BMW ///M5 lover

A grasshopper kept me company on the bus on the way home.

Well, not really what you think. The grasshopper was happily clinging to the side of the bus on the top of the window sill. It was huge; and beautiful. It had a mottled green exo and had the longest legs I had ever seen. Sadly as most Singaporeans are, most of the commuters were too busy finding gold on the floor or too wrapped up in their own world to notice a wonderful piece of nature (despite its size).

The haze has been a killer these few days, especially today. It was literally a soup when I came home. Visibility was down to nearly 1km only. And today was the first time I could not see clearly down my road when I looked. Totally unbelievable. Thanks to it too I have a perpetual sore throat. Goddamned Indonesian farmers.

NASA's telescopes have discovered a planet that is something short of amazing. Unlike Earth and similar planets in our Solar System that are evenly heated, Upsilon Andromeda b has one side of it baked in between 2,550 to 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,400 to 1,650 degrees Celsius) but only minus 4 to 450 degrees Fahrenheit (20 to 230 degrees Celsius) on the dark side. "If you were moving across the planet from the night side to the day side, the temperature jump would be equivalent to leaping into a volcano," said study leader Brad Hansen of the University of California, Los Angeles. Anyone remember the film Chronicles of Riddick? Remember the scene where he and couple of other escapees tried to run to the hangar to escape, all this while being chased by the scorching heat? Such a planet conjures up images of exotic, distant, mysterious heavenly bodies. Wow.

Went running with Audrey yesterday despite the haze. Made her go through my NCC warm up routine. Rather satisfying performing it after nearly a 6 month absence. I managed a 6 round, 15-min-odd run. Not too bad if I might say so. Could have ran faster but accompanied her for her 3 round, ah, stint. Went to meet Eunice for lunch after that. She was supposed to come run with us but overslept. Audrey and her had much fun trying to kill one of those machines that you slot a dollar coin in, turn a handle and a little dinky toy comes out. Problem was they didn't quite get what they wanted so both of them spent a combined amount of $10 trying to coax Donald Duck and some other toy out of the machine, to no avail.

And I'm the youngest.

Jo called from school. Completely forgot today was her first day of school. Amazing how two weeks of holidays can pass so fast. Her cat came back home to her, and I'm really happy for her. She had been agonizing over that missing feline for nearly 2 weeks. Maybe God really is looking down on us.

Tomorrow's start of a new term of German. Hopefully I get back Katrin, my old teacher. She's the only teacher I feel comfortable with: her explanations are clear-cut and precise.

And my new imaginary girlfriend is a BMW M5. Imaginary. That's the word.