The orange ball

Pooping dog

LOL

Why God doesn't have a Ph.D.

1) He had only one major publication.

2) It was in Hebrew.

3) It had no references.

4) It wasn't published in a referreed journal.

5) Some even doubt he wrote it by himself.

6) It may be true that he created the world, but what has he done since then?

7) His cooperative efforts have been quite limited.

8) The scientific community has had a hard time replicating his results.

9) He never applied to the ethics board for permission to use human subjects.

10) When one experiment went awry he tried to cover it up by drowning his

subjects.

11) When subjects didn't behave as predicted, he deleted them from the sample.

12) Some say he had his son teach the class.

13) He expelled his first two students for learning.

14) He rarely came to class, and he just told students to read the book.

15) Although there were only 10 requirements, most of his students failed his

tests.

16) His office hours were infrequent and usually held on a mountaintop.

Christmas presents!

Oh... I forgot to mention... thanks everyone for the wonderful Xmas presents!

Thanks mom and dad for the wonderful slowcooker. I will sure make lots of use of it (I actually already made a batch of chili last night hehehe).

Thanks to my bros for chipping in for the Apple TV!! It is such a wonderful product. Ian and I (Ian especially) LOVE IT!!

Thanks Ian for the power toothbrush you got from here. I am assuming it is not because you think I have bad breath LOL... just kidding... I did asked for an electric toothbrush :)

And thanks Jane for the Burberry wallet. Wow! You shouldn't have spent so much on me :)

Happy New Year 2012!!

2011 is behind us, and it's time for new resolutions!

My resolutions of the year?

Lots lol.

- Gym 3x week
- Read at least 1 book per month (gotta get back into that)
- Respect my budget (I've been spending way too much!)
- Try to eat paleo (I said try... lol)
- Calling my friends more often (i.e. more than once a year)

That's it.

What are everyone's resolutions?

Puppy wanted

But what to get?

I would really like to get a puppy for my little one. So I searched the web for the best family dogs.

So I found this --> Top 10 Family Dogs

I am actually tempted with a bulldog, because I heard they are very temper even and require little exercise.

What do you guys think?

Happy feet 2

Cheesy at times, strange other times, simple yet fairly philosophical, with a touch of darkness and foreboding, but overall very interesting. I would have thought the movie would not be suitable for younger kids (due to all of the above), but from reading parent's reviews, this movie seems to please both young and old.

NOTE: Worth being seen in 3D, this is a visual treat.

The Smurfs Movie - A review

I think it was good movie for kids movie and actually very true to the cartoons I grew up watching. Of course, the "cheese" factor in some parts was a little bit gut wrenching, but overall, this was what I expected to see...

I'll give it an 8/10 as a kids movie, a 6/10 for a remake of a classic.

Quote of the day

Criticism quote : because we sometimes have to be reminded

Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them. - Ralph Waldo Emerson (probably erroneously)

Bathroom

I'm dreaming about my ultimate bathroom. It has to has marble walls with stones floor. Then I want a his and hers different washbowls. Finally I want lots of natural light.

work out

First cross-fit class - I tried my first cross-fit class at Centennial gym ... It was so tiring!!!

We threw a 20 lbs ball and did so many burpees and squats

AMMERICANNN IDOOLL

AMERICAN IDOL WINNER HAS TO BE Crystal Bowersox!! She's so different and unique

 

AMMERICANNN IDOOLL

Crystal Bowersox is sooo goodddd! She's something really special!

 

Hungry

I have no idea what to make for lunch I have some leftover cheese from yesterday and some pita bread and salsa left in the fridge... What about some grill cheese?

Synthetic life form

I read this in the paper this morning

From The Guardian : Craig Venter creates synthetic life form

Craig Venter and his team have built the genome of a bacterium from scratch and incorporated it into a cell to make what they call the world's first synthetic life form

Scientists have created the world's first synthetic life form in a landmark experiment that paves the way for designer organisms that are built rather than evolved.



The controversial feat, which has occupied 20 scientists for more than 10 years at an estimated cost of $40m, was described by one researcher as "a defining moment in biology".



Craig Venter, the pioneering US geneticist behind the experiment, said the achievement heralds the dawn of a new era in which new life is made to benefit humanity, starting with bacteria that churn out biofuels, soak up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and even manufacture vaccines.

Cool! Now what?

allergies in dogs??

Damn... I think that  Mr. Winston has some allergies! He is constantly scratching and chewing... I feel so bad for Mr. Winston! I did some research and he seems to have all the symptoms described in thiscanine allergies site ... Should I go to the vet??? It's gonna cost me a fortune...

Don't know what to eat for lunch

I have no idea what to make for lunch I have some leftover cheese from yesterday and a bunch of pita bread and salsa in the fridge... Maybe that can make some good grill cheese?

Scientists create life

I read this on the internet this morning

From Times Online : Scientists create artificial life in laboratory

Synthetic life has been created in the laboratory in a feat of ingenuity that pushes the boundaries of humanity’s ability to manipulate the natural world.

Craig Venter, the biologist who led the effort to map the human genome, said yesterday that the first cell controlled entirely by man-made genetic instructions had been produced.

The synthetic bacterium, nicknamed Synthia, has been hailed as a step change in biological engineering, allowing the creation of organisms with specialised functions that could never have evolved in nature. The team at the J. Craig Venter Institute in Rockville, Maryland, is investigating how the technology could yield microbes that make vaccines, and algae that turn carbon dioxide into hydrocarbon biofuels.

Wow... I wonder what the next step is!

Star Trek

I'm watching Star Trek Voyager... I'm really a nerd lol! But I love it... I love that tv show!

News of the day

From the New York Times

NEW ORLEANS — After more than three weeks of efforts to stop a gushing oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico, BP engineers achieved some success on Sunday when they used a milelong pipe to capture some of the oil and divert it to a drill ship on the surface some 5,000 feet above the wellhead, company officials said.

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      Green: Gap in Rules on Oil Spills From Wells (May 17, 2010)

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      Giant Plumes of Oil Forming Under the Gulf (May 16, 2010)



After two false starts, engineers successfully inserted a narrow tube into the damaged pipe from which most of the oil is leaking.



“It’s working as planned,” Kent Wells, a senior executive vice president of BP, said at a briefing in Houston on Sunday afternoon. “So we do have oil and gas coming to the ship now, we do have a flare burning off the gas, and we have the oil that’s coming to the ship going to our surge tank.”



Mr. Wells said he could not yet say how much oil had been captured or what percentage of the oil leaking from a 21-inch riser pipe was now flowing into the 4-inch-wide insertion tube. “We want to slowly optimize it to try to capture as much of the oil and gas as we can without taking in a large amount of seawater,” he said.



So far, the spill has not spoiled beaches or delicate wetlands, in part because of favorable winds and tides and in part because of the use of booms to corral the oil and chemical dispersants.



The capture operation on Sunday was the first successful effort to stem the flow from the damaged well, which has been spewing oil since a rig exploded on April 20 and sank.



The announcement by BP came on the heels of reports that the spill might be might much worse than estimated. Scientists said they had found giant plumes of oil in the deep waters of the gulf, including one as large as 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick.



BP officials pointed out that even if the tube was successful, it was only a stopgap measure. The real goal, they said, is to seal the well permanently.



Preparations continued on Sunday on a plan to pump heavy drilling mud into the well through the blowout preventer, the safety device at the wellhead that failed during the accident.



In the procedure, called a top kill, the mud would be used to overcome the pressure of the rising oil, stopping the flow. The mud would be followed by cement, which would permanently seal the well.



Mr. Wells said Sunday that BP was a week to 10 days away from trying the maneuver.



The mud would be pumped from a drill ship, the Q4000, that is in place on the surface. Mr. Wells said the ship had more than 2 million gallons of mud on board — far more than needed — to pump into the well, which had reached about 13,000 feet below the seabed when the accident occurred.



In a brief interview, Mr. Wells said that a “junk shot,” an effort to clog the blowout preventer with golf balls and other objects before the mud is used, was still a possibility.



But in an apparent indication of the tube’s success, BP was already building a backup version.



The tube is basically a five-foot-long section of pipe outfitted with rubber seals designed to keep out seawater, attached in turn to a milelong section of pipe leading from the drill ship to the seafloor.



It was one of several proposed methods of stanching the flow of at least 210,000 gallons of oil a day that has been threatening marine life and sensitive coastal areas in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. BP officials have emphasized that none of the methods have been tried before at the depth of this leak.



At the briefing, Mr. Wells was asked about reports from a research vessel that discovered the huge plumes of oil. He said that he did not know anything about them, but that the Unified Area Command, the cooperative effort involving BP and state and local agencies, was seeking more information.



The plume reports added to the many questions that have been raised about the amount of leaking oil, which many scientists have said is far higher than the official estimate of 5,000 barrels, or 210,000 gallons, a day. That estimate was reached using satellite imagery, flyovers and visual observation, company officials have said.



The reports also raised concerns about the use of oil dispersants underwater, which the Environmental Protection Agency approved on Friday after several tests. Normally, dispersants are used on the surface, and scientists have said that the effects of using them underwater are largely unknown.



Representative Edward J. Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts and chairman of the Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment, criticized BP, saying it had failed to respond substantively to his requests for more information about how it had reached its estimate of how much oil is leaking. He also said the company had refused to engage independent scientists who might offer a better assessment of the amount.



“BP is burying its head in the sand on these underwater threats,” Mr. Markey said in a written statement on Sunday. “These huge plumes of oil are like hidden mushroom clouds that indicate a larger spill than originally thought and portend more dangerous long-term fallout for the Gulf of Mexico’s wildlife and economy.”



BP began trying to insert the tube on Friday, but an effort to connect the pipe leading from the drill ship to the tube failed and the device had to be brought back to the surface for adjustments.



“This is all part of reinventing technology,” Tom Mueller, a BP spokesman, said on Saturday. “It’s not what I’d call a problem — it’s what I’d call learning, reconfiguring, doing it again.”



Around midnight Saturday, the tube was reinserted and worked for about four hours before it was dislodged after being mishandled by the submersibles, Mr. Wells said.



“At that time, we were just starting to get oil to the surface,” Mr. Wells said.



The oil was going to the Discoverer Enterprise, a drill ship, which has equipment for separating water from oil and can hold about 5 million gallons of oil.



Though that attempt failed, it was important because it demonstrated that features designed to keep hydrates from forming were working, Mr. Wells said. Hydrates, icelike structures of methane and water molecules that form in the presence of seawater at low temperatures and high pressures, forced BP to abandon an earlier effort to corral the leak with a 98-ton containment dome.



Henry Fountain contributed reporting from New York.