Temet Nosce. "You know what that means? It's Latin. Means 'Know thyself.'"

The most interesting thing to me about The Apprentice is how clueless everyone is. They don't have the slightest idea the kind of impression they make. Jessie was by far the worst negotiator on her team, but she thinks she did a good job. Tammy thinks she's pretty good, has no clue that every single thing she says is cringeworthy. Omarosa knows everyone hates her but thinks it's everyone else's problem, not herself. Just in general, people's impressions of themselves is wildly out of whack with how other people see them.

There's one inescapable conclusion, at least for me: *I'm* probably not aware of how other people see me either. If everyone's clueless, I don't think I'm the exception.

I dunno, I find self-awareness really interesting. I loved that idea in Matrix Rel/Rev. That knowing who you are is much more important than the "choices" you make. I dunno, I think sometimes I spend too much time worrying about what I'm going to do and not enough time figuring out who I am. But anyway.

So I drive a '91 Toyota Corolla. The important stuff, like the engine, is in great shape. The interior though is slowly falling apart. The knob to the driver side window (I don't have power windows) fell off a couple years ago. Random parts of the LED clock are always on, so it's hard to tell what time it is. Interior light, broken. 2 huge cracks in the windshield. The covering for the light on the back window fell off. You can't open the rear passenger side door from the outside. The exterior is also in bad shape. On the roof and trunk, a lot of both the paint and base are gone.

All these things are a little annoying but not a huge deal. I've had a bigger problem recently though - the headboard is falling down. You know, the inside roof is sagging. This has actually happened over more than a year. Bubbles started to appear, and then entire sections sagged down. This past week, the back part has reached a point where it's dangerous - it sags so low it blocks the entire rear glass.

I dunno, how do you fix something like this? I tried some 3M spray adhesive, but the foam inside keeps it from sticking. I currently have the back taped up with packing tape but that's not gonna last for a long time. Do I go to the dealer? Auto detailer? No clue.

You know, I suck. People are constantly trying to and actually doing things for me. If I don't realize that, I'm just a jerk. So, sorry to everyone out there. I dunno, I have issues.

I've never prayed to "Jesus" or the "Holy Spirit". It's always to God the Father. Possibly because I grew up in an authoritarian Korean church. But I don't even remember hearing anyone pray to Jesus until I reached college, mostly from the IV folks. Where do people pick that up? And why do they do it? Our pastors' take seems to be that it (praying to Jesus or Holy Spirit)'s theologically acceptable but not precise. I'm just curious why people do it, since I never have.

Boundaries.

I've been feeling tired lately. Not burnt out, but decidedly tired. I think what it is is, I feel like I've been pouring myself out on people, responsibilities, and other tasks, but no one cares about me. That last part isn't true. What it is is more is that my natural inclination is to not ask people for help or say what I want. So much so that there are situations when people ask what I want and I'm slightly startled. I don't even know the answer to the question. Given that, it's no wonder I don't get what I need.

At any rate, I dunno, it's just kind of a tiring and lonely feeling. Work's eased up a bit and I've had a little more time to think so maybe that's why it's coming to a head? Or stuff that's happened? Should I tell this example? No one in my family got me anything for my birthday because they have no idea what to get me. Any time they ask what I want, I say nothing. So my mom got stuff for Jieun instead. I dunno, it's my fault and it's Biblically correct, but for some reason it made me feel tired.

At any rate, I think there are times I overcommit. Jieun does also, maybe we feed off of each other, I dunno. I've found this to be true at work and outside of it. The problem is my mindset, which is, don't complain (which wastes time) just do the work. So no one knows how overcommitted I am until it reaches a critical point. Not a good model.

Jieun's been watching America's Next Top Model and I caught parts of 3 episodes and it's surprisingly entertaining. Subcultures are just interesting to me because they all have their own rules and values and whatever. I spend a lot of time in the Asian-American Christian subculture and I'm sure tons of people find that bizarro. I find the high fashion subculture odd.

The show's all about high fashion, not commercial fashion. That's one thing that killed me, the disdain with which they treated commercial fashion. Like, the ultimate insult (maybe I'm wrong, I just saw little snippets of the show) is saying that someone or something fits with commercial fashion. Ouch. Cuckoo.

One difference between commercial and high fashion is apparently in high fashion they don't value beauty. They value a look. I dunno, I walked in once while Jieun was watching and saw all the girls and was like, none of them are beautiful, only a handful even attractive. I dunno, I just don't get high fashion at all.

I loved a comment someone made at the end about winner. "Her whole life is fashion." They meant that as a compliment. Where I come from, that's an insult. I dunno, interesting subculture.

Is it possible to really understand someone who doesn't really understand themself? Or is self-understanding a prerequisite for other people being able to understand them?

I'm just getting over Stanford's loss. I was pissed for a good day, and I'm still sad. Anyway, I honestly think we just weren't a good team. I hate to say that, but we have to face facts. It's clear the Pac-10 just utterly sucked this year. We beat Gonzaga, but they were overrated. The only good team we played all year was Kansas. We started the season ranked in the low teens, and that's I think about where we belonged. Our gaudy record against terrible opponents just masked that.

We were still a better team than Alabama, though. We gave that game away. That's gonna take a while to get over. I'm against Scott, I don't think the problem is that we're not physical enough. At least, that definitely wasn't the problem with the 'Bama game, if you watched it. The refs (not the head ref, the backup ref, according to the radio broadcast) simply would not let Stanford play physical. Tons of ticky-tack fouls. It was ridiculous. Don't even get me started on the last two "fouls" called on Childress. But still, we didn't make our shots, so we deserved to lose.

The problem in the past hasn't been that we're not tall and physical enough, it's that we couldn't keep up with quick athletic guards. Except last year when Okafor schooled us. But this year, the main probelm was that we're just a good not great team, masked by a gaudy record against bad opponents.

The other thing is, I love Montgomery, but he's a bit stubborn. He still runs the same offense he ran at Montana. Which is fine. But like, up to a few years ago, dunno if you remember this, but he was super stubborn against ever running a zone. So we would regularly get schooled by quick athletic schools like UCLA, where our guards couldn't keep up with their man. Still, for the longest time, he refused to run a zone. It's only in recent years he's added zones to the mix.

The other thing he was stubborn about was not calling a momentum breaking time out. Most coaches, when the other team starts getting on a run, the coach calls a time out, try to break the momentum, settle the players, get a good play going. Montgomery was against that, he'd never call the time out, just wait for the TV time out or whatever. I couldn't tell if he was doing that the 'Bama game. But I dunno, there are times our players could have used a little settling down. It was ugly out there.

We were overrated this year. It hurts to say that, but it's true I think. And I think we'd do better without the added pressure of an artificially high ranking.

Someone, I won't name names, made the absurd claim that Texas style barbecue is better in Chicago than in Texas. Absurd.

I'm going to make a similarly bold claim though, but this one is grounded in reality: Chicago-style pizza in the Bay Area is better than Chicago-style pizza in Chicago. Bold? I dunno. I've said it before, I've been to Giordano's, which is supposedly among the best. Eh. We went to Pizza Chicago last night and Dave's with me - it's really good. Better than Giordano's. And I think Zachary's is (on good days) better than Pizza Chicago.

So that's my claim, it's better here. I'm willing to be wrong, just name specific places in Chicago that Dave or someone else can verify.

I was listening to a conversation the other day that kind of made me sad. This person was just saying how in her law school, there are bunch of people into public interest, and they make a lot of material sacrifices to pursue that. Then she goes to church and she sees a bunch of BMWs and Mercedes in the parking lot. And she feels like, where is the sacrificial concern for other people that she sees in her non Christian friends? Or if she invited those friends to church, how would they feel about it? When they look at the parking lot, where would they think the congregation's treasure is?

I dunno, that cut me to the quick. There are some like I think Tony Campolo who are totally bold about it and say flat out that for a Christian to own a BMW is sin. I wouldn't go that far, I dunno if there's anything inherently wrong with it. But I do worry about the impression it might make to the community we're trying to reach out to. Just, where is our treasure?

At Promise Keepers they were big on warning against loving money. Like, you cannot experience spiritual growth if you love money, something bold like that. I dunno, I think I agree. I don't think it's possible for a group to grow if it's too comfortable in material things. It's not a matter of having things. It's a matter of being too comfortable in them. And it's something I worry about in myself.

Anyway, it's just an offhand comment she made but I've been chewing on it a lot. When the world sees me, where do they see me finding my treasure? I really don't know the answer, and that's sad.

So the teachers were talking about pushy parents last night. Enlightening conversation. It's no surprise, but aggressive parents definitely don't make teachers like their kids more. Anyway, there's this one kid, the dad's trying to get something and the teacher is saying how she is always available for the kid if the kid wants and the dad was trying to explain that the kid is kind of passive and the teacher's take is that maybe this is a good opportunity for the kid to learn to be more assertive.

I dunno, that made me think a bit. My mom was an aggressive parent. And I kind of think that handicapped me somewhat. Just, I got into a pattern where even if I didn't do something, things got done, if that makes any sense. Which trained me to expect things to just happen to me, instead of making it happen for myself. And that's something I'm trying to untrain now, and it's hard. It would have been way easier for me to live with the consequences of passivity and deal with it at an early age than try to undo a lifetime of learned behavior now. But being assertive about things I need/want does not come natural to me at all.

Here's another thing, I dunno how related it is. But Jieun likes being super involved. She on various committees at work, is helping choreograph the 8th grade play, she just helped judge a local Asian American Essay contest, stuff like that. Me, I don't get involved. And I was thinking about why. Part of it is, growing up, I assumed Asians couldn't get involved. White people got involved. Asians studied.

I dunno how I got involved with the jazz band thing, that was a fluke. But especially in high school, being a part of the B society was something for white folks is how I felt. And that kind of lingers with me. Whereas at Whitney everyone was Asian so Asians could do anything. Maybe that's the difference? I dunno.

I read a really disturbing stat the other day. It was either in Parade or the Merc. But it's estimated that 10% of all children fathers think are their own were actually fathered by other men. Not just 10% of all children. 10% of all children fathers believe to be their own. And chances are, that number is on the low side. I dunno, that is deeply disturbing to me.

My last post makes me sound so arrogant it pisses myself off. I hate me.

People get down on Californians all the time about not knowing geography. But honestly, most people don't know the geographies of places not close to them. Like, if you've not spent time in Texas, do you have any idea how truly huge the state is? How far Houston is from Dallas? How far El Paso is from everything? And tons of people I've met who've never been to California think San Francisco is right next to Los Angeles.

Anyway, when you live in the middle of a big state it's easier to be state centric, I think. When we were young, my sister and I once went to Ohio to visit our uncle, and we ended up driving from Ohio to South Carolina for a family reunion. I remember being shocked at how quickly we could pass through an entire state. Up to that point, I had only driven to Oregon, and just getting one state over took forever.

Boring.

I've seen Ezekiel 4:9 bread at Trader's Joe's but never tried it. I just hope it's not Ezekiel 4:12 bread also. That verse: "Eat the food as you would a barley cake; bake it in the sight of the people, using human excrement for fuel." Ick.

So at Chipotle, which of the choices (burrito, bowl, soft/hard tacos) gives the maximum volume? They're all the same price, but they can't all be the same amount of food. I just haven't figured out which gives the most.

So I've kind of been going through some confidence issues lately. You know, a lot of people seem to think I'm smart. That makes me angry. Not at them, at me. I dunno, am I giving off some kind of air of superiority that would make people think that? Why on earth would people think I'm smart? I dunno, that's kind of sucky about me, I think. And I'm starting to think that impression is misguided.

I actually agree with Arnold on his gay marriage stance. His stance is roughly, CA municipalities can't go around recognizing gay marriage for the simple reason that it's against state law. In 2000, CA voters passed Proposition 22, which states that "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." If the people want to overturn that, change the law, Arnold's fine with it. But as long as it is the law, it needs to be upheld.

That makes sense to me. The proposition may or may not be stupid. But regardless of how you feel about it, it's the law, and if you want to challenge it, you need to do that through proper means. Go through the courts. Maybe practice personal civil disobedience. But municipalities themselves can't go around ignoring whatever state laws they feel like, not matter how unjust they think they are. That's just a recipe for chaos.

I came to feel this way partly because of an episode of The Practice years ago. Lara Flynn Boyle was prosecuting this guy who raped and killed a nun. The case against him is fairly clear. But in the course of the proceedings it's revealed that the key evidence used was obtained by slightly improper means, which means it can't be used in trial and the case would have to be thrown out. Boyle makes an argument before the judge, that she knows the law and she knows legal precedent, but you (the judge) know what's right, this man clearly did this and it's utterly wrong that he should be set free on a technicality so she begs the judge to make a stand against this precedent, against the law, do what's right.

The judge deliberates for a really long time, but in the end she basically says that courts can't go around ignoring the law and legal precedent no matter how much they disagree. To do that would lead to legal anarchy. So no matter how strongly she feels about it, she has no choice but to throw out the case. Lara Flynn Boyle cries. And she's comforted by her roommate, who's also the murderer's defense attorney. That last part is ridiculous, but it really was a good episode.

Anyway, it made me think a lot and I 100% agree. The reason we need to follow law and legal precedent is because the alternative is anarchy. I dunno, I think that episode made me realize why the Constitution is held as the utmost standard. I used to think that people thought there was something inherently amazing about it. But it's not that at all. It's not a perfect document. That's why we have the whole amendment system. It's just, to have order in society, you need some sort of ultimate standard. If you let people do whatever they themselves think is right you'll just get chaos. You need that ultimate legal standard of the Constitution to have order in society.

I dunno, I think what's true legally is also true spiritually. Schaeffer talks about this a lot in The God Who Is There. But used to be a time, even if you didn't agree on what it was, there was a concept of an ultimate standard. Now there's not. And I think that's why there's so much spiritual, moral, even emotional anarchy nowadays. But I dunno.

Weather's been incredible lately. 80 balmy degrees. I love the Bay Area.

So I'm a wuss. We were hanging out in downtown Seattle on Friday night, and we come out of a Barnes and Noble when we see Justin Davis and Rob Little walking around with two random white girls. In town for the UW game I guess. I debate with myself whether I should go up to them and talk to them, maybe take a picture with them, I go back and forth while they're walking away. At one point I run after them but midway I wuss out and just turn around and walk back, saying nothing to them. A Cal grad friend makes up for my wussiness by yelling "Go Cardinal!" to which they turn and pump their fists.

I have no idea why I'm such a wuss. It's not even like they're famous. Why can't I just go up to them? I dunno, I'm just timid like that. It's embarrassing that a Cal (female) grad has more balls than me. I feel even worse because I'm pretty sure we lost the game because I didn't say anything to them that night. Stupid me.

I read an article in I think it was Foreign Affairs yesterday. Maybe Foreign Review? Foreign something or other. I never read highbrow magazines like this but the cover story was so incendiary and over the top I could not help myself. Basically it was saying that America is going to hell in a handbasket because of all the Spanish speaking immigrants.

I dunno, I can't remember reading such a bombastic no-holds barred article ever. It's central thesis is that America is great because it was started by Protestant English speakers. Totally bold. Probably racist. He had this line: "Would America be America if it were founded by Catholic French, Spanish, or Portuguese speakers? No. It would be Quebec, Mexico, or Brazil." Ouch.

I have no point, it was just a shocking article.

I was watching this Korean movie last night and I'm sorry, but I just don't get that weirdo kind of Korean singing. Dunno if you know what I'm talking about, it's like acapella with a drum and some person walking around and singing with a fan, but it sounds like a cow giving birth. Jieun says it's like a precursor to rap, but whatever, it's just painful to hear. There was this one Christmas service where this woman did a Christmas hymn in this style and I thought it was joke to start a skit and I laughed out loud. Whoops.

Anyway, you know the most disturbing part of the Passion movie to me. The trailers. I guess the theaters assumed that since it's a movie about Jesus it's a family film, so all the trailers were for kids movies, cartoons, Garfield the Movie, stuff like that. I was deeply disturbed. First of all, that they'd be so naive about what the movie is like. It's a highly violent R-rated movie. Ebert has argued it should be NC-17. At any rate, not a film for kids. Worst of all, I dunno, watching trailers like that doesn't exactly put you in the mood to meditate on Jesus' sacrifice. It really bothered me.

Interesting. I just voted for the first time with touch screens. I don't trust it at all. There's no paper record or anything. When you're done it just says "Vote Recorded". I dunno, just seems a little sketchy. I just hope to heck the machines aren't based on Windows. Sorry Simon.

Did I ever say I didn't like Don Moen? If I did I take it back - I love him. Besides that version of Shout To The Lord, one of the most passionless songs ever recorded. He was a huge influence on me growing up, and I can faithfully duplicate a lot of his playing. Especially the way he does I Want To Be Where You Are --> Here We Are (my favorite cheesy medley) and God Will Make A Way. I think Henry's mentioned the way I played the latter song, in particular a CMaj7/D chord on "He will make a *way* for me". But I can't take credit for that - I cribbed that from Don Moen.

He does something interesting on I Want To Be Where You Are also. There's a G2/B chord that comes after the first and third lines of the verses. It's the same progression. But after the first line, he plays it on the beat, whereas after the third, he comes in half a beat early. It's a subtle thing, but cool. I played it like that at Charles' wedding.

I've been seriously tempted to do an all cheese set sometime at church but I think our pastors would go into conniptions. They're not big fans of the cheese.

I don't think it's heretical to not love Passion. At all. I personally thought it was a good, but not great movie. I was deeply moved in parts, but it still wasn't fantastic, I thought. But good.

You know my favorite part of the movie. You'll think it's random. It's when he's interacting with (Virgin) Mary and he splashes water. I liked that. I dunno, most Jesus movies always make Jesus this super solemn guy all the time, but that can't be right. The scriptures say he was accused by some of being a glutton and a drunkard. Basically a party animal. So he must have been a fun guy. But you never see that side in Jesus movies. So I really liked that brief scene where it showed him being playful.

I have no idea how good an outreach movie it is. The whole time watching, I felt like a nonbeliever would just be totally lost. The power of the movie for me came from the context, and there wasn't much of that in the movie. And from what I've read, secular reviewers seem to feel that way. Confused, not moved.

re: the anti-Semitism thing, the worst thing we can do I think is get angry at Jews who object to the film. That's just perpetuating the anti-Semitic mindset they're angry about - *they* crucified Jesus, and now *they're* persecuting us. If we respond like that we give credence to their fears. I dunno, I just feel like we have to respond another way. Something more respectful, more loving.

I also don't think we can just brush aside their concerns either. I dunno. Anti-semitism is a real and unfortunate part of the Church's history, and it's naive I think to say it just came out of nowhere. Lots of famous people expressed anti-Semitic sentiments. Martin Luther is a big example. He clearly knew Scripture. It's not like he didn't know Jesus and most of his friends were Jews. But he still wrote what he wrote. I dunno, I just think it's better to say, yeah, there are things in Scripture that can and have been taken in history to support anti-Semitism but we recognize that to be wrong and repent of it. I dunno, my take.

Another brainteaser. Say you're playing a weirdo version of draw poker. First player chooses any five cards from the deck. Not at random, he can choose the exact cards he wants. They're displayed face up for the second player to see. The second player then chooses any five cards from the deck, again, the exact cards he wants, and displays them face up for the first player to see. The first player may then discard any of the cards he has, 0 to 5, and replace them with any cards he wants from the deck. Again, the exact cards he wants, and it's shown face up. The second player then does the same. Whoever has the better hand wins.

What's the ideal strategy for the first player?

I've said it before, I'll say it again: I suck at poker. There's just no other way to put it. Suck suck suck. Too bad it's so fun I can't stop playing.

I dunno. As you may or may not know, I'm on this don't quit something just because it's hard thing. But should I really be applying this principle to poker? I dunno.

re: the 4 blade razor, Schick Quattro, I guess you haven't seen the commercials. But they star Colby from Survivor: Australia and Survivor: All-Stars.

Question about queer eye for the straight guy. Are gays bothered that it's stereotypical? There's a camp out there that's against stereotypes period, even if they're positive ones, the idea being that all stereotypes pigeonhole people and are therefore wrong. So some people don't like Asians being called like a model minority or whatever, that they're industrious, etc. It's a positive thing to say, but still a pigeonholing stereotype, so they don't like it.

I think some people don't like Jackie Chan and Jet Li for similar reasons. Yeah, they're a positive Asian image, yeah, they're heroes, but they play into the Kung-Fu stereotype and some don't like that.

Does that apply to Queer Eye? The implicit assumption is that gay men are on the whole more fashionable and whatever than straight men. And that seems kinda stereotypical. There must be some gay slobs out there, right? Gays who are just clueless about fashion and culture. Doesn't the show just play into a stereotype? Does that bother anyone? Or are they all happy that it presents a positive image?

As for me, I dunno, don't be too mad or anything, but I'm not as bothered by stereotypes as other people. Asians are, in general, nerdy. Sorry. White men can't, in general, jump. And I dunno, all the gay men I know are in fact more fashionable than straight men.

Except for Gus. Random slam.

Interesting. I prefer ctrl-tab and ctrl-shift-tab to switch between tabs in Firefox because it resembles alt-tab and alt-shift-tab to switch between apps in Windows. Anyway.

Pastor told a great story in his sermon Sunday. I probably won't do justice to it but the gist is, there's a missionary in some country and he has this car that won't start unless it gets pushed first. It needs a running start. The missionary's solution: he either parks on a decline or leaves the car running. Ingenious, effective.

Eventually, the time comes for him to leave and a new missionary comes. Explaining the car he's about to inherit, the old missionary notes how the car has problems starting and he shares his clever method of dealing with it. While he's still talking, the new missionary looks under the hood, and tells the other what he finds: the problem is a loose cable. He tightens it up and to the other man's astonishment, the car then starts perfectly.

The point is, and actually, maybe I'm misrepresenting the point, but sometimes you get used to living without that you start to take it for granted. In particular, you can get used to living without God's power, and you take it for granted.

That resonated with me. I dunno, I think I've been at that point, accustomed to living without God's power, and various influences in my life have been shaking me from that recently. Sometime during college I think I became overly wary of spiritual things. Like when someone talks about hearing from God, I was more critical and skeptical than anything else. Problem is, as a practical result, I think I despaired of really hearing from God myself.

I dunno, I think that's wrong. Just, Biblically the *expectation* is that we hear from God. It's something every believer is supposed to experience. Anyway, I started going through My Utmost For His Highest a couple weeks ago and the entries were all about hearing God, listening to God. I dunno, I think that's what God's calling me to, to listen to Him more. Anyway.

Anyone interested in reading Purpose Driven Life? I think Jieun and I are gonna go through it, and it says it's good to do it with other people. If anyone wants.

Joe was a lifeguard, and he's always told me to stay out of the kiddie pool. Just, there's a reason why it's always warmer than other pools. Ick. Heated kiddie pool indeed.

Have you ever considered the absurdity of razor commercials? Adrian and I have talked about this before. But listen to a Gilette commercial. It's incredibly heroic. "THE BEST A MAN CAN GET!!!" You'd think you're saving the world or something. But you're not. You're just removing hair from your epidermis. It's really not that big a deal.

Just to clarify, Jieun is talking about Eric Mao.

Not me.

Spider solitaire update: I've clawed my way to a 3% win rate on difficult. 16 wins, 448 losses. I have no idea how I've gotten 16 wins. I honestly think that after you play enough games the computer feels sorry for you and starts making it easier. I'm 100% serious about this. Anyway, my high score on difficult is 1122, which is pretty good. I'm a loser.

The obscure bottled water brand at work is Poland Springs. Highly recommended. Are you with me, JR? I dunno.

So someone commented that it's silly to distinguish between good and bad people liking you. I've been thinking about that. I'm not sure if they're saying we shouldn't judge who's good and bad because everything is by God's grace or that we shouldn't care what people think because only God knows our heart or something else. But at any rate, I'm not convinced it's silly.

Just, it's a nice idea, but I'm not certain it's Biblical. I'm obviously not saying we should live primarily for the praise of other men. Nor am I saying that it's anything but grace by which someone can be called righteous. But Scripture clearly states that what Christians do will be noticed by others, that it affects how people view us. So what people think of us does serve as some kind of indication. And Scripture repeatedly draws a distinction between good (e.g. "righteous") and bad (e.g. "wicked") people, and moreover, calls for us to do the same, like not associating with the wicked, walking with the wise, stuff like that.

So Scripturally, I think it's clear that we're to make some judgment of who is good and bad, not to judge people, put ourselves above them or eliminate them from grace, but as a practical living thing. Maybe it's a stretch from there to say we should care more whether good people like us than bad. But given the weight of Scripture, it's a stretch I'm comfortable making. At least, I think there's more support behind that than saying we shouldn't distinguish between good and bad people or shouldn't care what other people think at all. I dunno.

50 First Dates: 1.5 stars. Maybe 1 star. A below average movie. And yet, I still cried. Twice. I'm serious, I've got some sort of medical malady or something, there's just no excuse for that.

We were talking about what it is in movies that make me cry. I think part of it is, when there's a character that's so in love that they're pushed to go beyond what they normally would, or to do something that's difficult or something like that, I dunno, that gets me. I'm not sure why.

But that's not completely it. Like, I cried at the end of School of Rock, and there's no love there at all. I also cried once in Shawshank, maybe the 3rd time I saw it, during the beer on the roof scene. No love there either.

Maybe what it is is just passion. I'm moved when I see people acting out of passion in a way that impacts others. That last part is key, I think. Someone's in love, whatever, big whoop. Someone's so in love that they do something powerful for something else, that moves me. I think School of Rock moved me because this thing he was so passionate about changed other people. I dunno, still figuring out what it is, because it's fairly annoying.

Weird problem for you math-y types. Say you have 2 boxes, each with money in it. You know that one box has twice the amount of money as the other, but you don't know what the exact amounts of money are, nor do you know which box has twice as much money, just that one does.

Say you pick a box at random, and open it, and it turns out to have $100. You are then given the option of keeping the $100 or forfeiting it and taking whatever's in the other box. Should you switch?

Intuitively, it makes no sense that picking a box at random and keeping it or picking a box at random and then choosing the other box would make any difference at all. But after you've opened the box, the expected value if you keep the $100 is $100. The expected value if you switch seems to be 0.5 x $50 + 0.5 x $200 (50% chance the other box has $50, 50% chance the other box has $200) = $125. Which means you should switch. Which is odd.

So what's the flaw in the analysis? Or is there one?

No idea who can answer this, but I'll try.

So I have an avi file, I think it uses the Xvid codec. Problem is, I try to play it in Media Player and the synchronization of the sound and video is messed up... sound lags by about 3 seconds. Is there anything I can do to repair it?

I wish I knew for sure who disliked me, like an exhaustive list. I dunno, I think knowing that could sometimes beneficial. I find it interesting when people talk about the people they don't like and they don't seem to realize that other people don't like them. It's an interesting disconnect.

Not that I care if everyone likes me. I heard a quote once that kinda influenced me a lot. But it basically said, you shouldn't seek that all people like you. Rather, you should seek that good people like you. Bad people, whatever, their opinion is irrelevant. It's nice if they respect you, but as far as like or dislike goes, it's not that important.

I jive with that a lot. I think the quality of the people that like you says way more about your character than how many people like you. So yeah, I kinda worry whether good people dislike me. I dunno.

There are people like Marshall who "dislike" me because my alma mater's basketball team is the highest ranked undefeated team in the nation, while his is mired in the middle of the Pac-10, a bubble team for the tournament at best. But that's just jealousy, not true dislike.

Speaking of which, that was a GREAT game on Saturday. I watched with a handful of assorted Stanford alumni, one of which was around during the Todd Lichti era, and it was great, we were jumping around at the end, it was reminiscent of the Elite Eight Rhode Island game in '98. Although, I hate to pull an old fogey thing, but I don't think anything will ever match up to that game. I remember at senior retreat we wrote about our top college experiences and I think every Stanford male mentioned that game. The best basketball experience of my life.

But yeah, what an awesome finish. That and the Casey Jacobsen shot to beat Duke are the runner up best endings to the RI game. Go Cardinal.

I think I've mentioned several times how I like the people at church. One of the big things is, everyone is chill. I'm a fairly laid-back guy I think, so I jive with that a lot.

But I dunno, I'm starting to think that's not necessarily a good thing, maybe even detrimental. The lack of non-chill people I mean. I was just talking to someone and yeah, I think everyone being chill kind of contributes to a lack of passion. We could probably use some more type-A personalities. Maybe I'm wrong. I dunno, just things I'm thinking about.

But yeah, being chill is OK, but it's definitely not the most important thing in the world. I don't think it's particularly emphasized in Scripture. And it's nice to have chill friends but it's probably better to have friends who are willing to get on your case every once in a while. Not too much, but yeah, a bit. Makes you a better person.

This post makes no sense at all, but whatever.

Growing up, I think I only flew 3 times for a family vacation, and none of those were really family vacations. I think once or twice to Oregon, but my dad never went. And I'm not sure we flew; at least one time we took the Amtrak. Once we flew to Ohio but that was just me and my sister. And once we went to Orlando, but that was for some conference for minority Baptist pastors.

So most of the vacations we took as a family were short things, camping, or LA or San Diego or Sonora, stuff like that. And after my dad became a pastor I think we dispensed with vacations completely, except for that one Orlando thing.

No real point to this.

I loved Nicci's last post. Nothing's more entertaining than rage. Anyway, I'm totally with her - "blessing" is a noun, let's keep it that way. I'm against the use of noun only forms as verbs or adjectives. It's like sewing two different types of cloth together. Just say no.

I'm personally against the SoCal use of "the" with freeways also. *The* 101. *The* 405. Just say take 101 North to 92 East. People understand what you're saying. You don't need random "the"s all over the place. Do SoCal people do that with road names also? Turn left at the Santa Monica Blvd? Turn left at the Malvern Ave.? Turn right at the 5th street? Would you say turn right at the El Camino Real? Isn't that redundant?

The weird thing about Houston is that everyone just uses the name only. So my parents write as their address ***** Boheme, Houston, TX. No drive, street, or whatever it is. Just Boheme. Everyone does that. But we still don't say turn left on the Boheme. It's just turn left on Boheme. As it should be.

I was perusing the Pebble Beach Pro-Am pairings and Kenny G is among the very best amateurs playing. His handicap is just 1. That's insane to me. Kenny G? Michael Bolton is just a 14 handicap. The slacker.

Anyway, he (Kenny G) is being paired with K.J. Choi. Maybe I can finagle a G/Choi signed hat. That would be a piece of memorabilia absurd enough for the Big Wong Palace.

It makes me sad that all my friends can't all be friends with each other. I wish they could. I think other people are like that too, like Minho was big on me meeting his groomsmen from LA. I dunno, I think my friends are all quality people, and one would like to think that quality people can all be friends. But it just doesn't work that way. 2 people can both be good, quality individuals and nevertheless just not click. No conflict or anything, just no connection. It's not like this is a shock or anything, it's just how life is, no big whoop. But it still makes me a little bit sad.

SN. There was a time in my life when I said how I believed that any two people, as long as they were sincere Christians, could have a happy marriage. I now think that's one of the stupidest things I've ever written. It's still always possible, I suppose, just not always probable. I dunno, I've just come to believe that two sincere, Bible-believing Christians can still have significant marital problems. Nothing the power of God can't overcome, but a good match makes things a lot easier. I dunno, so many things in life comes down to God's grace. Makes me really grateful for Jieun.

SSN. Do girls just not care about looks at all? I'm not just talking about Jieun and me. Like, what the heck is Beyonce doing with Jay-Z? I mean, honestly.

Anyway, it's kind of hard to gauge a person's character quickly, but I have a few indicators. One big one is how a person treats total dorks. People who treat dorks well, that's a sign of quality to me. Especially if the people are cool. Like Keith, come on, he's a cool guy. Shops at A|X and f.c.u.k., has the metrosexual look going, he's cool. But he's tight with nerds. Quality.

There are flaws with this, the biggest one being, I'm a dork, so in some sense what I'm really measuring is how well people treat me, which is biased. But still, I think it's a handy rule of thumb. Just in general, how people treat the least cool people, a decent measure of character.

One thing I like about Survivor is that there's a slow process of evolution going on. Every new cast learns from the mistakes of previous shows, so the strategies people use slowly change. It's really interesting to see what/how people have learned from previous seasons, and how they try to use that when they're on the show. The learning process, how they adapt, how the game changes, it's fascinating to me.

What I love about this season is it's like evolution squared. Not only are people adjusting their play based on previous seasons, they're also adjusting their play based on their own experience in the past. And lots of people are playing differently. Like Richard, the first alliance maker, is now being totally aloof. Jerri, girl who wouldn't shut up, is now trying to stay under the radar. Rupert is trying to not be so visible. It's interesting.

Or not.

I have no idea why I'm on this adaptation is the key to life thing but whatever.

Random story about Drew and Peter. I went on missions with Drew, and the next fall met Peter at Cal, at I think this joint Stanford/Cal praise thing (which I'm mildly against, but anyway). Anyway, Tim Dal., who had also been on our team, was also there, and when he saw Peter he assumed it was Drew and was really physical with him, I think like putting him in a headlock and giving him a noogie.

Peter I think was bewildered by this random white guy he's never seen coming up and giving him a noogie and was like, "Uh, I'm not Drew. I'm Peter." And at first, Tim didn't believe him. By the time he realized that it really wasn't Drew, it was too awkward, it's not like he can introduce himself after that. I dunno, good times.

The weird thing about twins to me is that when I know one, I automatically feel really comfortable with the other one even if I barely know them. Like, I think I was fairly chummy with Peter in the few times we've interacted even though we essentially have no relationship. And me being chummy with Jer the first time I met him is a semi-famous story. Something about familiar appearance puts me at ease. Actually, an even stranger thing is, when I meet someone that even vaguely looks like someone else I know, I'm automatically more comfortable with them also, which is very odd.

Anyway, can you guess which high school is most represented on jack.html? It's not even close: Whitney ("School Of Dreams") in Cerritos, with 6 people (Jieun, Carey, Susan, Jibin, John, Connie). Tied for second with 3 people each is Memorial in Houston (Becky, Martha, Jimmy) and Lynbrook in San Jose (Esther, Dave Lee, Kevbo). No one cares.

I want to get something straight. I am decidedly not a popular guy. Unless you define popular as sitting at home watching repeated episodes of Alias and playing endless games of Spider Solitaire. (SN. I have no idea what happened but all of a sudden I've gotten way better at Spider Solitaire. Like, I beat advanced level the other day. And my intermediate win rate before was 15%, now it's like 45%. No clue what happened.)

I'm not sure why I'm so emphatic about this. I think what it is is, I'm distrustful of a particular brand of super social person. I have no idea why. I can't even define what this is. Actually, maybe it's this. Some people are popular because they're genuinely friendly. I love people like this. All of the social people at church are like this. One of the things I like about it. Then there are people who *need* to feel like they know a lot of people. Something about that I distrust, no clue why.

I appreciate it more than my dad does so I borrowed it. It's fairly cool, no? You can see Gary Player and Vijay Singh right on the front. I dunno, I like it.

The best feeling in the world I think is feeling like you're making progress. Whether you're talking about lifting, sports, studying for a test, spiritual walk, or whatever, there's nothing better than the feeling of progress.

A corollary: one of the worst feelings in the world is feeling like you're making no progress. So, in grand tradition of Eric Yang, this entry is titled Things In Life That Currently Frustrate Me Because I'm Making No Measurable Progress On Them No Matter How Much Time I Spend.

#1: Basketball. I've resigned myself to sucking at basketball. You know how bad I am. You know how sometimes you're playing and there's like one girl there. I'm the one the girl guards. Sucks. Eddie says he gets excited about playing basketball. Can't relate at all. Me, my primary goal in basketball is to minimize injury. Whatever, I'll keep playing because it's a good social activity for guys but I'm resigned to sucking at it.

#2: Spider Solitaire. So I've been playing a lot of this recently. (Don't bother telling me I'm a loser. Preaching to the choir.) And I can't get my mind around it. I'm not sure what my win rate is, but it's pretty low. The thing that's frustrating is, I'm still not sure what good strategies are for this game. I've been trying to come up with reasonable heuristics and they haven't made any discernible difference on my win rate. Either the game is totally random, in which case I'm stupid for playing it, or I'm too stupid to figure out good strategies. Either way, I'm stupid. Argh, frustrating.

#3: Poker. After every poker session I analyze my play and I realized: I suck. The times I end up ahead it's a couple lucky hands, but by and large, I'm a poor poker player. I've been playing a lot, but I'm not getting much better. If anything, I'm worse.

Which in a sense is a blessing. You know, you can learn a lot about life playing poker. I'm not joking. The worst thing in poker is having an OK hand. It's not enough to win, but it's enough to make you want to keep playing with it, and you end up losing the most on hands like these. The same is true about poker itself, I think. The worst thing is being a decent poker player. Over time, you won't win, but you're good enough that you'll want to keep on playing. That's a curse.

So it's good that I know I suck, so I don't do anything stupid, like try to play for money online or go to card clubs. I'll stick with just playing with friends, because like basketball, poker is a nice social activity. I think I'm in favor of tournament games, losers buy winner lunch at In 'N Out. Makes the games matter, but doesn't make it matter too much.

But anyway, it's still frustrating that I suck after spending so much time on it. I played with some high school friends whom I always used to do well against, and either they've gotten a lot better or I've gotten a lot worse. I think it's both. As the Koreans in my complex might say, that is the suck.

I wonder who reads this page. I met Paul Lee's sister in law this weekend and she mentioned that she sometimes reads my page. That is utterly bizarro to me. What on earth she finds interesting about this page is beyond me.

I know also at least one of my pastors has read this at least once. Scary. Haven't been busted for heresy yet - a Good Sign.

I'm about to make another grand, sweeping, inaccurate overgeneralization. But it seems to me that the Asians that get most riled up about ethnic issues seem to come from areas where there are many Asians. That's interesting to me. Because they're less likely to have experienced racism themselves, I'd think, there being so many Asians around them. So why are they more sensitive to perceived affronts to Asians?

I'm not making any value judgments here, which is better or worse. My theory though is the more you get, the more you want. It's like Houston with housing. Since they all have houses, everyone wants a bigger house. Whereas in the Bay Area, people our age are content with (or at resigned to) having modest places. In places like SoCal, Asians are used to being treated as equals, so they're more demanding of stuff like that. Perhaps rightly so. But that's my theory.

I can do 10 pullups.

Whew. Just got my rebates for the best deal I've gotten in a while, 160 GB HD from Fry's for $60. Nerd joy ensues.

So at work they've been stocking the cooler with Dasani and some obscure bottled water brand, can't even remember the name. 80% of the bottles are Dasani. But me and everyone else grabs the other brand first. Dunno why everyone else does it, but I did because it's from mountain spring water, something like that, whereas Dasani is just "purified" so no clue where it comes from. I generally do that when I get bottled water, try to get the stuff that comes from mountains.

Now they've replaced that obscure mountain brand with Aquafina. My two water choices are both from "purified" sources, and I don't know which one to go with. I once read the label for Aquafina and it listed as the source: Houston Municipal Water Supply. I'm sorry, but there's no way I'm paying money for Houston Municipal water. I don't care how purified it is. In this case I'm not paying for the water, but still.

Thing is, I hate Dasani. It has this weird plastic-y taste. Anyway. Not that anyone cares about bottled water.

So I helped babysit on Saturday for the family LTG. 3 babysitters, 9 kids aged 1 to 4. Young handled the older kids, me and this girl handled the younger ones.

You know, I haven't watched kids a whole lot. I realized that I lack a fundamental understanding of what kids are like. So the kids made a mess of the room, just emptying everything and throwing it all over the place. Afterwards, while helping the mother of the house clean up, I was apologizing to her for the mess. And she responded, "It's OK. The kids were playing. That's what kids do."

Hmm. That's true. Kids play and make messes. That's what they do. I think I knew that, but I didn't really *know* that, if that makes any sense. Anyway, put 9 kids together and that tendency is reinforced exponentially.

Another thing kids do: cry. So at times, the younger kids would just cry. No real clue why. And when one kid starts crying, that sets off others. Some, you just have to hold. Some, you have to distract. But I kept asking myself why they're crying. And I dunno, there are reasons and whatever, but fundamentally, kids just cry. It's what they do. Who knew.

The scariest moment was when Young was occupied, me and the other sitter were each holding a crying baby, and one of the older girls comes up and says, "I'm going to use the bathroom by myself, OK?" DANGER. Is it OK? No clue. Too scared to let her go by herself. Too busy to go with her. Too risky to ask her to hold it. Panic. I actually don't know how it was resolved but I didn't smell urine all morning. I take that to be a good sign.

My favorite movies that had their wide release in 2003. I don't seem to watch that many movies anymore, so yeah, there's a lot missing.

1. Adaptation - I've written about this multiple times before so I won't belabor the point, but it's just a brilliant movie with interesting things to say about life, passion, and purpose. Some people think the movie spirals too far out of control in the third act, but the point is, it represents the acceptance and assimilation of things he had previously adamantly and inflexibly rejected - it's the full circle of adaptation. But anyway. I actually don't know a single person who loved this movie besides me.

2. Matrix Reloaded - Another movie most people disliked, but whatever, I liked it. It's beautifully shot, has some of the most incredible action sequences ever filmed, and discusses really interesting philosophical issues in non superficial and respectable ways. The movie definitely has its faults, but I find it extremely entertaining and thought provoking.

3. Love Actually - Another movie that has its faults, but I find myself still thinking about it. What I like is that the movie didn't stick with just the superficial sunny side of "love", but got into issues of pain, sacrifice, and hurt. That was surprising and interesting. The Hugh Grant, Englishman goes to America and body double stories were boring, but every other one had interesting ideas.

4. School Of Rock - Nothing deep about this movie at all, just extremely entertaining, the most purely entertaining movie I saw last year. They were fairly authentic with the music, which I appreciated a lot. And Jack Black plays ridiculous without slipping into self-parody, which is not easy. Great movie.

5. Ghosts of the Abyss - Just kidding. Trying to rile up Dave.

Everything else I saw I was OK with or liked. Better ones include Elf, Matrix Revolutions, X-Men 2, Cold Mountain, Identity.

Alias Season 1 is incredibly entertaining. And everyone says season 2 is better. That's insane.

So everyone wants to feel useful. But everyone hates feeling used. What makes it one and not the other? Is it gratitude? Frequency? Something else? I dunno, just something I've been thinking about.

I'm going to stop pointing out how these entries are boring. The great thing about the Web is, you don't have to read anything, it's not like in person conversation or the phone or even e-mail. So love it or leave it.

I finally watched Matrix Revolutions on IMAX. Like Reloaded, it's both better the second time around and better on IMAX. Although it's not quite as impressive as Reloaded on IMAX. That was awesome. But it was still pretty good, especially the machines attacking Zion - very cool. Anyway, I liked the movie a lot better this time. It's back up to between 3 and 3.5 stars.

Sorry, but I still have a lot of thoughts about the movie, and since no one cares, you might want to check out now.

I'm still angry at people who think the ending should have been fundamentally different. I do think it could have been much better. But at it's core, it had to involve a peace between man and machines. Because like I keep saying, a key point in the last two movies is the equivalence between man and machine. If you can't see that, I have no idea which movies you were watching. It's evident in Neo's talk with Councillor Hamann about men needing machines, vice versa, the talk about the Merovingian, him wanting power, him wanting pleasure, Architect saying how Neo carries source, the talk with Rama-Kandra in the train station about machines, love, and karma, Smith infecting Bane, tons of other stuffs. This idea is everywhere.

And if that's true, philosophically, the ending needs to involve some mutual respect between machines and man. It's not the status quo - there's a fundamentally different understanding about what "life" is. Machines, as conscious beings, are as worthy of life as humans. So it's doesn't make sense to destroy them. So it had to end with some kind of peace. The problem is, the movie doesn't make this point well at all, doesn't really emphasize this paradigm shift so in the end it feels like not much has changed.

In any case, I find it interesting but I disagree with all the philosophy of the third movie. I'll write about that some other time though, maybe.

Did everyone watch the Animatrix? One of them is really interesting, what happens is they capture a machine and then a bunch of them plug in with the machine and attempt to essentially convert it. There's so many fascinating ideas in this one. Like, they talk about why it's important to convert it instead of reprogramming it, which is interesting. This machine doesn't speak so they convert it through visual ideas, which brings up a bunch of interesting ideas about language and communication. And then this machine falls in love. I dunno, it's just a really interesting short.

Men's Fitness came out with their fittest/fattest cities list and Houston is no longer the fattest city in the U.S. It's Detroit. Chicago had the worst eating habits.