We escaped to the beach again

It was just sort of a hunch, a last minute decision of Go Or No Go, and then we said, "Screw it, let's just go." So we lugged whatever we could pack in the car & drove off. It was lovely, the decision-making in between & the decision itself. See ya. (Photo from feaverish)

Her morning elegance

Videos like this make my day. (via swissmiss)

Does it ring any bell?

If there is any truth to Nietzche's concept of eternal return, it is possible that in the life before I was sitting in the exact same spot writing the same post about Triceracopter, except I don't think in the past life there was anything as mind-blowingly awesome as the Triceracopter! (Photo via its Flickr page)

I swear they can read my mind

... and spun my nightmare off in this genius project! (via notcot)

The Pedestrian Project consists of several performers wearing entirely black custom-made costumes modeled after the generic images of men, women, and children seen on public signs.

The 80's called

Azry & I spent our weekends at our hometown, Sungai Petani, Kedah which is in the northern part of Malaysia and is about 4 hours drive from Kuala Lumpur. Every time I go back home I have a bad habit of rummaging through our old stuffs and chuckling at every find. I found the old Gila-Gila (Malaysian equivalent of MAD magazine) magazines in which I'd Tipp-Exed the conversations in the dialogue boxes and added those of my own, my old diaries in which I wrote about my hatred for certain teachers and backstabbing friends, and of course, old photos of me and my parents.

Taking a look at my parents' photos during their times at UiTM students (it was called Mara Institute of Technology back then) perhaps pre Akta University made me realized how they were such a fashion firebrand back then - Mum with her short skirts & afro hair and Dad with his bell bottom pants & sleek black hair with that razor-sharp sideburn that could make women of his times go crazy with every 'hi'.

I also found a stack of my old CDs - Savage Garden, Travis, Jewel & many more - so I popped in Savage Garden in the CD player and was taken back to the time when I had a fantasy Darren (the frontman) was standing outside on the road across the balcony of my apartment singing "The Lover After Me". *smacks herself*

And the telly aired a classic 80's flick (according to Ward) with a young Val Kilmer in it with his crazy university science experiment. Anybody knows the movie? (Photo via Dark Roasted Blend)

Yudl - Ay - EEE - Ooooo!

It's my birthday and I'll yodel if I want to! By the way, that's not my family, it's Akihiro Furuta's. Now excuse me while I go form my own all-family folk music band. I'll be the one playing the spoons by the way. There are spoons, Neo, there are spoons!

Three quirky men in an awesome video

How The Day Sounds from Miky Wolf on Vimeo.

And also for the fact that Elijah Wood is in it too. (via hellofrancis)

Speaking of quirky, Azry decided to keep his mustache and I absolutely hate it. Besides the fact that it itches when we kiss, the bush of facial hair on his upperlip makes him look a thousand years older than he already is and when he asked if he looked good, I said, "You look 48 and I'm your 18-year-old young & hot wife." Of course I still love him anyway.

Swinging underground

This project made me believe that it's OK to play more! Just how many times are you sitting in the subway train (here we call it the LRT) - numb, boring, pretending to read but actually was agitating how many stations it takes to reach our destination? 

The swing was designed by Caroline Woolard back in 2006 in the hope that the innocent amusement of swinging on the subway eclipses the atmosphere of numbness and suspicion partially generated by the infamous New York City subway dictate “if you see something, say something". (via Guerilla Innovation)

I also love her notion at the end of the paragraph: The swing began my Flying Lessons. Gravitation is a phenomenon through which all objects attract each other. Flight is the process by which an object achieves sustained movement through the air. Flying is the only way to escape a two-dimensional existence.

Polaroid lives!

If you have been with me since the beginning, I was an avid Polaroid photographer and you may have noticed that when Polaroid ceased the film production, it broke my heart. Thanks to Tina, I just got to know that if all goes to plan, the Polaroid factory in Enschede, Amsterdam, will soon be making film again! While you're at it, well, you know, my birthday is coming up very-very soon (clings at your feet and weeps incessantly).

Rafiq's new boogey(wo)man

Went bowling with Maya, Aida & her adorable 3-year-old son Rafiq last Saturday. This was Rafiq's first time meeting me, and needless to say he must have found Aunt Zana's loud cackles & perpetual pointless ramblings rather fearsome, so he wailed his cute little Mickey Mouse socks off.

I ♥ infographics!

One of my newly discovered love(s) are the art of information graphics. In my mind, I keep imagining how challenging it would be to turn a dull subject matter such as the results of last elections into an instant eye appeal as well as maintaining the accuracy of the subject as close as possible.

From IdN magazine Volume 15 No 4:

We are surrounded by information graphics - they illustrate information that would be unwieldy in text form, and act as visual shorthand for everyday concepts such as 'stop' and 'go'. In newspapers, infographics are commonly used to show the weather, as well as maps and site plans for newsworthy events and graphs for statistical data.

The John Deere company used a rabbit & a turtle icon to represent fast & slow on the throttle of its tractors. And one of the most universal icons of recent years is the 'love' heart representing the word 'love' on everything from T-shirts to greeting cards to NY.

Check out the the specialised designers in infographics portrayed in the issue: Number 27, Plusminus, SPVZ, Lamosca, Nicholas Felton (of Feltron annual report fame), Dave Bowker & many more.

You're the only guy who's ever been inside of me

Because every guy needs a little of other guy's love.

Computer says no

Thanks to Leila for letting me download a whole load of Little Britain (Season 1, 2, 3, Little Britain in USA & Little Britain Abroad, I've finished watching them all!) my daily conversations now will contain snippets of the script like Vicky Pollard's "Yeah but no but yeah but no but yeah but no.." or "SHUT UP !" or Andy's "Yeah I know." or "That one!" or Carol Beer's "Computer says no... *coughs*"

Thank you for the enlightenment, girl friend. Now I fully understand my dad's obsession with The Benny Hill Show long time ago. 

Maya's got a brand new dSLR

... and I discovered I could do more than 500 facial expressions. (Katie's Moo the cat & Samuel Beckett's from The Daily Aphorism at the back.)

This is Where We Live

This Is Where We Live from 4th Estate on Vimeo.

The film was produced in stop-motion over 3 weeks in autumn 2008. Each scene was shot on a home-made dolly by an insane bunch of animators. It's amazing how they can achieve this in just three weeks' time. (via swissmiss)

Someone once told me

Someone once told me I am smarter than him but never mind, he's practical he could get away with anything.

I am all for inspirational projects, so when Neil Perkin pointed to Someone Once Told Me where photographer Mario Cacciotollo took black & white pictures of people holding up a large piece of paper, upon which they write something someone has told them. I could get myself indulged reading all these inspiring messages. Or perhaps I have a partial for photography with ubiquitous fashion of holding posters up their heads?

Helping out with Delinn's GRE homework

Delinn's current enthusiasm of studying for the GRE has gotten me flipping the thesaurus and exercising my English vocabulary again and in a way, it's somewhat awesome. So Delinn, here's for you:

Delinn's lack of voice is caused by the inflamed throat perhaps due to her numerous amount of garrulous activities, which is often done leisurely albeit her supposed busyness with workloads.

Oh Delinn, before I forget, good luck! Er, when is the exam again?

Creative lessons from Bowie

Here's today's little inspiration: 10 creative lessons from David Bowie (from Stan's tweet). Because we love to liken the way we work to the ideas of our rock stars and such. Remember this post from Design Observer? The Sopranos was one of my favorite tv series back in the days.

Let the absorption begin

I am completely blown away by the simplicity of this idea. We used to do these kind of stuffs, writing using markers on a paper layered with another heavy stack of papers so that the absorbed ink won't stain our (almost) pristine white table. All this while we've been avoiding it. Yet Daniel Eatock decided to let nature take its course.  (via notcot)

Unhappy new year for Gaza

I, for one, am not the one you could talk to about political debates. Nor that I have any extensive knowledge about what happened over at Gaza, and the whole Israel vs Hamas hodgepodge, or whose geographical state it should incline on, or how many deaths of the civilians inflicted by this scene. I am just that person who wants this to end the soonest. 

"I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent." Mohandas Gandhi.

Photos from Boston.com.

Azry bottom burps in the water

And the waters off Phi Phi shore was never the same again (The respective parts are pixelated for your own good, trust me).

If there is a new year resolution for me

... it'd be to travel more. Pack light, perhaps a tube of lipgloss, two cameras and a journal, and wander aimlessly, losing sense of all time & space. If only. Inspired from Andrea, photo from (kerry) and I just recently found a cool tumblelog to feed my hunger for enchanting visuals.

The Seed

Procrastination from TutoxNet on Vimeo.

To promote their new version of software, Adobe CS4, John Kelly was given free reign to create The Seed : an animated journey through the life of an apple seed. The animation was funded by Adobe through their agency of record, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners. (via Trendland)

Duffy, digital music & the demise of graphics album cover

Perhaps a bit late in the bandwagon, but I just recently discovered Duffy's music & loving it to bits. Azry got me Dido's latest hits CD as well last Thursday, since I've always loved her. While you're at it, check out a brilliant article about digital music and the slow demise of the graphics album cover over at Design Assembly, my latest reading drug.

We made a new friend on the first morning of 2009

I woke up to a soft, pitiful yelp at the back of our kitchen on the morning of January 21st 2009. Wasn't much enthusiatic to the new day, I made my way to the kitchen door and opening it, I shrieked with horror upon finding Lincoln the cat in the midst of dugging his claws into this poor little fellow's ear. Upon seeing my presence, he wriggled himself out of Lincoln's grasp and ran towards me, as if asking for reassurance. Lincoln gave me a look that said about his bully victim, "Crybaby." and walked away. He had no say of protest the moment I picked up the little darling inside the house.

I called him 'Si Cantik' (the beautiful one) and it's pretty much self-explanatory for me. We didn't know where he came from, but Azry fell in love with him too and the other cats (Mother, Michael, Lincoln & Chitam) were probably plotting to throw him out of the house because he is so delightfully manja (sweet) and clings to us the whole time.

With much to add to the list, yes we are the crazy cats couple too.

2K9 <--- yet another cliched term

This is my obligatory post for yet another New Year (don't mind the lackadaisical tone) of 2009. Hoping for a better year, all of us. Today I decide to draw/take photos/document everything I consume, inspired by Keri Smith's How to be an Explorer of the World. Ask me about the outcome the next day. (Photo from World of Oddy)