trust

How do you measure trust? If you trust someone with your life, does that mean you trust him/her to drive your car?...with you in it? Maybe I have that question backwards.

Personally, there are plenty of people that I trust on issues of responsibility or money, that I wouldn't let drive my car. Don't I owe it to my car to make sure the people that get in the driver's seat know what they're doing?

Lunar New Year == food

Oof...it's the Lunar New Year today, and already I can barely fit in my jeans. Why? I had hotpot with a few friends on Tuesday in Redwood City. Then, on New Year's Eve we had lots of yummy food at home (including desserts, mmm). Today at work, the chefs put together a kickass New Year's banquet, complete with roast pig, roast duck, and dim sum. Tonight, it's a dumpling party in Sunnyvale, and more desserts. I've heard that in Taiwan, people just eat and eat all week, since they're on vacation anyway...and people ask me why I think going to Taiwan is all about food.

bleah again

This has been somewhat of a Bad Day (tm).

I can think of plenty of things on which I can blame the badness, but I think it's just one of those days. I'm hoping my afternoon yoga class will fix me.

we won! but I miss Aaron Sorkin

We won our basketball championship! In an ugly defensive battle, we came out on top, 19-11. That's our lowest offensive output yet, but I guess all that matters is that we won. After the game, they gave us some puke colored t-shirts, and we went out to celebrate at Left at Albuquerque's.

Later on at home, I watched an episode of the West Wing in which the President gives a State of the Union address. Apparently it's required that someone in the line of succession not be in the Capitol during the speech, in case something really bad happens. I wonder when that became a rule. I doubt it's in the Constitution.

Speaking of the West Wing...unlike some people, I didn't immediately notice when Aaron Sorkin left the show. Last week, watching "The Stormy Present" (current season) and "Noel" (season 2) back to back, I noticed. (As an aside, I love Tivo to death!) The earlier episodes seem to flow better, have more fitting/moving endings, and involve more creative dialogue. I was especially irked that Charlie spent the entire last episode telling President Bartlet that Leo was on the phone. Dule Hill deserves better.

SARS screening and playoff basketball

When I was in Taipei, I was amazed at the amount of temperature screening being done. The first day, we went to buy movie tickets, and they took our temperature using a little gizmo that they aimed at your head. When we actually went into the movie theatre, they had a big screen that displayed the amount of heat coming from everyone's bodies; people who were over the acceptable limit would presumably show up in red or some warning color. The nest day, we went to a hotel, and the parking attendant opened the door of our minivan, and used another little gadget to shoot infrared light at everyone's foreheads, and took our temperatures that way. After a couple of days, I stopped thinking about it. We had our temperatures taken at malls, restaurants, and entering the subway. I guess it takes that kind of vigilance to prevent another outbreak; looks like there are several cases in southern China already.

On another note, we've made it to the championships of our basketball league! Tonight we play the #4 seeded team; they knocked off the #1 seed last week. I'm glad they did, because we'd lost to the #1 seed twice, and we've beaten the #4 seed twice. We'll have to be careful keep our heads in the game, and not get overconfident or otherwise off-kilter. Speaking of which, maybe I should eat something.

New Zealand photos

Here are the promised New Zealand scenery photos. These were taken by James.









The first picture was taken from Queenstown. We stayed 3 days there, and we could see most of the view from our condo. The second picture was taken on the road between Te Anau and Milford Sound, the third on the road near Glenorchy, and the last one at Lake Tekapo.