Just to let you know that I’m still here. It’s just been a busy summer!

The past three months or so, we’ve …

1) Bought a new house
2) Packed and moved (we live in Pennsylvania now)
3) Redid our old house to sell
4) Started my own engineering business
5) J was offered (and accepted) a teaching job in a new school
6) Mom and sister came to visit for couple of weeks

I feel worn our and beat up mentally (and physically). Everything just was happening so fast but glad to say it’s slowly becoming normal again. Don’t think I can keep blogging regularly anymore but will be sure to at least keep it alive. Hope everyone is having a good summer.

I found something to put on my Xmas list.

Put it in your car, speed up to 88 mph and it’ll help you travel back (or forward) in time. It does work better with a Delorean.

For those of you who don’t have a clue what it is or what I am talking about, it is the flux capacitor from The Back to the Future movies. Very cool!

“Keep you friends close, and your enemies closer.”

One of the quotes that has always stuck in mind. Supposedly Sun Tzu said it first in his book The Art of War but that claim is subject to numerous debates.

My interpretation of it is … you should always keep an eye on your enemies so that you can anticipate their every move and not be sprung by surprise. *Enemies* could be someone you are competing with, a rival - within a personal, academic or business scenario.

Enemy is at times a harsh word for a rival. I picture an enemy on the battle ground getting ready to call on his troops against mine. However, in the literal sense, rivals or competitors are often than not on the other side looking towards you.

Does the saying make sense? I think it does. I believe everyone has so called *enemies* regardless of how polite or nice you are. There is always that one person that is going to be envious, jealous of you and more than happy to see you fail. Schadenfreude … a German word which means “Happiness at the misfortune of others” or “People taking pleasure in your pain”. It’s just human nature and a fact of life.

Someone once told me years ago that the more successful you are (whether it is in life or in business), the more *enemies* you are going to have. I guess that is a trade off of success. Success being a defined goal that changes from person to person.

The question is, can you be successful without enemies?

Not sure, I’m not there yet but I highly doubt it. The challenge in life would probably be to balance that success with the enemies (or obstacles) you are going to face. One of the keys to the betterment of life and being a more complete person.

I watched the new Indiana Jones movie last weekend. Here are some thoughts…

- they shouldn’t have mixed Science Fiction with Indy
Indiana Jones is traditionally known for mythical or biblical adventures, not SciFi. That is what makes him different. You’ll know what I mean when you go see it, there won’t be any spoilers here. Steven Spielberg has to learn to leave SciFi out of his movies especially one of this nature.

- good special effects, exciting scenes but the story seemed pretty light

- the villain looked more like a Nazi type German than Russian

- they should tried to bring back Jonathan Ke Quan (the little Asian boy from Temple of Doom)

- the villain died too easily

Is it worth watching? Definitely. But you might be a little disappointed if you went in with high expectations of it being like the previous three installments … it didn’t stick to a traditional Indy type adventure.

Interesting trivia: Tom Selleck was originally supposed to play Indiana Jones but backed out because he had commitments with the Magnum PI television show. I can’t imagine Indiana Jones with that moustache, can you?

I was watching the third installment of Blade yesterday and it got me thinking about the best and worst trilogies I’ve watched.

Here are my picks (in order)…

Best 10

1) The Godfather (they don’t make movies like that anymore)
2) Star Wars (the original three)
3) Lord of the Rings
4) Indiana Jones
5) Back to the Future (I love the concept of time travel; so I may be biased here)
6) Die Hard (pointless over the top action but you can’t help but be pumped when you see it)
7) Alien Bourne 1,2 and 3
8) Spiderman
9) Blade (very underrated but all three were nicely made; one of the better vampire movies)
10) Lethal Weapon (you can’t help but love the Danny Glover and Mel Gibson combo)
10) Mission Impossible (over the top action, lots of over acting but still pretty amusing to watch)

Worst 10

1) Matrix (classic way to spoil something good; the second one was just ok; the third one was just terrible)
2) Pirates of the Carribean (they should have left it at just one movie; the 2nd and 3rd ones were just sub standard)
3) Star Wars prequels (lots of hype, special effects were nothing we have not seen before and storyline was mediocre)
4) Rush Hour
5) Scream
6) The Fast and the Furious
7) Look Who’s Talking
8) Evil Dead
9) Species
10) Robocop

Honorable mentions

- Terminator (strong first two movies; would have been in the best ten if not for a subpar third installment)
- XMen (the first two movies were strong but killing off key characters just spoiled it for me)

Forgetables

- Beverly Hills Cop
- Austin Powers (it was just too much after the first one)
- Shrek (lost the plot after the first movie)
- Jurassic Park
- Highlander
- Aladdin
- Silence of the Lambs

Just stop and think about how far we’ve come in technology when Super Mario comes to the computer in the form of a 14 kb JavaScript code. It’s far from complete, and you’ll have to start over when you die but that’s besides the point — I’m in awe that something like that is actually possible.

Be sure to click the mouse on the game if Mario won’t move. When you die, you have to reload the page to start over. And yes, you can move left. Sorry.

Regular version: no music or with music

Double size: no music or with music

Source with writeup, instructions and full script.

So it wasn’t a supersized venti after all …

Haven’t been this excited over a movie in years. Finally my all time favorite Marvel superhero is making it to the big screen and it looks mighty fine! You know where I’ll be on May 2nd, 2008.

“Heroes aren’t born, they’re built”

Interesting trivia from IMDB:

# In October 1999, Quentin Tarantino was approached to write and direct the film. Later, Joss Whedon, a big fan of the comic book, was in negotiations to direct the film in June 2001. In December 2004, Nick Cassavetes was hired as a director, with the film to release in 2006, but everything fell through. Finally, Jon Favreau was hired as director.

# Nicolas Cage and Tom Cruise were interested in playing Iron Man. Cruise in particular was going to act in and produce the film.

Few months back I watched a news report on how some counties/ cities are recycling sewer water to make it suitable for drinking. The water is then fed back for human consumption and sold to some manufacturers. The water supposedly exceeds drinking standards and is purer than distilled water sold by wholesalers.

It is probably very good filtered drinking water, something Bobby Boucher would be proud of … at least I’d like to think so (you’ll soon find out why). I can also see the huge costs savings benefits on recycling vs. buying distilled water. However, the gross factor is probably the biggest factor to overcome. It is for me, and believe it would be for most people.

I can’t bear the thought of drinking water that was once the same water mixed with other *stuff* flushed down the toilet and water from the sinks. It gets worse when you top that up with the images of it coming from hospitals, schools, and other commercial establishments.

My biggest fears were realized couple of days ago when I read the label of a bottled water bottle we frequently buy from our grocery store. It wasn’t a Dasani, Evian or other more popular brands but a cheaper grocery store brand.

It said (in really small print), “Made from manufactured water from the City of XXXXX, XX.”

So it turns out that I’ve been drinking “toilet to tap” water for months and it makes me sick to my stomach. Funny thing is that I did mention when we first started buying this cheaper brand that it tasted much better than the more expensive ones.

Our dilemma now is whether to continue drinking it or throw the rest of the fifteen unopened bottles we have in the fridge. One thing we are sure of, we won’t be buying that brand of bottled water ever again.

Got this in my inbox today. Great, just what I need … a supersized Venti Starbucks cup. Like I don’t spend enough on Starbucks already.