Serial Experiments Larme

Dinner vs Supper

I used to think that the word "dinner" has the same meaning as "supper". Actually if you look up these two words in many English-Chinese dictionary (you can try an online one such as dict.cn), you will find that "supper" means "a meal eaten in evening" while "dinner" means "a meal eaten in the evening", comma (or semicolon), "the main meal" (these are literally translated from the Chinese explanations). In China the main meal is always in the evening, hence I can't tell the difference between "a meal eaten in evening" and "the main meal".

One day, (by saying "one day" I really mean today), I happened to be curious (and bored) enough to do a google search for the difference between "dinner" and "supper".

Here're the results:

From the wiki page of "dinner"

In the United Kingdom, dinner traditionally meant the main meal of the day. Because of differences in custom as to when this meal was taken, dinner might mean the evening meal (typically used by people in the South) or the midday meal

In some regions, such as the southern or rural mid-western United States, the Atlantic Provinces, parts of Saskatchewan, and Quebec, the evening repast is called supper (souper in Quebec), and dinner (dîner) refers to the noon repast, which itself would be called lunch in most parts of the United States and Canada. In the Southern United States, the main repast of the day is called Dinner, whether taken at noon or in the evening. On farms it was traditionally taken at noon. If Dinner, the main repast of the day, is at noon, the evening repast is called Supper. If Dinner, the main repast of the day, is in the evening the noon repast is called Lunch.

From the wiki page of "supper"

In parts of North America, and the United Kingdom, dinner may be referred to as supper. In most of the United States and Canada, Supper and Dinner are considered synonyms

So it's quite regional (and confusing for those travelers, I guess).

By the way wikipedia lists many meal names in this section therefore you can check it in case you want to know "what the fuck should I call the meal I take at 11?"

But what makes the difference? Please welcome the history section. "What Time is Dinner?" by Sherrie McMillan gives a general picture about the change of mealtimes from Medieval Ages to modern days for different classes and region. (As you grow up, you will find that industrial revolution affects far more things than you can imagine.)

Bonus: Ever notice that the url of "What Time is Dinner" is http://www.history-magazine.com/dinner2.html instead of http://www.history-magazine.com/dinner.html ? You will find a menu for dinner in 1860 if you use the latter one.

"The greatest philosopher of our time."

Again, I found this list from the awesome OnMyList. My favorites from the list include:

"I think I am, therefore, I am. I think."

"Ever notice that anyone going slower than you is an idiot, but anyone going faster is a maniac?"

and

"If god had intended us not to masturbate he would have made our arms shorter."

I certainly don't consider George Carlin as a candidate for the greatest philosopher. But no one is that stupid to correct it. You can read more quotes from Mr Carlin here.

Typhoon and McDonald's

When I am writing this post, the Typhoon Signla No.8 (Gale or storm force wind, you can check the details of different signal here) is in force. It's the first time in the past 3 years. Many restaurants in campus are closed. The few available option includes the McDonald's, where I had my dinner today. By the way, I love the Double Cheeseburger.

You really feel the power of nature when there's a typhoon. However, you can also feel the power of human being if you are staying in your room, typing with a cup of hot tea and listening to the wind blow outside.

Good Job! Apple

As I mentioned in previous post Apple released the new iWork with a spreadsheet application called "Numbers". And you know what? They use the ultimate number as one of Numbers' buttons. GJ!

You can see the screenshot in flickr gallery here.

Top Ten ways to fuck up your kids@Everything2.com

Take a look at Top Ten ways to fuck up your kids@Everything2.com. The first version is really funny. What I especially want to try are number ten (pretend to die) and number two (teach them right and left backwards) if I ever have a kid. An Japanese essayist Senoo Kappa[1] (who is also a scenic designer) told a similar story in one of his book: He taught his daughter the usage of "Thank you" and "You're welcome" reversely, then his daughter found that her father was cheating and refused to trust him for a long time. So seriously, if you want to be a good parent, don't try this at home!

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[1] It seems that Senoo Kappa is not very famous in the English world. His wiki page only has Japanese version and Chinese version. He's really a funny guy. Even his name is amusing.

Apple's summer Mac product press conference

Even though I'm an Apple fanboy, I still found the its latest press conference kinda boring. I think it's mainly my problem. From the live blogging you can find that today Steve Jobs focus on 2 things: the new iMac and softwares.

I never have a lot of interest in iMac since the G4 model. If I want to buy an All-in-One, I'll buy a laptop. If I want to buy a desktop, I will buy something modular so I can reuse the display (which is expensive and doesn't need to be updated as frequently as other part of a computer) when the machine is broken or outdated.

The iLife suit update doesn't interest me either. The only application from iLife iUse is iPhoto, and the one ('05) bundled with my ibook serves me well enough. But I think the new iPhoto will be helpful for people who have lots of photos. Categorizing photos by events is a simple but brilliant idea. The movie related applications are useless for me since I don't have a DV. GarageBand is good, but I have other professional applications to do music. ITunes should no longer be considered as a part of iLife, right? Finally, iWeb sucks.

The interesting part is the iWork. It now contains a spreadsheet hence it looks more like a office suit. Keynote and Pages can produce beautiful presentations and documents. Adding different views (for page layout and for word processing) to Pages is a good move. But as a Physics student, using latex to write papers and compose slides is a better option for me. Numbers (the name of the spreadsheet application) can't help me on plotting professional graphics. I have to do it under windows using Origin. But for business people iWork should be cool.

The only exciting news for me is that the mac mini won't die. I love this sweet little box. I have one on my desktop as a private server.

Update: The new Pages adds many new features including change tracking. This really makes iWork a serious competitor for MS Office. In my opinion Keynote is always superior than Powerpoint.

All about the Word "F***"

Yesterday when reading a post named "The Worst City Names in the World" on "OnMyList", I was surprised by a place called "Fucking" (in Austria, so the "full name" should be Fucking, Austria). What an awesome name! I can understand why the residents voted against changing the name in 2004 (see its wiki page). The only name which is as cool as "Fucking" is Hell (Hi, I live/was born in Hell!). However, there're already a ton of places named "Hell". I think many people have the same opinions as mine. The evidence is, from the same wiki page, the traffic sign with its name on it is frequently stolen.

The unfortunate traffic sign. I want one.

It seems that people really love the word "fuck". They use this word to express emotions like love, hate, good, bad. This lucky word has its own wiki page (and it's long!) , is used on millions of web pages (google it). Can anyone live without it?

"Fuck" is used in music industrial, an it plays an important role. I remember there's a "clean" version of Radiohead's "creep" which replaces the "fucking special" to "very special" . OMG this ruins half the song. And some idiots continue to do the same stupid thing (their enthusiasm of cutting the songs make me wonder if they have cut their own balls off). The good thing is that we can create songs with the f-word by ourselves. A simple strategy is every time you meet a word "love", you just replace it with "fuck". One of my favorite is Freddie Mercury's "I Was Born To Love You"

It's a great song. I'm a fan of queen. So please don't send email threats to me :)

How about movies? Wikipedia has a list of films that most frequently use the f-word. Cool! Even cooler, some one made "fucking short version" of some of these films.

Casino, ranked no.3, 398 "fuck"s.

Jarhead, ranked no.5, 335 "fuck"s.

Twin Town, ranked no.6, 318 "fuck"s.

Pulp Fiction, ranked no.19, 269 "fuck"s

The Big Lebowski, ranked no.20, 265 "fuck"s
If you are a pro wrestling fan. Do you remember the "The Big Valbowski" Val Vensi?

Jay And Silent Bob Strike Back, ranked no.21, 260 "fuck"s
"Watch the language, little boy! There is female's present."

And last but certainly not least, a combination of music and movie, "Dont say fuck" from South Park.

sick as a dog

I went to bed on 11 just to wake up at 12 because of some unknown sick feeling from my stomach. And some strange sound loop in my head. I force myself to throw up to overcome the sick feeling and have a hot shower but nothing turns better. Damn I swear I won't eat that much meat for dinner.

Update: I feel much better now. Before that I felt so cold cold cold cold (not that the cure's song)! And my skin is so sensitive that a slight friction will hurt!.