log 517

got a new monitor a few days ago. if you go and check out my photo album you will see it. 21 diagonal inches of pure perfection…well almost. It’s still on vga adapter right now, it should really be on the dvi port. To say the truth, I’ve never been so up to date with technology. The monitor is so new, the graphics driver haven’t even caught up. I’m actually keeping up with the latest nvidia drivers just so I can work the monitor at it’s best form. how exciting. But that’ll have to wait, I got bunch of jap drama on the hard drive that I want to watch first before fiddling with the un-install, install and reboot routine.

This morning my manager came by my cubicle as usual to check how my work is coming along. Then all of a sudden a long pause of nothing. "Have something I need to ask you, we have 2 positions opening for the next term, would you be interested?".  Now ain’t that great news?  Too bad I had to turn it down, tuition’s already paid, and I want to finish my 4th sem before heading out for another job, otherwise I will be stuck going to classes in the summer. Anyway I think I’ve found my place in this world. All my skills fit so well in this company, I love the job, love the location, love the hours and just about everything else that came with the job. Now all I have to do is convince myself that there’s nothing better for me elsewhere and to give up my dream of ever working in Japan.  hmmm…is that possible?

lately I feel a slight dislike for Chinese people who has a Japanese name. It is rather pretentious unless they have a good reason for it, like: they were born in Japan, they are working.worked in Japan, their ancestor is Japanese. A name should be something that represents your culture or something that’s practicle, like having a generic English name that’s easy for people around your to remember and pronounce. Sometimes I just feel like challenging them as see if they even know how to write their name in its native language.  Would be rather pathetic if they don’t.

(no offence to business people who deals with Japan business related matter and has a Japanese name, because that’s practicle)

Imitation is a form of flattery but forgery is a crime

I was out shopping today, looking for a wireless trackball so I can have total control of my desktop from the sofa. Turns out, most stores are not carrying such product anymore. I seriously dont’ know what companies like Logitech are thinking. With so many multimedia system emerging, it only makes sense to have a good device to control the cursor. Why not the wireless mouse? Because it takes room, mouse needs a surface to function. One of the wireless products I saw today had the right idea, just not good enough. The wireless gyro mouse is what I saw, good concept but the wrist is not as nible as our fingers.  Anyway they should really design is a trackball, with the standard 2 mouse button, a scroll wheel and 7 multimedia function keys (back, fb, play/pause, ff, next, stop). And dont’ design crap that’s the size of half a mouse pad, small and ergonomic is the key.

I assisted quite a few people today. Read some codes for a friend, I don’t exactly know what language it was writen in, It looks slightly like perl but not quite,…could have been coldfusion, that’s the only web language I haven’t really touch. Then I did some light translation (jap to eng) for another friend. While doing that, I was involuntarily tutoring a classmate with database stuff. (I don’t like to help him, because he doesn’t work hard enough on his own)  Then another friend asked me stuff about 3D Max. Oh and last night I made a 3D model for a friend who’s composing the graphics for a poster…..wow, I think this is the first time all my strange collection of skills come in handy in such a short time.  Covers design, language, programming, 3D imaging,…almost all the stuff I put on my resume.  ha ha ha

Lately I’ve been watching a jap drama series call "Slow Dance". It’s one of those typical cheesy japanese love stories that involves every day people. There’s this scene in episode 5 where the antagonist and his love interest sat at a cafe looking at the paper choosing a movie to watch on the day…..that’s sooo romantic…well not really to anyone but I thought so. I haven’t done anything unscheduled or pre-planned for ages.  Mostly because I don’t to feel insecure, I need to know where I’m going and what I’m doing every second of the day. Every new place I venture to, I look it up on the map at least 3 times before heading there. Everything I do is decided a few days before it actually occurs. Predictability makes life dull but it’s the most logical thing to do.

A while ago, my sis mention how useless the new friendster who viewed my profile function is because it allow people to set them to anonymous. I guess that is somewhat true. I did notice since a week after the function’s introduction, almost everyone is setting viewing to anonymous, that I don’t get. If you have an interest in people for friend, relationship or whatever, why hide it? I like to view my friend’s profile to see what’s going on in their life, whether there’re stuff they like to say that’s just better written in words. I like to view profiles of people who’s talented because I’m always looking for people who I might work with in the future. And of course I like to view profiles of single females who’re looking to start a relationship because I too am single. Only wussies(and creepy people with bad intentions) would hide themselves.  I viewed your profile because I want to!

How familiar are you with the programs you use? I’m really familiar with mine. If you’ve checked out my last post, imagine me sitting where the sofa is, with my usb keyboard and wireless mouse working on desktop 6 feet away. Hmmm…this is sign that I’m spending too much time on the computer. (or maybe not enough, eventually, I will be able to mentally control the computer) ^_^

So, here are my new acquisitions bought with my first week’s pay. 2 Ikea coffee tables.

P1.1/P1.2 - here are my second set of keyboard and mouse connected to my desktop so I can control the music video playback.

P1.3 - that’s Dragon Ash music video from a few years ago playing from my desktop to tv.

P2.1 - That’s acquisition #1. A nice side bench for my sofa.

P3.1 - That’s acquisition #2. 90×90 coffee table, perfect for board games. Anyone up for Monopoly?

Well, that’s the tour of my study/home office. Yes, when I have more $$, I will eventually furnish the basement and make a better one, something with more of a Japanese influence. For now, it’s good enough for work and enteraining for 6. Stupid thing, optical mouse doesn’t work on white glossy surfaces, so I will have to do something with that white table. And if you are thinking wtf’s with the unmatched colours, hey, it’s Ikea, my budget was $100, don’t expect so much!

Was watching donny deutsch on the topic: death in the ring on CNBC tonight. That guy is an idiot. He was comparing mix martial arts fighting with traditional stuff like boxing, wrestling..etc. To him, UFC is much more violent and "barbaric". Seriously, that isn’t true. Looking into boxing, those fighters get hit in the head more than 30 times in one fight. It’s so much more likely to cause brain damage. Wrestling is safer you say? Hell no. Those guys take a lot more hit intention and unintention. Not only that, wrestlers these days also have take hits from objects: chairs, hammer, trash can, ladder…you get the idea. UFC is much more organized and regulated. Also in UFC, the ref is this huge dude who did fight in the UFC. Who else better to trust to pull a guy off you from a chock hold? Those skinny refs from boxing who probably can’t take half a punch? ha. Another aspect of UFC that makes it much safer is their submisison rules. When fighting against one of these submission fighter, you’ll get broken bones or twisted limbs at most, no brain damage. Anyway, if you’ve ever watched the events, you know it’s more about skills unlike other sports.