Vintage? Antique?

We stayed with Mrs. L. She's got some vintage appliances still in use, which is awesome! There was a 40's-looking hair dryer last time I visited in... 2006? Too bad it was broken and had since been discarded. (I did take a picture last time, though.)

Honk Kong!

Cathy Pacific fed us well. But this also means not much sleep. Turbulence got strong whenever we ate, so, no good pictures. Wow, we arrived in Hong Kong in one piece. The vampire didn't kill me despite giving me a hard time.

Airport

Wow... Didn't think I can access the web from the airport! There are laptop access spots in the waiting area. (Well, of course I never had a laptop...) My flight is 2 AM. I arrived at 11:07. Got trough custom around midnight. Boarding starts at 1:35. Hmm... forgot to bring water. Gotta buy those $2 bottles. Robbery!

Packing hell

Yup it was hell. The vampire is here. Couldn't get the homework done. Couldn't e-mail whatever got done. Lost internet connection when I most need it. Sigh... Didn't eat or drink for 8 hours. Couldn't even deal with the vampire (gross). Because of me not finish packing, my family couldn't eat dinner until 9. Sigh... I owe my brother and his gang one. A big one.

Box of dragons

Hmm... looks like I can't procrastinate any more. This, is gonna be challenging...

("This" = to compress the content into a box half that size.)

Dinner

Sending my dad to stay with my brother's gang seems to be stressful for them both. But no one can take care of him while my mom and I are gone.

What am I going to do with the camera? Take the Coolpix with a better quality but dying battery, and only 3 megapix? Or the Cyber-shot which is perfect except for blurry pictures? Will I need the netbook? Will I be able to carry this piece of extra equipment?

Still need to write tons of e-mail which is the number one most time-consuming thing. (T_T)

Telus came to install TV today. Took 3.5 hours. We don't want a hole to be drilled in the wall, so the technician turn my internet into a wireless connection. (Now that I think of it, was that adapter free? He also replaced the modem.) When the guy left, everything was working fine. Then I closed all applications and set the computer to stand by before going out for dinner. Came back and I lost internet connection! Struggled for hours with no luck. Turns out the adapter isn't always connected even if it says so. Relogging in is the solution. Thanks Andrew for the help! You saved my day!

Bank

For the trip. One down from the to do list. Still got tons. 3 more days to go... (Panic)

Parkade

4 more days to go... Need to go to the bank... Need to do laundry... Need to clean up my room... Need to dig up some traveling documents... Need to notify a bunch of friend about my trip... Need to put away stuff that I can't finish... No, need to decide what corners to cut... (T_T)

Fire alarm

5 more days to go... Need to start packing... (T_T)

Rainbow

Wow! I think it was the second time I saw a rainbow in town.

Traffic jam

There was an accident on hwy 1. An ambulance and fire truck rushed down the hill and disappeared into the jam. Traffic was crawling. It took a while but luckily wasn't as bad as I expected. Of course, by the time I reached the "accident site" mid span of the bridge, nothing was there except for a pile of sand (for soaking up oil). So, why was it so congested??? Just as I was pulling into the driveway at home, the radio news reported another fresh accident on the bridge. Well, I'm glad I managed to squeeze through between the 2. That bridge is definitely a bottle neck you don't want to get stuck in.

My boss freaked out on me today. It was all due to mis-communication. Yet she spent a full hour lecturing me on my lack of common sense towards the amount of homework I should be handing in. Now she has parts that "she won't be able to use up before she dies". At the end, she's not going to pay me for all the hours I've already put in. I was asked to take a voluntary pay reduction because I'm partially responsible for putting her in a difficult place. (In short, she said she doesn't have enough money to pay me.) Sigh... I'm supposed to tell her how much I'm going to cut. And I should start butching my work in the future, which I never do. I had to deal with the aftermath of other people's butched job, and I think butching is wrong. Now, this, is putting me in an extremely difficult and sad place. I don't have time to deal with it now. The worst is, I still have some quite important and urgent homework that I'm supposed to hand in before my trip. It's taking longer than I thought, and it makes me very depressed trying to continue.

Yeah, this incident is a good push for me to find another job. Hopefully one that pays more and gives me less stress. For $8 an hour, the stress and responsibility level is not proportionate.

Coolpix vs Cyber-shot

Finally got time to do a comparison. (No, actually I don't have time. Just procrastinating from what I really should be doing.)

Left: Nikon Coolpix 2500. 2 megapixel. 6 years old. Image size 1600 x 1200, 300 dpi. Quality: fine.
Right: Sony Cyber-shot DSCS750 (?) 7.2 megapixel. 2 (?) years old. Image size 3072 x 2304, 72 dpi. Quality: fine.

• 1st complain, the colour is off. Well, I didn't mug with the setting back then, so it was probably set up poorly.
• 2nd complain, Sony's macro mode sucks! To avoid distortion, I usually zoom in a bit but not all the way. The depth of field is unacceptably shallow. Hence, most of the picture is out of focus. Which is not what I want. Nikon is better at that.
• 3rd complain, images from the Cyber-shot opens in Photoshop as 72 dpi even when image quality is set to the highest. Coolpix opens at 300 dpi.

This is after adjusting the mid tones with software.

Close up, no retouching. Click to enlarge. I didn't use a tripod so the angle is a little off.


Conclusion: I still like my 6-year old Coolpix better. And, it's got the swivel lens that is simply not available anymore.

10 days to go

10 more days until my trip... Still got tons to do... (panic panic panic...)

My traveling companion persuaded me to go to Kyoto with her. Budgetwise, I don't think I should do that. The difference would be a 7-day JR train pass which costs about $300. It's only a good deal if you take the bullet train. I've been to Kyoto in 1989 although I don't remember much. (Yeah yeah yeah, it's in the missing half of my brain.) I think a $150 local transportation budget is enough if I stay in Tokyo. However, my friend will be going to Kyoto and buying a pass no matter what. So if we travel together, I'll have to look up train fare every time while she can just sail through quickly. Hmm...

On the other hand, this Kyoto trip will be a day trip. Think of it this way. Round trip is about 6 hours. Spending 6 hours on a train isn't really what I want... (T_T)

However, I've given her plenty of hassle on this trip and maybe this is the time to repay.

Need time

Why am I so slow? I'm not getting enough done! (T_T)

Homework

Actually these are from before. Haven't been able to get much done lately. (T_T) I need to get more done... (T_T)

Dentures

My dad forgot to remove his dentures last night again. It happened before. I'm usually the last one to go to bed, so I can tell by looking at his mug to see if his dentures are soaking in there. My mom found out during lunch. Turn out he didn't brush at all before bed time either. My mom had to tell him to brush right there, at that very moment, otherwise he forgets again. Sigh... and his peeing progress at the hospital yesterday is fake. He still leaves a puddle in front of the toilet and stinks the hell out of the whole house. How can I not get depressed?

Here's another reason that makes me want to kill myself. The photo is part of a mountain of junk on his "desk". He goes around the back alley and picks up junk from the our block's houses on garbage collection day. Makes our house smells like a junk yard.

Gross

Took dad to his appointment (with an exam) again. Yeah, I know having someone poke a camera inside your dick is probably horrible, but I'm more traumatized by the sight of him on the bench with legs spread like a women giving birth. I'm the translator, so I can't escape. Managed to avoid the exam part, but between helping him into position and the doctor began, I couldn't avoid seeing "it". Not a pleasant sight at all. Gross, actually, really really gross. Made me want to throw up.

He didn't even attempt to cover himself up. He grabbed the huge paper towel sheet high up, which defeats its purpose. His lower body was all hanging out. Mom also didn't care to cover him up either. As if they wanted me to see on purpose. Sigh... if you want to expose yourself, do it somewhere else. Don't do it to me. I don't want to see any of that. I don't wan to have anything to do with that. It's traumatic. It's sexual harassment.

Now I'm depressed.

I went to art college for 4 years and did tons of life drawings. It's not that I haven't seen naked men. But dad was exceptionally, unacceptably gross.

Pomegranate

The intense red looks like making a ruby into the shape of a grain of corn. The juice is red like blood (and I bet it leaves tough stains too). What's the proper way to eat pomegranates? It took me 3 hours to eat 1/3. Of course I'm very sure that eating the grains one by one is not correct. But how else do you deal with the seeds?

Homework

Casting clean-up final. There were more but I didn't take pictures of.

Shoulder...

Aaawwww... it hurts and I can't move...
Got all ready to go to work, but decided I won't be much good and should stay home. Ended up sitting in front of the computer all day. (T_T) Hope tomorrow will be a better day. Not sure why or what, but the past week has been horrible.

Homework

Mini ribbon spools...

Kokugidou Edo rice crackers

Thanks Kazuyo for this one. She's a sumo fan! These rice crackers are hard. Probably baked not fried. You can tell the difference between the supermarket variety and this gift shop type. I was still craving salt so it tasted very good. Looking at the ingredient list, there's no weird additives. All natural. However, there is a sour after taste. Usually means they used real sugar.
Then there's the cake-type. For the lack of better words, it's like angel food cake with red bean paste fillings. Tastes very good! Unfortunately I probably waited a bit too long before opening it, the cakes are a little dry.

Phone+internet+TV

Today my household finally dumped satellite TV and switched to a Telus land line + internet + TV bundle. The whole ordeal (inquiry + cancellation of Bell + sign up) took 2 hours. I was exhausted afterward. Oh well, this will now cost around $100. Before, phone and internet together cost $80.

Awww the weather's killing me...

Cathy Pacific Asia Miles sucks!

(Image has nothing to do with subject.)

OK, I shouldn't have registered when I was falling asleep. But there should still be a way to fix the situation. There's NONE!!!

What happened was, when I copied my membership number down, I probably got it wrong. (But I always copy-and-paste! How can that go wrong?) Without a correct ID number, there's absolutely no way to do anything. And, I never received any confirmation e-mail either. So, did my registration actually go through?

The web site doesn't let me re-register either, saying I'm already in the system. (Then how come I didn't get the e-mail?) The 1-877 phone number is completely useless because it only offers 2 options. (1) Enter your membership number, and (2) if you want to listen to info on Asia Miles. Want to talk to an operator? In your next life.

My travel agent didn't give me any help either. Yeah of course. She's already got my money months ago and I'm of no use to her anymore. I'm talking about an attitude change here. It was pretty obvious when someone wants you to go away.

So, the last resort is the counter at the airport in Hong Kong.
Sigh... I'm so tired of all these trip crap. Why can't things go smoother?

Flu shot

Got a flu shot today. My arm hurts.

Great... I'm officially anemic. 88 out of 120... not sure what exactly that means, but my doctor put me on iron pills. Then he wanted another blood test for minerals. There goes 2 more tubes even though I'm already low on blood. Oh well. At least that explains the dizziness, skippy heart beat. Not to mention paleness. Probably also why I always feel cold too.

Homework

Loose broaches continues...

New Pinky

I've been dying to try this combination ever since I first saw 19, 20, 21. The background is computer screen. Quite handy.

Homework

Purses...

27 days to go

Oh my God oh my God... it's November already! I've done nothing to prepare for my trip!!!!!! (Panic)