Devoid of Anything Useful

It is still kind of unreal that I'm gonna have my first flight.

Ha.

祝自己一路顺风。。。

I have been thinking a little about what I do that I consider myself "semi-pro", and what is crippling me from becoming "pro" in that area. Here is a list:

Hobbies:

Rubik's cube - OLL, PLLs and the fact that I still cannot Sub-60
Yo-yo - String tricks
Juggling - 2-in-one-hand needs more practice.
RC flying - plane orientation
Inline Skating - T-Stops
Stepmania - Jumpstreams
Math - Calculus, and all the stuff in MOP
Jappy - Jap grammar, Animu nubness + long backlog, Shitted opinions
Language - English spelling, Chinese hanzi, expression in both.
Webpage layout - CSS
Electronics - I still can't do the Ohm/Amps/Volts in my head.
"Hacking" - I am still using low-tech methods
Google searching - I still need a few tries to find errors
IRC - Still can't remember all the flags
Programming:
Javascript - I'm still refering to stock code.
Perl, Python - I'm still at editing variables/flow operators
C++, Actionscript, PHP - Still need to refer for functions

Then, there are communities I am involved in but do not do/know a shit:

Touhou (#fantasia_gensokyo on irc.rizon.net)
DSLRs
Photoshoppers (those who edit photos)
Media designers (Those who create digital art)
ROM dumpers
Fansubbers
OSS (haven't created any)
Council (I'm not even in it)
Debating

So there, a screwed up number of lives, enough to last for very long

I just realized I wasted my 50th post on that stupid shit. Not that it matters.

Anyway, I must say I've been living too many lives at one time.

If a "life" is what you do, or what you tell people you do, then indeed I have too many.

However, each life always has one thing in common with the rest. Randomness notwithstanding, I can say my lack of decision-making ability and the fact that I do too many things in each life is the same.

Also, my Jung thingy personality is ISFP. Slightly different from Sec1's INTP. Maybe I actually have evolved? From a singular to someone who appreciates the collective? Maybe. But I must say my Feeling is only 1% from 0, so that could be still a transition.

Due to popular (i.e. 1 person) demand, I shall list the general content of that stupid dream that I had.

I was sitting in something that looked like an auditorium, then suddenly either Perry, Yibin or Nat (be thankful I forgot who) unleashed two 3d girls at me. Then they immediately leapt (flew?) to the seats next to me. Obviously they pestered me for a while and suddenly I exploded and woke up in cold sweat. The whole thing took about half an hour.

Also, somehow I remembered seeing 2 of my ex-classmates (female duh). Also be thankful that I forgot who.

Thank you. I hope to have no more.

Somehow I've come to understand the fear is not of the physical object, but of what comes out of it.

And for BSC, I've done most of the packing. Whee.

Nevermind that I din't put this in the previous post.

For them to have slashed the price from 70 to 20, something is not right. Yes, maybe it was big "members only" sale day, and that it was most likely already on discount before this. Actually, there is a perfectly logical explanation. No one buys them, or even better, no one expects them to be there. Apparently I found the stack beside some gundams going at 35++. wtf. They must be like, what-the-shit-is-this-no-one-buys-these-anymore-lets-sell-them-f**king-cheaply-so-we-can-look-perfectly-normal. But they were definitely repackaged, as the Rei was uber dirty...I had to scrub it with dishwashing liquid and a sponge.

Also, since I would not be appreciating Lunamaria too much except for the fact that her voice is not bad, I may want to sell it off. Obviously I will want to make some shit out of it, so starting price is $35. If anyone is interested... Nevermind. Yesterday there were at least 5 more, today I would expect that they would still be there. Go grab them yerselves.

They are not too bad, the highlight is the voices. Asuka doesn't say "kimochi warui" though, which actually pisses me off slightly. The voulme can't be controlled, but it is rather loud. Not unlike those other noisemaking toys you have seen.

w00t yeah 600th post. I'm supposed to be doing my biography but I spent the whole morning taking pics...

Here is a little clue:


I however, lament at my ability (or lack thereof) to operate a DSLR properly.
As we will see...

The story:
It was 9+pm. I have got to get a luggage for EFZ immersion stay. There is wan offer at OG for 20%+10% discount on Luggages and it closes at 11pm. Rushed down to get. Chosen, to wait in queue. While waiting, go to toy department. Feel like antique. Observe gashapon. Find they have NGE. Curse that coin compartment was recently emptied. Check to top to see F/SN, but none of the machines have it anyway. Turn around to see Lunamaria Hawke staring at the floor. Find 5 more. Find Rei and Asuka hidden below, one each. Find both to be dirty, but ignore. Check price, almost fainted. ????. PROFIT!!!

The Loot:

Ayanami Rei

Sohryu Asuka Langley

Lunamaria Hawke, who I have only known because this is at Latendo




No pantsu. Sorry!

They come with a switch so they don't drain the battery.Its 2 AA batteries


Bottom of boxes:


Of course, this is only some of the pics. I have pics of Koizumi figma and Rei Revoltech, but too lazy to upload nao.

1) When you find out that an offer for luggage (20%+10%) ends at 11pm and its already 9.30pm, rush down no matter what

2) If you have not been to a departmental store's toy section for a long time, you will feel like an antique

3) Stop to look and smell the flowers. Be observant.

Hopefully I will have time to provide details, and if I will it will appear on S--n--S

but I really think that some things just can't be shared.

yoinked from http://lists.ethernal.org/oldarchives/cantlug-0211/msg00174.html

There is an entire development methodology (whose name escapes me at the moment) that makes use of that very phenomenon.

We called it the Rubber Duck method of debugging. It goes like this:

1) Beg, borrow, steal, buy, fabricate or otherwise obtain a rubber duck
(bathtub variety)
2) Place rubber duck on desk and inform it you are just going to go over
some code with it, if that's all right.
3) Explain to the duck what you code is supposed to do, and then go into
detail and explain things line by line
4) At some point you will tell the duck what you are doing next and then
realise that that is not in fact what you are actually doing. The duck
will sit there serenely, happy in the knowledge that it has helped you
on your way.

Works every time. Actually, if you don't have a rubber duck you could at
a pinch ask a fellow programmer or engineer to sit in.

Andy

And of course, since I'm at it I might as well...
http://adam.blog.heroku.com/past/2009/3/16/push_systems_vs_pull_systems/
(nice comment later on)

http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2009/02/stepping_up_divison_by_zero_to.php
(I'm surprised people can actually come up with that)

http://www.presidiacreative.com/57-wallpapers-you-must-see/
(The link says it all)

http://dollarstorecrafts.com/
http://www.realsimple.com/
(nice)

http://pythonide.blogspot.com/2008/10/how-to-make-money-with-free-software.html
(uber)

I've been daoing my feeds pretty much. Seems like they have fallen in priority, yet I still feel the urgency. I will wait and see how my body responds.

我竟然开始做假期功课了。虽然没做完，但我真是无聊透底了。可能是因为扩展课程的时候已经有“哎呀！假期功课还没作”的心情。

But I do need to get started on Biography T_T.

I managed to get hold of a Shell Account at rootshell.be. My account is here. "What is it for?" you ask. Well, they are basically Linux servers running shells for people to play with. And depending on the service provider they can be quite powerful. rootshell.be allows some hosting with simple mail and other neat shit, but those are not the reasons to get an account.

w00t they are for the ssh tunnel I have been talking about. Anyway the near-1337 needed to understand it is...nevermind.

Facebook has got people grumbling. I don't really mind, except for the fact that my status gets pushed back a bit by my own link sharing, and that stories are expanded by default. I still see people not using the Twitterness correctly, and I have no intention to step in anyway.

Not again...

At this juncture, I must take special care.

It could be a ploy by the school. If it is so, I encourage them to go that way, and evidence does show that we are headed in the right direction.

But if this is going to be a Snape Killed Dumbledore sort of double-crossing, I don't really want it.

The current situation from what I understand is that:
1) As part of the FutureSchool@HCI initiative, Microsoft has pumped in quite a bit (relative to their current market value) of money and thus we saw those banners from them "[Congratulating] Hwa Chong Institution on becoming a FutureSchool".
2) Because of that, we are restricted to use only their products when dealing with "over the table" work. Whether it is enforced by law or by contract, it does not matter.
3) They have to keep Comp Lab 5 a secret, or at least not publicize that it has OSS on it.
4) Not just MS Office, but our servers are running IIS.

If these are my "observations", I produce 2 theories

A) The school is intending to walk into doom.
It is ignorantly accepting such sponsorship, Lab 5 is merely a bug they are too lazy to swat, and future document formats will be restricted to doc, xls and ppt

B) The school is planning to use this as a slingshot
It will first show acceptance; but internally there are already systems put into place such that even if Microsoft suddenly revokes all our school's licenses for no apparent reason, we will be back up and running on alternate systems with little panic. Minimal money from them is put into spending on licences, we are using it for external development.

Evidence supporting A:
Most of the thing that the school runs are currently MS based, like the Comp Labs (even 5 has XP installed) and the servers. It would be too much of a hassle to turn back after such infrastructure has been put into place. Lab 5's presence is also shrinking, being demoted into a lowly extra classroom, and when the comps are used for normal lessons they run on XP. The only occasions where the OSS will be used is EC3 training and the PHP MySOL course.

Evidence supporting B:
Lab 5 is still there. Teachers are starting to implement external systems like Ning, Wetpaint, Facebook and Moodle. Such cloud computing is generally OS independent. The servers run IIS, but are starting to show an OSS style of handling things.

So, if they are really going to do a LeeKY (first accepting the communist radicals then throwing them out eventually), I applaud that; just that I may not be there for long enough to see it. Even if they want to take path A, it would be at most for another 4 years. The Government is already looking into replacing their infrastructure anyway.

And I would still submit my homework in pdf unless I would be penalized if I do so otherwise.

The place that started it: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html

It appears I have been doing it without realizing.

Oh, and I managed to find some cool stuff, like FreeShells and other cool vpn shit.

Call me a noob or something, I don't care.

After reading Ascaloth's review of Clannad AS 22 on Riuva, I actually shed some tears. Of exactly what I do not know.

After following it like how anime was supposed to be watched (weekly), now I sort of understand the attachment people get. I am not as devoid of emotion as I thought myself to be.

The last time, I got shat when I watched Colbert die with wishes unanswered. But in the confusion of the not so mega-ecchi that ZnT had, coupled with his Doctor Who style revival, I do not think those were true tears.

But just reading the ending reviewed by someone, I think it removes external context of you watching it, and instead forces you to concentrate on what happened.

Aww nevermind. Not that I did not want those tears anyway. Dango full ver somehow did not alleviate the situation too.

I have no qualms about it, but I feel that there is quite a bit that I feel needs change.

It is not about the education system we have here, nor is it the mindset.

But not being able to do a project you are pretty much spending all your time on is not fun.

If I do need extra skills to convert it into a proper and presentable project, I am willing to learn. Not that I have not been paying attention during RS for the last 2 years.

Not everything should be quantified.

But I think I shall use the remaining part of the year to come up with a proper proposal, which I had planned to but never did execute when my projects started to go downhill.

I did not join GEP because I did not like projects with deadlines, especially if you like the project idea very much. If faced with the same decision today, I would reject for exactly the same reason, even if my mind was feeble then.

It simply removes all the notion that you have liked it.

return 0;

Why did I have to think of this 5 minutes before I was going to sleep

Before anyone else does, I did a search on "internet memes real life applications" and not many useful results surfaced.

So, next year's research topic: "Internet Memes and their real life effects and applications."

I will orient it towards spread theory and shit.

Todo ASAP:
1) Arrange for an SSH with YYC to poke through the Great Firewall of China.
2) Get all the wallpapers that 3S2'09 wants confirmed to print cheaply.
3) Make checklist of what electronics to get over at Beijing
4) Get extra battery for lappy.
5) Get power adapter for BSC.
6) Get list of what to pack.
7) Pack table

Before boarding plane
1) Load as many youtube vids as possible.
2) Hyperventilate
3) Make sure I do not screw up by saying "bomb" accidentally
4) Hyperventilate
5) Copy stuff from SG_HDD to lappy so that I dun need to do it anymore
6) Hype...nevermind
7) Shit (or rather, defecate)

Bilingual post :-p

我从3月30日到5月8日会在北京，就是我们的”卫星校园“（其实只是从北京师范大学第二附属中学借来的几间课室与设施罢了）。
我选择去是因为:
1) 我在这个时期没有任何重要的比赛
2）这个时候北京的气候不会太冷太热
3）在 Robotics 的几位重要人物都在忙着 SLC （Student Leaders Convention)， 就趁机在他们忙的时候走开；不然我出国他们也出国，课外活动就没人在了。

就因为这些原因碰巧符合，我就去好了。这也会是我第一次乘搭飞机，真刺激。

我看我在那里的几个大问题是：
1）上网可能有些困难（The Great Firewall of China)
2）找电插头给我膝上电脑充电
3）心理上接受那里的食品
4）冷天气
5）空气的素质
6) Clannad After Story 的最后几篇我可能下载不了

就那么几个罢了，也不是什么大问题。

Back to my normal life (or lack thereof), I have found Yahoo! Pipes (which helps me filter and combine feeds so that Liferea actually functions well), and TinEye, an image search engine. For the most extreme example I can offer of its ability, search for this image (source) gave me this.

It seems like I've been forced out of hibernation. Well, doing episode reviews are so donotwant and doing reviews of shows that have passed for so damn long are even more donotwant but I shall still do them anyways.

Let me start with a simple one. Jigoku Shoujo (or Hell Girl as I prefer calling it for some weird reason since I usually call by the Jap name like SHnY instead of TMHS but nevermind I'm sidetracking like shit).

Ok, basically you heard the story countless times, and after watching you would somehow get tired of it like I already am. And here I shall refer to season 1 first

Here is the stuff she says, translated and paraphrased so we don't die of boredom:
"Take this" (uketorinasai)
[Ai gives doll (Wanyuudou)]
"If you really wish to take revenge, you must pull the red string. Your target would be sent to hell immediatley." (bla bla hontou ni bla bla akai bla bla bla)
[Insert animation of person almost pulling]
"However, you make a contract with me. When a person is cursed, 2 graves are dug. You will also go to hell." (bla bla futatsu bla bla)
[Insert animation of person scared and reconsidering]
"Of course, that is after you die"
[Remove Enma Ai and present disappearence]
"The rest is up to you"

And the text on the website, "Your revenge, cleared" (anata no urami, harashimasu)

So that is pretty much what happens in almost every episode, plus minus a few lines for each case.

The template for an episode is pretty much like this:
1) Person gets bullied/wronged/etc that is caused by someone
2) (Optional) Person hears of Jigoku Tsuushin
3) Person accesses it. Optionally insert struggle process
4) The above transcript, give and take some details
5) Person uses doll (accidentally or not)
6) Revenge is taken with nice effects, method depending on what the target did.
7) Target on boat (nice boat?) with Ai, usually struggling etc
8) Ai says she will "ferry this vengance to hell"
9*) Candle appears in candlepool with Person's name, with Ai saying what is on the website.
10) Resolution, involve showing the mark on chest of Person

*Note: can sometimes be last, just before ED.

And after episode 8 comes a complication, where the Shibata family comes in.
Insert after 1): Tsugumi recieves contact
Insert after 4): Hajime tries to stop, usually not arriving in time/cannot persuade properly

Then there is Episode 13, where the past is explained. At the end of this episode we see someone who sent his friend to hell go to hell himself, but without torture.

Also, the last 3 episodes are very different. Basically its still their history in detail.

I shall not talk about the OP and ED since I have no such licence, but I must say the OP is some catchy shit and the ED is for curing insomnia.

So this is the post for the whole of Jigoku Shoujo 1. Even if I have time I may not do 2.