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In response to Gambitch's comment about my previous post, I have to say he's right, that the computer can't be connected to the internet. The only internet-enabled computers are laptops, which run on wireless.
Furthermore, the computer I'm working on is riddled with viruses, so it probably won't even be put on the intranet unless that is dealt with. I tried resizing the partition non-destructively like I did with this computer at home, but somehow it failed, so I gave up.
But I'm a happy man. The computer is hooked up to two LCD flatscreens, so that's a lot of desktop real estate for me to roll about in. My job is quite a programmer's wet dream, because I get to code all day long. I get to code all day long at home if I want, but firstly I don't get paid for that (even though my NS allowance is tiny, but it's still something), and secondly I don't fulfill my NS liability.
I've picked up Visual Basic for Microsoft Excel from scratch. Good thing the main program has already been coded (this was done in 1999/2000), and I think my job is to modify the code to add critical new features. Along the way I've identified various areas where I can improve useability and robustness.
There's nothing like having a job to make me work. No deadlines have been set for me yet, but definitely soon. Got a project to do this weekend also. My aunty, who's a school principal, asked me to do some writeup on the situation of Special Schools in Singapore. This issue has also recently come up in the news, along with the new Prime Minister, who talked about making Singapore more inclusive and "caring".
Weekend Today Newspaper has a front-page story on the "Rising Prices and the Defiant Young Smoker", basically describing the trend where a lot of youngsters are picking up the habit, and that increased taxes doesn't really do much. It just means they cut back on other stuff, like perhaps lunch, and they move towards cheaper brands.
But the thing that bugs me is that the Health Promotion Board is reportedly having such campaigns (quoted from Today Newspaper, Oct 2-3 2004, page 3):
- Smoking robs women of their looks, their health and their baby - press advertisements will contain this message
- Beauty, fashion and wellness businesses - the HPB will join forces with them to increase its outreach
This, even though according to the article, "Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan said in Parliament recently that a study had indicated that young women smoke because of 'peer pressure, to relief stress, control their weight and improve their social image'".
Health is health, and I'm afraid society's idea of beauty for women is so warped that the intersection with health is tenuous. "Beauty" businesses invariably send out the signal to women that they are too fat, and that they have fat in all the "wrong places". And they have advertisements showing actresses endorsing how their program made them slim again and fit for TV after having their baby.
The stress relieving effect of nicotine, coupled with the weight-loss effects of smoking, is a powerful formula attracting women to smoking. Everywhere you go, on billboards, in newspapers, you see advertisements and TV shows with women having perfectly flat tummies, and I can certainly imagine that women want to be like these women, because men like these women, and they diet, and maybe their friends tell them they can do more than diet, they can smoke, that will help them lose weight too.
I think health, both physical and mental, is the main force opposing the dieting and smoking trends. I don't think beauty businesses serve any social purposes at all. They sacrifice the well-being of many women to enrich their pockets. Beauty businesses are only good at pointing out that everyone is fat, or perhaps not fat, just fat in the wrong areas, focussing everyone on appearances and stressing how important it is that you look good, focussing on the superficial and the shallow. The mainstream fashion industry is no better, every so often parading skinny models down the catwalk in ridiculous and ridiculously expensive cloth.
Honestly, it's so terribly out of date. Content matters so much more than appearances. Websites with Flash and not much else suck. Plain html with great content are great sites. Clothing should be evolving into practicality: all pants should have pockets, as a start, and then maybe some lightweight electronics can be integrated, and I expect the day is near when our environment becomes so harsh that clothing has to be protective against UV rays, pollution, and cosmic and surface radiation.
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