Yum yum yum

I was pretty excited about installing and booting up EC2 instance of my own.  It really was a painless process where you just have to click on couple of buttons on AWS management console.  The power of cloud was within my reach and I was salivating when I typed in http://[elastic ip-address of my EC2 instance] in the browser.

Wait, something has gone wrong.  Terribly terribly wrong.

Instead of apache introduction page, I was greeted with unable to connect error page.  

Oh what a horror.  I felt sick from the bottom of my stomach.  The illusion of magic has been washed down the drain and I was left with naked error page that felt cold in bitter space of nothingness.

Lesson for people who just started their first EC2 instance: Their is no magic.  You still have to say the magic words yourself.  Luckily commands for linux system actually sound quite like arcane magic.  In order to get your LAMP server going, the magic word you have to utter is: YUM.

yum install httpd
yum install php
yum install mysql-server mysql

Type in above magic phrases to install apache, php and mysql on your EC2 instances.  Then finally utter below words to complete your magic spell:

service httpd start
service mysqld start

Now you can point your favorite browser to http://[elastic ip-address for EC2 browser] and marvel at the apache welcome page!  Cloud is a beautiful thing. *tears* 

You may notice that httpd service does not start automatically when you reboot your EC2 instance, which can be annoying since you have to start httpd manually every time you reboot it.  So when you are in the mood for some more magic casting, say below words:

chkconfig httpd --add
chkconfig httpd on --level 35

Then when you restart your EC2 instance, apache welcome page will greet you happily ever after~ =)

Yum yum yum 

New look. New mission.

I thought I would resurrect my old tumblr blog from its dusty grave and give it some new sprinkle of life.  I would design my own skin for it someday but I chose very simple design from tumblr’s free theme library for now.  

If you haven’t noticed, I am going through various turmoils in my professional and personal lives.  I feel like I am being washed away in the angry ocean and I can do nothing but wonder where I will end up?

Looks like my contractor job will come to en end pretty soon (Sad it would not last short 6 months extension that I signed earlier this March).  I held the job since I moved to Seoul, Korea and it helped me and my family through tough times.  I enjoyed people I worked with and BAE Systems is one of the best company I worked for.

I wish I can stay with the company longer but looks like its contract will be terminated prematurely soon.  I am still hoping something will come up and maybe I can take other contractor job in Seoul but its outlook looks bleak.

I hate the feeling that I am not in control of my life…

I am not worried about money too much, I feel I can live like a hobo and still can enjoy my life.  Laptop, pair of earphones and a cup of coffee in a local coffee shop is all I need to feel happy.  Maybe same is not true for my family but I am hoping they can cope with the change well too (maybe I am not being responsible? I am a big believer that being happy with material goods is not real happiness).

So I decided to start new mission: finding my own work and working for myself.  It doesn’t mean I will quit my day job (whatever it will be) but I want to have some consistency in my life.  When I say consistency, I don’t mean constant paycheck.  I mean something that I can pursue on my own and I can lead to wherever I can take it to.  I think I would use my blog to share my voyage with the world and to make sense of everything I come across in my pursuit.

I don’t think I can do it all by myself and I am hoping I can collaborate with my friends but I need to learn to be a self starter first.

New look.  New mission.  Same old me.  

Hopefully this recipe will work out great!

T-Mac cannot find a job

Let me be honest up front.  I am biased toward T-Mac, my favorite player since his Magic days.  But I will try to find some objective ground to defend my point.

Seems like everyone talks about how washed up he is and if he is worth the minimum wage.  People are so fast to step all over someone when they are down in sports, it is truly disturbing to watch.

Let’s compare some numbers. 

Kyle Lowry who is a back up PG in Houston just got 4 years $24 million dollar contract from Houston and Red94 cannot stop praising this guy.

Let’s look at his stat in 09-10 season compare to T-Mac’s short stunt in NY:

• PPG: T-Mac 9.4 vs Lowry 9.1
• MPG: T-Mac 26.1 vs Lowry 24.3
• FG %: T-Mac 0.389 vs Lowry 0.397
• FT %: T-Mac 0.754 vs Lowry 0.827
• RPG: T-Mac 3.7 vs Lowry 3.6
• APG: T-Mac 3.9 vs Lowry 4.5

There are more statistical categories but the point I am trying to make is T-Mac in his so-called ”washed up” form did just as well as Kyle Lowry.  Both teams played at a fast pace last season as Houston was trying to run in the absence of Yao Ming and NY is coached by re-inventor of gun-and-run offence so their numbers are comparable without having to adjust for the pace of the game.

Looking at the statistic, they are statistically even in my opinion. 

Now if we get into this hypothetical debate about whether T-Mac will have his athleticism back next season as he is rehabbing from his knee surgery and assume he cannot be slower than last season, above T-Mac stat is worst he can do next season. 

Kyle Lowry had no injury problem and probably is just reaching his prime.  If his statistic is identical to washed up T-Mac, does that mean Kyle Lowry is not that good or washed up T-Mac is still as good as him?

I think neither.  It just proves T-Mac is still a decent player who produces comparable statistic as someone who just signed for $24 million dollar contract.

I just think people are so eager to blindly put the player down when they have a bad year.  They make T-Mac sound like he is so bad that he should retire right now. 

I guess that’s the lesson of this digital age.  Be hesitatnt to accept the collective opinion of people as they usually have a little truth in them especially on internet.  If you want to know something, it is up to you to dig up the truth.

Now can someone give T-Mac a contract so he can prove people wrong?

Home sweet home~

Deep down inside me, there is a desire to have a place I can call home. 

No more moving from one small studio room to another studio, sleeping on a cheap bed and eating a dinner on a lap.  Appeal of owning a house is not about having an asset that will appreciate in time but rather it’s about transforming a finite place to suit me, to show my character.

Life seems fake when I know everything I have now is temporary.  My cheap and tiny frying pan.  Small bed that I bought from used furniture store.  They are mine but it’s not really mine in a sense I don’t expect to keep them for any longer than couple of years. 

Everything around me reminds me that this isn’t a home. 

Someone asked me few days ago if I am saving regularly, putting my money in the savings account or investing in a stock.  I answered “no”.  But then I thought it would be misleading to leave it at “no” so I explained I meant “No, I don’t save money for the sake of having more money.  And I don’t have a clear goal that I want to save for.”

So is owning a place that I can call home a worthy goal?

If aliens came to earth and decided to study earthlings and somehow picked me for a lengthy observation.  I bet they they would think that my main residence is my work.  I spend most of my usable day time at work for 9 hours from 8 am to 5 pm with an hour lunch break.  I use all my morning hour to prepare to go to work.  I go to sleep around 10 pm or 11 pm so I can wake up early in the morning to go to work.  Also getting stuck in the traffic for commuting back and forth should really count as working too.  So really, the quality time I can spend at home shrinks down to mere couple of hours. 

Most of the time, I don’t usually go straight home after work anyway.  I go out for dinner, watch movie, go to library, go shopping, go to gym or just hangout with people.  Even if I had a place of my own, daily schedule will still remain the same.  We don’t spend much time in a place we call home.

Work is new home.

It’s a rather depressing revelation.  We are overworking ourselves in the busy  modern life that we leave no time for actually having a place that we can call home.

Remember when we were kids, we always wanted to get out of house to play?  Now we are all grown up but we are stuck at work from 8 to 5 and still wanting to get out to play.

Confession

Thank you.

For every passing moment that you have spent with me.

Thank you.

For smiling back at me when our eyes met.

Thank you.

For telling me your stories and thoughts.

Thank you.

For making me feel home even in a distant land.

Thank you.

For making me realize life is more vibrant when I am with you.

This is my love confession to you.

I will never forget the trip to Jeju with you.

Yours truly.