Emoticons and Dead Mice: Part One

Disclaimer: If you cannot tolerate vivid descriptions of scientific experimentation of animals, you are kindly invited to leave, NOW. By entering this site, you will renounce your right to sue, defame, hack, firebomb, assasinate, disfigure, lay arms on, the author. If you refuse to take this shit, please leave this site and go here. Without further ado, I bring you: Emoticons and Dead Mice: Part One We cut up 6 dead mice on Tuesday for cell technology. Sorry, I couldn't get hold of any photos so far. It was quite a sombre affair, especially during the carbon dioxide gassing. I didn't get to see it, because it was too crowded. The dissection began shortly. I teamed up with Sanjeev and Elicia. I cut open the skin The rest was done by Sanjeev. He opened the visceral membrane and extracted the spleen. I must comment that his techinique was quite smooth. There was no fat stuck to the spleen at all. Excellent. There was no blood spilt. We didn't nick any of the blood vessels. I did the mashing up of the spleen, with the back of a syringe. Such strange improvision. What? Is NYP too poor to buy proper mortars and pestles? Never mind... In any case, the experiment took pretty long. Plenty of centrifugation. It was a nice experiment! Next time I'll cut up something bigger! Now about emoticions.. Their use in IM conversations has proliferated greatly. The latest trend seems to be that of substituting a particular word or letter with an animation. That wasn't a very good sample. Maybe something like this will do better? Holy shit....what the hell was that? I took about 3.34354664665 minutes just to read that line?! Either the writing is illegible, or my reading skills have been reduced to that of a toddler. I don't think the latter is true, so we'll have to go with the former. But hey, kids are getting smarter nowadays, you know what I mean? Don't you find this kind of writing annoying? It's bad enough that your sentences are consisted mainly of such animations. Now, what could be worse than that? Big animations, just like this! Spamming, I tell you! But wait, there's more. In their effort to attract more attention (acting cute, I'd say), they seem to have had so much practice, that some of them don't even realise that they use such animations in their conversations! Ok, maybe your kid brother/sister was using your profile (I'm sure...), but that's a lousy excuse really... anD doN't LeT me gEt sTartED On thE uSAgE Of tYpINg sUCh As thiS!! Ors fwensterz terminologiesss such as diaoZZZzzZz and testis w0rzz!! Oh my God, I think I just became more stupid. I will go into further detail on 'fwensterz terminologiesss' in the next installment! Thank you and God love you! This post is a public service announcement by the Royal English Police.

Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Ah, today is the feast of the Assumption.

On November 1st in the Holy Year of 1950, Pope Pius XII using the gift of Papal Infallibility, solemnly defined the Dogma (the Greek word for truth) of our Lady's Assumption when he said, "Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death."

Does this mean that the idea of Assumption was invented on this day? No. It was merely declared to be true on this day. The idea of Mary’s Assumption already came up during the time of the early Christians.

One may say, “How can this be possible if it’s not written in the Bible?” Well my friends, a lot of things are not written in the Bible. But that will be explained at another time.

In the Resurrection, the Body of our Lord Jesus Christ underwent a miraculous change, so that He received a Glorified Body, a body that would never again suffer pain or death, proving that He is really the King of kings and Lord of lords. He Alone is victorious over sin and death; thus defeating Satan and overcoming the world!

When Mary’s earthly life was drawing to an end, our Lord deemed it fitting that Mary should now share in and enjoy His victory. And what did God do for His Immaculate Mother? Shortly after Her death, the Lord received our Lady, Body and Soul into Heaven. For as Mary had shared in our Lord's terrible sufferings and death, so it was just that She should share in His Bodily Resurrection. Our Lord did not wish His Temple that is Her Body, to undergo corruption or decay in the tomb.

So what does this Assumption thingy really mean for all of us? Well, it means that God keeps His promises. We know that at the end of time, our souls will be reunited with our bodies, which will be resurrected, never to suffer and die again. As it goes in the Creed,

“We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the Communion of Saints,the Resurrection of the body, and life everlasting, Amen.”

He will share with all of His Faithful ones, His own Glorious Victory over sin and death.

Let us ask for the intercession of our Blessed Mother, that God will grant us the grace to make our journey towards our final destination.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc, et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now, and in the hour of our death. Amen.

天主圣母玛利亚，求您现在和我们临终时，为我们罪人祈求天主。亚孟。

A muse in the making

I had PALS Forum on Saturday. Oh damn, waking up so early just to go for this stupid thing. I met some new people. Hmm.

Well, I went for this workshop at 2 pm. It’s called Writing Workshop: Poetry in Practice. It was organized by some Dead Poets Society people from Sgforums. It was conducted by this local writer named Alvin Pang. I’ve never heard of him. Obviously I need to read more books.

It was funny to meet the forum people for the first time.

Me: Hi! I’m (insert nickname)! Guy I’m meeting for the first time: Hi! I’m (insert nickname)!

The rest of them laughed. There were quite a few students there. Mostly RI guys, 4 Whitely girls, and 2 from YJC I think.

I was the youngest of all the DPS people there. It was an interesting workshop. I learnt quite a bit. Metaphors. Line breaks. Nursery rhymes.

What? I paid $30 just to listen to nursery rhymes? Nah, there’s more.

Here’s a tip for analyzing poetry: Try reading or singing it. Aloud, if you must.

The weeks move so fast. Exams will be here real soon, followed by holidays!!

For Hibakusha

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world, grant us peace.

Atomic bombing of Nagasaki, 9 August 1945 For the Hibakusha (被爆者).

Sacerdotal Ordination of Deacons Damien de Wind and Valerian Chong

7 August 2005

I went to CL today. It was quite good. I was the leader today. The kids seem to be singing the songs with more joy now.

I had lunch at home with my family. I couldn’t be bothered to do my lab reports, so I was playing C&C Generals Zero Hour custom maps. Quite interesting. I was playing one mission where I had to fight off a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

Oh, I attended a Sacerdotal Ordination today! Two deacons from Holy Family were ordained priests. It was crowded. I had to sit at the back with this old ma and share the book with him. I couldn’t see much of what was happening at the front, from the back. It was really, really long. But it was interesting. Today was the first time I seen something like this. Archbishop Nicholas Chia ordained the two deacons, Damien de Wind and Valerian Chong. I don’t know them personally though.

It’s interesting to see how the Sacrament of Holy Orders is performed. The Archbishop lays his hands on them and says the prayer of ordination. He then proceeds to investiture them with their stole and chasuble. The stole and chasuble are liturgical garments. Priests wear them during Mass.

The stole represents the priest’s distinctive sharing in Christ’s priesthood. It symbolizes the office of the cleric, immortality and the yoke of Christ.

The chasuble represents the yoke of Christ.

After this, the archbishop anoints their palms with chrism oil. The anointing of hands symbolizes the priest’s distinctive participation in Christ’s priesthood.

+2 priests for the Lord's service. Praise the Lord!