Some spice for your trip?

Finally managed to catch Paprika with M and R on its final screening at the Picturehouse last night and what a trip! Watch the trailer here! It is also on youtube, but you really need to watch it in the highest quality to get a feel of what I am spouting.

What can I say. This movie is surreal. Top-notch animation combined with a completely mind twisting story line. So many things happening at once, dreams and reality melding into one huge creepy colourful parade led by the mail box and refrigerator.

The parade. I thought to myself that them animators must be tripping on something when they visualised this scene. There is no other explaination for its detail! Paprika morphing effortlessly in her dreams from one form to another. I'm so glad I caught it on the big screen because the largest home plasma TV in the market today simply won't do it justice. You know what's an even better idea? IMAX. If its screened on IMAX, I'd be the first in line to watch it there.

I can't remember half of the gibberish spouted by characters taken over by their dreams, but it was mind blowing. Random words strung together making sense in a twisted way. I was really impressed. Because I do that too and I always thought it meant that I was slightly mad. Well, now I know I'm not really. Obviously, I don't know its gibberish when I dreamt about my dream conversations, but I once woke up NNK in the middle of the night while we were in Japan to solemnly inform her that 'my brain was tethered to the rest of my body like a helium balloon, bobbing up and down.' I don't recall saying that to her but that's what she told me when we were out and about the following day. I suspect she had gotten used to my nocturnal mumblings by then, because I already spooked her out on the first day of our trip by almost re-enacting the scene in The Ring where Sadako crawled out of her TV set.

That'll be the story for another time. But I'm so happy I didn't miss this one.

Why do some crusties turn red when cooked?

This question was brought up by someone on the 'professional' mailing list I am a subscriber of. I don't feel good not naming names of those who provided answers to the discussion, but I don't want found out via google should one of these academics (or their students) google their names so suffice to say, I am merely paraphrasing their answers (with apologies).

Anyway.. someone asked the above question and it is something I've always wondered about too. Some crustaceans e.g. prawns also turn red on preservation and when asked by students, I've always replied with the standard 'That's due to protein denaturation which causes the animal to turn red'.

But thanks to the list, I have more explicit answers now! And it will undoubtedly be useful for next sem's practicals.

The culprit? Carotenoids. More specifically, astaxanthin. It exists as a protein-astaxanthin complex in the exoskeleton which gives the animal it's 'live colour'. When cooked, the protein is denatured and dissociates from astaxanthin, thus revealing the red pigment colour of astaxanthin alone.

Some crustaceans do not turn red on cooking. Stomatopods tend not to - they turn purplish. Someone on the list (he's my collaborator, as a matter of fact) suggests that this is due to the fact that these pigments are derived from diet and stomatopods tend to be more carnivorous than other crustaceans which tend to ingest more plant material or detritus.

Tadaaah! Mystery solved.

Dear aunties who were standing next to me at the meat chiller earlier on today,

Why oh why must you poke and press those little trays of meat and then put them back. You weren't even intending to buy any.

YES. THOSE are lovely cuts of pork belly. Nice pinkish colour, well distributed fats, lovingly sliced into just-so perfect thickness for sukiyaki and yakiniku. So nice to look at. But oh no.. you weren't going to be satisfied with just admiring, you had to physically pick them up and poke at them with your fat stubby fingers, just to confirm that yes.. these are indeed superior cuts of Kurobuta pork, denting the cellophane wrap in the process. AND NOW your other auntie friend feels obliged to PICK UP HER OWN little tray of pork and poke it so she can concur with your observations.

AND you repeated the same thing with those little trays of organic beef, and again with the jo-karubi beef, all the while talking to each other (jin sui hor). Ya.. jin sui.. but it wasn't anymore when you've had your wicked finger with them. They looked molested. A finger marked dent in the middle where you laid your finger on, out of shape cellophane wrap.

Jeez. I almost wanted to lean over tell you two off, but decided against it seeing that the both of you treat this outing more like an excursion than a proper grocery run, but it really does piss me off.

Why oh why oh why?!?!?!?!

/rant

Best laid plans

We did it!

Yesterday, M took part in her first ever mass running event, and I joined in after a decade long hiatus.

5km, in the blazing morning sun, no stopping! M clocked in at 36 mins and I followed about 30 seconds later. Its still a pretty good time as we knew we'd make it in under 40 minutes, but I had sort of set myself a personal target of under 35 minutes if possible.

Well... it wasn't possible after all. Running never comes easy and I was cursing to myself 2 km in and regretting a previous conversation with M.

"10km GE run?!?! HELL YEAH! Let's do it!" I take it all back now!

It was hard to move faster despite willing myself to due to an unfortunate breakfast choice of tuna mayo sandwich which was then trying to make itself back up my oesophagus, just to say hi. I almost wanted to stop sometime past the 4km mark; at one point, all I was thinking about was how good it'll be to just lie down. But I kept on moving even though it might have been faster if i had stopped and briskwalked. I just cursed under my breath and tried to get on with the programme as best as I could.

Eventually the 100m to go sign came into view and then 50m and before I knew it it was over.

I don't think I'm ready to cope with a 10km run just yet. Its a nice idea.. on paper. In the meantime, BL, M and I are thinking to joining the Sheares Bridge Run (now called Singapore Bay Run) on the 26th of August. 6km "Fun" Run (Actually, it isn't as fun as they make it out to be)! But it'll keep us moving till the end of the year where we are thinking of running 10km at the StanChart Marathon....

In the meantime, Evie just showed me the link to Run NUS on the 18th of August... Hills! I'll see if M, BL and R are interested.

Well done, M and BL!

i love youtube part 243

OMG... CREATURE COMFORTS!!!!



And there is a new american version too!

Geek cool!

I didn't know about the above TMBG song intil M told me about it! And I love ABC of Nations too!





There's a whole bunch of fun TMBG videos on youtube, so check it out if you're geek like me.



Chemical Brothers doing the Salmon Dance!



Jonathan Coulton talks about good ol' DNA, courtesy of Mr Duc.

Late night conversations with the mollusc man

Late night conversations with the mollusc man
Originally uploaded by island_girl

Its late.. but at least a section is sorted out. Can't remember half of what I was thinking when I last worked on the section, but its ok. I wish I had can get my hands on a proper pop gen thesis to look through so I know which bits to expand and which bits to gloss over. Right now I think I'm glossing over most of my methodology because all my knowledge is gleaned from publications that must nescessarily be short and concise.

I just had a thought while coming back from the loo. When this is finally all over, I shall throw a humungous crab party - makan lah. Not fancy dress. It shall be my sweet revenge. muahahahahah.