It's a matter of perception

My left eye is swollen. As to how it got that way, I have no idea.

I am a little disheartened. I had an idea of a software product/service that hadn't been made yet and could have been my project to innovate the industry. Sadly, my friends never did get onboard so I never got anywhere, and now I realize that someone else came up with the idea at www.picnik.com.
The concept of a free browser-based photo editor. Easy to use. Portable. Free.
Oh well. It was an awesome idea. I hope they get their product up and running though.

Ginger Milk!

So, I tried cooking Ginger Milk today, and I'm pretty happy with the results. Made a little mess on the stove though since the milked boiled and spilled while I had my back turned for maybe 5 seconds.

Sweet and spicy. It's how I like everything. The one thing though is that I thought it had too much water, it wasn't solid enough.

I've uploaded some of my pics up on to flickr. However, they're mostly the photos from the Toronto/NY part of my trip. I'll organize the Miami ones tomorrow. Take a look at the photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/30752270@N00/sets/72157594538565916/

Back home

I'm more tired than when I left.
The past few days have been draining because of the travelling compressed into such a small time frame.

I'm so lost right now. I have a couple of options, too many worth considering, I need some kind of sign or something. Choices are never easy, and only seem so when they don't affect you directly. I have such a hard time trying to understand myself, what I should do, what I want to do, what I can do, what I will do. Each is an avenue of possibilities and deciding which path to take is hard, but acting upon them is even harder. The hardest paths are the most rewarding, I have no hesitation embracing the difficulties of whatever is ... okay no, that's a lie. What do I need to do to take the first step. It's like my feet are broken.

To - NyC - To in 52 hours

Yeah, So.... I just spent 16 hours in the last 2 days sitting in the car.

My parents + me + my aunt/uncle/cousin + other cousin drove down to New York City to visit our newly married cousin Ahya Clarence and Atsi Lisa. The drive itself was relatively straightforward. Well, we did stop at a really new casino in Niagara Falls called the Fallsview.
We started off from Niagara Falls around 1:00 at night, and we pretty much drove all night on I-90/I-87 and getting into New York City around 10:30 in the morning. We took a look at Ahya Clarence's new house in Queens. They have some home improvement issues to address, but other than that it looked like a nice neighborhood.

NYC Drivers
1. What are lanes?
2. Cutting? You mean switching lanes!
3. Who uses signal lights?

NYC has the worst drivers I've ever seen. I think I'd have a heart attack if I ever drove there. NYC also has the worst highway system. There's overpasses, underpasses, turnpikes, criss-crossed highways, and an absolute mess of a driving jungle. You need to make a minimum of 10 "exits" to actually get where you're going. There's no such thing as a straight-line route.
We went shopping as the first stop in our city adventure. We drove through the Holland Tunnel to visit the giant Jersey Gardens Outlet Mall in Jersey City, NJ.
It was packed so we didn't really spent too much time there, but I did get a new kickass pair of white Nike runners.
We got to try a pretty good Malay/Thai restaurant in Manhattan's Chinatown on the first night called Penang. The dishes we ordered were kinda... weird because multiple ppl were ordering, so it was half Malay, and half Chinese style food.

I got to go on a night tour around Manhattan with my cuz Charles' courtesy of his girl friends in the city. We ate at some place called Brooklyn Diner on 57th St. Their Strawberry Blonde Cheesecake was awesome! but I was too full and couldn't finish it.

The Apple store on 5th ave? YEAH. It looks so awesome at night! I didn't get a chance to see it in the day. I didn't realize it went underground, and the parking was really bad when we were going around that area so we didn't bother going in. The glass structure really just puts a lot of the other stores to shame because of the amount of space they took and how trendy it is.

Shopping mostly on day 2, but I got a nice walk around Battery Park. We missed the ferry to Liberty Island, so we mostly just checked out the antics of street performers in the park. "You'll see black guys run real fast! Without cops behind!" quoted from the performers themselves Lolz!
It was lucky we were going around on Sunday since there were less tourists, especially at the Empire State Building. I took some night shots from the 80th floor, but I'm not sure how they turned out yet. It was so damn windy outside on the walkway, I think I may have lost grip on my camera at least 5 times when I was taking pictures off the side of the building.
We had dinner afterwards at Carmine's, a popular westernized Italian place just off to the side of Times Square. I got to see the little post where they drop the New Year's ball!
After dinner, we started on our way back to TO. We left around 10:30pm and somehow got back to the border by 6:30am. Crazy non-stop driving. I'm still tired since I didn't get much sleep, although I nodded off quite a bit (No, I wasn't driving, or we'd all be in scraps of metal).

Toronto

Whew. It's freeeeeeeeeezin. Well not really. I feel okay, but apparently it's -11 outside. It's mostly the windchill factor. It doesn't feel that cold unless the wind is blowing, then.... it's REALLY cold. Haha.

I'm off to NY tomorrow, if the weather plays nice.

Shark Valley, Everglades

I'm still fighting off my cold. Still have a clogged nose. I'm still half deaf.

Today, I went for an excursion in the Everglades, particularly, Shark Valley. We took a 2 hour "tram" ride around the area. It was a peaceful ride. There were some small alligators, lots of birds, and... a lot more birds. The tour and the Shark Valley area itself is geared more towards birdwatchers, but it was nonetheless a really relaxing trip around the marshy Everglades.

I'm heading to Toronto tomorrow. Shhhwww!

Supahbowl Sunday!

Okay, I guess distances must really look closer on maps. It's actually 9.5 miles out to Dolphin Stadium from here. So it's not really a couple of blocks.

Miami

Today is my first actual day in Miami.
I've been gone for the past 5 days on a cruise in ze Caribbean on the Carnival ship, Imagination. We arrived on Monday in Ft. Lauderdale w/ a transfer from Toronto's Pearson, my god-mum picked us up from the aeroporto and we took a small lunch before going to the Port of Miami. That's why today's really the first day.

Itinerary:
Day 1/Jan29:
Depart
Day 2:
Day at Sea
Day 3:
Grand Cayman
Day 4:
Ocho Rios, Jamaica
Day 5:
Day at Sea

Grand Cayman
Our cruise took us down to Grand Cayman to the city of Georgetown in le Cayman Islands! We took an island tour and I liked it! Though there wasn't that much to see. We didn't really get a chance to lie on the famous Seven Mile Beach (which is actually 5.5 miles, ask me later). The beach was beautiful! WHITE SANDS, plus the water looked so beautifully clean.

After that, we went to Hell. Literally! The city of Hell actually comes with its own post office so you can send postcards from Hell. It's kinda cheesy, but what else do tourists do? The name was derived from the local limestone deposits in the area which form up and create some very interesting rock crag formations which makes it look like you are in hell.

The next stop was my most favorite part of the trip. The Botswains Turtle Farm is a breeding farm for turtles. With a couple of varieties, but none that I can remember off the top of my head except for the green sea turtles which were the majority of the turtles in the tanks. The reason why this stop was my choisi favori is because I got to touch the turtles. I picked one out of the tank and, well... haha you had to be there... it freaked out. It kept trying to paddle away and slapping at my hands. These aren't the small turtles you normally think of either. The one I picked up was almost 2 feet at the longest diameter of the shell. Ah yeah!

We got to try out some of their local world-famous Tortuga Rum Cakes at the Tortuga Rum Company stores. It was just a little store with lots of rum products. So it was kinda meh.

We didn't really feel like exploring the shops in the area. There was definitely a lot to buy, but only if you have cash to burn. Grand Cayman is for the seriously rich and that's why all the high-end jewelry shops are there. Tax-free, and high-quality.

One interesting thing about the Caymans is that there is no property tax. If I have enough cash, I'd buy a property here. You just pay for the land + an initial 10% and then that's it. No more taxes to run you dry.

I'll post up pics later since I can't really upload on this comp. I'll post up my Jamaica experience tomorrow. I've been sick for today so... yeah, gotta crunch that cold for Super Bowl tomorrow. (I'm actually only a few blocks away from Dolphin Stadium. I'm wondering if I can hear the noise from here)

continued
Ocho Rios/Jamaica
We took the Prospect Plantation / Jitney Estate Tour which is probably one of the oldest plantations in Jamaica. We got to smell some really interesting leaves, like Lime leaves and Pimento (which is apparently different than the Pimento that you're thinking of reading this). We also got to taste some fresh sugar cane and some coconut with brown sugar. They grow lots of different fruits and it took a while trying to go through all of them.

At the end, we visited the Jitney Estate which was the house overlooking the edge of the water in the plantation. It's been visited by historical figures such as Sir Winston Churchill and some others. The location itself wasn't that interesting, but our tour guide and drivers were absolutely hilarious. Jamaicans will make fun of EVERYTHING. Yeah, mon.

Next! DUNN'S RIVER FALLS. This is one of those places that movie directors like to use. If I remember correctly, the most famous one was an old James Bond movie with Sean Connery. I didn't really understand what it meant to climb the falls when they told us. I only realized that when you get there, you are literally climbing up against the current of the falls. It's absolutely wonderful and majestic. It's so beautiful! But I wasn't able to get a picture since I was too afraid of losing my camera. I probably would have too since I dunked into the water a couple of times and I lost my glasses. We had to "bargain" with some of the locals to get it for us.
It ended up costing 40$ for some guy to get it for us. Oh wellz =/

There wasn't that much to shop for in Jamaica. Mostly souvenirs and junks.

Cruise related tidbits
Anyone who knows me knows I absolutely MUST TRY weird dishes. And that's what I did!
I gotta say the choice of soups was the most interesting...

Asparagus Velouté - a creamy Asparagus soup
Not so good

Strawberry Bisque - I laughed when I saw this, but I was compelled to try it
It was pretty good! It tasted like a light strawberry shake.

Orange Sory - I wasn't all too surprised with this since trying the Strawberry Bisque
It wasn't that good at all, the bitter orange taste made it unsavory.

Kickass dishes?
Nothing really, except for the honey-glazed Confit Duck. Oh man. It was so soft and tender and the honey-glaze tasted like some Chinese style cha-siu sauce, but better than any I've tried. YUM!

I was really disappointed at the Chateaubriand on the last night. It was pretty dry. Boo-urns. I really was hoping for a blow my mind experience for this type of steak, but woefully disappointed.

I participated in some game-show style trivia. A three-way competition to answer questions. I managed to beat out two girls and winning myself a free bottle of champagne! I forgot to take a picture of it, doh!

Miami-bound

I got a Hoya circular polarizer earlier today at Best Buy. I wished I had thought of getting one earlier, then maybe I would have been able to find one of better quality. It's alright though, since the one I got was pretty expensive already, costing about 80$. This last minute rush was hope to be able to get some good sky shots while I'm in Miami.

I'm leavin tomorrow and I'll probably be out of reach for at least the next 4 days. See ya!

Re-plugged

I got my new adapter today, so I'm re-plugged and okay to use my lappy again.

I've included some photos here of what the actual damage was on the adapter I sent back. Pretty scary stuff. Actually, it's not so scary in the pics. The smell... definitely the scariest of all...

Countdown: 3 days. I'm leaving Sunday morning!

Macbook Pro trying to kill me

Both of my index fingers look alright. They physically look complete and unscathed. However when I put a little bit of pressure on it, my nerves feel like they've been singed.

So... the cord for my power adapter on my Macbook Pro, is well, rather defective. I didn't notice it until now, but the plastic cord end housing near the mag-safe end is starting to melt. I think I may have singed my fingertips trying to touch it. I didn't notice since the damage wasn't really visible from the top. There are wires sticking out now, and the end of the housing is pretty much "blown outwards" like an umbrella, and partly melted in a couple of different spots. There's exposed wiring, and I could smell ozone when it was plugged in earlier.

Hopefully I can go get this changed out rather quickfast, since I'm not too happy not being able to work on my lappy. I am rather getting quite attached to my work environment being on OS X.

Banana chips

These banana chips I'm munching on are awesome. Crisp. Sweet, but not too sweet. Flavorful slices of candied banana. Mmm. The only downfall that is the last batch that I have. My mom got these from some small city in the Philippines, and it's not likely I'll be eating these any time soon. So, I'm savoring the last of these. yummmm.

Hopefully, when I go down to Miami, I can find some plantain chips that taste like this.

ETA: 11 days.

Back on the Rails!

It's snowing.... It's... -11 degrees right now, I'm hiding and not going outside. Too cold, there's been some snow here in Richmond, but it's still assailable. The next snow storm will definitely send the traffic into shock, though I'm sure it already is in Burnaby and Vancouver.

I'm taking another crack at Ruby on Rails again. I think I'm doing a lot better this time because I was thrown off by initial shock the first time. Attempting another try with a project in mind really helps so I can actually apply things on the fly instead of blindly reading through the manual. I'm getting the hang of it. I really must admit that the framework is genius. But it's still a bit esoteric in the examples / tutorials.

They really need a step-wise objective-based tutorial system to apply certain changes. I'm using the Agile Web Development with Rails book and the straight run through approach that they do is really unhelpful. It only makes me scratch my head and think I'm stupid because they're doing all these things in a few minutes while I take a couple hours to try and understand what single steps are for, and why they do it.

Hrm....

Countdown to trip: 16 more days

YouTube Channel Surfing

College Saga is a live-action RPG parody. It uses themes, concepts, and music from all of the classic console RPGs with twists and oddities that look even funnier with actual people acting them out. There's also a couple of outright political commentary, but nothing that's not common knowledge. The genius of it is that they mix the nuances of RPG's and are somehow able to use "actions" and convey it with blatant disregard for American figureheads. Haha, well, since the current American politicians are easy targets and always seem to work their way into mainstream media in the form of comedy, it just seems appropriate. But, I digress, the video speaks for itself.

It is probably funnier for people who plays RPGs, but it's just hilarious in its own respect.

Poker's Eve

I was at River Rock Casino tonight with my parents. My mom was playing the slots while, my dad and I were playing something called Pacific Poker. It's a mix in-between Texas Hold Em, and Lottery. We lost on 9 of the 10 tickets, but we managed to actually win on our last live ticket. Drawed a full house and managed to win back the original bets and then some. It was a lot because only 3 people out of... I have no idea how many actually, beat the house hands.

After that, I went home and continued playing more Poker After Dark Freeroll Tournaments for a shot at a table spot on the Poker After Dark tv show to play with pros. I almost won a spot to round 2 qualifiers, but I managed to lose again. This time though was my best finish with an unbelievable 3rd place. Had I beaten one more, I would have earned that spot. Oh well... I got a couple more days to try again.

If you're bored, take a look at me boxing on the Wii.

Prophets of my imagination

From a dream I had the other night, about a person who travels back in time to find out who a prophet figure, or some type of religious hero, was. In all irony, he finds that the icon he was looking for is himself, or another incarnation of himself.

A rough translation of what I can remember, of which I'm sure is not right. Dream memory plus a day to let it slip isn't exactly a carbon copy, but I thought it merits some analysis.
"Our true friends create the path to heaven
Salvation delivered to us by Angels"

It was odd, because the future presence who comes "back" uses the term of "Christ" rather than "Angels".

I'm not really well-versed in religious scripture or philosophy, so I'm pretty sure I'm crazy for creating all this in my head.

Segregation of friends

I feel bad in a sense, but I have trust in my instincts of dividing friends from other friends. I have problems mixing people with other people. I'm talking about inviting friends to go out, or invite them to a party. It's not something I do because I don't want them to know each other through me, yet it is exactly that. The most daunting hurdle is people who have different personalities. Some are more open and get along easily with strangers, while obviously some others have difficulties talking to new people. Clashes in personality are not in my best interest since I have no idea what to expect and I'd rather avoid the situation.

One of these "classifications" is the person who doesn't talk at all. You never want to invite them to parties because obviously they're just an ornament and people will feel uncomfortable around them. I guess I understand the situation. I'm either really silent or the opposite depending on the people I'm with. I wouldn't be a fun guest if I was in silent mode. I bring this topic up because what happened recently was at a party, friend "A" says friend "B" is weird, because of exactly that reason, friend "B" just didn't talk to us, and somewhat avoided us and went off to do something.

Is there some type of unwritten rule book regarding this type of behaviour?

Dream deprivation

I think yesternight was my first deep sleep in a few weeks. You know, that really restful sleep that when you wake up you feel energized. Deep, deep REM sleep. I think it was the first one in a while where I had a dream that my mind was completely engrossed in. I felt very emotional waking up. It was a powerful feeling evoked because of a decision I made. I haven't had one of these gut-wrenching straight-from-the-core visions in a while, and it usually comes when I feel detached. I'm not sure if it's enough to help me, but hopefully I have a couple more these next few days.

I can't remember what the dream was about a few minutes after I woke up. I wish I had remembered to write it down.

Whatsagood cookbook?

I saw some pretty nice lookin cookbooks at Yaohan. They were some I was really interested in but most if not all of them were completely in Mandarin only. I found some really neat ones with specific topics such as curries, and Chinese appetizers. What I was really eyeing was region-specific dishes for authentic culinary experiences that you normally wouldn't be able to figure out yourself. Hmm hmm....

Transformers!

If you haven't checked out the new Transformers trailer, you should!
It seems like it's revealing a lot more than it should, but hell I still think it looks awesome.