Suggestions

Jex & I found something really funny while discussing about the wedding one night. I wanted to see the list of exhibitors for the bridal fair we attended just recently. For some reason I don't usually type in URLs of websites in the address bar, but instead I type in a search in Google and click on the webpage from the results. So I started typing in "getting married" in the search bar on Firefox and then the suggestions list popped up and guess what the top suggestion result is?

Do a barrel roll!

A barrel roll is an aerial maneuver in which an airplane makes a complete rotation on its longitudinal axis while following a helical path, approximately maintaining its original direction.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barrel_roll

I saw this tweet from @TIME earlier today:

Of course, I had to try it! And, yes, I was pleasantly surprised. =)

You should try it out yourself, if you're curious. It's very important to try it out on Firefox or Chrome, because other browsers might not work.

Losing a Smartphone

Losing my Nexus One is one of the most expensive material losses I've experienced, so far. And it's only the second item I've actually had stolen from me, as far as I know. The first time was my wallet, stolen from my unattended bag, during our NSTP, teaching kids in Montalban. Naturally, I was devastated. I had around P400.00 worth of money in my wallet plus my ATM card, other cards and photos, I think. I only realized that it was gone when we were back in school for our NSTP debriefing.

Burn, baby burn

Robert Wilhelm Eberhard Bunsen (phew!) developed the very well known bunsen burner around the 1850s. Today is his 200th birthday and Google honors him with a very special doodle.

Google doodle for Robert Bunsen's 200th birthday

Since the image above is a screenshot you can't see that the doodle is actually animated. Go visit http://www.google.com if you want to see the animation (while it's still the 31st! If you visit this later than the 31st, you can probably find the animated logo in the Doodles history).

The very first Google doodle was released on August 30, 1998 for the Burning Man festival. If you look through the Doodles history you'll notice that the first doodles that came out were pretty simple. The main subject was always the Google logo and only "accessories" were added to pay tribute to a certain occasion or person. Over time the designs have evolved and doodles are now more interesting than ever. I especially loved the Pacman tribute last year because it was a live Pacman game that you could play! You can still see the logo in action (and play) here (http://www.google.com/pacman/)

Pacman Google doodle

What about you, what's your favorite Google Doodle?

Nexus One Manual Gingerbread Update

Last Sunday, I got a text from a friend, who also has a Nexus One, that he just got his Gingerbread update OTA (over the air). I was ecstatic and immediately turned my phone's wifi on. I was so disappointed not to see any prompt for an update. So I thought I'd give it a few more minutes before becoming totally disappointed. After a couple of games on Kongregate I hopefully unlocked my phone, but, sadly, no update prompt was waiting for me.

I was aware that not everyone gets updates OTA at the same time but I was just too curious and excited (and, fine, impatient) that I wanted my update right now! So I researched on manual Gingerbread updates for the Nexus One. When Froyo came out I also updated my phone manually, so I wasn't really worried about doing the same thing for Gingerbread.

I found this post from dkszone.net and read the comments on the post before I proceeded with following the instructions. I didn't follow their instructions 100% so I'll share what I did for my manual update.