Firefox 1.5 released!!!

I should be installing it tonight when I have time. I tried Dear Park Beta before, but some of my favorte plug-ins haven't been updated at the time. I'll report the new stuff and differences when I can.

Mean while, just go to http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/ and get it!

Summer Internship info...

Internship...
Seems hard to apply, but I guess I should at least try.
Housing doesn't seem to be a problem, since most of them provide them and/or stipends. (Now that's a surprise, I was expecting to do a night shift at some where like bestbuy to get money...)

One draw back is that most start in July, before I finish my final exams. (crap)

http://www.mimg.ucla.edu/undergrad/careers_interns.html

http://www.yale.edu/necuse/N99-BiologicalS.htm

http://www.ogsr.ucsd.edu/stars/program.htm

http://sea.ucsd.edu/summer_research/

The abserdity of the Sony Walkman A series

ソニ☆モバ: 本田雅一さんもウォークマンAへ失望

Seems like the new "Connect player" desktop software that "was supposed to sync with" the Walkman A series, is even less stable then the notorious Windows95. You get constant crashs, errors, and corrupt databases. The funny part, is that in this Japanese article, it mentioned something in the Q&A of that walkman, which instructed you what to do after you installed "Connect player". You'll fail to launch it, and you'd have to go to "task mannager" and "force application termination". In other words, please use "Ctrl+Alt+Delete" to close "Connect player"! This is pethetic. Releasing a software that is as stable as "Alpha-software" is like selling a gadget's innereds, and telling you to find out how to assemble it your self.

Sony fans are waiting for a good walkman because they don't like iPods. Now Sony is disapointing them with this crap? Well I guess the iPod nano is already the best music player. It's cool, sleak, small, stable and works as you expect it would. The only reason I haven't get one is that my Clie is doing just fine. However, although I like Sony, I would never buy such crap as the Walkman A. I would happily recommend anybody to get an iPod nano. No matter how strong your brand is, no one will buy unusable garbage. (Well, with the exception of Microsoft, though. Never figured why so many people liked their unstable stuff...)

學習、思考與林曜松

林曜松上生統時很喜歡岔開話題講「思考的重要性」，於是今天講完教學評鑑的事後，說自己「不吐不快」，然後就開始講自己女兒「很不一樣」的學習法XD

他女兒中學時曾問過：「為什麼你們大人要出那種考試來考我們？學習應該是我們自己的事！」
嗯，會挑戰制度果然不一樣。我國小時也問過討師相似的問題耶：「為何要考試，又不能確實的測驗出我們學了多少？」我也小小挑過考試制度呵。不過林伯伯的女兒最後修學到國外念，我則是屈服於環境，我沒有堅持啊～～！

社會化，就是在成長的過程中，屈服於社會的壓力，而成為大家所公認的「正常人」所應該表現的樣子。我在小五、小六時，徹底的被這個儒家社會社會化了；不再 挑戰權威，對於課本內容開始照單全收。不過從很多教授的言語中，可見勇於思考、懷疑、挑戰權威，是一個科學家所需要的條件。或許，在我們的升學制度中，應 開劉一點喘氣空間，給喜歡思考的人；而我們這些已經社會化的群人，則應該開始，「反社會化」。

搞什麼？！

明明禮拜二就要考神生了，卻整個下午加晚上看漫畫晃掉... 我的意志力和自覺可真是差勁。

半年前就跟自己講好要徹底把對愛情的渴望從自己的中徹底剷除，現在卻看愛情漫畫看的這麼hi... （其實更糟，某個已經有男友的女生的名字，還是時常出現在腦中干擾我的情緒）難道真的完全忘不了嗎？也許，單性生殖的生物還比較幸福，沒有這種煩惱。

有趣的是，愛情故事中的男主角總是桃花運好的誇張，被一堆女生倒貼，還不知道要選誰。我倒是重沒見過我認識的人被倒貼；只知道每次發現朋友間有八卦都是至少已經交往幾個月了XD 遲鈍啊～

另，倒是很羨慕漫畫中人物總是有個努力的目標，有個要實現的夢想。也許，有夢想的人才有資格談戀愛吧。

不過，愛情，對我來，是什麼呢？
單戀是酸的；追求是苦的；結果是痛的。那所謂「酸甜的滋味」中那「甜」的呢？只有看別人的愛情故事是甜的吧。所以，這東西可以說是騙人的娛樂工具？！
---
好吧，神生也快唸完一半了，有學長的筆記加重點整理讀的真快。沒想到課本用借的，除省錢外還有種好處^^

之後，要考TOEFL（進度嚴重落後），準備GRE，尋找要申請的研究所目標，明年暑假要做的Lab intern 也該認真考慮了，我聯要住哪，前哪裡來都還不知道呢。

嗯，我真是個只會畫大餅，卻一直打混的笨蛋。
---
Let's see... 週二晚上和同學的火雞野餐準備了兩大包Tortilla，希望吃得完。

Another new start at the lab

After that major setback 2 weeks ago, I was considering giving it up all together, and just focus on my studies and exams. But, I guess it's just not easy to give up something you love so much.

Since the exams is no longer that intense this week, I returned to the lab today, with plans to take care of all the undone stuff, and finish off my project, prepare it for the next one to come and tackle it. However, this morning, as the time to go gets near, I got excited, and all the hope seemed to kick in again. I rewrote my plans as soon as I got to the lab. After a discussion with my instructor and an acknowledgement of the whole situation, it turnes out that I still have the materials to start off midway. A fresh and slow new start is not nessecery. HOPE, it's really back. Haven't had this sense of hope for a long time. I'm more excited now.

OK, this time, I'll do it slowly, carefully. This maybe the last tackle at this project, since I don't have much time left. Much more major exams are closing in. With a whole new attatude, but not a fresh start, I hope I can do it right this time.

嘉南大圳、烏山頭與八田與一

今年年初書展時買的書：「嘉南大圳之父 八田與一傳」（譯自：台湾を愛した日本人　八田與一の生涯）終於找時間看完了。不僅更加認識了八田技師這個偉大的人之外，對於日治時代的臺灣歷史有了更進 一步的認識。一個日本人，可以如此無私的把自己的青春奉獻給台灣的嘉南平原。更驚人的是他那勇於定下壯大的計畫，並全利投入，完成夢想時所能發揮的力量。

嗯，看來夢想還是人生重要的一部分。想想，現在能在這個學校唸書，也是因為高中時期的自己的努力。該把過去「逐夢」的自己找回來吧。

有趣的是，我發現八田技師的生日跟我差一天，真巧。

書，越看越想到烏山頭水庫看看。去看看八田與一平易近人的銅像，去參拜一下他的長眠之處，去看一下昔日那熱鬧的烏山頭出張所現在長什麼樣子，去看看半個世 紀以前的日式工程宿舍長什麼樣子，去看看他們以前聚集看電影的網球場。最重要的，以要看看書中形容，有如珊瑚樹一般分枝，美麗的珊瑚潭，那最美麗的人工 湖。也想以單車，體驗以前烏山頭組合的人們天天在享受的大自然。烏山頭的美，在作者優美的筆法下，一一呈現；真想親身體驗。

Google找了一下，發現有單車路線介紹耶！而且還是offroad！嗯，找個時間去吧！
烏山頭風景區
單車路線介紹

名詞解説：Hyper Tamama Impact

Hyper Tamama Impact

ケロロ小隊のタママ二等兵の奥義であります。

翻成中文：「超級他媽媽嘴砲」是也。
簡稱：「超他媽的嘴砲。」
造句：「那個主任真是Hyper Tamama Impact。」

丟掉新注音，擁抱「新酷音」輸入法吧！

我想大家都非常討厭新注音，雖然它都亂選字，只會搞笑，問題一堆......不過大家看在它免費又是內建的，就將就使用。還是換個輸入法吧！之前試用過「自然輸入法」一陣子，不過因為不喜歡一個bar在那漂浮，又不習慣它切換中英文的方式，就不用了。

現在發現了「新酷音」輸入法這個結合「新注音」和「自然輸入法」的優點的超棒輸入法，幾乎不用選字，標點符號也不用忙著切換全/半形，打字真的變快了，錯字也少很多^^

更棒的是，它是採用GPL 的自由軟體，也就是本著免費分享精神的開放程式碼軟體啊！它還有各個不同平台的版本，除了Window$以外，MacOSX、Linux、Java Desktop System...等作業系統都支援。自由軟體好啊！

Links:
1. 「新酷音」輸入法首頁（請到此下載）
2. Blog: 「永遠的真田幸村」上的介紹

Spotlight on my dorm...

Funny.

Officially this is a male dorm room of 4, and of course, with 4 residents.
But actually, we have uh... 7, I guess.

3 normal residents, 1 perminent resident
(yes, I mean "always" by perminent, someone is rooted in this room, either in bed, or glued to "The World of Warcraft"...)
2 female weekly residents, and an additional resident who appears frequently.

We have 4 beds, 2 are occupied by 1 each(I'm one of which), another occupied by a couple, and the other occupied by 2 male + 1 female...

Is this a ghost house or what?

台北各大自行車道...

照片故事~~

第一拍

扛車扛車~~

壓隊中~~看到的只有背影(和八卦XD)

八里左岸

好帥的馬...

八里會館前休息中

主辦人大大

大佳河濱公園的噴泉

中午休息

大佳河濱公園另一景

Good news and bad news (for me, at least)

As a friend pointed to me that my recent "mood posts" are mostly about similar episodes of lostness and misery, here's some good news for a change.

In a life with a lack of sense of accomplishment, here's a strange way of getting that taste of success. The antiviral drug (valaciclover, a guanine analouge) worked and successfully inhibited that colony of Herpes zoster virus on my leg. Ah, sweet revenge :) Take that stupid virus!

And following, today I've got a great score (let's just say, a score that I'm very satisfied with) on the Virology exam I took last week. Hmm, guess you really do better on what you like.

And the bad news: After that ride to Keelong and back to Taipei, I felt very tired for the whole day, and now my throat is hurting. (NO... I still have reports and several unread chapters...) OK, time for a rest.

一部很棒的電影~ 茄子 アンダルシアの夏

(c)2003「茄子 アンダルシアの夏」製作委員会

以單車為主題的日本動畫, 以西班牙為故事場景, 生動的騎乘動作, 很棒的故事情節. 今天才在社辦看了片段, 以後要找時間看完^^
>預告片
>homepage
>DVD site

Docs2go 8 is now released

The much anticipated next version of Docs2go is now avaliable. However, I'm quite disapointed. Having looking around their web site, it seems that the only difference between Docs2go 7 and 8 is the addition of "PDF to go". That's it? Yup. Over hype, under deliver. This should be released as version 7.5 instead.
Or maybe I was a little spoiled by Sony, since I've been having native PDF support with Picsel viewer on my Clie for years, while Palm user can't do that until recently. But this means that I don't need the update! Actually, Docs2go 6 was good enough. The upgrade to version 7 gives you slower speeds, eye candy and an upgraded slideshow to go that was so buggy that it's almost unusable to me. Now this upgrade gives you the addition of "PDF to go" only. Consider the upgrade fee: 30USD! A rip-off! Palm users can just wait for the open source PalmPDF to come out of beta, and save the money.
By the way, someone said that some bug in slideshow to go 7 is still there. Crap. Picsel viewer also does Powerpoint files better then slideshow to go. Horray to the Clies!

The new Palm Pilot!

Just saw this on PDA24/7.

Yeah right, a "palm" pilot...I laughed so hard...
Kudos, man!

Herpes Virus...

段考壓力大, 學分修得多, 再加上睡眠不足
造成免疫力下降
結果病毒跑來湊熱鬧T_T

周日開始, 大腿長了一堆紅斑+水泡
(當時心想: 糟, 不睡覺, 腳開始爛了...XD)

沒想到竟在我狂K病毒學課本, 背Herpes Virus的特徵時
他本尊已經在我的腿上作怪

帶狀皰疹, 原來是以前發作過的水痘病毒(Vericela Zoster)再度出來活動啊

---
插曲

今天在臺大醫院公館院區花了六百多, 活活把我身上的錢榨乾
下周還要再一次...

醫生:"有沒有得過"水痘"或打過疫苗嗎?"
me :(遲疑)"...mmm...是 chicken pox嗎?"
醫生:"是的"
me :"有得過."

囧...rz

儲存格~胡思乱想もうひとつ〜

感覺脳中記憶人名的地方有如一整排的「儲存格」, 我們依毎個人和我們之間的關係分門別類的把各人名填入相應的格子中。其中有些格子如「父母」是唯讀的, 有些格子如「朋友」、「同學」則是可修改的, 而且我們一直在填入新的名字。

一直到現在, 我毎次到自己的記憶中找「最喜愛的人」這一格時, 想到的還是那個名字。明明去年底就知道已没希望了, 但心中最特別的這一格却還是都無法清空。想直接把這格整個除去也失敗。為何連這種事都失敗？

BX衝啊~~(鼓勵文)

據說還有希望是吧?
心動不如馬上行動!
不要龜了(看看我, 猶豫半年就沒了...)
要連我的份一起加油啊!

還在等你成功後請吃飯呢XD

Sony's Cybershot DSC-N1, with a touch screen!

Having using my Clie handheld (PDA) as my primary camera for 2 years, I admit I am not satisfied with the 0.3megapixal built in CMOS. We do have a Sony Cybershot F77 at home, but it has no optical zoom, and battery life is unacceptable. Also, navigating the menus with a 5 way directional pad just isn't my cup of tea (once you've tried working with a touch screen, you'll love it's simplicity and ease of navigation), although every single camera I've known are made that way.

Now, behold the Sony N1, to be released in Japan on Nov 18. First of all, it looks cool. (Yeah, I've always liked Sony's designs) And best of all, it now has a touch screen, which means that I can do all the settings just as on the Clie camera software I'm familiar with. Look how big the "buttons" on the screen are. By the way, it's a huge 3 inch screen, which means bigger picture previews and bigger on screen buttons.

Another plus of the touch screen seems to be the ability to do drawing on your pictures. But that really doesn't make sense to me. I've already had that ability with the built in photo editor on my Clie, but I seldom use it. I only use it to mark up pictures I took of some experiment results, which you can usually just do it on paper of on the lab's computer. No big deal. Besides, duddling on photos or applying fancy stickers to them seems stupid.

It has 3x optical zoom and 15 digital zoom. 3x optical zoom is good for most occations while digital zoom means nothing because it usually gives you fuzzy images. Also, as with most Cybershot cameras, it's equipted with a Carl Zeiss lens. I'm no expert of lenses, but from my experience with the F77, a high end lens doesn't make much sense on a simple point and shoot. To me, as long as you don't see obvious defects or image distortions, it's good enough. As for the most important part of a digital camera, we know that Sony's got good CCD technology(well as long as their manufacturing lines don't screw up, as what caused a recent major recall of billions of 2 year old Sony CCD parts).

But here's the most rediculus part of the whole product: What do you do with a 8.2megapixal CCD in a compact point-and-shot? For consumer cameras, 5MP is already more then enough. Even some older high end DSLRs that produce huge beautiful pictures only have 5megapixal. So what's a 8.2MP CCD doing in a point-and-shot? Waist memory space and force you to buy 2GB memory cards?

OK, finally a great touch screen user interface on a camera. But also a 8.2MP CCD as a major factor to drive up the price. Sony has done it again, a great idea that's going to be killed by pricing. I don't think I'll ever be buying a 8MP camera.

Distress

Once again, I screwed up on my experiments. The set back it self wasn't that hard to accept for me, as I was half expecting this result. I was a little so anxious to get it done yesterday night that I proceded even though I don't have enough of my sample, not enough enzymes and not so good a situation. However, these constent failers make me feel in dept to our lab, taken all the resources and money that I sort of wasted; and all the help everybody provided. I really wanted to get the molecular part of the project done with and move on to cell lines and viruses. But today's results made me have to make a fresh start, and simply let almost all that I have done in the past 3 months go down the drain. So much for the hard work.

But the real scarry part is that a look at my schedule revailed that I've only got 4 avaliable weeks left (1 day free per week) of the remainder of the semester. The mid-terms, finals, and TOEFL exams each taking out 2 weeks. After that, winter break gets eaten out by Chinese New Year, when no body works(OK, an empty lab). Then GRE preperation takes out the whole of next semester. And then school registration and other stuff might take out my last school year here. My little goal seems more and more distant.

Why does everything that I love seems to get farther from me with year? OK, the whole point of getting in to a good university was to get into a lab and do experiments to explore the world of science: my life goal since childhood. Then now I have to sacrafice lab work for a better lab in the future. Also, school romance, which most normal people crave for, is not just screwed up, but essentialy hopeless to me. Making wrong decision, being shy, and choosing the wrong girl brings major consequences. (Now is this situation what "learned hopelessness" , which was mentioned yesterday in psychology class, ment?)And, as I don't have time for lab work, the same goes to bike club activities.

Great, I always hate it when you are faced with time distribution and allocation of resources. However it seems that this is essentially the norm of life. Some how, life seems to be designed to be hard to enjoy.

"Life is like a straw, it sucks."