Sadly Potter

Just caught the new Harry Potter film and wasn't it positively depressing? In the beginning we had quite a bit of action with the chosen one being sent into hiding and the baddies being sinister all over the place. Then the threesome we grew up with took to the trees and the doom and gloom of open, wintry countryside. It can be pretty and all that but with three teens lost in the wilderness, hormones raging, with the chance of old Voldy-smashed-nose and his henchmen set to appear from behind a leaf, the film went bloody suicidal.

You could see it Harry's face. He was probably thinking 'Fine, that about does it and points his spindly stick at himself and chants "hocus pocus, I'm a jokus out of 'ere". Even i was tearing up, commiserating with the poor boy's fate. But he didn't. Then there was way too many scenes of muted scenery, the kind that freaks kids out and sets us adults thinking there's a spooky apparition in every shadow. Gloomy dusk shots that brought so much darkness to the film. Isn't the bloody thing still for children? All the colour got drained off. It was melancholy and morose. Depressing and devolving. Stark and dark. All that forest and rock and snow, too much to bear. Brrrr, gave me the shivers. I miss the HP of yore. Fun and banter and sparks up the arse. (The 3 brothers animation was awesome by the way).

Maybe it was a metaphor for maturing teen angst. So much bottled up, all that pressure to be alive, so much legacy to honor and recapture, love and hate and love again, so many creeps with bad hair and smells around. Heinous film. All three protagonists need to see a shrink.

And that thing around the neck was so LOTR.

But I still wanna know what happens last. All because we deserve to follow through. In your grasp you got us JK Rowling, in your literary grasp. (I haven't read any of the books though and missed the last two films. Yes, yes, that explains my shock an awe at all the devilish hues and miserable faces. Anyway kids beware of not so pleasant dreams.)

Green Earth Band

The office air was stale and I went around adjusting the nearby vents. One can set the speed and temperature of the flow of out each vent and that got me thinking, how they would be able to do that? Personalization of air would cost a lot and be a resource burden too. The next thought was that we couldn't work without airconditioning in the tropics. Even LKY has credited the air-conditioner as the best thing ever. He likes it as 22 degrees it was reported I think. The next thought that hit me was that mankind should not live in the tropics. As residents of this fragile planet we should congregate about the temperate regions, neat the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn or higher. Life would be literally cooler and we'd had summers and winters to satisfy our instincts for repetitive annualised change. We could let the tropics simply blossom on their own. Wild and untouched. Let the trees grow back, let the animals run free and settle themselves Darwin style. We'd have a lovely band of green around the centre of the Earth, quite vogue and verdant, and more importantly, ecologically re-balancing our carbon footprint and processing our carbon dioxide into life-giving oxygen. We might pick a few pockets to have super beaches because we all will need a tan, and of course eco-tours to get bitten by snakes and spiders while we ooh and ahh at vegetation unfamiliar. Litterbugs would be fed to tigers, Darwin style. It could work eh.

We just need to get rid of this nasty concept called countries, and passports.

Waiting For Outlook

I haven't been writing much. Hmmm. Thinking too hard about my writing and not just spewing it out. That's why. The artificial rules about blogging. Some of you getting alerts about this odd paragraph going up will be peeved. No meat, just waiting-for-my-computer-to-start-up dribble. As Tracy Jordan said "Blah, blah, blah, you get the point".

Topic to cover next time - how good 30 Rock is.

Oh look, email's up.

Airplane Oxygen Mask Rule For Parenting

Most people I know hardly pay attention to the safety briefings that take place before an airplane takes off. There's usually a few lines in the live demo or video that go: "if cabin pressure drops, an oxygen mask may fall from the ceiling in front of you. Strap it over your face like so. Passengers with children should attend to themselves first before helping others."

That last line should be a lesson to all parents - take care of yourself before you help your kids.

I've seen many parents who don't have a plan. The kids come and they handle it, somehow. I bet most parents from my parents era didn't have a plan and getting by was the norm. They worked hard and hoped for the best - values that work even today. Except that life has got a lot more complicated.

In Singapore, many parents are both forced to work to make ends meet or fulfill their ambitions. Both guy and girl are generally well educated and would like to pursue a career. They want to upgrade from a HDB flat to a condominium apartment. They want to trade in their Toyota for a continental car. When the kid(s) come along, these wants may not change. In most cases, parents work even harder.

Here's one problem that creeps along - they forget about their health. They grow fat and lazy, and are unable to commit any time to exercise and keeping fit. What parents forget is that their health is what enables them to take care of their kids. Once their sick, it's hard to manage the house let alone little persons.

I'm not talking about maintaining butts of steel or Greek god abs. Just weight, tone and cardio. Compromise and make the half an hour three times a week to sweat it out. Be it TV or a shorter lunch. Put in a walk on the park or run up the apartment block staircase. Think small doses for the long term, not mad frantic exercise for the short term only to attempt repetition following another new year resolution party.

Health is just one thing. There are many other things that parents need to sort out and keep in mind before they unleash their hopes and dreams on their little ones.

'Good counselor friend' told me that kids learn about how to love from the way their parents express love to each other. How right is that? There was also a promo trailer I remember for a TV show called Parenthood that mentioned that "being a parent makes me want to be a better person". That's right too. Would you want your kid to copy your bad habits or learn to be a better human being?

The questions seem hard but seriously, parenting in the 21st century is hard. Worse still, it's clear that many of the ills we see in society today stem from the way parents teach their kids. The small details affect the big picture. Everything from the value of thrift to the way we treat domestic help will be passed down to our kids. So think before you act. Your kids are watching and learning.