Ms. Best in English Apprehensive About an English Exam 0 comments

Oh, the irony! But, yes, it's true. The student who have always excelled in the English subject in high school, who aced the TOEIC exam in college, the one who has been reading and writing all her life, is a bit wary in taking the English Tests of all Tests.

IELTS or International English Language Testing System is the leading English proficiency exam required by various English speaking countries. It consists of 4 parts which are Listening, Reading, Writing and Speaking. As of my understanding, I need to get a score of 7 in all the categories (even though, technically, there is no pass or fail in the said exam) to be qualified to enter the United Kingdom, where I plan to study and work.

My searches in the internet made me realize that I do need to work for this as much as I've worked in passing my NLE because unlike the multiple choice TOEIC, which was pretty easy btw, IELTS is composed of identifications, essays and even an interview session for the Speaking part of the test. Now, listening and writing almost come naturally for me, but I'm pretty sure I suck at formal writing. I like articles, adjectives and adverbs way too much that when I write, a sentence can go on and on in sarcastic circles without much point in it. Which is, sadly, a major no-no in the said exam.

And I'm worse at interviews. The last time I had an interview was upon admission to FEU Institute of Nursing 2 years ago. It is an experience I wanted to forget. I bet I either sounded too cocky or completely boring. The ancient C.I. who interviewed me barely cracked a smile. Thank Obama my battery exam results were exemplary so I was not that concerned about being dropped out of an institute that I haven't entered yet.

Multiple choice is my forte. I know that for a fact. I have this knack in feeling out the right answer even though I have no idea what the question is about. I think that's the reason how I got a line of 8 in the NLE without even memorizing the developmental tasks in Pedia or any drug of choice for a given disease. If I were to take the NCLEX, with ample time and guidance for review, I'm pretty confident I could very well pass the said exam. This special power (both a gift and a curse), however, will not help me in any way in acing the IELTS.

I spent the whole day searching Google for a great review center for the IELTS. I found a couple, Niner and Kaplan. Are they any good? I know that some or most of the examinees just self review at home either by instructional CDs or via the internet. I've read that there are also many resources available at the British Council for sale. Those are all great alternatives but I'm so sick of being at home all the time right now that I'm yearning for a classroom setup.

I miss commuting and having somewhere to go to, something to do. I know it's my fault that I'm still stuck now at home with nothing but internet and TV for company because I refused to lower my pride and work in a call center or even volunteer somewhere because I have nobody to go with me. But those 2 1/2 months since passing the board exam are now over, there's no use crying over spilled OJ. So now, I really want to find a review center I'm comfortable with, study, and get my life back on track.

By the end of this month, I must be enrolled somewhere and studying my favorite subject. I'm optimistic about the review sessions because I love the language and any information about it will probably be accepted by my neurons with open arms. I've always wanted to enroll in a creative writing class but haven't got the chance since our units and subjects in nursing college is pretty much set (unlike other universities e.g. UP where you can pick your own minors).

I know this is a far cry from that. It's just I'm so ready for something to do. Watch as my BuddyPoke avatar jump up and down from excitement and her anime face light up in a comic smile.

Blueprint 2 comments

My life is so stagnant right now mosquitos are going to start breeding on me. We were supposed to line up really early last week for the IVT Training reservations in the Lung Center of the Philippines but since Pepeng was threatening to wind up the whole of Luzon that day and one of my friends who was supposed to go with us was still in an evacuation center, we all opted to just stay safe and warm at home for the time being in fear of being stranded somewhere in a middle of an endless lake.

Now, I have nothing to look forward to. No plans at all. Hospitals normally open their reservation slots at the start of the month for a training schedule for the next month. And if some hospital decided to kick the tradition, I don't think I have the energy nor the patience to do a telephone marathon, for the 4th time, calling the same institutions and asking the same questions and hearing the same answers.

Right now, I'm stuck at home, with terrible cramps and feeling overall useless. My semi-long goal for the meantime is to review for the IELTS examination that I need to pass in order to work abroad. Maybe early next year, I'll be able to take and pass the exam. Then we'll see what happens. If things work as planned, I won't be spending the whole next year here in the Philippines. I'll be working in the line of work I've studied for 4 years and earning my own money.

Here's to optimism. *raises glass of water* :)

Gooogle Chrome Themes: iLove 2 comments

I've been using Mozilla Firefox for quite some time now, Google Chrome once in a while. But when I opened the latter browser, I saw the flip page image in the lower corner of the homepage and clicked, out of curiosity. What greeted me was the wonderful page of google chrome themes that I've been waiting for since trying the browser. I loved the refreshing cleanliness of GC's UI 'cause it makes you see more of the screen rather than the annoying tools hogging all the space. Great for watching a video in the internet you don't want to full screen. And now that it's prettier and more fun to use, I think I'm switching again to GC until I become irritated on how I can't format my picture properly while posting entries here in my blog. Ironic, really, since Blogger and Google Chrome is both owned by Google. How can they make a browser not perfectly compatible with their own site? Weird.

I don't mind the unibar in GC. It's the address bar for most browsers but you can type search queries into it and google will wind up search findings for you. But I do prefer Opera's customizable Dial Pad for websites rather than GC's version of it which offers a thumbnail of your most frequently visited sites.

My new tab looks like this, btw. Pretty, eh?

So, what do you think? Ready to switch or still a Firefox loyal? Opera fan or, worse, IE user??

My Samsung 8300 Tocco / Ultratouch Review 5 comments

I've been using this phone since May this year. It's a graduation gift from my mom because I lost my Nokia 3230 last January and have been using an ancient Nokia model as substitute phone. Orginally, I was supposed to wait for the release of Nokia N86, my previous dream phone, because its Nokia's first 8MP and I was a loyal user of such brand and I love taking pictures with my phone. Compared to a digicam, my cp is something I take with me everywhere and it should be ready to take those impromptu stills. And upon researching about it for the nth time, as if fate decided for me, I discovered this beautiful Samsung touch on gsmarena.com, my favorite phone web resource. And it was love at first sight.

It was one of the prettiest mobiles out there. Still is, actually. Plus, it has everything I ever wanted in a phone (except wifi). It has an ultra responsive touch screen that pops with vibrant colors. I still have so much fun changing the wallpapers because all of which I tried looks great.

You need not press the screen for it to respond. The phone is heat sensitive so it measures the amount of heat of your thumb instead of the pressure on the screen so you just have to 'touch' it, literally. Downside is that, stylus, nails, pens, other items and cold-blooded vampire Edward Cullen cannot be used in handling this mobile. Otherwise, this feature is pretty cool.

Key features:

• Classy touchscreen slider with an alphanumeric keypad
• Commendable build quality
• Quad-band GSM and 3G with HSDPA support
• 8 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash, geo-tagging, face and smile detection, image stabilization, wide dynamic range and D1 video@30 fps
• 2.8" 16M color AMOLED touchscreen display with 400 x 240 pixel resolution
• Anti-scratch screen surface
• Accelerometer for screen auto rotate
• Proximity sensor for auto screen turn-off
• MicroSD card slot (up to 16 GB), 1 GB included
• Built-in GPS receiver with A-GPS support, Google Maps
• Stereo Bluetooth (A2DP)
• DivX/XviD video support
• Stereo FM radio with RDS, FM recording
• Document viewer
• Photo Contact
• Smart dialing

Main disadvantages

• User interface sometimes lags, especially when viewing pictures. Can be irritating.
• No Wi-Fi connectivity. That means I'm stuck with Globe's horrible internet connection with appalling fees.
• It's hard editing text, going back to a word and putting the cursor in the right place using only your fingers as there are no navigation keys. Takes practice but it's doable.

No virtual QWERTY keyboard, but who needs one? I text with one hand, sometimes even looking at another direction and the virtual keypad works great for me. I hardly use the actual keypad anymore as I find it hard texting with it with one hand because the phone is hard to balance with an open slide as it is too long.

As for its main feature, the camera works fantastic. Every shot looks crystal clear. The problem is that viewing the pictures you have just taken requires patience. Lots of it, as picture browsing sometimes hang and the transition is not as smooth as I would have preferred. Just transfer the pics to your PC with the handy dandy USB cable for viewing and problem solved.

With regards to battery life, the standby time's more than what I expected. The phone could last up to 2-3 days with minor usage, profile set on silent and no vibration, (as what I did with the Ondoy blackout phenomena). However, I could have set the backlight brightness and duration to a minimum and I'm pretty confident it could last another day.

Heavy usage of the phone's features (especially the camera, web browser and games) may drain your phone in less than one day's time. A flaw on the otherwise superb phone. :(

All in all, this mobile definitely suits me as I love touch screens and an amazing camera built in my phone. I'm not the kind of person who changes phones every month (I've only had 3 phones my entire life, this is the 4th one) and I'm pretty sure I'd be staying with my Tocco for at least a year. Hopefully, it doesn't get taken away by professional snatchers like my other phones. That would be pretty depressing. And costly.

Rotating Scheduled Brownouts in Metro Manila and Rizal 0 comments

Rotating brownouts hit Metro Manila

MANILA – Distribution utility Manila Electric Company (Meralco) said that it cannot determine until when rotating brownouts being implemented in wide part of Metro Manila will end.A fire affected one of the four 300 MVA transformers in the sub-station in Taytay, Rizal Wednesday night triggering the tripping off of the other transformers and the 115-kiloVolt lines of the Meralco sub-sector areas.It took firemen almost an hour to control the blaze.Authorities also had to use firefighting chemicals and retardants since the transformer reportedly contained oil.The fire was declared under control around 10:30 p.m.

The other transformer units available at the substation have also been cut off from the system because its control cables have been affected by the fire incident.

The affected transformer supplies power to 11 Meralco substations that service eastern Metro Manila.

Meralco officials said close to a million households are now suffering the three-hour rotating brownouts as a measure to mitigate a more massive, widespread power interruption caused by the transmission trouble at the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines' (NGCP) Dolores substation in Taytay, Rizal.

These brownouts affect areas in the eastern part of its franchise.

Meralco further said had the manual load dropping (MLD) not been imposed to, the power outage would have been more massive and may have resulted to a "system wide blackout."

The company could not say up to when the interruptions would be implemented, saying that “it all depends on the resolution of the transmission problem of the NGCP.”

The series of power outages began late Wednesday night in several parts of Metro Manila and Rizal after power was cut off to 13 Meralco substations including those situated in St. Anthony, Manggahan, Parang, Masinag, Marikina, Santolan, Cainta, Shangri-la, Mandaluyong, Hillcrest, Dolores, Cubao bank no. 2, and New Teresa.

This resulted to outages in various portions of Mandaluyong, Pasig, Marikina, Taguig; parts of Quezon City including Cubao.

Outages were also experienced in Cainta, Angono, Taytay, Binangonan, Antipolo, San Mateo and Montalban.

As of 11:40 p.m. Wednesday, power has already been restored to most of the affected areas after Meralco opted to shift load or transfer sourced power to operational substations.

Only Dolores 44 XM and portions of Dolores 47 XM were not restored.

At 6:39 a.m. Thursday, Meralco resorted to MLD affecting circuits served by Cubao and Marikina substations in order to ease the critical loading of Araneta-Kamuning 115 kV line.

Three-hour rotating brownouts may also be implemented Friday during noon-peak and three hours during the evening-peak periods.

Meralco though is doing its best to shorten the duration of the brownouts.

Energy Secretary Angelo T. Reyes ordered to fast track the repairs to unburden consumers suffering and experiencing the three hour rotating brownouts.

“I am confident that Meralco and NGCP will be able to re-establish connection of power in the areas and this should be done immediately. Restoring power will restore balance in those areas,” Reyes said.

Soonest possible time

Earlier, the NGCP, operator of the country’s transmission system, assured that supply of power in the eastern part of Metro Manila will be restored the soonest possible time.

Meralco had warned residents of eastern Metro Manila and Rizal province to brace for rotating brownouts ranging from three to four hours.

The warning came after Wednesday’s incident where a transformer of the NGCP in Taytay town was damaged.

Pasig, Mandaluyong, Marikina Quezon City and parts of Rizal including Cainta, Angono, Taytay, Binangonan, and Antipolo City went out of power supply around 9 p.m. Wednesday, minutes after Dolores substation of NGCP caught fire.

Meralco has at least five 115-kiloVolt lines that draw power from the Dolores substation.

Because of the power shutdown, Meralco is implementing a three-hour rotating brownout in the affected areas.

Meralco external communications manager Joe Zaldarriaga said the power interruptions will be implemented to minimize the disruptions in the affected areas such as Mandaluyong, Marikina, Pasig, San Juan, Quezon City, and Rizal province.

“We are implementing rotating brownouts to accommodate those affected (by Wednesday’s incident) … we appeal for understanding.”

Repairs, rehabilitation

But Ma. Cristina Cabalhin, head of NGCP’s corporate communications, said repairs and rehabilitation of the damaged transformers at its Dolores substation in Taytay, Rizal now are ongoing.

NGCP started conducting the requisite system test and one transformer unit “could be restored tonight,” she added.

“If we could restore one transformer it is likely that the rotating brownouts will be reduced,” Cabalhin said over a telephone interview.

Meralco said it will implement rotating brownouts lasting three hours maximum twice a day in its franchise area in Metro Manila while the transformers are not yet available.

As of 9:30 a.m. Thursday, 180 megawatts of power load have already been dropped from the Luzon grid.

To recall, Meralco said there are still 41,000 of their clients who remain without power due to Typhoon Ondoy which hit the country last month.

Areas with no power due to floodwaters include parts of Marikina, Cainta, Pasig, Taguig and parts of Binan, and Muntilupa.

NGCP meanwhile failed to give any timeframe on the completion of the rehabilitation and repairs of the Dolores substation.

“We really do not know when we could complete it (the repair) but we hope to do it soon,” the NCGP official said.

Complete list of rotating brownouts

Source: http://www.sunstar.com.ph/network/rotating-brownouts-hit-metro-manila

Grr. Fate is playing a cruel joke on us Ondoy survivors. And it's not funny.

Wordless Wednesdays: Current 0 comments

Photos of Bagyong Ondoy (Int'l Name: Ketsana) from the internet.

Ondoy's Wrath Part II: Ghost Town 6 comments

DAY 2 Sept. 27, 2009 (Sunday)

Having had a bad night's rest because of the unfavorable circumstances that we had to live through for the night, the only thing I want to do the next morning was to curl up in my bed and sleep. Which proved to be impossible because upon opening the front door, what greeted us was 1 inch thick mud covering the entire floor and we had to mud skate our way inside because it was so slippery. My ice skating teacher would've been proud.

Flood water still ankle deep.

Compared to our neighbors, our house was the way we left it. No refrigerator, sala set and dining table floated around the place and nearly all our appliances survived potential drowning. I did find out, however, that I forgot to salvage my high school memoirs from its bottom shelf so now my yearbook and handwritten short stories etc. are all wet and muddy. :( Add to that, the tremendous amount of work to be done to clean up our house made me weak in the knees.

No choice but to walk in the muddy water.

Because nobody was expected to do it but me, I started mopping a years worth of mop work. And I hate mopping. At first it seemed as if I was getting nowhere but after many hours and cycles of repetitive work which I absolutely dislike, our floor finally resembled a floor and not forest ground.

At about 5pm, my tita was still stranded somewhere in Junction (after a day and a half) and my tito started to have stomachaches and chest pains and we needed to buy medicine. Flood in our street had already subsided and somebody said that Junction was already water free so my Mom and Grandma decided to throw me and Tito in a wild goose chase for medicine and my tita with the sun already setting and no electricity anywhere nor flashlights.

I knew it was a bad idea from the start but everyone insisted, so I was forced to accompany my tito in a quest for an open Mercury Drug and my aunt. Streets near ours were already flood free but as we neared our subdivision's gate, water went as high as waist deep and we waded through it because my tito kept saying, "Dito lang yan, pagdating sa labas wala na yan, sa Junction wala na daw baha e..", even though I really wanted to head back, walk barefooted in my newly mopped floor and sleep in my comfy bed. Instead, we were half walking, half swimming in mudder water in pitch black darkness with only the moonlight to show us the way.

By the entrance of our subdivision, there is a gasoline station along the main road going to Junction and Sta. Lucia Mall. And I thought that when we get there, we would be greeted with lights and signs of civilization. What we saw gave me the chills.

Everything was dead. There were no signs, whatsoever, of life except for the few people walking in the middle of the highway going both ways. The warm light that I thought would be coming from the gas stop and the hi-way lights were turned off because the streets were still flooded with knee deep water.

I really wanted to go home at that point but since we've already walked and waded for so long and so far, we decided to walk further to Junction. Thank Obama there were people who were also braving the dark and creepy flood water or else I would've thought we were in a twisted episode of The Twilight Zone.

I will never forget the instance where we walked past the gates of Gruar I and II subdivisions. There were rumors that a lot of people died in those places because of the sudden rise of water and the shanty-ish houses occupying the said place. The eerily shadowed entrance of the village was enough to give me goosebumps but what really scared me off was the smell. It smelled of decay and death. I was so afraid that my legs blindly walking through the water would catch an arm or something. Thankfully, it didn't and after that, water started to subside as we reach Junction.

So the rumors were right. Junction was flood-less. Technically. They didn't mention how flooded it was still in all the streets leading to it.

The epicenter of Cainta, a once busy bustling intersection with roads leading to Ortigas Extension, Marcos Hi-Way, Cainta "Bayan" and Taytay looked like an industrial graveyard that night. No lights were on, no cars nor buses passing through, no life. And surprise surprise, Mercury Drug was also wiped out by the flood. So, no medicine.

To add salt to the gaping wound that was the uselessness of our midnight adventure, I could not, for the love of Obama, contact my missing tita. Her last text said that they were staying outside Robinson's Mall right across Mercury Drug (because they were rudely "asked" to exit the said mall in the middle of the storm) but she was not there. There were only a few people milling around the place and most of them looked sinister. In fact, on our way to the drug store, I saw some guy in a black leather jacket looting bread and Obama knows what from an abandoned Buy 1 Take 1 Burger stand.

At the same time, my tito decided to thicken the plot by saying that his chest hurt and that he could walk no more.

In front of Mercury Drug were couple of guys selling candies and crackers. My tito bought all the crackers he could find and sat on an empty monoblock chair to eat. I started texting my Mom and another Tita in panic mode, fearing it would be the last time I would get to use my phone. Every one of the people around us looked like robbers and drug addicts. And as if to prove my point, minutes later, some man (who I was 90% sure was crazy in the head) started talking to us and interviewing my tito on why he was sitting in his chair. My tito said he has hypertension and needed to rest and Loopness started talking about how doctors were idiots and that he defied all sickness without ever taking any medicine.

My other tita, in Ilo-Ilo, replied to my text plea, and said that my missing tita texted her and said that they went to Tuhog Tsibog etc., a restaurant by Park Place entrance, a subdivision walking distance from Junction. I said to my tito that we should go there to check. He refused to do so and wanted to walk back to our subdivision and seek shelter from his friend (who lives near our subdivision gates) so he could rest.

I started fuming inside. Pano naman ako? I cleaned our house all day so I could be mud free for the remainder of the night and sleep soundly, now he wanted to spend the night in the house of some friend? I really wanted to abandon him at that moment and head on to my friend/boyfriend's house but, fortunately, a plot twist came about.

Who knew talking with Loopness was worth something? My tito mentioned that if some kind of ride, may it be tricycle, pedicab, anything, was available, we would gladly pay for it so we could get back to our subdivision without walking. In the end, after a few minutes, 2 guys with a padyak with no seats surfaced. Ready to serve for P300. We jumped at the deal despite the horrific fee.

With the pedicab at our disposal, my tito asked if we could pass by Park Place to see if tita was still there. The 2 guys manning the pedicab surprisingly agreed.

When we arrived in Tuhog Tsibog, the open area of the restaurant/bar was barricaded with metal fences. Inside was darkness and more darkness. I could not see a thing and it was easily deductible that the place was devoid of people except for some men trying to start a 10 wheeler truck which got stranded in the middle of the road. In a twist of fate that made me believe in the power of miracles, just when I was about to leave because it seemed as if no one was there, something, or someone moved in the darkness and I saw a shadow stand up. Without thinking or seeing anything but shadow, I yelled, "Tita!". Ever so slowly, someone walked to me and, lo and behold, it was my missing tita.

Turned out, she was still with an officemate so the 4 of us crammed our way into the pedicab and went on another adventure back home. And even though it was still a long way back and we still had to wade through waist deep water for the second time, I didn't notice the time nor how tired I was because I was just so glad we're on our way back home and our peculiar padyak journey was filled with stories and various screams of

"Wag jan may manhole jan! Kaliwa kaliwa!"

and

"Oh! Kanal! Kanal! Sa gitna lang!".

Tito and I left our house at about 5PM. All 4 of us arrived at about 10PM. That was one of the longest and most unforgettable 4 hours of my life. And it made me believe more in miracles especially after sharing stories, we found out that the only reason tita stood up from her slumber in the Tuhog Tsibog etc. and allowed me to see her shadow and call out was that she felt cold and not because she saw me. If she hadn't stood up, if Loopness hadn't arrived and chatted away, if tito didn't have the stomach aches, we would not have this happy ending.

And that is nothing short of a miracle.

Ondoy's Wrath (Ketsana) Part I 4 comments

September 29, 2009 Tuesday

I am sitting in a wasteland as I am writing this on a pocket notebook with the only pen I could find (which happened to be a violet inked one). There is still no electricity, no communication with the outside world, running water is weak and traces of mud still occupies the corners of our house, a trademark reminder of the past days which rendered our town horror-struck and clinging for its life. Streets are still covered with drying remnants of those days while the sun is mocking us with its sun-shiney brightness. This is Day 4.


DAY 1 Sept. 26, 2009 (Saturday)

If you had told me this would be the day our belongings would half half-drown and we would have to sleep in our upstairs warehouse with the stocks, our neighbors and various pet dogs in a plywood covered with curtains and throw pillows, I would not have believed you.

We, Cainta-enos, are used to floods. Being a catch-basin of flood water coming from Antipolo and Taytay, houses are built in high grounds and cars are parked in high parking spaces and gasoline stations way before the storm as a common precautionary act. But no matter how water-savvy you are, nothing could have prepared anybody for that day.

Brown water was already past the gutter mark as I woke up that Saturday morning. I ate spaghetti as my Mom and I chatted casually about the storm and how my aunt was still stuck in our office warehouse near Junction. We were unconcerned about the rising water because never, in our 9 years of living here, did it reach our house, which was built a good 2-2.5 meters above the sidewalk, far higher than our neighbors.

I called my grandma to check how she was and if she needed help. She was already trying to put stuff in higher places and told me she didn't know how to disconnect my aunt's computer so I decided to put on my contact lenses and help. I was supposed to go there the normal way, walk down the street to their door, but the knee high current was way too strong so we decided to do an over-the-bakod stunt with a small chair and a ladder.

I concentrated on the mystic knots of the cords and cables of the PC while grandma was running around the place. 5 minutes later, water was already inside the house rising with frightening speed. I barely had time to salvage the CPU. 30 minutes later, the water had already reached thigh area and we were still scrambling to get things on higher ground. I kept telling her to evacuate already to our house but my grandma insisted to stay a bit longer. Minutes later, I heard my mom yelling that our house were nearing flood water wipeout and I needed to come home immediately.

Me and grandma did the over-the-bakot stunt and we scrambled to put important things in higher places and turn off the main power switch to avoid electrocution. We managed to lift the washing machine to the sink and the refrigerator up dining chairs.

Again, minutes later, flood water was inside the house and we had to evacuate to our warehouse upstairs. Armed with food, blankets and pillows, we tried to settle in our inhabitable upstairs landing. It was a bodega for our stocks and was not built for human habitation. While transferring things upstairs, my grandma saw our neighbors with nowhere to go because they don't have a second floor so we invited them to seek shelter with us.

View of our street at the peak of the storm.

Another angle featuring our drowning car with its lights automatically blinking as if asking for help.

It was like a movie in the making. The current was so strong that they had to tie a rope from their house to ours just to swim through. Everyone was soaking wet and shivering from the cold. Thankfully, we have lots of towels, bed sheets, canned goods and water stored so we made it through the night sleeping on plywoods on the floor. I had a horrible night because the dogs kept barking and I had to retie my pet Wuffy 5x I think because he kept getting out of his collar and scaring other people.

The next day, people were up before dawn even though we can't do anything before sunrise because there was no electricity and you really can't see anything. What greeted us that morning was gutter level flood water and a house full of slippery mud.

It was everywhere. It's like Mother Nature pooped on us all. Or gave us tons load of melted chocolate that smells funky. Whichever you prefer.

---

Bookworm Adventures 2: Fractured Fairytales 2 comments

And again with the geek mode and addictions, the latest member of the short list is a PC game starring a non-vertebrae. Bookworm Adventures 2, the latest offering of PopCap games is an addicting vocabulary game combined with RPG environment.

Your goal is to guide Lex the (book)Worm into different twisted fairy tale worlds and defeat equally crooked fairy tale characters to gain points, power ups, lives and saves. Every now and then, Moxie the Fox will intervene and offer you 4 mini games in which you can win ever so useful powers and lives. This time, companion guides like Granny Goose, that weird cat from Alice in Wonderland and other mystery guides I have yet to unravel can accompany you through the different levels of tiledom and grant healing elixirs to freshen up waning health.

For me, the game is pretty easy until you reach the difficult levels at the end of each chapters where all you can see on your tile grid is X, Y, and Zs and you need to Scramble or else play 3-letter elementary words. The characters are interesting and amusing to watch. Witty quips and character descriptions bring attitude to the game. It's not hard to stay glued to the monitor for hours long.

Like all games, it can get tiring after long hours of play, but it's enjoyable enough to keep you coming back for more. :)

AIDS Vaccine Research Brings In Good News 0 comments

AIDS vaccine promising; experts urge caution

By: Victoria Colliver, Chronicle Staff Writer


(09-24) 19:20 PDT -- As Bay Area scientists celebrated the first promising results from the largest-ever AIDS vaccine trial, they cautioned that much more research is needed before a vaccine could be available to the public.

The news that an experimental AIDS vaccine tested on 16,000 heterosexual volunteers in Thailand had been shown to be safe and modestly effective surprised researchers, who had become used to failure in the decades-long effort to find a vaccine to protect against HIV infection.

The elusive search for a vaccine has its roots in the Bay Area, where one of the two genetically engineered vaccines used in the Thai trial was developed.

The trial relied on a combination of a modified canary-pox vaccine from Sanofi Pasteur and a drug made from an engineered version of a protein found on the AIDS virus, which was made by a Brisbane biotechnology company called VaxGen Inc. The patent for the VaxGen vaccine is now owned by Global Solutions for Infectious Diseases, a nonprofit in South San Francisco.

"At this point, especially after all the failures, any promising information is exciting," said Dr. Phillip Berman, a VaxGen co-founder and inventor of the vaccine, who woke up to the news Thursday morning. "But it's still a long way to having an approved product and figuring out how to deliver the vaccine to the people who need it the most."

The watershed results announced Thursday in Bangkok came just over a year after the National Institutes of Health dropped plans for a large-scale test of its AIDS vaccine. Two years ago, Merck & Co. halted its vaccine study after results showed the drug may have actually increased some participants' susceptibility to the virus.

A one-two punch

The vaccine, known as RV 144, employed a two-pronged or "prime-boost" approach in the Phase 3 trial. The drug made by Sanofi Pasteur "primed" the body's immune system to attack HIV and the drug developed by VaxGen "boosted" the body's response.

According to the Thai Ministry of Health and the study's other backers, the vaccine regimen was safe and 31 percent effective in preventing HIV infection compared with a placebo. Researchers described that result as significant and promising for the future, but not enough to make such a product available to the public soon.

"We are still many years away from a vaccine that will be used universally," said Dr. Jay Levy, professor of medicine at the AIDS Research Institute at UC San Francisco and one of the discoverers of HIV. "But this is encouraging because it says maybe we can derive things from this study and not have to go into something totally different."

Half of the more than 16,000 study participants were given six doses of the vaccines in 2006, and half received placebos. All received condoms, counseling, regular HIV testing and treatment for any sexually transmitted diseases. Of the 8,197 volunteers who were given the vaccine, new infections occurred in 51 people. New infections occurred in 74 of 8,198 participants who received the placebo shot.

Questions remain

The most confusing aspect of the study is that the people who received the vaccine and still got infected had no lower levels of the virus than those who took the placebo and got infected. That indicates the vaccine may be better at preventing the virus than controlling it once it gets into the body.

"That would suggest the immune stimulus isn't very strong," Levy explained. "With that said, it still was enough to block low levels of the virus from coming into the body. We would want a vaccine that would also control the virus if it infects a person."

One strain rare here

In addition, the trial focused on two subsets of the HIV strain that are common in Thailand and Southeast Asia, only one of which is commonly found in the United States. So it's unclear whether the results of the vaccine combination could be replicated in a different population.

Researchers said many aspects of the trial results are unclear. For example, several scientists said it is uncertain how the drug combination worked and whether one part was more effective than the other.

"We don't really know why and how this vaccine worked and did what it did," said Dr. Alan Bernstein, executive director of the Global HIV Vaccine Enterprise, an alliance of AIDS scientists, governments and donors.

"This trial is raising more questions almost than it's answering," he said. "It's opened the door and it's opened up a whole lot of questions that are answerable and will be answered over the next months and years to come."

Because of the long time frame, health advocates warn that people should not count on a potential vaccine to treat and contain infections.

"It doesn't have a public health impact perhaps for many, many years," said Mark Cloutier, San Francisco AIDS Foundation. "We need to continue to keep our vigilance about prevention, testing and getting people into care."

Source:
San Francisco Chronicle
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/24/MNNM19S3NR.DTL

Being a part of the health care system (being stay at home blogger at the moment not counted), I could not be more concerned about serious illnesses that threaten our well-being every day. It's hard enough being amongst the sick and the dying for a living. Being enveloped in the gloom and despair of wrecked bodies and psyches regularly with pointy needles that could go through any skin barrier is even more terrifying.

Normally, I am not a paranoid person. When the Swine Flu broke out, I was probably the least concerned among my family and friends. I did research on the internet and after a while, I realized that it was nothing more than a severe type of common flu with a different strain. The virus, like any virus, is self limiting and will go away after our immune system gets into the rhythm of kicking its bottom. Though people should still be vigilant, they should not let paranoia reside in their brains because having the flu is not the worst thing that could happen to a man. It's not the worst type of disease to be infected either.

Which brings me back to HIV/AIDS. Sexual encounters and contaminated blood transfusions given, what's more bothersome to a registered nurse is the everyday possibility of a rogue used needle pricking your own skin and and ending your life (figuratively) before you know it. Even if you put on every medical suit of armor (PPE or Personal Protective Equipment) available, it still will not protect you unless every inch of your body is encased in metal. Which will weigh a ton, btw.

I've heard a bunch of horror nursing stories from school and review centers to know how important it is for a vaccine to be made real soon. Decades have gone on without any breakthrough and hopefully, this time, our researchers and specialists are in the right path. I, for one, could not wait for this vaccine to be distributed to the people in hopefully the near future. Health care workers and vulnerable groups of top priority of course. :)