Great stop-motion film...

I wonder how obscenely long time does it take to make such a complicated and amazing stop-motion film.

Enjoy!!!

Merry Christmas... and a Happy New Year!!!

So, exams ended on the 20th Dec for me, and well, results were better than expected. :) Anyway, can't believe that I'm done with 5 semesters here at the University of Michigan. Really, 5 semesters!!! And, I only have 1 semester worth of classes that I HAVE to take to graduate. With 3 semesters to spread them out, I will be taking a bunch of interesting classes. Probably, I'll slot in a year of another language there too in my senior year.

Next semester, I'll be taking 2 math classes, 2 economics, and 2 mini-courses on Geo-Science. 14 credits, which is pretty much good to go. The only drawback on my schedule is that I've early classes on Mon and Wed early at 8.30am, and then on Tues and Thurs, 9am-1pm then 4pm - 5.30pm. The good thing is, I still have my Friday off, which is VERY important.

So, I'm currently staying at my friend's apartment, it's been 5 nights now. To-do list over the break:
1) Finish reading The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
2) Finish reading Off the Books by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh
3) Finish planning my Spring Break (England and Ireland)
4) Uninstall Warcraft III before the end of break

Yar, the item 4 on the list is currently screwing the other 3 items on my to-do list. CRAP!!! Because of DOTA and TDs, I had been sleeping at 5-6am for 3 nights. BAD BAD BAD. Even more so because of my body clock that pretty much will wake me up at 10-11am the latest no matter what time I go to bed (unless I went to bed totally wasted). Anyway, I had been sleeping less than normal semester. DAMN!

So, because I had time to kill, on Christmas' Eve, I cooked a pretty decent Christmas dinner and it was pretty good. A picture says a thousand words, so, here they are!!!

The Menu:
-Jello Shots
-Sangria
-Rum(Bacardi(R) Gold) and Whiskey (Jack Daniel's(R)) + all kind of mixers
-Honey-glazed Ham
-Cheesy Tuna Noodle Casserole
-Bacon and Cheese Potato Skins
-Ice Cream

Jello Shots... I didn't think about the festive colors, or else, i would have gotten the strawberry (to get the red) instead of the blueberry.
Sangria... which turned out to be quite good, missing in the picture is creme soda, lemon juice, 2 shots of Bacardi (R) rum, and sugar.
Cheesy Tuna Noodle Casserole... before putting it into the oven to bake. This is my 'classic' dish, I had this so much during my freshman's summer semester. I love it.
Potato Skins and the Honey-Glazed Ham... in the oven, almost done.
Dinner's served... What do you think?

I guessed my estimation was wrong, and actually, we (LiLi, Chia Chye and I) was actually worried that we would not have enough food for ten, but actually, there's tons of leftovers, which we pigged over the leftovers for the next day. It was a great night!

Also, President Gerald R. Ford passed away (University of Michigan alumni, longest living president, the respected undertaker president in my opinion, the 38th President of the United States). He's also the most high-achieving athletes among all presidents. My condolences to Ford's family.

It's college bowl season. So, there will be a lot of college football too.

So, it's finals...

Hey guys, to start with, I would like to wish all who are having fun with finals, GOOD LUCK with that.

I had two on Tuesday, two more to go, one on next Tues and another one on next Wed. Both are possible killers, and are core subjects for my Actuarial Math major. So, wish me more luck on them.

Last weekend, I did nothing much, other than spending most of the time studying, I think that's about it. For Friday, after work, I think I went to run, and then, went to McD for dinner, where I abused the $1 menu. For $4, I had 2 McChicken, 1 4pcs-nuggets, and 1 side salad. Not bad at all.

Saturday, more studying, and possible running too.

Sunday, work, studying.

Monday, a lot more studying, and it was a bad day, as to stay awake or barely responsive if i may for the entire day, I had 3 cups of coffee, 2 double-shot, 4 teabags of tea, and also a bottle of Coke. Caffeine count --> countless... I bet it was at an illegal amount of caffeine in my system if I were to be pulled over. And fortunately, I'm not a spider.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caffeine

Tuesday... D-day... Had IOE exam in the afternoon, which was alright. I just need an above mean performance, and I think I did just that. At night, it was Accounting, which I think I did the same too. Above mean. That's the secret to success. :) Also, at night, I was really tired and should have gone to bed earlier, but knowing me, I didn't and instead, saw a chic-flick: The Devils wear Prada, which was alright.

Wednesday. Worked 7 hours, and then, met Quang for the holiday dinner. It was good. A bit disappointed with the crabcakes, as it wasn't as good as expected. Expectations kill. But having no expectations will not work either. I was pretty tired and took a nap after the heavy dinner. Woke up at about 8pm at night, saw the response from Zach saying that they were up for the idea of going to the bar. The NEW bar, Mitch's which just reopen on Monday, after closing down for 2 years. NICE.

So, the next paragraph or two will be dedicated to the night (yesterday night). So, Mitch's was pretty nice. Even though I had to pay $3 for cover, it was all worth the money because they had $2 pitcher of Miller High Life special. I mean, how can you go wrong with $2 /pitcher of beer. So, Zach, Chris and Alex were there when I got there. We saw Matt there too. We played quarters, at first it was speed quarters, which was really fun and you can actually 'strategize' to make someone drink. Can't believe that you need to use some brain cells playing a drinking game? Lol.
After Alex got too excited and broke a Martini glass, we had to switch to play regular quarters.

Also, there, I saw 3 classmates (from my Math 520 and Math 523 classes) which I think was pretty cool. Also, Gina talked about the bar crawl, which I think I'm game. Not sure, if we can get enough people from Actuarial Math to do that. But, I'm not sure if I'm eligible, because, most of the time, only seniors to bar crawling, so, I'll see.

So, Mitch's is definitely the best place for a drink now. Other bars need to step up with specials and all, or else, tough luck. Luckily, I got there early yesterday, at about 8.15am, as it was the last day of class, and Mitch's being newly reopen and all the hype about it still fresh, by 9pm, there's a monster line of people trying to get into the bar. Also, I like Mitch's because when it hit the limit of people allowed in the bar, it still wasn't too packed, unlike the Jug. The only down about Mitch's is the bathroom for guys. This is definitely the first bar where I've seen and experienced the bathroom line for gents is longer than the one for ladies. Come on, in the gents, there's only 1 urinal and 1 toilet. Throw in the trough. It's not cool for guys to be waiting in line, inside and/or outside the bathroom, because that creates opportunity for guys to talk. I mean, not cool. And I saw a guy punched a hole in the wall.

He was kinda drunk and said: you see this hole on the wall, I did it. It's easy.
And another guy said: No way, that guy who did that got thrown out of the bar the other day. And then: *BAM*, that first dude punched the wall hard enough and made an identical whole next to the first hole. Interesting.
See, shits happen when dudes have to line up to pee.

We left Mitch's at about 11, and picked up pizzas at the backroom pizza, for $1 a slice of cheese pizza. I had 2. Walked back to my room, tired and drunk, pretty much passed out on my bed.

This morning, woke up at about 4am, kinda messed up, feeling a bit of hungover, and quickly, and intelligently, I had a huge glass of water, and also, half a bottle of cranberry juice, which can do wonders (anti-oxidants and all), and went back to bed, and then, it was all good again when I woke up at 9ish. Went to CCRB for my 4-mile run on the threadmill, did it in 35 minutes. I'll increase it to 4.5 mile once I can do the 4-mile in 34 minutes.

that's about it so far... you guys take care...

current favorite song: Oasis - The Masterplan

A lot to talk about

It's been quite awhile since I drop some stuffs here. So, this post will contain shit load of stuffs... Too much stuffs had been happening since the Thanksgiving.

Nov 23rd.. Thursday

So, on Thanksgiving, it was a really lazy day for me, waking up at about 10am, did a bit of surfing, and reading, and then, took a nap. Was too lazy to get out of my bed to walk 15 minutes to have lunch, so, instead, I continued my reading/napping/time wasting until dinner, where Keng Yang and I went to Poh Yi-Kai Kiat-Mel-LiLi's church Thanksgiving dinner. The dinner was amazing, partly because I was really hungry, partly because it was free, and mostly because of the cooking and the people there. After the dinner, we started to play some board games. We wanted to play board games, but, we started off playing boring games, or games too complicated for us after our feasting, you know how more blood flows to the stomach after a heavy meal, and less blood to the brain kinda thing. At first, it was Cranium, which we don't really know how to play, we tried reading the instructions, and decided it was too much effort for us to play the game. The whole point of playing a game, is to have fun, so, not worth the effort. Then, we wanted to play 'Battle of the Sexes', which also, too culturally bias for us, a bunch of international students. After reading a few questions on the cards, we decided that, nope, it wasn't our game either. Then, we found 'Guesstures', a hardcore kinda charade game, where players are separated into 2 teams of equal players, then, a player is to choose four cards, and act out the word on the card and his/her teammates are to guess the word based on his/her actions before the card drops into the holder. As time constraint is the biggest concern, it's funny on how teammates react to the actor's action. Keng Yang was the biggest hit of the night, his actions were so funny that often enough, Lili and Mel broke into laughters so badly and couldn't guess anything. "Body" is the word, and imagine Keng Yang doing actions trying to get guess the word body.

It was fun. I took a walk around Ann Arbor normally busy streets after the dinner and game, it was empty, dead empty. For the entire State St, North University, and East University St., the only shop open was The Diag Party Shoppe. Yup. Even the student Union is closed. So much for diversity. It the university is diverse enough, I bet, they should have more shops that remain open for Thanksgiving. Don't you think so? Most international students stay in Ann Arbor over the 4-day break. Diversity is not just about black and white, i suppose.

Nov 24th Fri
So, it's Black Friday, the start of the shopping season for the Christmas. I woke up early this morning, at 6ish to surf through sites for great Black Friday deals. I bought a 200Gb hard drive for $25 bucks, not bad at all.

And then, at about 9am, we set off to Birch Run Prime Outlets Mall to shop, we really put in quite some effort to shop, as Birch Run is about 1hr and 15 minutes drive away. I bought some socks, a pair of jeans, a pair of pants, a couple of t-shirts, a polo, a dress shirt, a necktie, a bunch of Milano cookies, and a jacket, and after 7 hours, I'm about 200 bucks poorer. For lunch, we had A&W, and for dinner, we had quite OK Chinese food.

Got back to my room at about 10pm, and after resting for awhile, I went to the Brown Jug (again, my second time this week) to meet up with Zach, and Sam (it's been awhile since I last saw him), and their friend, I forgot his name. We didn't play any drinking games like we did on Wednesday - quarters. But, we did had fun chatting and all. We left the bar at about 1ish, and we went to the Burrito Joint to get some grubs. I bought a BBQ pork burrito, and it was awesome. The meat was juicy and all, much better than the one from Pancheros.

Nov 25th Sat
Woke up this morning at about 10am, kinda early, and went out for a run, then, went to South Quad (a good 15 minutes walk) to have lunch, and then, went to Borders to get a copy of The Innocent Man by John Grisham, and then, got back to my room at about 3pm, did a bit of homework, and then, at about 4.45pm, went to North Campus with Keng Yang to Eric's place to prepare for our Steamboat Thanksgiving Dinner. It was good stuff.

After the dinner, went to the Rock to watch half of the ND vs USC game, which ND lost. Gosh, Notre Dame, and Brady Quinn, you guys suck! Had a 40 oz for the night for the game and a movie.

Nov 26th Sun
Woke up at about 9.30am, worked, and then, got back, started doing more homework, as I had wasted so much time doing nothing over the past long weekend, and I don't like the feeling of being unproductive for so long. So, that's about it. What a pretty boring Thanksgiving break.

Nov 27th Mon
Worked, did more homework, went to a company's presentation, and that's about it. The company's information session was amazing. One of the best I've seen in so far. And I've been to many already.

Nov 28th Tue
Not sure what I did today, but, Tuesday's my killer day, so, mostly classes, and more classes til late.

Nov 29th Wed
Oh yar, forgot to mention that I started running again, since Monday actually. Threadmill running that is, well, can't blame me, it's too cold to run outdoor now, with below freezing weather most of the time, I don't want to run outdoor. Oh, Happy Birthday WEELI!!! Ryan Giggs to, if that means anything to you.

Nov 30th Thur
Oops, it's end of the week again. Gosh, that's quick. Case study is looming, and I don't like it. It was a really pretty complicated case study, on Seagate Technology Buyout in the year of 2000. I read the stuffs for like 3 times to understand what's going on. Oh yar, tonight, I went to London Philharmonic, it was an amazing show, also performing was Sarah Chang. Her violin play was mind-boggling. And she's really one of the most talented violinists I've seen, live or recorded. The program of the night:
Franz Liszt : Lew Preludes, S. 97
Jean Sibelius : Violin Concerto in d minor, Op. 47 (Allegro moderato, Adagio molto, Allegro, ma non tanto)
Johannes Brahms: Symphony No. 2 in D Major, Op. 73 (Allegro non troppo, Adagio non troppo, Allegretto grazioso, quasi andantino, Allegro con spirit)

Sibelius' Violin Concerto is really amazing. I mean, the pitch of the violin got impossibly high, even though it wasn't loud, the pitch is so high that it still stood out and it was so distinct and powerful. The Brahms is lively, and that's about it. Nothing great. I was kinda disappointed that there wasn't an encore. After the show, I went to the Rock, and played Wii with Dane and Jrod
til like 2am.

Dec 1st Fri
Worked, and then, did some more case study stuffs, and then, went to my the Rock to play some Wii. And then, went to Jen's belated 21st party, where I had quite some fun. I was really worn off by the end of the night. Got back to my room at about 3am.

Dec 2nd Sat
Woke up this morning, forgot what time, but well, oh wait, at about 10am, and then, met up with my groupmates to work on our case study, we spent about 4 hours on it, and got most questions answered. Had a late lunch, which was awful at about 3pm, and then, went to the Rock to watch the game, where USC lost to UCLA. What a great day for all mankind! But then, Florida beat Arkansas, what a tragedy. It was pretty uneventful, other than more Wii playing. I tried working on my Math 523 homework, but to no avail.

Dec 3rd Sun
Woke up at the usual 9ish, and then went to work, and then, did more work on my Math, this time Math 520, where it went pretty well. I should have spent more time on my IOE case study, but, was too lazy. Didn't really do much other stuffs.

Dec 4th Mon
Worked, did some homework, went to meet a professor, and then, went to bowling with some representatives of a company. It was fun, and finally, I found some of my long-lost touches, and was able to bowl a 140-150 average. I shoulda, coulda, woulda score like 20-30 points more if I were to find a 11 lbs ball. I was using a 10lbs ball, and there's always this stubborn pin left standing. There's once, on my 150 game, where I had 7 or 8 frames of 9 and spare (9/). It was a great night.

Got back at about 10pm, and met up with my groupmates again for the IOE case study at 11pm, and we worked til about 2am, and I continued to work on my own after going back to my room, til about 4am. And, went to bed at about 5. I did changed my alarm to 8.30am, so that I can work more on it.

Dec 5th Tue
But, I only changed the time, I didn't turned the alarm on. Bummer. So, I woke up at 10.10am, for my 10 am Math class. And I didn't have time to do more ad hoc analysis crap on the case study. So, in the end, we submitted what we already done, and hoping for the best with it.

Turned out it wasn't too bad, although we did missed something in our report. I was too tired to do my Accounting homework for the night too. Well, since I can drop 2 homeworks, dropping 1 isn't bad at all.

Dec 6th Wed
And worked, and then, tried doing my Math 523 homework which I failed to do last weekend. I had some progress, did 3 out of 5 question. But since I can drop 1 homework, I decided early on to drop my last one.

For dinner, Quang, Dane and I went to Bdubs, where 20% of our purchases go to ASB. So, to support my buddies and all in ASB, we decided to eat there. It was 50 cents Leg Wednesday anyway. So, it was all great. After the dinner, I went for a meeting, which I was locked out. So, I walked there, and waited for awhile, and walked back to my room.

Did some preparation for tomorrow's quiz, and hopefully, it will be find.

Dec 7th Thur
Woke up rather late again, at about 9.30am, luckily i did the reviewing for today's quiz yesterday night before I went to bed. The quiz turned out well. And then, the IOE discussion wasn't bad at all, our group got quite a lot of 'airtime', with me presenting my spreadsheets and answering a couple of questions. Woohoo... :)

So, that's about it... just to quote President Bush:"The Way Forward." Whatever it means? lol

Also, my condolences to the Kim family for James Kim, editor of CNET magazine, who lost his life while searching for help in the wilderness of Oregon. I still remember seeing him quite sometime ago, on TechTV, and often enough, reading his product reviews on CNET. Life's really unpredictable.

On another note, a random Wiki search, Flatulence (i search for this to get a better understanding of a plane due to a passenger lighting up matches to avoid embarrassment of flatulence or something like that), so, to learn more about flatulence, go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatulent

Also, the weather had been pretty cold lately, but not enough snow to blanket the place white. I need more snow.
So, here's a pic from my window. It's snowing!!!

And here's a picture of a snowflake on my window! It's really short focus, best I could do with my old digital camera. Try to see the details of the 'crystal'. Isn't it amazing?

Alright, it's been a really long post. Thanks for staying with me. Do make comments and say something in the chatterbox.