Happy Year Of The Dog!!

Another Chinese lunar year has gone by.

Seeing how this is Spencer's year, he has decided to kick off a year of achievement milestones by becoming stinkier than ever, even though my mom gave him a bath on earlier today. No one in the family can explain his horrific body odor. My dad postulated that his shit must be still stuck to his fur. We'll have to take him to the vet to find out.

The evening started with a Chinese New Year's Eve dinner at home, with an unusual selection of dishes based on homonyms for "year", "fortune", "health", and other good things in Chinese. Then we headed to a special Chinese New Year event at the Pacific National Exhibition (PNE). It's basically a stage with several different shows, and booths from big companies to small businesses selling things. Did I mention the smothering of Chinese tradition by commercialization through the ubiquitous shameless advertising and pandering...er, promotion?

Speaking of smothering, the crowd was horrific as expected. All the while, I was thinking how the avian flu virus would love to be here to join the festivities. But at least things could be worse. I could've been in Hong Kong Disneyland at this time of the year. What a fiasco! How could Disney not anticipate the thousands of people from Mainland China coming in? How could they miss the fact that Mainland Chinese have a longer holiday than Hongers? This oversight comes as a surprise, considering how Disney demonstrated their thorough understanding of Chinese people and culture in their feature-length animated film Mulan. (Yes, in the actual centuries-old story, there really was a small talking dragon with Robin Williams' type of humor!)

Despite this rocky start, I hope this year will bring good fortune to all (and me a job). We're all going to need it. Oh, and let's not forget health, since the avian flu is just around the corner.

All that has happened so far, we can certainly rule out this year as being the Year of the Mouse.

My Hairstylist Is Trying To Turn Me Into A Jedi

I decided to get a haircut today.

It's all part of tradition for the upcoming Chinese New Year this Sunday. As a new year is regarded as a fresh start, you have to tidy everything up before new year's day, like cleaning your house, taking your annual shower, and getting your hair cut.

The hairstylist I usually go when I'm home is a nice Chinese lady, and I'm usually satisfied with the job she does. We usually just have a casual chat when she does my hair. This time, the conversation subject was a little different. The hairstylist wanted to introduce me to her Qi Gong master and recommend his class to me.

That was when she started creeping me out.
For those of you who are not familiar with the concept of "qi", or "ki" in Japanese, it means "energy". Its Chinese character literally means "air" because it is believed that energy flows like air through everything in the universe. I'm sure this is among the parts of Asian culture influencing George Lucas when he made Star Wars (lightsaber=katana, Jedi garb=men's kimono, The Force=qi, etc.).

So back to my story. It doesn't sound unusual for her to simply introduce me to a Qi Gong master. After all, Qi Gong is widely practised, with significant benefit to physical and mental health. But then she went all out saying that this master is so good, he can do all these neat tricks, and how I just missed him demonstrating his skills at her salon the day before.

Apparently, his qi is so powerful that he can conjure up electricity. If you turn the lights off, he can produce sparks at his fingertips. He can hold a flourescent tube and light it up with his bare hands; my hairstylist showed me a photo of him accomplishing that feat in an info booklet she conveniently had with her. The master's qi is not only good for saving on power bills, he can apparently have near telekinetic powers. He can brush people aside like dry leaves with a brush of his hand. He can draw people closer towards him for a personal conversation. With his hands alone, he can transfer his qi energy to heal patients.

Then her awestruck conversation went to the Qi Gong master's son, to whom he has taught his Qi Gong skills. His son could also close also his eyes and see through several walls. Although both the master of his son are apparently well-connected in their homeland of China, the son is particularly relied upon by the Chinese police for his special skills in solving crimes.

Then my hairstylist tells me of a rare, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet the master. Since he has schools in China, California, and here, he is making a visit tomorrow, and the school will meet at some guy's house. The master has accepted the owner of the house as a student, on the condition that he finds nine more people to join! And once you do opt to join, it's US$600 up front!! To further corroborate her claims, she says that a woman from the yoga class next door, who met the Qi Gong master at the salon yesterday, will (conveniently) be back for a visit and can testify about the whole thing.

Not too long after my haircut was finished, this white lady comes over from the yoga school

At this point, if any of you have any common sense or survival instinct, a few red flags would pop when something like this happens to you. The intense reverence expressed by the hairstylist to the point of worship, the wacky and incredible Jesus tricks the Qi Gong Master can perform, the hefty membership fee in cash up front, the recruiting method reminiscient of a pyramid scheme, having another member come and reinforce the pitching process. I smell a cult.

At this point, I might as well call it a load of phooey and leave it at that. But I wanted to see for myself what this Qi Gong master can do. After all, I can refrain from carrying any cash with me, and I will keep telling myself to walk away. But more importantly, I wanted some answers, not for quiestions about the master or Qi Gong, but about life. Are our minds merely limited to what our science has been able to adequately delineate? Are we part of something greater in the universe, and is our gift of sentience able to understand that connection and unlock its powers? If a cargo ship full of tampons sinks, would the entire ocean get soaked up?

I told my mom what happend with the hairstylist. She told me that the hairstylist has pulled this stuff on her and my uncle before, which is why she now gets her hair done by some Korean lady near downtown. Despite my mom's skeptical rebuke, my curiosity is still keeping me undecided as to whether I should go to this meeting.

To get me off the fence, I decided to Google up the Qi Gong master's name. After all, if this guy can pull off such cool tricks, he surely will be famous enough to turn up a lot of search results. Nada. I even looked up his name in Chinese. It only shows in a few directory entries on some Chinese web sites.

So I decided not to go to the gathering, depriving you all of an even more interesting story to tell. I have doubts, and I'm still a bit creeped out about what happened. Who knows what would've happened there. Maybe they'll all put on Nike shoes and black clothes, drink cyanide fruit punch, and go to bed so that they can be picked up by an alien spaceship.

Or worse, they could be a bunch of loony scientologists.

Pick Your Dick

It's that time again for all Canadians.

The time to democratically choose between burning at the stake, draw and quartering, or death by 1,000 cuts. Three major political parties stepping on a bunch of minor, wimpy ones, and none of them desirable. Let's see what we got...

The incumbent Liberals have been in charge for 13 years, never made good on their original promise to get rid of the infamous Goods & Services Tax (GST), which doubled our sales tax to 14%. That was the very promise that got them elected in the first place. Then there's that sponsorship scandal. Their campaign is spent most on covering their own asses and throwing the occasional cheap shot towards the right to divert attention. I'm pretty sick of them.

Then there's the Conservatives, the very party whose government rewarded Canadians for their support by slapping us with the GST. But then again, since I'm sick of 13 years of Liberal lies, I just might go for several years of Conservative lies. And that's exactly what the Conservatives are banking on with perhaps the strongest campaigning among the three parties. But still, they're too right wing for my tastes, and the fact that their policies align with the US Republicans (aka United States of Bush) isn't very comforting either.

Then finally, there's the New Democratic Party (NDP). When I think of them, I think of their illustrious history in BC way back in the last decade - Mike Harcourt, Glen Clark, and the Bingogate scandal. However, their campaign seems to be aimed at marketing themselves as a viable alternative to the above parties, rather than any solid political platform. Yes, unlike the Liberals and the Conservatives, we at the NDP offer a unique and refreshing brand of corruption.

So who won?

The Conservatives won with a minority government, and the Liberals drop down to become the opposition party. Perhaps it's the best outcome, the least of the evils. The Liberals are no longer on top with their stale goverment, and if the Conservatives should ever decide to infringe on someone's rights, introduce another sales tax, and/or kiss George W. "NAFTA-my-ass" Bush's ass (not necessarily in that order), they have the Liberals breathing down their necks.

All in all, I'm looking forward to the new parliament in Ottawa that will be spending another term ignoring my province.

Mr. Fruity Head

Okay, now for my gripe of the week.

Whenever I wash my hair, I have to use a bit more conditioner than shampoo. It just has to be that way. So naturally, since I've purchased the same brand and volume of shampoo and conditioner, I run out of conditioner first. So now that I'm empty on conditioner, I've decided to buy a larger volume of conditioner to adapt to my disproportionate use of shampoo and conditioner.

The particular brand that I use is Herbal Essences®, because I like the nice floral smell. Yes it's girly, but I'm secure enough about my heterosexuality to use it. Unfortunately, the availability of this particular brand in larger quantities is quite limited, and with my hair and scalp becoming quite arid, I'm in desperate need of conditioner. Specifically, the only Herbal Essences conditioner available in larger size at Real Canadian Superstore (where I also have to buy groceries) is their Fruit Fusions® sub-brand...in pomegranate-lychee-persimmon blended "flavor". Not only does this shit smell fruity, but I swear it smells like strawberry Jell-O mix! Having no other choice because I don't want to make another trip elsewhere in this shitty weather we're having lately, I mustered my aforementioned heterosexual security to put up with being a fruity-head for half a year.

So should I blame Clairol for rewarding my brand loyalty for their Herbal Essences hair products with a more vicious affront on my masculinity through even more effeminating aromas? NO! I know my usual shampoo aroma exists in a larger size. I place the blame squarely on the retailer - Real Canadian Superstore. If you're a real fucking superstore (and probably not even Canadian, since it's likely some rich US motherfucker bought you out), you'd make more Stock-Keeping Units (SKU's) of Herbal Essences available. And even if shelf space is scarce (which is highly laughable considering your 10-hectare premises), you have completely neglected the male market in your selection of SKU's to put for sale. If it weren't for people with my degree of tolerance, you'd have lost half your shampoo/conditioner customers already!

And if you ever dare come up with a conditioner that smells like Jell-O Pudding Pops, I'm going to draw the line.

Deadly, Yet Ironic Hajj

Physically and financially able Muslims have the duty to go on a pilgrammage to Mecca, or a Hajj.

With millions of Muslims around the world and a huge portion of them gathered into one city, even if the Saudi royal family decided to expand the holiest mosque to envelop the entire city, the crowd's still going to be more packed than New Year's celebrations at Times Square. This is a process flow nightmare.

And if you've been keeping up with the news, you've probably heard that the nightmare did come true - 363 people have been trampled to death because someone decided to leave their luggage on the ground. Well, all I have to say is that there is a certain irony to it.

You go on a journey to become closer to God, and you end up getting the one-way trip to meet Him in person.

P.S. Happy Friday the 13th everyone! Please avoid people in 70's hockey masks.

Accounting Is Bad For The Bowels

Reading for accounting is such a pain.

I've been reading what feels like volumes for a financial accounting course that I'm taking towards Certified General Accountant (CGA) certification. More accurately, it's not the reading itself that's agonizing. It shouldn't be a problem to stay on schedule for the periodic quizzes if I spread out the reading over each day. What really busts my balls is trying to follow the numbers in the calculations made by the professor/textbook author. Especially when it comes to the preparation of financial statements.

Revenue $50,000...okay. Costs of Goods Sold $35,000...I see. Gross Margin $15,000...yes, that works out. Accounts Receivable $121,468...what the fuck!?!?

What really exacerbates the situation is that this is a distance education course; everything is done online from home, so you're on your own reading and understanding the material. There won't be anyone on hand to answer any questions. The best thing you could do is try your luck on the online forums, but it gets tedious for all parties asking questions every time a number doesn't seem right. So when I come across a numeric quantity from which there's no telling whence it came, there can be only one logical and inevitable conclusion.

The professor must've pulled the number out of his ass.

Yes, he just up and pulled it out just as a magician would pull a rabbit out of a hat. In fact, I've even come across such phenomena in my accounting courses for my MBA. Think about it. You have the professional and academic title that bears the credibility of an expert, as well as the responsibility to back it up. If you are an authority in the field of accounting and you can't figure out why your numbers don't balance out, you just can't leave it like that. It would damage your reputation. Asking someone else for help would also undermine your pride as an expert. So what else can you do other than to fudge it? Just pull out that magical number out of your magical anus that will make it balance. Then you try to fit your magic ass-number into the financial statements by putting it into an offsetting account - which you've probably made up as well and would usually have the word "Deferred" in its name.

Or for a cogent and less esoteric analogy, imagine that you're contracted to build a really nice house. Everything goes fine, until you realize that you don't know how to make the stone archway. If you sub-contract the job, you'll feel that people will no longer recognize you as a fancy home builder. So what do you do? You go for the jerry-rig and fashion a makeshift archway completely out of plaster, and paint it over to look like rocks.

So why do I want to make a career out of accounting, if there are so much bullshit as it seems? I'm confident that once I get the learning part out of the way, accounting could be way more interesting when I know how everything works, and I could finally put my geeky number skills to use. Well, I certainly don't want to go into academia and become an accounting professor.

My colon just isn't big enough to fit all those numbers.

Happy Belated New Year!!!

Alright, so my first entry for 2006 is late.

Well, I've been trying to spend more time with my visiting brother, since his girlfriend left a week ago. He just left today before school starts again for him. Well, that's my excuse and to hell with you all who don't buy it (I bet you're the same kind of people who insist on saying "Happy Holidays").

To the rest of you, wishes of happiness, health, and prosperity as always! I need you all to be in tip-top shape to read my blog and its inconspicuous product plugs. (Preparation H!) No, seriously, all of you take care of yourselves. Especially in a world that's starting to go to hell in natural disasters.

If any of you still haven't had enough of the countdown festivities, I found this neat website that has 360-degree panorama pics, complete with sound, of 2006 countdown parties in several major cities around the world. The centerpiece is Times Square in New York, where you get to see yourself stageside with Mariah Carey. You're going to need Quicktime to view these panorama shots. Yes, the same Quicktime that keeps harrassing you to upgrade to Quicktime Pro, under threat of killing your dog, whenever you open the program. If you already have Quicktime, then go to the website here.

Well, it certainly feels like New Year, except at my house. If you ever passed by our neighborhood at night, you know which house is ours. It is, without exception, the very last house to have Christmas lights on. My parents insist that since the Magi visited Jesus on January 6, the lights should stay on that long. Even inside, the decorations remained unchanged, including this 3-foot-tall annoying fucking plastic snowman with fiber optic trim, that plays a looped segment of Silent Night for an excruciating five minutes at the slightest bump. I really want to beat the shit out of this fucking snowman, but that would only encourage it to play partial Silent Night even longer. Crap. Foiled by a plastic snowman. How do I defeat a fiend that is electrically powered? Hmmm.....

If you want to go somewhere that feels like New Year's, go to the gym on the first day of the year that it opens. I went to the gym at the aquatic center down the hill, and the place was packed. Not only the swimming area, but the gym too. In addition to the regulars that I see there, I saw several new faces consisting mainly of middle-aged white men. I think it's safe to assume that all these extra people are trying to fulfill their new year resolutions of losing weight. I'm not too worried about not being able to use the bench press, because I expect this place to be extra-packed for only a couple of more weeks, the length of time people usually uphold their new year resolutions. Especially resolutions that involve physical work in a continent of fatasses.

As for resolutions, I certainly hope that this will be the year I get a freakin' job. Although it took my neighbor three years to find one, I already think that this bullshit has been going on too long. I'm sure I've come into this year with some aces up my sleeve. I've got a couple of professional recruiters on the trail for me, but I'd like to think that this one website, mkt10.com, will be the one to finally sink the ball into the cup. It's a highly elaborate job search site that offers a closer match to the appropriate job, at a level of detail far greater than anything Monster.com or Careerbuilder.com could offer.

How it works is that you spend a bit of time filling in a highly detailed questionnaire involving your background and skills that you've used in past jobs. You'll have to select the specific skills (e.g. data analysis, forecasting, communication) that you've used in each job, and prioritize them on how much you've used those skills. Employers have to fill in a similar questionnaire for the job openings that they're putting up. So the detail put into this questionnaire will theoretically provide the best job match. OH LOOK!! mkt10.com has sent me an e-mail with a job that has a 9.2/10 match factor. It's...a Mary Kay independent beauty consultant. Fuck.

And so, we're all probably going to go through a lot of hardships, as well as joys this year. We all have to keep our chins up, put on a brave face (or your poker face if you're playing poker), yet grit our teeth to meet whatever challenges that arise this year. I'm sure that with the proper attitude, we'll all pull through another year and end up better than the last. If even a jobless middle-aged man who lives with his parents like me can be this way in the face of difficulty, then so can you!

And if any of those difficulties result in facial scarring, I can offer you some of these quality Mary Kay products to mask it.