Vanishing honeybees

I guess you've read or heard about honeybees vanishing or dying mysteriously by the thousands--even millions perhaps?--as I did some weeks ago. I've been reminded about it again as I read another article about it on the New York Times just earlier. Aww... gee, the poor honeybees; not to mention the poor beekeepers whose livelihoods are threatened by this strange and as yet unsolved mystery.

Peg solitaire

Before I forget, I might as well mention that I wandered into www.shockwave.com sometime last week for the first time after so many months (a year perhaps?). I ended up playing peg solitaire.

I first played peg solitaire when it was given by my cousin to my sister and I as a gift. I was just eleven years old then and when I did try solving it ended up with one peg--although not in the middle hole as required. At that time, I just dismissed it as a fluke, that I had made a mistake somewhere along the way by failing to remove a peg that I had jumped. I don't believe I made any other attempt to solve it after that and the puzzle was forgotten.

Then more than ten years I acquired a version of it written for Windows 95 and completely surprised myself when, after just a few attempts, I solved the first and simplest configuration: the cross. I was immediately challenged and tried out the rest of the configurations: plus, arrow, pyramid, diamond, fireplace and the original. Somehow I must have picked up on a technique because I ended up solving every one of them that same evening!

Now this peg solitaire on the Shockwave games website had at lot more configurations; the square board version had fifty! I managed to solve all up to #37 before I had to quit due to the late hour. (I had an 8am lecture class the next day.) One frustration I had though was once I managed to solve a configuration, I almost never could remember exactly how I did it. Then later when I found that I had accumulated 44,790 points, I tried to post it among the high scores on the website but couldn't. I wasn't registered or, if I actually did long time ago, had forgotten my username and password. And then I found that the highest score posted was around 23,000 points. Damn!

P.S.
I've just realized that I should have taken a screenshot of my score... another damn!

IMDB's new look

Oooh... I've just discovered that IMDB now sports a new look. Definitely a much cleaner and lighter look. Check out the new layout/design for movies and for actors/actresses.

Federer's record of 161 weeks at #1

Today, my favorite tennis player, Roger Federer celebrates his 161st consecutive week ranked number 1, in the process breaking Jimmy Connor's 30-year-old record. CONGRATULATIONS TO ROGER!!!

That of course makes me extremely happy for him and very proud to be his fan! I've been his fan since I saw him play Schalken in the 2003 Wimbledon quarterfinals. Back then I somehow sensed that he would beat Andy Roddick in the semifinals and even go on to win the title. Hmm... I guess that makes me a fan for 190+ consecutive weeks! He-he. And I've never really been a tennis fan before that.

Anyways, ATP has a nice article congratulating Roger on its website and has put up a special photo gallery tribute. Just scanning the stats included in the article sends shivers down my spine. It's really scary what this great athlete has already achieved and I just can't imagine how far he can go in the years to come.

Ille mi par esse deo videtur. (He seems to me to be equal to a god.)
— Catullus

The 2007 Academy Awards

It's Oscars night or, rather, Oscars day over here! And I'm here at work and not a home watching the coverage live as I used to in the past years. (Oops, I'm not supposed to be spending time at work writing this post either, am I?) I don't have much of a choice since I have classes this morning. Of course, I'll be able to watch the replay tonight but knowing who the winners are will take away all the excitement naturally. All I can do right now is read (and react) about the winners on the news as it comes. (Wow! Helen Mirren's just won for best actress!)

I'm not rooting for anyone in particular. Haven't seen any of the nominated movies/performances at all as I rarely get to go watch a movie nowadays. It would be fun though to see how Ellen Degeneres does as a host. She seems to be really funny and I enjoyed her vocal performance as Dory in Finding Nemo. But I guess nobody will ever come close to Billy Crystal as host to the Oscar awards. I always look forward to his opening medley of the films nominated for best picture.

(Wow--again! Martin Scorcese's finally won as best director. I'm happy for him.)

A blog for the dog

Hi again. I've just set up another blog here called The Woggie Log. It's for our pet boxer (dog), Bryan. I intend to write there my so-called "woggie stowees", that is, stories about Bryan's idiosyncrasies of the day.

Now why a blog about our dog? My sister and I chat nearly everyday via Yahoo Messenger. Almost always she'd beg me for a woggie stowee. Bryan after all was her dog before she left the country to migrate to Canada. My woggie stowees are a way of keeping her updated with goings-on here at home. And given Bryan's personality, there's always lots of material for stowees.

A feeble attempt at a first blog entry

Hello and welcome to my personal blog. I'm starting this out just to see what it is like to have a blog and hence have no idea how this will turn out. I used to maintain a diary a long long time ago but the novelty of the idea wore off especially when writing down everything by hand on a notebook became tedious. Now with the computer and the tools that enable editing, etc. (as opposed to using the traditional eraser or resorting to the convenient but rather messy crossing out of mistakes on paper), it should be much easier for me to put down my thoughts--and edit what I've written, being the perfectionist and poor writer that I am.

Til next time then.