Some Real Food For Thought

Today I visited The Space Turtle, an awesome blog where you can find some interesting stories and funny content that is different from stuff you would find on many other blogs. Since the internet became much more accessible a few years back, people have been creating lots of random sites about stuff they like, don't like, hobbies and whoever knows what else. This means that there's lots of great content floating around out there, and lots of crap too.

The Space Turtle is different from many blogs today in that you can find quality short stories that are guaranteed to make you laugh. For example, I was reading a story on The Space Turtle called "The Killer Coder". It's actually not that long, but it was quite entertaining to read. I love especially the descriptive imagery that the author uses at the beginning of "The Killer Coder". The short story is about a ninja-avatar-hacker menace that infiltrates another computer in a quest for some treasure. The story goes on, describing the ninja's battles and encounters, and finally culminating in an epic battle with a cutlass-wielding pirate. Of course, our ninja-protagonist prevails, and finally claims his prize on the shores of a sandy beach.

One thing that irked me slightly was not knowing what the prize was, but that wasn't too big of a deal; the story was too well written for it to bother me for more than 5 seconds!

kamster

Absence

Ok recently I have been having a love affair. And you see, I'm really not that much of a romantic guy. Smoothly seductive words don't flow from my lips and I'm not always guaranteed a date for friday nights either. But you see, this time, my lover has been sending me vibes, positive vibes, vibes that are screaming "I want you to take our relationship to the next level."

And so, you must know that I have fallen in love with the acoustic guitar. O, the acoustic guitar. What a beautiful creation. The way it's six strings work together to create tunes and melodies in ways that no violin or piano ever could. Plus, all good bands have acoustic guitars. Actually, electrics are much more versatile, it's just that I don't own one at the moment. Lately I've learned how to play:

• Qing Tian (Clean Sky) by Jay Chou
• Tongue Tied by Faber Drive
• and Puff, the Magic Dragon by Peter, Paul and Mary (originally written by Leonard Lipton and Peter Yarrow)

Of course, I'm not really that good... especially if I never learn to use power-chords or learn to sweep pick, like all those crazy pros on YouTube. Speaking of YouTube, here's another video from the magical realm of online videos. Featured in it is my good buddy Jipooki playing some Crooked X.

If you like it, feel free to subscribe to Jipooki's videos. In fact, he should be uploading some more videos very soon. At least that's what he told me (he's already made like... 15 original compositions).

kamster

If Only She Had Known

A while ago my good buddy Jon referred me to a video that he had created with some of his peeps for an English assignment. At first I was skeptical; had I not created numerous immature and poorly-edited video projects with my friends in the past? Of course I had. I was not eager to watch this video, assuming that it would be poorly-made and a waste of a few minutes of my time. But what am I saying? I was convinved to watch it and it was, surprisingly, pretty good. There were no hints of poorly-covered-up laughter and the filming (by Chris) was quite steady and innovative at times. Below is the video; take a minute to check it out.



If you like what you see, feel free to subscribe to Jon's videos.

kamster

p.s Messenger Plus just doesn't do it for me. Sure, Messenger Lock is one of the handiest features I have ever encountered for MSN but I've had bad experiences with this addon in the past. Before my anti-virus program kept telling me I had adware (even though I declined the offer to install the sponsor program), and now it simply lags my computer like mad... even when I'm not using MSN. In fact, I just un-installed half an hour ago, and my computer instally sprung to life as if a heavy burden had been removed from it's proverbial shoulders. But it could just be my ancient computer... who knows?

quod erat demonstrandum

Today I encountered an interesting brainteaser in the form of a proof that somehow shows that 2 is equal to 1. If this proof were logical and true, I would be the Queen of England, but unfortunately it is not true and is instead fatally flawed. I don't really know how to lay out the premises and all that stuff in the proper mathematical way, so I'll just give you the proof right here with nothing added (it flows from top down... try to figure out where the proof falls apart):

• a = b
• a^2 = ab
• a^2 - b^2 = ab - b^2
• (a - b)(a + b) = b(a - b)
• a + b = b
• Subbing in a = b, b + b = b
• 2b = b
• Subbing in any non-zero value , 2 = 1 (or 4 = 2, or 8 = 4, etc.)

See if you can find the flaw in this proof without cheating (NO GOOGLE!). This took me about 10 minutes to figure out... First person to get the right answer gets a prize! Just leave you answer as a comment.

kamster

p.s I am really loving Sara Bareilles right now. Her song "Love Song" has got me hooked. She has a sound sort of like Chantal Kreviazuk... maybe a tiny bit less scratchy but that's the closest I can compare it to.

p.p.s Sorry the formatting is messed up... I wanted the equal signs to line up. It works here when I'm writing this but it doesn't appear properly when I post. And I'm too lazy to create a gif.

Inference to the Best Explanation

Fast food chains are always trying to create new and exciting products in hope of getting people hooked on them, telling their friends about it and coming back again and again for more. A good example of this is McDonald's Value Menu. Prior to it's inception, a meal from McDonalds could put you out 10 bucks and still not fill your stomach. Now, you can purchase two double cheeseburgers and an chilling ice coffee for 5 bucks less 30 cents (although the ice coffee isn't on the value menu), and actually get full!

On the other hand, there are some chains that attempt to do what McDonald's did a few years ago but fail miserably, like KFC (Killing Fulfilling Comestibles). Recently, they re-introduced (?) "Chicken Bowls", with "Layers of Flavour". The picture on their website and on the coupons I have show one of said bowls deconstructed, with cheese, pieces of chicken and corn magically floating above a black plastic bowl filled with mash potatoes and gravy.

Obviously, this was meant as comfort food. I mean, what's more unhealthy than fried chicken on mashed potatoes covered with melted cheese and gravy? So today I visited the local KFC and purchased one of these bowls, hoping to experience the euphoria usually associated with dumping a bucket of popcorn chicken in one's mouth.

Turns out, the chicken bowls are a big disappointment. They don't look half as appetizing as they do on paper, and there is a mysterious absence of cheese as well (my bowl did not have nearly as much as cheese as the bowl pictured above has). There isn't enough chicken either, and the potatoes are bland and tasteless, even when slathered with gravy. And most of all, it just doesn't work. You know how some things taste great together? Like pepperoni pizza and garlic seasoning? Chicken, corn, cheese and gravy just don't do it for me.I definitely won't be buying more chicken bowls any time soon.

kamster

p.s. readership has climbed to an all time high of 9 readers via FeedBurner, a jump of 3 from... yesterday. How exciting!!!111

p.p.s p.s does not stand for "please see", as most people assume but rather is derived from the latin post scriptum, meaning "after text", or "after script", usually placed at the end of a letter or article.

Jump the (smoking) gun

I'm not going to lie. I wasn't too tired to post about Washington, I was just too damn lazy. Right after I got back I was so tired and stuff and I went straight to get some ZZZ, promising myself that I would blog after I woke up. I guess I was just being to stupid.

But yeah, Washington DC was a SICK trip. We did so much crazy stuff, visited some sick places and did some fun stuff. We toured lots of famous places like the Vietnam memorial, Korean war memorial, Washington monument, Lincoln Memorial and Jefferson Memorial, just to name a few, although there were lots of other places we visited that I can't be bothered to remember and type out right now. We did do lots of other fun stuff too though, hehe. We toured some of Washington's lesser known districts like Alexandria (old Washington) and Georgetown where we did some shopping (although I didn't buy anything, STUPID ME!) and got some nice food as well. We also went on a three hour boat cruise on the Potomac, which was a nice touch on the last night in the hotel =(.

There wasn't too much work we had to do (thankfully) and as a result, a lot of bonding occurred between unlikely people... yeah. Although I am sorta annoyed that we didn't have too much time to chill in the hotels... if you get my drift ;).

Also you can probably tell that I'm being super lazy in writing this... although there is one thing that I can say for sure. I won't run around saying "America is a piece of sh*t" anymore. Yeah, after being in the capital of the US for 4 days, I realize that America and perhaps Americans as well have a sense of... how do I say this. Triumph? Maybe, or maybe it's just that they know how to commemorate their founding fathers and others who have influenced their long history. We don't have nearly as many monuments as they do ><.

That's not to say Americans don't piss me off. They do.

kamster