Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Wikipedia

Wikipedia to me is a very trustworthy information source - even if anyone can edit it. What I love is that since it's made by people, many times even cutting edge or very recent events have lots of information; or very old ones that would possibly not be able to live on the internet if it weren't for wikipedia. I love that there is a sense of responsibility to it, that writers will be checked and wiki documents will be asked to adhere to certain standards for the reader's benefit. I've learned a lot reading it - when I don't know something, I google the subject adding "wiki" to the search string so it basically takes me to the wikipedia article. I find that since the people contributing to an article are passionate about it, the information is very good and can give me a very good idea on a subject since it's also not restricted in any way.

I really hope it can stay as free as possible, but I would not mind if it had a small google bar to the right, kind of what gmail has, so that the site could profit from its vast traffic. I'm sure this way wikipedia could give back to the free software projects that helped it come to life, for example, or simply to be bigger and even more comprehensive.

I really want to thank the people that make wikipedia possible - you have an awe-inspiring job and will be remembered in history as noble, caring humans who helped the world be a better place.

Thank you wikipedia

For always being there for me. I've done what I can for you and hope to continue helping through the years.

Merry Christmas!

Support Wikipedia

Friday, October 22, 2010

10/22 pokerstars million dollar challenge freeroll password :)

Pokerstars has been coming out with some amazing promotions, the last of which is this one

million dollar challenge

I checked out online and the time for it in Costa Rica was friday at 00:00, or thrusday midnight. They give you the password for the freeroll, which is friday at 6 pm eastern. The pw for 10/22 is VANESSA, all in caps :)

see you there!

Thursday, September 30, 2010

pokerstars this wee hours of the morning

Played strictly 10-player, double or nothing, on pokerstars, around 8 tournaments. Finished winning back my 30% :)

I'd like to share a strategy that I think is paying off - these tournaments are, as you probably know, shorter and kinda easier. You play to get only for the first 5 spots. There is no importance on who got the most chips, all the top 5 get double their entrance. Hence, it's survival of the least dumb, or "just try to not get too unlucky".

Thus, there are a lot of players that won't move without anything else than premium hands, and who even with 2 big blinds will hang on to them with the hope someone else goes unlucky before them and they somehow manage to get into the money.

The critical part is when blinds get to around 100/200, because if you haven't done anything for the whole SNG, your stack starts dropping real fast at this point. Plus, there's probably between 8 and 6 players remaining, so there's probably one or two players that have doubled up, but most players are still around 1500 and having the same problem - chips are running out and those blinds look real good. This makes people go all in when they feel they have a strong hand.

After a period of all-ins, people have normalized their stacks, and only around 6 or 7 people remain. This, is where the hand that's coming up is relevant - some people have gotten out of the critical low stack and are now confident they can go back to sleeping. This is where you start taking advantage of the incredibly unfavorable position that risky plays have at this point - you are one place away from the money, 20 minutes into a SNG, and you don't want to be #6!


Funnily enough, the easiest people to push at this moment is anyone smaller than you. Some big stacks will not play with you since they don't want to jeopardize their stack, but if they do, they are looking to take you out, so pick your spots. But small stacks? Punish them! In any way possible. At this point just 3 blinds will cover most small stacks, so you only need 3 successful attempts to cover any small stack that decides it's "show time" to push all-in. But what you will see is that those small stacks will claw their chips and rather fold in places where they probably would play if they had the chips, and continue folding those raises.


I was the big blind, folded around the table, and the small blind probably thought he could steal my blind to stack a bit. He was terribly short stacked, maybe 6 BBs, and I had like 15. He probably didn't like the call. Up came a board I think he totally missed, maybe 2 8 9 . I had called with JT so I had a open ended straight. He bet one blind (leaving him with about 3 blinds). Sensing he was weak, I called the one blind.

Out came a card like 3. he bet again. I called. Note he has 2 BB's at this point.

The river card I can't remember. But he checked. This to me was, "I've fired all bullets into this and it just seems you will flat call me. I'm done. Hope you don't raise!". And of course, even if I knew I was probably losing I put him all in.

Why? Because it was so weird. I was sure he was trying to steal. I was sure he hadn't hit the flop. He might have had a pair of 5's for all I know. And I'm pretty sure he was thinking I had him beat.

So incredible as it is, this person folded. He was the next one to leave of course, since he only had 2 blinds. I think he made a mistake in not calling there. I think he only had one good decision point - go all in on the flop or stop firing and keep your 4 blinds when your steal didn't work. But he didn't have the courage in the end, just because there where only 6 left.

So, lesson learned: be courageous when others are fearful, and the opposite. It pays well in these SNGs. (isn't that Warren Buffet's?).

Monday, September 27, 2010

ichigo

If you are only watching the anime get outta here!

Who's excited over Ichigo?! Meeeeeeeee

Final Getsuga:

Mugetsu:

Thanks to wikia




pokerstars tonight

lost 30% :( played a 180 SNG, finished in the middle, played a re-buy, real crazy, finished in the middle. double or nothing we're positivie in the end bu nothing to be excited about :(

Saturday, September 25, 2010

This is one of the most fun things to see in your blog

One thing I really like about blogspot is that it's integrated with Google. Not because I can use my google account, but because they have such neat, free tools (that everyone else uses to make money). Me, I'm an idealist. I love seeing this report. I think those visits from Costa Rica and US are mainly me and my close friends, since some of us have a US public address at work (although I've seen some from NY and similar which aren't near anyone I know). Spain is probably Carlos, Dominican Republic one of my good friends over there. Canada, I do have some Stream friends, and I put money down that the Nicaragua one is Salvador.

But then, it gets really interesting. I don't know anyone in Japan (my favorite place in the whole wide world) or South Korea (internet mecca). The thought that someone in those high tech countries stumbled upon my blog and read it, makes writing it in English all worth it. I don't know how they got here (maybe because of Bleach posts?) but you are damn welcome to come by anytime, and leave me a comment :)

Costa Rica salutes you, visitors of the world :D

pokerstars tonight

played a double or nothing 10 person turbo sng. finished 6 :(

played a 50K freeroll qualifier, 50 person SNG, finished 3rd. Damn close. Added $8 to the account :D hope to get off microlimits soon... tom dwan, watch out...

durrrrrr

I do not know who to blame... but I WANT A DATE!

They backed out on the bunbury 3d movie :(

Sunday, September 19, 2010

I've missed some of the albums from my favorite bands, and that must be corrected!

Albums from:

Lucybell
Zoe
The Used
My chemical romance
Andres Calamaro
Enrique Bunbury
Thursday

have come out, must be obtained by any means, and listened - only then will Ariel repay for his insolence of not being up to date. And of course all shows possible will be attended.

Especially if they are a 3d movie 15 minutes away from my house :D :D :D

Saturday, September 18, 2010

New Lucybell album came out!

First single has those tones I love:

8.- Ave Fénix (Rocket Man)

Estoy vivo otra vez Sentir mi cuerpo acelerar Estoy vivo otra vez A tu galaxia incendiar Estoy vivo otra vez Arder no deja pensar Estoy vivo otra vez Y nada que recordar Desde mis cenizas renacer Ave fénix pero de papel Desde mis cenizas renacer Este fuego vivo me hace bien Estoy vivo otra vez Tu supernova en paz Estoy vivo otra vez Principios desde el final Desde mis cenizas renacer Ave fénix pero de papel Desde mis cenizas renacer Este fuego vivo me hace bien Tú me haces bien Desde mis cenizas renacer Ave fénix pero de papel Desde mis cenizas renacer Este fuego vivo me hace bien Me hace bien Me haces bien Me hace bien Me haces bien Desde mis cenizas renacer Ave fénix pero de papel

Video can be downloaded following this link

Friday, September 17, 2010

One thing I've been noticing more and more in this world...

I've recently embarked on removing the huge amount of people I had added to facebook while playing mafia wars, for the primary reason that I DON'T KNOW THEM. Thus, seeing their updates was completely un-meaningful (especially since I stopped playing Mafia Wars when it just grew old on me).

So far the experience has been enriching. I've started seeing the posts from my friends and known ones, getting to know them better and seeing what they are up to. I really like my facebook better now - let's face it, it is a great tool for sharing thoughts, pictures and gossip.

Being the (hmmm, middle aged?) person I am, nearing my 30's, I have noticed the same message from a lot of people near my age:

- People are meddling with my life
- People are expressing their opinion when it's not asked for
- People suck (heh)
- I don't like the quality of people that I considered my friends

And it's... both a shame and the curse of being so widely social thanks to things like Facebook. Do you remember the african proverb, "when you have a true friend, hold on to him with both hands?" I think we really can only make so many good, true friends in our life, and they are very few in total. In the book outliers, it is explained that true experts put in approximately 10,000 hours into their craft to reach that desirable level. Friendship is probably the same way. You must really invest time with that person, live together through various situations and still find each other's company appealing at the end of it, before the people you may consider "friends" today, become actually "good friends".

Thank you, to my friends, both the good and ones becoming "the good". I know our lives can change, but out hearts remain the same.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

I can't wait for bleach 432!

I just watched this again and I'm aching to see the next issue... damn Ichigo looks badass!!

I do hope they explain all of this later... we've never seen a shinigami with Ichigo's strength before... maybe that's what's needed to get into the royal guard?

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

there are two songs I can't find

And they are both costa rican:

"tu patria sigue siendo la misma, domingos de futbol, y noches de juerga... coro: costa rica aunque me encuentre, yo tan lejos de tu (suelo), cantaré, cantaré, Costa Rica yo te quiero"

the other one is a play on wilfrido vargas's el loco (I think)

"ayer me fui caminando, tras una negra diez cuadras, diciendole cosas tuanis, y tocandole la espalda. Se ha vuelto con su sombrilla, y un sombrillazo me ha dado, que me ha rajado la jupa, de la frente al otro lado. Al hospital fui a parar, recordando esa chiquilla, recordando sus caderas, recordando su sombrilla..."

internets, please save me where google has failed :(

Monday, September 13, 2010

NFL, we love you

Monday night football and spicy nachos with a cold drink and my lovely girlfriend. Life is good!

Friday, September 10, 2010

coming back to my blog

Some crazy stuff happening soon

Amy and I are getting married 10/10/10!

I went to church and confessed... that was a long time coming!

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

all right, I don´t hate crunchyroll anymore

This interview has made me realize that crunchyroll, in the end, is correct. For a moment there I even thought about a premium membership. But then I remembered I can see Naruto free.

Anime is a great hobby. Thousands of talented japanese think constantly on the next big thing. I truly am re-thinking getting a premium subscription now.

Monday, June 7, 2010

shit has hit the fan

http://www.dattebayo.com/pr/135

bleach by DB, you will be missed. crunchyroll sucks and deep in your heart you know it. It will be the dark ages until some other fansub group picks it up and does half the good work you did.

Those that serve, and pursue science, have opposing thumbs and vocal chords: those that command, and move with exceptional elegance, have paws and purr.

I am enjoying this little story based on the schrodinger cat dilemma. Pretty fun :D

Thursday, June 3, 2010

I'm now watching element hunters

Yes it's a kid's show. Yes, it's educational. Yes, I'm actually enjoying it.

The full show is in dattebayo's torrent tracker. Also, I've suffered to get higashi no Eden and kenichi. But hopefully nyaa torrents will save me!

Monday, May 24, 2010

crunchy roll - killing fansubs :(

It is with great sadness that I read Dattebayo´s post on the possibility of Crunchyroll acquiring the rights for Bleach.

link to dattebayo´s post

Suffice to say that what I´ve watched in crunchyroll sucks. Fansubs are a very serious things for fansubbers. You can find high quality fansubs at HD qualities very few hours after a release. If the show is popular, download speeds for torrents or DDs are optimal. It really means that anyone in the world, and I speak for Costa Rica, can get to see their favorite show almost in real time with Japan.

There really is no point of comparison between streaming an episode from youtube or downloading a 350+ MB file encoded in h264. I have a large monitor and the difference is painful. One of the coolest things of anime are the visuals, and there just isn´t enough justice done to the anime producers in a streaming version.

This is my public wish: I hope Crunchyroll doesn´t get Bleach. In fact, I wish Crunchyroll stops existing. I would much rather pay Dattebayo for their quality, fast subs that I can download using bittorrent (probably the most effective way of sharing files), than any streaming service.

I wish everything could be free in this world, but hey, people need to eat and be able to build their life. So, I just need to vent, and state that streaming media should not be the future of fansubbing.

Friday, May 21, 2010

Bleach 271 - we see ichigo´s kick ass form!

So if you´ve been living under a rock, it´s time to wake up. Ichigo is full fledged in the anime against Ulqiorra´s double release and Aizen is ready to kill everything in the manga. Gin´s bankai is out and you wouldn´t recognize Aizen now that he is meshed with the hougyouku!

Hakuouki 5,6,7 :D

Hakuouki just took a turn for the really cool. It turns out the villains have super healing abilities, and the little girl does too. Pretty cool knowing now the villains want the little girl off the shinsengumi and with them!

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Hakuouki 4 and Bleach 268

Pretty cool. Hakuouki's "villains" now ere formally introduced, and Bleach 268 is a continuation of Ulqiorra's and Ichigo's fight. What I don't understand is why Ichigo hasn't put on his mask yet...

Thursday, April 29, 2010

bleach manga 414 delayed!

I haven't written about Bleach lately, mostly because of work, but both the manga and anime are at a great moment.

Manga: Ichigo is fighting Gin, who finally used his bankai. Isshin is fighting Aizen, who says until now understands the Hogyuku. However, when Aizen is starting to combine with the hogyuku, Urahara sends him a benihana cry and... this week is delayed :(

Anime: Ichigo and everyone's favorite arrancar start duking it out. Last time, Inoue saved Ichigo's ass deploying a very fast shield.

So... no manga this week. Damn Tite Kubo, he really has his timing...

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Hakuouki! (and its april fools troll)

Found a new series (mainly because Dattebayo is subbing it) called Hakuouki. It is pretty cool, and if you saw Rurouni Kenshin, you will remember the shinsengumi. I don´t like spoiling the story but I do recommend watching it.

Apparently, one of the first subs of chapter 1, made by chonmage, was used as an april fool´s joke - however I do recommend you watch it, even if its a troll! Especially after seeing the first two episodes from Dattebayo. I was laughing like crazy :D

Here is a link to see the troll! :D http://www.megaupload.com/?d=ZOTI5K5V

new things for the house :D

so, since so much time has passed. wanted to give an update of the furnishing of our new home.

We got a used kenmore elite clothes dryer from my friend Manfred. Works like a charm and seems to have been a very good choice when he got it - king capacity, heavy duty sold me lol

An important addition to the house is a printer, and we got a HP C4680 from my friend Alvaro, who has been my go-to person when I need to buy hardware and software. He always makes a great deal for me and brings it to my house, I´ll leave you his e-mail, aj@alvaraojimenez.com (his website is not up still).

And my girlfriend heard news a sister of one of her best friends was having a furniture sellout since they are moving into a new home. We managed to pick a small dining room set, a la-z-boy recliner (its heaven really) and a small, rotating couch for some good money.

Overall, our new home is starting to look like a very nice place now. We picked up a plastic shelving unit very similar to this one Gorilla Rack GR5-3012-5IMP 5-Shelf 30-by-12-by-60-Inch Shelving Unit, Black but its a Grossfillex MaximumUp48, which measures 48x70x16. This is for me to put all my junk on and separate it from my significant other´s but I wanted it to remain visible :D

Well, that´s all for now. We´re really looking for ward to get married in October :D

Hugo, my car :D

So! I´ve been out a bit and haven´t done my best updating the blog. This entry is for my car.

After a total of 470,000 (around $900) my new clutch was setup with no drips. All in all, this was suspension, brakes and clutch renewals for my car.

I finally passed Riteve! Those who know it, know that you can´t drive a car if it has not passed Riteve, and well, mine was due October and until now I finally got it :p This is Riteve site if you want to learn more.

Having a new clutch is definitely awesome. Its soft and the car accelerates better since there are less inefficiencies between motor and wheels.

Now, the bad side (as there always is - you would have thought it was the money!). My car alarm acted up after I had the chassis and motor washed, and we had to completely disconnect it. That means my car has no alarm, no remote central locking system, and whatever we did messed up the electrical part, because now I don´t have the navigation pane lights and my stereo doesn´t work.

I guess I´ll take it next Saturday and have all that repaired... also I think my battery is due for replacement since now the charge goes out easily (or it might be the same electrical problem).

In the end though, I still love my car. I find it very appropriate. It is not the best "family" car, since the back seat is not really comfortable, but for my girlfriend and me, it is very dependable and has accompanied us through a lot. Did I ever tell you its named Hugo?

Sunday, April 11, 2010

this is a nice blog!

operated by a costa rican, from what I can tell, in union with someone in colombia and san francisco, california.

You do really appreciate it when you are in a strange country and are looking for something that can only be found home. 3 of the things that I really have liked to find are miguelitos, sopa azteca and ceviche!

http://www.manosenlamasa.com/

crap... some type of liquid is dropping from my car... and gardening!

its not from the radiator, doesn´t look like oil when compared to the one I can see from the thin metal indicator, but its definitely coming out :(

called super servicio, who are actually open on sundays, but they asked I wait until tomorrow... and that I better cancel riteve for this monday :(

We´ve decided to grow a small garden for basil, rosemary, coriander (or cilantro, don´t know which is the correct translation), and thyme :) I´ve just finished after prepping the soil, adding some quicklime and fertilizer. I tell you, cilantro has no consistency at all... I might need to start off the seeds for that one!

pulsar-x clutch ready and beautiful, my bb got wet, so how much does a corolla altezza cost

Saturday mid day we picked up the nissan and the new clutch is fun and I needed a bit to get used to it. the first time they changed the clutch cable, the gear kicked in at near floor bottom (and it was really uncomfortable) - now it kicks in almost at the last part of the pedal. it is fun though, since I feel like its a whole different car :)

sadly, my blackberry pearl fell into the sink in the night and got under the stream of water :( I dried as best as I could and it does turn on, but the keyboard is not responsive - I´ll go to work and pick up a small star shaped tool to try to do this :)

quoted the corolla altezza, and its only like $2K more expensive than the yaris. I´d really not buy the yaris and go for the altezza, which is a bigger car, a 1.8L engine, and has more extras and comfort.

Saturday, April 10, 2010

buying in amazon, and that trend definitely seems will rise

So, I´ll start tracking what we (amy or me) buy, or are looking at :D

First off, and the first use for the free banco promerica sponsored "aerocasillas" account, is a book amy needs for her residency:



We got it at $75 since Amazon not only sell themselves but also allows you to see other vendors. We got a usps shipping/tracking number and it is on its way to florida from texas :D

Bleach (anime and manga), my pulsar-x, hell I might as well ask what a corolla, elantra and mazda3 are worth, and get married!

So, if you aren´t stuck in anime oblivion, this week we had 2 great bits of news on bleach: first, in the anime, the zanpakatous have finally said "this is as far as we go" and next week we have the fight between ulqiorra and Ichigo! This should be monumental and I´m impatient to see it :D

aaand in bleach manga 411, we finally see aizen battle it out with Isshin (if ever for a brief second, but Aizen did use kido) and we see Gin´s bankai! Apparently Ichigo is not impressed and we should see this fight escalate. The truth is Gin seems to be testing waters only, he´s mighty deceptive...

My pulsar-x should be ready today, after a full clutch change. I´m actually awaiting this with high expectations, since I feel the car will be more responsive now to the power produced by the motor :D they had quoted $300 but final bill is for $220, so that´s good news!

You did see the toyota Yaris prices right? Damn, too expensive for an entry level car. I`m going to quote a mazda 3, a corolla, a nissan tiida and a hyundai elantra just to see where car prices are.

Oh, and battlefield bc2... wow its completely different in multiplayer than the single player game. Helmut (holy.cow, who got me (? am I there yet?) into serious gaming) had told me the single player was crap but I actually had fun with it, but playing online is so much more serious... I´ve only managed to play one night and only got like 1,200 points! But oh well, I´m the new guy and have to learn and adapt.

Aaand... new tag for today. I`m writing this in a separate partition I made for ubuntu 9.1. I can honestly say this is a very easy to use distro - it automatically told me I needed propietary drivers for my video card and the wireless (mine is a dektop, and + wireless it has 2 NICs) and went, found them and installed them. Also, when playing my anime videos, it told me I was missing codecs, found them and installed them. Not even windows is this easy. It did fail to tell me I had to close the video player and re-launch for them to be loaded, but that is the only nitpick in what could be a big time waster. Imagine, so far, I have not typed one single command in the shell and I`m enjoying my ubuntu! Also, nice touch, after asking for my password, I was able to see my big ntfs partition where I keep my stuff.

Today´s saturday after payday, so that means go pay your stuff. I just wish there were smaller waiting lines at the banks... and also, we are looking for a church to take the catholic curse to get married. We are thinking san antonio in guadalupe, or fatima in san pedro. We let Amy´s dad know last Sunday, Amy was real nervous lol but I think he received the news well. He was worried Amy wouldn´t continue her studies, but I guess he doesn´t know us that much... I´m already planning another masters after this one (business administration focusing on finance :D).

Monday, April 5, 2010

cant wait for Bleach, my poor nissan, and so you wanted to know what a Yaris is worth in Costa Rica?

Bleach is at a pretty good moment right now. We had arrancar encyclopedia in the last episode, which just might mean the bleach filler is ending :D :D :D Can´t wait to see tomorrow if I´m correct.

My trusty steed, my 1993 nissan pulsar-x SuperSaloon, which went into maintenance for suspension and rear brakes, is, at the moment, with the clutch pedal to the bottom. Super Servicio called me in and said my clutch cable was about to go off, and I should change it. I said yes. Silly wabbit. 2 days after I pick it up I´m clutchless, no idea why they messed it up.

If a friend hadn´t told me to turn it off, put 1st gear and turn it on, I wouldn´t had made it back to my house. Although, today when I tried taking it out, the engine was dead :( I dunno why it won´t start! It just does *ngh* *ngh* and no ignition.

Aaaand just because I´m a curious little rabbit, I asked how much a new full-electric-package Toyota Yaris is, manual and automatic. 23.5K and 25K. Yes, us dollars. Thanks for the taxes :(

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Bleach 409!!!

Bleach fans all over the world... rejoice... Aizen reveals Ichigo is half shinigami and half... he couldn´t finish, he was cut by the entrance of Kurosaki Ishin!!!!

Jesus I hope after this it goes into a flashback that tells all about Ishin and Kisuke!!

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

battlefield bad company 2

limited edition. just opened and smelled my life going away for a couple of months :D

Bleach 263 is out!

download ye bleach fans! http://www.dattebayo.com/t/b263.torrent

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Panda y mela, esta noche es suya!

Verlos casarse es algo tan lindo! Tan irreal, pues es ver culminar un sueno de, facil, 8 anos!

Ver a sus familias y amigos felices, verlos disfrutar SU dia! Solo para ustedes! Y saber que se Aman tanto y verlos tan felices :D

Es una fiesta esplendida, nada hace falta, todo en abundancia, todo mundo feliz! Todo muy Rico por cierto :D

Les deseo de corazon toda la felicidad del mundo en su dia, y les digo, una muy Linda boda!

Thursday, March 18, 2010

BLEACH manga 408 is AMAZING!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Of00u12Yejs wow!!!! Finally Aizen and Ichigo get to fight! Did... he really... die?!?!?!?!

To all bleach fans, rejoice! The manga is now getting pretty darn goooooood!!!

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

bleach 262, the lost canvas 09!

Hi all! been a while :) went to technology day today and it was fun.

Bleach 262 is out, in this never ending arc (cant wait to see the manga this week!) and surprise surprise, Saint Seiya The lost canvas 09 is out! I downloaded gleam´s fansub since they have not let me down.

See you soon!

Friday, March 12, 2010

Mi birthday party will be at... Van Gogh Rohrmoser!

http://cr2night.cr2nightdj.com/eventos/view.php?id=942

Close to home and 6,000 all you can drink, is probably the best deal I can get for all my friends :D

We´ll probably gather up at my house before and then go, so it should be a lot of fun!

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Bleach 261 and manga 406

dattebayo Bleach anime is out probably since yesterday... and a few hours from now bleach manga 406!

Sunday, March 7, 2010

and avatar didn't win!

And I haven't seen the hurt locker. We have to make Oscars Sunday to see all these great movies!

Johnny Depp is a mad clown

hee hee (real chuckle)

And then there's the Mad Hatter, a role so befitting Johnny Depp (working with Burton for the seventh time) that it might seem too obvious for him. There is a trace of the been-there-done-that to Depp's somewhat rootless performance, but wishing for him to cut back on playing mad clowns would be like telling Fred Astaire to quit all that dancing.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_film_review_alice_in_wonderland

Space as a hologram

I have one word to say.

WOW

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126911.300-our-world-may-be-a-giant-hologram.html?full=true

and, its finally settled:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6233YW20100304?loomia_ow=t0:s0:a49:g43:r2:c0.151079:b31573844:z0

Saturday, March 6, 2010

how do YOU manage your multiple identities?

Through my life, I've picked an idea (or stolen, if anyone knows who had it first let me know) that we as individuals manage multiple worlds. The worlds I talk about are our relationships with people, and each world is different.

Let me explain a bit more. I have a relationship with my father, where I show different aspects of myself than in the relationship with my brothers. I have a relationship with the love of my life, and it is utterly different from what any other woman knows about me. I have a relationship with my previous co-corkers, which is different than the one with the current ones.

However, each relationship is true in a sense, and each relationship is a "world" where there are experiences we have shared, past discussions, joint symbols, phrases or special words that mean something in such world. I call them worlds because they have a full identity, they grow and have their own atmosphere and culture.

Now, add the internet to this concept. In the internet, where originally each site had its own login, you manage an identity as XXX from Yahoo, YYY in hotmail, ZZZ in gmail, to name a few. You have a profile maybe in hi5, aol, myspace or facebook. You may be part of different forums or communities and in each one of these identities that you manage, the things others know about you may vary widely or be completely different.

But if there is one thing that will happen in the future, is that someone will type your name into google and check out everything that is related to you. Your collaboration to an e-mail list, a support case with your name on it, your comments on a myspace profile or when you uploaded a recipe. Everything at one point in time will be linked and displayable within a few google queries.

So what is the big deal? Well, you started using the internet thinking no one was seeing what you were doing. However, it is tracked. So every site you visited (ahem..) every post you made, maybe every IM chat you had, might be found by someone else in the future. It might be your spouse, your next hirer, your current boss, your father in law. Increasingly, when people want to investigate you for whatever reason, they will look to google and build an idea of who you are from what shows up.

I came across the question in subject while reading "the world is flat" by Thomas Friedman (which by the way, is available for download in english off a spanish site in the first page of google search, but in a word document with no formatting). I believe the only way we will ever be capable of managing multiple identities, and not have them come back to haunt us, is by trying to maintain one identity - and being honest with it. You have to come to grips with who you are, even if you only show certain aspects of your personality to certain people, and who you where, and who you will be, as the segmented worlds in the internet start to converge.

At least for the moments I have dedicated some thought to this, I increasingly find I have to be honest with my own life and tastes and do it in a way where I can show it to anyone who would like to "research" who I am. As such, the anime lover, the pokerstars player, the facebook mafia wars player, have to live in harmony with the IT manager, the technology enthusiast, the avid reader, the idealist, the cat lover and the glutton. Only some may know me for my love of burgers and buffalo wings, but that is part of who I am.

In short, I believe that the best way to manage your multiple worlds is realizing how many different traits can live in one person at a given time, and to have the maturity to accept who you are and present it to the world.

Or, shut it up and never let it touch the web lol

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Web 2.0

I will start a new blog on solely web 2.0 topics. I'm thinking I've read wikipedia, played and socially chatted on facebook, seen twitter in action, seen the power of youtube, made a blog with adsense ^^.

I'm looking for ideas on what more web 2.0 is. I think especially for companies. Leave me your comments :D

Bleach anime 260 / manga 406

Its that time of the week again! I'm browsing www.dattebayo.com for Bleach 260 to come up, and thrusday we shoulld be able to see manga 406 in english on youtube. Stay tuned, when they come up I'll put a comment on this post!

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Thursday night

And its time to crunch some numbers in Excel (which I'm finding I'm enjoying more since I've learned to use it better). I've always heard a phrase that whoever tells you they know how to use Excel is lying - and they probably only know about 20% of its functions. That people who you would think know excel, have seen people that really know excel, and those guys say they only know 70% of Excel :) .

Today I ran across (i.e., I chatted a bit with) a good friend of mine who also happened to be my boss over here at the best outsourcing partner in the world, Stream Global Services. I dearly miss him and his personality and will write him a pretty nice linkedin review very soon (wink wink) but I wanted to share his blog to my readers (all 57 of them according to google analytics lol). You will notice that probably there wasn't a person more enthused with Barack Obama's election in 2009 lol

http://politicalmangu.com/

Monday, February 22, 2010

Andres Calamaro - Alta Suciedad

Today I´ll talk about one of the best albums by Argentine rocl/pop star Andres Calamaro. Today I found a playlist on youtube that starts off with all the songs from this record. It is is simply amazing, probably the best in his prolific career.

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=753E780EAB8C692F&search_query=andres+calamaro

Really awesome album, even if you don´t understand spanish, you will find the music is perfect.

Also, I must say that while being in the outsourcing industry will always give you more insight into the world market than your regular Joe, I´m now reading a book that should be Outsourcing 101: The world is flat by Thomas L. Friedman. Pretty amazing and I´ve just started it.

This book was an assignment for half the class in one of my IT project management master degree classes. The other half, which was me, got assigned one of the best books I´ve read in my whole life: Juan Enriquez Cabot´s "As the future catches you". It is simply amazing. I haven´t found it on pdf, but I did go and bought the last copy from the Libreria Internacional over at Zapote.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Ebooks :D

Well, one thing you can definitely say about the internet is that now you can access that hot song and its lyrics immediately, instead of waiting; that now you can watch that video that you really wanted to see but no one had, and now you can find that book even if its not sold in your country.

With that in mind I ran across this blog that has links to ebooks.

http://www.timeanhalf.blogspot.com/

I specially liked the finance ones and will check them out for... evaluation purchases?

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Going to flash a WRT54G, v6!

Apparently they are tougher. Need to configure it as a wireless repeater while enabling wpa2. I´ve never understood how linksys can sell repeaters (or before when they sold the high gain antennae) at prices that are very similar to the WRT54G, when they could have just enabled the option on them.

well, dig in! http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

** update :D **

I am happy to report that instructions were very well done. I followed this to the letter and now I am off to my parent´s house to install the last part, a wireless repeater bridge :D

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Linksys_WRT54G_v5.0_%26_5.1_%26_6.0

http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Repeater_Bridge

Friday, February 19, 2010

Google analytics, bleach manga delayed!

With Jorge Ortiz´s help I *think* I added google analytics to my blog template correctly.

Today I was looking for the bleach manga and I learned this week´s has been delayed. Tite Kubo always does that doesn´t he? When the series is at a peak he takes a week off lol. I found his myspace page and turned out finding one of his first mangas, Zombie Powder. Shame that he cancelled it, I was really beginning to like it!

Well now its either sleep or finish my homework on using excel to analyze data :D I really like some of the things I´m learning this trimester, I find it very interesting and enriching as an IT pro. Some of them are using SQL 2005 business inteligence features, learning more about managing costs on projects, and well, about blogging and modern networks :D

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Lifehacker for Costa Rica, IT and well.. my life!

Do you know the webpage lifehacker.com ? if you don´t it´s definitely something worth seeing. I think the theme for my blog will be something like that... I want whoever reads it to find useful facts that I´ve acquired throughout my life.

Today I´m wondering about a costa rican phrase used when you are selling an old car. "Vender por partes", sell for parts, is a common social recommendation that you will hear when, say, you want to sell your '0ld and beaten down´ 1991 Ford Taurus. It happened to a friend of mine today - he let it go for around $300. Sure, the transmission was stuck on 1st, the steering hydraulics were making sounds and the a/c was a bit off, but I´m thinking the tires and rims alone are probably worth that!

That V6 would have probably made a lot of fun inside a Toyota corolla (wink wink to another friend). So what was left in the back of my head was, "where do you go when you want to sell for parts in Costa Rica?". People make it sound easy but I would have choked if my friend had asked me that.

Also, pivot tables rule in Excel 2007. I have to thank Luis Trejos for that. He showed me how easy they are. Basically if you have data inside a filter that you want to display, select it all, insert pivot table, and place rows and columns where you want. It´s really powerful :)

Monday, February 15, 2010

First post :D

This is my blog. To show all I know and am reading and learning about - experiment ground, companion, tool for the relentless critic called time. It might be in spanish at times (my native tongue, hooray for Costa Rica!) but really, English is the language of the world.

Hello World. For real :D