People always talk about the early bird but never about the early worm.

Have you ever read about the difference between your boss and you? Then, you all know that’s everything in this world is a matter of perspective. You could be a hero for some people, while others consider you as a traitor. People easily misunderstood what other people do because they have their own glasses. They critisize or praise you for what they see, and rarely for what you really are. You’re judged by your strengths and weaknesses but what someone see as weaknesses, could be one of your strengths. Remember the classic tale of Rudolph the red nose reindeer that has a very shiny nose, mocked by other reindeer until one foggy christmas eve, when his shining nose can guide Santa’s sleigh and go down in history?

And too prove that it’s only a matter of perspective, just remember when people who scorn you when you don’t please them, they turned to you when you do something that they love. Perspective can change, come and go, but the important thing is, perspective never 100% accurate.

You go to IT seminar and they give you this bag with a lot of free stuff in it. Mostly brochures about products and a nice dvd with softcopy, and a t-shirt that write whatever. Then, some colleague just got home from his holiday and give you this small, cute, and useless scented candle. At night, you go to your friend’s wedding and receive a mini glass that has writing saying “As We become one forever”. Before go to bed, you chuck all this free stuff to a drawer with free notepad, free pen, and spiderweb. It’s a small thing if you’re an introvert but if you like social gathering, this free stuff thing has got to stop.

1. Just say no politely. Smile and tell your giver that you didn’t bring any bag. Or if he give you bag, tell him you didn’t bring any car or you should take public transportation.
2. Dump it. Say sorry to mother earth for this violation and dump the free stuff mercilessly.
3. Digitalize it and then dump it. Take a picture or get a scanner (for postcard, birthday card) and put it on flickr. If you want to reminiscence you can watched that photograph instead. It still can tell thousand words you know.
4. Don’t dump it, shred it to pieces. Time to use those nasty shredder in the corner of your office to clean brochures, free registration form, and thank you notes.
5. Give it to your friend that need that stuff. A friend maybe need a notepad to write her groceries, and another friend maybe need a scented candle for her bathtub.
6. Give it to your friend the collector. Believe it or not, there’s people out there that collected wedding souvenir. So give it to them to add their collection.

A little cold heart will be helpful while being sentimental doesn’t help at all. But I want a free space, instead of free stuff. How about you?

Eventhough this site is written in English, but that doesn’t mean we don’t care about Indonesian language. Our language is full of diversity in words and phrases and the only site that have (almost) all the words and meaning is Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia Dalam Jaringan (KBBI Daring). It’s an official site from Pusat Bahasa, Departemen Pendidikan Nasional. The interface is quite simple. Just a search box and type the word you want to find out the meaning.

One thing that it lacks of is the meaning for words that used in Information Technology. There’s only one meaning of the word unduh (and it’s about marriage and not about downloading), unggah (not about uploading) and there’s no entries for sandikata (password).

KBBI Daring

For my RSS, I use Google Reader. I have tried Bloglines, and microsoft Outlook but since I want to integrate it with my main email, I use Google reader. What is RSS, you said? It’s a simple way to keep updates on someone’s blog, or news blog and it makes blogwalk a lot easier.

This ultimate list of RSS Reader contains more than 120 resources and I hope it’s useful for choosing your RSS Reader. Some can be used offline, windows based, linux based and some is web based. It’s up to you to find your suitable rss reader.

The Ultimate Guide to RSS Reader [via mashable.com]

Maybe some of you have heard this book, and although i’m not 100% agree with this book, there’s still one insight that stuck in my head. The power of positive thinking.

Mother Theresa once said that she’s not anti war, but pro peace. This is important because if we keep our focus on the negative side, even to deny or prohibit it, the influence of that denial still affect us. Remember Roy Marten? He’s a spokeperson for anti-drug, and he got caught buying drugs. How ironic is that?

Is this why eventhough there’s a slogan that said SAY NO TO DRUGS, the drug users in Indonesia is increasing? The slogan can be changed to SAY YES TO LIFE or LIVING HEALTHY 100%. Maybe we ought to change the second sign to Year of Full Stomach and Good Nutrition.

And it worked on every aspect of our lives as well. Don’t deny the devil, accept it, and focus on the other side, the good side.

Well, apparently if you sign up using google account you will have not one but two email address first one is your genuine xyz@gmail.com, the other is xyz@googlemail.com. But why does this important? Well, you can use it for some reason like :

1. Subscribe in yahoogroups or googlegroups using one of your google email and create a filter for those emails from group easier.
2. You can give for you VIP contact list a gmail.com email and the rest of your contact a googlemail.com address. This way you can separate each groups using filter and treat them differently.
3. You can give this treatment also for Business email and Personal email.

There is still some trick in gmail address, such as

1. You can give your email using dot like l.p.l.p.x@gmail.com or l…..plpx@gmail.com and it still sends to lplpx@gmail.com, but if there’s another account with l.p.l.p.x@gmail.com that email will be send to that person.
2. You can add plus sign like lplpx+test01@gmail.com and lplpx+test02@gmail.com and it send to lplpx.com as well.

Have a nice try.

Indonesia is in dire need for superhero. After reading this, I’ve concluded that the only superheroes that will save Indonesia has to come from Indonesia. Here is some superheroes that will hopefully come to safe the day.

1. Lookout, it’s INFRASTRUCTURE MAN! Yes, Infrastructure Man have several superpower like Super Strength, Super Heat Vision (can make asphalt to fix the street just in a few seconds), and Super Architectural Knowledge. He can build streets, houses, apartment, and even Mall in a few days even weeks. He can also fix every street that have holes in no time.
2. Oh, my God. It’s HONEST BANKER! Honest Banker used to be a villain by the name of, yup you guest it, Dishonest Banker. He can identify which transactions have a trace of corruption or even a non performing loan. He can transfer or froze any offshore account that owned by all congress member and CEO that suspected in illegal activities. His famous quotation is “Singapore, eat your heart out!”
3. Help me, DOMESTIC VIOLENCE GODDESS! Domestic Violence Goddess or DVG is a goddess that can be called using a secret mantra. As soon as the victim whispered the mantra, her super telekinetic power will make husbands and angry boyfriends suffers enormous pain in their most painful area. Rape victim can also called this mantra.
4. This is a job for DOCTOR VASECTOMY! Doctor Vasectomy is a genuine doctor that after an accident in his lab can create a subsonic wave that make any man instantly sterile. He’s awarded by President for his enormous effort in family planning.
5. CORRUPTION SLEEPER strikes again! Nobody knows who CORRUPTION SLEEPER real name is or even CS’ gender. CS always strikes when no one expects. CS targets every corruption suspects in Indonesia. CS’ trademarks are a powerful dosage of anesthesis called Thousand Sleep. CS sometimes leave some writing in victim’s body such as “Your days are numbered”, “You’ll do more good when you’re sleeping”

Of course those superheroes have villains. There are common villains like thugs, rapist, voodoo witchdoctor, dishonest congress member, and even greedy CEO. There are also big villains like MISTER BUROCRACY, STATUSQUO MASTER, and a secret organization named C.O.R.R.U.P.T.

But still, even superheroes needed every help from Indonesian people to fix our beloved country.

So, the president were talking in Lemhanas when some of the participants fell asleep. He got angry and told the sleepy participants to sleep outside. We might never in the same room with the president but just in case it happens, here are a few tips.

1. Carry a mint/coffee candy in your pocket. When you’re getting sleepy just put some candy on your mouth silently. Do it without anyone see you because you’ll get scorned because you chew something.
2. Move your body a little bit. Stretch your hand and move the toe in your shoes. Hopefully with some movement you won’t get sleepy anymore. Make a small movement and don’t overdo it.
3. Play with your cellphone either playing games, browse sites, or just plain texting. You must do it quietly so the speaker don’t see you as a good listener.
4. Ask some question. This is only worked of course if you know what the speaker are talking about.
5. Take notes or just plain scribble on the notebooks.
6. Lastly, think something that will aroused you, like angelina jolie or maria sharapova.

When you’re sleeping during someone’s presentation, you will be seen by the speaker as someone who are uncaring. Don’t let this happened to you.