Jin's Random Thoughts

Portland, Oregon

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 16:10:48 EDT

Things I want to do there:
http://www.portlandcm.org/index.php

Places I want to stay:
http://www.oregon.gov/OPRD/PARKS/rustic.shtml#1_ROOM_RUSTIC_CABINS

Organic U-Picks?

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 20:14:49 EDT

http://www.formosanursery.com/
http://www.pickyourown.org/canadabc.htm

Two really good baby books

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 13:16:49 EDT

What Babies Say Before They Can Talk (Paul C. Holinger)
* very effective methods on calming & putting baby to sleep

The Happiest Baby On The Block (Harvey Karp)
* infant signals & philosophy on how to deal with them (it's more aligned with my philosophy)
* theories on how to raise a happy & confident baby

Sushi Cook Fest Anyone?

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:08:24 EDT

Let's try for a sushi cook fest. Specifically, rolled sushi. I figure we just need one rice recipe and then a couple of ingredients recipe to roll into the rice (i.e. teriyaki beef, avocado, etc).

* Rice recipe (http://www.sushirecipes.org/sushi-rice.html)
* teriyaki beef
* cucumber
* avocado
* shiitake & kampo (http://www.recipezaar.com/119250)
* dried pork flakes
* pork sung (rou sung) or Japanese pink fish powder
* eggs (http://www.digsmagazine.com/recipe_sushi_futomaki.htm)

Pregnancy Diet Limitation

Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:26:45 EST

According to most nutrition websites (including health canada), I should try to avoid:

• Raw seafood, such as oysters or uncooked sushi

• Cheeses with a white, 'mouldy' rind, such as Brie and Camembert, and blue-veined cheeses like Stilton

• Pate, raw or undercooked meat, poultry, and eggs (cook all meat until there are no pink bits left and eggs till they are hard). All are possible sources of bacteria that can harm your unborn child.

• Liver and liver products (pate, liver sausage) should be avoided, too, because they may contain large amounts of the retinol form of vitamin A, too much of which could be bad for your developing baby.

• For some women, it is also important to avoid peanuts and foods that contain them. If you, your partner, or any of your other children (if you have any) have a history of allergies such as hayfever, asthma, or eczema, avoiding peanuts during pregnancy and breastfeeding may reduce your baby's chances of developing a potentially serious peanut allergy.

• No alcoholic drinks during pregnancy. Drinking too much alcohol can cause physical defects, learning disabilities, and emotional problems in children, so many experts recommend that you give up alcohol while you are pregnant.

• No smoking.

• Cut down on caffeine. This may be easy for women who are suddenly revolted by the stuff during their first trimester, but not so for everyone. Why is caffeine a potential problem? Research has linked consuming more than 300mg of caffeine a day with an increased risk of miscarriage and low birth weight. To be on the safe side stick to no more that three mugs of instant coffee or six cups of tea or eight cans of cola per day. Or, although there is no evidence that moderate amounts of caffeine will harm you or your baby, you may want to switch to decaf hot drinks and colas, instead.

In addition, I should ensure that I consume the recommended amount of calcium (1000mg), iron(27mg), and folic acid(400ug). This is to continue when I'm breastfeeding upto 6 months after birth. After 6 months, the baby require additional iron-rich food.

Note that calcium, tea, and coffee inhibits iron absorption. So it's best to consume milk, tea, and coffee +/-2hrs of iron feeding.

Silly Malaria-free Mosquitos Stats

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 03:31:33 EDT

On Monday morning, Jesse and I came across a radio interview with some malaria researcher. His research is on genetically modifying mosquitos to be malaria-resilient. The benefit of the research is to provide a method for controlling malaria infection. A malaria-resilient mosquito does not get sick from malaria and thus cannot not pass the disease to humans.

The researcher was all excited on the radio. His excitement is due to his controlled environment research which basically indicates that the population of the genetically modified mosquitos increase faster than that of the malaria-prone mosquitos.

I believe he mixed an equal amount of malaria-resilient modified mosquitos with that of malaria-prone mosquitos in a controlled environment (these mosquitos are fed malaria-infected mice within the controlled environment). After about 3 years or so, the population ratio of malaria-resilint vs malaria-prone mosquitos is 7:3! So the idea is that if we release these malaria-resilient mosquitos to the wild, these mosquitos will "replace" the malaria-resilient mosquitos.

Does anyone else see a flaw in his logic?! The total population of the mosquitos isn't a constant number! The malaria-resilient mosquitos probably just have a longer life-span than the malaria-infected mosquitos and thus becoming the majority of the population. But, at the same time, these malaria-resilient mosquitos increases the average lifespan of the overall mosquitos population without necessarily decreases/replaces the population of malaria-prone mosquitos (he didn't say if the gene of the malaria-resilient mosquitos are more dominant than that of malaria-prone mosquitos). Is that really what we want?

The 15th Day of Chinese New Year

Mon, 05 Mar 2007 01:16:55 EST

Apparently, the 15th day is a full moon and my mom insisted that I should eat some sweet dumplings. So, I bought some from T&T as they have some huge (fist-sized) freshly made sweet dumplings. I bought 3 kinds -- taro, sesame & peanuts, and water chestnut. I took them to my in-laws and we all tried some. They were quite yummy! At least now I can claim I practiced some of the tradition! Things were so busy at work and school that I haven't done anything traditional this year.

An Ode from a senior -- a touching story

Tue, 07 Nov 2006 23:55:18 EST

When an old lady died in the geriatric ward of a small hospital near Dundee, Scotland, it was believed that she had nothing left of any value. Later, when the nurses were going through her meager possessions, they found this poem. Its quality and content so impressed the staff that copies were made and distributed to every nurse in the hospital. One nurse took her copy to Ireland. The old lady's sole bequest to posterity has since appeared in the Christmas edition of the News Magazine of the North Ireland Association for Mental Health. A slide presentation has also been made based on her simple, but eloquent, poem. And this little old Scottish lady, with nothing left to give to the world, is now the author of this "anonymous" poem winging across the Internet:

Crabby Old Woman

What do you see, nurses?
What do you see?
What are you thinking
When you're looking at me?

A crabby old woman,
Not very wise,
Uncertain of habit,
With faraway eyes?

Who dribbles her food
And makes no reply
When you say in a loud voice,
"I do wish you'd try!"

Who seems not to notice
The things that you do,
And forever is losing
A stocking or shoe?

Who, resisting or not,
Lets you do as you will,
With bathing and feeding,
The long day to fill?

Is that what you're thinking?
Is that what you see?
Then open your eyes, nurse,
You're not looking at me.

I'll tell you who I am
As I sit here so still,
As I do at your bidding,
As I eat at your will.

I'm a small child of ten
With a father and mother,
Brothers and sisters,
Who love one another.

A young girl of sixteen
With wings on her feet
Dreaming that soon now
A lover she'll meet.

A bride soon at twenty,
My heart gives a leap,
Remembering the vows
That I promised to keep

At twenty-five now,
I have young of my own,
Who need me to guide
And a secure happy home.

A woman of thirty,
My young now grown fast,
Bound to each other
With ties that should last.

At forty, my young sons
Have grown and are gone,
But my man's beside me
To see I don't mourn.

At fifty once more,
Babies play round my knee,
Again we know children,
My loved one and me.

Dark days are upon me,
My husband is dead,
I look at the future,
I shudder with dread.

For my young are all rearing
Young of their own,
And I think of the years
And the love that I've known.

I'm now an old woman
And nature is cruel;
'Tis jest to make old age
Look like a fool.

The body, it crumbles,
Grace and vigor depart,
There is now a stone
Where I once had a heart.

But inside this old carcass
A young girl still dwells,
And now and again,
My battered heart swells.

I remember the joys,
I remember the pain,
And I'm loving and living
Life over again.

I think of the years
All too few, gone too fast,
And accept the stark fact
That nothing can last.

So open your eyes, people,
Open and see,
Not a crabby old woman;
Look closer . . . see ME!!

Mandatory Evacuation

Tue, 29 Aug 2006 16:05:51 EDT

What does that mean "mandatory evacuation"?! It means danger is coming so better get out of the way! But ... 100,000 people stayed to experience the category 5 Katrina. No wonder the rescue and emergency workers are stumped!

Let me explain. Jesse and I watched the passionate eye program from CBC yesterday. It was a good program. We find the reporters to be quite unbiased and they provided the facts. Fact 1 -- the mayor announced a mandatory evacuation. Fact 2 -- infrastructures were upgraded in the last hurricane to handle category 3 (not category 5 which is much stronger than 3). Fact 3 -- 100,000 people stayed instead of evacuating. Fact 4 -- 1,000 deaths. Fact 5 -- emergency workers are surprised that 100,000 people stayed.

Jesse said there can be two reasons -- one, people wants to stay back to protect their things. Two, some people don't have a way of getting out (i.e. no car and the public transit isn't the best, etc). My unanswered questions -- were the residence offered a ride to somewhere else? Somewhere safe? Were the residence also offered a shelter? Perhaps that would help encourage 100,000 people to evacuate ... I can't believe that there's 100,000 people that are dumb enough to stay back and face a life-threatening hurricane just to "protect their things".

Biased Newscasting

Thu, 24 Aug 2006 12:18:33 EDT

Jesse and I was just watching a CBC documentary more than a couple of nights ago. It shows the whole story behind the Vietnam, Kuwait, and Iraq war. It seems that the US government tends to control the flow of information through the media. The US reporters that contributed to the documentaries were fired because they made those documentaries about Vietnam, Kuwait, and/or Iraq war. Fortunately, they managed to share their good works in Canada.

It seems, however, that the government cannot control the internet. Free flow of information all flow through the net and they are forced to account for death tolls and other details related to the Iraq war.

How can a government in a demoncratic country gets so much power? Sounds like a dictactorship to me. =P