红酒·绿茶 / Red Wine & Green Tea / Vin Rouge et Thé Vert

Vaccaro's in Little Italy Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . Went to Vaccaro's with my "ski gang" to celebrate my birthday with some delightful Italian dessert. Thanks a lot for their wonderful gift and interesting card! It's been a memorable year for me: Bought a Powerbook (you have no idea how much easier it has made my life), recovered from a devastating relationship, picked up some great hobbies like classical music, art and skiing, moved to a new apartment I really like and most of all, made some fabulous friends. My wishes for the next year: Stay positive, work hard and play harder. BTW, wanna know what I gave myself for birthday: 512MB PC2700 SODIMM Memory made for Apple Powerbook G4 by Kingston . (Finally, no need to close an application to open another.) :D

"Spring" by Mengfu Zhao Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . We had a wonderful Lunar New Year party in our apartment; more than 20 people showed up. We ordered food from Szechuan House (it's far from the best; but it's the best within a reasonable distance.) and we had mahjong , poker, DDR (Dance Dance Revolution) Max, karaoke and movie DVDs for entertainment. P.S., read this if you are wondering what the title means.

Koss Porta Pro Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . Althought it's been more than one year since I got this stereophone under the recommendation of a tasteful/picky friend, Veera, long before I started this blog, I still felt happy and constantly amazed by its uncompromisable sound quality. With a frequency response of 15-25kHz and a sleek look, this piece stands out far above its peers. No matter what you are listening to, be it Yo-Yo Ma 's heavy violincello, Yundi Li 's poetic piano, or Anne Sofie von Otter 's heavenly mezzo-soprano, Koss Porta Pro will not let you down.

For the past month I'd been working on a project using C++, a programming language I've been overly hating and avoiding until recent. After struggling with its rich but misleading features, I finally realized that it was all about smart choices: It's like there are healthy food and unhealthy food and it's up to you to choose what to eat. In order to make smart choices, the first thing you need is to know about their nutrition facts. Below are some notes I would like to keep in mind: 1. STL is too general to be efficient. For maximum efficiency, write your own basic data structures. 2. Exception handling doesn't come for free. For maximum efficiency, use old-fashioned error messaging instead. 2. Virtual destructor is needed when you delete a polymorphic object pointer. See this article . 3. Be careful about 'const' declaration. See this article . 4. Read this FAQ carefully for thoughts about the design of C++. Learn how, le

Went ice-skating for free in the Patterson Park ice rink courtesy of the GSA . It was fun although I had not skated for years. Made a little bit progress in backward skating.

Arenas vs Rockets Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . I was so disappointed when I found out that Yao Ming could not show up in the 1/3 game at Wizards due to surgery . Because I was going to be the driver for several other people and it was my first-time NBA experience as well, I went to the game anyway. It turned out to be the worst NBA game I'd ever watched. Despite the absence of Yao , Rockets crushed Wizards at 123:112. Gilbert Arenas had to face the Rockets all by himself since his teammates could hardly catch up. Wizards had never leaded for a single second. It was disastrous. (By the way, talk about ugly mascot .) I did get a free Arenas T-shirt, though. It cheered me up a little bit. Now for something more cheerful - Wizards Dancers !

JBL Creature II Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . Got my JBL Creature II , a highly recommended 2.1 speaker for iPods and Macs, today and totally loved it. With frequency response from 45Hz to 20kHz, it proved itself to be more than good-looking. Industrial design at its best!

Voga Pinot Grigio 2004 Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . We had a cheerful New Year's Eve party in our apartment featuring a Malata karaoke machine (万利达歌王DVD). Li brought a nice Voga Pinot Grigio 2004 in an adorable perfume looking bottle. People were having a wonderful time and I, for the first time, enjoyed being a host.

I believe I can ski! Originally uploaded by nuance1979 . In the spirit of holiday, we held a cozy Christmas Eve party in our hotel rooms with wine, chips, poker and TV. Next morning everybody was experiencing sore muscle (not from the party) even with Advil , a leading pain reliever. (By the way, in Killington, Advil was sold in vending machines in restrooms along with condoms.) More and more people were coming to ski for Christmas. Based on my physical condition, I decided to ski leisurely for the last day. It was lucky for us to finally have some sunshine: it had been cloudy ever since we came and it was always foggy on the Peak. So we seized the precious opportunity to take some memorable pictures. My favorite was the one when Sika, one of the best skiers in our group, was captured fallen down on the snow with others nearby laughing hilariously at him. I skied mostly on green/easy trails except one run of blue/intermediate trails - Skyeburst and Bear Claw. My skills were no