what my handwriting say about me

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dirtiest job in the world

are you feeling down about the job you're doing or about to do in the future? and every day you go for work, do you feel like just going up to the big boss man and make a scene before quitting your dead-end job? well, after you finish this post, you might just thank the stars that you have the job that you have.

10 dirtiest job in science

By Candace Corner
CareerBuilder.com -> link

Manure Inspector

What they do: Wade through farming manure, inspecting different kinds of animal waste to make sure it is free from contaminants. By checking the manure, these scientists make sure that the harmful materials do not spread to infect vegetation, animals or consumers.

Orangutan-Pee Collector

What they do: Collect and analyze ape urine to study factors that effect their reproduction. The work involves tracking down apes and laying down large plastic sheets or attaching plastic bags to poles in hopes of catching adequate samples to analyze.

Hot-zone Superintendent

What they do: Perform maintenance work for bio-safety labs that study lethal airborne pathogens, for which there is no known cure. Their work enables scientists to study the nature of disease-causing organisms, such as anthrax.

Extremophile Excavator

What they do: Sift through the smelly fumes of arsenic-saturated mud areas in blistering heat in order to gather samples containing arsenic-eating extremophiles. The purpose is to find microbes that could possibly assist in the decontamination of the nation's freshwater sources.

Dysentery Stool Sample Analyzer

What they do: Study stool samples from diseased humans who have experienced diarrhea from a disease-causing microbe. The analysis allows these scientists to develop intestinal diagnostics to ease those suffering from the disease.

Semen Washer

What they do: Take semen samples under microscopic observation to study their sperm count, then spin, separate, add preservatives and freeze the samples for in vitro fertilization.

Volcanologist

What they do: Monitor volcanic regions to determine when they'll erupt next. In addition to dodging hot magma, these scientists mountain climb their way through the heat and fight their way through fogs of sulfur dioxide gas, ash, rocks and debris.

Carcass Cleaner

What they do: Clean corpses for display using one of a variety of cleaning methods. This may include immersing the body in boiling chemicals, placing maggots or beetles on the carcass, or picking off the leftover flesh.

Fistula Feeder

What they do: Study how the insides of cattle work. To do this, they deplug the fistula, an opening to the bovine intestinal system, and take samples from the forestomach to test their digestion and reaction to food additives.

Corpse-Flower Grower

What they do: Grow and tend to a towering, foul-smelling plant called the corpse flower. Similar to the way pleasant-smelling flowers attract honeybees, the corpse flower attracts its own bugs, Sumatran carrion beetles and flesh flies. These scientists are competing to grow the largest blooming plant in cultivation.

so, i hope this'll put things into perspective and make you appreciate what you do more. if doubts about your career resurfaces again, remind yourself of these dirty jobs and repeat these words in your mind: 'i love my job, i love my job, i love my job..'

how many drinks would kill you?

a friend of mine told me something really interesting the other day.

"did you know that if i drink 160 cans of red bull, i'd die?" he said, as he sip the energy drink.

of course, this caught my attention and needed to find out more.


personally, i'm not much of a caffeine-junky. i don't need a cup of coffee or chugging down a red bull to start the day. in fact, i very rarely drink coffee.. probably 10 times in a year? so yeah.. but i do, however, love diet coke (that's why i drink as much as i can here before going home cause brunei only has coke light and no, they are not the same). my favourite drink - that and pepsi max. can't get enough of it. it has caffeine but not enough to give me a sudden boost of energy.

note: these figures are of how much you have to have in your system to actually be lethal. it's not like having more than 160 red bull in a year or a month or even a week would kill you. but you have a good chance of feeling very sick having 60 red bulls in a day. you'll definitely pass out before even reaching the lethal dose. but please people.. don't be stupid to even try it. ':s

2nd note: the figures vary for each person. some have a high tolerance for caffeine.

coca-cola - 371 cans and you'll keel over.

diet coke - 284 cans and goodbye to you..

sprite / 7-up / tonic water - no caffeine in it but you could get killed by sugar intake though.

chocolate milk - 2556 cups and you're done for..

instant coffee - 224 cups and you'll be so awake that you won't ever get up!

mac donald's large coffee - 88 cups (now that's kinda doable.. very scary ':s)

starbucks' grande coffee - just 39 cups (holy fudge.. even more scary)

instant tea - 492 cups and you'll be walking into the light

there it is.. still craving for a cup/can to get through the day? ':)

there were a lot of drinks and even food to list here. go to the website and input your weight and the item you want to know how much to kill you.

energyfiend.com

i am the procrastinator!

we were given assignments a month ago and it's due tomorrow. as to not break the malay sacred rule, i kept it hidden on my shelf until finally yesterday, looked at the question. now i'm trying to attempt to finish it by sunrise. as if that's not bad enough, i just finished watching a movie and now blogging about it!When a teenage girl is faced with an unexpected pregnancy, she enlists the aid of her best friend in finding the unborn child a suitable home in this coming-of-age comedy drama from Thank You for Smoking director Jason Reitman.

Juno (Ellen Page) may seem wise beyond her years, but after sleeping with classmate Bleeker (Michael Cera), the pregnant teen quickly realizes how little she really knows about life. Thankfully, Juno has been blessed with parents (J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney) who trust their daughter's judgment, and a best friend named Leah (Olivia Thirlby), who's always willing to help out in a pinch.

With a little help from Leah, Juno soon comes into contact with Mark (Jason Bateman) and Vanessa (Jennifer Garner) -- an affluent suburban couple who have been unable to conceive a child of their own. Mark and Vanessa seem like they would make great parents, and are eager to adopt Juno's unborn child. Now, as adolescent Juno is faced with a series of very adult decisions, she will draw on the support of her family and friends in order to discover who she truly is, and discover that one bad choice can have a lifetime of consequences.

i just simply LOVE the movie from start to finish. the characters were awesome with witty mouths, especially juno. if that's not enough, the music in it is a pleasure to the ears. a very cute line-up of songs.

i've never heard of the movie before until a friend told me about it. apparently, it received oscar nominations.

ellen page - actress in a leading role

jason reitman - directing

best picture

best writing original screenplay


and after i watched it, i can see why.. what actually attracted me to the movie was ellen page. i saw her in another movie a while back. the trailer was awesome so i had to watch the movie and was NOT disappointed. she was amazing in it!


ellen page - my new favourite actress. ':)

iconic photographs

i've noticed that photography is a growing interest in brunei. photoblogs have been cropping up more and more recently. personally, i don't get it. unless you're making a living out of it, i see as just an expensive hobby. but don't shoot me just yet (pun intended), i like art and photographs are art. they portray the raw truth and sometimes could even change the world. here are some of the most iconic photographs ever took. later on, a more modern take on photographic art with the world press photo 2007 awards.

Galloping Horse 1878

Was there a moment midstride when horses had all hooves off the ground? Leland Stanford, the railroad baron and future university founder, bet there was—or at least that’s the story. It was 1872 when Stanford hired noted landscape photographer Eadweard Muybridge to figure it out. It took years, but Muybridge delivered: He rigged a racetrack with a dozen strings that triggered 12 cameras. Muybridge not only proved Stanford right but also set off the revolution in motion photography that would become movies.

Tiananmen Square 1989

A hunger strike by 3,000 students in Beijing had grown to a protest of more than a million as the injustices of a nation cried for reform. For seven weeks the people and the People’s Republic, in the person of soldiers dispatched by a riven Communist Party, warily eyed each other as the world waited. When this young man simply would not move, standing with his meager bags before a line of tanks, a hero was born. A second hero emerged as the tank driver refused to crush the man, and instead drove his killing machine around him. Soon this dream would end, and blood would fill Tiananmen. But this picture had shown a billion Chinese that there is hope.

First Human X-ray 1896

To know something like the back of your hand is a timeless concept, one taken yet further by Wilhelm Konrad Roentgen. While working on a series of experiments with a Crookes tube, he noticed that a bit of barium platinocyanide emitted a fluorescent glow. He then laid a photographic plate behind his wife’s hand (note the wedding rings), and made the first X-ray photo. Before that, physicians were unable to look inside a person’s body without making an incision. Roentgen was the recipient of the first Nobel Prize for Physics in 1901.

Earthrise 1968

The late adventure photographer Galen Rowell called it “the most influential environmental photograph ever taken.” Captured on Christmas Eve, 1968, near the end of one of the most tumultuous years the U.S. had ever known, the Earthrise photograph inspired contemplation of our fragile existence and our place in the cosmos. For years, Frank Borman and Bill Anders of the Apollo 8 mission each thought that he was the one who took the picture. An investigation of two rolls of film seemed to prove Borman had taken an earlier, black-and-white frame, and the iconic color photograph, which later graced a U.S. postage stamp and several book covers, was by Anders.

Execution of a Viet Cong Guerrilla 1968

i'm sure you think this is a disgusting picture depicting a gruesome scene of an evil man executing a cuffed man at point blank. how can man be so without morals as to do such a thing? i thought so too but unlike this picture, things aren't always in black and white..
what this picture, taken by Eddie Adams, didn't say was that the man being executed was captain of a Vietcong "revenge squad" that had executed dozens of unarmed civilians earlier the same day.

Regardless, it instantly became an icon of the war’s savagery and made the official pulling the trigger - General Nguyen Ngoc Loan - its iconic villain.

Sadly, the photograph’s legacy would haunt Loan for the rest of his life. Following the war, he was reviled where ever he went. After an Australian VA hospital refused to treat him, he was transferred to the United States, where he was met with a massive (though unsuccessful) campaign to deport him. He eventually settled in Virginia and opened a restaurant but was forced to close it down as soon as his past caught up with him. Vandals scrawled "we know who you are" on his walls, and business dried up.

Adams felt so bad for Loan that he apologized for having taken the photo at all, admitting, "The general killed the Vietcong; I killed the general with my camera."

Winners Gallery 2008

unfortunately, due to copyright reasons, i can't post the pictures here. please click on the link to find some of the most amazing pictures.

World Press Photo of the Year

may these inspire you to snap more of 'real life' rather than pretty pictures of flowers and fireworks.

how to flirt

i mentioned a few months ago that i bought a fantastic book - eHow: how to do just about everything. to be honest, i haven't even cracked it open - until now. i was glancing through the index and found that there a lot of really good stuff in it. for example, a step-by-step guide on how to flirt.

this caught my attention because, ofcourse, i don't how to flirt. i'm just too shy to do that. *notices a topic on how to overcome shyness in the index*

i think i mentioned this before but one time, a girl i never met flirted with me and you know what i did? i turned red, smiled and walked away.. uggghh.. smooth mr. lover boy..

so if you're not a natural flirt like me read on!

steps:

1. be confident -it's the magical charm that makes other want to get to know you.

2. smile, smile, smile.

3. think playful thoughts when gearing up to flirt. flirts are fun and engaging, and they love to play with others.

4. compliment a stranger or acquaintance on his or her clothes, eyes, smile or sense of humour, for starters.

5. keep your body language open and inviting: make eye contact, lightly touch the person's hand or arm when telling a stroy, toss your head back when you laugh. (personal note: i think this is a bit much.. especially the laughing like a maniac bit. ':s but a good tip: if you can't look a person in the eyes, stare at a point between the eyebrows. they can't tell.)

6. initiate stimulating conversation. at a loss for words? ask open-ended questions about the flirtee's job, home town, family, recent films seen or thoughts about a painting on the wall.

7. open up about yourself, giving some even more reason to like you. but don't go on and on - the goal is to engage and intrigue, not bore.

8. gauge the person's interest carefully. if you sense a red light - or worse, smug ridicule - make your exit graciously and immediately. you've got nicer people to meet.

9. progress in your flirtation, paying attention to cues from the object of your interest. if you perceive a sensual or sexual connection, make a bold move - ask for a date.

tips: avoid negative body language, such as crossing your arms, scowling, appearing overly stressed, looking downwards or walking in a hurry when you don't really need to.
give yourself time to learn the types of conversation starters that work for you. practise flirting wherever you can - at a local shop or laundrette, or with your friends.

warning! sexually suggestive remarks or touching is inappropriate among colleagues. keep any office flirting innocent at all times.


for more wonderful tips of just about everyting click here -> www.ehow.com
go get 'em tiger!

10 amusing techs

as promised, a worthy post is here.

today, we're living in a high-tech world. man have progressed 100 times more in the last 50 years than ever before. there's nothing i like more than technology, whether it be in medicine, helping man-kind or just developing in things that may not serve a helpful purpose other than mere entertainment or personal comfort. today, i'll share with you the latter.

here are 10 techs that i find amusing.

have a bath - anywhere!

like bathtubs? like being outside? can't really carry a bathtub with you outside? no fear! what you need is this...
just build a wood fire in the centre of the coiled tubing, fill up the sizeable polyfibre bowl and slip into the steamy warm water. its lightweight construction means you can haul it anywhere.

how big is it? 8 grown people can fit snuggly in it. cost: £3220
www.dutchtub.com

EEEEPP! is that a mouse??!

GUPI is a robotised guinea pig that looks and feels like a real one. GUPI is highly autonomous, he walks around in the house without bumping into anything or falling off a table or the stairs thanks to sensors in its eyes and legs..

GUPI is so smart he can also walk through a maze and you can be assured that he will find a way out. GUPI has a very interactive playing behaviour, if you don't play with him he becomes lonely and scared and he will go and hide in a dark place. But if you caress him he will feel loved and will be happy. GUPI can also hear you and he will react to voices and sounds, depending on his mood ..... When GUPI is happy he will actually come running at you when you call him, but when he's scared he can't stand noise and will run away from it.

When happy, GUPI will also follow a light beam so you can lead him wherever you want him to go. When GUPI gets hungry you can feed him (read : recharge his reloadable batteries) through a little carrot, and he's ready for a lot more fun together with his friends. As such GUPI creates the 'Tamagochi'® binding-effect. Gupi has unique identification codes in the chipsets, therefore, when other Gupi's are in the vicinity, they will express excited behaviour and they will learn gradually how to accept each other, how to share 'food' (battery re-loader), and how to play with each other! When one or more Gupi see one another they will sing and dance with each-other in a cute manner.

cost: £35
www.drinkstuff.com

sailing happily to anywhere

ok, this one isn't really a brilliant gadget or entertaining in any way, but the eco-friendly in me find it very cool. it's a bag made out of recycled sail! marked on it are the type of vessel it came from and even where that ship has been.

use this recycled shopping bags and reduce the usage of plastic!

on the website, they don't just sell bags. they sell a lot of other recycled and eco-friendly stuff from picture frames to bathroom stuff. so go green!

http://ecocentric.co.uk

scented candles? no thanks, i have my pen drive.

This Oil Burning Flash Drive is just plain weird.. This version comes in two distinct aromas, red rose and peppermint green. No word on the longevity of the aroma and you’ll need a steady hand for application. it goes for $US7.00

where's a pair chopsticks when you need one, eh?

what? it's still technology.. and it was amusing. i was certainly amused.. need i say more? ':)

analog watches are for sissies

if you think watches are just dull then give these babies a try. telling time isn't as easy as it used to be with the watches from Tokyo Flash. each model they design has its own different way of telling what time it is.

Oberon: it uses rings of glowing lights to represent seconds, minutes, tens of minutes and hours.

Pimp Easy: When the button is pressed for the time it will spiral all the lights on and off then show the time. Press the button again and the day and date will be displayed. Now what really makes this watch stand out, is the light up feature, the watch lights up every light in a spiral and then off in a spiral every 2 minutes from 6 PM to 1 AM.

Q version: One push of the button animates the LED's in various patterns before revealing the time, a function which can be skipped with a second press of the button. The Q version uses the established 12-5-9 method to tell the time. 12 hours, 5 groups of 10 minutes and 9 single minutes. Moving clockwise from the top of the display, the first two lines of LED's show the hours 1-12, each lit LED indicating one hour. The next line indicates minutes up to 50, each LED showing 10 minutes. The final two lines indicate single minutes 1-9, one LED for each minute.

with these, when someone asks you to look at your watch to know the time, you sit them down and explain..

www.tokyoflash.com

goodbye snooze button, i'll miss you

staying with the time-theme, if you're like me, i love hitting that snooze button a few times before properly waking up. but with this gadget, there's no such thing as snoozing!


this is the puzzle alarm clock. when it rings, the puzzle pieces explodes out and the only way to shut it up is to put the four-piece puzzle back together. it might sound like an easy task but just imagine waking up to the blare of the alarm and you have to find the pieces that could've scattered anywhere and solve put it together again.. sounds like hell to me..

cost: $USD 97.00

"flower, am i happy?"

This "Kotohana Flower" recognizes your feelings and changes its color corresponding to the feeling you have. The gadget judges your emotion through the ryhthm of your voice. A small microphone is hidden in the flowers to detect happiness (yellow), sadness (blue), excitement (red) and calmness (green).

be a pop star in the shower

there are a lot of other gadgety ways in bringing music into the bathroom (water-proof covers, etc) but i think this one is unique.


This is a great little shower radio that simply sticks to your bathroom tiles using the sucker provided. Perfect for those of you who love to sing in the shower! Operating the Shower Tap Radio couldn't be simpler than that. Turn the tap on the radio on, adjust the volume and tune into your favorite station!

a call from the future

finally, something to look forward to. i've always been a big fan of nokia and their seemingly endless innovations in the technology of communication. and by the look of it, it's not stopping any time soon. i'm so glad of that..



it's still a concept phone but hey, they're thinking about it.. if this doesn't come out.. something similarly spectacular would eventually come..

i love technology..