At the local store, trying to pick hair styling wax and looking for the lightest one. Two strengths are available: “mega starker” and “ultra starker”…
The only question is: does either go up to 11?
Author: Dave
Snowy Winter Break
Sorry for the abrupt end of communication, earlier this month: past two weeks were spent far from civilisation and internet access. But snowy mountains, skiing and delicious local food more than made up for it.
In Paris for New Year’s Eve (and a few more days after that), before going back to Berlin until the end of Winter.
Bioinformatics Conference Pro Tip
Can we all agree already to skip the “Why research on cancer is useful” introduction slide from now on?
If your talk lasts 25 minutes and goes into the minutiae of protein-protein interactions with regard to oncogenic pathways, maybe spending half of it convincing an audience of biologists and bioinformaticians that cancer is a bad thing that needs curing is not the best use of presentation time.
The Cove: Japan’s Delicious Dolphin Burger Industry
The Cove is not gonna make Japan many friends among the world’s dolphin and whale lovers, but it is definitely worth a watch.
Although it could probably go lighter on the whole Mission: Impossible antics (unfortunately, it seems you just can’t sell a documentary nowadays if it doesn’t feature endless gratuitous action montages), the scenes it captures are captivating and hard to ignore. Beyond the expected money shot of an expanse of ocean literally red with dolphin blood, the investigative work offers some fascinating insights into the cynical political maneuvering that goes on to ensure the fishing doesn’t stop.
The vast farce that is the International Whaling Commission and a long tradition of Japan’s bribing third world island countries for votes, gets the bashing it deserves: I don’t care what your opinions on the whaling issue are, if you seriously believe in the “scientific whaling” argument, you are very misinformed or a moron.
Casual observers of Japanese modern history do not need to be told of its infamous propensity to always side with industries against public welfare, when environmental or public health scandals strike. Others will probably think that the recount of Minamata disease’s infamous cover-up is exaggerated… After all, while Western countries routinely poison locals in remote third-world countries and get away with it, it is quite a rare thing for a country to let companies do it on its own soil and unfalteringly support them when things go awry (and long after that). Long-time residents will also enjoy the nod to Japan’s sub-par criminal justice system, delight in spotting the usual cast of Japanese administration characters (the blatantly corrupt – yet utterly polite – cop on local business’ payroll, the roboticized bureaucratic talking-head, the government “scientist” spouting pseudo-science etc. etc.), without, unfortunately, escaping the usual trite clichés (is there a single japanese story that cannot be illustrated with a nail and a hammer?).
This documentary is not without its faults and I honestly have my doubt about the efficiency of the “Us vs. Them” brand of activism, when confronted to Japanese culture. But regardless of which side of the Blubber Hamburger / Cute Smiling Cetacean debate you stand on, there are a couple items worth pondering in there.
Think you know Japanese music?
End-of-year Japanese Music Quiz, over at KanjiBox’s dev blog: 10 tracks, 10 artists, many genres…
Guess them all and win a bunch of iTunes coupons for free installs of KanjiBox for iPhone (along with my undying respect for your extensive musical culture).
So many zeros…
Today, the entire 3-month research stipend covering the cost of my stay in Berlin (living expenses, plane ticket etc), was deposited on my bank account. All at once.
Am I a bad person for even wondering how many years I could live off that, were I to accidentally end up on some remote beach island instead of Berlin’s Max Planck Institute for Molekular Genetics?
Kidney Stones: A Beginner’s Guide…
Personal Health Update
I wasn’t exactly handed a winning ticket at the Genetic Lottery. As a kid, it would have taken less time to list the parts that did work as they should have. But things got under control and I am generally fine these days1beside that violent twitching on the left side of my face and the regular furball coughing, that is.
However, God personally hates me and wants to make sure I know it. Which is why I belong to the statistically improbable demographic of young people with recurring kidney stone problems despite relatively healthy dietary habits2people in their twenties who barely drink a can of coke a month aren’t supposed to get kidney stones, let alone chronic ones.
On a nearly regular basis, about once every two years, I get to enjoy the pain of childbirth, minus naming process and postpartum hormones rush.
On the plus side, with the years, the routine has started to take the edge off (or I am developing a much higher tolerance to pain): when a stone episode strikes, nowadays, I just casually recoil in a fetal position for a couple hours at a time while waiting for it to pass after a week or so; years ago: I would longingly stare at a kitchen knife while considering my options for self-surgery on the spot.
The other good thing is that I have learned to recognise early symptoms (as well as the time they are likely to occur: mine always happen in Winter, for no reason any specialist has ever been able to explain satisfyingly), which helps preventing me from making bad decisions… such as embarking on a 15 hour trip home to San Francisco from Paris via London (aka: the Story of my First Stone). Testament to the good old pre-911 days: when some security guy at Heathrow noticed the sweaty, grimacing guy waiting for his plane, went and asked “Sir, I must ask you: have you been consuming any drugs?” and got a near-hysterical answer of “No, but if you have any, I’ll take them!” through gritted teeth… he just walked away as he came.
These days, once the chest pain shows up, I would know better than trying to lob it with, for sole comfort, 2 aspirins and a cup of boiling hot tea purchased on the Eurostar.
Three days into the current episode, I finally went for a consultation at my nearby hospital: a CT scan confirmed the obvious and I was sent on my way with the usual advices and a couple prescription drugs.
Incidentally: I paid ¥5,000 (less than $50) for a full consultation and a CT scan, both of which took a grand total of 40 minutes, from the moment I stepped into my neighbourhood clinic. The actual cost, pre-universal-coverage, was ¥19,000, or about $200 (for that money, a US CT technician won’t even spit on you): dear US readers, aren’t you glad you live in a country gloriously free of such pesky Universal Healthcare and reasonable health costs.
Anyway, all that to say that I am slightly incapacitated at the moment, and lagging on communication (although oddly productive on whatever I manage to put my mind to, in between two bouts of holding my abdomen, wondering if downing a bottle of Draino might help). It will get better and I’ll catch up on email and everything, soon (i.e. anywhere from next week to next year).
That’s it for the immediate personal health update. Everybody with a normally working pair of kidneys and zero interest in the practice of hobbyist medicine at home can (and should) stop reading right now. Trust me, there’s nothing interesting under the fold.
The Art of Subtle Rephrasing
Japanese girl at local bar: Do your prefer Japanese girls or foreign girls?
Dave: Err… huh… dunno… Country doesn’t have much to do with it…
Japanese girl: Aaah, of course… It does not matter…
Dave: Indeed.
[…]
Japanese girl: Ok, so… Which type of girl do you prefer: long straight black hair or blonde with blue eyes?
Kanji Stories…
After keeping it on the back burner for way too long, I felt I should finally make this project public, no matter how unpolished:
KanjiStory.com is a website geared towards people studying Japanese kanji (and, I guess, to a lesser extent, Chinese… but it probably needs some tuning for that). It provides a simple yet powerful interface for people to write kanji mnemonics in the form of a simple story.
The best way to see what I mean is to go register (10 seconds, one click), read a few stories and finally: take a stab at writing your own. Allowing users to contribute stories is at least 90% of the point of this website at this stage, so please do not just go, check out the dozen sample stories and call it a day without trying the editor.
The current version of the website, although quite spiffy code-wise, needs a huge amount of work to be called a proper beta. And then, there are two million cool features just waiting to be added. However, given my very limited time resources, I figured I would first check to see how much interest (and active participation) in the project I can raise, before committing any more time working on it.
Do not hesitate to post your comments and suggestions below, but keep in mind that this is all very early-stage development and that many new features will come, once (if) this ever takes off the ground as a community project.
As an aside, if you are a reasonably experienced PHP dev with an interest in contributing to this project: get in touch (use the address: “zedrdave” at Google’s mail).
If you want to be kept informed of future KanjiStory-related news, easiest way for now is to sign-up as a fan on the facebook page (until I set up a proper forum and RSS feed on the website).
Weekend Patterns
Note to Self of Two Weeks Ago: Great foresight on that massive batch of bolognese sauce in the freezer! Should consider storing more Saturday-morning emergency food around the house.
Note to Self of Yesterday Night: Maybe not so heavy on the distilled sweet potato juice, next time. Should consider picking a recreational heroin habit instead.