Thursday, January 31, 2008

Dangers in Travelling

ZEN THOUGHT

There are many kinds of dangers, travellers face on the road. Robber, bandits, and even on the road itself, there are many careless drivers who thought the public road is there as their personal race track. How many crashed cars out there must there be before they realize the danger of speeding on a public road? I don't think I'll forget that blood drenched road anytime soom, and since it was in a city close to underpass, I don't think that was animal's blood either. More like, a blind corner accident victim.

But for all the dangers out there, nothing bothers me more than the everyday danger than I face. They come silently, wolf in sheep's clothing. In fact, I'm staring at one right now. I'm talking about breakfast. Mountain House Scrambled Eggs with Ham and Red and Green Peppers. Prepared foods are always full of salt, reflected in high Sodium content. However, that pales in comparison with 266% Cholesterol level! Gosh, for the sake of God, of all the things that would kill me, I didn't think breakfast would be it.

I've always said that "Of all the things that would kill me, I didn't think chicken would be it." I said that soon to a taxi driver soon after I went to a hospital due to chicken bone in my throat. The friendly taxi driver offered this advice: "Don't eat chicken."

"OF course, I eat chicken!" I said, "That's all I eat."

The taxi driver smiled and said, "Don't eat!"

There you go. If you don't want your breakfast to kill you, just don't eat. Then you'll die of a different cause, such as starvation.

In all seriousness, though, there are many things that will kill us, including those commonly found in advertising. Cancer inducing chemical cosmetics notwithstanding, there's a lot more danger of coronary disease in one of those all-you-can-eat buffet bar than any other place on earth.

Speaking of which, if your work involves sitting all day long, do stretch your legs from time to time. Don't work so hard that you don't move for hours at a time. It raises the danger of Deep Vein Thrombosis. Not sure how to spell that last word. Basically, what that is, is a condition where blood clot is formed in your leg, and causes stroke. The way to prevent that is to keep the blood moving. Strengthening your legs will help also. I wonder what other dangers would there be in a pound of ice cream, or maybe triple layered chocolate cake, or all meat toppings combo pizza topping. Hmmm. Strangely enough, I'm getting hungry.

Well, staring at danger won't do anything good, so I'm going to do something about it. I'm going to eat that breakfast!

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Big Brain score

As I'm maxing out the capabilities, certain patterns emerged. I can see that Heavy Weight, Memo Random, and Missing Link is maximized. Boneyard holds Promise, as does cube game and Flash Memory.

Category Activity Easy Norm Hard
Compute
Coin Parison P471+ P472+ 432
Add Agency 336+ 340+ 349+
Written Math 349+ 358+ 362
Identify P
Shadow Shift 430+ 438+ 464+
Get in Shape 493+ 567+ 500
Match Maker 376 417+ 424+
Think
Heavyweight 446 430 420
PathFinder P431+ 438 454
Boneyard P 396+ 407+ 446+
Memorize
Sound Bites P348 387+ 395
Flash Memory P392+ P389+ 397+
MemoRandom P457 392 360
Analyze
Missing Link 372 414 458
CubeGame P447+ P448+ P420+
Animal Lines P381+ 436 468+

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Big Brain Academy DS Score

My latest score is A an Astronomer 1863 g. I saw on YouTube, somebody did 1600 g on cube game alone! Unbelievable!

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Big Brain Score

I've been practicing all week long, and the scores do improve. I've marked the score with asterisk for improvement and "P" for platinum medal. Although my brain size hasn't improved since last scoring, I do detect a faster easier time in working the puzzles. Potentially, my brain size can be over 2000 g! That would be nice.

A- a banker! 1660

Category
Activity Easy Norm Hard
Compute
Coin-parison *367 337 *432
Add Agency 306 327 290
Written Math *326 350 *362
Identify
Shadow Shift *369 *393 *385
Get in Shape P*474 P*445 P*500
MatchMaker P*376 P*388 *419
Think
Heavyweight *446 *430 *420
Pathfinder *370 *438 *454
Boneyard *326 *357 387
Memorize
Sound Bites P*348 *373 *395
Flash Memory P*373 P*374 337
Memorandom *423 *392 *360
Analyze
Missing Link *372 *414 P*458
Cube Game *415 P*412 *354
Animal Lines *374 *436 390

In all, 37 improvements and 10 Platinum medals. Not bad showing for one week practice.

Friday, January 18, 2008

Don't throw your baby into the river

NEWS
I was getting some junk food and approaching the counter when I saw some animated conversation. This was on Topeka Service Plaza Toll road. Curiosity got the best of me.

"What are you talking about?" I asked. Probably not the best question to pose to strangers.

"Well, you know the story a few weeks back about the woman who threw her baby into the river? It happened again, this time in Hawaii."

I purchased the newspaper right away. The Topeka Capital-Journal dated January 18, 2008. Turns out it was some man in hospital scrub throwing a baby boy from a highway overpass. Still same idea, though. The man was arrested.

Why would anyone commit infanticide like that? I do not know. It does remind me an old story. It was from Mahabharata.

There was a king who was in love with a pretty woman. The woman agreed to marry the king but with one condition: No question asked about her past. The king agreed and they got married. Soon she bore a child, which she promptly threw into the river. This happened six times, to the king's horror. The seventh child was born and the king stopped the woman from throwing the baby into the river.

"why would you do such a thing? Killing your own child!" the king cried.

The woman explained that there were these 7 gods who were exiled to the earth for their sin. They have to live their live as ordinary men until they die, at which time their sin would be forgiven and they'll be allowed back into heaven. She made a deal with them to shorten their lives as short as possible.

"and now, dear king, since you've broken your promise not to ask any question, I can do no more. There is this baby which you saved. Please raise him well. His name is Khrisna." upon saying those words, the woman thus flew into heaven, leaving the crying baby in the king's arm.

Khrisna is a Hindu God, and in this Christian country, people sometimes forget that there are religions who believe in reincarnation and Gods. Buddhism and Hindu are some religions other than Christian and Islam. Another one would be wiccan and pagan. Jewish is still another. I'm not familiar with all these different religions. I'm having enough trouble distinguishing different Christian sects. Would you believe some Christians don't go to church? The Amish, as far as I know, do not. They do hold services in their home, but they view churches as a commercial entity and should be avoided. What does the Bible say?

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Big Brain Fans

WEBSITE
www.bigbrainfans.com
my score of 1660 means I'm ranked 56th at the time of this posting. Not too shabby. I know that there are people with better scores that just aren't there, but some of the scores are rather unbelieveable!

The nice thing is, even if I don't break new high scores, activities do get easier with practice. I know I can improve Identify at least.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Big Brain Score

So with Nintendo Big Brain Academy, I've been improving steadily. Yesterday, I have the brain of a lawyer. Today at 1660, I have a brain of a banker. Not bad of a score, A-.

I also got some platinum medals. Strange that it doesn't seem to be score related.

Monday, January 14, 2008

Big Brain DS Score

PERSONAL TECH

I got myself Big Brain game Saturday. I pretty much got all the gold medals in one day. One battery charge is all it takes. I guess I was disappointed. Then again I think I can improve my scores.

My brain size was 1444 g in one day, so I guess that represent my raw talent. Here is my score on the second day:
Category
Activity Easy Normal Hard
Compute
Coin-parison 314 337 402
Add Agency 306 327 290
Written Math 296 350 316
Identify
Shadow Shift 353 349 339
Get in Shape 354 348 409
Match maker 342 340 319
Think
Heavyweight 380 302 296
Pathfinder 295 279 330
Boneyard 325 327 387
Memorize
Sound Bits 318 334 348
Flash Memory 333 341 337
Memo Random 336 328 314
Analyze
Missing Link 303 291 296
Cube Game 391 358 324
Animal Links 337 347 390

I was doing poorly on Coin-parison until I found out a way to put numbers on them. I kept confusing nickels and quarters, you see. Written Math is okay. Good for speed readers.

Shadow shift is kind of annoying because sometimes the shadow is buried under other shapes. They should fix that.

I think I'm maxing Heavyweight. The last puzzle was filled with 3 stuff per plate. Kind of hard to count that.

Sound bits is a bit tricky since I think some of the tempo is really quick on later stages. I end up missing beats. Same goes with Flash Memory. MemoRandom is about perfect though. Also, I hate it that Sound bits do not match up the positions upper and lower screens. It makes it harder to play Simple Simon.

Missing Link is nice, but on later pictures, the dots are so packed, it's difficult to check for orientation. Cube game reminds me of old IQ test I had to take. I scored 161, because the test do not score above 160. I wonder what my score means IQ wise.

This seems like a good game to develop your thinking, analysing, counting, pattern recognition, and memorizibg talent. Good to give the kids.

A final note: sometimes I found a new technique, but it ends up slower because it's new. Will have to practise for a few weeks before passing final judgement.

Friday, January 11, 2008

Chicken Stew

PERSONAL COOKING
Mountain House Chicken Stew
Potatoes, Chicken, carrots, peas, corn oil, nonfat dry milk, modified corn starch, salt, hydrolyzed corn soy wheat gluten protein, onions, chicken fat, sugar, and other things.

Does it taste good? Yes. Surprisingly so. Stew isn't my normal food consumption, but it really taste good. I get suspicious immediately, and checked the nutrition fact for salt, and there it is: Sodium 57% per serving. Unfortunately for me, I ate the whole package by myself, and that 2 servings per bag means that I'm sodium rich at the moment. Note to self: do not eat salty snack if eating this product.

The water was relatively hot, but not boiling. It was a little on the low side, resulting in some dried potato cube, but I don't mind at all. A testament of how delicious the food is.

I like the 0 g Trans Fat per serving label at the front, but don't really like the 2.5 g Saturated Fat Nutrition info at the back, nor the 11 g Total Fat per serving info.

It sure tastes good, though.

Mountain House Chicken Stew: Good.

Pesto Salmon with Pasta

PERSONAL COOKING
I was trying out new dishes and lacking any good ideas, I went and bought quite a few variety of prepared food. In this case, I went to REI and bought some freeze dried food. So here is what I think.

Pesto Salmon with Pasta. Sounds good. I especially like salmon. Unfortunately, I have to pass on this one. The salmon steak comes with skin attached, which I have trouble separating. It also comes with its own package. There's also a package of olive oil, but since the direction results in it being mixed with water, I couldn't really taste it. The pasta is fine, I suppose. Pretty hard to mix with water, resulting in some crunchy texture. To be fair, the water is lukewarm, rather than boiling. Still, I don't remember having trouble with chicken and rice version.

Next time I'm in the mood for Salmon, I'll just buy the salmon separately. Add that to any meal, including instant rice. Just make sure that the fish is in oil, rather than water.

Backpacker's Pantry Pesto Salmon with Pasta: not good.