What Should I Do With My Life? by Po Bronson. Lot of people must be asking this question to themselves thesedays. I didn’t read this book, but it sounds pretty interesting. Here’s the NPR interview with the author, review of the book from slashdot.org, and an article on fastcompany.com based on the book.
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Monthly Archive for March, 2003
More than a decade ago, I saw this book in my friend Injoon’s bookshelf. Eversince then, I’ve been wanting to read it someday, but never got around to it until very recently, when I came across it at a local used book store.
I’d like to recommend this book to everyone. It’s short, and very easy to read, but it’s “one of those book” that stay with you, hopefully, for a long time. If you are too cheap to pay $2 for your own copy, you can read it for free online here [Project Gutenberg]
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Quote of the day:
“You know the world’s gone mad when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, the Swiss hold the America’s Cup, France is accusing the USA of arrogance and the Germans don’t want to go to war, and the three most powerful men in America are named ‘Bush’, ‘Dick’, and ‘Colon.’ Need I say more?”- Chris Rock
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- Ai-go — d’oh
- Doctor Kim — 1.what you call Korean adults, if you don’t know their name.
2. the person that a Korean fresh from korea (see fob and jfk), should try paging if they happen to be at an airport or at a hospital where they need a translator. - Go-saeng—what all Korean parents went through so that we can have all the stuff we have—including the multi-trillion dollar debt hanging over our heads.
- Holding hands—the big giant leap towards marriage—or at least it seems that way when Koreans gossip about it—oh my gosh, bodily contact!! Koreans tend to mature out of the kootie stage at a later average age.
- Yo-no-mo-sae-ki—an adult’s way of saying, “Hey, what’s up dude?!”
Click here to see the full list
(Thanks to Bennet)
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I was driving back from LA this weekend with my friend Kenny. And while we were talking about random stuffs to fight off sleepiness, he told me some interesting facts and theories about the number 12. So I’ve decided to do some research ^^
The number 12 appears in many places, that it’s weird even if it’s just a coincidence: 12 months, 12 hours in face of analog clock, 12 inches in a foot, 12 signs of zodiac, … In the Bible, Jacob had 12 sons, 12 tribes were started after Moses lead his people out of Egypt, and Jesus had 12 diciples.
Some scientists believe that base-12 counting (”dozenal” vs base-10 decimal) is more natural and more convenient way of counting (which may explain the many occurrences of the number 12, mentioned above). If people had 12 fingers, we’d count in base-12 for sure. In fact, there’s even a theory that many people had 12 fingers long ago, but the recessive gene that cause this “disorder” has quickly disappeared over time. Also in some societies, they killed off all infants with 12 fingers. This was probably due to the following Bible passage:
In still another battle, which took place at Gath, there was a huge man with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot–twenty-four in all. He also was descended from Rapha. When he taunted Israel, Jonathan son of Shimeah, David’s brother, killed him. (2 Samuel 21:20-21)
Anyway, here’re some links if you want to find out more about the number 12:
I had sent an inquiry email to Starbucks asking about their secret menu items, and they were kind enough to write me back 
Here’s the response I got:
Dear Min,
Thank you for contacting Starbucks Coffee Company.
Unfortunately, we don’t know what a redeye is either! Could you give me a bit more information about the drink that this customer was handed? It could be that this was a local slang term for a type of Starbucks beverage, and we would love to figure out the answer as well. Do you have anymore clues?
…
So it sounds like these aren’t their “official” secret-menu :D Use them at your own risk, so you won’t look stupid infront of 20 people waiting in line.
UPDATE
Here’s the reply I got when I gave him the link below:
Thanks Min!:
Wow, that’s an interesting new drink. Thanks for sharing it with us.
…
Dang, I was hoping I could get some free coffee out of this…
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Next time you go to In-n-Out, try ordering one of the following: “Animal Style”, “Wish Burger”, “Protein Style”, “Old Fashioned Style”, “Flying Dutchman”, Double Meat”, “4×4″, “2×4″, “Grilled Cheese”, “Fries Well Done”, “Choco Vanilla Swirl Shake”, “Neopolitan Shake”. Complete descriptions at: In-N-Out Burger Secret Menu [zenlemur.com]
Tony tells me that he saw someone order a “redeye” from Starbucks, but we can’t seem to find anything about it on-line. It must be super-secret! Does anyone know?
UPDATE:
An “unleaded” or “a why bother” is a decaffinated coffee. A “double-why bother” adds fat free milk. “Shot in the dark”, “piledriver” and “redeye” are all standard drip coffee with an added shot of espresso.
See the full article here (Thanks to Tony)
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From New Scientist : World’s first brain prosthesis. Hey I might need one of these! :) It’s implications and questions related to the AI are discussed here [kuro5hin.org].
Here’s another fascinating article about artificial-sight research [Wired 09/2002] which enables a blind man to see (and drive!) with the help of computers. These kinds of direct man-machine interface advances are both cool and scary at the same time. Ideas such as the plugs in back of our necks (the Matrix), or downloading our memories and “ghosts” (consciousness) into computers (Ghost in the Shell) is not so far fetched.
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http://www.lebonze.co.uk/stuff/move.htm
(Thanks to Bennet)
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Just finished reading “Kitchen Confidential - Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly” by Anthony Bourdain, an executive chef (is he still?) at Les Halles in NY, and also the host of A Cook’s Tour on the Food Network.
Some Do’s and Don’ts from the chef himself:
- Never order fish on Monday — you’ll most likely get the fish from Thursday.
- Do not order mussels unless you know the chef personally — “most cooks are less than scrupulous in their handling of them.”
- No hollandaise sauce — “bacteria love hollandaise.
- Avoid restaurants with filthy bathrooms
- Tuesday and Thursday are the best nights to dine out — the food is fresh and the chef is well rested after a Sunday or a Monday off. “Fridays and Saturdays, food is fresh, but it’s too busy, so the chef and the cooks can’t pay as much attention to your food as they — and you — might like.”
UPDATE: O-kay.. as “tsl” commented, Bourdain does say something about vegetarians:
Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn. To me, life without veal stock, pork fat, sausage, organ meat, demi-glace or even stinky cheese is a life not worth living. Vegetarians are the enemy of everything good and decent in the human spirit, an affront to all I stand for, the pure enjoyment of food. The body, these waterheads imagine, is a temple that should not be polluted by animal protein.
…
Amoebas, however, are tranferred most easily through the handling of raw, uncooked vegetables, particularly during the washing of salad greens and leafy produce. So think about that next time you want to exchange deep tongue kisses with a vegetarian
But hey, what does he know? He’s just a crackhead! 
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Try this:
- Goto www.google.com
- Type “french military victories”
- Click [I'm Feeling Lucky]
(Thanks to Tony Lee)
UPDATE: It used to say “Did you mean: “french military defeats?”" but now it seems like google is trying to load (www.albinoblacksheep.com). Whatever this site is, it was blocked by friend’s company’s proxy server, so it may not be safe for work. Try at your own risk! :D
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