Long-form

Long-form blog posts and editorials. Topics cover both personal and the world at large. 

Symphony this life - 10 things I think

10 THINGS I THINK

1. Someone is going to have to explain to me how the Warriors are down one game to two against a Cavaliers team that hasn’t got Kevin Love or Kyrie Irving. On paper they should be crushing them, but as the saying goes, that’s why they play the games.

2. Chipotle is already one of my favorite chain restaurants, and now, even more so. It’s been announced the company will begin to offer paid sick leave and vacation for its employees - including part-time workers. Suffice it to say, the Chipotle will see plenty more of my money in the future.

3. Last week I heavily criticized the Mercedes F1 team for their horrendous gaff at the Monaco Grand Prix, but thanks to FOM releasing new radio messages between the team and driver, it looks like half of the blame needs to go towards Lewis Hamilton! Turns out the decision to box the car wasn’t the sole wonton decision by the team, but Hamilton himself wanted to pit as well - he was entirely complicit to the maneuver! It’s no wonder he didn’t go ballistic against his team in the aftermath - he knew he cocked it up.

4. I take great satisfaction in the fact the current Giants third baseman Matt Duffy has got a higher OPS than the acrimoniously departed Pablo Sandoval. “The Panda” should’ve probably done something with the bat first before trashing his former organization. Karma is a wonderful thing, isn’t it?

5. I think Zoe Saldana’s husband taking her last name is absolutely beautiful.

6. Sergio Marchionne is a very impressive man in the flesh, so it’s puzzling as to why he is unable to steward the Fiat group into anything resembling a proper auto manufacturer. (Ferrari not withstanding.) Lancia is all but dead, Fiat can’t decide what it wants to do, Maserati can’t compete with the Germans, and Alfa Romeo is on its hundredth revival plan.

Perhaps the ousted Luca Di Montezemolo should’ve taken over instead.

7. The Gilmore Girls reunion at the ATX Festival was absolutely everything. Yes, I’m an avid fan of the series, except for season 7. I don’t see how anybody can actually like season 7.

8. It’s a shame I’ve got to wait until autumn, because my iPhone 5S could really use the battery and storage-space saving technology in the recently announced iOS 9. That, or I just badly need to upgrade to iPhone 6.

9. If you’re sick of Hollywood whitewashing Asian-themed films (the Aloha movie, ahem), then you really should support Wong Fu Productions first feature film Everything Before Us by watching it on their Vimeo page. As always, it’s immensely important to support independent artists.

10. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is this weekend, and I promise I’ll actually attend one of those within the next few years. It’ll have to coincide with the big European jaunt that anyone who doesn’t live on that continent aspires to do.

In the meantime, I’ll have to make do with the sublime people that do the Radio Le Mans broadcast.       

Something kinda crazy - 10 things I think

10 THINGS I THINK

1. The supposed Fight of the Century was quite the letdown, wasn’t it? I’m hugely disappointed in Pacquiao’s inability to land any punches of significance on Mayweather; getting through Floyd’s vaunted defensive style was the only way Manny could’ve persevered in the bout. If Pacquiao wasn’t able to breakthrough, I’m not sure any other fighter out there can (don’t humor me with Amir Khan).

I completely understand the common fan’s complaints of the fight being uninteresting and Mayweather is a coward for the frequent evasion and hugs on to Pacquiao: they’re simply unfamiliar with the sport. Admittedly, Floyd’s style never made for fantastic fights, but from a pure technical standpoint, his display against Manny was an absolute masterpiece.

I for one don’t want a rematch. The result will be the same.

2. Avengers Age of Ultron was as spectacular and awesome as I thought it would be. There will definitely be many more viewings in theatres in the immediate future, a personal honor reserved for only the very best of films (the first Avengers film, Inception, Lord of the Rings trilogy, etc.)

It is slightly bittersweet that Joss Whedon will no longer helm the third Avengers film, though it’s a good bet he’ll have some input on certain macro elements. I’ve full confidence in the Russo brothers, and am already anticipating next year’s Captain America film, poised to be essentially Avengers 2.5.

3. I’ve completely fallen head over heels for Elizabeth Olsen. There was no character I adored more in Avengers Age of Ultron than her brilliant interpretation of Scarlet Witch. Forget a standalone Black Widow movie (blasphemous, I know); I now desperately want a Scarlet Witch movie. It won’t happen, of course, because Disney and Marvel have shown they aren’t particularly fond of female super heroes. I doubt we would’ve even gotten as much Black Widow screen-time in the previous films if not for Joss Whedon.

4. It’s almost guaranteed that Pietro Maximoff will not “stay dead” in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so take heed, Avengers fans mourning the death of Quicksilver. It is no coincidence that a scene of his burial was conspicuously absent at the end of Age of Ultron. Don’t you think if Pietro had truly passed, there would’ve been be a proper funeral worthy of a fallen Avenger?  

I’d bet good money Quicksilver will return for the third Avengers film, if not sooner.

5. Judging from the size of the men in the Dear Future Husband video, Meghan Trainor is most definitely not all about that bass. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

6. The entrepreneurial spirit in me absolute applaud the company that’s offering a gold-plating service to Apple Watch owners. For a relatively cheap sum of $400 on top of the price of the watch, customers can own a timepiece that resembles exactly the insanely expensive Apple Watch Edition model. I certainly can’t tell the difference between the factory gold and aftermarket gold plating.

Face it, only the richest of the rich can afford to blow upwards of 10 thousand dollars on a watch that is a guaranteed to be obsolete in a few year’s time. Now, thanks to a few enterprising folks, you too can wear a gold Apple Watch for only 10 percent of the price. Fake rich never looked so good.

7. First person to invent clear or invisible brake pad material - so you don’t get those visually horrendous brake-dusts on your fancy aluminum wheels - will make a princely sum indeed. Due to the drought, I haven’t been able to do a proper wash of the wheels on the STI, and the resulting mess is not pleasing at all. The wheels were silver in color, but now they are a brilliant shade of matte brown. It’s okay, because like a well-worn pair of Chucks, Subaru cars look good dirty. At least that’s what I tell myself anyways.

It’ll be a splendid day when the Californian drought is over, though I’m not holding my breath.

8. Good to see the San Francisco Giants make it back to .500, not that I’ve got any expectations for this season or anything. It was a historically dreadful month of April for them, so perhaps the team is merely deviating back to the mean. Nevertheless, I simply want them to be somewhat competitive, so that when I attend games in the flesh, the product on the field is entertaining and worth my hard-earned (ha!) money.

9. I recently for the first time encountered a person with one of those brand new Macbooks. In the flesh the laptop looks impossible skinny, easily mistakable for an iPad plugged in to a keyboard dock. Unfortunately the guy who owns it chose to purchase the gold version, which I have to say, made him look incredibly douche. A golden laptop just looks altogether awkward and unnatural. Unless you’re a Prince from the Middle East, it would be wise to tick the box for either the silver or space gray option.

10. It’s inconceivable that in 2015, the LPGA tour can name a tournament the “Swinging Skirts LPGA Classic” and everybody is fine with it. You don’t see the PGA tour name an equivalent tournament the “Swinging Pants Classic”, do you? The fact the tournament was held here in San Francisco’s Harding Park is especially shameful. 

Not spring, love, or cherry blossom - 10 things I think

10 THINGS I THINK

1. It’s always a fantastic time when the San Francisco Giants goes head-to-head against our bitter rivals the Los Angeles Dodgers, especially so when I get the chance to listen to the Dodgers’ broadcast legend Vin Scully calling the games. Don’t get me wrong, I’m massively fond of our very own Giants broadcasters, but as baseball fans all recognize, Vin Scully is simply on another stratosphere.

Every new season could be Scully’s last, so every opportunity to listen must be taken advantaged of. It’ll be a bittersweet day indeed when the great man hangs up the microphone.  

2. I love it when people call out Millennials on their frequent entitlement tendencies. As someone that works at a university campus, I witness first hand the disease everyday. Not exactly sure how the latest crop of college students were raised, but never before have I encountered a group of people so expectative of having everything handed to them or go alongside their wishes. Worse, college Millennials don’t seem to handle failure well, if at all.

I’d be a insanely rich person indeed if I received a dollar every time a student came into my office, asking if they could borrow a charger for their laptop. Why do people not bring chargers along with their laptops? It’s common sense, isn’t it? Battery technology hasn’t advanced to a state where you can risk not carrying a charger just yet.

And the students had the gall to complain the university doesn’t provide services for them. Sorry, darling, you’re responsible for your failure to bring a charger with you, not me.

3. Sad news: Chipotle will be raising prices on its steak and barbacoa meat in the near future. Well, sad news for other people, because personally I always select chicken when I frequent Chipotle, because I am a cheapskate, and chicken is likely better for me anyways.

Let me know when they raise the price on chicken, because then I’ll be incredibly annoyed like the rest of you, and subsequently will still begrudgingly eat at Chipotle. Because it’s so damn awesome.  

4. The news of that Pulitzer-winning journalist in Los Angeles having to quit his newspaper job because he couldn’t afford the rent on his salary is extremely depressing. The future of the fourth estate is murky indeed if talents are quitting the industry due to finances. People should be alarmed because local news media is immensely more important than national news networks because the stories they cover/uncover directly affects the citizenry. The survival of those entities is absolutely crucial.

On a more selfish tangent, I’m glad I chose not to major in journalism for my college study, though the reason wasn’t because I knew the financial future for journalist is less than ideal. I simply hated grammar and editing; it’s the writing component that I really enjoy.

5. Allow me to fully admit that I am a bandwagon Warriors fan, and now that they are in the playoffs, I’ve now started actually watching the basketball games. Hopefully the Warriors run through the playoffs will last all the way until the end of June, because the Bay Area certainly needs a championship for their sport franchises, am I right?

Unlike most bandwagon fans, I refuse to refer to the Warriors with the pronouns we, us, or our. Doing so would be despicable.

6. The second Star Wars Episode 7 teaser trailer is short, but spectacular all the same. Of course, we still have zero inkling of how the plot will unfold, nor have we even seen all the major characters yet. The producers did throw Star Wars fans a bone by ending the trailer with Han Solo and Chewbacca, and I’ve got to say that brief little sequence was absolutely awesome. “Chewie, we’re home.” My god that was perfect.

It’s going to be a banner year indeed for cinema, what with Furious 7 already broken all sorts of box-office records, the second Avengers movie comes out in less than two weeks, the 23rd Bond film, and of course, Star Wars to bookend it all in December. My wallet is ready.

7. Today is Earth Day, the one singular day out of the year where people whom otherwise couldn’t care less, pretend they actually give a crap about environmental conservation. That is no shade, because society has made it such that the priorities just aren’t there. The poor haven’t got the money or time to worry about whether or not they are recycling properly, because they spend all their energy simply surviving another day. Rich people don’t feel the need to care for the Earth and limit their personal carbon footprint, because I must have five cars and a mansion to park them in, damn it.

As someone who lives on the lower fringes of what is considered middle-class, there’s not much I can personally do. I sort and recycle, try to use as few amounts of water as possible, and keep a careful eye on my monthly energy consumption. Beyond those strategies, I can only entrust on the powerful few to fight the bigger battle in preventing humans from destroying the planet.  

8. A few weeks ago (some date in the lunar calendar) were the time most Chinese families visit and pay respect to their respective dead. That means a pilgrimage to the cemetery. Unfortunately for me, the entirety of my deceased relatives are buried in China, therefore I was unable to fulfill the annual duty. It did however led me to a discussion with friends on why did our previous generation spend so much money simply to have a plot of land to be buried in.

My own maternal grandparents are each paying more than ten thousand dollars for their eventual resting place, which I must admit if a bit morbid of an act. For me, I just can’t fathom paying such sums for a thing I won’t even be alive for. I’d imagine my offspring would rather me bequeathing them the money instead. When I’m gone from this world, I shall give instructions to turn my remains to ash, and then ceremoniously scatter into the ocean; the ocean from whence all life originates from.

9. Jon Stewart has announced that August 6th will be his final appearance as host of The Daily Show. His farewell show will no doubt be one for the ages, more so than even Stephen Colbert’s epic final Report. I quite literally grew up watching The Daily Show, and the sixth day of August will one of great sadness and celebration all at once.

10.  I’ve been having tremendous amounts of ‘grass is greener’ syndrome with my car lately. Fairly sure I’m not sick of the STI, but more than ever I find myself looking at other cars to buy. It certainly doesn’t make financial sense to trade the car in having only owned it for a little over two years, because the not insignificant amount of taxes I paid in purchasing it will largely be forsaken (not to mentioned I’d have to pay taxes again on the new car.)

But life is about variety, isn’t it? There are times you’ve just got to go for it. There’s a stark difference between financial irresponsibility and financial incapability, and besides, the future isn’t guaranteed anyways. We shall see, but chances are good I might not be in the same car in a few months time.  

When you're in sublime - 10 things I think

10 THINGS I THINK

1. It’s going to take all my self-control powers (and there isn’t much to begin with) to not trade in the STI for the forthcoming Mazda MX-5 Miata Club. A lightweight roadster with just enough power (atmospheric, of course), mechanical limited-slip-differential, Brembo brakes, and forged BBS wheels: the recipe for pure driving fun. The amount of want for that car is immensely palpable. Someone please stop me from pouring all the positive equity in the STI down the drain.

2. I’m supremely happy that Duke men’s basketball has won the national championship. I know rooting for Duke is akin to rooting for the Yankees or the Dodgers, but they’ve been my favorite team ever since I started watching college basketball more than a decade ago. Every year I pick them to win the tournament in my brackets, even though I know the likelihood of that happening is next to zero. Duke does have a knack of winning it all once in every decade, so as a fan I can absolutely live with that. Granted, I sure hope this championship won’t be the last in the 2010s.

3. Baseball is back, and the Giants are already in trouble (haha!) Before the first pitch is even thrown the team lost two starters in the rotation, with no timetable for their return. Hunter Pence is still recovering from his spring training injury, so he’ll be watching from the dugout for the first few weeks. It’s going to be tough sledding for the team at the start of the season, with big question marks in the rotation for anybody not named Madison Bumgarner.

I couldn’t care less, really, whether or not the Giants are competitive this year. After winning three championships in the previous five years, I’m more than fulfilled and satisfied as a long-time fan of the team. This year I’m simply going to enjoy the baseball for what it is: a good time no matter what. I will draw zero negativity from the Giants, even if they lose every night in the most stupid of fashions.

4. The ending tribute to Paul Walker at the end of Furious 7 was so incredibly, brilliantly well done. If I were a person capable of crying in movies, I would have (lady sat next to me had full-on waterworks.) For sure that final sequence will be replayed on my computer many, many times once the film is out on home media.

RIP once again to Paul Walker. A good guy, a car guy; he was one of us, and gone far too soon.

5. Food product manufacturers: please stop trying to infuse Sriracha into every bloody piece of food you can find. If I wanted a Sriracha-flavored doughnut, I’d put actual Sriracha sauce on a doughnut (that actually sounds quite disgusting) Leave the flavor as what it originally is: hot sauce.  

6. The blatant murder of Walter Scott by a cop in South Carolina is absolutely sickening. Scott’s family and the American public cannot accept anything less than a first-degree murder conviction - it’d be an epic failure of justice otherwise.

It’s horrifying to think the aftermath of the shooting would’ve transpired completely differently (and the murdering cop likely off the hook) had someone not caught the heinous act on video.

7. You know that phenomenon where you think you don’t need something until you’ve got it, and that once you’ve got it, you don’t know how you ever did live without out it? Well, like a smartphone or Bluetooth in a car, my recently purchased Macbook Air has been a joy to use. Browsing the web while lounging on the couch is such an experience, especially for the massively lazy person like me. Needing a lightweight laptop when you’ve already got a desktop computer is for sure a first-world problem.

8. I’ve found a new favorite font! In place of the previous champion Helvetica, I’ve moved my typeface preference to Helvetica Neue Light (big difference, I know.) It’s the same gorgeous Helvetica, just much more minimalist and elegant.

In fact, this humble blog have just converted from vanilla Helvetica to the evolved version. Looks awesome, doesn’t it?

9. Apple finally rolled out the much-anticipated (by me) Photos app alongside the new Yosemite 10.10.3 update. Finally, I can save my entire photo collection permanently (hopefully, anyways) into the cloud. I’ve been meaning to collate and organize my photos for the longest time (compared to my immaculately maintained music collection, the state of disarray is downright tragic), and now with the transition to the Photos app in OS X, I finally got the impetus to do it. Best of all, I can access to all of it from anywhere on the planet right on my iPhone.

10. All the congratulations in the world to my good friend Charlene for passing her board exam, and is now a certified family nurse practitioner. All my friends are smarter/better than I am, and that’s absolutely awesome.