Good insightful article on blogging.

Heh cool. I can post from my sidekick using the web browser. It wouldn’t work before without javascript support. Now it does, and I’m able to post from here. Cool.

I’m on the last plane to bring me home to springfield, il. My mom is gonna pick me up. Usually, dad would also go but he has to work tonight, his last before he’s off from work for a week. So, mom and I are gonna have lunch when I get there.

I notice airports have gotten better as compared to last year, with the screening and new fed dept in charge of security. Check-in wasn’t too bad but I had to be alert and look for a shorter line or get into a fast queue. I thought I was a little late but I got to the gate in time.

The plane just moved, so I better hit the submit button before I lose wireless service. :-)

I pretend I’m in a movie, like that movie about a boy trying to get home for christmas and he was the “cute” boy in home improvement with Tim Allen. Only if I could remember the name… Know what I’m talking about? Yeah, you do? ok great…

There’s a few things I gotta do when I step inside my parents’ home. This is the longest time I’ve been away from home. Let me calculate… the last time I was home was uh may.. wow, I can’t remember exactly when. It’s been that long.

I realize I’m no longer a kid who asks dad for some change to play video arcale. How do I know? because this is the first time I’ve paid my own airfare without asking my parents for some help. One thing that will never change. The refigerator is full of foods and all free!

-My parents have tons of things in the house. I gotta find a way to get rid of the things. Selling on ebay is one way.
-I gotta fix my parents’ computer; it probably has more virus than the bird flu.
-I gotta test the cable speed and see if I can get the upload rate up to at least 256 kbps.
-Got a few projects to work on, in which two of them I’m hoping to unveil over the break.
-I plan to do all the cooking for my parents. I was already a chef before I knew it. I will talk abt that later.
-What better way to de-stress? snowboarding! I found out there is a snow resort not very far from my home, about 2 hours away. That means I can go riding where in the past, I thought I had nowhere to go.
-There’s a big poker tournament coming up on the 30th of Dec. This will show how much skill I have in poker. Details to folllow.
-I gotta spend time with my family of three—dad, mom, and grandma—and life is not getting any shorter.

Oh, I remember the name of the movie now. It’s called “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” and the boy’s name is Jonathan Taylor Thomas. Any of you ever watched that?

Warning signs slow cars better than cameras

Auto Express said checks in England showed 25 per cent of drivers speeding at speed camera sites, but only 16 per cent at flashing speed limit signs.

Now, this is something to consider! Do you have any idea how many cameras does DC have? More than fifty but not all of them are used for speed ticketing. The largest automotive organization, AAA, has declared DC as a top strict enforcement area, which is the first time in 105 years. Last October, DC fined $2.9 million dollars from flashing at speeding vehicles and since 1999, it has earned more than $122 million dollars. The officials keep saying it’s to make the area safer. Yeah right! Dear DC officials, what do you have to say after this article? Doesn’t that contradict your point of making the area safer? You’re just using us to take our money out for your own benefits.

Oh pul-eeze…

In about 6 months or so, I’m gonna be out of here!

I just ate a can of spaghetti boyardee, 8 sticks of new Oreo, turkey sandwich (with one bread) with mustard and cheese, beef ramen, and a leftover steak with A1 sauce. Oh, I had a milk to go with that too.

+ + + + + =

Anyone care to count how many calories altogether?

all pics are found from images.google.com.

Thought this was cool…. even more prevalent in the deaf world, which is like 1% of the entire population.

Yahoo! Answers - theory of six degrees of separation

In 1967, psychologist Stanley Milgram tried to test the theory by sending several letters to random people in the Midwest. The letter featured the name, address, and occupation of a single person on the East Coast; participants were asked to forward the letters to the people who they thought were most likely to know the person. It took an average of five intermediaries to reach the target.

AOL shareholders should be glad abt this news.

The deal shows that Google is willing to pay to preserve its lucrative relationship with AOL and prevent Microsoft from becoming a bigger provider of Internet search tools. A deal between Microsoft and AOL would have made Microsoft’s own advertising network more attractive.

The struggle over AOL reflects the larger competitive landscape between rivals Google and Microsoft, said Internet analyst Scott Kessler of Standard and Poor’s.

The proposed agreement with Google gives AOL more flexibility to sell Google search ads, and have them appear only on AOL sites. The online service currently directs advertisers to Google’s Web site with no way to limit display ads to its own customers.

AOL is Google’s biggest customer, accounting for about $420 million, or about 10 percent, of Google’s revenue during the first nine months of this year, according to regulatory filings.

Most of the $420 million came from the ads Google distributes on AOL’s Web site. The two companies first began working together in 2002 when Google wrestled away AOL from another online advertising network currently owned by Yahoo Inc.

Microsoft, which increasingly views Google as a fierce rival, has been negotiating with Time Warner since January but did not propose any cash investment in AOL, officials said.

*update*

Google has bought 5% of AOL for one billion dollars, preventing Microsoft from making a big move into the search engine market.

Gmail Mobile.

Type http://m.gmail.com in ur browser on your sidekick. Only one image will be loaded (Google logo) and the rest is all text, which means it gets downloaded fast. Oh yeah, you can always search ur emails. No need to sort. :-)

Calvin really loves snow, especially making snowmans.

Some of my fave:

Click on pics to enlarge.

Type “20002″ or your zip code and “weather” in the google search. Now you get your weather report in < 1 second than loading up on weather.com and bunch of ads. :-)

This guy has a point. “There is no God”. The bottom point? Enjoy your life.

Believing there’s no God stops me from being solipsistic. I can read ideas from all different people from all different cultures. Without God, we can agree on reality, and I can keep learning where I’m wrong. We can all keep adjusting, so we can really communicate. I don’t travel in circles where people say, “I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith.” That’s just a long-winded religious way to say, “shut up,” or another two words that the FCC likes less.

Wanna know which one is really the best search engine? Google, Yahoo, or MSN? Don’t sweat, there’s an easy way to find out.. Just take this test and you shall see. *matrix theme plays*

Saw this on “How Stuffs work?” website. Someone asked what is the largest passenger ship in the world? Ofc, US carriers hold the title for being the largest ship but what about passengers? We all know about Titantic, which I think got way too hyped up ‘cuz someone said it was “unsinkable”. Ofc, nothing can be ever unsinkable! Right now, it’s the Royal Carribean Cruise line’s Explorer of the Seas. But something bigger is going to be built. It’s called the Freedom Ship. Currently, they’re still trying to find more investors and raise money to build this ship. The specs are as eye-popping as they can get. Check this out.

Freedom Ship from How Stuffs Works.

Freedom Ship FAQ - more info abt this ship.

No cruise ship that has ever been built can compare to the enormity of Freedom Ship. Imagine a mile-long stretch of 25-story-tall buildings in New York City; now imagine that floating on the water. If you can picture that, then you get the general idea of Freedom Ship’s size. At 4,320 feet (1,317 meters) long, 725 feet (221 m) wide and 340 feet (103 m) tall, the ship is taller than the length of a football field and wider than two football fields put together.

Freedom Ship will have 17,000 residential units and will be home to more than 60,000 people, including residents and all of the personnel that will be required to maintain the ship. The floating city will continuously circle the world and will travel to most of Earth’s coastal regions, offering residents the ability to see the entire globe without leaving their home. All of the ship’s employees will be given food, housing, uniforms, medical and dental care and a continuing education program. The ship will contain all of the features that any modern city might have, including:

*17,000 living units, with prices in the range of $180,000 to $2.5 million, including a small number of premium suites currently priced up to $44 million.
* A $200 million hospital
* A 3,800-foot (1,158-m) landing strip, which will serve private planes and some small commercial aircraft that carry no more than 40 passengers
* Hangars for private aircraft
* A marina for residents’ yachts
* A large shopping mall
* A school system offering K-12 and college education
* A golf driving range
* Bicycle paths
* 200 open acres for recreation
* 3,000 commercial units in a similar price range
* 2,400 time-share units
* 10,000 hotel units
* A World Class Casino
* A ferryboat transportation system that provides departures every 15 minutes, 24 hours a day, to 3 or more local cities giving ship residents access to the local neighborhood and up to 30,000 land-based residents a chance to spend a day on the ship.

Sketches:

It’s true. “Truth sets us free.” That.

I would have posted pics when I got back except I was too tired and exhausted from snowboarding for about five hours straight. Bummer, I forgot to charge my camera so the battery ran out when we got to the top of mountains (hills). Nonetheless, here’s the pics. :-)

I started learn how to snowboard three years ago when RIT offered a PE class in snowboarding with a discount pass, so it was a good time for me to learn and use the deal. But I didn’t even snowboard once last year as I moved to DC, started my first real job and was basically in middle of everything that’s going on. Now I’m more settled this year and after living in DC for more than a year, you definitely want to get out of DC whenever you can. So, last sunday was a great time to be out of DC.

I was really rusty when I started the first run down the slope and I told Blake that I’d read in a mag that about 1 in 6 snowboarders get hurt and I sure hope I’m not gonna be that person. He said not to worry and just take your time as u build up confidence. As soon as he said that, he went off, zooming down the slope. I was like holy shit, he’s already gone! I gotta try and catch up. Down the slope, I fell or slipped a few times, not really used to riding the board in a long time and I felt like I was a beginner all over again. I told myself to be in control of my board and take my time without going too fast. Eventually, I was able to pick up and after a few runs, I became a lot better and able to stay with Blake but he’s way up on a different level than I am. I have a long way to go to become as good as he is. He can jump high while my jumps are a joke, barely lifting off the ground.

One big drawback about this ski resort is that they don’t serve alcoholic beverage! Instead, we got some coffee. And overall, the entire resort is pretty small but is the nearest resort to DC. There’s a bigger resort in Wisp, abt 3 hrs from here. I’m gonna snowboard as much as I can and get ready for Colorado later this year! :-)

Life’s too damn short. I’m gonna go snowboarding at Whitetail!!!

Will post again after I get back. Can’t wait!

Who would have thought that Swiss Army knife and Geekiness would mix? :-) The only thing it’s missing is a screwdriver. That would have closed the deal for me. Nearly all computer parts have screws.

Hmm, this is neat and looks promising…

answers.yahoo.com

Question: How old is the oldest man on Earth at the time being?

Answer: Emiliano Mercado Del Toro (Puerto Rico), born in Cabo Rojo on August 21, 1891, became the oldest fully authenticated man residing in the world on 17 January 2005 at the age of 113 years 149 days.

Currently living in Isabela, Puerto Rico, he is also the oldest living veteran, having been called up in 1918 by the US Army. A non-combat veteran, he was two months into training when World War I ended on 11 November 1918.

Someone is definitely right. “When in doubt, go.”

I’m glad I went to the Argonaut Bar despite the fact I went alone. Well, I realize there’s nothing wrong with that. Just go, and you might be surprised at what u’ll get.

I just learned that I may have a mild case of AHD or maybe a severe case at that but I hope not. Thanks, Blake, And hope we’ll go snowboard this weekend! Remember what I said: if we see a single snowflake falling, we go!

It’s funny. I did go to the GSA party last Saturday night and oddly enough, I felt somewhat alone there, although a good number of people went. But tonight, I didn’t feel alone, even there were less people who went but I happened to know more people personally and that’s what it made it worthwhile.

And I found someone who’s actually more serious at golf than I am and that’s gonna motivate me to play golf more often and be competitive.

Lastly but not least, I finally met someone who understands the myth that it’s completely untrue that someone who could hear doesn’t mean that s/he could speak well too. I’m one of those people.

:-)

Saw this on someone’s blog and thought I’d share with you guys. A good perspective on life and money.

A boat docked in a tiny Mexican village. An American tourist complimented the Mexican fisherman on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took him to catch them.

“Not very long,” answered the Mexican.

“But then, why didn’t you stay out longer and catch more?” asked the American.

The Mexican explained that his small catch was sufficient to meet his needs and those of his family.

The American asked, “But what do you do with the rest of your time?”

“I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, and take a siesta with my wife. In the evenings, I go into the village to see my friends, play the guitar, and sing a few songs. I have a full life.”

The American interrupted, “I have an MBA from Harvard, and I can help you! You should start by fishing longer every day. You can then sell the extra fish you catch. With the extra revenue, you can buy a bigger boat.”

“And after that?” asked the Mexican.

“With the extra money the larger boat will bring, you can buy a second one and a third one and so on until you have an entire fleet of trawlers. Instead of selling your fish to a middle man, you can then negotiate directly with the processing plants and maybe even open your own plant. You can then leave this little village and move to Mexico City, Los Angeles, or even New York City! From there you can direct your huge new enterprise.”

“How long would that take?” asked the Mexican.

“Twenty, perhaps twenty-five years,” replied the American.

“And after that?”

“Afterwards? Well my friend, That’s when it gets really interesting,” answered the American, laughing. “When your business gets really big, you can start selling stocks and make millions!”

“Millions? Really? And after that?” said the Mexican.

“After that you’ll be able to retire, live in a tiny village near the coast, sleep late, play with your children, catch a few fish, take a siesta with your wife and spend your evenings doing what you like and enjoying your friends.”

And the moral is: Know where you’re going in life… you may already be there.

Monkeysphere. I beg you to click and read the article. It may be wordy and require a few brain cells to process it. If you get it, you get it. :-) Basically, everything is irrelevant unless it’s personal to you (by being in monkeysphere with you).

Some random thoughts:

I always try to remember Ben Franklin’s twelve rules and one of them is “Incentive is everything.” Want to see something done? You gotta give that person some incentive to do it. Most of the time, it’s money but it can be anything else (negotiating comes in play here) and everything can be an incentive, I mean everything, like sex. One example was that in the last few days, I had four people IMing me right out of the blue. They were the kind that rarely send me an IM or at least initiate a conversation so I immediately knew they wanted something from me. Sure enough, I was right. They were asking if I had heard about this apparently new money pyramid scheme - monavie. I told them I’m not interested and I heard nothing more from them after that. Again, incentive is everything.

Do you know that Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity not only applies to time or physics only but also to other things? Like a person is only blind WHEN someone else can see aka “In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.” Einstein’s theory simply states that one object has certain qualities when in relation to another. When I think about it, it’s really true. We can’t say this is the best camera we’ve used till we’ve tested others cameras first. Or this girl is really hot-looking after we’ve looked at other women. In a way, theory of relativity is just like comparing and contrasting—finding these qualities that one has and another doesn’t.

I love learning.

I gotta do this guide and banish Windows from this hard drive forever. :-)

Windows in your pocket.

In case you’re wondering why I bother to use Windows, well, there’s still some programs I need to use that isn’t available on Linux, like Sorenson’s Envision videophone program, NexTalk program to place TTY calls, and while I’m not exactly used to the GIMP program, I’m still using Fireworks to design websites. I know there’s a vmware but it’s slower and anything less than its optimal speed is intolerable.

The best part is that it’s portable, so when I go to see my parents for christmas, I just plug in my USB and start up the “mini” windows and do stuffs without messing up my parents’ computer. So I wouldn’t have to hear my dad saying, “What did u do with my bookmarks!?”.

Microsoft, Google still vying for AOL

Google and Microsoft are fighting over to get a deal with AOL that will allow them to tap their internet advertisements within AOL. Even though AOL is rapidly losing subscribers to a broadband service, it is still the largest internet service provider, so, whoever got the deal would be HUGE. Microsoft probably has the edge in money and is desperate to set off in internet advertisments but it’s Google that has the momentum and has an immediate credibility.

Moreover, Google is eyeing a deal with Comcast cable company, also for internet advertising plus possible other things like an agreement to put Google as a default search engine on the Comcast’s start-up disk, which was what they did with Mozilla Firefox’s default homepage - to the google search.

Now, I can see why Google is so insistent on getting information as much as possible, every data counts—doesn’t matter what they are and after building a huge wealth of data, they can go after the businesses and say we have the data, we have every possible data there is and we can help you make money off advertisements by the means of our data.

It’s only beginning.

Mom: Are you still at work?
Me: Yes, I am.
Mom: Do you know it’s snowing in DC area now?
Me: Really, it’s snowing hard?
Mom: The Weather Channel said around 1 to 2 inches of snow expected.
Me: Ah ok, I’ll stay here till 8 pm after traffic eases up a bit.
Mom: Ok, if there’s zero visibility outside, don’t try to drive. Stay at a motel.
Me: Mom! I’m sure it’s not that bad.
Mom: You never know. If it’s that bad in the broad daylight, imagine how bad it’ll be when it’s snowing.
Me: I’ll let u know when I get home.

An hour later and we’re on VP (videophone).

Me: I got home ok.
Mom: I can see that. Were the roads bad?
Me: No, it was just a wet road and there was not much traffic as I thought.
Mom: Ok good, I’m happy you got home safely.
Me: Yeah, oh, speaking of snow, could you send me my snowboard boots, gloves, goggle, and pants. I forgot to bring them back with me.
Mom: *shakes her head* ok, I’ll tell Dad to get them. Where did you put them?
Me: It should be either in the garage or in my closet.
Mom: Nothing new; can’t remember where you put stuffs.
Me: you know me.

Dad: Ok, I found them. So, do you want it to be fedex-ed or ground shipping through PO? (my dad works at a post office.)
Me: Uh, how long will the ground shipping take?
Dad: It’ll take abt 7 days.
Me: that long? could you make that in 3 days?
Dad: Ok, I’ll put it through first-class.

Wanna see how Google throws a holiday party? Look no further than here and here.

No, I didn’t go. :-(

And check this convo out with two IBMers after I gave her the link.

Pamela: wanna see google holiday party pixs?
Brian: nahhh. I don’t want to be envious of google employees
Pamela: http://www.xanga.com/GrowingGrass
Brian: strange party
Brian: looks like fun too
Pamela: airhockey, pp, billard. wow
Brian: yeah. ok. now you’re getting me a bit jealous of google.

:-)

I need some inspiration, dammit.

It’s about time that someone has created a complete list of how much caffeine there is in every drink. AMP’s my fave energy drink—it has 112.5 caffeine.

Caffeine Content Chart. :-)

Flat panel tv on each aisle?, Posted via Sidekick II by natech.

Wal-mart trying to be tech?

On the way to work this morning, I happened to see two hybrid cars rolling next to each other on the highway. Obviously, one was a Toyota Prius and the other a Honda Civic Hybrid. It occurred to me that hybrid cars are becoming more mainstream ‘cuz, like on the HOV lane , one in every 5 car is a Toyota Prius. It’s only going to go up with the gas price (although it’s being cheaper right now but $3.00 a gallon is going to be a fixture in the near future) and urban houses being ridiculously expensive, people are going to have a long commute to work. Anyway, while I was able to look at two hybrid cars at the same time, the new 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid is much better-looking than the Prius. Aside from being a Honda loyal owner, I really like the new look of the Civic and if you are going to get the car, you better be able to afford it (duh). So I was already thinking how can I get my hands on the new Civic. So, look at what I have here:

1. 2006 Honda Civic Hybrid MSRP: $21,850. I’ll negotiate for 20k, although that probably will be very hard due to high demand and stupid dealership markups.

2. Google’s Fuel-Efficient Vehicle Incentive Program: $5,000 cash.

3. Federal Tax Credit - $2,100 (that’s a CREDIT to you, not a mere deduction. )

4. Washington DC sales tax waiver and discounted vehicle registration - abt $1,000.

So, Estimated Final Price = $11,900. Plus if i sold my car for $13,000. Well, I’ll be damned, Who thought I’d actually get some money for getting a hybrid car? And not to mention, years of saving money on gas, which comes in thousands, not just hundreds.

mm-hmm….

Apparently, someone took a pic of this roadmap of Sidekick lineup. Looks like Sidekick III is identical to II except the mp3 player thing, which I don’t need. Then a new redesign in 2007 called a Sidekick NG that can play video.

Drinking ice water actually help you to burn calories. Really!

Let’s figure out exactly what you’re burning when you drink a 16-ounce (0.5 liter) glass of ice water:

* The temperature of ice water can be estimated at zero degrees Celsius.
* Body temperature can be estimated at 37 degrees Celsius.
* It takes 1 calorie to raise 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius.
* There are 473.18 grams in 16 fluid ounces of water.

So in the case of a 16-ounce glass of ice water, your body must raise the temperature of 473.18 grams of water from zero to 37 degrees C. In doing so, your body burns 17,508 calories. But that’s calories with a little “c.” Your body only burns 17.5 Calories, and in the grand scheme of a 2,000-Calorie diet, that 17.5 isn’t very significant.

http://www.iconizeme.com/

Damn, I wanna do that but I won’t pay $50 for it. I gotta find myself a photoshop tutorial and create one!

Wow, someone has taken a scientific approach to examine if you really saved more with a hybrid car. The conclusion? hybrid cars are still too expensive, gas prices aren’t high enough (hard to believe, I know), and you actually save more if you bought an economy car (even better if you bought it used) than a hybrid, at least for now. The point of this? wait 5 years when hybrid cars become more mainstreamed, gas becoming more expensive, and when you are in market for a new car. The link here.

Oh yeah, anyone has seen this link? It’s awesome, you now can track who’s visiting your blog and how much traffic you get a day. Google is on a roll. And I can see it’s slowly developing into its own brand familar image, other than the google search. Google Analytics and Google College .

As we all use Google for our search stuffs—let they be a scoop on latest celebrites, cars, toys, games, even for research papers, and other countless things, but some have used Google more personal, like finding an instruction to perform a CPR, a Heimlich maneuver on a dog, or finding your father you never met before, as told at this link: Google User Testimonials. There is one funny story that one student actually cited Google in his research paper. :-)

Another one here that someone used Google Maps to prove that the street was two-way lanes, not one way street and his case got dismissed from the court.

Google is not only just for common people like us but help businesses too, like this. Using Google search engine help “the National Park Service, where website complaints declined by a factor of 20.”

Google also entered in a language translation competition with other companies participating like IBM, Cal Tech, U.S. Army laboratory, and came out first in accuracy. Tough translation from Arabic to English and Chinese to English.

Finally, as an employee for Google, I find this story funny. Yahoo employees sneak into Google for a free lunch.

I just got back here from jason lamberton’s wine n cheese party. All I can say is that 2008 Politics has begun and if you thought the 2004 Election was crazy, the 2008 is going to be even more insane. That’s cuz both parties are up for grabs. Everything is at stakes. What we have voted in 2004 might be different than we would vote in 2008. That’ll be the biggest debate ‘cuz that is a generation shifting; it’s our time to make the call. Secondly, if we ever agreed on anything, females will get the most attention. It’ll be Hillary Clinton of the Democratic Party v.s. Condoleeza Rice of the Republican party. It’s gonna be one hell of a race, nothing like the 2004 election between Kerry and Bush.

However, in my final opinion, it’s gonna be the Democratic party, even though I might vote for the Republicans. Another debate at the tossup: who would come first? black president or female president? I think a white female president.

The 2008 Election has begun.

GM tumbles 6% to 23-year low

Ouch, I feel sorry for those shareholders. Better start buying Toyota and Honda stocks. Toyota Corp. is on pace to overtake GM’s status as the largest automaker. Toyota says they will put hybrid engines in all of their vehicles. When a 4runner comes out with a hybrid, I’ll be the first on the list. :-)

It’s all about the connection, baby.

Now that the NBA season is back in a full swing, finally there’s something to watch during late nights. If you ever watched a bit of sportscenter, there was an outcry among the league about the new rule this year: players have to dress up in a suit. Quite naturally and expectedly, Allen Iverson was the first to protest. Even one player complained he will need stipends to help cover the suit costs, despite his minimum contract is $250,000 a year. The commissioner, David Stern, said the reason for this is to make the NBA look sharp and professional. Well, look at those pics and tell me what you see.

I think it’s working, don’t you say?

Oh my god, seeing this pic nearly made me go off…you know, down there. *panting* I already have a mini ipod and was actually satisfied with it, despite the new Ipod Nano. But this pic, holy shit, this is reason enough that I’m gonna go the next day and buy the Nano and this headphone!!

It’s not everyday that my alma mater, RIT, got mentioned in a national syndicated comic strip. When I first entered RIT, RIT was not considered as a first-tier like MIT, Cal Tech, etc. But it has been building and growing and this comic strip shows that RIT now shares the same list with other premier technical universities.

‘Geek-heavy’ RIT draws a few ‘Doonesbury’ chuckles

My dream chair, Posted via Sidekick II by natech.

Gotta have one of these in the future. =)

First one is the earliest pic I have although my family has more earlier pictures like baek-il, which is a celebration for babies that turn 100 days old, but they wish to keep it. I’ll need to fly back and scan more pictures.

Second one was when I arrived in America and ofc, as any proud happy parent, took me to my first photography session.

Third and fourth were the day I officially became a U.S. citizen. Now, I heard there is a new law signed by ex-President Clinton that all children who got adopted automatically became US citizens, as if they were born in the US. No need to wait for seven years to become one. The man in black gown I stood behind, I believe, was Governer Thompson of Illinois.

Last pic - my high school graduation.

Here are some pics of my Korean family when I visited in 2001. Cool fact: my sister is deaf.

Good Friday, Posted via Sidekick II by natech.

Drank 2 Coors, 40oz Hurricance malt, 32oz Mickey malt. That’s the total of 96oz or 8 beers. All in abt 2 hrs. :-)

Oh yeah, foot bag makes a great ice breaker. I noticed people like doing multiple things like talking, trying to hold their beer in their hand, stuffing burgers into their mouths and playing footbag all at the same time.

Oh yeah, I finally got my free Google t-shirt, :-D

Workout, Posted via Sidekick II by natech.

Managed to get myself out to workout after finishing work at 7 pm, then 45 mins drive back home (should be 30 mins but not in dc traffic.) :-(

Did supersets, then got out on the track. I started on the lane one as first lap, moved to second lane as second lap, and so on. Toward the 8th lane, I was panting hard and the eastern wind was blowing at me. I feel good, able to get “knots” out of my body. Hope to keep it up.

Tomorrow’s Friday, hooray!

I’ve been always fascinated by science—it’s probably my best and fave subject in high school before computers overtook me. I still read scientific books, loved Bill Bryson’s book on Short History of Nearly Everything, Genome Project, etc. I was just browsing and found this really mind-blowing link. The Solar System. It might take a while for your web browser to fetch the image since it’s a big one. To echo Bill Bryson’s words, it’s just impossible to imagine how big the Universe is. We can’t even fathom how big at all. It’s larger than any bigs you can think of.

In this pic, I can’t even find Earth using the horizontal scroll. I’d just miss it as it’s too small to see. I have to use the link to see it. The creator was really clever to use pixels as a scale comparison. 1,000 km = 1 pixel. This is far more accurate and make a better example than the fake planets on wires that are in every science classroom. Jupiter and Saturn make fascinating planets; would love to visit there if we ever have a such technology, which we will but not in our lifetime, probably and instead of trying to build a space station (still not finished), they’re starting a project to build a base on the moon that will serve as a launchpad to Mars and once that is achieved, other planets come next in the line.

Pluto - all the way to the right. Imagine, we’re all pulled around Sun, all thanks to gravitiy. If not for gravity, shit, we’d be completely wander-less and lost.

Hope you enjoy the image as much as I am. See if I can somehow shrink this image enough to fit on my widescreen panel. :-)

States I’ve been to…

create your own personalized map of the USA

1) Alabama - went to the space camp in Huntsville during middle school and high school.
2) Illinois - my home state
3) Iowa - boring state - bunch of Amish families there - from what I remember during early family trip
4) Missouri - most of my dad’s relatives live there.
5) Wisconsin - my good friend has a cabin there near Dells, many lakes there. Good for outdoors.
6) California - SF Bay, Santa Cruz, Brubank,
7) Las Vegas, Nevada - flight stop, got delayed, had to stay at a hotel, temperature was 120 degrees, damn.
8) Oregon - YLC 1997
9) Minnesota - flight stops there many times but never even went out of airport.
10 Hawaii - flew there four times. Rich diversity there.
11) Kansas - Gallaudet Academic bowl - 1998 - should have won the regional there but got jeopardized BIG-TIME. Our lead was almost doubled, 120 to 65. Missouri team had to bet all their points and they got it right, we wrong. The score became 105 to 130. That was one of the sickest moments in my entire life. We also found out that we answered the most questions compared with other regionals. That next year, they changed the game format, no more “gambling” on the final question. Also, we did beat the Missouri team in the first round and then they fought to advance to the finals and beat us and they got to go to the Deaf Nationals in Washington DC. Damn. I was pissed off.
12) Indiana - their deaf school is our biggest rival
13) Detriot, Michigan
14) New York - NYC, Buffalo, and Rochester.
15) Florida - my parents’ good friends live there, interned in Miami, Walt Disney in Orlando, Tampa Bay, Clearwater, Daytona Beach. Probably my most vacationed state.
16) Atlanta, Georgia. Had my IBM interview there.
17) Denver, Colorado - my freshman roommate lives there and recently got married.
18) Ohio - went to the Cedar Park amusement park, which is one of top 5 parks in the US. Is a middle point between Illinois and Washington DC, so I usually stay over a friend’s place there.
19) Pennsylvania - Had to drive through PA to get into NY; just tons of forests there. Sylvan means wood or forest in Latin. (I took Latin class in college). Also went over a friend’s who lives in Philadelphia.
20) Virginia - my uncle lives there; can’t miss it if u drive to DC.
21) Maryland - same as above, the latter one.
22) Delaware - had to drive thru to get to Ocean City.
23) New Jersey - drove through it.
24) Kentucky - drove through it
25) Tennessee - dropped my friend off at his brother’s home, who was in the army.
26) West Virginia - drove through it.

So, 24 more states to go! Dang, still a lot of states to visit. Wanna go to Vermont for snowboarding this winter season.

create your own visited country map

South Korea - 2002. Cities: Incheon, Kwangu, Seoul, HamYong. Would like to go back and travel more.

China - 2001. Cities: Beijing - visited the Great Wall; incredible sighting! Highly recommended. Also went down to Tian Jin to visit their Deaf college technical program. Would like to visit Hong Kong next time I go to China. FYI, the distance between Beijing and Hong Kong is farther than NYC and LA, so the people and cultures are vastly different even they’re Chinese.

Mexico - 2001 - Cancun - Spring break, what else? That place is entirely americanized. Full of bars and clubs. Did go to Chichen Itza. It was fun climbing up the pyramid there. Highly recommended too. Heh, we were able to get a rental car under 25 years or older policy (I was the one doing all the negotations) and cost only $50 dollars for an entire day. Definitely beat staying in Cancun all week. You get to see the real side of Mexican life and saw homes that were just a shack with a bed sheet as a front entrance and you could see the entire family inside.

Canada - went to Toronto many times, close to Rochester, about 3 hours drive. Been to Niagara Falls; gorgeous sight, highly recommended.

Still haven’t gone to Europe yet. I really love to travel but work keeps getting in the way. Hope I’ll have more opportunities later.

Water dispenser in refigerator, Posted via Sidekick II by natech.

This water dispenser is really useful. I’ve been drinking more water

while saving money on bottled water. Also I’m drinking less pop now. Go

H20!

Figured I’d at least try to write a post of some depth and thoughts. First, this is a trackback from Jason Lamberton’s entry on Chaos and Order.

If you could scroll down to the end of a fairly long entry, he said he is in the process of becoming a Deaf professional blogger. A professional blogger is someone who blogs daily and able to earn a living on ads profits, donations, or sponsorship with media companies like About.com or Weblogs Inc. One well-known professional blogger is Jason Kottke.

Well, I’m proud to say that I was the one who came over his place and helped him set up a new blog (that shall be unveiled later whenever Jason decides to). I suggested him to use Wordpress so that he’s in complete control of his own work instead of being stored on other servers like Blogger. Jason and I went back a long time ago—wow I can actually start saying “A long time ago…”—when our mothers were classmates at Illinois School for the Deaf before his mother moved to California when she was a junior. We didn’t meet first in person as we were one of the early members of AOL version 1.0 I think they’re up to 9.0 now or something? Finally, in 1994, we came to visit the family and that summer, I broke my ankle while playing basketball. It was awful and I was stuck in a cast for 8 weeks but I could walk not too bad without the aid of crutches. Anyway, that’s how we met and fast became good friends. I remember we loved to play NHL 95 on SNES. We managed to score more than 30 goals in one game, heh.

A lot has changed since we played that game on SNES. We’d play together on the floor hockey team when he was a goalie and I was a forward during my freshman year at Gallaudet. Recently, he was studying to get a Phd but as you can see from the entry, he dropped out of the fellowship program. Now, his goal is to become a professional blogger. Let’s help him!

We’re at a point where we really need to decide what we want to do with our life. That’s what we talked about the most when I was over his place. We both realize that it’s important to document our life because when we’re gone from this place, nothing is left except our shit. No one is going to crack our skulls open and read what’s inside our brains. Jason said there is a kit that allows you to print your diaries and put them in a notebook for archives. For now, we could save our diaries on a server but what if something chaotic happens? No proof to show we did exist. I’m thinking abt printing all of my entries and put in a binder so I can reflect and remember.

One thing I learned while chatting with Jason was how he doesn’t want to be affiliated with anyone. He doesn’t want anyone to be telling him what to do and he has tons of ideas he desperately wants to see to happen. So, we were discussing how blogging can work out for him so he could share his ideas, document his life, and earn something out of it. He has this idea about vlogging. It’s a way of using ASL to document ourselves instead of just typing words. The only way to “print” ASL is to videotape ourselves signing. I think it’s a cool idea and I’m thinking abt using my webcam to record my signing. Never mind, I’m gonna do it now… *turning on the webcam and signing to myself for vlogging*

*update* - that didn’t go well as I thought—need to work on compressing video from 10mb. I’ll need to find a decent video editor. But if you got a big bandwidth, see me on vlog here.

You should see windows media player embedded in the webpage (sorry mac users) and you will need to wait a few minutes before the video shows up.

Testing this new Flock web browser that allows you to blog directly from ur browser instead of going into the blog page at all… Wow, it does work… I highly recommend you to try.  Ofc, it’s free. 

Well, looks like I don’t even need to go into my website to post an entry.  I can also edit entries from this Flock browser.  It’s being called a social browser that uses my del.icio.us bookmarks as favorites.  So that means whenever I happen to reinstall browsers, I don’t even need to save my bookmarks since it’s being stored on del.icio.us servers.  Cool idea and what’s more, this is actually based on Firefox browser, so it’s not yet another web browser who wants to fight Microsoft’s IE. 

You know it’s Fall when you find yourself completely in the dark after you step out of the building and you feel the wind blowing at you with some mist spraying at your face. When you get into the car, the first thing wasn’t to put your seat belt on but to turn the heater on and set the wipers on delay mode.

It’s been more than a week since I’ve started working at Google. I can’t indulge too much details here but I do want to share my experience here so I can reflect back when I hit 50 if I’ll live that long. The job is everything what I always want in a job. I’m not a whiz programmer who can make a working calculator right from the scratch in one sitting. What I enjoy the most is just looking for problems, find them and then solve them. I enjoy tweaking things, making things work and work on different things. This job isn’t focused on one thing only and we have flexibility to do what we enjoy working on. That way, we end up being jack of all trades. I’m learning Linux to improve my skill and enough that I will no longer need to use Windows again except for several programs such as Envision and Nextalk TTY emulator. I’ll probably vmware it eventually. However, that’s not the best part of this job. The best part is communication. In our geek world, we don’t really need to have to talk to each other through voice–in fact, some people actually prefer IMs over using their voice so some people don’t have to be distracted while listening to their fave mp3 songs. I’m glad I chose this field, so I don’t feel disabled.

Christmas is coming up faster than you’d think. To be inspired, I found this really cool stuff that I’m gonna use this holiday season - Photo stamps by Yahoo. With this feature, you can put your very own picture right onto a postage stamp. Now you don’t have to be famous to be on a stamp. :-)

Ok, the sports media is all over the controversial play that happened during the game two of ALCS between the Chicago White Sox and the Anaheim Angels. Having seen the replay a dozen times, I’ve come to a conclusion that the ball never hit the dirt and the reason why it was so damn confusing was because the catcher’s mitt was on the ground and the ball just went into the mitt, even though the mitt was on the ground—still doesn’t mean the ball did hit the dirt. However, that wasn’t even the point because the home plate umpire couldn’t even see the ball anyway. He was, in fact, unsure if the ball had touched the ground so he kinda left the play wide open but the catcher never did anything to seal the play. He just assumed that the umpire made the out call due to the handsign, which was for a strike call. So, the hitter, a catcher himself, knew there was a benefit of doubt, decided to run to the first base (he said he never heard the verbal cue from the umpire so he ran but I think it had to do with the benefit of doubt and his catcher instincts). The Angels catcher never made the tag, the hitter taking the shot to run to the first base and that’s the whole play. We could argue all night whether if we should have an instant replay like other sports or that the umpire made a confusing strike/out call by his handsign. But in my opinion, this could be all avoided, had the catcher tagged the hitter especially when the stakes are high and when there is a doubt involved.

It’s been refreshing to see NHL highlights after their one year lockout and there’s a new rule in overtime: shootouts. Paul Kariya is really a master at the shootout. He’s 2 for 2 thus far. The key success? never give a daylight of a time to the goalie to see what is your shot going to be or ur next move. I really like the shootouts ‘cuz it puts more emphasis on your skills, help save costs on operation (you would think all those alcohol beverages would help offset the operation costs but it doesn’t), more anticipation on the outcome because that will be determined in a matter of few minutes, not twenty minutes or double overtimes.

I can’t wait for NBA to start. Go Manu Ginobili! and am really curious to see how the miami team is gonna play this year with the almost competely new roster except for Shaq and Wade. The same goes for Kobe and Lebron—how big are they gonna be this season.

Michelle Wie, who just turned pro, is so fucking lucky. I really envy her and I find myself looking at her tan legs—she does have nice legs.

Damn, look at this perfect-picture posture! they should use her posture for their official LPGA logo.

Oh boy, there is a tag trend going on as I’ve been tagged twice simultaneously by Kertong (you a soft-hearted for listening to the moron’s whinings and changed the tag on me!) and Euge to tell five quirky things about myself. I’m not gonna list five things twice ‘cuz if I did that, no one would want to visit my website again. Here goes:

5 random quirks/factoids/quirky factoids/factual quirks — you get the idea…

1) Initially wanted to have four or five kids in the future ‘cuz I’m so damn tired of having a small family—only four of us, my parents, my grandma and me—at thanksgiving or christmas every year. You see, my dad’s an only child, so am I and we have no siblings. My mom’s parents passed away before I even got to the US and she has a brother but we haven’t seen him in two years or so. It’s probably the deaf thing, how sad. My dad’s father passed away two weeks after I left for college. My grandpa was a nice kind quiet guy who served in the World War II, loved the St.Louis Cardinals, had not one but two heart bypass surgeries (they used the artery from his left leg to replace the no-good artery to his heart) and let me smoke his long pipe. I still remembered his last words to me. I was visiting the grandparents for the last time a day before my parents and I get on the road trip to Washington DC. As I was going to leave, my grandpa, sitting in his favorite la-z-boy chair, asked me when I will be back visiting them again (he would say please come back soon whenever I come to visit them) and I said no this is the last time before I head to college. He spurted out “Oh shit! I better get up and hug you for the last time.” Indeed, we hugged for the last time ever. So, it’s been four of us ever since and it somehow feels smaller and smaller every year, if that’s even possible. However, now that I realize how expensive is to raise a kid, I’m not so sure about wanting four or five kids anymore.

2) Ok, the first one was pretty long. For some reason, I don’t like putting on my clothes in the bathroom after I finish shower. I guess I get claustrophobic in there. I just dry myself off, wrap the towel around me, walk out of shower to my room and put on clothes or just shorts if I’m not going anywhere.

3) When I first came to the US, landing at the O’Hare airport in Chicago, my first ever meal in America was nonetheless a happy meal from McDonald’s. My parents and I were all snuggling together in the backseat with my uncle (mom’s bro) being the driver. My stomach was starting to grumble a bit and that’s when I spotted the golden arch of McDonald’s and I pointed my finger there. My dad immediately knew what I mean. It was probably our first communication exchange and the first time anyone actually understood me. ASL (American Sign Language) rules!

4) I’ve broken my bones three times. First one was when I fell off a monkey bar, and I was dumb (blame my stupid reflexes) to stick my left arm out as the first point of impact when I landed on Earth again. Second one was my ankle when I was playing basketball and went up hard for a rebound and on the way down, my left shoes caught someone’s shoes and my ankle touched the hardwood before everything else did. Third one, hopefully my last one, was my wrist when I was fighting for an extra yardage while carrying the football in a varsity high school game. One linebacker was holding my shoulder pads by the neck (it’s called a horse tackle which is being illegal in the NFL this year and that’s how Terrell Owens got hurt last season) and then one fat lineman just jumped out and landed me onto the ground and my wrist got stuck between me and the ground, then *snapped*. Ouch.

5) Ah, last one.. uhh, oh, whenever I’m waiting for something, like an elevator or metro subway to come, I would do a golf practice swing, pretending I’m out on a golf course, hitting a hole in one or a 300 yards drive. The purpose for this is to stay in form and check my swing technique.

Now I get to TAG three people and they are kimmisan, elisa, and adam. :-)

Asian Women: Up For Grabs

Fell upon this article. This girl says it all! She observed why Asian men aren’t particularly attractive to other races except their own kind. Here’s some excerpts:

“First, the media never portrays Asian men in a dominant role. They are always portrayed as nerdy, geeky, brainiacs, with no sense of themselves and no ability to attract women. In other words, the media portrays Asian men as incapable and undesirable.”

“Second, American society has many negative stereotypes towards Asian men. It has become a complete joke to think that an Asian man could ever “satisfy” a woman. Their “manlihood” is the constant subject of jokes and insults. For this reason, most women view Asian men as asexual and feminine.”

“For these reasons, Asian women, and women in general in American society are taught to view Asian men as undesirable and feeble. As you will see, this is the reason why Asian women are now up for grabs…”

“So what is the end result of all this? Asian women are “up for grabs” and this has essentially devasted Asian men. Asian men are getting the axe on two levels here. First, they are only seen as being able to date their own kind (other Asian girls). At the same time, their own kind, at an increasing rate, tends not to prefer them sexually.”

I’m probably the perfect victim of this. At my deaf school, all the way from kindergarten to 12th grade, I was pretty much the only Asian in my class every year and was known as a “school freak” although I felt I didn’t study that much. Moreover, I never had a single girlfriend myself and the fact there was a total of only 150 students in the entire high school didn’t help much and not to mention, half of them were mentally-challenged or had multiple disabilities. However, my experience in college has gotten better—I guess because it’s more diverse and students were more open-minded.

Last week, I watched a Gallaudet football game and there were cheerleaders rooting for the team. They had 3 male cheerleaders and guess what? not even one male was a white. Two Asians (one was obviously a Korean but the other one, not sure, looked like a thai to me) and one Hispanic. They were a perfect example of what Asian males are portayed: asexual and feminine. And what of the varsity football team? not even one Asian on the team! Even Yao Ming, currently the tallest player in the NBA, is perceived as a soft, weak center.

I couldn’t agree more with the last paragraph. My Asian roommate (half Japanese and Chinese) is dating a white girl—he has never dated an Asian before and doesn’t plan to. My good friend (Korean) is attracted to Puetro Ricans or Hispanics (basically looking for Jessica Alba lookalikes), although he’s now curious about dating a Korean girl because he’s getting tired of getting pushed by girls in the past. There’s another friend (Chinese) who has a baby with a PR girl too. I think one major reason why Asian men don’t want to date their own kind is that they would be perceived as too Asian or dating a white girl would help them to look more American. Look no further than Tiger Woods who’s a half Asian and Africian-American. He got married to a white model girl.

Clearly, Asian women are up for grabs.

This morning, I was reading my RSS newsfeeder and saw this article that made me somewhat sad. Some of you may know I own a 2004 Honda Civic Si (wish it’s a Type R, dammit), but someday it will be! All hatchbacks were assembled in the UK as shown below. While reading this artcile, it said that this Type R hatchback was a massive success, quadrupling the original UK forecast to 35,190 sales and was consisently voted What Car? Hot Hatch Of The Year from 2002 to 2004, BBC Top Gear’s Best Hot Hatch 2002 and Auto Express’s Best Sporting Car 2003.

Now, I wonder why couldn’t our hatchbacks be as successful as it did in the UK. They should have used the Type R engine or a K20A2, same engine found in the RSX Type S. The U.S. Honda Marketing was probably afraid to use the same engine cuz it would hurt the RSX sales. :-(

Here’s to a future engine swap!

my car. you can see some difference like the red seats, headlight projectors, LED indicators on the door mirrors, red emblem logo, and ofc the driver seat on the right side.

I’ve been tagged by sweet