U. Q.'s original intentions of joining J's startup were doubtful, or even evidently dubious.

All the same, if we objectively evaluate the case, U.Q. isn't suitable for a tech startup, furthermore, he's likely not suitable for a startup in any business field at all. Because, he's gotten no growth during the past five years or so, and it's probable that he's got no growth potential in him for the future.

Besides, maybe even more pivotally, things which U.Q. had done and hadn't done brought home to J what sort of person U.Q. is.

Can you believe that around half of Americans and Canadians who married have gone, are going, or will go through divorcement, which is naturally traumatic for most people, at least once in their lifetime?

But it is a fact.

I don't know how fastidious French people are with what they wear on them. But I know they look elegant.

Sometime when I watch public interments for Canadian soldiers in news videos, I have a strange thought that the cold fact is those obsequies are for the alive to observe, not for the fallen to, and the dead is dead.

Very subtle feelings and threads of thoughts are amenable to being aroused by reading literature.

From a point of view of personal and familial gains, Bill Clinton hadn't been born as a person of social standing, but he made the Clintons a family of some estate. He's a remarkable man.

Personally I don't think the Verdana typeface looks good.

A calm lake surface doesn't betoken all the currents and sways underneath. A calm life doesn't betoken all the activities busily happening in one's mind and intellectual world.

Making Chinese dishes at home is finicky, hence time-consuming. It's true at least in a Canadian kitchen.

Some of RIM's ads displayed on mobile phones seem to be inept.

For instance, one small ad in an Android app reads "Introducing the Playbook OS 2" close to a text icon of "Blackberry Playbook". Period. Well, that one is almost like an antic. What are the product's benefits to consumers, which is supposed to be the message the ad should convey? Gee.

Oscar Wilde wrote the following in his "A Florentine Tragedy": "And the dumb river shall receive your corse and wash it all unheeded to the sea."

I'm not very sure if the adverb "all" describes "wash" or "unheeded".

Reflecting on U. Q., now I know he's not diffident at all.

Many established business people only gave snatches of their time to D, an entrepreneur, who had had a pipe dream. And maybe most importantly, there was only himself in that pipe dream, other flaws of D aside.

One of my acquaintances once told me that all WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) wrestling matches, which mostly look antic, are fake and prearranged.

It's said that the famous The Devil's Brigade, the very first modern official special force which was a joint unit of American and Canadian military, fordid many German forces in their covert attacks during WWII.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil's_Brigade.

Usually it's the very deep and subtle personal thoughts and preferences which make one travel along a certain line of life journey or another.

For instance, assume one can really freely choose, if he prefers equality to equity, then he goes with Communism or something alike; if his preference is the other way around, then Capitalism is his cup of tea.

So in that aspect, every individual should consider very deeply about his own intellectual system, so to speak. Put it another way:

"The unexamined life is not worth living."
-Socrates

:-)

D and E are difficult to play ball with. That's their own choices and their own fates.

Sigh. RIM has been forced to compete against Apple, Google, and Microsoft. RIM is out of its league.

When you see maimed and killed American and Canadian soldiers, you wonder for exactly what those troopers fight, and for exactly what the democracies they represent fight.

Here goes a short video about the famous The Bunghole liquor store in Salem, MA, U.S.A.

The guy cheesily said that the T-shirt No. 5 is the most popular with ladies. :-)

Traditional publishing has transitioned to web publishing. Traditional typography has to web typography.

If base motives are what's driving the Wall Street, then the society and government should reign it by all means and don't give it even one chance to become a monster.

It seems so to me for now. After the Europeans landed onto the continent of North America, the trauma for First Nations people has lasted till this day, because the cultures of the First Nations were sort of too primitive to accommodate or blend with the then European cultures.

Of course, that thought of mine is too naive and primitive for the matter which must be quite complex. Nonetheless, I write it down.

Under the current education system of China, there are a lot of essential elements missing.

For one thing, young students don't get to consider death the leveller, which is among the few ultimate things. Entering a university as elite as possible and gaining a job as high-pay as possible seem to be the only things which the system fosters on students' minds.

Some Chinese people are apt to be perennially amenable to speculation trends in the society. That's playing with fire, as well as not being constructive, I'm afraid.

When I was very young and in China, my gorge rose when I thought that my entire life would be expended in a very confining system which belittles personal choice and personal efforts.

Of course, China has changed dramatically. But that was my youth and my then potential life.

I don't know why all the fashion models walking on T-platforms keep that universal glassy look on their faces. There must be some deep reasons for that in the fashion trade.

I've done things which I'd wanted to do, thanks to the societal environment by courtesy of the Quebec province.

The Arial typeface seems to be becoming the de facto font of websites.

I've never seen a pretty cooking oil flagon. Should oil makers make it look more appealing?

You pick any established entrepreneur, and I can tell you that he's gone through many purgatories yet he's carried on, bearing his persistence and vision.

For some years, I had been snatching at almost every moment to enhance my English proficiency.

Now that activity can abate since my English has reached a certain level and I can treat it as a side project. It had been an outland journey.

Java used to be my favorite runtime, when I was in school. No more.

And the acquisition of it by Oracle didn't help it in my eyes.

One of the worst scenarios for this world in the coming years would be that an international war between or among major countries breaks out.

If that really happens, the world economy which has been sluggishly climbing out of the mess of the Late-2000s Financial Crisis will be traumatized again, deeper in troubles.

Let's wish it won't happen. Knock the wood.

Sarah Palin published a memoir titled "Going Rogue" in 2009. What did she mean by that book title? Gee.

I've stumbled on a 2010 movie which intrigues me.

"A fanatically devout knight and his small band of church-hired mercenaries" went "to a remote, pestilence-free village" to find out why the black death plague didn't affect them at all.

Here goes a well written flick review on NYT: Black Death (2010).

In a biz deal, the two parties involved are the supplier and the procurer. From the supplier's perspective, it wants the deal to be fair, but it may not really care very much whether the deal is truly equitable or not.

I never thought that the modern flush toilet was invented as early as in the 16th century.

There are two interesting tifles about it.

One is that the forerunner of it was called Ajax. Web developers beware, Ajax is something like toilet. :-)

1596: Sir John Harington (born 1561) published A New Discourse of a Stale Subject, Called the Metamorphosis of Ajax, describing a forerunner to the modern flush toilet installed at his house at Kelston.[7] The design had a flush valve to let water out of the tank, and a wash-down design to empty the bowl. He installed one for his godmother Elizabeth I of England at Richmond Palace, although she refused to use it because it made too much noise.[citation needed] The Ajax was not taken up on a wide scale in England, but was adopted in France under the name Angrez. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flush_toilet#History

The other piece is that in the era in which it was invented by Sir John Harington, "life in England during the 16th century continued to be distinguished by a stench no modern nose could easily sustain."

“Even in the goodliest and stateliest palaces of our realm,” John Harington wrote in 1596 about his invention of an early flush toilet, “still this same whoreson saucy stink.” 

http://tv.nytimes.com/2008/03/28/arts/television/28tudo.html

By the way, it seems that on the other hand, the traditional Chinese society and mentality have quenched technological inventions and advancements so much. One example is that it seems no ancient Chinese had been involved in the evolution of the inventions of flush toilets.

There are many weapons which root from very ancient times. Cudgel is one of them. Baton (a.k.a. truncheon and nightstick) is a similar one. Specifically, cudgel has got more military war flair with it.

Search for "cudgel" on:

http://www.ehow.com/list_7320442_weapons-used-egyptian-wars.html

and

http://www.hinduwisdom.info/War_in_Ancient_India.htm

and

http://rtw.heavengames.com/history/civs/ancient_africa/armiesancientafrica/ .

And then see the images at http://www.google.ca/search?q=cudgel&hl=en&safe=off&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&ei=8M1JT-CSDcHu0gH_u-SuDg&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&ved=0CA8Q_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=675&qscrl=1 .

Here goes a pic in which there are batons hidden in the back:

(From http://goo.gl/bZxKb)

It's so hard to locate the complete changelogs of some open source software projects, if they exist at all. What boo-boos for the projects.

Sexton is such a popular last name that I begin to marvel if sexton was among the top occupations in the ancient times in the West.

I wonder whether there are profound effects left on people's mentality about and perception of the stock market by the trauma of this Late-2000s financial crisis.

Canada's economic prospect, particularly that of Alberta, is galled by the potential irreversible damages to the environment by the production of tar sands (a.k.a. oil sands) in the province.

See this piece of news: Oilsands pose 'significant environmental and financial risk' to Alberta, says PCO.

It may be more common than one thinks that a person appears easy-going but he's actually not amenable at all.

E's ignorance and self-centeredness, or selfishness, stir arrantly, time and time again.

Dictionary.com claims that "people who can define Kibe may know 45,520 words".

(See http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/kibe.)

It knows how to flatter me. But I refuse to accept the compliment.

If you think about an area's functionality, you get impressed by its complexity. For instances, the unphysical arrangements of snow removal and the physical sewer system. It's a lot of work.

Montreal's Mount Royal is actually only a hill called "Mount" by courtesy.

I used to think Google is nearly perfect.

Not any more, since it cancelled the "Shared items" thing in Google Reader and supplanted it with Google+.

But Google has retained some classiness here and there, still.

I think Motorola makes picked phones.

風雪連路，街燈暗淡。蒙特婁，朔方之地。

Enthusiasts across the world have been snapping up any new product which Apple rolls out. Such a phenomenon.

There are two sorts of entrepreneurs. One sort are in purgatory, the other in limbo.

The former will eventually go to heaven, and the latter will perennially stay in oblivion.

A plate is twice as big as a stoup. :-)

See Cambridge Ale - NYT.

"If a stoup of ale were ordered, a quart pot would be sent; if a plate, a great tankard containing two quarts."

Cambridge culture. "...those still, book-lined chambers, the very air of which seemed saturated with the aroma of elegant scholarship".

It seems good that Quebec possesses an egalitarian streak.

I've seen many Chinese immigrants in Montreal whose English needs to get mended. But they put no efforts in it.

I'm afraid by that, they've drastically narrowed down their future career choices and flexibility.

Anyways, they made that choice. Who am I to insist they should enhance their English? Moreover, it's really very painstaking and time-consuming (been there, done that), as a matter of fact which most of native speakers of Western languages never have seemed to comprehend, by the way.

The word "publican" feels remote and intimately mysterious.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Publican .

What sort of equity would you most like to own? Equity in your own business, equity in your mortgaged house, or equity in the public stock market?

How does it feel in public houses in Europe these days which are immersed in the steep economic recession?

I suspect that some failed entrepreneurs have cudgeled their brains about why they failed and probably they will never find it.

It's just in their blind spot, and it is that they don't know how to be a good man. As simple as that, and as profound as that.

Time is my enemy everyday. Time is my friend in the long term.

Is goodman Stephen Harper all about the economy of Canada?

The seventy-ish billionaire businessman Richard Elman 'started career as a "coolie in a scrap yard" after quitting school at age 15'.

See http://www.forbes.com/profile/richard-elman/ .

How grieved he must feel when he looks back to his puzzled scrapyard "coolie" years, I guess.

Many software developers have flocked to mobile dev in good faith. Is there a bubble in that industry?

I don't know how well Panasonic cherishes its own brand name. It would probably do well if it managed the quality of its products, many of which are made in China, BETTER.

If a Japanese major brand loses its quality appeal, it loses its way in this world, which is overflowed with commodity product suppliers with relatively shoddy workmanship.

By the way, the above thought of mine about Panasonic products' deteriorating quality can be accompanied by this piece of news: Sony, Panasonic Forecast Deeper Losses as Samsung Dominates.

Are the occurrences of poorer product workmanship and historical corporate loss just a coincidence for Panasonic? Probably not.

For a biz, amenability to market demands and customer demands are crucial. But for life, maybe unamenability to them are.

Many people think Groupon has done errantly with the investors' money it raised.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupon#Initial_public_offering_filing .

Life and competition is less equitable in China than in the U.S. and Canada. Why do some Chinese return to the former from the latter and try to snatch opportunities over there? What advantages do they have there? Or they mainly just wanna make a quick buck?

This is a tough era for the rulers in Arab countries. They must be afraid to be sent to the gallows by the mass one day.

Arab people's world is no longer the same as before, profoundly.

Should e-commerce websites call their free shipping, which typically happens when your purchase order reaches a certain amount of dollars, "courtesy shipping" instead?

When J was in his teens and twenties, he had never thought he would want to become a classy guy when he grew mature. That is called enlightenment.

Due to modern standards, the old-fashioned English word "heathen" is indeed an offensive one which has a rather ancient beginning of existence.

In the Merriam-Webster's 11th Collegiate Dictionary, its noun form has got two meanings:

1: an unconverted member of a people or nation that does not acknowledge the God of the Bible
2: an uncivilized or irreligious person

Essentially, the doctrine reflected in the word dictates that the civilization and education of a person equals to the enlightenment of him about the great existence, authority, and love of God. Well, that had been true in Western history when education and civilization had been mainly conducted in and through Christian churches and their affiliated facilities.

It seems that the hoariness of the BBQ chicken restaurant industry doesn't prevent new eateries of its sort from perennially popping up.

There seems to be some sort of start-up boom in the U.S., Canada, and China. Do you want to snatch the opportunity? Do you dare to? :-)

Social media marketing aside, I don't find Facebook an apt tool to be used among most average Joes.

Facebooking is overly time-consuming, overly vain, and overly addictive.

我喜歡陽光。今天 Montreal 的陽光好。

古時的游牧民族『逐水草而居』。我這種人最理想的遷徙方式應該是逐春日秋陽而居吧。

不知道對於人類的身體來說，歷經春秋卻不經冬夏的身體是什麼狀態。

Why do opportunities slide askance? Because one hasn't prepared very well for them.

So from now on, don't waste an hour of your time. Instead, put it to good use in order to prepare for future opportunities :-)

It's very apparent that the beleaguered and plagued ship of RIM will sink further, willy-nilly.

An acquaintance of mine, who switched from Blackberry to iPhone, just now said to me that the latter is A LOT better than the former. For one thing, the Blackberry Messenger, which is even one of the flagship features of Blackberry products, constantly freezes, while iPhone offers many excellent features and apps which easily win over those of Blackberry.

All in all, now seems to be the time to count the months to the end of RIM known as an independent company in existence, given the fleetingly changing competitive landscape of the smart phone and tablet industry (read: Apple, Android, Samsung, HTC, Amazon's Kindle Fire), combined with the relatively weak leadership in the RIM corporation and the relatively slow speed of innovation and improvement of RIM's products.

All the above remarks of mine are as-objective-as-possible evaluation of the situation, from my perspective.

Has the intergenerational equity been broken between the baby boomers and the following generations?

There are so many delvers into the stock market speculation in this world.

Financial market speculation is a great global pastime.

In the popular flick "Forrest Gump", Gump had never let his persistence to be douted, not even a shred.

However, it seems that he had had no consideration of morals until the end, from my impression which is vague now.

I've just snatched a relatively quick recovery from a cold. Boy, it's rough to be caught in sickness in a busy life.

I think Spanish is easily melodious.

I don't like very much the situation that in Canada, patients are very amenable to being blindfolded by the medical doctors.

Some doctors don't explain well, some are incompetent. Above all, there is no objective system to help people judge the competence of doctors.

Are Apple and other multinationals errant American businesses? They are just global businesses which have no social obligations towards the United States of America.

See http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html .

When will the laud for American dream resurface?

I don't know, but I'm sure it will.

Some people tend to be good employees. And some others are apt to become entrepreneurs.

One world, two types of people. Diversity matters.

I've seldom received courtesy calls from the companies whose services I've used as a consumer. Should they make more calls?

An excellent businessman may not look classy, but he typically is a classy deliverer of business value.

Why doesn't every website just give out very simple and brief privacy policies? Ideally, the gist should be there, just clear and straight.

An acquaintance of mine told me that in Portugal, some city people still have a live-in maid in their houses. And those maids are typically uneducated peasant girls from the countryside.

Essentially, it appears like Portugal still has some sort of two-tier system, the upper tier is its city residents, the lower one its country residents.

So it seems that in that aspect, that part of Europe is very much like China. And, the North America is more equitable than that part of Europe.

A young man may only encounter deaths and tragedies mainly through snatches of literature. And he should consider that as education.

Obama's hair has turned hoary since he, a personification of "change", went to Washington D.C.

See http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/1034318--is-the-white-house-turning-obama-grey .

Music video - Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel ("Gretchen am Spinnrade" in German) - Sung by Barbara Bonney, music by Franz Schubert, and lyrics from text in Goethe's Faust

Goethe corresponds to “歌德” in Chinese.

Apple is a classic case of how a company can win girls' hearts. Take the example of its Macbook laptops, they are very thin, smooth, and maybe most importantly, free from the necessity for people to acquire technical knowledge about computers in order to maintain them.

You can see myriads and myriads of girls who bear Macbooks around. Many of those girls would rather pay premium prices for Mac computers and yet buy some other stuff from cheap dollar stores.

Who bears forward the fate of a company? The owner, of course.

Then do you think that he would rather allow a staff member to become irreplaceable?

The world knows that products made in China are inexpensive. But it looks askance at their quality.

Will that tendency soon change?

For Canadians working with minimum wages, such as those working at Tim Horton's outlets, every sliver of that small income counts for their livelihood. If they lose one or two slivers of it, they probably will lose their home telephone line or something. It's that bad.

Sigh. There are good student loans programs from the government across Canada. Why don't those workers just get a student loan, whatever their ages are, and finish a career education program which targets fields in high demand from employers? Programs like that typically only require 2 - 3 years of full-time study and the prerequisite of a high-school diploma.

Then life and their newly found earning power will be a lot better for them. Sigh. I don't understand why they don't take that surefire route.

This is a windy night with light snowfall. I'm fixing myself a cup of coffee.

"Nice talking to you," J said to the retired man who had come to Canada from Portugal a very long time ago.