island tales #34

Simmie's Survival Tips #1

Here's the situation. You start your car one fine day, and to your utter horror, the needle is best buddies with the ominous red dot labelled with an 'E'. You're miles from the nearest petrol station, and worse, it's rush hour AND there is an accident somewhere along the expressway, so the roads are crawling with cars. Now what?

1) Rule number one is Don't Panic. That is possibly the worst thing you can do in any situation. Take deep breaths and try to remember Simmie's Survival Tips (now available in printed form at a reasonable price of... whatever it costs for you to print out this page, adjusted for local inflation), it's a slightly better option than Panicking.

2) Before you do anything else, plan the rest of the journey. (insert cliche here: he who fails to plan, plans to fail). While you're at it, try and include a gas station somewhere along the route. Preferably somewhere AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE along the route. Not to put too much emphasis on it, but when you're running desperately low on fuel, a gas station would, perhaps, have a rather high priority on your list of desired destinations.

3) Conserve fuel. Which means no revving the engine to sound cool, no sudden 180km/h handbrake turns, no playing with the highlights, no stressing the air conditioning systems at full blast, no extremely loud music thumping out of your speakers, and if possible keep the car moving until you get some more gas into the tank. In other words, drive like those old guys you find on the road early sunday morning.

4) Should you actually run out of fuel halfway, activate your hazard lights, guide the car to a safe spot (on the shoulder of the road, a parking lot, whatever), whip out your mobile phone and call for help. Be sure to state where you are: statements such as "OI FRIEND! (insert expletive of choice here)!!! I RAN OUT OF FUEL! (insert more expletives)!!! COME HELP ME LIAO!! *hangs up*" will really help you vent that pent up frustration on your unfortunate listener, but aren't of much use to whoever it is you are calling.

5) Again, always remain calm. And next time, for goodness sake, check your gas level before starting any journey! (insert cliche here: avoidance is better than cure)

This social message was brought to you by Simmie and the Half a Cup of Coffee's Self Preservation Foundation. Please forward all gratitude (monetary or otherwise) to the less fortunate in your neighbourhood.

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And on a totally different note, I'm thinking of getting a new computer soon. Still undecided on the exact specifications, but i'm planning to switch to DDR/DDR2 RAM, a 3 gig processor, new motherboard (USB2.0, SATA, PCI-e), SATA hard disk drive (160 gig, most probably), and a casing with better airflow. Everything else will most likely be recycled, including the fx5700 im currently using.

Hm. Only one small problem.

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Dear Santa,

I hope you're reading this blog. I have been a good boy this year, i think. How's the North Pole?

Yours sincerely,
nerdook.