Finally found my Mickey Mouse watch!

       I've been looking for a nice classic Mickey Mouse watch for many years. Never found it......until now.

       Classic oyster style case, nice black leather strap and chrome case. Unfortunately the hour and minute hands are not Mickey's hands like the one I had when I was a little boy. But this is good enough. A nice classic look.

      The best thing about it? I got it for only rm15 during clearance sale. I got mine from Cotton On at 1 Utama. Not sure if the other branches have it.

       I've been looking for years and I finally found it plus it's so unbelievably cheap, it's the cheapest watch I have ever had in my life. Super awesome, super cheap, super happy!

Blogger App doesn't work!

Isn't it ironic that a billion dollar company
like Google, who owns Blogger, makes a Blogger App that doesn't work?

If you select a photo from Album, it just results in a black box and when you click Publish......it fails.

It only works if you use the App to take a photo and immediately upload. What a load of horseshit from a billion dollar company.

There are 9 year old kids out there who make better Apps. Come on Google, you can do better than that!

Canon PowerShot G1X MkII

           I've always wanted a nice compact camera with a big sensor and I did buy the Sony NEX 3 and NEX 5, five years ago. Those were groundbreaking cameras back then. Super compact body with an APS-C sensor. However, the lenses were a huge disappointment. The 18-55mm kit lens and 16mm f2.8 pancake lens were terrible. The kit lens was a very soft, everything looked soft and fuzzy. The pancake lens was my favourite 24mm FF equivalent focal length but at f2.8 just didn't cut it for me. It also had a horrible, bulky, screw on flash. The size of the camera wasn't all that compact either, with the 18-55mm lens and flash. It was actually quite front heavy and unwieldy. I sold them off after a while. I much preferred my Leica D-Lux 4 and Lumix LX3. Those 2 lil cameras were fantastic and I've always yearned for a new camera with the qualities of the D-Lux4/LX3 but with a big huge sensor in it. Anyway, let's get on with the Canon PowerShot G1X MkII.

            It has taken Canon a long time but they have finally come out with a superb lil pocket rocket camera. I was quite tempted by the first G1X but it was riddled with flaws. The new G1X MkII is now a dream come true for me. I've waited 5 long years for a camera like it. Here's why I love it so much.

1. Compact body. Fits in my cargo shorts pocket.

2. Big 1.5" sensor which is almost as big as full APS-C.

3. Very nice focal length of 24-120mm FF equivalent.

4. Very fast lens at f2.0-f3.9.

5. Built in pop up flash that can bounce.

6. 2 Control Rings on lens barrel which allows customisation for eg. Aperture, Shutter, Exposure compensation etc.

7. NFC and Wifi with iOS and Android compatibility. The Android phone/tablet app works very well and file transfers are very quick. I haven't tried it with IOS yet.

8. Hotshoe is compatible with all my Canon Speedlites including the ST-E2 wireless flash commander.

9. A nice and sharp, tilting 3", 1.04M dot touchscreen LCD. The tilting LCD combined with the 24mm wide angle lens makes for very good selfies. Don't laugh, I do it a lot and I know you do too. Haha.

10. Solid build. Full magnesium and aluminum construction if I remember reading correctly. Feels like a Panzer Tank in my hands.

11. I also read an interview of the Canon engineers who developed the camera, that the lens unit is actually made to Canon L Lens standards. They just couldn't label it as such because it's a designation allowed on the full frame EF lenses only. I remember there was actually a PowerShot with a red ring and labeled as L Lens but Canon never used the L Lens label on a compact ever again. Maybe it suffered from bad sales figures or something and Canon didn't want to jeopardise the L reputation?

I've only had it for a couple of days and that's all I can think of. I will add more pros and cons about it after using it for another week or so.

Here's some sample pics. I will post up more soon.

Photography, my long lost love.

I have been so into triathlons the past 2 years, I almost forgot about photography, one of the loves of my life. So I went to the dry cabinet, in search of a camera to reignite my love for photography.

This lil Fuji X10's been sitting in the dry cabinet for 2 years. I actually forgot I had it. Dusted it off and took it out for a walkabout the past few days and enjoyed myself sooooooooooo much. There's just something about these lil cameras......pure enjoyment instead of lugging the big huge DSLR and lenses.

I spent the next few days with my X10 and fell in love all over again. Haven't felt the pure joy of photography in such a long time.

Here's a few pics from the walkabout with my darling X10.

I have since fallen deeply, madly in love again. I am back!

Quiznos Subs is in KL!

OMG! My dream has come true. Quiznos is here at last. It's gonna open right next to TGIF in 1 Utama. Everytime I go to Singapore, I have it for lunch, dinner and supper. Now I can have it anytime, any day, at home. Yay!

My long, hard, painful, journey in the fight against cancer.

Today is my 42nd birthday, but I am only 10 years old.

         I died 10 years ago when the doctor gave me the worst news ever. I was knocking on death's door and the Grim Reaper was waiting just behind the door. I was so weak I couldn't even walk anymore. The whole left side of my body was gone. I had lost all feeling and control on the left side of my body. I couldn't feel my left arm, leg and torso. I couldn't even feel the left side of my face. I also lost my left ear to the cancer. Everything on my left side was gone. I also suffered from a massively painful, violent and exhausting 12 hour long bout of hiccups. My spleen was so enlarged, it squashed my stomach, diaphragm, lungs, basically everything inside and the only way my body knew how to react was massive and violent hiccups. I was in so much pain......I really didn't care about living anymore. Death would have been a pleasure. At least then, the relentless pain would stop!

        I always thought I was blessed with strong, healthy, sporting genes. My father was a legendary Malaysian sportsman who is in the National Hall of Fame. I was once a strong and healthy athlete too. I never got sick. I never thought of dying young but now I was reduced to a crumpled bag of bones waiting to die. After the doctor gave me the diagnosis of cancer, my world imploded. I thought it was the end. Yes, I was in so much pain and thought death would be a pleasure but hearing the doctor say it, really hit home and I just broke down and cried and cried and cried.........the whole day.

        Thank God I have the best and strongest wife in the world. She was with me in the hospital, day and night. She was with me at all times, never leaving my side. She knew I was afraid to be alone, very, very, very afraid. I was so afraid of the Grim Reaper sneaking up from the shadows and grabbing my soul. I couldn't sleep at night because there was so much pain even with the painkillers. All I could do was lie in bed and wait for the sun to rise. Besides the excruciating pain, I was also afraid of the dark now. According to statistics, most terminally ill people die during the night. I didn't know it then, but I had developed a fear of the dark. Every morning, I would just sit by the window in the hospital and look out, waiting for the sun to rise. Fortunately the room I was in, had a beautiful view of the Subang Jaya park. I would be so relieved when the sun rose and filled my room with warm, rejuvenating light. The warmth of the sunlight felt like God's blessing and I was allowed to live another day.

        The simple joy of watching and hearing the birds singing in the trees at sunrise was now the best thing on earth, not a billion dollars in the bank, not a big house, not a Porsche in the garage. All I wanted was time, to do all the things I never had time to do. I was a workaholic working 15 hour days and all I could think of was money money money. I said my prayers and I asked God to give me 5 good, pain free years. I needed it to do all the things and say all the things I needed to say to my wife and kids. I stopped everything. I stopped working. I sold off the business. All I wanted now was my dearest wife and kids and the simple pleasure of waking up strong and healthy every day.

        I asked for 5 good years, I have had 10 years now. It might not have been a smooth journey, I was a real bastard to my wife and kids in the first 3 years. I had violent moods swings, massive rage issues and depression. It took me 3 long years to come out of the dark, gloomy clouds of sadness and anger. They call it the "Why me?" stage. I have since learned that it does no good and I am just wasting whatever precious time I have left. I now try and be happy every day and just be thankful for every extra day I get.

        My dearest wife Sally, I LOVE YOU from the bottom of my heart. You stuck it out with me. You steered my broken sampan through the fog of hell, you helped me escape from the Grim Reaper. Most women would have packed up and left in the middle of the night. You took it on the chin for 3 horrible, long suffering years of me being a total bastard. I am so grateful you are still here with me. I wouldn't have pulled through without you. You are my rock, my navigator, my partner, and I am eternally grateful for that. It hasn't been a perfect 10 years but I will keep on fighting. I will try for 10 more good years and then hopefully another 10 more years after that.

 I WILL LIVESTRONG!!!!!!!!

I'm back!!!!!

Hello everybody, after almost 2 long years, I'm back! Been a really busy couple of years training and doing triathlons. Decided to start writing and sharing stories with you guys on my blog again. I will be sharing the story of my long, hard fight against cancer in the past 10 years for my comeback article, so hang on, it'll be up in a while.