Big Bad Bus

on Tuesday 11 October 2005
It took 5 minutes to find a parking space. It took 5 minutes to walk up to the office. 10 minutes to get from Midvalley to Hartamas. But 70 minutes to get from my house to Midvalley.

Stupid bus had to break down right under the bridge connecting Old Klang Road to the Jalan Syed Putra and Midvalley exits, reducing the already small 2-lane bottleneck joining 4 lanes to one lane. The backlog that simple breakdown caused probably stretched all the way to Sri Petaling for all I know, seeing as to how the section of the road in front of OUG was already packed when I came upon it. My foot is sore. I could've gone to Klang for breakfast and back and still be earlier.

Wedding Rings

on Wednesday 5 October 2005
In case anyone's interested, and since I remembered neotrax's post on diamonds, I found a little primer on the wedding bands as well. More importantly, it talks about platinum versus white gold, and another on platinum wedding bands.

In summary of those links, here's are a few points which I think are interesting and rather significant:
  • A ton of platinum ore only produces about an ounce (~28.35 grams) of platinum.
  • Platinum is at least as strong as white gold, if not more.
  • Platinum 950/1000 means 95% platinum. The other 5% is alloyed for casting and shaping purposes so it doesn't matter. But do note that some are 900/1000 (90%) platinum.
  • White gold and yellow gold are the same metal, but different alloy.
  • Yellow gold is gold alloyed with copper, zinc, and silver.
  • White gold is gold alloyed with copper, zinc, and nickel.
  • 24 karat gold is 100% gold. Pure gold is actually quite soft, softer than silver. It scratches easily. 18 karat gold is about 75% gold, while 14 karat gold is about 58.33% gold. The less gold in it, the more scratch-resistant, but less "gold-looking".
  • A scratch on platinum or white gold is not an actual visible scratch. Platinum scratches causes furrows to build up on the metal, making it look frosted. Scratches on white gold actually removes metal, causing it to lose its whiteness and look yellow-ish.
  • Apparently, burnishing a platinum back to shine is actually cheaper than doing the same for white gold. Platinum burnishing involves pushing or flattening the built-up furrows. Burnishing white gold usually involves coating on a layer of Rhodium (white-ish metal), possibly every 2 to 3 years. Platinum will always be white.
  • Most interesting is that it tells of retailers biasing towards white gold due to reasons of economy. It makes more business sense to get rid of their white gold stock (since it's cheaper than platinum) than to order a new platinum band.

Realms of Evil Pantheon

on
For those who play D&D 3.0 and 3.5, and looking for a custom and very interesting evil-themed pantheon, I'd recommend these created by KingOfChaos in the forums of the Realms of Evil (more in D&D Links in the sidebar). Mature rating of course, in case you're offended by dark, but very creative, ideas. RPGers only I suppose.

For those who don't know, here's a quick overview: deities are divine beings in game worlds that grant power to their worshippers, who in turn channels the divine energy into spells and other abilities. Each deity is often aligned to particular theme, idea, or philosophy (termed portfolio), such as the sun, good, greed, nobility, etc. While there are hundreds and thousands of custom-designed deities for even more campaign worlds, this pantheon (a collection of deities) takes all portfolios traditionally aligned to good deities and twists them in a creative and diabolical way to fit an evil deity. Nice!

Realms of Evil Pantheon
  • Felmara - She of the Whip, Denier of Death, The Crippled Hand of Healing, Merciless Mother
  • Kromentar - Ruin of Knowledge, The Scar on Reality, The Overmind, The Master Liar
  • Marchion - The Father of Invention, Flesh Hater, Death’s Factory, Bonecrusher
  • Shevari - Mother of the Lost, Keeper of the Woods, The Dire Druid, The Killing Earth
  • Sinesstra - The Dark Lover, The Hand of Betrayal, Lady of Grief, Murdering Matron
  • Sorsancrot - The Winds of Death, Plague Lord of the Wind, The Fickle King, Traveler’s Bane
  • Zinraak - Nightkiller, The Grand Tyrant, Giver of Deserts, The Ashfather, Hunter of Shadows

Edit: The forum was moved. Updated the links.