Pan Admun Republic of Western Blog

Spring is finally here, I was driving to work one day and suddenly realized how nice and pleasant the morning was; The sun is warm, the clouds flowing in from the West. The highway is not packed with cars. I'm feeling calm and refresh after a good night of rest and It's perfect. The lighting is good and has that wide-angle/3D feel.

It is one of those 'smell the rose' moments for me. (while driving?)

Blah blah ha ha blah, I blah blah and blah. Butthen it choke and bleh. So haha blah bleh.

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I hope my future girlfriend uses the same shampoo....

ReJoice

I just read a comment in slashdot this morning that blogs are just narcissistic rantings, I guess there are many views to it and I certainly don't see it this way.

I believed blogging is a way for people to keep journal of themselves, voice their opinions about things, and make their marks on earth. It's like people have their own homepage in the old days (yeah, I make it sound ancient, but it just barely over 10 years ago), and that's that. Are those empty me-too, hello-world like homepages just narcissistic rantings? Maybe. But it's called "Freedom of speech".

Yes, maybe search engine need to be smarter so people can filter out blog/moblog when searching for "information" and don't want to know someone's opinion about it.

To me, blogging is a way for me to horn my writing skills and critical thinking. I often found myself too "whatever" and "soft" to things I read, which I could be more sensitive to. It comes down to make some analysis and form an opinion on things I read. That's why I do blogging.

So, I got the blackmail material now. Hahaha.

Ryan 1
Ryan 2

Vincent,

Here's to find the 2 pictures. Click to open, then right mouse to save image.

Picture 1
Picture 2

Chinese black bean is commonly used in Chinese dishes and I think everyone from Hong Kong know how to make at least one dish using it.

One simple way to cook with Chinese black bean is steaming ribs with Chinese black beans, which put salty favour to it when the sauce can be mixed with rich (so it won't taste blended).

Ingredients:
- Pork ribs
- Black beans
- Oil

Procedures:
- Cut up ribs in small pieces
- Rinse the black bean to allow it moists
- Mix ribs, black bean and some oil
- Let it sit for 10-15 minutes
- Boil up water in wok
- Steam the ribs in wok until cooked.

It's simple and yummy.

When I went to Toronto last time, my Uncle Nick shown me how to make this green onion pancake. Of course he makes it look so easy, and so yummy. So, I tried it when joining the parents x2 and Heng for a BBQ night followed by Starcraft.

Ingrediants:
- Green onion
- Oil
- Salt
- Flour

Procedures:
1 - Mix flour with warm water, scale ~3:1
2 - Let dough stall for 15 minutes to allow flour absorb the moisture
3 - Massage the dough until it's moist and soft (~1/2 hours)
4 - Apply some flour on table/surface, iron the dough flat on the table into thin sheet with roller
5 - Apply layer of oil on top, add a lot of salt (4 spoons) and green onion (1.5 bunch)
6 - Roll up the green onion in dough
7 - Cut in 3-4 inches piece, iron flat the piece
8 - Pan fry it.

I turns out ok, but it lacks salt and green onion and the pancake a bit too tough after cool off. I guess I need to work more on it.

When I think of picking up chick for one night stand (no, I don't mean the act of pickup done by me, just "pickup" in general), this image always pop up in my mind; A Bar or some sort of clubing place, a lot of trendy/cool looking people, loud techno music, people engaging in ear-to-ear chat, eye contacts, flirting, buying drinks, dancing closely, and newly met "love bird" head out of the place to do the deed or whatever they desired.

With modern technology, it becomes a whole new ball game:

Place: Anywhere - a mall, shopping strip in downtown, a book store, a subway
Time: Anytime - during rush hour, at lunch time, a Sunday afternoon

All you need is a cellphone with bluetooth turns on and you can send a simple message (via bluetooth business card function) like "toothing? 613-xxx-xxxx". You send someone a message and if she replies back or via SMS, you've got game! It's better than ICQ, MSN and Friendster.

Once becomes outreaching to all nearby devices and whatever it reaches is real (ok, it might be a pork-chop...) and close-by. It needs not to be a sex advanture with a stranger, it could be just a chat with some stranger you "bump" into. It's up to you. The closest thing I can think of is someone saw your stat or pick you randomly out of millions and ICQ/MSN you saying "wanna chat? I'm bored."

Gee, I got the best reason to get a Bluetooth phone now.

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Some thinks he is a laughing stock and should go home.

Some thinks he is talented, funny and comical.

I just found him a bit wierd..... handsome? He's not. Talented? I failed to see that with my bias taste on things. But hey, he has his 15 minutes. I respect him has this level of self-esteem and confident to go national on TV, knowing many think he is an idiot. But I still somewhat embarassed by him being from Hong Kong like me... and performing she "bangs".

Oh well, I need my fix of self-esteem boosting. Hahaha.

She Bangs and William Hung's page

My Uncle Nick introduces me to this spice. It is a kind of dried and grounded leaves that added a distinct smell and favor to meat. Heng uses it for cooking as well, just that I never pay attention to it.

I gave this spice a try the other day since I was tired of preparing meat the same good old Chinese soysause-suger-sesameoil-cornstarch-whitepepper way. It turns out kind of weird on stir-fry beef, but I think should be on chicken (how about pork?) and by oven broil.

Oh, well. I will try again.

Today's the last game of the season for our Wedesday night floor hockey games. The games are organized by co-workers and friends. It's been a so-so 1st season as the game turnout was not as good as expected and the gym was a bit too small.

Nonetheless, the games were fun even my skill sucks. It was more enjoyable than the OSSC games I had last fall while the plays are less agressive and skill level is closer. I got a few goals during the season. The goalie part is particularly exciting.

In addition, I found floor hockey are very demanding game. There was a lot of running even the gym was small. I guess it is like that when there is only 3 players on each side and each player has to go both defense and offense on the same time. I just never adjust to the game pace and exhrust too quickly.

Injuries are a problem, many are out of action due to injuries in game, my scary eye injury came to mind; I was hited by a hockey ball, the iris bleed a bit. My left eye was swelled and in pain for a week. It's only get better after some special eyedrops and a lot of resting. There is a small chance of some long-term effect.... sucks. At least, I wear glass for the game now.

Anyway, it is done now. The soccer and ultimate season is coming next!

On the way home, I saw a few kids by Baseline road waving a Sens flag and a sigh says "Honk 4 Sens". It didn't occur to me the city is in playoff mode again; People painting their face, All the red/white jersey; restaurents putting up Sens Go sign, flags on cars, etc.

People keep saying Hockey is Canada, I was never really feel it so real until I saw these kids. I guess it is in the blood.

I went down to Toronto this Easter long weekend. It is the first time I go to TO this year. I usually stop driving down once snow started in Winter. Now snow has melted, TO off I go!

The usual events were all attempted; having good asian food (all-I-can-eat Japanese, Korean BBQ, Shanghaiese, Dim-sum, Chinese desserts), shopping, hang around with friends, and watched Hellboy.

The hightlight of the trip included; found "Expect the unexpected" DVD finally! Learnt from my Uncle Nick how to make onion pancake, got to try making it sometimes.

After the Tremblant trip last week, I decided to do more snowboarding there before the end of the season.

So, I returned this week with a co-worker visiting from China. This week also is the Spin Symposium, we hang around by the super-pipe to see the female qualification round. There are also a lot of people doing big jumps like flips, grabs, 180, 360..... it's just fun to watch from the chairlift.


Big Air Jump
Video 1
Video 2
Video 3
Video 4
Video 5