maxEasyGuide

The Kiss of Eternity = The Kiss of Life

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 11:48:00 +0000

On 24th July 2010, Lydia and I took part in “The Kiss of Eternity” organized by Cathay to celebrate their 75 Anniversary. It’s an endurance challenge which the last standing participant kissing the giant size diamond prop will win the Lustria Diamond Jewellery set, worth $75,000 sponsored by Soo Kee Jewellery. For me, that’ll mean our wedding jewellery well taken care of, so does the 20% down-payment requirement for the HDB property unit we are looking at.

On that day itself, we started off with some mini games which decide the winner will get to choose their kissing spot first. Lydia and I emerged as the winner for the mini game and we were both happy enough to get to choose the kissing spot first. This will be the kissing spot that both lips must not leave in order to win the grand prize. It’s a good start to the endurance challenge, that’s what I told myself.

The endurance challenge game started at 5pm, 24th July. There were 9 participants(a representative from each couple) in total, and among us, only one lady and one 68 years old man. Participants are given 5 or 10 minutes break every alternate 2 hours during the challenge. No other body parts were allowed to be in contact with the diamond prop, only lips were to be firmly placed on the lips mark which we chose earlier on. In my mind, strong will and determination to win the jewellery set for my most loved lady will keep me through the end.

Game master officiated starting of the game! Songs blasted away from the PA system, few peoples stopped by to see what’s going on, participants concentrated on kissing firmly on the diamond. 1st 2 hours passed easily for all of us, and then we were given 5 minutes break. If things was going on at this pace, I should be able outlast all of them. That was easier said than done….

5 minutes break was up and every participant back to their position for another round of 2 hours. Not sure how much time has passed and suddenly there was loud applause. Not sure what’s going on as I couldn’t turn my head to see, I can only roll my eyes left and right trying to see what’s happening. Shortly after that, game master announced that one participant gave up. To my surprised, it’s not the old uncle but a young man like me. Game continued on for the rest of us. Not knowing the time, we can only relied on our surrounding to guess how much time has passed and how much time left till our next break.

Another round of applause sent off the old uncle who had held on for 3 hours 10 mins. Participants’ number was down to 7, and we were still gluing our lips to the kissing mark. All are hoping to outlast one another. My whole body started to feel the uneasiness of the prolonged standing but it’s still acceptable. 2nd round passed with two participants quit the game, now everyone got their 10 mins break. I quickly gobbled up some biscuits that Lydia prepared for me and then lied down to get some sleep.

Good time passed swiftly without me noticing it and once again game master reminded us there was 2 more mins before resuming the game. Lydia, my loveliest girlfriend helped to massage my leg before I proceed to the kissing position. She hugged me and whispered to me, “You can do it”. These words of encouragement were what I needed most when my body stamina was deteriorating. I readied myself for the 3rd round, stretched my leg and arms before heading to the kissing position. Another round of 2 hours start and next break will be at 11:20pm. From this round on ward, I not only had to sustain physical fatigue but also sleepiness.

Time passed…… Tried hard to keep myself awake and not went into sleep state. I guessed aching leg and shoulder did a little bit of favor in keeping me awake by making me do some exercise on my leg and arms.

“It’s 1 hour left to your 5 mins break!” game master announced. That’s when my heart got troubled, my leg, back, shoulder and neck felt even sore. I’ve been standing for so long and yet it’s just 1 hour? Never mind, it’s just another hour to go, trying to comfort myself. Songs didn’t help in speeding up the time passed, rather it torture me by reminding how slow the time passed. One song after another, yet it’s still not our break yet. Listening anxiously and impatiently for the announcement yet it’s so quiet. I felt like my Gastrocnemius muscle going to break any moment.

Then the announcement came, which I thought finally I can have a 5 mins rest. But my heart sank when I heard, “Another 30 mins till your break”. WHAT! Only 20 mins has passed since last announcement, how could that be possible, I’ve heard countless of songs being played yet it’s just 30 mins. Disbelieving my ears, I’ve to kiss on in order to win. Just another half an hour to go… I will be doing fine. Then I started to track the number of songs being played to decide how much time has passed. I was assuming back then, each song will play for 4 mins. Usually, I lost count after counting first few songs. It doesn’t really matter, because I knew I was getting closer to my break time though it seems thousands year away.

“Another 15 mins till your break”. As usual, shocked by the slowness of passing time but my heart had not gave up. The closer to break time, the slower the time passed. I guessed I was physically worn up and really thirst for the break. “It’s 5 mins till your break”. Finally, just another 5 mins and I’ll be able to get to rest, yearned my heart. “It’s 4 mins till your break”. Minutes passed incredibly slow, I never realized that passing a minute can be so painstaking. Bedridden people with conscious mind must be feeling the same as I was, and it’s fortunate enough that this was just a game with an ending. I really felt so sad for what they are going through, which not all people understand. “60 more sec till your break”…“30 more sec”…“10 more sec”…”5, 4, 3, 2, 1. You may have your 5 mins break now”

Lydia quickly grabbed me and supported me to lie down. She had been standing nearby but can’t communicate with me because of rules and regulations. I really appreciated her effort in staying by my side to let me know that she’s supporting me. I can sense her worries yet supportive heart. It must be torturing for her to see what I was going through physically and mentally. I didn’t bother with food or going to wash room, just drank a little and lied down quickly to get some sleep for the mid-night battle.

5 mins break was over just as fast as I closed my eye. Depriving of sleep, exhausted body, I dragged my body up from the floor with Lydia’s help and headed to the arena once again. Not knowing how much longer I could kiss on to the diamond, but with strong determination and mind, I must win the grand prize. This prize is very important to us as we need it to fund a HDB unit that we are keen in but insufficient of cash on hand. Prior to selling it, we can use it for our wedding as well and that will save a little from spending on jewellery if not much. What a good plan, I thought. Well, at least that’s the reason I joined this endurance challenge.

Another round finished with usual groaning and anticipation for the break time.

It’s 3:35am, and the 6th round started. Half hour through this round, my whole body muscle ached terribly. Though my heart was unwilling to give up but my body couldn’t take it anymore. Am I going to quit and called it a day? Am I going to hold on to win the deposit I need for the HDB unit? I just didn’t know how much more I can hold on. Then, I started to lay my hand on my neck, shoulder, back and thigh; not to massage but pray. Trusting God will strengthen them so that I could carry on with the race, at least for this round. There was a plan going through my mind, which was “let’s finish this round, which end at 5:35am, then play for another half hour till 6:00am, then quit and take cab back home because after 6, there will no 50% mid-night surcharge for the cab fare”. It’s funny for still being very calculative even at the point of collapsing.

The round ended, I quickly lied down and didn’t tell Lydia bout the plan that ran through my mind because I didn’t want to disappoint her. I didn’t have any plan either in winning this challenge but just pray. It’s no longer up to me to control that either.

Yes, ‘final’ round started; at least that was what I planned. Looks like the 10mins rest didn’t help much in relieving my soreness and aching because my body still ached badly. I can no longer rely on my own strength, just pray whenever I felt that I can’t make it. Around 6am, another guy dropped out and it really did cheer me up a little because I am closer to the grand prize. So, there are four of us left after 13 hours. The guy just dropped out was one of the Subaru car challenge participant as well, where winner has to glue his hands on the car for longest possible. One of remaining contestant was a Guard of Honour for three years, looks like a tough one to me.

I managed to finish the ‘final’ round without giving up as planned earlier. Perhaps, dropping out of Subaru guy kept me going though it didn’t guarantee me to be the last standing man. It’s getting longer and longer between subsequent participant dismissals. This showed how far each one of us is willing to go for the grand prize. Guard of Honour was dismissed 6 hours after the Subaru guy dismissal. Judging by the trend, next dismissal will probably happen 12 hours later.

“It’s 24 hours since we started the challenge!” announced the game master. I had never imagined that I could last this long. Deep in my heart I know that it’s through prayer that God had sustained me. If not, I already quit 10 hours ago and lied comfortably on my bed sleeping away. Again, Lydia concerned about my body which was under tremendous strain and stress. I promised her that I’ll back out if I really can’t hold on anymore.

New round started off at 7pm, 25th July 2010 but this round will last 4 hours before the break. To me, it seemed to be knock-out round and it was a good thing because I didn’t wish this whole thing to drag on. I guessed organizer also realized that their game marshals were getting tired even watching over us while seated. I really hoped that winner will emerge from this round. Since morning, I had been shutting my eyes for a short while just to get some rest and wished that time can pass faster by doing so. I started to think of how to outlast the other two by constantly doing some leg and hand exercise in order to keep me awake and relieve my muscle.

“Max… Max…” a very unfamiliar voice called out to me. I opened my eye and helped to a chair nearby. Still not knowing what exactly happen, a game marshal told me that I was disqualified because I’ve moved my lip beyond the kissing lip mark. I clocked 27 hours for this challenge. Aching and exhausted body superseded the sadness the moment I heard it. “I’m sorry that I can’t win the grand prize for you my dear”, uttered me to Lydia. “It’s alright; you’ve done your best. You’ve earn my heart and that’s what matter more to me”, Lydia comforted me by my side.

Man can plan, try hard achieving what’s being planned but it’s not up to us to decide whether we can achieve what we have planned. As of now, I can only trust in the LORD for His provision.

Change Display Icon Beside Address URL

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:57:00 +0000

Materials needed:
1) Get your desired icon picture(around 22 x 22 pixel).

Steps:
1) Get an image of gif, jpg, bmp, ico, png type. Its dimension should be around 22x22 pixel(you can use Windows Paint to resize it).

2) Upload the image to ImageShack(http://imageshack.us/). Please login through the link sent to your email.

3) Click on "My Images" after you login.

4) You can see the image that you uploaded just now. Click on the "i" button.

5) Take note the link in the "Direct" field.

6) Now login to your blogspot and choose "Layout"->"Edit HTML". Look for "TITLE" in the template as shown in 3.

7) Paste the following codes after the "HEAD" as shown in print screen. The bold address will be from STEP 5.
#link href='http://img217.imageshack.us/img217/3580/globewx5.png' rel='SHORTCUT ICON'/'@
*please replace # with < and @ with > or else it wouldn't work.

8) Lastly, click on "SAVE TEMPLATE" and it's all set.

Restore Default Folders Icon in Vista

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 13:44:00 +0000

Scenario:
A) One day, you open your profile and find that your beautiful Vista icon for Documents, Pictures, Music, Downloads folder is gone. Everything just revert back to old times yellow folder....

Materials needed:
1) Icon package(get the 'desktop.ini' for most folder)

Steps:
1) Go to your user profile folder and select the folder(for me, it's Documents) that you wish to transform back to default Vista icon.

2) Double click to open the folder. Then go to 'Organize'->'Folder and Search Options'.

3) Check 'Show hidden files and folders' and click 'OK'.

4) Right now you should be able to see the file named 'desktop'. It's configurations types of file so it has .ini extension. (If you don't see any file by that name, don't panic. You can just copy and paste the desktop.ini from respective folders in the Icon package)

*you might want to backup a copy of this file first.
5) Open the 'desktop' file. Copy following code(for Documents only) and replace it into the file content and save.
[.ShellClassInfo]
LocalizedResourceName=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21770
IconResource=%SystemRoot%\system32\imageres.dll,-112
IconFile=%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll
IconIndex=-235

6) Log off windows and log in again to see the magic.

7) Follow step (4) to (6) for other folder that has lost its 'true colours'. Just make sure you replace the right 'desktop' code from few code listed below or from the 'Icon package'.

For Pictures folder,
[.ShellClassInfo]
LocalizedResourceName=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21779
InfoTip=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-12688
IconResource=%SystemRoot%\system32\imageres.dll,-113
IconFile=%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll
IconIndex=-236
[LocalizedFileNames]
Sample Pictures.lnk=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21805

For Music folder,
[.ShellClassInfo]
LocalizedResourceName=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21790
InfoTip=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-12689
IconResource=%SystemRoot%\system32\imageres.dll,-108
IconFile=%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll
IconIndex=-237
[LocalizedFileNames]
Sample Music.lnk=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21806

For Downloads folder,
[.ShellClassInfo]
LocalizedResourceName=@%SystemRoot%\system32\shell32.dll,-21798
IconResource=%SystemRoot%\system32\imageres.dll,-184

Auto Ping Blueserver Using AutoHotkey

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 11:09:00 +0000

Options:
A) None.

Materials needed:
1) AutoHotkey (free from http://www.autohotkey.com).

Steps:
1) Install AutoHotkey and run AutoHotkey.

2) AutoHotkey shall appear at the taskbar.

3) Right click on it and select 'Edit This Script'.

4) Copy the text below and paste it in.
#MaxThreadsPerHotKey 10 ; Maximum time F7 can be activated
$F7:: ; F7 hotkey.
#MaxThreadsPerHotKey 1

if keepPing = y
{
keepPing = ; Make it blank to signal that thread's loop to stop.
return ; End this thread so that the one underneath will resume and see the change.
}

keepPing = y

Loop,
{
if keepPing = ; stop by pressing F7 again.
break
Send, {Enter}/p{Enter}
Sleep, 300000
}

keepPing = ; preparation for the next press of this hotkey.
return

5) And you will get this new script as shown below.

6) Close the script and right click on the AutoHotkey in the taskbar again. Select 'Reload This Script' to load your newly modified script.

7) To enable this Auto Ping script: in the blueserver game, hit 'F7' once to turn it on and hitting 'F7' again to switch it off.

B) Shrink Vista Partition for WinXp Installation

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Sat, 10 May 2008 07:59:00 +0000

Options:
A) If you have an available partition for WinXp installation, go to "WinXp Installation".

Materials needed:
1) PerfectDisk 2008(30 days trial version, download here).

Steps:
*make sure you backup the drive you going to shrink just in case anything goes wrong.
1) In Windows Vista, go to "Start", right click on "Computer" and choose "Manage". You will be prompted, just click "Continue".

2) Click on "Disk Management" and you will see the information of your hardisk installed.

3) Right click on the "VistatOS" drive, in my case it's "(C:)" and choose "Shrink Volume...".

4) By default Vista will give you the largest amount of space that you are able to shrink, it's not the free space that you have on that drive. Why?(If you want to find out, please refer to Query 1 or you are satisfied with the amount of space that you can shrink, just proceed to Step 5).

*Steps below followed after I use "PerfectDisk 2008" to empty more usable space for my XP drive. Need help on it? Go here: Get more usable space out of free space using PerfectDisk 2008
5) Please input the amount of space(in MB) for the new drive and allocate wisely, as you need to take into consideration of programs that you will install on this new drive, data storage and so on. I input "1000"(in MB) then only you click "Shrink".

6) Wait for new partition to be created. Then right click on it to choose "New Simple Volume...".

7) Click "Next".

8) Click "Next".

9) Now assign the drive letter(for my case, it's F).

10) Input the "Volume label" as "WinXp" for easy identification later and check "Perform quick format" as well.

11) Choose "Finish" and you have a new partition ready for WinXp installation. Proceed to normal WinXp installation procedure.

Proceed to?
A) If you have an empty partition for WinXp installation, proceed to "WinXp Installation".

Extracting SATA driver from their EXE without Floppy Disk(FD) drive.

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:57:00 +0000

Options:
Obiously, you don't have any option to use Floppy Disk.

Materials needed:
1) SATA drivers(from your respective chipset manufacturer website, for me it's intel http://downloadcenter.intel.com)
2) WinImage(30 days trial copy from http://www.winimage.com)

Steps:
1) Download the intel SATA drivers. Make sure you get the correct file by downloading something called "Floppy Configuration Utility".

2) Extract the file and you will get green icon "f6flpy32".

3) Extract the "f6flpy32" again and you will get this a file with .IMA extension.

4) Ok, now you need to open up WinImage and browse to the latest extracted folder "f6flpy32" to load the .IMA file.

5) TATA, you will see all the SATA driver files needed for slipstreaming WinXp using nLite. Before you can use them, extract them to any folder(I name it "SATA driver" on my desktop) by selecting all of the files and choose "Extract".

6) You will be prompted, choose "Extract all files into the same folder".

7) If you open up the "SATA driver" folder, the content is exactly the same with the content Floppy Disk. The difference is that you don't need a FD.

Proceed to?
A) Guide for "Slipstreaming SATA driver into WinXp boot cd using nLite"

A) Slipstreaming SATA driver into WinXp boot cd using nLite

noreply@blogger.com (MAX TING) — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 12:56:00 +0000

Options:
A) If you don't have Floppy Disk Drive especially on a notebook. You still can install Win Xp but you need to read the "Slipstreaming SATA driver into WinXp boot cd using nLite".
B) If you have FD drive, skip this step and go to "Shrink Vista Partition for WinXp Installation".
C) If you have an empty partition for WinXp installation, proceed to "WinXp Installation"

Materials needed:
1) nLite(download here), a free tool to help you slipstreaming(integrate) your SATA drivers into WinXp installation disk.
2) Extracted SATA drivers(if you are using Intel chipset Intel 82801GR/GH, 631xESB/632xESB, 82801GHM, ICH8R/ICH9R, 82801HEM SATA RAID Controller, get the drivers from here)

Steps:
1) Get your Windows XP installation disk and copy the contents to a new folder(I named it "WinXp").

2) Extract the SATA drivers you downloaded into a folder, namely "Floppy 32Bit". (Need help for "Extracting SATA driver from their EXE without Floppy Disk(FD)")

3) Run nLite->choose "Next".

4) Now, locate the Windows folder(for me, it's "WinXp").

5) Next again and you will come to "Presets". Ignore this by choosing "Next" again.

6) In "Task Selection", choose "Drivers" and "Bootable ISO" by high-lighting them.

7) Choose "Insert"->"Single driver"

8) Browse to the SATA driver folder(I named it "Floppy 32Bit") and select either one of the .INF file, I choose "iaahci.inf".

9) A screen like below will pop-up, make sure it's "Textmode driver" and select all of them by holding CTRL+A key and choose "OK"

10) You shall see something like this. Choose "Next" and you will be prompted.

11) Choose "Yes" to start the process.

12) Let it finish and choose "Next".

13) Finally, you can create your project as ISO image or burn it directly to CD-R under "Mode". I choose "Direct Burn". You can put anything for "Label" but not too long. Choose "Burn" and you will be prompted again.

14) Choose "Yes" to burn it to CD-R. Wait for it to finish and choose "Next"

15) Choose "Finish" to exit nLite.

Proceed to?
A) Go to "Shrink Vista Partition for WinXp Installation" if you don't have any partition to use.
B) If you have an empty partition for WinXp installation, proceed to "WinXp Installation"