IKEA Sucks

I bought this pan in November 2008 when I moved in my own apartment. After I have used it for just around a year, every time I turn up my gas stove much, the handle turns red and burns. Since I was out of country from end of December and did not come back until just a week ago, this is what the pan looked like back in last December. Another example of IKEA's quality. Now there is a big hole in the handle. It is time for me to shop another sauce pan.

IKEA may have pretty neat design, but their products just do not last long. They offer to help design the whole kitchen, or apartment for people who do not know how to start. Nice promotion for IKEA, but huge mistake for those who buy the whole set of IKEA unless they are so much into changing their furniture every a year or two. For me, shopping a suace pan is even a big hassle.

Curling

One thing I learned over the past month is curling. This game is not known to Taiwanese at all. I guess most of us have seen this game at one point of our lives and do not have a clue what it is. I learned the rule and had a very good time watching curling at Olympics and Tim Horton's Brier.

Nice thing about curling is that it is slow and predictable, quite contrary to other sports like baseball or hockey, when I have a hard time knowing where the ball is from TV even. In the curling game, there is normally a short discussion among the team members regarding the next rock they throw, and camera then focuses on the house. It is a great time to have a discussion with friends the options they may have and what not, it being a raze, take off, tap and roll, or even just a freeze. The rock is big and visible the whole time during the throw, and it is so easy to keep my eyes on the rock on TV. I don't even need any comment to know if that is a good throw or not. It is so enjoyable.

And a better thing is that, when both teams are equally competitive, it is always a good game until the very last rock.

I felt sad that once I returned to Taiwan, I would not be able to watch curling anymore. Well, I was checking TSN's website the other day to read news about curling, and then happened to find that, TSN actually uploads ALL the games online. All means all the ends of every single draw. I get to review any game of Brier or Scotties whenever and wherever I'd like to. I hope they'll do the same thing for women's world championship, which is coming up on March 20th. Not sure if it will be still as fun to watch it alone, but I'll definitely watch it.

Attached is the final rock from Kevin Koe, who represents Alberta in the Tim Horton Brier. This is a game that is good till this very last rock when Alberta beat Ontario by few inches. What a shot!

Davinci Code

I know I am so far behind everyone to read this book. I tried. But every time I started to read a few chapters, those religious terms just scared me off. Without the religious background, even though I looked them up in the dictionary, I still did not understand what they were to proceed reading properly.

So why now? It was frigid gold out. Not being able to go out to do much, I was desperate in February to find something to read to kill some time. And this copy happens to be hardcover, and have lots of photos. Good first impression.

Look at the photo here. This is the paragraph when Langdon explained the trick Davinci played on the church, and the invisible head between woman's hand and the kid, and the lady's finger indicating a knife to cut the head. The church was not happy about it, so Davinci made the church another one, and both have been preserved. I got to read the book, and have these 2 photos right on the book for reference, which makes reading so much more enjoyable.

But maybe this book and movie created so much buzz some years earlier, so I expected a lot from the book, but the result is quite disappointing.

Don't take me wrong. I enjoyed the main story line. It's quite exciting. But other than that, the other story lines are very weak. I watched the movie long time ago, and did not remember anything except the curator lying on the floor mimicking one of Davinci's famous painting. I could still guess something wrong with the rich guy and the Teacher, and the connection is even easier to figure out, once the butler was involved and claimed he is the only one who knows the Teacher's true identity.

The story has a very good start, but the other lines are very weak. They work at best like transitions between Landon's main line, and fail to give a strong impression of what they do and who they are. There is some story about the albino, but such a storyline is a no brainer, and there is just something missing in how the Teacher can be behind the whole thing single-handedly. I think it's good just to watch the movie. At least movie has a faster pace than the novel, and gives you little time to think what makes sense, and what does not.