眼望望

生日

2011-09-25T17:44:00.000-07:00

昨晚老婆在枕上放了生日卡，又大一歲了。。。婚後第一個生日，一大早八點沒到，被祝賀的電話吵醒了，跟家人通過電郵，如以往一樣沒怎樣慶祝，過了如常的星期天。重要的人在身邊已很足夠了。
Wish everyone a happy, happy day!

merry christmas

2010-12-24T15:33:00.000-08:00

Though it's no surprise we would get an amazing gift (actually 2) from the company for this holiday, it's still an incredible joy to have received it. What a step up from the Nexus One. The Nexus S delivers what Android has promised to users and beyond.

Thanks!

Nexus S

fragmentation

2010-09-10T12:46:00.000-07:00

One problem in the Android ecosystem today is fragmentation. If the phone is not the nexus one, chances are the OS is older than Froyo (2.2). Even for new phones at the time of writing, I still see Donut (1.6) being shipped. If the device is not released by Google, it seems that its version is always lagging behind. In the spectrum, only a small percentage made up by these Google branded privileged devices will have the most up to date OS. The rest, and majority, of handsets will be at best one version behind. Now that Google no longer sells its own devices, these privileged devices will become smaller and smaller as the market grows. This fragmentation will be more pronounced unless some sorta rule enforces the manufacturer must keep up.

A lot of friends asked when they will see the OS upgrade (eg Eclair to Froyo) for their non Google branded devices. It's a popular question I too see in various social forums. Of Nokia, this question used to be more popular than others. 1. Nokia has shipped more devices than anyone else. 2. Their Symbian OS was stone aged with historical problems and patches all over it. So people look for fixes in the upgrade. 3. Its sick distribution strategy creates a problem where some regions get an upgrade while others don't based on the product code. That's why software like Nemesis exists to help users with their product code.

Android excels in the mobile market with a phenomenal momentum. Unfortunately, though, its increasing number of users are also asking the very same upgrade question. No one should be mistaken that the device manufacturers like Sansung, HTC, Motorola, oh yeah Nokia, are product companies. At the end of the day it all comes down to how many products they have sold. It's the revenue and profit their stockholders look at every quarter. Obviously it's their best interest to sell more devices. Upgrading the sold devices, however, is costly and most of them don't even have the infrastructure such as OverTheAir, user friendly firmware tools, to do so. And most importantly, upgrade doesn't add to sales numbers. Following the money trail, it makes a lot of sense for these companies to make new devices with the new OS versions than to create an upgrade path for sold devices. With some clever marketing campaign, users will be buying the new shiny device with the OS version we have been waiting for to upgrade. Why bother to upgrade. Just buy a new phone. That's a win situation for product companies.

A personal example was the Galaxy phone I got. It was shipped with Cupcake. Samsung was to release the Donut upgrade later last year. Never happened. But of course it shipped with new phones with Donut and Eclair shortly after. And it's not just Samsung. That's how they all do it.

the plan

2010-05-10T16:14:00.000-07:00

休息了半年，終於忍不住回來，其實我沒離開過，只是工作和個人的事情太忙，沒有以前的時間來嚤咕兩句了。這段時間，我的生活多了點變化，我要結婚了。遇上了一個我值得全心去愛的人像不可能，但確實我遇上了，一個可能是廿年前已訂下的緣份。雖然我倆分隔兩地，但感覺很真實，因為我倆都肯為對方付出。而這點正是她與其他人的分別。

3 hk

2009-12-08T20:48:00.000-08:00

Prepaid

Activation ##123#

Balance ##122#

Check digit 1

秋天的童話

2009-11-15T05:42:00.000-08:00

最近有機會重溫這套經典的電影，八七年的故事，八七年的紐約。相比第一次看的時候，現在確有好多共鳴，房屋，環境，Brooklyn Bridge，JFK，甚至人物，十幾年變化像大，但又好像沒什麼變。小時候怎想到自己能親身經歴，回想過去的１０年，到處遊覓，若不是有機會離開香港，也沒有機會能接觸到這些體驗，能看到世界其他面。更深的想法是，工作，生活體驗，以及朋友，現在的一切不是因為我懂廣東話而來，是英語（之後國語）讓我來到這裡。日後，我亦想我小朋友能更早有機會看下，認識到這世界有不同面，看事物可以有著不同的考慮，不被一個小地方，國際不流通的語言，這個框框所規限。

代價

2009-10-05T16:20:00.000-07:00

有回報就有風險這個道理在投資角度上一點不陌生。一直我覺得感情亦是如是，想有回報必然會有風險，賭的是幾萬元的介指還是十多年的青春，甚至一生的所有。過去損傷太多，覺自己已沒這本錢。有是生活，沒有也是生活。快樂仍要看個人的觀景角度。

winmo and android

2009-09-18T03:17:00.000-07:00

6.1 and cupcake. Winmo has been around as far as I could remember. The PDA era, rivals of the PocketPC and Palm armies. But I couldn't care less; I never had either. Because a device without network, it's nothing more than a paperless notepad: it only has things you wrote on it. Nothing more or less.

"Over the past 5, no, almost a decade, technology has grown, but winmo has evolved little." Looking at my Omnia2, I first thought of it. On 2nd thought, I wish the store accepted returns.
The 1st platform was released in April 2000, conveniently named Pocket PC 2000. So, on average, it incremented 1.5 versions of the platform per year. On Android, for the 11 months of the first release of G1 to Donut to Eclair, achievement was incredible and the SDK was well received from developers. App store is, IMO, not a new concept, but it was iphone and android made it popular. The rest appeared like a rushed afterthought.

Winmo6.5 is buggy, slow and very user unfriendly. An average user is not gonna care how much memory a task takes or use a task manager to kill an misbehaved app. It should just work. The platform and app framework should manage the memory usage and guard against misbehaved apps.

Any UI (Samsung's) builds on top of a buggy platform just makes things easily worse. For starters, it can't add a new number to an existing contact. It's not like it told you it can't add it. It said it added but it didn't. Last time I checked it was called lying. I ended up disabling all the addon UI to stop the annoyance.

The only thing I like of my Samsung OmniaII over Galaxy was that the speed of the handwriting. The time that it takes to recognize I made a stroke on the screen and draws it on the screen was close to instantaneous. On the Galaxy, users have to slow down and it doesn't even do half a decent job.

Android. When we first met, the kernel was run on a bulk, green PCB board on an engineer desk. Nothing eye pleasing. IMO, despite of its tremendous accomplishment for the year, it still has a lot of challenges ahead. User friendliness is a big part of it. It's where we pick up from winmo.

Contact list was my biggest complaint. As of Donut, a user has to add the phone number to the Contacts (Gmail) and they will get pulled to the device. So I (and others) had to spend a day to go through and added phone numbers to my Gmail contacts. My argument is that it's more natural for the user to add emails to the email address book than phone numbers. Most of us (before the advent of Android and Gmail) already have a phone contains all contacts of which do not necessarily have email addresses (1800 numbers, banks, plumbing services, etc). Creating arbitrary entires in Gmail isn't even a natural path for non email contacts. What I'd suggest is at the start of the Android phone, it should be able to accept a contact list from another phone via bluetooth. And instead of download from Gmail contacts, it uploads these contacts to it. Then the next time when the user uses Gmail and type in the contact in the TO box, he/she can see the phone contact and email contact, and add/merge them appropriately. Spending a day of pain to go through possibly thousands of entries in Gmail and add the phone numbers to it isn't acceptable, esp for Google.

For the past 10 years, I have seen winmo and palm's platform battle over networkless PDAs. Now we have Android, Symbian, Blackberry, 2 WebOSes and others. It's the Warring States Period of mobile platforms and history teaches us they soon will be combined and consolidated. And I do look forward to Android sticking its place at the top.

非誠勿擾

2009-07-03T16:06:00.000-07:00

有些人無論外表怎樣吸引，性格怎樣適合，總是覺得欠了點東西，沒有什麼 chemistry 。人長大了，化學越來越少作用，沒有幻想，沒有童真，沒有只不見面兩天的煎敖，思緒慢慢的排出生活以外，變得越來越不重要。
說女人有壓力，男人的也一樣重，老夫老妻有問題，老夫少妻問題可更多的，長大了就發現原來年齡才是成長最大的包狀。沒結局的，就不要浪費時間吧。

公司早餐

大人的遊戲

2009-05-11T16:31:00.001-07:00

「烈日當空」作為戲名予人多點幻想空間，看電影當然希望有點驚喜。與一般香港青少年問題的電影題材分別不大，一樣是學術上沒有什麼傑出，生活上又是一無事處的一群，以無聊抵抗無聊，但卻呼喊著要逃離這現實的框框「大人的遊戲」。他們裡有吸毒的，迷戀男女關係的，幻想不勞而獲甚至守株待兔，一切他們所響往的想做的，不就正正是大人世界裡的玩意嗎。
若真的討倦大人的道路，上課考試，那不如脫下校服，看看自己走出來的路又怎樣吧。

bucket list

2009-04-23T17:59:00.001-07:00

. NZ tour on motorbike
. Buy a house in Otaru
. Shoot a boozuka
. Propose in summer in a very humid place

廿年來的故事

2009-03-03T23:11:00.000-08:00

沒見廿多年，近日竟然一連碰上幾個舊同學，是挺開心的，而且因為是小學認識的關係，對大家二十多年來的變化特別感興趣，生活圈子，在哪一行工作，結婚孩子，一推空格，一班很熟但又似一無所知的陌生人，令我大起好奇心。可以好奇多久呢？五個小時電話？二十封電郵？之後又怎樣了？我在國外還好，起碼回香港時，都可以籍口籍口出來吃個飯聊一聊，跟據經驗，反而他們都在香港的更疏(弓一木中)離。很多事情又真的很難勉強，一個人能兼顧的事情的確有限。就讓自己多成點籍口吧。

雪の楽

2009-02-12T20:23:00.000-08:00

5 年前在多倫多一個週末決定上 Blue Mountain 學滑雪，選的是雪板，也請了一整天的教練，決定要回家前能完整的滑一次那條最斜的綠道。今天站在這山頂上，面前令人竦然的景色，過去的日子讓我盡情享受這刻的快樂，若只能留在初級道就實在太暗然了。
原本來トマム，除了滑雪還想坐剷雪車 (Cat) 上山看日出，可惜的因為人數不夠，只能當 private tour ，而每人費用則攀上萬元，唯待下次吧。在日本滑道的等級沒有像西方的綠，藍，黑，雙黑分的清楚，什麼顏色都有，而且只分上中下級沒有所謂的 double black 。就算是上級其實只是比較難的藍，所以不要被嚇倒。因為人不是很多，遇然停下來看看風景，蠻舒服哩！

トマムの氷の教会

熟識的陌生人

2009-02-11T20:21:00.000-08:00

到外地旅遊很容易結識到朋友，除了因為他們友善之外，更主要的是我臉皮厚，懂的說不懂的也說，而且覺得很安全，他們住在那邊，能逃到哪裡哩。
雖然札榥，富良野，小樽是北海道著名的遊客區，但當地人仍很友善熱情，沒有東京那份小小的冷漠感。來到冬天的北海道，部份原因是上次答應了這些剛認識的朋友，定要看看雪下的北海道，更重要的是要吃到只有冬天才有的キンキ。當然離不開為食。
後籐君榮升調理師 (ちょうりし)，即 chef ，可以獨立主理菜式，比夏天結識他時是邁進了一大步。除了後籐君，當然還有大島店長的拉麵店。不旦生意滔滔，還多了一位年青的助手。一番嘘寒後就開始吃好東西，什麼事情比一邊聊天一邊吃東西還快樂呢。。。（很像還有挺多的耶）。雖然我們不是很認識彼此，但那份真誠卻好比知心好友。我們因為工作家庭，好朋友都不在身邊，但每當我們相聚聊天，那些熟悉真致的感情卻像從來沒離開過，大家擁有著一份不能磨滅的感覺。每當我想起北海道，很自然他們都會出現眼前，都嚇我一跳。

一粒庵の元気ラーメン
巽鮨の八角刺身、キンキ寿司

雪まつり

2009-02-09T20:19:00.000-08:00

踏進北海道遇上漫天飄雪，但一點也不冷，到步時已是深夜了，街上沒什麼人，當然趁機會看看札幌雪下的一面，感覺像整個城市都屬於我一個。在這沒人認識我的地方，吃什麼走什麼方向都只需要對自己負責，沒什麼人去討好，更沒有人來嘍嗦。寇仲說的勇敢往前證明自己的價值，每趟踏足一個陌生的地方都有這番話的感觸。
來到白色的北海道正為了碰上每年一度的雪祭，每個地方的雪祭都各有特式，以雪為樂，札幌剛到了第六十回更是值得慶祝，遊人比以往的多，使今年的札幌市更熱鬧。小樽的雪祭雖然沒札幌的大規模，但正因為小鎮，居民也比一般大城市的熱心，到了晚上燈火從運河至大小街道的燃點著，氣氛濃厚。說可在日本是個夢想，那能住在小樽會是夢想中的一極。

北海道序

2009-02-07T20:16:00.000-08:00

離開的時候一日一日的漸近，過去的３個月日本東京留下深刻的印象，生出定居的嚮往，從一個陌生的地方由零開始，有說不出的興奮。夏天的北海道充滿田園氣息，一浪一浪的花園，清爽的天氣，好香的燒肉，猶像昨日的記憶。答應了北海道的朋友，一定要體驗下北海道美麗的冬天。以北海道作為日本的最後一站的確是最好不過。今次能自由自在背著包的去倍是開心，更會把北海道的點滴與東京很照顧我的同事分享。雪祭，滑雪板，冰祭，破冰船，ノロコ，我全都要！

氷バール

2009-02-03T23:08:00.000-08:00

我們一班同事去 icebar 的日子終於來了，雖然是有點冷 (-5C)，但超好玩，三個月來覺得我已成為他們的一份子，不覺得有什麼隔模，深深感動著他們的真誠。在東京的時間後快就過去，這三個月的体驗我獲益很多，認識了很多好朋友，也加深了解那邊的生活和文化，我慶幸有這樣的機會。日本是個嚮往的地方，能夠在那邊生活當然是最好，在一個地方，從無到有，言語和生活，那種滿足感，過程中的體驗，有如回到初到加拿大的時候，那麼令人興奮。
皆さん、楽しかたですよ、ありがとうございました。

あけおめ、ことよろ

2009-01-24T05:56:00.000-08:00

時間過得很快，過多兩個星期，又重回北海道，一個披著雪的北海道。迫不及待！十二年後的牛年，又會遇上誰呢。

やばいうまい弁当

late change

2008-12-20T11:45:00.000-08:00

工作剛過十年，過去有對有錯，曾可惜也曾精采，可能當日結婚了，又會是一條不同的路。但也沒不可能知道。今天再次看到一個熟識的笑容，添了份母親的幸福。過去種種的思念，我倆的片段，有如昨日發生。每當聽到"我愛你"，我們短暫但銘心的日子，又重演淚水裡，一個只能停留在過去的經歴。或許我也一樣沒曾離開過那裡，徘徊著，看不到別的。

下個十年

2008-12-13T10:01:00.000-08:00

年末總是忙東忙西，忙寄出心意給一年裡沒怎聯絡的好友，忙安排出外旅遊，忙趕工作。來了東京好一陣子，也習慣了這邊的生活，唯一差了是語言。日本人大多都很禮貎，沒禮貎都是外國人，例如公司裡一個才年頭加入的Eng Manager，超 presuming，瞧不起人。但也無所謂，減不了我留在東京的响往。
最近參加了同事們攪的忘年會，雖然很多都不認識，但也玩得很棒很快樂，發現很多其實都會說國語。

ちゃんこ鍋, カレー南盆，忘年會ロンドンバス

比較

2008-12-02T01:25:00.000-08:00

年長了，經歴多了，反而更知道什麼行，什麼不行，也比較知道自己想要些什麼。常在 facebook 看到一些小朋友認為感情能一輩子是理所當然，受了些委屈便像碎了她們一生的夢，時間還早呢。
比較是我們的壞習慣，無論在哪個民族，哪個文化，人都逃不過互相比較，工作，職位，薪水，男女朋友甚至孩子。比較可以簡單化事情，比較之下可以容易的看出好壞，高低，pros and cons，不用花腦力精神去客觀的了解評詁一件事或人。單只聽起來已覺得容易多了。
有了以前的日子，遇上了不同的人，在前面的我分得出什麼真假，清楚什麼路其實不是路。墾丁北海道旅行裡那些片段我多都忘了，期待二月時會更好更愉快。

中村のインドカレー，神田のかつカレー丼，カレー屋晴之日の牛カレー

やったいる

2008-11-26T17:55:00.000-08:00

第一次吃餃子可算是珮珊包的，也有9, 10 年了，平凡但一夥夥的就是好吃。在東京雖然還沒完全適應，但從前唸書時的承諾都一一實現了，仍是那個樣子，國語學會了，也用著那個錢包，每次吃餃子也會偷偷的想起你。

京鼎小館，小籠湯包，烏龍茶小籠包，土雞湯

胡同, 朋友開的燒肉店

2008-11-24T22:35:00.000-08:00

胡同店面不是很大，風格有點像日本的いざかや，服務員都是年青男女，除了先奉上飲料還會替顧客開貯物，服務非常貼心。材料林林種種，我問可否おまかせ，服務也特意替我安排。材料的份量都比平時少一半，正好讓我嘗試更多不同的食物。服務員不旦畢時替我換鐵網還會親切的聊天，已10 點多一點也沒疲累的面容，還有每當客人點菜時他們會以日語高喊菜名，挺好玩的！
他們也很樂意和客人拍照聊天，氣氛相當好，一瞬間大家就像認識了很久的朋友。而且食物新鮮好吃，一點也不賴。我最後還多點了幾道菜，好好的吃個夠。而且價錢也不貴。
離開的時候，他們好幾個會親自送客人出門，也送上名片。這就過了一個愉快的晚上。胡同令人印象深刻。

胡同燒肉夜食

W902 TW Special

2008-11-21T08:47:00.000-08:00

An unexpected but pleasant surprise from the Taipei trip was the SonyEricsson W902. Alright, I did read the review from eprice before but forgotten about it till I stopped by the SonyEricsson flagship store in XiMen. It's a beautiful phone packed with a 5MP AF camera. As far back as I could remember, the Walkman series seems to always have had a crippled camera (non AF). The W902 is an exciting exception. Granted, it's the same old 320x240, a 2.2 TFT (no OLED) and I could argue the K810i still takes better picture, but it's everything better than the C702 I have used and the K850i I used to own. Camera reaction is quicker; focus is more accurate; lens and shutter positions are much more ergonomic (without easily blocking the lens or dropping the phone by doing so); firmware is stabler (no more reboots); better build material; it comes with a 8Mb M2 and a very loud speaker. It's a decent upgrade. Oh, and the fact that it's not sold in Hong Kong was a bonus (to rareness) too.
While I was at the store, I also did a quick check on the X1 (silver). First thing I noticed was the screen doesn't go landscape unless the keyboard is slid open. Same problem with the current G1. The WinMo was done indeed better, speed wise, than others, but still I wasn't super impressed with the panel and the touch quality (iPhone is still better at the touchiness). At this point I'm extremely happy with my Bold and it doesn't add much value from having an X1.
W902 + Bold are gonna keep me pretty happy for quite some time.

トロ築地早餐

2008-11-18T02:13:00.000-08:00

鬧鐘還沒響就醒了, 這幾天真的吃太好太飽, 胃有點不舒服, 加上喉痛還沒全好, 真得想睡回去, 但一班同事約好, 還得起床梳洗. 6 點, 天雖還沒亮但車站卻不乏人流, 對築地魚市場的人來說更像是中午. 市場人多, 車更多, 騎著奇怪的三輪車在人群來穿插. 7 點了, 吃早餐的時候, 來到大和寿司人気店, 排隊的人真不少, 這次到了おとうさん的店裡, 是應該比較好吃.

おまかせ過後, 再要了面前的超美的トロ, 脂肪細平均, 非常美, 800 円 a piece, 但店長也特地給了我一大片, 不吃トロ怎算來了築地呢, 真的是最美最豪的早餐! 也因為太好吃了, 可惜沒閒拍照.

法式 30

2008-11-16T06:22:00.000-08:00

早上就開始下雨，週末了，很想出去走走，以前在紐約，下雨天街道總是變得髒髒的，令人有種速速回去的感覺。在横浜的小街小巷走都沒這樣覺得，只是很多店還沒開，所以沒什麼好逛。朋友推薦的法式餐廳要走15 分鐘，但我又迷路花了半個小時，肚子超餓。其實這餐廰不是做傳統的法國菜，是有點日法 fusion 的味道，前陣子一直狂吃拉麵，在下回咖喱之前，剛好來換換口味。就點了一道有30 種材料的午餐，有四小盆，份量不會太多，有肉有素有海鮮，有點像懷石料理 mini 版，最後還有3 個甜點，也只是一個カツ丼的價錢，一點也不貴。難怪坐下後，一團團的太太們也進來用餐。
喝著咖啡看外面的細雨，想越來越喜歡這個地方。

D'epice, depice.exblog.jp

群雄拉面

2008-11-13T06:10:00.000-08:00

一連數日吃了幾家拉麵館還到了新横浜的拉麵博物館，吃拉麵吃的挺過癮。つけラーメン有兩家是蠻有特式的，すずらん特式以平打面和大大塊叉燒 (チャシウ) 做招來，而つけ麺屋的ぶた湯底最好喝。他們都在渋谷駅附近的小巷裡，不容易找，但絶対值得一試，還要排隊。
一蘭的格局最特別，一格一格的，而且當拉麵送上後，服務員就把布後的簾拉下，可能是要讓客人更有自己的空間去享受吧，蠻特別的，只是我反而常偷看隔壁的。麵多少，硬軟程度，叉燒份量，洋葱要綠還是白的都可以坐下後自行選擇。湯一點都不咸，配合幼麵相當好吃。去了兩次隊末都排到路上，只有第三次才吃得到, 是人気極高的店。

平打(ひらうち)チャシウ面，大盛り, つけ麺屋やすべえ, 一蘭

Boldie

2008-11-09T04:37:00.000-08:00

It has been awhile since I wrote about the SE702. Well, today my new blackberry arrived, with the help of my coworker. Bold is the 2nd GSM blackberry that supports 3G, and works in Japan. It is a huge improvement over the 8707g, released back in mid August 2006. Support of UTMS 3G was then little known among users. Not only does Bold supports HDSPA but it is also equipped GPS, wifi and a javascript enabled browser. A much faster processor. A beautiful screen. A slim body. The best keyboard ever in blackberry. All in all it makes serving the net, watching media and playing with Google Map a pleasure from it predecessor. Easily can switch from/to wifi and it logons instantly with the 3G network (Japan). Though there were some glitches I saw in this gmm build: no street view and not loading map tiles in Wifi-only mode, I believe they will get fixed soon.
Bold is one highly anticipated device. Definitely worth the wait! Tempted making it my primary device... next will check out SE X1.

つけ面新愛

2008-11-09T00:42:00.000-08:00

つけ面。一個原本陌生的名字, 今天只要是想一想就要流口水. 這種拉麵的特式是麵和湯分開, 吃的時候把麵泡在湯裡吃, 和蕎麦點醬油一樣. 湯是超濃的而且特別好吃, 吃完麵喝湯時, 要加白色的面湯 (スープ割り), 才不會太咸. 在渋谷和秋葉原吃過兩次就上癮了. 實在太好吃了, 比一般的拉面更好吃. 東京特選!

中華街

2008-11-03T06:40:00.000-08:00

横浜, 名字因為輪呔而不覺得陌生, 但對這城市就一無所知. 這次在日本就住在横浜附近, 離中華街很近. 週末閒著去了横浜駅走走, 逛逛商店, 也特別去了巴士經過的汽車用品專門店. 横浜的感覺像一個年青的城市, 新的高廈, 地方也挺空廣, 沒有新宿, 渋谷的壓迫感, 挺喜歡的, 當然如果有車子會更好.
說到中華街, 其實很失望, 食物奇貴, 味道麻麻, 例如一個蒜泥白肉, 1900 円, 華而不實, 扣肉刀削麵的味道也比不上渋谷駅前的担担麵, 價錢也貴了. 在紐約, 多倫多裡這個唐人街不講中文的, 接觸的都只說日語. 像只是給日本遊客觀光的地方, 失望!

渋谷駅前担担麵, 中華街扣肉刀削麵, 蒜泥白肉

横浜カプセル

2008-11-02T02:19:00.000-08:00

原以為４點半到步會趕不及到旅館, 所以特訂了一晚カプセルホテル, 感覺還好的, 有點像香港的籠屋豪華版, 有毛巾, 電視等, 但因為在地庫所以不能用手機, 而且也沒有地方可以充電, 是有點不方便.
在日本第一個晚餐, 可能時差關係沒有太大胃口, 選了快餐, 吃カレ, 也只選了簡單的雞蛋, １辛和基本份量. １辛 (から)是正常印度咖喱的辣度, 是有點辣了.
雖然已不是第一次來東京, 但感覺很不一樣, 以前也沒待超過兩個禮拜, 這次要留三個月, 只是花錢已不完全像一個遊客般的自由, 主以經濟為先, 不能亂花. 但同時很享受那種在一個陌生國家干活的刺激感, 現在只專心做好兩件事, 工作和學日語. 有點像回到以前讀書的時候, 那種別的都不用想不用干, 又沒人吵, 簡單的生活.
也差不多 10 年了, 看到珮珊的兒子和女兒也覺得她很幸福, 那份我無法給予的快樂.

桜木町カプセル, 一番屋オムエッゴカレ

繞一圈

2008-10-25T23:38:00.000-07:00

離開前的一個週末, 除了打包和安排身邊的事而之外, 就到附近幾家店吃吃東西. 本來就不喜歡吵吵鬧鬧, 週末都是靜靜的過, 做該做的事, 沒覺得無聊. 在美國待了８年多了, 生活上也習慣了, 又轉到另一個地方, 少不免是有點焦急, 畢竟已不是以前的年青了. 但同時也明白, 如果要去的話, 只可能是現在, 再過多幾年, 生活上可更難容許.
我剛好在她來的前一天走, 反正沒事了, 也最好不見面.

Pho Vi Hoa 牛肉河粉, Tofu house 的味噌湯(老闆娘送), Bibimbap, Al Bob, 香港茶餐廳餐肉蛋公仔麵, 冰檸檬茶少甜

學了誰

2008-10-18T00:41:00.000-07:00

本來對「畫皮」只是抱著看甄子丹功夫的心態, 反而驚喜的是小唯周迅, 很清秀. 劇的重點不是功夫, 但一點也不失望. 最後一句無奈的我愛你, 比什麼都來得感動. 其實我們懂愛, 願因愛為對方犧牲, 都是從神和耶蘇處學來的, 但偏偏人不願承認. 我可為誰犧牲呢.
吃飯不是我請客就是各付各的, 超不喜歡的就是別人請. 我點菜, 前題是好吃想吃, 所以我毛病的是點太多, 每樣都想嚐, 自由自在. 而別人請客, 我自不然先看的是價錢, 因為不想讓人覺得因為不用付錢我就獅子開大口. 所以別人請客, 點東西便得綁手綁腳, 明明想點飲料就因對方沒點, 覺得不好意思就沒點, 好不舒服. 開到老遠, 只吃了一個普通的親子丼, 一點都不值.
想吃得自在又省錢還是自己一個去吃吧.

Menlo Park Gombei, 親子丼

生日快樂

2008-10-10T23:11:00.000-07:00

剛好在苦惱要去哪裡吃東西, 就到了已好一段時間沒去的越南粉店的附近, 一家連 pierre 都說好吃的店. 不知道有多久沒吃過這家的粉了, 想不到連三豆冰也改了樣子, 變了果凍的樣子, 紅的一夥夥尤其好吃, 加上椰子奶, 感覺好舒服喔. 最近眼淚都很難控制, 都怪牽牛花害的, 好多好多都讓我感動讓我要記住的提點, 要感恩身邊的所有, 看看經濟的海嘯就知道這世界沒有東西是必然的. 突然好想好想家, 好想弟弟們, 好想 pierre 他們... 女兒好嗎？

Pho Vi Hoa, 3 beans with coconut

路人

2008-09-30T01:29:00.000-07:00

愛情令人生精采, 但生命不只有愛情, 親情才真的牽動我心.

擺脫

2008-09-28T19:19:00.000-07:00

日本甜點不旦外表特別講究, 其甜味比較溫和, 不會一口就覺得膩. 今天到了一家連鎖日式蛋糕店, 買了四件小蛋糕, 已忍不住在車上打開嚐嚐, 最後也變成了我的午餐. 除了芒果椰子慕絲最上面的糖槳為略甜以外, 其他的都很不錯. 奶油的氣泡足夠, 芒果慕絲和椰絲層一軟一硬對比下質感很好, 不同味道的巧克力混在一起味道一極. 好吃的蛋糕加上一杯芒果珍珠奶綠滿足了一個下午. 正!

Satura Cakes, mango coconut mousse, classic chocolate, strawberry shortcakes

五色

2008-09-23T16:58:00.000-07:00

早陣子看了一個有關韓國飲食文化的節目, 原來韓國料理環繞著五色, 白, 綠, 紅, 黃, 褐. 五色代表著不同的原素, 烹調講求五色均衡, 用以調和身體. 怪不得每次吃韓國菜時都覺得色彩繽紛. 這次自己弄點小食, 就只是差了雞蛋的黃, 但也很好看.

點滴

2008-09-04T04:39:00.000-07:00

自旅行後, 今天又見彈子汽水, 不是薰衣草味道, 但仍勾起旅行的回憶. 要到一個新地方生活, 重新適應, 帶給我興奮和期待, 我就是天生遊牧民族.

遊雲

2008-09-01T22:28:00.000-07:00

長週末, 懶洋洋, 歌詞整天繞著腦裡...
個多月來懶散了, 又多點愁善感, 發現原來身邊可以無所不談的朋友真的很少, 不是沒有, 而是大家的生活階段不同, 結了婚有了小孩, 覺得溝通困難, 畢竟大家的 priorities 都不一樣了. 我比我想像中怕孤獨, 所以整日轉個不停, 愛弄花樣, 可能正是因為我沒目標, 精神都花在一些不關重要的東西上, 結果最後什麼都沒得著. 所以我決定了去東京. 我不知道將來會變成怎樣, 不過不留下就得向前走. 很快又來一個大的轉變了.

戒毒

2008-08-21T02:40:00.000-07:00

週末巧碰上 Japantown 的熱鬧, 一起分享夏天的喜悅, 令我想起墾丁熱鬧. 我還趕得及到槙吃午飯, 過了一個輕鬆愉快的星期天.
近日 "戒毒" 常掛在嘴邊, 形容自己今在戒毒期, 不好的事要放下去除, 瀟洒的過著歡喜的自己.

SF Japantown
槙, 牛ワッパ

醉紫

2008-08-14T18:28:00.000-07:00

放過自己

2008-08-11T13:45:00.000-07:00

每次不是為別人作嫁衣便是遇人不淑, 近幾年遇上的都是那些最不應該遇上. 宇凌的經歷仍新尤記憶, 沒有她我亦想不到自己可以如此固執盲目, 最少宇凌明白自己被她的脾氣影響著. 沒止境的付出只會更渴求回報, 最後自己更傷. 不適合就得清醒好勝的心, 及早離場. 好心放過自己.

破鞋

2008-08-09T18:30:00.001-07:00

要從 gmm 才䁱得大坑在哪裡. 從小就很少接觸港島, 過了海我就變了一個路癡. 只會繞著地鐵站遊的我, 今次特別走到大坑, 找越南美食, 在炎炎香港的 7 月下雖然不是很好受, 不過心就回到小時候尋找寶藏般的興奮. 轉入綄沙街不久就來到聞名的火車頭前.

火車頭, 咖喱牛腩飯, 雜果賓治, 不過味道都很普通呢

Like Home

2008-08-07T17:01:00.000-07:00

At last, I got rid of the annoying N82 and back in the SE country. C702 is no flagship. It doesn't have zoom when the camera is set at 3MP either, but it's the SE menu and the simplicity I have always loved. It has GPS like the N82. Though no wifi, but then wifi is so overrated. The gmm integration is extremely useful where MyLocation blue dot has an arrow indicating my current direction of travel. The camera is not near as good as that of the K810i, but it meets my need on most closeup on food. All in all, I am very happy with the phone.

PS. i also looked at the F488. It looked really cool but the widgets bored me after 5 mins and the menu was too clumsy.

豆豆

2008-08-06T18:31:00.000-07:00

豆先生在函館是名店, 只此一家並無分店. 雖有限定醬油湯可選, 來到函館當然要試試塩湯拉麵. 塩湯味道比味噌醬油清淡, 味道像沒有蒽味的雲吞湯, 而且不油. 麵可選普通的蛋麵或布海苔(ふのり), 以蛋麵 Q 感最好. 湯麵的味道跟駅前店的有明顯的差別. 最有特式, 最有驚喜的應該是魷魚包飯, 魷魚本身很甜, 內包著炒過的日本米, 味道一流.
豆先生每天只營業數小時, 由 11 時到下午 3 時, 想試麵就得注意.

函館マメさん, 塩ラーメン, いかめし

新朋友

2008-08-05T12:12:00.000-07:00

小樽港口城市, 海鮮新鮮不奇怪, 難得的是雖然遊客多, 小樽人的熱情好客仍不減半分. 這次旅行中認識新朋友裡以小樽最雞同鴨講, 亦以小樽的最多最深刻印象. 由玻璃體驗館到壽司店, 小樽確是令人非常懷念的地方.
在巽鮨, 看到有賴尿蝦, 問一問刺身怎樣, 看起來只有二十歲的後藤さん豎手說 okok, 那當然要試一下啦. 想不到賴尿蝦肉質結實, 米膏甜又一點都不膩. 太好吃了！與後藤さん和大吾さん聊了起來, 半日半英語, 非常好玩, 沒有隔模, 只有真誠, 最後大家還交換電話和電郵, 約定冬天再見！
後藤さん, 冬また!

小樽巽鮨, しゃこ刺身, 鮨親子丼

格好いい

2008-08-04T16:51:00.000-07:00

很多人知道札幌拉麵以味噌有名, 但有機會去深入了解一家拉麵店背後的知慧就不一定常有. 尤其是日語麻麻的我, 今能兩次到訪札幌名店「一粒庵」, 並與其店長大島さん談了店名「一粒庵」的意義, 經驗實在難忘, 也更興幸店長英語一流. 一粒庵是一間不張揚的拉麵名店, 位置在札幌駅不遠的地庫. 店長煮麵會以漏斗計時, 並會全神貫注, 暫不聊天, 認真又有型. 味噌湯濃帶點燒烤味, 只是個湯好喝到會發光, 絕對是鎮店之湯. 一吋厚的叉燒, 柔軟鬆化, 用筷子已能把它分四五, 好吃到不想回家. 另一款的醬油湯底一點都不咸, 一樣可以喝完, 一滴不留. 喜歡醬油湯的一定要試. 連吃兩碗頭一樣大的拉麵胃雖在抱怨, 但嘴裡仍在享受著美味. 店雖小, 一人打理, 一日賣佰多碗拉麵, 自有他的實力. 一定會再來一粒庵. 大島店長，冬また!

札幌一粒庵, 元気のでる醤油ラーメン, 厚焼きチャーシューみそラーメン

甜心戀人

2008-08-03T01:15:00.000-07:00

由喜歡開始, 經過了解欣賞, 釀出愛.
宮の沢白いの戀人, Caramel hazelnut soda float

盡享悠閑天

2008-08-02T05:07:00.000-07:00

悠悠的享受旅行中的喜樂, 沒時間的束縛, 脫離了軌道, 隨心而行. 沒人吵著停車收罰單, 鬧著騎機車, 每分鐘囉唆路有否走錯, 拍照怎樣才好. 靜靜聽著海水搬家, 樹葉揮手和漫漫的呼吸聲.
沒有你原來我過得更快樂.

愛滷味

2008-08-01T13:46:00.000-07:00

聽墾丁這個地方就聽得多, 但要直到現在才有機會去. 聽司機說墾丁一年都很熱, 心想冬天來一定很棒因為人不多而且房租是超平宜. 墾丁大街白天人不多, 因為大家都到海灘去, 我看到的, 以南灣人最多, 又難找位子停車. 幸好只要不阻礙交通, 都可以停在店前白線內, 不會太多人管. 到了晚上墾丁就變了一個最靠近海邊的超級夜市. 人不單要分流, 連交通也只能在某些地方才能左右轉.
對滷味的印象特別深刻, 看上去不怎樣的一盤, 但就十分入味, 濃但不咸, 一大盤 300NT, 完全明白台灣人為什麼那麼愛滷味.

墾丁一品滷味

天秤座

2008-06-30T13:00:00.000-07:00

很多學生都是飯堂的常客, 去飯堂一般的目的是填肚, 而且價錢大眾化. 週末經過超市, ４點多還沒吃過什麼東西, 便坐下叫了叉燒鷄飯, 份量嚇了我一跳, 飯多不奇, 但鷄肉和叉燒也滿滿. 但看看價錢又嚇了一跳, ７塊多美金吃個叉鷄飯....
吃了兩口, 又自然拿起手機上網, 看 Youtube, 覆電郵. 以前老師常說, 吃飯不要看書, 要專心不然很容易有胃病, 小時候倒沒邊吃飯邊看書的習慣, 但反而人長大了, 自制能力都欠捧, 但也可能是一個人吃飯太無聊吧.

Ranch 99

偷師

2008-06-29T07:25:00.000-07:00

朋友個個讚金門蛋塔, 開車往返要兩個小時, 第一次買了半打, 一晚吃光, 隔天又去, 買了兩打, 還是剛出爐, 要排隊, 開車了兩百多里, 絕對值得. 我覺得最讚是皮薄, 雖然只賣酥皮, 但做得棒就足夠了.

金門餅家

Summer special

2008-06-10T02:48:00.000-07:00

最近 castro 的 tofu house 有夏天新菜, Al Bob. 熱烘烘的飯, 上面有一層蔬菜, 金針菇, 魚子和蝦仁, 還有紫菜, 外面看來已很不錯, 但翻一翻才知道下面是一層厚厚的魚子和蝦仁, 材料滿爆. Special menu never tastes so delicious!

Tofu house, Al Bob

現實

2008-05-25T00:31:00.000-07:00

記得年青時喜歡一個人靠的是純綷感覺, 喜歡這個就是這個, 很明確的感覺, 不會三心兩意. 年紀大了就越來越會比較, 再不像以前般的想愛就去愛, 現在會考慮很多, 感覺有當然好, 但絕對不是唯一, 對方年紀, 外表, 性格, 經濟狀況, 事業, 嗜好, 家人等等也是考慮因素, 喜歡誰和與誰在一起再不是單單以感覺來驅動, 而是一個交易, 甚至一項投資, 要有最佳的回報.
自大學後, 那種 "非君不嫁" 的感覺也忘了. 年青就是那樣可愛.

炸両, 即叫即蒸, 外滑裡脆. 靚粥一世.

好吃到抖

2008-05-04T20:20:00.000-07:00

最近工作, 生活都很忙, 尤其是工作, 為了爭取時間除了在公司攪到三更半夜, 連週末都不放過. 同事還以為我忘了關掉 IM, 因為在那種時間在公司是超不正常. 吃飯段練都變得是奢侈, 基本上這段日子肚子都是靠著 castro 各餐館老闆幫忙. castro 附近的店都不大, 菜式雖也不多, 但就那幾款做得好. 對現在只想填肚子沒時間試菜的我倒適合不過. 這家的牛肉 bibimbap 是超好吃的, 加上她們的辣醬, 好吃到抖. 要吃掉所有顏色才健康的!

Tofu house, Dolsot Bibimbap

好吃不怕遠

2008-04-30T16:21:00.000-07:00

要到 japan town 得花上一個多小時, 已想著去好幾個星期了但要到上個禮拜才真正的實行. 最近灣區天氣
反復, 一天可以很悶熱, 但隔天就變得很涼快, 這天剛好熱了點, 走過幾間館子, 最後也是選了上次的拉麵館, 還是點了那個天婦羅蕎麥麵. 醬油一點都不咸, 麵條冰冰的, 吃下去特別舒服.

三船てん笊蕎麦

記得 Bonnie

撞牆

2008-04-25T02:40:00.000-07:00

雖然已經是４月中, 但在灣區氣溫仍是挺涼的, 所以我們幾個好朋友又跑到小肥羊新店吃火鍋. 我們４個人邊吃邊聊, 有說有笑, 一吃就上幾個小時, 超開心的. 幾天之後, 別的同事提議到同一家店吃飯, 我最初也無所謂, 但吃了幾分鐘感覺就不對, 可能是覺得他們有點偏激吧, 聊起來一點都不投機, 整整一頓飯我都沒幾句, 看看手錶吃了不夠一個小時就買單了. 這飯局真痛苦.
同一個餐館, 吃同樣的東西, 感覺就天堂地獄, 寧願一個人吃也不要找錯對象.

很開心 Jean 買到喜歡的房子, 終有地方攪燒烤會. Yay!

San Mateo 小肥羊

吸引力

2008-04-03T18:21:00.000-07:00

有次朋友提到一家新店, 單是名字已很吸引, 讓人期待. 前天有空去吃晚飯, 雖然我吃辣的能耐不高, 但也非常享受辣的味道, 還忍著不喝茶, 因為實在太好吃不想沖淡. 辣本身的味道, 讓我太開味界. 那道水煮魚簡真是 "指定" 菜, 一定要點!

麻辣誘惑, 粉蒸羊肉, 水煮魚, 八寶茶

鳴謝 Jean

老字號

2008-03-24T11:59:00.001-07:00

今個週末剛好要回去紐約, 早上剛下飛機就從 JFK 跑到發拉盛去吃早點. 離開紐約後最不捨得就是發拉盛的美食還有一班老商戶.

朱記鍋貼雖漲了少價但仍舊人山人海. 很多人都專程開車來買.
鹿鳴春是蟹粉小籠包的名店. 發拉盛店比較大.

Fring, Out!

2008-03-21T14:38:00.000-07:00

One neat thing about N82 is that it's very mobile net savvy in a relatively small package. After getting more familiar with the phone, I decided to explore about the internet calling feature. On paper Fring only consumes data packets and leaves the voice channel alone. Sounds like a good usecase in a roaming situation as long as I have WiFi access, in hotels and airports. A few minutes into it though, I removed the app in disgust.
As some of the reviews mentioned, Fring imported the phone book. But what I didn't know was it also imported all the call history. And even though I cleared the history list, it refilled the list every time the application started. No opt-out option. Annoyance 1.
Annoyance 2 happened when I made skype calls. It required way too many clicks to call someone on my contact list: cellular call or skype call, input box with the phone number, and manually added the international signature '+'. Then call. It required to add the international dialing signature '+' to every number, regardless of calling international or domestic numbers. The app already knew my phone number so it could have figured out whether that was a domestic or long distance call. In addition, annoyance 3, Fring gave no option to let the user just enter and call a number. It has to be called either from the phone book or the skype contact list.
However, what topped it all was it changed my phone preferences [03/25/2008: it was the installation changed the preferences]. It increased my ringtone volume to almost full, shut off vibrate, set the ringtone for repeated play and turned on the warning tone. Bottom line, if you change my settings, you are sooo going home!

The binary was Fring92.sis.

PS. A lot of friends have asked me about iSkoot. I don't give a second thought about them because its business case is just flawed. The 2 biggest usecases of VoIP are to avoid expensive long distance and roaming minutes. iSkoot uses both voice minutes and data to make a call. Why would I want that?!!

口疏

2008-03-16T20:27:00.000-07:00

從前我就寫得不多, 但今次改變一下看看感覺如何. 聽朋友介紹, 知道附近開了家茶餐廳, 還說怎樣有水凖, 所以晚飯就踩踩場. 人的確多, 可能是因為新開吧, 遲一點的話, 恐怕就沒有位子給我這單個子. 略看了餐牌, 便點了紅酒炆牛尾配白飯, 淨雲吞, 要杯熱鴛鴦. 雖是純試菜心態, 但應該吃得完. 東張西望一下, 有４位服務員, 兩男兩女, 而廚房就有５位, 像是３主２助, 以茶餐廳的大小來說算多了點.
菜上的廷快, 茶餐廳就是要快嘛, 雲吞有 8 夥, 不算大但反覺得餡實在, 不像某家, 沒有一口都是豬肉味的感覺, 在嘴裡知道是雲吞而不是"豬肉吞". 菜心也爽, 沒泡過頭也不老, 只是湯略咸了些. 牛尾顏色紅的有點假, 牛尾肉軟, 輕輕用筷子已把肉分開, 醬汁雖然顏色怪怪但不算太濃, 不配飯也不會覺得過咸. 兩道菜都廷好, 雖然茶餐廳多做牛脷而不做牛尾. 不過要說最喜歡就一定是那杯鴛鴦, 鴛鴦最棒的味道就是那種茶配咖啡的苦味, 所以我從不加糖, 味道要調到剛剛好才好喝, 我能整杯喝完, 就算在香港也不過幾家. 這家不賴!

Hong Kong Bistro on Castro
淨雲吞
紅酒炆牛尾

鳴謝 May

後記: 還有一事要提, Hong Kong Bistro 具備免費無密碼 wifi (ssid: 'HongKongBistro'), 對要隨時上網的食客是超方便呢!

N82 the missing review

2008-02-29T11:54:00.000-08:00

I spend a lot of time about mobile phones, from personal to career. Over the years, mobile phone has become more than a calling device. In fact, making calls has become more of the secondary, or tertiary, purpose of my phone usage. Rather, I spend the 99% of the time (confirmed by the monthly bill) on the device surfing the web, taking pictures (over 400 last year), writing my blog and uploading videos.
For the nature of it, I have multiple phones and change them frequently too, as in two phones a year. Indeed it's an obsession. Not so much of having the latest and shiniest phones though, rather of a drive to seek the next powerful phone with even greater simplicity--ergonomics. It's hard to make the fastest car on the racetrack, but it's exponentially harder to make the fastest car a useful daily commuter at the same time.
As early as grey/gold themed T68 I have used SonyEricsson as my primary personal phone over the years. Part of it was I used to work for both of its founding companies, but most was of the phone's design and ergonomic elegance. That was till K850i released. Shamed of such a flagship phone, its overall quality was a leap step back, worse than the K810i in a lot of aspects. For the first time I've gone over the fence and have a Nokia.
Little I knew about the N82 or the new S60 3.0 platform, yet like a reasonable consumer, I crawled over reviews and videos before committing another few thousand dollars. Other than repeating the specs, showing the menus and taking a few still pictures, these reviews offered little. None of them gave me the practical aspect for everyday use. So I decided to write about them--the annoyances that I wish I knew of. Perhaps as the baseline for future reference like the UIQ.

Phone book
I will start by the most common, the phone book. S60 has decided each contact of the phone must be a person, because rather than having just one 'name' field like SE does, it has first and last name. What about those 1800 customer service numbers? Having first and last names are just restrictive and unnecessary. Ok, so if it gives user the ability to change the fields, user can make the name a single field themselves. Not a big deal. However, user would have to modify the field to every single time, current or new. It does not do the setting once and for all. And it gets better. Adding or modifying the contact field is only available if the phone language is Chinese. The option of sorting by lastname or firstname is, on the other hand, only available in English. Internationalization should be faithful not discriminative. The logic behind this language dependent option escapes me.
S60 prides itself as a multi-task platform. But what's a truly good multi-task platform is it seamlessly works without user's knowledge. After I finish dialing a call from the phone book, it still reminds open in the background. It has to be closed manually every time. Why make life harder than it is!

Call history
The call history shows the incoming, outgoing and missed calls all in separate windows. It looks organized at a glance. But it's painful not having all of them shown in one convenient list. For those of us who drive, that's one major annoyance. 1 click shows all is essential. Ergonomics, Nokia, ergonomics! A great product is always about the little things.

Absence minded
SMS
Another annoyance is the phone is very 'forgetful'. It doesn't remember all of the user preferences/settings. When it remembers, it only remembers partially and mostly about theose rarely changed. On SMS, it doesn't remember any of the people have been text messaged. No popularity, frequently sent list. For hundreds of contacts in my phone book, I will have to do a search every time I try to send a message to the same people.

Camera
Another example is the camera. It doesn't remember any of the last camera settings, macro, flash, EV values. Every time the camera is on, it goes back to its default. The only thing it does remember though is the camera mode: still or video. I am curious how hard it is to remember everything else. It comes with a 2Gb memory card doesn't it?!

Ergonomics
Speaking of camera, the frustration just goes on and on. After a snapshot is taken, user cannot zoom in on the snapshot. To do zoom, user will have to quit camera and enter the viewing mode. Even so, the zoom in/out takes forever (long progress bar) as it renders each zoom level, even with merely 3Mb pixels photos. Furthermore, not only the center button cannot trigger the snapshot (must be by the top shutter button) but also the most used camera settings such as white balance and EV values are buried down the option list that the user would have to navigate through. No 1-button shortcuts to EV values or colour balance. Torturing user experience.

Latency
Granted, the photo quality on N82 is gorgeous over its rivals. Colour balance and focus are accurate. That is, only if user has the time for them. The camera is awfully slow to be useful. It takes a very long time to focus, worse of between shots. It thinks rethinks and thinks again. Nokia has forgotten the motto in photography, "Don't miss the moment". Instead, Nokia's is "Let's miss the moment". And I have missed many since ownership. Can't imagine N95 camera is said to be slower than the N82's.

Flash from the focus light
Arguably the stupidest annoyance of all is its orange focus light. It lits up for focus aid. No questions there. After the focus is locked in, the focus light flashes once again right before the shutter takes place. It can be reproduced very very easily. Usually the subject is from a distance, the orange light doesn't do any harm and in the dark the xenon flash will help offset the orange reflection on the subject. However, it's a huge problem when the subject is close. In macro situation where the xenon flash is turned off to avoid a white wash, the shutter will open longer to admit more light and the weird orange light just gets in the way. I have had too many closeup pictures (like of food) with a orange reflection in the middle. It's a very stupid bug in the firmware and should be fixed!

Phone status
How much juice is left in the battery? There's no way to know, other than from a third party software that the user has to install separately. The SE 'volume' keys when not in a call or playing music serve as a status key. It shows the phone's number, battery life, current profile and alarm settings. I suppose Nokia didn't think these are important to user, and it takes a non Nokia phone app to find out.

And the annoyances go on. Cannot choose flight mode at startup. Text input does not show a window of the character sequence. Platform relies unnecessarily heavily on PC support. No bulk import phone book. Voice commands useless when it ties only to applications. No magic word to answer or make calls. Can't assign voice command to individual contact. High maintenance to keep the file system organized.

I am beating a dead horse. But I always come back to the point. A great product is all about the little things. Why iPhone is so successful? Not because it has the unparalleled technologies. In fact, its technologies are crippled in a lot of ways. No video capture, 2Mb pixel non-AF camera, no MMS, no 3G, no GPS, etc. Even touchscreen is not new. Its success is due to the fact that it cares about the little things. The ergonomic things. Apple spent 90% of its resource to make the UI experience incredible and the success goes beyond just the iPhone.
Powerful technological features on mobile phones are important but they have to create a great user experience to be useful. S60 still has a very long way to go.

回娘家

2008-02-28T23:30:00.000-08:00

每次去台北都讓我開心不已.
這次原以為只是為工作兩天, 不會有什麼時間出去逛, 但最後我不旦到了 101 地庫, 去過誠品 (好幾次), 還有師大夜市和試了 Sogo 附近的新鼎泰豐第 3 分店. 收獲真不少.
台灣小吃多, 好吃就不用說, 最要命的是超平宜. 從熟食到 711 都超平, 又不用付小費. 簡直是我的天堂.
但有點要注意的是可能因為競爭激烈而且抄風旺盛, 他們都不喜歡拍照, 不論是拍舖前或者是食物都會讓他們很緊張, 我就試過被說了. 所以我都會買回去再拍. 不過其實台北的照片我離譜的少, 尤其是食物, 可能因為每次想到要拍照的時候已吃了一半, 總不能拍骨頭吧. 哈！
台北真的很棒, 那些忘了的味道, 又重新繞在嘴裡.

101 的三巡海南雞麵 130 NT
101 的山崎麵包, 奶油泡芙 45 NT

公司旅行

2008-02-07T03:15:00.000-08:00

公司取消一年一度的滑雪改了去 LA 的狄士尼, 原本都沒抱太大期望, 始終是狄士尼跟 orlando 的, 東京的又會有什麼區別, 但幸好我錯了. 跟一班同事去玩和吃是出乎的正. 當然送幾千人去幾天旅行, 安排上的 scale 也是很厲害, 旅遊車, 機場, 航空公司, 酒店, 等等都很棒, 不愧是 Google.

Bubba Gump Shrimp on Katella: clam chowder, shrimp new orleans, pedal menu

基本需要

2008-01-31T11:25:00.001-08:00

就在左右

旅行就要享受

2008-01-26T16:20:00.000-08:00

去旅行當然要享受, 不一定要吃好的, 但一定要有特式, 要有新的體驗. 這次去澳洲安排的朋友不單是吃素的, 還處處找特平的地方隨便填肚就好, 覺得自己當了難民. 唯有自己動身找點好吃的.

Sydney, fish market, 芝士蒸縲, opera house

Vodafone AU

2008-01-19T19:56:00.000-08:00

prepaid
APN. live.vodafone.com
proxy. 10.202.2.60:8080:http

又新年

2008-01-03T13:07:00.001-08:00

新的一年要去舊重整.

飛機餐

2007-12-11T17:51:00.001-08:00

飛機餐也可以吃得好. 只是那個甜點就超吸引.

滿足

2007-10-20T19:14:00.000-07:00

一定有人情味才好吃.

梅子扒豆苗, 廚房製造
牛ミニワッパ, 槙, japan town

宵夜街頭

2007-10-20T18:58:00.000-07:00

東京售賣機處處, 熱烘烘的泡麵最吸引. 哪怕餓著睡不覺.

自由活動

2007-09-23T08:45:00.000-07:00

六個月內第二次返香港, 從來沒試過這麼密, 而且是一人行. 好處的是自由活動, 到處吃東西. 普通早餐奶茶至潮州壕仔粥, 壕仔真不少喔, 吃得挺爽. 本來也想去一家日式連瑣拉麵店, 但因為每間經過的, 人都很多, 反而到了機場才有機會嚐嚐. 正當我站在一旁等候我的號碼的時候, 發現一排 "人牆" 風吹不動, 擋著領餐位置, 挺有趣的. 未來這個星期再戰東京!

"香港仔魚蛋粉", 尖沙咀地鐵附近. 在香港也不用付小費, 真方便.

吃飯要看誰

2007-08-07T11:33:00.000-07:00

與誰吃飯其實廷重要, 我覺得吃東西這動作向來就不美, 要是跟一些不熟的人去吃飯, 感覺就像在陌生人面前脫褲子. 所以不熟的人我盡不會跟他們吃飯, 要是情況不容許, 我頂多吃一點點或者只喝飲料. 我朋友都習慣的怪脾氣, 不會逼我 "見客". 相反地如果是跟好朋友去吃飯, 我不單有說有笑, 而且食量驚人. 跟好朋友去吃東西根本就是一種享受. 很容易上癮喔.

記得開心牛尾

2007-07-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

前陣子到了倫敦的辦公室工作一個多禮拜, 工作雖然很忙, 但享受 good food 是我們公司獨一無二的文化. 禮拜五浩浩蘯蘯到 cafe 吃午飯, 竟然發現有牛尾.
牛尾中間一塊四角型的骨頭, 少少的肉就藏在角之間. 想要好吃肉軟, 是相當花時間. 以我們 cafe 的水準牛尾當然非常到位. 對上一次吃到牛尾就是在群姐的家, 牛尾是她老公拿手菜之一, 還吃了荔枝, 已好幾年沒嚐過, 他們還給我一大包帶回家. 那晚超開心. 荔枝更不捨得吃, 只准自己一天吃一顆.
以後一定要回三藩市見見他們.

書香

2007-06-22T19:42:00.000-07:00

每年去台灣都一定空一日去誠品走走. 因為有些中文書外國真的買不到. 而這兩年, 對中式甜品的書愛不惜手, 因為自己對中式甜品一點也不懂.

最近回香港就給我買了一書１００中式甜品, 只是看看已超餓了。

100 中式甜品 Winnie 姐著海濱圖書公司 2006
ISBN-13: 978-988-202-427-4

三聖海鮮

2007-06-21T18:22:00.000-07:00

自從去過屯門三聖吃海鮮,就上了癮, 每次回香港,第一個晚上一定跟家人去三聖吃晚飯. 而眾多海鮮裡, 我最喜歡就是賴尿蝦,尤其是椒鹽. 只是想想口水已流不停. 賴尿蝦像相沒有龍蝦有鉗的霸氣, 熟了也沒有吸引的紅色,肉也沒有其鮮嫩, 但就喜歡上它一大塊粗肉. 爽！

地點
屯門三聖, 可以從西鐵轉到輕鐵, 在三聖站下車, 往海邊的方向走,就會看到一排的海鮮檔, 只有一家酒家, 廷獨市的但也沒辦法. 那間海鮮檔老闆跟我爸是朋友, 所以每次都一定到他那邊.

八月到日本, 一定常回香港大吃一頓. (日本沒有賴尿蝦).

眼望望

生日