RX300 tire repairment

Discovered the right front tire is a little low at about 26 lbs the night before our scheduled trip to Pacific Grove on 20120625.  Inflated the tire and checked the next morning, it dropped from 31 to 30 lbs, thinking it's probably due to cold night.  Drove to Pacific Grove, checked into Asilomar Conference Ground, visited Monterey Bay Aquarium and drove back, the car felt a little strange as it tend to veer to the right occasionally, checked the left front tire pressure, it became 20 lbs.

Found out that there was a puncture at the bottom of the tire on the inner side after removing it, since the Chevron station, which usually handles this kind of problem, is under renovation, I had to come up with another solution - options: 1. Check out if Chevron has a temporary shop that still fix autos; 2. Purchase a tire repairing kit and do it myself; 3. Find another tire store that can take care of this.  I ended up getting a tire repairing kit ($10) from Auto Zone after option number 1 didn't exist.  The kit includes one puncture cleaning tool, 5 repairing strings, one string insertion tool, and one tube of rubber cement.  The first string went all the way in as I could not stop in time, but the second one was inserted just right.  After removing the excess string, inflated the tire to 31 lbs, the tire was checked and, voila, no more leakage.  I then rotate the tires according to the manual - right front to left rear, left rear to left front, left front to right rear, and right rear to right front, did a test drive in the neighborhood, put everything back in the car - spare tire, tools, and special socket.  I need to check the tires on a daily basis at least the first week then weekly afterward - I should have the tires replaced sometime end of the year.

Home Wi-Fi tips

In order for all (almost all) Wi-Fi devices, including iPOD Touch, iMAC, NBs, and Android phones, to work encryption keys must be set properly, the following are tested and work properly.

plhome2: "airstationwep" - 128-bit WEP (13 ASCII characters)
2WIRE: "xxxxanitayyyy" - 128-bit WEP (13 ASCII characters)

2WIRE DHCP server must be (appears to be) be enabled, only those devices with leased IP addresses (randomly assigned or pre-fixed that are known to 2WIRE router) are allowed access to the Internet - otherwise blocked.

2WIRE router security setting requirements

The custom pass phrase entered is not valid for the selected encryption type. WEP encryption requires either 10 hexadecimal characters or 5 ASCII characters to enable 64-bit encryption and 26 hexadecimal characters or 13 ASCII characters to enable 128-bit encryption.TKIP (WPA-PSK) & AES-CCMP (WPA2-PSK) require either 64 hexadecimal characters or an ASCII “pass phrase” between 8 and 63 alphanumeric characters.

Trouble Shooting:

- When having Internet problem (for example, upstream very slow - as is the case since early 2012) connecting from downstairs, wire or wireless, reseting the Linksys workgroup switch might resolve the problem.

可樂果

1/17/2012: Went to Daiso to look for something interesting, it is different from the last two years when I was able to find some useful gadgets, looks like it removed some merchandises that were probably not selling well, I will likely not coming back for a while.

申請健保與國民年金代繳

1. Get 委託郵局代繳費用申請書 online (2 copies) along with instruction page

2. Prepare one copy of 身分證 (required for 國民年金代繳)

3.Prepare one copy of last 健保繳費單或繳費收據 (required for 健保費代繳)

4.Fill out 委託郵局代繳費用申請書 accordingly
- 申請日期
- □新辦代繳
- 申請人戶名
- 申請人身分證號
- 存簿局號與帳號
- 聯絡電話
- 蓋章或簽名
- 聯絡電話
- 國民年金保險費一欄的 (1) 被保險人姓名 與 (2) 被保險人身分證號
- 全民健康保險費 第六類被保險人 一欄的 (1) 分局別代號, (2) 被保險人姓名(繳款單之繳款人), (3) 被保險人身分證號, (4) 所屬投保 單位代號

2012 movie experience

Mr. Popper's Penguins: Jim Carrey rekindle his broken marriage from 6 penguins sent from his late father (1/6/2012 - In-flight movie on China Airlines flight CI003 going back to Taiwan)

One Day: Jim Sturgess found out that the girl, Anne Hathaway, whom he knows all his life turned out to be the true love he had been searching for after her tragic death (1/6/2012 - In-flight movie on China Airlines flight CI003 going back to Taiwan)

Moneyball: Brad Pitts uses the analytical skill of a Harvard graduate and a limited player payroll budget to find talents for 2002 Athletics and turned around the team's poor performance - winning a MLB record 20 consecutive wins (1/6/2012 - In-flight movie on China Airlines flight CI003 going back to Taiwan)

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen: Efforts in creating a Salmon population in Yemen (3/19/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Friends with Kids: Two good friends try to have kid together but stay single (3/19/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

The Descendants: A group of Hawaiian natives struggle to determine if they want to sell their heritage and the last piece virgin land of the island for commercial use (3/24/2012 - online from www.funshion.com; 風行網)

Tower Heist: A group of people try to take back their retirement investment from a con man (3/24/2012 - online from www.funshion.com; 風行網)

The Hunger Games: The annual game of the nation Panem (consists of the Capitol ans 13 districts, a post-apocalyptic North America, the Capitol developed the Hunger Games to punish the citizens of Panem for their rebellion and to remind citizens of the absolute power of the Capitol and of the consequences of rebelling against the Capitolwhich it uses to punish its citizens. (4/2/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Marvels The Avengers: A comic superhero film - The Iron Man, The Hulk, Thor, Captain America, Black Widow, and Hawkeye. (5/29/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Bernie: A true story about a funeral director befriends a rich widow and eventually killed her when he couldn't stand her. (6/11/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)


The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel: The story of a group of British retirees moving to a retirement hotel in India - lots of dialogue and suprises. (6/11/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Beasts of the Southern Wild: In a forgotten but defiant bayou community cut off from the rest of the world by a sprawling levee, a six-year-old girl exists on the brink of orphanhood. Buoyed by her childish optimism and extraordinary imagination, she believes that the natural world is in balance with the universe until a fierce storm changes her reality. Desperate to repair the structure of her world in order to save her ailing father and sinking home, this tiny hero must learn to survive unstoppable catastrophes of epic proportions.. (7/19/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Moonrise Kingdom: Two early teens' love experience(7/24/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Looper: Persons from the future are sent back through time travel to be executed (10/2/2012 - Great Mall)

Argo: The true story of 6 Americans escape IRAN during the US embassy being held hostage (10/22/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Skyfall: The 23rd 007 movie, the best ever. New Q - a change to younger generation, final appearance of Judi Dench as M. (11/12/2012 - Santana Row CineArts)

Silver linings playbook: A mentally unstable male (triggered by discovering his wife's affair) goes home to try to get back with his wife (12/10/2012 - AMC Mercado 20)