hello, world

"hello, world" was the first program I'd ever written. Well, besides the ones I'd written in Pascal, but I don't count those.

I remember being very excited about writing a program, as simple as it was. It reminded me of the days when my brother would create Choose Your Own Adventure games for me in Basic on our IBM PC. Now, I had that magic ability too!

This was a time when e-mail was exciting too. I remember standing in line at the university library to check and send emails. Nowadays, it seems that email is considered one of the most annoying forms of communication, scraping the bottom of the barrel alongside voicemail.

I still love email. Email is slow. People have fewer expectations about receiving a reply to an email versus the immediate expectation with texts or chat. You can sit and think about an email before replying. With chat, there's an underlying pressure to say something.

This is coming from someone who loves letter writing. Hand-written notes are also enjoyable to create. But when email became mainstream, we took it for granted that we could keep in touch with anyone and it was so low-effort.

One of the reasons I like letter writing is because it takes effort. You need paper. You need the person's address. You need to address the envelope. You need a stamp. And worst of all, you need to find a mailbox. What a pain, I admit.

But I still love it.

One of my favorite pastimes is reading other people's letters and notes. Here are three of my favorite compilations:

• Letters of Sylvia Plath Volume I: 1940-1956
• Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track: The Letters of Richard P. Feynman
• Letters to Judy: What Your Kids Wish They Could Tell You by Judy Blume

If you don't feel anything when reading Feynman's letters to his wife or the letter from the little kid to Judy Blume who wished the ground would swallow her up, you're a soulless brute.

Anyway, the point is that I feel nostalgic for the early days of the internet so I created this blog. It may not make it through the summer. Who knows.

I like Teslas. They are fast and fun to drive. But here in the Americas, we don't have much of a choice when it comes to EVs. The options are all pricey.

In China, you can buy a brand new BYD EV for about USD $11,000.

Can you buy any new vehicle here for $11K? About two decades ago, I got my first car—a 1995 VW Golf—for $6,500. Looking online, I see a 7-year-old VW Golf going for $8K. 🤔

Notably, Tesla—like Apple—introduces microscopic year-to-year improvements that aren't worth the upgrade, imo. It wasn't until this year that Tesla made a significant upgrade to their Model 3 battery, and threw a screen in the back for the kiddies. Still. This is nothing compared to the advancements that the Chinese EV makers are introducing with each new model.

We're playing catch up, big time.

I am on a calorie restricted diet and I have been eating the same meals for almost 3 weeks. Apps like Fitness Pal put their barcode scanner as a premium feature and I'm too lazy to calculate the calories for every new meal, so I end up eating the same thing.

I know you are supposed to "eat the rainbow", but is there a difference between eating the same thing for 3 weeks and then changing it up for the next 3 weeks?

Here's a snack hack:

• Step 1: Get a rice cooker.
• Step 2: Do this.

Btw, you don't need a fancy 6-section rice mold. Wet your hands, salt them, and shape the scalding hot rice with your bare hands. I use a mold because I'm not good at the manual method, but it's a single.

You can also use canned tuna, for example and make a small pile in the center, instead of or in addition to the seasoning.

This is what I've been eating as a snack instead of, for example, Cheetos Flaming Crunchy, which is suprisingly good but a huge calorie bomb.

Dieting is actually fun in a weird way. Everything tastes better. 🤔

Recently when I was scouring Reddit to see whether any blogging relics of the 90s were still around, I was pleased to discover a treasure trove of personal blogs. One of them was a speckled trout.

The first time you read a personal blog, it never fully makes sense since you have no context. If it's interesting, it makes you dig around to understand their story better.

It turns out part of this story involved the author's spouse taking his life some six years earlier. I was on a quest to recapture the rawness of the 90s internet and boy did I find it.

One reason for this blog is to practice writing faster. You can't make a good livelihood out of writing if it takes days to produce a draft for one 1,000 to 2,000-word article.

Granted, the time it takes to write is related to how much research you need to do. But here I am talking only about writing, assuming whatever research needs to be done is mostly front-loaded.

I've discovered that the more effort invested at the beginning, the less distraction later. For me, part of this includes writing an outline, sticking with it, and editing later. Whenever I veer from this process, it's RIP Productivity.

"Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man." -Francis Bacon

I recently read a book by American journalist and economist Henry Hazlitt called Thinking as a Science.

Henry Hazlitt is best-known for his book, Economics in One Lesson, written in 1946. He contributed to many major publications including the New York Times, Newsweek, and the Wall Street Journal.

Thinking as a Science is a manual for thinking using personally reasoned logic and original insights.

I am impressed that a book written in 1916 about how to think can be more relevant than ever, over 100 years later. Why? Because the internet makes it easy to find instant answers to questions in the absence of curiousity and original thought.

The chapter, Writing One's Thoughts, reminded me of a recurring experience that I frequently brush aside.

When I have an idea that I want to think about later, I write it down. For example, an idea for an article to write, ideas to pitch to a client, a new project or business idea to research, a recipe or quick meal hack to try, how to turn my car into a camper, what is the cost and logistics of a prefab capsule house, or whether to grow an indoor herb garden, etc.

I consolidate these ideas in a Notion database and give them a priority tag. When my energy is low and I need inspiration, I look to this list for a motivational boost.

Here’s where the recurring experience I mentioned comes into play. When I read these notes later, I often wonder, "Why did I think this was a good idea?” I’m not questioning whether the idea was objectively good or bad, but that I am so far removed from my original thought.

I don’t write down every harebrained idea that comes to my head because I don’t want to waste time later reviewing a list of harebrained ideas. I only write down the ones that I am excited to think about later.

I chalked up this discrepancy to lack of precise language to describe my thinking so that when I read it later, I didn’t understand the original thought, making me an inexact (wo)man.

Sharpening the words sharpens the idea, right? 🤔

As Hazlitt writes, “The wording is never the thought. The thought itself can only exist in the mind.”.

If the thought can only exist in the mind, it makes sense that when I read my notes, they mean something slightly different to me each time. The words point to the thought, but the words are not the thought itself.

Furthermore, that thought has associations that change with time and experience. If someone else reads your notes, your words conjure up a network of thoughts and ideas based on their background and experience. If you do a reasonably good job, your words will translate roughly as you intended. If you do a poor job, all bets are off.

Think about a car. You’ll likely have an image of a car come to mind with specific properties. For example, a red jeep. Another person might think of a white pickup truck because that’s what they drive. Not only do you not know what image will come up in another person’s mind with the word car, but from one moment to the next when you think about a car, most likely you will have a different image.

One way to capture thoughts with words as accurately as possible is to approach them from as many angles as possible. Write the idea down as a pitch or proposal knowing that your future self will read it and need to be persuaded of its value.

For example, write a book review article about Henry Hazlitt’s Thinking as a Science. If that was my description, a week later I can imagine myself deprioritizing it or deleting it altogether, citing "I'm too busy for this".

But if I position the idea as a pitch, it’s easier to decide later whether or not it’s worth doing. This book was insightful because of x, y, z, and most people probably haven’t heard about it and might be interested to read it, not to mention it is freely available. And it will help draw an audience to my site. That way at least when you read it, you will have a specific line of thinking that you can more decisively accept or reject rather than some vague idea.

Growing a year-long indoor herb garden can be written from a benefits perspective. For example, growing an herb garden will save money and increase self-sufficiency. When you revisit this, maybe you won the lottery and no longer care about saving money. At least you understand the thought process behind the original idea.

Communication is a guessing exercise. You can never be sure how words will be interpreted from one person to the next, or even how you will perceive your own words when revisited.

Since Gen X is the most ignored—but best—generation on the planet, this post is dedicated to you, Gen X.

Best Things About Growing Up Gen X (in Vancouver, Canada)

• Expo 86
• PNE (when it was good)
• Free McDonald's toys & magazines
• McDonald's caboose birthday parties
• McDonald Land characters milling around
• McDonald's hamburger days at school
• (yes, I liked McDonald's a LOT)
• Writing to pen pals
• Talking on the phone.. thank God for call waiting
• Atari and arcades
• Big Wheels (I had a Green Machine.. *cough*)
• Playing outside all day...no helicopter parents
• Mixtapes, records and taping songs off the radio
• Much Music
• Riding bikes
• New Skytrain (before it gave you hearing loss)
• $2.50 Tuesdays (movies)
• Popeye cigarettes
• Renting R movies (oblivious immigrant parents)
• Prince, MJ... RIP
• Latchkey life (?)

From Orison Swett Marden's 1901 book, An Iron Will:

When Henry Ward Beecher was asked how it was that he could accomplish so much more than other men, he replied:

"I don't do more, but less, than other people. They do all their work three times over: once in anticipation, once in actuality, once in rumination. I do mine in actuality alone, doing it once instead of three times."

The Yen is weak and Japan is getting overrun with tourists. Restaurants are exploring two-tiered pricing for foreigners vs locals.

I get that it's a hassle dealing with non-Japanese speakers, and for smaller restaurants that have no problem filling up tables night after night, it might not be worth the bother. With social media, once a restaurant goes viral, it's RIP availability. As a local, wouldn't you find that annoying?

An all-you-can-eat buffet in Shibuya, a restaurant and shopping hub for tourists and locals, already has dual pricing.

Since its opening in April, the restaurant has charged foreign tourists 7,678 yen for an all-you-can-eat and drink seafood buffet for a weekday dinner, while Japanese and foreigners living in Japan can have the same meal for 1,100 yen less.

That's an over $40 difference!

Language is the real issue and many foreigners are fluent in Japanese. How about a "Japanese-speakers Only" sign in the window? Westerners in particular might find this highly offensive but they wouldn't be allowed into the restaurant to voice their concerns, so it's no skin off the restaurateur's back.

Anyway.

🏆 GuruMick wins the best comment award with:

Customers unfamiliar with Japanese language aren't seeking a discussion of, say, Plato, when they interact with waiters. They just want to know what's on this plato...

This is an excerpt from a book called “Territory of Light” written by a Japanese author, Yuko Tsushima. It was originally published in 1978 and was translated into English as recently as 2018.

It's about a young Japanese woman in 1970s Tokyo who is left to raise her two-year-old daughter alone after her husband leaves them.

This is one of my favourite passages.

“At Christmastime I had got out the little artificial fir tree from deep inside the closet and assembled and decorated it with my daughter.

That tree, its tiny lights twinkling. Her, motionless before it for a long time, rapt in its multicoloured drops of light. And me, standing back, looking on.

To her, it was the most beautiful of sights, countless joys shimmering invitingly in their splendour.

It was a cheap tree that Fojino had bought at a local supermarket when she was a year old, saying, 'This'll do for now, won't it? It'll only get broken with her touching it. They're really quite expensive.”

💔

Recently I was invited to dinner at a friend’s house where she made me the best hamburg steak I have ever tasted. It was a recipe from a Final Fantasy cookbook.

The hamburg steak is a ground beef patty known as hambagu in Japanese. Like many Japanese dishes, they took an existing food and adapted it to Japanese sensibilities. This dish was from the frikadelle, originally from Germany, I believe, but super common in other parts of Europe.

Hamburg steak, however simple, has a special meaning for me because I grew up eating it, along with other originally non-Japanese Japanese dishes called yōshoku which means Western food. Other examples of yōshoku include korokke (croquette), doria (gratin), omurice (omlette + rice), napolitan (spaghetti with tomato sauce), and most well-known is kareraisu (curry rice).

You could say that the Japanese take foreign dishes and butcher them but in my experience, the result is usually amazing. I wouldn’t say they’re better, but different. For example, I like Japanese curry rice but I’d never say it’s better than, say, South Indian curry, which is one of my favorites.

Anyway, I was so impressed with this video game version of hamburg steak that I got the recipe from my friend and made it last night.

My version was not nearly as impressive as my friend’s. Hers had a nice, even browning and a slightly depressed spheroid shape. The ones I've had in the past, including my own, always had a flat patty shape. It’s amazing how the shape of food can make it look more delicious, and because the spherical nature of the patty made the center a little less cooked, the shape directly contributed to its scrumptiousness.

Despite not looking as good, the hamburg steak I made was delicious.

Back in my post about dieting, I mentioned eating the same meal for weeks on end. That meal was spaghetti because I made tonnes of spaghetti meat sauce and froze it.

I will spend the next couple of weeks working on this Final Fantasy hamburg steak.

Growing up, I thought my family was “rich”. Not like Richie Rich rich, but rich enough that Santa Claus always managed to find our house and bring me what I asked for, most of the time.

We were not rich. At times, finances were very tight, but I didn’t know this until later because I rarely heard my parents talk about money.

My mom was wise when it came to budgeting and still is. I learned from her that how rich you feel isn’t about how much money you make, but about learning to make the most of what you have and living within your means.

But living within your means isn’t great for the psyche if you always long for things you want but can’t afford. I do remember my mom asking my dad for a mink coat several times but I never got the impression that the acquisition of material things was important. I also didn’t have the impression that it was wrong either. It just wasn’t given much attention.

The other thing about being at peace with living within your means is not depriving yourself when it’s unnecessary. It’s not like we spent the least amount on everything possible. It was about being strategically frugal so we could spend freely when it mattered.

Finally, we had wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in the basement. Books were a big thing in my house. I’ll never forget the time I used my dad’s English dictionary, which must have been five inches thick, as a step ladder. Boy did that trigger my mom! She scolded me and told me not to put anything on top of books, much less my sweaty little feet. My parents were hard on us about doing well in school and the books in our house on every topic under the sun taught me that curiousity was important too.

You always hear about successful people who grew up poor and used this as a focal point for their motivation to work hard and achieve financial security. I admire people who pulled themselves out of dire straits through straight-up determination. But I am thankful to my parents for shielding me from that kind of stress.

Today’s topic is totally something I would have written in my journal when I was a teenager. Since the spirit of this blog captures the 90s when I actually was a teenager, here goes.

Oh btw, I’m not going to list every single city. That’s for CapyClub™ premium subscribers only. To become a member, snail mail me a few notes in your local currency.

I love lists so here are some travel lists.

✈️ Countries I’ve been to:

• Canada (duh)
• USA
• Japan
• Mexico
• Korea
• Netherlands
• Belgium
• France
• Costa Rica
• Italy
• Germany
• Austria
• Spain
• China

🧳 Countries I’d like to visit soon:

• Thailand
• Malaysia
• Vietnam
• Singapore

🤔 Someday destinations:

• Taiwan
• Tibet
• Africa
• Eastern Europe
• South America
• Philippines
• UAE

🚇 Favorite cities:

• 🇯🇵 Tokyo
• 🇪🇸 Santander
• 🇩🇪 Baden-Baden
• 🇩🇪 Berlin
• 🇨🇳 Xi'an

🤤 Countries with my favourite foods:

• Japan
• Italy
• France

☺️ Countries with the friendliest people:

• Mexico
• Spain
• Costa Rica

❤️ Countries that, while I was there, made me think “I’m moving here”

• Japan
• Germany
• Costa Rica
• Spain

Yours truly dislikes clutter. So when my Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor suggested I get a massage gun to fix my foot soreness, I was reluctant. The last thing I need is another device to clutter up my home. I mean, my spare tires live in my bedroom right now, ok?

Fortunately, my mom has a massage gun that I could try out before buying one. Folks... it worked, big time.

Let me back up. The days before my acupuncture treatment, I would wake up and walk around like a baby giraffe for about 15 minutes because of the soreness. I really don't understand where it came from but it's related to blood deficiency and lack of circulation to my legs and feet.

With the help of acupuncture and herbs, my feet started feeling maybe 50% better. After using the massage gun, the pain is now 100% gone.

Bless my TCM doctor. I wish for everyone to have a doctor like him.

Should I start going to the gym? I have failed many times to keep a regular gym schedule so I vowed long ago never to bother again. The problem is, I need to build strength and I can't seem to do it at home, despite having free weights readily available. I guess I am getting too lazy, plus it feels like a hot yoga studio in my place these days.

I've come to believe that no matter how much you exercise and eat well, without strength training, a broken hip awaits you in your 80s (or earlier).

I had a minor knee injury earlier this year which made it painful to walk even one block. It made me realize how much we take walking for granted.

We'll see if that's enough motivation for me to get my butt out of this seat and into a gym.

By the time I started watching Tom & Jerry cartoons, they'd become softer and lacking the hard-hitting life lessons like these from the 40s and 50s. Check out Blue Cat Blues and Heavenly Puss and prepare for some gut-wrenching drama.

The other day I found a note taped to my door. Sound carries in buildings with wooden frames like ours... I heard the sound of heavy boxes being dropped...just wanted to let you know.

I'd already had at least two noise complaints from this person over two years. Those ones were not as nice. Let me tell you: nothing good is ever written on lined yellow note paper.

I typed a message in response on cartoony dog stationery from Daiso: I honestly cannot be quieter than I already am without it being unnatural. Of course, this was nestled between softer statements...sorry for the noise...it was most likely the contractors who were doing work in the living room... blah blah blah

What I actually wanted to say was...lady, I changed the way I freakin walk in my own home because of you.

Now, what I can't figure out is what kind of karma I created out of this interaction. Because my lingering irritation is generating negative energy and I'm pretty sure karma doesn't factor in cute dog stationery.

I spend the better part of every day writing: emails, proposals, in my journal, harebrained ideas, to-do lists, book notes, blog articles, writing in this thing. And most of it is garbage.

I'm not saying that to be self-deprecating or because I have no self-esteem. It's just the truth.

Because when you don't do something very seriously for a long time and then you try to do it seriously, it is going to be garbage.

That's the Fifth Noble Truth. (You heard it here first.)

Although TikTok does not jibe with Gen-X sensibilities, it has a good algorithm for feeding tailored content to its users. The other day, I watched a video of a mom and daughter rating the attractiveness of men from their respective generations (70s & 80s men vs present day). Keep in mind, I am only talking about celebrities.

Let me tell you, there was no contest. Men from the 70s, 80s, even 90s win, hands down.

No offense, Pete Davidson. 😑

Bad experiences have an important place in life. Without "bad", "good" has no meaning.

I went to the ER once and ended up spending a week and a half as an inpatient because no one could figure out how to fix my problem.

One of the memories that stuck with me is being transported back to my hospital room after a very painful procedure. The porter, the person who transports patients from one place to another, dumped me on to the bed and left without even a half-hearted attempt at arranging the blanket over me.

I can't tell you how excruciating the pain was after that procedure. The most pain always happens right after a doctor says, "This won't hurt a bit".

Those were some of the worst and scariest days of my life. Sometimes when I'm going through a rough patch, I think back to those nights I'd be staring out the window, desperately wanting to be on the outside, just to take a simple walk around the block with my dog.

You don't control the thoughts that pop into your head, no matter how hard you try. I try not to vocalize some of the less-than-savory thoughts that I have like complaining about this and that.

Instead, I prefer to respect the old adage, if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all. Still, I've come to believe that just because you don't say your thoughts out loud, it doesn't mean they aren't negatively affecting you.

It's similar to dreaming. Have you ever had a dream where you did something you'd never consider doing in real life like stealing or even worse (am I allowed to say murder on the internet or will the Mounties come knocking on my door?)

Like thoughts, you have no control over the contents of your dream, assuming you aren't lucid dreaming. So you can wash your hands of any responsibility, right?

Another way of thinking is that something within you has created these mental defilements. They don't come out of nowhere. And somehow or another, they need to be addressed or they will fester.

My dad's birthday is this week. He would have been 88 years old. I remember being a kid and giving him gifts he would never use. He was truly impossible to buy a gift for. The one time I got him a gift he liked and used was when he picked it out himself. It was a book about cancer. Otherwise, I know that at least one of my birthday gifts to him found its final resting place in the trash. Now, I don't hold this against him but I do believe that one of the prerequisites to having children is learning how to muster up a little sentimentality. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Happy birthday, Dad. I hope there's a good bookstore up in Heaven ଘ(੭ˊᵕˋ)੭* ੈ✩‧₊˚

I saw a video the other day of a Gen-Z girl asking why her generation was so into Jellycats. What's a Jellycat, I thought. I can't leave mysteries like this unsolved so I did some "research".

oMG they are so cute. Ha. I think I will be 80 years old and still like childish things like Jellycats.

One thing I vow not to do when I am old and grey, however, is to wear age-inappropriate clothing. Let me say...I actually do believe a person can wear whatever they like. It's a (supposedly) free world.

On the other hand, there's Madonna. I loved Madonna. And the fact that she's still alive while her contemporaries (MJ, Prince, George Michael etc) have all passed, tells me she took care of herself. But she dresses and acts in a way that is really not becoming of someone her age.

Me, on the other hand, I wish to age gracefully...but with a Jellycat hanging off my purse. (ᵔ⩊ᵔ)

ʕ •ᴥ• ʔ

( ´(ｴ)ˋ )

I was walking my dog and a man sitting on the patio of a cafe whistled at my dog. I assume he was trying to get his attention so my dog would approach him. We were well past him and he was still whistling. I absolutely hate it when people do this because my dog is already easily distracted and the last thing I want to do is stop at some random guy's table so that he can pet him or whatever. He laughed at me and I gave him the death stare. People are so annoying.

I recommend being friendly with your neighbours. I'm not talking about becoming best friends, just make note of their faces and say hello when you see them.

First of all, saying hello/goodbye is part of basic manners. Second of all, if you live in a major Western city, chances are that crime is on the rise. If you are some recluse who never socializes and is always flying under the radar, your neighbours might not even notice (or care) if someone suspicious is trying to break into your home or your car.

(｡•́︿•̀｡)

Yours truly has watched hundreds of hours of true crime documentaries which is a) why I am so paranoid, b) why I'd never trust anyone even remotely cruel to animals much less children (serial killer in the making), and c) why I never walk past a windowless van.

Stay safe out there kids. And be friendly to your neighbours. Capyneko out! ◣(´ᴥ`)◢

This year I learned that Linkedin has piles of bogus job postings. I was surprised. I guess I'm still naive about these things.

Over the last six or seven years, I'd used Linkedin occasionally to find work. Back then it was a professional network and as far as I could see, the job postings were legit. Oh, and people didn't post their entire life story on there. Today it seems at least one person in the feed starts a post with, "I don't usually post personal content on here but..." blah blah blah blah personal content blah blah blah

To me, Linkedin as a social network is super lame. Maybe I don't follow the right people. But I hung on because every once in a while, a good opportunity falls into my lap with zero effort. But lately all I get is spam and recruiters who are usually unprofessional and have no idea what they are talking about and honestly no idea how to recruit good people.

All these social media platforms-Linkedin, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram-were useful and fun when they first started. Now they all suck. I have contemplated ditching all of them.

I still like Reddit but it too has declined. If you could see some of the posts in my hometown's subreddit, you'd be shocked at the level of heavy-handed censorship. It got so bad that people created alternative subreddits because their posts kept getting removed.

I've only started watching YouTube and TikTok with any regularity in the last year and I've noticed that words that were never censored before are now bleeped out. When did some words become taboo and why?

YouTube's and TikTok's terms of service restrict children under 13 years of age from accessing their services unless under the supervision of an adult. Is it because of the 14 to 18-year-old audience whose parents should be the ones to be monitoring their social media usage? So we're left with adults. Why aren't adults allowed to hear words like murder?

This seems like the continued infantilization of Western civilization where any word with the slightest possibility of offending even one human being on Earth must be banned. I mean, I have trigger words too but I wouldn't want them banned. Just nonsense.

Another question is, do you sometimes look an animal in his eyes and feel like he understands WAY more than he is letting on? Well, sometimes my dog STARES at me in such an eerie way that I have to look away first.

Speaking of animals, I would never hurt an animal on purpose, one because I'm not a serial killer in the making, but two, because in the next realm, YOU may be the dog and HE may be the human, in which case, good luck getting a rib eye or a Pup Cup, for that matter.

I believe it was Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

Capybaras: Buddhas of the Animal World.