Brass Monkey is a neighborhood Irish bar with a mix of the up-scale Meatpacking District scene and a more down-to-earth locale. It is located on Little West 12th Street next to the West Side Highway. They have an extensive list of beers with over 75 imports. Their own brew isn’t bad either.

Brass Monkey has two floors with a full bar on both and an area for smokers. A friend of mine attempted to climb out of it, onto some fire escapes, and was promptly removed by the bouncers. He is still able to get in so I guess it wasn’t that bad. Apparently, there was a great view of the city from up there.

The staff is generally very friendly. I have seen a bartender kick a French guy and his friends out. I don’t know why and I didn’t bother trying to find out. I just ordered my drinks and returned to my friends. :)

The crowd is generally mixed with all sorts of people. The music is varied–rock, pop,  and hip-hop–with a larger space in the back that could be used for dancing. The DJ’s generally provide a good mix of the new and the old–I’ve never complained about the music at this place.

It isn’t a club so there’s no designated dancing area. People aren’t always getting their groove on and I have noticed that sometimes people are not really into the music–my friends and I are. Maybe they just need more drinks? Dancing isn’t out of character for this place so if you feel like it: do it. You’ll inspire everyone else.

They serve food here as well if you are feeling hungry. I have not had much of their food. I’ve only tried some of it once and don’t really remember much of it. I don’t recall that it was bad so, it must have been at least average.

I’ve been there mostly on Friday or Saturday nights so my experiences are skewed to those nights. They are the busiest nights in the city and it has been great so far. It has definitely become one of my favorite places in the Meatpacking District. I’m generally not amused by the high-prices of other places in the area–like $12 shots of tequila. I know NY is expensive but, $8 shots is about as much as I am willing to pay before I feel like a fool. We are also in bad economic times. :)

Brass Monkey is priced well and has a great environment. I definitely recommend this bar to those from out of town or country and New York natives like myself.

A great number of people receive freshly printed bachelor degrees from colleges across the United States every year. After four years of studying and/or partying, we get a piece of paper that says we have competent knowledge in a specific field. Some of us studied a little more and some of us partied a little more–I have a bias against excess studying. Each experience will create a different end result.

I finished my undergraduate studies at Pace University this past Fall semester. It took me one extra semester to take all the classes I needed–transferring three times takes a toll on your credits. It was also probably the best college semester I’ve ever had so I’m glad that I didn’t finish in the usual four years and had to take an extra semester.

It seems common to not know what to do with yourself after college. I can’t say I have that problem as I’ve worked every year I was in college except for one: freshmen year. I also never found college to be all the important. So why did I bother going through the whole thing and give myself quite a sum of student loans? Everyone else was doing it? Seemed prudent? Maybe I like to have degrees and pieces of paper that say I’m smart?

The worse part of the college experience is the student loans. I don’t actually know exactly how much money I owe–and I’d rather not figure it out right this minute–but, I know it is upwards of $50,000 and under $100,000. I also refused to have my parents pay for it whether they could or not as it was my choice to go to school. I’m not too concerned about the loans. It is certainly not good to have debt but, at least I didn’t spend it on useless crap at the mall. :)

I’m sure all the money issues will be sorted out and be fine in the end. The best part of the college experience is the networking. Whether you get to know people from partying or group projects or just randomly around campus, these are probably connections that will be useful to you later in life–if not already.

I am no authority on this as I’ve just finished college but, life experience has shown me that it is always more about who you know than what you know. For those of us who finish college with a job waiting or a job already, we mostly likely got them through internships or connections that we had or made in the last four years. There is very little I can say about colleges in small towns across middle America but, I know that colleges in New York City all offer resources for locating internships. After all, all the businesses are here.

I never actually had an internship during college. I had one immediately after high school. It was at an independent game company in New York City: Black Hammer Game. That connection has helped put me in the position I am today but, we’ll get back to that.

I went to school in Tempe, AZ for a year at the University of Advancing Technology to study Game Design. The school was small–had about 2000 students–and it was very focused on technology. It made sense considering what I was looking to study.

However, studying Game Design just wasn’t my thing. I firmly believe schools are where passions go to die. I dislike jobs and think that having a job is really not the best means to any financial ends. I’m not looking to be a Bill Gates or Warren Buffet but, I’m also not looking to be the average person whose livelihood is in the hands of someone else. Popular thinking says that we should find a safe, secure job. I find that to be an oxy-moron. How can a job be safe or secure? You have no control over it so that alone makes it unsafe and insecure.

Anyhow, I did leave UAT after a year and transferred back home to New York City. I definitely learned a thing or two at UAT and it was a nice experience. I had decided to study business when I came back to New York. It had nothing to do with being in New York. I felt that since I didn’t really believe in safe, secure jobs, I might as well study something that could be applicable to a variety of endeavors. I’ve always had an entrepreneurial spirit.

It took me some time to decide that marketing was my best choice of major. I had transferred to Baruch College after leaving Arizona. Of the three schools that I ended up going to, Baruch was the worst–I am biased against city, state, and most other non-private colleges. After a year of mulling around Baruch, I transferred to Pace University in downtown Manhattan. It was there that I decided my major should be marketing.

Pace was the better experience of the three–I also spent the most time there. I enjoyed my time there and did feel that the school offered something useful. If I were to continue my education at some time in the future so that I can have a bunch of extra letters around my name, and this is at no fault of Pace, I will probably do it in another country. I’m only after the experience and not so much the education. I always feel I can get a better or equal education on my own by doing and reading. Schools are not the only place for learning.

So while I was going to school in New York, I was working the entire time. I had worked for a small internet start-up that a friend of mine in high school had started. About two years later, I went to work for a game company owned by the person who gave me the internship three years ago at Black Hammer Game. Isn’t it interesting how life events weave in and out of each other? At both places I was a programmer. A lot of people find that combination strange. I studied marketing but, I worked as a programmer.

I don’t think it is strange at all unless I was looking to make a career out of something. :) Since I hate jobs and don’t plan to keep one for very long, the idea of a career isn’t really on my radar. I hope that it doesn’t happen accidentally–that would mean I lost focus.

I’m not bad at my job and I’ve got a few games online that people have played at places like Cartoon Network, Comedy Central, Adult Swim, Facebook, etc. but, I’m not in love with programming. I would be even more displeased if I was doing mundane programming work like I did at the internet start-up. At least I am making games now–it’s good for conversation. Nevertheless, I can’t stay being a programmer–I already know it. I suppose it is a good skill to have.

My entrepreneurial spirit can never be kept in check. My desire for freedom to do what I want, when I want, and how I want cannot be tamed.

A bunch of my friends graduated a semester earlier. They finished in the regular four year fashion. Most of them are working in the field that they got their degrees in. Those who are working also had internships during their college career. The ones who aren’t currently working at a job didn’t really put the same effort into networking. From what I can tell, it had very little to do with grades and much more to do with everything else.

For my friends, it was never really a question of what to do next. They just kinda knew that after college, they would get a job doing what they just spent four years studying. Ironically, a lot of them were finance majors and the economy collapsed as they were graduating. Luckily, they still managed to find work.

Now that I have finally finished college, I do feel as if a part of my life is freed. It does feel like I’ve conquered something. Climbed a mounting. Ran a marathon. Something. My parents never went to college. My grandparents did not either. They came over to the United States in the 70’s from Hong Kong. In my immediate family, I would be the first with a college degree. I fully expect my brother to graduate in 3 years and the rest of my younger cousins to so in the future as well.

With this feeling of extra time in my life, I don’t really question what I will do next. I know that in the immediate future, I will be working where I am working and continuing to “mind my own business.” In six months to a year from now, things are more hazy. I never plan that far in advance anyway so it is nothing new. I know that I can’t work at a job forever and being that I am only 22, forever is not a very long time to me.

I know that I will continuously be looking for ways to become financially independent and really be safe and secure by putting my future in my own hands. There are a bunch of things that I want to do or have started and this extra time will be filled by those endeavors–this blog being one of them.

For those who are reading this and have graduated college, there isn’t much I can offer. We are in the same relative place in life. Perhaps my story was interesting to read. Where we go from here will probably be different. For those who are just starting college or are a year or two into it, I would say that your best bet is not to focus on grades like a hawk. I’d go to work. Take a risk–better now than later. It is the networks that will make the post-college experience better, not the grades.

And with the economy in the shape that it is, I would steer away from the idea of finding a safe and secure job after college. If bad economic times teaches us anything, it is that safe and secure jobs do not exist. Now is really the time to be independent, resilient, and continuously learning.

There is something that I would really like to do. It will probably sound very cliche and common but, I do want to see the world. There is never a good time to do it. Maybe I should have done more studying abroad? I didn’t do any. Who knows. I know that I refuse to live with “what if”’s so it is just a matter of catalyst.

The future I see is exciting. There is nothing stable in the global economy. World economic strength is in the process of switching hands whether we, as Americans, like it or not. I don’t even know what continent I will find myself a year or two from now. I don’t know exactly what kind of work I’ll be doing. I love this feeling of excitement, anxiousness, uncertainty, and the adrenaline that comes with it. :)

It is the night of Christmas Eve or basically 35 minutes into Christmas as i am writing this. I am not actually waiting for Santa Claus but, if he shows up, I’d gladly have a beer with the man–can he get a DUI? I have finished my last semester at Pace University for a BA in Marketing. All should be fine unless I am somehow missing a class or one of my professors this semester decides to fail me. Barring any freak occurrences, I should be fine.

Of all the years and semesters of college that I’ve had across three different schools, this last semester was by far the most memorable. It does have the advantage of being the one that happened last so there might be some bias but, I’m pretty sure I’ve not had this much fun in all my eight other semesters.

I’ve dubbed this past semester my international semester. I didn’t actually travel anywhere. I was still in New York City but, the world kinda came to me. In my entire college experience I had never met so many students from different countries. They were mostly from Europe with a few from Asia and Australia.

At this point I have only known these people for a little over 3 months. It really isn’t a lot of time and for the most part we just partied at least every weekend with a few random weekdays. As with all human relationships, we get to know some people better than others. Of those who I have gotten to know better, I am really glad that I had the chance to do so. I do expect that we will stay in touch or become even closer but, experience has taught me that none of that is ever for sure.

I know that I’ve grown a lot in these last three months as we’ve exchanged ideas and parts of lives and cultures. It is an experience that gives you a different perspective on the world. I was never a flag-wearing “patriotic” American but, I had always felt a certain superiority that I was American. Of course, the rest of the world thinks otherwise but, I had no means of connecting to people from different places.

I do not feel that way anymore. Part of it has to do with my continuous understanding of Liberty but, a lot of it had to do with all the people I’ve met in the last three months. I think that I am a better person now than I was three months ago.

There is that feeling of uncertainty with my “mini United Nations”. Most of them are staying for another semester so I’ll still be seeing them but, what happens after that? I hope that we do stay in contact and visit each other in our respective homes. The people that I’ve met had been unbelievably kind, funny, interesting, and a general blast to be around. Why would I want to lose that?

I’ve spent summers bar and club hopping in NY before I’ve met these people but, there is something different here. I can’t really pinpoint the difference. I just feel it. We are doing more than drinking and partying. I have been exceptionally impressed by the “high level” conversations that we’ve had. It seems like the Europeans just have more intelligent things to say. It is unfortunate that I can’t say the same about the majority of my fellow Americans.

One of the most recent thoughts that have resulted this last semester is the idea that the United States is not the only country I can live in. It is amazing to me that I’ve considered moving away from the United States. I still love the principles that my country supposedly stands for but, it is going down the toilet. Our freedoms are disappearing and the economy is looking more and more like the Soviet Union. All of this combined with my experience in the last semester is telling me that I don’t have to say here. People everywhere else aren’t really that archaic. :) There will never be another city like New York and I know I will miss it but, that’s about the only drawback I can see.

Of course, I have no idea what I’ll exactly do in the future but, my mind has expanded it options and that is a big step.

So, I have loved my last and final semester as a undergraduate college student. It has been the best one I’ve experienced in every aspect. The people have been amazing. The conversations: amazing. The experience: amazing. Now, it is just a matter of seeing where it goes from here.

I had mentioned my switch from Starbucks to Dunkin Donuts for my usual coffee a while back. Since then, I had actually started buying coffee from Starbucks again. For the most part, it wasn’t the same pleasant experience I had remembered from when they were a company to be modeled after. The product was better and the staff was friendlier. I don’t know what Starbucks’ is doing since its fall in stock price and reduction of expansion but, it isn’t making things better.

The quality of the coffee appears to have gone down significantly. I have received less than preferable temperature for a regular tall coffee more than once. The Starbucks I remember always had their coffee at a certain temperature and the staff were well-trained to make sure that happens. The new pike roast is just not as good as what Starbucks used to have.

Last week, I had went into a Starbucks to accompany someone who was actually buying a cup of coffee. I had went to Dunkin Donuts prior and bought a medium cup of coffee and a bagel with cream cheese. We entered this Starbucks and the staff behind the counter proceeded to heckle me about the Dunkin Donuts’ product I was holding. It would have been friendly teasing if the barista had not suggested that they provide me with a paper bag with place my DD in as to not embarrass Starbucks when I walk out–how insulting.

The barista should leave the marketing to the marketers. Due to the barista’s faulty misplacement of brand image over customer service, I have since told many friends and acquaintances about this story. And now, I have made it available to the internet. This whole social network thing is a rather powerful means of spreading a message.

I am unlikely to buy coffee from a Starbucks again in a long time and I would suggest that when you have the option of Starbucks or some other coffee house, go with the latter. A company that is no longer operating in a fashion that justifies its price should be punished by decreased revenues and market share.

I didn’t watch the VMA’s. I have long since stopped watching much of what MTV does unless it shows up on YouTube. If it was that spectacular or newsworthy, it’ll find a way to reach me. I had no idea Christina Aguilera was going to perform at the VMA’s. I found out on YouTube a couple of days after the fact. I guess I wasn’t really checking YouTube that much.

Anyway, I’ve always been a big fan of Christina’s music. She is of the few modern pop artists whose albums I buy. So her VMA performance consisted of a renewed version of Genie in a Bottle. I thought that was awesome considering that was the first song I had ever heard from her. I was a kid in Junior High School at the time and I thought she was pretty good back then.

Surely, my musical tastes have changed and her albums after the first are definitely better. I personally love the way Christina evolves her music with each new album. It’s never the same stuff as the last.

Her new single–Keeps Getting Better–sounds different than anything shes done before as well. I’ve listened to it a bunch of times now–all on YouTube–and I must say it is pretty good. I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed with her music so I might be a little biased. She also uses the word “super” in the chorus so how can I dislike that? It would be most fantastic if the radio keeps the phrase “super bitch” in their version–they probably won’t.

So if you haven’t heard it, listen below:

I’ve been looking for an alternative to both Internet Explorer and FireFox. With the new releases of IE and FireFox, they have both gotten crappier–slower. So when I found out Google released Chrome–or some beta version of it–I downloaded as soon as I could. Now I am writing this post using Chrome. :)

I have only used it for a little bit. I tested from projects I was working on at work in it. I did find a problem with Flash that Safari also has except its even worse in Chrome. Flash’s Mouse.hide() doesn’t really work very well in Safari and it works even less well in Chrome. I have no idea why this is the case but, someone should really look into that–works perfectly in IE and FireFox.

Chrome is a lot faster than IE or FireFox. There is much less clutter. The design is clean and simple–very Googlesque. I have only visited a handful of sites and most worked flawlessly. I’ll probably continue to use Chrome for a while longer to see how it fairs against the other browsers. I’m hoping it turns out to be the browser I’m looking for: light-weight, fast, doesn’t crash, and works.

I don’t write nearly as much programming help posts than I could be. There seems to be so much of them out there as it is. However, when I come across something that I think isn’t all that well known or clearly discussed, I feel compelled to release that information into the great unknown of the Internet.

So, I was doing a project that needed a Flash movie–coded in AS3–to make some calls to JavaScript for functionality that JavaScript is more capable of doing. There are various FSCommands that you can use in ActionScript but, nothing really suited my needs. I had some JavaScript functions that needed to be called when certain things happened in the Flash movie.

The quickest method I found for doing this is simply using navigateToURL(). You simply make a call to javascript:FUNC()wth target of _self. More specifically:

navigateToURL("javascript:FUNC()", "_self")

That’s it. :)

I went to see Motley Crue this weekend–Saturday, August 23rd, 2008– at the PNC Bank Arts Center. The Crue put on a great show. I personally love the sexual images mixed in with the political messages. What I took away most from the show was from one of the opening bands: Sixx: A.M. I knew nothing about this band until I went to see the show. Trapt, Papa Roach, and Buckcheery also opened but, they didn’t leave quite the same impression. Sixx: A.M. is Nikki Sixx’s–of Motley Crue–band. They played some great music and I went to find some more when I got home. They are pretty awesome. If you’ve never listened to them before, go do it now. :)

Here is a taste of their 1st single: Life is Beautiful:

The IOC can officially report that He Kexin of China won the Gold in the uneven bars event finals but, without some meaningful sudden death scenario, He Kexin and Nastia Liukin of the USA should both have received Gold. Liukin and He both scored a 16.725 in the event–creating a tie–but, with some illogical mathematics, Liukin fell into second place and a received a Silver.

The first tiebreaker scenario made sense. The competitor with the higher execution score would place ahead. That makes sense since execution is meaningful in gymnastics. However, He and Liukin had the same execution score.

The second tiebreaker scenario didn’t make sense. The calculation of the execution score takes into account 6 deductions. The two extremes are dropped and the four remaining deductions are averaged and then subtracted from 10. This second tiebreaker drops the next highest deduction and averages the remaining three.

Do you see the ironic and illogical reasoning behind this? The Olympics is a competition to find the best athelete or to put it a different way: an athlete who makes the least mistakes. Deductions are bad. This tiebreaker takes the highest remaining deduction and gets rid of it. The person who made a bigger error benefits. Does that really make sense?

If we took a look at the deductions for Liukin and He, they had the same lowest deduction of .7 but He’s highest deduction was a 1.1 while Liukin’s was a 1.0. Liukin did have three 1.0 deductions while He had 2 1.1 deductions. Anyone with any common sense and understanding of what Olympic competition is can see that this tiebreaker rule makes no sense.

I am not suggesting the Liukin should have received the Gold medal. I may be biased and rooting for Team USA but, I also believe in fair and clear competition. This tiebreaker was neither. I am in favor of a sudden death tiebreaker. Both competitors should have done the event again–probably with a different routine–until a clear winner could be determined.

I put up a video at Tommy Liberty about a 12 year old girl who was in the area where the conflict between Georgia and Russia is occurring. She squarely places the blame on Georgia for attacking South Ossetia and causing all the death and destruction–she was actually thankful for the Russians. Watch it.

Knowing what we know, do we really want to get involved in this conflict? I’m saying that we should not put a base in Poland and send aid to Georgia.

About time! Our women’s gymnastics team took the gold and silver in the all around finals. The Chinese had won gold in the men’s team, men’s all around, and women’s team. The Chinese national anthem was becoming quite common in the gymnastics arena. We finally got to hear a different tune.

Nastia Luikin and Shawn Johnson took the gold and silver respectively. Yang Yilin of China took the bronze.

Isn’t that catchy? Tommy Liberty. In line with mission to create focused blogs on topics that I like writing about, I have launched Tommy Liberty as the place where I will keep my political writings. I’ve also put a tab in the menu above alongside my fitness blog. :)

Gymnastics is one of the events that I watch every Olympics and this time is no different. While our men’s team took the Bronze and were ecstatic about it, our women’s team took the Silver and the reaction was completely different. I’m not saying we should accept Silver and be done with it–our team is damn good and we should be aiming for the Gold. The Chinese team so happened to have been better on that day.

Alicia Sacramone would be the easy target to pick out and blame for our loss to China. NBC’s Johnny R explains why Alicia should not be blamed. She didn’t have her best performances at the team finals but, I’m sure she wanted to have done better–her reactions tell the story. There are still more events coming up for Alicia and other members of our gymnastics team. What we should be doing is supporting our athletes in their upcoming events.

There are still more Gold medals to be won and while the Chinese surprised us this time, we’ll be ready for them next time. :)

I talked about creating separate blogs for a few topics that I like writing about and leaving this blog as something more personal. The first of those blogs is ready! I’ve made a tab in the menu here under “Fitness”.  The name of the blog is PartTime Personal Trainer. I’ve actually had my eye on that name for a while but never did anything with it–until now. You should check it out if you have any interest in fitness. :)

A new Cold War is certainly an attention grabber and will sell news–that is why I titled this what I did. Hopefully, we don’t send troops over to Georgia in an attempt to defend them against the Russians. The news is reporting the situation as an invasion by Russia but, the reality is hardly as black and white.

You can read an in-depth look at what is really going on here. The main point is that Georgia invaded the “breakaway” province of South Ossetia where a lot of Russian citizens happen to reside. Russia used their military might in response to Georgia’s actions. It is hard to put the fault on Russia in this scenario as Russia is protecting its own citizens. We would expect our government to protected American citizens living in Mexico if certain danger were to arise–there is little difference in this case.

The media will try to make this out to be an aggressive action by Russia because that will sell the news. The only prudent move we can make is to stay out of the affairs of that area. We’ve already got our hands full with the Middle East and a weak economy at home. And besides, do our politicians really have the moral high ground to condemn Russia when we’ve invaded a country that did no harm to us?