I saw MythBusters on the Discovery Channel for the first time last Saturday and again tonight. It has instantly become one of my favorite TV shows. Tonight they fired handguns and rifles, including a 50-caliber, into a pool to see how deep underwater you would have to be to avoid getting hurt (at 30 degrees, …
Author Archives: Jimmy Lin
Visiting San Francisco
It’s odd that, now that I’m living in the South Bay, I seem to be going to San Francisco more often than I was in Berkeley. In fact, I’ve gone up once a week for the past 4 weeks: to visit Francis, Simona, Rich, and Agata [photo]; Ame and Chris’s wedding reception; a Super Bowl …
Turin or Torino?
Are the Winter Olympics being held in Turin or Torino? Yes. Different media outlets are using different conventions: the Chronicle says “Turin,” while NBC and CBS Radio say “Torino.” I find “Torino” to be a little jarring. We don’t usually use the local name for a city if it has a different English name: we …
Moving to WordPress.com
While Yahoo 360 has an easy-to-use blogging service, it’s a little too basic for me. There are three things that are missing: Putting my entries into categories Importing entries from my old blog Changing the template of the blog (let’s face it, I’m a control freak) So now I’m giving WordPress.com a shot. It’s got …
Restaurants to try out
There a few restaurants that have been featured on Check, Please! Bay Area on KQED Channel 9 that I want to try out. Ninna in Oakland: Mediterranean/Thai fusion. Sounds weird, but all three reviewers thoroughly enjoyed it. Piperade in San Francisco: Basque Bissap Baobab in San Francisco: Senegalese Aziza in San Francisco: California-inspired Morrocan (or …
Trying out Yahoo! 360°
(This was originally posted to my Yahoo! 360° blog) Unfortunately, the site that was hosting my blog, TrailBlazing.org, has unexpectedly gone down, and its maintainer, my friend Francis, doesn’t have time to track down the problem. Plus, I don’t want him to spend time fixing something that, essentially, only I was using. So I’m now …
Asia trip reactions: Food
Not surprisingly, we got some great food touring Asia. A few meals stand out in my mind. In Tokyo, we ate at a teppanyaki restaurant, complete with our own chef [photos]. The beef, with a lot of marbling, was tender and flavorful, but also quite greasy — you can’t eat as much of that beef …
Asia trip reactions: Language
Even though the Japanese are polite and want to help you, it can be hard to communicate with them because their English is quite bad. Now, I don’t expect the entire country to be fluent in a foreign language. But, for example, Yodobashi Camera is a gigantic Japanese electronics store that makes Fry’s Electronics look …
Asia trip reactions: Discipline and Politeness
You’ve probably heard that the Japanese are very disciplined. It’s true. Matt and I saw this while in the front car of a Tokyo subway train, where we could see into the driver’s cab. He sat up straight, in his uniform and gloves, and was constantly on alert. He regularly pointed at either his instrument …
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Smart cards for transit
Both Hong Kong and Taipei have RFID smart cards available for paying fares on subways and buses. Taipei even knocks 20% off of each subway ride. You don’t need to take the card out, just hover your wallet over the reader. It’s amazingly convenient. The Bay Area desperately needs something like this, especially since we …