Toga the Penguin

Ok this sucks... and why do they assume the thief is a male?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051220/ap_on_re_eu/toga_the_penguin

Baby Penguin Is Stolen From Zoo

LONDON - A baby penguin thought to have been snatched from a zoo as a quirky festive gift is unlikely to survive until Christmas Day, his keeper warned Tuesday.

Toga, a three-month old jackass penguin, was stolen from Amazon World on the Isle of Wight in southern England on Saturday.

Zoo manager Kath Bright said the bird, who was taken from a compound where he lived with his parents and four other penguins, would probably die of malnutrition if not urgently returned.

"Toga is very, very vulnerable. The penguin is still being fed by his parents and we don't believe it could survive more than five days," she told The Associated Press.

"The bird has already been missing for around three days and is likely to be severely dehydrated. If he isn't returned before Thursday he is likely to become so ill that even intensive care treatment won't save him."

The brown and white penguin will bite if frightened and refuses to be fed by human hand, Bright said. Toga is too young to have yet had a gender confirmed, but along with tradition, is referred to as a male, she added..

Bright said there was no sign of forced entry to the pen, but said a thief would have been able to climb into the compound and carry Toga away.

"We can't understand what may have been going through the thief's head, but we are worried someone decided a penguin would make the perfect Christmas gift," she added. "There has been a lot of attention because of the film 'March of the Penguins.' Perhaps someone saw the film and thought their wife or girlfriend would be thrilled to have one as a present."

The French movie was a box-office hit and has been credited with drawing tourists to penguin spotting sites across the world.

Stoners vs. Toddlers

This was pretty funny. The only thing that's not amusing to me is the fact that Ryan's last name is....Stoner. Our poor children!
Stoners vs. Six-Year-Olds: A Radar Investigation : In the Magazine : Radar Magazine

Coffee before exams?

Coffee is good for your short term memory?

CHICAGO, Nov. 30 - A cup of coffee is good for the memory, at least the short term memory, according to research reported today.


In a study of 15 healthy men ages 26 to 47, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) detected significant activity in the brain's memory centers 20 minutes after the men consumed 100 mg of caffeine, according an Austrian study reported at the Radiological Society of North America meeting here.


The activity was significantly greater than men who were imaged after consuming a matched placebo (P<0.05), said Florian Koppelstatter, M.D., of the University Hospital Innsbruck.


He said the fMRI scan detected activity in the anterior cingulate cortex of the brain, which is responsible for some short-term memory functions.


The men, all right-handed, underwent fMRI scans on two days. Half of the men were initially given water that contained a tasteless concentration of 100 mg of caffeine -- about the equivalent of two cups of coffee -- and half were given ordinary water. The groups were crossed over for the second scans.


Dr. Koppelstatter said that fMRI routinely detected activity as participants completed memory tasks during the scan, but caffeine significantly boosted brain function beyond that expected level. In addition to greater activity in the anterior cingulate cortex, men taking caffeine had increased activity in frontal cortex, and the inferior parital cortex. Moreover, since the men were all right handed, the increased activity was greater in the left hemisphere.


Twenty-minutes after consuming the drinks -- a time that Dr.Koppelstatter said was calculated as the caffeine's peak potency time in the brain -- the men underwent fMRI scans. He noted that caffeine's effect diminishes after 45 minutes.


Dr.Koppelstatter said the scans clearly demonstrated that caffeine has a definite impact on short-term memory processes. "This effect takes part in the distinct part of the working memory network that controls attention and concentration."


Michael Brant-Zawadzki, M.D., chairman of the RSNA communications committee and moderator at press conference where Dr. Koppelstatter discussed his research, said the findings will probably not surprise anyone because "we all know that coffee makes us more alert, but now we know how that works."


He said that finding also suggests a possible research target for the development of drugs to improve memory function. "It may be possible to develop drugs like caffeine that can stimulate these same brain regions," he said.




Primary source: Radiological Society of North America
Source reference:
Koppelstatter, F et al. "Influence of CAFFEINE Excess on Activation Patterns in Verbal Working Memory"

Microsoft LIVE ideas

http://ideas.live.com/

Check out the website for Microsoft's version of Google product betas. Some sound pretty interesting. Especially the checkup center and the antivirus.

Bodies - The Exhibition

I know you want to see this... come on, who wants to go? I'll be happy to tag along.
Here's the article from MSNBC

NEW YORK - If an anatomy textbook came to life, it might look like “Bodies … The Exhibition,” a show that opened Saturday at South Street Seaport in Manhattan.

The exhibit features 22 human bodies and 260 specimens preserved for display in a 30,000-square-foot space. Highlights include skinless cadavers in a football player’s pose, another throwing a baseball and one body holding hands with its own removed skeleton — all to show how muscles, tendons and bones work together.

There IS something similar in Philly called BODY WORLDS: The Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies. It has over 200 exhibits. I am going there in the next week or two with my sister.

In other news:

1. The world's first partial face transplant was recently performed - by a doc who performed the world's first double-forearm transplant already. link
   
2. Scientists have successfully implemented a full human schomosome into mice to study Down's syndrome (caused by an extra choromosome 21). link
3. After decades there might be a hope for people with lupus - at least in preventing kidney disease - in the name of a drug called CellCept. link
   

Merriam-Webster Asks: What's Your Favorite Word (That's Not in the Dictionary)?

No you do not have aphasia. You're not disorganized or schizophrenic. Other people do it too. Here's an article about neologisms from Merriam-Webster:

What a lovely bunch of vocabularians (persons who make up new words) you are! Lasterday (refers to any day before today) we squinched (action required to fit something into a space that is slightly too small) a schmiglet (a small unit of measurement) of your awesomtastic (so wonderful the words just meld in your mouth) one-of-a-kind entries into this space in preparation for our Top Ten reveal. With so many chizzy (awesome, super, happening) creations to choose from, we admit to becoming a bit flusterpated (a state of being flustered that's so intense, one's actions and words become bound up) and fahoodled (confused, esp. when trying to think of too many things at once). We craughed (to cry and laugh simultaneously), we troddled (to wander around without knowing of doing so), and finally decided to use the schwack (a large amount) of multiple entries received as the basis for the Top Ten—this is, let's not forget, all about favoritism.

From the thousands of submissions we received, here, then, are the ten words (not in the dictionary) entered the most often:

Top Ten Favorite Words (Not in the Dictionary)

1. ginormous (adj): bigger than gigantic and bigger than enormous

2. confuzzled (adj): confused and puzzled at the same time

3. woot (interj): an exclamation of joy or excitement

4. chillax (v): chill out/relax, hang out with friends

5. cognitive displaysia (n): the feeling you have before you even leave the house that you are going to forget something and not remember it until you're on the highway

6. gription (n): the purchase gained by friction: "My car needs new tires because the old ones have lost their gription."

7. phonecrastinate (v): to put off answering the phone until caller ID displays the incoming name and number

8. slickery (adj): having a surface that is wet and icy
(Edit: Don't let that be you -a)

9. snirt (n): snow that is dirty, often seen by the side of roads and parking lots that have been plowed

10. lingweenie (n): a person incapable of producing neologisms

View previous Favorite Words (Not in the Dictionary)

An Article From Last year

Why Don’t Lottery Winners Run Wild?

Peter Hartlaub

[This is appropriate considering someone else won over 300 million dollars just recently in Anaheim. I knew I should have bought a lottery ticket at Disneyland! -Amit]

When was the last time a new lottery winner unveiled a master plan to blow the winnings on something useless and frivolous? Just once, wouldn’t it be nice to read about someone who insists on spending the money to “find some better-looking friends.” How about a promise to “squander my winnings on hookers and blow and Oakland Raiders personal seat licenses”?

As the lucky ticket holders from the latest California Super LottoPlus $100 million jackpot trickle forward this week, the public must once again settle for people like 80-year-old Los Altos Hills resident Walter Tracey, an otherwise pleasant man who told the media that his third of the prize will be devoted in part toward home repairs and scholastic funds for his grandchildren.

Lottery winners, by the very act of becoming rich while everyone else remains broke, are already annoying. But nothing twists the knife deeper for us losers than a winner who doesn’t do anything fun with his windfall. Whether it’s because of lessons learned from Enron or repeated tech-stock blunders, this is a culture

Psi-Ops (or ESPionage)

Since I have so much time to kill (I love it!), here's another game I finished. It's actually a Third person Shooter instead of FPS, which somewhat turned me off, but actually the TPS makes it much easier to play this game. There's something really fun about being able to life people shooting at you in air and drop them off a ledge. Not to mention taking control of their minds and shooting their buddies. Or hit them with a really big piece of rock. Or burn them to a crisp using a wave of scorching fire from your arm. or to drain their mind until their head pops. Or... you get the idea.

here's a review with pics:

http://ps2.ign.com/articles/523/523279p1.html

Now before I get busy, who wants to go see the broadway play Mama Mia with me?

Quake 4 (and Doom III)

ID software’s Wolfenstein 3D is arguably the first popular First Person Shooter. Doom however, is the game I remember really being impressed by (1994?). The graphics, the dark story, and the sheer, bloody fun was incomparable to any other game to date. It proved that the shareware strategy could be successful, and the FPS was a genre to be welcomed by gamers. ID’s Quake was a parallel world to Doom, with more emphasis on the bizarre and the alien than doom. With updated engine and technology, it also set new limits for FPS. Quake 3, despite being a fun game, offered no more depth into the interesting single-player story-world of the franchise. Therefore it was a complete surprise to see a huge and extremely comprehensive single-player game and storyline in the Doom III engine based Quake 4.

Doom III, in my opinion was outstanding in the way it creeped you out. It took very little imagination (especially with a good headset and the volume cranked up) to almost feel like a soldier fighting in a huge “urban” battlefield. The depth, quality, quantity of radio chatter–screams in your ears from dying civilian and marines, desperate requests of backup, orders from the brass, etc. – made it a very immersing experience. Of course the dirty trick of making you fight in almost pitch black levels with a flashlight that lasts 5 seconds did set you up for very suspenseful encounters.

On the other hand, Quake 4 takes all that, along with the beautiful graphics that accompany each ID game, and somehow manages to immerse you in the gaming environment even deeper as CPL Cain. I actually stopped moving many times to avoid running into the next skirmish just so I could finish listening to the conversations in my headset in peace. I even found it interesting to stop and listen to the idle conversations among the many NPCs in the game. And despite the fact that I had a permanent flashlight this time around (thank god), I was still creeped out more playing Quake 4 than Doom III–almost to the level of F.E.A.R.

Oh and a word of advice if you’re actually thinking of playing the game. When you get to the brain all the way at the end… you have to shoot at it near the ceiling to damage it. I must have wasted 30 minutes running around it trying to dodge the never-ending supply of enemies white shooting at the thing’s “feet” before I figured it out.

New Godzilla

AOL News - Giant 'Godzilla' Crocodile Hunted in Sea

it looks like a T-rex with flippers.

Chicken Little Goes Big

When a friend of mine suggested dinner and a movie with her, her roommate, and her roommate's friend, I figured it was a good idea. When I got to their place, I realized they wanted to see Chicken Little. My immediate inclination was "What the hell?" But then I remembered how funny the comemrcials/trailers seemed. And then there was this phone call with another two friends who told me how much they liked the movie on its premiere. Tantalization won, and I agreed to go. Man, it was actually a really fun movie. I am so glad I went. Big thumbs up for your choice, Calee. And no, I am not giving away anything from the movie. Suffice to say, it is a good big-screen adventure should you deem it interesting enough to see. It's also probably the only CGI animation so far I don't feel awkward seeing around kids. Don't wait until the DVD.. it just won't be as much fun - trust me.

New Jersey Gubernatorial Elections

How come Jersey elections tend to be so nasty? According to radio interviews, both candidates were surprised at the amount of mud slinging in this election. Like they hadn't seen the last two elections. According to NYTIMES:

In New Jersey, a swing state often considered a national bellwether, polls showed the race for governor narrowing. The campaign is breaking the state record for expenditures, with the two wealthy candidates having spent $72 million.

Their private lives had taken the spotlight as the Forrester campaign featured his wife in one commercial, then broadcast another quoting Mr. Corzine's ex-wife reacting to the Andrea Forrester advertisement and saying, "John did let his family down, and he'll probably let New Jersey down, too." Mr. Corzine was also criticized for forgiving a $470,000 mortgage to a former girlfriend who is president of a state workers' union. In the last week, both candidates have been questioned about women with whom they were said to be romantically involved, triggering lurid headlines, despite their denials.

The focus on the candidates' personal lives recalled Gov. James E. McGreevey's sudden resignation last year with the startling admission of an affair with a man that his aides said he had appointed as his homeland security adviser. The vacancy in Trenton was filled last November by Acting Gov. Richard J. Codey, who decided not to run.

Disneyland!

I am writing this post in retrospect, but today we actually decided to go to Disneyland. I mean, why not? It’s a place to visit at least once in your lifetime. We were going to do something random like the San Diego Zoo, but by noon we were parking at Goofy Level 4-b. Man, it was like a five minute drive inside the parking lot. Which was a GOOD thing because on a random Wednesday in November there is very little traffic in themeparks. Don’t get me wrong–there were plenty of people there, but man, it would have been hell if it were really crowded. The tickets were like 76 bucks each for two parks, but we got our (my) money’s worth. It literally took 5 minutes to get on most rides... 5 minutes to walk from the entranceway to the begininng of the line. Seriously. We must have only waited on two rides (15-20 min) near the end of the day when we were tired and cold (after getting soaked in this ridiculous geyser that was there just to spite us in this water ride). All in all though, it was a great day. We met up with a friend to eat at UC Irvine and then just went out and had fun. Vacation sure is nice.

LA / Hollywood

So as most of you know I have been in California since last Friday. I have been staying with a friend from College at Huntington Beach /OC area. He has been showing me around as I have never been to California, and I have been having a blast so far. Last night we went to West Hollywood for a Halloween parade and show. It was very interesting to see all the outrageous costumes, the fair in general, and the costume contests (my favorite being two people dressed as a combined house destroyed by hurricanes, representing FEMA: "Federal Emergency My Ass"). They had a band playing as well. Parking was a bitch, but we eventually found a large parging garage with ridiculously cheap prices - ONE buck for three hours and an extra dollar per hour beyond that. After 4 hours we left the area and drove over to Malibu to meet a person staying at this HUGE house by the beach - like a couple of blocks from Pepperdine. The view from this place was absolutely amazing. We hung out there for a bit and then slept over.

This morning we got to see the area in the sunlight and, yeah, I think I need to live in a place like this. Driving up there at 2 in the morning did not do the area justice. We left from there to go to Hollywood to drop off a person there. He showed us around a little bit and then we parked and took a trolley tour for an hour. It was pretty interesting to get the history of the area and to learn about the sidewalk stars and the Chinese theater. We were pretty tired by the evening so we drove to my friend's place at Huntington beach, where I am writing this. We're not sure about our plans for the night, but we agree we need to go back to Malibu to party this Thurs/Fri.

F.E.A.R.

Now normally I don’t have much to say about games, no matter how much I enjoy them. F.E.A.R. is one of the most hyped up games of the year, and despite not knowing much about the game (and refusing to play a stupid demo version–not that I had the time so far anyway), I finally got the game yesterday. It’s a pretty good first person shooter/adventure in the style of Half-Life with a very creepy feel to it–like a mixture of Max Payne’s dream sequences and the insanity of The Suffering. But that’s not what I feel the need to talk about. I got the biggest surprise of my gaming life during a particular firefight between my character and a squadron of 3-4 soldiers. I was pinned down behind some machinery and wanted to backtrack in this squarish area to approach the enemy from the rear and suddenly I hear enemy radio chatter: “Watch out! He’s trying to flank!” Needless to say, I stopped dead in my tracks with my jaw on the ground, thinking “What the @^%#?? They know?!?!?!” Quite possibly the coolest AI trick ever implemented in such a game.

USMLE Step II - Clinical Knowledge and Clinical Skills - and Residency

So this last week was interesting... I took Step 2 Clinical Knowledge on Thursday - nine hours including some break time and then Clinical Skills yesterday in Philly - about eight hours including orientation and breaks. I was getting slightly nervous about having the second exam so close to the first one, but it was pretty easy. I am glad I didn't waste more time studying for it. I'm so glad that they are both done and over with. Now the last two standardized exams I need to take this year are Advanced Care and Life Support at the end of November, and recertifying in Basic Life Support in (probably) March.
My military interviews for residency are already over, but I am applying to some civilian schools as a backup. I have interviews scheduled at four so far (late December and beyond), and I need to call back a fifth to set one up. I am waiting to hear back from three more, but they're probably tougher to get interviews for so they may just say no, especially since they know I am an Army match. In any case, I already met my expectations of getting interviews in (at least) half of my applications, so I don't really care what the other schools/hospitals say. I have about one percent chance of actually needing to interview with them anyway. I will know about the Army in early December, and if they tell me I'm going to DC or Honolulu, I will have to call back all these programs and tell them to cancel my interviews. Which would, of course, save me a lot of hassle, time, and money. Let's see how it goes.

Strawberry on the Shortcake

This was one of the first Japanese Dramas I ever saw. I think there are 10 episodes. Part of the reason I like watching the J-dramas is that they ARE short. You get that nice feeling of continuity, and then there’s an (admittedly) illogical sense of fulfillment after finishing the series. But with dramas that only last one season, it’s more like watching a really long and involved movie. There’s no more annoying fluff and filler episodes. You just get a highly streamlined story.

Of course, I may like this drama because it was one of the first few I saw. However, it was a really bittersweet, endearing, emotional experience watching this production. I doubt it’s even considered to be one of the premier j-dramas, but I highly recommend it if anyone gets a chance. It really makes you think about people’s personalities, life’s quirks, fate, and love. Plus, it has music by ABBA (opening and closing themes), and it fits so well that you can almost believe the songs were written just for this show. It’s a beautiful, haunting series, definitely worth watching. It made me go out and get a ABBA’s greatest hits CD. Which, incidentally, is not a bad buy. Check out the drama info here. Oh, and if you use torrents (and if you don’t know what I am talking about, I think you need to do some googling) you can go here to download the drama. Hurry up becuse who knows how long people will be seeding/uploading. Unfortunately I do not know of any way to buy it with English subtitles. You’re gonna have to download the free version, but it’s really good quality and has excellent English subtitles.

Therapist in a Box

When I still worked at the bank my friend gave me this Therapist in a Box as a joke. It's got a little timer and a squeeze toy couch and some amusing cards with quotes and booklet on therapy. God knows I needed some therapy when I was working there. Anyway, I was cleaning out the spare bedroom and found it again, and finally got around to reading the booklet and such. I found this quote to be amusing and thought I would share:
"The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they are okay, then it's you."
-Rita Mae Brown, American author and playwright

Is it you??

This is ridiculous. And quite amazing.

I have had this picture on my hard drive for a while, and just rediscovered it. I thought it was an interesting mind-game, so I put it up here. Wrkos pettry wlel deson’t it?

Free telephone calls using your computer

I don’t know how many people ever used Dialpad back when it was free. All you had to do was to click on an ad every so often and you could call anyone in the US for as long as you wanted through your computer. One of the original VOIP services. Nowadays VOIP services tend to be pc to pc, which doesn’t really make any sense to me if you use IM services already. Anyway, I did notice a couple of services which still offer pc to telephone services for free. Voipbuster lets you call for one min to a lot of countries, and for unlimited minutes if you DEPOSIT 5 Euros (6 bucks?) in their account using paypal. If you call free countries (like US and UK, but oddly enough not Canada), you don’t lose your deposit. Supposedly you can only call land lines, but I have called my cell phone from voipbuster and the call was listed as “FREE” and went through. Go figure.

Adcalls, on the other hand, lets you call US and Canada for free, no other strings attached. More in line with the spirits of the free dialpad. Of course, the only reason anyone would have to use it is if their cell phone reception at home sucks (like mine), if they’re running out of minutes, or, of course, to call Canada. Too bad I no longer have any people in Canada I call, but it would be nice not to pay any long distance charges. Quality seems to be decent, and it DOES call cell phones. I had some problem with the volume of my voice being slightly low for the other party, but that may be headset issues on my end.

(Maybe if you’re in Kuwait with internet, either of those options would be viable to limit cell phone costs)

Best Buy or Best Lie?

URL: Best Buy or Best Lie?

Now this is actually something I can very well relate to. Maybe not in the extent that the author in this article did, but at least in wondering about that guy or girl at the door who I KNOW doesn’t care asking me how I am doing. But maybe its a northeast US peeve.. I am sure store greetings work well in countries where the culture demands make such greetings mandatory and expected.

Aspiring Vatican Exorcists

AOL News - It's the First Day of School for Aspiring Vatican Exorcists

Anyone looking for a career change? Classes are now starting!

Wish I Was In Nebraska...

LINCOLN, Nebraska (Oct. 10) - One gas station manager's mistake paid off for drivers who were able to buy fuel for about a tenth of the current price.
For 30 to 45 minutes Friday, three of the Kabredlo's Convenience Store's four pumps sold premium unleaded gas for 29 cents a gallon (6 euro cents a liter) - about a tenth of the current price. Gas hasn't been that cheap since 1955, according to AAA Nebraska.
Until the mistake was caught, lines formed at the store as news of the cheap fuel spread, said Max Wolfe, who was doing landscaping for Kabredlo's.
Wolfe and his co-workers took time out to fill up. "I was on E, and I filled my tank up for $4 (about euro3.30)," Wolfe said. "It made my day."
Nathan Olson said he usually pays $72 (euro60) to fill his gas-guzzling 1998 Ford F-150. On Friday, he filled the tank three-quarters full for $3.50 (euro2.90).
On average, Lincoln gas stations are charging $2.93 a gallon for gas (64 euro cents a liter), according to AAA.

Cops Looking For $1 Million Bill Counterfeiter

Click here to check out this story.

Apparently the police is looking for some guy in Idaho who is trying to pass off a million dollar bill. Oh come on–I can’t even consider that counterfeiting. Its obviously a joke–and who the hell has change for a million anyway? Though i guess if its Idaho, someone may actually believe him.. (If you’re from idaho, then I’m just kidding.)

Jew-Sponsored Stock Car Booed Off Track

Now THIS is newsworthy (onion style)
I wonder if NASCAR and INDY allow religious symbols on cars.. though all that ad-space is probably very expensive and all the cars are corporately sponsored anyway.

Monster モンスター

Animenfo’s blurb on this anime

I don’t think I have ever been as hooked on a series–anime, tv drama, regular television, everything included–as I am when watching an episode of Monster. Despite many other excellent anime I have seen, with the possible exception of Hajime no Ippo, none have been able to capture my attention almost very second of the series as well as Monster has. Exactly what is it about this anime that makes every episode so exciting and thrilling? Perhaps its the fact that it’s about a “renegade” doctor. Or maybe because it’s about a frustrated good versus an oh-so-plausible yet almost supernatural evil. There’s plenty of action, and plenty of suspense. And each episode makes you feel like you’ve learned a new secret... or you’re uncovering a new part of the “conspiracy.” And there’s plenty of intrigue in the inevitable way that different characters end up crossing paths and sharing their pieces of puzzles.

Take for example the last episode I watched. Two characters who were briefly introduced (separately) earlier in the series, a detective and a criminal psychologist/psychoanalyst are interviewing serial killers. Even though they had different roles and information about the monster loose in society, they end up teaming together and discovering that these seemingly unconnected cases all had one deadly link in common: the three serial killers had all killed one person out of their many victims because they were told to by a message consisting of the respective victim’s name in a sandbox in a certain park in Germany. The way its done almost gives you chills. And you have to realize–these people aren’t even the main characters! Those people are busy solving their own mysteries.

Testing.. Testing... Testing....

So I figured this MS Word plugin for blogger seemed like a useful thing to try. Now that I am actually in MS Word, I realize that this doesn’t feel quite as interesting as it does typing in information directly in the webpage designed to be formatted for blog posting. For example, I am confused as to the lack of a title... I guess it will either ask me or I should just make and glorify one here. This also means that I have to personally change the color of my text, etc. This may be a bigger hassle than I thought before… but I have to say, it is nice having autocorrect and autospellcheck/grammercheck. Furthermore, even though I tend to write small blogs, using word does decrease the risk of losing a blog due to browser malfunctions. Assuming I save the blogs I type on Word. At least it has a recovery function.

(image placeholder)(image placeholder)

I wonder if I can actually orient pictures better in posts using Microsoft word…. Hmmm not sure about that… I think I’ll actually need to a WYSIWYG type editor to make it perfect. In any case, enough stalling. Let’s see how this looks when posted.

PS–Apparently it does ask me for the title, and it does NOT handle images yet. At least I can add them after posting.

A cell phone that points to Mecca

THE HAGUE, Netherlands–For Muslims, it’s a high-tech call to prayer. A new cellular telephone generates five automated reminders a day at prayer time and points Muslims in the direction of Mecca.

It also contains a copy of the Islamic holy book, the Quran, in both Arabic and English.

Check out the link.

Now this is crazy, but I am sure it’s gonna sell to its intended audience. But at the same time, if you’re really religious, I am sure you can manage without a cell phone to remind you to pray. Though I guess the compass thing is relatively useful if there’s no mosque in sight.

Gator-guzzling python comes to messy end

This is one messed up fight...

MIAMI–The alligator has some foreign competition at the top of the Everglades food chain, and the results of the struggle are horror-movie messy.

A 13-foot Burmese python recently burst after it apparently tried to swallow a live, six-foot alligator whole, authorities said.

The incident has heightened biologists’ fears that the nonnative snakes could threaten a host of other animal species in the Everglades.

Family Guy Movie Update

Well it will be out in less than one week on DVD.. and it's actually got a lot of extras. Here's the scoop from amazon.com's sales list:

This item will be released on September 27, 2005.

Product Details
Director: Peter Shin, Pete Michels
Encoding: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. This DVD will probably NOT be viewable in other countries. Read more about DVD formats.)
Format: Animated, Color, Closed-captioned
Rated: NR
Studio: Twentieth Century Fox Home Video
DVD Release Date: September 27, 2005
Run Time: 88
DVD Features:
Available subtitles: English, Spanish, French
Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Commentary by creator Seth Macfarlane, cast members, and writers
Bonus uncensored audio track
Animatic comparison
From IMDb: Quotes & Trivia

Description
In this exclusive 88 minute DVD premiere, featuring brand new, never before seen content, Stewie, the maniacal baby genius, is distracted from his plans for world domination when he sees a man who looks just like him on television. Convinced that this man must be his real father (after all, how could he possibly share genetic material with the dimwitted Peter?), Stewie sets off on a cross-country road trip to find him. But his incredible journey leads him to discoveries far more vile and shocking that anything found in his diaper.

Hawaiian Dictionary!

Check this out:

Now you can actually understand the meaning of all those unpronouncable road names!

The Manchurian Candidate

I have watched this movie three times with various people here at Tripler... and I have to say it's one of the most engrossing movies I have seen in a while. I watched the 2004 edition with Denzel, but apparently the 1962 edition with Frank Sinatra is supposed to be excellent as well. Of course, what made the movie more interesting to us was all the army involvement as well as the information about the Medal of Honor. Fascinating stuff, watch it if you get a chance. Hell.. netflix is only like $7.99 right now. And I am hearing stuff about peerflix.com - trading DVDs for .99 cent online. I am not sure how much it would be to mail them though. It seems like the company may give you free mailers, but I don't see how it could be making any money if it does that. On the same account though, I don't even see how netflix can be making any money with their rates. Also, movieflix.com seems interesting for downloading movies legally. This website has some info on the legal movie download sites: http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/kimkomando/2004-09-27-komando_x.htm

USS Crommelin

So two days ago I got to take a tour of one of the Navy frigates, top down. It was really neat... we went all over the ship including the engine rooms, med holds, operations, command center, xo and the captain's quarters, bridge, and on deck to look at the attack and defensive systems. It's good to be an officer in the Navy.. but I can see how much it would suck to be an enlisted. The person showing us around was an E6, the ship Doc/corpsman. He's pretty much the top ranking personnel after the captain and XO. He takes care of everyone on the ship by himself.. minor surgeries to dental work. Since this trip was organized through the department of Psychiatry at Tripler, the doc was trying to show us exactly what psych capabilities he had. Which was pretty much nothing. They had pain medication but very little even in terms of antipsychotics and SSRIs. Somewhat confusing - considering that they would have no way to get more while on a mission in the middle of the ocean.. but I guess they manage somehow. The ships latest missions have been busting drug runners... they destroyed the last ship they captured in front of the apprehended crew members... took them two hours of pummeling it with their cannon. I took pictures including their R2D2 type phalanx defense system. I will try to post them when I get a chance.

Sarkar (2005)

I had a talk with one of my friends about taking Step II (for me) and what to expect on an ADT/things to do before getting there (for him). Helped me docus on how to direct my studying... in the meanwhile, I still managed to make time to watch the new Hindi movie Sarkar... a Ram Gopal Verma film about (surprise) the Mumbai underworld. It's actually inspired by the Godfather, and, surprisingly, is actually an original movie unlike most "inspirations" done by Bollywood which tend to be word-for-word remakes. Though, as my sister pointed out, RGV's films are pretty original historically.

Anyway, the movie was excellent, featuring both Bacchans are father and son. I have to admit, it is kinda cool to have a father and son duo acting together in a movie as father and son. Especially when the father is the greatest movie star ever in Indian cinema history.

Sin City

So I saw the movie last night as it came out on DVD, and it was very different than I expected it to be. It felt like I was watching something out of Max Payne (the video game). VERY cool, very interesting. My sister and I were watching it late last night, staving off our drowsiness. Too bad I didn’t get to see it on the big screen–would have been something. Today’s obligatory movie will be Stealth. I heard it sucked ... but we will see. Movies with Jessica Biel do make me wary though... For example, what exactly was she doing in Blade Trinity??? It was very annoying to find a seventh heaven cast member in a vampire movie of all things.

Lola Renna (1998) Courtesy of amazon.com 

Hooked on Run Lola Run

I any of you have still not seen this movie (Lola Rennt), you SO need to see it. It's short (80 min) German film from 1998. The DVD version does come in English audio, and it's pretty decent, but trust me, you will like the German version a lot better. It was my favorite movie of '98 - mine and Dana's actually (we were both taking German at the time we first saw it). I am sure she'll appreciate it that I showed it last week to a friend of mine and his sister, and they seemed to love it. In fact, my friend was only going to watch for 10 minutes after my insistance, and he ending up watching all of it. And yeah, Dana, it was still great to watch it even now.

Best News Article EVER

How sad... but how sinfully satisfying....

Russia's Spam-King Brutally Murdered

Vardan Kushnir, notorious for sending spam to each and every Russian citizen with e-mail, was found dead in his Moscow apartment on Sunday. He died after suffering repeated blows to the head.

Kushnir, 35, headed the English learning centers the Center for American English, the New York English Centre and the Centre for Spoken English, all known to have aggressive Internet advertising policies in which millions of e-mails were sent every day.

In the past angry Internet users have targeted the American English centre by publishing the Center’s telephone numbers anywhere on the Web to provoke telephone calls. The Center’s telephone was advertised as a contact number for cheap sex services, or bargain real estate sales.

Another attack involved hundreds of people making phone calls to the American English Center and sending it numerous e-mails back, but Vardan Kushnir remained sure of his right to spam, saying it was what e-mails were for.

Under Russian law, spamming is not considered illegal, although lawmakers are working on legal projects that could protect Russian Internet users like they do in Europe and the U.S.

MosNews

Who Says you Need Eyes . . .

Close you Eyes and ... FIGHT! Who needs to see to do a Fatality!

Read this unbelievable article....

Brice Mellen is a whiz at video games such as "Mortal Kombat."

In that regard, the 17-year-old isn't much different from so many others his age.

Except for one thing: He's blind.

And as he easily dispatched foes who took him on recently at a Lincoln gaming center, the affable and smiling Mellen remained humble.

"I can't say that I'm a superpro," he said, working the controller like an extension of his body. "I can be beat."

Those bold enough to challenge him weren't so lucky. One by one, while playing "Soul Caliber 2," their video characters were decapitated, eviscerated and gutted without mercy by Mellen's on-screen alter ego.

"I'm getting bored," Mellen said in jest as he won game after game.

Blind since birth when his optic nerve didn't connect because of Leber's disease, Mellen honed his video game skills over the years through patient and not-so-patient playing, memorizing key joystick operations and moves in certain games, asking lots of questions and paying particular attention to audio cues. He worked his way up from games such as "Space Invaders" and "Asteroid," onto the modern combat games.

"I guess I don't know how I do it, really," Mellen said, as he continued playing while facing away from the screen. "It's beyond me."

Mellen knows this much: He started playing at home when he was about 7.

"He enjoyed trying to play, but he wasn't very good at first," said his father, Larry Mellen. "But he just kept on trying. ... He's broken a lot of controllers."

When the question of broken controllers comes up, Mellen flashes a smile and just shrugs.

"I used to have quite a temper," he said. "Me and controllers didn't get along very well."

Now they get along just fine.

While playing "Soul Caliber 2," Mellen worked his way through the introductory screens with ease, knowing exactly what to click to start the game he wanted.

He rarely asked for help. Once the game started he didn't need any help.

"How do I move?" an exasperated opponent, Ryan O'Banion, asked during a battle in which his character is frozen in place.

"You can't," Mellen answered before finishing him off.

"That's what happens. It's why I don't play him," O'Banion said after his blood-spattered character's corpse vanishes from the screen.

How Mellen became so good is a mystery to his father.

"He just sat there and he tried and tried until he got it right," Larry Mellen said. "He didn't ever complain to me or anyone about how hard it was."

Mellen hangs out any chance he gets at the DogTags Gaming Center in Lincoln, which opened last month. Every now and then someone will come in and think he can easily beat the blind kid.

That attitude doesn't faze Mellen.

"I'll challenge them, maybe. If I feel like a challenge," he said, displaying an infectious confidence. "I freak people out by playing facing backwards."

There's nothing he likes better than playing video games, Mellen said.

He will be a senior in high school next year. After graduation, he plans to take a year off because he wants a break from school.

When he does go to college, Mellen wants to study -- what else? -- video-game design.

Source: Buisness Week

Lazy Friday and More of Narnia

So today was my last day of procrastinating. I had to pick up my sister from Philly, but my dad ending up driving, so I just accompanied him. It gave me a chance to read more of the Narnia Chronicles.. I am almost done with the last book - I think about 50 pages to go. I'll finish that in the next hour and finally be done... I have to say, I remembered almost NOTHING from this series - it's like reading it for the very first time. I can easily see all of the novels being turned into movies. Since they're so short, you could probably make two or three movies encompassing all seven of them.

Since I was near my "basement", after we picked up my sister we went to my place. I had to pick up something I had accidentally left behind on Sunday, and I also managed to pick up a few study guides. Too many books to read, but it's nice to have them just in case. Maybe I whould get an early night's sleep to prepare for tomorrow... but somehow I doubt that will happen. I can always watcha movie instead - Sin City? A Hindi movie? My sister bought a few that she wants me to see. I, in turn, want her to watch The Family Guy movie (hilarious, as I mentioned, though I wonder if it will be R rated - I can't wait to watch it in theater!), and a DVD I made of her and my parents' trip to California last year. It came out pretty well, though I didn't do any editing and stuff. It's just too bothersome to any cleaning up and soundtracks and so on... Though since most of the video is from a car, it already comes with its own soundtrack :)

Family Guy Movie

So I saw the Family Guy Movie yesterday and it was hilarious–as expected. What I didn’t realize until a few minutes ago was that it won’t be released for another two months... that’s kinda weird.. though I am very glad I got to see it. That’s also where I got my blog name (Grind my gears)... you’ll see in due time :)

Here’s a couple of related links:
IMDB Entry
Leaked Movie

Playing Doctor: Responding to Tom Cruise's psychiatry rant.

I found this great article at slate.msn.com
I am posting it here:

Playing Doctor
Responding to Tom Cruise’s psychiatry rant.
Posted Thursday, July 28, 2005, at 3:35 AM PT


Get “Dear Prudence” delivered to your inbox each week; click here to sign up. Please send your questions for publication to prudence@slate.com. (Questions may be edited.)

Dear Prudie,
After hearing Tom Cruise’s ignorant and uninformed rant about psychiatry being a “pseudoscience,” I had to write. Unfortunately, too many people listen to the opinions of celebrities and take them as gospel. Tom Cruise’s irresponsible preaching could harm many people and increase the stigma our society already attaches to those with mental-health issues. I respect your support of the mental-health fields, so I hope this message can get to those folks who need help but are afraid to get it because of people like Mr. Cruise, who have easy access to the media. I am a licensed clinical psychologist currently providing care for our nation’s military. I could only stare in disbelief at Mr. Cruise’s announcement that psychiatric disorders “can be treated with exercise and vitamins.” Part of a soldier’s job is to exercise and be healthy, including taking vitamins as appropriate, and let me tell you, those things have never “cured” a psychiatric disorder yet. Tell a soldier with post-traumatic stress disorder that exercise and vitamins will “cure” him, and he’ll walk out of your office and continue suffering. Tell a suicidal young mother that exercise and vitamins will “cure” her, and you will leave her feeling just as hopeless as when she walked in. I don’t know what “research” Mr. Cruise is reading that tells him there is no such thing as a chemical imbalance, but I suspect it is more of L. Ron Hubbard’s. Talk to any reputable neurologist; it is not Mr. Cruise who can read the results of PET scans or functional MRIs. For those of you out there who are suffering from depression, anxiety, PTSD, or any other mental-health disorder, please don’t listen to the preaching of celebrities who claim to be experts in mental health. Seek help from a licensed mental health provider. Contact your HMO, NAMI (the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill), or talk to your family doctor for a referral. There are affordable mental-health options in every community.

—M.D., Ph.D

Dear M.,
Prudie seldom runs comment letters like yours, but it seemed worth doing in light of the massive publicity given to this particular actor’s pronouncements. We must hope that thoughtful people do not take their medical directives from celebrities who have ties to a religion or a cult, however one wishes to see it. And of course Prudie is a lay person, but jumping up and down on a couch—on television—did suggest that this young man was, at the very least, manic.

—Prudie, consequentially

(copyrighted to its respective owners/Dear Prudie/MSN)

And a picture of me in my uniform - served as a sort of interview picture, but I need to snap a better one to email the secretaries of all the people I interviewed with at Walter Reed. 

Convoys in downtown DC... that was an interesting sight to see.. You can see Jared on the left taking pictures of the procession as well. 

No, this picture is NOT altered 

First Blog Day

I'm not sure if I am even going to use this, but I guess I am going to have to make a first entry. I have about 19 days left to study for Step 2, and I haven't really started yet. Hopefully, tomorrow I should be able to start... A lack of a car makes my plans of driving to Piscataway to study at the school library very unrealistic. Thankfully, I do have some study material here... Let's see how it goes.

It was definitely fun being at Walter Reed for 4 weeks, and even though it was low stress, the hours were a lot longer than I expected. I guess I should have realized that I'd need a few days to just do nothing before I could start studying again. Though it is a little weird to be staying at home, and knowing I will be here for another five months instead of being in Cherry Hill. I am glad though, because I can worry less about food and other items when staying with family. With Henry staying at my place, I don't mind dropping by when needed to pick up things. I am still paying one-third of the rent there for the rest of the year, as it is.

It'll be sad to go back down to DC from now on since Jared's been moved to Kuwait. No matter who else I could stay with, Jared was always nice to have to visit and crash over when needed. Though thankfully Dana is still in the area and, in her own words, why do I need other friends to visit when I can have "quality instead of quantity." I guess she is right to a certain degree - as I have known her for seven years now (I can't believe its been that long already) and she's always happy to hang out with me. Plus, as Marc is now working, he is also a stable presence in that area, and I have to say I really enjoyed hanging out with him, and I am glad that He, Dana, and I got to spend my last day in DC together.

Oddly enough, it's more fun than I thought it would be to write my thoughts on here. However, I really doubt I will have meaningful things to say everyday. There's a reaosn I don't keep a jouranl.. though I do think I tried a few times... (I wonder what happened to those entries??) No wonder Scott's been having fun with his blog on xanga. But I guess he's actually doing something cool while secluded from the rest of us. It makes perfect sense to use a blog on a VERY long World Tour. I think he said he was in Vietnam (Ho Chi Minh City) last I talked to him... I wonder if he ever went to Cambodia.

Anyway, time for lunch (brunch).