Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Our crayfish thinks he's a monkey.
Well he seems to like to climb the vegetation in the tank, anyways.
Btw the vegetation in the tank is just some watercress we stuck into the gravel, and it seems to be taking root.
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Shaping a Baguette
I had to look this up on the net... it seems that what you do is basically punch down your risen dough, fold it into a big square and cut it into 3 strips. Then fold them over a few times, and hide the cut areas' seams on the bottom.
Forming them wasn't as easy as I expected... Here's a couple of pictures - first a good one, and then another where you'll see where I didn't get one of the seams on the bottom properly.
Allen.
Flip it around though, and you'll see the baguette in the front is not right at all, the seam was supposed to be on the bottom to avoid this. The other ones are fine though.
Forming them wasn't as easy as I expected... Here's a couple of pictures - first a good one, and then another where you'll see where I didn't get one of the seams on the bottom properly.
Allen.
Flip it around though, and you'll see the baguette in the front is not right at all, the seam was supposed to be on the bottom to avoid this. The other ones are fine though.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
How do I cook these?!
Well, I do know I am supposed to stir fry these rice cake slices, probably with some julienned pork and some napa, but I don't know if any preparation work goes into them before they hit the wok.
We bought them from a Korean supermarket from their fresh section - they are rubbery and not soft, so I'm wondering if they are meant to be cooked as is, or if we have to do something else, like soak them, or boil them.
Going to have to experiment a bit.
Allen.
edit - okay, Kathy said they boiled nicely in soup and softened right up. That's a relief!
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Baking with the starter
I did another batch of those French rolls - this time I tried used the starter that I'd made instead of dry packaged yeast. The starter displaces some of the flour and some of the water, and I had to figure out just how much I was replacing, involving some guess work.
So I added 2 cups of the starter, and took out 1 cup of flour and 1 cup of water. It kneaded pretty wet, and I ended adding the excluded cup of flour back in. If I were to do this again, I would take out all 1.5 cups of the water and just use the liquid from the starter.
The kneaded dough took twice as long to rise at both stages - I don't know if I should attribute that to the excess water or the quality of the starter. I didn't take any pictures during the process but I did take a shot of the end result.
The bread had a hint of sourness, but I guess that's to be expected since I used sourdough starter instructions. Kathy says she doesn't notice any sour flavour at all.
It's probably because I've been re-mixing in the clear alcohol-smelling liquid that comes out on top of the starter as instructed. (The liquid is called hooch.) I wonder if I can minimize that sour taste if I get rid of the hooch instead of mixing it back in.
I was a little worried at first about if it was just plain "gone bad" but I ate half a bun last night, and I didn't end up in the hospital. I ate another one in the morning after toasting and it was not too bad either... Toasted and buttered it was actually pretty good.
Allen.
So I added 2 cups of the starter, and took out 1 cup of flour and 1 cup of water. It kneaded pretty wet, and I ended adding the excluded cup of flour back in. If I were to do this again, I would take out all 1.5 cups of the water and just use the liquid from the starter.
The kneaded dough took twice as long to rise at both stages - I don't know if I should attribute that to the excess water or the quality of the starter. I didn't take any pictures during the process but I did take a shot of the end result.
The bread had a hint of sourness, but I guess that's to be expected since I used sourdough starter instructions. Kathy says she doesn't notice any sour flavour at all.
It's probably because I've been re-mixing in the clear alcohol-smelling liquid that comes out on top of the starter as instructed. (The liquid is called hooch.) I wonder if I can minimize that sour taste if I get rid of the hooch instead of mixing it back in.
I was a little worried at first about if it was just plain "gone bad" but I ate half a bun last night, and I didn't end up in the hospital. I ate another one in the morning after toasting and it was not too bad either... Toasted and buttered it was actually pretty good.
Allen.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Baking misadventure on the weekend.
We have this old 5lb sack of cake & pastry flour in the pantry that has been there forever. I think we bought it by mistake one day. Anyways, we tried making some bread rolls out of it this weekend and the results were pretty bad - the flour wouldn't knead nicely and wouldn't rise properly, and then after baking they were dense, crumbling little bricks. Actually it reminded me a little bit of biscuits, so maybe I'll try a biscuit recipe on them instead tonight when I get home. Biscuits are supposed to be crumbly right?
I also tried making a yeast starter out of the cake flour and an old mostly-used jar of dry yeast - old as in years past it's stamped date, but it is just yeast after all. The only thing that would mean is that there is less live yeast and you won't get the expected amount of rising activity from it. But drop it in a starter and maintain it for a few days, it should become a viable yeast culture again right? There were a lot of recipes on the net about yeast starters, they basically all said the same thing - once started, they are virtually unkillable. Every so often, get rid of some of it somehow (bake with it or toss it out), and feed the remainder with some water and flour to make it it's original size again. Once a day if you leave it out, once a week if you refrigerate it. I will find out how it goes soon enough, if it works I wont need to buy yeast any more, haha.
We did pick up some unbleached all purpose flour so we could do some actual, successful baking as well: I made a batch of nice looking rolls, using the same recipe that the cake flour failed miserably with. What a difference the right flour makes. I used the recipe from here. The best part of this recipe is that there is no milk or eggs in it, cause we are always missing either eggs or milk.
Allen.
French Bread Rolls to Die For
edit - the biscuit idea was edible but did not look too pretty - white as a sheet of paper even though fully cooked. I tried browning the top with the broil mode but it browned skipping the 'golden' part entirely.
I also tried making a yeast starter out of the cake flour and an old mostly-used jar of dry yeast - old as in years past it's stamped date, but it is just yeast after all. The only thing that would mean is that there is less live yeast and you won't get the expected amount of rising activity from it. But drop it in a starter and maintain it for a few days, it should become a viable yeast culture again right? There were a lot of recipes on the net about yeast starters, they basically all said the same thing - once started, they are virtually unkillable. Every so often, get rid of some of it somehow (bake with it or toss it out), and feed the remainder with some water and flour to make it it's original size again. Once a day if you leave it out, once a week if you refrigerate it. I will find out how it goes soon enough, if it works I wont need to buy yeast any more, haha.
We did pick up some unbleached all purpose flour so we could do some actual, successful baking as well: I made a batch of nice looking rolls, using the same recipe that the cake flour failed miserably with. What a difference the right flour makes. I used the recipe from here. The best part of this recipe is that there is no milk or eggs in it, cause we are always missing either eggs or milk.
Allen.
French Bread Rolls to Die For
Here it is in the oven
Here they're starting to brown
Here they are shortly before devouringedit - the biscuit idea was edible but did not look too pretty - white as a sheet of paper even though fully cooked. I tried browning the top with the broil mode but it browned skipping the 'golden' part entirely.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Lets try those tires again...
We lucked out and the Canadian Tire near my workplace had a new shipment of Goodyear Nordic winter tires about 2 weeks ago, and I got them installed, balanced and aligned. However, they have been giving us a rougher and rougher ride as time passed by - there was a decided rolling motion at low speeds, and a vibration at high speeds.
So we kept planning to go to Canadian Tire to get it checked, but things kept coming up and I didn't have either time or the car at my disposal. Anyways, on Thursday this week I finally had both, so I dropped by the Canadian Tire and told them I was having trouble with the new tires and wheels. It took a while before they could look at it, but when they did, they said that both rear tires have some sort of manufacturing defect, and their manager could authorize a replacement.
The tricky part was that the manager was not on duty in the evening, and would be in the morning, so I had to bring the car in again if I wanted the warranty work done. They gave me a card with a number to call. Of course, it was going to be a bit difficult since work was extra busy and Friday is one of Kathy's downtown work days.
So on Friday morning, I called the manager up and asked him about my case. He was already aware of it when I called, which was a pleasant surprise, and said I just had to drop the car off. So I got Kathy to drop me off at work, then take the car over to the Canadian Tire cause it is right next to the Leslie Subway stop on the Sheppard line. They called in the early afternoon to say that they have checked and replaced the 2 tires and all 4 of the steel rims too. That's a lot of replacement parts - how come it was done so badly the first time around?
Anyways, I told Kathy and she picked up the car after work. The cashier gave her a bit of a hassle and tried to charge us $340 for the rims, but thank goodness I had given Kathy all the receipts, and it listed the rim purchase. Its funny how they reassure us we don't need the old receipts cause all the data is on file, and then stuff like this still happens. So we got all of this fixed via the warranty, and the car is riding smoothly again, as it should be.
Allen.
So we kept planning to go to Canadian Tire to get it checked, but things kept coming up and I didn't have either time or the car at my disposal. Anyways, on Thursday this week I finally had both, so I dropped by the Canadian Tire and told them I was having trouble with the new tires and wheels. It took a while before they could look at it, but when they did, they said that both rear tires have some sort of manufacturing defect, and their manager could authorize a replacement.
The tricky part was that the manager was not on duty in the evening, and would be in the morning, so I had to bring the car in again if I wanted the warranty work done. They gave me a card with a number to call. Of course, it was going to be a bit difficult since work was extra busy and Friday is one of Kathy's downtown work days.
So on Friday morning, I called the manager up and asked him about my case. He was already aware of it when I called, which was a pleasant surprise, and said I just had to drop the car off. So I got Kathy to drop me off at work, then take the car over to the Canadian Tire cause it is right next to the Leslie Subway stop on the Sheppard line. They called in the early afternoon to say that they have checked and replaced the 2 tires and all 4 of the steel rims too. That's a lot of replacement parts - how come it was done so badly the first time around?
Anyways, I told Kathy and she picked up the car after work. The cashier gave her a bit of a hassle and tried to charge us $340 for the rims, but thank goodness I had given Kathy all the receipts, and it listed the rim purchase. Its funny how they reassure us we don't need the old receipts cause all the data is on file, and then stuff like this still happens. So we got all of this fixed via the warranty, and the car is riding smoothly again, as it should be.
Allen.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Winter Tires
Well its starting to get a bit slushy and slippery on the roads these days, so I decided I wanted to get a set of winter tires this year.
The problem is that all the tires in my size are sold out everywhere. Its funny cause usually it's the other way around for my old Corolla - parts are cheap and plentiful and you can shop around for a good deal.
The stores say that in Quebec they've enacted a safety law which requires all drivers to use winter tires from Dec 15th to March 15th this winter, and that the demand for tires is so great that they are buying tires here. I've even seen a few articles on CBC saying there is a thriving black market coming up around snow tire theft.
Anyways, whatever the reason, I'm having some real trouble finding snow tires, unless I'm willing to spend about $150 a tire on some premium stuff... and that doesn't include the price of a set of metal rims, which is another item that is in low supply at all the stores near home and work. Sigh.
Allen.
The problem is that all the tires in my size are sold out everywhere. Its funny cause usually it's the other way around for my old Corolla - parts are cheap and plentiful and you can shop around for a good deal.
The stores say that in Quebec they've enacted a safety law which requires all drivers to use winter tires from Dec 15th to March 15th this winter, and that the demand for tires is so great that they are buying tires here. I've even seen a few articles on CBC saying there is a thriving black market coming up around snow tire theft.
Anyways, whatever the reason, I'm having some real trouble finding snow tires, unless I'm willing to spend about $150 a tire on some premium stuff... and that doesn't include the price of a set of metal rims, which is another item that is in low supply at all the stores near home and work. Sigh.
Allen.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Joseki and Go problems.
This is what I currently think - Joseki are sets of ideal moves. It's basically a combo sequence of play, encompassing best choices for your moves and your opponent's moves. Ideally you want to play a joseki that puts you ahead and gives you initiative, without your opponent realizing that they are playing into the losing side of the joseki pattern. (or maybe they do realize it but they can only play as recommended because it would minimize their losses.)
There was a quote somewhere I saw that said something about "learn your joseki and then forget it." Another one said "learning joseki reduces your playing level by 2 ranks". Both of them refer to the fact that rote learning is bad - you will not learn overall strategy as well, I suppose, and it can make you predictable, for sure. I think that we are just supposed to be able to recognize when joseki is possible instead, and regard it in terms of a strategic advantage instead of playing out the whole thing on a tactical level.
--
Do as much as you can with as few actual moves as possible seems to be the order of the day in go.
I've been doing go problems on a website called Go Problems. (what a straightforward name) It looks like they have a lot of material - I'm just looking at the lower level problems at the moment. I like how I can choose what difficulty of problem I want to look at. I also like that there are commentaries on the problems. Also, I can continue playing out the problem past it's ending point in order to see for myself just WHY something is good or not good (because I am a noob). Very helpful, and doesn't cost anything :D
Allen.
There was a quote somewhere I saw that said something about "learn your joseki and then forget it." Another one said "learning joseki reduces your playing level by 2 ranks". Both of them refer to the fact that rote learning is bad - you will not learn overall strategy as well, I suppose, and it can make you predictable, for sure. I think that we are just supposed to be able to recognize when joseki is possible instead, and regard it in terms of a strategic advantage instead of playing out the whole thing on a tactical level.
--
Do as much as you can with as few actual moves as possible seems to be the order of the day in go.
I've been doing go problems on a website called Go Problems. (what a straightforward name) It looks like they have a lot of material - I'm just looking at the lower level problems at the moment. I like how I can choose what difficulty of problem I want to look at. I also like that there are commentaries on the problems. Also, I can continue playing out the problem past it's ending point in order to see for myself just WHY something is good or not good (because I am a noob). Very helpful, and doesn't cost anything :D
Allen.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Go is not easy
I used the Interactive Way to Go as my introduction to the rules. It looked pretty informative with clickable java programs showing each rule, and I was done with it soon enough. I thought to myself - Okay, now I'm ready to give this a shot! What do I have to lose?
Apparently my dignity, pride, cockiness, and any form of hubris you can think of. It was very humbling.
The past week or so, I have been playing some computer go at home. I have been losing nonstop. This has been really frustrating, especially when I'm given a huge 9 stone lead on a small beginner board that's 13x13 in size. No matter what I put down the computer had a counter for it instantly.
Totally massacred each time.
So I set out to read more about Go. Maybe find something about overall strategy on the internet. I dug into a few go related sites I'd found:
The Sensei's Library
Tel's Go Notes
Wikipedia's entries on Go, and Go Strategy/Tactics
and oddly enough,
Hitachi's Life and Death Problems of Go which is too advanced for me but they give good descriptions of what is going on.
(what's an electronics company have to do with Go theory?)
Even the online game store I bought my Go set at has a pdf that describes how to play.
Anyways, spending this time in front of a computer seems to be more productive than spending in from of a go game at this point, though I wouldn't actually stop playing - I have to try out what I'm reading about after all.
So my splatter movie grade deaths are getting a little less spectacular now, and I get to throw a few punches as I'm sinking.
Sometimes a punch actually connects and I win, though it's more luck than anything else.
Allen.
* The version I've been trying is the open source GnuGo, compiled to run on my Windows PC. (Using a Drago interface)
Apparently my dignity, pride, cockiness, and any form of hubris you can think of. It was very humbling.
The past week or so, I have been playing some computer go at home. I have been losing nonstop. This has been really frustrating, especially when I'm given a huge 9 stone lead on a small beginner board that's 13x13 in size. No matter what I put down the computer had a counter for it instantly.
Totally massacred each time.
So I set out to read more about Go. Maybe find something about overall strategy on the internet. I dug into a few go related sites I'd found:
The Sensei's Library
Tel's Go Notes
Wikipedia's entries on Go, and Go Strategy/Tactics
and oddly enough,
Hitachi's Life and Death Problems of Go which is too advanced for me but they give good descriptions of what is going on.
(what's an electronics company have to do with Go theory?)
Even the online game store I bought my Go set at has a pdf that describes how to play.
Anyways, spending this time in front of a computer seems to be more productive than spending in from of a go game at this point, though I wouldn't actually stop playing - I have to try out what I'm reading about after all.
So my splatter movie grade deaths are getting a little less spectacular now, and I get to throw a few punches as I'm sinking.
Sometimes a punch actually connects and I win, though it's more luck than anything else.
Allen.
* The version I've been trying is the open source GnuGo, compiled to run on my Windows PC. (Using a Drago interface)
Cleaned the go stones
As a quick edit, I washed the go stones last night with some dishwashing detergent. After drying, I applied some baby oil by hand and rubbed them clean with some clean kitchen towels. They kept their nice matte look and now smell a little bit like baby oil. (Basically they look the same but don't smell weird any more)
Also, I can run my hands through them in the bowl now without the blackboard-scratching feeling. I guess they just needed a bit of oil to get rid of the scratchiness.
It took an hour and a half of oiling and polishing to get the black stones done. I was doing them one or two at a time until I figured that just rubbing handfuls of oily stones in the towel worked just as well, (just enough so that the stones didn't scratch and rub each other) else it would have taken over 2 hours. In comparison, I oiled and polished the white stones in about 15 or 20 minutes.
Allen.
Also, I can run my hands through them in the bowl now without the blackboard-scratching feeling. I guess they just needed a bit of oil to get rid of the scratchiness.
It took an hour and a half of oiling and polishing to get the black stones done. I was doing them one or two at a time until I figured that just rubbing handfuls of oily stones in the towel worked just as well, (just enough so that the stones didn't scratch and rub each other) else it would have taken over 2 hours. In comparison, I oiled and polished the white stones in about 15 or 20 minutes.
Allen.
Monday, November 10, 2008
Go (the game)
I bought a go board recently. Learning to play go is one of those things that I have thought about for a pretty long time, but never really gotten around to doing.
I remember seeing my dad play Go with Uncle Kao here in Canada when I was little, a long, long time ago. They had taken a big square cardboard box and drawn an uneven looking grid on the back, using a ballpoint pen and a piece of cardboard as a ruler. On top of this box, they started playing the stones, deep in thought as I watched them. I had no idea how the game worked, but they were putting the stones on the intersections of the lines, which I had never seen before. Games always had their playing pieces played in the squares didn't they? Checkers, chess, board games of all sizes and shapes, never had I seen one where you play on the intersecting lines. (though I guess Xianqi does it as well)
I thought it was fascinating. I'd only seen them play that one time, but it was quite a vivid memory.
Anyways, I want to talk about the purchase! I picked up the set from the Go Game Store after searching a number of sites, as it looked like they had some of the nicest solid boards. An even better point was that they were located in Canada (Brampton!) so I could avoid having to pay any customs fees as I would generally have to do when purchasing from the US. I contacted the store and got some Canadian pricing for their sets - I ended up getting this set from them.
The board is made from 3 pieces of spruce wood attached together, and is an inch thick. Its roughly about 17 inches by 18 inches, which is the Japanese standard size. I'm really happy with the colour of the board. Its very soothing to look at.
The stones are rounded on both sides, and have a beautiful matte finish to them. They're called Yunzi, named for their original production in Yunnan. They are a special formulation of glass made especially for go stones. The formula was lost at some point in the past, making these tiles a rarity. It was reverse engineered in the last 50 years or so, and are being mass produced now. (with changes in the formulation to remove the now-unacceptable lead content.) The only part of it I don't like is that if you run your hands through the stones it feels like you're scratching a blackboard. Just thinking about it is making my skin crawl. I guess its not a big deal, since we're not supposed to do that anyways.
The stones do smell a bit funny - I think I'm supposed to wash and then oil them, which I haven't gotten around to doing. Info on the internet says to use sewing machine oil, but since I don't have any around, I will probably have to find an alternative. For all I know, the funny smell might even be sewing machine oil already.
Before anyone asks, I did watch the Hikaru no Go anime. All of it. In 2007. Yes it influenced me to pick up a Japanese style set instead of a Chinese style set.*
Allen.
* Japanese style sets use bi-convex stones and Chinese style sets use single convex stones. Like my MS Paint picture? :P
I remember seeing my dad play Go with Uncle Kao here in Canada when I was little, a long, long time ago. They had taken a big square cardboard box and drawn an uneven looking grid on the back, using a ballpoint pen and a piece of cardboard as a ruler. On top of this box, they started playing the stones, deep in thought as I watched them. I had no idea how the game worked, but they were putting the stones on the intersections of the lines, which I had never seen before. Games always had their playing pieces played in the squares didn't they? Checkers, chess, board games of all sizes and shapes, never had I seen one where you play on the intersecting lines. (though I guess Xianqi does it as well)
I thought it was fascinating. I'd only seen them play that one time, but it was quite a vivid memory.
Anyways, I want to talk about the purchase! I picked up the set from the Go Game Store after searching a number of sites, as it looked like they had some of the nicest solid boards. An even better point was that they were located in Canada (Brampton!) so I could avoid having to pay any customs fees as I would generally have to do when purchasing from the US. I contacted the store and got some Canadian pricing for their sets - I ended up getting this set from them.
The board is made from 3 pieces of spruce wood attached together, and is an inch thick. Its roughly about 17 inches by 18 inches, which is the Japanese standard size. I'm really happy with the colour of the board. Its very soothing to look at.
The stones are rounded on both sides, and have a beautiful matte finish to them. They're called Yunzi, named for their original production in Yunnan. They are a special formulation of glass made especially for go stones. The formula was lost at some point in the past, making these tiles a rarity. It was reverse engineered in the last 50 years or so, and are being mass produced now. (with changes in the formulation to remove the now-unacceptable lead content.) The only part of it I don't like is that if you run your hands through the stones it feels like you're scratching a blackboard. Just thinking about it is making my skin crawl. I guess its not a big deal, since we're not supposed to do that anyways.
The stones do smell a bit funny - I think I'm supposed to wash and then oil them, which I haven't gotten around to doing. Info on the internet says to use sewing machine oil, but since I don't have any around, I will probably have to find an alternative. For all I know, the funny smell might even be sewing machine oil already.
Before anyone asks, I did watch the Hikaru no Go anime. All of it. In 2007. Yes it influenced me to pick up a Japanese style set instead of a Chinese style set.*
Allen.
* Japanese style sets use bi-convex stones and Chinese style sets use single convex stones. Like my MS Paint picture? :P
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Sony Cybershot DSCW120
Well today I'm going to go pick up that Sony digital camera. Hope it's in stock!
Sony Cybershot DSCW120
Also it turned out that the old camera we used to have was not a Canon, it was a Kodak. A Kodak LS443, 4 megapixel in the 1-2 megapixel days. It had a Schneider-Kreuznach German lens.
The Sony I'm looking at has a Carl Zeiss lens - it's the primary reason I'm going for it - hopefully the quality will live up the brand name.
Allen.
edit - got it now, it is very nice :D
Sony Cybershot DSCW120
Also it turned out that the old camera we used to have was not a Canon, it was a Kodak. A Kodak LS443, 4 megapixel in the 1-2 megapixel days. It had a Schneider-Kreuznach German lens.
The Sony I'm looking at has a Carl Zeiss lens - it's the primary reason I'm going for it - hopefully the quality will live up the brand name.
Allen.
edit - got it now, it is very nice :D
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
Pic of the hair
Here's what my hair looks like right now (taken earlier tonight) - I'm the short red hair in the centre and K is to my side looking on. You can get an idea of how red is is this way. :D
Camera 2
I really want a nice camera. Argh. Well I guess nice-for-the-price, good bang for the buck, whatever you want to call it.
I looked at the Sony Cybershot DSCW120, it's on sale at the Best Buy - I might go pick up one of those. K says she likes the shutter sound it makes when you take a picture with it. :D
Allen.
I looked at the Sony Cybershot DSCW120, it's on sale at the Best Buy - I might go pick up one of those. K says she likes the shutter sound it makes when you take a picture with it. :D
Allen.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Allen the Red
Oh, I should also mention, I dyed my hair red over the weekend. :D BRIGHT RED.
I managed to dye my scalp red too in the process. Now that merits a bit of typing.
I bought the dye at one of those hair product specialty shops in Pacific Mall. The salesgirl basically asked what colour I wanted. She showed me a colour chart with sample "hair" in it that was supposed to be the right colour after dyeing. I wanted something really red. (Red is my favourite colour) The salesgirl was sort of shocked and asked a couple times if I was sure I wanted something so red, to which I replied, definitely, yes. Kathy, who had shown me the shop, just chuckled to herself. Anyways, she told me about what I needed to get the hair to the shade of red in the sample - the actual dye plus a peroxide goop that was rated at 40% something, in order to bleach my hair white first before the colour would take. Kathy got her to write down the instructions, and we paid about $20 for the two items.
When I got around to dyeing my hair, I checked the package instructions, and they were all in French. I decided my French wasn't good enough to read hair dyeing instructions, and I looked up some additional information on the net about it. What I found was a contradictory mess:
I was supposed to wait for 45 minutes to let the dye set in, but I couldn't help but play with my hair during the time. I probably should have let it be, peacefully, but I was all hmm, I should rub here and make sure I get more dye there. So for about 30 minutes, I have been basically massaging my scalp with dye. I decide that that was enough, since my scalp was getting a bit itchy, and my hair was starting to look seriously red instead of black. Maybe it was cause I had marinated my scalp with peroxide for 20 minutes before I did the dyeing.
I pop into the shower and rinse off the stuff... shampoo, etc - a lot of dye goes down the drain but hey, my scalp is still red, I can see in the medicine cabinet from where I am in the shower. Even part of my forehead is still bright red. I continue showering for a while, the dye still making the water all bloody. After about 15 or 20 minutes, my forehead stopped looking like it'd been split open, and became a bit more normal. My scalp was still really red though. I guess all the manipulation did do something about opening the pores, and the dye on my scalp really settled in. Anyways, I washed as best as I could considered I had to get over to F's place soon. I figured that after a while the oils from my scalp should counter the dyes and the topmost layer should wear down eventually. What's done is done - next time though, I gotta look up how to dye short hair without dying my scalp even redder than the hair in the process.
So anyways, the second day after another wash, my scalp looks much more normal... now on the third day, it's a bit better again, but not normal enough - someone at work today commented "hey part of your scalp is red!" I was like - Yeah I know and it kinda sucks. (Argh) Hopefully it will be better soon, haha.
Other than the scalp stuff, I really like the redness of the hair. :D I'd take a picture but I still haven't looked around for a camera right now... maybe I'll dig up my webcam or something.
Allen.
I managed to dye my scalp red too in the process. Now that merits a bit of typing.
I bought the dye at one of those hair product specialty shops in Pacific Mall. The salesgirl basically asked what colour I wanted. She showed me a colour chart with sample "hair" in it that was supposed to be the right colour after dyeing. I wanted something really red. (Red is my favourite colour) The salesgirl was sort of shocked and asked a couple times if I was sure I wanted something so red, to which I replied, definitely, yes. Kathy, who had shown me the shop, just chuckled to herself. Anyways, she told me about what I needed to get the hair to the shade of red in the sample - the actual dye plus a peroxide goop that was rated at 40% something, in order to bleach my hair white first before the colour would take. Kathy got her to write down the instructions, and we paid about $20 for the two items.
When I got around to dyeing my hair, I checked the package instructions, and they were all in French. I decided my French wasn't good enough to read hair dyeing instructions, and I looked up some additional information on the net about it. What I found was a contradictory mess:
- Hair should be washed before dyeing to get rid of excess oils.
- Hair should NOT be washed before dyeing so you retain the oils.
- Apply peroxide straight to hair.
- Apply peroxide:water in a 1:1 ratio to hair.
- Peroxide works only if you sun your hair.
- You should not feel any burning sensation on your scalp.
- Some burning sensations on your scalp are normal.
- I washed my hair and dried it with a blow dryer.
- I put on some plastic gloves and took a liberal handful of the peroxide goop, and started spreading it on my hair.
- I expected to see it start to lighten after a while, but 20 minutes passed with no result except that my scalp was a bit irritated.
- So I mentioned it to Kathy who said - didn't you read the instructions??
- I dug up the instructions which said I had to MIX the peroxide and the dye in 1:1 proportions, and then put that on my hair, in a one step bleach+dye process. DOH!
- I washed my hair clean of the peroxide, and dried it again.
- I mixed some of the dye and peroxide together in a ceramic bowl and started applying it to my hair by hand. It was somewhat irritating and I wondered if I had "opened my pores" too much from all the prior manipulation according to some of the web sites.
- I dug up a toothbrush from under the sink to help with the root parts.
- I gave up on the toothbrush and just started rubbing the stuff onto my head. I look like I'm a bloodied car crash survivor or something.
I was supposed to wait for 45 minutes to let the dye set in, but I couldn't help but play with my hair during the time. I probably should have let it be, peacefully, but I was all hmm, I should rub here and make sure I get more dye there. So for about 30 minutes, I have been basically massaging my scalp with dye. I decide that that was enough, since my scalp was getting a bit itchy, and my hair was starting to look seriously red instead of black. Maybe it was cause I had marinated my scalp with peroxide for 20 minutes before I did the dyeing.
I pop into the shower and rinse off the stuff... shampoo, etc - a lot of dye goes down the drain but hey, my scalp is still red, I can see in the medicine cabinet from where I am in the shower. Even part of my forehead is still bright red. I continue showering for a while, the dye still making the water all bloody. After about 15 or 20 minutes, my forehead stopped looking like it'd been split open, and became a bit more normal. My scalp was still really red though. I guess all the manipulation did do something about opening the pores, and the dye on my scalp really settled in. Anyways, I washed as best as I could considered I had to get over to F's place soon. I figured that after a while the oils from my scalp should counter the dyes and the topmost layer should wear down eventually. What's done is done - next time though, I gotta look up how to dye short hair without dying my scalp even redder than the hair in the process.
So anyways, the second day after another wash, my scalp looks much more normal... now on the third day, it's a bit better again, but not normal enough - someone at work today commented "hey part of your scalp is red!" I was like - Yeah I know and it kinda sucks. (Argh) Hopefully it will be better soon, haha.
Other than the scalp stuff, I really like the redness of the hair. :D I'd take a picture but I still haven't looked around for a camera right now... maybe I'll dig up my webcam or something.
Allen.
The Chako Izakaya
This weekend Kathy and I went over to F's to see his newborn baby girl. Such a little sweetie. Sleeps like 22 hours a day according to F's wife, which was a huge difference from their first one. Anyways, after being there for a bit, we ended up going out for dinner.
I felt like something seafood, maybe at a Red Lobster or something, but having only thought of it in the car, we didn't check to see where the closest locations were - we decided to check out the Marlowe or the Alice Fazooli's in a restaurant area around Hwy 7 and 404. Turns out that the Marlowe was a bit more upscale than we felt like, and the Alice Fazooli's didn't have much of a seafood menu. (didn't Alice used to be a Italian seafood place?) Anyway, after hmming and hawing a while, we ended up at the Chako Restaurant Izakaya that was in the same area, the others looked like they wanted to try it out, and I figured I could get my seafood fix from grilling some salmon or something.
Chako is a Korean BBQ. Looked pretty nice and we'd passed by it a few times before and wondered if it was any good. We arrived pretty early, just shy of 6pm like a bunch of senior citizens, and were seated immediately. It was a nice table with 2 grills on it, which was nice cause there were 4 of us. We looked at the menus and there was quite a bit of stuff to look at. The waiter asked us what we wanted and had a little notepad out, but being sort of hungry and since it was all-you-can-eat, we just asked him to bring some of everything. Also we ordered some Sapporo beer. In the amount we wanted, it was being sold in 2, 3, or 4 litre sizes, and we figured 3L would be plenty to get us happy. He bowed and left, and someone came to light the grills.
A few minutes later, he came back with some of those Korean appetizer plates - some tofu, some kelp, kimchee etc. Then another waiter showed up with a plate of sushi and maki roll on it. Miso Soup too. Then somehow, everything appeared at once in a hubbub of serving staff and trays - little stackable black-and-red trays of meats and veggies. (well I guess we did say some of everything) So we set to grilling. It was pretty good stuff! The meats were well marinated and the vegetables nice and fresh. Course F and E didn't really want to have anything to do with the veggies so it fell to Kathy and I to finish off most of it. We were good with all of the dishes except for maybe this whitefish that seemed to have been defrosted from a frozen package and not fresh like the salmon.
They brought the beer over at some point too, I dont recall if it was before or after the food stampede. It came with these little juice glasses from Ikea. The beer came in a little wooden barrel - that was kind of cool. It had a tap on the front and the top was removable so we could see how much beer we had left... though after a few glasses, F kept telling us there were 3 glasses left, even though we must have gotten at least 12 more out of it.
We stared ordering more of some of the dishes as we grilled - there was an especially good lamb, and the bulgogi beef was nice and marblized. I think we ordered like 4 sets of short ribs as well. By the end of it we had eaten quite a bit. Not half as much as we did when we were in our teens, but we put in a pretty good show I thought. I know that on the last two little trays of beef, they started doing the usual Korean BBQ thing where they hint that you shouldn't eat any more by serving you semi-frozen unseasoned meat. It was a bit funny too, when we were at the end we figured we could do 1 tray of short rib and 1 tray of bulgogi - we stressed to the waiter that we just wanted these last 2... and he misinterpreted it as we wanted 2 of each, so we got double the portion we wanted. So we went from the 100% full we thought we'd end up at, to a solid 120% of food induced discomfort. I think E went way past that, he somehow managed to fit in 2 bowls of rice on top of everything else.
We ended up sticking around a bit longer cause we thought maybe some ice cream might help smooth things out. They also appeared to have some oriental style mango pudding, and we had a bit of a discussion on how "mango" flavour is never mango-like, sort of how "grape" flavour is not the same thing as grape. So we got some of one and some of the other - some mango ice cream, some mango pudding, and some green tea ice cream. The two mango desserts tasted completely different from each other and neither one tasted like mango. E said that the pudding was more of a lychee flavour, and the ice cream was more of the usual artifical mango flavor. I has some of the green tea ice cream which was pretty normal.
Oh if you are in their washrooms (a bunch of nice little individual rooms) make sure you don't turn on the faucet all the way - it's a fancy looking affair but designed in such a way that water will bounce right out of the sink and into your lap if you turn it too high.
So anyways we did have a good time, the food was of pretty good quality, and the service was REALLY good compared the the standard service at a chinese-korean restaurant. It was really good enough that I'm actually spending time writing about how I like it instead of how I don't like it. :D I would definitely consider eating there again. Btw, it looks like it's owned by the people who run the Destiny tea shop. (link)
We rounded off the night with a bit of Rock Band, which none of us had played for a while, so we were pretty rusty. I think I sang like 4 songs before my throat started giving out. Okay, maybe about 1/2 way through the 2nd song, I had a coughing fit and had to go down an octave, which was a bit on the low side. Dammit why are so many songs either too high or too low for me? Oh well, it was still fun. Before one of the songs I was playing guitar on, Kathy was poking a drum stick into my ear to bug me, so I played badly on on purpose. I meant to keep it near the fail mark of the 3rd life, but I sucked enough that I actually died, doh! Sorry E who was trying to sing Oasis.
Allen.
I felt like something seafood, maybe at a Red Lobster or something, but having only thought of it in the car, we didn't check to see where the closest locations were - we decided to check out the Marlowe or the Alice Fazooli's in a restaurant area around Hwy 7 and 404. Turns out that the Marlowe was a bit more upscale than we felt like, and the Alice Fazooli's didn't have much of a seafood menu. (didn't Alice used to be a Italian seafood place?) Anyway, after hmming and hawing a while, we ended up at the Chako Restaurant Izakaya that was in the same area, the others looked like they wanted to try it out, and I figured I could get my seafood fix from grilling some salmon or something.
Chako is a Korean BBQ. Looked pretty nice and we'd passed by it a few times before and wondered if it was any good. We arrived pretty early, just shy of 6pm like a bunch of senior citizens, and were seated immediately. It was a nice table with 2 grills on it, which was nice cause there were 4 of us. We looked at the menus and there was quite a bit of stuff to look at. The waiter asked us what we wanted and had a little notepad out, but being sort of hungry and since it was all-you-can-eat, we just asked him to bring some of everything. Also we ordered some Sapporo beer. In the amount we wanted, it was being sold in 2, 3, or 4 litre sizes, and we figured 3L would be plenty to get us happy. He bowed and left, and someone came to light the grills.
A few minutes later, he came back with some of those Korean appetizer plates - some tofu, some kelp, kimchee etc. Then another waiter showed up with a plate of sushi and maki roll on it. Miso Soup too. Then somehow, everything appeared at once in a hubbub of serving staff and trays - little stackable black-and-red trays of meats and veggies. (well I guess we did say some of everything) So we set to grilling. It was pretty good stuff! The meats were well marinated and the vegetables nice and fresh. Course F and E didn't really want to have anything to do with the veggies so it fell to Kathy and I to finish off most of it. We were good with all of the dishes except for maybe this whitefish that seemed to have been defrosted from a frozen package and not fresh like the salmon.
They brought the beer over at some point too, I dont recall if it was before or after the food stampede. It came with these little juice glasses from Ikea. The beer came in a little wooden barrel - that was kind of cool. It had a tap on the front and the top was removable so we could see how much beer we had left... though after a few glasses, F kept telling us there were 3 glasses left, even though we must have gotten at least 12 more out of it.
We stared ordering more of some of the dishes as we grilled - there was an especially good lamb, and the bulgogi beef was nice and marblized. I think we ordered like 4 sets of short ribs as well. By the end of it we had eaten quite a bit. Not half as much as we did when we were in our teens, but we put in a pretty good show I thought. I know that on the last two little trays of beef, they started doing the usual Korean BBQ thing where they hint that you shouldn't eat any more by serving you semi-frozen unseasoned meat. It was a bit funny too, when we were at the end we figured we could do 1 tray of short rib and 1 tray of bulgogi - we stressed to the waiter that we just wanted these last 2... and he misinterpreted it as we wanted 2 of each, so we got double the portion we wanted. So we went from the 100% full we thought we'd end up at, to a solid 120% of food induced discomfort. I think E went way past that, he somehow managed to fit in 2 bowls of rice on top of everything else.
We ended up sticking around a bit longer cause we thought maybe some ice cream might help smooth things out. They also appeared to have some oriental style mango pudding, and we had a bit of a discussion on how "mango" flavour is never mango-like, sort of how "grape" flavour is not the same thing as grape. So we got some of one and some of the other - some mango ice cream, some mango pudding, and some green tea ice cream. The two mango desserts tasted completely different from each other and neither one tasted like mango. E said that the pudding was more of a lychee flavour, and the ice cream was more of the usual artifical mango flavor. I has some of the green tea ice cream which was pretty normal.
Oh if you are in their washrooms (a bunch of nice little individual rooms) make sure you don't turn on the faucet all the way - it's a fancy looking affair but designed in such a way that water will bounce right out of the sink and into your lap if you turn it too high.
So anyways we did have a good time, the food was of pretty good quality, and the service was REALLY good compared the the standard service at a chinese-korean restaurant. It was really good enough that I'm actually spending time writing about how I like it instead of how I don't like it. :D I would definitely consider eating there again. Btw, it looks like it's owned by the people who run the Destiny tea shop. (link)
We rounded off the night with a bit of Rock Band, which none of us had played for a while, so we were pretty rusty. I think I sang like 4 songs before my throat started giving out. Okay, maybe about 1/2 way through the 2nd song, I had a coughing fit and had to go down an octave, which was a bit on the low side. Dammit why are so many songs either too high or too low for me? Oh well, it was still fun. Before one of the songs I was playing guitar on, Kathy was poking a drum stick into my ear to bug me, so I played badly on on purpose. I meant to keep it near the fail mark of the 3rd life, but I sucked enough that I actually died, doh! Sorry E who was trying to sing Oasis.
Allen.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
First Snow of the Season & Global Warming Experts
Well it snowed last night while we were all asleep. It came early compared to the last several years - it used to be that we'd wonder if there would be snow or not by Christmas time.
Someone at work mentioned that some global warming expert was saying how this is an indicator that global warming is happening. I was stunned for a bit, wondering what sort of reasoning could possibly have deducted a global warming trend from a colder winter. Apparently, someone somewhere is saying that just before it gets REALLY warm, it will suddenly get really cold... as if the mercury or alcohol in a thermometer was crouching down to get ready to jump for an all new height. I haven't tried looking up where this comes from but it really just makes me want to close my eyes and forget I ever heard it. Sure, modifying the atmosphere with pollution is not a good thing, but this sort of weird interpretation says scare-mongering to me.
I really hope it was just the "telephone effect", where too many retellings of the same story had warped it beyond recognition.
Allen.
Someone at work mentioned that some global warming expert was saying how this is an indicator that global warming is happening. I was stunned for a bit, wondering what sort of reasoning could possibly have deducted a global warming trend from a colder winter. Apparently, someone somewhere is saying that just before it gets REALLY warm, it will suddenly get really cold... as if the mercury or alcohol in a thermometer was crouching down to get ready to jump for an all new height. I haven't tried looking up where this comes from but it really just makes me want to close my eyes and forget I ever heard it. Sure, modifying the atmosphere with pollution is not a good thing, but this sort of weird interpretation says scare-mongering to me.
I really hope it was just the "telephone effect", where too many retellings of the same story had warped it beyond recognition.
Allen.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Chen Style Tai Chi (太極拳)
About a month or so ago, the wife and I started taking some tai chi classes at a dojo in Richmond Hill. Ji Hong Tai Chi. They teach Chen, Yang, and Wu style tai chi at that location and it feels like the instructors there know what they are doing. The version I am taking right now is the Chen style tai chi, its the one that appeals to me the most, with it's energetic bursts of motion, as opposed the more stately Yang style.
The class is only for an hour a week, one morning class every Sunday. I think I can handle a bit faster a pace than we're going right now, maybe 2 classes a week would be nice. The school has divided the form into 3 parts and listed them as Chen 1, 2 and 3. I think it might be a good idea to take Chen 2 and 3 at the same time after I'm done with Chen 1. Plus the per-course cost is cheaper for 2 classes in one term, than 1 class per term. Right now we're probably about just under half way through Chen 1.
The instructor we have is a kind of a petite woman originally from Singapore. Master May or Sifu May, everyone calls her. In the class when she is doing the moves, you can see an aura of energy and concentration radiating from her, much bigger than her diminutive frame, and is quite impressive. She is teaching the course in a combination of English and Cantonese. English for the main part, and Cantonese to drive home some points if certain people are not getting things right. On the first day she asked us which language we'd prefer to have the course taught in, English, Mandarin, or Cantonese. We settled on English only, since some people didn't speak Mandarin and some people didn't speak Cantonese... but I guess some of the students need a bit more help in their own language.
Speaking of the students in the class, some of them seem fairly advanced. They nail down the motions beautifully without too much effort or correction from the instructor. I'll guess they've taken another tai chi form before. I feel like I'm learning a bit more by watching them interpret the instructor's moves. On the other hand, there are also students that are absolutely atrocious - stiff armed and stiff legged, doing half or less of each move as it is presented. You can call me elitist if you want, but if we spent any more time on them, we would be learning the form as 6 parts rather than 3 parts. I can appreciate their dedication to learning it though, if not their form.
I'd say I'm sort of in the middle of these two groups. A few problems here and there with width of stance and footing, but nothing glaringly wrong. My body is usually in the right posture and my hands are generally in the right positions. I have taken a Yang style course before a long time ago, and I've always had a passing interest in martial arts, so I think that helps somewhat.
Allen.
The class is only for an hour a week, one morning class every Sunday. I think I can handle a bit faster a pace than we're going right now, maybe 2 classes a week would be nice. The school has divided the form into 3 parts and listed them as Chen 1, 2 and 3. I think it might be a good idea to take Chen 2 and 3 at the same time after I'm done with Chen 1. Plus the per-course cost is cheaper for 2 classes in one term, than 1 class per term. Right now we're probably about just under half way through Chen 1.
The instructor we have is a kind of a petite woman originally from Singapore. Master May or Sifu May, everyone calls her. In the class when she is doing the moves, you can see an aura of energy and concentration radiating from her, much bigger than her diminutive frame, and is quite impressive. She is teaching the course in a combination of English and Cantonese. English for the main part, and Cantonese to drive home some points if certain people are not getting things right. On the first day she asked us which language we'd prefer to have the course taught in, English, Mandarin, or Cantonese. We settled on English only, since some people didn't speak Mandarin and some people didn't speak Cantonese... but I guess some of the students need a bit more help in their own language.
Speaking of the students in the class, some of them seem fairly advanced. They nail down the motions beautifully without too much effort or correction from the instructor. I'll guess they've taken another tai chi form before. I feel like I'm learning a bit more by watching them interpret the instructor's moves. On the other hand, there are also students that are absolutely atrocious - stiff armed and stiff legged, doing half or less of each move as it is presented. You can call me elitist if you want, but if we spent any more time on them, we would be learning the form as 6 parts rather than 3 parts. I can appreciate their dedication to learning it though, if not their form.
I'd say I'm sort of in the middle of these two groups. A few problems here and there with width of stance and footing, but nothing glaringly wrong. My body is usually in the right posture and my hands are generally in the right positions. I have taken a Yang style course before a long time ago, and I've always had a passing interest in martial arts, so I think that helps somewhat.
Allen.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Camera, hmm
I really should get a digital camera again. The last one that Kathy and I had broke while she was on her trip in China last year, and was left behind. I guess it's all right, it had lasted us quite a while. Heck, I'd gotten it for her before we'd even gotten married, and we've been together now for longer than I can remember. (since 2003 in regular terms)
It was a Cannon 8 megapixel auto of some type that I don't recall, back from when it was more common to have a 2 or 4 megapixel camera. What I do recall was that it did have a decent battery life and good quality output. I remember Kathy showing me pictures from the Cannon, and pictures that her sister had taken with a 2007 cheapo 8 megapixel camera. Compared side by side, the picture quality was very noticeable. Probably had to do with the nice lens or something that the Cannon had.
It was a Cannon 8 megapixel auto of some type that I don't recall, back from when it was more common to have a 2 or 4 megapixel camera. What I do recall was that it did have a decent battery life and good quality output. I remember Kathy showing me pictures from the Cannon, and pictures that her sister had taken with a 2007 cheapo 8 megapixel camera. Compared side by side, the picture quality was very noticeable. Probably had to do with the nice lens or something that the Cannon had.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)