Not even close

The blue devils (16-1,6-1 ACC) thumped the hokies (11-7,4-3 ACC) yesterday, 100-65. The five-game winning streak of the hokies ended at the Cameron indoor stadium. Duke came in too strong and the hokies did a lot of fouls (e.g. Zabian Dowdell had 15 points and 34 fouls). The full story is here.

The hokies are now tied with the terrapins in the 4th place in the ACC.

This week, the hokies will face the hurricanes (tue) and the demon deacons (sat).

Desperation and Direction

De Quiros of Inquirer recently comments on the issue of the Philippines having too many Colleges and Universities. He wrote:

I remember again too the non-joke about Pinoy and Chinoy college graduates. When Pinoy graduates meet, they ask each other, "What job have you landed?" When Chinoy graduates meet, they ask each other, "What business have you opened?" We can say the same thing about the graduates of our colleges and universities and those of other Asian countries. When they meet, our graduates ask each other, "Which country do you want to go to?" When the graduates of other Asian colleges and universities meet, they ask each other, "Where do we want our country to go?" The first is called resignation, the second is called ambition. The first is called desperation, the second is called direction. The first is called getting by, the second is called getting ahead.

We just want the first, let's not bother reducing our colleges and universities. Let's scrap them altogether.

Yes, I agree this is sad -- but the offered alternative will not help.

Secure computing?

Nick McGrath of Microsoft says Linux security is a myth. He went on to say that Red Hat Linux for example will not take responsibility if your system is compromised. I think he missed the point that security is never guaranteed. Even Microsoft will not pay me if my Windows system running on my laptop is compromised. McGrath cannot deny that a lot of spywares and viruses target Microsoft Windows systems. Furthermore, their home-grown applications like Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Internet Explorer are not secure either.

If you want your computer to be secure. You should consider locking it in a safe and throw the key in the middle of Atlantic ocean. :)

Tough choice

It's a good thing I never have to decide this way. :)

Improving basketball program?

Virginia Tech Hokies beat the Virginia Cavaliers today in basketball, 79-73. This is the 4th ACC conference win of the hokies. After losing the first two conference games to UNC Tar Heels (51-85) and to Florida St. Seminoles (70-77), the hokies have beaten 4 ACC teams in a row since Jan 5. The hokies defeated the Clemson tigers (59-57), the NC St. Wolfpack (72-71) , #12 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (70-69), and now Virginia Cavaliers (79-73).

Looks like Carlos Dixon et al. are showing that the hokies can't be pushed around in the ACC basketball.

Zabian Dowdell's spectacular reverse layup was one of many highlights
for the Hokies in a 79-73 ACC victory over UVa.

RA 1530 and other G.C. lingo

The Philippine Province of the Jesuits recently published a book entitled 'Ehem! A Manual for Deepening Involvement in Combating Corruption'. It features a glossary of graft and corruption lingo. Obvious examples are "senatong", "tonggressman", and "konsuholtant". There are also terms like "RA 1530" which refers to government employees who show up for work only during paydays. Inq7.net has a short review of the manual.

Video search

Google plans to augment their service with video search. I'm wondering how they would do it exactly. CNN has the story.

Double Victory

Efren "Bata" Reyes won double victory at the 2005 annual Derby City Classic yesterday -- the 9-ball division and the one-pocket division. The 50 year old, toothless magician of Angeles City, Pampanga gained the title "Master of the Table." Nobody does it like Bata. Full story of Inq7.net is here.

Mac Mini

I'm sure most people know about Mac Mini -- the most "affordable" Mac G4 to hit the market. Price starts at $499. However, the configuration I want (i.e. with superdrive, 512MB RAM, Mac keyboard and mouse, etc) would still cost $1,110.00. hmmmnn. I wish I have that money.

Schedule next Fall

The hokies will play 5 road games and 6 home games next Fall. The complete schedule follows:

Sept 3   at NC State        Atlantic division member

Sept 10  at Duke            Coastal division member

Sept 17  vs Georgia Tech    Coastal division member

Sept 24  vs Ohio University Non-conference game

Oct 1    at West Virginia   Non-conference game

Oct 8    vs Marshall        Non-conference game

Oct 20   at Maryland        Atlantic division member

Oct 27   vs Boston College  Atlantic division member

Nov 5    vs Miami           Coastal division member

Nov 19   at Virginia        Coastal division member

Nov 26   vs North Carolina  Coastal division member

The first official ACC Championship will be on Dec 3. If the hokies win the coastal division, they may proceed to Jacksonville, Florida as defending champs.

Movie for code-heads

Tom Hanks stars in a movie adaptation of Dan Brown's 'Da Vinci Code'. He's professor Robert Langdon in this future movie thriller. The movie is scheduled for release next year, 2006.

Olivia Decker, the owner of Chateau de Villette near Paris, reportedly let her bedroom be rented by tourists for $55,000 a week. Her chateau of course figured notably in Dan Brown's book and will also be in the movie adaptation.

Beauty contest in IT?

The Philippine Computer Society opened a can of worms. They are pushing for a contest dubbed 'Digital Pinay 2005'. The selection criteria follows: intelligence (40 %); text votes (20%); beauty/presentability (20%); and poise/personality (20%). Of course they will face critics saying this contest will not be good in the IT industry. PCS at first included vital statistics in their application form (bust, waist, and hips [in centimeters]). In the sanitized application forms, vital statistics, including weight and height are removed. Needless to say, this outrageous contest didn't go well with the women in the IT industry. Perhaps the PCS, the oldest computer organization in the Philippines, is in need of promo girls. :)

Look at Sacha Chua's current blog for some funny comments. Inq7.net also has the story.

Biological Robots

Jianzhong Xi, Jacob Schmidt and Carlo Montemagno of the University of California Los Angeles have grown rat cells onto microscopic silicon chips. They then got it walk like primitive legs. Their technique is thought to be a first step in creating self assembling robots.

Image that: self-assembling robots?

The full CNN.com report is here.

National title contenders

CollegeFootballNews.com ranks the Hokies 5th in national title contenders. Great on paper huh? This reminds me of the 2003 preseason rankings of the hokies -- hmmmn.

5. Virginia Tech 2004 Record: 10-3 ACC

The Hokies flourished last year with its nobody-respects-us attitude. Can they handle being the hunted? Frank Beamer teams have crashed and burned recently when they were supposed to be great, but the pressure is on anyway with just about everyone of note coming back on both sides of the ball (helped mostly by the return of Jimmy Williams to the secondary). Everyone but ACC Player of the Year Bryan Randall, so Marcus Vick has to put everything in the past and be the player everyone was hoping he’d be before all the trouble.

Biggest offensive loss: QB Bryan Randall
Biggest defensive loss: DT Jim Davis

Love your heart

Last friday I got a wake up call. I went to Schiffert Center to get cure for my infected right ear (which I usually get whenever I have colds). The nurse asked me if I have taken any medication lately. I told her I have taken NyQuil for the two consecutive nights (I had colds and fever). -- She said I have to stop taking NyQuil since my blood pressure is high. I have hypertension?

I now regularly monitor my bp using a portable bp monitor I bought at Walmart. I guess I also need to schedule some exercise soon. My latest bp is almost normal -- so being diet conscious does pay. :)

bill vs publicity-hungry politicians

I don't usually agree with Senator Santiago. But her latest bill vs publicity-hungry politicians earns my support. I am doubtful however if it will pass the congress. Knowing our politicians, this bill may not be debated at all in the "hollow"ed session halls.

It is sickening to see public work and public service projects being associated with politicians when the money used in these projects actually came from people's taxes. That is if there are any projects at all. It in fact interesting to see the unusual rise in the number of short term public works projects before any elections. Of course the projects will shamelessly thank the politician(s) who 'purportedly' financed the project out of their 'pork barrels' or any other government discretionary funds.

The Inq7.net story about this is here.

What a Vick!

Jess is right! Vick is a blast and so are his teammates. The Atlanta Falcons routed the Rams 47-17.

Pinoys are back

Botch, Vanini, and Cesmac are back in town. Ces completes the set of eight remaining pinoy graduate students at Virginia Tech. Monday next week is the start of classes.

Kinda useful worksheet

PHDComics.com recently posted this interesting worksheet. :)

Galactica

The new Battlestar Galactica looks interesting. The premiere is on 14 Jan 2005.

Colds

I think I caught one. Hoping it won't turn into flu.

BORUTESU FAIBU NI

azuketa inochi ...

On Voltes V we trust our lives.

Months before I came here in the states in 2001, I actually searched the internet for information about Voltes V. I found none that satisfied me. Recently, I saw an AD in Inq7.net about Voltes V. The link leads to divisoria.com (which is actually now part of store.yahoo.com). For $60, you can get the entire 40 episodes of Voltes V. Cool. But I managed to hold my credit card tightly. Not now. :)

Perhaps by impulse, I searched for Voltes V using Google. There may be better websites devoted to Voltes V than four years ago -- I found Ivan Chen's Voltes V shrine. The site is very interesting specially the trivia section. Click the picture below to go to Ivan Chen's website.

In the eyes of a child

This morning, Suzette shared with me how Eking is amazed by the blue sky, the clouds, and the sea. He is also very interested in various animals and plants. Last december, they went to Cebu zoo and recently they went to a botanical garden. Eking is beginning to ask the 'dreaded' whys. :)

Lazy saturday afternoon

Got a headache -- took acetaminophen -- played James Taylor music -- massaged my head with a vaporub -- and ... I will sleep after posting this. :)

Ideas

Sometimes I feel the same way. :)

Early pre-season rankings

Stewart Mandel of SI.com ranks the Virginia Tech Hokies 3rd in his early 2005 pre-season power rankings. Meanwhile, Pat Forde of ESPN.com ranks the Hokies 11th.

The ACC website announced that this year, Virginia Tech will play Boston College Eagles (home), Duke Blue Devils (road), Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (home), Maryland Terrapins (road), Miami Hurricanes (home), North Carolina Tar Heels (home), NC State Wolfpack (road), and Virginia Cavaliers (road).

In eight months, the Hokies will again play football in the newly renovated Lane Stadium - thanks to the $52-millon west side expansion project. After finishing in the top 10 of the AP and coaches' polls, returning 14 starters from the Sugar Bowl, and another Vick at the helm, a lot more are expected.

Hokies are top 10!

The hokies started the 2004 season unranked. Playing underdogs in most of the games, they mustered 7 wins and 1 loss in ACC -- and won the ACC championship. They played Auburn tigers in the Sugar bowl and lost. The score 16-13 however is not that bad. After being blanked in the first three quarters (16-0), the hokies blanked the Auburn in the fourth quarter. It should be exciting if Bryan Randall had the ball for one last time. With 2:01 minutes left, the Auburn tigers simply let the clock fade away. They must have sensed that the hokies got their groove back.

The hokies lost to #1 (USC) and #2 (Auburn) in the country. They also lost to NC State because of missed field goal of Brandon Pace. They won against Western Michigan, Duke, #30/#26 West Virginia, Wake Forest, Florida A&M, #35/#37 Georgia Tech, UNC, Maryland, #23 Virginia, and #11 Miami Florida.

Thanks to seniors Bryan Randall, Jim Davis, Eric Green, and the rest of the team who made the 2004 season exciting to watch. Finishing 10 wins and 3 losses is great. The hokies are #10 in the final AP and coaches' polls and #8 in the final ranking of College Football News. With Marcus Randall in the 2005 season, can the hokies do better?

First day of work

Written a program to generate a couple of reports, prepared a description of statistical analysis of ozone stress data, studied possible statisticl analysis of promoters data, ...

whew!

Opportunities lost

Oh well. The hokie defense is extremely good but the offense and the special teams didn't deliver. The game is not yet done -- but from the looks of it, the hokies already lost the Sugar bowl.

Better luck next time in the 2005 season.

UPDATE: The Hokies managed to score 13 points in the 4th quarter but short of 3 points to tie with Auburn. The final score: Auburn 16 - Virginia Tech 13.

If only Jesse Allen didn't fumble the 'sure' touchdown pass in the first half ...
If only Brandon Pace didn't miss a field goal ...
If only ...

Again, all together now. Oh well...

:)

Underdogs again

The hokies played as underdogs most of the time in the 2004 season -- tomorrow they will meet the Auburn tigers in the Sugar bowl. Experts predict the scores shown below:

                           Auburn        Virginia Tech

Stewart Mendel (SI.com)         24               14

B.J. Schecter (SI.com)          34               24

John Harris (CFN)               24               18

CFN Preview                     26               17

Foxsport.com shows that the hokies are currently 6.5 underdogs.

I still believe that hokies can pull off a win tomorrow. Go Hokies!

Happy New Year!

I wish to graduate this year -- :)