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Saturday, August 26, 2006

I like Doom Dong

Doom Dong will be playing tonight @

Art City Studios
197 Dubbers St
Ventura, CA 93001
(805) 648-1690

Tickets: $8 donation is encouraged to KEEP ART ALIVE!
Doors open @ 8:30pm - 1:00am?
Doom Dong plays @ 11:00pm.

Get your best nerdy artsy gear in check and watch the show :D While there, feel free to see the various artworks of many talented sculptors and artisans of the Ventura art scene and watch my cousin's band! It's for a good cause! See Jason before he heads off to MN T^T!

For more info on who else is playing:
www.myspace.com/doomdong

For info on this and other shows & bands:
www.circusspoc.com*

Prodigy

As if you didn't have an inferiority complex before, you'd probably get one now. The smartest mathematician in the world is a professor at UCLA. Terry Tao got his Ph.D. at Princeton by age 21 (note: most people are in their junior year of college by that time. Ph.D.s take anywhere from 5-8 years to complete...T^T) and received the Nobel Prize in Mathematics (given to only one person every four years--usually in ones entire academic career). My initial reaction upon reading "Big deal, age 31 professor in math gets Nobel Prize". Reading further down the article then made me realize how much of a big shot this guy is and and yet "effortlessly" intelligent and amazingly humble. How I wish I was that smart even if it was just math alone T^T.

All that aside, I've noticed that sometimes the actually smart people that I've come to know are usually the ones who are the most quiet, often times soft spoken, inhibited, and downtoearth. The ones lesser than those people (and smarter than me) academic wise, are the ones who grind their teeth always placing second best to the genius that doesn't even break a sweat. That is of course not always the case, but my friends who are in that genius category seem to fit that mold. As for me? I'm just an average Shine with Trendy dreams.

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Big Five

I was listening to KNX1070 this morning and they were talking about how employers were using various methods to screen their potential employees such as checking their online profiles, bloggs, ethics at home, and personality tests like the Myers-Briggs and so forth. I was curious to see what score I would get taking these, so I decided to take two short ones. In the end, I basically got what I already know. I guess I haven't changed much in the past few years, but my introversion isn't as bad as it used to be. See, there's hope! ^^

Big Five Test Results

Extroversion (42%) moderately low which suggests you are reclusive, quiet, unassertive, and private.
Accommodation (50%) medium which suggests you are moderately kind natured, trusting, and helpful while still maintaining your own interests.
Orderliness (62%) moderately high which suggests you are, at times, overly organized, neat, structured and restrained at the expense too often of flexibility, variety, spontaneity, and fun.
Emotional Stability (50%) medium which suggests you average somewhere in between being calm and resilient and being anxious and reactive.
Inquisitiveness (74%) high which suggests you are very intellectual, curious, imaginative but possibly not very practical.

Take Free Big Five Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

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Your personality type is RCOAI

You are reserved, moderately calm, organized, moderately accommodating, and intellectual, and may prefer a city which matches those traits.

The largest representation of your personality type can be found in the these U.S. cities: Albuquerque/Santa Fe, Norfolk, Oklahoma City, Nashville, Tucson, Dallas/Ft. Worth, San Antonio, Indianapolis, Memphis, Milwaukee, Orange County, Los Angeles and these international countries/regions Indonesia, Ukraine, Denmark, Middle East, Czech Republic, India, Caribbean, Romania, Hungary, Greece, Guam, Israel, South Korea, Norway, Mexico

What Places In The World Match Your Personality?
City Reviews at CityCulture.org

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Two cool findings I heard today. One is that the astronomy community is debating whether to change the definition of a planet. Why? Because Pluto is significantly smaller than they thought it was. it's about half the size of the earth's moon. So, either they change the definition and we gain 56 more planets or they just eliminate Pluto. Who knows what they decide to do.

-Edit- 08.24.06
Today it has been decided that Pluto will be considered a dwarf planet and will no longer be part of the nine planets we know. So, we only have eight planets left until they discover something much larger. Pluto is considered to be the second largest dwarf planet. I don't know what the largest is, but a professor from Caltech discovered that planet back in 2003 which eventually resulted in dismissing Pluto from our textbooks as the planet after Neptune. Who knew? I'll probably edit this later or maybe not.

Also, stemcell research has taken a better turn. They've found a way to do stemcell research with one cell before it becomes an embryo. It might be slower, but it's a breakthrough and I support it.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

Superman Returns

I just got back from watching Superman Returns. The verdict? I actually liked it. I would like to give an extensive review of the movie right now, but I'm very tired and I have to wake up early tomorrow, so that will have to wait. Anyway most people know the basic story of Superman. Hailed from the planet Krypton, his planet was being destroyed, so his father sends him to the planet Earth where he was picked up and raised by a childless farming couple, grew up a relatively normal life, and eventually worked as a news reporter for the Daily Planet where he works along side his unrequited love interest Lois Lane. Oh yeah and his only weakness is Kryptonite. Now that's out of the way we head to Superman's story for this movie.

A somewhat non spoilery synopsis. In this installment, the story takes place after Clarke Kent and his alter ego have already established themselves in society. Clarke left earth five years before in search of what was left of his home planet only to find a wasteland. Clarke returns after a five year absence only to discover that his lady love has moved on with a new guy and has a son. On the other end of the spectrum Lex Luther, Superman's arch enemy, has found a way to get out of jail and get back into power. The story revolves around Clarke coming to terms with Lois moving on without him and starting a new family and thwarting Lex Luther's new scheme towards world domination.

In all I actually enjoyed the movie. I really didn't have much to complain about aside from the fact that Lois seems more indestructable than Superman is and Lex Luther (Kevin Spacey) should have been someone a bit younger, but who's counting here anyway? The cast as a whole worked pretty well togther. The actor playing Richard, (Scott Summers aka Cyclose of X-Men) Lois's new beau, is a likable character who you kind of feel sorry for (like Scott), Lois (Kate Bosworth) does a decent job portraying the spunky and somewhat annoying character of Lois Lane. In a way, she bring a bit more likability to Lois. I was actually annoyed by Lois in the begining, but later on I kind of let it go. I suppose if I were to pick on anything, it might be the lack of emphasis on Kal (Kumar from Harold and Kumar) hehe j/k. But yeah he barely says 5 words in the entire film. Seriously though, it might be the lack of the hatred factor. They do well with the story of Superman without having to retell the story that most of us are familiar with, but as great of an actor Spacey is, the really needed to find a way to make you hate him more. I just can't put my finger on it. I mean he did all the things bad guys do, but somehow I can't really hate Luther completely. I guess the movie dwells on the lighter side. It doesn't really rip you up like other stories tend to.

All in all this movie lives up to the hype I've heard. It was very well written and well cast. The special effects were decent and the chemistry between the characters and actors went well. Performances by Brandon Rouch (I think his name was...I'll correct it later cause Im too lazy to google it), despite being a rookie in his first major starring role did well not to butcher an icon of the past decade. Although Christopher Reeve will probably be the only real superman most generations of today will remember, he does a good job of continuing the legacy and the saga. In a way, he brings a bit more humanity in Clarke than the other supermans I've seen.

Oh yeah and one more thing, this movie and the entire Superman series couldn't be anymore pro-Christianity. if you didn't get the allusion to God the Father and Jesus, either you aren't Christian or you're just plain oblivious. I could just imagine instead of "S" on the front it would say "J" ^^. Anyway I need to sleep so I'll get back to this post later.

Thursday, August 10, 2006

the BIG KAHUNA

We threw my nephew Parker (b. July 30, 2005) his first birthday party complete with roasted pig aka lechon, leis and tiki pinata ^^. Last minute, but it was pretty fun. I even got to wear my pseudo-Hawaiian inspired-California dress thingy :D

Sunday, August 6, 2006

Sweet Like Honey

Cover of Arashi's Aozora Pedal (Regular Edition)

My obsession with this series had me buying the movie's single. Aozora Pedal was written by Suga Shikao. It is the ending theme of the Honey and Clover movie. I really wish I could hear his version of this song. It is a somber and reminiscient type of song in the traditional Suga Shiko fashion. However, I think since Arashi is a pop group, it was made slightly more upbeat to suit their image. As a whole, it is more mature and of course more meaningful since it accompanies and compliments Honey and Clover.

I was a bit disappointed to find that the single didn't contain the movie trailer, but I was surprised to actually like all of the tracks in it. It (Ltd Ed B) did come with a making of the PV though. I think that would be harder to find than the PV itself. Edition A, however is already out of stock. The 3 editions (Ltd Ed A, B, Regular) were released August 1 2006. Edition A has the Aozora Pedal PV . The look and feel of the album in itself is very atypical from Arashi's previous ones. Although technically I don't own any of their previous albums, I do like this one. I guess Suga Shikao has something to do with that. I'm glad Honey and Clover is how it is. I has yet to disappoint me even until the end of the manga.

Honey and Clover ch 64 Final Chapter

tired.

Just got back from Christine's luau grad party. Dang those guys know how to party. Anyway I met a lot of really cool people. I was forced to do karaoke with these naturally "high" spirits. Everyone laughing playing Maffia (kind of like clue/salem witch trials). I got to chat with Christine for a bit. Apparently she got me a pencil from VA (haha I was so stoked when she told me) and she's heading to Maui nextweek for vacation. I think she and her cousins are also going camping tomorrow. Anyway she is such an awesome person with the nicest family and cool/dorky friends. Aside from being so smart and multitalented, they party hard. Unfortunately, from the several dozen people she introduced me to, I could only remember the name of one person since we talked together the longest. Luckily our talk was not the debate/distressing type.

Among the sea of nursing students and such Christine's cousin was a 4th year gradstudent doing research in psychometrics at UCSD--fully funded btw. He's never paid a cent of tuition in his life. He is that smart or that lucky. We were both surprised and glad to find someone with mutual psychology background. He and I were saying how we, outside of the lab, almost never get to talk about our work in the psychological field. It kind of makes you feel hungry for conversation. I feel kind of bad cause I caught myself venting a lot of my frustrations and trying to absorb his insights of the whole gradschool application/researchwork/conference/publication/papersubmission/review etc. Hopefully I didn't bore him to death. It was weird and refreshing to know someone in such a field and Filipino. I've never met a Filipino in graduate school relating to psychology, let alone psychometrics. Although I guess it's not too much of a surprise since he was bio then premed and found psychometrics more interesting. What was weird was that he looked so much like a guy I knew in college, but put together and a lot taller. I couldn't help but stare.

I was lucky that he was very knowledgeable in the graduate application process. He offered to review my statement and as I was of course hesitant, he assured me it was no problem since he could really help as he's part of the application review board. You can only imagine how intimidated I was. Aside from his stellar academic track record (honors++), he actually has a life outside gradschool. Yes the man not only has a perfect GPA and GRE scores, but he surfs, mountain bikes, practices martial arts and regularly plays sports. And although I may know this much already, I can assure you he is a very grounded person. Now that is very rare. I've known plenty of geniuses in my day and alot of them achieving that much success become a bit full of themselves or become plain arrogant. He's the type of person you wish you could hate, but you can't cause he's just a genuinely cool and nice guy. Now, will I let him read and correct my statement? That's another story, but I can't stand how certan people easily develop such a high expectation of you only to find a mere shell of what they expected you to be. I think my greatest fear apart from lonliness is disappointment.

Moving along the gradschool line. I had the weirdest roadtrip outing thing today (afterwards, I rushed to Christine's party- sooo tired).I met up with a couple of gradstudents/incoming gradstudents from LMU. We were to meet at Portos in Glendale then head off to LMU. As I got to Portos, I didn't expect the place to be that big and that packed. It was like a flea market inside. The lines were just massive choas and hysteria. And yet, everyone is served at a quick pace with satisfactory service. The place is very clean and welcoming as chaotic as it is. Their guava rolls are awesome too. Anyway, after Portos I had to make the scary trek to LMU from the 5 to the 110 sto the 10W to the 405s. And you know what? I didn't get lost on any of those freeway changes. I missed the very last exit to LMU and couldn't make a U turn to correct my mistake. That was very frustrating. After finally getting to the campus I felt very serene. The place was very clean, very quiet and peaceful. It's a small, but beautiful campus. I was surprised at how well groomed it was. But then I rememberd that it was a Catholic school. Coming from one, I know how strict they are about that. I think if I decided to go there I would really like it. It's so close to Marina del Ray and LAX, but it's also snug in a nice upscale community. It's very relaxing.

I finally got a new phone after maybe 4 years? Reason for not changing phones is "I'm not a phone whore" like most of you people out there who live for it. I dislike talking on the phone. TMs are okay though. So, getting a new one would be pointless as I rarely talk on it anyway. This time around though, although my phone was perfect for my needs, the LCD was wearing out and it was getting harder to read names and numbers off parts of the screen. I didn't want to risk my phone dying on me with all those numbers on there, so I finally gave in and got a new one. This time, it's not a Motorolla, but it's still a flip phone. LG VX8300 I believe. On par if not better than that lame Razr that everyone has. So, I'm happy. Finally my phone is on par with the coolness of my camera ^^. Okay I'm dead tired. Time for bed ZZzzzz.

Tuesday, August 1, 2006

Attention Please...

Attempted to make a return only to find that my creditcard expired and my bank hasn't sent me a new card yet *grrrrrrrrr*.In other news, my first post in a long while on dA is put on hold. You can read the reason why here. Since I will not be posting there, I'll post my work here.

The picture on the left is an arial shot of Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada. This was taken last Sunday on our way back home. Pretty nice eh? (Haha, sorry I just had to say it). The original title that I was thinking of was "Attention Please" since well you know...Luckily I came to my senses thought of something more fitting and descriptive at the same time :)

This one's for Bert.