再冷靜的女人，有時候也會很激動。那天我們坐車，我只不過是唸了前面車子的牌照號碼，太座就~~~
5738 xx

A large, noisy gathering of birds out front this morning. The choir included tkrat/樹鵲 (Himalayan Tree Pie, Dendrocitta formosae) and 白喉笑鶇 (白喉噪眉, White-throated laughing thrush, Garrulax albogularis).

This afternoon Yumin kept barking his snake bark, a ways downhill. This was today's third snake. I decided to go have a look, if for nothing else, then to bring the beagle home. In a nearby vegetable patch, he was facing down a 南蛇 (Ptyas mucosus, Dhaman rat snake).

The snake struck at Yumin several times, just to keep him on his toes. Byajing circled around in back of the snake, but we managed to keep her out of the fray.

It turned to look at us, and stick its tongue out at us, then returned its attention to Yumin.

Finally, we convinced him to leave the snake alone.

Take the money and run:
Meet Leo Gao, the accidental millionaire::
going
and back

攷慮買相機的朋友們，不必攷慮Olympus：難用、易當機、售後服務爛透了。
If you buy an Olympus camera, you will have lots of memories; precious few good photos, but lots of memories.
I bought an Olympus TG-810 in September, 2011 because I want a camera for outdoor photography (click here). It is very slow to start up and slow to respond. The shutter is heavy and very slow. If you try to take a photo of a bird flying, what you will get is a blurry blob (unlike my previous cameras such as the Sony and Panasonic, which all gave excellent, clear-cut shots.) The super-macro is fixed focus, so you have to move your camera back and forth to try and find the focus. Usually you can't. Most super-macro shots come out blurry. It does not handle outdoor lighting very well, and indoors, you can eat a bowl of noodles between the time you press the shutter and the actual flash.
It has a very useful GPS, so when you use this function, and play your photos on the computer, you can read such constructive information as:
GPS latitude: -1.#IND -1.#IND -1.#IND
GPS longitude: -1.#IND -1.#IND -1.#IND
Trying to erase a photo in the camera is so difficult and time-wasting that it's easier to just erase them when you upload to your computer.
One day a rare bird perched on a branch not three meters from me. I took half a dozen photos. On another camera, I would have an excellent record of this remarkable event. With my Olympus, I got blurry, blotchy spots of color that you could barely recognize as a bird.
But at least it's a camera.
In August, 2012, the camera started shutting down by itself, and by September it was crashing every time I took a photo. The screen would go black or turn green.
On October 1, 2012, I took the camera to the store where I purchased it. The boss examined the camera and immediately agreed that it needed to be fixed, so he sent it to the Olympus dealer in Taiwan. I didn't hear anything until October 9, when someone from Olympus phoned and said that the camera was fine, there was nothing wrong with it. I told him it didn't work; he said I shouldn't use it in a desert; I haven't been near a desert or a beach. (This is Taiwan, and as far as I know, there aren't any deserts here.) He said that the camera should never be used where there is dust. Isn't this camera waterproof? I asked him to examine it and tell me what he found.
I posted on the Olympus FaceBook page, but they didn't respond. By October 17, I still hadn't heard anything from Customer Service, so I went to the dealer again. They promised to help, but apparently didn't do anything. On October 22, I phoned the Olympus Service and asked about my camera. They said there's nothing wrong with the camera. I told them that I have friends coming to Taiwan from abroad on October 25, so please hurry up. The next day, on October 23, I phoned again, and they said there’s nothing wrong with the camera. By this time, I had already given up, so I told them that I have friends coming to Taiwan on October 25, so please send me the camera immediately. I also phoned the dealer. He told me that Olympus would send the camera to his store on the 25th, so I could go pick it up there. His store is over an hour's drive away; I said that when I bought the camera, he promised door-to-door pickup and delivery for any repairs. This promise is also on the Olympus Taiwan website. He said that doesn't count, I had to go to his store to get my camera. Finally, after some argument, he agreed to have the camera delivered to me today, October 24. Customer Service told me they would have the camera delivered to me today, October 24.
This morning, Customer Service phoned and told me that there is nothing wrong with the camera, so they will send it to me tomorrow, October 25. I told them that yesterday they promised to deliver the camera to me today, and that since my friends are coming, I will not be home on October 24. They said it's not convenient for them to deliver today (the 24th), so they may deliver on October 26.
So, tomorrow my friends will visit, and I will not have any photos to commemorate the event. Thanks to Olympus!

What kind of trauma is this going to cause? A little girl wearing a black and white Halloween costume was mistaken for a skunk and shot. The lasting injury will not be from the bullet, but from being mistaken for a skunk.
I know you don't believe me, I didn't either, so click here:::
skunk→
I have labeled these photos to prevent further confusion. I trust you will find this helpful.

← little girl

But don’t you think people in the States are going a little overboard with the guns?

我扗北京時，有人問我南方人是不是很喜歡「八」這個數字？是啊，八八八、發發發，很多人認為八是吉數，所以電話號碼、汽車牌照，八字售價高。大概是吧，我們找些「八吉」的史例來參攷看看。
好，晉朝八王之亂…不大好吧。還有呢，八國聯軍？八年抗戰！王八！還有、還有亂七八糟、橫七豎八、八股文、四荒八極、八荒之外、七零八落、七上八下、七手八腳、八面受敵、八難三災、七瘡八孔，吉乎？吉乎？
誒，怎麼搞得？總該有好的！
八面玲瓏，可好可壞；天龍八部吧，八百壯士！壯烈，但有點慘。八仙過海！
正經八板！好，終于找到吉數了。下臺鞠躬。但休想要我多拿錢求個「八」字。
六！六一定很吉祥！六神無主！…六親不認！我看，算了。

RIP to George McGovern, an honorable man, but I remember how my Viet Namese friends in Saigon hated him. He thought he was their savior, but to the Viet Namese in the early 1970s, he came across as arrogant and patronizing. He never bothered to learn about their culture, but deposited his own romanticisms and ideals on them. They did not appreciate it.

It's interesting how our eyes play tricks on us. It could be a side-effect of efficiency. Of course when you read, your eyes gallop along the page, not recognizing each letter as you come to it. But still, I was a bit surprised by the headline that I thought said

GIANT ROACH COBERTO KELLY OUT WITH CONCUSSION

I have to admit it caught my attention. I went back and read again:

GIANTS COACH ROBERTO KELLY OUT WITH CONCUSSION

Oh. Would some of the players care to comment on which is the more appropriate version?

一
漢書、宣帝紀：「五鳳五年，匈奴單于稱臣，遺弟谷蠡王入侍。」谷蠡，後為北方少數民族首領之稱。(五鳳五年，西元前五十三年)
後漢書、文苑傳：杜篤：「椎鳴鏑，釘鹿蠡。」李賢注：「匈奴有左右鹿蠡王。」
顏師古曰：「谷、鹿字雖不同，而音則同耳。」可見上古音輔音群之跡。
二
三國、晉時鮮卑部族拓跋，李蓋提與林安慶溯自阿爾泰語系：拓=tog、跋=beg，tog者，塵土； beg者，氏族。
可見上古韻~g至三國猶存。

Does power corrupt? Or are those who seek power by nature corruptible?

Few have power thrust upon them. Nobody who doesn't love power would bother to wrestle with turds all the way to a position of power. Maybe it is the nature of the beast that they seek power in order to savor its intoxication, and are then corrupted by it.

What kind of scum would shoot a 14 year old girl?

But the Taliban have good reason to fear Malala. If Bush had sent teachers all over the Arab world instead of soldiers, those cowards would be long gone. They fear education more than anything.

If I had been President in 2001, I would have sent all the basketball stars I could find to every village and farm, donated thousands of basketballs, and built thousands of courts. Michael Jordan is infinitely more appealing than bin Laden. By now, if you said Taliban, people would be asking, Yeah, what ever happened to those jerks?

click

天未亮，矇矇睡眠中聽到山中林裏狗吠，聲音非常耳熟，就是我們可愛的皮狗Yumin。追到蛇？貓？Byajing不吠，所以應該不是貓咪。只有Yumin吠，所以不是野狗：野狗會對話。

拜託，不要叫我拎著手電筒到裏面去看呀！天黑夜凉牀煖，不想去。

Yumin很配合，很快就犇回來，到ngasal Silan，好了，不是蛇，蛇不會跑那麼遠，或許是小野獸。五點。怕吵到人家，只好起牀提手電筒。

如果我叫Yumin，我也吵到人，所以我就輕輕敲鑼。山寧鑼靜音幽，一次、兩次，Yumin就不吠了，九次，我停槌，Yumin從黑暗中回到家了。

It was still dark when I heard a dog barking way off into the jungle. A very familiar bark. Who could it be but beagle Yumin? Maybe he had found a snake or a kitty cat. No, if it were a cat, Byajing would be barking too. If it were a wild dog, they would be carrying on a dialogue.

Oh no, don't drag me out of bed into the dark, dark jungle! The night was cool and the bed was warm.

Yumin cooperated. He came racing back and off down the mountain. Okay, it wasn't a snake, a snake wouldn't go that far, it was probably some wild animal. Five o'clock. I didn't want to bother the neighbors downhill, so I dragged myself out of bed, got the flashlight, and went outside. 14 degrees C. But if I called for Yumin, I would be disturbing people, too, so I lightly rang the gong, once, twice, Yumin stopped barking. Shortly after the ninth ring, Yumin trotted in out of the darkness.

Now may I go back to bed?



五胡錄：「涼州這片貧瘠的土地，竟然成為幾十年來中國最平和的樂土‧…最後和平的土地一旦開戰，變成了最悲慘的地方。」
讀至斯，捨卷，不寒而慄。

自從林爽文之亂，兩百多年來，臺灣幸免于戰。宋人錢易著越娘記敘述五代亂世：「自郎官以下，廩米皆自負，雖公卿亦有菜色。聞宮中悉衣補完之服，所賜士卒之袍袴，皆宮人為之。民間之有妻者，十之二三耳；兵火饑饉，不能自救，故不暇畜妻子也。穀米未熟則刈，且慮為兵所掠焉。金革之聲，日暮盈耳。當是時，父不保子，夫不保妻，兄不保弟，朝不保暮。市里索莫，郊坰寂然，目斷平野，千里無煙。加之疾疫相仍，水旱繼至，易子而屠有之矣，兄弟夫婦又可知也！當時人有詩云，『火內燒成羅綺灰，九衢踏盡公卿骨。』古語云，『寧為治世犬，莫作亂世人。』」
案：郎官，尚書省郎中與員外郎，為五、六品官。

看倌，你敢不養生嗎？你敢把生命委託醫生嗎？現在執業醫生也許有些醫術，切記醫學院的學生上課吃麵的事實~~看過兩句，請大家參攷：

年輕不養生

老年養醫生

還有一句：

吃藥不如吃素。

It has long been forgotten that Hippocrates taught, Let your food be your medicine. Is it a better idea to put your life in a doctor's hands, or to take the responsibility yourself? Eat well (=vegan), stay away from bad habits such as smoking, drinking, or accepting too much stress, exercise, get close to nature, regulate your life, think, think, think!

If you need more persuasion, watch this: :click:: 13 minutes

so I was like, hey, man, you guys lost my case, it should have been a slam dunk verdict but you guys screwed it up, and they was like, yeah man, but hey, we only got one bong so we gotta share so we you know, we, man, you know like so we got only one bong so maaaan it’s like you want a toke you gotta wait foreeever man, so you know like hey man whacha so uptight about man, just cool it and when you get the bong you can have a toke too, man, so why you worry about you case, man, I mean, you want a toke man? and so and so I was all like well hey sure man but hey you guys lost my case and they was all

heeeeeyyy mannnn ~~~

現代人很好騙。只要利用大眾盲從、愛起哄的弱點，就很好擺佈，而且人越多越好騙。一個人，也許還能理智思攷，但是一大群人搖旗吶喊，理智就消失了。
這位默默無聞的年輕人想過過「名人」癮，所以他打扮成名人，帶了幾個保鑣、攝影師到紐約時代廣場~~請看看

臺灣記者、商人、政客都很懂得這個道理，所以鼓吹大眾起哄。「這款很多人買」、「要買要快」、「心動不如行動」，都是商家屢試不爽的招術，把你口袋裏的錢移到他們的口袋裏。記者與政客最愛「憤怒」、「民眾怒吼」，因為那是一種完全失去理性的狀態，沒辦法深思熟慮，所以很容易為有心人所用。