鯨 - Jing1 - Whale

鯨魚 - Jing1 Yu2 - Whale Fish — Whale

中文.com points out that inside 鯨 is 魚京 - Yu2 Jing1 - Fish Capital. I like that.

嗑 - Ke4 - Crack With Front Teeth

Strange that there’s a word for this. I wonder if you ever use it to say anything other than 嗑瓜子 - Ke4 Gua1 Zi3 - Crack Melon Seeds?

Update: Jenny reports that in her family they have never 嗑瓜子. Instead they 啃瓜子 - Ken3 Gua1 Zi3 - Gnaw Melon Seeds.

Further update: I am also required to report that Jenny’s Grandmother’s 啃瓜子 technique is unstoppable.

灑 - Sa3 - Splash, Sprinkle

噴灑器 - Pen1 Sa3 Qi4 - Spray Sprinkle Device — Sprinkler

盲 - Mang2 - Blind

Tonight’s movie: Zatoichi, the 2003 Takeshi Kitano version. Strange. A samurai movie with tap dancing. Was the original that kooky? Anyway, after having seen this, and The One Armed Swordsman, I feel I’m ready for Zatoichi Meets the One Armed Swordsman.

髕 - Bin4 - Kneecap

髕骨 - Bin4 Gu3 - Kneecap Bone — Kneecap

漿 - Jiang1 - Paste

泥漿 - Ni2 Jiang1 - Mud Paste — Slurry

豆漿 - Dou4 Jiang1 - Soybean Paste — Soybean Milk

Look over on the right. Just below the “recent comments”. See it? The thing that says “links:”? Those are my 10 latest del.icio.us links, which were trivial to add, thanks to this wonderful plugin.

Update: The “display extended description” feature of that plugin is bugged. Here’s the fix. Just add these two lines to the beginning of the _delicious_startelem function:

global $_display_tags;
global $_display_extended;

鮭 - Gui1 - Salmon

鮭魚 - Gui1 Yu2 - Salmon Fish — Salmon

Salmon is not what we had for dinner tonight.

肉 - Rou4 - Meat, Flesh

資料 - Zi1 Liao4 - Capital Material — Data

元資料 - Yuan2 Zi1 Liao4 - Primary Capital Material — Metadata

肉資料 - Rou4 Zi1 Liao4 - Meat Capital Material — Meatdata

肉資料是元資料的相反

映 - Ying4 - Reflect, Shine

Nice shiny new house number!

砸 - Za2 - Pound, Mash, Break

砸破 - Za2 Po4 - Pound Break — Smash

Toto and Effie had a self storage unit full of old furniture that needed to be disposed of. They rented a dumpster which would not fit all the furniture… as long as it was intact. They asked me to come and bring my new favorite tool, the sledgehammer! It was great! The most fun I’ve had in a long time! I’m amazed at how easy it is to wreak so much destruction with just an 8# sledghammer. With a good swing, you don’t even feel any resistance as the hammer just tears the furniture apart.

Hardest thing to break: Amazingly, the papasan chair. The sledgehammer just bounced off of it! I had to instead attack it and pry it apart with a regular claw hammer bit by bit.

Most fun thing to break: Hard to say. All the big, heavy stuff was great. There was a two level shelf held together by about 10 thick wooden posts. Turning it on its side and smashing through all the posts reminded me of the training scenes in many kung fu movies where they learn how to break legs.

Interesting finds: One box contained a book of Apple II programs, mostly games, ready to type in and execute! Including some in assembly language. Also, Soundwave. The rumored treasure (a hidden coin collection) was, however, not found.

透 - Tou4 - Penetrate, Thorough

Sometimes Chinese is very very orderly and logical:

透明 - Tou4 Ming2 - Penetrate Light — Transparent
半透明 - Ban4 Tou4 Ming2 - Half Penetrate Light — Translucent
不透明 - Bu4 Tou4 Ming2 - Not Penetrate Light — Opaque

Pass it on.

岩 - Yan2 - Rock, Cliff

岩漿 - Yan2 Jiang1 - Rock Paste — Lava

Or is that 熔岩 - Rong2 Yan2 - Smelt Rock — Lava? Actually Google prefers this one by almost 5 to 1. UNLESS! You restrict the search to Chinese pages only! Then the first one wins.

浪 - Lang4 - Wave, Dissipate

浪費 - Lang4 Fei4 - Dissipate Consume — Waste

That’s what Jenny thinks our insane 12:01 showtime, $9.50×2+snacks^expensive, and a lost night’s sleep will turn in to. I tend to agree, but…

By the way: 西斯 - Xi1 Si1 - Sith

汗 - Han4 - Perspiration, Sweat

Almost, almost looks sweaty. So does 流汗 - Liu2 Han4 - Flow Sweat — Sweat.

圖 - Tu2 - Diagram, Plan, Picture, Chart

字圖 - Zi4 Tu2 - Character Picture — Glyph

唬 - Hu3 - Roar

A Roar comes from the Mouth (口) of a Tiger (虎).

笛 - Di2 - Flute

長笛 - Chang2 Di2 - Long Flute — Flute

Ultimate Chinese/English Musical Instrument Dictionary

浮 - Fu2 - Float, Exceed

For my money, TV just doesn’t get any better than Will It Float?.

驗 - Yan4 - Examine, Test, Check

驗證 - Yan4 Zheng4 - Examine Prove — Verify

Ever wonder what would happen if you turned off the Java bytecode verifier? Don’t. Don’t wonder, and don’t do it. It’s bad. Really really bad. How bad? Consider total protonic reversal. Then add rats.

福 - Fu2 - Good Fortune, Happiness

福和橋 - Fu2 He2 Qiao2 - Good Fortune Harmony Bridge

When we went to visit her, Jenny’s aunt lived in 永和 very near one end of the 福和橋, a bridge in outer Taipei. A live webcam happens to be aimed at this bridge. Now she lives in some other place, not near any MRT station, much to my dismay.

Are you in the US? Do you have cable? Do you get AZN? If the answers to all three questions are YES, then starting tomorrow, and on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays at 8 PM for the next month or so you are watching Rooftop Room Cat! Congratulations!

UPDATE: Uhhh…. the website said it was supposed to start today, but actually they’re just showing the last episode of Hotelier again. Try again Tuesday!

蘋 - Ping2 - Apple

蘋果 - Ping2 Guo3 - Apple Fruit — Apple

蘋果西打 - Ping2 Guo3 Xi1 Da3 - Apple Cider — The label (actually it is written backwards, 打西果蘋) on one side of this can of apple soda we bought at the asian market. The other side says “APPLE SIDRA”.

膽 - Dan3 - Gall Bladder, Courage

膽固醇 - Dan3 Gu4 Chun2 - Gall Solid -Sterol — Cholesterol

Why “Gall Solid”? OOOoooooohhhhh…..

錘 - Chui2 - Hammer

大錘 - Da4 Chui2 - Big Hammer — Sledgehammer

I was really hoping Chinese would have a cool word for SLEDGEHAMMER but I guess ultimately it is just a big hammer. Oh well.

I’m kinda glad I haven’t bought Tiger yet. It turns out that the new Safari + Dashboad team up to allow an unremovable (!) executable to be installed and run just by visiting a web site, like this one, which has a demo and a full explanatation. Sure, dashboard widgets run in a sandbox. How easy are sandboxes to break out of? Maybe I’ll wait for 10.4.1.

UPDATE: According to an update to the linked article, people who have already installed Tiger can protect themselves by unchecking “Automatically open safe files” in Safari preferences. It’s apparently checked by default, and Dashboard widgets are considered “safe”.

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緣 - Yuan2 - Reason, Cause, Fate, Hem, Edge

緣份 - Yuan2 Fen4 - Fate Portion — Fate, Destiny

A saying: 有緣千里來相會 - You3 Yuan2 Qian1 Li3 Lai2 Xiang1 Hui4 - Have Fate Thousand Li Come Mutual Meet — With fate, even if separated by a thousand miles, you will meet.

And the converse: 無緣對面不相逢 - Wu2 Yuan2 Dui4 Mian4 Bu4 Xiang1 Feng2 - Without Fate Opposite Side No Mutual Meet — Without fate, even across the same room, you will not meet.

寶 - Bao3 - Treasure, Precious

寶寶 - Bao3 Bao3 - Precious Precious — Baby, Darling

念 - Nian4 - Think Of, Study, Read Aloud

念動力 - Nian4 Dong4 Li4 - Think Move Power — Telekinesis

心理學 - Xin1 Li3 Xue2 - Spirit Idea Study — Psychology

超心理學 - Chao1 Xin1 Li3 Xue2 - Super Spirit Idea Study — Parapsychology

And 西洋神秘學 - Xi1 Yang2 Shen2 Mi4 Xue2 - Western Foreign Spirit Secret Study — Western Mysterious Studies (?) looks like a dictionary of all sorts of parapsychological and pseudoscientific terms

辦 - Ban4 - Handle, Manage, Host, Deal With, Do

YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE * !

釜 - Fu3 - Cauldron

釜山 - Fu3 Shan1 - Cauldron Mountain - 부산 - Busan

渡 - Du4 - Cross, Pass, Ford

渡船 - Du4 Chuan2 - Cross Boat — Ferry Another item on life’s TODO list: Take the “Umitobukabutomushi” (“Beetle Ferry”) from Fukuoka to Busan.

Road Sign Math just drove me insane.

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Time Traveler Convention!

May 7, 2005, 10:00pm EDT (08 May 2005 02:00:00 UTC)

East Campus Courtyard, MIT

42:21:36.025°N, 71:05:16.332°W

(42.360007,-071.087870 in decimal degrees)

Some good commentary at the Slashdot discussion, like, why didn’t they set the date in the PAST so we don’t have to wait a week to see if it is a success?

拖 - Tuo1 - Drag

拖拉機 - Tuo1 La1 Ji1 - Drag Pull Machine — Tractor

拖放 - Tuo1 Fang4 - Drag Release — Drag and Drop

步 - Bu4 - Step, Pace, March

同步 - Tong2 Bu4 - Same Step — Synchronous

非同步 - Fei1 Tong2 Bu4 - Non Same Step — Asynchronous