DUDE!!!

Yesterday I had my first conversation with a native Japanese speaker. I have to admit that it does take a lot of patience to actually find a language exchange partner (that has similar interests). There are times where I was starting to believe that it was impossible to find a language exchange partner. However, when I received my first invite, I realized that I was wrong.

One thing that I have to mention is my approach of finding a partner. I wait for responses, I don’t actually pursue a partner because that is not how I am. Although if I had done the complete opposite I would probably have a lot more contacts on Skype. After paying a bit of attention to Skype’s language exchange community forums, I found that a few people do want to have an English conversation regardless if you speak their language or not. This gave me hope and ideas. One of my ideas was to volunteer to help those that actually want to have an oral conversation. The reason why I used the word ‘volunteer’ is because there are some sites that require paid memberships to speak with a native English speaker.

This offer has enticed a few people to contact me, the way I intended. Unfortunately for my side of the exchange, my level of the Japanese language is still at noob levels. Meaning I am not able to carry on an actual conversation, however I am working on it though . I will list a few suggestions for those of you who are interested in finding a language exchange partner (the free method).

1. Patience like I mentioned is very important. Without it I would probably have been discouraged and gave up. It is actually very necessary to have patience in learning any language I believe. Immersing yourself in another’s language is probably one of the best ways to learn. That is why I chose to participate in language exchanges.
2. Use the Internet as a resource, this is a no brainer. There are plenty of free help websites in learning your desired language. An example that I could give is learning Kana. I found a lot of guides that teaches the brush strokes and their sounds. Also I found vocabulary sheets and free online dictionary for the Japanese language. There are many forums that you could visit to aid you in your studies.
3. Here are two language exchange sites that I found to be very good. They are italki.com and language-exchanges.org. Both of these are very populated which is a good thing. Also Myspace and Facebook are good social networks that you could use.
4. What I want to talk about next is regarding the applications that you’d use for chatting with your new partner. So far I learned that MSN messenger and Skype are the two popular clients used for voice chatting. Those that don’t like voice chats typically use e-mail as the primary form of communication.

I’m still new to the language exchange scene so feel free to let me know of your experiences and suggestions.

Well, this was on the list of movies that I missed out on of 2004. I guess I post later about how ghey the movie is.

Laters…

Driving home I realized that my car has a lot of problems. Considering the fact that I’ve only owned this car for about two years now, the cost of repairs on this vehicle has exceeded its initial purchase price. Then again I believe that I am also responsible for the issues that Henry has been through.

When I open the hood to examine my car, I just see lots of cables and gunk. Honestly I know know nothing about cars. I’ve explained this to my mechanic multiple times and he just calls it ignorance. I try to keep up with my car by checking the “oil”, but that is about it. Unfortunately, that’s all I know how to do.

Today I have paid for the registrations on the car and at the moment I am applying for the Consumer Assistance Program for the repairs of my car. I hope I qualify so that I can get my car’s smog problem fixed. Also I hope that I don’t have to front out that much cash to resolve the issue.

Santa isn’t retired guys:

Last night while I was waiting for food at the drive-thru I noticed that Henry’s temperature gauge was rising up. This is strange and abnormal. When this occurred almost a year ago, I had to replace the stock radiator because there was a crack. Fortunately the temperature gauge did not read as high as before. When the radiator first broke down a long time ago, it went to the red zone on the meter. This time, it has barely gone past the middle margin.

I hope this is not a serious issue, because if it is, this is freaking bad. Like all of the previous posts, you may have already gotten the hint that I am broke. I tried to check the car for any leaks last night, but couldn’t really see anything. I will check again this morning. I hope its just a sensor or nothing.

My fifth generation Honda Accord is my first real car that belongs to me (I had an Isuzu before, just not mine). Like everyone else, I’ve grown attached to my first car. I see potential in it (maybe more if it was standard) and I wished that I have taken better care of it. This car has many major repairs such as the transmission. I hope that my financial situation gets a little bit better so that maybe I could fix it up like an engine swap or something.

This is a subject that I have looked into recently after finding out that I may have to replace Henry’s stock motor. I have reading up on swapping an H22 into it… and supposedly its a bit more powerful. Okay enough of the wishful thinking and back to reality. =( Damn, I need a better job, or more hours.

[Update]
It appears that Tony is right. My temperature gauge did not fluctuate like it did last night. I wonder what was going on. It didn’t pass the middle margin of the meter so that was a good sign. I checked the radiator fluid, and it was up to the cap, which I assume is normal.

This was the craptop that I bought a while ago (I don’t remember the date). I assume that was less than a year ago when I purchased it, well I hope it is. The reason why is because I started noticing the right mouse button not responding as it use to. Of course I ignored it and applied a bit more pressure than usual. -_- Then yesterday, it got worse. Now sometimes I get no responses at all.

The first thing that I did when I noticed the problem was restarting my computer, hoping that it was just a glitch. After the restart, same issue just not as bad as it is now. Then I went to go test the mouse by making a web page that had about twenty alert boxes when you tried to close the window (just like the rick roll page I had). With twenty clicks, those alert boxes would disappear (because there are twenty). I had to click maybe twice the amount to get rid of them. This meaning that the problem did exist and that I could generate the issue.

I did a bit of research, and I guess this issue isn’t rare. It happens to a lot of notebooks such as HP, Toshiba, Gateways, and especially Sony Vaios. Unfortunately for me, in order to replace the mouse buttons on this Sony I’m using is far more difficult than your typical notebook. This is a big bummer.

After concluding that this is not a software issue, I decided to contact Sony. Bad news is that the repair department of Sony is only open during their business hours. I’m planning to call them tomorrow and hoping that I still have warranty. Also, this better be covered. I took good care of this notebook, and it hardly leaves the house, and if it does then it is packaged with care. They better ship me a box too without charge.

[Update]
My current experiment with ants. I’m looking for something that kills brown ants on contact.

Collection of brown and red ants

I watched the new X-Files movie. It was pretty lame. However, I would recommend the movie to any Xfiles geek. I enjoyed it. >.>

The end. -_-

I have to admit that Sliders season three was really lame. I rather not elaborate because I don’t feel like it at the moment. After the last episode of the season three, I paused sliders for about a week or two. Then I started season four.

The only reason that I didn’t remove sliders off my queue was the fact that I <3 Sliders. Also because there isn’t much to watch on netflix ‘watch it now’. -_- However, season four’s first episode did hold a lot of shock value. This is the only reason why I’m writing something about Sliders again. There new plot is very interesting. And I choose not to elaborate because first, I’m lazy, second I don’t want to ruin it for you.

Now I continue watching season four.

Mr. Grasshopper who ate a facking flower!!!

Like I was telling Ian, while I was waiting at the ‘tumblers’ I saw a cute grasshopper that landed near me. And as you might have seen the campus pictures I took, the trees had flowers. Well, Mr. Grasshopper came by and picked up a huge pedal and ate it. OMGWTF>!?!?!