San Servolo #1

Well, it seems this year I have to start preparing early for conference season, but if all goes well it really is going to be worth it. The first one on the line is a small one taking place in a small island near Venice, called San Servolo (the island, not the conference).
I am really exited at the opportunity of going to Italy, since I haven't gone back since leaving it behind me 14 years ago, only there's a small problem: the student admission fee is 150 Euros, while board and lodging is another 650 - that's a lot. My prof. told me to write a letter to the organizing prof. and ask him to cut me some slack and grant me "financial support".
On one hand, my prof. has the money - he's just cheap, and it really makes me uncomfortable writing and asking for support, but on the other hand, the prof. doesn't owe me anything, does he? It's not like he has any obligation to send me abroad, right?

In any case, I updated my CV, and sent it along with the letter and the registration form. All that's left is crossing my fingers.

More then meets the eye indeed

My generation, if you'll allow me for a moment to speak in very general terms, seems to be comprised of people who hate transformers, and people who love them. Obviously, I love them, like any self respecting geek, and that's why I'm quite exited about this post. Check this out:



Well, that's not all.
Some dude figured out that "In the Transformers movie trailer between :37 and :39 the frame shows "Sector Seven Org" at the top and "Takara 83" at the bottom. If you go to SectorSeven.org and type in takara83 as your password you are treated to a screen full of mess. It looks like a person's desktop and clicking on the exclamation mark on the dock brings up a video sequence where a Lt. Col. Powers talks about discovering a "blip."

If you want you can go straight here, to bypass the super-secret-password-screen. I know it all seems pretty childish, but the site is pretty cool (although not very informative). I guess as the movie release date gets closer, they intend to update it with more info...

Short #2 (I told you more were coming)

Obviously you read my last post, and diligently followed the links, and watched all the pretty videos. So now, just for you, because you deserve it:

SPOILER ALERT: do NOT watch it before you see the videos linked in the last post!

Will it blend?

I really don't know why blenders seem so cool to me, how much do you really use a blender, really? Maybe during the first few weeks or two after you buy a new one, you drink a few smoothies to quench you thirst while also trying to justify the expense, but after all - It's just a kitchen utensil, like a stove or a can opener.

Now forget everything, and take a look at what Blendtec is offering. No, it not a hoax, it really is a blender that costs 825.00$, and it really is equipped with a 1500-watt motor. This beast is able to vaporize a bag of marbles, or a huge stack of ballpoint pens, and lately it even crushed an Ipod! See for yourselves (under "don't try this at home").

I think that settles it then - until there is a stove that can turn hockey pucks into dust, or a can opener that can crack a nutcracker, the blender remains the undeniable king of all kitchen utensils.

James Kim

At first I didn't really think about writing something about him. There's already so much stuff about his story on the net: news articles, pieces written by his friends, family and coworkers, and bloggers too - people like me that hadn't even met the guy but only followed his work.
Thing is, it dawned on me that only net-geeks like me really knew anything about him, as events were unfolding I tried desperately to find someone to talk to about this (flesh and blood, not a virtual-over-the-net kind of someone). I guess in America things might be a little different - it's such a "juicy" story, tragic, smelling of "family life", yet without a gory aftertaste - I bet American television had a field day with it; but here in Israel I couldn't find anyone who knew anything, and no one even reported anything, not even a little post on Ynet or anything.
In any case, I hope I've got you interested enough to devote the next five minutes of your day to read a bit about what happened to him, his wife, and their two kids. I'm not going to give you a play-by-play of what happened, as I said, there's so much already out there, I'm just going to give you a few links I deemed good enough for you two skim through:

First of all, Wikipedia. It gives a good overview of the whole ordeal. In case they take it down, you can read a bit it in this articles from the NYTimes. C|Net wrote a lot about him, he was working there at the time, so their pages are the most emotionally compelling: this one is a news update from when they found his wife and kids, and this one is from when they found him.
C|Net also has a nice "In memoriam" article dedicated to James, which includes a small video.

If, after all of this, a benevolent philanthropic mood strikes you, you can donate some money to the "James Kim Memorial Fund", so his girls can go to college when they're old enough, and the family can cover the expenses of the costly search-and-rescue helicopter-missions.

It's alive! ALIVE!

A while back I got this link sent to me, and while I was able to enjoyed it, I didn't find anything that really made me jump out of my seat. I know I need a new thumbdrive, because all I've been using for the last two years has been an old 256MB PQI specimen, but when today I ran into the following clip - I knew I had found its replacement:



All that's left is flying to Tokyo to pick one out, or maybe just settle for this diamond-encrusted thing of beauty (it's true what they say - people gold-plate anything nowadays...).

I would totally use that!

Having a well thought-out industrial design is one of our modern society's most understated virtues. How many products have you skipped over in the past, only because you didn't think they were easy enough to use, how many have you decided not to buy because they were too intricate, or didn't serve their purpose well enough? Me? I really like innovative designs, just as long as the innovation has a clear intention - when designers have simple solutions to every day's simple problems - that's when they've hit the nail on its head.
Case and point - check this thing out. He's designed other thing as well, but the "ROLLERtoaster" is just a stroke of genius.

Update: It took me a while to remember where I had seen this piece of crap, but what a great counterexample. Honestly, did you ever feel like you would need a dual-screen phone? Don't get me wrong - surfing the web on a tiny screen sucks, but this phone doesn't even get close to solving that problem, it just creates a new one (having to hide every time you need to make a phone call, to avoid being made fun of).

Short #1 (more to come, I think)

I love Seinfeld, the show much more then the guy (which I think is a bit of a jerk). Anyway, I found this short SNL clip - even if you only know a little bit about Seinfeld, and even less about OZ, you'll still be able to appreciate it just as much as I did:

The Zen of surfing

On days like these, when you feel like crawling back to bed and starting over, it's nice to have a way to pass the time without too much of a mental effort - vegging out, if you will. Here's a very partial list of my "OMG, I really need a brake!!" bookmarks:

1. Cuteoverload.com - I try to visit it at least once or twice a month, it's such a special site. I just get such a warm and fuzzy feeling every time, it's amazing.
2. Thinkgeek.com - Because what's better then to shop around for stuff that's really cool, although way too expensive and quite stupid and unnecessary?
3. Google Earth - I know, it's not a site. Still, hand's down one of the better ways to get a break during a busy day. When was the last time you visited the Great Pyramids, Sydney and the Tour Eiffel, all on the same day?
4. Homer Simpsons quotes: This site has been in my favorites for god knows how long, but every time I go there - I mean, how can you not laugh at: "It's true... I'm a rageaholic! I just can't live without rageahol!"
5. Allposters.com - I'm telling you, one day I'll order 10000 posters, and that will make all those hours I spent here worth while.
6. Catsthatlooklikehitler.com and Stuffonmycat.com - Just because I'm a dog-person doesn't mean I don't like to make fun of cats. These are two very weird sites...
   

Well, I'm not in the mood for continuing so I guess that's it for today. Good night to me, and may we all have more fruitful days (especially them). Amen.

Linux ramblings

I've toyed with linux for the past few years, just for the fun of it I've sampled Mandrake (now Mandiva), Suse and Ubuntu.
Most times, I end up getting rid of it after a few days, because I just don't see the point - I know it's "cooler", and I know it runs smoother, and I know it's safer, but to tell you the truth I'm happy with my Xp install. I can do everything on it, even gaming, and I don't feel like it's too slow, or unsafe or anything.
Still, there is one thing I really liked last time I installed Suse - after installing XGL, I installed Compiz (now called Beryl), which is a program that let's you use amazing 3D effects on your desktop. Nevermind if you don't understand, the only thing I can tell you the end product looked beautiful!
To cut a long story short, I decided a while ago I wanted to give the new version of Ubuntu a shot, but I was kinda bummed I wouldn't be able to have the same cool effects again. Well - turns out I was very wrong, because I found a few how-two's for installing xgl\beryl on ubuntu.
I can't say I'm done yet, but just so you understand, take a look at what the end-product should look like:



If you want that kind of eye-candy too, all I can say is it's not as hard as you might think. First all get Ubuntu, and then check this tutorial and this wiki. If in the middle of the process you get frustrated, don't hesitate to drop me a line - moral support will only be a few minutes away...

Solving maths problems neither Newton nor Pythagoras could conquer

Although it might not be quite complicated a problem as Fermat's last theorem, it nevertheless is a famous one: what do you get when you divide something by zero? Well, "nullity" is what you get if you ask Dr James Anderson, from the University of Reading's computer science department. He calls what he came up with "a theorem", but it seems all he really did is invent a new symbol. According this article, the new concept has already made it into the school system in the UK, so I wonder when will we hear about it in Israel...
The funniest thing about all of this, is a quote given in the article, where Dr. Anderson tries to justify spending his time on such a stupid subject:

"Imagine you're landing on an airplane and the automatic pilot's working," he suggests. "If it divides by zero and the computer stops working - you're in big trouble. If your heart pacemaker divides by zero, you're dead."

Is that the best he can do? Really?
If you have a spare minute, and Realplayer installed, open the article and check the video links there.

Basketball stats shown live on players' shirts

Think about it, don't dismiss the idea so quickly, try to visualize it: it's a shirt that has all kinds of numbers and colorful bars, that can tell you stats about the player (see image on the right).
I read this whole article about it, and the more I think about it, the less practical it gets: the way it's configured now, the player has to actually play with an iPod-sized device strapped on, and the shirt itself doesn't really feel like a normal shirt at all, but it's more of a synthetic mesh of polyester and electronics. You know, even if they did succeed in incorporating everything into a regular shirt (which i don't think would happen in a million years), and let's even say the players them selfs start using them and reading stats off one-another, what would make them think anyone in the crowd would be able to read those tiny figures off of the player's shirt?
As much as the idea sounds cool at first, it feels highly improbable....

http://www.chacha.com/

I found a new search engine. Now, I know, you'll ask me "why would you need anything but google?" - well, this engine gives you the chance to chat with a "guide" that helps you find what you where looking for. It sounds weird, so I tried it : I typed "Roy Rubin" and what I got was a chat window. This is the conversation that followed:

JessicaB: Welcome to ChaCha!
JessicaB: Hello!
You: Yeah?
JessicaB: What would you like to know about Roy Rubin?
You: I saw a post about this engine and i wanted to search for something to see what it's all about
You: so i typed my own name
You: are you really getting payed to search with me?
JessicaB: Yes.
You: wow
JessicaB: Are you a famous Roy Rubin?
You: not really, though my mother think i might be some day. where's the money behind all of this?
JessicaB: Do you mean how do we get paid?
JessicaB: Sorry, the system is lagging this morning.
You: no, i mean, what's the business model behind this weird site... only adds? that's it?
JessicaB: Well, I know we are paid through the advertising, but let me send you a link to the owner's site.
JessicaB: The fifth link is for ChaCha's owner.
You: are you all English speakers? or do you have international staff as well?
JessicaB: As you can see, he has many companies.
JessicaB: The requirement right now states you must speak English.
You: yeah but what if i wanted help with something in hebrew?
JessicaB: Hopefully in the future, the will have multilingual guides.
You: cool
JessicaB: Right now we are still in Beta testing.
You: well, i should be going...
JessicaB: The biggest thing right now is to get the system working smoothly and build the database.
You: i guess
JessicaB: Okay, have a great day!
You: you too!
JessicaB: Thanks for using ChaCha! I hope you had a great search experience!

I'm really speechless. Try it yourselves and tell me what you got!
Oh, and by the way, here is the link she gave me to the guy behind this peculiar enterprise.

Update: after spending the last 24 hours trying to think of a good search topic, one I wasn't able to tackle on my own, I can't seem to get anyone to guide me any more! All I get is a laconic message telling me that "all chacha guides are currently searching with others". Deam it.

Shaking clean the residues of older definitions

There's a Douglas Adams quote I ran into a while back that goes: “I seldom end up where I wanted to go, but almost always end up where I need to be”. I feel like this quote might just be the theme of this post.

When I decided to jump back on the blog-writing-horse, I was sure I'd delete everything and start from scratch. Now that I'm here though, I can't do it - I love these post, I remember how cathartic it felt writing them, and I just can't see what was the thinking behind the decision to delete them.
So, since I am now NOT going to delete them, this post is going to be split into two main sections: The main purpose of the first section will be giving all those past-posts a nice ending, sort of, and perhaps allowing me to have a certain sense of closure. The second part, as you might already be suspecting, will be about starting anew, giving this blog a fresh new direction, shaking clean the residues of older definitions.

I. My mother died about two months ago. I'm pretty sure I would have mentioned it anyway, but since I've written about her getting sick, I feel obligated to write about it. The whole week leading up to her passing away, was one of the worst weeks I had ever had. We all felt it was coming, she was asleep most of the time, and very hazy (at best) when she was awake. Then there was the funeral, and the shiv'a.
The funeral was beautiful, as much as a funeral could be under those circumstances, and the only thing I can say about what came later is that I had a lot of fun. Enjoying the shiv'a really took me by surprise - I really didn't know what to expect - but it was nice, spending all that time at home, doing nothing most of the day, talking to friends later in the evening. I guess my experience was much different then dad's or Neomi's, and I do feel blessed not to have had to endure what they went through, especially Neomi - she had a continuous stream of people coming in, dozens.
I guess I have to talk about school and the work at the lab too, I've ranted so much about it I should say a few words. It might be just a question of me having a streak of good days, but lately I feel better about all of this: Finishing the degree doesn't seems like such a daunting task any more, and the work at the lab, well - let's just say that the prof. will be here and here during the next two months, so I have some breathing space to unwind and take care of myself and my work, first and foremost.
That's it then.

II. I don't think I'll write personal stuff anymore, not anywhere near what I've written till now. I guess if something major happens I'll drop a line or two, but nothing more then that. The era for all that touchy-feely crap has hereby ended.
What I will write about, is stuff I encounter everyday on the net. Let me explain: I surf a lot, a big bunch of different sites, and I would really like a place where I can just through all those links, and come back to them later on. As it stands, I'm doing this mostly for myself (that much hasn't changed :-)), but I get the feeling if you visit once in a while, you might find something amusing that you've overlooked during your surfing experiences.

P.S. I will also start writing posts that are much MUCH shorter, so don't let that worry you...

Addictions

Wow, a whole month has passed. I don’t know where to begin.

Actually I have an idea on how to begin: the reason I didn’t write for such a long time is because NOT writing is very addictive. First you decide not to write every day, then you somehow reach the idea that you should write only if you have something to say, and even more so, only when you feel like it –what’s the point after all. Then, a whole month passes by – and in my case – I’m not very surprised.

I have a very addictive personality – once I find a good pub, or a great diner, I go there every time, until something disturbs the equilibrium and I don’t like it anymore – either the pub gets too crowded or my favorite bartender quits, or the diner gets new menus and cancels my favorite deep-fried dish.

The thing that’s becoming most troubling is that I think I’ve become addicted to laziness. I’m sure I’m not the first 25-year-old who stills lives with his parents, and I know I have mitigating circumstances on my side, but still, it really bothers me.

I’m also doing badly at school, either because I hate what I’m studying or I’m just lazy and don’t study enough (or at all) – I have a “find a shortcut first” kind of attitude towards it that I can’t shake off. I just want to move on.

And my job! Working in this lab is drilling a hole through my heart inch by inch. I’d give a lung to anyone willing to provide me with a 9-to-5 job which pays well enough for me to start living independently, and I’d throw in a kidney if that job takes me so far away from here I’d have to learn a new language. That actually ties in with me feeling lazy - maybe I should get off my fat butt and find myself that kind of a job. Isn’t that what a sane human being would do?

I just know that, for whatever reason, this isn’t going to happen soon, and that for now I’m stuck.

I didn't even get any cheese!

Well, my last semester is about to begin, and I already know it's gonna be horrible. I have about 3 billion courses, because I have to make up for credits lost on last year's slack-off. For now, I still have to write a paper for a course on the history of basic chemical terms: it was an interesting enough class, but I really have to stretch my bullshiting skills in order to pull this last requirement off...

Monday and Tuesday I spent in Tel-Aviv, visiting the 71st Meeting of the Israeli Chemical Society. Most lectures were, at best, bearable, and on the really boring ones I read a book, hiding behind the meeting's booklet. By the way, "The Kite Runner" is a very engaging book - it might be devastatingly depressing at times, but being so easy to read, I always managed to get to the uplifting parts rather quickly. Anyway, going back to the lectures, the last lecture I attended was one given by Prof. P. Atkins. It was really great, finally witnessing academical greatness, or maybe I was just star – struck by the guy who wrote my second-year textbook on physical chemistry…
After that lecture, I ran out to meet Daniel, a friend of mine from the big city (doesn’t every Jerusalemite have at least one?). To those who don't know, this is what the streets of Tel-Aviv look like:






















I always get lost; I don't think I ever had a positive experience navigating these streets. Well, this time I managed to find my way rather rapidly, thanks to the guiding voice of Daniel, which curiously enough was to blame for getting me lost in the first place.
After 30 minutes of navigating, I had the pleasure of meeting Katia, his Finnish girlfriend, which is a really smart, pleasant and good looking girl. I refuse to let it eat me from the inside out. For now, I’m managing to be happy for him and that’s it. My time will come, won’t it?

I'd rather have an enema

T'is the season of exams and term-papers, here at the Hebrew University. I HATE exams: I'm really bad at studying properly, and so I tend to not do so well in classes that really need you to sit on your ass; like advanced organic chemistry, which I already failed once.
I've spent all of this week, trying to study - I took time off the lab, and I told the other-job people that I won't translate anything this week, but all I was left with is a lot of free time to play basketball and Texas Hold'em with friends. @#%*@%&#. I hate school, I feel 14 again.
At least I have something to look forward too: Thursday in Tel-Aviv, the Israeli basketball league is holding the semi-finals for the cup tournament. My sister and I already have tickets, I'm sooo exited - all there's left is for Hapoel to play well. Oh, and the NBA All-star weekend is only a few days away! I don't think I'll watch the rookies challenge game, cause I might have a date on Friday night, but I sure am going to watch the all-star game on Sunday.

Adidas Stabil 6 Red

I will get to the shoes in a minute...

My D-link router died last night after a week-long struggle, and after about a year and a half of working for us. I have no bones to pick with D-link about the router - I bought it when home-office-small-routers where only starting to appear and were really costly, and it did serve me well, apart from the occasional disconnection. On the other hand, it didn't give me a good enough reason to buy D-link again, so when faced with new competition I decided to invest in a 3Com router, this time around. It took me about 30 minutes to get it working. It would actually have taken me 5 minutes, but I had some problems with the ADSL modem I have. Well, all's well now, and life can go on. Happy ending at last.

On a different subject - It seems my impromptu-second-job I undertook, translating for a tourism site, is not gonna be so easy to ditch. I really want a new video card, but the money this month was invested in the router, and paying back people from last month. I guess I'll do it for at least another month. I should have expected that forgoing a second income would be difficult...

About the shoes - I won a competition on TV! The Israeli sports channel - channel 5 - chooses a lucky winner from all the people who phone in and pick an MVP in the weekly basketball game they choose to air. I phoned in when they showed the Rishon vs. Ramat Gan game (which was really good and ended in overtime), and chose a guy called Omar Snid. Turns out I was picked to recieve 400 NIS to spend on adidas shoes, a sucky MP3 player, and a pair of sunglasses.
I had to add a few shekels to get the adidas shoes I mention but they are really worth it! Aren't they beautiful?

Flixonase Aqueous Nasal Spray

It's been about 10 days - I'm sick with some kind of throat infection and I've been spending all my time at home. I've started taking antibiotics and some kind of spray (above mentioned), for now the fever is gone and only the nasty cough and flam have remained for me to cope with.
The positive part of the ordeal is that for the past week I've started translating for the job I took. I don't really agree with the enterprise since all we do is rip off different local sites, and they're not even paying that well... I guess I'll do it for a month, or until I have enough to buy a decent video card - I really want to play F.E.A.R.
Hapoel had a great game yesterday, beating by 12 a team from Belgrade. It feels like things are looking up for us underdogs. I even bought tickets for me and my sister to the Israeli final four. I do hope we get there because I hate scalping tickets.

Sometime life feels like a bad song

Since I can't link from the title - this one might be appropriate for this post.

On one hand, I don't like writing about really serious stuff that's going on with me, I guess I'm not really used yet to venting on-line. On the other hand, I do feel there's room for it - feeling like I'm sharing my troubles with people out there might be nice.

My mother has cancer. She discovered a lump about 8 years ago, was operated, and recovered. All was well, until about 2 years ago, when she started having back pains. Now – the cancer has spread around her back and onto her liver.

The hospital where she undergoes chemotherapy referred her and my dad to a psychologist, which after a couple of session with them decided she wants to talk to me too. Well, I’ve never seen a psychologist, and I was kind of intrigued at the prospect.

She is really nice, more then you’d expect is common of therapists (after all empathy should be implied, right?). When I talked to her, and especially when she talked, you could see how she felt from little facial expressions she’d make. For example, I could anticipate she might say something meaningful, because a second before she’d sort of wrinkle her nose. I really liked that. Let’s close the subject for now with that…

Oh, I have a job interview today. It’s just a part-time thing, translating Italian web-sites to Hebrew for a tourism site. I bet I can do it from home – and make my folks help me with some of it. I’d be nice having a second income – the lab just doesn’t quite support my lavish lifestyle...