Category: Other

Factor 75 Meal #2

Since I have to eat these by next Wednesday (February 28th), I went ahead and microwaved a second meal tonight for dinner. This is what I had:

There was a small cup (upper left in photo above) of what appeared to be garlic butter. The instructions said to “remove cup” but did not tell me what to do with it. Leave it cold on-the-side? Warm it up and pour over the entree? Dip the chicken breast? Here is what the entree looked like after heating:

There was more meat in this entree compared to the previous meal. I gave it three stars out of five. The chick was not flavorful, even after pouring all the (cold) garlic butter on it. There were also no grill marks on the “grilled” chicken. So, was it really grilled or boiled or cooked another way? I wished they would give a bit more broccoli and fewer potatoes. I was too lazy to plate the entree again, and I also did not have a knife handy. I picked up the entire piece of chicken and took bites out of it. Maybe if I plated the entree and cut the chicken into strips, it would look more appealing. The potatoes were fine, but they ended up sitting in a layer of garlic butter at the bottom of the tray, so it was really greasy. I washed my hands twice and it still feels greasy.

Nutrition-wise, this meal was healthier than the previous one. There was less fat, cholesterol, and sodium, but it had a similar amount of protein. If they added a bit more seasoning to the chicken, I would give it a higher score.

New License Plates

License plates for my new Model X have not arrived yet, but I did receive the title from the DMV today. I paid $847 for auto registration and my license number begins with 9K. Almost seven years ago, I got my Model S, and the license plate started with 7W.

if we assume all letter and number combinations can be used, the last five digits of the California license number can support 676,000 combinations. That is 26 x 26 x 10 x 10 x 10. If we start at 7X to 9G prefix, that is 36 different prefixes. Therefore, in the past seven years, California incremented through around 24 million passenger car license plate numbers. Does that sound legit? Am I missing something from the calculation?

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As long as I have the license plate number, I can go ahead and apply for California HOV stickers!

Apple Vision Pro

Expensive.

I have an old Oculus Rift that attaches to my PC and its video card. It works ok but the long cable is irritating, and it does not have augmented reality since you cannot see through the visor. There have been improvements and I thought about getting the latest Oculus Quest 3. It is self-contained and costs $500.

So, when Apple announced its VR headset, I was very surprised at the $3,500 price tag. Is the headset actually worth that much or is Apple exacting an early-adopter tax on a bunch of rich people?

I think I will wait for the inevitable Apple Vision Pro 2. Hopefully the pricing will be more reasonable.

Night Photos

My niece and I drove out to Corona Del Mar State Beach last night at around 7:40 pm to take some photos. She needs to take a photo of the ocean each month as part of her marine biology class. However, we just took some pics from the parking lot so there was no marine life to be seen. I was good to get out of the house at night and we did see some stars from the beach.

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On the drive home, my niece commented that it would be awesome to live in Corona Del Mar. I just checked Redfin and houses near the state beach are five million dollars and up. That is crazy expensive, even for Southern California.

RRR

I watched this ridiculous Indian movie yesterday.

My coworker told me a few weeks ago that this was his favorite recent movie, and it was really good. I took him at his word, but also checked Rotton Tomatoes where it has a score of 95%. Anyway, the movie turned out to be Bollywood light, with all the crazy CGI stuff but a bit light on big musical sets until the end. It was not a bad movie, especially if you like Bollywood, but it was not that good. I texted my coworker after the movie, and he laughed.

Yes, three hours. My niece thought it was hilarious though.

Happy 2024!

Despite my pessimistic recap of 2023 in the last post, I am looking forward to the new year. Even though I have pending surgery in two days, I think I am well cared for and there are a lot of people praying for me. My work situation will be resolved after this brief delay, and I am still making travel plans.

2023 Recap

If you count the last week of this 2023, it has been a shitty year. I am still living with the consequences of poor decision making earlier this month and will not know until next week if I will walk normally again.

Here are some good and bad memories from 2023:

GoodBad
Meeting and developing deep friendship with new coworkerCoworker gets fired then finding out relationship was not that deep
Having friend from over a decade ago visit from ChinaChina friend breaks relationship with her best friend while in USA (not me)
Del Mar track party with previously mentioned coworkerLost main analyst on work team; had to rehire quicky
Company stock price increased 25%, solidifying retirement plansGot a lot more responsibility and larger team at work with no raise
Long awaited trip to Toronto to visit relativesRelatives getting old and staying in nursing homes; uncle in US passes
Finally decided to replace seven-year-old car with new Tesla Model XBreak foot badly and cannot drive new car for at least three months

I think if my foot heals and I can finally retire, 2024 will be a better year. I will still be alone, but have time to focus on finding new friends and companionship.

Instagram Meme Wisdom

I believe you find out something about yourself when you are forced to be alone with your thoughts. I have been struggling with relationships for a long time, and I have written about a recent coworker/friend relationship in some recent posts. Sitting alone with my metal foot for the past few days has given me some clarity, but not much.

You know what the worst feeling is
It is when you find out
You didn’t mean as much to someone
As you thought you did
And you end up feeling so stupid
For caring about that person for so long

I realize now that work relationships do not last once you are no longer employed at the same place. Without the daily proxmity from sharing the same office, what you once thought was a close relationship turns out to be just a distant acquaintance. I guess the best I can hope for is this meme:

Christmas Eve Dinner in Paris

No, I am not going to Paris for Christmas. During our last trip to Europe, we stayed in the Hotel Regina Louvre. It was a very nice and expensive hotel, very neat to the Louvre Museum. I would have preferred something more modern, but the rooms were comfortable, and the breakfast was excellent.

Since I am now on their emailing list, I received this a few days ago:

It is their Christmas Eve Dinner menu. I counted only four courses and it cost €190 without wine. I know the dinner is at a luxury hotel in Paris, but that is expensive. I need to see what comparable dinners in Los Angeles cost.

Trolled by Duolingo

I have been posting lately about being single and loss of friendship. It is affecting my mental health, and I am trying to deal with it. As a diversion, I have been doing Chinese lessons on Duolingo. I already know Chinese, but I am unfamiliar with pinyin and simplified Chinese characters since I was originally from Taiwan.

I got these two exercises this week. I think I am being trolled by Duolingo:

The correct answer to the first one is just “Stop dreaming.” All the other words are decoys and are random.

Wedding in Bali

I just received an invite to a wedding via a WhatsApp message. This is the brother of my other cousin that is getting married in Taipei in a few weeks. They both live in Shanghai, so it makes sense that the weddings are over there as well. I am not going to the Taipei wedding on December 23td but may go to the one in Bali on July 1st. However, they want an RSVP by December 31st. I guess they expect everyone to plan international trips that far in advance.

I am contemplating on going because I will be 100% retired by then. It may be a change to bring my parents to Malaysia so my mom can visit where she was born one last time. I also have a friend that lives in Bali. She worked for me right out of school for several years as a financial analyst. The wedding is being held at the Raffles Bali, which is one of the most expensive hotels I have seen. All the rooms are villas and start at over $1,000/night. They also have a wedding package. I saw elsewhere online that it costs $15,000 for twenty guests.

That will be a long and expensive flight from Los Angeles.

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I found out about their engagement from an Instagram post. I think that was a few months ago so from engagement to wedding in about eight to nine months.

Latest Kyiv Attack

It is surreal. I just saw new about Russia sending its largest drone attack since the invasion. The article said 74 out of 75 drones were intercepted, which is great. However, I was on a Teams call with my friend/student in Kyiv and he said he spent the night from 2:00 am to 7:00 am hiding out in the corridor of his apartment, listening to the air raid siren and Iranian drones fly overhead.

Right before this, we were talking about a used MacBook Pro he just purchased. His wife is a hair stylist and wanted to shoot instructional videos and put them on YouTube. Then we talked about his work and plans for Christmas. All normal stuff. What is not said is that one cheap Iranian drone launched by Putin and end all that if the drone gets through air defenses and hits hit apartment.

Fuck Putin.

Post-Retirement Travel Plans

I feel like I need to plan something as soon as possible or I will never start my post-retirement travels. Two coworkers just returned from Japan and Korea, and another coworker is in Hong Kong right now. I mentioned several times before that I was invited to a wedding in Taipei near Christmas but decided not to go. For short trips, I think going solo is okay. For international trips, however, it does feel better to have a travel partner or three. For Taipei, it can count as local travel since I was born there and speak the language, but there is still culture shock when I go.

A couple from my old church recommended Supera Tours. They have been on a few trips with them. It looks like a Chinese travel agency, but they book relatively luxurious hotels and have decent itineraries. Pricing looks like around $500 per day without airfare. Given that I spent $15,000 on a two-week trip to Europe, that is a good price. Most of their tours seem to be focused on Japan however.

I need to find more travel agency sites that target solo travelers. Many tours have a single supplement since they expect to put two people in one room. The one I have been looking at for a while is Abercrombie and Kent. Their prices are very high but everything seems super luxurious. They have stuff like:

Looking at the prices, who is taking these trips? Rich, white people? How much net worth do you need to have to feel comfortable in dropping $400k for two people on a trip?

China Tourist Visa

About fifteen years ago, I travelled to China often to help my friend with his company. I got many tourist visas since I was only there a week each time, and China did not offer tourist visas that were over twelve months. On my first trip, I only applied for a single-entry visa so I had to get another one on my next quarterly trip.

A lot has changed since that time. Due to the rise of Xi Jinping and the recent zero-COVID theater, it is a lot harder to visit China. Also due to the trade war, it has become inconvenient for work to visit China because of politics and the threat of electronic data theft. However, my friend in Beijing keeps asking me to visit, and now a coworker mentioned he may travel to Beijing for a wedding, so I am looking into getting a tourist visa again.

In the past, I would fill out a paper form, then take it to a travel agency. They would charge $35 to drop off the application at the Chinese consulate in Los Angeles, then pick it up for you. This was totally worth it as long as you had time. Nowadays, you have to fill out a webform, plus provide additional documentation.

Round-trip air tickets and hotel orders (name and personal information of the applicant must be included); 

Or invitation letters issued by a relevant entity (e.g. Travel agency) or individual inside China (Photocopies of Chinese ID (front and back) of the inviting individual must be included)

This requirement is new (for me anyway). It feels like you have to commit to your trip before knowing if you will receive a visa. Why not vet the applicant first, then let them plan. It is as if China does not really want visitors. Since I will not reserve flights and hotels without a visa, my friend will need to write a letter of invitation, and use her address as my “where you stay” form info.

Buying Unnecessary Stuff

I have been looking at a pair of bookshelf speakers for a long time. These are the KEF LS50 Meta, and they are very highly rated. For Black Friday, they are on sale for $1,000 per pair. For the longest time, the price was $1,600 per pair. I believe my very old McIntosh amplifier can drive the speakers. However, I already have many (mediocre) amplifiers and speakers. Right now, I do not even have the same speaker connected to the McIntosh. The left channel has a JBL speaker, and the right channel has an Infinity. These are both large eight inch two-ways and sound satisfactory.

In the past, I have been careful with buying stuff, especially non-essential things like electronics. This was mainly because I created financial budgets and plans for work, but also I was poor. Now that I can afford things, it is tempting to go out and just buy stuff I have always wanted. I have some leeway, but that could be very bad if I want to retire.

In the end, I need to decide what I want to do after retirement. Sitting around listening to music is attractive, but I have good wireless headphones and that feels like a berter choice. I also have another audio system in the family room with decent psb/Polk audio apeakers. I guess I am afraid to get hooked since high-end audio equipment can be very expensive.

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Ugh, the struggle is real. I just checked Amazon again and instead of Monday, the delivery date is now December 8th. The “seller” also changed from Crutchfield to The KEF Store. I went directly to the KEF site and had a pair of black LS50’s in the cart, but I opted out again. They are great speakers, and the price is low. I have another month to think about it.

Crappy iPhone

I am currently using an iPhone 12. It is the base model without any suffixes, and only has 128 GB of memory. Since Apple releases a new phone each year, my phone is only three years old. Ever since I bought it, the battery performance has been total shit. I remember looking at the battery status early on and seeing “service” already. I have run out of battery many times during the day, especially when I need to take lots of photos and cannot recharge.

This is going to take forever.

Right now, I am trying to update the system to iOS 17.1.1. I have about 8 GB of memory free, but that is not enough for the update, and the installer is temporarily removing apps. I just bought an Apple Watch 9 so I can upgrade my Watch 6 and give it to my mom. I am self-imposing a limit of one Apple device per year, so an iPhone upgrade will have to wait another year.

  • 2020: iPhone 12 and Apple Watch 6
  • 2021: MacBook Pro 14″ with M1Pro
  • 2022: iPad Pro
  • 2023: Apple Watch 9

During the past few years, I also bought the larger iPad Pro for my dad, and the smaller iPad Pro and iPhone 14 Max for my mom. Starting with a used Apple II+ in the early 1980’s, I have been a very loyal Apple customer. They have good products, but Apple corporate is crap, much like my experience with Tesla.

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The update failed. I got an error message saying that I need 4.86 GB of free memory. That is fine, but I have more than 8 GB free:

Maybe the update process already deleted some apps since there was only about 6 GB free when I started the update process. The phone is updating right now after I started the process again. I hope it will remember what happened before the update failure and restore the deleted apps afterwards.

Also, please please do not brick my iPhone on the update.

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Whew! The update is complete. However, now I show 114.26 GB out of 128 GB used. Was that the system deleting the temporary update files, or my iPhone forgetting to restore deleted apps?

다시 만난 세계

I saw this music video pop up on my YouTube homepage just now. This song is likely the most famous K-Pop girl group song. The video says 2002, but it was originally released in 2007. I remember seeing their debut performance and thinking there were too many members in the group. It took me many months before I could recognize each member individually.

It is hard to imagine that sixteen years have passed since this song came out. I just got divorced in 2006 and really got into K-Pop because I wanted to listen to music but did not want to hear the lyrics. Soon it became the only genre of music I listened to. After getting Spotify, my music selection has been more diversified.

Google Timeline +3 Years

Almost three years ago, I posted about my entire Google Timeline (GT) history. I read that Google Timeline went live during the summer of 2015 (although my first record was on May 24, 2014), you would expect a lot more dots going from five years of data to eight years of data. I also received my kidney transplant in January of 2021, so I was more able to travel. However, COVID-19 was still raging, and travel worldwide would not rebound for another eighteen months.

Here is the total timeline as of today (November 20, 2023) versus the data from November 29, 2020.

The primary difference is the summer 2022 trip to Europe. There are dots in England, Italy, and France. I also made the map wider since I saw a random dot out in the middle of the Pacific. Zooming in…

From the above, GT says on February 8, 2018, I came home from four hours, then drove 3,600 miles to the International Date Line, and drove home. Both the recorded time and GPS location are completely messed up. If. you look up Hot Tub Under the Stars, the search results show a rental cabin in Big Bear. Strange.

If you just compare 2023 versus 2020, there is a significant difference too. This is all of 2020:

Compared to 2023:

Plus, our family trip to Canada in September/October 2023:

I was also invited to two other trips this year. One was a Thanksgiving trip (now) to Korea with several coworkers, and my cousin’s wedding in Taipei over Christmas. Unfortunately, those trips did not pan out. If I do retire next year, I hope to see more dots in other US cities and other countries.