Hm, Smirnoff

On a day like this, I should drink it. Who likes it? Come with me and drink it together.

But I'm afraid that I can't buy it anywhere.

Independent news paper, Salon.com

One of my ex-coworkers has liked this independent press, so sometimes recommended it to me.

But I hardly visited at Salon.com 'cause the website didn't look cool for me.

Anyway, today finally I stopped by it to look for an article about the men's gymnastics all-around final. Oh~ here it is.

Unfavorable Scoring Denies Gymnasts

I really freaked out after watching the result of Olympics' gymnastics (Individual All-around). Now I'm reading an article on Yahoo.com about the result.

Do you really think so? Paul Hamm is one of the greatest gymnasts. But the US is the biggest powerful nation in FIG as well as in the world. Any nations can't ignore the US and its people, right?

Why do you think it was fair for him to earn 9.837 and for a Korean gymnast to earn 9.475 on the high bar? You know no Japanese gymnasts didn't earn more than 9.837 on the high bar in men's team competition. Do you really think that Paul's performance was worth getting 9.837?

And you really know the fact that "In usual circumstances, one wouldn’t get a score more than 9.0, but it happened that way on Paul's vault."

What I used to be like?!

Some people have a precious chance to think about themselves or change their lives when they come across weird experience even they can't explain.

In February of 2001, I was on travel in Japan by myself. Before I went to Japan, I thought I was an expertise in travel. For one month before leaving for Tokyo, I started to study Japanese culture and important places by using a travel guide book; however, I didn't learn the Japanese language. Although I knew only a few Japanese words, I never felt uncertain about traveling there.

So what happened to me then?

I'm gonna tell the story next time. Don't go away. Stick around.

Determine Your Clutter Quotient

Determine Your Clutter Quotient

My room gets messy. A lot of stuff I don't know when I got is mounting up. So this Clutter Quotient is a good measurement for my life sytle. OK! Let's start!

To what degree does each statement reflect your situation:
1 = seldom or never, 2 = sometimes, 3 = usually, 4 = always

■ When I have free time, I go shopping.
■ I keep bills, bank statements and other mail in piles.
■ I have more than 10 plastic shopping bags in my house.
■ I save magazines with interesting articles or recipes.
■ I get tired just thinking about cleaning up all the clutter around me.
■ I often do two or more small projects at once.
■ My house may seem messy to others, but I know where everything is.
■ I discourage unexpected visitors.
■ I don't clean up certain things because otherewise I forget about them.
■ I don't have time to keep things in order.
■ I don't clean up the mess because if I do it just gets messy again.
■ I have a hard time getting rid of things.
■ The degree of stress in my house is connected with the amount of clutter.

Add up the points.
17: No prolem. You've got your clutter under control.
17 - 25: Clutter is only an occasional problem.
26 - 34: You are at risk of developing a clutter problem, but you're also capable of breaking old habits.
35 - 43: Ok, let's face it, if you don't do something now your clutter problem will only get worse.
44 - 52: Sound the alarm! It's high time you tacked the mess!

from odemagazine.com