Stem Cells Mend Spinal Cords

Alright, Michael, I get the idea. Stem cell works; and I believe you even without this article: Stem Cells Mend Spinal Cords from Wired. Convince your Religious Rights and Evangelical White House this and the world will be a better place.

This study shows that stem cells collected from rat embryos can be grown into specialized cells by producing a special chemical called growth factor which helps myelin attach on to nerve fibers for better conductivity of nerve signals.

But this still goes to the core of the question: Do stem cells collected from the umbilical cord blood work just as well?

Forbes Best of the Web Showdown

Forbes Best of the Web logo Forbes posted its pick of Best of the Web a few days ago. I was surprised that under the technology weblog section, I already subscribe to six out of 8 blogs they recommended. Am I at the forefront of blog reading, or there’s just not that many good technology blogs out there?

Given that I already subscribe to 51 blogs, I probably should stick to what I have now. But they do have some pretty good art blogs I will probably check out and attempt to read on a daily basis.

God damn it, I am a blog whore!

Discover Your Roots

Linode logo Kyung got me hooked on Linode a while ago. The company offers a virtual private server (aka virtual dedicated server) service that’s actually pretty amazing. It basically takes a server, divide it up into multiple mini-servers and provides root access to its customers within the perimeter of the VPS. Unfortunately I only know of services that provide Linux-based VPS for public use. Linode stood out for me because it offers a good variety of Linux flavors to choose from. For Windows, I believe VMWare or Microsoft’s newly acquired VirtualPC do similar tricks for enterprise level operations.

Linode is probably the best way for to really have a stab at Linux. Its installation process takes literally minutes. So that means, if I ever screw up the server, I can simply reinstall everything within minutes instead of hours usually associated with home-built machines.

Another unique thing about Linode is that it’s based on User Mode Linux (open source) as opposed to Virtuozzo, which is a more popular (but not free) platform.

There are several companies that offer VPS. However, a few were getting a lot of buzz when I was researching for a good VPS service:
Dinix
JVDS
Rimuhosting

I believe the above services are Virtuozzo based and do not have as many variety of Linux installs to choose from. I am sure there are at least a dozen more companies out there. But based on what I’ve read at the time, the above companies came highly recommended via several forums.

I eventually had to stop using Linode because of resource issues. The plan I was able to afford didn’t come with enough resources for me to sustain a fairly high load. But otherwise, Linode was great. If anyone ever wants to build a home-grown “Linode”, tutorials can be found here and here.

I wish there was a company that offered VPS for Mac OSX though. This is one of those times when being a Mac user sucks.

Cell Phone Reception and Tower Search

Cell Phone Reception and Tower Search” uses enhanced Google Maps to map out towers nearby a given location. Yet another smart use of the technology. For you American users, plug in a location near you to see how many towers are nearby. Maybe it’ll explain why your reception isn’t so hot.

Dang it I like Google.

Plastic Key to the Rescue

AAA Club logo As part of the perk of being a AAA Club member, each household is allowed a free duplicate “emergency” key in case of vehicle lock out. Surely, duplicate of a real key can easily cost upwards $80+. What a deal, we thought. But it turned out that it’s a plastic version of the key that only allows you to open the car door, but it’s not strong enough to be used in the ignition hole. What a disappointment. But hey, it works.

The plastic duplicate is part of cut out of a wallet sized card (AAA calls it CreditCard Key; how imaginative). So it’s very easy to keep in the wallet in case of emergency, which did happen once before. Grace got locked out by mistake when the car washing crew left the key in our car. We bought the car used, so it only came with one set of key and remote; not so coincidentally, both of them were in the car. Dumb ass car washers.

Next up: bid for a spare remote on eBay when a good deal shows up… Loans Now may sound like a solution.

Update: Got myself a keyless entry remote. I had to find the programming instruction separately though. The instruction works for both Infiniti Q45 and J30 series made before 1997 I think. Some people on eBay were selling the instruction for $5 a pop. Jerks. On the other hand, car dealers typically charge around $70 for programming a new remote. Jackasses.

To Be or Not To Be…

Because of the unique composition of our family, I was intrigued to find out what citizenship possibilities there are for my son.

U.S. Citizenship — this is a given since my son will automatically get a U.S. Citizenship when he’s born within the borders of the United States. United States does not allow dual citizenships with very few exceptions.

Taiwanese Citizenship — this is not a particularly useful citizenship in terms of travel, but it probably beats having a passport from China since Mainland Chinese have an extremely high “disappearance” rate when they travel aboard. But for the sake of comparison, I found out that Taiwanese citizenship is extremely easy to get if either one of the parents is a citizen of Taiwan, which I am. Another downside of having a citizenship from Taiwan, particularly for a male, is Taiwan’s compulsory military service for one year and six months (or extended civilian service option) for all males before the age of 40. Taiwan allows dual citizenships.

Malaysian Citizenship — Malaysia is really a funny country. On paper the government claims it does not discriminate anyone. But in practice, it’s probably one of the most discriminatory countries in Southeast Asia (it’s hard to beat Indonesia in its mistreatment toward Chinese though). In this case, unless a child is born in Malaysia to a Malaysian parent, the father must be Malaysian if the child is born outside of Malaysia. But… what about the right of the mother? Why can’t the mother enjoy the same right for her son if she’s married a non-Malaysian and the child is born outside of Malaysia? That’s one f*cked messed up rule. Messed F*cked up, yes, but consistent with most Muslim-faith based countries I guess. More information can be found here and here. So does Malaysia allow dual citizenships? My knee tells me “no”.

We haven’t had too much pleasant experience with Malaysia and its policies as of lately. Hopefully this will change as Jai, a friend of ours, swears by the government’s efficiency. But for now, Malaysia isn’t giving too many reasons for some people whose children may consider Malaysia as their home. If Malaysia wants to be able to compete more aggressively in this global climate, it has to do more to allow qualified people to be part of its society more indiscriminately.

Just my two cents.

UniPod. Uncool.

Went downtown to pick up our library card from the San Jose Public Library. As we walked toward the library, I finally saw a MP3 player that’s not an iPod, a first for the past six months since I started this observation. This guy was using an iRiver. Obviously nobody bothered to tell this kid what it takes to be hip in this town. Even though the MP3 player itself was white, it can’t fool me with its vertical scroll bar.

Anything else but iPod is just uncool.

Yet Another Ultrasound

So we got our fourth ultrasound today… doctor’s orders. Seeing that Grace’s Asian belly was smaller than the average Caucasian bellies, the doctor ordered the fourth ultrasound scan PLUS a fetus stress test. But the ultrasound result concluded that we have a developmentally healthy baby, weighing at 7 lbs with two more weeks to go. The ultrasound technician thinks the baby will probably weigh 8 to 9 lbs by the time Grace delivers. Yikes… that’s one giant baby. Since ultrasound turned out fine, we skipped the fetal stress test. Michael’s son only weighed 7 lbs at birth Maybe Kongfu Death Grip won’t be necessary for my son to beat his if they ever get into a fight.

More pictures to follow when I get my hands on a scanner sometime this week. We have a picture of his face from the ultrasound! I would post the videos too, but to your untrained eyes, the clips just look like a moving slob of unprocessed meat.

Update: Alien faces…

Squished baby face 1
Squished baby face 2
Squished baby face 3

A Long Lost Friend

Got in touch with a long lost friend today…

Maggie and I go way back… Ok, not that far back… We met during our Freshman year at SCAD. My first trip out of America was to Bahamas, the home country of Maggie. Her family is so warm and fuzzy it makes me feel maybe I should call her parents mom and dad!

Bahamas is one of those Taiwan-friendly countries where Taiwanese passport holders are treated as humans. When I first arrived at the customs, they thought I was from China (the passport cover reads “The Republic of China”, which can be easily mistaken as “The People’s Republic of China”, which is the communist China), so they wouldn’t let me pass the customs. But upon closer interrogation examination, a big smile lit up their faces and welcomed me. This was the first time when I felt being a Taiwanese didn’t suck.

I later found out from Maggie’s parents that Taiwan has been enjoying close diplomatic ties with Bahamas. It’s rare because most of the countries in the world don’t really have spines in supporting a democratic, but small, country like Taiwan even though everyone’s promoting democracy with anti-communism sentiments. God damn hypocrites.

So Maggie’s been giving me the shpills on what’s up with some of our mutual friends. It’s interesting to see where everyone is in terms of life stages years after graduation. Maggie herself is crossing over to a new stage of life — marriage! Her husband is a geek — just the kind of people I like. So everything is going to be alright…. Hah!

Blog Whore

God damn it. I am such a blog whore. I still have about two dozen+ ideas I have saved up in my “to-blog” folder on the desktop that I want to sit down and write about. But I just keep getting distracted with all the interesting tech crap I have been blogging about. I wish I can get paid to blog about all the nonsense that’s in my head full time. That’d be the day.

Note to self: Blog about the following….
– Eileen Fisher
– Meme
– Moral politics (a little help here, Brian?)
– “Harry Potter” books and young readership
Self-storage America
– Aristotle & dreams
– Human brain
– The Graphing Calculator Story
– Republicans’ Plan to Incorporate Church into State (Evangelical America)
– CNN USA v.s. CNN Elsewhere in the World
– Illusion of Freedom v.s. Lack of Freedom
Various NPR episodes

But I am extremely happy that I’ve been able to get some stuff out of my head (like that Bob Lazar guy) which I’ve always wanted to document somewhere.