Things overheard

So, much like my life two years ago, I'm at a starbucks in a mall,
surfing the Internet and looking for a job.

Different continents.

But not much is different.

Well, I guess that there is much more English being spoken and far
less Chinese. I overhear the Chinese conversations, understand what
people are saying, but keep holding back at saying anything (unless
someone strikes up conversation). I mean, merely understanding what
others are saying is not an entitlement to chat with them. (it would
not usually be kosher to do that with people who natively speak your
language, right?)

But still, it's interesting hearing chinese people comparing starbucks
here and at home much like I am too. Did not learn anything special,
but I guess if one acquires a taste for lattes, you will feed that
hunger whenever and where ever you can.

Brewed coffee for me. Black, like I like my men. :p

we're already living in a revolution, in a way

Read a very interesting article comparing the spread of internet publishing, its implications for newspapers & traditional media.

It's probably the most similar to when the printing press first emerged in 1500 - and the implications of that were very widespread indeed.

Not to say that people back in the 14th century wouldn't have understood the significance of the printing press, but they may not have been able to see the full extent of its influence...probably very much like people now trying to deal with the impact of the networked/"interneted" society we're creating.

Anyway, the article is long but I found it fascinating.

http://www.shirky.com/weblog/2009/03/newspapers-and-thinking-the-unthinkable/

Thanks to Charles Stross' blog for pointing me towards this article.

(If you like sci-fi books, then you would probably find his work very interesting)

stupid monkey!

Tried out this site - you can make your own machinima movies for free; and have lines delivered in a Radiohead-esque (or new ipod shuffle-esque) artificial voice.

Just did a test run; it seems to work well.

hindsight is 20/20

I took my PMP exam today. Passed. (yay)

But this story is about prior to taking the exam.

I showed up to the test site about an hour early (was a little jittery and there wasn't much else to do at home).

Nothing in the way of a starbucks or somewhere else to hang out prior to the test in the immediate vicinity, so I went out for a walk and came across a small-ish doughnut & espresso shop.

There was nothing else comparable around so I went in. The proprietor had maybe 3 dozen doughnuts left (he starts business at 4:30 am each day and it was already 1:30 pm when I walked in).

I got a few things and we started talking. It turns out this guy's family was originally from somewhere in Guangdong province, China, somewhere outside of Guangzhou. Of course I was interested as I cannot easily forget my life over there (but I'm really not living in the past either).

When we got to discussing the topic of China & the rapid economic growth & changes there, he mentioned that he had the opportunity to go in on an investment with some of his cousins, who had remained in China and not immigrated to the US. Their business? Selling gravel.

If I were in this man's shoes, in the mid-80's, hearing about an opportunity to invest in a Chinese cousin's gravel company, I would have been suspicious, to say the least. As the guy I was talking with had been back then.

However, it turns out that his family's business turned out to be wildly successful. Sounds as if they have more money now than they know what to do with. They ended up selling gravel on a lot of gov't contracts for train & subway development...and infrastructure spending was certainly going on with reckless abandon in China in the 80's and 90's.

I had to pause and reflect how I'd deal with a missed opportunity of sorts like that if I were in his shoes.

The shop owner seemed to have some pangs of regret, but on the other hand did not seem to be a broken man - far from it; he was jovial and spoke proudly of his sons, who are gainfully employed doing jobs they really like (both involving computers & software) around Seattle. He was also very proud about his business, which had been running strong for 22 years.

I guess that there could always be missed opportunities in one's life, but if you let that eat at you then you would miss out on what you were actually living.

Meh. I guess it is late for me (finally getting used to the time change) and I'm reaching to find something profound in what was just a random conversation.

(but hey, talking with the dude was both interesting and cleared my mind prior to taking the exam).

flawed logic

Mean people suck.

Everybody is mean (sometimes).

Therefore:

Everybody sucks (sometimes).

I was pleased enough with myself for putting that together (or remembering it) in the midst of cleaning the house earlier. Now...well, whatever - it's a post.

gotta recommend a game - on sale for the rest of this weekend

If you love simple, but beautiful games as well as being thrifty, then this is totally worth a look.

(Assuming you read this blog, and see it on march 8, 2009 within a US-based time zone).

http://store.steampowered.com/app/22000/

World of Goo is an engrossing game, and $5 is a very good deal for it. I had heard about a lot of critical love for the game, but I had not tried it...at $5, I gave it a whirl & I must say it's excellent...great casual game.

Enabler

Nightly ritual of drinking wine and providing some to cat.

Science Tattoos

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/science-tattoo-emporium/

In case you were wondering - do the scientifically-inclined get body art?

Certainly, some do, and the photographic proof is here.

Every day

I make sandwiches like this every day for the wife and myself.

This one has wasabi mayonaise.

Getting ready for the test

I'm studying to take a test to be a certified PMP - Project Management Professional.

Have been reviewing the material nearly every day for the past week and a half; and for the rest of the coming week I plan on taking one practice exam per day.

It's been nice having a clear goal to work towards (and sometimes slack-off from :) ) during my otherwise amorphously-defined free time as I search for a new job.

Not sure what I'll do after I finish the exam (and pass) - I'm hoping this will be one extra thing to help me  land a job.

In the meantime, I like having some time just for me during the day and getting to explore the neighborhood on sunny spring days and spend time with our cats when I'm at home...not an unpleasant existence; it's just that requirement to have continued steady income for survival seems to be at odds with it.

I'm not usually a dog person, but...

Was at a party last night and a friend brought his newly adopted puppy.

Gotta say, indeed very cute!

Very friendly, and even though he peed in places he shouldn't, he was
a big hit. People liked the dog too. Ha ha. :)

I am liking the itunes genius feature

I am kind of lazy about making playlists on my own; I tend to either listen to everything on shuffle or specifically narrow down to an artist or album. So, the "auto-playlist" feature that Genius provides in iTunes is much appreciated. My experiences with it thus far are solid.

Unfortunately, it's not too solid with anything too obscure; sucks if I'm feeling like listening to punk-rock from east Asian countries. Oh well. I can deal with that.

novelty of studying all the time is wearing off

Glad that my cats are around to keep me company at home. Also glad that the exam I'm studying for is now less than two weeks away. Studying all the time at home is growing a little old & isolating.

Maybe it's just that I overdid it yesterday.

Bedtime cat

We always have company in bed. We are not allowed to move much.

study helper

I'm trying to get some studying done, and someone at home is giving me her special brand of "help".

I appreciate the company, but she does make it difficult to read.

pictures of DIY home hotpot

Had been working on making hotpot at home last weekend, here's some photographic evidence:

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

From Valentines Adventures

really should post something

Have been sort of bad about posting lately; although I've been getting a little more active as far as Twitter goes that's not exactly the same thing.

The weekend was fine - and the weather was fantastic; visited a little historic town outside of Tacoma for the purposes of meetup/flickr enthusiasts event.

Got some interesting pictures up (most of which are  which I do intend to load up on Flickr at some point, but I haven't got around to it yet).

Had intended on doing some cooking; but after getting all the shopping done we decided to take it easy at home the rest of the day. We did a bunch of laundry & tidied up quite a bit, however.

Will do some Lasagna tomorrow and I think it should turn out pretty good.

sick of twitter already

So, I guess for some people twitter is a way of life?

I like the ability to keep up with friends  & learn a little more about them than I'd know otherwise.

On the other hand, I have now met some people who really, really seem to love twitter and use it constantly, and I am not getting the value of it from them.

I do not want what is effectively another RSS reader, feeding me more news than I can handle.

It's almost as if Twitter = the hive mind.

You can achieve an almost constant sense of awareness, at the price that you become so involved in that reality that you cannot really do anything else....if you're constantly writing tweets and are also scouring the net for new stories to post to your twitter feed & digg & other news aggregators, then what the hell kind of life is that?

Well, maybe it works for some people. But it's not my thing. Will try and stick to minor twitters...

going to try twittering

I'm late to the game here but I guess better late than never....

If you'd like to follow me, please add "daninbusiness" to your list.

the nerve of some people

Just was terribly annoyed (galled?) that someone just tried the following stunt today.

I needed a haircut, and after I got done with my workout at the gym, I called my usual place of haircutting business, confirmed the wait, put my name on the list, and headed over.

As I'm parking my car, another vehicle speeds in at the same time, and a half-bald dude runs out of the car, pushing me out of the way as we enter the hair-cutting establishment.

He looks at the list, moves his finger down it, sees the name (my name) "Dan" is at the top, and tells the reciptionist, "I'm Dan." She seats him, but there's a wait.

I tell the receptionist, "I'm Dan. I called 10 minutes ago, do you want to see my phone and my ID?"

The receptionist pauses, not making a scene, stars the "Dan" at the top of the list, writes "Dan" down at the bottom of the list, and tells me to have a seat.

The next opening that comes up, she passes to me, and "impostor Dan" is still waiting.

I smugly enjoy my haircut; I'm happy that I'm a regular (the receptionist knew me and was certain she had only received one phone call from a Dan).

But seriously (as far as imposter Dan goes), who the fuck tries that kind of crap? Does it work? Is it worth it? Was he in such a rush that this really was going to somehow save time? Has he ever been called out on this before?

I appreciate that the receptionist had to be diplomatic & discrete, but on the other hand, I kind of want this imposter dude to be called out on being a douchebag...he should be punished!

I guess he was, in a way, in that he had to wait longer than he probably intended to get his haircut...but it's not like he's really discouraged from trying this shit again.

Seriously, is the economy so bad that people have to be douche-y to one another? Or would this guy have been a dick no matter what the economic state of the union?