mahalo.

this is a trip. weeiiiird optical illusion.

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn7564

Actually, possibly a newly formed solar system.

What a pain. Don’t use it. You’d think that with all these mortgage banks “competing” to get your business, you’d get better rates, closing costs, and monthly payments. Instead, I’m getting back some of the worst numbers I’ve seen when compared against the Mortgage Watch in the SJ Mercury and ING Direct.

The best part, is when the loan agents call you each time you reject one of their offers. The typical message left behind will be something like “Hi David, my name is … from … and I just noticed that you rejected one of our offers from LendingTree.com. Please give me a call, I’m sure I can beat any offer out there.” Negotiation to get a better offer is fine, but when you know that you’re going to be against at least four other companies out there in a side-by-side comparison, you’d think that they’d make a better effort to put a reasonable offer on the table. Which is why I won’t call them back. I don’t want to have to fight tooth-and-nail to reach a point where they give me terms that I find reasonable compared to the market.

The other thing is, when they list closing costs, they list things like underwriting fees, attorney fees, and a few other fees, but they leave out the biggest ones, like, title insurance, title transfer, odd days interest… items that are $500+ items on their own. And plus, their quoted APR is AFTER you pay for points, which adds a couple of thousand to the closing costs as well.

Which is why I’m just leaning towards ING. They have good numbers, they flat out state the monthly payment, and they have a full list of closing costs and an explanation of what each one is. And, in general, they just seem like they’re more interested in making customers happy by beating the competition.

Buying real estate is a pain in the butt. All kinds of sleaze all over the place.

good mileage for the weekend.

on saturday, i went up to the city, attempting to visit an open house for an apartment. unfortunately, traffic was so bad that i ended up getting there half an hour late, so that was that.

the good news was, that put me right on schedule to go to the OASES charity poker tournament across the bay in oakland. but unlike my final two table performance last year, i only survived one table merge before getting knocked out. my first hand really hurt me. i had QQ and another guy had AA and all the cards that came out were low (no face cards), so it was hard to figure out exactly what he had. he raised by a pretty good amount pre-flop, but bet fairly modestly after that… especially since it was the first hand, it was tough to tell if he was just holding big slick or something. oh well, i probably should have forced the issue earlier when 7,8,9 came out on the flop. if you guess that he had a high card, that probably wouldn’t have done much for him.

after that, i went to berkeley and got some naan n curry for dinner… that was pretty good until i decided, “hey, i’m done with my east bay stint early enough to go sub for an ice hockey game.” so i drove down from berkeley to my house to pick up my gear, and then down to logitech ice for a game. it was probably a good thing i showed up too, because with me, our team only had 10 skaters (2 lines is relatively short benched in ice). i’m happy to say that i scored the first goal of the game and the game-winning goal for an overall 3-2 victory.

one thing i’ve learned about too many hockey players over the course of these 4 years or so playing in leagues. many of them have very skewed perceptions and active imaginations when watching their team play. you’ll hear all kinds of whiners seeing things that didn’t happen. i know every sport has their overprotective parent, but really, hockey is just filled with an unbelievably large number of babies. especially on teams that are doing poorly… it’s like they need to find someone else to blame it on.

the one play that i’m thinking about is set up with a puck sitting on the boards. one of their guys and i are charging for it in opposite directions, so we’re headed right towards each other. i reach out with my stick (left arm) to poke at it, and then he runs into my stick/arm. so if you can imagine, he’s wedged between my body and my stick, and my stick is wedged between his body and the boards. so with my body’s momentum, it basically gives him a pretty nasty clothesline. man… his team wouldn’t have the end of it. i heard that the goalie was yelling that i hacked the back of his head with my stick. nevermind that the stick hit the front of his neck and that i promptly dropped my stick. then while he was down, we scored. i mean hey, sucks for him, but both refs were looking right at it and they know as well as i did - i did nothing wrong on that play. maybe the other team would have preferred that i lay into him instead. then at least his body wouldn’t have been caught on my stick.

anyways. back to the driving.

after the game, i had to get up early sunday for my sister’s graduation in davis. that meant setting the alarm for 5AM and beginning the drive at 6. For whatever reason, I thought it was going to take around 2.5 hr to get there. turns out it only took 1 hr 45 min. at least i saved my family some good seats.

graduation over, went to get lunch, and headed home and crashed from 6 to 9. that’s it. about 400 miles covered over two days… tired.

i hadn’t been to the optometrist in about 2 years before this may. finally i go and get a new pair of contacts. wouldn’t you know, tonight during my game, i turned my head a little too quick and one of my new contacts flew out of my eye! i guess it’s a good thing i have a spare set, but i’m not comfortable living without a backup plan!

From time to time, the hosts of the radio show Love Line, Adam Corolla and Dr Drew, play this game called “Germany and Florida,” where callers call in with bizarre news stories and Adam and Dr Drew are supposed to figure out whether the story took place in Germany and Florida. The premise is there is a concentration of strange stories in these two locations. Well, looks like the Schindlers are still at it:
Terry Schiavo autopsy

“Their report shows what we have said — that Terri was not terminal,” said the Schindlers’ attorney, David Gibbs. “Terri Schiavo was not in an end-of-life situation. The decision was made to end her life, and we believe it was done in a barbaric manner.”

This is in response to the medical report which stated:

A report from a neuropathologist who served as a consultant to the autopsy said Schiavo’s brain was “grossly abnormal and weighed only 615 grams (1.35 pounds).” That weight is less than half of that expected for a woman of her age
[…]
Schiavo’s brain damage “was irreversible, and no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss of neurons,” Thogmartin said.

He said, the vision centers of her brain were dead, meaning she was blind. And his examination showed she would have been unable to take nourishment by mouth because of the danger she might aspirate the food.

But without removal of the feeding tube, and if conditions such as pneumonia and urinary tract infections — common in bed-ridden patients — were treated, Terri Schiavo could have lived another decade, Thogmartin estimated.

What is wrong with these people? First of all, they insisted that Terri Schiavo be kept alive because they believed that with intense therapy, she could make a recovery - not that she could be kept alive with no improvement. Now confronted with the fact that she would in fact never have recovered, would have lived about 10 more years at best, blind and unable to eat (nevermind braindead!), they defend the argument against ending her life simply on the fact that she “was not terminal”?

It’s not that what happened to Terry Schiavo wasn’t a sad situation and that the parents have no reason to be grieving. But I think they need to recognize that it’s time to stop levelling accusations against Michael Schiavo that liken him to a heartless killer. Considering their reaction to autopsy results, I think it’s pretty clear now that they wanted their daughter to stay alive for their own coping purposes, not for any additional benefit to their daughter because it doesn’t seem that there was much more of a life in store for her.

this tuesday, we had our first game of the season and lost 2-1 in OT to the division champs from last season. The painful part of it all was that we only had five skaters, meaning only one guy got to rest at a time. I guess it was good that I had played ice on Sunday, otherwise I would have been totally out of it.

Yesterday I had another game with my d4 team. Usually, we have about 9-11 guys show up so I was expecting to just be able to ride this one out and recover from Tuesday. Unfortunately, due to a combination of migraines, injuries, and other commitments, we started with five skaters. again. we ended up with 6, but this was a considerably faster game. luckily, we were able to pull out a 5-2 victory on that one. regardless, i’m still hurting. but i’m still looking forward to ice on sunday.

The good news is that it looks like the NHL and NHLPA have finally agreed on a salary cap. Thank goodness. And I’m so happy that Goodenow and that damn union caved. What a waste of our time. Next time, forget the negotiations. Just go straight for the impasse and bring on the replacement players. The average player salary in 2004 was $1,830,126 - approximately 75% of league revenues ($1.93 billion). This, in comparison to other sports leagues NBA (55%), MLB (63%), and NFL (64%). Even if you assume that the league is not completely accurate with its numbers and player’s salaries are in fact more in the area of 65% of league revenues, there are multiple teams that are on the verge of folding! Doesn’t that tell you something? Does the NHLPA intend to stand up and say that those teams don’t have it as bad as they say until they go under?

Some people make the argument that hockey requires the most skill of any professional sport, and for that reason, the players should be making more money. Even if that were the case (which I do not think it is), that argument only holds if the amount that people pay to watch professional sports is directly proportional to the skill of the athletes. For people who understand and appreciate the intracacies of a given sport, that may be true. But for a broader audience, most people watch sports to be entertained - and they don’t care about skills related to the game if they’re not interested in the game itself. As a player, you might work harder, be faster, stronger, and tougher than any other sport out there. But if no one cares and no one wants to pay to watch you do what you do, who’s going to fund this $50 million contract of yours?

Yes, it’s true. Professional sports are also enslaved by the open market and the laws of supply and demand. So the NHLPA needs to get over themselves and if they really feel like they’re taken advantage of and that they deserve better money for their skills, they should go somewhere where people will pay them for it - since they believe that audience exists. Let someone who actually appreciates the opportunity to play for a living and loves the game take the spot on the ice. If there were such a large disparity in noticeable skill between the pros as they are and the next level down, I might care. But from what I’ve seen, there is not - so really, I’m overjoyed that Goodenow and the union has finally conceded their position.

i subbed in for a ice hockey game today. it was the first time i played ice since february of last year, and i have to say… i got better! either that or just everyone else on my old team was way too skilled. but i remember that one of my biggest problems was accelerating from standstill, i would often slip the first push and it would put me off balance, but i didn’t have that problem today. i also managed to stickhandle and shoot the puck without losing my balance.

i think in general, try to play a more “power it down the line” game in rollerhockey has translated into a good practice for ice. now that i’ve paid the annual USA hockey membership fee, i might as well sub in a few more games.

i haven’t put up a picture in a while, so here’s one from the last game of ice hockey i played before this one (update actually, it was the second to last. this looks like game 1 of the best-of-3 series, which we won in 2 games). this is a picture of my back (#8) as i come in to the slot during the championship series of our division at iceoplex in fremont. and the reason the name on the back looks so long is because it says “NAPALM.” since we were the “patriots,” we were all supposed to choose war/combat-related names for our jerseys.

Summer of Code

A really cool idea. There are really cool open source projects out there (gaim, open office, wine, perl, fedora…) but most college kids wouldn’t think of spending a summer working on these projects because:
1. No pay
2. No direction - you basically have to get into the project and find something to do.

The summer of code addresses both of these problems by offering a $4500 stipend for any student that completes their project and having the project sponsors suggest projects that the students might undertake.

At the end of the program (coding ends Sept 1), Google will announce their results at OSCON (Open Source Convention).

Rewinding back a couple of days.

During Hawaii, my canon powershot s30 (finally) died. Well… to be more accurate, I drowned it. Was a little too aggressive with trying to get shots out in the water and well… the sandwich bags couldn’t cut it. After 3 good years, it was time to move on.

I wasn’t quite ready for a digital SLR yet, so I had my eyes set on the Canon S70 (the newest model down the S30’s line), the Canon S500, and the Canon SD500. In my head, this was the basic way I looked at these three cameras:
Pros:
S70 - wide angle, same battery (the battery from the S30 still works), same digital film type (Compact Flash), same features I liked in the S30
S500 - more compact, has most of the features I want (only aperature priority missing), cheaper than the S70 by about $100, same digital film type
SD500 - even more compact the the S500, about the same set of features as the S500

Cons:
S70 - Most expensive, purple fringing at wide angle, corner blur at wide angle, focus a bit slow, playback a bit slow
S500 - No aperature priority, different battery type, no aperature or shutter speed feedback in the display or review
SD500 - More expensive than the S500 basically just for the size, not as good image quality, not so good battery life

I cut out the SD500 immediately. I don’t need a super cute tiny camera and i’m sure as heck not going to pay more for it. Between the S70 and the S500, it was tough.

For one thing, it’s important for me to know the shutter speed because that tells me whether or not I can keep my hands steady for the shot (I usually avoid a flash when possible) or whether or not I need to adjust the ISO to help myself out. On the other hand, there is a shake indicator, which probably turns on when you hit 1/40 sec or slower.

The loss of aperature priority hurt too, but thinking about it, it’s been a while since I’ve really made any use of that. But thinking about the imperfections in the S70 (purple fringing, corner blur at wide angle, slow focus) and the S60 (same as the S70 but lower pixel count), i feel like Canon will make an effort to remedy those problems somewhat in the S80. And hopefully, the S80 will have the Digic II processor in it as well, which supposedly helps out focus speed a lot.

Then the battery form factor… well, who really cares. Digital camera batteries are relatively cheap and if I ever find myself in a situation where I think I’ll be taking so many pictures inbetween access to a power outlet, I’ll just spring for one. I’ll look at this as a chance to experience what it’s really like to carry around a camera with a form factor as small as the S500.

After all that, I decided to go with… the S410. Yes, that’s right, the wimpier brother of the S500 and the camera that everyone and their mom’s have. Why? Because the only difference between the S500 and the S410 is that the S500 is a 5 megapixel camera while the S410 is a 4 megapixel camera. Considering that I was already happy with my S30 (3 megapixel), I wasn’t going to pay an extra $50 for the extra megapixels. And in the end, this is to hold me over until the S80 or its equivalent hits the market and reaches a reasonable prices (or when I’m willing to spend a grand on a digital slr).

And that’s how it is. After starting with the S500, the S70, and the SD500, I finally decided on the S410. And instead of setting me back $380 or so, it only put me back around $250.

As far as 24 goes, I just wanted to put out there that Tony living was not the predictable ending! At the end of each day, something terrible happening to a character is the norm. Carlos Bernand and Reiko Aylesworth were both not signed as full time this season, so it seemed like they were brought back to bring closure to their characters. there were too many unanswered questions after season 3. considering that a major character has been killed in every season since season 1 - tony dying would have been easy (and dramatic) closure for the tony michelle characters. Maybe they just kept them alive because it’s what existing fans wanted… plus… there probably wasn’t enough time to have something happen to both jack and tony. AND it was supposed to be obvious that mandy and tony weren’t the ones being led to the car. Otherwise, why would there have been the scene with her blowing away her neighbors? Yeah CTU didn’t know, but i don’t think it was supposed to be a surprise to the viewer.

What I do miss about the show, is the use of the split screens to show action in multiple places at once. They’ve been slowly using them less and less since season 1 (i.e. watching teri call jack while he’s in the field and having his phone ring at an inopportune moment). And… they’re really starting to take some liberties with the real time format.

But otherwise, what I’ve heard season 5 might be about would be awesome. They may have held off of some people dying for a reason =)