December 2004 - Posts
Here's my 2004 Top Twelve CDs for this year in order of enjoyment. Note that these are the ones I liked listening to the most during the year, regardless of when they were actually released or when I bought them.
1. CAKE - Pressure Chief
OK. The long wait is over. The day has finally come. CAKE returns with the kick-ass Pressure Chief CD. If you like CAKE you will enjoy this album from start to finish. All songs are good. You will sing and chant along with the band, particularly with songs such as 'No Phone', 'Carbon Monoxide', 'The Guitar Man', and others. Excellent to listen while coding or driving.
2. Barenaked Ladies - Everything to Everyone
This most highly anticipated CD came out last year and was the most collaborative effort of the Ladies. All songs are good, well worth your money. The longer you listen to the tracks, the more they grow on you. I was surprised that it didn't sell as well as previous BNL albums. Lyrics are very deep and meaningful as is the Barenaked Ladies' style.
3. Barenaked Ladies - Gordon
This was Barenaked Ladies' first commercial album and contains some of their best, most inspired songs. I love listening to 'Hello City' and 'Box Set' on quiet Saturdays or early morning drives. For some reason I can relate a lot to those two songs. It has a more acoustic or jazzy style as compared with their later releases.
4. Frente - Marvin the Album
I remembered that the band Frente had a few minor hits back during my college days. On a hunch that I've been missing something all these years, I bought both of their albums from eBay. Oh man! Angie Hart has a killer voice that will make you fall in love with her. Their music is raw, crazy, and touching. 'Ordinary Angels' and 'Labour of Love' are the best tracks here. If you like something sickeningly sweet, listen to 'Accidentally Kelly Street'.
5. Paperboy - Nine Yards
This is a classic. It's rap, but it's good rap. I ordered it mainly because I recalled the song 'Ditty' from college days. And was pleasantly surprised that many of the other songs were good too. Good driving and programming music. It contains a considerable amount of profanity and explicit lyrics which you will love to rap along with.
6. Tears For Fears - Everybody Loves a Happy Ending
Tears for Fears evokes fond memories for many of those who grew up in the 80's. I didn't share that nostalgia, but still found this CD very inspiring and entertaining. I like the first song which starts with the line 'Wake Up' as if Orzabal was speaking directly to me. 'The Devil' and 'Call Me Mellow' are my other faves. If you like the style of the Beatles, you'll like this one.
7. Barenaked Ladies - Barenaked for the Holidays
Barenaked Ladies needed some extra cash so they recorded this special Christmas album. What a bonus! I even got into the Christmas spirit for the first time in a long while. The original BNL songs are what makes this great. In particular I enjoyed the country-style song 'Footprints' though I'm still trying to figure out what it's about.
8. Frente - Shape
This was Frente's second and last CD. Very underrated album. This was very CAKE-like. Just replace John McCrea's monotone voice with Angie's sweet angellic tone. More low-key and serious than their first release. 'Horrible' (a tongue twister-like song) and 'Jungle' (60's-style) are the tracks that stand out.
9. Marc Almond - The Stars We Are
I had this on cassette tape back in high school. Lots of nostalgia while listening to this one. 'Bittersweet' and 'The Very Last Pearl' are so good, you will listen to them over and over again. Perfect to play in the afternoon with the sun out and the windows open.
10. CAKE - Motorcade of Generosity
CAKE's first album. For some reason I kept playing this CD over and over last summer. The music is pure and raw. Very underrated. Good to listen while working on the computer. Lots of good songs: 'Ruby Sees All', 'Jolene', 'Rock n Roll Lifestyle', and my fave 'You Part the Waters' which the band actually played in their live concert. Yeah!!
11. Geri Halliwell - Scream If You Wanna Go Faster
Don't laugh. Whenever I tell people I think Geri Halliwell is actually a good singer, I usually get either chuckles or sneers. Give this a try. I'm sure you will like 'Circles Round the Moon' and 'Heaven and Hell'.
12. David Benoit - Fuzzy Logic
I first heard David Benoit's 'Then the Morning Comes' on the radio jazz station. I enjoyed the music so much I bought the whole CD and was not disappointed. Perfect music when relaxing and savoring victory. I was also surprised later on to find out that 'Then the Morning Comes' is the instrumental remake of an original Smash Mouth song by the same name (which is also good by the way).
This was a good year for listening to music. What made it better was that I got to watch my two favorite bands of all time, CAKE and Barenaked Ladies, in live Concerts, which were real treats. I got the CAKE shirts, hats and everything which I plan to wear first thing in the new year. So, tell me, how can you afford your Rock n' Roll Lifestyle?
Here's a list of the books I've enjoyed reading and learning from this year, in order of importance:
1. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
Robert Cialdini
This book was so good I read it twice to make sure I remembered the new ideas and concepts it presented. It changed the way I looked at a lot of things. It shows you how and why people act in certain ways. How we are manipulated into doing things we don't like, and how to defend against these tricks. A wealth of information on human psychology and human nature.
2. Programming Pearls
Jon Bentley
I thought I knew how to write code. Then I read this book and learned I was an amateur. Probably the best programming book you'll ever read. You can feel just how much Jon Bentley loves his craft. It will teach you how to think of the problem, evaluate different solutions, implement the best one for the given situation, make tradeoffs between performance and maintainability. I read the first edition of this book (borrowed from the company library), and am looking forward to read the new chapters added in the second edition.
3. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Douglas Adams
After I bought a used copy of this, I thought it would be a throwaway fiction book to pass the time. To my surprise it was one of the most enjoyable reads I've had in a long time. For some reason I could really relate to Arthur Dent's character and predicament.
4. Die Broke
Stephen Pollan, Mark Levine
I first read this book five years ago, then read it again this year after I came across a used copy in the bookstore. There are a lot of revolutionary ideas here on how to think about your career (quit today, don't retire), money (pay cash), and life (die broke). If you ever felt lost in your life or job, this book is a must read.
5. Maximum Achievement
Brian Tracy
I have to confess, this is a very cheesy book on Success. I cringed while reading some of the chapters, and don't necessarily agree with everything the author says. Still, there are a lot of great techniques and ideas here on utilizing the powers of your mind, setting goals, and how to find a parking space. Napoleon Hill to me is still the best Success writer, but Tracy manages to embrace and extend many of Hill's best teachings.
6. Tricks of the Windows Game Programming Gurus
Andre Lamothe
I'm indebted to Andre Lamothe for his great work in writing this book. He's a hero to ordinary programmers everywhere who dream of being world-class developers. This is not just a book about game programming, but a book on how to write good quality, high-performance code. A lot of software development techniques with lots of working code you will learn from. Reading this book made me a better programmer.
7. Nightmares and Geezenstacks
Fredric Brown
Sometimes I crave for short stories that stimulate the imagination, that make you think of things you won't ordinarily think of. Fredric Brown fits the bill nicely. Lots of weird stories, crazy scenarios, haunting endings.
8. Awaken the Giant Within
Anthony Robbins
Another cheesy Success book (I notice a pattern here) by renowned self-help guru Tony Robbins who cracks me up whenever I see him on TV. But this book did give me lots of useful techniques for managing my emotions, and on how to control and use them to my advantage. I like the chapters explaining how the mind works, how we can train it to serve us. The chapter on how to effect a revolutionary change in an instant is worth the price of the book alone. Also lots of good information on Neuro-Science and NLP techniques.
9. Relativity Simply Explained
Martin Gardner
A great science book. It explains difficult concepts in very simple terms. I didn't know anything about Einstein's theory of relativity before. Now I can at least start to grasp it. This is the type of book that will make you think.
10. Rebel Code
Glyn Moody
This book tells the stories of our open source heroes - the people who made sacrifices to give us the great computing environment we have today. I like the chapters on Richard Stallman, Larry Wall, and Linus Torvalds. It can get long-winded at times but if you want to get inspired after a long day of coding, this is the book for you.
Special Mention:
How to Sell Anything to Anybody
Joe Girard, Stanley Brown, Robert Casemore
Jack: Straight from the Gut
Jack Welch
The Richest Man in Babylon
George S. Clason
Invasions
Isaac Asimov, Martin Greenberg, Charles Waugh, editors
Any books you've read this year that you can recommend? Send them to me or post your list. I'll be glad to check them out!
(Update 12/29/2004: Added 'Programming Pearls' to the list. Also rearranged the order to better reflect the order of importance. -rob)
I discovered this useful technique for dealing with those pesky irritations we encounter day by day. You know what I'm talking about, dealing with negative individuals, or being exposed to annoying and counterproductive behavior that can break your own positive momentum.
The way to get over it is to put things in proper perspective, stop whining, and start fighting for our lives. Think about it, during times of great stress such as major wars, illness, or alien invasions, we would focus all our concentration and abilities on the conflict, and everything else would be petty or even silly annoyances. If you were literally fighting for your life, you wouldn't even sweat the small stuff.
That's why I believe those in the military have a mental and physical edge over your typical 9 to 5 office worker. They have been exposed to the rigid US Army basic training and survival program. They have been put through life and death situations and decisions. They're used to getting up at 5 in the morning, doing pushups, breakfast, the 5-mile jog under rain and mud, more physical training. And all this takes place before noon. Makes pesky problems such as that gossipy co-worker or neanderthal neighbor seem kind of lame by comparison.
I particularly like the core seven US Army values of loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage. You just gotta admire those guys. I need to start my own personal boot camp in the coming year. Give myself a kick in the ass.
I received this from the email today:
Please accept -- with no obligation, implied or implicit, on behalf of the wisher or wishee -- my best wishes for an environmentally-conscious, socially-responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice, practiced within the traditions and/or within the religious or secular belief(s) of your choice and with respect for the traditions and/or religious or secular beliefs of others or for their choice to not practice traditions and/or religious or secular beliefs at all; and for a fiscally-successful, personally-fulfilling, medically-uncomplicated recognition of the onset of what is generally accepted as the new Gregorian calendar year, but with due respect for calendars of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great*, and without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, sexual orientation, political affiliation, or choice of computer operating system of the wisher.
DISCLAIMER
By accepting this greeting you are accepting the terms of the greeting and all responsibility associated with it. This greeting is subject to clarification and/or revocation at any time at the discretion of the wisher. This greeting is non-transferable without the express written consent of the wisher. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for himself/herself or for others. This greeting is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first. Warranty is limited to replacement of this greeting or issuance of a new greeting at the sole discretion of the wisher, who assumes no responsibility for any unintended emotional stress this greeting may bring to those not caught up in the holiday spirit.
By accepting this greeting you agree to subscribe to annual updates at a cost completely arbitrary to the wisher at the time of renewal. Failure to subscribe - in effect, failure to renew this greeting - will result in forfeiture of the original greeting, loss of your parents' homes, euthanasia for your and your neighbors' pets, and prosecution in a kangaroo court of law comprised of the wisher's closest friends and paid business associates, convened by the wisher at a location deemed most inconvenient to you. Reading of this disclaimer constitutes your acceptance of the greeting. Oh, and I almost forgot...this disclaimer supersedes all local, state and federal laws previously enacted to prevent such disclaimers from superseding all local, state and federal laws.
* -- This does not imply that the United States of America is necessarily greater than any other country, or that it is the only America in the western and/or eastern hemispheres.
Whew, what a greeting. And I see CAKE already has a poll for this.
Anyway, this agnostic wishes to greet everyone a Merry Christmas (or Happy Holidays, whichever you prefer).
My favorite scene in Rocky III is when the ringside interviewer asks Mr. T what his prediction is for his fight against Rocky Balboa. Mr. T answers "My prediction? Pain."
So let's talk about pain. No one likes pain. We want to avoid it. We remember times of intense pain. This is part of man's survival instinct.
But pain has a use. It is a great motivator. So too is failure. We remember major failures, big losses, as much as painful events.
Problem is, when everything is going right, when things are going well, we tend to get soft. We become complacent, thinking everything will go our way. Once in a while we need a swift kick in the ass to awaken that human survival instinct. Pain, failure, is every bit important to survive. Think about it.
One of my favorite quotes from Napoleon Hill goes: "Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit." We need to remind ourselves of this especially when things are going well. And we need to embrace failure and pain, to harness its power.
Back to the movie, Rocky had it too easy, he was living the good life, all his needs were taken care of. He got soft and lost that mental edge, eventually losing to Clubber Lang. He had to regain the eye of the tiger and get back that missing mental edge.
Now what are you waiting for?
I'll never forget one thing Michael Jordan wrote in one of his books. Back when the Bulls kept losing to Detroit in the eastern conference semifinals, Jordan approached it knowing that he only needed to beat Detroit once. Just one time to get that feeling of beating the Pistons. Then once he had that feeling, he would know how to do it over and over again.
No wonder Jordan is a 6-time NBA champion. Without knowing it, he utilized one proven technique for success. Starting with the end, and working back to the beginning. Conditioning your mind that the result already exists, and letting it work for you.
Like last night, I recorded the Jazz - Blazers game because I knew I'd get home late. And I like to relax and watch the whole game while rooting for the Jazz. I got home in time to catch the last quarter and overtime where the Jazz won by 5 points. Then content with knowing they won, I started watching the recording. Of course since I already knew Utah would win, I was more relaxed, knowing that whatever happened in the first three quarters, my team would still come out winners in the end. Portland would build leads of 5 or 6 points but I was never too concerned, because I already knew the final score.
So planning your life, your desires, your goals, is the same way. Start at the end. Know the final score first. Get the feeling first, then duplication of the result will be trivial. Relax and be content and subconsciously you will get there.
By the way, the Jazz just snapped out of a 6-game losing streak. Very frustrating losses. I think they were all mental. They felt like losers, so they would do anything to get out of winning. It had very little to do with basketball. Once the team sees itself as a winning group, the actual winning will follow.
Tough day. Had to fix a lot of bugs under pressure. Deadline is this Friday. I'm sure I'll make it, I'm not worried.
For this one security-related bug I had to do maintenance in 50+ source files across the product. What's annoying is that I don't think the bug fix is even necessary. But management wants the fix to satisfy some sort of checklist.
What's more depressing is seeing how bad a lot of the existing code is. A lot of the code looks sloppy, as if it was thrown in in sort of a mad rush to make the deadline. A lot of my old code looks good though and I admired my own handiwork. Or probably I'm biased.
I asked Dan, our PM, to set aside some time in the next release so that I can do a code scrub to fix some of the scruffy parts of the codebase. He said something like "We'll see if we have time" and I can see in his eyes he would rather I spend more time with new features or accomplishing some manager's checklist.
---
Q: What's the difference between a goal and a dream?
A: A goal has a deadline.
Here are some tips for better health:
- Eat lots of fruits and vegetables.
Make fruits and vegetables your main source of nutrition. Eat readily available fresh fruits such as apples, banana, cantaloupe, grapes etc. first thing in the morning. Fruits are nature's food that is easily absorbed by the body and converted to energy. Skip the usual oily and fried foods which are difficult to digest and zaps the body of much-needed energy. Instead, give your body a boost by having a healthy helping of fruits in season.
- Drink lots of water.
Drink pure water everyday to let your body cleanse itself of toxins and poisons. Drink a glass of water upon waking up, and don't forget to drink throughout the day. Avoid having too much sugared and caffeinated drinks such as softdrinks and coffee, they do not serve the purpose of cleansing the body of toxins, and the body spends time cleaning up after it. Water is needed to sustain life so make sure you drink enough of it.
- Eat less meat, less dairy products, more vegetables.
Our digestive system does not process animal and dairy products very well. Meat and dairy produces a lot of waste by-products in our system that can become toxic. It also takes more than 8 hours to fully digest, having an added burden to our intestines. Give your body a break by eating whatever vegetables are readily available. Eat carrots, broccoli, onions, spinach, cabbage, anything you can get your hands on.
- Do moderate exercise.
Regular aerobic exercise strengthens the body physically and mentally. Make sure your cardiovascular system is in tip-top shape by doing moderate exercises. Don't overdo it though, exercising to the point of exhaustion zaps the body of reserve energy it needs to fight disease and lowers the immune system. A daily 20-minute walk is a good place to start. Make sure you get plenty of fresh air when you exercise. If you work at Makati, there are many places to do your walking. Other areas are more difficult, so you might want to invest in a gym membership or stair climber you can use at home.
- Practice deep breathing.
Stress kills the immune system and causes mental imbalances which can result in many psychosomatic diseases. The best method to relieve stress is to practice deep breathing, meditation, and relaxation. Every night before going to sleep let your body relax by taking a deep breath, let your lungs fill to capacity, then slowly exhale. Repeat until you find yourself relaxed. This simple exercise defeats stress and allows a more restful sleep.
- Think positive thoughts.
Thoughts are things. Thoughts are powerful. If you think negative thoughts, you will attract negative energy which in turn attracts disease. If you think positive thoughts you will attract positive energy and good health. Likewise, you should avoid people who radiate negative energy. If you need to change your environment, do so, for the sake of your health. Hang out with happy, good-natured people, and together attract good health and fortune.
- Cleanse the body periodically.
To remain healthy, your body needs periodic tune-ups where you eliminate deadly toxins, negative thoughts, and ill-will. Regular cleansing of the mind and body can be done once a week. Fasting is an effective way for our digestive system to clean itself of any toxic residue. Make sure to drink lots of water and fruit juice which the body can use to flush out the toxins. Get plenty of rest on your cleansing day, your body will use up its remaining energy to clean itself. You also need to cleanse your mind of any stressful or negative thoughts. Practice yoga, deep breathing or meditatation, preferably in a room with complete silence, without any distractions. Turn off the TV and your cellphone. Sit alone, take controlled deep breathes and purge your mind of the worries of the
week.
- Take antioxidant vitamin supplements.
Drink lots of vitamin C, E and Selenium. These are the vitamins that strengthen the immune system and protect our cells from damage. The great thing about vitamin C is that it is water-soluble so if your body doesn't need it, it is easily discarded. Take 250 - 500 mg of vitamin C 2-3 times a day. Take 400IU of vitamin E, preferably one with selenium once a day. Give your body all the support it needs to fight disease.
- Use health tonics.
Nature provides us with so much miracle wonder cures that keeps the body healthy. Here are some you can use:
* Garlic - Chop up a couple of cloves of garlic and eat it raw or with your food. This wonder food
strengthens the immune system and cures colds, high blood pressure, impotence, truly amazing.
* Onions - Eat it raw or in a salad or sandwich. It cleans the lungs and contains a lot of nutrients.
* Ginseng - This heal-all root provides additional energy that the body can use to fight disease. Many, many uses. And it is now available in capsule form.
* Green tea - One of the secrets of good health. Green tea contains natural anti-oxidants that the body uses to fight disease and cancer. Drink green tea instead of coffee.
* Natural Vinegar - Contains lots of disease-fighting minerals. Good for fighting colds and sore throat. Use only natural vinegar such as Del Monte cane vinegar or Bragg Apple Cider Vinegar. Mix a couple of tablespoons of vinegar in a glass of water to have a nutritious drink.
* Ginger - Promotes good digestion and circulation. Eat some raw ginger by itself or with a meal.
* Red pepper - Protects against colds and flu, promotes a healthy cardiovascular system. Eat it raw
or mix a teaspoon or two of tabasco sauce in a vinegar drink.
Recommended books:
- Spontaneous Healing by Andrew Weil
- Fit for Life by Harvey Diamond
- Folk Medicine by D.C. Jarvis
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