Blog

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

Utilitarian longevity

At work we deal with plenty of computers of varying vintage. A constant I’ve seen is just how robust Mac desktops can be. We’re still comfortably deploying machines dating as fast back as 2015! Can’t say the same about Mac laptops, however: those tend to get absolutely abused. Any MacBook Air/Pro with the dreaded butterfly keyboard returns to us fairly useless. iMacs on the hand, because of their unmoving nature, will simply solider on until Apple ceases support in the latest macOS update.

These days I’m all about functional things lasting a long time. Which is to say I’m trying to be the type of person who keeps stuff for an extended period, instead of replacing them with the latest new shiny thing soon as it is available. Today is as good a day as any to start. I’m still going to trade in my iPhone for a new one every year, but at least the old phone goes back to Apple to live another day for a new master. Last week I returned a pair of AirPods Max headphones, instead choosing to keep using a pair of Bose QC35 headphones that’s been with me since the mid 2010s.

There will be no computer upgrade for me this year as well. I’ve trade in for a new MacBook Pro for the past three years, and the trend stops now. I don’t care how awesome the M2-powered MacBook Pros will be this year - I’m not switching! This M1 Max 16-inch MacBook Pro costs a whole lot of money, and it is still plenty fast for my purposes. I’m looking to get at least five years out of this one. Besides, my general workflow these days involves nothing heavy: a browser to access the Internet is all I need, really. I’m typing this right onto Squarespace’s CMS!

The reason we can still deploy 2015 iMacs into the field is precisely because the typical user only needs it to access the Internet. Add in Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat to the mix, and that’s pretty much all there is to it. I reckon those iMacs can be of service for at least three more years. A decade of use! Now that’s longevity.

Chinatown futures

This past weekend there was a car show in San Francisco’s chinatown. Organizers closed down Grant Avenue, from California all the way to Broadway. A reputed 100 cars of varying price and exoticism showed up for the event. It was a amazing to see. One, because you generally don’t expect to see a car show in Chinatown. Two, it’s great that people are holding events in Chinatown to stimulate the local economy. We absolutely cannot let this historic enclave die.

It’s tough, though. The pandemic have knocked more than a few places out of business. The remaining restaurants and shops are mostly run by people of my parents’ generation. You really don’t see my generation accepting the baton and continuing on the legacy (so to speak). And it makes sense: Asian parents toil endlessly to give their children a better life. They aspire for us to be people of power and influence in corporate America (plus the usual doctor and lawyer). Running a gift shop in Chinatown is most certainly not that.

I have a friend whose parents recently retired from operating a restaurant out in the east bay. My friend and his siblings have no desire to takeover the family business. Because they’ve all got better jobs and a far easier life than sweating in a kitchen six days a week. The family ended up selling the restaurant.

So there is a some latent concern about what Chinatown will look like in a few years’ time. Who will take up the mantel once the current owners and operators retire - if it won’t be their offsprings? I think it will have to be the same type of people who my friend’s parents sold their restaurant to. Working-class Chinese immigrants who’ve been in this country for a bit - so they have some saved capital - and are looking for the next step up in investment.

To the next twenty years

After well over two decades, it was time for a new mattress. I’ve had the same twin-sized mattress since I was in middle school. It was purchased at a Levitz store. Remember those? It and Sears was the place to go to for furniture, before IKEA took over the world. The sofa set at my parents’ house was also bought there. And it’s still going strong.

So was my old mattress. In all honesty there was nothing wrong with it. I was sleeping just fine, right up until the day I replaced it. The reason for replacement is one, it’s not exactly sanitary to keep a mattress for that long (it’s been through two moves as well), and two, mattress technology have surely improved over the decades. For someone who cares about sleep as much as I do, it was antithetical to still have such a old mattress. I need all the advantages I can get.

Online mattress-in-a-box is all the rage these days. I settled on the Helix brand. Partly due to the influence of the company sponsoring some of the Youtube channels I watch. Those kind of advertising is rather effective, isn’t it? (It’s the coupon code.) Helix also shows up frequently on the list of best mattresses that I’ve researched. What’s particularly intriguing is it has a sleep quiz for people to find out the most suitable model for how they sleep. The side sleeper me ended up with the Helix Midnight Luxe. Of course I paid extra for the Luxe version - this thing will be used for a third of my daily life for the foreseeable future.

By the way, educators get 15% off at Helix. That would be me!

Through the process I learned that California has a law that any place that sells mattresses - be in brick-and-mortar or online - has to pick up the old one for free. I was somewhat worried about what to do with the old one, but then Helix send me an email - after the Midnight Luxe shipped - that there’s a free pickup service. It’s farmed out to a third-party, of course. I’m just happy that’s not something I have to worry about anymore.

I’ve got 100 days to figure out of the Midnight Luxe is worth keeping. It’s still very early to tell. The first few nights my body rejected the new mattress as not belonging to me. As if I’ve traveled somewhere and I’m in a hotel. I kept waking up throughout the night. It has gotten better in subsequent nights, so let’s see how it goes. What I can say is the Helix is supremely comfortable. Memory foam is indeed a wonder material.

Grand opening, grand closing

And… I have to return the AirPods Max. The weight penalty of the aluminum and stainless steel construction is just too much, however nice the materials feel to the hand. Headphones should not be this heavy! After an hour of wear, I had pressure pain at the parts above my ears, and top of the head where the headband rested. The AirPods Max is useless to me if I cannot wear it for an extended period without discomfort. Granted, I have an idiosyncratically big head, so your mileage may indeed vary. I’m sure there’s plenty of happy AirPods Max customers out there, with regular sized noggins.

What I will not be returning however is the iPhone 14 Pro. Not that there is any danger of a new iPhone being such a disappointment that I would exchange it for an older unit. The new 2,000 nit peak brightness display is super handy: the full gamut of colors and detail remains highly visible even in direct sunlight. I appreciated this feature the first time I stepped outside with the new phone. No doubt it’s murderous on the battery to boost the screen to this brightness level, but it’s nice to have when you need it.

Also nice to have is the now always-on display. It’s a bit disconcerting at first, after nearly a decade of using iPhones without it. Unlike competing android phones, the iPhone 14 Pro’s entire display remains on. Brightness goes way down, obviously, but in certain situations it is still rather bright. I kept mistaking the always-on lock screen for someone calling me. Other times I would, out of habit, press the power button to turn off the display entirely. Because I thought the phone was still on.

The stars of the show of any “pro” iPhone is naturally the camera system. The camera bumps on the iPhone 14 Pro have once again increased in size. Necessitating yet another new case to go along with the new phone. (Otherwise, the iPhone 13 Pro case would have fit!) Rest in Peace forever to smartphones that sit completely level on a flat surface - once you’ve put a case on. I’ve not yet done enough shooting to really see and feel the latest improvements. The 13 Pro is already so damn good. But, the larger sensors in the 14 Pro can only be a good thing.

AirPods Max impressions

The first thing that comes to mind when picking up a pair of AirPods Max is: “My god this thing is heavy.” The aluminum and stainless steel construction feels absolutely premium to the hand, but the weight penalty is significant. My old pair of Bose QC35 - all plastic construction - feels downright feathery in comparison. I’ve got a fairly large head, so the increased heft shouldn’t be a problem. However, I can definitely feel the weight whenever I move. AirPods Max is best suited for stationary use.

Which is a shame because the noise-cancelling is fantastic. That is to be expected from a headphone with ear cups that completely surround the ear. Coupled with the magic voodoo that Apple does with nine microphones, the AirPods Max will easily quiet down your world. It just sucks that I’m very unlikely to take them on the road. Because of the aforementioned weight, and because the provided carrying case does not protect the entire headphone.

The QC35 will stay in the stable.

From a sound quality perspective, I would say the AirPods Max sounds marginally better than the already fantastic AirPods Pro. Admittedly, I am very much not an audiophile. The files I’m playing are at best 320kbps MP3 files, streamed over a bluetooth connection. The fact that I can scarcely tell the difference between a $550 pair of headphone and a $250 pair of earbuds is probably down to the quality - or the relative lack thereof - of the music files.

And you definitely should not spend $550 on the AirPods Max if all you’re listening to are MP3 files. This headphone is a luxury item to the extreme. The reason I bought a pair was because Woot.com is selling officially Apple refurbished units for $369 (nice). That brings it in line with the other premium headphones on the market.

I was wrong

I have in my hands the brand-new iPhone 14 Pro. Getting my annual iPhone upgrade could not have been easier, if you discount the fact I had to wake up at 5:00 AM two Fridays ago to preorder. I am lucky to live only a few blocks away from an Apple Store. That is precisely where I chose to pickup the new phone last Friday. No need to play the UPS waiting game for shipping.

I chose a 5:15 PM pickup time so that I can go after work. I am not too rabid a fan that I cannot wait a few more hours to get the new product. In fact, I didn’t even activate the iPhone 14 Pro until the next day. As expected, there was a significant queue outside the Apple Store. I however had an advantage: my appointment was purely picking up. I’m not trading in a device (at that time, anyways), nor am I setting up the new iPhone at the store. Just hand me the device and I can get out of there.

So I bypassed a bunch of people in line with more complicated transactions. Perfect.

Not sure why people want to trade-in a device at the store without first transferring data to the new phone. Apple makes it absolutely easy with “Quick Start”: put the old iPhone next to the new one, follow the prompts, and about an hour or so (depend on how much stuff you have), I was done. In Apple parlance, it is indeed magic how effortless this data transfer method is. No more restore from iCloud backups for me, henceforth.

Also surprisingly easy was the transition from physical SIM card to eSIM. I had reservations when I found out the entire iPhone 14 lineup in the United States will feature eSIM only. I feared that the new activation procedure won’t be as simple as taking the SIM card out of the old iPhone and put into the new. Worse, it read like a perfect opportunity for Verizon to play games and force customers to pay the extortionate $30 upgrade fee. Want to transition to eSIM? Pay up, sucker!

I was wrong! Switching to eSIM is super easy. The Quick Start process transferred the data from the physical SIM inside my iPhone 13 Pro right onto the new iPhone 14 Pro. It was done in matter of minutes. No need to call Verizon or go to the Verizon website. Apple have really thought this process through to make it as seamless as possible for the customer. Bravo.

Criminal elements

My mom informed me there was a police raid recently in their townhome building. Thankfully this time it was not for my felonious brother (no joke). Rather, it was for the son of our downstairs neighbor, who is about my age. Apparently (and allegedly) he was a major fentanyl dealer. The feds came bright and early to smash in and arrest him. San Francisco’s new district attorney - Brooke Jenkins - is not messing around!

It was kind of a surprise to hear about this because I’d always thought the son was a stand-up guy. A regular dude with a job, a wife, and a baby daughter. Growing up in Visitation valley’s public housing, I expect to be amongst some criminal elements. For over twenty years there wasn’t a peep of bad news from our direct neighbors. If anything, it was my own brother who’s had trouble with the law. It’s sad to see.

At least it wasn’t strong-arm robbery or killing a guy. Just distributing some illicit substances to willing customers (again, allegedly). Victimless crime? These are consenting adults making transactions with one another, after all. Sure, I live in a neighbor now where I don’t see any drug users on the streets. People who live in the Tenderloin would say there’s definitely victims to this whole drug thing. The blocked sidewalks, the human excrement, and the street harassment.

These quality of life stuff is hugely important. Residents ought to feel safe and protected in their own neighborhoods. The reason we recalled the previous district attorney is because we largely did not feel safe. It doesn’t matter of crime statistics show otherwise. Often times, feelings don’t care about your facts, and not the other way around. Good to hear that DA Jenkins is on it.