Saturday, October 21, 2006
Shoutout to
everting for informing me of this ... I am dictionary.com's
Word of the Day! Did you know that my name means all of those things? I'd bet you did! Feel free to use my name in any creative sentences you can think of. Best submission gets a personally baked loaf of banana bread from yours truly.
Word of the Day: Ken
October 20th, 2006
ken \KEN\, noun: 1. Perception; understanding; knowledge.
2. The range of vision.
3. View; sight.
He was to make several important discoveries, the most significant being that infantile paralysis was caused not by germs, as cerebrospinal meningitis had been, but by a mysterious agent just then emerging into the ken of science.
-- James Thomas Flexner, Maverick's Progress
So we are predisposed -- if not preprogrammed -- to accept tales of animals who display human motives, understanding, reason, and intentions. It takes a far greater imagination to conceive the possibility that a dog's mental life may assume a form that is simply beyond our ken.
-- Stephen Budiansky, If a Lion Could Talk
Libussa, the youngest, particularly beautiful, unworldly and serious, was able to see what was hidden from other people's ken and to prophesy.
-- Peter Demetz, Prague in Black and Gold
Ken is from Middle English kennen, from Old English cennan, "to declare, to make known."
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
This
guy totally stole my awesome idea: Picture Search! I had this idea a couple years ago and was going to tell google to implement this feature. How cool would it be to be able to search for a picture by sketching it on the screen? Too bad that this guy stole my idea ... evil evil person! Fortunately for me, it seems like the implemention just isn't very good right now, take a look:
Does the picture that I drew look more like the actual picture:
or this one?
Hmm ... a big cookie for anyone who can actually get the search to return you the correct picture. Oh yea, some Thailand picture here.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Bangkok is a crazy place. Busy streets, little cars, cheap food, huge shopping malls ... I would be overwhelmed if it were my first time here.
Random thoughts:
1) There are languages that are melodious and pleasing to the ear, Thai is not one of them! I can listen to someone speak Korean, French, and Mandarin all day long, but Thai drives me crazy.
2) Thailand is a spiritually dark place. There are temples at every street corner and hordes of people worshipping idols everywhere. You can feel that something is off ... there's darkness everywhere.
3) Food is so good and cheap here! I had an amazing chocolate banana crepe today among other things. This probably means I'll end up a couple pounds heavier when I leave in a week.
4) All Thai girls wear tons of make up. I am not sure why, but everyone has an inch of powder on their faces at all times. Maybe this way the transvestite can blend in a little easier.
5) Bangkok is a dangerous place. Whenever you walk around at night and see a group of scantily clad girls roaming about the street corner on stilletos, you know something is seriously wrong. Careful careful.
6) It's disgusting to see
old white guys foreigners walking down the street with some half-naked young Thai girl in his arms. What's sad is that it's pretty normal here, half of Bangkok is the red light district.
More random thoughts later. I better get to bed to counteract the jet-lag.
Friday, October 13, 2006
I AM TIRED! It's 5am at home and 6pm here at Toyko. In another two hours I'm going to hop on another plane to fly to Bangkok. From what I can tell, I'm either incredibly tired or incredibly awake. I'm at the border between delirium and lucidity and don't know which side I am stepping into. For all I know none of this will make sense later, but heck who cares, I'm in Toyko ...
no one understands me anyway.
One of the benefits of being stuck on a plane is that you have a lot of time to think. And a mind is a dangerous thing, you never want it to wander off too far into the deep end, especially when you're in delirium.
I thought about how awesome it would be if I could fly, how different life would be if I were far away from home again - living another adventure, how sad it would be if my friends and family were taken away from me, how empty I would feel inside if I lived in a world where no one understands me. I wondered how life would like if I were on an episode of LOST along with the people on the plane with me. Think about how strange it would be to fight "the others" with a horde of Japanese people ...
Okay I'm definitely delirious and can't think straight. I need to go walk around and clear my head ...
I wish you were here with me.
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
is me.
I never thought that this day would come. But sadly, we all have to accept the hard cold truth some time in life.
Did you see that? I'm OVERWEIGHT! Lately people have been reminding me that I look bigger now than a year ago. They have good reason though; livings in East Asia for 2 years starved me, so I was a good 15 lbs lighter a year ago, but now I'm OVERWEIGHT!
I turned on the TV last night and saw the saddest show in the world:
The Biggest Loser. It's so horrible on so many levels that I don't even want to start talking about it here. (notice that one of the contestants is named Ken.) Ok honestly, I wouldn't be posting this if I really have a problem with my weight. Fine, I still want to weigh less, but I don't think I'm fat or have a poor body image.
With that said, it's a real tragedy that people are so pressured by our society to be
skinny. The media really messed this one up big time, all the women in the world want to be
thin, and even guys are getting into the fray these days. I wish that everyone can be happy with exactly how they look. So what you were born with a bigger body build, does that make you less of a person? NO. Does that make you less beautiful? NO. Does that mean you will never find someone to love you? NO!
Check this article out on the
thin pill.
P.S. - "It is possible to be overweight but not having too much fat, especially for those with a large muscle mass from body building or other muscle building exercises." <-- yup, that's me
