Q: "How can we as an IT sector help you broaden the economy as you move out of a crisis and take advantage of that great scientific talent that you have?"

A: "We don't need any help. We are not invalids. We don't have limited capacity. Pensioners should be helped, developing countries should be helped."

— In an exchange at the Davos forum, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin graciously declines Michael Dell's offer of assistance

Video I put together for the CF fundraiser

Had a fundraiser Sunday night for Cystic Fibrosis at Sports Basement. Sports Basement provided the space, snacks, and drinks. Friends stopped by and donated money, hung out, and won some raffle prizes. We also had a silent auction for a wine tour and a sake tasting. This was the video I put together to show everybody explaining Cystic Fibrosis. Enjoy.

Loving dessert

Dessert on Tuesday night.

Dessert on Monday night.

Today Barack Obama became President and apparently some pranksters thought it would be funny to change Bush St. to Obama St. :) Article can be found here.

Sharing a couple articles that I've read in the past few days. One from the NY Times talks about increased enrollment in the military as the economy worsens. This doesn't surprise me as I've even considered the military, albeit, mine has been a consistent thought over 10 or more years regardless of the economy. Pat has joined the Army in the past year but his reasons aren't the same as the ones listed in the article. Lowered standards for entry also don't matter for him as he probably raised the average IQ level a good 3 points by joining :) Not to say that ... y'all know what I mean. I'm just saying the article says the standards were lowered but that isn't the case for Pat's acceptance, he's quite intelligent. Here is the link to the article.
Article number two has to do with serving food in another person's restaurant. Matt and I did this when we first started serving ramen back in June. Because of different issues we decided to partner up with a cafe and serve ramen out of his place and he would take care of the drinks. It would have been a good relationship but certain factors forced us to reconsider the arrangement and put the venture on hold. I haven't yet checked out the place in the Mission where this guy is serving his food but will update once I've gone. Good idea to save on overhead. Of course for us, renting space in a commercial kitchen was expensive... Check out the article

So I taught in Okinawa for 5 years and I've just read an article that is a first for me. A girl I taught in Okinawa in highschool ended up marrying a military man and just had a baby. Unfortunately the father of the child was killed in Iraq last August. I know that Japanese marry American military but it's the first time where I've encountered a situation where a student I taught lost somebody due to the war in Iraq. According to the article, she's moving to Tennessee to raise her son in her husband's hometown. I pray that everything works out with her move and her & her son's future.

The article can be found here.

Open Source Promotion in Okinawa

I like to follow news about Okinawa in the hopes that work opportunities there expand beyond teaching jobs, agriculture, and tourism. This article gives me hope and its actually something I heard about a while ago as I've met guys here in SF working for Okinawa pref. promoting this center. Time to get back in touch with Mr. Tamaki and see if there are job opportunities :) Also, I'm glad to hear that Adaptive Planning, a good company in the BI and performance management space, partnering up.

Here's the article

Here is a job I don't want. Love what he says at the end.

High Voltage Cable Inspection
Uploaded by monnotman

1st night in Vegas...What happens in Vegas...

I got nothing