I was organizing my toy display tonight and move the empty boxes on the shelf to make more room. I found myself has been following toy news on the internet closely, and participating discussion in the toy collector’s forum. I don’t find many people in real life share this same hobby as I do, maybe with the only exception Kenny. I think collection Japanese toy is more common in HK than here in Canada where there a lot more other things to collection. Unlike other people I met on the net, I didn’t buy random toy that appeals to me. I only buy the toy line I like most and to complete the line. I will sell off the toys from the line I dropped to free up some shelf space. I believe if I wait a bit longer, I could even turn a small profit from selling those toys. From now on, I will focus on just three major toy lines: all new Macross toys, Gundam HCM-Pro and non-MSV Gundam FIX. Occationally I may buy SoC if Bandai remake something I always wanted or owned as a kid.

I got the DVD with everyone’s WYD photos from Jan last night, it’s over 3.5GB in total. I have been checking out the pictures this afternoon. I tried to delete some blurry and meaningless ones without me in the picture. This process took me almost 2 hours, and I reclaim 500MB disk spaces. It interesting to check out other’s pictures. Although most of them are identical shots from different angle, some of them do capture important moments. I was taking to my colleague the other day on the problem of organizing photos. He is using Adobe albums to tag all this photos for easy searching. I just dump all my pictures in a directory with sub folders sorted chronologically. I have to remember the when about of the event in order to dig out some old pictures. The only logical solution to this problem is desktop facial recognition, cameras with embed GPS and album software able to sync up with the outlook calender. Every information about the picture: time, place, event and people is then fully captured. This will once for all solved the problem of trying to identify that mysterous picture from the past.

Today is Pat’s birthday. We had started with having dim sum at Crystal Mall Top Gun. Although I had heard bad reputation from my friends, I found that place is quite decent. The food is pretty good and not as expensive as I thought. The best part is each of us get a tea set to make our own favour of tea. I walked Charlie in the afternoon while Pat was organizing her WYD photos. Tonight we went to the Oktoberfest at St. Paul with Tammy. Tammy is born on the same year same day as Pat. Before we had down to Richmond, we droped off the birthday present for Brenda, and I took a picture of three birthday girls. I wonder what is the chance of knowing three people have the same birthday.

The Oktoberfest tonight is so-so, can’t compare to the real Bravian food we had in Germany. However it is always good to get together with the WYD team. The most disappointed thing of tonight is how can an Oktoberfest without German beer? We stayed until 11:00p.m., had some folk dance with the church old folks, and I got pushed out to particple in a stupid dancing competition in traditional german way. Then we headed to the Also Louge in No. 3 road to have a drink and cut the cake. That place is quite nice, we had ordered some cocktail and appetizers, both taste pretty good. The waitess suggested flaming lamborghini for Pat and Tammy, said it is the birthday drink. It a pretty smart way pursading us to spend more money, cost that drink is usually the most expensive cocktail on the menu. Tammy is pretty drunk after taking the flaming lamborghini, which is equivalent to 4 shooters. Somehow Pat is still quite awake, probably she has a higher body mass ratio. The girls talk a lot of things which I pay no attention to. I was concentrated in watching an old Charlie Chaplin movie showing on the big screen. I think it is the first Chaplin film I had ever watched, and I think it is very funny. Those old Chaplin really suits the atomsphere, it’s black and white and soundless. What a brillant form of entertainment without bothering the guests. We stayed there until almost the closing time.

Tonight, I went to Grand Ball Room for their friday night dancing party with Pat for the first time. We tried to pick up our dancing skills, but unfortunately I had forgot all the moves I had learnt before my vacation. Moreover I have trouble counting the beats of the songs. No only I can’t count how many beats in a bar, I can’t even tell the genre of the song. The only exception is cha-cha and tango which have easy to recongize features. Thus Pat gave me a special training on counting the rythm. We sat there for about an hour and I had counted the beats of more than ten songs. I found the songs with heavy and simple drums is much easier to follow. At the end, both me and Pat have headache from the beats, so we decided to go home early. On our way back home, I felt there was a hammer keep pounding my brain in a rythm while I was driving. I guess I will see the rythm and beats in my dream tonight.

I went to have dim sum during lunch today at Carefree close to work. We used to go to that place for lunch, but it had changed from a HK style cafe to dim sum resturant while I was in vacation. Before the change, it only serve set lunch in the afternoon, and doesn’t attract too many customers. I found that the place is quite crowded today, I heard that we have to wait in line on a Friday. The dim sum served there is not bad, the taste is good, price is cheap, although the dishes are not as fancy as Kirin in Coquitlam. Since it is the only dim sum resturant in the area, it has a natural monoploy in the market. This is another successful story of surviving in the business world. Poor will lead to changes, changes will lead to prosperity. I wonder when will PMC learn this lesson and make up the mind to brand out into a new sector where there is less competitors?