Little Mac

Finally we added another member to our Apple's family, a small Macbook Pro for Jin :)

Roomba 577

iRobot Roomba 577 is an automatic vacuum robot which can be programed to run on its own according to a set schedule of up to 7 times a week. I bought this for Jin as her birthday present but in fact, it's probably a present for both of us. Vacuuming has never been this fun since we adopted this little baby! It comes with a self-docking station for recharging and 2 "lighthouse/virtual wall" units which can be placed strategically around house to direct the Roomba where to vacuum and where not to. The units are crucial for the Roomba to find its way back to the docking station once it finishes vacuuming. The unit comes equipped with multiple sensors at the front to detect obstacles such as walls and furniture and to help it navigate around them. It is also clever enough to detect a ledge so it will not fall down a flight of stairs.

I have tested Roomba on carpet, rug and hard floor and it passes favourably. Because Roomba can adjust its height automatically, it has no problems going from one surface to another, and also unlikely to get bogged down by wires or uneven surfaces. I am absolutely amazed at how effective this little gadget is at the job and the sheer amount of dusts and hair it is capable of picking up.

More info can be found here. If you are sick of regular vacuuming, give this iRobot a go and you will not be disappointed!

Something for the kitchen

Despite needing regular sharpening, I love my big and cheap Chinese cleaver which I probably have been using for more than a decade now. While the cleaver is great for cutting through bones and making mince out of steak, it is sometime too big and clumsy for other purposes.

We have been looking for a good cooks knife for quite sometime now and today, we finally bite the bullet and bought not just one, but a full block set of knives! As you can see from the following photos, each Ran knife is beautifully crafted and forged from 69 layers of damascus steel and sharpened to perfection. While using the newly sharpened meat cleaver is great, cutting using these Ran knives is something else! They are so sharp that they are in fact, a bit scary to use.

Photo session with i-family :)

i-love Apple...

Good Bye Joey

Our dear pet rabbit, Joey died yesterday. It was indeed a truly sad moment for us...rest in peace our dear companion :(

Kaiser Baas USB HDTV

As we don't watch a lot of TV shows, I tend not to spend (waste) too much on a digital set top box and yes, we still use analog tvs :) We bought a $99 DGTEC hd tv tuner about couple years ago for our bedroom and it lasted just that. So I decided to try something different (and even cheaper) this time round, a USB tv tuner for my bedroom pc. It was an amazing piece of technology I think for the price I paid for it at Harvey Norman. It is made by an OZ company who makes digital photo frames :) This USB stick is capable 1080i display and it allows typical PVR features such as schedule recording with EPG and time-shift for those emergency toilet breaks. It comes with a copy of PowerCinema 5 by Cyberlink which is rather pleasant to use. Setting up the device is a no-brainer, fully plug and play on XP and Vista. However, I was a little disappointed with the remote controller provided, the remote only works at direct line-of-sight only and I mean direct!! So if you plug this thingy at the back of your computer, the remote will have no use at all. Luckily my Logitech diNovo Mini never let me down :)

Paper Cactus

The last of the set :) Have a fantastic weekend my friends!

Paper Cactus

This is the second one, the third one is coming :)










p/s taken with bounced light vs without (previous post)

Paper Cactus

Jin made this one from paper the other night, I thought it was rather amazing :)

Harmony 785

With 5 remote controllers littered around our coffee table, I think it's about time I do something about it. Using multiple remotes is not only cumbersome, but also a little frustrating if you happen to misplace one of them.

Well, not anymore with this clever product from Logitech. The Harmony 785 comes with a docking station which charges the remote when it's not in use. Setting up the remote controller was a breeze with the software package enclosed. All I need to do was list out all the model numbers of devices that I wanted to be controlled by it and the software did the rest by downloading the neccesary codes onto the remote. It also has the ability to "learn" new IR funtions from existing remotes via the software. The harmony 785 has a built-in motion sensor which activate the screen and all the buttons whenever the remote is picked up.

The remote has a small colour LCD screen that will help you navigate through different devices and "activities" installed on the remote. Devices are grouped under various "activities" and by selecting the particular activity, it will turn on all neccessary devices needed to launch the activity while turning off other components that are not needed. For instance, by selecting "Watch DVD" on the menu, the remote will turn on the TV, AV receiver and DVD player with the push of a button. Because it has the ability to "learn", it can be set to control virtually everything that has remote in the house, including the air-conditioning unit, heating as well as my media PC!

Non-productive week

This week was a rather non-productive week and hence, nothing much to write here. The stifling summer heat is killing me slowly and I just can't wait for to arrival of autumn and the end of this rediculous daylight saving trial in Perth. I bet there are not many places on earth you can still get sunburn after 7pm!





























Like to share few shots taken at home (anti-clockwise): tailor made ted clothing by Jin, new toy made for me by Jin and a gift from Dao (feeling cooler already by just looking at it, don't you agree? hehe!)

Hot and Cold

Last week, my experiment with the Thailand fried noodle (Pad Tai) was apparently a success according to Jin and my sister-in-law :) This week I thought I might give the Thailand's hot and sour soup (tom yam kung) a go. Here is a simple recipe for the soup, it is actually quite easy to prepare as long as you have all the ingredients ready.

Ingredients:
1.25 L chiken stock
1 tbs Tom Yam stock/paste
4 kaffir leaves (whole)
2 stalks lemongrass, squashed
3 tbs lemon/lime juice
fish sauce to taste
1 large cut red chillli
2 tsp sugar
some straw mushroom
10 raw deveined king prawn

Boil the chicken stock, add the Tom Yam paste, kaffir leaves, lemon grass and cut chilli into the pot and bring to boil. Then, add the rest of the ingredients into the soup and simmer until the prawns are cooked. Add some sugar if the soup turns out to be too sour. Simple as that :) ....The soup is best served with cool air conditioning :)

Earlier today, we went out to Rick Hart and got ourselves an ice shaver. Jin was craving for "ice kacang" for a long time so finally her dream came true today! We gobbled up our first homemade "ice kacang" as fast as we made it and it was indeed a slice of heaven in a long hot week!

Happy New Year!

Jin's mum said your age correlates to how fast you are travelling through life. For instance, a 10 year-old child will proceed through a year at 10km/h whereas an old fart like me will be travelling more than 3 times faster! And that's a truely scary FACT! People always say end of the year is the time to reflect on the past and make new resolutions for the next. As time is running out faster than ever, it's hard to think of any significant accomplishment of the past year let alone making new ones for the next :) Well, shot less photos last year, got 2 speeding tickets (me and her each) and lost some money in shares are hardly called "achievements"!

We started new year with a big clean out of our backyard which was full of weeds and spiders. I must have killed more than 20 spiders (I hate spiders!!) and found one family (or colony?!) of mice near our gas hot water system. I caught three little mice but decided to let them go because they were just too cute (some might disagree) LOL! But we did go to Bunning this afternoon to grab some rodent bait so Jin can feel safe in the house :)

It was a extremely hot day today and the last thing we want to do was to turn up more heat to cook our dinner. Luckily, our friends Dao and Lek decided to come over and cook dinner for us!! A little intro, they currently work in a Thai restaurant and Dao is actually the head chef there and that could only mean a one thing, a restaurant quality meal at home!!

Happy New Year to all my friends and visitors to my little blog and all the best for the 2009!

Coffee Break!

"The bad news is that the All Ords fell by 200 points. The good news is that I didn't know there were 200 points left." - Compareshares.com.au :))

School holiday = trouble time

Want to share some "art" work on my fence with all of you. Haven't these idiots got better things to do?

Gudget of the Month!

From my previous post, I explained about my new upgraded desktop computer. But do you ever think about what are you going to do with all those old obsolete parts each time you upgrade your PC? In my case, they are still perfectly working and reasonably capable E6400 Intel chip and mobo. Well, I have built myself a fully function HTPC in our bedroom :)) It's main function is not really for movie watching but more like for listening to music while surfing the net in my doona on Sunday morning hehe! A typical remote control for a media PC will not even come close to what a keyboard and mouse combo is capable of.

This is when my gudget of the month comes in! A diNovo Mini by Logitech.

This little keyboard remote control is an truely amazing piece of technology! The diNovo Mini 's sleek construction, functional design and ease of use is extraordinary. And because it uses Bluetooth technology, it also has an amazing working range of more than 9m!

The whole keypad is no bigger than the size of my palm but it has a fully functional keyboard and a touchpad built in! And this is more than enough to control a fully fletched PC from the comfort of your sofa or in my case, my bed :)

It comes with a rechargable battery much like your mobile phone. Once fully charged, it will last for a least a month or so, or at least what they claim to last. So...if you are tired of your gigantic keyboard and mouse combo with limited range, then it's time to get yourself one of these little babies, you will not be dissappointed!

A brief look back

Sorry about the lack of updates lately, life goes on as usual (and sucks at time)... I have not been taking photos for a while now and hence, sort of "retired" from the Flickr at the moment. I am still toying with the ideas purchasing a second camera body and the Canon 50mm f1.4 prime lens though. However, at the moment, we have to start saving up money for another new car for Jin as her Holden Barina is a little long in tooth.... c'mon Sat Lotto!!!

I have upgraded my old computer E6400 to a better budget quadcore photoshop/gaming rig :)

Q9450@3.0Ghz (fsb375,vcore1.23) + P5kpro + Zalman CNPS7700
Corsair XMS2 6400C4 @1000mhz 4-4-4-12 (4x1Gb)
ATI HD3870 512MbDDR4(820/1230)

Although far from the "extreme" version for those deep pocket nerds, this Q9450 really pack a punch and everything seems to work a whole lot faster and smoother.

Completed Crysis on the above system, although the framerate with all settings maxed out are barely playable still! Crysis is the only game I have purchased since Neverwinter Nights 2 earlier last year and I must say, it is one of the best looking game I have ever seen and played! So there you go, if you only buy one game per year, this is the one to get if you haven't already done so....but you will have to make sure your gaming rig can handle it :)

Seen Iron Man at the movie last Tuesday...well, it's not as good as I would hope for but may be my expectation was too high after reading all the raving reviews on the net. However, I truely enjoyed watching the Iron Man character portrayed by the alter ego and ultra sarcastic Downey jr. The casts were excellent! However, Transformer is still my favourite :)

Last but not least, cought a nasty cold couple days ago and I am still as sick as a dog right now....

Christmas comes early :)

Introducing the newest addition to our family : Betty :))

Betty is a budgie, a small Australian parakeets given to us as a Christmas present by KC, one of the pharmacy assistant at work.

Because she is only a baby right now, we are trying hard to train her as much as possible so she will not be afraid of handling by human. Apparent like certain species of parrot, budgie can learn how to talk as well!

Today, we got her a brand new home and a hanging stand!! When she has become more domesticated, I will bring her out to shoot more photos and post them on my flickr page. But at the moment, Betty is pretty much confined to her cage :)

Creator of Bomida :)

Jin's friend Kyeong Ah arrived from Korea last Tuesday and she has been staying with us for the past few days. Although she sort of staying with us, she was hardly home most of the time as she was out meeting and catching up with her old mates around Perth. Tonight we had sort of a farewell dinner for her as she is heading to Margaret River for a few days with her friends before flying over to Melbourne. I met her in Korea when I was staying in Sang Ju with Jin and she gave me the nickname "bomida" which I use for my photographic work and my blog :)

The following photo was taken with the aid of a dolphin torch light. It is a rose brought over by Kyeong Ah from her friend's backyard in Busselton. It's one of the biggest bloom I have ever seen! Unfortunately, its petals were getting a little old with some browny discolouration. However, the touch light seemed to do a great job by not only hiding those imperfections, it has also greatly increased the colour saturation as well!

I have another photo which I want to share with you all, especially Dao :) This photo was taken couple of months ago when Dao came over to our place. It basically consists of 3 photos put together under Photoshop with some effect filters and layers and lots of mucking around. Bigger version can be found on my Flickr website.

New TV unit

I would like to do a before and after shots but I was too excited with the arrival of our final piece of furniture for our lounge room, I totally forgot about it. As Karen and Bill would have recalled, that LG tv must have weighed a ton! With great effort, we managed to shift the tv down and up onto the new unit without smashing a single toe!

The no nonsense unit is clean and simple and it's just the way me and Jin like it :) We have been shopping around for a long time and most of the low line units we came across were either too tall or too "complicated" in design = ugly :) My next mission is to get a flat panel monitor for our "entertainment" PC.