I stumbled upon a post on Curly Wurly’s blog and thought to myself - that’s quite a smart-looking girl and didn’t realise what it was all about until I read her blog. You see, Megan was Michael. Nothing short of that. And it’s quite amazing what she went through - getting married, having kids and finally realizing that he wasn’t really what he wanted to be.

Megan started a blog of the entire process of transitioning - up to the point of informing her office colleagues of her plans to transition. Then the year end came and she went for some surgeries and return to - behold this - Microsoft, where she was and still is working as a manager. While it is what she did that counts, her following weeks after her return in the new year will determine how well she’d be getting on.

I’m not sure how I’d react if Daniel returns as Danielle or Edmund returns as Eden or Nick returns as Nicole… but I believe that a little plastic surgery goes a long way. No, I don’t discriminate but my brain does need some time to adjust and looking different does help a lot. =) Meanwhile, I wish Megan all the best for the new year.

Woohoo! I am really happy for the taxi drivers - because in the midst of the booming economy, their pay has finally risen and it is good news for them! I just hope that their rent will not be going up soon. You know? Pass the buck? Technically, if fare have risen by about 49%, then theoretically, they would only need to work 66.6% as hard as before the hike to earn back the same amount as they did previously.

Extrapolating that, it means that instead of having to drive for 15 hours, they would only need to drive for 10 lucrative hours to get back the same earnings as they did. Any more and it’d be a "pay rise". Of course we can’t extrapolate in such a manner, but it basically means that if they maintain their driving routine, they should earn more.

Never mind the drop in demand.

Speaking of which, I believe that 66.6% seems to be a rather familiar number. No, I didn’t rig the figure. It’s calculated based on the 49% increase in fares. Simple maths. Really.

DEMAND for taxis has fallen since the fare hike three weeks ago, but at least one cab operator is confident cabbies’ income has not suffered in spite of that.

Market leader ComfortDelGro Corp, which has about 65 per cent of the 23,900 taxis here, says preliminary data shows cabbies’ earnings have actually risen.

‘Our initial indications are that drivers’ income has gone up by about 10-11 per cent since the fare changes were implemented on Dec 17,” said ComfortDelGro spokesman Tammy Tan. ‘The average driver takes back about $270 more per month.”

But Ms Tan said call bookings have fallen by over 20 per cent.

With long queues of taxis waiting for passengers in several parts of town, commuters are finding it less of a necessity to phone for a cab now.

Other operators are not certain how the fare hike - which has raised the cost of rides by at least 5 per cent - has affected cabbies’ income.

Mr Johnny Harjantho, managing director of Smart Taxis, also said call bookings for Smart - which has about 800 cabs - have fallen by ‘about 40 per cent”. He said this is not necessarily bad because the company has in the past found it hard to cater to all bookings.

SMRT Taxis, which has over 3,000 cabs, claimed its call bookings had shrunk by ‘about 100 a day’ (or an estimated 5 per cent), but said it had no indication of how cabbies’ incomes were affected.

Premier Taxis, with about 2,200 cabs, said its call bookings have been ‘pretty bad’ since the fare hike.

Companies expect business to pick up soon as the new work and school year gets into full swing. ‘The real test is what demand will be like after Chinese New Year,” said Mr Harjantho.

Senior transport analyst Lim Jit Soon concurs. ‘Frankly, it is too early to tell. People may be staying away initially, which is a knee-jerk reaction. Then they might come back.”

But he said even if the demand does not pick up, ‘it’s better for the industry as there will be fewer complaints about not being to get a taxi”.

Article obtained from straitstimes.com on 4th January 2008

PhoneBAK for O2 Zinc by Bak2U (bärk-tə-yōō) is probably one of the most amazing software I have ever installed in my entire life till this point in time. My ActiveSync didn’t work as I thought it would - which I later discovered to be a setting on my PDA. Despite this, all it took was for me to copy the .cab file to my PDA to run on it. This is just the beginning of the fun part…

Ok, I have to admit that I am not a manual’s person - which means I don’t usually like to RTFM (read the friendly manual), but the installation process is intuitive enough for me to get to this stage.

After installing it, I didn’t see any icons in the Programs directory - which is quite a good thing because you won’t want the person who found/took your phone to know that you have PhoneBAK installed. So being a geek, I went into the Program Files directory where I found the directory. Clicking on PhoneBak.exe, the program fired up. As I didn’t want to mess up any settings, I opened the PDF file that came together with the software.

Ok. I admit it. Before I could proceed any further, it asked me for a password, which I won’t know till I read the manual. =P

After I got in, it reminded me that I have 3 days to register my copy before it expires and locks me out of my own phone ceases to be a really useful software to help safeguard my precious phone. Configuration from here on is a breeze. The first tab allowed me to add in notification numbers. It is important not to add in your own number. At first, I thought I had it figured out, but on second thoughts, I still don’t know why… but oh well, I added in the number of my other phones, my friend’s, my mum’s, my grandma’s, my dad’s, my neighbour’s and the police station hotline because I realise that I can now send SMSes to landed numbers and when the other person picks it up, the entire SMS gets read. Then again, I’m not too sure if it’s a good idea. Well, it probably depends on what messages you configure for it.

The next tab allows you to add in your SIM ID. This can usually be found on your SIM card. However, it adds the current SIM ID to the software database and you can either add the other IDs in manually or run this program again when you insert your other SIM cards. Of course, when you do the latter, an SMS will be sent out from that SIM card that you just used.

The 3rd tab is my favourite tab. You can add any messages you want. I replaced the default message with something along the lines of "Your stolen/missing phone has been used by an unauthorized SIM card". Of course, if you really lose your phone, then it’s no longer as amusing. However, if you do intend to use the police hotline as your notification number, then you might want to key in something like "This is a prank message. I don’t think you police can really catch me. Really. Maybe you should try hard, like really hard. Moreover, you guys probably do not know what I am using a stolen phone. Do you guys think you can really catch me? Really? Really? Really?". Well, it’s extra long so that the police can have some time to trace the number. =P But seriously, DO NOT route your messages to the police hot line because you might one day get a new SIM card (perhaps a 3G SIM card with the same phone number) and it’d still send the message if you hadn’t configure it. You have been warned.

The next tab is the activation tab - where you must enter your activation code within 3 days before it locks up your phone the software deactivates. It’s quite a simple step so there is no need for further discussion.

The last tab is the password tab - where you change the password where you initially entered. Do (1) change your password and (2) try not to use your mobile number/NRIC number/IMEI number as your password because these are some of the first few things that the perpetrator will use. Instead, use something that only you know. Something that is seemingly random… like 3452897956098204098560982345454524879098234957985692736487643593854. Ok, I was just kidding. It’s probably too long anyway.

So there you have it - the really useful software that doesn’t give the finder any excuse not to return you your phone. However, do remember to reward the person if you really dropped it and someone really returns it to you. After all, what is more precious than preventing your videos from leaking out? It’d be fun if the software can access the mobile cell station ID and triangulation information - better if it is able to record incoming and outgoing calls, SMSes and conversations. This will definitely track them down.

And just for the fun of it, I swapped the SIM card with my other SIM card and it worked like a charm. My friend, mother, grandmother, neighbour and minus the police station all got the message. Of course, besides my friend who has my other number, no one knew what in the world the message was for, so do think of a useful message to write when you configure your software so that you can also be notified somehow. Either that or you tell your mother, grandmother, dad and neighbour about the new software too and get them to try it as well! Haha… you’d never know if they’d ever need it.

However, while that is still a dream, PhoneBAK from Bak2U still does what it is meant to be - an excellent anti-theft software that aims to provide loss protection. So, go on and try it today at http://bestmobilesoftwares.com/Home.htm or find out more at http://www.bak2u.com.