Haha! Finally have access to my blog again.

已经有一段时间我没发新帖子了。 今天送给大家上周末一些收获。

Just wanted to spread the word that Flickr in the last week added a new server farm. For those who are accessing flickr via the Access Flickr plugin, it’s time to upgrade your plugin to 1.9! Check ths link Flickr Farms Test to see which servers you have access to. If Farm 4 is not available to you then you’ve confirmed your need for the new plugin. However, 1.9 is not readily available yet so getting this plugin will require a few more steps more than usual.

1. Register an account at https://addons.mozilla.org/
2. Click on My Account . Enable Show sandbox .
3. Now, access this page Access Flickr 1.9
4. Download the new plugin and install!

Source :Access Flickr 1.9 Instructions

I will add Chinese instructions later.

Lately, my dvd-rom stopped working correctly. Dvd’s wouldn’t read nor write. Instead, it started making clicking noises, similar to what a hard drive makes when it tries to let you it’s about to die. At first I thought it was a Vista issue, as that was the only change to my system prior to the dvd-rom malfunctioning. I must spent a good many hours looking through forums, trying to find updated drivers, but everything I read insisted I had all the drivers I needed to make it work. Last night, I needed to load some files from a dvd, so I gave the dvd-rom a whirl. Same issues, the dvd drive wouldn’t read and instead decided to click at me. With nothing to lose, I took my handy bulb blower and gave the led a few quick puffs and put the CD back in. Surprisingly, the dvd loaded, I was able to do a directory listing, but the files still wouldn’t copy over. Quite infuriating.

Then I thought, maybe, just maybe because my laptop is inclined (with my dvd drive tipped about 20 degrees from the horizontal osition) the incline was somehow interfering with the spinning of the disk. I set my laptop stand back to the 0 degrees position, and tried reading the disc again. And of course, everything loaded.

So that was it. 1) Laptop stands with an incline and optical drives are probably not a good match for each other. 2) Though tempting, it’s probably not fair to blame everything on Vista.

五一期间，我们去了几个中国有名的地点，首先去了苏州。 苏州和杭州在中国思想里像天堂似的，但是它带给我们第一个印象就没有那么好。 到了苏州火车站，我们发现周围都盖着灰尘，旁边的建筑都拆了而到处都是瓦砾。由于我们几天就要回上海，我就先急忙去找火车销售区买票。 终于找到了销售区，看到那们多人在抢着买票，我就立刻放弃。 两手空空，我们打算先去宾馆然后请他们帮我们买票。 我们预定的宾馆是亨德利宾馆，可能在我们的旅游中最合理一家。 到了宾馆以后，前台的服务员就告诉我们五一火车票很紧张，最好还是买长途车票。 因为我有在十一期间买火车票的经验，我很快接受了他的推荐。 在房间休息了一段时间以后，我们就先去了“虎丘“。

Full set of Suzhou pictures