Blog

Short blog posts, journal entries, and random thoughts. Topics include a mix of personal and the world at large.

Aaand it's gone

I am scheduled to receive a $3,500 bonus check as negotiated by our union at work. And all of that money is heading straight back out. Most of it will go towards my BMW M2 Competition. The annual CA license fee is due soon, something like $700 dollars. The six months renewal on the car insurance is also coming right up. That’s another $1,000 out the door. And that’s if I’m lucky and the premiums don’t increase. I sure hope not too many people are wrecking their BMWs these days.

The M2 has scheduled maintenance in September, but thankfully that is still paid for by BMW. The second of three years of free maintenance. I’m going to enjoy that while it lasts because getting the car serviced at a dealership cannot be cheap. I’m still undecided if I will stick with BMW of San Francisco after the free servicing expires. An independent mechanic would be cheaper, but there are convenient loaner vehicles at a dealership. Something to think about next year.

So half of the bonus check goes towards the M2. Like I always say: if I weren’t a car enthusiast I would be far richer. Of course, Uncle Sam takes a chunk of that bonus money as well. The full $3,500 is symbolic only.

The yearly hosting fee for this Squarespace website is also due next month. The fee were raised back in February, so it’ll be my first time paying the new privilege of $252 for the business plan. Not exactly sure what I’m receiving in return for the price increase. I’m sure it’s just Squarespace trying to get more money because it simply can. Obviously I am going to continue paying up because this site of mine is very important to me. Even if there’s not a single visitor.

I could use some chicken

Sometimes after getting home from work you just want to order delivery KFC and pig out. All because the work week has been hellaciously rigorous. I did exactly that today, as I was too tired to be bothered with making actual dinner. I unwinded to some music whilst waiting for the Grubhub driver to bring me the food from about a mile away. I did make a bowl of veggies though, because as a good Chinese boy, I cannot have fried chicken without some green stuff (not that kind) to balance it out.

Indeed it’s been a tough week at work. It’s the first week of fall semester on campus, and us IT folks are just running around trying to take care of everybody. Soon as we finish one thing, another is waiting for us, likely already overdue. Good news is the work day is finite: I put in my eight hours then I can go home and not think about it until the next day. Still ruminating over work stuff after dinner? That can’t be me!

San Francisco State is back to 75% In-person classes now, and it’s absolutely weird to have a bustling campus again after two and a half years of relative ghost town. The throngs of people during the hours when everybody is either getting out of a class or heading to class (such as the two o’clock hour) is amazing to see once again. Also amazing to see is a bunch of bible thumpers returning to the campus quad to call the rest of us devil worshippers. A student wearing a short skirt was simple walking by and got called a slut.

You can say things are back to normal. The only thing that isn’t is that SF State still has an indoor mask mandate. Though even that is scheduled to go away after next week, predicated on COVID case loads in San Francisco continuing to stay low and mild.

What’s better after a hard day than fried chicken? I struggle to think of anything else that isn’t sex.

You get a parking ticket!

Today a friend shared with me this article about parking citations in San Francisco have made a comeback from the depths of the pandemic. March of this year was the first time the number of tickets breached 100,000 since the start of COVID. Last month the city took in $8.5 million in citation revenue! That seems like a lot of money to me, surely more than enough to pay for the dozens or so meter maids.

The article goes on to say that most of the tickets are from street cleaning, a fine San Francisco tradition. No other city I know of have such a rigorous cleaning schedule. If you street-park your car in San Francisco, you have move it off one side of the street every week for about two hours. The cleaning machine can then drive by and do its thing. Many times I’ve seen neighbors forget the schedule and end up with a ticket. I avoid this by entering the street cleaning days onto my calendar for the whole year, at the beginning of the year

Lucky for my neighborhood, street cleaning is only a twice-a-month affair.

I have to say it is nice to have clean streets. And I’m sure those are some good paying jobs there at the Department of Public Works operating those cleaning trucks. But let’s not kid ourselves: street cleaning is also a money generator for San Francisco. I just hope that revenue go towards something productive vis a vis the roads, like taking care of potholes in a timely manner. I think that’s a fine bargain: the forgetful parkers amongst us subsidizing the upkeep of our streets.

Not so grand theft auto

A few weeks back, my father’s Toyota Corolla got stolen. Thankfully it wasn’t the strong-arm variety. The car was parked at his work when it got borrowed without permission. A vagrant waltz in through an open door and took, amongst other things, my father’s jacket. In it was unfortunately the car keys. I’m sure my father has learned his lesson of leaving any key unattended and away from him.

First order of business upon learning your car’s been stolen is to call the non-emergency police line to file a report. Then it’s a call to the insurance company so that whatever dangerous stunts the thief may pull, you’re not liable for. Then I guess you just wait to hear back from the police? Surely after a certain period (weeks?) the insurance would deem the car irretrievable, and cut you a check for the present value of the car.

That is, if the car is comprehensively insured.

Having to buy a replacement vehicle would not be the ideal outcome for us, because the car market right now remains insane. Due to the chip shortage, new and used car prices are super inflated. Even if the insurance check is large enough to cover the inflation, finding a car to buy is a challenge in it of itself. Car shopping these days is not fun at all, even if you’ve got the money. There just aren’t that many on the dealer lots to go around.

Lucky for my dad, police found the Corolla abandoned on a street some hours after the report was filed. It was then towed to an impound lot. It took about two weeks for the case to close, then we were able to go retrieve the car. No charge of any impound fees, which is nice and unexpected. The only expense out of this ordeal will be getting a new second key and recoding both at a Toyota dealership.

The Giant Race 2022

Yesterday I ran a 10K for the first time in six years. The annual Giant Race was once again held at Oracle Park. Coming out of the socially slumbering pandemic, I wanted to participate in the race again to get the joy of running with thousands of other people. Also, one of my good friends have never done any sort of long distance running event, so I wanted to be along with her for the challenge.

It was a typical mild Sunday morning in San Francisco, though unlike the previous years that I’ve done the race, this year the sun was completely out. No cloud or fog cover whatsoever. It was definitely a struggle through the sections where there were no shade coverage. I am far too used to training in the dense fog of the western side of San Francisco.

Also unlike in previous years, there were not a half marathon category. The longest distance is the 10K. Because of this, the organizers only cordoned off the streets from the ballpark northward up the Embarcadero, and turning around just past the Ferry Building. Two loops of this make the 10K. Back in 2016, we’d run all the way up towards Pier 39 before turning back. One loop of that would be the 10K.

Doing two loops definitely threw me off psychologically. Having to immediately repeat the route I just did created a mental burden which I’m pretty sure affected my overall performance. The second time around was more challenging and not as enjoyable.

With all those excuses fully baked in, I can now say I ran the 10K in about 58 minutes. That’s almost 10 minutes longer than my 2016 effort. Honestly, I probably did not train as hard as I should. Nonetheless I’m quite happy with that time, as getting it in under one hour was my goal. Of course, the runner’s high afterwards is the absolute best feeling in the world. That’s why we all run, right? And also for the big meal afterwards. Because “A victory should be honored with revels!”

No mods for old man

It’s been nearly two years of ownership with my BMW M2 Competition. The common question I get from fellow car guys is if I’m going to do any modifications to it. Because as of right now the car is still bone stock as it left the factory. There isn’t even a decal on the windows, zero signs of personalization whatsoever. The days of spending the next paycheck on car parts is truly passed and gone.

It’s not that I wouldn’t want to do modifications to the M2. The problem is, the parts I would want to put on the car are so god damn expensive. $200 set of lowering springs and $1000 set of wheels this is not. When you’re dealing with cars the caliber of a BMW M2, a proper suspension upgrade is $3,200 for a set of Ohlin dampers. If I want to change the wheels, only a $4,000 set of M Performance wheels will do. What about an exhaust upgrade? The Akrapovic unit made out of titanium I very much would like is $5,700.

Car parts - the good stuff, anyways - are incredibly expensive! Just those three items I mentioned alone is enough money to buy a whole other used car. Never mind the fact that I also want to wrap the M2 in red - a color it never came with from the factory. Had red been offered - it was available in the lower trims of the 2 series - I would have bought it in that color instead of white.

So yes, I would love to do modifications to the M2. But I’m at a point in life I am unwilling (and shouldn’t, honestly) to spend nearly $15,000 to replace parts on a car that works perfectly fine. I rather save that money towards a down payment on a whole other car. Like the forthcoming Honda Civic Type R…

Going round in circles

On the roads near the San Francisco State campus, there are a few roundabouts. A type of road feature more often seen in Europe, it’s an efficient way to filter traffic connecting multiple roads, without resorting to stop lights. Unfortunately, because roundabouts are so rare here in the States, often times drivers have no idea what to do with them. The rules are simple, really: anyone in the roundabout have absolute right of way. All other traffic hoping to enter has to yield.

I think that’s the problem: yielding. I encounter too many drivers these days who loathe to wait for any seconds longer. You should see their frustration queuing at a red light! God forbid you’re the car blocking them from making a right turn on red.

Anyways, it’s always fun during the start of fall semesters because there would be new drivers to the area. And invariably some of them would do something crazy in the roundabouts near campus. Just the other day I was following a car inside the roundabout circle, and it actually stopped to let another car in. Luckily the other driver knew the rules, and waved the erroneous driver off.

Hey, at least it’s not someone going in the wrong direction! Public service announcement: roundabouts only goes one way - counter-clockwise in America.

But because this is America, and our driving standards to get a license is notoriously poor, I can never relax even during times when I have the absolute right of way. Never know when the next car approaching the circle don’t know or simply don’t care to yield to roundabout traffic. So I never assume: ease off the throttle, be prepared to brake. And if the car is a Nissan Altima, there’s a high chance it will not yield at all.