m

Blue roses (and black roses) have been the holy grail of rose breeders -- while dyeing them is definitely an option, to create a natural blue rose has been until now, thought to be impossible. (Of course, the scientists do cheat a bit, by introducing a gene that is not in the genetic structure of roses).

News like this make me wonder if perhaps David Brin's Uplift Saga isn't too far off from what mankind will be able to do in the future.

Posted by Michael Huang at 08:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I am always amazed by people I know who, even after completing 4 years in university couldn't spell correctly or write legibly. It always amazed me that out of almost all of my friends at the university, I was the only male who could write in cursive. It was such that I often got complimented on my cursive (though in my mind it's really not that neat).

In third grade, they always told us that in fourth we'd have to do everything in cursive, but fourth grade came and went, and they never penalized anyone for not using cursive, so all the boys went back to their printing. For me, I think the reason I kept it up was a speed thing -- I could write faster in cursive than I could with printing, which definitely came in handy on the in-class essay exams I'd need to write at Cal.

Posted by Michael Huang at 07:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Most of these computer myths are already known, but there are two that I wouldn't have included in the list, mainly because they aren't really PC myths, but rather technology myths.

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The lights came on, but the engine wouldn't crank. I tried again. Still no go. Admitting defeat, I popped the hood, and took a look around the engine compartment. Nothing loose, nothing jammed, nothing leaking.

I went back into the car, shut the door and cranked it again. The engine sputtered a bit, and then roared to life. Yes, I think it is time to get my battery replaced. After 2 and a half years, of daily driving, parts are starting to wear out. I had the water pump replaced last week, and now I'm left wondering at what will be the next thing to go. Part of me just wants to give it up, replace it with say an M3, a Z4 or a Boxster. Then the economical side of me kicks in, convincing myself that it is far cheaper to maintain the Celica. (A car battery costs less than $100)

Posted by Michael Huang at 06:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

"The Cat Returns" is about a girl named Haru who saves a cat, and finds herself whisked away to the Cat Kingdom to be rewarded, however, none of the gifts are really suitable for a human being. It borders on comedy and fantasy, and is probably closer to the feel of "Kiki's Delivery Service" or "My Neighbor Totoro" than "Spirited Away" or "Princess Mononoke".

I found myself enjoying the movie quite a bit.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I really could have done without this movie, and I could have done without the second one too.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It finally arrived today.

I did have to switch cell phone providers and I did want to keep my old phone number, so I also had to jump through hoops to get that switched over (which should happen in the next 6 - 24 hours, or so they claim). I haven't read the manual yet to find out all the capabilities yet, but it does have Bluetooth and a built-in cameraphone in addition to the feature which was the primary motivation for switching -- the flip-out QWERTY keyboard.

Update: It took approximately 3 hours to switch over.

I'll do a full review later once I get home.

The Nokia 6820 is pretty different from my Nokia 3390. One of the main differences for instance that instead of having a single button in the middle for making selections, there is now a joystick. The menu system is almost the same as my previous phone, except that it now adds several new sections. I have not been able to find for instance, the Keyguard function, which I've grown accustomed to always setting. It has a calendar, an improved contacts section, a to-do-list, and a place for memos. It also has a little thing for AIM/ICQ messaging (I'm going to have to figure out how that works) as well as a web browser (I'll likely never use that function)

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I'd say that within the last month, I've watched a decent amount and I am slowly making my way through the queue. I've also been borrowing some anime from Greencine too, but most of it has failed to excite me.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Normally moves aren't too bad -- you get a truck, a couple of friends together, haul a bunch of boxes into the truck and you're pretty much on your way.

That would've been too simple and far too easy.

Let's start with the truck.

This is your everyday, normal 14 foot moving truck. Because of bad experiences with U-Haul, my friend decided to rent the truck from Public Storage. It turns out that Public Storage is much worse than U-Haul. Not only do they lose reservations, but they also accept returns of trucks without their keys. Yes, that's right, even though my friend had a reservation, they double-booked the van and forgot to get the keys back from the previous user of the van. So, my friend waited until Public Storage called the guy up and had him drive by to return the keys.

Not too bad, right? It does get worse. After packing up the van with all manner of boxes and objects, we drive down to the new apartment complex. The PS van is the lead car, since none of us know where it is. While we're in the apartment complex's parking lot, looking for a place to park the truck and unload, we hear a loud crack, as if someone had clapped two pieces of wood together.

We look to the side and we see this:

Ok, so there's a little debris. We probably brushed the edge of those pylons jutting out, right? We look up and we see this:

Yep. That's right, the corner of the moving van smacked the corner of an apartment and practically tore the wall away.

My friend avoided the yellow pole on the side of the street, but notice, the pole and the overhang are off by about 3 feet.

This is the damage at the smallest point, where the wall here is pulled out about 6 inches.

This is the damage at the upper part, which is a lot more than 6 inches pulled out. You can see nails ripped straight out of the wood, as well as a broken pipe. The insulation is just about to fall out, and not visible from this angle is the light switch/electrical plugs which were pulled out with the overhang, leaving a nice square hole in the kitchen.

Posted by Michael Huang at 09:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

I do notice that the list runs the gamut from things you would read in highschool english, but also includes a bevy of scifi and fantasy, with a smattering of children's books thrown in. My count is 64 (before the 3 I added). If I read Terry Pratchett, I'd probably do better, as it seemed to me to have an large amount of his books in this list. (the one book of his that I did read -- Strata, isn't in there). I also notice that a trend seems to be books that have become movies. I'm not sure what the signifigance of this book list is -- whether it is a theme or if it just something random. I do note that most of the works are fiction (though there is some poetry and non-fiction in there as well).

Last week, the college board posted 101 Great Books, and this list does resemble that in some ways.

bold are books I've read and completed
italics are books either incomplete or sitting on my bookshelf.

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. 1984, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far AWAY From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Susskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie
101. Three Men In A Boat, Jerome K. Jerome
102. Small Gods, Terry Pratchett
103. The Beach, Alex Garland
104. Dracula, Bram Stoker
105. Point Blanc, Anthony Horowitz
106. The Pickwick Papers, Charles Dickens
107. Stormbreaker, Anthony Horowitz
108. The Wasp Factory, Iain Banks
109. The Day Of The Jackal, Frederick Forsyth
110. The Illustrated Mum, Jacqueline Wilson
111. Jude The Obscure, Thomas Hardy
112. The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole Aged 13 1/2, Sue Townsend
113. The Cruel Sea, Nicholas Monsarrat
114. Les Miserables, Victor Hugo
115. The Mayor Of Casterbridge, Thomas Hardy
116. The Dare Game, Jacqueline Wilson
117. Bad Girls, Jacqueline Wilson
118. The Picture Of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
119. Shogun, James Clavell
120. The Day Of The Triffids, John Wyndham
121. Lola Rose, Jacqueline Wilson
122. Vanity Fair, William Makepeace Thackeray
123. The Forsyte Saga, John Galsworthy
124. House Of Leaves, Mark Z. Danielewski
125. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
126. Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett
127. Angus, Thongs And Full-Frontal Snogging, Louise Rennison
128. The Hound Of The Baskervilles, Arthur Conan Doyle
129. Possession: A Romance, A.S. Byatt
130. The Master And Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov
131. The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
132. Danny The Champion Of The World, Roald Dahl
133. East Of Eden, John Steinbeck
134. George's Marvellous Medicine, Roald Dahl
135. Wyrd Sisters, Terry Pratchett
136. The Color Purple, Alice Walker
137. Hogfather, Terry Pratchett
138. The Thirty-Nine Steps, John Buchan
139. Girls In Tears, Jacqueline Wilson
140. Sleepovers, Jacqueline Wilson
141. All Quiet On The Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
142. Behind The Scenes At The Museum, Kate Atkinson
143. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby
144. It, Stephen King
145. James And The Giant Peach, Roald Dahl
146. The Green Mile, Stephen King
147. Papillon, Henri Charriere
148. Men At Arms, Terry Pratchett
149. Master And Commander, Patrick O'Brian
150. Skeleton Key, Anthony Horowitz
151. Soul Music, Terry Pratchett
152. Thief Of Time, Terry Pratchett
153. The Fifth Elephant, Terry Pratchett
154. Atonement, Ian McEwan
155. Secrets, Jacqueline Wilson
156. The Silver Sword, Ian Serraillier
157. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey
158. Heart Of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
159. Kim, Rudyard Kipling
160. Cross Stitch, Diana Gabaldon
161. Moby Dick, Herman Melville
162. River God, Wilbur Smith
163. Sunset Song, Lewis Grassic Gibbon
164. The Shipping News, Annie Proulx
165. The World According To Garp, John Irving
166. Lorna Doone, R.D. Blackmore
167. Girls Out Late, Jacqueline Wilson
168. The Far Pavilions, M.M. Kaye
169. The Witches, Roald Dahl
170. Charlotte's Web, E.B. White
171. Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
172. They Used To Play On Grass, Terry Venables and Gordon Williams
173. The Old Man And The Sea, Ernest Hemingway
174. The Name Of The Rose, Umberto Eco
175. Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder
176. Dustbin Baby, Jacqueline Wilson
177. Fantastic Mr. Fox, Roald Dahl
178. Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
179. Jonathan Livingstone Seagull, Richard Bach
180. The Little Prince, Antoine De Saint-Exupery
181. The Suitcase Kid, Jacqueline Wilson
182. Oliver Twist, Charles Dickens
183. The Power Of One, Bryce Courtenay
184. Silas Mar(i)ner, George Eliot
185. American Psycho, Bret Easton Ellis
186. The Diary Of A Nobody, George and Weedon Gross-mith
187. Trainspotting, Irvine Welsh
188. Goosebumps, R.L. Stine
189. Heidi, Johanna Spyri
190. Sons And Lovers, D.H Lawrence
191. The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Milan Kundera
192. Man And Boy, Tony Parsons
193. The Truth, Terry Pratchett
194. The War Of The Worlds, H.G. Wells
195. The Horse Whisperer, Nicholas Evans
196. A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
197. Witches Abroad, Terry Pratchett
198. The Once And Future King, T.H. White
199. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle
200. Flowers In The Attic, V.C. Andress
201. The Silmarillion, JRR Tolkien
202. The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan
203. The Great Hunt, Robert Jordan
204. The Dragon Reborn, Robert Jordan
205. Fires of Heaven, Robert Jordan
206. Lord of Chaos, Robert Jordan
207. Winter's Heart, Robert Jordan
208. A Crown of Swords, Robert Jordan
209. Crossroads of Twilight, Robert Jordan
210. A Path of Daggers, Robert Jordan
211. As Nature Made Him, John Colapinto
212. Microserfs, Douglas Coupland
213. The Married Man, Edmund White
214. Winter's Tale, Mark Helprin
215. The History of Sexuality, Michel Foucault
216. Cry to Heaven, Anne Rice
217. Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe, John Boswell
218. Equus, Peter Shaffer
219. The Man Who Ate Everything, Jeffrey Steingarten
220. Letters To A Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke
221. Ella Minnow Pea, Mark Dunn
222. The Vampire Lestat, Anne Rice
223. Anthem, Ayn Rand
224. The Bridge To Terabithia, Katherine Paterson
225. Tartuffe, Moliere
226. The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka
227. The Crucible, Arthur Miller
228. The Trial, Franz Kafka
229. Oedipus Rex, Sophocles
230. Oedipus at Colonus, Sophocles
231. Death Be Not Proud, John Gunther
232. A Doll's House, Henrik Ibsen
233. Hedda Gabler, Henrik Ibsen
234. Ethan Frome, Edith Wharton
235. A Raisin In The Sun, Lorraine Hansberry
236. ALIVE!, Piers Paul Read
237. Grapefruit, Yoko Ono
238. Trickster Makes This World, Lewis Hyde
239. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley
240. Chronicles of Thomas Convenant, Unbeliever, Stephen Donaldson
241. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny
242. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon
243. Summerland, Michael Chabon
244. A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole
245. Candide, Voltaire
246. The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More, Roald Dahl
247. Ringworld, Larry Niven
248. The King Must Die, Mary Renault
249. Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein
250. A Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L'Engle
251. The Eyre Affair, Jasper Fforde
252. The House Of The Seven Gables, Nathaniel Hawthorne
253. The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne
254. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan
255. The Great Gilly Hopkins, Katherine Paterson
256. Chocolate Fever, Robert Kimmel Smith
257. Xanth: The Quest for Magic, Piers Anthony
258. The Lost Princess of Oz, L.Frank Baum
259. Wonder Boys, Michael Chabon
260. Lost In A Good Book, Jasper Fforde
261. Well Of Lost Plots, Jasper Fforde
262. Life Of Pi, Yann Martel
263. The Bean Trees, Barbara Kingsolver
264. A Yellow Rraft In Blue Water, Michael Dorris
265. Little House on the Prairie, Laura Ingalls Wilder
266. Where The Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls
267. Griffin & Sabine, Nick Bantock
268. Witch of Black Bird Pond, Joyce Friedland
269. Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, Robert C. O'Brien
270. Tuck Everlasting, Natalie Babbitt
271. The Cay, Theodore Taylor
272. From The Mixed-Up Files Of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, L. Konigsburg
273. The Phantom Tollbooth, Norton Jester
274. The Westing Game, Ellen Raskin
275. The Kitchen God's Wife, Amy Tan
276. The Bonesetter's Daughter, Amy Tan
277. Relic, Duglas Preston & Lincolon Child
278. Wicked, Gregory Maguire
279. American Gods, Neil Gaiman
280. Misty of Chincoteague, Marguerite Henry
281. The Girl Next Door, Jack Ketchum
282. Haunted, Judith St. George
283. Singularity, William Sleator
284. A Short History of Nearly Everything, Bill Bryson
285. Different Seasons, Stephen King
286. Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk
287. About a Boy, Nick Hornby
288. The Bookman's Wake, John Dunning
289. The Church of Dead Girls, Stephen Dobyns
290. Illusions, Richard Bach
291. Magic's Pawn, Mercedes Lackey
292. Magic's Promise, Mercedes Lackey
293. Magic's Price, Mercedes Lackey
294. The Dancing Wu Li Masters, Gary Zukav
295. Spirits of Flux and Anchor, Jack L. Chalker
296. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice
297. The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices, Brenda Love
298. Infinite Jest, David Foster Wallace
299. The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison
300. The Cider House Rules, John Irving
301. Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card
302. Girlfriend in a Coma, Douglas Coupland
303. The Lion's Game, Nelson Demille
304. The Sun, The Moon, and the Stars, Stephen Brust
305. Cyteen, C.J Cheryh
306. Foucault's Pendulum, Umberto Eco
307. Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson
308. Invisible Monsters, Chuck Palahniuk
309. Camber of Culdi, Kathryn Kurtz
310. The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand
311. War and Rememberance, Herman Wouk
312. The Art of War, Sun Tzu
313. The Giver, Lois Lowry
314. The Telling, Ursula Le Guin
315. Xenogenesis (or Lilith's Brood), Octavia Butler (Dawn, Adulthood Rites, Imago)
316. A Civil Campaign, Lois McMaster Bujold
317. The Curse of Chalion, Lois McMaster Bujold
318. The Aeneid, Publius Vergilius Maro (Vergil)
319. Hanta Yo, Ruth Beebe Hill
320. The Princess Bride, S. Morganstern (William Goldman)
321. Beowulf, Anonymous
322. The Sparrow, Maria Doria Russell
323. Deerskin, Robin McKinley
324. Dragonsong, Anne McCaffrey
325. Passage, Connie Willis
326. Otherland, Tad Williams
327. Tigana, Guy Gavriel Kay
328. Number the Stars, Lois Lowry
329. Beloved, Toni Morrison
330. Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal, Christopher Moore
331. The mysterious disappearance of Leon, I mean Noel, Ellen Raskin
332. Summer Sisters, Judy Blume
333. The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Victor Hugo
334. The Island on Bird Street, Uri Orlev
335. Midnight in the Dollhouse, Marjorie Filley Stover
336. The Miracle Worker, William Gibson
337. The Genesis Code, John Case
338. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson
339. Paradise Lost, John Milton
340. Phantom, Susan Kay
341. The Mummy or Ramses the Damned, Anne Rice
342. Anno Dracula, Kim Newman
343. The Dresden Files: Grave Peril, Jim Butcher
344. Tokyo Suckerpunch, Issac Adamson
345. The Winter of Magic's Return, Pamela Service
346. The Oddkins, Dean R. Koontz
347. My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok
348. The Last Goodbye, Raymond Chandler
349. At Swim, Two Boys, Jaime O'Neill
350. Othello, William Shakespeare
351. The Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas
352. The Collected Poems of William Butler Yeats
353. Sati, Christopher Pike
354. The Inferno, Dante
355. The Apology, Plato
356. The Small Rain, Madeline L'Engle
357. The Man Who Tasted Shapes, Richard E Cytowick
358. 5 Novels, Daniel Pinkwater
359. The Sevenwaters Trilogy, Juliet Marillier
360. Girl with a Pearl Earring, Tracy Chevalier
361. To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf
362. Our Town, Thorton Wilder
363. Green Grass Running Water, Thomas King
364. The Interpreter, Suzanne Glass
365. The Moor's Last Sigh, Salman Rushdie
366. The Mother Tongue, Bill Bryson
367. A Passage to India, E.M. Forster
368. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Stephen Chbosky
369. The Phantom of the Opera, Gaston Leroux
370. Pages for You, Sylvia Brownrigg
371. The Changeover, Margaret Mahy
372. Howl's Moving Castle, Diana Wynne Jones
373. Angels and Demons, Dan Brown
374. Johnny Got His Gun, Dalton Trumbo
375. Shosha, Isaac Bashevis Singer
376. Travels With Charley, John Steinbeck
377. The Diving-bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby
378. The Lunatic at Large by J. Storer Clouston
379. Time for bed by David Baddiel
380. Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold
381. Quite Ugly One Morning by Christopher Brookmyre
382. The Bloody Sun by Marion Zimmer Bradley
383. Sewer, Gas, and Eletric by Matt Ruff
384. Jhereg by Steven Brust
385. So You Want To Be A Wizard by Diane Duane
386. Perdido Street Station, China Mieville
387. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Anne Bronte
388. Road-side Dog, Czeslaw Milosz
389. The English Patient, Michael Ondaatje
390. Neuromancer, William Gibson
391. The Epistemology of the Closet, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
392. A Canticle for Liebowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr
393. The Mask of Apollo, Mary Renault
394. The Gunslinger, Stephen King
395. Romeo and Juliet, William Shakespeare
396. Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke
397. A Season of Mists, Neil Gaiman
398. Ivanhoe, Walter Scott
399. The God Boy, Ian Cross
400. The Beekeeper's Apprentice, Laurie R. King
401. Finn Family Moomintroll, Tove Jansson
402. Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock
403. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (Blade Runner), Philip K. Dick
404. Assassin's Apprentice, Robin Hobb
405. number9dream, David Mitchell
406. A Game of Thrones, George R.R. Martin
407. Five Quarters of the Orange, Joanne Harris
408. Bridget Jones - The Edge of Reason, Helen Fielding
409. Yann Martel - Self
410. Totto chan - Tetsuko Kuroyanagi
411. Underworld, Don DeLillo
412. The Remains Of The Day, Kazuo Ishiguro
413. The Periodic Table, Primo Levi
414. To Ride Pegasus, Anne McCaffrey
415. Riding a Pale Horse, Piers Anthony
416. The Blackstone Chronicles, John Saul
417. Runaway Horses, Yukio Mishima
418. Lost Illusions, Honore de Balzac
419. Trents' Last Case, E.H. Bentley
420. The Popes Rhinocerous, Lawrence Norfolk
421. Scoop, Evelyn Waugh
422. The Thought Gang, Tibor Fischer
423. The Dante Club, Matthew Pearl
424. Neverwhere, Neil Gaiman
425. The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe
426. The Player of Games, Iain M. Banks
427. Islands in the Stream, Ernest Hemingway
428. American Tabloid, James Ellroy
429. Confessions of a Homing Pigeon - Nicholas Meyer
430. An Equal Music, Vikram Seth
431. Blindness, Jose Saramago
432. Maurice, E.M. Forster
433. Symposium, Plato
434. If Nobody Speaks of Remarkable Things, Jon McGregor
435. The Awakening, Kate Chopin
436. The Chronicles of Chrestomanci, Diana Wynne Jones
437. Guilty Pleasures: An Anita Blake book, Laurell K, Hamiliton
438. Obsidian Butterfly, Laurell K, Hamilition
439. A Caress of Twiligh, Laurell K, Hamiliion
440. Chocolat, Joanne Harris
441. I Have Lived A Thousand Years, Livia Bitton-Jackson
442. Something from Nothing, Phoebe Gilman
443. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
444. Sabriel, Garth Nix
445. Ring of Endles Light, Madeline L'Engle
446. 44 - Dublin Made Me, Peter Sheridan
447. To The Hilt, Dick Francis
448. The Andalite Chronicles, K.A. Applegate
449. Bobby Sands: Writings from Prison, Bobby Sands
450. Sybil, Flora Rheta Schreiber
451. Confessions of an Actor, Laurence Olivier
452. The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman, Angela Carter
453. Sweet Thursday, John Steinbeck
454. Life Before Man, Margaret Atwood
455. Three, Ann Quin
456. Survivor, Chuck Palahniuk
457. She's Come Undone, Wally Lamb
458. Barbara Kingsolver - Animal Dreams
459. Robert Heinlein - Time Enough for Love
460. Robert Heinlein - The Cat Who Walks Through Walls
461. Man's Search for Meaning - Victor Frankl
462. Cunt - Inga Muscio
463. Siddhartha - Herman Hesse
464. The Sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
465. The Death of Artemio Cruz - Carlos Fuentes
466. Schismatrix - Bruce Sterling
467. The Stranger - Albert Camus
468. The Crying of Lot 49 - Thomas Pynchon
469. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
470. Lirael, Garth Nix
471. Foundation, Isaac Asimov
472. Hamlet, William Shakespeare

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The game isn't yet over yet, but it's clear the Lakers have given up.

Posted by Michael Huang at 08:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Today, as I'm driving out from lunch, I stop my car so that a duck and her two ducklings could cross the street. As I wait for them to pass, I notice that the two ducklings can't make it up the curb, and the mother duck is quacking madly. I turn on my emergency lights, step out of my car (which is not quite blocking traffic), and carry the two ducklings over the curb. A mother pushing a stroller nearby comes up to me, and says "I guess you've done your good deed of the day." I'm about to leave, when I notice a van stopped on the other side of the roadway divider. "There's some on this side too." "There are?" I walked over to the other side of the divider, and sure enough, there were 6 other ducklings. I caught one and carried him over to the mother duck. The guys in the van saw me doing this, and got out of the truck to help me catch and carry the ducklings over. It didn't take very long at all, probably less than 5 minutes.

After the mother duck and her ducklings had gone on their way (on the side of the road they were trying to cross to, there's a canal of water), I started to think about life, the universe and how seemingly unrelated events just seem to click together.

A series of events led to me having lunch at two, instead of my usual one o'clock meal, which normally doesn't even require that I leave the office -- but I had errands to run today, which seemed rather important at the time, but not time critical. If others had not stopped to help, I would have spent the next twenty or thirty minutes helping the duckling cross, and I wouldn't have minded one bit.

I think most of the time, we think we don't make much of a difference in the world. But we do. Our actions may never seem like much on our parts, but sometimes those actions mean the world to them.

When I think about human beings helping animals, my mind sometimes starts thinking about how this all seems to the animal being helped. Those ducklings I carried over were scared of me, scared that I was going to eat them instead of help them I suppose. If you think of the animal world, there aren't many other animals which would knowingly aid another species.

Posted by Michael Huang at 04:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

My sister brought the DVD to take with us as we drove up after we had left my parents' house after Christmas. She gave me the DVD, where it sat in a case in my car for a good 2 months, before I finally moved it into the house. It sat for another 3 months in my living room. One afternoon after Sunday brunch, I decided to bring the DVD with me to Christine's place. Christine was working on one of her many art projects (although I believe at the time it was this one).

"Do you want to watch something on TiVo or more of Buffy?"
"Well, I have this DVD my sister gave me. It's a korean film called 'My Sassy Girl'. I haven't watched it yet. "
"I've seen it a couple of times already."
"Oh. Do you mind watching it again?"
"Sure. It's good. I never get tired of watching it." Christine said, with nary a hint of emotion in her voice.
Never get tired of watching it? I reserve that statement for pretty special films. In a good year, I can find one or two titles at best that are really worthy of repeat viewing that extent. In my current dvd library, there are only a few that qualify: The Princess Bride,Contact, My Best Friend's Wedding, GalaxyQuest, The Truman Show, Shrek, and a few others. If you look at the list, most of them are comedies (the sole exception being Contact), because cleverly scripted jokes are always funny, no matter how many times the joke is told. Take for example almost all of the clever dialogue in The Princess Bride is funny no matter how many times you hear it (i.e. My name is Inigo Montoya... but only less well known is... have fun storming the castle!)

My Sassy Girl lived up to that statement. It has witty dialogue, and good, funny laugh yourself silly situations. It works because it uses comedy within the story -- the incidents also serves the purpose of building emotional attachment to the characters, and creating memorable situations that advance the plot. It really is a great film, and I can understand why it can withstand repeat viewings.

A few weeks ago, I came across a stack of Asian DVDs and VCDs at a used bookstore, and on a whim, I bought a few of them. One of them was The Sound of Colors, a romantic comedy starring Tony Leung and Miriam Yeung. This movie based on a picture book, re-ignited my interest in Asian films, and I immediately placed an order at YesAsia.com for more movies. (Cat introduced me to yesasia) At around the same time, I also joined Greencine, which specializes in independent and niche films on DVD. Over the past two weeks, I've just been going through my queue of DVDs.

The Lovers - suggested by Cat
My Lucky Star
Magic Kitchen
Love Undercover
Love Undercover 2
Good Times, Bed Times
Sausalito
Turn Left, Turn Right
Infernal Affairs I
Looking for Mr. Perfect

With the exception of Looking for Mr. Perfect, they've all been pretty good. Looking for Mr. Perfect is only entertaining as "the villains" are dancing martial artists -- that is, they integrate ballroom and tap into their Jackie Chan-like martial arts style. I started to watch Infernal Affairs II, and found myself bored. IA2 makes the classic mistake of being a prequel, which loses much of the dramatic tension of the first IA. I'll probably do full reviews of these movies at some point, and I still have around 10 films sitting in my house, waiting to be watched.

As ashamed as I am to say it, I didn't fully take advantage of my time at Cal to view the Asian films they'd show every week at the UC Theater (now closed). What they showed wasn't anything really famous or spectacular, in fact to me, what it seemed like really was the Kung Fu movie of the week. I'm actually not a big fan of action flicks -- I prefer drama or something that makes me laugh or touches my heart. I can enjoy a big-explosion-martial arts-gunplay-and-car-chase movie as much as the next guy, but I also understand that type of movie is designed to do one thing -- be a big budget film. I did still manage to see things like The Wedding Banquet, and Eat Drink Man Woman while at Cal, (but those were not part of UC Theater's showings -- UC Theater tended to only show old Jet Li movies. )

Posted by Michael Huang at 04:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

I have eaten 7 out of 10 of the foods. How about you? The only ones I have not eaten are the "Quaker 100% Natural Oats and Honey Granola", the Entenmann's Donuts, and the Wow! Chips. 2, 3, 4 and 10 I've only had once. I have number 6 once in a while, only because sometimes my mother will send me food over the mail, and I feel bad having it go to waste. 8 is almost a staple food, and I'll have to work on finding some substitutes. 7 I stopped eating about 2 years ago, since I found out that potatoes at high temperatures can produce carcinogenic compounds. 9, being potato based and having Olestra and coming out after the study on potatoes made me positive I'd never eat them. 10 I've had once, and I felt so sick and bloated that I swore I'd never have it again.

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

The title of the link is not representative of the information contained within. It's actually an editorial piece on learning Mandarin Chinese and the trials of adopting a child from China. I applaud the fact that the author of the article is attempting to learn Mandarin Chinese so that he can communicate with his adopted Chinese daughter. The problem I have is that he seems to be using only written materials to educate himself in the language, and that is simply not good enough. Mandarin Chinese is a tonal language, unlike English which is atonal. Trying to learn Chinese from a book is a near impossible task. A sentence like "ma ma ma ma de ma ma?" "Is mother scolding the horse's rope?" becomes unintelligible to the person being spoken to. Whereas tone in English often carries emotional context, "That one. That one! That one?", in Mandarin Chinese, the tone of the word stays consistant regardless of regardless of the emotion -- emotion is conveyed in the language in the choice of the words themselves, as well as the volume of the words spoken.

A recent study showed that Mandarin Chinese requires use of both sides of the brain, whereas English only requires one. Mandarin and Taiwanese were the first languages I learned as a child, I learned English early on, and it has since become my primary speaking language. The dictionary of my mind looks something like this:
I: gwa, ngoh, wo, watashi, boku, yo
speak/say: gong, jang, hanashite, shuo, habla
english: yingyi, yingwen, yingmahn, eigo, ingles
question indicator: a, ma, ka

When I speak a foreign language, my brain shifts into the grammatical structure of the appropriate language and constructs the sentence using the index. Words from English are subbed in for words that I can't remember.

Posted by Michael Huang at 03:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This movie is based on a rather well-known children's book series. I haven't read it yet, but I should. I haven't read The Polar Express yet, and they made a movie out of that as well. I have a healthy dose of respect for any author that can encourage children to read for their own pleasure. I only hope by making movies, it encourages more children to read the books instead of wait for the movie.

Posted by Michael Huang at 09:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I think that people watching this who hadn't read the book will very likely be confused. The director choose to make a lot of cuts and edits to the book in his adaptation, much to the detriment of the story. Those who have read the books will find much missing in the movie.

Posted by Michael Huang at 09:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

They won't be used for meat, since it's too expensive to genetically engineer cows to be immune to mad cow. Instead it's going to be used for making drugs to fight other diseases.

Posted by Michael Huang at 10:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

I'm rather surprised at this announcement, as I always considered Sony's CLIE line far superior to Palm's Pilots. However, in America, a gizmo has to have both a competitive price point to ensure success, and unfortunately for Sony, their superior feature set wasn't enough to justify the price premium. In the long run, it probably doesn't matter much, as the useful features of PDA get integrated into cell phones, and the entertainment functions of the PDA get integrated into Sony's other line of handheld devices.

Analysts cautious about Sony PSP

Since I didn't go to the show, I didn't see the Sony PSP. My thoughts are that Sony will have to do some work in order to dethrone the current king of portable video games -- Nintendo's Gameboy Advance. Coincidentally, Nintendo has ceased production on the original GBA, and is now only manufacturing Gameboy Advance SPs. My problems with the PSP is it looks a little too much like Atari's ill-fated Lynx - the first colour handheld, it retailed for $199.95, which was astronomical, compared to the $79.95 Nintendo Gameboy, and the 149.95 Sega Game Gear. The Lynx was superior technology wise, but a lack of good software titles killed it. Sony has much more support than Atari or Sega, but the high price tag of the PSP will limit consumers. As one of the potential buyers in the target age group (men 18-35 with large disposable incomes), I actually think the market is pretty limited.

Let me see if I can explain it using myself as an example:
1. I already have a Playstation 2 at home with a good library of games, a big TV, and stereo speakers. Unless I have a situation where portability is an issue, I'd much rather spend my time on my couch playing the game than just about anywhere else.
2. I have a job that requires commuting. While I imagine some people who take the bus or the train to work might find this feature useful, for most, playing and showing off a new $300 high tech gadget is a good way to be labeled as a potential victim for mugging.
3. People who have $300 to throw away for a portable video game system probably have at least one (or more) of the following: portable MP3 player, laptop computer, PDA, cell phone. The laptop, PDA or cellphone could all provide game entertainment capabilies, and the MP3 player provides an alternative entertainment option.

They call the PSP the walkman of the 21st century -- but think back to when the walkman came out -- in those days, the market for portable electronics didn't exist. These days, the competition is intense for your portable time -- there are so many options these days: laptop, pda, gameboy, cellphone, mp3 player?

I wish that someone in Sony had taken a Interface Design class before creating the PSP -- the screen sitting the center of the device, with the controls on the side create a unique handheld problem -- namely you jostle the screen as you play the game. It's much better to design controls on the bottom rather than the side, because you don't have as much screen movement. There are two other design mistakes I see. One is the lack of screen protection for the PSP, and the other is it's dimensions. It is quite tiny -- a bit larger than the size of about a candy bar style cellphone, and I wonder if the buttons will be large enough to have the tactile feel of the PS2 controllers.

1 GB Hi-MD Player on the way

Sony is also releasing a new MiniDisc Player that can store up to 1GB of music. The MiniDisc format hasn't really been popular in the states (as it has been in Asia), and MP3 players have really obliterated the portable music market. One has to wonder how successful this device will be, given the competition it faces.

Posted by Michael Huang at 12:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)