A Compendium of Whats New Since I Last Updated

Yes, its another one of your favourite types of post to read, my beloved Happy Desolation readers. It is my greatest pleasure to present to you, the billionth "Here's Whats New Since I Last Updated This Blog" post.

To celebrate this special event, I have decided to do something new. This something new, is actually a compendium of everything interesting that has happened since I last blogged. Without further ado, I present it:



Yes, nothing has happened. Oh wait, apart from the following:

1) The pace of school has sped up. I have end of term exams starting next week Tuesday.

2) I'm hot. I'm losing weight. Still a bit puffy and fluffy though, but the chicks like it that way, don'tcha? (Screams of "NOOOO!!!" lol)

3) Directly related to number 2, I've started Pai Lum Tao Kung Fu classes. Yes, Yours Truly is a Kung Fu ckhead.

4) I've learned a lot of Japanese since I last updated, but my rate of learning has slowed down, thanks to this millstone around my neck called school.

Christmas is coming soon. That means Christmas PARTIES!!! Heheheheheh...(would any one of my DEAREST FRIENDS reading this, be so kind as to hook me up with some free passes...thanks...you guys are the best!!! lololol)

I really forgot about Happy Desolation for a little (not forgot as in forgot that I had it, but forgot more as in NEGLECTED it). I really, really do want to be more regular with my blogging in the future. If things work out as they should, I should be actually.

Well yeah kids, that's about it really. Have fun till next time.

Peace,
Lord Robinson.

LCD Monitors Are Oh So Juicy

Yes...it's shameful. I was living in the 1980s before today. I was holding down a dreadfully antiquated CRT monitor. Now...I'm finally in the 1990s...I got a 19 inch LCD monitor. My eyes are still trying to readjust to the new aspect ratio and different brightness and such, since I can't seem to set them exactly like how they used to be on my old CRT, but hell, change is good.

Lately, I've been listening to the Notorious B.I.G. I'm really enjoying his song Juicy. For regular readers, you would all know that my listening tastes are quite eclectic...I jump from listening Benny Benassi, Daft Punk and the Global Deejays, to Notorious B.I.G. and Nas to Vybz Kartel and Tony Matterhorn to Saosin and Limp Bizkit. I have a very "globalized" ear, as a friend once put it.

My friends are all full of shit.

Generally though, while I listen to practically every type of music, I noticed I tend towards songs with strong and/or repetitive/driving basslines. Maybe I have some subconscious desire to have some subliminal messaging programmed into me...who knows?

Onto the next topic...Kanye West really needs some concept of appropriateness. Ugh..he's a great rapper, but he needs to SHUT UP once in a while. I think what he did to Taylor Swift at the VMAs was just terrible. Even if Beyonce deserved the award more, I don't think he should have ruined Taylor Swift's time onstage like that. How would it have gone if Nas, for example, ran up on Kanye receiving an award onstage, grabbed the mic from him, and shouted, "My man Jay-Z deserves this shit, Kanye is just some wack ass crap man!!"

Not very well, I can tell you that.

Anyway, I should just say that I seem to be overcompensating with blog posts on weekends, since I can hardly do them during the week, but I suppose getting 2 loaves on Friday and Saturday is better than getting none at all for the week right?

I apologize to creator of that idiomatic expression. Like, I'm totally sorry for butchering it like that dude..it was nasty. That was so bad...there was like blood all over the place and stuff, you know?

Learning Japanese is going pretty well by the way. I know somewhere in the region of 100 basic kanji (the 80 Grade 1 Joyo Kanji + a couple of common verb kanji). I'll start Grade 2 Kanji eventually, hopefully, by the end of next week...but I'll just have to see how that fits in with my school schedule.

Oh yes...and for all those who it matters to, PUA Haze is alive, kicking ass and taking names.

Peace Out,
Lord Robinson

P.S. Here's something for the non-Jamaicans to figure out, most Jamaicans worth their salt should figure this out in 10 seconds or less. It's a line from a dancehall song, you can post the answer to the comment box or email the answer to me if you think you know what it means. Extra points if you can tell me the name of the song it's from.

"If yu tell me fi squint me nuh squint my eye."

Good luck people.

Twitter, Japanese and Mathematics

No, I guarantee you that none of the nouns in the title of this blog post are linked, I'm not that far gone yet. However, I'm blogging about them right now since they're significant. First, onto the issue of Twitter.

Yes, I've been a lazy BASTARD lately. I haven't been updating my blog, but I have been updating my Twitter feed. As I write this, I'm on the eve of my 100th Twitter post(For those of you retards who don't know English, it means I'm at 99 Twitter posts...dumbasses.) If you got to this link via Twitter, it means that you just clicked on my 100th Twitter post, WOOT!!! That's right people, my 100th Twitter post was a link to my blog...wow!!

Everyone knows how AWESOME Twitter is, so I won't waste my time regurgitating what you can find all over the web. So instead, I'm going to talk about the useless crap that has been going on in my life.

First, one of the obvious facts of life. I, Gavin Robinson, r teh HAXXORS!!

Why?

Well, within 3 weeks, I have managed to acquire a functioning knowledge of Japanese, including knowing the entire Hiragana and Katakana tables, knowing basic conversational Japanese, knowing how to conjugate regular Ichidan and Godan verbs (the two main categories of verbs in Japanese, similar to ar/er/ir verbs in Spanish), and learning 12.5% of all Japanese Grade 1 Kanji, as well as the on-yomi readings, kun-yomi readings and the radicals associated with the Kanji.

Yes, I'm boasting. So what? Bite me.

But then, what sort of blogger would I be if I didn't use this to spread free information?

So how did I do it?

Well first of all, get some oxygen to your brain. I'm not advocating the usage of hyperbaric oxygen chambers, but some cardiovascular exercise (in my case, skipping) does help to improve memory (at least it helped mine). I don't seem to be getting any fitter (yet), but at least I'm not getting any fatter.

Next, bite into your lower lip, and prepare for pain while you learn the hiragana and katakana syllablaries. Seriously, this is painful. It's like one of the hardest things (next to memorizing Kanji). This is especially true if you're a natural English speaker like me (or most of the people that come to this blog T_T). It may feel unnatural drawing symbols to represent syllables, but you'll get over it soon. Personally, I found it easier to start with katakana and move on to hiragana. The way I learned it was by learning the katakana/hiragana in sets of 2-5 at a time, then writing each character out about 12-25 times (yes, WRITING them). Then I learnt some vocabulary that used them, and practiced writing those words from memory (its easy to remember words in romaji). I kept this up until I could write the whole Katakana/Hiragana table from memory. I highly recommend these lessons:

Kanji Kafe's Complete Katakana Lessons (also contains incomplete Hiragana lessons)
Hiragana Exercises
Joyo Kanji Up To Sixth Grade Level


Next, go and learn some basic conversational Japanese vocabulary. About.com's Japanese lessons are a good place to start. Don't get ahead of yourself and try Kanji now...you will be in PAIN!!(as in eternal damnation style pain)

After you've soaked up enough conversation vocabulary, check out verb and adjective conjugations (also on About.com's Japanese lessons). Yes, adjectives can be conjugated in Japanese too. Thankfully, adjective conjugations aren't very hard. Neither are verb conjugations for that matter. You'll see once you reach this stage. While learning about verbs, you should also learn basic sentence patterns such as how to say that one noun is another noun, or a certain adjective describes a noun.

By now, you should probably have run into a few difficulties here and there with little oddities in the language. This is why I recommend getting a friend who is DAMN good with the language. Preferably a HOT one.

Sadly, my search for a hot girl that knew Japanese was an EPIC FAIL =[. The one I found was a nice enough person though, and relatively smart. (I'm kidding Shrewy, please don't kill me '^_^ ). In all honesty though, I consider myself fortunate to have found a friend who fit all the criteria for a J-sensei. =]

But seriously, a good friend who knows the language and/or a friend who is interested in learning the language is a great help. The wise friend who knows the language can always help you when you're stuck, and the friend who is interested in learning provides a source of rivalry...so you always feel motivated to work. Then again, that's just me...and lots of my friends say I'm overcompetitive...balls to you all!!! (some friends they are T_T).

By this time, you should know the basic sentence structures, so take a day (as in a 12 hour day) to make some basic sentences using the verbs, tenses and sentence structures you know. You may periodically need to refresh your knowledge of the kana tables by trying to write them down from memory. Personally, I find the hiragana for the syllabes "mu", "yu","ne" and "nu", as well as the katakana for the syllables "mu" and "ne", a bit hard to remember.

Do a refresher on everything for the better part of a week (about 4-5) days, and then go and try some learn some Japanese Grade 1 Kanji. I guarantee you that this is the hardest part.

You can now go and try to read some Japanese websites. I recommend getting the Rikaichan browser plugin for Firefox first though, because there are going to be quite a few phrases/Kanji you don't know. I also recommend getting the Denshi Jisho bookmarklet, for quick reference.

Tada...you now know enough Japanese to find the bathroom if you ever find yourself in the middle of a Yakuza conference by accident (although in all honesty, I think you'd have bigger problems than wetting yourself if you found yourself in the middle of one of those O_o).

Next...up..Mathematics.

Yes, I bet some of you cretinous proles have looked up on some AWESOME people such as myself at times in the past, and wondered, "How can he multiply such large numbers, mentally, so QUICKLY?!"

Well, all your human sacrifices have pleased the I, so the I has decided to reveal to the thou how the I dost do it. Keep in mind that everyone is different, and this is just MY personal method, so other people may tell you different stuff. Mine works fine for me though, so I'm cool with it.

Look at this:

369 x 69

You could do it mentally, but it would take a lot more than 15 seconds. Using my method, you can do it in less than 8 or so. Of course, doing mental arithmetic also depends on how well I slept the night before...some days were just NOT meant for Mathematics.

You split up the numbers first.

369 to 3 6 9
69 to 6 and 9

Now, here's what you do. Normally, you'd multiply 369 by 9 and multiply 369 by 60 and add them, using conventional mathematical methods (If you're confused about multiplying by 60, think about it, you put a 0 at then end, then multiply 369 by 6 to get the second number you use to add. This is equivalent to multiplying by 60. If you're still confused, just think about it a bit.)

So here's what you do, multiply the first separate set of numbers (thats 3, 6 and 9) by the 9 from 69.

So, this gives you:

27 54 81

Now what you do is add these numbers together as follows:

2700
0540
+ 81
------
3321

That's the first number.

You find the second number in a similar manner, but multiply your result by 10.

So, for the second set, you'd have:

18 36 54

This produces:

1800
0360
+ 54
------
2214

which you then multiply by 10 to get 22140. You then add this and the previous number to get:

22140+3321 = 25461

This principle works off the fact that its faster to break up the different parts of the number and add them than it is to try multiplying the WHOLE number by something else. In this way, it's a simplification of traditional multiplication, although the basic principle stays the same.

Still, this has been a LONG post, and I don't want to bore you people now (as if you aren't bored already). So, I'm going to say:

ざまたガャビン
(Later,
Gavin.)

P.S. My friend's an artist btw, and I figure one of the best ways to thank her would be to link to her DeviantArt profile...so I'm putting it here for the WHOOOOLE world to make fun of:

Laugh away =]

EDIT: Added a link to a site containing the Kanji up to Grade 6 level.