TMI

This post is possibly going to be one of those TMI posts - too much info!!
It might not be a bad idea for you to close the browser right now or simply watch the Wolverine trailer below and then quit.

Are you still here? Well don't say i didn't warn you. Possibly i have made too much of the following so now that read the below, it will seem too inconsequential. There is no winning!!

I have bunions. You don't know what it is? well click on the word!! basically it is a slight deformity of the foot, extremely common, that makes you have a little bump next to the base of my big toe. My right foot's bunion is bigger. It's hereditary and related to how you place your feet and the bunching up of the toes. Recently a friend suggested i use toe spacers to separate my toes and ensure that the bones don't bunch up. I bought them yesterday (finally) and am wearing them today.. and so far, they seem interesting. I am hopeful!!! It's amazing that I didn't know about them earlier. I will have to keep wearing them and write a follow up blog later on, on their effectiveness. They won't reverse the condition but they supposedly improve comfort.
ok, back to wolverine ;-)

Dreamz

I had a horrible dream last night. I was one of the grownup kids of a big family, one father who had had multiple wives. Suddenly all the kids belonging to the other mothers started being murdered except for our mother who had three daughters (i was one of them). One of my sisters had another daughter as well. Our father had just been released from jail and we knew it was him, but we didn't know why he was doing this and to whom. It was really stressful, trying not to provoke the father and trying to escape and wondering if he was going to also kill his granddaughter. In the meanwhile we find out that he is killing them because he loved our mother the best and since she had passed away, this was his way of showing his affection for her and only her. In the end, just when he is about to murder his granddaughter, we attack him and take him down. I woke up before knowing exactly what happened though, if he had been totally taken down.
What a dream...

Why doesn't the pot boil????

You've heard of the saying "A watched pot never boils" right?
well, today for me the appropriate saying is "A watched inbox doesn't receive the email that you're waiting for".

I'm waiting... sigh!

JCVD

Last night, Atlanta and I went to watch JCVD with our karate club. The movie is very good, extremely stressful but funny and sad actually. I really felt for van Damme by the end of the movie. I really recommend watching it. Osu!!
Meanwhile, enjoy the following teaser trailer that they showed at Cannes.

Most popular pages

It is always interesting to see who accesses my blog and how they get there. In particular, I have two posts which appear very popular with random people.
The first is my post on funny myths. I have no idea why, but I get a lot of hits on this page from google searches.
The second one which is more interesting is my post on the legend behind the song Sari Galin. My original post was based on what my Turkish friend had told me about it since I couldn't find information about this song anywhere (and it is a most beautiful song, with many translations). Seems I had touched upon a well, touchy topic, as you can see by reading the comments that people have left there. I got another comment yesterday and when i looked on google, I think i am very high up on the search list. It's really very interesting... and as Atlas said, there is so much hate in the world!!

My police hour

A couple of days ago I had an interesting run in with the police. I went to park my car near a shop when i noticed that a policeman on his bike was behind me. He wasn't flashing any lights but was obviously following me, so i started wondering how long he had been following me! I quickly parked the car and stayed in my seat wondering what I had done wrong - I wasn't driving fast, I had put my blinkers on when I had turned, I wasn't talking on the phone... what had I done? While I was waiting, he was standing behind the car, reading off the number plate and talking on his walkie-talkie. I wasn't sure if I should get out of the car or not... I'd heard all these stories and some of the cops I had seen in the US were so scary. I started to open the door slowly, giving him plenty of time to object, in case I wasn't following protocol.
Since he didn't say anything I got out and half frightened out of my skin, I approached the policeman. However, the guy was the nicest man ever. I was so nervous and he was all friendly with a big smile and very talkative. Seems my registration was overdue. He wrote me a ticket but I kept thanking him for not scaring me. I think I must have been very embarrassing and I don't get embarrassed that easily, so you can imagine...!!!
Afterward I just kept laughing at myself and what a fool I must have seemed to the guy!!

Privacy

One of the topics I find really interesting in my research work is privacy. There are so many different types and levels of privacy that can be achieved. There is also usually a cost associated with the privacy level. The funny thing is that although people in academia (like me) think privacy is SUCH an important thing, most people don't care about it all that much! Showcase numero 1: seems 300 MIT kids were willing to trade all voice and data privacy with an iphone.

Anyway I wasn't planning on writing about this stuff! I wanted to write about two pet peeves of mine related to privacy. First is when you are at your desk, behind the computer and someone comes up to talk to you. Now the first thing they do is they look at your monitor and see what you were doing.... grrr!! So very rude!
The second pet peeve involves people posting up pictures of people without asking their permission. This is annoying and I think it is VERY rude. It is a total invasion of their privacy and yet... how can some people not realize it? if anyone wants to put up photos of me on the internet, so that anyone can have access to it, they better tell me and ask my permission.
Grrr.

Dijkstra's words

I love this quote by Dijkstra:
"The usual way in which we plan today for tomorrow is in yesterday's vocabulary."
It comes from an article written 20 years ago by Edsger Dijkstra, which discusses the state of computer science education.

Socratic method

This is a really interesting article about teaching using asking instead of telling (the Socratic method). The author teaches primary school children about binary arithmetic. The article contains the questions and responses of the class and I really enjoyed going thru the logic and teaching method.

Tantrums

However much money you pay for an airline ticket, you cannot control who you sit with. I am always apprehensive about sitting next to really fat people or worst, smelly people or those that make unnecessary noises. Babies are always tough as well, you never know when they are going to throw a tantrum.
On my flight today, a small family with a 1-2 year old were sitting across me. The little boy behaved really well thru most of the flight -- he was energetic and wouldn't sit down but he was happy and played with him mum and dad. About 2/3 of the way through though I don't know what happened but he suddenly started crying and crying really loud. Nothing his parents did helped. Usually I can get annoyed and think oh I didn't pay all this money to have this noise pollution. But you should have seen this little boy, his little body was racked with sobs and he was so upset. After maybe 10-5 minutes or so, his mum managed to quite him down a little bit. She was rocking him in her arms and you could see that although he had quietened down, he was trembling and hiccuping.
I was thinking first how weird it is to be a little child in this world and how when they are upset, it is such a sad sight to see. Once I stopped thinking about myself and imagine it from the perspective of the little guy, I was just sad and wanted to make him feel better. Poor little guy.
Meanwhile I was seeing how the parents were handling this. Many times I have said oh I am not ready to be a parent because how can i handle a child throwing a tantrum? But can anyone truly be ready to handle such a situation? Would there be a time when a person says, ok from now on, I can take anything the little kid throws at me.
I think that it is true that you need to have a certain level of maturity before you think about kids, but I don't think you are ever going to get to a stage when you think you are totally ready. I believe you are never going to be totally ready for all the facets of child bearing so waiting for that time to arrive is simply futile.
Having a child will bring you many moments of wondrous beauty and to balance, moments when you want to throw your hands in the air and say what have i gotten myself into. I think the point is, just like your own life, concentrate on the beauty and appreciate those moments all the more.
Of course, what do I know!! :-P

Infinite memory

I read an interesting article tonight about a woman who has an infallible memory of events from her life. She remembers everything - every single little thing - that happened to her since the age of 15. A couple of interesting things from the article:
- she remembers events infallibly, but not facts. So she didn't do particularly good on memory tests and also she didn't shine in school. So that's kind of useless right?
- For her, the adage "time heals all wounds" doesn't apply as she remembers all bad events clearly.
"I don't look back at the past with any distance. It's more like experiencing everything over and over again, and those memories trigger exactly the same emotions in me. It's like an endless, chaotic film that can completely overpower me. And there's no stop button."

For someone who has a horrible memory of both events and facts, a perfect memory is very very desirable. And yet I am not sure if I could accept not being able to rely on time to heal some of my wounds. It's funny how the disadvantages of certain gifts are not always clear.

billions and billions

Who would have thought Sagan's use of billions and billions would be so prophetic? This last week I have been watching CNN (yes I am in Calgary and thus have access to ... well, tens and tens of channels!) and the numbers that people are using are just so... well, large! 700 billion for this, 800 billion for that...

Speaking of big numbers, I was reading up on the googol, you know, as you would....
here is what wiki was saying:

"One googol is presumed to be greater than the number of elementary particles in the observable universe, which has been variously estimated from 10⁷⁹ up to 10⁸¹. A googol is also greater than the number of Planck times elapsed since the Big Bang which is estimated at around 8 × 10⁶⁰.

Since a googolplex is one followed by a googol zeroes, it would not be possible to write down or store a googolplex in decimal notation, even if all the matter in the known universe were converted into 0s. Indeed, if you had an unlimited supply of ink and paper, you would need around 10²⁰ times the current age of the universe to fully write down a googolplex."

Pretty big. So, where was I? right. Don't you worry about the state of economy in US? I'm getting more and more worried. I wish I could bury my head in sand and wait until things become better. That works, no? :-P

Post-Defense Depression

No, no, I joke, no one is depressed. I was just making a play on the name postpartum depression and I just found the resulting name funny (not that there is anything funny with PPD). I am very happy I defended and I don't have to worry about that anymore.
Having said that... I also feel really fragile. My position and future is so uncertain and I have no idea what will happen. One minute I think, oh this will be great, I will have a job, I am qualified and then something slightly negative happens (or even doesn't happen!) and I become really depressed about my future. The economy is bad, my record is not good enough,... sigh. I feel like the Dow Jones, where my stocks are just falling falling and falling in this time of uncertainty!

Buika

My newly discovered obsession is an album by a Spanish singer Concha Buika who mixes up flamenco with jazz and african rhythems and funk. I really like her most recent album called Nina de Fuego (Girl of Fire) as it has more flamenco than her other ones. I have been obsessively listening to a number of the tracks, including the one below:

I love her husky voice, vibrating with emotion. Then there is her rendition of Volver.

Doctor, doctor, give me the news, I've got a...

So... the climax of my graduate career went by in a very anti-climatic manner. Last Friday after another horrendous traveling experience I defended and I am PHinisheD. Well, kind of, there are still stuff left over to do, but I have passed. Yay. Very anti-climatic indeed. I am more worried about finding a job. What to do, what to do.
I did enjoy a really fun weekend though. My lovely Atlas bought me flowers and I celebrated with MD and CA friend.

A real pageant

Tonight I watched a really interesting documentary on PBS about the Miss Navajo Pageant (official site). One of the few requirements is that the contestants should know how to speak Navajo language, be over 18 and not married.
The pageant followed a very interesting schedule:
Day 1: they were asked about the Navajo government and council etc.
Day 2: they had to butcher a live sheep, clean it and cook it. Then they were tested on their grasp of the Navajo language
Day 3: they showcase their traditional skills
Day 4: The coronation

The women were beautiful, not in the glamorous Hollywood sense, rather in their smooth, tanned skins and high cheekbones and straight black hair. They seemed so sweet and so simple and so removed from the beauty pageants that are run these days where the women look so fake and decadent.

Games

Last night Atlas and I were invited to a game party where we spent all evening playing all different kinds of games. It was so much fun!! We played Taboo (which I LOVED), apples to Apples (random), Fact or Crap (really random because hardly anyone could tell them apart!) and Spoon (a hard hitting card game). I used to play monopoly and other card and board games a lot when i was younger but these days it is always video games. Well no more I say to you. Today is the dawn of a new era and the name of this era is...

Smile

This video always makes me Smile :-)

Enjoy.

The future looks bright

... indeed it does. It might sound trite, but hope is an amazing thing. It is wonderful to be able to look up to someone, to be inspired by someone, to aspire to be a better person. We all need to have hope and have ideals.

As I write this, I know that it is easy to laugh at my words and their idealism. But what's the point of constant cynicism? We need to hope and we need to dream and dream big.
I am happy to be here in the US right now.

Meanwhile, it seems Southpark already has an episode out about the election results. You can see some of the clips here and the whole episode is on hulu i think. Kind of funny :-)

Day Zero

Can you believe tomorrow's Day Zero? Why are all day zeros so anti-climatic? My big day zero is approaching fast and yet I am starting to feel that anti-climatic feeling.

Anyway, back to tomorrow. I hope I am happy tomorrow night. I really do.

Meanwhile I read a very nice blog entry by Linus Torvald's blog who talks about the danger of being "against" something as opposed to "pro". This is a really nice and subtle point.

Haunting Allegretto

Isn't funny how when you suddenly learn about something, subsequently you see it everywhere. You wonder how you missed it the whole time before, or did everyone really learn it with you? (the first sounds more plausible of course!)
This has been the case with the soundtrack of the movie The Fall. They play Beethoven's 7th Symphony, Allegretto, which is absolutely beautiful.
Since we first heard it during the movie, we then found it in our records and now I have heard it twice on my classic FM radio.

However did I miss this beautiful piece of music before?!!

Updates

I have lots of little updates :-)

1 - Altavisto and I are going to start karate lessons. We have found a nice small karate class close to our house and we went for our first lesson yesterday. It was wonderful and invigorating! Altavisto's kickass kicks have already been praised.
Meanwhile, I keep getting lost in the combinations!!

2 - I learned a big Spanish word today: desfortunadamente.. not sure of the spelling because i only heard it. But by the great spagetti overlord, how does one's tongue go around so many syllables???

3 - we are getting a TV. well, we are being presented with a TV, a combined gift from mi madre y tio. Most unexpected and too generous by half. Supposedly a house warming present, except for the fact that we don't seem to have a house :-P
It's a huge ass TV, 37" which will mean our screen size will increase by a factor of 4!!! Holy mother. It's disconcerning to say the least.
As I was telling Altavisto, he has no more excuses for losing when he plays his online games :-P

4 - I got done with one deadline last saturday. Now two more left by next wednesday. Wish me luck!
and then it's off to Spain I go... YAY!!!

Mortal Komedy

Mortal Komedy

If you have ever played Mortal Kombat, you will ROFL and LOL and all types of other acronyms at the above video.

The Fall

Last week I watched a spectacular visual celebration, a movie called The Fall, directed by the one-named Tarsem. The movie was set in the 1920s in LA, in a hospital. While a young Romanian girl gets to know another patient--a paralyzed young stuntman--he tells her a fantastical story. The movie reminded me in some ways of Pan's Labyrinth and known my love for that movie, it should be realized that this is a high complement indeed.

The funny thing is that almost half the critics liked the movie and the other half did not. The main criticism was that the director put style before the development of the characters and story. It is true that the scenes in the movie were amazing, like a painting at times with expansive scenes and so much color. It reminded me of the movie Gabbeh. However I also very much liked the story. The amount of tears I shed at the end of the movie was a testimony to the emotional grab of the movie.

Return of the TV

TV has been sorely missed in our household and it is high time for its return. I am organizing a welcome back party.
Alas first, I have to decide which TV to invite to come and stay with us.
Has anyone done any recent research on what to look for in TVs? or have any brands/deals they recommend?

Gray days

You know those days when you wake up after a night when by all accounts you should be rested - instead you are tired and angry at the world and don't want to talk to anyone? You wish you could just continue sleeping and sleeping and not have to deal with anyone?
well, um, I'm having one of those days. Instead of sleeping though, I am at work and working on my deadlines, and counting down the hours before I can go home.
oh and the sky is gray today. really.

Update: Znoina cheered me up immensely by introducing me to Hoops and Yoyo! they're hilarious. It's off to coffee shop i go. :-)

Deadline extended

Those two little words are like music to my ears. They can make my day, make me see the world thru rose colored glasses, let me find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.... they make everything magic...
Not one but both my conference deadlines were extended and I am a happy happy girl.

Mortally wounded

How does one get a bruise on the pad of their thumb?
By playing Mortal Kombat till the wee hours.
We have discovered a new nightly activity.
Me Mileena, Altavisto Raiden. Round 1... Fight!

weird

There are some really weird pictures in this blog.

Inspiring words

It is a good week to have TV - the democratic convention is on and it makes for very exciting TV.
Last night I watched Michelle Obama's speech (video) and I was so impressed and so inspired by her words. Hope is a beautiful thing and i think her words, and similarly Obama's, make one dream and believe in ideals as opposed to the cynicism and pragmatism of the world.
There were two things that she said which I liked a lot.

"Barack stood up that day, and spoke words that have stayed with me ever since. He talked about "The world as it is" and "The world as it should be." And he said that all too often, we accept the distance between the two, and settle for the world as it is - even when it doesn't reflect our values and aspirations. But he reminded us that we know what our world should look like. We know what fairness and justice and opportunity look like. And he urged us to believe in ourselves - to find the strength within ourselves to strive for the world as it should be. And isn't that the great American story?"
...
"And one day, they - and your sons and daughters - will tell their own children about what we did together in this election. They'll tell them how this time, we listened to our hopes, instead of our fears. How this time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming. How this time, in this great country - where a girl from the South Side of Chicago can go to college and law school, and the son of a single mother from Hawaii can go all the way to the White House - we committed ourselves to building the world as it should be."

I really liked the line that we have to listen to our hopes, instead of our fears. This is what the Bush era has done to us - it has made us so afraid that we are willing to forgo so much of our rights. Every time I pass the airport security (and it happened again last friday) I think well maybe it's ok for them to check security so rigorously, since it's better that i actually reach my destination. But when i heard the above words, I realized this mentality is the result of the fear that they raise in us; we are willing to accept anything.
Rather, we need to not forget our ideals and not lower our standards.

(this actually reminds me of some of what saenz said about Uribe)

Mexican by Indians?

The other day, Algernon and I stopped by a Mexican restaurant to have lunch. We went in and the restaurant owner and waiters were Indian. So we came out. Somehow it was not quite right having Mexican by Indians. Was I being prejudice?
I am not sure if I want to have Indian food by Mexicans either. Of course, I know the labor is always done somehow by the Latin Americans.

The Olympics

Watching the Olympics this year has been kind of tough for me, mainly because we don't have a TV. :-P The only time I get to watch it is when I go to the gym! I get on a cardio machine and watch one of the silent screens in front of me and since somehow they don't have close caption, I imagine what they say. And time between the commercials flies actually. Even the commercials have suddenly become pretty innovative and interesting. Who has seen the one about wind energy and the ancient greek who throws the discus and because of the wind, the discus changes course and topples the parthenon? :-P

And so 10 days or so have passed and although it is such a huge event in the world, it hasn't really made its self aware in my life.
It makes you wonder how easy it is to not be aware of things going on around you. and this leads to two questions: how much are you really aware of what's going on around you, and how much do you really need to be aware of what is going on around you. Do I really need to know about the Olympics?

New Obsession

My new obsession, Flight of the Conchords, is a TV show on HBO about two NZ-ers trying to make it as a band in NY. The show and the songs in it are some of the most creative and funny i have ever heard. They are ear worms and when i play them, I go in a trance of ecstasy.. :-P

Here is one of the songs from the show which they play in concert -- my second goal in life right now is to watch these guys in concert. Anyway Jemaine and Bret explain the song so no more introduction but listen well to the lyrics.

Christine has introduced me to a lot of new obsessions lately... remind me to tell you about the other shows that are a must.

Wasabe

I have not been a faithful blogger in the last month or so... and a lot has happened. It all started when we had a family reunion in mid august which coincided with the best of the best movie, The Dark Knight. We watched it on IMAX and it was magnificent - Batman as usual was the torn hero, while his nemesis the Joker was evil and chaos combined. I was reminded of the passing of Heath Ledger and it is such a shame. In some ways I was glad his face was always covered by makeup - it distanced him from his character.

I also went for a visit to LA and met up with some old family friends whom i hadn't seen for nearly 10 years - the kids had grown and they were little women now. I love watching and talking to teenagers and young adults - their views and their thought processes and what they deem as cool. Those years are hard! I remember I really wanted a boy friend but of course at that age, if you don't have the look and the cool cat act, which let me assure you i didn't, then boy friends were rare and scarce. It didn't help that i looked different to a lot of people around me. Now i look back and just think what a life.
My mum used to say to me that being young is beautiful. I didn't use to agree with that but now i see these fresh faced kids and understand what she was talking about. (not that i am old now ofcourse, but it is all relative). We used to worry about our hair, our skin, am i too fat, are my legs long enough, am i cute enough... so much energy!
Sorry how did i get in this meandering? :-P

I also went (twice) to the Frida Kahlo exhibition in Sf MOMA - i will have to write about her in a separate post. it was really interesting, her paintings were so emotional and i am glad i went twice because my feelings changed.

As I said lots has happened in these times. I will have to be more consistent with my blogging.
Meanwhile here is a really fun song I heard yesterday by Lily Allen called "GWB (Fuck you very much)", addressing, i assume, the esteemed leader of the first world central. Although some say it means Guess Who batman, which doesn't make sense to me. regardless, it is upbeat with not so upbeat lyrics. Reminds me of her other song Smile.
Boomp3.com
If you want your own copy, you can get it here.

An interesting music video

Carmensita by Devendra Banhart, From "Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon"
Video features Natalie Portman.

The Hammer is My Penis

oh wasn't the Horribleness himself smashing? the music is simply wonderful and deserves adoration from far and wide.
Seems Hulu is now streaming the full version of the show (for both US and international viewers). Meanwhile, Joss posted a very funny blog on the site of the video.
I was reading about Joss' panel at Comic-Con and it seems they are not only making a commentary dvd later on in the year but along with that a musical called Commentary! which yes, is a musical version of the commentary of Dr Horrible with Joss and everyone singing. sweet.
for now, here are the lyrics of one of my favourite tracks...

Laundry day
see you there
underthings
tumbling
Want to say
"Love your hair"
here I go...
mumbling

With my freeze ray I will stop the world
With my freeze ray I will find the time to find the words to...

Tell you how
how you make
make me feel
what's the phrase?
Like a fool
kinda sick
special needs
anyways

With my freeze ray I will stop the pain
It's not a death ray or an ice beam
(that's all Johhny Snow)
I just think you need time to know

That I'm the guy to make it real
the feelings you don't dare to feel
I'll bend to the world to our will
and we'll make time stand still

That's the plan
Rule the world
you and me
anyday

Love your hair
(Penny spoken: "What?")
(Dr. Horrible spoken: "no no I uh love the...air, heh...")
anyway...

With my freeze ray I will stop--(interrupted by Moist's entrance)

Dr Horrible: I've got a PhD in Horribleness.

Ahoy all you fans of Joss Whedan.
DaJoss has a new 3-part musical-comedy web series, Dr Horrible, that is being released incrementally this week before being taken off the web this sunday, after which it will be available on DVD. So... you only have a couple of more days before it is no more. They have released parts 1 and 2 and 3 will be released tomorrow. Part 2 is quite hilarious... I had a couple of outbursts of laughter while watching at work!
It's a superhero spoof starring Neil Patrick Harris as a supervillain wannabe who dreams of being accepted into the Evil League of Evil (what a sweet name!). Thwarting him from his goal is his nemesis, Captain Hammer (played by "Firefly" star Nathan Fillion), as well as his affection for a girl from the Laundromat (played by Felicia Day).

Oopse... it did it again.

The edge of the case of my macbook where the wrist rests has cracked... AGAIN. Last time I was assured it was only the fault of one manufacturer and that it had been rectified. Not so.
I was reading on the web about what a common problem this is. This guy had had to get his fixed three times already.
I have to say i am a bit disappointed with apple. I thought i was getting such a stable and great box.
My macbook crashes and cracks. In spite of the fact that i care for it like a baby - getting it bibs (iskin) and protective clothing (cover).
I use my computer all the time so i can't take leave it in support every couple of months for a couple of days.
This is bad form.
and horrible timing.

w0w... seriously.

Listen to this and just... absorb.

Back story: A girl named Olga was out with her friends and she talked to this guy named Dmitri for all of two minutes. Then she gave him her card and said “give me a call.” These are the messages he left. It gets especially funny/shocking/horrifying near the end. source.


I mean seriously... wow.

Rainb0w and the Tree

A magical photo. Here is more information.
Doesn't it remind you of the tree from the Fountain?
(dedicated to the lovely Gillen, photographer extradinare)

L0ngyearbyen

This was an amazing article about the town of Longyearbyen where it is forbidden to die! It's so interesting how different lives can be, even in this day and age. Or I guess, especially in this day and age. Also the effect of the environment on the day to day life; e.g. how the children needed extra physiotherapy as the couldn't move their arms around too much because of all clothing.
Fascinating!
btw did you notice it's in Svalbard.

According to this BBC article, a US air strike in eastern Afghanistan on Sunday killed 47 civilians, 39 of them women and children, most wedding party guests.
Did anyone see this in the US media? Can you imagine what would have happened even if a single one of those civilians killed was American?
I abhor this double standard we live in. The worth of a person depends on their nationality.

New Ear Worm

This is the song at the end of the puzzle game Portal which was very cool indeed. The gamer is promised cake if they solve the puzzles but at the end they find out the cake is a lie. There is a HAL-type computer GLaDOS who provides the commentary and this is her voice singing at the end. It is such a darkly funny and catchy song!!

'Still Alive' by Jonathan Coulton: http://www.jonathancoulton.com
and sung by Ellen McLain

Lyrics:
This was a triumph.
I'm making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS.
It's hard to overstate my satisfaction.
Aperture Science
We do what we must
because we can.
For the good of all of us.
Except the ones who are dead.
But there's no sense crying over every mistake.
You just keep on trying till you run out of cake.
And the Science gets done.
And you make a neat gun.
For the people who are still alive.
I'm not even angry.
I'm being so sincere right now.
Even though you broke my heart.
And killed me.
And tore me to pieces.
And threw every piece into a fire.
As they burned it hurt because I was so happy for you!
Now these points of data make a beautiful line.
And we're out of beta.
We're releasing on time.
So I'm GLaD. I got burned.
Think of all the things we learned
for the people who are still alive.
Go ahead and leave me.
I think I prefer to stay inside.
Maybe you'll find someone else to help you.
Maybe Black Mesa
THAT WAS A JOKE.
HAHA. FAT CHANCE.
Anyway, this cake is great.
It's so delicious and moist.
Look at me still talking
when there's Science to do.
When I look out there, it makes me GLaD I'm not you.
I've experiments to run.
There is research to be done.
On the people who are still alive.
And believe me I am still alive.
I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
I feel FANTASTIC and I'm still alive.
While you're dying I'll be still alive.
And when you're dead I will be still alive.
STILL ALIVE

Masha D'yans

Some lovely friends from MD gave me the above farewell card a couple of months ago which I am in love with. It has been sitting on top of my bookcase and every time I look at it, I become light and happy. It is such a joyful image and the girl's hair reminds me of my own, which is kind of wild and never where it is supposed to be. I have kind of given up trying to appear neat.
Today finally I decided to see if I can find out more about the card (I've been looking at posters for our house - I'll write more later). Anyway, I found out that the artist is Masha D'yans. All her images are really lovely, fantastical and so light and happy. I never get tired of looking at them.
I found out Target carries her cards so I will have to check them out this weekend.
Let me know which of her images you like best.

How marriage works

This was an interesting article about a catholic priest's advice on who to marry and who not to marry - I guess it's mostly advice for women.
Here's a summary of what he said:

- Never marry a man who has no friends
- Similar attitude towards money
- Steer clear of someone whose life you can run, who never makes demands counter to yours.
[this one was interesting because it's unusual but still true.]
- Is he overly attached to his mother and her mythical apron strings?
- Does he have a sense of humor?
- Take a good, unsentimental look at his family — you’ll learn a lot about him and his attitude towards women.
- similar religious beliefs
- Does he possess those character traits that add up to a good human being — the willingness to forgive, praise, be courteous? Or is he inclined to be a fibber, to fits of rage, to be a control freak, to be envious of you, to be secretive?

It's funny he said that at the end of his lectures, people were left off wondering if anyone was left that satisfied his criterion! but i think a lot of what he said make a lot of sense. At least for me.
of course, just between me and you, I think i landed me a pretty good fish.

most valuable possession

I just read about this armed robbery that happened close to our house and you know what i was thinking... omg if that happens to me, i hope they don't take my computer!! it has all of my research files!
I am not sure what it says about me that this is the first thing I think about.

Maybe I need to get a back up!

tongue tricks mania

this is just weird... although.. the last one is kind of cute!

WRAPUP 5-Colombia rescues Betancourt, 3 US hostages

*Betancourt, 3 Americans, 11 other hostages rescued *Rescue operation tricked guerrillas *Betancourt, weeping, thanks Colombian military *Bush congratulates Uribe *U.S. ex-hostages en route to United States, Colombia says By Hugh...

read more | digg story

Our reality

In the midst of paper rejections from snotty conferences, it is good to remind of ourselves what reality is for some people. After 6 years of being a hostage, Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt is finally rescued by the government forces. oh yes 14 others were as well.
It is a happy day after all.

Grave of the Firefly

Last night we watched the movie Grave of the Firefly, an old (1988) anime. It was an amazing movie, it played with your heart strings like a virtuoso. It is the story of the survival of a brother and a sister, made orphan by the firebombing of Kobe during WWII. I don't want to give away any spoilers, so I don't know how much to write and what to say. Something I liked about it a lot was how nothing was totally good, and similary nothing was totally bad. Actually the only bad thing is war. I don't want to give away the ending but once you finish watch it, i recommend wiki'ing it and finding out more about the author of the story and the semi-autobiographical aspect of it.
Here is a trailer for the movie:

and here is a review of it by Roger Ebert with some interesting views.


ps now I have two favourite shows with the term firefly in them!

The D0llhouse

oh yes my lambs, i cannot wait till January arrives.. and with it, brings me a d0llhouse.

Have i mentioned my love for El Senor Joss Whedon?

First review. My heart Pounds.

http://www.aintitcool.com/node/37214

Me.want. to.watch.
Me.hungry. to. watch.dis. movie.
Me.thirsty. for.de. dark.knigh.

Interesting stuff

A most lovely sight is the descent into San Francisco, especially at night. When coming from the north, you fly south along the bay and then make almost a 360 turn before landing. The runway starts almost at the water so you fly low along the water and then you touch ground.
Sydney airport has a similar runway, but I have only landed there in day light, early morning to be exact. So none of the loveliness of the lights along the water.

On other news, "Footage from a video camera handed out by an Israeli human rights group appears to show Jewish settlers beating up Palestinians in the West Bank." The article is very sad and it still amazes me that Palestine can be legally occupied like that. It boggles the mind.
However, what was more surprising was the beautiful, practical and feasible solution to counter human rights violations, implemented by these people.

The human rights group called B'Tselem seems handed out about 100 video cameras to the palestinians in the west bank region.
The thinking behind the project is that when trouble flares, rather than just giving a statement to the Israeli police or army, video carries much more weight.
"The difference is amazing," says Oren Yakobovich, who leads the Shooting Back project.
"When they have the camera, they have proof that something happened. They now have something they can work with, to use as a weapon."

I really really liked this idea of handing out video cameras to build accountability. A wonderful use of new technology.

Fiançailles

If you like the movie Amelie, watch A Very Long Engagement, by the same director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and starring the very same Audrey Tautou. The movie has the same whimsical story telling and characters. Maybe there were too many characters, maybe the ending was too feel-good... can such a movie ever end badly? but it was sweet and heart felt.

So guess what i watched tonight? :-)

check out...

Valardur's recent post on some AMAZING new directions of research! blows my mind and makes me want to try out crack cocaine.

Contact

Did you all hear about the newly discovered uncontacted tribe in the Amazonas in Brazil? It is such an amazing thing that there are still parts of the world which civilization has not yet corrupted. Here are more photos of the tribe and their little world. I find the one where the tribesmen are pointing their arrows at the plane the most powerful -- they don't know what a plane is. From what I understand, the tribe is to remain isolated. It makes me wonder if it is ok for them to remain untouched by civilization. Isn't also good for them to choose how they want to live?
Alvaro mentioned how this policy of leaving them alone seems in line with that of Star Trek - don't contact a new world, unless they contact you first. They need to grow and be mature enough... don't you wonder how many other worlds are watching us, waiting for us to 'mature'? :-)

Also, it seems there are more than 100 of these uncontacted tribes, more than half in south america, incl. Colombia, but a fair number in New Guinea (isn't that fascinating?). But 'uncontacted' doesn't necessarily mean that they don't know of the world outside. Some decide that they don't want to assimilate, and so go further in, in to the jungles.

Unrelated to this, I started reading about New Guinea and it seems it is known for cannibalism, although ceremonial, up until even 1970s. The interesting thing is that the reason the Aussie government outlawed cannibalism in their part of New Guinea because it led to a disease........

New App1e product: the i-Rack!

Really funny video!

Own interpretation

Just a Little Rain
(Malvina Reynolds)

Just a little rain falling all around
The grass lifts its head to the heavenly sound
Just a little rain, just a little rain
What have they done to the rain?

Just a little boy standing in the rain
The gentle rain that falls for years
And the grass is gone and the boy disappears
And the rain keeps falling like helpless tears
And what have they done to the rain?

Just a little breeze out of the sky
The leaves nod their heads as the breeze blows by
Just a little breeze with some smoke in its eye
And what have they done to the rain?

---

When i first read the lyrics of this song, I thought they were so gentle and beautiful and sad and magical.
In fact, the imagery that it evoked was nothing like what it was really about. It was actually written as part of a campaign to stop nuclear testing in the atmosphere, which was producing fall-out. Similarly here is how the song by the Searchers sounds. This is an instance when my own imagination did a much better job of interpreting the song.
What did you guys think?

Desparately Seeking Onion

Last weekend Altavisto and I watched the movie The Fountain. Has anyone else watched it? It is one of those movies which is wonderfully acted and layered like an onion and at the end of the movie, we are left off, wondering how the layers were ordered and if the layers were real or imaginary. The hubby gave me his interpretation and although it was better than my own confused mess, I am not yet convinced. I will have to read up on it. If you have seen it and have your hypothesis handy, let me know!!

On another note, we also watched the super cool movie Super Bad. Oh yeah. Definitely on another level, but had quite a few LOL moments.

Cafe where art thou?

It's been nearly 10 days that I have stopped my two cups of coffee in the morning habit. I am drinking black tea as replacement which has much less caffeine and I no longer get headaches. However you know what I have discovered? I like the taste and smell of coffee....I miss it! I no longer need it but would like to drink it. That is good right? :-)
However I will never sink to the level of green teas... they are still yuck! :-P

Btw again where are my blogger sisters and brothers?!!!

El Laberinto del Fauno

My favourite movie of all time is El Laberinto del Fauno by the genius Guillermo del Toro. I saw it when it first came out and this weekend I watched all the extras on the dvd and the entire film with director's commentaries. If you liked the movie, I really recommend watching the movie with the commentaries because like del Toro mentions in the extras, there are so many layers to the movie and learning the layers only increases your appreciation of the movie. I am so amazed that the movie didn't get more awards -- for sure, it deserved the Oscar for best foreign movie. The acting alone was brilliant. The storyline fantastical. The score enchanting.
I won't say too much about the movie because it seems everything I want to say is better conveyed by the many reviews of the movie. So instead I will list various quotes which I liked and some comments. Note there will be sp0ilers so if you haven't seen the movie, go see it! and then read the quotes. :-)
Btw, other movies related to this which I want to watch are: The Devil's Backbone and The Little Princess.

"When we're kids, we all really believe that there is a rabbit-hole somewhere that we can tumble down and come out in a magical place. But as we grow up, the belief wanes but the need for that belief increases." This is so true. Perhaps this is why religion becomes so important to some grown ups.

And although audiences have interpreted the film's bittersweet ending as everything from a religious metaphor to a psychological allegory, del Toro offers a simpler, but more poetic, explanation, that of "I always think of that beautiful quote by Kierkegaard that says the tyrant's reign ends with his death, but the martyr's reign starts with his death. I think that is the essence of the movie: It's about living forever by choosing how you die."
At the end of the movie, I really struggled with the idea of whether the fantasy world was real or not. Why can't it be? But I guess it's not. Along the same lines, a reviewer writes: "she defies her stepfather with the knowledge he can kill her. But what he does not know is that he cannot take her life."

"The bulk of the movie deals with one question: How does one contend with overwhelming, tyrannical violence?" Everyone deals differently, from the brutal violence that Captain Vidal leashes out on those around him, to the guerrilla warfare of the rebels, the double life of Mercedes and the Dr, the acceptance of the mother and its total rejection by Ofelia.

The first lines of the movie, quoted from the faun, reads: "A long time ago, in the underground realm, where there are no lies or pain, there lived a Princess who dreamed of the human world. She dreamed of blue skies, soft breeze, and sunshine. One day, eluding her keepers, the Princess escaped. Once outside, the brightness blinded her and erased every trace of the past from her memory. She forgot who she was and where she came from. Her body suffered cold, sickness, and pain. Eventually, she died. However, her father, the King, always knew that the Princess' soul would return, perhaps in another body, in another place, at another time. And he would wait for her, until he drew his last breath, until the world stopped turning..."
This quote kind of reminded me of the parallel of this movie and that of The Little Prince where he escapes from his world and comes to earth seeking people, thinking that then he will no longer be lonely. He learns too late that you can still be lonely in a sea of people. Another of my favourite books.

Sliding Doors

One of the best things about joining facebo0k has been that I have gotten in touch with a lot of my high school friends back in W011ongong. Unfortunately, I had lost touch with everyone except for 3 wonderful people and now I got a chance to see what everyone was up to. What struck me and strikes me every time I go to their homepages is the different paths we have taken since high school. Almost everyone in that group is married, settled down with at least one kid. It's amazing, girl or boy, their profile pictures is of them holding a baby, a toddler or a kid. Sometimes a big kid and I wonder how soon after graduation they had the kid.
Meanwhile, here I am still in school with an unsettled future and as time goes by, the prospect of kids becomes more and more scary. It is such a huge responsibility and they will be here forever. The good times and the bad times. You think marriage is scary but it is nothing compared to bringing someone to life and saying "here you go, goodluck and all, it's not really a fair and just world". And the funny thing is that as time goes by, for me the responsibility of a kid becomes more scary. Don't get me wrong I want a kid or two, but when you start thinking about the why and the how and the randomness of it all, it is such a heavy responsibility... almost like playing god!! Maybe the idea is not to think about it and over-analyze it -- simply go for it. Who knows.
Going back to my school mates, it is weird how our lives are so different. From my whole year which i think had about 100 kids, give and take a few, I think only 3 people did phds and haven't had the expected sequence of events after their high school. The cool kids are nearly all homebodies and the uncool kids have come into their element. They have become cool.
Seriously going thru high school is so stressful and scarring!! you have to escape it first before you can leave behind the tangles and the shadows and become your own person.

Hypocrisy

Here is something interesting I ran into today:
"I don't understand why it is illegal for me to pay someone to have sex in private, but it is legal for me pay that person to have sex while I videotape it and put it on a DVD for public sale as long as they sign a waiver. One--and mind you, the most private one--is illegal prostitution. The other--the more public act--is legal pornography."
Seems logical no? Makes you wonder why prostitution is illegal anyway.

Anyway someone else responded with the following reason:
"The reason pornography can't be outlawed in the same way that prostitution is that, since it is filmed, written, photographed, etc. it is considered "free expression" and therefore covered by the First Amendment. Although some things that are covered by the First Amendment are outlawed (such as child pornography), the reasons behind the law have to be much more compelling to pass constitutional muster. To outlaw prostitution, the state need only prove that it has a good reason to do so, and virtually anything they can come up with is considered ok. Hope this helps."

Extraordinary feats

First watch this and see why the pics are so special...

and then prepare to be amazed by the following video.

Even though I see the video, I still can't believe it. (no disrespect but...) do elephants really have this much intelligence? I wonder at the kind of training they have had.

Tranquila!

"Originally built in 1901, this walkway now serves as an approach to Makinodromo, the famous climbing sector of El Chorro." (Copied from Jeerjeerak's blog)
Being an acrophobe, this video was terrifying. All I could hear in my ear was the tranquila of the colombian guides in my ear as I was climbing the trees in the Amazonas! Amazing video!! Thanks Jeerjeerak-e gol! just when i started complaining about people not blogging too! :-P

From Wiki about El Caminito del Rey (The pathway of the King):
In 1901, it was obvious that the workers of the Chorro Falls and Gaitanejo Falls needed a walkway to cross between the falls, to provide transport of materials, vigilance and maintenance of the channel. Construction of the walkway lasted four years. It was finished in 1905.

In 1921 the king Alfonso XIII had to cross the walkway for the inauguration of the dam Conde del Guadalhorce, and it became known by its present name.

The walkway has now gone many years without maintenance, and is in a highly deteriorated and dangerous state. It is one meter (3 ft) in width, and is over 700 feet (200 m) above the river. Nearly all of the path has no handrail. Some parts of the walkway have completely collapsed and have been replaced by a beam and a metallic wire on the wall. Many people have lost their lives on the walkway in recent years. After four people died in two accidents in 1999 and 2000, the local government closed the entrances. However, adventurous tourists still find their way into the walkway.

state of the bl0gosphere

yo yo wassup wit mi homies in da crowd.. der used 2 be blog happy people around, but doz dayz are gone. No more bloggin for my girls out there, JeerK and ChissyG, nor my boyz in da hood, Valardur y Altavisto.
I know chrissyG is roaming the wilds of the valley of the kings, and altavisto is rakin in his air miles, but wazzup wit da rest??
and why isn't Juanton not bloggin?????

Amazing photos

Check out these aerial photos of Iran's salt deserts and seas by the photographer George Steinmetz.
- the flamingos are gorgeous
- the wind tower is amazing, something out of a sci-fi movie
- you also see a picture of the old city of Bam, just before the earthquake of 2005(?) leveled it. It is such a sobering thought that something can stand the test of time for hundreds and thousands of years and then.... just gone overnight.
You guys know what other photo Steinmetz has taken right? the photo of the caravan of camels in the desert.

Technical writing

Recently I started looking into articles on technical writing, and let me tell you, these manuscripts are absolutely fascinating!! I really find interesting when I should use dashes and hyphens; et al. is not italicized; both e.g. and i.e. should have commas after them.... and more.
As an example, check out this site. Isn't it very interesting? then you go and find all the errors of other people's papers and you wonder at their ignorance :-P
hey, i think i just realized why my advisor is so finicky with correct writing. It drives me up the wall that instead of reading the content of the paper (at least on the first round) he instead concentrates on the writing. Maybe he read too many of these articles and now he can't help it.
oh good Spaghetti Monster, i better stop reading these articles before i turn into him!!! noooooo!!! :-P

Follow up to the Goat

Yummy Riesling

I tasted the following wine at my lovely friend SJ's house last week. Sooo good!!! It is nice and sweet and refreshing - yummy! I can totally see me having a glass of that after dinner sometime... and this is saying a lot because I am not much of an alcohol drinker at all.
(You know the picture I have in mind? of Homer with his tongue out, salivating!!)


Producer: Schmitt Sohne
Wine: Blue Riesling QbA
Country: Germany
Appellation: Mosel-Saar-Ruwer
Wine Type: White
Primary Varietal: Riesling
Grade: B
Designation: Good and Cheap
Price: $8

She said she got it from Trader Joe's - except when i went there to get me some, i didn't see it.

Where is my goat?

oh I see, it is way up there.
why did it go up there? for two very different reasons.

Africa seems to be a favorite target for many philanthropists but I often get annoyed, if not insulted by the do-gooder, condescending, fake attitude of these people. These rich people think suddenly by going to Africa, they are suddenly so deep and full of conscience. Just by going there, they think they have done something amazing.
Remember when Paris Hilton wanted to be show she has become a better person. How do she show her changed attitude? oh yes, she wanted to "give back" by visiting Africa. Salvation.
Take the show Idol Gives Back, which is essentially a money raising show by American Id0l, focusing on the plight of Africans. First of all, why only Africa? because it is fashionable? have they looked at the other poor parts of the world? Do they even know of them??
Let me not digress. They show you these videos of these singers or what not, that mix in with the poor African people. This is the way a typical clip progresses: They show the famous person/s talking to a couple of poor black people, then they show a crowd of black people dancing or something and the rich white are standing on the side and laughing and clapping - oh yes they are really in with the crowd now. and then they hug the people and offer some deep reflection. Hallelujah.
Oh come on!! I wonder what the African people themselves are thinking - oh here comes the big white man on their high horse again - it must be that time of the year again when the fund raisers are on.
And after all that of course the rich white people go back to Hollywood, and live their lives of excess and debauchery.
Ok maybe I am exaggerating. And maybe that is not the way the Africans themselves see it. I have never asked any African Americans actually what they think of this all.
All I know is that if they kept doing that about Iran, i would be pissed off.

well this was a long verbiage. I will divulge the second reason why my goat is up later.

To Submit

It is such a weird feeling when you know the paper you submitted to a conference is not appropriate for that conference. I know it is going to get rejected but at the moment, I have removed all other possible options. It is either to submit here or not to. I feel regret as I could have submitted to another, more appropriate conference about a week ago, alas my deity preferred this one. Meanwhile I have learned not to listen to this deity much cause he sometimes speaks from his nether regions.
What to do... well not much now. Suck it in, keep your head down and find the next target.

TV Box?

On Altavisto's recent trip to Nipon, he bought a fancy Tv Box for converting a composite cable to VGA, so we could play our game cube. It's pretty cool and it seems to do many more things than just this conversion, like possibly TV tuning etc. This all seems pretty cool except.... the manual is in japanese. So we can't figure anything out!!!
The inhumanity :-P
ps. any japanese out there that want to help us?!!!

Quote

"The greatest contraceptive one can have in the developing world is the knowledge that your children will live."
Julius K Nyerere, President of Tanzania 1964-1985

This is a quote that we saw on the slideshows of Al Gore in his The Inconvenient Truth, which we just got around to finishing. I thought it was a very nice, poignant quote.

ps I wish he could help me with the intro of my papers... he motivates the problem so well!! :-P

300 million dead

I liked this blog entry, found on digg. It talks about how the 300 million american people have all died on the inside.
"4000 dead American soldiers, that is; it's almost as if the two orders of magnitude greater number of slaughtered Iraqis, the millions of refugees, the destruction of an entire country, simply don't matter and don't count. Americans find it hard to gather outrage over thousands of our own dead, and tens of thousands wounded, and they sure as hell aren't going to get stirred up over hundreds of thousands of dead foreigners."
someone else commented:
"A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." -- Joseph Stalin
Also another interesting comment:
"And that's just the 4000 they officially count. If you're shot in Iraq, but die on the plane to the hospital in Germany, you are not counted as a casualty in Iraq. And DoD doesn't even count dead American contractors."

There is nothing worst than apathy.

Bi11ie Jean gets a facelift

Listen to this version of Bi11ie Jean by this American 1dol contestant David C00k. It is so fabulous and chilling.

ps. I hope this upload works... my first upload of music!!

technos3xual

See if you know the meaning of the following words: heterosexual, homosexual, transsexual,
technosexual...
say what? The following article was pretty informative and contained an interesting interview with a man who has married his robot lover Alice. It was funny when he said that at the beginning of their relationship she dumped him and so he had to delete her memory and start over. Otherwise it actually wasn't that bad. As long as he is happy. It can definitely help people who want relationships but cannot have them for whatever reasons. Not having a partner can be lonely. I do wonder though if the technosexuality will be as prevalent as is predicted by some.
Do you think there is anything wrong with it?

Happy Pi Day!

What's so special about the following poem? (Try and answer with out reading the article)
Sir, I bear a rhyme excelling
In mystic force and magic spelling.

The article is actually really interesting. I love this one:
"in 1873, William Shanks announced he had found 707 digits over years of hand-cramping work; unfortunately, he had made a mistake after the 527th place. The following digits were all wrong." D'uh!!!

Also... "Pi Day is a time to honour not just a number and our fascination with it, but also the essential truth that there are some things we simply cannot know. We can only get close to knowing."

Democracy... Iranian style

It's election time again in Iran because ya know, Iran is, like, a democracy, ya know?
Ha! What kind of democracy disqualifies any candidate that might disagree in the slightest with the current regime? Let the people decide what they want.
This makes me mad.
Don't get me wrong though, such democracies are all around the world. For example, in Russia where Kasparov was having so much problems. or Venezuela where Chavez seems to somehow have a never ending term. Cuba doesn't even hold elections, right? :-P Even in the US, if a candidate is not rich, don't bother running for election. But I guess it's all relative.

Let's play a game... Can you name other so called democratic countries?

Doktor = Jail?

This one is just plain weird! It seems in Germany, unless you hold a doctorate degree from EU, you cannot call yourself a doctor. If you do, go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200.

Man Hug Methodology

Hilarious and educational - not only for the men, but also for the women. A `man' is a mysterious creature.

And the airbed went Poof!

Let me tell you a funny story. Albarino bought an airbed, instead of a bed, when he moved in to our new place in Berkeley. He thought it was easier to carry home etc. So the airbed was HUGE, a motherflying queen which filled our bedroom. We ended up having to buy it king sized sheets because it was so fat - like a botero painting! I wanted to buy a proper bed but Alnarido insisted this was a great bed and it is going to work. sigh.... do you know how this story is going to end?
Remember the time I said our house is guest friendly? well no more. The night my friend left our house, just when we were looking around the house and congratulating ourselves for such a nice looking house, such a guest friendly house, the airbed went poof and it went saggy and it went decrepit. Inconceivable!!
So now our house is again a mess. We sleep in the middle of the living room, on the guest sofa bed. Where is the humanity!!
Anyhow, the moral of this story? Stick to your convictions and don't sleep on an airbed for too long. However big and hearty it looks!

Mas Cafe?

I have discovered something funny - my body needs more coffee in cold weather.
I used to only need 1 cup of java a day; since i have been in calgary, a 2nd cup has been added. And it is not even cold here!!
Anyone know the reasons behind this relationship?

p.s. did you know about this?

The Politic Hour

It is seriously unfair that in 2004 the Democrats had such douche bags for candidates and this year we have both Obama and Hillary and only one will win.

The Underdog
The power of the underdog for me is amazing. I want (mostly) who is not winning. I think I like Obama better (I say i think, because the feminist in me wants to welcome a woman president but then the idealist in me likes Obama better). But since Obama's rocket of a campaign (it has been pretty much going up, up and beyond), and the total obsession with Obama around me, I seem to always be defending Hillary. And not because i like her and want her to win (I am undecided like the other aspects of my life!). Only because she is turning out in some ways to be the underdog of the story. Which is kind of weird.
Who do you think will get the nomination in the end? My friend RSN, who is an Obama fan, thinks Hillary will win in the end, because people in general tend to make more conservative choices.

The Beachboy
McCain has won the republican nomination. People, even on the left, seem to generally like him. But do we like him simply because he is not as bad as the other candidates? He is still pretty bad!! True it is more likely that he will unite the republicans and the democrats, and yes it is true that he is not a fan of torture.... but his foreign policies are still not good. He wants to go to war with Iran... wasn't he the one that sang "bomb, bomb, bomb, iran" to the tune of the Beach Boys? He has always supported the war in iraq. I think the scary thing is that he has certain good characteristics so he is more likely to get elected in current america than the other republican candidates. The other candidates had no chance. This is not good.

Guest Friendly

Our home is now guest friendly!
Today we bought a sofa for when we want to sit in the living room, which converts to a bed for the friendly guest who comes to visit us. Technology... what will they think of next! A car with wings, that flies???
But cereally my back really thanks us for buying that sofa... do you know how difficult a time I had watching DVDs and playing games? I mean, that's why i kept losing at the games..... Either I could lean back against the wall and not see anything (b/c the monitor was too far away) or sat close to the monitor and have my back hurt. What's a girl to do??
Anyhow so we have a bed for you, we have pillows and the house looks good and smells good! we have video games, the wireless Internets (the only one on the block that still uses 802.11b. We are HIGH tech baby!) so....

We want YOU!

ps. Got my baby back. Its facelift looks so natural! Takes away at least 6 months from the age of the computer. Esp when we added the 2G of RAM.... wopaa! It's too fast now. It opens up the apps before I even think about opening 'em. Tricky devil!

pps. Special thanks goes out to mi esposo for being very manly and putting together the sofa-bed-convertible. Honestly, Scarface should come to you for manly lessons :-P That's what we started watching today btw.

The store took my baby!!

ok so they took it with my blessing. And ok, so my baby macbook needed to get a face lift. But still.... the store ate my baby! (did i say ate? :-P)
The front of my macb00k case got cracked a while ago for no apparent reason - seems that this is a common event. I patched it up with a sticky tape and waited until a time when I couldn't convince myself that I didn't NEED the macbook for my work. The time arrived last friday when i finished this report and had to wait for feedback and read papers. So I had to go... and they took it without any question. Once it was taken i realized what a dumkomf i am! I hadn't backedup my data.... Not without my backup!
Anyway they are supposed to get back to me today - lets see how long I will have to do without my baby.

N0 C0untry

Last night I finally watched the much anticipated N0 C0untry 4 0ld Men and I am sorry to say it did not live up to its hype. Yes the acting was great, yes the scenes and the way the movie was made were great, but I was left wanting at the end of the movie. What was the message, the moral of this story? In fact what was the point of it all? Did I miss something?

Update:
I went and read up on IMDB and wiki and it seems there were depths I wasn't aware of. Seems there is something about futility, fate and the element of chance. It doesn't matter what you plan.
One thing which I realized after I researched the movie was how anti-hollywood this movie is.
Quoting from someone on IMDB: (spoiler alert!!)
"The way it inverts the action/thriller. The final act has been so maligned by so many people because it does the exact thing the Coens were aware that it would do. It destroys the adjusted perceptions of the audience and forces them to confront things that are not there. We are denied the "satisfaction" of watching Moss die, Chigurh is denied the satisfaction of killing Moss, Bell is denied the satisfaction of restoring order, Carla Jean does not get to walk off into the sunset with her husband -- nothing in this movie ends the way Hollywood would want it to, which is one of the reasons I think it's absolutely brilliant."

1 week and 6 days

Tomorrow marks my 2 week anniversary since moving to Berkeley. The house is nice but sparse. The university has a great feel to it and I hung around the library and the cafes for the first 10 days and then was able to ask for a desk at the department. Also sitting in a couple of classes.

I have to say, I quite like the Berkeley area. The atmosphere is so hippy and free thinking and intellectual. Love it love it!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

The last couple of days I have been listening to Amy Winehouse non-stop. It is the first time I am listening to her - prior to that I was very much turned off her by the bad publicity and the beehive didn't help!
So I know this is very much of an inappropriate Valentine's Day song to post, but it is just so beautiful. Love is a Losing Game.

Aboriginal Proverb

We are all visitors to this time, this place.
We are just passing through.
Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow, to love... and then we return home.

The Gre8t Dictat0r

Have you seen this film?
"Charlie Chaplin's first dialogue picture, The Great Dictator (1940), was an act of defiance against Hitler and Nazism, filmed and released in the US one year before it abandoned its policy of isolationism to enter World War II. Chaplin played the role of a Nazi-like dictator "Adenoid Hynkel", Dictator of Tomainia, clearly modeled on Hitler.

The film was seen as an act of courage in the political environment of the time, both for its ridicule of Nazism and for the portrayal of overt Jewish characters and the depiction of their persecution. Chaplin played both the role of Adenoid Hynkel and also that of a look-alike Jewish barber cruelly persecuted by the Nazis. The barber physically resembles Chaplin's Tramp character, but is not considered to be the Tramp. At the conclusion, the two characters Chaplin portrayed swapped positions through a complex plot, and he dropped out of his comic character to address the audience directly in a speech." Above is the speech.