On Local Maxima
There’s this manga series I follow religiously called Chihayafuru. One of the themes it covers is the realities of becoming elite in a field: the personal cost, the conditions necessary to become elite, and the cost to your support network. In the case of the story, the field is a niche card game called Karuta that basically only exists in Japan. As a result, there’s a lot of Japan specific Read More
Transactional Relationships
It recently occurred to me when taking my language classes that I probably spend more time with my tutors than any other person, on a given week. Excluding work, of course. Which leads me to my next point: I spend more time with my coworkers than anyone else in my life. I’d wager many average Americans’ lives work out in a similar fashion. It’s weird to consider, because we have Read More
Theory vs Application
I feel like traditional schooling focuses too much on theory and not enough on application. What do I mean by that? Take a look at core curriculum: Math – what is math? In many ways, it’s the underlying theory behind how things work. I think it’s great to teach this stuff. But We’re missing the application – how does this topic relate to your day to day life? For example, Read More
What I Learned From Grinding Language classes for 9 Months
Over this past year, I’d say my biggest accomplishment was building out my language learning habit and actually improving somewhat in my foreign language speaking skills. So what exactly did I do to learn new languages? I started taking tutoring classes online. Originally, I scheduled weekly classes to learn Chinese. Now, I’m learning Mandarin, Cantonese, Spanish and Japanese. Now, am I learning them all equally as well? Not even close. Read More
Chicanery – on Crossing the Rubicon
I’m really into Better Call Saul . It’s my favorite current TV show, and my personal canon of Great TV Shows™ . My favorite episodes in particular are the ones that address the relationship between Jimmy and Chuck – the underlying resentment that’s simmering throughout the series. Whenever the series decides to confront the elephant in the room, things complode – it’s like dynamite. I’m thinking of two episodes in Read More
Directing Your Life
I follow a couple of various career forums – Fishbowl, Blind, and CSCareerquestions. I’ve been seeing a bunch of people ask similar questions – typically, new grads who’ve moved for a job are lonely and looking for social outlets – Since they’re new to the area, they don’t know anyone, and unlike their hometown or college, they don’t have a built in system for meeting people outside of work. Their Read More
The Feedback Loop: On Incorporating Retrospectives
You ever revisit an old song/movie/book/TV show that you loved in the past, but found out it was actually pretty bad, or dated? Keep in mind, there’s a difference between having your tastes change over time and just visual rot over time. For example, specific genres like action movies usually age worse than other genres, say a romance or drama, because they usually rely on more special effects. In this Read More
Formality vs Informality: Why Blogs are good
You know, when I think of the rise of blogs and how they’ve contributed to destroying our media institutions, blogs are kind of bad. Literally any dipshit with an opinion can opine on a subject they know nothing about, and it can be designated as significant as an expert in the field who has diligently researched the topic. Having said that, they also do the opposite – they can empower Read More
Titans of Cultural Industry
I was reading this reddit thread about the creator of Spongebob Squarepants passing away. A lot of the commenters were mentioning the culture in the USA regarding shared cultural references that the show provided, as millions of children in the US grew up watching the series. It reminded me of something I wanted to write about: the change in default culture in America. Think about founding fathers America: what was Read More
Devaluing Content – On the Internet of Shit
If you look at the current wave of the internet, the dominant financial force is the move to social media. Reddit, Instagram, Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, etc. It’s no longer the hot new thing, but a part of entrenched conglomerates coming after your time and attention. Here’s a hot button issue that’s increasingly talked about now: drinking from the internet firehose. Back in the 90’s, the internet was a small place. Read More