Absurd Singularity

Exchange Place is just so dead on the weekends.

12mm, f/8, 1/125s

18 and a half minutes to go before the game

Last night took my mother to see the Knicks vs Nets game at Continental Arena for her birthday. Got pretty good seats (8 rows back from the floor) for a cheap (relatively speaking) price since one team almost no one cares about and the other team sucks in a big way. But they're both amongst my mom's favorite teams so double points for me. ;-)

Jump Ball!

Anyway, it was interesting to see first-hand the defensive inability of the Knicks. I've heard about it all season but man they couldn't D anything last night. At the half the Nets' 3-point shooting was 60 freaking %. And the majority of those were wide open looks. It was ridiculous. On the Nets side, Vince Carter put on a show last night. Quite a phenomenal athlete and an exciting player to watch.

Eddy Curry going over the center

The Nets pretty much blew the game open in the middle of the second quarter, building and maintaining a 21 point lead until they started sitting their starters with about 8 minutes left in the final quarter. Once they did that though, the bench players stunk it up REAL bad. The entire last 7 minutes of the game the Nets bench scored 5 points total. 2 of them coming from free throws. Good lord that was a pathetic display. Not that the Knicks did much better against the Nets bench but they did cut the lead down to 13 at the final buzzer. But I feel bad for Larry Brown. I'm not sure what it is but the Knicks just don't seem to understand how to play good defense which is surprising since Brown's the coach.

Umm, what is Vince doing?

At least he knows what's important. ;-)

Anyway, I made do with a 50mm f/1.4 lens throughout the game which turned out to be a bit shorter than ideal but I didn't think security was going to let me through with the 70-200IS. Plus I actually fit the camera body and lens in separate pockets of my jacket. The security person who patted me down felt the camera but all he asked was if it was a bottle (no outside beverages!) and that was it. Didn't even ask me to take it out. Maybe I should get the 85mm f/1.8 or 135 f/2 after all. ;-p

Curry going over the defender again

Took the majority of the action shots using shutter priority set at 1/125s and later 1/160s. At that speed the lens was wide open at 1.4 constantly so getting a well-focused shot was a bit of a pain as any slight discrepency meant a shot that was focused where I didn't want. But managed to come away with some decent shots (with some extra help from Photoshop ;-). But the 50mm never fails to impress me. 100% crops of some of the pics revealed quite detailed shots of the people on the other side of the floor. Too bad I'll be selling it off in a little while.

Vince Carter and Jason Kidd having fun

Jefferson going for the 3

Vince with the dunk!

A subdued bench, for good reason.

This past weekend had some pretty nice weather, ideal for being outside and doing some photography. So that's what I did. Erin's friend was in town so we hit a few tourist spots. I brought along my Tokina 12-24 and Sigma 24-70. The Sigma I hadn't used in quite some time so thought I'd dust it off a bit and refresh my memory on what it was capable of. I wasn't disappointed. Both lenses are capable of putting out some wonderfully sharp and colorful photos. Then again it was a bright, sunny day so it wasn't as if we were stretching the limits of the lenses or anything. Good pics nonetheless.

Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 @ 70mm, f/8, 1/500s, ISO 800

Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 @ 42mm, f/9, 1/500s, ISO 100

Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 @ 70mm, f/4, 1/100s, ISO 100

Tokina 12-24 f/4 @ 12mm, f/10, 1/200s, ISO 100

Tokina 12-24 f/4 @ 12mm, f/7.1, 1/200s, ISO 100

Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 @ 70mm, f/8, 1/500s, ISO 100

Just got my Canon 35mm f/1.4 lens back from the Canon Service Center here in Jamesburg, NJ and I'm sooooo psyched! They done fixed this baby up good! =) I had sent it in cause I noticed a larger than normal gap between the rear lens and the mount and they were able to fix it under the repair warranty since I had sent it in 3 months ago to fix a squeaky focus ring. And it came back lookin' great! Now it's pretty much brand spankin' new. So glad to have this lens back. ^o^

After looking at the lens mount after the fix, man, there's a HUGE difference before and after. This is what it looked like before the fix:

And this is what it looks like after:

If you look at the before picture, I had basically sent it in to get the areas circled in blue (melted, bubbly spot) and red (big gap) fixed. What I got back not only fixed those 2 areas but it also looks like the lens itself should have been mounted like a quarter of an inch further up the barrel to begin with! Makes me wonder how the heck I was shooting with no problems before. But anyway, I'm just glad it's back. =)

Erin came into the city this evening to catch dinner down at one of our favorite standbys, the matter-of-factly named "Excellent Pork Chop House" on Doyers. It's a bit of a farther walk to get to from the subway stations but the good food and prices are tough to beat.

The main reason that we frequent it as much as we do is because it's the only place we know of that serves the Din Tai Fung style chicken soup that we just absolutely love. Excellent Pork Chop House has the soup in chicken and spare rib form and both are pretty good. They taste pretty much the same except one has chicken and the other has spare ribs. A bit more oily than the Din Tai Fung version but still tastes good.

My usual fare is their Braised Chicken/Spare Rib Soup with Vegetable Rice combo. Oddly enough, and a warning to vegetarians, their "Vegetable Rice" has meat (pork bits specifically) in it. Basically it's lettuce, some sort of pickled veggie, and pork meat sauce over rice. It's the same rice you get if you order their rice dishes (e.g. Pork Chop/Chicken Leg over Rice). I usually order the combo and get a pork chop on the side. I think it's slightly cheaper that way (instead of getting a Pork Chop over Rice and the soup separately) but I may be mistaken. This time around the waitress made it even more slightly cheaper for us by charging us beef noodle soup w/beef price for Erin's beef noodle soup (no beef) and swapping out her beef for my pork chop.

When the name of your restaurant is "Excellent Pork Chop House", your pork chop should live up to the hype. There's no disappointment in that regard here. Their pork chop is seasoned and salted well and fried to perfection. Nice, tender and juicy. The Vietnamese style grilled pork chop is still my favorite way to season a pork chop but this is a pretty close second.

The only dish that I don't like here is their wonton noodle soup. Not that great. Had it once, never again.

Typically a trip to Chinatown with Erin usually involves me winding up as a pack mule as she stocks up on fruits from the roadside vendors. We didn't get any lychee this time around (she prefers to buy them still stuck on the branches instead of individually like in the above pic) and was more in the mood for guava anyway. But the prices they charge for guava here in the US is highway robbery. $4 per pound. In Taiwan you can get like half a dozen for $1 or something ridiculous like that.

I had the Tokina 12-24 lens on hand during this outing and got some interesting shooting from the hip type shots on the way home.

Motion blur's fun every now and then. =)

Yesterday we took a trip to visit what I thought was the New Jersey State Aquarium in Camden, NJ. It had apparently been renamed Adventure Aquarium for some reason. Wasn't until I was doing some research for this entry when I read that it had been going downhill for some years now before shutting down near the end of 2004 and then reopening last year under private management. But apparently the new and improved aquarium is much better than the old so I guess we picked a good time to go.

Braved the midafternoon heat today to sit out in my parent's backyard for a little bit to see if I could catch some wildlife with my 70-200IS lens + 1.4x extender. The animals were smarter than I apparently as all I could see was a robin, a blackbird, and a chipmunk.

This fella actually landed about 20 feet or so away from me which was surprising. Usually the birds will take off at the first sign of movement but I guess this one had seen me sitting there for awhile so didn't think I was dangerous. Plus I guess landing that worm didn't hurt either.

I haven't seen a chipmunk in quite awhile at my parent's place so I was glad to see this one. Good to see that our chipmunk family apparently has been doing quite well in the past 20 some odd years. I had originally spotted him climbing up this wall while I was sitting down on the patio so I was surprised to see him still in the area when I walked back towards the wall. He sat there snacking on something for a while and staring at me about 15 feet away.

After he was done eating he scampered off to find more goodies I guess. But not before taking another glance back at me to make sure I wasn't about to hunt him down.

Above pictures were processed in PS2, auto-leveled, contrasted, and colored if I felt it looked better, and sharpened up one notch. For those photo buffs you can see 100% crops (non-sharpened) of the critters here:

Spent a few hours at the Jersey Shore today. Ventured out with my 10-22mm w/Circular Polarizer and 70-200IS w/1.4x Extender. There were 3 novice surfers playing around, no comparison to the guys we saw on the North Shore of Oahu. Tough to surf when the waves are miniscule. Click on the pic above for the small picture gallery.

My mother told us about a family of cats that suddenly showed up in her backyard and lo and behold, I caught sight of them late in the afternoon.

I first saw the mother chilling out on the ledge. She would look at me whenever she heard my shutter go off. Just your typical gray tabby. Not sure if she was abandoned but I do remember we had cat sightings going a decade or so back so maybe there is a family of wild cats roaming our neighborhood.

After a little while the mother jumped off the ledge and headed off towards our neighbors yard. Then this kitten appeared from the other side of the ledge. S/he immediately jumped back down after catching sight of me when I took this shot.

Intrigued, my mother and I took a closer look at our wall back there to see where this family was staying and discovered that there were 2 holes in the back side of the wall where they were hiding out in. Just 2 kittens and their mom. So I camped out on top of the wall a good distance away to see if I could get some shots. This kitten would stick his head out and then duck back in when he caught site of me.

Eventually I moved to a closer position that gave me a clear shot of their hideaway. The two holes seemed to be connected in the back. But it's definitely a good hideout for them as you wouldn't even suspect they were there unless you were looking for them.

The two siblings would take turns peeking out. They knew I was still there and didn't seem to be overly afraid but wouldn't come out while I was there.

With the sun setting too quickly I took a last few shots and left them alone. Hopefully we didn't scare the mother away and she'll come back for her kids. Wonder how long they'll stay here and what they're eating.

Just a few photos taken over the weekend:

Just a quick snap of my current dSLR setup. It's pretty much complete. Maybe one final lens that I'd like (Canon 90mm TS-E) but it's more of a specialty lens that I can hold off on 'til much later. Anyway, starting from left to right:

First Row:
    • Canon BG-E3 Battery Grip
    • Canon Digital Rebel XTi
    • Canon Speedlite 580EX Flash
    • Canon ST-E2 Transmitter
    • Canon EF 1.4x II Teleconverter

Second Row:
    • Canon EF 300mm f/4L IS USM
    • Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM
    • Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM
    • Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM
    • Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L USM
    • Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM

Only things not pictured here are my monopod and tripod.

Anyhoo, been a bit tardy in blogging lately cause lots of crap going on (namely me being on a jury panel and my water heater flooding the hell out of everything) so will catch up on that stuff later.

At the request of Erin's cousin, we spent part of an afternoon checking out the Nintendo World store down by Rockefeller Center. I also figured we could make our first trip to the fabled 5th Avenue Apple Store since we were in the general vicinity.

Not exactly sure what this thing they were putting up at the eastern border of Rockefeller Center. But it sure was shiny.

Took us a little while to find the store because it's not in the central Rockefeller Center area, rather a block south on 48th. Upon entering the first section you come to is for Nintendo DS stuff.

I know there are some hardcore Nintendo fans out there but to pay $500 for one of these jewel-encrusted ones is even a bit too much for me. Then again, if it was a jewel-encrusted camera... no, even I wouldn't get it then. =p

The central area of the first floor was a pit encircled with and containing multiple DS units where you can try out a whole bunch of different games for it. Here I'm engrossed in a new release that I'm embarrassed to say is called Cooking Mama. In it, you uh, cook stuff. But it's a great example of the type of games Nintendo can come up with when you have a touchpad and stylus at your disposal. Erin thought it was hysterical and at $19.99 new, may be worth a pick up.

Prior to coming to the store, I had read that they were accepting pre-orders for the upcoming Nintendo Wii. I wasn't really planning on pre-ordering but I figured since I was there I might as well ask about it. According to this fella that I was talking to, they would be getting TONS of units. He specifically said that he had no idea where Engadget got the information that they only had 300 or so slots for preorders as he had not heard anything about it and had personally taken about 30 preorders that day before me. So I preordered one. The new control system looks interesting enough, the price was right, and I figured if they actually have a shortage of them in the beginning (although I kinda doubt this), I could keep an eye out on eBay prices and sell it if it was high enough to be worthwhile. ;-)

Halfway up the stairs to the second floor the wall is taken up by this prominent logo. This pic is just to show Erin's cousin that we were actually there. ;-p

Stepping out of the elevator on the second floor you're met with this view. A whole bunch of giant displays arranged cylindrically. The displays are pretty unique too. Not just the typical plasma or LCD monitor. Not sure what the heck these things are, they just look like a really thin display sandwiched between 2 pieces of plastic. The displays themselves looked nice but glare was terrible.

The second floor of the store is mostly clothing and accessories but the Gamecube section is up here as well. Off to the side is the little area where you can try out some of the Gamecube games. Only 3 seats is not really enough but oh well.

Anyway, I'll post the Apple Store pics a bit later...

After leaving Nintendo World we continued onwards to the Fifth Avenue Apple Store. The location is quite nice, situated in an open plaza surrounded by benches, tables and chairs where visitors can take a break from either shopping the length of Fifth Ave or ambling around Central Park. Unfortunately, knowing this, the entire sidewalk in front of the cube is lined up nose to nose with hot dog/pretzel/shish-ka-bob/refreshment vendors which spew a pretty impressive amount of smoke into the air around the glass cube. Apple's cleaning costs must be freakin' astronomical.

Constant stream of visitors even at 5 in the afternoon on a Sunday. And as been reported previously, the glass elevator, while looking pretty cool, seems to be also rather temperamental as it was once again, not open for public use.

The spiral stairway was rather nice too. Entering the store itself revealed, well, a typical Apple Store. Clean and simply laid out, it was larger than what I was expecting. Only difference I noticed is that they seem to have a bigger bag selection here than in the other stores I've been to.

I really like the design of the stairway/elevator structure as well as the open space around it. Think they did a very nice job. Now if they could only make the elevator a bit more reliable...

I could probably stand down in the store and look upwards all day. Especially with a nice sky.

Overall it definitely is the most impressive looking Apple Store that I've seen. A good amount of security around although I think someone can still chuck a rock at the glass cube and take off without being caught if they were fast enough. But they probably have tons of security cameras pointed at the thing too. Anyway, definitely worth a visit if you're in the city; I'm sure it's probably more of a tourist attraction than a computer store.

Despite the freakishly warm weather we've been having for the past month or so, fall is finally here.

This here is Reese, my parent's neighbor's lab. Whenever I visit my parents I'll usually take a bunch of pics of him if he happens to be out and about. Anyway, this one particular picture stunned me when I was going through my shots because of its unprocessed sharpness. The focus was dead on and it was spectacular. You can download the full-sized image here for a look-see. Converted from RAW without any post-processing. Damn, when this 300mm f/4 IS hits, it's one scary piece of glass.

I purchased the original Nintendo DS system when it was first released only to sell it a few months later to help pay for the subsequent Sony PSP system. It didn't help that back then there was only one game that I considered buying and even that one I wasn't particularly wedded to.

Now, almost 2 years later, I've jumped back on the bandwagon and picked up this Nintendo DS Lite - Onyx system. And talk about having to handle it with kid gloves, this thing's more of a fingerprint magnet than the black iPod and PSP! The highly reflective glossy black surface takes up the entire top and bottom casing. This is one item you'll want to store with a chamois cloth. =p Although I've found that the microfiber keyboard cover that comes with the Marware Protection Pack for MacBook works pretty darn well too.

At least the playing area doesn't have the same glossy characteristics. The D-pad was surprisingly not stiff upon first contact which was kinda weird cause you usually expect a few days breaking in period for those things. Despite its smaller size, I haven't found it to be too uncomfortable yet...

Compared to its older brother the DS Lite is definitely much more svelte, without the fat bottom look. The entire system is actually the same width as the top case of the original DS. Definitely takes care of my prior beef with the original DS in that there seemed to be too much open/unused space just lying around.

The one thing about the DS Lite that just absolutely crushes the old DS is the screen (or screens in this case). The original DS screens were rather dim and grainy which I thought was rather odd for a system released at the time. Especially when compared to the PSP that came out shortly afterwards, the DS screen was a joke. These new Lite systems fixes that problem completely. Not only are the screens brighter but they seem to be much more colorful as well. The Lite is what the DS system should have been to begin with 2 years ago when it comes to the hardware.

And the first thing I did after removing it from the box? Slap on screen protectors of course. I've been using these Brando Ultraclears for awhile now and they're highly recommended in my book. They make them for pretty much anything that has an LCD screen. They are a bit pricier than the ones you'll find at say Best Buy or whatnot and you have to wait longer for them since they ship from Hong Kong, but I've yet to see another brand that's as easy to use. These things are great!

Anyway, hopefully I'll hang on to this one longer than I did the original. I now have 3 games for it that I play on a regular basis, but only one that I would actually play in public. How sad is that. ;-p Somehow I feel uncomfortable playing a cooking game or calling to my imaginary dogs in public. Go figure. ;-p But, this thing won't be leaving the house until the hopefully spiffy case I just ordered for it comes in.

The news of my main hard drive death was partly mitigated that same evening by an email I received from Apple notifying me that my ordered MacBook Pro (MBP) was finally leaving the largest Commie nation in the world. A BTO unit with 15.4" glossy screen, 2.33Ghz Core 2 Duo Processor, 2GB RAM, DL-burning SuperDrive and hard drive bumped up to a 160GB 5400RPM job. I was pretty psyched to say the least.

I've generally had pretty good luck with shipping when it came to ordering from the online Apple store. Even though I pay just for regular shipping, my purchases arrive in what seems like FedEx 2-Day service. This time was no different. My MBP was picked up at 1:38 am on 10/30 and reached my front door at 8:57 am on 10/31. I was pretty stunned.

My mom's previous notebook, a Sony VGN-A130, gave up the ghost a few weeks back and I was tasked with either fixing it or just finding a new one for her. Since it was out of warranty and it wasn't the RAM or the HD that was causing the problem, having it sent back to Sony for repair would most likely have cost over $700. In light of that, I figured it made more sense to just get a new one.

For the price and specs that my mom had in mind, I decided on the Sony N series (VGN-N150P/B to be exact) which Gizmodo had done a brief writeup on, saying that it was Sony's stylistic ripoff of the MacBook. Maybe if you were half-blind and standing across the room from both units.

As previously mentioned, I had pre-ordered the Nintendo Wii many moons ago and since it's now the end of November, it was time to collect and flip it on eBay play.

Obtaining the unit was a story in itself as I think the Nintendo World Store here in NYC did a pretty bad job of handling preorders. It all started the Thursday of the week that the Wii was to be launched. I called up the store to ask when they'd be open on Sunday (launch day) cause I figured I'd just saunter in, pick up my preorder, and be on my merry way. Was informed that they would be opening at 8am but after I mentioned that I had a preorder, the guy also said that they'd be open at 6am for preorders.

6am? Uh, ok. Never one to shrink from really early mornings when it comes to gadgets, I dutifully got up at 5:30am Sunday morning and putzed around till 6 before giving the store a call to confirm that they were actually open. And they were, so we zipped into Manhattan; probably the easiest commute into NYC I've ever had. At the corner of 48th and 6th, I see the line. Now the Nintendo World Store is located basically smack dab inbetween 5th and 6th Avenues. The line that I saw stretched from the front door west towards 6th Ave, and then north to 49th Street. It probably went farther than that but I couldn't see around that corner. No problem I thought, I preordered! This line was for the pinheads who weren't prescient enough to do so.

So I found a parking spot on 48th between 6th and 7th Ave and we walked to the front where I looked around for an employee or somebody to ask what the deal was with preorders. The store was open, and there were a couple of non-employees within so I assumed it'd be a quick affair. WRONG. The first guy I spoke to had just gotten his Wii and he told me that even with a preorder, you had to wait in line. Are you f**kin' kidding me?!?! Apparently every so often an employee would make his way down the line to pull out preorder people. The guy suggested I just hang around near a break in the line (parking garage entrance) but I didn't want to look like I was cutting. Especially since the people near the front probably had been waiting there since the prior afternoon. After confirming with a store employee that I did indeed have to wait in line, we decided to just go home. It was relatively cold that morning and Erin wasn't dressed for an extended outdoor stay. I figured I'd just come back the following day before work and pick it up then. But still, what the hell's the point of preordering if you still have to line up a day before? They should have at least had a separate line for preorders.

So not being able to get my Wii on launch day wasn't particularly critical but Nintendo World should have been better organized. If I had preordered at a local store like Gamestop, they would've just called me to let me know the unit had arrived and I could just show up and get it. No waiting in a two-mile line crap. Anyway, I arrived back at the store Monday morning at around 9:30 (they opened at 9), and while there was no line outside the store (yet), there were already two lines in the store, one leading up to the first floor cashiers, and the other winding up to the second floor cashiers. And again, they weren't differentiating between preorders and joe schmoe. Good thing I showed up when I did cause they actually locked the doors about 10 minutes after and restarted the line outside. Took me about another 30-40 minutes waiting to get to the front and pick up my Wii (along with another Wiimote, a classic controller, and Zelda) but at least it was finally over. The Wii, despite it's diminutive size, comes in a rather hefty package. Not sure what the hell they crammed into this thing but it's no featherweight. Plus it didn't help that the bag they were using had string handles that were waaaaay too long.

So, was it worth it?

No, they're not just empty boxes I picked up from some game store. ;-p

Eventually I'll get rid of one. But which one...

With Erin down to her last week or so of pregnancy, we decided to take a trip into the city since it's supposedly good for the mother if she does a good amount of walking and/or stair climbing. Plus she had a hankering for Peking duck and we didn't know of a good restaurant in Jersey that had it. So away we went.

We typically walk from the World Trade Center to Chinatown and recently we've discovered somewhat of a shortcut through the city police headquarters building and courthouses. Outside one of the courthouses sits two pretty nice statues: one of a woman with a shield, and another of a woman with what I am assuming are rolls of laws.

They're pretty nicely done although not in a particularly prominent place, located on a non-entrance side of a building which is kinda strange.

So our first destination (since we had left home relatively late) was the Peking Duck House on Mott Street to grab some late lunch/early dinner. They've got some great duck and my family has been coming here since I was a wee lad. They weren't always in this location, originally a few buildings over and on the second floor and they weren't so classy looking either. But the duck has remained more or less the same. Unfortunately, they used to have great soup dumplings (siao lung bao) too but ever since they moved to their current location that hasn't been the case. Erin also likes taking home the duck carcass (you have to ask the waiter to wrap it up for you) and boiling it for an hour or two. Makes absolutely phenomenal soup. Just add soft tofu, cabbage and mushrooms. Great stuff.

Afterwards we headed up to Rockefeller Center cause I wanted to check out the downloadable demos at the Nintendo World Store (not as exciting as I had hoped; downloaded demos disappear once you turn off your DS). Realized that this probably wasn't the best of ideas since it was now Christmas season and the Rockefeller Christmas tree had just gone up last week. So, the entire area was packed to the brim with tourists and shoppers. Hell, the entire area between Times Square and Rockefeller was a nightmare.

The department store across 5th Ave from Rockefeller Plaza had these giant illuminated snowflakes on the entire facade of the building that would light up to music and stuff. I think they had a show every so often. This basically caused the entire section of 5th Ave between 48th and 49th Streets to be packed to the gills with people either staring at this building or trying to take a picture of the Christmas tree (the view from 5th Ave was the only way to see the star on top of the tree). I'm surprised we got out of that mass in one piece.

On the way up towards FAO Schwartz, thought I'd take a quick pic of the nice Atlas statue a block north of Rockefeller.

There was also a giant illuminated snowflake suspended above the intersection at 57th and 5th. First time I've seen that.