Vegan -day 121-

"Why did you become a vegan?"
This is the most frequently asked question after I decided to be a vegan.

I have two versions of answers for the question, shorter and longer versions. The shorter version is simple: "One morning, when I wake up, I noticed that I am a vegan." People sometime laugh when I say so, but it is exactly what happened to me. No more, no less.

Although I usually do not tell, I have the longer version of the answer. Some people believe that all creature experience the same pain and suffering as we humans do (that is why to be a vegan). But I personally do not know about it (they may or they may not). I am a scientist, so if you say "the same pain", I would wonder how can you quantify the pain? I do not want to give an unnecessary pain to any creature, but I do not mind hunting animals to eat (That is a part of nature). The true longer version of my answer is that I became a vegan because I have to survive in a foreign country as a stranger. Living in a foreign country for a long period (such as 10 years) is a really tough challenge. It is totally different from visiting the foreign country for sightseeing. Nothing happens as you expected in a foreign countries, you have to be extraordinary careful all the time. All the time.

I just noticed that I need very strong physical and mental intensity to survive here. Being a vegan and running a marathon are part of my training to obtain them.

Here comes another Bubble.

I like this video very much. "Yes, I will blog about this song."

Macbook Air

Steve Jobs announced the Macbook Air at his keynote speech this morning.

According to him, Apple's new slim Macbook, which is now called Macbook Air, is 13.3-inch widescreen display and provided with full size keyboards. However, it is still very slim and can fit to an envelope.

I like this Macbook Air very much, but only problem for me is that its hard disk size is too small. Steve says that the Macbook Air will be shipped with 80GB drive, option of 64GB SSD. These sizes are not big enough to be my main computer, but I will buy the Macbook Air as soon as possible. Good job Steve!

Macworld

Macworld will start from tomorrow in the San Francisco Moscone Center. I am expecting that Steve Jobs will present about new slim macbook pro tomorrow at his keynote speech.

I will have to work tomorrow but I may visit the Moscone Center to attend the keynote presentation.

Picture of the day.

This is my mother's painting. I did not know that she can paint this well. Her love to her daughter and grand-son is definitely helping her painting here. Love is strong.

Obama Triumphs in Iowa.

Barack Obama just send me an e-mail that he won in Iowa. Wow, I was not totally expecting this. Last night TV said that Clinton was leading in Iowa by 5% margin.

Takuya -

We just won Iowa, and I'm about to head down to talk to everyone.

Democrats turned out in record numbers tonight, and independents and even some Republicans joined our party to stand together for change.

Thank you for everything you've done to make this possible.

- Barack

I am happy that Barack Obama is making a history.

Facebook vs LinkedIn

Facebook and LinkedIn are popular social network services (SNS) in the United States. Facebook is getting more and more popular recently. Early adapters or people who love new stuff would like Facebook since it is intensively changing and introducing new services. But since it is developing, Facebook usually contains a lot of bugs which annoy you.

Interesting thing is that I usually find friends elder than me on Linkedin and ones younger than me on Facebook. Since LinkedIn is for established and professional people, it is convincing. But these facts indicate that my age is just between young and established people. I do not know if I want to stay young or to get established soon.

These are links to my facebook and LinkedIn pages.

Firefox

Like majority of my blog readers, I use the Firefox as a web browser. I like this browser because it is easier to customize than others. However, only one problem I am facing is that this browser takes forever to download pdf files. I do not know what is wrong with my setting, but I always have to lunch the Internet Explorer for pdf download. Since I have to download a lot of pdf files for my work, it is actually frustrating. If anyone knows a good way to resolve this problem, please let me know.

Picture of the day.

A cool picture from photoshop contest 07.

U.S. economy is heading to a recession.

It has been suggested that the U.S. economy is now heading toward a great recession (See this article). Primary problem is subprime lending, which lead the U.S. economy into hosing bubble.

The subprime loan is the high risk lending for people without good credit histories. You can easily see the problem of this system: “Why are the most risky loan products sold to the least sophisticated borrowers?”

Similar hosing bubble actually happened in Japan in the end of 1980s. I was a high school student, therefore I did not actually experienced the bubble phase of Japanese economy. I just watched elder people getting enthusiastic and crazy. They bought unnecessary and expensive brand goods and spent money like water. They just got too much money because their hosing prices were raising too high. And one morning the prices suddenly dropped. They lost everything in one day.

After the blast of the bubble economy, Japan experienced the most severe recession. It took 15 years to fully recover from it.

I just hope that the U.S. economy does not contain such a huge problem. Although this report says U.S. economy is still strong now, I think the U.S. economy will experience the recession soon. I hope the recession will be short and minor.