Bye bye, Comcast

I've been curious about Clearwire for a while now, and finally I've decided to give it a shot. Comcast has always seemed to have issues in my building, and after my Internet connection was out for three days last week, I'd had enough. So I'm up and running on my new Clearwire modem tonight -- it was very easy to set up and I'm not finding that the download speed is slower than Comcast. Actually, I'm finding the opposite: I'm able to watch episodes of The Office on NBC.com without a hitch, whereas with Comcast, my connection constantly blinked out.

Tags: Comcast Clearwire

This is fun

Warning: there is insta-audio in the above-linked website, which I hate. Still, though, its build-your-own avatar tool is quite fun.

I've jumped onto YouTube

I was with my family visiting my cousin over the weekend; she lives near Port Angeles, WA. My sister Bethany I and availed ourselves of her trampoline.



This little video -- in all its jerky and grainy glory -- is actually the first I've ever uploaded to YouTube. It's a remarkably easy process. I thought there would be some difficulty with the 3g2 video format that my phone uses, but there wasn't any problem; everything gets converted.

Tags: YouTube trampoline 3g2 video format

Linkalicious: 8/9/07

Dear readers, here are some interesting tidbits, hastily proffered. More substantial posts coming your way soon.

• In strict botanical parlance, bananas are berries -- but strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries are not.
• Google's Chinese name is "Gu Ge," which translates to "harvest song." This is a bit more appealing than the translation of Google's English name: old hound.
• A people-search engine called Spock is currently in beta. Among other things, it's an interesting new way to manage one's online identity. Let me know if you'd like an invite.
• TV's really all about the ads -- particularly on a new site that NBC will be launching, called Didja.com. This site will offer visitors nothing but ads, both classic and contemporary.

Tags: Linkalicious Spock Didja.com banana berry berries Gu Ge

Mysteries of the bus

As I boarded the bus the other morning, I saw the scene at left: a woman seated with a "Congrats!" balloon so large that she had to turn her face to the side to make room for it.

I wondered: did someone give her this balloon -- was this burdensome prize hers? Or was she bringing it to work, to give to someone else?

What do you think?
	She gave the balloon to someone else, after the bus ride.
	Someone (husband?) gave it to her that morning.
	A stranger randomly gave her the balloon as she boarded the bus.
	It's hers; she just carries it around as an accessory.
pollcode.com free polls

Speaking of the bus, as the Seattle Weekly has recently pointed out, bus drivers have a tough job.

Tags: bus driver balloon mystery Seattle

Can The Simpsons improve your mental health?

I was researching connections between The Simpsons and health for today's blog post on The Healia Blog, and I ran across this story:

Simply acknowledging mental health on such a popular television show might help 'normalise' the illnesses, say Australian trainee psychiatrist Dr Hannah Mendelson and director/cinematographer Gil Poznanski from Melbourne.

This idea is not without its detractors, however.

I'm not sure what to think about this question. On the one hand, if something is suppressed and kept under the carpet, there's an argument for bringing it out into the light. On the other hand, it's possible to go too far and make people feel belittled. Has The Simpsons done that? I don't think so.

After reading about the brilliant marketing campaign over the past few weeks (The Seattle Kwik-E-Mart is a sight to behold), I'm looking forward to watching the movie and seeing if it lives up to the hype.

Tags: The Simpsons movie mental health

Eavesdroppers

I've been laughing (silently to myself) at overheard snippets of conversation for years, so I was immediately charmed by a blog I happened upon via BlogExplosion the other day: Eavesdroppers. Here, you can find a compendium of eavesdropped bits of conversation, compiled by three bloggers.

One example:

[Two middle-aged women are discussing their mothers.]

Woman 1: I'm really thankful that my mother's mind is still good like it is.
Woman 2: Yeah, that's great.
Woman 1: She's still sharp for 78, aren't you Mom? Aren't you 78?
"Mom": Umm... I don't know, I guess so.

Tags: Eavesdroppers eavesdropping blog

Happy Harry Potter weekend

Requisite note: no spoilers here!

Prior to this past weekend -- Harry Potter Weekend, truly an international event -- I hadn't read any of the Harry Potter books.

Now that the weekend's over, I've read fifty or so pages from the latest Harry Potter book. I was reading over the shoulder of a friend of mine, and I began to get a sense of what all the fuss is about. It's definitely an enjoyable read.

My friend and I had been at the Harry Potter release party at University Bookstore on Friday night. I wasn't surprised by the throngs of kids in costume -- no, it was all the costumed adults, all quite earnest, who threw me for a loop. There was even a band there, playing Harry Potter-themed music and shouting out the countdown to midnight after every song. We'd had a few drinks beforehand, so it was all pretty amusing.

Is this the biggest book event ever? Perhaps. I heard on a recent WSJ podcast that this was the biggest single product distribution for Amazon.com. Certainly, a whole lot of trees went into this. Yesterday evening, it seemed like half the people in my bus were intently perusing their copies.

Tags: Harry Potter amazon.com product distribution release party costumes

Cranes aplenty

I snapped the photo at right with my phone as I walked across the I-405 overpass this evening. I was on my daily walk from work to the Bellevue Transit Center.

As the profusion of cranes attest, construction is on a tear in Bellevue, WA, and has been for a while. There was even a tragic accident involving a crane last November.

I'm reminded of all the cranes poking out of downtown Seattle during the Internet boom, eight years ago. At the time, friends and I jokingly envisioned "crane wars" wherein the slumbering mechanical giants would suddenly come to life and battle each other, a la Transformers.

Although I confess the walk over the I-405 overpass is not in the least enjoyable -- motorists on the on-ramps actually seem to purposefully accelerate in an attempt to run over my fleeing pedestrian self -- I do sometimes see fun things nearby, like the geese on the sidewalk on Monday morning.

Tags: cranes Bellevue construction 405 pedestrian traffic geese

The iPhone: a head-turner

On the morning of June 30, the day after iPhones were released to the ravenous public, I was having some breakfast at The Globe Cafe and noticed, a few booths away, three guys gingerly passing a gleaming new iPhone back and forth. I couldn't help it: I had to walk up and get a closer look, and the owner was gracious enough to let me touch it.

The other day at work, one of my coworkers brought in his new iPhone and we all gathered round for a demo. Impressive? Yes, quite. I won't go on about its features, as they have been discussed in painstaking detail throughout the blogosphere.

People are impressed with other people's iPhones. So I predict that this summer, a sizeable number of people will successfully use their iPhones to successfully woo romantic partners. Just by flashing their iPhones as they walk down the street. It will happen. I'm sure.

Tags: iPhone woo head-turner

Drumming again, a decade later

Over a decade ago, back in college, I drummed with a few bands. We played Nirvana and Pavement covers and it was lots of fun.

I didn't really do much drumming after that until just recently, after the end of this past school year. I've taken up drumming with a CCR cover band called Revival Revival. It's an absolute blast! We just had our first show,
at a house party, and we'll be doing more shows throughout the summer.

Drumming with a fun-focused cover band is markedly different from anything I was up to during my first year of grad school. It's a refreshing diversion, actually -- a nice way to take a vacation from school for the next few months.

Tags: drumming CCR Creedence cover band summer Revival Revival

Did I just ... ?

Lately in the mornings I find myself unsure if I just took my multivitamin. It's my custom during breakfast to become intensely fixated on whatever I'm reading. So I've got the little bottle of multivitamins next to me, and I remember that I had the thought "I will take my vitamin" I few moments ago. But did I actually take one just now? I cannot recall.

Isn't this what happens to old people? Uh-oh. I suppose I need one of these.

Tags: forgetfulness vitamin

Coffee: two sides to the debate

I've been thinking I should really cut back on my coffee consumption lately. I've entered two+ cup-a-day territory, and that just can't be good. Can it?

Apparently there are two schools of thought on this issue, as this recent BBC story points out. On the one hand,

caffeine eases withdrawal symptoms which build up overnight, but does not make people more alert than normal....all the drink does is counteract the mild caffeine withdrawal symptoms people are experiencing because they have gone without the stimulant overnight.

The possible adverse health effects of coffee aren't really a secret, but aren't well substantiated either:

not long ago, in the 1970s and '80s, coffee's name was mud. It was connected — tenuously or incorrectly, experts now say — to pancreatic cancer, heart attacks, birth defects, miscarriage, osteoporosis, and other ill effects.

On the other hand, maybe it's good for you...

a wealth of scientific evidence suggests that moderate coffee consumption of four to five cups per day is perfectly safe for the general population and does have a beneficial effect on alertness and performance even in regular coffee drinkers.

Pictured above: me, feverishly imbibing coffee during last summer's family road trip.

Tags: coffee health debate

Six idiosyncrasies

My friend Cybele recently tagged me with a request that I write a post about six of my idiosynrasies. Here we go:

1. I can juggle.

2. Just a few years ago, if I drank the slightest sip of coffee I would "go into orbit," to borrow one of my dad's expressions. Something changed (MBA program) over the past year, and now I drink two (large) cups of (strong) coffee per day.

3. I am completely allergic to dairy products -- not lactose intolerance, but the full-on allergy. I can't eat anything with any dairy in the ingredients -- whey, etc. This means I check a lot of labels. And I tend to eat a lot of Asian food.

4. I was a spelling bee champion in junior high, winning 3rd place in the Western Washington regional spelling bee finals.

5. This isn't all that idiosyncratic, but it seems to surprise many of my current MBA classmates: my appearance has changed a bit over the years. In the mid-90s, I had long hair and a beard. (The photo shows my sister and me at a costume party; the beard is real.) At other points, I've had skater hair, no hair, 70s hair, and a short-lived moustache.

6. I am fourth-generation Washingtonian.

Tags: idiosyncrasy idiosyncrasies dairy allergy juggle hair

X, Y, Z

Why do so many drug names contain the letters x, y, and z? I am curious about this.

Tags: drug names x y z

Like Treebeard, but not in a good way

My sister, brother-in-law, and his son spent the better part of today here in my apartment, as there was no power in their southwest Seattle home until this evening. Like many Seattleites, they had an unsettling evening this past Wednesday. But they had the added bonus of listening to a tree hammer against their gutter (pictured). They said it sounded like Treebeard was out there, making a ruckus.

Tags: Seattle wind storm power tree gutter

Wind-strewn wasteland

So, the wind was pretty intense in Seattle last night.

I walked around my neighborhood today and took some blurry pictures with my phone. Here's a couple of plastic chairs. The white chair is merely upside-down; the green chair suffered a much more grisly fate!


A lot of parked vehicles got damaged last night. There was a group of folks around this wind-felled tree, all snapping pix with their phones. I wondered to myself how many of these people work at Microsoft. The Microsoft campus was essentially closed today.


Chainsawing a tree in the yard:


Power stayed on in my building, but it went out in some houses in my neighborhood (the Internet cafe in my neighborhood was packed to the gills. More Microsofties, no doubt). Down in Southwest Seattle, where my sister and brother-in-law live, power is out everywhere. They're actually on their way up to my place right now, to fill up on gas and take showers.

Tags: Seattle Capitol Hill wind storm tree

My building just shook

Seriously. It's really that windy outside.

Since finishing up my first quarter as an MBA student on Tuesday, I've spent the past few days earnestly relaxing, absolutely revelling in the lack of a schedule. I've been catching up on blog-reading. I also watched 49 Up. This film gave me the same feeling I get when I look at old photos of my parents (and me): an awestruck awareness of the quick flicker of mortality.

Tonight I was walking down 15th Ave, my scarf blowing this way and that in the (then calmer) wind, when I ran into my old friend Brian. He invited me over to watch The Office and have some beer. Walking back from his place (my scarf flapping more, as the wind picked up), I thought how great it was to do something spontaneous like that, something unscheduled.

My winter break is going to be all about that.

Tags: Seattle wind rain storm unscheduled spontaneity 49 Up mortality

The ultimate rejection letter

This was making the rounds amongst my classmates today.

Jon Swift: satirical genius

If you're in the mood for some excellent political satire, check out Jon Swift. This blog has become one of my new favorite study breaks!

Tags: Jon Swift politics satire