Rock Bands in Seattle

Recently I read the news about the music tours from Guns N' Roses and Pearl Jam. It reminds me the good old days when I was in college. Perhaps I was young at that time, I was on hook with American modern (back then) rock music. It was early 90s, I recalled the top notch rock bands included Guns N' Roses, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Metallica. U2 and REM were hot too, although I don't their music were as rock.

Nirvana and Pearl Jam were from Seattle, where I studied. Before Pearl Jam became super famous, they once hosted a small free concert in Seattle Center (Space Needle) and I watched it. How much are their tickets now? I don't even try to ask.

For Nirvana, they became famous overnight with one hit song, Smell Like Teen Spirit. At the peak of their career, main member Kurt Cobain committed suicide. He shot himself in his head. It shocked the whole city. Then Nirvana went down quietly. With all the fame, fortune, and talent, it seems not enough without a loving soul.

Reference: Grunge Music

Snap Shot: 123456

May car is 9 years old. Recently it reach 123,456 miles. I think it is an interesting milestone so I took a snap shot.

Web Cast

Recently I have joined a few web casts. I find this is a convenient way of listening presentation. Someone from a remote site hosts a presentation, I logon the web cast network, then I can see the presentation online dynamically. Sometimes they use WebEx and sometimes MS Live Meeting. For listening the talk, I use telephone conference call function. The sound quality is still much better using the phone.

When not asking question, I put mute on my phone. Then I can do other stuff on my desk and no one knows. If I want to take a break, I can just leave for a drink or restroom. No one cares. For knowledge learning, web cast is almost as efficient as listening presentation in person. The only problem, presentation is sometimes boring. Without people watching, I felt asleep a couple times during those web casts.

Chinese Stocks

Following up my Christian Q&A blog this week. Here are some Chinese Stock I own and watching:

STP: A Solar Power company. China is hungry for energy resource.

ACTS: First public fabless IC design house, locate in Zhuhai. Makes mp3 players and other portable electronics.

SNDA: China biggest online game vendor. How many kids in China like to play online game? Go figure.

SMI: China first semiconductor foundry. China can not produce enough chip to supply domestic need. There are $6 billion trade deficit on IC chip last year.

LFC: China Life: China largest insurance company. As quality of life improves, people and business are more concern on insurance.

* Why I buy Chinese Stocks (1) (2) (3)

Nerdy chat

During friends' gathering, usually I like chat with other people. Chat topics are typical: gossips, stocks, job markets, sport news, etc. But there is one topic that I like the most, which is tech industry related topic.

If I meet people who are in IC industry, I won't be shy to open conversation with them. Somehow I like to know what other people do in this industry. Any new development? What's hot and what's not. I also like to talk to people who write software code or web development. These aren't main task at work but it is something I like to know about the latest developments.

My wife says I look really nerdy when I keep talking tech related stuff in friends' gathering. Mmm ... I guess she is right.