Upon receiving the weekly food delivery I found out a bag of farro has been split open spilling the grains all over the box.
Usually such incidents will trigger a short bout of anger release (e.g., cursing), but (to my surprise, probably due waking up from a better-than-average sleep) I just gathered the grains via a sequence of containers of decreasing sizes and found the whole process very soothing.
2021-07-08
A soothing process
Home demolition
Astonishing photos from AP of Israel leveling family home of an alleged Palestinian attacker.
Justice and human-rights issues aside, wouldn’t it be more economical to repossess the home and such?
2021-07-07
Cannot afford to help 扶不起的阿斗
A corrupt, incompetent national government lost to a popular local militia as the foreign supporter leaves; Afghanistan in 2021, China in 1949, etc.
2021-07-06
Don’t respond to bots
I usually ignore inquiries (such as students seeking internships or recruiters on LinkedIn) that are obviously auto-generated with spammy, generic, robotic descriptions. If you want me to reply you in person, ask me in kind.
2021-07-05
Persistent nudge
When I was a kid my parents were very persistent in nudging me towards the desired behaviors.
Recently I have applied the same persistence in nudging them for taking covid vaccines.
🙂
2021-07-04
Where did you come from?
Since my arrival at the US in 1996 I have been asked the same question many times: where did you come from?
Most of the inquirers were benign, especially those also from other countries.
For probably once or twice that were otherwise, my response was simply asking the same question back: where (the f***, via facial expression) did you come from?
Except for native Americans, we were all coming from different places, just at different times.
2021-07-02
Likewise
This app recommends across a variety of mediums such movies, books, and podcasts.
I am not sure how good its algorithm is, but I do wonder how it competes with individual platforms such as Netflix, Amazon, and Apple/Android podcasts with both the content and the recommendation in place, which are much more convenient to provide preferences and reviews.
The notion recommendations from people you trust can also be achieved from existing social networks such as Facebook and Nextdoor.
2021-07-01
2021-06-29
The importance of money
During a dream earlier this morning I recalled an event that happened earlier in my life.
One day, during my college freshman year, I was waiting at a bus stop.
A woman approached me asking me to do a survey, selecting from a list of things most important to me in a prioritized order.
I put money as the third or fourth option, and she asked: is money really that important?
You wouldn’t even bring up something for discussion if you really don’t care about it, right?
In retrospect (also happened in my dream), I realized that what really happened is that the woman has been trying to convince herself that money is not important because she didn’t think she has enough of it.
(Lying to oneself is even worse than lying to other people.)
Like everything else, the importance of money is not binary; one cannot live without it, and yet one probably wouldn’t trade his/her life for it.