A typical trip home after work from coolnalu on Vimeo.

Two post ago I compared a view Kodak cameras I found at Walmart, and bought the one with best overall performance. However, after I got the camera, the build of the camera factored in as well. I got the package in about a week. One interesting thing is that the packaging guy put in cushioning materials in a least sensible way, like the following

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Boston is GREAT!

Simplified Story, Moving Fast Makes Time Goes Slower

I’ve been so busy interviewing in the last month that the time passed by completely unnoticed by me. All I remembered was interview with company 1 on Monday, company 2 on Tuesday, company 3 & 4 on Thursday and next rounds of interviews started on the following Monday, then the very last interview was on a Friday. Until all the ashes eventually fell on the ground have I figured my hair has grown to 2cm from 0.5cm, a pair of new leather shoes got worn out, and bills totaled $1,000 spent on traveling, dining in, grocery, and places I could not remember.

Sanctuary in Job Hunting

But overall it was a great experience. During the many trips to Newton from downtown, I was sitting on the green line train, listening to my iPod, OSTs from movies of Hayao Miyazaki (宮崎 駿), and watching the green forest along the sides. Sunshine made ways between leaves and casted light spots on soil and trunks. Occasionally the train stops at some old, quiet, and rural rail stations. Everything was so peaceful and as my ears were filled with the relaxing music, I felt I was in a neverland just like the ones depicted in Hayao’s movies.

Frustrations Shall Go Away

There were still some frustrations though. I had a tough time finding a good apartment and I felt it was harder than finding a job. Then I remember before I left Toronto, I said to myself I’d like to try a different life style, one in which I don’t plan ahead of time but rely purely on how things naturally come out. I wanted stress my durability so that I can stay calm and concentrated even if I won’t have a place to live the next day or won’t have enough cash to buy a meal and have no where to refill my pocket. I just can’t believe how closely the things came out as I wished. But it turns out I am simply not quite that type of person. Just be myself and make plans early as I always do should get me the best result.

Forecast

Next Post:The tough offer selection process

Microsoft just launched its “I’m” campaign by hosting it at im.live.com. Coincidence or not, IM also stands for Instant Messenger, so whether they want to brain wash people’s understanding on “IM” is a question.

What’s “I’m”?

It might sounds naive but all you need to do to join “I’m” is by adding special text code in your Windows Live Messenger display name, to have a tiny icon like the one the right appear in your name. A few text codes are available on the campaign homepage, but there are still some other “secret codes” that still works but not shown in the homepage. Following are the official ones:

How does adding a text code help out charities?

This icon trick only works on Windows Live Messenger 8.1, so to spread the idea around means persuading your friends to update/switch to version 8.1. It is through this that the “I’m” initiative can save advertisement fees and use that portion of money to donate to the organizations. And it also help promote the organizations at the meantime too since users usually will do a bit of investigation to decide which organizations they will support by adding specific text codes representing them.

How is it going?

So far I’ve had about 11 contacts added “I’m” code in their names, and that’s been just a few days. But how would that go. At this point it might be cool to add something others don’t know of yet in your name. But as time goes along, many people will start to leave out the text code. How would the initiative keep this up, is a question for them.

Were it not because Gao, Yuan sent me the nerd test two weeks ago, I wouldn’t have realized how nerdy I am. I scored 75% in the test, but I can be much nerdy than that. Simply because some of the questions are so obvious that you know the result will show you’re nerdier if you choose “you know it” than you don’t, so I escaped some, pretending that I don’t know about it. O well.

But, I should have known that I am nerdy without taking any tests. It’s just that I’ve been so used to the lifestyle I have and never thought about it.

• First of all, I don’t watch TV. If I like a particular series, I’ll download as many seasons as I can find off the Internet and watch them whenever I feel I want to, in particular, when I am having dinner. That doesn’t sound too bad, but the problem is, the TV series available for download out there, are usually at least a year behind the latest ones. That means, I live in a world a year behind others’, on average.
• Secondly, I don’t make new friends, or rarely do, in real life. That’s probably not quite precise, since every time I get into a new environment, I got to know a lot of new people and faces. But, 99% of chances are, the relationships will limit to saying hi when met in the hallway and not a word more than that. This is a big problem though, but I’ve been so used to it, probably for years that I just don’t feel lonely at all. It might also be why I haven’t been sent to a mental hospital, yet.
• Kind of followed from above, I cannot speak fluently, either in English or my mother tongue. So there is no wonder why my spoken English got hardly improved in the last few years. Because I just couldn’t speak logically or consiously, not even in the language I am more familiar with!
• Another thing is I bite nails when I feel nervous. Yep. To be a nerd you gotta have some bad habit.

There are a bunch of other symptoms on me though, but the killing one is, I wanna to be nerdier, a researcher!

A list of my other symptoms (not exhaustive):

• I don’t drink
• I don’t clubbing
• I don’t smoke
• I don’t call friends
• I don’t read literature
• I don’t know politics
• I don’t watch sports nor care about the results
• I don’t recognize a lot of celebrities nor know the buzz
• I can stay home all alone without feeling lonely
• I don’t know how to bargaining