Into the Darkness

I managed to finish the morning ward round pretty early, and after a quick search on the net, there was an 11.30 am Star Trek show at Pavilion. A quick text to Puan Anita - to ask for her permission of course - and then I was off. Got to Bukit Bintang well in time, popcorn and all.

If you were expecting full-on action flick, you would be disappointed. There was of course the obligatory action scene, but on the whole, it was a plot-driven movie, and the scope of the storyline on the whole was actually pretty narrow. None of this safe the universe thing - but maybe they were doing it one star system at a time.

It was clearly a franchise movie - expect a third instalment of the series coming in the next few years. The dead giveaway was the ending - the crew embarked on a 5-year mission into deep space as the closing credit rolled on. This could also set the series up for television.

Anyhow, being a Trekkie, I liked the direction JJ Abram was taking the franchise. Clearly a work in progress rather than a pure stand alone movie. Some pretty heavy scene, while the villain did not actually die - which possible appearance in future ventures. Interesting none the less.

Mother's Day Part I

Round One of our Mother's Day weekend dinner was at Makan Kitchen, Double Tree in KL. It used to be one of Anita's favourite but after tonight's affair, I don't think that she was in any hurry to return. It was, to put it mildly, disappointing.

The spread was poor, with only limited local selection. The main bulk happened to be Indian, and it was not great. I'm a fan of Indian food, but this was worst than the Mamak stalls. In fact, it was an insult to compare this to my local mamak. It was really bad. The rice was overcooked, while the naan was the opposite. The daal and curry was too plain - it seemed that they left the spices in the cupboard.

The only highlight was the satay. It was as tasty as I remembered it here and the peanut sauce that came with it was top notch. The kebab was not too bad either.

There was no salad, and there was no Japanese item on the spread. The dessert was also left wanting. There was only 3 dishes to go with rice if you wanted to go for the Malay selection. As for Chinese, the less mentioned the better.

Apparently they had a new chef just appointed to the outlet. A gregarious American gentleman called Adam who went from one table to another introducing himself. He only started there three weeks ago, previously stationed in China from what I heard. He certainly had his job cut out to sort out this shamble. And good luck to him.

So, for the next few months, I'll pass on coming back here.

Trouble Brewing

This was the sight that greeted me when I arrived home from work yesterday. Suffice to say, there was a spring cleaning going on at the study as far as Lego pieces were concerned. The last time this happened, half the stuff on my table went missing. Apparently, Irfan had the urge to clear things up …….. Better keep my stuff at a safe place then …..

Upload Done

It took me a good week or so, but finally the photos from the recent Penang MSH meeting were up. It was just that I had a couple of calls right after the meeting last week, and finding time to sit down and go through the photos was a bit difficult. After the photos were done, then there was a small matter of uploading the the photos onto my server. And that would take bandwidth as each photos was about 1Mb in size. It didn't take that long with the fibre connection at the apartment, but finding time to do so at the apartment was another story.

Once the photos were ported up, then I had to embed than onto the website. And that took me another couple of hours. It wasn't long but finding the time to sit down and do them was the problem.

Anyhow, it was all done. I decided to capture the photos in RAW on the 7D, making colour management through Aperture, less tricky. I was actually pretty happy with the results.

Moysey!

It looked like the transition plan was already in motion. Last night, before I went to bed, this was the headline - I was too busy to blog earlier in the day. David Moyes. I thought that one day he would come over to United, but not straight away to manage. Maybe to be an assistant to Sir Alex before taking over. And would have joined up many years back. And since that didn't happen, I thought he would have missed the boat.

I was no secret that Sir Alex was a fan of Moyes. And me too, even when he was managing Preston, there was something about him which marked him for greatness. Not as a flair superstar manager in the Mourinho mould, but more of a grafter. The question moving forward now would be, does Manchester United want somebody with flair, or a working man. The fax that Motes was offered a bumper six year contract indicated that United was committed with a long term project. Mourinho would not have agreed to be tied down that long.

Listening to his interview on the BBC, it was very c,ear that Moyes was shell shocked with the whole development. But the fact that it came before the end of the season would help both Everton and United to start building for the future.

As a United fan, I have to admit that there is some apprehension to the appointment, mainly to the lack of European experience on Moyes' part. There is no doubting his temperament. What would be interesting would be how things would pan out if the results did not go his way in the first few months - Everton was a notorious slow started under Moyes. Will the fans started going on his back? No doubt about it. But his reaction then would be important. Otherwise, the job might just be too big for him. I would be more than happy to give him the benefit of the doubt though.

And on the same token, I would also like to welcome a certain Marouone Fellaini .....