I have this portable white casio table top clock in my bathroom. Tonight I got out of the shower and glazed at it only to find a blank liquid display staring right back at me. It was clear that the battery had died, so I plopped a couple fresh ones and it was back in effect. Now, this clock and I go way back... Now when I say way back, I mean waaaay back... Not only do we go waaaaay back, we share a funny story, too. ;) I thought I'd share it with you guys

So, it was back in the early/mid 80's when I was living in Cairo, Egypt. I believe our family was invited to a Cairo Korean family sports event. (Korean people love having sports-related get-togethers) Since it was supposed to be a fun event, you have to have prizes to give out, right? I don't remember the exact details of the day, but the one that all the kids were looking forward to was the treasure hunt. Treasure hunt, for those of you not familiar with the term, is a game where they strategically place little pieces of papers with cryptic codes on them throughout the vicinity and people are supposed to run around looking for one within the designated time limit. It's fun, trust me. :) Well, so after a few minutes of exploring I found a piece of paper that had "#1" written on it That usually means the 1st place prize!! Now... hold up... lemme rewind a bit... ;)

So it was the day before the event and I was out in a shopping district near our place with my dad. Half way through our shopping we ran into the person who was in charge of the get-together. It looked like he was out shopping for the prizes! So naturally I was curious to see what he had bought, and guess what I saw??? A huge He-Man sticker board which was basically a package consisting of bunch of plastic boards with cool drawings of the various locations of Eternia on them. Then of course there were hundreds of little semi-adhesive sticker thingies that you can sprinkle all over the board (semi-adhesive since you can move it around to different spots if you get sick of having a he-man sticker in front of the castle greyskull all the time, etc...). Naturally I flipped!!! Those of you who know me from my Cairo days know that I was a huge He-Man nut... I probably had the most action figures and other related junk like video tapes, etc...(man, all that money could have gone towards a new set of springs for Bora... *SIGH*). Ok, so back to the main trunk of the story...

When I saw the "#1" writing on my treasure I knew it was gonna be that huge He-Man board game thing. I was psyched to the extreme!!! You have no idea, man... Then the time was up and we all gathered back to the main event area to receive our prizes. Naturally they started calling from the highest number. 6th place, 5th place, 4th place, 3rd place, 2nd place... wait a second... Why is that dude taking the huge He-Man board game out and giving it to the 2nd place winner??? Oh... my... god... The He-Man board game was a 2nd place prize.... o_0 *CRAZY*. Then came the 1st place prize, and it was this dinky little portable casio table-top clock!!! I just burst out into tears. I was just crying, crying and crying... I wanted that He-Man board game, dammit... My mom told me the reason why the clock was the 1st place prize... It was more expensive than the He-Man board game... As if I cared.... If you're 8 years old you don't want no stinking portable table-top clock... YOU WANT THE HE-MAN BOARD GAME! *SIGH* Oh, well.. so this portable clock has been in my life ever since... Bitter sweet memories, I must say. ;) The thing really lasts, though... I think I need to change the battery only every 4,5 years or so. Built Casio tough! :) Funny how I still have all these little things from my childhood days and how they bring back such memories... :D

Sometimes it truly baffles me that some adults have no clue how to bring their child up. C'mon... I don't even have kids, and I know more than some of these so-called parents... That's sad... It seems as if they have no notion of "being in their shoes". Many times I witness parents beating their child up without letting the child know why the hell he/she is being beat up. Doesn't common sense tell you that you should let the child know? (I'm not talking about infants, I'm talking about kids who understand words) Then there are times when kids get into trouble and the parents scold them without even giving the child the benefit of the doubt. Ok, the child is in trouble. That already happened. "-ed", means past tense dear wise one. How about listening to the kid to find out what had happened, then solve the problem, then talk to the kid how this can be prevented from now on. I mean... Are you venting for your own relief or are you there to guide the child out of the trouble??? Get your priorities straight! To add insult to the injury, what if the child is already a young adult for god's sake... If you don't treat the child with respect and logical reasoning, you're only making matters worse for the future. Why don't they realize this?

I have been blessed with awesome parents whom I am personally very close to. Until I became a junior high student, I was, too, beaten. However, my mom always made a point to make sure that I knew exactly what I had done wrong and she even asked me how I should be punished. I would then tell her that I had done X and Y, so I should be hit on my butt 10 times with a stick as a reminder that I shouldn't do this the next time. Now, as soon as I entered junior high my parents told me that from here on everyone in the family will resort to discussions only without any physical treatment. You know that takes a lot of courage on the part of an Asian parent to say something like that. However, the kid will eventually realize that it actually means more responsibility has been put on his/her shoulders. It's called trust and with trust comes responsibility. Of course it's again up to the parent to make sure that the kid realizes that and that he/she doesn't abuse the newly given status of a trusted child (Kids should realize how much of a risk parents are taking when they do this, so you had better not take advtange of this in the wrong way).

Since then I was able to sit down and talk about various issues with them, and both parties were enlightened as to how each thought of the issues at hand. (i.e. why kids my age think a certain way and why adults view them in certain ways). At the end of the discussion we would all come out with a much better understanding of both parties involved and given that I was still yet to be an independent young adult, I had to make compromises to stay within reasonable boundaries. Now if my parents were to have just beat the shit out of me cuz I was spending more time playing the guitar than reading English textbooks, do you think I would have made the compromise of making sure that I covered my grounds to a certain extent before investing the rest of the time in guitar playing? No way... I would have probably just said "fuck it", and rebelled against school work just playing the guitar all day long (and perhaps a great guitarist would have been born. ^^;; ), or I would have just become a child scared as shit of his parents who can never share anything with them in the fear of being punished again. I mean, is it really all that difficult to talk with your kids???? Do these people act the same way when they're out in the world socializing with others? If their friends don't listen to them , or act in contrary to their beliefs, do they just yell at them at the top of their lungs or beat the shit out of them, too??? Am I waaaay out of line??? Am I living in some fantasy world when I think all conflicts can be resolved without any violence or yelling???

It takes a lot less physical and emotional strength ( none of which is a requirement when you're talking with a well-brought up young adult ) and instead it takes more patience, understanding and logic ( all of which is a requirement for mature parents ). The only conclusion I can make is that those adults don't deserve to have kids... I'm sorry... I'm flat out being honest here. Then they blame their kids for doing stuff wrong all the time??? What the F!@#??? If there's something your kid has done wrong, then it's that he/she has chosen the wrong parents. *DOH* I forgot.. they didn't even have a choice.... *SIGH*

Now if you're a child in this situation, you need to rise up, confront them and reason with them. The chances are that they're ignorant and unwilling which will result in more beating, or they'll be surprised at this new found knowledge that they have learned... The former reaction is certinaly a possible outcoming since these so-called parents don't know any better... Please, dear clueless parents... Wake up and treat your kid with respect already! Treating your kid with respect is different from spoling your child... *SIGH*... Look, nobody said parenting was easy. Actually, it's HARD!!! So if you're not up for it, don't have kids, dammit...

So, I went and saw the 10PM showing of "The Matrix: Reloaded" last night with Cubbie. Loews was all sold out, so we resorted to Showcase East in Monroeville (It must have been like 5 years since I've gone to see a movie there).

The lasting impression I currently have is that Keanu said "shit" instead of "whoa", and that Trinity used SSH to connect to the power plant's network. (I'm a geek... shoot me) ...

Pretty much all the fight scenes sucked just as badly as it did in the last one (and there are so many of them, all so long... ) ok, maybe it got a tiny bit better, but that's cuz they hired better opponents who really "know kungfu" while Mr. Fishburne and Mr. Reeves sat on their asses for the past ~4 years. Of course there are spots here and there within each fight scene that make you go "ooooooh...", but it's so far apart and rare that none of it really lasts the way they do in movies like "The Hero", for example.

Ok, maybe I'm a bit harsh... From a technical standpoint, there definitely has been a lot of effort put in, but I personally don't care how much hardcore editing went into producing the final composite, nor do I care if the global illumination algorithm used to make the 3D renderings made it look unbelievably real... Keanu can't fight, and obvoulsy no fast forwarding or camera/computer trickery was able to make up for it. And I naturally get distracted and taken out of the virtual world of story telling when there is obviously a glaring flaw *cough* keanu can't fight *cough* (I am actually starting to think that whenever there was a bit in a fight scene that makes it look as if Keanu fights well they were actually CG versions of Keanu) I find it interesting that so far one of the worst Jet Li films I've seen is named "The One" , and Keanu happens to be "The One"... Coincidence? At least the freeway scene was pretty good even though it was really long (far more entertaining than all of the fight scenes combined). Hey, there's a complement!

Of course, just like the previous one, biblical allusions are abundunt and as you dig deeper into the mythology those W bros have patched up from various other mythologies it may seem kinda cool. So it will make you want to probably watch it over to make sure you spotted all the plot points. Oh, and if you have yet to ponder on the whole free-will VS. fate debate that has been going on for decades, maybe this movie will open your eyes up that way, too... However, from a story-telling perspective and straight-up entertainment value I think it falls quite a bit short.

Bottom line... don't go see it for its fight scenes, or special effects cuz it's nothing you'll be really impressed about given that there aren't anything really new here... Don't go see it for its story telling, or acting, either... go see it cuz you know you want to... perhaps cuz you're just a big fan... or cuz it's your guilty pleasure... or since you just don't want to feel left out when others around you start quoting from it, leaving you clueless.

Would I strongly recommend it? nah... but I won't try to stop you, either. You might want to go Matinee, tho... Or wait till the DVD comes out so you can watch all the behind the movie stories along with it. I guess my point is that I think an entire comic book series or an animated version of the same story would have been much better served than this movie.

Well, only 6 months until Matrix 3 comes out! I'll go matinee this time.

A very good friend of mine just got married the other day in Seoul. 5/8/2003 to be exact. Jiwon, Kim. That is the name of this spring time bride. She works as some super sekrit spy journalist in Seoul. pu heh heh. Something like that... ^^;; Jiwon ah! You had better be happy with this marriage girl!!! Much love! I'm sorry I couldn't be there... I'll see you next year for sure, tho! Miss you very much! Guys, bring those cheerful greetings on for my dear friend!

You know those losers? Like the type of people who blame their equipment for their own lack of skillllz??? Yeah, those losers... Don't you just HATE THEM??? Well, I'm one of them. ^^;; I basically gave up on the whole heel and toe thing on my stock pedals... I claim impossibility. (does that make either grammatical or trying-to-sound-like-a-lawyer sense?) Anyway, so I bought a set of razo magnesium pedal covers (I chose these cuz they had height-adjustable gas pedals. ) and installed them. I chose this set because it did not require drilling and naturally assumed it'd be less hassel to install... Lemme just say that putting these on was no walk in the park, either... Damn europeans have their own ways of design pedals so that Japanese pedal covers don't go on very easily... grrrr.... Oh well, so I spent an hour or so and finally got them on. Phew~ Now... heel-and-toeing is... hmmm... well... I can do it while I'm not in motion... heh heh heh... ^^;;; Well, that's a good start no??? Ok, I'm gonna get this down by the end of summer! Mark my words!!

Well, so since I put down my summer projects for my 2 alter egos, I thought I might as well put some down here as well...

• Gain 10 pounds
• 3 words: Heel and Toe.
• 1 word: Vacation... *SIGH* I need a break, dammit...