Fried Chicken

This is supposed to be southern fried chicken.  I am not quite sure what makes Southern Southern.  The recipe is a search result returned by Google, where else?  Maybe it's my range I don't think the cooking time was right for me.  It almost calls for double the time I used which was already a bit much as the chicken was dark rather than golden brown, not burnt but just a bit on the dark side.   I cooked 6 min on each side.  The meat was really well cooked except the skin got darker than I like, that's all.  I used regular milk rather than butter milk and no attempt was made to measure anything.  I was very liberal when it comes to seasoning, salt, black pepper, chili flakes, cayenne pepper, paprika ....  The last time I made it the boys loved it.

蘇打綠 sodagreen -【我好想你】MV 官方完整版

Random Shot

Shot at f/2.8 using my Nikon 20-35 f/2.8.  The autofocus, despite not AF-S, seems to be quite robust.

Fruity Cereal Cookie

If you like candily sweet then go for it I am not stopping you.

Momofuku Ramen

My wife was wondering how they can make the poached egg so neat sitting pretty on the noodle ... the answer my friend is the eggs are poached in individual holders separately and later transported to the bowl of ramen.  Everything is done right.  I am glad my wife stopped me ordering two.  One is definitely enough.  We don't want a surfeit of food and stuff ourselves silly with pork belly.

Pork Buns

Why one less pork?  I guess it might just as well for health sake perhaps.  This is as good as if not better than we thought.  The pork belly melts and seems not heavy at all.  You can easily eat too much before you even you realize it.

Heirloom tomato salad

This is a good one with good acidity and sweetness.  Can go a bit easy on the salt though.  I like the tomatoes and other "exotic" ingredients.  The presentation is nice without overly fuzzy.

Man at work

Chef preparing our tomato salad.  Guy has these retro glasses on a la Terry Richardson.

Heirloom tomato salad

Like the ingredients and the acidity.  At momofuku noodle bar.  We were seated at the bar got to witness the  intense action inside the open kitchen.

Breakfast

Basil and tomatoes from backyard.

Random Pictures

George Lam or His song or both Considered "stale" by Some

I can't believe George Lam would ever be associated with "old soil."  But hey you never know.  I am also intrigued by the fact that one can actually complain about how "old soil" a song is to some government agencyTVB.  (I guess I got confused and mixed up with another reportage on the same article about Rubber Band or eraser or something)  Judging from Lam's getup below, there might be cause for concern.  I guess he can do whatever he wants, because you know he is Ah Lam.  He seems to be wearing the same jacket and pants since 1945, oh well.  And personally, I wouldn't button up the bottom button of any jacket, ever.  But that's just me.

 Photo from mingpaonews.com

Urban Cycling

Photos processed by Instagram
These shots were taken with a manual Nikkor 105 f/2.5 lens.  I was waiting for the bus and why not gave it a try.  I was actually quite happy with the some of the shots.
Then today I thought maybe with my usual Nikkor 80-200 f/2.8 I should be getting more keepers.  I actually missed a bus while I kept myself busy looking for my shot.  Too bad all of them came out no good.

Middle School Graduation

This is a difficult shot, I was giving up but I am glad I didn't.

Graduation ... Almost

Candies

Some Books

Large JPEG Basic

Mister Harry

Straight from the camera JPEG Basic.

Random Picture

The lens is the first AF lens I bought after having my Nikon F5 imported from the future.  I don't use this lens enough.  When I got my D70 I got it as a package with the 18-70, so this lens doesn't get a lot of use at all.  I think it's a good lens, though in my mind, a bit bland and with no character--what I actually mean to say is my pictures are bland with no character.

Apple blossom

US Rubber Company

Primary School Days

The Urban Cyclist

shot using my oldie but goodie Nikon D7000 and my Nikkor AFS 18-70.  The lens is good enough but I always want a more professional looking one.  Just so I think I look better.  I panned to the right in his direction a bit.  This is from a BASIC jpg, USM, and a crop in Instagram without any filter.

Tomb sweeping festival camping

Thirty years ago.

Happy tomb sweeping festival

Thirty years ago.

Spring time weather finally

For some reason I don't like calling t-shirts tees.

Dual Time

Scrambled Egg

The thing with cooking is unless you are a total idiot you can't be too wrong.  At least not all the time.

Occam's Razor

He cannot log in to the system ...

a) He is new, just started yesterday

b) He got too many login's and passwords

c) The instruction is not clear though correct

d) He is an idiot

The correct answer is d

Social Media

Facebook bullshit I don't do (but feel free to do it yourself) ...

Some bullshit human tragedies with some bullshit disturbing pictures ... please Like and Share.

Some bullshit mosaic pictures asking people to Like and press some bullshit number to see some more bullshit stuff.

Fairway Gelato

http://instagr.am/p/W7yb9RiV_T/

I like ice cream better.

At Fairway

http://instagr.am/p/W70N0vCVyo/supermarkets used to carry everyday staples with reasonable and affordable prices.  Now they are organic this and that and food prices just gone off the roof.

Hand wash

It takes forever to finish a load using the dishwasher. Sometimes I just rather do it the old fashioned way--have my wife washed it. Or me rather actually.

I'd Rather Be High

Holy cow deluxe edition or version!

Domestification

Got my discount cards and coupons.

Look mom No Vent

Green kitchen

Compromise compromise compromise.

The Grandmaster

All directors are self-indulgent.  But Wong Kar-wai takes it to a whole new level.  Wong spends ten years researching "The Grandmaster," ten years shooting it on and off, another ten years shooting the Matrix-like trailer and yet another ten years flip flopping between whether to make the English title plural or singular, struggling whether the story is about the only man that matters in the whole universe, the one and only Man,  Yip Man or it is really more about a number of grand masters.  After forty long years and countless broken spareribs from Leung Chiu Wai, Wong finally decides it's just "The Grandmaster," without the ass.

When the flag drops, the bullshit stops.  We hear enough of the back story.  So how is the movie?  Here is what my friend has to say.  I have nothing to say about the actual movie as I have not seen it yet or if ever.

QUOTE

I saw the Grandmasters 一代宗师 today. Kind of underwhelming. Not up to my expectations. I think Wong lost the plot somewhere. Not a great piece of story-telling. Would it be better had the movie been four hours long? I don't know. Anyway, Wong said that wouldn't happen in the next ten years. Was he trying to do to much in one movie? Possibly. The movie is educational in some ways, like introducing us to the various schools of Kung Fu, and there is romance, some fight scenes and hilarious elements as well. In the end, I was kind of lost. Zang is stunning as usual. The snow scene is very beautiful. That part should have been longer. The part of 宋乔慧 should have been longer too. No wonder she is pissed. I think Wong has taken too long to make the movie. Kind of funny because Wong only took 2 months to make the Chungking express, and yet that movie is such a classic. For all I know, this Grandmasters, with all its relative commercial success, won't become a classic despite some outstanding performances from Tony Leung and Zang ziyi.

UNQUOTE

I think I share the sentiment.

CVS Photo develop, print, scan minor disaster

I never learn.  I took a chance with CVS photo processing hoping and wishing that they would just do the work right, somehow on the first time, if not, then the second time.  But of course there was no miracle, not even a minor one.

I left my 160VC film there to develop, print, and scan.  I was able to drop it off at lunch and picked it up after work. The color came out awful but I can't argue with that because it could be anything but their error.

Then after I took the prints home, I found out they were all printed dusty and laterally inverted, i.e. mirror images, including the scans.  By the way, the scans were pretty awful too.  But I would only comment on dust.

The following day I brought back the whole envelop to the shop and the lady at the counter just wanted to examine the negative ... with her bare hands, running her well manicured fingers on the negative, not so much as caressing or holding on the edge but just as if holding on toilet paper or something.  Anyway, I dared not say a word except whining here.  She agreed to have it redone.  But somehow, she never said "sorry" or anything to that extent.

The machine was kind of broken so I had to call to make sure it's available.  And it was available after work.  I went there to pick it up again.  The pictures printed out right meaning they were laterally correct this time.  But they didn't give me the CD-ROM.  So the guy did it on the spot, burned one CD for me.   I couldn't check it on the spot so I went home, and found out the images were all laterally inverted.  Bravo.

They just couldn't do anything right the first time or even the second time.  I should know and it's my fault.  Would I let them do my film photos again, maybe.  Who knows.

Me Fixing the Odyssey 2001 Sliding Door

The sliding door hasn't been working since the snow on New Year day.  And I didn't bother to fix it.  And this time around it simply didn't fix itself when the temperature became warmer.  Today I finally got to see my mechanic on my way to Home Cheapot.  My mechanic told me I needed to re-seat the battery so as to reset the electronics of the power sliding door.  But he needed to have the code to unlock or lock the alarm system, which I didn't have it committed to memory nor did I have it with me 24 by 7.  Anyway, being the least handy man on earth, I am very reluctant to un-seat the gigantic battery myself, anytime I need to use a wrench and a screw driver is just too much, plus adding electricity to the mix just gave me pause.  http://www.hightechdad.com/2007/01/17/fixing-a-honda-odyssey-automatic-sliding-door/
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_to_make_Honda_Odyssey_sliding_doors_lock_open#ixzz194e9ncWQ
I did my Google search on this problem some time before but never before did I find this easy fix:  pull fuse number 13 and push it back in.  I was ecstatic to read that except I had no idea where fuse 13 is.  Further search returned the result I was looking for.  The fuse is located on the right hand side of the front passenger leg well.  It's definitely  meant to be user serviceable.  I tried to pull it out with my bare hand but it was too snug, so I wondered if I needed a pair of pliers or something; at the same time, I was wary that I might break something if I didn't pull it out properly.  The manual came to my rescue.  Actually there is a fuse puller provided, inside the fuse box under the hood on the messenger side.  Armed with the fuse puller, a torch light (my eyesight isn't great) I was able to pull fuse #13 which says nothing about the sliding door but does say clock on the manual.  I pulled it out using the fuse puller and plugged in back in after some 30 seconds or 1 minute.  And everything just worked.  The power sliding door roared back to life.

Thanks Internet, thanks Google.  And a big thank to myself.

Warning:  if you somehow, screwed up, destroyed your car, causing property damage, injury, or even death to yourself or others, you are solely responsible for your own stupidity and misery, not me.

Where Are We Now?

1984

1987

notes:  to see them bigger?  right click and open in new tab then max it to full size.  it is possible to read the jpeg's.