First we had the Seafood soup noodles. The noodle was a white color type. There are a generous serving of seafood. There were prawns, squids and vegetables in the soup.

When the fried rice was served, it looked like just a simple plate of fried rice. However, upon further look, we found the gems were all buried in the rice. There were again prawns and squids hidden.

Just like the fried rice, the omelet looked like an egg bun, so originally looking. There was a knife provided. We used the knife to cut open the omelet. The gems were in there. Inside the omelet, there was a generous chili crab.

This was another delicious meal I had in Phuket. And I know I will definitely miss the food there.

Recently, I need to draw block diagrams for some presentations and reports. I began to explore using the free vector-based diagramming program OpenOffice.org Draw to create such diagrams.

I have used other expensive vector-based diagramming program before. Comparing to these programs, OpenOffice.org Draw produces professional looking diagrams to be pasted in the documents or presentations without the money cost involved.

In general, I find that OpenOffice.org Draw is quite easy to use. It took me some time to get myself familiar to the new interface. This software calls its functions differently. For example, instead of “order”, it is called “arrange” for deciding which item to be in front or at the back.

Other the naming difference, there are very few difference as compared to other vector-based diagramming software.

OpenOffice.org Draw, being part of the suite, provides easy export to Adobe PDF files. This allows us to easily put these files in the public domain without the worry that other would modify it.

There are also some areas which I think the OpenOffice.org Draw can improve on.

One area is the lack of “single click to rotate 90 degree” function. OpenOffice.org Draw does provide the free hand rotate function. But sometime, we do need to rotate the object at 90 degree for alignment. It would be some issue for people like me who has poor sense of alignment.

Overall, OpenOffice.org Draw is a very useful and easy to use vector-based diagramming program without the money cost. It has helped me to produce professional looking diagrams.

OpenOffice.org suite is available for free downloading at http://www.openoffice.org/

In 26 June 2009 Dilbert Comic Strip, there is this employee (Ted, the generic guy I think) who said “I can’t afford my mortgage because of my pay cut. The bank will take my house.”

Asok the intern replied: “I saved a bundle by being a renter. I should buy your house for next to nothing.”

Click here to view the comic strip from Dilbert’s Official Website

This comic strip highlighted some import lessons from Robert Kiyosaki’s books.

Robert Kiyosaki had been repeatedly highlighted that, the house we are living in is NOT an asset but a liability. The bigger the house, the bigger the liability it is. The reason is that, instead of putting money in our pocket, the house we are living in is taking money FROM our pocket. One day, when we have difficulty paying the mortgage, the bank will take it away.

This is what happened to Ted. When he suffered a pay cut, he could not afford the mortgage and ended the bank taking the house away.

Robert Kiyosaki also repeatedly advised that we should go for positive cash flow, earning passive income. No matter what happen to the economy out there, the positive passive income cash flow will continue to give us the financial income we need. When the economy turned bad, we can use the income to buy more assets which generate more positive passive income cash flow.

Asok, the intern, despite of his low salary, was not affected by the pay cut. This is because he has been getting positive passive income cash flow as a renter. Now, he can buy the house from Ted to get more rental positive income.

In 27 June 2009 Dilbert Comic Strip, Catbert the evil Director of Human Resource said, “You shouldn’t come to work just for money. You should come to work to avoid not having money.”
Click here to view the comic strip from Dilbert’s Official Website

This statement further highlighted the message from Robert Kiyosaki’s books, especially the latest one, Conspiracy of the Rich. In his book, he mentioned that the education system is designed to produce employees and specialists. These groups of people are trained to go for job security. There is this fear among the employees that, if they lost their jobs, they will lose their income.

Catbert the Evil Director of Human Resource was voicing out the fear in the employees, the fear of loss of income. And this was the fear that kept people working for money, for job security.

Based on these two comic strips, I can’t help but to link the relationship between Scott Adam’s Dilbert Comic Strip and Robert Kiyosaki’s books.