the coffee cup

According to Talleyrand(1754-1838), a French statesman, that a perfect recipe for a coffee is that it should be “Black as the devil, hot as hell, pure as an angel, sweet as love.”

As time passed by, technologies advances, so does our choice with our choices of our perfect cup of coffee.  From a coffee brew, decaf coffee, flavored coffee, roasted coffee, chocolate coffee to more more appetizing variety of espresso and latte, people now a dayes had learn to love and bring with them a cup of coffee.   French press? Ground or whole bean? Frosty? Regular or unleaded? Americano, cappuccino, espresso, macchiato, mocha, or latte? Pick your choice and you will experience the different taste of life a cup of coffee may bring.

One reason I love Japanese foods is that they are healthy.    That’s why i always find myself in a Japanese restaurant every week or sometimes twice a week, and i got lucky thrice a week.  I usually go out with my house buddy every Sunday during dinner and i usually got myself a set of Ramen, Gyoza, Chahan(fried rice) and cold tea.  But today i got a different menu, this time I treated myself  to a Okonomiyaki and Takoyaki.   Okonomiyaki is commonly known as a Japanese Pizza or Japanese Pancake.  On the other hand, Takoyaki is a popular Japanese dumpling with its main ingredient, an Octopus.  Here are some pictures of both i got from Kagura, an Okonomiyaki restaurant at Little Tokyo, Makati.

Avid fans of Warcraft 3, a new DotA Allstart Map has been release.  DotA Allstars Map 6.60 had lots of new stuff in it, from new Heroes, Items, Modes and Commands to Gameplay and Performance.  New faces/heroes were also introduce in this new map namely Batrider(for Team Scourge) and Tauren Chieftain(for Team Sentinel).  There were also new reworked and abilities to the existing Heroes skills. They also added new basic item and recipe item.  Aghanim’s scepter now has new recipies.    There are now 6 recipe shops and new game modes like -cd and -rs.  Now this is exciting.  I can’t wait to download the map now… actually i already did.  What are you waiting for? download the map now and lets play Warcraft Defense of the Ancient.  Below are the some new stuff  in the DotA Allstars Map 6.60.  For the full changelog click here.

Heroes

· Added a new hero Batrider to the Scourge
· Added a new hero Tauren Chieftain to the Sentinel
· Lightning Revenant: Reworked
· Medusa: Replaced Chain Lightning with a new ability Mystic Snake
· Medusa: Replaced Purge with a new ability Stone Gaze
· Netherdrake: Replaced Frenzy with a new ability Nethertoxin
· Rogue Knight: Replaced Toughness Aura with a new ability Warcry
· Slayer: Replaced Ultimate with a new ability Fiery Soul
· Twin Head Dragon: Replaced Autofire with a new ability Liquid Fire
· Troll Warlord: Replaced Rampage with a new ability Battle Trance
· Rogue Knight: Reworked how Stormbolt works
· Morphling: Reworked how Morphiling’s Adaptive Strike works
· Crystal Maiden: Replaced Frost Nova with a similar new ability Crystal Nova
· Phantom Assassin: Changed Blink Strike to a new ability Phantom Strike
· Ogre Magi: Reworked Multicast chance mechanism
· Sniper: Replaced Scattershot with a new ability Shrapnel
· Troll Warlord: Replaced Fervor Aura with a new ability Fervor (works like Beastmaster’s passive used to)
· Beastmaster: Replaced Beast Rage with a new ability Inner Beast (works like Troll’s old attack speed aura)
· Anti-Mage: Reworked Mana Void damage mechanism (now deals equal splash damage to units near the target)
· Silencer: Recoded Last Word to properly detect animation canceling and silence after a spell is casted
· Treant Protector: Reworked Eyes in the Forest
· Admiral: Lowered Agility (18->14) and Agility Per Level (1.7->1.3)
· Axe: Lowered Base Armor by 1 point (2.8->1.8)
· Bane Elemental: Improved cast range on Enfeeble (800->1000)
· Bristleback: Improved Base Intelligence growth by 0.6
· Bristleback: Improved side angles on Bristleback (90->110)
· Bristleback: Returned the Bristleback passive Quill Spray release cap back (300->250)

Items

· Added a new basic item Ghost Scepter
· Added a new basic item Quelling Blade
· Added a new basic item Talisman of Evasion
· Added a new recipe item Poor Man’s Shield
· Added a new recipe item Force Staff
· Added a new recipe item Khadgar’s Pipe of Insight
· Added a new recipe item Magic Wand
· Aghanim’s Scepter: New Recipe
· Manta Style: Reworked
· Diffusal Blade: Can be upgraded once. Original stats adjusted
· Maelstrom: Recipe and stats adjusted

Recipe Shops

· Gateway Relics: Misc items that are primarily early game upgrades

· Supportive Vestments: Various support style items that you get for your team

· Arcane Sanctum: Castable or spell heavy themed items
· Protectorate: Has mainly defensive/survival style items
· Enchanted Artificats: Mostly orb effect items (with the exception of Yasha)
· Ancient Weaponry: All other weapon items.
· Note: I’m aware that Aegis is no longer needed in the shops, but I’m keeping it there until we need the space to help new users be aware of its existance through Roshan.

Modes and Commands

· Added a new game mode -cd (-CaptainsDraft)
· Added a new game mode -rs (-randomside) to randomize which side your team starts in. This does not shuffle the players. It just places a team randomly as either Sentinel or Scourge.
· Added -random Intelligence/Strength/Agility. It gives you 100 less bonus gold than the 250 bonus gold the regular -random gives you.
· Added a new -tips system.If you enter the command, the game will give you 5 pointers (at various stages in the game) that are unique to each hero to help you get the basics down. These are not intended to imply guideliens on how to play a hero, but rather as simple tips if you are new with that hero. These are a work in progress.
· Added -water random
· -water now supports any color combinations using -water r g b format
· You can now change the terrain using -terrain snow on a per user basis. It is no longer a game mode. The “-terrain” or “-terrain default” command reverts the terrain to its normal state. Some of the other terrain modes you guys have emailed me about are still being worked on. I disabled them from this version because of some glitches they cause that haven’t been fixed yet. I will work on them more in the future if you guys want them.
· Added -disablehelp to Force Staff

Gameplay and Performance

· Added a few new terrain paths; here are the rough areas that a change has been done in
· To the right of the Sentinel Secret Shop above the ramp
· Above the Sentinel Goblin Shop
· Between the forest and the top Scourge lane
· Right side of sent jungle
· To the right of the second top Sentinel tower
· Added a new tree to the Scourge jungle
· In the area between the pair of Scourge neutrals near the powerup
· Range rax no longer has extra regeneration
· Added a new regeneration armor mechanism for towers and rax.

Again another interesting talk and show-off of fascinating breakthrough was presented in my one of my favorite site TED.com.  Jeff Han of NYU demos to a lot of audience his breakthrough touchscreen.  He shows off a cheap, scalable multi-touch and pressure-sensitive computer screen interface that makes the audience clap, whistle and gasped audibly over his great presentation.  Jeff Han has created a simple, multi-touch, multi-user screen interface.  With such innovation using only your fingers are enough to navigate the screen.  And according to TED.com this might herald the end of the point-and-click era.  You can watch his talk here and be amazed of what he will show you.

One of the newest bad habits people have acquired and developed over a year were greatly influenced by our wireless hand held devices such as BlackBerry and other business type phones.  And most of these bad habits were committed during a conversation and business meetings.   Such habits were very rude and very costly.

Such habit is considered as bad manners and poor office etiquette.   Keeping yourself preoccupied to a hand-held device rather than listening to a conversation or paying attention to a meeting happens so frequently that businesses are complaining for such rudeness.  A lot of people often check their emails during meetings.  It happens all the time, and it will definitely get worse.  It has become an addiction.

Such habits have their price.  Had held devices like BlackBerry and business phones distracts our attention span that can lead to lost productivity and wasted dollars.  This is because people aren’t focused on their work.  People showing such bad manners with a wireless device were actually reprimanded and some had even lost their jobs.

It is so ironic that sometimes Technology allows us to do counter-productive things and teach us to be rude.  Well I believe we are still on the stage of trying to understand the proper usage of such technologies.  The fact that we are a learning individual, we do commit some mistakes.  But as we learn new things, we should also learn how to mind our manners.

Maybe some of you didn’t notice that Microsoft had released its new Internet Explorer 8.  Microsoft had made a silent released last week on their new version of IE which they had claimed better and one of the fastest web browsers available in the market.  In fact it is even faster than Chrome and Firefox.  Wow! Probably Microsoft had done a major tweaking on their IE just to catch up with Chrome and Firefox.  With such proclamation, many were in a state of shocked and “that’s unbelievable” face.  Well according to a list of fastest web browsers by Webslug, IE 8 has a little improvement but still far from being amongst the fastest web browsers.  And as a proof of Microsoft’s claim here is the LINK of their video showing its viewers that IE 8 is FASTER than Chrome and Firefox.

do something every day and it quickly becomes second nature.  it does make sense right?  according to Tim Crowe, “the best time of the day to exercise is when you can do it and the best exercise is the one you like doing and can do regularly”.

1. take 10, 000 steps a day.

2. eat breakfast without fail.

3. never skip meals.

4. savour each bite/don’t eat while doing something else.

5. stop eating before you are full.

6. eat slowly/put your fork down between bites.

7. enjoy your favorite foods in moderation.

8. avoid shopping on an empty stomach.

9. target easy wins-e.g. have a diet soft drink instead of a regular one.

10. keep to a shopping list.

11. have five small healthy meals a day instead of three large ones.

12. keep a sense of humour.

13. always leave something on your plate.

14. eat with cutlery, not your fingers.

15. get most of your calories before noon.

rdasia.com

Hi guys, i just want to share with you a video of Tim Brown’s talk on “The Powerful Link between Creativity and Play”.  One of our innovative engineer sent it to me when i ask him suggestions on improving our Tecnical Paper activities.  It was an interesting talk and it was beautifully delivered.  So instead of giving me his suggestions, he let me ponder on what Tim Brown can offer for me.  About his talk, was delivered at the 2008 Serious Play conference.  Here designer Tim Brown talks about the powerful relationship between creative thinking and play — with many examples you can try at home (and one that maybe you shouldn’t).  Indeed it’s true, sometimes to be creative in what we do, we can make use the concept of play.  I had actually made a lot of realization while listening to his talk.  I hope it would give you an idea too to be creative in what you do.

Tim Brown’s : Creativity and Play

i didn’t believe it, and yet i walked on, closer and closer, unable to stop myself, and then stopped where we are now, staring at the figure who sat on that rock before me, looking up at me here.  It was God!  There was no question.  He was sheathed in flesh, dark-skinned form the sun, dark-haired, and had the dark eyes of the desert people, but it was God! My God!

and there he sat in this fleshly body, looking at me with human eyes, and the eyes of God, and I could see the Light totally filling Him and contained within Him and concealed from the outside world by His flesh as if it were th strongest membrane betwixt Heaven and Earth.

if there is more terrible than this revelation, it was that He was looking at me and that he knew me and had been waiting for me, and that all I felt for Him, as I looked at Him, was love.

i feel like eating a doughnut today… why? nothing actually… well every time i’m down and disappointed… i would easily dragged my self in any restaurants nearby and eat til i can’t eat anymore… eheheh it was somewhat my way of releasing all these bad energies inside me and channel it on the food served before me.. ehehehe weird… but i try to restrain my self from getting stress because if it continues then i would end up weighing twice in the next few months…fortunately i got myself quickly in front of my PC clicking the left and right button of my small black ibm mouse playing WarCraft or DotA most of the time…. after such i log-on to Ragnarok and kill some players online…it’s good that Ragnarok now allow such Player Kill(PK) features… of the 10 prospects i tried to kill, only 2-3 were successful.. 70% of them killed me without mercy… ehehehehe and so i press the escape button and log-out… but since i’m in the office now… and i felt disappointed… that nothing works well around me… that i’m such a looser and a failure today… guess i will get myself a doughnut now… ehehehehe… hmmm i think a coffee too is a best partner for it…