Home Brewing

Brewing beer is easy!

Joy of Home Brewing, by Charlie Papazian, is the 'bible' in beer brewery world. You should be able to borrow one from your local library. I checked our mine from our local library. What you really need is the first part--"how to" for the beginner.

To brew beer you need three things: 1. a bucket (keg), 2. malt extract, and 3. yeast. The process is simple: boiling the malt extract, wait for the temperature to cool down, add yeast, pour into the keg, then wait.

The secret to be successful is the sanitization process. Basically, you want to get rid of other bacterias except beer yeast. You don't need special sanitizer, home plain bleach is good enough. You have to water thoroughly to remove the bleach odor. Sanitize everything you will touch--the can opener, spoon, keg, pot... If you fail, most likely you did not sanitize well. Yet, don't worry, the failed beer is still drinkable and won't get you sick. (for the alcohol in the beer will kill bacterias) The taste is not pleasant, though.

Temperature is important, too, and autumn is a perfect season to brew ale.

There are a lot of information online, too. Check out http://www.beertown.org/homebrewing/

To start you first batch, you would like to use malt extract rather than to malt barley yourself. The malt extract is just "麦芽糖"+hops (for the bitterness in the beer). You can buy malt extract from local brewery store or on-line. Normally, the can comes with a bag of yeast.

I got my initial brewing accessories (keg ..etc), as well as malt extract cans, from Mr. Beer I chose it simply for the shape of the keg. There are many on-line suppliers. You can choose the one you like. You don't need bottles. Soda bottles will do. Recently, I found that there is no need for bottles at all. It is perfectly fine and tasteful to drink fresh ale from the keg directly. So, I omitted bottling lately.

唐德剛譯注的胡適口述自傳

搬家後，一箱箱的書都沒有好好整理，書架上的書也被文蕾擺得看似整齊，實則雜亂--小姐她是把書按大小高矮來放的。你若要找本書，要是不曉得她長得啥樣--高矮胖瘦--你就別想在那整齊的書架上覓得伊人芳蹤。

這不是嗎？我就在一本畫冊，及一本卜卦算命中間找到了唐德剛譯注的胡適口述自傳。

懂得看這本書的人，大多不是沖著適之先生的大名，而是想在唐德剛的注釋中找尋趣味。這算是本奇書了--注釋寫得比本文還多還好。這書記載著上下兩代留學生的思想，境遇，及其中千絲萬縷的關系。我站在書架前一翻，就又定住了。

這書現在大概也沒有幾人有興趣了--我兒子大概永遠也看不懂了。

信能格

建中三年中，我最难忘的老师有两位--高一的工艺老师信能格，及高二，高三的生物老师杨义贤。他们都是好老师，特立独行，都有自己的个性与脾气。建中是学生好，老师烂，他们是例外。

把信老师的工艺课比作高中生涯的震撼教育并不为过--那时大家刚考上建中，心中那股兴奋都在信老师的第一堂课后荡然无存。大块头，东北大嗓门，长得很像军中士官长，一进教室，无语，先左右扫视一遍，我心中已经不寒而慄；一开口，我简直开始后悔考上建中，他说，说得很慢，说的很响亮： “我，叫信能格，相信我，你就能及格！” 果不其然，高一课程中，最在同学们心中形成压迫感，最让人感到绝望，最让人花心思花精力，还不见得有回报，就是信老师的工艺课。在制图课中，我们画了无数的图，画好就“面呈”批阅，最常见的就是他哗啦一下，把图纸撕成两半，回去重画，回座时，还得忍受他的冷嘲热讽。问题是我的图那里不对了，我都不知道。我瞪着图纸，自己检讨，自己找可能的理由，再重画，再去信爷那试试运气。这过程很像我后来编程，完全是跟自己较劲。不同的是电脑仁慈多了，不会给你来个见缝插针，伤口上洒盐。

慢慢地，自己也摸索出规律，信爷也越来越少把我的图纸给“哗啦”了。一学期下来，我多年不治的粗心大意，居然就这样给治好了。有些同学进步不大，信老师都真的心狠手辣地给当了，而且当率颇高，血流成河，很多功课好的同学，全栽在工艺这科。这下子大家吓坏了，原来真的遇到了土匪头了，言而有信，动真格的，白刀进红刀出。一学期就这样过了。

到了下半学年，大家已经知道信爷不是吃素的，全都不敢不把工艺不当回事。每个人发了块长条木板，信老板发了话：“从这扁平木板给我搞出个三维立体的东西，什麽都可以。不及格的，补考时，一样给木板，一天内从木板给我兜出个圆球，可以直线滚十几公尺的，及格。” 这太可怕了。从此大家一到工艺课就又画设计图，又锯又切，又拼又凑，忙得很，潜力也激发出来了。期末时，大家的作品是花样百出，琳琅满目。我比较保守，做了把斧头，因为不用太多曲线。印象比较深刻的是有人做了把金庸小说碧血剑中金蛇郎君的金蛇剑，剑身如同书中所述，就如是一条蛇盘曲而成。我到今天都怀疑是捉刀作品，因为这把剑是期末时突然冒出来的。不过，剑主人好像是及格了。

当然有人不及格，补考时好像真的是兜圆球，但我实在不记得有没有人补考过关。按常理，我实在难想像有谁有本事补考能过居然会落得要补考。这不合逻辑。


生物杨老师的事另文再述。

My octagonal taboret

With many weekends' labors and sweats, my octagonal taboret is almost done, and Mother is extremely pleased by my work. Next steps would be adjusting, sanding and finishing. This taboret is purely done with hand tools. For that reason, some adjustments are required.

This was a good learning experience to me, particularly on the mortises and tenons cutting techniques. I use a mallet and a chisel for mortising. After experimenting few different ways, my mortise cutting technique, now, fixes on the Japanese woodworking tradition--start from the middle line of a mortise, and gradually work towards the edges of the mortises by cutting a thin slice each time. This technique produces a beautiful mortise that can't be made with other means.

My next project would be a float-top coffee table. It would be an art-and-crafts furniture, yet, I will finish it in different hues to achieve a modern atmosphere. The shape of the table looks like the following one.


from Thos. Moser

Lost Horizon

Lately, I ran into different utopias. Now, I am going to talk about Lost Horizon, by James Hilton.

The famous term, "Shangri-La" first appeared in the book "Lost Horizon." In the book, an airplane was hijacked, and four passengers were abducted to Shangri-La. Those four passengers , Conway, Barnard, Mallison and Miss Brinklow, represent four different characters: Conway represents widsom and logic; Mallison ethics and emotions; MissBrinklow, a missonery, religional zeal; and Barnard, a realistic aloofness and irresponsible attitude towards the society.

While Mallison tried to escape out from Shangri-La, and Barnard enjoyed hidding there, and Miss Brinklow zealously seeked to expand Christrian terrotory there, Conway, carrying a slacking attitude, actually found Shangri-La his true destination.

From the begining of the book, we learned that Conway eventually left Shangri-La and lost his memory, and he set out a journey to return to it after regaining his memory. The rest of the book is a back-tracking of what happenend in between. I am now at the two-third of the book and eager to find out how he left the Shangri-La and how he lost his memory.

Similar to Plato's Republic, Shangri-La is governed by a Philosopher King, albeit his title is High Lama. Like More's Utopia, Lost Horizon has many acute observations about our current society. Kind of cynical and kind of austere. The existence of Shagri-La is based on a pessimistic fore-vision on our society.

龔鵬程與經典

我本來對文學這玩意就比較感興趣，自然對藝文中人也比較注意。龔鵬程就是其中一位。

知道他初始是因為他的文章，再來是他主編的一套書“經典”。（高中時老跑一家書店看書兼喝水--學校旁有座永豐餘大樓，地下室有家很不錯的書店，飲水機的水夠冰涼，廁所乾凈，書味道很香，擺設的書也有水平，空間設計也高雅，我進去了就不想走了。在我心中，誠品都不如它。就在那書店中，我看了“經典”，也知道了鄭問。）

經典套書的設計很別致--書本尺寸不大，比掌中書略大，但比一般書小，可以放入口袋中。封面樸素典雅套米黃配楓紅，內文印刷精緻，導讀都寫得很好。重要的是價格不貴，我一個學生還負擔得起。（一本書70元，我把車費省下，一個月可以買一本。）經典這套書，我就這樣斷斷續續的買，實在沒法買的，就拼命在書店看，一直到我當兵時，手頭比較鬆了，才買得多。出國時，也把其中我喜愛的幾本飄洋過海地帶來。總之，經典一直沒有離開我；我也沒有忘了經典。（後來回國時，大約是書商為了賺錢，發現經典的本子變大了，變得有些臃腫，失去了本來的典雅，我失望之余，也就沒有再買餘下的冊子。）

喜愛經典，除了它的選本，它的設計，更因為龔鵬程寫的總序--

經典，就是經典。經典的存在與需要，不必有太多的理論來辯護。
。。。經典就是人心靈的故鄉，而當我們要與知識為友時，可能除了摩挲經典，尚友古人之外，也別無他途。歷史的煙塵與風霜，會消蝕一切生命；時代空茫與動蕩，徒然帶來無限悲涼，但在這其中所遺留下的人物典型與知識典范，卻永遠在歷史中發光，指引我們邁向真理之門。它對每個時代，每個人都有意義。而且，這種意義又不是單向的：就在每個人每個時代不斷含咀諷誦經典的過程中，經典的生命也在成長，其意蘊也愈發豐饒。出版，詮釋與閱讀的活動，正同時開顯了經典的意涵，也豐富了我們的心靈。。。。。

是啊，經典就是經典，讀就是了。


這是經典變肥變大後的樣子把劍俠傳弎字橫排移到紅色方塊內左上方，書本大約切齊方塊，大概有原來面貌。

Utopia

I am reading Thomas More's Utopia ( Penguin, 2003, translated by Paul Turner ).
The little book is very readable, and it provides lots of materials for thinking.

One would be surprised to realize that the modern society we are in today is not so different from the one More was in. Many social problems Raphael condemned still exist today, and there are still no good solutions yet.

One might argue that isn't Utopia intended for coping with those social problems? True, Utopia, through Raphael's mouth, was depicted as an ideal world, where Utopians live happily--short working hours, only 6 hours per day, few idle labors and life-long education. It is a society where money, gold and silver lose their values.

Yet, other descriptions about Utopia chill me--you need travel permission to travel, otherwise, it is a capital crime; "Everyone has any eye on you, so you are bound to do good work." In other words, Utopia is an ideal world because there is no need for prisons; on the other hand, it is the worst one since it itself is a whole prison.

The author does not take human natures-- love and hatred, happiness and sadness, sympathy and cruelness--into accounts, so I feel he is describing a world of ants rather than a world of people.

** By the way, the book demonstrates lots of debating skills. I learned a lot about them from the book.

** By the way, Utopia is a world without beers.

奇怪的基督長老教會

是什麽历史缘故，基督長老教會老是和陈水扁搞在一起？以前支持台独也就算了，那可以叫做反对当权，反对独裁, 虽然我并不同意老是以宗教为幌子而行政治之实。但是阿扁当权八年，为何屡见基督長老教會同他搅混？要劝他悔改也要等他入狱再做。更何况，他根本不会悔改，他是一个面对神都会骗的人。基督長老教會的行为难道不是变成只有立场，没有是非的民粹主义？那又岂是基督教导的道理？

斗志

小时候打乒乓球，教练每天耳提面命的强调“斗志”。打的差，但是一球都不放弃的队员还有时会被表扬。队员之间慢慢也有了比拼斗志的念头，尤其是我这种好胜心特别重，不服输的人，更是把斗志挂在心头，无论是多球训练打摆速，体能训练（长跑，折返，仰卧起坐，伏地挺身，蛙跳，冲楼梯），队内打循环，我都全力以赴，力争不是第一也要第二。训练到回家倒头就睡，第二天全身酸痛，下不了楼，我也倒退着慢慢下楼，强忍身体疼痛，心中揣着斗志，一样去训练。

我打球本来就反应敏捷，有了斗志，成绩更是不一样，很快就做队长。对内比赛，同龄第一，也常常胜高两级的队员；对外比赛成绩也好。

由于我日日早晚训练，受了伤，也以斗志为由强忍，後遗症也就如影随形。两年後，我右脚掌得了肌腱囊肿，後来开刀了事，球也就打不了了。唉，我小时候不明瞭斗志的真实内涵，无由断送我运动生涯。

跆拳道赛，苏丽文的作为是斗志的最高表现。苏丽文的高斗志生死战打法是明白她已到了运动生涯的顶峰，过了今天，没有明天，是破釜沉舟，是壮烈，是真情流露，是令人感动，可歌可泣，但不足为大多数人取。相较之下，刘翔的退赛是为长远计，是比较理智，正因为如此，刘翔的退赛方式太戏剧化，予人作戏之感。（我也认为是作戏。）

Hou Da La! 不亦快哉

看陳水扁，吳淑珍，陳致中如同過街老鼠，人人喊打，不亦快哉，是炎炎夏日的一道下酒菜。得嘞！浮一大白！Hou Da La!

病酒

古人喝酒講求群歡，視獨飲為傷身之舉。唯吾愛飲，尤好獨酌，其來有自。

幼時自個兒習詩背詞學文，詞境文意，不甚了了，大半不解，只是喜歡。唯獨對李白的月下獨酌，及蘇東坡的前赤壁賦，不但過目不忘，而且心領神會， 彷若前生已悉--詩境文意所描寫的廣寒寂寥以及看破之後而來豁達灑脫甚對余脾性。心向往之，口不停誦。心之所向，情之所感，每每令余擊桌而歌，大呼小叫，不能自已。人視我狂，焉能知吾心中事。

稍長，偷酒喫，將醉未醉，醺醺然，我舞零亂；飄飄然，如憑虛御風，未誦詩文，而有其效，從此病酒。

--On the day of home brewing the third batch.

要減肥哦

我好胖啊。

不知道是人到中年了還是在家工作的副作用，我，越來越胖--面上氣質全無，滿臉橫肉；身上肌肉沒有，全是肥肉。外在還是次要，主要是行動受到影響--上樓梯有些氣喘噓噓，割草有些體力不支--我的氣力都用來支撐自己的重量了。

要減肥哦！

My muse about life

One's life is a journey from his birth to his death. At any moment, the journey is shorter, and the final destination closer, albeit the person does not know when the journey will be over. Sometimes, it is better to travel than to arrive.

Sam Maloof and programming

As being a programmer, who always wants to promote programming as an aesthetic way about lives instead of as a pure engineering thing, I can't reject the association between programming and furniture making.

Turf War

Few people truly love lawn maintenance, and my dear neighbor is one of them. The rest, including me, do it for peer pressure--for being 'good neighbors.' I do it and hate it.

Turf war, on New Yorker, discusses this issue. Two notes from the article:

1. Sometimes, having guts is not enough. A 76-year old widow got hand-cuffed away for letting her lawn 'brown.'
2. Wild Ones is promoting 'Natural Plants, Natural Landscapes'. Hmm.. I love that slogan. Under that, there would be no more 'weeds', instead, they are 'natural plants.' A yard full of 'natural plants' has a 'natural landscape'. How nice it is!

音響桌

書房放了一臺音響，就放在地上，實在不好看，也不方便。我想自己做個桌子放音響。形狀約略為圖中桌形，但要矮些。

Cherry Console Table by Liza Wheeler

The purpose of life

Today, I pondered the following paragraph for a very long period of time.

"I told Chris the other night that Phaedrus spent his entire life pursuing a ghost. That was true. The ghost he pursued was the ghost that underlies all of technology, all of modern science, all of Western thought. It was the ghost of rationality itself. I told Chris that he found the ghost and that when he found it he trashed it good. I think in a figurative sense that is true. The things I hope to bring to light as we go along are some of the things he uncovered. Now the times are such that other may at last find them of value. No one then would see the ghost that Phaedrus pursued, but I think now that more and more people see it, or get glimpse of it in bad moments, a ghost which called itself rationality, but whose appearance is that of incoherence and meaninglessness, which causes the most normal of everyday acts to seem slightly mad because of their irrelevance to anything else. This is the ghost of normal everyday assumptions which declares that the ultimate purpose of life, which is to keep alive, is impossible, but that is the ultimate purpose of life anyway, so that great minds struggle to cure diseases so that people may live longer, but only mad men ask why. One lives longer in order that he may live longer. There is no other purpose. That is what the ghost says." from ZAMM p81

下午的一齣戲

听着陈明章的‘下午的一齣戲‘，回想起一段往事。

那是在夏天一个刚下过雷阵雨的傍晚，交大校园地上湿漉漉的，而我翘课躲在图书馆吹冷气看书。看小说看得是满眼金星，实在需要到外头走走。我趿着拖鞋就在计中旁信步乱走，突然在风中听到吉他伴着歌声时断时续，我下意识的往吉他声处走去。

一小圈人围着一个抱着吉他正弹着起劲的人。那人中等身材，其貌不扬，一身汗衫，短裤加拖鞋，标准交大学生装扮，只不过老了一点，又留着胡子。我猜大概是哪个苦读多年的博士班学生。他吉他弹得极好，歌声沙哑普通，但是在他吉他伴奏下散发出沧桑魔力，如梦似幻，把我迷住了。我看到有张海报写着一个我不熟悉的名字--陈明章。原来不是毕不了业的博士班学生，而是个走唱人。

这就是我初次邂逅陈明章。

Make our own boat

We just spent a very relaxing and fun weekend together with WangBo and XiaoJie's family: we BBQed, we camped (well, in the living room) , and we rowed in the paper boat we made and won the second place! Yes, we made a big paper boat and we rowed it on a lake! It was fun!



The past weekend was the 5th annual Howard County Boat Float contest. Wang's family invited us to join the contest. We were on the same team--the Lion Team. The contest was to make a boat with cardboards and duct tapes only, and to rowed the boat across a distance on the lake. Whoever rowed the fastest, made the most fabulous boat, or sinked in the most unthinkable way would be rewarded. See their website here: http://www.hocoboatfloat.com/

It was our first time and we had no experience at all. After a brief discussion, we decided to make a simple 'box-like' boat, which fits one or two people. Someone thought the shape of the boat is closer to a coffin than to a box. Anyway, a coffin is a box.

Wang Bo and I were responsible for making the boat; ladies for 'wrapping' it with a big plastic sheet to 'seal' the boat. From the beginning of the boat making, we told the differences between neat girls and lousy boys. Wang and I initially just wanted to put a girl as a model on a flat cardboard sheet and lousily folded the paper around the model to form the shape of the boat. That idea was quickly overthrown by girls. Girls like neat things and straight lines are among them. So be it. We boys made a so-called neat boat by following girls' orders; girls wrapped the boat like a gift. By far, no one knew if the good-looking boat would sustain the moment of testing--being afloat beyond the distance to row.

One of our competitors made a very solid and beautifully aerodynamic-shaped boat that was basically covered by tapes. Among these two, whose boat would be more buoyant?

The moment of the truth finally came. Initially, we boys tended to be as heroic as possible by being the sailors. Soon, we discarded the heroic idea as a bystander left us a comment--"that would interesting!" after he peeked inside the boat and glanced over us, the sailors to be. My interpretation was "that would be interesting to see how two over-sized men, crowded in a tiny paper boat, tried to vainly rescue themselves from the inevitable fate." Instead, as being shown repeatedly in history, our ladies, as legend heroines, came to our rescues. They volunteered to be the sailors for being physically smaller and for being more agile.

Yet, our heroines did not have a good start for the flaw of the boat design. The bottom of the boat was too narrow, and the sides of the boat were not strong enough to resist water pressures. For that, our heroines got overthrown instantly out from the boat and Wenlei got injured.

"Never giving up" was the spirit behind of this contest, and we are the faithful followers of the spirit. Our remaining heroine, Xiao Jie, tried again alone. This time, she succeeded! She had a perfect sense of balance and used it beautifully while rowing the boat. She managed to keep the boat aloft from the start point till the destination. That was truly heroic!

Finally, we got the second place in the contest! It was fun to put theory into practice, and it is the contest I want to attend next year!

(Thank you for reading the whole article. By the way, don't blame me if I 'forgot' to mention that there were only two teams in our class.)

余秋雨是人嗎？

我看了余秋雨的這篇文章。通篇胡說八道， 整個一個偽善， 加”死道友不死貧道“的語氣。我開始有"他還是個人嗎？“的疑問了。

• “确实很难快速腾出手来处理已经倒塌的校舍建筑质量的法律问题” 法院應不是救災單位，怎么就不能展開調查？

• ”你们所遭遇的丧子之痛，全国人民都感同身受。十三亿人在同一时间全部肃立，默哀三分钟，这肯定是人类历史上最浩大、最隆重的悼念仪式。悼念对象，就有 你们的孩子。在全国哀悼日，一位佛学大师对我说，有十几亿人护持，这些往生者全都成了菩萨，会一直佑护中国。我想，你们的孩子如果九天有灵，也一定已经安 宁。“ 的潛意思是說“已經那么多人為你孩子哀悼了， 夠意思了，就別鬧了。”

• “一些对中国人历来不怀好意的人，正天天等着我们做错一点什么呢。“ 你是說別丟人現眼？

立此存照

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_46e94efe01009iom.html

余秋雨

　　昨天从海外一些媒体看到，灾区一些家长捧着遇难子女的照片请愿，要求通过法律诉讼来惩处一些造成房屋倒塌的学校领导和承包商。从画面上看得出，警察们 正用温和的方式劝解，但家长们情绪激烈。由此，那些已经很长时间找不到反华借口的媒体又开始进行反华宣传了，诬陷性的说法有四点：

　　1、 是天灾，更是人祸；

　　2、 官方宣布，这事法院不受理；

　　3、 五个境外记者拍摄这种场面时被公安“短时间拘留”，询问他们的身份；

　　4、 难道地震真使中国民主了吗？

　　为此，我要含泪向这些请愿灾民作如下劝告——

　　你们所遭遇的丧子之痛，全国人民都感同身受。十三亿人在同一时间全部肃立，默哀三分钟，这肯定是人类历史上最浩大、最隆重的悼念仪式。悼念对象，就有 你们的孩子。在全国哀悼日，一位佛学大师对我说，有十几亿人护持，这些往生者全都成了菩萨，会一直佑护中国。我想，你们的孩子如果九天有灵，也一定已经安 宁。

　　校舍建造的质量，当然必须追究，那些偷工减料的建筑承包商和其他责任者，必须受到法律严惩。我现在想不出在目前这种情况下，还会有什么机构胆敢包庇这些人。你们请愿所说的话，其实早已是各级政府和广大民众的决心。但是，这需要有一个过程。

　　因为，无论怎么说，这次大灾难主要还是天灾。当然也有未倒的房屋、幸存的学校，但这有多方面的因素，不能仅仅从一个角度来论定。已经有好几位国际地震专家说，地震到了七点八级，理论上一切房屋都会倒塌，除非有特殊原因，而这次四川，是八级！

　　有了这个主因，再要论定房屋倒塌的其他原因，就麻烦得多了，需要有较长时间的科学检测和辩论，而且要经得起国际同等级的灾测比照。我希望有关方面能在 搜救生命、挖掘遗体之后尽力保护校舍倒塌的实物证据，以便今后进行司法技术调查。但在目前，不能急躁，因为还有更危急的事。

　　堰塞湖的问题是悬在几十万人头上的凶剑，卫生防疫问题也急不可待，灾区上上下下所有的力量还在气喘吁吁地忙于救灾，人口大幅度流动，一切都处于临时状 态，因此，确实很难快速腾出手来处理已经倒塌的校舍建筑质量的法律问题。我想，你们一定是识大体、明大理的人，先让大家把最危急的关及几十万、几百万活着 的人的安全问题解决了，怎么样？

　　你们受灾以来的杰出表现，已经为整个中华民族赢来了最高尊严。你们一定不会否认，这些天来，无论是中国的各级政府、军队、武警、医生，还是全国各地和 世界各国的救援者、志愿者都尽心尽力、令人感动。只有当这些里里外外的多重力量不受干扰地集合在一起，才能把今后十分艰巨的任务一步步完成。因此，你们要 做的是以主人的身份使这种动人的气氛保持下去，避免横生枝节。一些对中国人历来不怀好意的人，正天天等着我们做错一点什么呢。

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_46e94efe01009iom.html