WWAN, Why You Should Not Use It

I now can tell you first hand why you should avoid WWAN, also known as 3G broadband, mobile broadband and the like. It is awsome… in theory. It is awesome…. when it works. But as it only works 50-60% of the time the monthly fee of “woah-you-pay-THAT-for-broadband” starts to scare you more than that creature that lives under your bathroom sink.

Pizza Dreams

It's a warm summers day. The weather is too good for anything but a cold beer at a street corner café. As I drink the first gulps of my beer I realize that a friend from school sits next to me and looks out over the traffic. Not only is it odd to see him but he also drinks a beer which is unusual since he is a teetotaler. Not knowing what to say I continue drinking my beer and watch the cars pass by. My friends reaction to his encounter with alcohol results in him throwing a piece of cheese into the traffic. I've seen much worse things happening to people as a result of alcohol but disturbingly the car, avoiding the piece of cheese, skids up the pavement and hits a man leaning against the wall. I am not certain of what happened and I cannot remember what happened to the poor guy. I vaguely recall that he was already dead before the car hit him.

Painkillers

At the local pharmacy.

Me: Hi, I would like some Ipren (a brand of ibuprofen [iso-butyl-propanoic-phenolic acid]).

Pharmacist: Have you tried it before?

Of course I have tried painkillers before, I'm 21... surely at some point during that time I've must have been in some sort of pain. Tempted to say: "No, does it hurt?" I pushed away that very amusing thought and said...

Heard @ the Airport

Airport security: Is this your jacket, sir?

Me: Yes, it's mine.

Airport security: Please follow me, sir.

I followed the security person on my socks, since other security personnel were busy examining my shoes for shoebombs or if the smell could be lethal (which wouldn't suprise me at all).

Airport security: We saw something strange on the x-ray, sir.

Me: Ok...

The security person felt my jacket for bumps and found one and suddenly...

Airport security: What's this?!

I opened the inside pocket of the jacket and showed him my cardholder.

Me: It's a cardholder.

Airport security: What do you use it for?

Me: I store credit cards in it.

I opened the cardholder to show him the cards. He took one out (to test it for sharpness?) and soon put it back, a little disappointed that I wasn't one of those bad guys he'd seen in the movies as a little boy.

Airport security: Ok, that's fine. You can go, sir.

Sure I could have killed someone with my VISA that day, but lucky for the cabin crew I didn't feel like it (busy vomiting in a brown paper bag).

Killing Spree

I had him cornered now. Lying awake I had been planning my revenge; each and every move. A faint light from the window from the rising sun and you could see him feeling the walls for a way out. His shadow was dancing on the walls. A last macabre dance. I chose my moment carefully. Not too quickly, as to prevent him from getting a chance to escape, and not too slowly so that he would not get his hopes up. He sensed the tension and froze. I smacked my hand against the wall. Mosquitoes versus Ruben, 0-1. I went back to bed.

Wednesday Afternoon

Initiator proteins. Helicase. Some protein keeping DNA strands apart. DNA polymerase. Oh, end of lesson. Not raining anymore. Took the bus here so have to take the bus home as well. Wow, that's a lot of people waiting for the bus. Poor girl, that laughter is a turn off. Have a lot of embryology to read when I get home. Embryology. Wonder how many points that is in scrabble. Why do I care I haven't played scrabble for ages. Finally, the bus arrives. Got to look cool while pressing the bus card against the stupid reader. Come on read the stupid card! No place to sit. Just got to stand up for 20 minutes. Wow, the chauffeur is really stressed now. Impressive taking that turn at that speed. Maybe his reckless driving will cause a crash and I have to save them all with basic life support. Cool. With loads of Hollywood-like explosions and people crying. Dammit, that was my stop. Have to walk a bit then. Hmm, what should I have for dinner. Chicken with rice, chicken with pasta or chicken with bread. No wait, I have fish as well. Chicken with fish, that's it.

For Every Cigarette, There’s Nicorette

Update on my life: I live, I eat, I study, my immune system takes a nap and forgets to tell me it's invited streptococcus pyogenes but I found out anyhow because they had a big friggin' party in my throat and now I have to clean it up with penicillin.

And oh, the heading refers to the ad campaign they're currently running on the pharmacies in Odense. My father, working for McNeil, that makes Nicorette, will be so happy.

Wild Nights in Odense

No, I haven't actually been out partying much. Mostly because I'm not a party person, and second the first weeks have been quite hard, in terms of studying. Organic chemistry has never been my strongest side. In fact I found a way to get around the hard organic chemistry questions on the final exams (you simply choose kinetics, equilibrium or something else fun). But now I cannot escape, so it seems I have to put a little more effort into my reading.

The title then refers to my stay at Danhostel in the centre of Odense. And with centre I mean next to the central station. Actually Östre Stationsvej seems to be one of the most favoured routes by ambulances, police and firetrucks. So my nights were calm (and sleepless) but some other people surely had a lot of action. What's good is that I now can sleep through almost anything. I'm off to celebrate my sisters 18th birthday but you can see some Norweigian humour about their Danish language. Hilarious if you're not from Denmark.

First Day at SDU

My first day at medical school is over. Or not really, I still have 3 essays on Hypermobiltas articulorum to read. Yes, from now on I will show off my latin skillz (like I had any) whenever I get the chance. Interesting day though; I started the day by coming late to my first lecture (which was more of a morale boosting welcome "yes you can"), then a small discussion two and two, to get to know each other. We were then introduced to the task ahead (write a five page essay together [groups of 4-5 this time) based on the articles on Hypermobilitas articulorum). I am sure we will complete our task with merit. Then the tour, ending with body parts in formalin followed by lunch. Tasty curry chicken sandwich, fruit and water. More discussion and explanation and that was about it.
Tomorrow we'll have a real lecture on Life, Health and Disease (very roughly translated) and very much can be brought up within those loose boundaries. Still, we are a few who really look forward to real lectures (although in Danish) so it should be fun.
Hopefully you can see pictures of my recently bought books (Essential Cell Biology, Cellular Physiology, First Aid and Documenta Physiologica) and my anatomy study cards. There is also an arty view from my window. When I get a real internet connection (in 2 weeks) I will post the full size ones.

I Do Not Know Anything About Companies but…

… isn't it strange that Sony Ericsson will fire 2 000 people although the company didn't do as bad as predicted in the fourth quarter 2008? What's even more disturbing is that Posten (Swedish Post) is charging one more SEK for every letter you send, while the CEO of Posten earns 900 000 SEK a month (~€83 211, £77 832 or $107 759). Last year Volvo fired 4 000 people but the CEO still rewards himself with 1.8 million SEK a month (~€166 423, £155 665 or $215 518). Skånetrafiken (responsible for public transport in southern Sweden) has increased prices by 2 SEK per trip (about 240 SEK more for my occasional trips but much more for commuters). Isn't that stupid to do since it's less expensive to take the car, thus polluting the air, thus contributing to global warming, and then the Earth explodes and we all die?

Something tells me they got it right in the East: Toyota cut the annual bonus of the 10 000 bosses in the company by 10% and reducing production in their luxury daughter company Lexus. Samsung will survive this economy crisis by cutting bosses wages with 20% and re-structure the company into two separate parts.

Why make the rich richer? How much is a CEO's work really worth? Aren't football players a bit overpaid too? And how much would you pay me to see me kick a leather ball in fishing net attached to white poles? Huh?!

17 Days till Lift Off

No, I am not going to be the first person in space (I am apparently 48 years too late). The metaphorical rocket I am writing about is going to somewhere a lot smaller than space, somewhere they speak a language resembling Swedish spoken with a swollen tongue and severe toothache, somewhere my money is worth much less: Denmark. Actually I am very excited about studying in Denmark. There will be cultural and language complications of course but I will finally have a life (get a life they told me but who's laughing now)!
This means I will have considerably less time to blog and I will probably rant more about dead bodies, blood and all the diseases I will discover I am suffering from. But don't worry I will definitely squeeze in some more photo tutorials and other stuff. As you might have noticed I have been very interested in photography lately and my interest will increase when I finally buy a D-SLR this summer. The reason I don't buy one now is simply that the D-SLR will act as bait and I will reward myself with it if I pass this year's exams!
In order to have something reoccurring to blog about I am going to use my other big interest: music. Each month I will post a song and a brief explanation of why this song is important to me. In the end of 2009 I will have posted 12 songs and maybe you can vote for your favourite. I haven't really thought this through but I am very excited.
Next up: How to take photographs of the moon… with a compact!

Bad Ideas and Nightmares

This whole post is a response to something Dror Feiler, an Israeli Swede, said while discussing the concept of punk on Swedish radio. Despite being a middle-aged man, he is a proper punk himself, or maybe rebel is a better word. His best idea and dream is peace between Israel and Palestine. He uses some unconventional methods to say the least. Still I will choose to discuss the worst of his ideas, and what implications it has:

I believe that we should not be able to own anything. We should not even be able to "own" a relationship (no man can be someone's husband and no woman can be someone's wife).

I feel the world tremble as illegal downloaders jump with excitement. The above is not a quote and it is translated from Swedish to English. The idea is communist without a doubt, and it will not work… ever. The real problem is that it does not even work in theory. There cannot be a society where nothing can be owned. A whole legal system would collapse. For instance, how do you define theft? If I see a BMW that I know nobody owns I could just take it. A person who also wants it could kill me (can I own the right to live?) and take the car. Chaos.

I got really angry at the first statement but then Dror Feiler continued with a real life example where they had tried this. Somewhere on Earth a group of people put all their watches in a basket. Then they all picked a watch from the basket and got stuck with it. Amazing, but wait. Didn't they just trade their own watch for another (which I suspect they didn't like)? Trade: You give something you own in return for something else. If they didn't like their new watch could they go to someone with a watch they like and trade again? After endless watch swapping would everyone end up with the same watch they had in the first place? Probably yes.

Modern humans (well since forever) define themselves by what they own: The clothes we wear, the amount of money we own and the property we own. This creates class differences (which communists don't like but from which we cannot escape) and it has always been this way. For many years it has been about land, the more you own the better. The Roman and British Empires are examples of this and in the animal world the owning of big pieces of land is sometimes essential for survival.

High on some hippie drug, Dror Feiler, thinks that humans should do something that has never been seen before: create a community where nothing can be owned, where everyone is the same, where no one has the right to choose and where any present swingers club will look like Sunday church. I hear the lions roaring with laughter.

I'm Not a Geek

In a response to Pont's latest blogpost, I am not a geek. So, to prove it I have to postpone my Vista slipstream special and post some more photos. I tried to come up with a story based on a ridiculous claim by a Israeli Communist speaking on Swedish radio: "There should be no ownership". Great idea, nuthead. Redefine "theft", please. Maybe I will discuss this in a later post, first VAIO Photo Elite. 

I have brought this up before, and I cannot stop thinking about how sweet a Sony Alpha 900 would be (only one left to win now) so I keep posting photos every week hoping that quantity will solve my lack in quality. All editing done in Paint.NET, (the first image is a HDR and was merged by Photomatix Pro 3.0) by the way, so now you know what you can do (and should not do).

How to Spot a Desperate Salesperson

You are shopping around casually when suddenly you are confronted by a salesperson. You are not really interested in what s/he has to offer but s/he seems so nice, and the product actually makes some sense when the salesperson is talking about it. You buy it, overpriced of course and with an extra insurance, because you can never be too careful, and using the product for the first time you know you have been swindled. No, don't feel bad. We have all been there and here is what you should watch for the next time:

• "I actually have one of these at home and I haven't had any problems with it" There are variations on this line (my wife/husband/best friend etc), but basically what they want you to think is that you "know" someone who "owns" this product and is very happy with it. The naïve part of you wants to believe it, and you will be more likely to buy the product.
  
• "This is one of the most sold items" A total irrelevant remark but the line implies that the product is "popular" and that the "majority" of the people choose to buy this product. Why should you deviate from the majority?
  
• "This product will be 100% compatible with future standards" I wonder if those who bought HD-DVD players agree with that statement today. Nothing is 100% compatible with future standards.
  
• "You are lucky, we have one left in stock" A statement that wants you to think that the product is popular and because there is just one left you should probably buy it now, before someone else does. A little tip: If it really is popular other stores will have this product, and there will probably be future shipments. No need to be hasty.
  
• My last tip is: Salespersons never "small talk", when they talk about the weather or compliment your taste they are trying to be "friendly", i.e. to manipulate you. Chances are you will buy the product from a "friend" and not from a stranger.
  

To know if a product is good use sites like pricerunner.com, kelkoo.com, prisjakt.nu (link to the right), etc. and read customer reviews (or CNET reviews). The problem with reviews in magazines is that they usually recite specs, which is not as interesting to a potential buyer as a pro and con list of the product. The last tip in this post is: It is always cheaper on the internet and cheapest in Germany.

VAIO Photo Elite Contest

Readers who don't check out my twitter messages (to the right) will not know that I've entered the VAIO Photo Elite competition on Club VAIO's website. But now you know. The rules are simple: since VAIO is celebrating their 10th anniversary you should upload a picture that describes the recent ten years of your life. Feel free to upload as many photos you like. It should also contain the VAIO logo somehow. And, oh... don't forget that the photo(s) should have something to do with celebration. Right. And who decides who will win? I guess I’ll find that one out.

 Just to check out the competition I entered the gallery and looked at some of the "elite" photos already uploaded. Most of them were rubbish, futile attempts to paste a VAIO computer into sunsets, under the paws of puppies, in citrus trees… and so on. Most of the photos did not meet the above criteria so I decided to just upload some of my favourite photos.

 So why are there so many desperate attempts to win? Anyone know of Sony’s Alpha series? Two (very) lucky winners will win a Sony Alpha 900, a digital SLR camera with a whopping 24.6 Megapixels, a specially built CMOS sensor and it can take 5 pictures per second. Wow. And that’s why I have uploaded not less than 10 pictures so far. There are also 6 Sony DSC-H10, with 8.1 Megapixels and 10x optical zoom, which you can win.  

 But since most of the competitors are from Germany, there is a quite good chance that the winners will be able to take better pictures of sausages than before. But I won’t give up since 5 of my photos have been in the Hall of Fame (Top 30) and thrown out of there. Nevertheless, here are some of my photos, including the Tassi (cat) versus VAIO photo shot!

When You Cannot Sleep

Sometimes I go to bed without falling asleep and spend the time thinking for one or two hours. Not only is it frustrating but the thoughts I have are as irritating as the question "What is the meaning of life?" So I've decided to post a list of things I think about when I cannot sleep:

• If there is no spoon, in the movie Matrix, why are there buildings, pavement, and stairs in the way? Shouldn't Neo be able to realize that these material things do not exist in the Matrix? If Neo could see that there is no spoon, he should be able to travel through the floors like the twins in Matrix Reloaded.
  
• First the ratio between the width and the height of a TV screen was 4:3 now it is 16:9 (4²:3²). Will future TV sets have the dimensions 64:27 (4³:3³)?
• Steven Wright once said that "Dancing is a vertical expression of a horizontal desire". Does that mean that dancers are better in bed? Or do they just want it more than others?
  
• Would I sleep better if I untangled myself from this bubble wrap and put my pajama back on?
  

(I bet you cannot sleep now, huh?)

In the Supermarket

Today I decided to do my shopping in Mästerlivs. It is a supermarket but it has range of unusual provisions which you are not likely to find in any other supermarket. Unfortunately they apparently lack some common provisions, like raisins. This is a translated conversation between me and one of their employees (obviously not of the month):

• Excuse me, where do you have the raisins?
  
• They are on the shelf to the right of you, waist high.
  
• That's dried plumes.
  
• That's the only kind of raisins we have.
  
• Ok (interested and a little scared). Do you have… dried grapes?
  
• We have dried fruit over there (pointing to the fruit section).
  
• Ok. Thank you. (I paid for the rest and got the hell out of there)
  

Tomorrow I will hand in my CV to Mästerlivs with an added ability: "Can distinguish between raisins and dried prunes."

Odd One Out

On my way home from my morning run I realized I wasn't going blind. There, on a bench, an older woman dressed in pink was sucking on a dummy. Her dog was as impassive as its giant wannabe-baby owner. My first thought was: Poor woman. My second thought was: Do I smell bacon? And my third thought was: Help! This is one of the kinds of people I will help as a future doctor.

On my final sprint I told myself to calm down. I don't have to think of this now; they will certainly teach me how to interact with people like her in medical school. With a pulse of 190 BPM and panting like a dog with a hyperactivity disorder, I felt completely calm: No need to plan for tomorrow when you can't. Or that's what I told my imaginary girlfriend when she told me she was pregnant.

Internet: Freedom of Speech or Loss of Etiquette?

Internet has without a doubt given normal people (with access to a computer and internet) the chance to express ourselves freely on the net. This blog is, in fact, one of the best examples I can think of. But YouTube is of course another brilliant example. On YouTube you are not only limited to words and pictures but can air thoughts and feelings through the medium of video. To be frank, not every person out there is a video persona. I have seen some creepy videos out there, but never have I had the urge to spat out something like "Idiot" or "You need help, you psycho" - like the majority of YouTube visitors seem to have.

So why is it that when we are left with an opportunity to say something useful we revert back into 6^th graders bullying other kids. Well, it is quite easy to write obscenities in the comment section when all you have left behind is a cryptic nickname like HitMan26 or MisterDonkey87. My mind first wanted to correlate these internet comments with prank calls, which gives you a similar anonymity, but prank calls are just jokes while a comment like "Idiot" or "Take off your clothes and have sex" (which was a recent comment to a video of two girls pretending to be Sarah Palin's daughter and her friend) are just… preposterous.

So that's it then; when we are faced with an opportunity to choose a new internet personality we choose the identity of the bully and know-it-all with a my-dick-is-so-small-and-I-haven't-got-some-in-ages complex so deeply rooted that not even the brightest psychiatrist could help this poor SOB. I sincerely hope that dictatorship is not the answer to this misuse of free speech. (But if it is the only way out I would like to apply for the job as a dictator or mad scientist, please get back to me @: ruben.la.clae+dictator@gmail.com)

More Cars on the Road, Less Competent Drivers

I recently read in Time magazine that roundabouts are becoming a huge success in the US. They have approximately 1000 roundabouts over there. I know at least 10 roundabouts in the city Helsingborg, where I live. 

I am forced to idle thus forced to kill the Earth

I really understand the popularity of the roundabout; it is time efficient (no idling), good for the environment (no idling) and sometimes they are even pretty, decorated with ornaments and the occasional roundabout dog (Swedes had a tradition of putting a dog in the center of the roundabout, not a real one obviously). So far so good.

But what is the point of having a roundabout if people cannot show where they are going. Yes, I am speaking of something as fundamental as an indicator. By turning on your indicator just before exiting the roundabout you can inform people that you are on your way out thus leaving space for other vehicles to enter the roundabout. This is what I have learnt to do in driving school, but older and more "skilled" drivers seem to think it is cool not to show where you are going.

I realize when I write this that I am starting to sound like a grumpy old man although I am just 20. But come on people, the point of roundabouts is to decrease, and often eliminate, idling time but by not showing where you are going I am forced to idle thus forced to kill the Earth. I usually find myself stopping although I had not needed to, had the incompetent driver just used his indicators. I do not mind starting and stopping a lot (but Al Gore does) but I rather cruise at constant speed than to stop when I really do not have to.