Goddess of Gambling

Cheapo Shaving Soap

For the cheapo inside me. Well actually it isn't as cheap as I want it to be or think it would me. The label doesn't say anything about natural so I guess it's all tough chemical just for manly man like yours truly.

Update 1/3/2011:
Williams Mug Shaving Soap
I tried it last night.  I soaked it under hot water inside a mug while taking a hot shower.  Poured out the water, whipped up a lather with my brush without really trying as I was kind of in a hurry.  The lather was good and it didn't disappear while I was shaving.  So it wasn't all that bad.  The lather tended to leave some white residue on the blade which I had to wash and remove afterwards.  The scent was a bit hospital like if you were to inhale directly from the soap solid state but when used on shaving, it's a very faint and pleasant scent which also disappeared rather quite quickly, by morning, you couldn't smell anything.

Snack Bowl

Kodachrome

This is it.  Every good thing must come to an end.  I've never tried any Kodachrome, but what ever chromes I've tried before from Big Yellow, I am not very happy with, it could be me, the chrome or the processing or the catch all:  a combination of them.  I will still shoot film whenever I feel like it.  I still have some exposed rolls in my refrigerator and inside my cameras begging to be used and developed.  But I like to keep them waiting.

You are Your Garbage

Low quality garbage.
Thank you for looking.

I am the Dishwasher

Keeping things clean and tidy.  I don't have a lot of experience with dishwasher actually almost none as a user.  One time I saw a friend of mine used one, back then she was an FOB-fresh off the boat, or does it even have anything to do with it at all?  She put too much detergent or in the wrong compartment and the machine overflowed with bubbles, it was quite a scene.  I used one lately and was impressed how noisy it was and how clean the dishes came out.  So it's really a mixed bag.  But I suspect the machine uses more power and water.

No Lunch Like Instant Noodle Lunch

Goodest Lunch

 

Absolutely Awesome Lunch

 

As if rice and roast pork aren't awesome enough, add some noodle ... pan fried noodle, white rice and roast pork.  And you got to add some greens as they are good for a balanced diet.  Wow, what can I tell you?  I really put Rachael Ray to shame.

Awesome Lunch

 

Awesome roast pork from last evening.  I am easily satisfied with roast pork fried rice.

Nutritiousest Lunch

春暖花開

That's how I feel today.

Merry Christmas 2010

Thank you.

Unplowed Snow Covered Street

小情歌

Blizzard 2010

Blizzard 2010

Snowstorm 2010

Snowstorm 2010

Me And Crazy Harry

Inception

One word: WTF?  OKAY, three words.

The Hangover

Every man lives out his failed bachelor party through The Hangover.

Ski Christmas 2010

Mr. Harry in orange.

Inglourious Basterds

**Spoiler Alert**
Tarantino's long-winded re-imagination of World War II events that lead up to the successful assassination of Hitler and the end of the War.  If only things were that easy.  Stylistically it's the same as every other movie he's done in the past so the movie is peppered with dialogues some witty some not and the movie is structured in chapters.  Nothing new.  Pitt and Waltz play interesting and psychotic adversaries.  Though, in the end Pitt's character Aldo Raine wins, it's Waltz's character Han Landa that wins the heart of the audience.  Pitt's supposedly southern accent at times sound more Sling Blade than just southern.  Good but mildly retarded just like the rest of the movie.

Gomorrah

**Spoiler Alert**
Gomorrah is a gritty drama that resembles a documentary.  If you like documentary then it's fine.  But if you prefer glam up over stylized movie then perhaps it's not really for you.  The characters are ordinary ugly looking boys and guys just like you and me, maybe just me.  There aren't any Hollywood stars, so no lookers to look at.  Its anti-Hollywood aesthetic is its only aesthetic.  It's like since we don't have Brad Pitt or George Clooney we might as well just use the ugliest looking guys around.  I especially like the touch of playing a Teresa Tang's Xiao chen gu shi.  It just proves the fact that whenever there's Chinese there's Teresa Tang's songs, even in someing some god forsaken slum in the middle of nowhere in Naples or somewhere in southern Italy.  I will go on to suggest mandating every movie depicting Chinese should have a Teresa Tang's song in it.  It just makes the movie better.  In the end a couple of gangsters wanna be kids died a horrendous death, their bodies got chucked away by a bulldozer, just like some illegal toxic waste disposal also depicted in the movie.  It was done as a matter of fact without glamor without mercy just like the way life is.

Oldie

This is definitely oldie but I just don't think it's goodie.  The album title oddly mirrors what I feel when I see this CD on the shelf, it's like wow that's seems like ages ago and who the heck actually listens to this now or even when it first came out?  I think the library uses random access to store and retrieve any Chinese media.  So to find something in particular is almost impossible, you need some luck, lots of it.

The greatest discovery of the day is I see two machines that handle media other than books, i.e. DVD or CD. You put the media on the a conveyor belt one at a time, the machine acknowledges receipt of the return and when you are done, the machine prints you a receipt. So there is no more staff forgetting to scan your returns, at least for media material.

My Blueberry Nights

If you like a director you can always find some reason or excuse to like him. But I think Wong Kar-wai is really pushing it.

My Blueberry Nights is another endless tribute of Wong Kar-wai to himself both thematically and aesthetically. Except this time the language is in English and the setting is in America. I feel like the movie is a total mashup of what he has already done tirelessly since the 80s. The movie is contrived and stale. Worse, Jude Law doesn't really make it any better. So I got tired of it. When you make a successful movie and you have said something already, do you still keep up the same theme, telling the same story ad nauseam? I guess you can at least that's what Wong has been doing for a long long time, perhaps too long and hopefully the eagerly anticipated The Grandmasters can inject some freshness to Wong's repertoire.

Let the Right One In

I saw Let me In before I saw this original, because you know I am just a typical American movie goer. I don't think the Swedish original is any better or worse than the American remake for the simple fact that the remake is an exact carbon copy of the original except it's in English saving the average American from the chore of reading English subtitle. Granted it's the original so kudos to its originality. This movie belongs to one of those peculiar categories, a fantastic fantasy movie about childhood alienation with fair amount of horror, violence, love, friendship and blood sucking vampire thrown in just to kick things up a few notches. A very well made movie that goes above and beyond the pure gore.

Nikon D7000 Body is Shipping

According to my mole embedded deep in the retail industry, the Nikon D7000 body only is shipping just in time for this Christmas.

A Single Man

*SPOILER ALERT*

It is a seriously sexy movie, anal retentively so. Its only flaw is it's simply flawless. Everything is too neat, too clean and too beautiful. Firth plays a middle-aged, hopelessly romantic professor, George who just loses his lover, Jim of sixteen years. The movie chronicles how George lives his supposedly very last day. Though the movie says Jim dies in a car accident while visiting his family but I like to think he just leaves George for another man, probably the self proclaimed cousin who calls George over the phone to deliver the bad news. All the characters in the movie live high up in Maslow's pyramid. A frozen loaf of bread presents the biggest challenge in their everyday living, otherwise their major concerns or preoccupations are of existential in nature, like how to connect with the right person, purpose of their existence. Basically the movie is very bourgeois, very non-proletariat, very Tom Ford, very superfluous. Having said that, I do enjoy the movie, the aesthetic, the nuanced dialogues and voice over and the overall look and feel and also the dignified performance of the cast, especially that of Colin Firth who leads the movie from beginning to end. Of course life has its own little irony--just when George finds his moment of clarity and perhaps a reason or two to soldier on, then "it" just came.

Men Who Couldn't Keep Their beep in Their Pants

It looks like Yum couldn't keep his thingy in his pants and his hands to himself. At least that's according to the allegations leveled against him so far. It is potentially criminal in addition to being salacious and ugly but seriously who knows what really happened except the parties involved. Meanwhile some of his party members ask him to prove his innocence. Even if he comes out of this unscathed, legally speaking, can he be electable? Do the voters mind? Is he a damaged goods? Or like people say if something doesn't kill you it only makes you stronger?

On the other side of the pond or something, there are more details coming out of Sweden on the case against Assange. It looks like Assange has problem leaving his thingy in his pants also.

Week in Review

Here is my wikileaks from cables intercepted online ... To protect the innocent, some parts of the cables are redacted and edited for readability.

I was not in the States long enough. Otherwise I could claim to have the 鬼仔性格 and got away with it. Ren can do the same. I tend to think that this is politically motivated. Ren was not being careful enough. He fell to a honeytrap.  Don't we have assumption of innocence before proven guilty in hk? What do you say, [redacted]? I am having a runny nose. I hope I can recover in time.

Ha ha, I think his legal team can use 鬼仔性格 as mitigating evidence, or not. 
Sexual assault and rape are very serious allegations.  Yam should not get a free pass because he is Yam or got accused of crimes he didn't do because of his political aspiration.  If and that's a big if, there is any crime involved, that is more like date rape cases, it can be hard to prove.  More like her words against his.  With a good legal team he can definitely get off the hook.  A fair amount of public opinions tend to think that the allegation is politically motivated.

It's more like they are trying to criminalize man perfidy or womanizing

UPDATE:
North and South Koreas promise to give us a year end barbecue that's so big and so huge that that may just end human civilization as we know it. Live like there is no tomorrow.

Home Alone star Scarlett Johansson and Ryan Reynolds call it quits ending their two-year marriage. They issued a statement, that says, in part "while privacy isn't expected, it's certainly appreciated." It turns out nobody actually cares. That being said, it reminds me some time ago Ngai and Chow of Hong Kong blame every shit they defecate on the gutter media from their sorry-ass relationship to Ngai's womanizing. I mean take some responsibility already.

Christmas Party

Nativity

Baby Jesus will be here soon.

Available to a Local Library Near You

Remember the Fallen

Just my Kind of Fast Food

Under the bridge with not for sale chicken thighs.

One of my favorites.

Riceroll and Coffee on LIRR Platform

My favorite fast food in downtown Flushing.  Thumbs up.  The LIRR platform was bone chillingly cold.  Probably minus -75 degree or something.

Breakfast

Guys, there is no fancy food here.  Just food I like or don't like but eat anyway.

Big Wong

White St and W Broadway

Christmas, Lost and Remembered

Christmas is about sending friends and families Christmas cards.  Or at least receive them.  Thank you very much.

早餐

Week in Review

Yeah this is overdue but this is my blog.

Obama cedes his presidency, temporarily, to Bill Clinton so he can catch up with his wife at some party.

Johnny Depp's greasy hair is no match to the lion's mane.  Boo!!! Boo!!! Boo!!!.  Narnia tops the weekend's box office.  The Tourist by Johnny Depp's greasy dirty hair and Angelina Jolie's lips, is a distant second.

(Diversion:  WTF is this Lamusique George Lam?  Is it a ploy to jazz up all his or other's songs, to kick them up from pop to jazz or some other arty farty renditions?  As if Jazz or new is better?  Maybe.  I guess they are just too lazy to crank out new material for him or there simply no market for new material from good old Lam anymore?  So same old shit for the same old audience.  People who love Lam are generally old and now gullible too.)

The Social Network
The Golden Globe nominations are out.  Among the movies nominated, the one and only one I saw was The Social Network.  The reason I saw the movie was number one it fits my schedule.  Number two I saw a clip of the movie on David Letterman and I was duly impressed by Jesse Eisenberg performance.  Basically the movie boils down Facebook as Mark Zuckerberg's way to get back (at) Erica Albright who jilts him not because he's a nerd but because he's an asshole.  But Zuckerberg is not just another asshole, Zuckerberg is an exceptional, one of a kind smart asshole who doesn't necessarily invent the social network but he sure comes out on top.  And in the process, he breaks all barriers by sheer intellectual prowess and ruthlessness, forever changes the world communicates and makes himself billions, not bad for a 26-year-old.  Indeed, not bad for an Ivy League dropout who, at least according to the movie, tries desperately to belong in the beginning and ends up dropping out to create a parallel universe that's uniquely himself or his time that's not shackled by class or birth.  I can't help but think of Philip Roth's seminal American Pastoral, in which it says something about Ivy League--"a world of Gentile wealth where the building were covered with ivy and the people had money and dressed in a certain style.  Didn't admit Jews, didn't know Jews, probably didn't like Jews all that much."  Zuckerberg sure comes a long way and would have made the Swede proud.

Christmas, Lost and Remembered

It's a thrill to receive Christmas card in the mail.  I have grown a bit phobic to mail nowadays, because there can only be bad news in the mail--all the bad things that I can think of, I just don't have any courage to open the mailbox.  Christmas is the only time of the year that mail is actually welcome.  Thank you.

Breakfast

Sunrise Mart

Me and a hot woman just checked out this newly opened Sunrise Mart on 41st and 5th.  It has a nicely stocked mart tucked in the back, a dining area on the mezzanine level and a fast food take-away/eat-in open kitchen/order counter in the front.  The shop just opens and it has yet to work out its workflow, the ordering is slow and the food counter staff isn't all that knowledgeable or efficient.  The staff overall is courteous.  I ordered a bowl of chicken cutlet with curry over white rice and my lunch date ordered a shrimp tempura udon.  Both were good, especially the udon which in addition to the two shrimps also comes with a few pieces of vegetable tempuras, which is kind of a surprise as the other mart Yagura on the same block just gives shrimps and udon and no vegetable except maybe a few specks of scallion.  The food is definitely on a par with its neighbors: Zaiya, Mai (which opened a couple of months ago but the food isn't as good as the restaurant it replaced.  This is more of a restaurant than the rest of the Japanese establishments there) and Yagura there.  I hope they can work out the kinks very quickly.

Alphabet

There are twenty six characters in the English alphabet.

牽阮的手-- 蘇打綠

蛋和朋友

The egg is indeed an old friend of mine from yesterday just in case you are wondering.

UPDATE:  After a day in the fridge, the egg tastes better than ever.  Don't let its appearance fool you.

Chinese Leaders Love Egosurfing

Thanks to WikiLeaks we now know for sure Chinese leaders are just like all egomaniacs:  they too enjoy egosurfing themselves on Google.  And when they find something unflattering about themselves and their families, which is just about every search result out there, they take it out on the messenger, i.e. Google, the search giant.  Li Changchun is not only an egosurfer but also an important member of the ruling party who in light of all the unflattering search results punishes Google financially and deems the international Google site an "illegal site" which I am sure many content providers also agree.  Plenty of hackings on US government agencies and corporations are also attributed to hackers in China with the knowledge of the Chinese government if not outright approval.  Like one of my learned friends suggests, these cable leaks might very well be an orchestrated effort by some US agency, possibly to sway public opinions and to let the world know what has been going on in US diplomacy.

The New York Times got a hold of the related cables and produces this article online and soon to be at a news stand near you.

Nobody Likes a Whistle Blower?

When your pal ceases to be your pal you know you are in trouble.  PayPal doesn't want to be pal with WikiLeaks.  Ouch!

Library

Library is great.  It's green before green is a fad and a lifestyle.  Of all the places, library is probably one of the most technological advanced place that is free, accessible by all, disadvantaged or otherwise.  A few weeks ago I got to use one of its self check out machines.  Now there is no scanning in the old sense of the word.  You just need to take out your library card, punch in the PIN, stack the check-out material, may that be books, magazines or DVDs, on the station and the machine just knows.  I would have thought that the supermarket would have adopted this technology first.  Checking out material is great but returning is really a double-edged sword.  Sure you can just drop off the material at some magic book slot and keep your fingers crossed that the "system" or actually some staff would pick them up and scan and return them so your name would be cleared.  Alas, I got screwed way too many times--the system says the material is returned late or worse never returned, that is, lost (one time I find the book returned on the shelf and bring it it to the librarian).  And every time I have to talk to the manager and as if she is doing a big favor by "waving" whatever fees the system says I owe.  It really bothers me because I return the material on time and in order and I end up having to plead my case to have the fees "waived."  Even though every time that happens I am able to get the fee waived but it really kind of makes me look bad, standing there, as if I try to talk my way out of some penalty in the amount of cents and dollars, though the latest episode actually involves nine bucks.  Perhaps returns should just be scanned on the spot as well so it won't end up like my words against theirs.

ID3

The mp3 id3 tag is a major hurdle for me to try to be informed.  There is just not a whole lot of interest in the English speaking world to get this thing "fixed" let alone talk about it so much so to the extent it's indexed and searchable in Google.  For people like me who is not technical enough but barely able to follow instructions a good how-to would be great.

蛋

Tee or T-shirt

Definitely T-shirt.

Christmas, Lost and Remembered

Christmas to us kids was about giving the prettiest Christmas card to the girl you secretly adored but would never admit or even let her know.  Well I don't think if I ever had one--I still can't admit it, I am just that shy.  You also exchanged cards with all your friends but that's just to cover up and divert others from the only card you ever truly wanted to give.  That was a time when nobody had yet discovered a make-up festival called Valentine's Day which was so designed by merchants to make money and to make all the singletons weep.  So Christmas was the only big day for us kids, to have some fun exchanging tacky cards with even tackier handwritten messages like "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!" no matter the card had that same exact message already printed in the front and the fact that we saw each other every day.  Of course all these crazy card exchanges within a classroom of some forty pupils began in early December and ran on till the climactic festive finale that was our grand Christmas party production in our make-shift auditorium inside our seedy school.  I don't remember back then if I knew of, let alone sent or received any Hallmark or any import fancy cards that actually broadcast class and taste.  All I remember were glitters, lots of them.  Looking back, they were kind of cool in their own silly tacky way.  You know whenever you look back in time you kind of look through things with a nostalgic filter which invariably aestheticizes and makes everything oddly beautiful.  Me and my sisters gathered our stacks of Christmas cards from friends and relatives and hopefully secret admirers, and hung them up on some strings we so artfully arranged on our window so they garlanded like a Christmas tree, only there wasn't any real Christmas tree except strings of Christmas cards with glitters and childish blessings.  We lived in a crammed apartment in a neighborhood where people had very modest means.  But Christmas was the time of the year every window from every household wanted to look its best or richest: that would be a small plastic fantastic Christmas tree with lightings! The decoration was so good nobody wanted to ever take it down until some months later,  when an even greater festival, so mega and so important that deserved and demanded the Japanese NHK Red and White Song Contest broadcast, Chinese New Year came along.  I still love and yearn for Christmas cards, with or without glitters.

D7000 Review From Dpreview.com is Up

The eagerly awaited and much anticipated D7000 review from Dpreview is up now.  I read it somewhat.  It seems like the only gripe dpreview has is the D7000 tends to over expose in high contrast scenes.  It doesn't bother me, not that much.  So I guess all is good.

The link to Amazon, the parent of dpreview, points to a vendor selling a D7000 body $300 above MSRP.  I mean sure it's one of the very few vendors if not the only one that actually (or allegedly) has this much coveted camera in stock.  Yes, it's a free market the demand drives the price and some people are willing to pay a premium for that.  But in the long run, does it hurt the vendor's reputation?  Do they care?  I sure will remember vendors who price gouge and won't bother to shop at them ever.  If some random guy waited for hours and hours to get a Wii and paid retail and put it on eBay, I feel like he sure can let the market decide.  But what the heck did an authorized Nikon reseller do?  Nothing.  I guess that makes the price gouging from an authorized Nikon reseller even more cringe inducing.

Math Problem 14 x 5

Somebody I know told me he did the calculation in his head like that

(14/2) x (5x2)
=7 x 10
=70

I thought that was brilliant.  Mechanically I can do it in my head (yes, I actually can).  Or at most I would think OKAY, 14 x 5 = 10 x 5 + 4 x 5 = 70.  But I would never have thought about the first method.

Christmas, Lost and Remembered

As a child growing up in poor rural Hong Kong, Christmas was the big festival I looked forward to all year long and enjoyed through all my primary school years.  The apparently interminable mundane and boring school life all of a sudden got interrupted.  A nice pretty school girl got to pretend to be Mary looking radiant and serene while cradling a plastic baby doll wrapped in a blanket, a well behaved school boy got to play Joseph, the bland carpenter; and lesser boys and girls got to be a scholar or a sheep or even a tree.  The actual performance was fun but so were the endless rehearsals before the big day.  I wasn't much of a performer myself as I don't recall playing any characters in Nativity, I might have a bit part in singing reserved for the less lessor kids. But I guess I just enjoyed the spectacle and the chaos that was our Christmas party.  I remember there would always be that magic show from the Chus Magic Troupe and the magician and his assistant always seriously made sure there were nobody, us kids included, looking from the side or in the back, because nobody should know their ultra secretive and stupid rope trick or card trick except themselves.  And the obligatory Christmas boring speech from somebody high up in the church who had the good grace to come to see us perform in our make-shift stage and auditorium.  One (or every) year the church dude in funny robe and outlandish attire got particular annoyed by kids backstage.  Oh well, loosen up it was Christmas time.  The whole assembly hall was done by removing the partitions between classrooms and the stage was desks pushed together to one end.  Hey you had an auditorium right there.  I remember the teacher in charge, Fatty Som, always favored one kid and put him in charge of the project--he's a pilot now, I being one of the lesser kids would labor to push the desks together and received the underserved scorn should anything go mildly awry--Fatty was not always jolly.  No performers fell off the desks-pushed-together stage ever.  So we actually had a solid safety record, it was actually a minor miracle compared to how often mega stars fall off the stage injured or died prematurely.  The stage would have been a much safer place only if I were a stage manager.

After the big party all the pupils got their Christmas in a bag: a purple cellophane goody bag full of candies and carefully tied with a little tiny curly colored ribbon.  Please I want my purple cellophane Christmas goody bag (i.e. in addition to all the iStuff from Apple).

Merry Christmas, to all the Gentiles, out there.

An Education

Pentax as used by David, his suave manner and the world he seemingly inhabits mesmerize and fascinate the 16-year old smart but naive Jenny.  The story cannot be more predictable and tired.  But for some reasons, the beautiful Carey Mulligen definitely being one, the movie works spectacularly well.  Everything kind of falls into place effortlessly and it even has a satisfying happy ending.

If you don't want to appear sleazy, don't shoot with a Pentax.  Try Nikon, i.e St. Nikon instead.  On the other hand, Pentax is the way to go if you want to look suave and uber-sleazy.


image via image shack via vorobaz of pentax forum.  St. Nikon via Nikonrumors.com

A few words on camera ready stance:  It's not bad.  But I think it could be better.  The focusing hand should really cradle the base plate to give more stability to the camera when focusing and especially when depressing the shutter release button.  But this stance looks indefinitely better than some I see in recent movies--mouths ajar and elbows sticking out like chicken flapping its wings.

update due to reader request:
PS:  OKAY, my (after) thought about the movie itself.  It's well cast, well acted, well written, well directed, overall pretty well made. It's not a comedy or a tragedy, it's just a drama about a girl's coming-of-age story somewhere in suburban England in the soon to be radical 60s.  I don't think Jenny is a victim here, even at times, she tries to fool herself to be one.  I feel like she benefits from or at least a willing participant of this whole failed love affair thing in her life, her parents aren't all that innocent either.  She gets what she bargains for, her yearning for a trip to Paris was fulfilled, she got to see things and go places she and her peers could only dream of.  Whatever she loses, her virginity her innocence, is more than made up by the life lesson she learned from David.  What an education indeed.

Stephen Chow Tells the Truth

It's not political correct but it's the truth, not only in his movies but in general, around the world.  Most Hollywood movies or the whole movie industry are gratingly patriarchal.  Women only play secondary roles in the movie industry.  Few if any Hollywood female stars can open a movie.  Audience may even want to be politically correct and pay lip service to alternative cinema but when it comes to actually opening up their wallet and parting their cash it is an entirely different story.



Please note there are at least three movie clips played along in the video above, at 0.25" Appledaily mistakenly captions the clip as CJ7 while it should really be Kung Fu or Kung Fu Hustle.  The voice over commentary is largely forgettable.  I choose to listen to what Chow says only.

Despite what Chow says: to choose the female lead based only on looks.  His female characters, lead or support, aren't all that bad at all: smart, funny, hard working, independent and kind-hearted.  But the reality or indeed irony is if you aren't pretty you aren't going to be Chow's leading lady, even if the character is supposedly ugly looking--think Zhao Mei in Shaolin Soccer or Karen Mok in The God of Cookery or his most other movies.  Perhaps Chow's Kung Fu Hustle is by far Chow's most blatantly Chow's movie ever where Fong, the protagonist love's interest is made a mute, naturally not having any spoken dialogs to distract from her natural beauty and Chow can just concentrate on being Chow without even have to worry about what she has to say.  I think that's a stroke of genius.

We'll be back soon.

Not soon enough for those eager beavers.  If you want to buy shiny beautiful objects to prop up your self esteem or your image (I am totally talking about myself), and more importantly save a few bucks in the process, hey there is no better day than today--Black Friday, the day after we  cheerfully eat ourselves silly and forget we actually don't have any money to spend.  Today is the day we reaffirm ourselves and the whole wide world consumerism is still alive and well.

Thanksgiving Dishes

This year, I broke the tradition.  I used a chicken instead.

To be cooked and mashed potatoes.  If your mashed potato doesn't taste good, add more butter.  That's the best tip I can give you.

Garlic to be roasted for the mashed potato

Lobsters

Beet (and Goat's Cheese Salad)

That's it.  Enough over-sharing.  For now.

The Grand Master

Instant Noodle

Instant noodle and mountain dew.  Mr. Alex ate his own cooked instant noodle.

ESWN on Tsao Chip on Sontag

The beginning of a nerd feud: ESWN calls Tsao Chip out on his op-ed piece on Susan Sontag. ESWN accuses Tsao cherry-picks one or two lines out of Sontag's works and condemns the whole category of Tsao's so called "American leftist intellectuals," and gratingly, got "paid very well for doing that."  And what's even worse, the op-ed is "factually challenged"--Tsao says Sontag never visited China.

Sontag, of course, visited China, more than once.  And she herself was in all likelihood "Made in China."  Her parents lived and made a living in Tianjin, China; she was probably conceived in China and only later born in New York.  Her biological father died in China and the name Sontag was taken from her stepfather.

Tsao fail.

Before School

Instant Noodle

The last time I used a Tri-X was probably a thousand years ago.  This was taken when Alex first cooked: 2 packs of instant noodle, for himself and me.  The scan was exceptionally poor.  But who cares.

Facebook Rules the Internet

Finally, at long last, Facebook dethroned Google as the most go to site in America.  And, finally we can put a face or two on why the US economy is on a tail spin and unemployment stands at 10% or thereabout.  Because nobody is working at work anymore.    Blame it on Mark Zuckerberg.

Crazy Stuff I Let Our Kid Not Do

I let my kid not take the Hunter entrance exam because he doesn't feel like it.  Franky I was disappointed and I second guess my decision or rather non decision but who knows, I didn't go to Hunter and I turned out fabulous (though most people disagree this assessment.)  Not that he would automatically pass or be accepted just by being eligible to take the test but at least there is a chance (Hunter is harder than Ivy League or so I was told).  Oh well it's not meant to be.  There is always some other high schools like where kids would fight every day on the hallway and end up having the ugliest girlfriend imaginable--that's what I told my kid but still he wouldn't budge.

Things I Noticed And Crazy Stuff I Told My Kid

I went to my kid's middle school and I noticed most of them have already carried a cell phone.  Kids who just turned eleven years old or so.  If you don't catch up with the latest trend, the trend would just catch up with you.

We got him one of our old Nokia handsets with left over prepaid voice plan that has been lying sullenly in some closet of ours forever.  My kid asked me "Are we poor?"  My answer: "Absolutely."

Many kids have iPhone, iPhone Touch or iPad or all  ...  My explanation to my kid, which I don't quite believe I said it myself was something like this:  Some people can't define themselves and they need to buy shiny beautiful stuff to help define themselves and to feel belong.  I am sure you can do better than that.

Finally

Finally, at long last, a Chinese waitress, actually uttered the two magic words "Thank you" when she picked up the check.  Wow.  I never would have thought that would happen in my life time.  (I always feel like I am nicer to the wait staff than the wait staff to me.)  But it did happen.  Just like that I have my faith restored in Asian hospitality and humanity again.

Grade School Photo Retouching Front Page Material

Perhaps it is because it's a Saturday and everybody is sick and tired of bad news already.

This front page article talks about how modern photography can easily manipulate image, at a price and at the request of the parents.  It goes on to discuss should we or should we not do it just because we can and how it might affect the child's self esteem or some crap like that.  Personally I have never requested any retouching (or implanted false memories) because my kids are just perfect the way they are, period.  No, actually we have way bigger problems than that.  Because often times, the pictures came back blurry and totally out of focus.  What horror.  How the photographer, if he can call himself one, manages to take an out of focus picture in a studio kind of setting is beyond me.  I am ecstatic when the picture is actually in focus, forget about retouching.