Le Blogger

Quick, short update---the car has been bought! Pictures to follow soon...time to start thinking of a suitable name for my new car!! Suggestions?

Check out this cute little game . Needs several tries to get win. Basically choose the right sequence for placing objects on the world to guide the hero to victory! A great site for finding little games to play is Jay is . Still haven't gotten a car...need mobility.

This is so bad its milk up my nose funny. More amazingly my dad actually sent them to me, and to just about everyone he knows (I think). Good sense of humour dad! Speaking of bad English, check out www.engrish.com . Remember, whenever you visit a non-English speaking country, be on the lookout for funnies. This isn't us being mean and trying to make fun of other people (well it is actually sort of), but sometimes its really funny! I'm sure we can find some Chinese or Japanese in America that just doesn't make sense either...but of course, its not as common, since English is the most spoken language in the world.

Went to say goodbye to my car. I learned to drive with this car! It's too bad I have to let it go as it's time is up. What an amazing car though! Look at the mileage. The engine was fine too up until the last minute. I called it Shadowfax because it was white and at its age could easily still hit 80+ mph on the highways. Of course, the real King of Horses wouldn't look as dirty, hehe, but then, I'm no real Gandalf either.

This is not a good week. Yesterday as I was on my way to the airport to pick up a new student, my car died. Fortunately I had enough sense to steer towards the curb when the car suddenly started shaking extremely violently. Not entirely sure what the problem was with all that shaking, as no warning signals had lighted up nor was the engine temperature too high. I decided to restart. And could not. Thank God for the invention of the cellphone! Of course, I think another divine intervention also delayed the flight of the new student, so my replacement picker-upper arrived an hour before the student did, but my car's bust. And living in the outbacks (as compared to NY) without a car I'm as good as useless. Can't go anywhere except my kitchen, and the fridge is unfortunately rather empty-looking. Bummer. Good time to have lots of friends with cars. Hopefully I'll know what to do about a car in the next few days. Aiya.

I'm totally stunned...this site is great. Basically they have pictures of urinals from all over the world! Check it out! www.urinals.net . I have to say, I'm pretty picky about urinals. I don't think I could go at some of these, it's just nastiness. I dunno, if things were that urgent, I'd probably rather piss in my pants than stand in front of some of them. Others are just way cool. I would probably drink lots of water just to be able to say, hey I pissed there! Imagine, going to the Vatican and using the Pope's personal urinal! Or his toilet even! You know, you could boast, "I plopped a good one in the Holy Father's!" There does seem to be a site about toilets too. Here .

I've been meaning to put these up for some time. These pics were taken before Wang Chien-ming moved up to the Major Leagues to pitch for the Yankees. He happened to stop by Durham to play the AAA Durham Bulls, and so several of us decided to support our Taiwanese star! He really packs a punch with those pitches and has such a calm, cool control. We are all really proud of his achievements. Here he is in the bullpen prior to the start of the game, and chatting/ giving autographs afterwards! And some may think the flag is sort of "tu (dirt)," but I think there's nothing wrong with it! It's Tai-kuh, in a good way!

I'm reading the biography of John Bardeen, co-inventor of the transistor and co-author of the BCS theory of superconductivity. He won a Nobel Prize in Physics for each of these discoveries, making him the only person ever to win two Nobels in the same category. The book is "True Genius---The Life and Science of John Bardeen" by Hoddeson and Daitch. He's not as well known to the public as Einstein or Feynman, but his contributions to science are up there with the greats. Here's a quote that I find very wise, from a man not known for saying much. People have said about Bardeen, "he doesn't say much, but when he does say something, you pay attention." "I feel that science cannot provide an answer to the ultimate questions about the meaning and purpose of life. With religion, one can get answers on faith. Most scientists leave them open and perhaps unanswerable, but do abide by a code of moral values. For civilized society to succeed, there must be