Michelle Kwan, you go girl!!!!

If you haven't heard already, Michelle Kwan is making another run at the Olympic Gold medal. Yeah! I really enjoy watching her skate - I don't really think she will win the gold medal, but it sure is nice to see her on the olympic team. Who knows, maybe this being her last chance, the adrenaline will be good for her and she can give Slutzkaya(sp?) for the medal...

Mike Celizic of the NBC news (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11048886/) says that she should concede her spot and pass on the torch.... Do you think so? I don't agree. I think she's still one of the best skaters in the US, as evident by her recent groin injury - that during that span no one else seems to have stepped up to prove that they are worthy of the last olympic spot - otherwise, why are we even argueing over this?

Therefore, I wish you the best of luck, and I wish that you would grab that gold medal to prove to the world, that you are still the best skater out there.

j

Memoirs...

Saw Memoris of a Geisha this past weekend. Blah! I had such high hopes for this movie - it just wasn't dramatic enough... Kinda blend... *sigh*. Also, wasn't too impressed with Ziyi Zhang's performance.

Some positives: 1. The scenery was beautiful. 2. Michelle Yeoh is still beautiful, and 3. Gong Li is still an amazing actress. I guess that kinda made the $6.50 that I spent to watch the matinee not such a big loss.

Summary: video.

Read something really cool this morning, in a daily devotional...

"Worship is also bottom-up. We can start by observing our world, our lives, and our history and begin to find God’s hand in all this. This is what you would expect from a scientist. Scientists begin with observation at the most basic level. They start with particulars and try and build conclusions or theories based on those particulars. For a scientist to believe in God (especially one who helped discover the universe’s most fundamental elements) means he started by observing the universe from the ground up, and based on all the particulars he gathered, God become his final conclusion. There was no other way for him to correlate all the facts that have been gathered by all the scientists over all time. "

How interesting! I've never thought of it this way - I mean, to think that there are no other conclusion other than "God" through observing the world. Thats pretty powerful. I've always seen miracles around me, but never thought that this could be the conclusion to God.

hmmm.

john

Do we have the power?

Brain fart of the day: Do we have the power to influence others? Sure we do. Should we have the power to influence the others? Well, its too late now, cuz we do have the power. God gave us that power and commanded us to use it wisely. But should we exert our influence on others even if they don't want it?

I am reflecting upon why people "should" do something. There never is such a thing. We are free to praise God in the way that He wants us to praise Him. Isn't that true? If a person is old enough, and just wants to be left alone to praise God, why should any of us detract that person away from praising God with our thoughts?

Maybe, in the case of all that has been happening at church, I've spoken too much to too many people. They don't need it, they don't deserve it. Maybe they don't want to hear it, whether it'd be my complaints or anyone elses. Maybe they just want to praise God with other brothers and sisters in Christ. Who am I to take that away?

Lord, I come before you, and I repent for my sins with regards to my tongue, my voice, and my influence on others. May they seek you always, and may everyone be so in tuned with you that they follow you directly rather than being influenced by others. Amen.

*sigh* its almost 1AM, and I am still awake.
Why? Because I love God. Through thick or thin, through the times when He is carrying me, and when there are two sets of footprints, through the periods when Satan attacks. Because no matter what happens, God provides.

Church is going through crisis right now. 3 deacons leaving within a week. Thats not good, considering we only have about 8 deacons. Who said church was easy? Who said serving God is easy? It sure wasn't easy for Jeremiah, in chapter 12, as he complained: "You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?"

Church is not easy. But would I rather live without it? NO WAY!

Two interesting site I read about today from Darryl my good friend....
Where's George
BookCrossing
Similar concept, I like BookCrossing better. The idea is that you read a book, tag it with a BookCrossing number, and then give it away, donate it, whatever... then at some point in the future, when someone else reads the book, and discovers the book crossing number, they can goto www.bookcrossing.com and register the book, and you can see where your book ended up.

wheregeorge is the similar idea, using serial numbers on money bills.

Cool idea, kinda like when we were kids, and we attached these post cards to balloons and let them go to see where they end up and get mailed back from.... interesting concept.

That reminds me, if you haven't seen "Pay It Forward" the movie, go see it. :-)
john

SBC DSL internet.
Man. I installed SBC DSL yesterday at my home. I hope you are reading this, cuz it will ask you whether or not you want to merge your DSL account with your YAHOO account. Make sure you say no.

I made the mistake of saying 'YES', and now whenever I log into my.yahoo.com or mail.yahoo.com or any yahoo related sites, I get this annoying BLUE SBC DSL banner that just kinda makes everything look funny... Yikes! Its really annoying. Not only that, it slow down the browsing capabilities because SBC downloads a bunch of crap banners that I don't want (like news, weather..etc).

*sigh* I guess they're all in the business of making money... ok. gotta goto meeting. stay tuned.
john

Something I read today that I really liked. In China, they welcome new believers by saying "Jesus now has a new pair of eyes to see with, new ears to listen with, new hands to help with, and a new heart to love others with". Isn't this so true? Its so wonderful to be in God's kindgom and to serve Him. It has changed my life - and filled my life with joy and happiness. It can do the same thing to yours. :-)

j

Conflict of Interest.

How can a person be humble yet be ambitious in life at the same time? Is that a contradiction of terms? In terms of been a Christian, I think there is a really fine line between the two. Ok gotta work more on this later
john

Went to small group last night. We are doing this bible study that goes along with '40 Days of Purpose' book by Rick Warren. Its pretty cool - Pastor Rick offers quite a bit of insights to life and "What on earth are we here for?".

This week's lesson on discipleship is perhaps the toughest chapter to swallow. I think its very easy to be a worker for God, but I think its very hard to be a disciple of God. I mean, its easy to "do" the things at church, but its hard to "work" out our own salvation. After all, Paul did tell us to continue to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.

I think its easy for me to do the things at church. Hosting small groups, hangout, hold/organize different events, participate in church organizing and planning. I've done all that, and thats a part of my life. But I realized that I haven't exactly been "working out" my salvation - that is, my personal relationship with God, and my reliance on Him. Its so hard!

The one thing that I heard yesterday that really hit me was when Pastor Rick asked "How do you know when you are relying on God?". His answer was to take a look at your prayer life. Whatever you pray about is whatever you rely on God for....

Hmm. Moral of the day? pray!
john

Man. It gets more sad everytime I read about the fire down in LA and all. Its so sad. My heart goes out to all the fire fighters and the people that have or are nearing the loss of their homes. I shall be praying for you all. I hope that things will turn out ok.

As far as I know, I spoke with Hsin today that most of our friends are ok. Can you imagine driving down the freeway and seeing the hills on fire? Thats what my friend Juliet told me. She said that from her house she can see the fire in the hills...yikes.

Thats just a bit too close. Hopefully, the rain will start to come.

Speaking of which, today is my 2 month wedding anniversary. We're going to goto a resturant recommended by our friend darryl. Its called Chez TJ. We'll see how things go. :-)

Keep praying for the victims and the situation in LA.
john

Its been a year since I have blogged. Although, looking at my last blog, at least the work situation is the same... Its still pretty busy here at Terayon - as we move into new projects and more development. Although, it defintiely is more fun.

Since the last time I posted, I have gotten engaged, married, moved in with my wife, went to Japan, and had a mini-honeymoon in Carmel. Talk about changes, eh? Boy I must say I've had a full year so far in 2003. Definitely looking forward to going to Australia before the end of the year.

:-) So much to catch up on, can't do it all today... Stay tuned!

john

Wow! its been a while since I've blogged! Sorries!

Yeah, life has been really busy here at Terayon. Partly because I am still kinda trying to learn the ropes, partly because there is a lot of pressure to produce results. I think overall eventhough I am stressed, things are going well. I'm learning and absorbing at a rate that I've never did before. Thats great news.

I guess I have some time to blog today because I've just proven an important concept here at work about the feasibility of a particular task... Therefore, now a lot of the pressure is off and I just have to do a lot of the busy work (to write the code) now. hehehe :-)

Thats right! call me a NERD!!!

yeah!

john

Alright. So I know now to speak correct english:

"Liz and I went to the park" as opposed to "Me and Liz went to the park."
"Liz gave me the ball" as opposed to "Liz gave I the ball..."

But I didn't know, and now I do know, that...
"Decimate" means to destroy 10%, while "obliterate" means to destroy 100%.
"e.g." is used to give examples, "i.e." is used to explain something.
"Irregardless" is not a word.
"Affect" is a verb. "effect" is used more as a noun than verb.
Its "6AM", not "6AM in the morning" because 6AM = morning.

All curteosy of the Encarta Encyclopedia.
Thanks Microsoft & Encarta!

john

Last night, a bunch of the engineering school friends all got together for dinner. It was cool, to catch up on all the things that happened and laughed about the stupid things that we did back in school... It was great. One of them got married, and the rest of them are still the same, working for their respective companies. Its pretty cool.

In amist of all that, I didn't get a chance to call Liz last night. You know the funny thing is that I really missed talking to her last night. I went to bed thinking that something was missing - like I haven't completed my day yet or something like that. Its really interesting!!! I guess I feel that way because it was 1) a break from my normal routine, and 2) I just miss her lots (yuck! that was such a mushy comment!!).

Anyways, definitely calling her today. :-)

love ya, pooh bear

john

Found this interesting site on the web: X-Box Hacking

First off, I don't have an X-Box, not intend on getting one (unless its really cheap), and even if I do get one, I probably won't hack it. I have no access to Japanese games anymore anyways. Plus, it just takes too much time. As if the PS/2 isn't keeping me busy enough.

BUT, reading about the technology used to HACK the X-Box and the technology inside the X-BOX is really interesting. I came across this article by Andrew Huang, who published his first X-Box hacking paper: Keeping Secrets in Hardware: the Microsoft XBox Case Study. Just reading about all the technology thats inside the X-Box is very exciting. After all, I do the same thing at work, just in a different kind of system. That, and I design, not hack.

I guess the moral of the story is how selfish humans are. We go through great length (like Microsoft) to protect the "data" so that no one else can see what genius inventions other people came up with. We go through layers and layers of encryption just so others wouldn't be able to know what it is. Why? Economic reasons, of course. If people don't know how it works, then the only way to play XBox games is to buy it straight from Microsoft, helping Microsoft making millions of $$$. In the process, Microsoft probably spent millions of dollars and weeks to come up with a scheme to "hide" all this information, only to be broken in by a MIT professor. Just goes on to show you, that no matter what you do, there is always a way around it. :-)

You know, I can't wait until the day that information just flows, for free, and we humans don't take adventage of one another. Rather, we use the knowledge and expertise that is shared amongst everyone to propel our society forward to bigger and better things, and we give credit (in both $$$ and recognition) where its due. As for me, I try to buy origional DVDs and play original PS2 games, along with NOT downloading MP3s and actually buying the CDs that I want to listen to.

john

Ok... This is going to sound Nerdy, but I really like technology. I think its really neat.

I went to a series of training seminars that ended today which talked about cable modem transfer protocols. In it, there were quite some discussions about S-CDMA, which stands for Synchronous CMDA (Code-Division Multiple Access). We hear about CDMA all the time (you know, in Cel phones! That's how Qualcomm was able to get their stock up to $600/share!). So I finally understood somewhat of how CDMA works. Its pretty cool! It takes narrow-band of information, multiply it by a certain "code" and then transmit it on a particular channel in a certain timeslot. Up to a set of cel phones can do this all at the same time, in the same timeslot. There is no confusion when that happens because of the "codes" that the signal multiplies to are Orthagonal (i.e. mutual exclusive, as in no dependency on each other). Anyhow. the adventages of CDMA is that it buys you SNR (Signal to Noise Ratio) so that you are more immune to noise.

I think thats how it work. Its new to me, and not easy to swallow and remember. I'm sure I'll learn more in the days to come!

john

Hsin and Dennis went to Thunderhill Raceways today. I'm so jealous. I wish I can take a day off and go racing....

I've been trying to figure out what to get for myself as a present since I got my first paycheck. Yikes! There are lots of things that I want, like a new cel phone, new rims for my car, some more upgrades to the Miata...etc. I've thought about it quite a bit and I think I've decided to use it to replenish my savings account that I had to deplete due to unemployment. I think thats a good choice, as right now - who knows if one's paycheck is their last one with that company?

Getting laid off (or company go out of business) officially sucks, I've declared. Looking back on it, it really sucks. Don't let other people tell you otherwise. If you are a worry wart like me, it sucks. :-)

john

So 2nd day at work here.... Man, I wish I can just know everything instantly so I can start working immediately. Its killing me to have to read everything. *sigh*....

Anyhow, I've been so excited and so busy that I have forgotten to blog about what happened: I FOUND A JOB!!!!! Yeah. I started working for a company called Terayon Communication Systems yesterday as a software engineer working on the CMTS (Cable Modem Termination System). How's that for a nerdy comment?!?!?!

Anyhow. I'm glad to be back in the swing of things. Hopefully, this will help me blog more often!

john

man, i gotta get my butt in gear and start to blog. But its so hot here!

ok, this sitting at home thing just doesn't do it for me anymore. I need a JOB!!!! I need something to keep me occupied. Yesterday, I was so bored that I decided to re-arrange all the furniture in the house. Then, about 3/4 of the way through it, I decided that it was too much work and I am too tired. So now, the furnitures are in weird places and the house is a mess. Well, good thing no one is visiting anytime soon and only Hsin lives here.... He's used to the mess.

john