Saturday, January 31, 2009

Stress

My coworker the other day asked me if I feel stress working at the company. Being a supporting staff, it's about the only time I feel superior over her. "Just a little bit," I told her. Really, I can't complaint, have no grounds or reasons to. I honestly am happy at this point in my life. Have a great husband, two adorable cats, blessed with no accidents (kids) so far, have a job that I don't hate... in fact, quite prefer, love to eat, have enough disposable income to enjoy dining and buying myself inexpensive happiness (video games, mangas, etc.) My biggest problem in life right now?

(1) I'm not sure which characters to use in my party in Star Ocean: Second Evolution:



and this problem is caused by

(2) The Star Ocean 2 Official Guide is BACK ORDERED!!

This one:



I want to say, Great for Bradygames!! In this down economy their products are SOLD out!! Or maybe just some bad coordination job that caused the guide to NOT BE AVAILABLE on it's release date.

Oh yeah, and

(3) Hubby occasionally gripes that I don't update my blog enough.

See? I really don't have a lot of grounds to complain about much in life. :)

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Hubby and Tonkatsu*

Hubby likes tonkatsu. My friend A has tonkatsu recipe. Great, right? I got recipe from her, passed it onto Hubby. Hubby was making it one time (note: he had made it very successfully a few times before) and asked me, "How long do I fry these for?" Silly me, forgetting for a moment that he's a MAN, replied, "'til it's golden brown!" Five minutes later, the pork chop came out a few shades darker than "golden brown." Hubby said, "well, there are levels of browness!" "Yes, honey, and golden brown is the level." What was I thinking? Should have just said three mintues! A term that men can understand!

THEN, he poured himself some sauce and started eating without me. Grumbling about him not getting me tonkatsu sauce, I went to get it myself. I opened up the fridge and could not see the tonkatsu sauce in plain sight. You'd think that since Hubby just used it, it'll be the first thing I see. The only thing that remotely resembles tonkatu sauce is honey glazed teriyaki sauce!

"Ummmm, sweetie, are you using teriyaki sauce with your pork chop?"

"OOOOOOHHHHHHHHH, is that what it is? I was just thinking why they don't taste like they do before!" =.=

And the whole time he thought the different taste was because of the OIL!

***

*Tonkatsu is Japanese style fried pork chop.

Monday, January 19, 2009

My Husband, The Alcoholic...?

For those who had seen me declining vehemently when someone offers alcoholic beverages to my husband, they must think he makes a horrible drunk. That can't be farther away from the truth.

Of the seven years we've been together, I've seen him drunk twice... both times he puked miserably into the toilet... And he wonders why I don't want to "experienced being drunk at least once in my life." Real convincing, honey.

Most of the time, he doesn't get to that point. Then why do I react so strongly? Well, he does three things when he has alcohol in him:

(1) Like most people, he became very chatty, and the volume goes up a couple notches.

(2) That filter (of what to say and what not to say) that was barely there before the alcohol simply becomes nonexsistent -- and no amount nudging and kicking could stop him.

(3) (And the most important point) He couldn't stay awake after that!! Yes, the selfish wife, especially when we are on vacation, wants him to stay up to entertain me, instead of being passing out in bed. :P

People always say, "this amount won't get him drunk." Little do they know, him being drunk was the last thing I worry about. ;)

Crack

For my HK friend HL: Crack is a lower grade of cocaine.

***

So my friend A likes to use the word "crack" a lot. A person who's being a moron : he/she is smoking crack.

A dish that's so delicious that we can't stop eating: It has crack inside. :D

***

(More) note to HL: When you say something/someone "cracks me up" = so funny it makes me laugh. :D

A Series of Unfortunate Events

There's a reason why there's a series of books, and subsequently a movie, by the name of A Series of Unfortunate Events -- because they DO happen in a series!!

It all started when I lost the TV remote. The TV remote!! I don't mean the living room that could have fell into any of the crevices in the couch, I am talking about the bedroom one! I got up, turned the TV on, casually tossed the remote on top of the blanket and it was never to be seen again!! I removed BOTH blankets from the bed; looked on the floor around the bed; Hubby even lifted the mattress. Nope! Not a sign! Ugh!

Then what's arguably one of God's best invention - my space heater - died!! It's been making some strange noises for a while now... that's what you get for buying the cheapest money can get. :( Then it just stopped. Alas. Luckily I was already ready that morning.

THEN! That night when I came home from work, I discovered that one of my kitties -- most likely CC knocked over a half-empty glass of water and my laptop was sitting on top of a small puddle of water!! Luckily my 220-pages Star Ocean Official Study Guide was faithfully lying between the glass and the laptop and soaked up most of the water. Even so, my laptop was still dripping with water when I picked it up.

My luck finally turned when, after drying for 24 hours, we were able to remove the harddrive from my laptop AND retrieve the data from it!!! Then, after replugging it back into my laptop... well, long story short, I am blogging from my laptop!! :)

THEN! The remote control resurfaced!!! Just fell onto the ground, from somewhere between the bed frame and the mattress!! Why Hubby didn't spotted it when he lifted the mattress we'll never know. I'm not complaining!

AND! When Hubby took apart the space heater -- one of God's best gift to mankind -- to try to fix it for me, it's working again!!! (Not sure for how much longer, but what the heck! :)

Hopefully this bad streak is over. :)

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Return of the Condor Heroes

If Hubby could, indeed, miraculously, sit through all 59 episodes of Legend of the Condor Heroes with me, perhaps I should consider a newer version of the Return of the Condor Heroes. Perhaps this 2005 version



instead of the original 83 version. :D (They made BOTH condor series in the SAME year? And you wonder why it's so tacky...)



And if Hubby really, really gets hooked (please, please, get hooked), we can move onto Duke of the Mount Deer. :) Don't worry, baby, we won't run out any time soon. ;)

LOCH '83

So I received Legend of the Condor Heroes (LOCH '83) in the mail!! Woohoo!! That's this one:



First of all: Wow, loved the seller on Amazon. Super fast shipping. Rediculously low shipping & handling charges. I felt for sure the dude will pull the discs out and ship them in sleeves and told me something like "Yeah, they are from a box set, but I didn't ship the boxes." Noooo, I got them the way TVB intended.

Watching a king fu show back from 25 years ago (WOW!) provides a whole different level entertainment, especially when you watch it with your WHITE husband. For starters, the tackiness had passed the point of annoyance and straigt to hilarious. A few examples:

(1) You can tell the weapons are very light stuff wrapped in aluminum foil
(2) Since it was filmed in Hong Kong, most of the "outdoor" scenes were obviously shot in studios
(3) A scene when two guys were fighting on ice I could SWEAR I saw ice skates on their feet
(4) Another scene when a large piece of ice (big enough to hold a polar bear) were sent flying in the air and then chopped up, the filming crew obviously sliced up a THIN piece of styrofoam and tossed it into the air... couldn't they have at least used a thicker one?
(5) A scene a guy was shot by arrows, the arrows only stayed "in" the corpse for the other guy to examine because the dead guy was obviously holding onto them with his hands

I laughed so hard. It was like high school on stage performance. Hahaha. I only hope that Hubby can put up with me for a few more episodes. ;)

Oh yeah, the translation was PROFESSIONAL quality. No, I am not being facetious. Many of the lines I would have translated the same way. So far I was not able to pick out any blaring errors. And believe me, I am good at that.

Overall: great entertainment value. Let me go check and see what year Return of the Legend of the Conor Heroes were made in. :)

Tuesday, January 6, 2009

A Series of Frustrating Incidents

I've been very grumpy this evening because of a series of frustrating, invigorating technical incidents. I'll try to recount them in chronological order:

- Acquired a RPG game without the instruction booklet

- Evidently one can find just about anything on the internet (including but not limited to the making of a bomb, so I heard) EXCEPT for the instruction booklet

- I've found FAQs that give me more information about the game EXCEPT for the instruction booklet. People will go above and beyond to make the actual GAME available online, but NOT the instruction booklet... go figure

- Went to the well known GameFly site and contemplated signing up to them and an online rep (via live chat) popped up and asked me if he (could be a she, I guess) could help me so I specifically asked if I will have access to the instruction booklet if I rent games from them. "Yes," he reassured me, "it'll be available as PDF once we mailed you the game."

- Signed up for GameFly and guess what? No instruction booklet!!!!! For for this specific game!!!!

- Emailed customer support, which on their website said will respond "within 24 hours," it's been 36 hours and counting. "Excellent customer service, GameFly!!"

- Have I mentioned that the one customer service number (which I am sure is meant for those who has NOT YET signed up) was very hidden, and convinently operate between the hours of 9 AM - 1 PM PT, when I'll be at work.

- Wanted to go that night to purchase the Complete gaming menu, but as luck will have it, it was after Best Buy's operating hour. The Borders closest to me was out of stock. The FIVE Barnes & Nobles closest to me none have the book in stock!! (I looked on their respective websites. I did not called them. Despite my persistent search, I DO have a life...)

- Finally acquired the Complete Manual, suprisingly it contains just about everything about the game EXCEPT for the piece of information that I was looking for. Okay, I haven't read the entire manual from cover to cover yet. I guess it could be an overlook on my part

- Change of pace and went to play with my iPod Touch instead, a bunch of PODCASTS from iTunes conveniently will not load onto my second generation iPod Touch. If the "the file has not been transferred because this format cannot be played on your iPod" error message was annoying, it was not as annoying as after I had accidentally check the "do not show this message again" box. So now instead of letting me know that my iPod does not support formats like mp4, gif, jpg, and iTunes own podcasts, it just does nothing. No errors, no messages, just nothing.

- Bought a bunch of DVDs from Amazon and they arrived today (highlight of my day). Really in the mood to go and leave the seller a RAVING feedback, but guess what? Evidently there is no link on Amazon to leave a positive feedback for their independent sellers prematurely until THEY decided it's time to send you the link. Four weeks from now I can't be bothered to follow the link to leave a feedback. Why should the awesome seller be penalized for Amazon bizarre way of doing things?

- Last but not the least, I've received in the mail a form from ASPCA that the pet insurance for my beloved cat is overdue and to "complete this form and fax back to us." Guess what? You guessed it, the letter has everything on it BUT a fax number. Are you kidding me? Seriously??

- As a side note, also found out that when the battery in my iPod Touch dies, Apple will conveniently replace a new one for me for a low, low cost of $85. No problem, just another trip to the money tree in my backyard...

If you are a total stranger AND finished reading this entire blog then I'm not sure which of us have more of a life, you or me. And if after reading this entry you are dying to find out what game I am talking about, it's



and the complete manual that'll tell you about everything you will ever want to know about the game:



Can a person truly be so unfortunate? Oh wait, I still have a job to go back to tomorrow. Deep breath. Deep breath.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Legend of the Condor Heroes 射鵰英雄傳

Never would I have thought that my search for the Legend of the Condor Heroes DVDs would end at Amazon.com. For the longest time I've been eying, hoping that I can find it cheaper in HK, but, having a non-Chinese speaking husband, I need to get a version with English subtitles. That was a few years' wait before that came to fruition. Finally when I decided to bite the bullet and bought from YesAsia and was eagerly waiting for their arrival, I, instead, received an email that the item was backordered, and the supplier was very unlikely to produce any more in the future!!! Imagine the disappointment! However, I refused to give up so easily. If this product exists, are you to tell me that the very last copy was SOLD? And I absolutely cannot find it on the internet, in the entire WORLD? I did another search, with it Chinese name. The best I could find was a few bitorrent links. Mind you, I laughed at the English translation of this show when I first saw it at YesAsia. "Hahaha, they have an English name for it?" I thought to myself. Especially when the patrons leaving feedback shortened it to "LOCH '83" (the show was originally made in 1983), it was totally American... okay, might be Canadian. But I woke up one morning and was enlightened: if I want to find the version with English subtitles, shouldn't I search it under it's English name? Lo and behold, this entire time it was waiting to be purchased on Amazon. Okay, individually sellers from Amazon, but Amazon nonetheless. For those of you who are still searching, here's the link. I can't testify for the quality of the product whatsoever, I am still waiting eagerly for it to arrive at my doorstep. But the last email confirmed that it has been shipped, not backordered. :)

Saturday, January 3, 2009

Cakes! Cakes! Cakes!

This was not my cake. I have never seen this cake in real life, nor do I know the peeps who had it, but wasn't that an awesome cake? :D I mean, with a cake that looks like this, does it even matter if it TASTES good (some might argue that it stills is important, I guess it depends on how much the folks paid for it. hehehe)

I guess I should give credits to the folks who initially posted this. This phone was taken from Wired.com blog under gadgets: food and drink category.

More pictures of it can be found at My birthday cake- the photo shoot.

And the talented cake baker is Granny Schmidts.

Thursday, January 1, 2009

Cellphones v Health

Check out this article on The Times of India:

Cell phones may cause heart disease (and kidney stones, and Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's)

Here's some excerpt from it:

"People should stay miles away from mobile phones if they're mindful of their heath, for a new study has found that the handsets may lead to heart disease and kidney stones.

***

Sweden's Lund University researchers found that exposure to cell phone radiation could cause proteins and toxins to leak into the brain, according to Softpedia.com. This can lead to Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's, reports the
New York Daily News."

My favorite part was:

"Also, Softpedia.com has said that the Federation of the Electronics Industry claims that there is no conclusive proof that cell phones are a health hazard."

Really? The Federation of the Electronics Industry claims that? They didn't declare that everybody should stop using their cell phone at once and revert back to land lines? Go figure?? Did Philip Morris gleefully agree with the first report the remotely suggested that smoking could have an adverse effect on your HEALTH?

That said, am I going to give up the convenience of my cellphone? No. Nobody can stand going back technologically, but I do worry about the next generation who are used to having their cell phones glue to their heads. 20 years from now, people will be suing the cell phone companies just like they do the cigarette companies now. It's a nice karmic circle.

Movie Marathon

My most favorite thing to do during weekend/holidays/vacations is to stay home and watch many, many (new) movies with the husband. I never knew that it could get to a point where my brain turns into mush from watching too many movies. Hubby and I watched 15 movies in the span of 8 days. I even had a hard time keeping track of all that we've watched and could only reconstruct the list with Hubby's help. Why would anyone want to reconstruct that? Oh, I dunno, it makes me feel so senile not being able to recall what movies I have watched, just a few days ago. To prevent myself from losing the list, I am going to post it to my blog. :) I was going to do it everyday, but that boat has so sailed...

Day 1

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian - not bad
Spiderwick Chronicles - liked it better than Narnia
War, Inc. - funky movie, but worth watching

Day 2

Hellboy 2: The Golden Army - nice fighting scenes :D
Death Race - even though the ending was predictable, it was still very entertaining, worth watching
The Women - good!

Day 3

Stuck - ugh... kinda odd, says it's "inspired by a real life incident." I should look it up to find out the "real" part. Funny thing, of the entire movie, my husband found the part where the pen was missing from the guy's socket most unbelievable...
Eagle Eye - lots and lots and lots of cars were destroyed in the making of this movie....

Day 4

House Bunny - dumber than expected

Day 5

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Worrier - even dumber than House Bunny... granted, historical accuracy was out the window from the get go... but did the revived emperor (don't tell me this is the spoiler) had to transform into an EUROPEAN dragon? And the peeps could miraculously speak English! And good English at that, at the most random times!
Lazarus Project - slow and bizarre, but overall not too bad

Day 6

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 - not bad, but definitely meant for young girls
Sex & Death 101 - funky movie, highly recommended!
Duchess - A tad on the slow side -- it's not your average action filled (aka lots of explosions) Hollywood videos, but the pretty Duchess more than make up for it.

Day 7

Virgin Terriroty - A movie that I accidentally stumbled upon in Blockbuster. Exceeded expectation. Lots of sexually explicit scenes, but if that does not bother you, it was otherwise a funny movie. :)
WarGame - Hubby said it's a remake from some old movie. Very similar plot to Eagle Eye. Could be better, could be worse. It was a mediocre movie.