what liFE ELse?

(It's been over a year since I've written on this blog (darn facebook!) - welcome back to me!)

Last year, the company I work at introduced a product called Allex, a nutraceutical for allergic disease that helps treat symptoms such as stuffy nose, skin rash, watery eyes, etc. The reason it can treat all these symptoms at once is because it treats the root cause, which is the body's own immune system's hyper-reaction to allergens. In addition, its main ingredient is extracted from hardy kiwi, so there are no harmful side effects like chemical drugs (unless you're allergic to kiwis).

OK, now that I've gotten the background out of the way, take a look at a video of our company's first ever TV commercial. The person in the white lab coat is none other than our very own Dr. Seon-Hee Kim, the head of our nutraceutical and phytomedicine development department. To be honest, we were surprised at how pretty she looks in the commercial (not that she's unattractive, but still, makeup does wonders, you know?). She's a super-nice person and a pretty good spokesperson :)

A while ago (I can't remember when exactly), I downloaded an mp3 of a song called Count on This by The Frail. I was pretty impressed so I saved it. Today, I listened to the song again for the first time in a while and remembered why I liked it, so I tried to find their entry on Wikipedia. Amazingly enough, they don't have one (someone get on it!...I'm too lazy to look up their information anywhere else! OK, I did find their myspace page.). I guess they aren't too popular yet, but I'm here to champion their cause, or at least delude myself into thinking I am. It's kind of cool, actually, that I'm a fan of a band most people have never heard of.

The Frail are an electronic indie band that plays poppy music with moderate electronic beats (nothing like the rock-edge of The Prodigy or the weird ambient noises of Future Sound of London). They're not amazingly innovative or anything, but their songs are catchy and, for some reason, remind me of my college days spent hanging out with my friends on the University of Pennyslvania campus or Center City, aware of the future when we'd have to graduate and find a job, but trying to enjoy the time we had left before then. Their music makes me feel wistful and wish I could go back to those days.

Lately, after so many years with little to be excited about, it's been good to be a Philly sports fan. Three of the four Philadelphia professional sports teams have been very good. The Phillies are defending world champions and just added Cliff Lee to an already strong team, the Eagles had a great draft and are considered to be the strongest contender in the NFC, and the Flyers added Chris Pronger to a team that was already in contention for the Stanley Cup.

Then, there are the Sixers.

Man, are they horrible. Someone who doesn't know the current state of the NBA might look at their 41-41 record and think, "They're not horrible, just mediocre. At least they're not the Clippers." I can't believe I'm saying this, but I almost wish that they were the Clippers. What I mean is, I wish that they'd be that bad for just one year.

Let me explain. The Sixers' 2007-2008 team showed lots of improvement from the previous year, using their young players to run as much as possible against other teams to tire them out and score easy baskets. However, when they had to slow down and play a traditional half-court game with lots of passing, they didn't have a player who could score easily near the basket. Coupled with the fact that they didn't have any players that could shoot well from the outside, it meant that they couldn't beat the teams that could stop them from running.

To try to solve this problem, the Sixers signed free-agent power forward Elton Brand to a large ($80 million!) free-agent contract away from the Clippers. Nevermind the fact that he was coming off an injury that caused him to miss most of the previous year, or that they still didn't have any good outside shooters - everyone and their grandmom thought it was a great move. The Sixers finally had the power forward they'd been lacking and were expected to close the gap between themselves and the elite teams of the Eastern Conference, while the Clippers were in disarray (as always) and were expected to be one of the worst teams in the NBA.

So what happened? The Clippers played to expectations and finished with the third worst record in the league. As for the Sixers, they couldn't mesh Brand's half-court skills with their running style and were a mess through the first 25 games, before finally going back to playing the running style they were good at...because Brand went down with an injury. When he finally did come back, he got injured again and had surgery, missing the rest of the season. He played 29 out of 82 games - a salary of $551,724 a game. Ugh.

Armed with the third-worst record in the league (and the third-best chance to get the number one pick), the Clippers got lucky and were awarded the number one pick in the NBA draft lottery. They did what everyone expected and picked University of Oklahoma power forward Blake Griffin. So, in a year, they went from Elton Brand to Blake Griffin. Right now, no one in their right mind would give up Griffin for Brand.

There are three ways to acquire players for your team in the NBA: trades, free-agency, and the draft. In the NBA, it's so hard to make trades that have any real impact on your team because of the ridiculous and restrictive 10% rule (the value of the contracts being traded must be within 10% of each other) and most of the top-level players get resigned right away by their current teams before becoming free-agents, since their current team is allowed to offer the most money. That leaves the draft. Most years, only the top two or three players (sometimes one or none) can be considered to be the type of players that have enough skill to lead a team to a championship - "franchise players," if you will. The worst teams, obviously, have the best chance to get the top picks. Oftentimes, teams will purposely lose (or, at least, not try their best) to try to raise their chances of getting a talented player, especially if a player like Lebron James is available.

It's not as simple as I stated above, obviously - luck is involved, and sometimes good trades or free-agent signings happen - but more often than not it's true. Right now, the Sixers are neither good enough to win a championship nor bad enough to get one of the coveted top picks. As long as they're stuck in this middle-ground, they'll continue to make the playoffs, maybe get to the second round before a better team beats them, and settle for another pick in the 13~19 range that will only net them a good, not great, player. It's like limbo.

However, it seems that the Sixers have been trying to get out of this rut. Instead of resigning their former point guard Andre Miller to the three year contract he was demanding, they declined and let him become a free agent. I applaud them for moving on from a player who, although might help you win a couple more games, is clearly not a part of their future. He's a good point guard who's 33, shoots poorly, plays poor defense, and is out of shape. In fact, now that I think about it, I'd be pretty upset if they had signed him for three more years. Of course, this means that they have no experienced point guard on their team. Along with the fact that their core players are young, I expect them to go through some growing pains - i.e., lose more than they win. Which, as I've been saying all along, is not a bad thing in the NBA. Maybe then they can get a high pick and address their biggest need - an athletic shooting guard who can actually shoot.

The Sixers' core players:
- Andre Iguodala: they're paying him like a franchise player, but I've yet to see signs of him being one
- Thaddeus Young: he'll be a very competent player in the NBA for a long time, but probably never a star
- Marreese Speights: he can score, but his defense and rebounding need a lot of work
- Jrue Holiday: a rookie point guard - he'll have a tough learning curve
- Lou Williams: a combo guard - too small to play shooting guard, too selfish to play point guard, he's best suited to come off the bench, but wants to start
- Jason Smith: coming off a big injury that caused him to miss the whole year

They still have two giant potential anchors in Elton Brand (signed until the 2012-2013 season) and Samuel Dalembert (a knucklehead who'll never be more than he is now, a good shot-blocking center who does little else well; signed until the 2010-2011 season). With those two eating up almost half of the salary cap by themselves, the Sixers are lucky most of their core players, other than Iguodala, are being paid comparatively less.

It seems to me that the Sixers want to see how far their core players will take them before deciding to add or subtract from the team. In my opinion, if they could somehow trade Iguodala for a really good shooting guard, that might solve a lot of their problems. That's easier said than done, of course. I'm glad I'm not running the team, just using this blog to try to make sense of the one team in Philadelphia that just doesn't seem to get it right now.

At least they did one thing right by going back to their old logos.

My favorite new comic is One Piece, a pirate fantasy created by Eiichiro Oda. It's about a 17-year-old boy named Luffy who has a special power gained by eating a "devil fruit," where he can stretch his body as if it was made out of rubber. He wants to become the Pirate King by obtaining a treasure called the One Piece; to do so, he needs a crew, which he eventually gains throughout the series. Actually, the comic isn't new (it started in 1997), but I only just started reading it. As usual, whenever I start a new series, be it TV, comic, or whatever, I get so into it that I sometimes even neglect my sleep.

There are several reasons I like this comic so much. First, I love comics in general but I haven't had a chance to read many lately, so it's almost as if I'm making up for lost time (I've only liked two other comics this much since college, Mugen No Juunin and Naruto). Second, the art is fantastic. There are some people who don't like it, but it's detailed (most of the time), unique, and matches the tone and pace of the story, which is silly, dramatic, and action-packed. Speaking of the story, that's the third thing I like - it's epic. The world that One Piece is set in has more than 170 countries, while the story deals with a history dating back more than 900 years (of course, the world is much older than that). Fourth, I love the characters. The main characters (for the most part) are very life-like - some are cowardly, others are greedy and selfish, and one even has an inferiority complex. The secondary and minor characters even have their quirks and peculiarities. The enemies are quite cool as well and provide more than adequate obstacles to the advancement of the main characters' goals. The final thing is that the story is funny - I mean, gut-busting funny. I haven't laughed this much while reading a comic since Ranma 1/2.

I'm not recommending anyone to go read it - this isn't a review or anything. I'm just telling you why I like it. But don't let me stop you if you want to go check it out.

Luffy getting his prized possession from his hero, Shanks.

The first album I ever bought was Off the Deep End (in cassette form - remember those?), by "Weird Al" Yankovic, a parody artist. One of my best friends in elementary school was a big fan of his, so we would sometimes lounge around his house while listening to "Weird Al"'s songs and having a good laugh. However, since he had all of the albums, I never felt the need to buy any of them. Also, my family didn't really have money for me to spend on superfluous items at the time.

One morning during my freshman year of high school, I was sitting in my homeroom and watching the TV in our classroom while waiting for first period to start. I don't remember what I was watching exactly (I think it was a syndicated TV morning program made for high schools hosted by Lisa Ling), but they played a music video with a really good song. I asked the girl next to me what it was and she said it was Smells Like Nirvana. Eventually, I went out and bought the album because I really liked the song and my friend was no longer around (he had moved to Minnesota). What's strange (especially for people that have known me for a long time) is that, at first, I liked "Weird Al"'s parody version better than the original Nirvana song. However, I eventually started to listen to Nirvana, became totally blown away, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Michael Jackson's death meant different things to his fans, but my favorite memories of him are the parodies that "Weird Al" did of his songs. Michael was a strange person, but at least he wasn't afraid to laugh at himself, or let others do it.

I use Adobe Illustrator a lot at work to make documents, posters, catalogs, etc. Since only a few other people at my company use the program, the best way to show the file to others to get it checked and proof-read is to send it in pdf format, which is available for anyone to view. Instead of opening an Illustrator file and saving it to pdf format everytime I want to send it, though, I usually just save the original file as a pdf file, with all of the Illustrator components included. That way I can right-click on the file icon and select "open with --> Adobe Illustrator" to quickly open it and do whatever editing I need.



I'd been using Illustrator CS2 since I started working here, but we recently upgraded to CS4. After I installed it, for some reason, Illustrator wasn't in the list of selectable programs. When I did a search for it, I thought I clicked on the actual program but it was only a shortcut, so it didn't work. I tried to reinstall (which took about 2 hours) but it didn't help.

I finally stopped trying to solve the problem on my own and went to search for a solution on Google, which led me to this website. It had a thread about the problem I was having and a link to this neat little software. Problem solved!

It wasn't a huge problem, but solving it made me a little bit happier than before. That's what life is mostly made of, I think: little happy moments.

I can't believe I went the whole month of June without a post on this blog. It's a combination of three things: my laziness, my company's network blocking some parts of this blog site (not intentionally, I think), and Facebook. To be honest, Facebook is normally a big time-waster. It is however, useful for me, moreso than others, because I can keep up with the lives of friends I'm not normally able to talk to easily (i.e., living outside of Korea). Not only that, it's not just me writing and others reading; we can communicate too, although not as freely as on a phone, of course.

That being said, Facebook is hurting this blog. I think I need to arrange my posts and writings. I have three social networking sites that I use: 1) Facebook (www.facebook.com/jeffheo), 2) this blog, and 3) Cyworld (www.cyworld.com/jeffheo). From now on, I'll use 1 for simple status updates and links to videos and web articles; 2 for longer posts and uploaded videos, music, and pictures (especially my own drawings); and 3 for photographs of my life (at least while I'm here in Korea). That way, I should be able to use all three without sacrificing any of them. 1 is most practical in this day and age, but I'm sentimental about 2, while 3 is useful for people in Korea.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

When I was around 8 or 9 years old, I was one of the tallest kids in my neighborhood, believe it or not. In fact, I was also one of the most athletic kids as well. I was so much faster than the other kids that whenever we played football, they would institute a rule for me - I couldn't run more than 30 yards at a time. I also remember playing soccer once with some nighborhood kids, and I ended up scoring more goals than anyone. I could have been Messi!

Unfortunately, that was the end of my glory days. By the time I entered 7th grade, I had become one of the shortest and least athletic kids around. It's not that I didn't like or play sports, but it doesn't help when you consistently get picked close to last for teams. It also didn't help that my hobbies were playing video games and eating instant noodles, usually at the same time. I'm sure with some more vitamins, milk, and beef, I might have been able to grow an inch or two - nothing great, but better than nothing.

Another thing (and something I might have mentioned before) is that I wasn't so self-conscious about my height until I came to Korea. It shouldn't be too surprising, I guess, since it coincides with the start of my dating life. Now that I'm working out consistently, I feel a lot better about my body, and consequently myself. Sometimes I worry about what my children will be like, or at least a potential son. Let's not kid ourselves - height is 90% hereditary. I guess the only option is to marry a tall girl.

The president of Iran spoke yesterday at an anti-racism conference held by the United Nations, in which he spewed a vile, hate-filled speech directed at Israel. Many delegates from countries that hadn't already boycotted the conference got up and walked out. If you watch the video, many of the people who aren't leaving look like they want to get up too, but aren't quite sure what to do (the cowards).

This is the second UN anti-racism conference. The first was considered a failure because of the anti-semitic atmosphere and attempts by some countries to illegitimatize anti-Islamic comments. This conference was doomed to failure as soon as the UN allowed someone who called the Holocaust a myth, hosted a Holocaust-denial conference, and wants to destroy Israel. I understand that everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, but to be allowed to spew his racist views at an anti-racism conference is almost beyond belief.

I'd always half-expected, half-hoped that the United Nations would be a source of peace in the world. My hopes grew even more when a Korean became the Secretary-General in 2007. I guess that's why I'm so disappointed in the UN whenever I read news like this. I get less and less confident that the UN can bring about any real change. I think its only useful role is as a kind of meeting place for all the countries, as a way to keep each other in check, which is no small thing. However, in the end, it has no real power to bring about significant change or even protect people, if movies like Hotel Rwanda are to believed.