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Friday/ the games people play now

These examples of text message ‘games’ adults play are from Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal.    The Very Busy Bee sends text messages without reason (to look important and popular when out with friends), the Mystery Maker sends blank messages to see how people will respond, the Clueless Replier pretends not to recognize the sender as to appear cool and aloof, the Waiting Gamer waits hours or days to reply and the Constant Chirper has other text him (her?) when on a date so that his phone seems to be constantly buzzing !  So the technology has changed, but the game playing has been around a long time, as that 1968 song from Joe South called ‘The Games People Play’, attests :

Na na na Na na na Na na / Talkin’bout you and me, yeah /and the games people play
Oh the games people play now/ ev’ry night and ev’ry day now/ never meaning what they say, yeah/ never saying what they mean.

 

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Thursday/ when the cat’s away the squirrels play

I am checking out the cat through the closed front door, and the cat is checking me out.   The feline looks quite disinclined to make an effort to contain the squirreling going on among the leaves and maple seeds on my back deck !   That’s four days’ worth of leaves.   They were all swept up by afternoon (by me)- but it’s going to be several more weeks before the neighbor’s maple tree is bare.   Those big Canadian flag size leaves keep coming down.

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Wednesday/ little Saturday at Jamjuree

Little Saturday is a Scandinavian concept that adds Wednesday to the list of ‘drinking days’.  We use the term sometimes in South Africa as well.   Six of us went to Jamjuree, a Thai restaurant on 15th Ave.    Singha beer is served everywhere in Thailand, and we always ask for it here in Jamjuree.   I love the golden lion on the label – Singha is indeed a mystical lion, found in ancient Hindu and Thai stories.     The food was delicious : red curry and fried rice with pineapple, wide rice noodles and coconut soup with chicken and mushroom.   I had to look how Bangkok is doing with the flood water that is still everywhere, and it looks as if it hasn’t really started to recede.    Click on the map or paste the link into a browser for a version of it that can be zoomed in and out.

http://203.150.230.27/FloodMap/index.html?search=&locate=&xmin=11105110.04837066&ymin=1518928.8106264025&xmax=11303081.95162934&ymax=1639852.1893735975

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Tuesday/ Washington State icons

This little display is in the lobby downstairs in my company’s office building downtown.  (I forgot to note the artist).  The State is flanked by salmon (of course), and the Washington State Red Delicious apples*.   The trees at the top of the ‘Evergreen State’are probably Western Hemlock pine trees (the official Washington State tree).    Smith Tower (1914) is on the left, the Space Needle (1962) is on the right.  And I would hazard a guess that the little light bulbs are our volcanic mountains.

*From WIkipedia – In the 1980s, Red Delicious represented three-quarters of the harvest in Washington state.   A decade later, reliance on Red Delicious had helped to push Washington state’s apple industry to the edge.   In 2000, Congress approved and President Bill Clinton signed a bill to bail out the apple industry, after apple growers had lost $760 million since 1997.  Today the Red Delicious crop makes up only about a third of the apple production (still the largest proportion) along with other cultivars such as Cameo, Fuji and Gala.

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Monday/ plush Doraemon and Ponyo mug

I’m still unpacking some of souvenirs from my trip to Japan, so here is Doraemon the earless robotic cat from the 22nd century ‘presenting’ a Noritake porcelain coffee mug with the Ponyo character on.  Ponyo is an animated adventure centered on a 5-year-old boy and his relationship with a goldfish princess who longs to become human.   It is a product of Japanese animation legend Hayao Miyazaki and the story was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale ‘The Little Mermaid’.    The movie came out in 2008 and I believe the ‘Ponyo on the Cliff by Blue Mug’ shortly after that.   And is that the ever-possible tsunami that is depicted on the cup?  It certainly seems like it.

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Sunday/ an iPad, finally

I finally ran out on Sunday to the Apple store to buy a black 64Gb iPad2 with wi-fi only.  Black because it’s classier than white, 64 Gb because it’s got the most storage space for my photos and music and digital content and wi-fi only with no 3G phone connectivity because I already have an iPhone.     The magnetic cover can fold up and serve as an angled stand.  It switches the pad on automatically when you pull it open, a nice touch.   Several Google applications I had on my phone got synched over through my PC and is now four times as large (Scrabble is one) – very nice, although those do not make the best use of the native iPad screen resolution.  I think it will be fixed shortly.  (I hope so).   I love the way my blog is displayed when accessed via Facebook (not that I read my own blog, but I’m sure I will in future).  The blog sits on the WordPress server ‘cloud’ and not on the iPad, a thought that is still a little unsettling to me.  Do I own the content, or does WordPress (they provide free server hosting space for the blog)?  Will they pull the plug on it some time?

The 1Q84 book from Japanese author Haruki Murakami (translated into English, of course), a runaway hit in Japan, is my first e-book.   I like my paper books, so I will have to get used to reading like this!  Yikes.   And the Apple store does not stock many titles.   I will have to download Amazon’s little application that can allow me to buy books through them.  Even so : I don’t think the iPad color display is a match for the black and white electronic ink of the Kindles.  But my I needed my slate do a whole lot more – and does it ever.   It carries 1500 songs, a dozen or so music videos, and for now just a smattering of my favorite pictures.   It may end up carrying 1000s once I upload all my favorite pictures of the recent and distant past (scanned pictures).  It can display a map of anywhere in the world where there is a signal, many times with place markers and directions.  The mint.com financial app gives me up-to-the-minute balances and transaction detail of every one of my financial accounts : every bank account, savings account, credit card account, retirement account and even values for fixed assets.   So I can ride the roller coaster of the stock market every day.   I subscribed to free reports from the New York Times newspaper; it comes will free marketing propaganda such as ‘Explore the promise of Canadian oil sands’ (No thank you).

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Saturday/ the leaves are falling

None of the very early white stuff (snow) they have in the Northeast, to report here in the Pacific Northwest.   It is cloudy and rainy, though – so when the sun does come out, it makes the fall colors of the leaves come alive.   I took this picture here on Capitol Hill.

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Friday/ demolishing the Alaskan Way Viaduct south-end

The Alaskan Way Viaduct is Seattle’s north-south double-decker freeway that runs along the Puget Sound water’s edge by downtown.  It opened in 1953, and is now ugly and earthquake-damaged.  (The Nisqually Earthquake on Feb 28, 2001 was one of the largest recorded earthquakes in Washington state history.   The quake measured 6.8 on the MMS and lasted approximately 45 seconds).

In early 2009, the State of Washington, King County, the City of Seattle, and the Port of Seattle revealed that they had agreed to replace the viaduct with a four-lane, 2-mile (3.2 km) long underground tunnel.   The project is estimated to cost some US$4 billion.   So after a lot of soul-searching and political wrangling, construction of the tunnel has now officially started with the demolition of the south end of the Viaduct.  (Boring the tunnel will only start in early 2013.  Hitachi Zosen Corp. of Osaka, Japan will provide the 60 feet in diameter and more than 300 feet long boring machine.   The company has already supplied the tunnel-boring machine currently used in the Capitol Hill train station construction).

New on-ramps will continue to allow traffic to use the viaduct for some time.    The demolition work has drawn a lot of people, but by the time my friends and I stopped by Friday night after dinner the week’s work that started Fri Oct 21 was ahead of schedule and traffic will be allowed to start using the new on-ramp on Saturday instead of on Monday.

Map from WSDOT website

^Picture by Associated Press

^Photo by Joshua Trujillo, Seattlepi.com

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Thursday/ east west home best

I’m home!   There it is : the 787 Dreamliner that was sitting on the tarmac at Hong Kong airport.  I believe it is the one that made the world-first charter flight from Tokyo to Hong Kong on Wednesday.   The tunnel is at Tokyo’s Narita airport; the tubular lighting emitted a low but effective light.   Name the purveyor of the fine silk scarf? (Yes, ‘H’ is the clue).   From the airport’s toy store : stuffed Pokemon characters and ‘Franky’ with the killer arms (but what about his legs? those need a work-out!).   And the kaiseki  (a traditional multi-course Japanese dinner) served on the way to Tokyo was excellent.

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Thursday/ at Hong Kong airport

My beer from last night; the view of the airport as I stepped into the hotel elevator to check out; Halloween display in the airport lounge (nice Chinese lantern with the skeleton on).   I smiled when I saw the sign on the airport shuttle train bringing us to the gate, say  ‘alight here’.   Would we say that in the USA? ‘Alight here’ ?  Well, I’m going to alight in Seattle.

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Wednesday/ at the Sky City

My colleague and I made it to the Marriott Sky City (airport hotel) here at Hong Kong airport.    Our driver thought our destination was the Marriott in Central District on Hong Kong Island, and we had to explain nooo – the Marriott we want is the one at the airport.     But by then we were in the Harbour Tunnel on the way to Hong Kong Island, so we caught a glimpse of the buildings there before we turned around and made our way to Lantau Island where the hotel is.

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Tuesday/ starting to pack up

I have a lot of stuff to squish into my two bags!   One bag goes with me, and the other stays at the hotel.   I go home on Thursday morning.   Meanwhile there are news reports of Hong Kong airport ground personnel mulling a strike (but nothing noted on the airport’s website yet).   And I see Narita airport (my stopover to Seattle) is posting radiation measurements every day to calm public fears over radiation from Fukushima.     It is fine – there is no problem.   

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Monday/ Dapeng Fortress

The first picture of the roadside banner is mine – taken from the bus Monday morning.  It is close to where we work.  Dapeng Fortress (picture and information from Wikipedia) was built in 1394 as a military fortress against pirates.  It later developed into a town during the Ming and Qing dynasties.  In 1571, it sustained a siege of over forty days by Japanese pirates equipped with scaling ladders.  

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Sunday/ The Adventures of Tintin

Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson’s 3D animated ‘The Adventures of Tintin’ based on Hergé’s famous cartoon character has premiered in Brussels this weekend.  It will only start showing in the USA on Dec 21.   Tintin fan that I am,  I will have to go and see it.

The Tintin books  have been translated into 60 languages.   The picture shows this week’s TIME magazine cover, and next to it the Japanese translation of ‘King Ottokar’s Sceptre’ that I bought when I was in Tokyo.   It was not easy to find the bookstore that carried it !

From the TIME article – Hergé drew his panels in an elegant, instantly recognizable style that has been so influential, it has acquired a name : ligne claire, or clear line.   Its hallmarks are steady even lines, gorgeous washes of color, precisely detailed backgrounds and stylized, cartoonish faces.

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Saturday/ day trip to Hong Kong

Here are pictures of my jaunt to Hong Kong on Saturday :

I’m sitting in the taxi on the way to Luohu train station and border crossing in Shenzhen.    Look for the signs that say ‘To Hong Kong’ and eventually you will end up at the customs check point.    For some reason an inordinate number of Mainlanders wanted to cross today, so the ‘Foreigner’ section and lanes inside were just swamped with people as well.  But an official called the few of us that were obviously foreign :  ) out to a barricaded lane they carved out for us.  ‘Thank you, thank you’ I said as he let us through.   Once on the Hong Kong side where you pick up the East Rail Line to the city, it was smooth going.   I took it down south all the way to Hung Hom station in the heart of Kowloon.   The pink mural is from there, showing the wavy roof of the station.      Of course there is a bus terminal and taxi stands outside as well.    But I took the train to Tsim Tsa Tsui from there where the people picture was taken and where I ogled some Swiss watches in the windows.   (Which one is best?  The super square design from Jaeger Le Coultre, or the one with the Salvador Dali-ish numerals from Frank Muller?).    Then I bought some newsmagazines, a math book ‘Alex’s Adventures in Numberland’ and a few grocery items before I headed back.      The Shenzhen Shangri-la with the UFO restaurant at the top (in the center of the last picture below) is my personal landmark when I arrive back at the sprawling Luoho train station.

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Friday night

The red arch advertises a boat and yacht show here in the Shenzhen marina across from the hotel.  I will try to get more pictures this weekend of the rich peoples’ toys.   Four of us from work had beers and a bite at the Sheraton.  Mine was a fancy pad thai in an egg net with shrimp (not sure how egg is used to make a net, but there it is).    Back at our own hotel I just relaxed and watched some TV.    It was not possible to escape the coverage of Gadhafi’s demise or the Greek debt crisis.   And watch out below for the space junk of a German satellite about to come down.   Looks like South Africa is safe, but Seattle and Japan might get pommeled !

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Thursday/ sweet love (stay sweet)

Here’s another example of the little gift candy boxes that one’s coworker might hand out to you when he or she gets married.     The words on the box remind me of Queen’s raucous song ‘Sweet Lady’ from their album A Night at the Opera (lyrics below, not for the faint of heart!).   At the time of its release it was the most expensive album ever recorded.

Sweet Lady from A Night At The Opera (1975), words by Brian May

You call me up and treat me like a dog
You call me up and tear me up inside
You’ve got me on a lead
Ooh you bring me down you shout around
You don’t believe that I’m alone
Ooh you don’t believe me

Sweet lady sweet lady
Sweet lady stay sweet you say

You call me up and feed me all the lines
You call me sweet like I’m some kind of cheese
Waiting on the shelf
You eat me up you hold me down
I’m just a fool to make you a home
Ooh you really do and you say

Sweet lady sweet lady
Sweet lady ooh c’mon stay sweet

My sweet lady
Though it seems like we wait for ever
Stay sweet baby
Believe and we’ve got everything we need
Sweet lady sweet lady
Sweet lady stay sweet
Stay sweet sweet lady

Oh runaway come on
Yeah yeah
Yeah yeah
Sweet lady

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Wednesday/ Writing Functional Specifications

We are (almost) done playing in our Sandbox system and now hard at work writing Functional Specifications.    Functional Specifications will be used to write Technical Specifications, and then SAP’s programming language will be used by our development team to write code.    But wait!  Is SAP not pre-coded, packaged software?  What needs to be coded, then?  Well, we are tweaking the way the standard system works so that the screens and the functions make for a better fit for the business environment.

So what could be tweaked, and what should be left as is?  Ahh : that could be a matter of fierce debate!  As an example : on the classic Work Order screen below, changes on the HeaderData tab’s layout should be avoided.    That is just too radical.  It will confuse users that have used SAP elsewhere, and make the Germans ask Was ist denn hier los?!  What is going on here?  if they are called on for bug fixes or support.  But it should be fine to have the system do additional checks for the accuracy of entered data, depending on which one of the ‘System Conditions’ was selected.

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Tuesday/ mandarins 橘 and naartjies

Mandarins are indigenous to south east Asia, and sometimes these are given as freebies in the cafeteria where we have lunch.     A closely related fruit of this kind is found in South Africa, where they are called naartjies in Afrikaans, originally from the Tamil word nartei meaning citrus.

This plump little ‘loose-rinded fruit from a spiny orange tree’ as Merriam-Webster describes it (see below), was easy to peel and delicious!

From Merriam-Webster dictionary

man·da·rin

noun ˈman-d(ə-)rən

definition of mandarin

1   a : a public official in the Chinese Empire of any of nine superior grades b (1) : a pedantic official (2) : bureaucrat c : a person of position and influence often in intellectual or literary circles; especially : an elder and often traditionalist or reactionary member of such a circle

2   capitalized a : a form of spoken Chinese used by the court and the official classes of the Empire b : the group of closely related Chinese dialects that are spoken in about four fifths of the country and have a standard variety centering about Beijing

3   [Swedish mandarin (apelsin) mandarin (orange), ultimately from Portuguese mandarim mandarin; perhaps from the color of a mandarin’s robes] a : a small spiny orange tree (Citrus reticulata) of southeastern Asia with yellow to reddish-orange loose-rinded fruits; also : a tree (as the satsuma) developed in cultivation from the mandarin by artificial selection or hybridization b : the fruit of a mandarin

— man·da·rin·ic adjective

— man·da·rin·ism noun