Blog

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

Le Mans 2023 or bust

The annual 24 hours of Le Mans endurance race is this weekend. I wish I was in France right now to attend in person. Barring anything too dramatic, the winner of the race will likely be a Toyota. The top P1 class just isn't that competitive. Next year, entry from Peugeot, Ferrari, and Porsche will flip the excitement level to the other end of the spectrum. That’s the one to look forward to.

So let me put in on paper now: I aim to attend the 2023 running of Le Mans. Getting time off from work shouldn't be a problem, since the summer months are significantly less busy on a university campus. The main barrier will likely be cost. Travel cost right now is insanely high, and if the trend doesn't come back down. an international trip to France might be prohibitively expensive.

For shits and giggles, I looked at flights to Seoul, South Korea for early August (this year). Prices are at least twice as much compared to the last time I flew there back in 2017. Two thousand dollars for an economy roundtrip is rather high. Even flying on off-peak days won't really save significantly over the weekend days. Probably a confluence of high demand, high fuel cost, and overall inflation.

I am definitely not going to fly anywhere this summer, and likely the rest of 2022. I have to hope that things will return to a true normal next year. In the meantime, there's much saving to do in preparation.

Inflation is too damn high!

The struggle is real. Just today I bought an order of popcorn chicken at a Quickly, and it was nearly eight dollars after taxes. Not that many years ago, that same bag of chicken would have been under five dollars. That much money for not really amounting to a full meal is kind of shocking. I should have known, after paying nearly seven dollars for a gallon of gas last week, that such inflation was to be expected every where. But damn if it isn’t still surprising every time.

Good thing I seldom eat out. If I did so regularly, I probably would have to cut back by now. Honestly, inflation hasn’t affected me that severely. I am lucky to say there’s enough room in the budget for these increases. An extra few dollars here and there for a quart of milk or a dozen eggs isn’t going to upend my lifestyle. If it did, I’ve got bigger things to worry about than inflation.

It’s good to see the Fed doing something to tackle the problem - by raising rates. Interest on my savings account with Ally have crept back up to 0.75%, after being stuck at 0.50% since the end of 2020. I guess I can count that as a sort of stimulus. I mean, the IRS is certainly going to tax that as income! All things being equal, I think the Fed should further tighten fiscal policy and raise the rates some more. I’m paying nearly eight dollars for popcorn chicken!

And it’s not like my income is going up commensurately. Fingers crossed the union can get some inflation-adjusted increases on the next contract.

Just fix the podcast app

For all the new features coming to each iteration of iOS for the iPhone, you know what I wish Apple would fix? The god damn podcast app. Podcasts are as popular as ever, so it’s difficult to understand why the Apple podcast app continues to suck so much. I don’t care what amazing thing Apple shows every WWDC; please simply fix the stuff that are still broken to this day.

I am sick and tired of the podcast app not remembering my playlist. It seems that adding more than 10 shows to the upcoming list is enough to flummoxed it. The app remembers for a time, until one day you go to listen to a show and everything is lost. It would usually queue up a podcast I’ve already listen to, with nothing to follow. I would begrudgingly build out the playlist again, awaiting the next rug pull.

What I hate even more is when the podcast app lose my place on a particular show completely. How the heck is this acceptable? Is system memory so precious that the OS can’t spare a few bytes to keep the place on a podcast? It doesn’t seem to have any problem leaving songs where I left off in the music app! I am this close to switching to a third-party podcast app, if I weren’t so lazy.

So keep your customizable home screens and shared iCloud photo libraries. When is the podcast app getting revised? It’s been broken as I’ve described above for years now!

Free car wash!

The trick to getting your car washed for free: loan it out to other people!

These days I'm not as consistent in washing my car as I would like. 10 years ago I would religiously take out the bucket and soap once every two weeks. Nowadays I thank the weather gods when it rains because that's a free car wash that I don't have to do. The key is to use wax when I do wash my BMW M2. The waxed surface repels dust and foreign debris quite readily, allowing the rain drops to do most of the work.

This is what happens when you get old, kids: you start caring less and less about keeping things in pristine condition. Not to say you should go the other end of the spectrum and actively neglect on maintenance. The goal is to maximize the utility for as long as possible. I certainly don't make the sort of money to be disposable with the expensive things I buy.

So that means I would have to wash the car every once in a while. There's only so much rain water can do, especially when California has been in drought conditions for the longest time. But recently I've noticed something: the last two times I let a fellow car enthusiast borrow the M2, it has returned to me freshly washed and fueled. That's the code: a gentlemen always return a borrowed car (or anything, really) in cleaner condition and a fully filled tank.

Obviously I try to also loan my car out in somewhat clean condition, and fill up on gas before handing the keys over. Courtesy begets courtesy. A free car wash, however, is something I can happily live with in this quid pro quo situation.

The Giant Race

With the pandemic practically over, it’s time to get back to doing things we did before the whole fiasco. One of those things for me is running. Building up cardio is an important part of an exercise regiment. I just happen to find running the easiest and cheapest - not because I particularly enjoy doing it. Swimming is better for my joints for sure, but there’s the cost of entrance, and having to do laundry immediately afterwards each and every time.

Back in 2014 and 2016 I participated in The Giant Race. It's an annual run event put together by the San Francisco Giants organization. Runners start and end at iconic Oracle Park stadium on a summer Saturday morning (enough alliterating for you?) Traditionally there’s race distances of 5K, 10K, and a half marathon. Having done the 10K twice previously, I was kind of psyched to attempt the half marathon this year.

Sadly that will have to wait because the half marathon is not an option for 2022. The longest distance on offer is the 10K. That’s a distance I can do tomorrow with zero training (not so humble brag). It would be nice to be able to challenge myself; surely the half will return in future years. If I have to guess, cost is the reason the organizer have pruned the half marathon: shutting down the Embarcadero along the pier all the way to Pier 39 can’t be cheap!

Even though I can do a 10K tomorrow straight out of bed, ideally I still should start back up running in preparation. Good thing I live much closer to Lake Merced - my running arena of choice - than I did pre-pandemic. Far easier to get up on a Saturday morning to do the 4.5 miles round the lake. It’s only been two weeks thus far, and the key for me is not so much the distance, but the pace. I am quite far away from the 8 minute 30 seconds per mile the last time I did The Giant Race.

There’s work to do!

Everyday I ruck

These days I’ve been carrying a 30-pound weight in my backpack on my walks to and from work. It serves to add a bit of exercise to my otherwise normal routine. To get a modicum of strength and cardio training during those 20 minutes of walking. And all it takes really is a few taped up bricks. I of course did not go the cheap route. I instead spent nearly $300 on a new backpack and a weight that fits in it perfectly.

I don’t do things half-arsed.

Rucking the 30-pound weight made me realize one thing: people of a larger size (read: fat) essentially carry around this weight all the time. They don’t get to take the weight off once they arrive at work like I do. The increased pressure on the joints and the back is significant. I certainly feel it in my knees and shoulder area. This is what it would be like if I were 30 pounds heavier. Which I was, way back in my college days. The freshman 15 gets to us all.

And I’ve been determined since then to live a lean and healthy life. Sort of ironic that in finding a new way to exercise, it has also reminded me of how I used to be. That is some built-in motivation! What I am looking forward to is taking the 30-pound weight on long hikes. It’s a great and easy way to add some difficulty to some of these hiking trails that lack heavy elevation.

Might not make it

Last week, a good friend of mine had a running high fever along with stomach pains. It necessitated a trip to the ER. she ended up staying at the hospital for about two days. Her entire reproductive system was inflamed to the point of a needing a full round of antibiotics. More bad news: the doctor looked at her blood results and said quite pointedly that if my friend doesn’t change her lifestyle, she won’t make it pass age 40.

You know how for the longest time we looked at age 40 as some life event that’s far out into the distant future? Well that’s no longer the case for me and my group of friends! When I heard the doctor’s grim warning for my friend, I internally calculated, “Wait a minute, 40 is only six years away!” It goes to show just how drastic of a condition my friend is in. The situation is dire.

The solution is simple - on paper. For a healthy lifestyle, all you need is a combination of good diet, exercise, and proper amounts of sleep. Everybody knows this. But much like the smoker who understands he merely has to stop smoking, the execution is exponentially more difficult that the prescription. I mean, if it were so easy, we would all be fit and healthy.

I sincerely hope this health scare is the appropriate wake up call for my friend. From talking with her, she seems to understand the precariousness. She knows what she must do, so fingers crossed the process gets followed through. Slowly!