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Another XP Annoyance Bites the Dust!

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010

I’ve been using Windows XP for 8 years.  8 long years.

Ironically, one reason that I have been so hesitant to upgrade to Vista or Windows 7 is that my transition from Windows 98 to Windows XP was so traumatic.  (OMG, I sound like an abuse victim on Dr. Phil.)

Anyway, one thing that has always irritated the sh*t out of me is the “All Programs” menu that you get when you click on the XP “Start” button.

If you love software as much as I do (especially free demos), your “All Programs” menu is chock-full of mysterious menu items arranged in a random, non-alphabetized mess.  More than once I’ve started to download software only to find out that it was already installed on my PC.

And for 8 long years, I’ve assumed that there wasn’t anything I could do about it.

But today is a new day!

Just open up the All Programs menus, and right-click on any menu item.  Near the bottom of the drop-down menu, you’ll see the magic words “Sort by Name.”  Give that baby a click, and all of a sudden, everything is in alphabetical order.

Yep.  8 long years…

Here are some more tips:

  1. You can rename any item on the All Programs menu by right-clicking it.
  2. Specifically, if there are any items that you want at the top of the list, you can add an initial zero or two to the name of the item to get it to come first in the alphabet.  (Some folder names shouldn’t be changed.  Don’t rename “Startup.”  Also, pay attention to any warnings that pop up — it’s XP trying to stop you from doing something stupid.)
  3. You might also want to rename any items with non-intuitive or downright baffling names.
  4. If you want to go to the folder containing the items on the All Programs menu, you can right-click on the All Programs button and then click on “Explore.”  (The items on the All Programs list should be located in the folder containing your profile in a sub-folder named “Start Menu\Programs.”)
  5. Actually, clicking on “Explore” will only show you the menu items associated with the profile you logged in with.  If you can’t find what you’re looking for in that folder, try right-clicking on All Programs and then clicking on “Explore All Users.”
  6. One reason that you might want to go into the Start Menu\Programs folder(s) is to create groups and subgroups of menu items — you can create new folders, name them whatever you want, and then drag (or cut-and-paste) menu items to your heart’s delight.
  7. If there’s a menu item that belongs in more than one group or subgroup, you can make as many copies of that item as you need.
  8. You may find one or more All Programs menu items consisting of a folder containing a single folder or shortcut.  You can chop out a layer of the hierarchy by dragging, moving, or cutting and pasting the single lower-level item up into the “Start Menu\Programs” folder, and then deleting the original folder (which should now be empty).
  9. If you want, you can move individual menu items from one profile to another.
  10. Finally, the All Programs list includes both shortcuts and folders containing shortcuts.  After you alphabetize the list, the folders and the shortcuts will be alphabetized into two separate groups.  If that bothers you, you can move each shortcut you care about into its own appropriately named new folder.

Before you get too creative, especially with Tips 6-10, I urge you to make a backup copy of any “Start Menu\Programs” folder that you want to make changes to.  (But you knew that already, didn’t you?)

Good luck!

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Why I’m For Birthright Citizenship

Friday, August 13th, 2010

If you’re born in the US, you’re a US citizen.  (If you’re a trivia buff, there are exceptions — for example, the rule doesn’t apply to children of foreign diplomats or to children of soldiers in an occupying army.)

I’m a benefactor of this rule — my parents had not yet completed the naturalization process when I was born in New York City all those years ago.  But thanks to the Fourteenth Amendment, I was a US citizen from Day One.

Lately, there has been talk of changing the Fourteenth Amendment to get rid of birthright citizenship.  Those in favor of the change paint a dark picture of pregnant women from foreign countries making their way onto American soil for the express purpose of hitting the citizenship jackpot.

Here’s why I’m against changing the law:

  1. Birthright citizenship has been a huge success story.  It has contributed significantly to America’s spectacular growth over the past 100+ years, by greatly accelerating the assimilation of immigrants and their children into American society.
  2. Birthright citizenship is easy to understand and apply.  If you can prove that you were born in the US, you’re a US citizen.  End of story.
  3. The correlative of No. 2 is that doing away with birthright citizenship would be an administrative nightmare (and a bureaucrat’s paradise).  Imagine the tons of paperwork and lawyers’ fees that would be generated if everyone had to prove that their parents were US citizens.
  4. Any change in the law would unfairly affect people of color.  When’s the last time that you heard anyone questioning the citizenship of a white person?
  5. In fact, even under current law, there have been numerous incidents of US citizens (invariably non-white) being wrongly deported.  Changing the law would vastly increase the ability of the government to mess with people’s lives.
  6. Are pregnant foreigners coming into the US to drop “anchor babies”?  Possibly.  But nowhere near as many as the anti-BC crowd would have you believe.  And certainly nowhere near enough to justify a nuclear change in policy.

There’s an Asian American angle to the story.  Back in the 1890′s, a San Francisco resident named Wong Kim Ark, born in the US to Chinese parents, went to visit China.  When he came back to the US, the authorities wouldn’t let him into the country because, in their view, Mr. Wong was “a subject of the emperor of China,” and not a US citizen.

One of the truly great things about America is that even a cook can have his day in the highest court in the land:

United States v. Wong Kim Ark

The Fourteenth Amendment rocks!

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Dan Choi, True American

Friday, July 23rd, 2010

I have nothing but respect for this guy.

Lt. Dan Choi, West Point graduate, Iraq veteran (infantry), and son of a Korean American Southern Baptist minister, had the courage to tell the world that he’s gay — even though he knew that it might cost him his career and his relationship with his father.

Well, it did end up costing him his career, at least for the time being — the Army has just discharged him pursuant to the infamous Don’t Ask Don’t Tell (DADT) policy.

As for Lt. Choi’s relationship with his father — time will tell.  (FWIW, seeing how he has conducted himself throughout his ordeal, I for one would be damned proud if he were my son.)

Here is Lt. Choi, being interviewed by Rachel Maddow:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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What’s the Chinese word for “chutzpah”?

Friday, June 11th, 2010

In China, a man named Lu split up with his wife.  Then, deciding that he no longer wanted to raise their two-year-old son, Mr. Lu sold the boy online to a couple in Beijing.

Mr. Lu subsequently reconciled with his wife, leading to what has to have been the Mother of All Awkward Conversations:

“Mommy’s home!  Come here, little precious!  Little precious?”

“Honey, I’ve got good news and bad news.  The good news is that I was finally able to make a down payment on that backhoe I’ve had my eye on…”

In a breathtakingly brazen attempt to get his son back, Mr. Lu contacted the police and accused the Beijing couple of child trafficking.

After the smoke cleared, Mr. Lu was convicted of child abandonment, receiving a 6-month suspended sentence and 1-year probation.

The Beijing couple was found to have done nothing wrong.  However, the 18000 RMB (approx. $2,600) that the couple paid for the child was “confiscated” by the authorities.

Link to Article

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I’m glad I don’t live in Arizona…

Thursday, April 29th, 2010

It still surprises me when I run into a white person who isn’t familiar with the term “FOB,” as used in the Asian American community.

FOB stands for “Fresh Off the Boat,” and is used to refer to a person from Asia who has recently arrived in America. More often than not, the term is used pejoratively to describe Asian men, particularly teenagers and young adults. (It’s also the name of a play by Asian American playwright David Henry Hwang.)

By and large, Asian Americans can be pretty harsh on FOBs. I’m no psychologist, but it seems to me that it’s an example of sh*t flowing downhill.

Growing up as an Asian American can be tough at times. You take an awful lot of grief from mean non-Asian people in your life, not to mention the grief you take from your own family. All that ill feeling has to get channeled somewhere.  What better target than Long Duk Dong?

In case you’re not a fan of director John Hughes, Long Duk Dong (played by Utah-born Gedde Watanabe) is an Asian foreign exchange student in the film Sixteen Candles who attempts to provide some comic relief as Molly Ringwald strives mightily to survive the indignity of being ignored by her family on her 16th birthday:

Long Duk Dong is FOB.  He talks funny, he dresses funny, and he has funny hair.  He’s childlike, giggly, and socially inept.  Early on in the film, he latches onto a crude phrase used to describe female anatomy, which he delightedly lets fly at the screenwriter’s whim.  (To his dubious credit, Long Duk Dong manages to lose his virginity by the end of the movie, in what has to be the least erotic sex scene ever filmed.)

Here’s the thing — when you grow up as an Asian American male, you convince yourself that there’s no way anyone would ever confuse you with Long Duk Dong.  You speak perfect English.  You have better clothes and better hair (at least some of the time).  You take pains to avoid acting in a childlike or giggly manner.

Yep, there’s no way anyone would think you were FOB.

Yet, deep down, I know that an awful lot of people in America just don’t see that much of a difference between me and Long Duk Dong.

And if I were living in Arizona, that would scare the crap out of me.

(By the way, I don’t want anyone to think I’m down on Gedde Watanabe for taking the role.  There just isn’t that much work for Asian American actors.  IMHO, he did the best he could with the script that he was given.  Gedde went onto better things, including leading roles in the films Volunteers and Gung Ho.)

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The Perfect DDR Shoe…

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

All right, I’m exaggerating — the perfect DDR shoe would be a shoe that made my feet move 20% faster, while at the same time making me look 5 inches taller, 10 pounds lighter, and 25 years younger.

But I digress.

I’m not saying that you’re going to be doing your social life any favors, but if you want to significantly improve your Dance Dance Revolution experience, you might want to check out the Vibram Five Fingers shoe:

It’s a little disconcerting at first to be able to feel the dancepad with the bottoms of your feet and your toes, but once you get used to the shoes, they rock!

Of course, I’m talking about using the shoes for the arcade, or an arcade-type dancepad, such as the Cobalt Flux or the RedOctane Afterburner.  For soft pads, you should stick to bare feet.

VFF shoes aren’t cheap (around $80 online for the Classic), but I’m not complaining.  If the internet is to be believed, the shoes are also good for running — but start out slow, and build up to longer distances and higher speeds gradually…

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I guess you had to be there…

Sunday, March 28th, 2010

Contrary to popular opinion, Republicans do not hold the monopoly on racially insensitive attempts at humor. New Hampshire State Representative Nick Levasseur, a Democrat, uncorked this beaut on Facebook:

“Anime is a prime example of why two nukes just wasn’t enough.”

Apparently, Representative Levasseur thinks that the US should have kept dropping nuclear weapons on Japan until the world was 100% safe from Sailor Moon.

To his credit, the Representative’s apology did not include the obligatory: “I’m sorry if anyone was offended.”

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Oh, those wacky Koreans!

Sunday, March 7th, 2010

Am I the only one who thinks this might be a hoax?

Various sources report that a South Korean couple became so addicted to an online video game that they allowed their 3-month-old infant to starve to death, while nurturing their “virtual” child in a video gaming parlor.

Link to Article

Here’s why I’m not 100% convinced that this is a real story:

  1. Not one single news source that I could find has named either the father or mother.
  2. The story is just a little too cute — a little too perfect.
  3. The story reinforces stereotypes about Koreans being technology-obsessed lunatics without a life.  (I know, I know — people in glass houses…)
  4. If there’s one thing that Koreans are more obsessed about than video games, it’s their children.

Time will tell, I guess.

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Oh, those wacky Koreans!

Sunday, January 17th, 2010

Mr. Kotter he’s not.

South Korean math teacher Woo Hyung-chul’s teaching methods include cursing at his students and hitting them with a shovel.

But because it’s South Korea, his students love him.  According to the Korea Times:

Students who gave up on math call him a “messiah” for redeeming them from the deep, dark valley of hopelessness and a state of utter lack of motivation.

How do you say “Stockholm syndrome” in Korean?

Link to Article

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Why did it have to be a geeky Asian guy from New Jersey?

Saturday, January 9th, 2010

Mystery solved.

That guy who ducked under the security rope at Newark Airport a few days ago, triggering a six-hour panic turns out to be an Asian guy (presumably geeky) from Piscataway, NJ. If you’re curious, you can find his name on Google.

It boggles my mind to think that they were able to pick this one guy out of the thousands of Asian guys who live in and around Piscataway.

I can’t say that I’m too surprised at the ethnicity of the mystery man. When I heard about some guy who, out of an apparent mix of impulsivity and a disdain for authority, embarked on a breathtakingly stupid course of action so that he could spend a few minutes with a woman, well, let’s just say that I’ve been there.

Here’s some video, in case you missed the original story:

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