Last Friday at the Steppe Inne of British Embassy, three very talented and good looking Mongolian young ladies played some great music.

Everyone was impressed with, not just their presentation, but their music skills as well. When they first walked in, the women in attendance greeted the musicians with “oohs” and “aah”.  I don’t believe any of us really were ready for the well dressed women to walk in…  I do know this though: their musical skills were really quite good.

Check out the video below:

While walking down the street one day a ‘Member of The Senate’ is tragically hit by a truck and dies. His soul arrives in heaven and is met by St. Peter at the entrance.

‘Welcome to heaven,’ says St. Peter. ‘Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a high official around these parts, you see, so we’re not sure what to do with you.’

‘No problem, just let me in,’ says the Senator.
‘Well, I’d like to, but I have orders from higher up. What we’ll do is have you spend one day in hell and one in heaven. Then you can choose where to spend eternity.’

‘Really, I’ve made up my mind. I want to be in heaven,’ says the Senator.

‘I’m sorry, but we have our rules.’

And with that, St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to hell. The doors open and he finds himself in the middle of a green golf course. In the distance is a clubhouse and standing in front of it are all his friends and other politicians who had worked with him.

Everyone is very happy and in evening dress. They run to greet him, shake his hand, and reminisce about the good times they had while getting rich at the expense of the people.

They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster, caviar and champagne. Also present is the devil, who really is a very friendly & nice guy who has a good time dancing and telling jokes. They are having such a good time that before he realizes it, it is time to go.

Everyone gives him a hearty farewell and waves while the elevator rises… The elevator goes up, up, up and the door reopens on heaven where St. Peter is waiting for him. ‘Now it’s time to visit heaven.’

So, 24 hours pass with the Senator joining a group of contented souls moving from cloud to cloud, playing the harp and singing. They have a good time and, before he realizes it, the 24 hours have gone by and St. Peter returns.

‘Well, then, you’ve spent a day in hell and another in heaven. Now choose your eternity.’

The Senator reflects for a minute, then he answers: ‘Well, I would never have said it before, I mean heaven has been delightful, but I think I would be better off in hell.’

So St. Peter escorts him to the elevator and he goes down, down, down to hell. Now the doors of the elevator open and he’s in the middle of a barren land covered with waste and garbage. He sees all his friends, dressed in rags, picking up the trash and putting it in black bags as more trash falls from above. The devil comes over to him and puts his arm around his shoulder.

‘I don’t understand,’ stammers the Senator. ‘Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and clubhouse, and we ate lobster and caviar, drank champagne, and danced and had a great time. Now there’s just a wasteland full of garbage and my friends look miserable. What happened?’

The devil looks at him, smiles and says, ‘Yesterday we were campaigning.. .. Today you voted.’

Image Borrowed from DailyGalaxy.com

We have all seen movies like The Matrix, Star Wars, I Robot, and Short Circuit that feature robots that can think and feel like humans or having robotic arms and legs.  These movies generally go in the Sci-Fi categories, but should they?

We used to think these were things that were going to happen in the future, but it is already happening.

We already have robots that can form societies (both good AND evil).  This story is really incredible.  Some of the robots take the malicious route of lying in order to have access to the food (recharging) to themselves.  Some of course take the higher road and warn other to not approach dangerous areas… Simply incredible that robots can form societies.  These robots learn what is food and what areas are dangerous.  And, they also make their own behavioral judgments.

Then, we also have robots that show human emotion.  This is supposed to be THE THING that separates a human from a robot.  This is definitely WAY beyond those robot dogs and pets from a decade ago.  These robots LEARN and MIMIC human facial expressions.

If robots can feel and form societies, how are we, humans, really different from robots?

And, consider this: A team of scientists from Sweden and Italy have been able to make a robotic hand that can feel.

We already know about pig hearts and whatever else out there. I think all the Japanimations, or those futuristic Japanese animes, have got it right.  Within the next twenty or thirty years, it is very possible that we have robots with feelings running around and humans with all robotic replacement parts.  After all, all of this is already happening.

I think this could be either really exciting and interesting, or just freaking plain weird and freaky.  What’s your take?

Guinness World Records said that 8 foot 1 inch (2.47 meter) Sultan Kosen, from the town of Mardin in eastern Turkey, is now officially the tallest man walking the planet.

Recently I read an article on Yahoo on the world’s new tallest guy Sultan Kosen from Turkey.  What struck me about the story wasn’t his height, but just his simple wishes to date girls and to eventually marry one.  The guy said he never had a girlfriend, but he hoped his new fame will help him find dates.

Reading the story just made me realize we are all human and we all want the similar things in life.  No matter where we are in the world, men are simple creatures.  We all want to date the opposite sex (unless you are guy of course).  I mean you gotta read what he said:

“Up until now it’s been really difficult to find a girlfriend. I’ve never had one, they were usually scared of me. …Hopefully now that I’m famous I’ll be able to meet lots of girls. I’d like to get married.”

Come on!  You gotta give the guy some props.  Most of us guys have not had it as difficult as him.  We always were able to date one way or another.  What if you were in his shoes?  27 years old and not being able to date?

So maybe we can help get the word out and help him get a girlfriend.  If you know anyone in Turkey, please pass this forward.  Let’s help a brother out. 

I ran across this comment while reading the news about the Allen Iverson going to Memphis Grizzlies.  It was posted by numba333.  I guess this answers any questions whether AI will fit into the Memphis Grizzlies system and whether this revives his career, etc.  hehe

Without further due, here is the comment:

Mayo dribbles up the court, looking for his shot…..STOLEN by Allen Iverson. What the heck? Mayo is guarding AI. Iverson looking for his shot. Can’t get it off. Randolph screaming for the ball. STRIPPED by Gay!!!! Gay goes up for the shot. BLOCKED by Randolph. Randolph for layup, misses, rebound, misses, rebound, misses, rebound, misses, rebound….Mayo leaps takes the ball away, dribbles it out, doubleteamed by Gay and AI. Nets just standing around watching in disbelief.

Marc Gasol is drinking a Gatorade…..this is embarassing……

This is just plain BS.  It should be illegal to send SPAM like this.  Most SPAM’s I can just ignore without even giving it a second thought…. Why the (*&# would someone send me a SPAM that said something like this?

highlyregardedsalmon: Hey, I know this is weird, but I don’t know who else to turn to.  I’m thinking about. . .you know. . .ending it all.  Can we talk?

While I was just doing my thing and working away, this came to my Yahoo! Messenger.  The difficult part is… I recognize this ID because I think I received SPAM from this before!  Not that repeat spammers are more welcome or anything, it’s just there is a small, or a very tiny, possibility there might be a “real” human behind this.

At the end of the day though, it’s not someone I know.  And, I don’t want to encourage spammers or give out any sort of information to them.

It’s just that this is the most freaking weird SPAM that I have ever received in my life.  Maybe that’s because I wasn’t expecting it.

Do you think I did the right thing by not replying?  Has anyone else received a SPAM from highlyregardedsalmon@yahoo.com?

Let me know if you also have an interesting SPAM story to share.

EDIT: It was a Salmon Bot

I did a quick research and found out that this is Salmon Bot.  It works in a really interesting matter.  Salmon Bots let you chat with another user with both you and the other user under the pretense that this bot is the person with whom you are chatting.

You can read more about the Salmon Bots here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TheGreatHatsby

And, this is the original link that made me realize that this is a Salmon Bot: http://friendfeed.com/evansims/likes.  Scroll down to Mark Krynsky, the fourth person on the list, and click on “more comments”.  It’s actually a funny post because the guy thought the IM he received was a salmon baking brownies. 

Update: Another salmon bot: upendedsalmon

Just got this one today (2009/6/11):

upendedsalmon: I don’t believe your lies.

I marked it as SPAM immediately.

Lebron James and Cavs Sweep Hawks in Five Games

Just right now, 9pm in Mongolia on May 12th, 2009, while I was watching Bloomberg, I saw for the first time in my life, Bloomberg cover sports.  The reporter on Bloomberg Asia showed highlights of LeBron James and Cavs and talked about how the Cavs have swept the Hawks in the second round… and then went on to say that Game 5 is on later tonight.

LOL. WOW, maybe Bloomberg SHOULD just stick to finances… maybe they’ll make better predictions!

It was actually a very nice coverage.  Like everything you come to expect from Bloomberg, the story was short and to the point, with some great graphic highlights of LeBron James making spectacular plays.  They even mentioned that he just got his first NBA MVP and that the Cleveland Cavaliers are undefeated this postseason, etc.   The only problem is that they made a completely false prediction.

I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that there is NO WAY that the Cavs are going to play the Hawks tonight.

This was definitely the highlight of my evening.  I think Bloomberg just added 5 additional minutes to my life for the sheer joy that I have gained from this.

By the way, I should probably mention that I have only been watching Bloomberg since March this year.   So, maybe Bloomberg has covered sports in the past.  I just hadn’t seen it before.  So needless to say, it was already amuzing to begin with… just to see Bloomberg covering sports.

It wasn’t even just any sports; it was my favorite sport – basketball.  Being in Mongolia, most of the basketball games are in Chinese or Russian languages.  Others are in Mongolian language dubbed over Russian/Chinese.  As you can see, I was pretty excited to begin with.  And, then hearing game 5 is later tonight… as Peter from Family Guy would say… freaking awesome!

I’m out like Hawks in five games.

One photo says it all (AP Photo/Bill Haber/ESPN.com)

Did you watch the game?

I watched it on justin.tv.  ESPN and Star Sports were showing baseball and soccer, so this was the only place I could watch the game from Mongolia.  Every 3-4 sec the screen froze for a 1-2 sec, but it still was wonderful to watch the third Nuggets game and the first Nuggets playoff game in the last two years.  Just hearing the announcers and other people talk about the Nuggets was exciting.

Anyway, this game was just unbelievable.  I mean, I was just completely at loss for words.  WOW. 

Hornets are done.

Even the announcers were calling it done.  It was just incredible.  I mean how can these players stand getting beat like that?  I cannot even picture myself in Hornets’ shoes.  Though stuff.

I never though the Nuggets could bottle up CP3 like they did.

Of course, Kmart shut down D West, but that was not totally unexpected.  This has got to be one of THE MOST demoralizing losses ever for the Hornets.  They are going to come out to play in Denver… at least for the first one and a halft quarters.  If we can withstand it and get up on them by 20, they are done.  They are going to be so demoralized, they might not even show up in the second half of the game 5.

Watching the facial expressions of Coach Byron and the players just said it all.  Coach Byron went from very upset to HUGELY disappointed to trying to already forget this one all in the same game.

Coach Byron During the Historic Defeat (AP Photo/Bill Haber/ESPN.com)

The Nuggets were up 60 points at one point and the game was not even over.  The Hornets and their fans just could not wait for this grueling and painful-to-watch game to finish any sooner.

WOW

I mean forget about the Hornets and their players and fans being in shock.  I AM in shock!  I am still completely in awe… after nearly four hours since the game ended.  It’s still unbelievable that a team with an MVP candidate being obliterated in the playoffs at home.  WOW

This is actually a really interesting post.  It is a writing by a girl talking about:

1. How important marriage is
2. Why she wants to marry a western person
3. The better living situations, better conditions in the Western world, etc.

So you ask, what is wrong with that?  Well, here are a few of her excerpts:

• “China does not have any men suitable for me”
• “I want to have a huge living room, big enough to be like a small salon… Even the bathroom must be big enough to fit in a large bathtub…
• “The Western world I have seen in television and movies is simply like heaven”
• “Western boys are all very excellent… Ever since I was small, I liked watching Western movies, such as Roman Holiday or Gone with the Wind…”

Anyway, without further due, I think you should read her excerpt yourself.  It is very eye-opening to what actually goes on in the heads of girls like her, who flock to guys with money or power.  Very interesting.

Read in full at ChinaSmack.com.

Route Taken by the Crazy Chinese Busdriver

Two days ago, an upset Chinese man steals a bus, runs over a motorcyclist, and drives on for 5km before being stopped.  When finally stopped, his response was: “I wanted to kill someone… I keep getting bullied…”

It’s really incredible how cruel this guy was.  He totally lost his mind.

Upon noticing a motorcyclist being dragged by the bus, a taxi driver chased down the busdriver and could not get him to stop even with the help of another car on the other side of the bus.  The busdriver even drove through two cars that were up ahead of it.

The guy finally turned himself in and gave an interview.  Read more about it at shanghaiist.com.