Author: shun

Baby Hiccups

Yesterday Grace came to my desk and put my hand on her tummy. At first I didn’t feel anything. But after a few seconds, I felt a few sudden movements. Grace said the fetus is having hiccups (or that’s what the book says).

Another related story: The other day we went to the mall to get the mattress for the baby. We stopped by at the food court to get a bite. Sometimes the fetus moves when Grace’s eating. The book says eating is a pleasant experience for the fetus. Moments later, Grace tried some of my spicy chicken. I guess the baby somehow “tasted” but was surprised. So he gave Grace a strong kick. Oops~ sorry.

Vlogging — A How To

Yeah. This is just the thing I need. A how to on video blogging (Man Cleans Freezer, Film at 11). How do those people find time to vlog? Damn it.

Freevlog has a good tutorial. And apparently vloggers recommend using Internet Archive (free hosing) and Ourmedia to archive video clips.

I would include more helpful links and descriptions, but the article at Wired News did a really good job. So I’ll just stop here…

I wonder when iTunes will start including a feature to download vlogs? And how long before mainstream media caught on and start offering vlogs as a source of news outlet for the general public?

Dead Birds and the Weather

Scientists are discovering more and more dead birds alongside the beaches of California coast (Dead Birds Do Tell Tales). They think this could only mean that the drastic pattern changes in the weather have severely disrupted the ecosystem.

“Something big is going on out there,” said Julia Parrish, an associate professor in the School of Aquatic Fisheries and Sciences at the University of Washington. “I’m left with no obvious smoking gun, but birds are a good signal because they feed high up on the food chain.”
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“In 50 years, this has never happened,” said Bill Peterson, an oceanographer with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Newport, Oregon. “If this continues, we will have a food chain that is basically impoverished from the very lowest levels.”

This could be a pattern that takes place every __ (fill in the blank) years which scientists have overlooked. OR this is something so screwed up that we don’t even realize the severity of it. But of course, we can always count on George W. Bush’s scientists to give a direct and comprehensive answer.

Editing CSS with Ease

Found this nice little app — Xyle Scope.

It’s a WYSIWYG application that makes editing CSS style sheets way easier than “edit-save-refresh browser” method. And because it’s got a built-in browser, you can see the changes as you go. This is also a good way for beginners to learn how other people utilize their CSS files on their sites.

Xyle Scope Screen Shot

Xyle Scope Icon

Styled Checkboxes

There hasn’t been a lot of changes on styling check boxes and radio buttons on HTML forms. But this article Styled Checkboxes took CSS to the next level.

With XHTML, some Javascript and a bit of creativity, form fields can look really nice with this example. Check it out!

And as usual, Slashdot has a flood of comments about this.

Blogging + Video = Vlogging

Great. I finally caught on to blogging. But now this new “Vlogging” thing is slowly creeping into people’s RSS feeds.

Where do people find time for all this?! Damn it.

UPDATE: Like I was saying, Vlogging is catching on. Someone in NYC caught this on his video phone about a bank employee and a customer going off on each other.

Vlogger image of a fight

The Interpreter

Saw The Interpreter (Nicole Kidman, Sean Penn) on Tuesday evening at the dollar theatre. I thought the story was okay though it could really lose the “love” chemistry between Kidman and Penn. Kidman was the life of the show with a great performance towards the end of the movie.

After the flick, Grace said “What was that Tom Cruise thinking leaving Nicole Kidman!” I was like, “Hey, you are preaching to the choir!”

When I told Patrick (yes, THE Patrick Melton, winner of last year’s Project Greenlight. More info here and here; not to be confused with the OTHER Patrick Melton, somewhat famous underground PodCaster) I was going to see the movie, he blandly said he heard it was “okay”. But hey, he’s a professional writer; I just wanted to be entertained (mainly because of Nicole Kidman)!

But he’s right. The movie was okay.

Speaking of Patrick, him and his wife, Ee-bin, are coming over for Thanksgiving again this year. We are excited because they’ll be able to see our new baby then! Last year Grace and Ee-bin cooked a crazy turkey which took us almost a week to finish. Patrick and I spent most of our vacation on Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

I wonder what he’s going to bring this year…. (his new iBook is a dead given).