Tsunami advisory

Just got an email from UCSD police warning us to stay away from the beach due to strong winds and crazy a$$ waves from the earthquake in the pacific. Hope Samoa is doing alright.

Grocery math

http://blog.mrmeyer.com/?p=4646

Ever wonder what's faster... going through the express line at the grocery store with a few people or standing in line with one person but with many items?  well this guy figures it all out, and statistically you're better off waiting behind the lone shopper with many items.  From this guy's calculations and observations... there's a much longer wait associated with an extra grocery shopper rather than adding an extra item.  Makes plenty sense!  but I'm a pretty big fan of the self check out haha.  I've also realized why I never enjoyed math reading this...

do some good, get free admission to Disneyland

So it goes like this: register with HandsOn Network (which covers many volunteer orgs like Habitat for Humanity), and if you do one day's volunteering than you can print out an online certificate and present it at Disneyland in Anaheim or Disney World in Orlando and get a free day pass.  You can read all about it here on Yahoo!  Smart and awesome marketing

Laziness taken to the next level [Honda]

man it must be fun to work in the R&D department for Honda, cause you can make super useful stuff like this

MacLane's LEGOs

whoaa check out this guy's LEGO creations, he makes small little 'collectible' figurines from different animated series, but also some bigger projects like a full sized wall-e and the grumpy old guy from Up.  each of his models are pretty veery distinguishable which is amazing since I remember when I played with LEGOs I didn't have an ounce of ingenuity like this guy

Good Advertising

always liked companies that spent the extra effort to make their products stand out with packaging and clever commercials. in this case a really well cut trailer for 'where the wild things are' has suddenly made it one of my must see movies. i think i've read the book as a kid, but i really don't remember. the production and style of the movie looks very promising and stays true to some of the original elements. too bad embedding has been disabled but here you go:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RY-dXsR_ZFg

another one is for the new halo 3 odst game, which even though i don't have an xbox360 has kind of made me a fan of halo. very well done and lots of money put into the marketing machine utilizing live action. the old halo3 commercials were very good as well, really liked their motto 'finish the fight'



and here's one more bit of advertising that's more of the clever side: dog food advertising with nutri balance... give your dog bad food, prepare to get stabbed in the back

birds are secretly composers

The story goes this guy saw a picture of birds sitting on electrical wires in a newspaper, so he got the idea of turning the birds into notes and wanted to see what song they were composing. The author says the photo is unedited, and it's a pretty nice piece of creativity

Birds on the Wires from Jarbas Agnelli on Vimeo.

TokyooykoT by Joan Jimenez

This is one of those rare videos that truly captures the essence of a city, with the music perfectly paired with the video. I've been to Tokyo once when I was in middle school, but that was long ago and our time to explore was limited because our family was part of a tour group. Really, really hope I can go to Japan again... here's the Google translation for the video's description:

"The reality is the contrast between what we have inside and what exists outside. I invite you to share a trip to Tokyo where I set eyes and the music and to each one of your senses."

Kanye's such a bastard

As seen on Go Nintendo.

Taiwan girl's pursuit to kiss 100 random guys in Paris

check this out... 27 year old Music major Yang Ya-ching has been blogging about her mission to kiss 100 random guys in Paris, France.  From the article she's currently at 54, but she's been blogging about each of her experiences and even including photos.  Too bad I can't read Chinese, but for each encounter she writes a little blurb about who the person was, making a nice story and a fairly personal account of each kiss.  So far she's kissed factory workers to models to soldiers... pretty big hit so far, as she's close hitting 2 million visitors on her blog

"Yang, who plans to write a book about her kissing experiences, has attracted 1.97 million visitors to her blog (www.wretch.cc/blog/angelduck777/24982946), including more than 224,000 on Monday alone."

iPhone Owners Are the True Heros [from Gizmodo]

forwarded from my Google Reader (haha another plus to having blogger linked to google)... makes me somewhat envious of iPhone owners cause it's pretty much true... can't wait for iPhone to jump to other carriers!

iPhone Owners Are the True Heros [Humor]: "

Chrome R8

like whoa shinyy

Mayday tries to make more Chinese <3 the NFL

yes, there can be something related between football and Taiwan! Looks like the NFL has realized its inadequacies overseas. The NBA and MLB have long had established relations internationally to 'spread the game,' and now the NFL is getting into action by employing none other than Taiwanese band Mayday (五月天). Pretty funny, I wonder how it'll turn out... my interest has officially been piqued

"We've started to understand what the code is to get into the Chinese market," said Chris Parsons, the NFL's vice president in charge of international operations. The key is not the game itself, but all the trappings of American culture that surround the action on the field.

Which is how Stone, Monster, Ashin, Masa and Ming -- the members of a Taiwanese band called Mayday -- happened to spend 10 days riding a bus around the Northeast this month, meeting cheerleaders and marching bands and playing flag football for a TV show that will run on China Central Television, or CCTV, this fall. All in the hopes of converting tens of millions of Chinese into fans of American football."

read more about it here and here

Anyone heard of this secret menu item at In-N-Out?

Just read about this on Consumerist.com. Apparently there's another secret menu item that I haven't heard of... basically they just add a spicy sauce to your burger. You just say burger with 'fried mustard & chopped chilis.' Anyone heard of this or tried it? sounds delish

Update: well, just go here for a comprehensive 'secret menu' listing (there's one on their corporate website but definitely leaves stuff out). most of it i've seen before more or less, but useful neverthelesss

Sam Tsui's Michael Jackson Medley

nice a cappella medley

Jump!

Hey blogger has jump breaks now!

Korea's first huge disaster movie, looks decent!

Check these out [been too busy to post]

It looks like Monopoly's going to start a worldwide game based on Google Maps starting tomorrow, sounds like so much fun

Remember racing on Laguna Seca in Gran Turismo?  Walk it on street view now!

View Larger Map

Interesting trends site... I think it's based off twitter, actually I have no idea but its nice

Like to review movies? Want to figure out which movies belong in your top 10?  Try Flickchart.  When I'm bored I just listen to music and go through this site, you just pick between two movies which one you like more, and you do this over and over and it remembers your picks and sorts them accordingly... basically a time waster

Ponyo!

Here's a link to watch Miyazaki's Ponyo in japanese with english subtitles. It's a story about a little fish who wants to become human. It's so cute!! Ponyo's in theaters right now, but it's in english. Miley Cyrus' little sis and the Jonas' bros little brother are the voices of the little girl and boy in the movie. Matt Damon, Tina Fey, Liam Nielson and some other big names are in the english version of the move too. I haven't seen the english version yet, but i think the japanese version is reallly good! Miyazaki made spirited away, totoro and some other japanese animated movies too. Here's an article about Miyazaki's Ponyo! : )

LLWS Update: Chula Vista def. Taiwan

Chula Vista was just too good a team, too deep, and too athletic.  Their weakest player was probably their starting pitcher who gave up two back to back homeruns, but their manager quickly pulled him and put in their all star Kiko Garcia who pitched the rest of the game and didn't really give anything for the Taiwan kids to work with.  Basically, it sucked haha.  Final score was 6-3, and the one thing the Taiwan kids can come away with is that they didn't give up any home runs which is what Chula Vista was known for.  The game got real interesting with the bases loaded in the 5th for Taiwan and 1 out, but Chula Vista turned a nasty double play.  Odds were definitely against Taiwan but I like the effort and gave Chula Vista a good scare, especially with that monster 2 run home run by Sung Wen-Hua.   



Damn been too busy the past few days, got lots of stuff to post mmmmmmmmmmr