Blog

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

Right in the feels

Yesterday I was introduced to this interesting article about busyness, within which the following is quoted:

“This busyness serves as a kind of existential reassurance, a hedge against emptiness. Obviously your life cannot possibly be silly, or trivial, or meaningless if you are so busy, completely booked every hour of the day. All this noise, and rush, and stress seem contrived to cover up some fear at the center of our lives.”

This hit me right in the gut.

I’m not super obsessed with being busy, but I do try to keep productive whenever I can. Whenever I’m idle it feel as if I’m wasting this one life I’ve got, so I keep to a tight schedule and try to maximize the learning opportunities. Indeed I’m that asshole who can’t understand people’s infatuation with watching television; those mindless hours are better spent on more creative endeavors, or self improvement. On such occasions I grab a book instead, or edit photographs.

But it’s easy to get trapped into a productivity hamster wheel, where I’m singularly focused on finishing a task as quickly as possible, and moving on to the next. I don’t get satisfaction for the day until the list is finished, which on reflection is not the healthiest thing to do, because I’m completely negating the joy that comes from the process. If life becomes just a series of checkmarks, then you’re forever looking towards the next item to mark off. I keep busy because I’m afraid the music will stop.

Because when the music stops, I die.

My busyness is absolutely a sort of existential reassurance, not as a hedge against emptiness, but rather a hedge against my fear of mortality. Since my youth I’ve had difficulty accepting that all of this is finite, and someday I won’t be walking on this earth. Worse still is the feeling that I won’t know what happens afterwards, an eternal sleep from which there’s no awakening. That final threshold of human life have always had a scary hold onto my psyche, even to this day as a full-fledged adult. The continued practice of stoicism and the acceptance of death sometimes isn’t enough to hold back the demons.

Being busy, does; so I keep at it, but reading that passage above completely pierced through the facade. I’m afraid of death, yet I’m mindlessly barreling through it without stopping to feel alive in the present. That’s not okay. Instead of using busyness as a blanket to hide away the darkness, I need to steer into the slide and confront the pangs of fear whenever it materializes.

Not to say I shall become be slothful and lazy (my default mode, actually), but rather to slow down and really focus on what’s at hand, rather than what’s coming up next. Also, it’s perfectly okay to take a break, and have frivolous moments - especially if it’s spent with family or friends.

BTS on SNL!

I’ve been listening to Kpop for over a decade now, and have watched Saturday Night Live (SNL) continuously for equally as long. Never in all my imaginations would I think I’d ever see those two entities collide. A Kpop artist as a musical act on SNL? Unfathomable.

So it was somewhat surreal to see BTS perform on SNL this past Saturday. Hearing Korean language being sung on an American television program is something unthinkable only until recently, and I’m super prideful that BTS didn’t dilute their brand of music – namely attempt to do American pop – in their rise to worldwide fame.

Huge credit must go to PSY and ‘Gangnam Style’ for busting the door open.

I can’t help to think of the Kpop artists before BTS that have tried to enter the western markets and have largely failed. Artists who were mega popular in Asia, but died out to a whimper here in the States: Kwon Boa, Bi Rain, and Wonder Girls. Perhaps back then America wasn’t yet ready for an Asian act to enter their domain, and BTS is lucky to be birthed during a time when the smartphone and rampant Internet access have flattened and broaden our horizons.

10 years ago, access to Kpop in the States was decidedly underground, having to rely on the benefaction of kind Korean netizens uploading the MP3 files onto the Internet. Fast forward to today, new Kpop releases happen simultaneously on almost all the streaming platforms. It’s a massive change.

I think the failure of earlier Kpop artists was also in large part due to them Americanizing their sound – singing in English. In their attempt to pander to a different audience, they lost a core of their original fan-base who wished they’d kept doing Kpop, while simultaneously the unfamiliar American audience looked strangely at these singers from Asia is doing American pop. BTS achieve popularity in the West because they never strayed from Kpop and singing in Korean, and I think people are strongly drawn to that authenticity. Entering the American market was never a goal for those guys: it just sort of happened, very organically.

In truth I would say BTS isn’t even the most talented group currently in Kpop (I’d rank Block B above them; come at me), but to see a group of Asian males be so adored by an American demographic is something great to see from a representation standpoint. I have to get behind that, and also I do like BTS’ music.

Naturally then I tuned in live to SNL, and it was interesting to see on my twitter feed other people seeing BTS perform for the very first time. Some were amazed at their ability to coordinately dance and sing live at the same time, while others were (rightfully) confused about some of the English lyrics not making the best grammatical sense. Overall, people were impressed, and so was I. What a beautiful sight it was indeed.

Happy tax day

A very happy tax day to my fellow Americans. I hope you’ve either paid your taxes or have filed an extension.

If on the other hand you’re due to receive a hefty return, congratulations! You’ve just loan money to the federal government with zero interest for one whole year. With savings accounts (finally) paying in the two percent, it’s financially better to owe taxes at the end of the year than getting a sum back. I adjusted my W2 deduction accordingly so that I owe a small amount at tax time.

Obviously, what other people do with their money is none of my concern (as long as you don’t ask taxpayers to bail you out of anything), and I recognize that for some, having a sizeable tax return is a good mechanism to enforce a savings habit they wouldn’t otherwise have the discipline to implement. But that only works if those same people don’t then go spend their tax return completely, rather than storing it in a bank account. I’m afraid not that many actually do that.

2018 is the first year of the Trump tax cuts, and from that perspective I have to say it’s been awesome to keep more of my earned money. We’ve all been getting slightly more in take-home over the entire year, so my actual burden come tax day is more or less the same as before. That is, if I hadn’t bought the GT3.

In order to pay for the 911, I had to sell a large portion of my investment account holdings. Thanks to the bull market that’s going on its second decade (one wonders how long that will last), the returns were quite good, which meant one thing: capital gains tax. I won’t go on a diatribe about the unfairness of taxing capital gains, but let’s just say I think it’s wrong to tax money that has already been taxed upon.

Anyways, having to pay capital gains meant my tax bill was considerably more than usual, so naturally I waited until the last possible minute to file. My parents also had to pay taxes, so yesterday I filed both of them in one go. Say what you want about TurboTax lobbying congress to keep their pseudo monopoly on tax filing services, but at least their software is super intuitive and easy to use. Additionally, it was absolutely free for my parents to file both Federal and Stat, so honestly I can’t ask for more.

I’ll see everybody again next year; same time, same place.

I get to gripe about gas prices again

Gasoline prices have uniformly shot back up above the $4 dollar threshold here in San Francisco, and it feels weird for me to once again be able to grumble about high petrol costs. After nine months of not owning a car, I’ve now got a vehicle to feed, and a super thirsty one at that. The 15 miles-per-gallon average I’m getting with the GT3 almost makes me miss having my previous MX-5 Miata, a car that in its worst day still averaged 27 miles to the gallon.

The GT3 is loads more fun, though. Obviously.

Nevertheless, feeding a 15mpg habit gets expensive really quickly, especially so because the GT3 has a 23-gallon fuel tank. With the latest uptick in prices, a typical fill-up is well into the $80 dollars territory; now I know exactly the pain drivers of heavy SUVs feel every time they’re at the pump.

It’s well known California has the dubious honor of the highest gas prices in the nation, but the real indignation is for that privilege we don’t even get the best possible grade of gas. While rest of the States get to enjoy the sweet nectar of 93 octane, California is saddled with lowly 91 at the maximum. Worse, highly strung sports car engines absolutely demands as much octane you can give it: the GT3’s flat-six is tuned for 93, so being restricted to 91 is not an unsubstantial compromise.

There are gas stations in the area that sells 100 octane petrol, but we’re talking about nearly $10 dollars a gallon. No thanks.

I wouldn’t mind paying the most for gas if we were able to get the highest grade of octane. Since that’s not the case, I’m going to protest along with the rest of the drivers whenever prices shoot up, as it has done this past week. Indeed, even though I commute using public transportation, on the weekends I put quite a bit of miles on the GT3, so I’m not all that different from the person who commutes via car.

Granted, no one ever said the car hobby was inexpensive.

I so wish I can get this California legacy plate and not the sort of ugly black and yellow one.

SFO vs. LAX

I am in the midst of planning for my usual summer holiday, and this year the destination is the isle of Japan. My friends and I are targeting the third week of July for this trip, and the obvious first order of business is to secure our flights. So on to Google Flights I went and executed a search for nonstop flights from San Francisco to Tokyo.

Sadly, the results were shockingly expensive.

For sure it was never going to be cheap flying to the other side of the planet, but nearly $1,800 for a roundtrip fare in economy is incredibly high – I can fly to Singapore for not much more. That fare is simply too rich for our group, especially considering Tokyo’s cost of living is world-famous for not being cheap in the slightest. We can’t blow a massive part of our budget on airfare alone.

An alternative plan, then: we dared to look at one-stop flights. As a general rule I’m wholly against routes with layovers, principally because it’s an enormous waste of time to be hanging out for hours at a transfer airport waiting for the connecting flight. Vacation time from work is already precious as is (thanks, America), so if I can pay a bit more to save time, I almost always do.

Unless of course the nonstop flight is untenably expensive. For the trip to Japan we found a one-stop flight for significantly less at $1,200 that involved a layover in Incheon, which honestly for me isn’t the worst thing in the world. I still hold fond memories the South Korea trip two years ago, so the opportunity to spend a bit time in that country again draws no protest from me.

My friends and I were all set on that itinerary, except I remembered that we are heading for Los Angeles only two days before the departure date, so what if we flew out of LAX instead? Once again to Google Flights I went, and to my utter surprise and indignity (at SFO), a direct flight from Los Angeles to Tokyo is even cheaper than our one-stop flight out of San Francisco.

What the heck!?

I understand there’s a larger Japanese population down south, but Japan is a popular travel destination for persons of all ethnic backgrounds, so I’m really quite miffed at why a direct flight out of San Francisco is some $600 dearer. In a childish protest sort of way, that’s not fair!

It’s an easy choice then for us to fly out of LAX. We’re still very ahead of the SFO-HND route in cost after accounting for the additional rental car down to Los Angeles and the flight back to San Francisco on the return. More importantly, we get a nonstop route over the Pacific, which is just the ultimate.

I can and will go back to South Korea at another date.

Fast mountain driving is an exercise

Can spirited driving be considered as exercise?

After what transpired this past Saturday, I certainly think so.

It was a glorious post-rain afternoon basking in sunshine, on a long stretch of winding tarmac where nary a car could be found (we were out in the middle of nowhere); I had the first opportunity to really explore the lofty limits of the 911 GT3 since I bought it back in January. For a word to sum up the experience, it would be ‘sweaty’.

Perhaps an empty parking lot might have been the more ideal proving ground to start off with, because for the first quarter stretch of the road I was super hesitant with my inputs, not daring to upset the car. Admittedly I had yet to break the GT3’s backend loose even once, so I had zero idea what its dynamics were like. All I knew at the time was the Porsche has tremendous power and grip, and it’s up to me to find the edge where either of those begin to falter.

That is, if my body is up to the task.

For the first proper go on a twisty mountain road in anger, I can say I handled myself fairly well: my friend who was following behind told me afterwards that I got noticeably quicker the deeper we got into the route. That said I simply could not keep up with the driver in front of me in a Chevrolet SS; he’s had 60,000 miles of familiarity with that car, and in his capable hands the SS disappeared from my windshield in short order. No doubt the GT3 is capable of going much faster - a 475 horsepower sports car ought to be quicker than a 4,000lb sports sedan; the problem is obviously not the car, but rather me.

Nevertheless, I was absolutely hustling the car to my (not so great) abilities, and it was indeed quite the workout. Even with the automatic climate control set at the standard 72 degrees, my back was perspiring heavily, and my palms needed periodic wipes on my shirt. I had to take off my hat because sweat was forming on my head as well. A leisure weekend drive it certainly was not.

And I felt the affects the following morning: I must have gripped the steering wheel too hard because my fingers were sore, and due to the countless shuffling of the right foot between braking and acceleration, the calve muscles were barking. I guess I never appreciated - until now - how much of an athlete a racing driver has to be, and how sorely lacking my own conditioning is.

Looking forward to improving on both fronts: mastering the GT3, and making sure my body is up to the task of doing it.

Kofi did it.

I don’t usually cry when I watch professional wrestling: it’s the not the sort of entertainment that would elicit tears. But last night’s Wrestlemania 35 was quite different.

When Kofi Kingston pinned Daniel Bryan 1-2-3 for the WWE Championship, I was in tears for a solid 10 minutes, and still getting choked-up thinking about it now.

Pro-wrestling may be “fake” and “scripted”, but those emotions were as real as can be. Kofi’s climatic win was everything I love about wrestling: a dramatic underdog story of perseverance, mixed in with a solid dose of athleticism and high-flying acrobatics. It’s why I kept watching WWE since childhood and well into adulthood, even though I know results are predetermined; because who doesn’t get moved by a good underdog story?

And the Kofi storyline was fabulously executed: from the chance opportunity in replacing Mustafa Ali at a match nearly two months ago, to building up the ultimate underdog tale of the corporate deck stacked against him for 11 years, and then finally winning the gold at Wrestlemania. Us fans were rabidly behind Kofi since the match as Ali’s substitute, and credit to the WWE creative team for latching onto the momentum and giving us the catharsis.

The match itself was really well done, too. There was weight and consequence to every move, and the finish cannot be more perfect. We were at the edge of our seats the entire time, wondering if at any moment the dream can be snatched away from Kofi. It was beautiful.

It’s funny; I’ve had discussion with my friends over the years about how Kofi is just a world title win away from being a grand slam champion (having had held all the major belts in the WWE), but would the company ever give him such a push? For the past five years Kofi’s been flourishing as a member of the New Day stable, and it seemed inconceivable that he’d be singled out for a world title run (we’d always thought it’d be Big E who’d get the push when the time comes).

Which makes what happened last night so intensely more special for me. In a way I can’t believe it actually happened, and it could not have gone to a more deserving person. An indelible Wrestlemania moment for sure.