Bridge Maker
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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "milan27" journal:[<< Previous 20 entries]
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09:44 pm
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How to Stay on Comcast's $99 bundle promotion after a year
Looked at my Comcast bill today, it's about 50 dollars more than it used to be. The first reaction is of course wtf, then I realized that my one year "triple play" bundle or whatever they called it is up this month. As an avid consumerist reader, I knew it was time to call and try to get the promotion rate back.
Talked to a rep named Katie first. Naturally, she tried to upsell me on the $130 bundle with HBO and STARZ. I hate when people pull that shit, don't try to upsell me when I'm trying to get things for cheaper, it has the opposite effect. So after I patiently explained to her that this other bundle provides no value to me because I don't watch movie channels, she explains she has no power to do anything. So I made her transfer me to the Customer Retention Center and talked to Sherri.
Same bullshit about 20 minutes. No, I don't want the $130 bundle. Yes, I will switch to FIOS because they have a promotion deal. What's preventing me from switching back and forth every year and always get the promotion rate? What difference does it make to Comcast if I did that? After she gave me some bullshit about how it is a competitive market, I gave her a business proposal. I could either go back and forth with Comcast and Fios every year, or I could stay with Comcast and give my money to them every year with the promotion rate, and they would get more money out of me.
Finally, she decided to keep me on the promotion rate. Thank you consumerist, or I would've never known to be transferred to the retention department.
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12:56 am
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Two
It’s a hefty goal I have set. In order to achieve it, there must be an organized, consistent, and coordinated effort on my part. These are three of my weaknesses. But like I said, the old me must die for the new one to be born. In this entry I will lay out the groundworks which have set the foundations which have set my goal in motion. 1. Starting my own business. This was a very important initiative I took. About three months ago, I was searching the net to find some opportunities for a sound business. One thing led to another, it rekindled my entrepreneurial spirits that have been resting inside of me since 2001. I took the first initiative, called up Matt and told him about my ideas. We were both very excited, and later Justin jumped aboard. One important Kiyosaki has taught me is that you must be around like minded people in order to achieve greatness. In many ways, environments can shape a person’s future. I am not at liberty to discuss our business before it is registered (which should happen in a week or two), but it is very exciting. We have laid out all the groundwork, the research is pretty much done. I am currently working on putting together several marketing packages/catalogs, writing down and installing a few marketing strategies, and mapping out our targeted consumer groups. Matt is taking care of the website and logo designs (he is a graphic designer), and Justin is taking care of all the legal stuff (he is an engineer with some experience in accounting). One day when this company is able to succeed, it’ll be attributed to the three of us coming together with competent and diverse skills, a way to use leverage to build a successful system. 2. Joining a network marketing business I used to shun away whenever I hear of network marketing. I thought they were pyramid schemes. That is, until I realized cooperations are the ultimate pyramid schemes. Network marketing businesses have many excellent features. They will invest in you as long as you put in the time and effort, and they want you to get to the top. Most cooperations will fire you if you don’t do your job right immediately, and try to keep you at the bottom. NMBs also provide an opportunity for you to start a business with very little capital but provide you massive system backing. Most importantly, they train you in important entrepreneurial areas such as sales and marketing. For these reasons I joined World Financial Group, a marketing branch of the Aegon Group. I am currently being trained twice every week on sales and marketing, learning about different financial products such as life insurances, mutual funds, stocks and bonds, etc. I see joining WFG as killing two birds with one stone. I am learning about personal finances, a variety of investment vehicles I can utilize in the future, at the same time gaining knowledge and skills in sales and marketing. 3. Finally, I decided I really need to get out of my comfort zone to set things in motion. When people are comfortable, they tend to stay the way they are, and grow complacent. This is what my job at Brown University has done to me, and since I’m extra lazy, it really isn’t good. I have quit my job, effective after Christmas. I joined an affiliate company of Executive-Advertising in East Providence. It is more of a business opportunity than a job. I will work full time as a door to door salesman (with the chance of being promoted to associate manager in 2-3 weeks) for 6-8 months selling marketing material for professional sports teams, local restaurants, hotel chains, direct TV and so on and so forth. My income will be completely dependent on my sales. In 6-8 months, I will have the opportunity to build my own team and become an assistant manager. As an AM, I will run my own sales and marketing campaigns from an office, having my team do the dirty work. After which I will become a manager, deal with clients directly to come up with marketing plans and details, with an unlimited earning potential. At that point I am free to open an office anywhere I please, with zero cost on my part. This program is going to make or break me (I’ll make sure it makes me). By the end of my five year period, I should have 3 successful business going, making passive income that accumulates to 1 million dollars. However, the odds are that most businesses fail in the first five years. But that’s ok, because failure is the mother of success. I don’t lie down because of failure, I get back up again, having learned lessons from my failures. In five years time, I will succeed.
Current Location: desk
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05:45 pm
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One
I’m back. It’s been a while but this journal is going to be completely transformed. From today, I’m going to keep a running journal of how I am planning and acting on to make 1 million dollars in less than five years. Five years is a deadline. For those of you who are reading my journal (all 3 of you), this may sound crazy. But let me assure you, it is not. I believe it’s important to set goals, and keep them in my face all the time, to give me the pressure I need to achieve them. The reason why New Year’s resolution doesn’t work for most people is because it’s forgotten as fast as it’s made. First a little history. When I was a freshman in college, I met Andrew. Andrew is a China-nut, he studied abroad in China for 2 years while in college, spoke fluent Chinese and knew almost as much about China as I do. This was very refreshing for me, to see a white person having so much understanding and passion for my country. Andrew inspired me in many ways, I learned my first financial lesson when he recommended me to read Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki. The book has been on the New York Time’s Best Sellers List since 2000. I have since then read many books in Robert Kiyosaki’s collection, including his latest co-authored book with Donald Trump, Why We Want You to be Rich. A few brief points that are important in all his teachings for those of you who are interested: l In 1973, the US government enacted ERISA, a law which took away the Direct Benefit plans enjoyed by employees after retirement, replaced them with Direct Contribution plans such as the 401(k). Of course, the 401(k)s were not meant to be retirement plans, as the stock market fluctuates, there are no guaranteed retirement money for the employees. l As the baby boomers start to retire in 3-4 years, Social Security and Medi-cade are in big trouble and facing bankruptcy. Don’t expect to get anything from these government programs after we retire. l The rich teach their kids about money, while the poor and the middle class don’t. The rich put their money in investments (paper investments, real estate, and business), while the poor and the middle class put their money in saving accounts in the bank. l As a result, the rich’s money keeps growing and multiplying, while the poor and the middle class loose money by putting it in the bank. l The rich don’t pay taxes (legally), while others are pinned down by heavy taxation. l Freedom is the opposite of security. When I went to college, I was taught the traditional success formula by my upbringing and surroundings. “Go to school, get good grades, a good education. Then get a good job with good benefits, and save.” This mentality was engraved in me so deep that even when faced with all the above facts and more, it’s hard to get rid of. Even today, I struggle with it sometimes. Because it’s always easy to go back to the employee mentality, and get in my comfort zone. But I have to let that part of me die. For something new and better, the old has to die. It’s like the saying, “everyone wants to go to heaven, but no one wants to die.” I’m not religious, but the saying makes a lot of sense. It’s an easy decision for me to become an entrepreneur, to not go down the employee route. In the last three months, I have started to gain the necessary education and skills for an entrepreneur. I have started a business with Matt and Justin (Andrew’s twin brothers) that is almost ready to be registered, joined a network marketing financial firm to gain more knowledge and skills, quit Brown University for a job at a marketing/sales firm in East Providence. I will elaborate on all these decisions in my next entry. This brings me back to my goal: 1 million in 5 years. The foundations are set. The countdown begins now.
Current Location: Desk
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11:23 pm
[Link] | So I have two bumper stickers on my car. One is the John Kerry/Edwards sticker from the last election, the other one I got last summer that states "The Road to Hell is Paved with Republicans". A little provactive, but it's a bumper sticker, it's supposed to make a point. The latter sticker has always had good stories with me on the road (especially when I was in Georgia), but today's story tops them all.
I drove to the mall this afternoon with Viet for lunch, b/c he craved crappy mall Chinese food, and I'm always a sucker for crappy American Chinese food. It was a nice day out, so I had the music going and the windows rolled down. We stopped at a red light to turn left into the mall, and at this moment, a 2006 blue Cadillac pulled along side us in the next lane. This is where the story begins.
The guy rolls down his window, looks at us, and says "Is this your car?" Viet was confused as to who the question was directed at, so I answered "Yeah, it's my car." "Did you put the stickers on the bumper?" It was a busy main street, so we couldn't hear him very well. Viet looks at me, and I caught something about the stickers, so I replied "yeah, I certainly did." Now the good part. The guy went on to say the following.
"Do you ever wonder why Republicans drive cars like this," pointing to his new shiny Cadillac, "and Democrats drive cars like that?" Referring to my 89 Camry. In my head I was thinking, "wow, you just proved the point. Repulicans like you care nothing but money and are headed to hell." But of course, I am never quick for clever responses, and he did catch me off guard. So I just laughed and he drove off.
If you examine the bumper sticker carefully, it doesn't say "all Republicans go to hell". Most people who sees it on my commute from home to work everyday probably just laughs it off, whether they're democrats or republicans or others. It shouldn't bother you if you don't think you fit the bill. So for this guy to come up and actually say something, it can only mean one thing. It bothered him. He's one of the Republicans described in the sticker, so he felt the need to come up and say something. Look, I'm not even a democrat, personally I think there's as many democrats as republicans paving the road to hell, but since the republicans are the one in power (and doing a shitty job), they're the ones deserving that sticker. The End.
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04:27 pm
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Stop saying you support the troops
It's the most empty phrase ever thrown out. It's like an imaginary banner tha covers you, no matter if you're for or against this unjust war. Let's forget the fact that the US went into war under false premises, false intentions; this so called "pre-emptive" strike (I bet dubya doesn't know what that word means, because it certainly was not a pre-emptive strike), shock and awe (which killed thousands of innocent Iraqis), etc. etc. Let's forget about all this.
Support the troops? Somebody tell me what it means. Let's see, your country started a war, invading a lesser country. It sent troops in to fight this war, willingly or unwillingly. Is it necessary to say that you "support the troops"? They're our troops, you don't need to say you suppor them. You certainly don't need to slap that shit in the form of a bumper sticker/ribbon on your big ass SUV or Hummer. Because when you do that, it's ironic, it becomes an oxymoron.
Bush said he isn't ruling out using tactic nukes against Iran. That's great news. Because all we need right now is to be the only country in the world to use nukes not only once, not only twice, but three times. And after that happens, you can proudly slap on that "W" sticker next to your "Suppor the troops" sticker on the "bigger than ever" Hummer 5 that they're gonna make.
What will you say then? Suppor the troops? Or "Suppor the Nuke Throwers?"
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10:20 pm
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March Madness
It's that time of the year, when everything else come to a halt. This will be the only things that I do for the next two weeks: logging on to espn.com, starring at the live score update, screaming at the screen, and watching my brackets slowly (or rather quickly) fall apart. Go Huskies!
So work has been ok. I've learned to accept that nothing in science works, nor repeatable, nor quick. My boss just had surgery for her nose to unblock her synasis. I don't know how to spell that word. I'm really tired of some people in the building though. God.
I think I've decided to go to business school sometime in the future (within a year or two), and grab a MBA. This science thing may not work out as planned. Sorry guys.
Current Mood:  crazy
Current Music: March Madness
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06:12 pm
[Link] | 人说，爱情，很简单~~
易拉罐拉环一直喜欢易拉罐，
可是易拉罐的心里却住着可乐。
所以每当喝完罐装可乐，
请把拉环放入可乐罐，
成全拉环的爱情~~~
This is very interesting, for those of you who knows Chinese.
Current Mood:  jumpy
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05:17 pm
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Religion Quiz
( I am an anthiest )
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12:16 am
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An update in Chinese
“出来混，迟早要还的。”
这句话很经典。第一次在电影里听到，就留意了一下。虽然说搭不上边儿，但总觉得好玩儿。今天无意在网上有又看到了。不过今天看到的时候，又深深的想了一想，这句话确实有道理。其实每个人在社会上总是有那么一段时间是在混。在单位里混，在家里头混。不过呢，只要有混过的，都是得还的。我相信这句话，也就高兴了不少。
Current Mood:  睡了
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11:42 pm
[Link] | ( survey )
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12:11 am
[Link] | ( meme )
Current Mood:  Vomit
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04:17 pm
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Who is it?
Ring, Ring...
"Hi, Yes, Tony, I'm still here. Do you know how early it is?"
"Yes Mr. Bush, but we were just attacked."
"What? By who? Is it the evildoers?"
"I assume so. The Europe Al Queda group of Jihad claimed responsibility on their website. There were 37 people dead, and more than 700 injured."
"What did they do?"
"They bombed our tubes, Mr. President."
"What kind of tubes? Why do you have people in the tubes?"
"The subway, sir."
"Oh, ok. Well, we'll smoke 'em out."
"Georgie, this war is killing us. We both wanted Saddam, now we got him out, and convinced the public he had WMDs, but now, it looks like people are catching on, and, the militants won't let us go."
"Calm down there Tony. We don't even know for sure who attacked you. I mean, by all means, it could be the French."
"The French?"
"Why of course. They always opposed the war, much like the militant terrorists do. And, didn't they just lose the Olympic bid to London? I think they were also mad at you for renaming food items such as the freedom fries."
"Sir, I believe the freedom fries was you guys."
"Oh, well, anyway. Don't worry, whoever it is, we'll smoke 'em out."
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12:48 am
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Branden Looper eats hairy Yankee asses
And he also sucks dirty yankee balls
Current Mood:  Still PIssed Off
Current Music: bitchslapping Looper's mom
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11:39 pm
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Brandon Looper is a Motherfucking Waste of Life
Fuck you Looper, FUCK YOU. YOU ARE THE WORST PITCHER IN THE HISTORY OF BASEBALL. You are worse than all the worst players put together. Please slit your wrists and kill yourself. Or Hang yourself. Or get hit by a truck. I will fucking Kill you if you don't do it yourself. Goodnight.
and Fuck you Looper.
Current Mood: pissed off
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12:02 am
[Link] | Wow, what a day at lab. I am possibly the worst TA ever, or, just had the most embrassing TA moment ever.
Everything has been going smoothly up till now. I've been real careful with everything, had mad tips from Cale. Learned not to boil over agrose solution in front of a class, not to skip any protocol procedures, not to over or under incubate, not to...
Damn, not to break gels while taking them out of the well. Wow, this was like, 2 weeks of work from the whole class. Two weeks of endlessly purifying DNA, two weeks of running test gels, two weeks of growing cultures, two weeks of transformation. Every single piece of data from our entire time here is on that gel. So just to make sure, I wanted to take the gel out and stain it by myself so nobody messes up. It is a big gel, bigger than anyone has every done, including me.
I held it, carefully, over to the hood, where I have just made the ethidium bromide solution. But the tray was a little to close to the window. I moved one of my hands off the gel for one sec to move the tray, and splat, there goes the whole gel, into 3 pieces. God Damn it Jesus fucking Christ.
Worst day in lab yet. Good thing Allison is a very experienced southern blot/probe person. She told me we could just put the gel together and everything will work. It's working so far. She did the whole set up for the Southern too. She looked more like the TA than I did today.
But everyone was very supportive of me and I reall, really appreciate that. Thanks guys.
Current Mood: relieved
Current Music: Meet the Mets
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11:55 pm
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Thursday
I hate cell phones. They must be one of the worst inventions on earth.
Remember the times when nobody you knew had a cell phone, except for one of your rich uncles? He would carry one of those huge-mongous 2 by 4 blocks that weighs about 20 pounds and yell into it, just so that everyone would notice he is using his cell phone, and no you can't have one. He let me play with it once though.
The other day I saw a pickup driver on a cellphone missing a minivan on the turning lane by about an inch, and of course, the driver of the minivan was also on her cell phone. "Damn, that car almost hit the other car, jesus!" As I slowly turned my Camry around the corner, telling Scott what happened on my cell.
What is more irratating is when people's phones ring in the lab, when I'm teaching the class. It's safe to say most people have had cell phones for at least 3-4 years now. It would be understandable if they just bought a phone, for the first time. It's the first couple of days, they havn't figured them out yet, and phones ringing in a class setting can be excused. But after 4 years??? I think you have figured it out by now, turn the damn thing off.
And stop causing accidnets.
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03:36 pm
[Link] | It's always fun to come to lab on weekends, especially when your e-coli refuses to grow. Dr. Arnold thinks it's a bad bad strand. Oh well.
The Mets lost to the Skankees, what else is new?? If our infield could field and not give the Yankees 6 outs in an inning, we could've won. Damn the yankees.
More e-coli. peace
Current Mood: sucky
Current Music: lab sounds
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02:49 pm
[Link] | Finally got down to Georgia, no traffic on the way from Baltimore to here!! Amazing.
It is Thursday, and after making media, doing inoculations, and preparing cells since 7 AM...I don't even know what to do with myself...So, in other news,
Majority Leader Bill Frist (R) was caught smoking in a federal government owned restaurant, when the waiter asked Frist to nip his ciggarett because he was on federal government property, our dear leader Bill refused, claiming "I AM the federal government" (True story, you can't make this shit up)
You can now order McDonnells at Walmart's checkout line!! Mickie Ds and Walmart, two of the finest cooperations in Amercia, helping making Amercians obese since, um, the creation of obesity.
I am still in lab, so I'll write later, once I have internet, that would be Monday. Peace.
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12:00 am
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Your Political Profile
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Overall: 15% Conservative, 85% Liberal
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Social Issues: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal
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Personal Responsibility: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal
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Fiscal Issues: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal
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Ethics: 0% Conservative, 100% Liberal
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Defense and Crime: 75% Conservative, 25% Liberal
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06:09 pm
[Link] | Dear Tom Glavin,
Way to ruin my graduation day by pitching another atrocious game. Wow, you just ruined an otherwise wonderful day. Go kill yourself.
And btw, I graduated today, yay :-)
Current Mood:  confused
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