def-bl0g

60

2012-02-05T23:39:00.000-08:00

Just a number.

Turns out that yesterday, Saturday morning, is a really popular time for people from all walks of life to get their lab visits done at the clinic. The blood draws, the cultures, the injections, fun stuff like that. It's interesting: my folks say that one constant in life is that you'll never, ever enjoy a visit to the clinic or hospital.

In this case, they were correct. It was a waste of time and fuel. The wait time to get 10 mL of blood drawn and pee in a cup was an hour. I couldn't fathom waiting around in that room for more than five minutes. I could perhaps justify the wait if the labs were a free service being offered, because then everybody could partake. Because this is America, somebody had to pay for the privilege of waiting an hour. Not me, thankfully.

But time is money. There were other things to do. I'll go during some other time, like during the work day. And then I'm on someone else's dime (read: The Corporation's) though with their approval. Le sigh. All that fasting for nothing.

Better start lifting weights...

2012-01-27T21:21:00.000-08:00

The Brick is back, and it's bigger and heavier than before.

Tomorrow and Sunday, it will get its first two real workouts. That all said, because of how large and heavy The Brick is, I'll be getting some workouts, too! A hike/stroll/jog tomorrow, and a mushroom-picking expedition the day after. This will be a good weekend, folks.

I'm excited.

Happy Chinese New Year!

2012-01-23T23:05:00.001-08:00

Or Lunar, or hell, even Canthan. ;)

Eat well, get your hong bao, shoot off a couple legal firecrackers and a sparkler or nine.
Let's welcome the year of the dragon!

My room is breaking down.

2012-01-11T21:16:00.000-08:00

This is what years of neglect, contentment, and complacency (pick two) get me. Stuff's falling apart. Damn.

The plastic chair roller pad thing is cracking and I've already kicked away two small pieces leaving an inconvenient hole in my rolling surface.
Keyboard tray is dying. It's held on by duct tape and can go any minute now.
Desk is in general disrepair and many surfaces are hella dusty.

So, so lazy... I don't want to fix them, but I'll have problems down the line if I don't. Meh.

Best and worst of 2011

2012-01-02T18:32:00.000-08:00

The best = a little package from a friend, cheering me up after my ailments from the Taiwan trip. :D Thanks!
Its contents were a letter and these:

Pre-Post-Holiday Gifts. A cuuuuuuuute little bunny rabbit keychain (who now oversees my camera gear shelf) and two knit chapstick holders in Christmas colors. Weeee!

The worst (okay, Best of Spam 2011): this spam email. Warning: not safe for work! I never signed up for any of this shit! And boy, is that stuff filthy. :(

...and a happy new year!

2012-01-01T02:54:00.000-08:00

Welcome, welcome, please welcome 2012. It's already started and started weirdly. Rather, 2011 ended weirdly. The continuum of life cares not about trivial things like "years," however. We move on.

Happy New Year, reader(s)! Make 2012 a good one. And please call it "twenty twelve." You don't call the War of 1812 the "War of One Thousand Eight Hundred and Twelve," right?

Holiday season wallpaper!

2011-12-30T19:12:00.000-08:00

From Taiwan, with love:

Bulowan in the morning. Taken at the Leader Hotel, a beautiful spot that unfortunately started off a string of illnesses (both minor and severe) within our family. Personally, I'm still recovering.

Want the full version? Ask me, as usual, I'll be happy to provide.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-25T00:21:00.000-08:00

[Autoposted]

And Happy Everything Else that Happens to Fall this Time of Year.

:)

Time flies...

2011-12-11T21:22:00.001-08:00

From the Guild Wars Wiki:

In the week of August 10, 2009, Nicholas mistakenly appeared in Arbor Bay requesting Krait Skins, instead of in the Wilderness of Bahdza. 116 weeks later, he re-appeared in Arbor Bay requesting Krait Skins at a slightly different location (original location), ending two years of speculation about whether his initial appearance was part of the original cycle or not.

I remember farming for those Krait Skins with a friend. I kept all fifteen (not four) skins in my inventory for all 116 of those weeks, and then turned them in.As Neo would say, "Whoa." A hundred and sixteen weeks. That's two years and change. Guild Wars has pretty much passed out of my life now, but that friend hasn't, and I hope they don't in the future.

In that time:

I've changed jobs...
spent oodles of money on camera gear...
recording thousands of wonderful memories...
many of them with a girlfriend...
upon who I wish Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Season's Greetings, etc. to...
...not to forget the rest of you reader(s).

I'll be on vacation soon. def-bl0g still won't go away, but I'm still on blogging break.
Here's a Project 52, special November wallpaper edition:

Life and Death, Sideways. Fall colors were vibrant in the Bay Area in the past month. We've taken video driving down some local roads and I've shot some stills capturing the season of autumn. But there comes a moment where you need to know when to put the camera down and enjoy the experience without a black blob of plastic between the world and your eyes. Driving through a narrow, quiet road lined with colorful shedding trees is one of those times.

Camera hunting

2011-11-26T10:10:00.000-08:00

All right. I've turned into full-on gear snob when before anything with a sensor and a shutter button would have done the job just fine. But I don't think I'm alone when I criticize the current crop of compact cameras. In ~~two~~ three words, I summarize: they're [mostly] terribad.

First, touchscreens. Okay, I get it -- a lot of our other devices are getting increasingly touch-based, and perhaps it was time to extend the technology to image capturing devices. But photography has often been about recording the decisive moment: fiddling around cursing fat fingers doesn't help that. Adding insult to injury, the crappy visibility of most LCDs out there in sunlight is going to be even more compromised with finger smudges. I don't think the designers thought it through. Pass for now on the touch screens.

Second, more modes and gimmicks than I can shake a stick at. I almost feel some of the compacts out on the market beat my DSLR (a high-end model) in features and complexity. Remember, these things were designed for the average joe to point. and. click. Now he has to twiddle with touch screens, try not to fumble and hit the video recording button by mistake, and ah - of course - deal with the inevitable shutter lag that's always plagued this class of camera. Film point-and-shoots were never this bad, not even the $50 Wal-Mart specials I had for a few months before jamming the advance by dropping it.

Losing critical controls was the most enraging thing. Where are my mode dials? (Why, buried in the menu system or behind a touch screen, of course.) How do I change exposure compensation if I'm taking a picture against the sun and my girlfriend's face is nothing but a muddy silhouette? (As many as four button presses, argh.) That's why I feel these cameras don't offer the ease of use as a DSLR. When a digital camera get things wrong in auto mode, you're stuck. The DSLR just lets you fix things quicker, by not obfuscating everything in the menus.

And finally, screen quality. You'd think that manufacturers, having taketh away the optical viewfinder, would try to make composition and framing as easy as possible. But no, that'd be too easy, and they'd rather save a few bucks on the screen per unit sold, irritating John Q. Public who can't see what's on his screen at the beach. Out of the "current" field of compacts, just over a quarter of them have screens that came out after the Stone Age. The Nikon D2, back in 2004, had a comparable LCD to many of today's compacts. Progress has been made, but progress is slow. I'm asking only for a 640x480 LCD. That's not even as high resolution as my smartphone's screen. And of course, the touch screen features don't help. Touch shutter's the most awesome way to cause shaky pictures.

So, three things:

No touchscreen and similar value-subtracted features.
Reasonable external control (I don't mind four clicks to get to exposure compensation on a point-and-shoot if I only need it sparingly) with a mode dial.
1080p video.

Hmm. Only choices around are ~$250. It's Thanksgiving weekend. Can we do better?

Tablet hunting

2011-11-25T23:51:00.001-08:00

Black Friday has come and virtually all gone now. And I missed about four tablet deals thanks to slow internet, extraordinarily limited stock, acts of God, or a combination of all three factors and more. Pif.

The rumor mill is rumbling about a new nVidia Tegra 3 or something like that coming out soon. But that's cutting it awfully close to the vacation next month. Prices are dropping, though, just not quickly enough. Whereas netbooks started low and went lower, tablets seem to be holding price fairly well, which has surprised me. Lots of shared components between them and smartphones (and indeed other system-on-a-chip devices) and there's been more than a year of R&D time now since the original iPad. So where are the good ones at or around $250-300? Take my money, insert tablet manufacturer here, please.

My family and I require only a few things of you:

Android 3.x
1 GHz dual (or more!) core
Expandable and highly connectable
A camera

Speaking of the last item, I've been hunting for a new point-and-click for Taiwan. But the trials and tribulations of that search warrant a whole new blog post. Ick. Those little compact cameras have lost their touch with the world, now. More on that later.

No words needed.

2011-11-17T21:59:00.001-08:00

Hat tip: reddit.

Errr... wow.

2011-11-07T23:58:00.000-08:00

News of interest to me since I use Olympus camera gear: a statement issued by the company regarding its latest book-cooking scandal.

Worth mentioning: a lot of the money was used to mask losses incurred on investments dating back some twenty years ago. Let's see, twenty years ago, what was that, carry the one, HOLYSHIT that's 1991. Way to make me feel old, Olympus. First give scares about the future of the imaging division, then CEO/board shenanigans, a money scandal, and now this. Thanks. Thanks for making me realize that today's Americans coming of drinking age were born in a completely different decade than I was.

Yikes.I'm getting old, fast!!

Best of spam, Autumn 2011

2011-11-02T00:11:00.000-07:00

Haven't had one of these in a while...

To: deanbryan7@yahoo.co.uk
Sunday, October 30, 2011 10:12 PM
Let us meet each other. Friends call me Ira.

I wonder how old are you? It is difficult recognize from the photo. You want to know, how I look for shure.

Blonde hair, shiny skin, pretty face. My friend showed to me your profile. Funny, is not it?

Email me some information about you, please.

From my throwaway. I just gotta know -- who's the unlucky Dean Bryan receiving this excrement? Half of these spam emails aren't even addressed to me, and I get them! Bah.

Value-subtracted features

2011-10-30T10:54:00.000-07:00

In an effort to sell us everything in one product, including the kitchen sink, manufacturers have lost sight of what made their products great in the first place: simplicity.

Nowhere does this seem more apparent than in laboratory equipment. There's this wonderful multi-dispensing pipettor on my coworker's bench that I use more than he does. And that's because the thing took us (he of a Master's degree, and me being a tinkerer) a combined 15 minutes to figure out. The easy operation of the past: draw up lots of liquid. Mark a aliquot size. Dispense those aliquots until liquid runs out.

When your pipette has as many modes as a modern DSLR on the dial, a dot matrix LCD, and can take about six different types of tips, you wonder, where did the good old days go...?

Nice knowing you...

2011-10-17T23:53:00.001-07:00

Aww, my favorite character in a certain TV show seems to have been written off. Sad.

RIP Steve Jobs

2011-10-08T07:35:00.000-07:00

Yes, a little late to the party. No, I haven't been living in a cave.

He will be missed. The tech industry has really lost a visionary. I have my disagreements with Apple and how they handle certain aspects of products, but one can't deny at all how they've definitely set themselves aside as different. Hey, "different." Wasn't that one of their marketing taglines years ago?

So true.

2011-10-03T22:57:00.000-07:00

Hat tip: reddit

I haven't laughed this hard in a long, long time. Oh gosh, I'm atwitter every time I watch this gif. Now, which character was I again?

A very expensive magnifier.

2011-09-25T19:40:00.000-07:00

Last week, my family and I attended my company's summer picnic. Never mind that summer was almost already over. Weather was great and the location was nice. Half Moon Bay is a nice spot for a picnic.

So I brought my Nikon D2h: it's already beat up and I got it on the cheap. The professional build meant that salt and sand spray wouldn't bother it too much. That wasn't true of the lenses I brought along, though. In a failed effort to run down a frisbee that got away from one of us, my brother kicked the snot out of my camera which was on the ground next to a large pile of dead kelp. He's okay, the camera's okay, but the lens wasn't.

So I did a post-mortem on the lens - dead indeed (zoom and focus cams broken). On the plus side, the front element of the lens is a very high quality magnifier. So all that remains is $125 worth of magnifying glass, and a few interesting parts. Bah.

Gone...

2011-09-22T22:22:00.000-07:00

Wow. Either the economy is way worse than I'm giving it credit for or life hates me. First world problem: all the places I like are going out of business.

Except Blockbuster. Fuck Blockbuster.

The casualties:

Pizza Hut in Mountain View. Okay, the place was a bit shoddy and business never seemed too great, but the pizza was cheap and good. It was the only game in town. Now the closest Pizza Huts are over 10-15 minutes away. May as well ask for delivery. There is a Little Caesar's, though. Worth a try.
Quizno's a couple blocks from the camera store. Again, the only one reasonably close by (I thought there was another, but that one went under years ago). The owner of this franchise was a dick, though, once overcharging my dad for something by not honoring a coupon and getting into his face about it. Once ownership changed hands, this outfit was good if not great. The site is now a consulting firm, methinks.
Blockbuster down the road from my high school. Like I said, fuck Blockbuster. Them and their dumb fees. When we wanted VHS tapes back in the day, it was always to Hollywood Video.

Who's next?

Best of spam, September 2011

2011-09-12T01:20:00.000-07:00

I still do not inhabit Azeroth, and they keep trying....
What I find funny is how the English just breaks down halfway into the email.

Greetings!

When you take to the skies astride a blazing, eagle-winged lion, your comrades will know you mean business. Serious business. So saddle up, because this flying mount will travel as fast as your riding skill will take you, and it can even travel at 310% speed if you have at least one other 310% speed mount.
Once activated, this World of Warcraft in-game pet key applies to all present and future characters on a single World of Warcraft license.
we will be complimentary seat to the 5,000 players. You can log Web site application, we will be lucky players randomly.
Please click this link to apply
https://us.battle.net.net/account/support/Winged-Guardian?ticket=441B413B4AB24CF83BE066AA5F3B2E4B353D4DE3DD17C1122417128F9A3D76E3

If your account passes the check successfully, we will send a code for the Winged Guardian flying mount to you in the form of e-mail.
The World of Warcraft Support Team
Blizzard Entertainment

Oh, and the link doesn't work either. lawls

Never forget?

2011-09-11T13:11:00.000-07:00

I don't need a reason to not forget 9/11, but this will get pretty damn old by the time I'm a geezer.

Internet photos showed t-shirts commemorating the ten-year anniversary of the incidents. Like true capitalist Good 'Murricans. Mmm-hmmmmm. Shows a lot about what this country really thinks.

Hard vs. Soft

2011-09-09T00:18:00.000-07:00

So product designers are catering to the folks who were born after the year 2000, I think. To make you feel old, realize that a child born at the dawn of the millennium is a bit over eleven and a half years old. What? They may not remember what 9/11 is (for those in the US), but they certainly won't know what a floppy disk is, and will find VHS's and 35mm film curiosities.

For this generation of folks, I guess they're used to "techno-wonders" like soft buttons. These are found on smartphones, cameras, and yes, even my monitor. Whyyyyyyyy? Is it not easier to wire a switch that makes the connection when a button is depressed? Sometimes, my monitor thinks I'm not human enough to turn it on. Or it feels unloved and wants the soft, caressing stroke of my thumb over its power button. Whatever. It sucks.

Better to have the hard function button than a soft button that doesn't give tactile feedback when activated. This goes for a lot of devices, in my opinion. Even the PCR thermal cyclers at work have jumped onto the soft button (well, electronic interface) bandwagon. Hey - the cycler costs thousands of dollars already. Hire a usability expert for the next iteration.

Call me an old cahoot, but I like it when I can see a clear cause (my input) and effect (device's output). Touch screens are just about tolerable with haptic feedback, and that's where I'll draw the line.

52.35 - Because I promised it.

2011-09-02T03:33:00.000-07:00

(Scheduled post.)
Another baseball-themed photo for last week....

Oh, say can you see? Children from Addison Elementary School from Palo Alto sang the national anthem at last Thursday's Giants-Astros game to lots of applause. A job well done and a good show for the city of Palo Alto! The Astros would later win this game.

I went to another game on Tuesday (another Giants loss, le sigh) and they a middle school choir sing the national anthem. The middle schoolers were no doubt better (and there were fewer of them, too) but give the little kids credit. I'll tip my cap to them.

Mega-meh

2011-09-01T20:34:00.000-07:00

Clearly, nobody cares, and I'm getting pretty close to that point. Maybe it's time for another blogging break. After the last one, I came back bigger and better than ever. I'll keep in touch, I'll keep taking pictures (but not posting them here...) and I'll come back to def-bl0g sooner or later.

For my sake, I hope it's sooner. :)
Ta-ta for now!!

52.35 scheduled for tomorrow

2011-08-28T22:40:00.000-07:00

Sorry folks. On the laptop tonight after some hard work this weekend. Can't/don't want to edit photos on this monitor, so the Project 52 post will be tomorrow.

If anyone cares.

52.34 - Fun at the camera store...

2011-08-23T09:01:00.000-07:00

So, if you watch [insert sport here] you've no doubt noticed the photographers on the sidelines using giant, giant lenses. That's a fact of life: to not get steamrolled by players, you need to shoot from afar. And to shoot from afar, you need long lenses. Long lenses to shoot sports properly get big and expensive. This Sunday, at the local camera store, I got my first glimpse at one of the "big boys" up close and personal.

This was a Nikon 400mm f/2.8 alphabet-soup lens, on sale for the bargain price of $3500...

Contemplation. Big lenses are big purchases, and new specimens can often fetch prices that you could get a used car for. For most of us, the car is a much better buy. Perhaps not for this gentleman, though, who looked and sounded serious about his stuff.

One day, if I have enough "fuck you" money, I'll grab a lens like this, walk around town with it, and pretend it's a bazooka. So far, the Sigma 300mm f/2.8 looks like the most bazooka-like lens that one could handhold usefully. That'd be fun; oh yeah.

52.34 - Not here.

2011-08-22T21:56:00.000-07:00

I've been so tired the past couple weeks. Work on the weekdays. Work on the weekends. When will it stop? Something's gonna crack soon, and it might be me!
If/when I get some motivation to do some photo editing, you'll get the Project 52 update. Deadline is Saturday.

Amusing.

2011-08-20T23:59:00.000-07:00

Shows that I'm too easily amused. Our order at In-N-Out the other day came out to be... you guessed it, thirteen dollars and thirty-seven cents. $13.37. Leet.

Okay. I should have a blog post of some substance coming up soon. This has become My Life In A Bit Over 140 Characters (aka a more elaborate version of Twitter) for a while. Kind of junkyardy. Not good. Haven't had much motivation to write. Only Project 52 has kept this blog afloat, and even then I'm finding it more a nuisance than fun some weeks. That loss of motivation really isn't good at all. Photo quality drops, post processing time decreases, and meh...

Time to right this ship? Or simply accept the fact that I'm in one of those periods where I could use a break again?

When science doesn't work...

2011-08-18T19:33:00.000-07:00

Yeah, my boss told me not to lose too much sleep over it. I present:

Click to enlarge

... the truth. Ack. At least I have three more chances waiting in the wings. This doesn't feel good.

52.33 - Baseball!

2011-08-15T21:45:00.000-07:00

A day at the yard. A bad day, since the Giants lost. But a good afternoon and evening.

Pirates @ Giants, 2011-08-10. The Pirates would win this game 9-2 pretty decisively. I had a blast taking in the field and the players with the D2h. Too bad about the result of the game, though. Just like today's, I guess it wasn't meant to be.

I am going to another game later in the month. So far, my record for the season at AT&T Park is 1-1, and 1-2 on the year (I saw the Giants in Oakland during interleague play, where the A's dished out three beatings of the Giants to return the favor from earlier in the season). Lifetime, I think I have a losing record when going to sporting events.

NJ Nets: 0-2 (considering I only went to watch them when Michael Jordan of the legendary Bulls squads came in to play, this is understandable)
SF 49ers: 0-1. Candlestick Park was too cold for me to bear, so I've only gone once.
California Golden Bears: 1-0. Went to one game my freshman year and that's it, but I followed every game I could on TV or radio. Want to see them at AT&T this year.
SF Giants: 1-4, the only win being the July 6 fourteen-inning epic.

Sad.

Project 52 delay

2011-08-14T23:34:00.001-07:00

Long day in the city today. Post will be up tomorrow. Enjoy the picture of the Bay Bridge for now.

Take care, readers! Love you all.

The Bay Bridge

2011-08-13T10:25:00.000-07:00

Rule number one of nighttime photography: find a stable platform. I thought I did, but turns out that walkers and cars and probably the waves juuuuuust destabilized the shot. Hmm. Doesn't show up at this size. So why not, here's a bonus photo for y'all...

From Wednesday night:

Next to me, there were a few Asian girls setting up their DSLRs on tripods trying to get a similar shot. Since I had to be mobile that day, I simply plopped the camera down on a railing post set a reasonable exposure from my internal bank of exposures, and let 'er rip.

It'd definitely do better as a square crop. Don't forget, there's optimization to be done before and after the shot. Like cloning out the airplane that happened to fly by...

urmom

2011-08-11T19:02:00.000-07:00

After a couple years of a dry spell, I unleashed a "your mom" joke last night. I nearly lost it all laughing so hard from it. Juvenile, you're thinking. And you'd be right. But that felt really cathartic.

Mhmm. Your mom. Just wait; there's more to come.

52.32 - Bad bunny

2011-08-08T00:01:00.000-07:00

Not my usual subject matter at all. And definitely not my usual post-processing at all. For some reason, I had a dream about classic Doom last week, and again about Ragnarok Online a couple nights ago. And when you bleed in either game, the screen turns red.

So, I was out and about on Saturday and chanced across a toy store which had *gasp* stuffed bunnies! Pretty good ones, too, although these were hand puppets. One of them looked particularly angry, and I tried to convey that with what I saw in the dream: an angry, blood red overlay. Sadly, as you look through an SLR, it's usually at a slightly different angle than what the eye sees. So the "emotion" of the rabbit didn't come through as much. You do need to be careful when looking through the viewfinder.

Ferocious Rabbit. Just ready to go on a rampage. Had my Photoshop skills been better, flame would have been coming out of its mouth. ;)

Project 52 August!

2011-08-07T23:03:00.000-07:00

Trying to come up with a theme for August...

...loading...

Okay, here's one. Fun and games.
Why not a month dedicated to what I love to do in my spare time? Toys, video games, baseball games, tennis matches, whatever. Just photographically document something about them somewhere, once a week. Shouldn't be so hard, and again it's not my usual subject matter, so it'll get me thinking before clicking.

52.32 is scheduled to post at 12:01 am tomorrow.

Best of spam, August 2011

2011-08-03T00:30:00.000-07:00

Oh, this one's good.

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Body:

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Thank you for your understanding.

sflrpgxw22:26:26n8xxkuox5

.......wow. I'm not even gonna bother redacting anything in there. This one's worth 1.8 lulz.

52.31 - a Scrabble game.

2011-07-31T23:52:00.000-07:00

My dad cheated at this one. And won. He's no longer trustworthy. See if you can spot where the incident occurred. (We play with some interesting house rules, which include "recycling" blanks.)

Sorry for the low resolution. The mistake is in "ASSURING", in which my dad played a spurious blank and it later up ended as ASEURING. Oops!

"Cliff? Here!"

2011-07-26T22:52:00.000-07:00

Here is 52.30.

An anchor on land.

Kind of a stretched out metaphor of how I've been feeling the past month or so. Something like that: square peg in a round hole, fish out of water, etc. etc. Still staying afloat, though. So an anchor probably isn't the most appropriate summation of it all.

52.30 - Tardy

2011-07-25T23:23:00.000-07:00

Cripes! Yesterday was Sunday, but I pretty much spent the entire day out of the house and couldn't come up with time to post up last week's Project 52. Actually, the story's the same today. Promise it'll be up tomorrow. Promise.

Edit: I'm a moron. It is actually week 30.

So, so tired

2011-07-21T00:36:00.000-07:00

Feels good, like a rewarding workout. In the lab at eight. Out the door at six. Took only a thirty-minute lunch. Yeaaaaah. Couldn't have done that at the old job (they wanted me out at five)...

My reward? The mountain has been crested; now on the way down where gravity gives you a little assist. I'm speaking metaphorically here, of course. Should be an interesting Friday at the lab if everything goes right. So I'm still alive.

This was a trial...

Project 52 Goodness

2011-07-17T21:56:00.000-07:00

The project pages will be updated soon. :P Yea, I know, I've been slacking. Mental Health Week did not keep me from clicking away. Here's what I've been shooting since July...

52.27 - Fish Feeding
From the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

I like to visit this place infrequently. Exhibits always change, new things are there to see and touch, and Cannery Row makes for fun shopping. Here, we caught the afternoon feeding of the fish in the kelp forest. Lots and lots of different kinds of fish. Later, they'd scatter food powder toward what would be the top right of the frame.

To my surprise: not so much of a feeding frenzy. Animals at the aquarium are well-behaved. Not Natural.

52.28 - Overly Friendly Squirrel
From San Francisco's Japanese Tea Garden at Golden Gate Park.

I have not seen a squirrel so bold and fearless since graduating from Berkeley. Let's put it this way: I shot this with a 35 mm lens, and the only cropping I did was vertical. This little guy (or gal) just stood at the top of the post and munched, munched, munched. Cuuuuuuute!

Yeah. Fat, fearless squirrel? Not Natural.

52.29 - Foggy San Francisco
One could argue that this is SF's natural weather. But hey, it's a cityscape! Cities aren't natural. ;)

Where did the last three years go?

2011-07-12T23:24:00.000-07:00

Well, that's what it kind of feels like. Of course, the past three years passed and things happened. Quite good things, in fact. I graduated from Berkeley, visited Europe, gained over a year and a half of work experience, and, well, more. Still, I'm back where I was in the summer of 2008, and looking back, the last three years have passed in a flash. In a nutshell, I'm getting old.

Meh.

Project 52 post(s) coming up sometime this week when I clean up my desk (again), convert some RAWs, and punch them out for web output. Until then, sleep creep is going to catch up with me (again) soon. See, last week was mental health week, not physical health week!

It begins

2011-07-11T00:41:00.001-07:00

Closing the chapter on Mental Health Week (and I definitely needed it). Here we go, let's put the pen to the paper...

Mental health week

2011-07-01T12:17:00.000-07:00

def-bl0g will take approximately a week off for a mental health break. It's time to rest, recharge, and recuperate. Not quite figuratively speaking, the phoenix has built its nest and erupted in flames, and I'm in that waiting period before being reborn.

Also, your Project 52 categoy for July: Not Nature. The majority of my posts this year have so far documented natural subjects. I need to push myself to change that.

Creepy

2011-06-28T22:46:00.000-07:00

Conjuring up memories of 56k dial up modem internet in three, two, ...
I remember when my brother used to have this sound as his cell phone ringtone. Can't do that with this one; in the video (below) the connection sound (dialing and handshake) is slowed down 700%. Any sound gets eerie when slowed down this much, but knowing what this sound is makes the experience awesome. Almost sounds like Portal 2 music...

Damn. Right.

2011-06-27T00:55:00.000-07:00

From craigslist (posting is here and will go stale sooner rather than later):

To the mindless drones in my fast lane on 280.

So, there you were in my fast lane, first the idiot in his green Prius tootling along at 60 talking on his phone. He's the one that caused me to make an end-run to the #4 lane, which, deftly completed (and with a minimum of fuss) presented me with a free and clear opportunity to use the #2 lane in order to get past the vehicular arterial blockage embodied by YOU, in your shiny red Volvo C70. As I prepared to make my pass through the only available avenue left to me (thanks to your collective inability to yield to faster traffic), I got a sense that something was wrong.

Wait. . . is she really gonna? Oh yes! She's merging into the #2 lane without even checking six. Well, at least she's got the good manners to signal! Thank you Bavaria. Thank you Munich. Thank you in arrears and all perpetuity to the demigods that designed my car. If not for their diligence and refusal to accept second-best, my front-end would have been well and truly planted right up your Volvo's bulbous, fetid posterior. Ruining at a very minimum our morning, and at worst possibly our whole existences. But no! Thanks to countless hours of toil, and many sleepless nights put in by the wizards of BMW - and a little dash of good reactions from yours truly, I was able to brake and spare your worthless hide from the eventual punishment your shitty driving will eventually mete out upon you.

THIS is why you Yield.

THIS is why if you are NOT PASSING you get the Fuck Out Of The Fast Lane, #1 Lane, whatever you want to call it.

If you are not faster than the flow of traffic, GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE #1 LANE AND LEAVE IT FOR THE PEOPLE THAT NEED TO USE IT TO PASS YOUR SLOW, TALKING ON THE PHONE, PRIUS/VOLVO "driving" ASSES.

That's why we call it the fast lane. Please get out of it. FAST!

YES! Please, other motorists, L2Drive.

52.26 - BBQ Gone... Wrong

2011-06-26T23:34:00.000-07:00

Sometime earlier this week... one of the scarier moments with our dinky backyard grill. Windy, dry, and warm. Tastes like chicken.

At least the food came out okay.

Summer!

2011-06-22T18:41:00.000-07:00

The days will start to shorten again. That was quick, wasn't it? Personally, I'm glad it's summertime, because that means it's the time to get off my ass and go out. The Bay Area has been blessed with too much great weather the past couple weeks - it's almost criminal to waste the sun. Sure, it makes for great baseball games to watch - but being at the park in person is so much better.

I can smell the garlic fries already.

52.25 - Froyo

2011-06-20T01:06:00.000-07:00

The first time I had ever heard of frozen yogurt was years too late. Already in my senior year at UC Berkeley, the hole-in-the-wall outfit known as Yogurt Park slipped under the radar. "How could one miss it?" I was asked. How could one not miss it?, I would reply. Impasse.

Turns out the craze for frozen yogurt (hereforth known as froyo) was just building. Within a few months, there seemed to be a froyo place around every corner in Berkeley, San Francisco, up and down the Peninsula, and so on. You couldn't spit without hitting one. The appeal of frozen yogurt is that it's superficially healthy - unlike ice cream, which is... milk and cream, froyo had yogurt! And yogurt is supposed to help your digestive system and stuff like that. Furthermore, froyo didn't taste much different than ice cream or gelato, and could be persuaded to take on creative flavors as well (and lose its characteristic tartness). What's not to like?

A Cup of Nubi. When it came to id vs. ego, the id won, and consequently this cup of froyo is very sweet-toothy. Inside were a very good Hawaiian Passion or something like that with the blue "Electic Bubble Gum". On top: the usual assortment of toppings, with the novel Burst Boba added. Those provided some pretty awesome texture to the treat.

I have a BOGO coupon if anyone's interested...

Happy Father's Day!

2011-06-19T22:46:00.000-07:00

Played golf today to make my dad's Father's Day a good one. This time, at least, I was able to get a few balls up in the air. Unfortunately, when I did, I tended to pop them up (even with drivers or woods), meaning little distance. Sports are hard.

Your Project 52 post is ready but scheduled for tomorrow.
Happy Father's Day!

Checked off

2011-06-18T21:47:00.000-07:00

Driving up to San Francisco on US Route 101, one is treated to a Hollywood-like sign when passing South San Francisco. As expected, the sign reads:

SOUTH
SAN FRANCISCO
THE INDUSTRIAL CITY

For a couple of months now (perhaps longer), the "US" in "Industrial" has been speckled with the Stars and Stripes in a gesture of nationalism. Someone had to go up to paint the letters, so how did they get there?

Turns out there's a park reachable from the endless streets of suburbia with a couple of steep trails. Think the Big C in Berkeley, except with a couple more C's. And up the trails lie the letters - and it's not as big a climb as one might imagine, since the starting point is some ways up the hill. The letters themselves are large and impressive. According to Eye on the Bay, made out of concrete.

Here's your question of the day: concrete, as we know, is poured out as a slurry. The letters are on a hill. Even with a mold of the letter, you'll have to fight uneven ground and loose soil. How were they poured and set without the bottoms being thicker? (They aren't thicker at the bottom, indicating good worksmanship - but they are cracking and in need of new paint jobs.)

Visit the sign yourself! Not a difficult hike, especially if you take the peripheral entrance. It's one thing that you're supposed to do as a Bay Area resident. I have checked it off, now. :)

52.24 - Fruits and Veggies

2011-06-12T19:49:00.000-07:00

Guest shot: my dad wanted to play with my camera and wanted to test out its color rendition. I took a few shots of the same setup but decided to share his instead.

Healthy and hearty. Those are some Chinese vegetables on the left. You should know what everything else is!

omg, an AM post

2011-06-11T11:41:00.000-07:00

Some counters:

Weeks since computer format: 3
Weeks after I promised myself to get MS Office and Photoshop working: 2
Weeks past the wallpaper change date: 1

So it's time to get all those done, I think. If I can pick up my lazy butt from my chair. Wait a sec...

Okay, wallpaper.

From the archives: The mountains near Donner Lake. Unintentional lens flare, again.

Random accessed memory

2011-06-08T22:48:00.000-07:00

Watching Jeopardy! tonight brought it up. Some clue about motorcycles, I think. So, here's the story.

In the second grade, a new kid joined the school after winter break. You heard it here first: little kids are nasty little buggers. If you're the new kid, you're going to get the stink eye, be unpopular, et cetera. So of course that happened, and he (of course) sought refuge in me, the other social "outcast." Hey, I didn't choose to be the only Asian student in my class. On the plus side, associating himself with me could only raise his stock; he had nowhere to go but up.

Turns out there was a reason this kid (we'll call him "Carl") was unpopular. He stunk. Little boys are not known for being hygienic, but Carl was known for being unhygienic. Eeeep. During recess, he'd chase girls and their pigtails in futility (Carl was, like many American kids of this generation, overweight) and end up sweaty and full of BO. A quarter of the time, he'd simply end up in trouble. I don't know why I tried to befriend him. Misery loves company, I suppose.

One afternoon, once school had let out, we were on the playground waiting for our parents. Normally, during this time, we'd play cops 'n robbers, borrow some jump ropes, and do whatever it is that kids did in their free time back then. (You know, be outside.) Carl was showing off a new shirt he had gotten. At first sight, there was nothing special about it - just a boyish T-shirt, proudly showing a motorcycle on the front. It had a trick, though, and that trick was Carl's undoing.

Press where a breast pocket would be on a polo shirt and Carl's shirt would play a sound. You know those "squeeze me" animals that chirp or honk? Same idea here, only with a T-shirt. I don't know what Carl's shirt was supposed to be selling me, but the sound bite sticks with me today. Press the shirt, and...

Ride to live, live to ride. VROOOOOOOOOOOOM

And Carl was proud of this! Very proud, indeed. Some would say . . . too proud. He was showing it off to everybody who would listen as if he just discovered gold in the sandbox. I was fighting back laughter since the vrooooooom was corny. And little kids being the tattles and gossipers they are, word got out about Carl's shirt by the next recess.

He was done, I think. Carl never lived it down for the rest of the year. But to his credit, he never backed down. On more than a few occasions after the fact he wore that same shirt and everyone would smile or smirk when they saw him in it. So there you have it, Carl's fifteen minutes of fame. Too bad it came in elementary school. Who knows where he is today. If I were him, I'd have kept that shirt and hung it on a wall like a stuffed dear head.

52.23 - East meets West

2011-06-05T01:58:00.000-07:00

Repeat after me: the Nikon D2h is a fun camera. It, being about eight years old now, is quirky. Shadows aren't where I want them to be, colors are a little cooler than my Olympus output, and half the controls are backward. But you get used to them. A good tradesman knows his tools.

A good tradesman can also appreciate pizza:

is there something wrong with this picture?

In the third grade, a good friend of mine always ate his meals with a fork and knife. Even if the school lunch for the day was chicken nuggets and carrot sticks, he'd be stabbing them with a fork. Well, everyone has their quirks. You could imagine the problems this caused for a kid in third grade, especially on pizza day (Fridays). He wasn't using chopsticks, like I was in the picture above. Just the ol' fork-and-knife combo.

He was teased. I, by association, was teased. Little kids are mean and nasty little creatures. By now, I've learned my lesson. Sometimes, you just have to get your hands dirty and eat. Eat like there's no tomorrow. Savor the taste. And don't use chopsticks to eat pizza.

Project 52 June

2011-06-04T19:36:00.001-07:00

The theme is "food". Good food, bad food, gourmet food, raggedy omelets, it will all be fair game this month. Recipes included if I can dredge them up. We start tomorrow.

Also: The Nikon D2h is a fun camera. That's all.

Projects 52, Napa trip, and less!

2011-05-30T00:08:00.000-07:00

Still lazy and haven't bothered to get Photoshop working yet. :D
However, Friday's trip to wine country was prime photo taking time. I love food photography (probably the upcoming theme for June) and the change of scenery meant... landscapes! Due to lack of a good editing program I'll throw up what should've been last week's straight out of camera, and of course the same for this week's Project 52 offering.

52.21 - On the road
How I wish I could have edited this to spruce up the picture a bit... as is, it's really "meh". Not what I wanted to post. Ick.

As mentioned before, it's fun to play and take shots outside your comfort zone. Here was a spur-of-the-moment decision: to capture the road as we barreled through suburban Sunnyvale. Nothing short of a multi-thousand dollar gyroscope was going to stabilize the shot, but that's okay. Notice how all the lights came from the horizon point and away from the center of the scene as we passed them. The arcs of light flanking the roadway make or break the shot. I tried to wait for a good variety... headlights from opposing cars on the left and a green signal on the right.

52.22 - Rural [Robert Mondavi Winery] - from Napa, CA

A more than welcome change of scenery. On the Peninsula, it's suburban sprawl for endless miles. The only reprieve are parks like the Foothill one in Palo Alto or the many on the edges of the San Francisco Bay. To experience fresh, clean air and see green, white, and blue was rejuvenating. Here, I shoot down three lines of grape vines. Read the rocks at the feet of the vines to see what they're going to be used for!

Happy Memorial Day, for those celebrating. I know I'm helping myself to the four day weekend. Feels good.

Fortune cookie

2011-05-27T01:13:00.001-07:00

Tuesday, from the Chinese I ate:

A four-wheeled adventure will soon bring you joy.

How right you are, my little cookie. To wine country I go, within 12 hours. Should be fun. Should be photographically excellent. Mmm-hmmmmmm.

52.21 - Project 52 delay

2011-05-22T23:47:00.000-07:00

New install of Windows, so Photoshop isn't up running yet, my card reader is still stuck in the Vista era (or plain broken) and my memory cards aren't playing too nicely. Since when could you write protect a CF card? Perfect storm of badness. In lieu of something shot this week, here's one from the archives for your enjoyment.

Lake Tahoe on a November 28 evening. This is a 50-second exposure from the balcony of our resort hotel. That's right, 50 seconds. Long exposure is tough. Camera meters aren't used to such low light and you have to toy around to get something acceptable. But you do have lots of leeway. The unit of photographic exposure is an EV (or "stop" in the common parlance) which represents a doubling of the light passing through the lens. Thus exposing for only 25 seconds here would make the picture here dimmer but still usable, if barely. It goes without saying that 100 seconds wouldn't be terribly wrong either. But through trial and error you come up with an exposure that's workable. By the way, 50 seconds is long enough such that the star at the corner of the frame made a very slight trail. Yes, the Earth moves!

The actual shot for this week will be coming up as soon as all my workflow is up and running. I don't want to deal with Olympus's software or Paint, and the card reader needs to be nursed back to health.

Windows 7, musings, etc.

2011-05-21T19:50:00.000-07:00

Formatted and making myself at home again. Programs need to be downloaded, games tested, utilities re-installed. The big bugaboo is trying to squeeze another install of Microsoft Office on the license. Will it work? Only one way to find out...

My desktop computer regrew its two legs. (Backstory: something, either a cosmic ray or a spark when I plugged my headphones in or a fluke with video card drivers shot off the balls of my desktop install.) Again, it rightfully claims the faster spot against my still-excellent laptop. The comparison I drew up here is still apt. After helping a friend finally choose and settle on a laptop after four months of hemming and hawing, it's clear: while the market is definitely choosing mobile, prices are still up. We're not quite there yet - I think it'll be a few generations before mobile stuff becomes really, really good and well-implemented. So, those buying the new gizmos are financing needed R&D. Prices up.

Not before they went down, though: remember the whole netbook craze one to two years ago? The $350 Eee PC by Asus sparked a trend and within a year all the major design outlets had a competitor, some going rather upscale (sorry, Dell, I'm not paying $900 just to go small). As you could imagine, margins were probably razor thin on such cheap computers. Then the iPad was released and prices rose back up. After all, the technology and ecosystem were there now, thanks to the iOS and Android mobile operating systems and apps. Of course, the hardware, too, was largely borrowed from smartphones. And therefore it's no surprise that tablets command smartphone prices - $400-600 - remember, you are not bound to a contract by purchasing a standalone tablet.

Where are netbooks now? Kind of.... passe. A few friends of mine swear by theirs. I could not use something so small - blame fat fingers. Too large to be truly mobile, too small for usability. I live with the compromises on the Droid 2 because it actually does useful things (like Angry Birds and taking phone calls). Can't say that with a tablet or netbook.

So, right: Windows 7. Still loving it. Was impressed with it on my laptop and still impressed now. I haven't had less trouble getting networking to work until today. Windows 7. Say it again with me. Windows 7.

sleep creep

2011-05-20T01:03:00.000-07:00

somehow, it's 1 am...

Why do I do this to myself? I can survive on six hours of sleep during the workweek, but I'm one car accident away from that - and I've gotten heavy eyes on the road. Not good. Totally not good.

Interfaces

2011-05-17T23:35:00.000-07:00

Nothing's more frustrating than a klunky, awkward user experience. When tasks that should be easy aren't, when menu choices are seemingly pulled from a hat and ordered at random, and when the competition does it so much better... you get the picture.

So, on my Droid 2, there is App A and there's App B. App A is handy, familiar, and clear about what you can do and what it is doing. App B is convoluted and unwieldy and looks like it could use some major refactoring or customization options. Both the companies making A and B are major players in their markets and the differences in their programs couldn't be larger. To no surprise, A's non-mobile product outshines B's, despite B trying different takes on the concept over the years. A is also the much more successful company - at the moment.

The same story for a couple competing websites I use. Let's call them C and D. The apt comparison here would be Facebook close to its public inception, to MySpace at its former height. Website C is smaller, slicker, and well-put together. The almost-standardization of user accounts might seem limiting and formulaic. As it turns out, though, the quality of the content on C is, in my experience, leaps and bounds better than on D. Website D's setup is a travesty - a successful travesty that's ugly as crap and non-uniform, and just uncomfortable to use. But by sheer inertia it'll stick around, and we must endure (Internet Explorer 6, anyone?).

If only the interfaces A and D were better thought out, I'd be a happier person. The user experience really matters in the digital age. Haven't these companies learned from the auto manufacturers? Same mountain, different ski slopes taking you down to the bottom. When it comes to getting what I want, I'll pass on the double black diamond.

52.20 - Telephone-pole 'scape

2011-05-16T00:01:00.000-07:00

Not a landscape. But a photo forum I frequent has a weekly Sunday 'Scapes thread, and this is the one going on there. Because I like it.

Up, up and away. Rules are meant to be broken. One of the first new photographers learn is to avoid putting the subject smack in the center. This is because, in a way, your eyes aren't in the center of your head (unless you're Cyclops). Putting the subject off center allows the eyes to move around the picture and take in the elements of the composition. Here, I want attention right at the center, to move the viewer's gaze up the pole and to radiate out with the wires, eventually culminating in the contrast between bright pole/clouds, the blue sky, and the black transformer and wires.

I love taking pictures right after a rain storm. Have I mentioned this before? The air becomes so clear, the light almost magical. It would look even more striking if I had used a polarizer for this shot, but then our eyes would have been blinded by the awesomeness.

The fan that got away

2011-05-15T13:37:00.000-07:00

Your Project 52 post is ready but will be scheduled for 12:01 am tomorrow, since I don't like to post twice on the same day. So look at this. It is great. A fan at a baseball game took to the field and escaped. Normally, when this happens, you have some inebriated streaker looking to make $50 off his friends. Not this time. Into the night he went:

Best of spam, May 2011

2011-05-10T22:27:00.000-07:00

My throwaway Yahoo! email address is like a black hole. It will pull things in that have no business being there. Such as this spam email, addressed to a davidmoody101@gmail.com:

Let’s start. I’m joy that I have a chance to get acquainted with such attractive guy.
Parents named me Irisha. I love all kind of entertainment and I love running. Well .. it’s Difficult to write
I’ve got shiny smile and attractive body.

Write me.

Look through your pictures, and I wanna know you closer.

Hope read you soon

Bad English... what pictures... at least she is hot? I can't believe someone took the time to write this. Bots have better grammar.

52.19: Across the Bay

2011-05-08T11:42:00.000-07:00

Took the alternative camera for a brief spin. Windy and cold, and I had one goal in mind: to get this shot.

This is not really "across" the Bay. Swiveling 45 degrees to the right of this viewpoint, you'd see the San Francisco International Airport. A further 10-20 degrees and the actual East Bay might come into view depending on visibility (which was average for the day this shot was taken). Then pointing toward the southeast the long stretch of the San Mateo Bridge shows up, which is quickly obscured by a small peninsula jutting out. There isn't much in making a panorama here, though: you'd catch too much water.

Cinco de Mayo

2011-05-05T00:35:00.000-07:00

The Fifth of May, as it were. Make it a good one.

Remember, folks, this is mostly an American-created holiday. It's got little to do with Mexico (only a portion of that country observes Cinco de Mayo), it's not their Independence Day, please stop trying to sound smart. Thank you.

The big news

2011-05-03T20:17:00.000-07:00

It was made sure the whole world knew: Osama bin Laden was killed. Great! I'm actually pleased to hear this news. But I wasn't pleased at how this country handled it. Waving flags, chanting "USA! USA!" screams of douchebaggery to me. Gracious in defeat, humble in victory and all that. But no, not my fellow countrymen.

I'm also slightly worried about retaliation, but security's going to be upped around the Bay Area. Which doesn't make me feel any more secure, but it's important to realize that the chances of becoming a terror victim are very low anyway.

52.18 - Landscapes

2011-05-01T23:07:00.000-07:00

This month: landscapes. The Project 52 page for March and April will be completed. Time flies; it doesn't feel like long ago at all that I turned the page on March. Scary...

Desolate, dystopian, derelict... choose your d-word. While you would most associate landscapes being taken with wide-angle lenses (to get the feeling of placing the viewer in the picture) it's not necessary to use one. This was taken with a 300mm equivalent lens, and a macro at that. Indeed, if I used my wideangle, the porta-potty would be a distant speck from where I stood (shooting through a chain link fence).

My hope for this month: see more landscapes. Weather and light are getting really good.

capsule

2011-04-29T00:39:00.000-07:00

The world as I'm seeing it...

Important:

Boosting the economy and getting the job market back on track
Reforming the education system so it doesn't suck. Honestly, at one point California spent more on its prisons than on higher education. Inexcusable.
What's going on with the rising prices and shrinking quantities of food goods?
Fixing my sleep schedule!!!

Not:

Obama's place of birth or citizenship status. He's the fucking President already, he is obviously qualified, shut up. That means you, Mr. Trump.
The royal wedding. Can this shit please stop? I don't care. Report news on Libya, or try to get people enraged at gas prices or something. Meaningful events. Please.

Portal 2

2011-04-26T01:27:00.000-07:00

Finished! Just a couple hours ago (why am I still awake?). Excellent game. Well worth it. Showed just how primitive Portal 1 was, graphically at least. I'm still convinced that the tests in Portal 1 were more difficult, if only because more timing and jumping was involved. The new mechanics in Portal 2 were great, there was a semblance of a plot, the dialogue was snarky as usual... oh, yes.

Now I need to find a copy of the Doom 3 expansion for cheap. Anyone out there can help?

52.17 - Purple

2011-04-24T01:34:00.000-07:00

Unrelated note: my camera has problems capturing very specific shades of purple, instead rendering it as a strange shade of lavender. That's totally not how my eyes saw that flower. From what I've read, purple was difficult for many films to get right, and that hasn't changed for digitals. Must have something to do with UV light filtration.

On to the photo of the week. This is a gorgeous flower from the neighborhood (like most of the shots from this month) - what you see one week is totally different than the week before or what is there the next week!

Maybe I should have titled this post "White." Very striking colors on every flower from this plant. Click to enlarge.

Well, that's all we'll get for April! Sadly, there is no April 31, so I'll have to cook up a new topic for next week and May.Or maybe I'll throw in a bonus post to make up for being late last week... since flowers are definitely among my favorite subjects, I doubt I'll be able to resist the temptation.

Weekend update

2011-04-23T00:22:00.000-07:00

I've been pretty quiet. What's happened this week? Not much to report, really.

Emergency crunch time for a peptide. It's funny how my boss trusts a certain method more, and it didn't work. I switch to the other one and the peptide (rushed) comes out really great. To be fair, though, this peptide really needed the other chemistry to be synthesized optimally.
Change is in the air for me. More to come in the near future.
Taxes have been done... and they hurt.
My ND filter and chapstick have been located. The former was in my brother's car, having slipped out of the bag (hah!); the latter was wedged in an obscure corner near the bedpost.
I have failed to keep a good sleep schedule and my health isn't going to keep up this way.

Missing: ND filter

2011-04-19T18:26:00.000-07:00

I'm missing a 72mm ND8 filter for camera lenses. It should be in a beige microfiber pouch. And it probably fell out of my bag, which has seen some action lately. Hopefully, this is one of those cases where I stuffed the filter+pouch somewhere obscure and I'll call myself a nincompoop if it's found.

Also missing: my chap stick. This one really should be in my room somewhere, but it's been out of sight for a week. What's going on...?

Oops! I'm late! [52.16]

2011-04-18T02:02:00.000-07:00

Eight minutes past midnight and I've forgotten to put up this week's Project 52 photo. Without further ado, here it is.

Almost flowers. By the time I walk past these buds this week, they'll have bloomed into the flowers you saw in 52.5. Such is life. By the way, I was trying to come up with a more visually pleasing crop of this photo, but couldn't (in the standard aspect ratios, anyway) and ended up not doing much. As much as filling the frame is a nice compositional tip, other times framing loosely can help. That's the case here.

Little things

2011-04-14T22:27:00.000-07:00

Minor tasks have mounted to the point of needing to dedicate an evening to taking care of all of them. I hate that. But it feels downright sublime to knock out all those chores. Nothing quite matches that feeling of accomplishment, I guarantee it.

So: tomorrow's the day. Things will get done. Oh, yes, they will.

7

2011-04-13T18:38:00.000-07:00

So the nuclear incident in Japan (which luck has most definitely not been smiling upon) was upgraded to level 7. That means "major accident" and is the same ranking the Chernobyl incident back in the 1980s got. Strange, huh? I've been keeping up with the goings-on at Fukushima and if that warrants a 7, Chernobyl would be a 15 or something like that.

I still support nuclear power. There just has to be a better way to store that waste, though.

Happy thoughts. Here's my new wallpaper.

52.15 - Orange

2011-04-10T19:43:00.000-07:00

From a walk to the local library on Monday.
I thought it was a little insect on the flower scrambling around for some leverage but on closer inspection, the gray thing's just a bit of detritus. Too bad... bugs on flowers make for very good pictures. Next time, maybe!

For Sale. An attractive potted plant outside the supermarket. Took pictures of the interesting ones and saw a 'bug' on this flower. Really, I don't think it's an insect but I've been wrong before. Colors in the background are not me tripping on LSD, but just other plants blasted out of focus.

The best feeling ever...

2011-04-07T20:33:00.001-07:00

... is when a pop-up ad that manages to sneak through the cracks ends up pulling up a 404 message. Who has the last laugh, huh, bitch?

>:D

Radio goings-on

2011-04-04T23:15:00.000-07:00

I listen to the radio a lot now. On the commute, in the lab, and for baseball and football games. For a free service, I can tolerate the ads. But not the songs that just won't die. Or certain irritating advertisements. Who decided it was a good idea to allow radio ads to use sounds like truck horns, cell phone ringtones, and police sirens?

Keep in mind, this is the mindless Top 40 / Pop radio that keeps me sane in the car and at work...

Songs I'm happy to hear (because they're catchy, or I like them, etc.) in no particular order

Almost anything by Green Day
...and Coldplay
Kelly Clarkson (in moderation)
Taylor Swift (in moderation)
Beyonce (in moderation)
Either of the two popular Lady Antebellum songs
Either of the two Evanescence songs on air
Katy Perry's "Firework" and "Teenage Dream" (I'll pass on the rest)
The remaining airtime Leona Lewis gets, perhaps 0.5-1 song per day now
The Eagles - Hotel California (rare, now)
Usher (not every 2 hours please)
Pink's "Glitter in the Air" and "Fuckin' Perfect" - pity they censor it. Her other songs? Ugh.
Far East Movement (in moderation) - "Rocketeer", despite the crap it gets, is catchy
I don't know how this one still lives, but Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams" is awesome in the lab
Black Eyed Peas . . . in small doses, this includes Fergie's solo stuff
Most of the Plain White Tees stuff that makes it onto radio
And the same with Colbie Caillat, Jason Mraz, Daughtry
Believe it or not, some of Eminem's stuff is nice to drive to - "I Need A Doctor" and "Love the Way You Lie".

Songs that have outlived their usefulness, in my opinion:

Train's "Hey Soul Sister". Killed by overplaying. I found "If It's Love" to be a fun song, and am happy "Marry Me" tanked out of airplay like a dropped lead brick.
Taylor Swift - You Belong With Me : whine, whine, whine, build a bridge and get over it.
Pink - Please Don't Leave Me : death by overplaying.
Kesha - Tik Tok : still fun but threatening to reach overplay death
Lady Gaga - Bad Romance. She has other songs too, you know! "Alejandro" anyone? But do yourself a service and watch this.
OneRepublic (in general) - usually good stuff, but not every 90 minutes, pretty please?

I wish I heard more of these:

'90s stuff. Example: everyone hates Ace of Base now, but they were good back then!
More of the alternative/punky side - Linkin Park, Avril Lavigne (in moderation) - I know the stations can't stray too far off Top 40/Pop though.
Indies, like Ingrid Michaelson. Does Muse qualify here?
Throwing a country song in there once every day wouldn't be so bad.
Sarah McLachlan and other very talented vocalists who have fallen by the wayside.
Some of Rihanna's and Snow Patrol's older songs.

Rage-inducers every time they come up:

Nickelback. Seriously, if music could sound like vomit, they would be the textbook definition.
Pink - Raise Your Glass : never has the same artist produced songs I quite like and quite hate. Oddly enough, "Fuckin Perfect" is supposed to be the thematic sequel to this song.
Taio Cruz - Dynamite : loud, annoying, and he has some other OK songs.
Enrique Iglesias - I don't like what his songs are about but they have some nice hooks.
Almost anything else by Kesha. She is not that good, folks.

For obvious reasons, the lists above are rather incomplete, but give you a sense of what I like and dislike. I can't be all-encompassing due to my rather limited working memory (just ask my friends) but hey, nobody's fuckin' perfect.

52.14 - Blue

2011-04-03T23:30:00.000-07:00

In some places this little thing would be an unwanted weed. To me, it's a sign of things to come. Spring is young, and so is this inflorescence:

March showers bring... well, ain't that the truth? I will check back weekly to see how it's doing. This is near the Sanchez Channel in Burlingame.

The March-April Project 52 page will be updated, and I've a new blog post scheduled for tomorrow. Stay tuned.

April things...

2011-04-02T11:36:00.000-07:00

In case you missed it, yesterday was April Fools Day, and the "engagement" was a brilliant plan more than a month in the making. The ring was real, though, but it's not an engagement ring. Just something pretty for her. So, that was that, we ruffled a few feathers all in good fun, and the news on the wedding is that there will be no wedding. There.

Next: Project 52 April. It's springtime, so what better subjects out there than flowers? I love taking plant and flower pictures (as overdone as they are). But if they're all going to bloom soon, I want to capture it on ~~film~~ flash memory.

It's done!

2011-04-01T00:26:00.000-07:00

I've asked the girl of my dreams for her hand in marriage. It was over two years ago that we started talking after a particularly efficient run through some dungeon in Guild Wars. What was this other player chatting me up for? Well, it wasn't some other player, it was the woman I would eventually fall in love with.

Sure, like most long distance relationships start, things were rocky. We were timid and giddy with the thing called love, and it stuck. We chat every chance we could despite the distance between us. And over the weeks, months, and years, that distance narrowed. We are now together. Though the closest we've physically been was at the train station, we're spiritually and emotionally one. And that's what counts.

I popped the question a couple weeks ago, by the way, and while I was a nervous wreck it all melted away when she said yes. Decisions were made on the ring (and what a ring it is). We're not quite sure when to plan the wedding for but expect some news soon!

52.13: The sky over Gunn

2011-03-27T23:13:00.000-07:00

The family and I played tennis at good old Gunn High School today. While I had already shot some skies this week, I dragged the camera along hoping for something better. And yes, there was better.

Holy light. Perhaps the most striking part about this photograph is the difference between the deep blue sky way up there and the pedestrian blue sky by the lamp post. I do not know why it's like this - it's not a botched Photoshop job, for sure. Just Mother Nature doing her thing.

This sort of formation with the sun almost breaking through some spotty cloud cover was present late Friday afternoon. I took shots like this from Costco, from Safeway, and even while stopped at red lights. (Author's note: please don't be a moron and do that.) But none of those matched this. See, that's the difference between a routine grab shot and lining up a good one and putting it away.

The everything post

2011-03-26T17:30:00.000-07:00

As promised so, so long ago, the goodies:

Little funny bunny, very cute.
"Hydrogel" balls. They're in the sulfuric acid bottle. Swell in water overnight, use them to passively water plants. Useful, bouncy, and awesome. Also, blue ones make for excellent blue ball jokes.
Bracelet with a kickass color scheme.
Not shown: a letter and bubble wrap envelope.

Next: my review of The Social Network, which I finally had the pleasure to watch on DVD the other night.

Good:

Though not meant to be a documentary, the movie was watchable (humor, hot chicks ;) and believable. There was little guesswork involved while keeping the theme.
And hey, they worked in the nonfiction parts very well.
Aaron Sorkin's known for writing really good conversations, and he did not disappoint here.
Casting was good, even using Justin Timberlake as the Napster dude. I guess he can act, but it's not like the role demanded much of him.

Bad:

Zuckerberg's personality grated on me from the first minute. It was House-like, but taken too far. I know, I'm one of those types of person.
Unnecessarily loud party scenes.

Deserving of Oscar nominations, yes. Deserving of the trophy? Yes, with slight misgivings. It's too bad The Social Network got snubbed, I think.

Now, lastly, it's the annual Carnival of Death in the Tetris community. I've already done my part by setting a new, complete-game personal best, but one can always improve. There are six days to go.

Phew! That's it. Stay tuned for the weekly Project 52 post tomorrow. I'll try to update more often so this sort of catch-up doesn't have to happen as much...

Goodies

2011-03-22T22:52:00.000-07:00

They came, they saw, they conquered. And resulted in swollen blue balls.
Pics to come tomorrow, when lighting is better and I have more motivation to take pictures.

You know who you are: thank you!

52.12 - Sky in turmoil

2011-03-20T17:25:00.001-07:00

This week's photo (actually taken last Sunday, so I'm cheating a bit; left the memory card at work, hopefully) sums up this week's weather in one shot.

Bipolar weather. One day, I was out taking photos during a walk at lunch. The next day, the authorities announced a tornado warning for a large swath of the Bay Area! I haven't seen rain that hard in a long, long time. And above, the sun was out but inclement weather clearly threatened.

Damn, I'm old.

2011-03-16T22:59:00.000-07:00

Watching American Idol (commence pointing and laughing) it was brought to my attention that I was older than the majority, if not all of the contestants. Huh, wait, what?

That's right! Some of them were even born in the mid-1990s. To me, it feels like people born in those years should still be in middle school, but no, they're old enough and mature enough to be singing on national TV. What was I doing at that age . . . Ragnarok Online? (It was worth it.) Well, so's life. We follow the arrow of time until we finally catch up and impale ourselves on it, hopefully later rather than sooner.

Doggone it, I am old.

No, no, no

2011-03-15T00:05:00.000-07:00

I hate the American news media. Too often they overhype and underdeliver. With the tragedy in Japan still unfolding, I'm reading about nuclear catastrophe this and numbers with a lot of zeroes that all being thrown around. No, it stops here. Reporting's supposed to be about the facts. Not speculation or spreading FUD [fear, uncertainty and doubt]. Just the facts, Jack.

It happens every time some medical or scientific breakthrough is reported in a journal. The popular science magazines focus on some small finding in the paper, ask softball questions to the author, and publish sensational headlines suggesting the cure for cancer/AIDS/whatever is at hand and imminent (if only so-and-so organization would receive more funding). No, that's wrong. Even worse, the regular news outlets pick up the story and then it becomes a game of Chinese Telephone, and then the public is fed outright misinformation. You see, I'm still waiting for my flying car. Since 1997, when The Fifth Element came out and so many sources claimed we'd all be zipping around by 2010. Interestingly, we're still using our 1994 Camry.

So, still think you're getting "news" from the mainstream media? I don't think so. It's so filtered, so sensationalized, and so written for the lowest common denominator that the only thing you can be certain is that something happened. The details, well, I find my local newspaper, Al-Jazeera, the BBC, or secondary sources doing a better job than some of the big boys. That's just wrong.

52.11 - Pastel silhouette

2011-03-13T13:31:00.000-07:00

No epic sunset yet. Here's one of the better ones from this week.

Missed. This was taken immediately after I arrived home from work. On the way, I saw orange and knew it was my day to go out to take pictures. But the sun was fading fast and by the time I could get back outside and find a good vantage point, the sky was pink. The "Golden Hour" for photography doesn't last long!

One of the most beautiful skies I've seen was the gradient from a warm peach to the cool blue back in Taiwan when we watched the sunrise at Alishan. Here, it was kind of similar, but the colors not as brilliant. And obviously, the sun was on its way down, not up. What I want is some large, open space with a distant picturesque skyline. But we don't have that around here; the Bay Area is simply too developed.

Thursday midnight update

2011-03-10T00:03:00.000-08:00

So much happened in one day :P

Good things:

Made another good peptide.
My roll of film was developed and the prints look OK. Not great (something's off about the colors) but OK, so the camera isn't leaking light and the shutter works.
Steady-state busy at work. The days aren't strenuous anymore.
Words with Friends stopped being lame after a reinstall on the smartphone.

Bad things:

Gave my computer its first blue screen in years when moving the photo archive to the new drive.
One peptide turned out bad, and we have no freaking idea why.
Ring shopping (to be explained later) is kind of a chore. Remind me not to get married soon.

Wednesday midnight update

2011-03-09T01:03:00.000-08:00

The good:

Dentist appointment revealed no cavities.
Made a good peptide.
House this week was good on the character/plot development. Medicine 'meh' as usual.
Shot a roll of film in the OM-1, but this time in broad daylight. Nice, retro experience.
I should be hearing from grad schools soon.
Giants keep winning in Spring Training.
Angry Birds Seasons St. Patrick's Day levels are out. Whoo-hoo-hoo!

The bad:

I need to floss more, of course.
And sleep more! 1 am! FFFFFUUUUUUUUUU
Made a bad peptide (but to my credit, when it comes to custom syntheses, you never really know what to expect. They're like boxes of hydrophobic chocolates.)
Morons on the road almost getting me killed.

The ugly:

You. Just kidding. Thanks for reading!

52.10 - Overcast

2011-03-06T22:44:00.000-08:00

Overcast skies are really boring. Gray, lifeless, dull. But alarmingly bright. Ever had one of those days where it was overcast, yet you were squinting for some seemingly unexplainable reason? I hate that. This day, luckily, wasn't one of them, but it didn't lend itself to being a good photographic subject. And so again, I turned to my camera's built-in "Art Filters" to see what it could do. And it turns out, it did a lot. It found dark in the clouds where I couldn't and excessively jacked up the contrast in the scene. Good. It needed it.

Here's the result:

Dystopia. Used correctly, the art filter can make the mundane look less boring, at minimum. Do it wrong (as I tried once on a sunny day) and you ruin a shot. Play, but don't forget why you're playing around. By the way, the green bits are vegetation that are growing on rocks that fall under the flow of sewer pipes. If life throws you poop, make the most of it, I guess.

We're still expecting rain in the area this week. I want to get at least one striking sunset this month. Fingers crossed.

Project 52 March

2011-03-04T22:58:00.000-08:00

This month's topics: skies. It's reaching that time of year when rain showers will bring stunning-looking clouds. When light is wonderful right as I leave for work, and as I arrive back home from it. In other words, the theme is to get me looking around. Not everything interesting is at eye level.

One from the archives...

August 28, 2009. From a walk around the neighborhood with my family. As unreal as the sky looks here, that's pretty much what my own two eyes saw. The camera perhaps punched up the colors a bit on its own, though that only serves to make the memory stronger. This isn't the full shot; click to enlarge. You can guess this served as a desktop wallpaper for me some time ago...

the March of time

2011-03-01T23:08:00.000-08:00

I liked a song on the radio today, and had to look it up. Nowadays, you can just plug it into Shazam or any number of similar apps. My favorite tactic is to memorize a couple lines and search Google for them. Invariably, you'll get what you wanted. Most interesting is how other people obviously had the same idea, and you can get an auto-completion entry without having to type down all the lines! Ain't that some shit?

Back then, when gas cost a dollar a gallon and men were men, it wasn't this easy. What prompted this post was some weekend cleaning: I came across a stapled packet of papers that contained song lyrics! That was so '90s! Everything from Seal's "Kiss From A Rose" to Christmas songs like "The First Noel". And then I noticed - hey, these were made with a typewriter. That takes us back another decade or two.

Apparently, my parents had before transcribed songs from CD or radio onto paper using a typewriter. That's pretty impressive. You can't make mistakes, of course, and what if you miss a line or two? Very impressive indeed.

See, this is what people did before the Internet. We have it so good today. ;D
Oh, and happy March. We're by one measure 1/6 of the way through 2011. Time's passing quickly now. Before I know it, I'll be 40 years old...

52.9: Friend or foe?

2011-02-27T00:56:00.000-08:00

There was no snow after all. Good: that means I don't have to worry about my cacti. Or do I?

Every year. After the rains, weeds start invading my cactus pots. As you might imagine, removing those weeds can be a rather tender operation. One bad jerky movement and it's a trip to pain city. So, isn't it interesting how a little weed, no more than a few weeks old, is evidently taller than my years-old cactus? It is, on the other hand, much easier to uproot. ;) Mother Nature is fascinating.

So, I was messing around with some lesser-used options on my camera to make this photo, and decided on the baked-in vignetting (or, as the camera calls it, "Pin Hole") effect. I like the effect as it draws the viewer's eye to a centrally-placed subject, such as the cactus here. But it's much easier to set in Photoshop - the strength of the vignetting, how harsh it is, etc. whereas the camera's version is fire-and-forget. You'll notice the light falloff on the top left of the weed, so the algorithm isn't intelligent.

But, as I want to say with this and my latest wallpaper, it pays to play. Try out new things. Make boring subjects not boring. Anything to get the creative juices working (especially when you're shooting a normal focal length, as I was this month).

Will it snow?

2011-02-26T00:19:00.000-08:00

Rumor had it snow was coming to the SF Bay Area. Well, not yesterday. I woke up to moderate rain and a rather sluggish commute to work. If it's raining, it's not snowing. Too bad. By lunchtime, the sun was out, yet temperatures were low - the wind chill factor doing its thing. On the plus side, it made eating out at lunch that much more pleasurable. Instead of frozen food for three days in a row, lunch today consisted of an absolutely delicious, large quesadilla from a local supermarket taqueria. Good stuff.

The way home was surprisingly traffic-free, even factoring in a late start away from work. That must have been nature balancing out some strangely horrid commutes in the past couple weeks. Things work out from time to time, there's no need to worry so much about life. Anyone who made a name for themselves probably didn't.

So, snow: forecasted for elevations of 3000 ft. and up, then revised anywhere between 1000 and 1500 ft, and some daring meteorologists said sea level! I live in a town a scant 60 feet above sea level, so it's not likely I'll see snow. But the camera will be ready. Rain or shine, hail or snow, I haven't went out to shoot for my last Project 52 entry of February yet. Let's see if that image will be predominantly white.

Wallpaper change

2011-02-23T00:06:00.000-08:00

I'm going with abstract again.
So, this is what a spider web looks like after randomly selecting stuff from the menu in Photoshop:

Digitally mutilated spiderweb. Note, if your monitor's brightness and contrast are set too high (as they most likely are) this picture will look pretty horrible. For that reason, the wallpaper shown above probably won't last me a month - I'll need to find a more photogenic subject next time.

I wish I had the power of Apple's design team behind me to clip the blacks and get a glossy, shiny Web 2.0 look to the dark bits. But for literally three and a half minutes of dicking around with interesting things in Photoshop, the result is... interesting. Yeah.

52.8: Unreal chemistry

2011-02-20T11:51:00.000-08:00

Chemists are often portrayed as working with brightly-colored, bubbly flasks, holding them out in the open air and otherwise having a blast. Well, sorry, that's just not true in the real world. Perhaps it happens in academia, where labs often ignore safety standards and do deal with novel chemicals, but not where I work. That's a bummer.

It was to my delight this week that I was finally able to add a different dye to a certain compound (and it worked first try!). That dye is rhodamine B, and though it looks like a green powder, it's pink when in solution. And it. Gets. Everywhere.

Here's a filter flask that I was using that had processed some of the rhodamine-labeled compound two days prior...

Hey, it's pink! Unlike what you may see in TV, cartoons, or stock photos, organic chemistry isn't very visual. Solvents are often clear (and stinky), solids are nondescript white or yellowish powders, and solutions tend toward entropic brown muck after a while. You have to be working with inorganic compounds or dyes to spice things up in your beaker.

Runoff from that filter flask is still pink. My analytical balance is a little pink now. Heck, my boss got some dye on his hands by touching the bottle carelessly, and his fingers are pink. I hope the rhodamine washes out, otherwise it's going to look like Barbie's dollhouse on my bench.