroom (somebody had a collect call from nature and we just followed to touch up). Once we’re out, our ‘weapons’ came out and started shooting people up left, right and centre. No, it’s not CounterStrike Source or Battlefield 2: Modern Combat in real life but just us and our digicams snapping away. Took our group photographs there outside the Ballroom before being ‘ushered’ in.
On the way to the ballroom entrance, we’re shot at like celebrities (all right, I’m exaggerating a bit here) with the red carpet entrance. Well, first thought is hmm, the ballroom’s not bad! So the comments I’ve heard abt the place was quite right after all. The seats were not too bad, but I was so evil in protecting my spot (nicely positioned to see the stage). Well, a pang of guilt now springs into mind but it’s already over. Too late to do anything about it.
Food? Ah, splendid! (How come I’m the one eating the most on my table? Should have more guys on the same table as me la, feel so weird eating alone while the rest at other tables ate with gusto) Debbie, I heard you wiped out about half of the prawns on your table! Hehe. At least I got my fill (although it’s a bit strange to eat in the darkness). Why couldn’t they just leave the lights on when we’re having dinner with the performances going on stage? And where are the darned waiters when you want more tea? Crap, it’s not the first time pouring tea for everyone on my table (you people aren’t my family in a literal sense summore!). This time, I outdid my previous feat. Instead of only one table, I went and served all 23 people across 3 tables?!?! I’m really nutters! Might as well refund me some of my ticket money for helping them out a bit. hehe.
Yeah, that’s right. We started off with a band (Charles is in there). Well, the music was a bit too loud for me (you know, the usual band music). After all, it’s not exactly my favourite genre of music to listen to (heh, if they hire DJ Tiesto I’ll be perfectly happy enough, but the price for one ticket will now be RM880!) Then I didn’t pay much attention to the performances any more since I was busy eating. Yeap, that’s right. Think I gotten immune to performances already (all those years of I.U’s, school functions and one MPT5 must have finally gotten to my head). The funny part is, I sent away the remainder of the chicken because I thought nobody is apparently interested in food, and I have eaten my fill. After all, almost nobody seems interested in second helpings! And 5 minutes later, when the chicken (or was it duck?) was replaced with a full plate of prawn, Say suddenly asked where was the previous dish, and then almost everybody on the whole table started going hey, where did it go! They ended up having to ask the waiter to get the dish back.
Then on comes the highlight of the whole event, Prom Royals. There’s the lucky draw, but nothing of particular interest because only Thinesh got the lucky draw. How come 004,005 and 006 got prizes when it was supposed to be random?!?! Grrr…. The Prom King selection was quite interesting (one guy really came up with the ’60s look! Black rimmed glasses, short pants, bow tie and all). He didn’t get the title, but he definitely earned the generous round of applause (well, I ceased clapping by that time because some of the lotion on my hands wore off, and my skin cracked). Prom Queen, its a no-contest, IMHO. That gal practically outshone the rest, although she stumbled on the questioning part.
And then, its photoshoot again! Somebody told us at the mamak later, that our class must have been the most poser one, because we’re the ones most happily snapping away? Probably because we’re the most tech-savvy class right? ;P Sadly, my photos turned out to be crap so I’ll have to rely on some other photographers to replace my defective copies. Idiot me! Still have a long way to go in learning photography. Missed out the lecturers though (only gotten Ms. Annie).
Well, finished the thing at about 0000. Then somebody suggested mamak, and 7 of us went. Stayed there till 0200, where I discovered my photography error and found a new way to screw the laser printer (thanks Zheng Guang). Then spent 3 hrs reviewing the photos in full size (and discovered the problem was far worse than I had originally thought), surfed around before going to sleep at 0500. And then it’s up at 0730, waiting to go play pool at 1000. Hope those guys are already up…
Well, apparenty there is more than just a slight problem with my photos. Except for a few photos, most of them show some blurring. Thankfully, with the exception of a couple of photos, most have duplicates in other photographs. I hope that all of you with the copies could replace my defective ones ASAP. I’m terribly sorry for the inconvenience caused (Apparently, the settings wasn’t properly calibrated).
I’ve uploaded all the photos I have into my profile photos, so I hope you guys could please kindly go there and help me replace the darned defectives! Thank you all very very much for your help!
Odd match up of two seemingly different things?
Not really, after you see this!
The Vitruvian Penguin!
For comparison, the Virtuvian Man!
Where the heck did I get the funny picture? Well, its from the December ‘05 issue of Sciam in the Antigravity column, avaliable here. People certainly make weird connections all the time, and this is certainly no exception. The March of The Penguins and Intelligent Design? I’m not complaining, since its a nice way to start the day, with a laugh!
Heh, went all the way to Pyramid for the afternoon and back again.
Nope, its not out for an outing (but met and spotted some friends there) but it’s to check on my beloved PC.
Good news, its working again.
Bad news is that one of the RAM conked out, and I have no reassurance that its solely the RAM’s fault (hmm, my bet’s still on that motherboard). Now I’m stuck with the measly 512MB of RAM and not 1GB. What a bummer. Thankfully I’ve invested that extra cash for a Lifetime Warranty for my Kingston RAM. At least I wouldn’t have to spend big bucks on getting this piece of junk working again. But precious time is still lost. This sucks big time.
So, as there is no additional systems to fill the void left behind by this PC I made a compromise with the repair guy. I take the PC back home with me for now, and I’ll send it back when they send the next batch of hardware to the Asus service centre.
And when they get around to checking my PC at the service centre, here are the pros and cons again :
The good news is if they can’t fix it, I get a new motherboard.
The bad news is they might have to ship the system to Taiwan if the centre here can’t fix it. And it might take up to a whole month!!!
Think about it, 30 whole days without a PC all to yourself to use?!!? Man, I can go nuts (Yeah, I’m that wired, or more like addicted) But in the meantime I have to scavenge parts to make a makeshift PC at the moment. Lets see, I have spare powerboxes, CPU, RAM, motherboard, but no spare HDDs! Plus the motherboard is defective. Hope I can work a miracle! But Brandon, if you’re reading this you’ll know what I’m thinking right now. Some PCs are left unused somewhere in Subang Jaya. Hehehe.
Next stop, repair my optical mouse and upgrade to a wireless network!
Yahoo! Its all over now. Now, time to settle in for the long wait. Well, no bloggings yet until I get my PC fixed. Until then stay tuned!
Well, today seems to be one of those days where the all the sites I went to doubled the number of daily articles! But after the usual couple of hours sorting through the news and updates, I think this few articles are worth sharing:
Is coloured bubbles a dream or reality?
Now it is!
Read on PopSci how this 2 men spent 11 years and half a million dollars coming up with the world’s first coloured bubbles! And yes, vivid, evenly coloured bubbles that vanishes after the dye gets on your clothes! Brilliant!
And here, its not the whole thing unless you have Discovery Channel but if you have zero knowledge of liposuction (like me, who knows that it involves sucking out fat) the featured video of the day should interest you.
The verdict is in. Sugar does relieve stress! What a sweet solution. =) SciAm has the story here. But its only proven for mice, not humans so you’d better be careful before risking the gain of a few pounds of fat to unwind!
On a more political and IT related news, the US keeps its hold over the root servers. That’s good, since we don’t need to worry about what website we’re going to see the next time we decide to go to lets say www.xxxxx.com. =)
About healthcare, H5N1 rears its head in China again with the first confirmed death. With more mutations discovered in Vietnam, Stage 4 seems a setp closer now.
And now, moving on to the animal kingdom. If you think that lizards are completely harmless, think again. They have venom! But thankfully, its nothing that can kill. NewScientist has the scoop here
