daninbusiness

Saturday, March 03, 2007

perfect day in Shenzhen so far

Warm breezes, lots of sun.

Can't complain about the weather at all right now. It will be air-conditioning weather soon enough; just have to enjoy the nice weather while it's here.

(To give reference for those reading this in Minnesota - I'd say the weather right now is roughly equivalent to mid-late May...shorts aren't really necessary but you could wear them if you really wanted to and be comfortable...)

Wednesday, February 28, 2007

changing habits isn't easy

Need to change stuff around a bit if I really want to grow.

I'm trying to write a book; and I've made the deceptively simple goal for myself of getting 3 pages of material done per day.

I thought that this was a modest goal, but actually doing it still is a little challenging. Breaking habits (ie, instinctively searching the web when I have a free moment, turn on a DVD when I'm at home, eating alone, choosing to tinker with the computer rather than actually using it productively, blogging, etc) does take a bit of effort.

I guess I really should look at it like Iook at going to the gym - something I really just need to do, no matter what.

(I'm not slavish about going to the gym, but I average around 3 times a week).

Tuesday, February 27, 2007

My submission was accepted on slashdot...word!

Finally, now I too have joined the ranks of Slashdot readers who have submitted a news article for discussion!

Seems like I picked a good topic that has started some interesting conversation and not too many flame wars. Check it out; the Slashdot post about the NY Times Bee article.

One thing that is surprising, however - how many Slashdot readers are really that experienced in Bee-raising? Evidently more than one might expect, unless people are simply claiming knowledge for the sake of "winning" an on line argument .

(Check that link out, it's one of the better somethingawful articles I've read; satirical but kind of insightful if you've ever read any Internet forums).

Feeling way better

Got home early yesterday, took it easy. Ended up doing a bunch of updates to my Ubuntu install, including breaking the graphics drivers, then fixing them again. Since my friend Ron was kind enough to count on me to set up a new computer rig for his new movie, I felt a need to live up to his expectations and practice a bit at home.

After an unexpected (but always welcome) visit from my friend Jonid and his wife, I ended up coming home kind of late.

Woke up at 6 am from the sound of my cat Blackie going insane; she appeared to be having a seizure (she seems to have them around once every 6 months). This didn't help me getting any rest; I finally fell back asleep and kept having weird dreams where I was checking my watch and it was always unbelievably late, then really waking up and only an hour had passed. But then, sure enough, I did end up sleeping in, quite late...was finally roused by a call from one of my co-workers telling me to get online and chat via skype with a client.

The rest was good - I feel much better, have energy at work, and am actually getting a lot done today. Yay for sleep!

(perhaps I'm also in a good mood since my staff was all present in the office today, and we could actually get answers and work on things effectively, rather than the comparatively stale "vacation" environment that we were experiencing earlier)

Sunday, February 25, 2007

feeling a little sick today

I suppose that this is what I get for staying up until well past 2 am then getting up at 6:30 am.

Headachey.

funny piece of spam

This is a rather funny sounding piece of spam that I've received several pieces of:

Hi
How are you ? Call me.
for many children,
Poor you, i don't even think how much spam you are recive.
Jennifer Gervasio
68796D6D786671756679776A33746668796E726E456B68746E786872

I did a Google search on Jennifer Gervasio, out of curiosity's sake - I've no idea how this woman's name ended up in this spam blast but judging from the results, it doesn't appear as if she masterminded it.

Not so Beautiful

Reflection: It's oddly reassuring that without fail, as cheesy ballads are totally exhausted and over-saturated in the west, they will be enthusiastically adopted 3-4 years later by the Chinese mainstream.

Not so beautiful

Keeping my ipod on to block out the noise on the bus and the radio. To my surprise, I can still hear a song, and it's in english. Pause mp3, what could this be? Why, James Blunt's "Beautiful". No cause for alarm. Unpause mp3. Increase volume, significantly. Reflection: It's oddly reassuring that without fail, as cheesy ballads are totally exhausted and over-saturated in the west, they will be enthusiastically adopted 3-4 years later by the Chinese mainstream.

made it out

Shaking from having a bit too much coffee today (and in the process of having another).

It was a beautiful day outside; lots of sun, warm breeze, totally comfortable in jeans+t-shirt. It's February 25!!! I guess that is normal weather for this region, but I still can't get over the fact it's so nice in FEBRUARY!

Anyway, stuff to do now, among other things working through another chapter of "The Success Journey", by John C. Maxwell. It is pretty interesting and encouraging me to think about what success means for me, what I want to do with my life, blah blah blah.

Got a new playlist installed on my ipod, and am listening to a lot of songs by the band Muse. I am very out of touch with the "music scene" in the west, and I don't really know what kind of reception Muse has received stateside. For what it's worth, I'm finding it pretty good; their music has grown on me. The singer has kind of a whiny, Thom-Yorkish voice, the lyrics seem a little more complicated than the usual emo-rock crap, and the instrumentation skills are pretty tight, doing sort of complicated but rocking songs that average 4-5 minutes each. A little like Radiohead, with less slow songs and perhaps sticking a little closer to straight rock rather than Radiohead's tendency to write sprawling experimental songs (not that I mind Radiohead).

Saturday, February 24, 2007

pictures uploaded to Picasa

I finally got up from bed and have loaded the pictures online from last night's exercise in depravity. It was a good time; but now it's already 14:00 and I need to be productive...

The sun is so bright out today; hard to imagine that it was drizzly and rainy all day yesterday.

Being outside for a bit feels like a great idea.

late saturday night /sunday am

Was at my friend William's for a birthday celebration. Ended up just being a party at his place where I stayed from 9 pm to 4 am.

Came back home, and it's rainy. But it clears things; it feels fresh outside. I took a bunch of pictures; will probably upload them after sleep.

Friday, February 23, 2007

props to RSS! (very geeky ramblings below)

One minor note of geeky goodness - I've finally figured out how to use RSS...(I know it's been commonly used for several years now, but I just never bothered with it).

Anyway, I've gotten Sage (an RSS aggregator extension https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/77/) all setup on Firefox now, and I already see how useful it is. Hopefully, it may help me use my web surfing time a little more effectively.

On another note, I recall people speculating that sooner or later, operating systems would sort of become irrelevant as web standard programs accessible across any browser would largely become dominant. I had been a little doubtful of that when I first read that; but recently, as I see my wife becoming addicted to Flickr, and myself as I switch to using blogspot, Picasa, gmail, facebook, myspace, etc, and I find that I am able to do the same things regardless of what computer or OS that I'm running Firefox on. Also, considering that all of this stuff is web-browser based, it means that participating in most online stuff really doesn't require a powerful computer.

(Gaming still does; if one actually has time for that sort of thing...).

Also, don't know if anyone out there regularly uses Opera (I like it, but I just can't seem to find a good reason to use it as my main browser in place of Firefox). But I noticed that the latest version (9.10) seems to support widgets. I haven't found anything super useful yet, but someone published a game called "Circular tetris", which managed to suck up 20 minutes of my time...

New Video from a cool HK band, little fat pig

I'm not sure if this was a home-grown effort or if they had some outside assistance; but I think it's a half-decent video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRRqxnZhuRQ

I've met the people in this band, and they are super nice and fun to hang out with.

So it is with all the love in my heart that I say - I'm not sure if I could listen to this song all day; but I could watch the video a few more times. So if you're reading this, you should give it a shot too.

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Rockin' the gym again

Back from gym. I like the fact that on vacation it's easy to go to the gym in the middle of the day. I guess in a perfect world, I'd be up at 7 and at the gym. This doesn't work so well for me, since:

1. I'm rarely up at 7, unless it's coming back from somewhere
2. The gym doesn't open until 10 am anyway...

Guess I'll make do with it as is.

missing Macau...last Flickr test thing, I swear

Macau was super fun! Hope that this thing works - I'm pretty psyched about how easy it is...

testing flickr again via performancing...if this works right, then SWEET..

Hope that this will work right...if it all goes to plan, then this will somehow update exactly and automatically to both my blog and Flickr in the same go. We'll see.

This is a picture from Chinese new year (2007); year of the pig. I was going to upload this to my iWeb/.Mac site some time ago, but it just hasn't been co-operative.

Anyway, 恭喜发财!

Testing out blogging via Flock

Had heard about Flock some time ago, but due to semi-buggy implementation as well as limitations/unsteady connections in China, it just didn't seem to do the trick. However, it seems to be working kind of solid now. Sweet. :)

wow...can't belive that I found this and it is working again...

However, it would appear to be so.

For a moment while updating to my other Blogger/Blogspot blog, I had thought that this one was lost in the ether. Happy that it was not.

Well, I anticipate some consolidation of all of these blogs, + my .Mac blog...we'll see how it all works out.

I also really, really hope that this stays accessible for a while. Running this setup would be even more hassle-free than setting up wordpress (I think); but it could be done.

Anyway, wo-hoo!!!

Marsha's out studying now, so it's just the cats and I; I'm rocking the laptop and a long ethernet cord and sitting on the couch. Good lazy day, and I've actually been writing quite a bit, it feels like...

I'm getting a kick out of seeing my old posts, too...brings me back to the days of my life in 2005...

Monday, November 07, 2005

Music thoughts & other reviews...

Have had the opportunity to listen to a bunch of stuff that's new to me (but most of it's been out for a little while already, I think):

First impressions:

1. Bloodhound Gang - Hefty Fine

Good for a laugh; seems like their recorded sound is much closer to what they do live.

2. Franz Ferdinand - you could have it better

(or whatever the title is)...

A follow-up that has a few real stand-out songs which are excellent. The rest? Well, doesn't do it for me. Their first album was more consistent all the way through, but the songs didn't quite have the high points like they do here.

3. Hard-Fi - Stars of CCTV

The big winner of this week's aquisitions; solid all the way through; kind of like an updated more disco-ey Clash sound.

4. Arcade Fire - Funeral

Some really brilliant stuff on this one, cool orchestrations, fantastic drumming, rocking out, cool male & female vocals; can't complain on this.

5. Kaiser Chiefs -

Solid too.

6. Louis XIV

Seems like they really really really wish they were the White Stripes, and remind me of the Strokes as well.

But, alright anyway; some of the perverted lyrics are pretty funny, and they work their songs around a lot of handclap-enhanced/catchy drum beats.

7. Stubby Little Fingers

Totally ahead of their time (late 70's??!?); they rock pretty hard and are also pretty positive (I felt uplifted listening through). I think MXPX and nearly all of the late 90's early & mid 00's bands owe them some kind of debt.

8. Rammstein - the new one

I've listened to this the least; but I was struck how quiet the first two songs were. But cool in its own way; I'll give this a bit more time later on

9. The prodigy - greatest hits or whatever it's called

I obtained the special edition of this, thinking it would be better; but I think the "bonus" disc might just be a bunch of crap.

Other stuff -

Battlestar Galactica - the newer version.

The DVD set I snagged of seasons 1 & 2 has been pretty good so far; I had been feeling guilty about considering this before...

(even marsha seemed to get into the pilot).

Books -

I'm still working on "Watership Down"; thought it would be worth re-reading - and it totally is.

The author worked in a lot of clever details and descriptions in it; I really admire his style, choice of subject matter, and how he makes it all work (and how he's created a world of rabbit culture and mythology).

Well, I should sleep now...it's late.

Mirroring what's on the website:

It's been while...

I have been maintaining a journal; just haven't been updating the website (www.daninbusiness.com) accordingly.

But - without further adeiu, here are some of the gaps in my life, in chronilogical order (from last post, that is)...

Journal - October 26
Business trip.

Chinese airports - still boring, but I realize that is probably true in most airports the world over.
I also realize that previously I've always been using the worse half of the Shenzhen terminal; that probably gave a very bad impression.

Guilty pleasure :
I've said it before & now I'm saying it again - I love Hamasaki Ayumi's music.
She is basically the Britney Spears of j-pop, her music is formulaic, she's totally a product - but I really like her music anyway. It probably helps that I don't understand the lyrics - I sincerely doubt there's anything profound in there. She has some great producers - her techno-y dance songs usually feature more loud guitars than other Asian pop artists - maybe that's why I like her music.

I don't listen to much other j-pop, however, mostly since what I've heard before is super predictable. (not so different than anywhere else) And real cds in japan cost $30. stupid government-propped /inflated recording industry! The pirated selection in China is limited, at best - perhaps that is partly due to it being so chic to hate on japanese at the moment here.
(while I can't condone the Japanese gov'ts ass-backward stance on war attrocities in textbooks, widespread bigotry/racism like in China now seems wrong).

Regardless, people here still seem to love their Sony stuff& their hondas.

Other recent music (at least to me) -

Franz Ferdinand - You could have it.....
Seems good to me.

My chemical Romance-
haven't i heard this before -oh, for the past 5 years???
are so cal pop-punk bands the new boy bands? (seems sc, but the other replacement would be annoying american-idol style "artists" - these people can sing, but where/what is the art?)
I used to seriously like this sound, but how many songs about teenage love can one really be into?

The Used - The Used
Seems okay for what it is. Better than papa roach, but same idea.
If i had paid for this, I'd be disappointed.

Journal Oct 28

Interesting note-
in Wenzhou (RuiAn), the taxi drivers have colluded to keep prices constant.
This is in response to increased oil prices; they'll lose money if they were to use the meter.
However, by law they're restricted to using the meter and using the official gov't mandated pricing scheme.

So now, no one uses the meter - there's no record at all of what has been paid. Prices are agreed upon per what district in town you're going to.
it's strange at first not knowing what is going on, but it makes sense if you understand it. it's a great example of how people in China create workarounds to otherwise unchanging, backwards law.

Journal October 29
Marsha and I are going to Hong Kong now. It's my birthday!

Had a great time last night, home with Marsha (I came back from a business trip around midnight), talking, drinking whiskey, playing with our cats.
Am on the train now towards Kowloon. Major birthday celebration is delayed for a week; I'd prefer a more laid-back weekend.
Reading "Last ofthe Mohecians".

This passage struck me as very funny (in an immature way, fitting for my 26th birthday).

"...as she artlessly suffered the morning air to blow aside the green veil which descended low from her beaver."

I'm sure there's an explanation for what "beaver" is referring to in this historical context.

I'm also sure i'm not the first reader in years.recent to find that (unintentionally) funny as hell.

Journal November 1
My band had a show; featuring a Nihlistic dancer clad in black for our last song. I think without this dancer's sweet moves, the 8-minute, 2-chord dirge that closes our set(?!?) would have bored the crowd to tears.

Hopefully my band's website should have pictures and maybe a video clip of this memorable performance relatively soon.

A new friend from Italy recorded our entire show and is making a DVD of it (for prosterity, or something).

Journal for November 4

Such a beautiful day, it makes you almost cry.

Perfect sky, gentle breeze, warm sun. Shame to be indoors.

On another note, something has been bothering me for the past week everytime I pass it on the way to work; I just never bother commenting on it until much later - I Can't believe that they opened another barber shop in the same place where one had failed miserably after 2 long years near my apartment.

The new owners seem like nice people; I don't want to see them fail, but I'm just floored that they didn't bother to learn who the past tennant was & why their business failed and that they ignored the 10 other barbershops (of which at least 50% must be legit and not brothels) within a 5 minute walk of the apartment complex.

November 5

Crazy night yesterday. Now I'm slowly recovering from what isn't quite a hangover, as well as a burning ass from sichuan food that was yesterday's dinner.

That's probably more information than the kind souls who read my meandering posts here will care to stand for...

November 6

Not much else to say immediately.

It's a warm day of rest & recovery from last night's festivities - big BBQ party at our office villa for mutual friends; around 30-some people in total. I feel sorry for our Ayi (maid) who will have to clean this tomorrow (but not that sorry, she gets a bonus for it).

Party seemed to go really well; we had lots of food for everyone, it cooked well, apparently no one got food poisoning (or bird flu) so all in all I can't complain.

Since it was a week from my birthday, some people were even nice enough to bring me a few presents!

Not a bad time.

Today is rest and relax day, however - I'm writing this at Starbucks and am meeting up with a friend to hang out with later on.

Marsha is in a serious "rest at home mood".

I felt that it was more important to go out and check on new computer games that may have been released since last week as well as check what new movies are out in the USA (by checking what the bootleggers have to offer...arr matey!!!!!!!)

No good explanation for why I was up so early this morning...but Eigi & Blackie were upset - they had knocked our laundry bag into their litter box and then suddenly were upset that they didn't have a place to releave themselves...so they tried very hard (and successfully) to get our attention at 7:30 am.

Marsha was up really early too, maybe since I brought some McDonalds breakfast, which totally hit the spot after a hard day's drinking.

November 7

Exciting news - A friend who has a band will be playing in the Rock-it festival in Hong Kong this year...and this friend's regular guitarist is unfortunately, unavailable...so guess who gets to fill in?

Should be fun!

I am practicing a bit in order to prepare.

Here's a press release featuring the artist I will be playing in support of at the upcoming event:

http://www.rockit-hk.com/Rockit05/Rockit0515.php?subname=Dirt%20Star

Anyway - that's the deal for now.

Peace,

-Dan