Hung Truong: The Blog!

Fighting The Common Cold With Cold-Eeze!

On Sunday night, my throat felt somewhat congested, so I figured I was catching a cold. I wasn’t going to just accept it without a fight!

Cold-Eeze is like a cough drop, but it has some special Zinc ingredient in it. From my understanding, the Zinc coats your throat and prevents the cold virus from replicating. One note: the stuff tastes really gross, and it sort of stays in your mouth long after the lozenge is gone. Imagine eating the peel of a banana. Kick it down a notch and you have Cold-Eeze.

Last time I had a cold, I tried using Cold-Eeze to decrease the length of it. I used it the late in day after I felt like I was getting sick, so I ended up being sick for more than a week.

This time, I took it right away, even before I was sure that I was sick. Today, Thursday, I feel about as good as I did on Sunday. I’m definitely past the hump. In my experience, I’ve had colds that have been a lot worse (I didn’t really feel all that sick during the worst days, Tuesday and Wednesday) and they’ve lasted a lot longer too.

I wouldn’t say that Cold-Eeze cures anything; it just makes your cold shorter and weaker. Even if you’re skeptical about it, I’d say it’s worth it to have some lying around so you can test it yourself if you’re starting to feel sick.

Maybe it is a placebo, but hey, whatever makes you feel better, right?

Cool Shwag From Jlist: Final Fantasy XII Potion, Question Mark Box Bank, Sound Effect Capsule Toy, Busted Pocari Sweat!

So today I got my package from Jlist containing all of the sweet nerd stuff that I’ve been waiting for! I got the Final Fantasy XII Potion (4 of them), a Question Mark Box Bank (with character inside), a sound effect Capsule Toy, and a busted pouch of Pocari Sweat (I didn’t ask for it to be busted).

First, the Final Fantasy Potion:

Yes, that’s my hand in the picture. Maybe I should be a hand model… Anyway, the bottles were a bit smaller than I envisioned. I’m going to be drinking the potion along with my cousin, who ordered 2 with me. I was thinking of doing a video review or something. I’ve heard it tastes like medicine, but I think I’m getting a slight cold, so maybe the potion will cure it!

Next, the Question Mark Box Bank:

Yep, it’s a bank shaped like the box in Mario that you hit to make a coin or whatever appear. I tried punching it. It just made my hand hurt. I envisioned it would be bigger than it actually turned out to be. It can probably hold like, $1 worth of change. Yay.

It also came with a keychain character. I got a blooper. He came in a little protective baggie. I like it.

Next up, the other Sound-Making Keychain!

There are six of these keychains in all, but I ordered one and got a random one. It makes the Mario swimming sound. It’s a lot bigger than I thought it would be, and I dunno if I should walk around with it as a keychain. It could go off in my pants without warning! Check out my quick demo video of it in action!

Last but not least (well, probably both) is the Busted Pouch of Pocari Sweat (try saying that five times fast!):

I’m going to ask Jlist if they’ll send me an unbusted one. It sort of got all over the other stuff and made it look like I got some cocaine with my order. True, there’s still some mix in the pouch, but now that it’s open, I dunno if I wanna ingest it. For all I know, it IS cocaine!!!

EDIT: Jlist wrote back saying that they’d send me a replacement. How cool are they!?

So yeah. That’s it. If you wanna be cool like me and get crazy stuff from Japan, check out Jlist. They’ve got some neat stuff. Shipping is kind of a lot, but if you buy in bulk, it becomes somewhat reasonable.

Science Sez: Most People Think They Are Above Average; Are Wrong

I found this interesting article via digg.

It basically argues that, while most people believe they are above average in competence versus everyone else, it’s impossible for that to be true for the majority of people. It also concludes that people who think they are superior are actually unaware of their incompetance, and the more competent people might sell themselves short, because they are better able to assess their shortcomings as well as others’.

In short, the study showed that the researchers’ predictions were spot-on. Participants scoring in the bottom quartile grossly overestimated their test performance and ability, and analysis confirmed that this miscalibration was due to deficits in metacognitive skill (the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error).

This sort of begs the question: Would you rather be a confident idiot, or an unsure genius? I guess thinking about it damns you either way.

It also reminds me of the Japanese saying, baka wa kaze wo hikanai: Idiots can’t catch colds (because they’re too stupid to realize they have them).

Of course, the people who did the research could have just been overestimating themselves when they assumed they were running the experiments correctly…

Super Michael Jackson Brothers!

So quite randomly, I was reminded of this crazy flash animation starring Michael Jackson in Mario World. If you’re an old school gamer, you’ll remember Super Mario Brothers as well as the ill-fated Genesis game, Moonwalker, starring Michael Jackson himself.

This animation just has Michael going through Super Mario Brothers using his own special skills. There are other crazier animations (with awesome music, BTW) that have him saving the world from a giant Zangief from SF2 that’s trying to drop kick it. No joke!

Mr. Michael Jackson sprite creator, I salute you. If it weren’t for your efforts, we wouldn’t have these insane flash animations to look at today. Your work will be remembered for decades into the future!

Guilty Gear Isuka: I Think I’m Getting Too Old For This…

So today I decided to take a somewhat dusty, unopened version of Guilty Gear Isuka (that I bought from Amazon.com for $10) off the shelf and actually play it! I’m something of a crazy game buyer (I buy them when they’re cheap), and I have way too many to actually play them all. Anyway, I popped it into my PS2 and was immediately confused.

Guilty Gear Isuka is a sprite-based fighter, kind of like Street Fighter 2. It’s also probably one of the last in a dying breed of games. This Guilty Gear is actually the first one I’ve ever played (though I’ve seen it being played in the Genshiken anime!). The graphics are top notch, and the cool factor is definitely there.

I figured, “if it’s cool enough for hardcore otaku, it’s cool enough for me!” I think I’m getting old. Sure, the moves are all fireball/hold back forward type moves, but there’s other complicated things built in. The game supports 4 players at once, which is kinda cool, but that means you have to do your own turning.

Also, I found that in the middle of a battle, the game’ll say something like “Joker has appeared!” and throw you into a two on one battle. Totally not fair! I have a feeling that in my youth, I’d have probably spent more time on this game (memorizing moves, continuing a billion times after dying), but I just don’t have it in me anymore.

Give me my tried and true Tekken fighting style, and I’ll get Heihachi on your ass!