Dave and I rode another 44km last night. Over the Phu My bridge and back and then a couple of times around our loop through the industrial park. A good ride.

I got up at 5am because some people are picking up my friend Luke and me at 6:30am to go out to the countryside. We are going to participate in a Vietnamese television show about foreigners learning about Vietnamese culture. All we have told is that we are going to learn how to harvest some type of seaweed. Definitely taking some extra clothes along for that. Also taking a camera, so more later. (I knew running back into my old “agent,” Vinh Phuc, would pay off.) I shaved this morning and managed not to sever my earlobe like I did the last time I filmed something in Vietnam.

Peace!

“Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world’s first bionic man. We can make him better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster.”

So my Xbox 360 has been broken (not the red ring of death this time – it pumps out sound to the TV but no video at all, which is less than ideal) for a couple of months now. At first I didn’t get it fixed because I was in the middle of marking exams and didn’t need the distraction. After that, it’s only been out of sheer laziness.

Anyway, earlier this week I took it in to the shop to have it repaired. They told me three days, so I went back today to pick it up. It’s not ready – two more days. And here’s the terrible part: They already have the new Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 game there and ready to buy. I’ve been waiting for this game to come out for like a year now – and now it’s sitting there on the shelf for $1.25 and I can’t buy it. Well, I guess I can buy it, but without an Xbox to play it on it doesn’t really do me a whole lot of good.

I’ve had the Kindle app on my iPhone for a while but hadn’t tried to download any books. I finally tried it and it is awesome. We can’t buy books over wi-fi yet here in Vietnam, but that is no big deal. I registered the Kindle app with Amazon and then bought a book – Daemon by Daniel Suarez – from the Amazon Kindle store. It downloaded to my computer and synced with my iPhone in about one minute flat. And it was only $9.99 – which is a pretty fair price for a book. Especially since I don’t have to convince someone coming to visit me here in Vietnam to lug a bunch of books over here for me (or to bring a suitcase full of books back myself every time I go to the U.S. like I’ve been doing).

The only thing that’s not great about it is reading on the small iPhone screen. It can hold about one short paragraph at a time – which is really not enough. Once you get into the groove it’s not a big deal – you just keep flicking along and hardly notice it – but it would be much nicer if the screen was larger and could hold a full page of text at a time. Just less flicking and probably a more immersive/absorbing reading experience.

It really makes me want to buy one of the full-sized Kindle (or Barnes & Noble’s new Nook ereader or whatever). But I think what would be ideal for me would be an iPhone-like device with a larger (and possibly even higher-resolution) screen. I’ve been waiting for Apple to come out with a tablet for a couple of years now, as that would be the perfect device for me. But Kindles aren’t really that prohibitively expensive, and if Apple doesn’t come out with the tablet by, say, January 2010, I’m going to break down and buy a Kindle then – if not before.

But for now – just being able to buy a book for $10 and read it here immediately in Vietnam is awesome. Yay Kindle!

[Update: I had forgotten that Amazon has also announced a freestanding Kindle application for the PC - meaning that you'll be able to read books on your laptop as well - that will supposedly be released sometime in November. That will definitely tide me over while I wait to see what Apple comes out with.]

I’ve probably mentioned Grooveshark (www.grooveshark.com) on this blog before – I’m too lazy to do a simple search to find out – but if you have not tried it yet you should. They just updated it to a new version and it’s even better than before – faster, cleaner and more intuitive interface, etc. It’s basically a web-app version of iTunes – except you can play any music on the web, not just your own files. It’s rare that I search for something that I can’t find. I listen to it at work all the time. I also use it to make the playlists that I embed on this blog sometime. Anyway, check it out. In my opinion it’s the best web-based music player (at least until Spotify opens up to the U.S. market – or I guess for me the Vietnamese market).

I got back on the bike last night for the first time in over two weeks and rode 28 kilometers. I’ve been sick – I am not sure what I had but it wasn’t good. I think I had the flu for a few days, but since then I’ve had a persistent cough and very low energy. I’m finally feeling well enough to start exercising again, but still coughing a little bit. Apparently it’s been going around here.

I tried the normal Vietnamese method of overdosing on antibiotics as well as Thao’s Vietnamese folk remedies and nothing seemed to help but time. Anyway, I’m glad that’s over with.

It felt good to get back on the bike – I had been dreading it but it was actually enjoyable and felt good to move. I slept well last night. Damn this is a boring post. It’s like Facebook status update or a tweet on Twitter: “About to go to lunch.” “Back from lunch. Had salad.” “Leaving work to head home.” “Home.” “About to go to bed.” “Just woke up.”

Sorry.

I saw two movies over the past week or so, The Informant and Where the Wild Things Are.

I had been looking forward to Where the Wild Things Are for about a year. Unfortunately, I thought it was awful. I never got caught up in the movie – never felt drawn into it. It just felt like a kid running around with a bunch of big puppets to me. And I thought the plot – what there was of one – was pretty lame. Didn’t really go anywhere. Which I suppose should not be very surprising since the original book they adapted for the screen was extremely short. Also, casting James Gandolfini as voice of the main wild thing was a particularly dumb move. His voice is so inextricably linked with Tony Soprano in my mind that everytime he talked I kept expecting to see Syl, Paulie Walnuts, and Christopher Moltisanti jump out from behind a tree. Boo Spike Jonze! Boo! I’d give it about a 3 out of 10.

The Informant, on the other hand, was very well done. I hadn’t heard much about it, but a friend of mine saw it and recommended it to me. Very funny and a very intelligent movie. Matt Damon plays the lead role perfectly. I really enjoyed it and it kept my attention from start to finish. Easily an 8 out of 10.

http://news.bookweb.org/7130.html

Rather than trying to argue that lower book prices are ‘harmful to consumers,” why don’t you spend your time coming up with an alternative to your doomed business model (which I strongly feel will be even more doomed once ereaders like the Kindle, Nook, etc., really gain traction in the marketplace and books become as widely pirated as movies, software, music, etc.).