Christina Sng dot com

My 100 year old grandmother, fiesty as a whip in her day, succumbed to organ failure from advanced pancreatic cancer, and passed away peacefully on Friday with her family around her. RIP Mama. We miss you very much.

Having been around for almost as long as the Internet as we know it, the one thing I can be sure of is that the stability of our Internet connection is not something we can count on.

Back when broadband first came about, connection was intermittent and annoyingly slow and unreliable. I remember having 2 accounts: one broadband and one very cheap dial-up.

The reason is this. Sometimes you simply need to get online and during these times, it is usually to do something that requires very little bandwidth. Perhaps you desperately need to receive an urgent email, or login to Ebay to ensure you win that bid, or simply to check if your stocks are diving or flying. The worst thing that can happen is your broadband is down. And yes, it happens even now, albeit not as often, but it does.

You yourself know how reliable your broadband is. So if it isn’t, get a separate dial-up, something cheap and without a contract (the latter is very important). With something non-committal like Basic ISP’s unlimited dial-up for $6.95, you just can’t go wrong.

When your Internet connection is down, ask yourself this: would you pay $6.95 right now just to get online?

I reckon 15 years down the road, the kids would be sitting at their computers (networked and setup by me unless they take such an interest in computing like me… but I digress), chatting with their friends and having a whole world open to them that I don’t know about.

Or do I? Aha! Enter Computer Spy Mama.

Unbeknownst to them, Mama has installed a computer spy program on each of their computers. So if they are up to sneaky things, I’ll know about it.

Or do I want to even know about it? I trust I know my kids, but sometimes trouble lurks in unexpected places. I guess I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Maybe they’ll be smart and just learn how to work their computers themselves. I think I have put it on their homeschooling curriculum. Dang it.

Still, this cute little computer spy gadget is making me drool and feel all stealthy and spy-like. Wait… their Daddy is not very PC-literate… *evil grin*

There was a best-I-can-describe-it portable heater smell emanating from the vent of my Lenovo v100 a few days ago. I’d been leaving the laptop on and leaving my glass a tad too close to the vent and caused 2 auto shutdowns due to overheating (this is from retrospect).

The most likely possibility was that perhaps some pet hair or hair had gotten stuck inside and just needed a camera blower to clean it. I lent a concentrated amount of my own CO2 but to little effect. Other suggestions included burnt chips and an impending fire. I quickly shut it down and did not turn it on again.

A call to Lenovo saw me bounced around to 2 different venues thanks to the efficiency of outsourcing. So was the very polite advice, which was to bring it to the service centre where they would charge me $50 for simply looking at it (or at their discretion).

I protested that while IBM was still IBM, my Thinkpad was always looked at for free, then I would be charged if I required further work. Of course these were the same guys who, in Melbourne, pronounced my Thinkpad deader than dead, causing me to weep in my husband’s arms for its demise, only to start it up months later back in Singapore to find it running again, as if nothing had happened.

Further investigation uncovered that Melbourne’s erratic power supply may have been at fault.

Anyhow, while that old Thinkpad sits in the unexciting museum cupboard in my study reminiscing about the good old days (it worked for 10 years – might actually still work but I haven’t tried turning it on), I thought the Lenovo’s days were numbered when the smell persisted on the vent itself and I removed it from the room. I even contemplated buying a Mac, only to be rather concerned about the “toxic smells” coming from it too (Google: Mac+toxic+smell).

3 days later (and many hours wasted researching for a non-toxic laptop later), the smell was suddenly gone. A few good sniffs delivered just hot air up my nose and I was relieved that the need to search for another laptop was over.

Incidentally, Nokia is still the greenest company. Have a look at the Greenpeace report and see where Lenovo and the rest stand.

One of the few skills I do not possess is driving. To most people’s surprise I never took my licence. Well, that’s incorrect. I did take my basic and passed, but failed my advanced theory. Never took it again.

Actually I have a licence to ride a motorcycle up to 200cc and had owned a Kawasaki KMX 125 when I was 17, but I gave that up when I went to Canada to study. But that is not all that practical when it comes to driving my kids around.

So at the old age of 36 I am going to prepare myself to go learn driving. First I have to pass my basic theory test, then my advanced theory, both of which I have to be sufficiently awake and alert to study and sit for.

Next, to survive 20 hours worth of driving lessons and then pass my driver’s practical exam. It all sounds so long and dreary that it feels like such a chore to take it on. Plus the primary nightmare of finding someone to look after the 2 kids while I go for those 2 hour lessons.

Hence the wait for Jade to be a little older so her naps are more predictable and she is on solids and can do without Mom for around 3 hours at a stretch.

Anyway, to inspire me to undertake this endeavour (since I swore after university I’d never sit for another exam again, but I did, and that is another story), my husband told me to look around for what car I’d like to drive as my very first car. Of course he never said he’d buy it for me but hey, who knows.

Now I’ve always known without a doubt that my favourite car, the one I want to drive most is a 2010 Jeep. No doubt about that. But Jeeps are not very environmental and will probably cost an arm and a leg in taxes and petrol.

The Volvo XC60 looks really pretty but what caught my eye was this BMW X6 hybrid review – is BMW also going hybrid? That would certainly change my perception of them. It seems every guy out there wants a Z4, preferably the latest 2010 BMW Z4, but me, I like the Porsche Cayman S in black.

But realistically, I would probably end up with a nice Toyota, safest car for the kids.

I must confess it has been years since I have gamed on anything other than a PC (and now iPod Touch). Video games have come a long way since I was a kid some 30 years ago. I was one of the earliest players of GameBoy, well, when it was just GameBoy.

To me, the epitome of true gaming is Wii, which has really taken it to the next level with its incredibly realistic interactivity using its exceptionally creative game controllers. Wii is everything gaming should be in this digital age and more, but for its awful avatars on Wii Sports.

So far I have resisted the temptation to buy a Wii. It promises to be fun, exciting for the whole family, and very very distracting. My brother and sister have each gotten one for their own households already and so we’ve been ho-hum about it. I mean, if we really want to play, we can go there.

I told myself I would raise my kids sans TV and video games and I meant it, but already Jack is playing educational games on our iPod Touch (see, it has become ours now, not mine!) and he watches some telly at Grandma’s.

Still, when we finally do achieve the technology to create video games in the most realistic manner – to actually wield a sword or katana, and walk and jump in an RPG (tiring as it might seem), I will gladly surrender my free time to this inspired existence.

I finally bade farewell to my Yahoo email, setting it into its grave. It was a long and fruitful relationship but spammers got to it.

I had used it as my website contact years ago but quickly switched to typing the various spam avoidance configurations such as emailaddress[at]yahoo.com, emailaddress[at]yahoo dot com, and even emailaddressNOSPAM[at]yahoo dot com.

But unfortunately, like a locust attack, the spammers were merciless. The ratio of actual emails to spam went from 5:1 to 1:5 then 1:50, and then I called it a day and laid that poor address to rest.

There are few ways around it. If you want people to contact you, especially if you’re an online store, you need a contact form or an email address. The latter is problematic because forms can fail, and many have.

There are programs that can help you hide your email address like A.T.G., aka AntiSpam “Mailto” Tag Generator which basically encrypts the ‘mailto:’ HTML code containing your clickable email address with JavaScript.

Here is an in-depth explanation of how it works. There’s a trial version with a watermark, but certainly worth a buy for $9.99 if you need to put your email address online for any reason at all.

While checking out The Garden Slug, really the nicest diner I’ve ever been to (great food, fun peeps, neat decor, pet-friendly too although my cats will probably bolt to the kitchen first), I caught a glimpse of this neat blog… and spied a familiar face (yup, that one that greets me every morning to tell me to get up – not Jack).

My irreplaceable iPod Touch. And this cute baby below is by far the coolest looking case I’ve seen so far, barring my very pretty but rather chalky feeling Agent18 FlowerVest I’m still trying to get used to. That means rubber because my baby’s rubber mat feels the same.

Gonna put it on my birthday wishlist because sans the income my cool producer job used to afford me, these niceties have since become wants, not needs. Here’s the blog of the talented woman who makes them. Support handmade (well, the few things remaining that can be)!

Here are the funnest, most educational apps to date for toddlers and childlike adults since our last review in February 2009.

1. Elephant Song

Wonderfully interactive, beautifully simple pictures, and a lovely song. When my son first played it, it was my morning anthem for a few weeks. After a while, I couldn’t get the song out of my head. It originated in YouTube but found its way to the iPhone, and for that I am grateful. The recent upgrade has made it more interactive. And to top it off, the app is free.

2. Preschool Arcade

The sequel to Preschool Adventure. Again, I woke up to the sounds of the arcade with this game which I’d been reluctant to try because I was afraid it wouldn’t be educational. But the developers very pleasantly surprised me and what followed was an educational, musical extravaganza which taught my son numbers, alphabets, and shapes in an arcade environment. Very cleverly educational and very good family fun for the children.

3. Ike’s Machine

This is also a sequel to Ike the Inventor, this time for slightly older kids. But you get to create things from blueprints that show the formulas (e.g. to make a book, you need 5 units of a blue stick, 10 units of a green stick, and 50 units of a green liquid). I thought it might have been too difficult for a 3 year old, but no, with a few weeks of help, my son soon mastered reading measurements from a blueprint and addition from this wonderful app and can now play it himself. Kudos to the brilliant inventor!

4. The Boy Who Cried Wolf

From the same people who brought you The Little Red Hen, the same delightful little girl narrates the familiar story of the boy who cried wolf, along with interactive characters and a kind end to this morality tale.

5. Dem Bones

A really fun game to teach kids about our skeleton. A skeleton is laid bare at the start with a pile of bones on the ground. The child must then put the bones back to where they belong according which bone is called. Good giggly fun for parent and child to play together.

6. Where’s Gumbo?

A classic “find someone” game turned interactive. Cute and engaging for a toddler, and switches on their seeking radar (see: The Science of Parenting).

7. First Words: At Home

From the First Words series. A child learns spelling by putting the alphabets back into the shadowed boxes. Simple, familiar, and educational.

8. ShapeBuilder

This one sparks everyone’s curiosity. A shape is presented with various jigsaw pieces to be filled. When filled, it transforms into either a gimme or an object you just could not have thought of. Very fun for both parent and child. Jack played this for hours.

9. Artsee

Similar to ShapeBuilder but this time you use your finger to splatter paint onto the shape and you’ll be asked to guess what it is out of 3 options. I say “you” in this case because I end up playing it too.

10. Old MacDonald’s Farm

Old MacDonald’s has expanded his farm with more animals than Noah could ever hold. This time, we can listen to him sing about sharks, dinosaurs, walruses, and even an octopus. It brought us lots of laughs and very loud animal sounds. No, no one called the zoo.

Part 1, written in February 2009, can be found on my personal blog Strange Machines.

After scouring the ads for 2 weeks, I’ve concluded that the 3 mobile service providers here simply concentrate on customer acquisition (ok, to be fair to Starhub, they do give their customers $50-200 vouchers depending on their plan every year, but their customer service person on the phone admitted that sometimes customers have to call them to remind them to send them their vouchers).

The 2 telcos I could switch to offer $100 to new sign ups but NOT on all phones, which explains why I haven’t jumped ship yet. The irony is that the only telco that offers $100 off ALL phones is the one I am currently with, and the $100 is only if you’re a new sign up.

So what they are telling us is, switch every 2 years. It pays to. Why be loyal? There really is no benefit.

Now I simply have to wait for some other telco to offer me the N86 at $100 less and I’m gone.

Wouldn’t it be cheaper to just retain me with a “you’re so special for being with us for over 10 years” $100 off my next phone bonus?