Making good and bad choices...

Today I don't feel like meeting people. I don't feel like going out... I woke up around 9 this morning, a friend asked me to go Dim Sum at 11. I said I would be at church. Well, I didn't go to church either. At around 11. I got up to turn on my computer to see if I can listen to the sermon on church's webcast live feature... well, it's not working yet.

Last night, I spend around $130 to celebrate my co-worker's birthday with some other friends. I didn't get home until around 4:30am. Most of the people were buzzed out. However, my head was very clear. I am losing appetite for this type of activities. Last night, I was thinking... what the millenium party would be like if I made it there. I want to strive to get there and be the firsts among the resurrected.

However, I made some bad choices last night... spent too much money, ate too much, drank too much... and the results: gained 4 lbs and feeling bad about going out to eat and spend time with other God seeking brothers and sisters. And it's funny how I don't have a hangover like I thought I would have. My head is absolutely cristal...

Maybe I'll just wash up a bit and try to make it to church now.

... and still, gotta be making good choices about what I eat as well.

11:48am... stomach not doing great. I guess I'll stay home after all.

dream last night...

I was running as fast as a speeding car. The Spirit of God was on me and I was running on the sidewalk. There were no cars and other pedestrians on the road...

And then, I saw what looked like 3 men running toward me... all faceless and with dark clouds above them. We were going to collide, and for some reason, I decided to keep on going. As I approach them, they turned into 3 different dogs and I passed through them as a penetrating sword. There was no stopping in me. I was speeding even faster.

All of the sudden, I saw a small brown dog running past me from behind me, and then, a larger black hunter dog running past me following the small brown dog. The hunter dog turned around and looked at me and I turned around and ran the other way just as fast as I was moving forward.

The brown dog ran past me again with the black hunter dog following it and it looked at me again... non-vicious or threatening type of look both times. I turned around and went around them by getting off the side walk and speeding toward the direction I was going. I woke up... and I never saw the third dog.

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What is means to me:

After what I deemed to be a great realization from Friday night fellowship bible study, I now have a much more concrete idea of what my next step is in spiritual maturity as well as my direction. My running speedingly is a confirmation that I will run to God with His power in me. The 3 faceless men running toward me are the enemy who tried to stop me. They were powerful but not as powerful as God. So they turned into dogs while I ran past them... however, they still have the power to run as the same pace or even faster then me. So the first small brown dog ran past me... distracting me.

Now, I've always like smaller dogs and not too fond of larger dogs. So a small dog running ahead of me will get my attention. It represents that distraction and temptation will come even when I'm running in full force serving God wholeheartedly.

And then, a black hunter dog ran past me. This is one of the dogs that I have much fear for. Even though the dog was looking at me with an innocent look, I knew this was a danger sign... I was threatened by it and I turned away from running toward God to go back my own direction.

They caught up with me again. And this time, I deviated from the path I was on. And went around them. Speeding toward God.

I'm sure the third dog, if caught up with me, would have the power to overtake me... I felt it was the beast.

Gotta watch my spending this month...

Yup, I bought the DVD set for the Condor Heroes (神雕俠侶): $65 (with tax and everything).

Logitech VX Revolution Laser mouse for notebook: $85
Logitech MX Revolution Laser mouse for desktop: $85
Car registration renewal: $66
Dell Latitude D420 6 cell battery: $85

Time to starve myself and save money....

On a side note. the drama 神雕俠侶 is really distracting me... it makes me wonders away from reality. Come on, self control and discipline. Gotta sleep early... it's already past midnight

Santa Barbara business trip

Today I went to the city of Santa Barbara with my boss and co-worker Rex for a presentation. It went well... the passion was there while I was there and suddenlt dissipates when I got back to the office... finding the arrival of my new desktop mouse: The MX Revolution Mouse.


Prayers... prayers.... prayers...

Logitech VX Revolution

My first laser mouse! The VX Revolution is designed for notebook users with a small USB radio that can be inserted into the mouse for easy transport. Supposedly, the battery can last up to one year... so we shall see about that. It uses one AA battery.

Looking for the real me

Am I this guy? Riding the fences for so long... I better let somebody love me... before it's too late.

Some thoughts to ponder before going to bed tonight.


Desperado, why don't you come to your senses?
You been out ridin' fences for so long now
Oh, you're a hard one
But I know that you've got your reasons
These things that are pleasin' you
Can hurt you somehow

Don't you draw the queen of diamonds boy
She'll beat you if she's able
No, the queen of hearts is always your best bet

Now it seems to me, some fine things
Have been laid upon your table
But you only want the ones you can't get

Desperado, oh, you ain't gettin' no younger
Your pain and your hunger, they've drivin' you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, that's just some people talkin'
Your prison is walking through this world all alone

Don't your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky won't snow and the sun won't shine
It's hard to tell the night time from the day
You're losin' all your highs and lows
Ain't it funny how the feeling goes away?
Desperado, why don't you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, and open the gate
It may be rainin', but there's a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you
(let sombody love you)
You better let somebody love you
before it's too late

Reunion with Lucy

I think it's been 7 or 8 years now... since I last saw Lucy. She was in Junior high school when I knew her... and know, she's happily married and moved to Taiwan. We went to Little Tokyo for Shabu Shabu and then went to Cashbox KTV to sing some songs. Lucy, you have a great voice! Next time I'm in Taiwan, if your husband permits, let's hang out again, k?

Have fun at the Shanhai Grand Prix.

May God keep you and bless you.

Donald

Dell Latitude D420: New 6 cell battery

This is what it's supposed to look like! It's a few ounces lighter than the 9 cell battery that we originally purchased, but it looks so much better! Look at the size of the 9 cell battery... it acted as a wrist pad for me.

On the other hand the 6 cell battery can only last a bit over 4 hours. Whereas the 9 cell battery can last up to 7.4 hours. In any case... it's plenty for me. ^^

I placed my SLVR phone next to it for size reference.

Finished configuring!

Finally, I've finished configuring the Cisco Catalyst 3750G. This was supposed to be my little weekend project (from last Friday to this Tuesday while at work) to play with the CLI of Cisco and make sure that it will work with the system I set up in the company lab using a Foundry as the core. As expected, my weekend plans on reading up on this came to a complete failure as... well, I need to have some fin and rest. Hahaha.

I still remember that the first time I get to play around with a router of this class... it took me one week to understand PIM and Multicast. From what others told me, that's really fast... but I was under the pressure of a deadline. Another few days to look at the different routing protocols... and then, after a few weeks, to finally get to configure VLAN and inter-VLAN routing. This time, on a complete different router, it took me about 4 hours.

The key to get this done quickly: know exactly the protocols and applications the network requires, map out the ports, IP addresses, subnets, priorities... etc. Look up the commands from Cisco, have a working network running the protocols and applications, and connect the router on the Gig port to see if it works or not. Luckily, it did.

I feel happy. Now I'm ready to return this loaner to my customer.

Prayer

Lord, thank you for the past 4 years of experiencing you in the wilderness. I know in faith that you are leading me to the land flowing with milk and honey. You have told me... and I will stay strong, faithful, and persistent til the end. But be merciful on me should I become weak... for I am imperfect. Your grace is sufficient for me and your strength is made perfect in my weakness. I ask that you will grant me eyes of vision that will see far so that I will not dwell within the immediates that present themselves. Let me do things with a new heart, a new mind, and new ways... that I wasn't familiar with less I become prideful. Mold me into the right shape as you are the master builder.

This is my desire... to seek and dwell in your place all the days of my life. So that I'll know that I've truly lived as I was called to. Lord, hear my prayers. Thank you for never letting me go... it is all about You.

In Yous Son's name,

Amen.

Will I live as I've tried in the past?

Today, I was flattered to be asked to take the leading role in serving the Daniel fellowship with the service of worship. I was amazed at first, and then all the past thoughts and experiences came rushing through my head... the different styles, the songs, the ways to sing, ways to play the guitar, frustrations, triumphs, the music, the drums, the worship nights, SOP, SOWer, singing to harmonize, studio recording, song writing attempts... and then, all of a sudden, I came to a screeching halt. The people that were working with me just packed up and leave... actually, I'm not sure if I was the first to pack or not.

I definitely needed prayer. I've serve in the same role... many times before since 1988. God had seemed to bestow upon me certain talents in music... while the meeting went on and we moved on to address other concerns, my head was thinking about what will I do... this time around.

God has given me another chance to serve him. Despite my past weakness, my lack of ability, my insistence... I wonder if I will be using what I knew from before, or will I be able to start anew. Using a heart that's untainted. Passion unextinquished. Love unmarked.. Sometimes I'm envious of the new Christians that we were so blessed to have recently. I wish that my flame can re-ignite. That it can burn without being hindered...

And everything starts again... now, with prayer

My first company notebook

Yup, that's right. My first company notebook. It was one of those "Buy one get one free" deals from Dell. The Dell Latitude D420: 3 lbs with 12.1" wide screen. Intel Mobile Core Duo U2500 (1.2Ghz) with 2MB of L2 Cache. 1G of DDR2 RAM. 30G HDD (small), 8X DVD+-RW (External), IO ports: GigE, Modem, USB, Firewire, Infrared, SD slot, and external monitor port (should have gotten Bluetooth too). And ya... a battery that lasts more than 7 hours.

Now I can retire my P4 17" widescreen HP notebook/desktop replacement for future travels.

神雕俠侶

Anyone has this set of VCDs or DVDs that I can borrow?

I've been a fan of Jin Yon since I was in elementary school... and 神雕俠侶 is one of the first set of books that I've read.

The girl is so pretty!!!

Another interesting story

鞋不合腳，沙子作祟
很耐人尋味的話：

「人生猶如一本書。
愚蠢的人將它草草翻過，


聰明的人卻會將它細細慢嚼，

為什麼呢？因為聰明的人知道，只能讀一次。」



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她是我的同學，也是公認的校花，畢業後和我在台北上班，不久她結了婚，

丈夫是某政要的秘書，有名的筆桿子，真的是郎才女貌，作為同學自然為她美好生活而高興。

雖然和她見面的機會不多，但她的好消息卻不斷傳來：丈夫升職了、她當母親了。*偶爾在街上遇見她，濃淡適宜的妝容，氣質優雅極了，直覺她真是一個幸福的女人。

最近又遇見她，她還是那麼美麗，較之以前更多了幾分成熟，
我向她打趣，有愛情的滋潤，女人的美麗就是不一樣，她只是淡淡一笑，平靜之中似乎有些憂傷。

她說：「婚姻如鞋，合不合腳只有自己知道。」
「妳那雙優質的婚姻鞋難道不合腳嗎？」我反問。
她的話匣子打開了，也許是平時她少有傾心訴說的機會，此時，她歷數丈夫的種種陋習：喝酒、抽煙、應酬多、早出晚歸……。

讓她慢慢地受不了，她是個很敏感的女人，很在乎自己的感受，天長日久，灰色情緒漸漸堆積，離婚的心情都有了。
沉默了半響，我問她：「妳愛妳的丈夫嗎？」我這明顯的廢話，從她的表情就應該看得出來，她正是因為太愛、太在乎，所以才會有失望。「妳丈夫愛妳嗎？」這也是廢話，她不可能與一個不愛自己的人在一起生活。

我笑著對她說：「其實妳的鞋子還是很合腳的，只不過鞋子裡有幾粒沙子而已。」

她是個聰明的女人，她明白了我的意思，她笑著說，那沙子挺硌人的，要想辦法把它們拿出來才好。

處理沙子的問題，那可是妳自己的事，我笑了，這世上有很多人說鞋子不合腳，其實未必就是鞋子有問題，可能是鞋中之沙造成了一種不合腳的錯覺，因為幾顆沙粒而放棄整雙鞋子，那可是天下第一號大笨蛋，她聽後笑開了，笑得嫵媚而動人。