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I was in my kitchen last night making a cup of hot chocolate when I had a revelation.

But first, let me back up a little bit to touch on the finer points of the art making hot chocolate. If you’ve made hot chocolate from a powder mix, then you’ll know that it isn’t always easy to get the powder all mixed in. When you drop the spoon of powder into the hot milk, the outside of the clump of powder turns into this gooey mess that seals the milk away from the dry powder inside the clump. So to get it all mixed in you have to smash the clump and do all kinds of other strange contortions to expose the dry parts to the milk. Something that at first glance seems to be a simple process ends up being quite a bit more dramatic.

That’s when it occurred to me. There could be some deep philosophical meaning hidden in the art of stirring a cup of hot chocolate. (Plus I haven’t written anything on my blog in forever, so I could really really really use some new content!) Simple things being not so simple… or that powder hidden inside and protected by a layer of gooey mix… there must be some deep thought that could be connected to this. So I stood there mindlessly stirring that cup while trying to uncover the truth hidden beneath those mesmerizing brown swirls of chocolate.

But nothing came to me. It was late already, and stir as I might, my brain was just too tired to put together a coherent thought. As the last brown islands of hot chocolate mix surrendered to the swirling sea of milk, it finally struck me. I had my big revelation of the night.

Sometimes it really is nothing more than just a cup of hot chocolate.

Today is one of those days when I just can’t wait to get back into my car.

Why, you ask?

Is it because I secretly long to cast off these chains of routine and to drive off over the horizon with no destination in mind… to see where the winds of fate will carry me… and even if I am met with disaster and ruin, at least I would have stepped out from the mires of the here and now.

Mmmm… not really.

Or is it because I grow weary of toiling within this tangled weave of existence where not even the best planned threads run true for very long… oh if I could only escape to my car where the destination is clear and the way forward is as simple as pressing a couple of pedals and twiddling a wheel.

Mmmm… nope, don’t think it’s that either.

It’s actually quite simple… two words, really: Air condition.

Yes, air condition. Lately my car has been the only place where I can escape from the heat. Like any good cheap asian, I try really hard not to turn on the air condition at home. When I was younger I used to complain that my parents would never turn the AC on. But now that I have my own place and pay my own bills, I’m doing the exact same thing… if I’m not passing out from the heat, it’s not hot enough for the AC yet! (well okay, slightly exaggerated)  And then there’s the office where I work at. The AC is on full blast, but it’s completely overwhelmed by the big fat server that’s pouring out heat in the back room. Trust me, 80 to 85 degrees is no fun for an office.

So that leaves my car. It’s the one refuge where I can turn the AC on and escape from the heat. Ah… blessed air condition… if my commute could only be longer on days like this…

There’s this research study that’s been showing up in the news recently. It’s about how having fat friends increases your chances of being fat. Here’s a news articles about the study:

Find Yourself Packing it On? Blame Friends (New York Times)

So was your first reaction the same as mines? I thought it was just so plainly obvious… a study of which was completely unnecessary. I mean seriously, all it boils down to is that your friends tend to influence your behavior. And there’s no good reason why this doesn’t include lifestyle decisions that influence obesity. Did we really need a research study to figure this out? A little common sense would have saved loads of research dollars (or perhaps pounds would be more appropriate in this case…)

So go find yourself some skinny friends! Maybe they will make you skinnier. That is if you care about that sort of stuff. I don’t particularly care… but I guess my opinion doesn’t carry too much “weight” on this issue. :-)

This is blasphemous! A bottle of two-buck-chuck is named as California’s best Chardonnay?!

http://abcnews.go.com/WN/story?id=3372578

Oh well, to make myself feel better after this great travesty, I’m going to go swing by Trader Joe’s a buy a few bottles of Chuck. ;-)

But with all kidding aside, I’m of the opinion that a lot of this wine tasting “science” is just people trying to sound all cultured and classy with all these mysterious wine tasting words. I mean seriously, do I really want to taste leather or truffles in my wine? Mmmm…. nah, I think I’ll pass. Just give me something that I personally enjoy. That’s probably impossible to figure out from reading somebody else’s review… so I guess that gives me a great excuse to go try out more wines! ;-)

So I almost died today… twice in a row! What a day.

Well okay, so I didn’t really almost die… my car almost got hit twice today. Twice in the same intersection by two different cars running the same red light. It’s one of those funky five way intersections that people get confused by if the don’t drive through it every day. So I guess the first car got confused, and the second was just following without looking at the stoplight.

So anyway, lots of tire smoke and adrenaline and whatever, but thankfully nothing crashed together. Normally I would have some choice words about the stupid people in our society and the problems they cause… but I’m just so tired today that I don’t feel like ranting. Yah… I’m really really really tired when I’m not ready with a stupid people rant. ;-)

So instead of ranting, I’ll just leave you with a parting thought:

A kitten dies every time a stupid act is committed. Please… Think of the kittens!

I’ve got another great time waster! (I’m starting to notice a disturbing trend with what I’ve been posting here lately… :-) )

Go here to get the Democracy Player: http://www.getdemocracy.com/

For you gearheads out there, it’s a RSS aggregator combined with a Bittorrent client combined with a video player.

In plain English, it’s like Youtube… but less of a disorganized mess… and with fewer dumb videos of cats playing pianos. The idea is that it automatically downloads lists of (legally) free videos/podcasts/etc out there and organizes them into categorized lists/channels. Then you pick what interests you and download and watch them. And if you must, you can also search for Youtube videos and watch them or save them for later.

You can think of Youtube as something like the bargain bin at Kmart — it’s mostly full of crap, but once in a while you’ll find a gem. I’ve found that the Democracy Player at least has things categorized onto different shelves. There’s still crap on there, but at least now you’ve got a fighting chance of avoiding it.

One thing to note is that it’s not streaming video like Youtube, so you’ll have to wait for the whole video to download before you can watch it. So it’s best done where you have a fast connection… not that I’m suggesting that you try this at work or at a school library. Oh no, I wouldn’t advocate such gratuitous waste of what could have otherwise been a productive use of your time. But hey, those are still great places to try it. ;-)

So anyway, give it a try… It’s free, so what can you lose? Or you could always go back to watching your cats playing pianos. It’s up to you.

Normally I try to avoid giving any additional attention to celebrity news, but this one was too good to pass up:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/TV/05/11/paris.hilton.ap/

So the old news is that Paris Hilton is going to jail (yes, I laughed too when I first heard about it). Now some judge is cutting down her sentence for good behavior. No surprise there… but the funny/ridiculous part about this is what they cited as giving her credit for “good behavior”:

Officials considered several factors in calculating the credit, including that she appeared for her latest court date, he said.

Huh? Since when did just showing up to court constitute “good behavior”? It’s what’s demanded of you! Otherwise the cops are going to come looking for you. Oh wait I almost forgot… this is Paris Hilton we’re talking about. Acting like a normal person qualifies as “good behavior” for her.

Okay I promise, no more silly celebrity news. Well… at least until something really outlandish happens. Which should take about a month considering the current state of society. ;-)

Normally I wouldn’t consider myself to be much of a germaphobe or a clean-freak, but this still needs to be said. You know how some people have really dirty mice? No not the four-legged type. I mean computer mice. Sometimes it’s just a bit greasy from people with a habit of maintaining less-than-clean hands. At least that’s somewhat understandable. It’s still gross, but understandable.

But some people take this much much farther. Have you seen those mice that have a visible layer of filth covering it? Not just visible, but a layer of filth that’s thick enough to give texture to an otherwise smooth surface. That’s not just gross… it’s so far beyond gross that words cannot begin to describe it. But I mean seriously, how can anybody tolerate that level of filth and still use that mouse every day? Sure it’s your own germs, but who knows what kinds of creatures are breeding and spawning new forms of uncleanliness inside that filth!

So for the sake of the children, please keep your mice clean! (okay that makes no sense, but it always sounds better when it’s “for the children”) And if you don’t care about the children, then at least do it so that you won’t annoy people because they have to wash their hands after using your computer.