stlplace

Category: advice and tips

  • Two credit card and Digital Wallet tips

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    Digital wallet and credit card expiration and automatic extension

    Investopedia : What Is a Digital Wallet? Also quote Investopedia

    There are several digital wallets available. Here are some of the most well-known:

    Cash App
    Apple Pay
    Google Wallet
    Samsung Pay
    PayPal
    Venmo
    AliPay
    Walmart Pay
    Dwolla
    Vodafone M-PESA

    Personally I use Apple Pay (in store) and PayPal (online stores). I know some investors or speculators like to dunk on the PayPal stock $PYPL. But I noticed in recent years that both Apple Pay and PayPal do CC renewal (extension) automatically: at least for the Chase CC. This is good – one less hassle. When you think about this automatic renewing feature: it’s very similar to the “opt-in” feature in some of the apps or websites.

    On the contrary, credit card stores on e-commerce website (let’s say MSD or Spire Gas company payment section is also e-commerce) usually just let the stored credit card expire: from Amazon to Panera. Basically if we want to use the credit card again, we need to either edit or delete/re-add the card.

    Apple Pay

    For me I didn’t use Apple Pay extensively until I got the Apple Watch. I saw it first hand at the “Daily Grind” coffee shop at Mastercard O’fallon campus: I noticed my colleague was paying via Apple Watch. One thing I didn’t try: I may try next time if I get a chance, I heard the campus only accepts Mastercard. So what if I pay via a Visa card on Apple Watch? 🙂 Anyway I pay mostly via Apple Watch nowadays at grocery stores: Aldi, Dierbergs, Trader Joe’s and Schnucks. One more tip: for PayPal, I encourage you set up multi-factor authentication (YT Video).

    I have used the Square (now Block) Inc’ Cash App and Google Pay in the past too. I liked Cash App. It seems to me Google Pay (chrome web browser version) seems a bit half baked for me 🙁

    Back to the credit card expiration, I noticed, on many automatic payment websites, e.g., MSD, CCRC and the J etc., I need to manually update the expiration date or re-type in the CC information on their website. This is okay, as I don’t have to a ton of places to update. Although I appreciate if they can just automatically update themselves. I had some glitches with MSD website after updating the card – had to try a few times to make sure the auto pay is still setup and work as intended.

    This reminds me of the e-wallet for kids. We have seen those in the Scholastic book fair at school – e-wallet for teachers or kids. However, debit card or Apple Pay (on Apple watch) has much wide usage.

    Kids debit card or CC

    I found Chase offers a kids debit card. There is a caveat though: I found I cannot fund the account online. So I still need to stop by the branch sometime to put in some money there so my 9 year old can use at her Dragon Den (LFGCPA spirit wear/swags store) this fall 🙂

    Also I noticed Amex offers CC (additional cardholder) to kids 13 and older. I gave my 13 year old this card. Btw, not too long ago, she had it lost from theft. Amex texted me right away – and I was able to remediate quickly. Thinking this is somewhat like safety or security feature: I mean shopping credit card. It provides a digital trace. For example, I know at which store my card was being used.

    Don’t lock in the foreign exchange rate

    Use credit card internationally: make sure use no foreign transaction fee card; no need to lock the rate – it will be more expensive to pay the fees for “locking the rate”. Many years ago in Shanghai, at the Courtyard Xujiahui – I locked the rate after the receptionist 店小二 told me about this feature, and later on I realized the rate (the fees) is not favorable to me.

    I used CC in Shanghai in 2016, as well as shopping at Amazon Germany store (and maybe, Amazon Canada, and some other online store in UK), and I chose not to lock in the rate from then the Courtyard Xu’jia’hui stay.

    Note in China, the Visa, Mastercard, Amex and Discover credit cards are not widely accepted. The most popular payments methods in China are Alipay and WeChat Pay. It seems from the Merchant perspective, the latter 2 are much cheaper (source: X).

    ……顾晓敏还提到，外卡刷卡手续费高昂，单笔费率基本上在2.5％到3.5％不等，而支付宝单笔费率仅为3.8‰，因此很多商户更愿意让外国人使用现金或支付宝、微信，外卡刷卡率仅为23.19％。……”

    A related topic, is the profit margin of Stripe. Quote:

    Stripe’s EBITDA profit is $100M, and they processed roughly $1 trillion in 2023, which means their profit margin is 100m/1tn = 0.01%.

    I actually agree with Cristina Cordova: processing volume ≠ revenue

    This got me thinking, what is Stripe’s annual revenue? Per Backlinko: Stripe’s gross revenue reached $14.4 billion in 2022. So the math is 100 / 14400 = 0.69%

    Last but not least, make sure you get a “no foreign transaction fee” credit card: Chase offers quite a few cards with this feature, namely, Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Amazon and Chase Hyatt. Amex Gold doesn’t have foreign transaction fee either.

  • Ankle injury and recovery – 从哪里摔倒就从哪里爬起来

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    I don’t know about you, but I was fairly enthusiastic about sports when I was in the middle school and part of the high school. At one time I thought I should join the Chinese youth soccer team (under 16), which looking back I don’t think that’s possible.

    A few months ago I also talked about Tennis 网球. Recently (to be precise on Jan 7 Sunday evening) my old daughter injured her ankle during a tennis clinics session. I only saw her injured after the fact, as I didn’t see her fall on the spot, which is a few minutes towards the end of clinics. So we got the ankle wraps and tapes etc. from the Walgreens. But she still jumps on one leg – because she could not use any force on her injured ankle. The second day was Monday (school day), obviously we cannot go to school under this condition. And because “wait and see”, as well as “my wife’s reluctance go to urgent care” that day, I went ahead and bought Crutches from Walgreens (I posted it on CL recently).

    Urgent care and specialists

    The following Tuesday we still went to the Total Access Urgent care (TAUC) next to Walgreens at Creve Coeur (cost: $175.00 not too bad). Then it’s following up. I chose and went to the Shriner’s Hospital for that: 2 trips, the cost to us is only $102.13, plus they have magicians on site sometimes. This seems very reasonable. This is much cheaper than the X-ray service fee (more than $400) from BJC for scoliosis (false positive, but nonetheless the checkup/x-ray and followup with specialist (not too bad there).

    (Update 03-18-2024) It seems the Shriner’s Hospital changed their billing in the month of February. Since last time I paid them inside MyChart, I received 2 more bills and I paid them online (a new bill pay website, not from MyChart). The total is about $250. Btw, BJC sent one more bill from the doctor who reads the X-ray, it’s not a lot – but overall cost seems high to me.

    (Update 03-26-2023) Okay, I think now I understand most bills now. There were 5 bills or 5 payments from my side. Two bills for the X ray which although it says the doctor’s name in the insurance company website’s benefit explanation section. Two bills for the nurse practitioner who looked at S. And one therapist who came for the 2nd visit. The total out of pocket for Shriner’s hospital is about $450 for us.

    4 Bills from the Shriner’s hospital, I think I turned off the paper bill in MyChart and one of the paper bill didn’t come

    Btw, I am selling a few gentenly used items on eBay to recover some of the costs.

    Set of 2 Theraband Resistance Bands – Green and Blue

    Ovation Medical Walking Boot Adjustable Support, Black, Size Medium, Adjustable

    Walgreens Ankle Support, Antimicrobial, Adjustable One Size Fits All

    Below was written on 02-04-2024 从哪里摔倒就从哪里爬起来

    Our old daughter back to court after 3 weeks break, at CCRC.

    几个礼拜前她的脚踝扭了：现在已恢复。我几个礼拜之前说了买网球鞋的事：大家如打网球，可以参考一下。A side note is our 13 year old got to hang out with her friend in the mall on Saturday. I recall when I was her age: I like to hang out at the bookstore by myself, and also I saved some changes and bought snacks such as 金团 一种糯米做的甜点。美国中西部没有金团，类似的甜点有mochi 应该是从日本来的。Anyway I am quite happy she is back to her normal routine, and also enjoys some “chill time” with her friend.

    Adolescence

    Our 13 year old is soon going to be 14 year old. And recently she started to pick up her own clothes, and I think some of it (the style) is likely influenced by the TikTok and YT shorts, her friends (again TT and YTS), and some stores such as Aerie (American Eagle).

    In contrast, I recall I started to pick my own clothes around similar age.

    Performative Society

    Other related topics: how hard should parents push adolescent kids on sports, for that matter anything.

    I felt we increasingly live in a performative society, thinking applicable to me (or my work) as well. This is a bigger topic and I will come back to it sometime soon, hopefully.

    PS: personally I haven’t had hurt my ankle that bad, when I was a teen. I did get my ankle hurt once during a soccer game, in which my teammate accidentally kicked my left ankle (using his dominant foot, right foot), he and I was trying to kick the same soccer ball.

  • Don’t solely relying on the income from day job

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    Reasons for that: economy and layoffs – we have zero control on neither; at certain point, companies and organizations started to discriminate against older workers in terms of hiring and firing (layoffs), due to their potentially higher salary, higher healthcare expense, and so on.

    Tech Job Cuts: tweet and video by Dee Bosa of CNBC
    Chances of layoffs at the Magnificent 7

    Surprising, at least for now, AI is the not main reason for the tech layoffs, per the YT video below.

    Note we have no controls over the layoffs, especially in terms of the company’s decision. In theory we have some influence such as do our job well, but this is not guaranteed to help one avoid layoffs.

    Some of the things I can think of or I am doing

    Blogging (make some ads money from Google, very hard). The downside of this one is it takes lots of traffic to generate a bit ads revenue. Similar for the YouTube video creation. For me this is even harder than the eBay.

    Selling on eBay (is eBay increasing becoming a flea market, btw?). One side benefit of selling on eBay is declutter, as well as reduce, reuse and recycle theme. Reducing the carbon footprint is rewarding for me.

    Part-time gig (e.g., adjunct teaching at Webster U). Note this is not scalable as it’s mainly selling time for money.

    Stocks: note this one is risky. But it potentially could have more rewards (again, this depends on many factors, such as the capital one has).

    A related topic is to reduce the expense via DIY

  • Year end tax moves and my thoughts on personal finance and investing

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    Some friends asked me about the year end tax moves, such as the tax loss selling etc. Here is a good article on the topic – Tax-Loss Harvesting: What It Is, How It Works. My take on tax: this is at least secondary maybe even more down the priority list. The No. 1 priority in the personal finance/investing is don’t lose your money. Ideally we don’t want any type of loss. Tax loss is applicable only after we lose the money during investing. If we don’t have loss in the 1st place, would it be better?

    But I do appreciate the mindset of 亡羊补牢。Or salvage whatever we can (not exact translation).

    Another question is what to contribute if we need to contribute to the regular IRA account. The latter is an easier question. The deadline to fund IRA is actually usually the tax day (the middle of April), so we still have time. As to investments, I only recommend the S&P 500 index funds and I explained it more here.

    The 529 plans I setup for my girls

    I have a fairly small 529 plan for my girls, which I started shortly after they were born (see my blog post one, blog post two, and blog post three).

    With the enhancement of the 529 plans by the law passed by congress in the recent years, it becomes a tool for retirement as well. Read this for more details.

    The thing I taught my 13 year old the other day, is the 12/6 compounded interest rule (snowball effect), an investment that grows 12% annually, in 6 years it will double. From 2010 to 2023, since I invested in S&P 500 index fund, and the S&P 500 index did well since 2010, the money I put in quadrupled. It was a small amount of money. But the compounded interest concept is important and we saw it in action.

    Another thing many working people can consider is the HSA account. I heard it has even more benefits for retirement compared to the 529. So something to read about, think about and do something about 🙂

    My free tips on PF and investing

    Like many good things in life, don’t rush it. Take the time, savor the moment, think it through, before jump into the market and make big moves: Rome is NOT built in a day. So was the business empire such as Berkshire Hathaway, or the GPU, AI chip designer nVidia. They are built in decades.

    Hindsight is 20/20

    Look at the about 1,137% or 11 times gain of $CVNA. Below is the YTD chart of Carvana vs CarMax ($KMX), Tesla ($TSLA) and S&P 500 index. But the million dollar question is: who bought and hold the $CVNA this year (until today)?

  • How I learned spoken English after coming to the USA and started teaching

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    Using Spoken English the 1st time in the USA

    97年夏天我第一次来美国，我的飞机航班是东航上海虹桥(SHA) 到洛杉矶 (LAX, China Eastern MU 583), 当时好像用的是麦道11(Btw, 93年好像有一次事故），再从洛杉矶坐TWA航班飞圣路易斯(STL)。我在洛杉矶机场犯了一个不大不小的错误。我当时很想上厕所，急着从机场（入境处和海关）出来，结果一出来就拿错了行李。等我发现我拿错了，我已经出了海关，我赶紧用我的英语跟美国机场的工作人员解释，还好他听懂了，让我进去跟东航的地勤人员说上话，交换了行李（取到了我自己的行李）。这个箱子是当时上海第一百货的牌子，估计我们都是在一百买的，这个箱子实用也较便宜。这一次是我的口语第一次在美国派到用场。

    PS: 大概在2005/6年在圣村的机场，又碰到一件类似的事情，这一次是Diplomat的灰色硬壳箱。对方把我的箱子拿到家以后，没有多想，直接撬锁。后来她通过航空公司陪了我大概是五十还是一百块钱(USD)：她没有拿我的东西，就是赔我的坏掉的箱锁。那个箱子今年回国才退休。Also: I have other stories with the diplomat luggage (1 and 2) back in 2007 when I tried to replace a broken wheel. So this one really last for a long time: at least from 2007 to 2023. I think I bought it before 2007 too.

    Learning English in Missouri S&T at Rolla

    Note the adults tend to stay or social with her/his own ethic group or friends, and use the 1st language he/she is familiar with. When I was a graduate student in Rolla more than 20 years ago, I used to have an American professor, and he made a comment which I agree: American grad students stay with the Americans, Chinese students stay with the Chinese, and Indian students stay with Indians.

    I have Indian born advisor, and I talked to Indian born graduate students. One nice thing is one fellow graduate student sometimes corrected my English, and that really helped. Not many people would correct or point out. Btw, that particular grad student is now a technology VP at a credit rating agency.

    At one time, I was able to translate for the professors during a meeting. I think the fellow graduate student is from Africa and he has some accent, but it’s not too hard to guess or figure out.

    Host family
    When I was new to Rolla, I got to learn the Stoltz family through the international office’s host family program. And they helped my English (via conversations), and get familiar with the America culture in many aspects. I still remember, the dinners, the trips to the Governor’s Manson, to Branson and the Xmas gifts.

    Fraternity

    At one time because I live with American undergrad everyday, and listen to their talking daily, I felt English is almost like “my native language”. Also once my “big brother” told me: you lived in a quite unique fraternity. And I agree: in the beginning of my stay there, I rode bike from school to the fraternity house every day. When the weather was bad I would call the house for help, and my brothers never failed to pick me up. That includes the rides in the snow days too.

    I retook the English test again a few years later: got a “fair” grade from another Indian born professor.

    TV and Movies are also a very important source of education for my Oral English. Back in those days it was mostly the Blockbuster videos, and just movies on the TV. Now it’s mostly streaming mostly from Netflix, Amazon and Hulu. American middle schools and high school tv 📺 or movies 🎥
    High School: Gilmore girls (Netflix)
    High School: Breakfast club (I watched via Amazon Prime, free)
    College: back to school 🏫 (Amazon, for a fee)

    Holiday themed movies

    Love Actually (a classic, watch it on Netflix before 12/31/2023)

    Holiday in Vineyard (Netflix)

    Christmas with a View (Netflix, going away on 1/1/24)

    More

    Romantic series: the Virgin River (Netflix, the series 5 just debuted and the last episode has holiday theme/Christmas celebration)

    Other comedies:

    Seinfeld

    Friends

    No Hard Feelings (Jennifer Lawrence, new on Netflix)

    NPR

    Most listened programs: morning edition, all things considered, market place, planet money and ted radio hour.

    Listened in the past, enjoyed but no longer available or no longer listen much due change of taste or programming: Diane Rhem show, Fresh Air (Terry Gros), Car Talk, Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, Weekend Edition.

    Including BBC World Service (in the night)

    Teaching

    I taught in China. Many years ago in SH. Failed. Will talk more about that exp. later, hopefully 🙁

    When I was new to Rolla, I failed in the Teaching Assistant (TA) English test – later I tried to practice oral English with a English teacher during lunch (once a week). I didn’t teach when at Rolla (again because I flunked the spoken English test), and had to look for RA (research assistant) job in the school. Later on I taught in Abacus Rolla, to a few fellow grad students, and I did okay. It was friendly environment too.

    This fall I started teaching graduate course at Webster U. 韦伯斯特大学客座教授（其实就是兼职 adjunct professor 🙂 Couple funny things:

    1. I was nervous before doing this, but my wife and 13 year old daughter were quite nervous too;
    2. I think it’s giving me some energy interacting with younger folks (all graduate students are younger than me). I do interact with my kids quite a bit too: to be precise more than interacting with them, or Uber-ing them around. But most kids will eventually grow up and live on their own. That’s where interacting with young folks becoming more important: I believe that’s one reason Warren Buffett likes to teach at school sometimes, or hosting the MBA students at his company’s HQ or at the annual shareholder meeting. Also the BRK meeting, plus Charlie’s Daily Journal Co and past Wesco shareholder meetings allow both of them to interact with many people, including many young people too. That’s one secret sauce of their longetibity.

  • My blunder on presenting today

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    Today I made a pretty bad mistake on my presentation. Basically, I messed up my audio shortly after I got started, and I was not aware of it for about 6 minutes or so: until I realized I was kicked out the meeting. The audio issue was caused by my airpods losing battery, and I switched to the bluetooth headset. But it appears the airpods is still connected as I did not put the airpods in the pod (partially due to presenting, and I was a bit overwhelmed). Because the airpods was making noise, my colleague dropped me from the meeting, which I did not realized as I was switch between the tabs on Chrome web broswer: the meeting was just a tab and it was not obvious.

    Going forward, I am going to implement two changes: no two bluetooth devices at the same time (again due to not complete switch over or disconnecting issue); also I am going to pull out the google meet tab to its own window so that I can be made aware.

    Remote working brings a lot of convenience, and it brings a lot of challenges too (remember the lawyer’s I am not a cat incident on Zoom?). One thing I think it’s important is the empathy. I think the place I am working is okay, but not perfect. Without getting too much details, I feel I did not get much support, rather received some criticisms instead. There are better ways to handle that. If I am a leader, I would handle it differently.

  • Covid vaccine in St. Louis county

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    St. Louis County COVID-19 Vaccines (pre-register)

    Providers (hospitals in alphabetical order)

    BJC

    Mercy

    SSM

    St. Luke

    Precautions / things to pay attention before taking vaccines.

  • Holmdel BOE election

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    FB

    Patch

    betterholmdeleducation (Platform)

    data, media (social media, year sign, email etc)

    Linda Zhang

    Irfan Lateef

    Ladue

    2012

    Ladue School Board Candidate Q&A With Sheri Glantz ” If funding allows, adding the option of Chinese to our foreign language department would be a priority.” (do I hear any volunteer here? Kidding. I mean a part time Chinese instructor to be serious)

    2013

    5 Candidates State Their Positions on Ladue School District Issues

    Jeff Kopolow, Dan Regelean Elected to the Ladue School Board (data)

    2014

    2015

    BOE results: Glantz, Goldstein won (out of 5 candidates)

    2016

    BOE results: Johnson, Kopolow won (out of 3 candidates)

    2017

    FB: Kisha Lee: The Key to a Stronger Ladue (2017 Meet the Candidates Night; won again in 2020 run #unopposed). From my recent memory Kisha is the first African American woman to be elected to Ladue BOE. As you may have read from above, she started in 2013.

    2018

    Glantz and Goldstein Re-Elected to Ladue Schools Board of Education

    for more detailed information on election, refer to County Board of Election (citizen can request)

    2019

    results (county board of election): Johnson, Kopolow won out of 3 canidates

    2020: there was no election on this year and the incumbent ran #unopposed (there was no new comer). The bylaw says that if there is no bond issue, and there is no new comer, there is no need for election.

    2021

    Marissa Rosen 4 Ladue April 6, 2021

    Procedure to file for BOE

    Board Briefs (blog)

    Official web site

  • Where to buy masks

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    Masks are much more widely available, and much more widely accepted now, compared to the early days of shutdown, or in February when the US was not directly impacted by COVID. I recall buying masks at Chinese grocery store, also at the Aliexpress.com (a subsidiary of Alibaba that serves customers outside of China). Also friends in China sent in some. All those are one time use “surgical type” or “dusk” masks. The quality was okay but great. Now those are more widely available in large websites or stores as well: Amazon, Costco, Walmart etc. The price came down as well.

    But I am not a big fan of one time use masks. I had one cotton mask before the pandemic, and I used it a lot (I do need to wash it more often). Recently I found those Hanes masks are good or decent. They have 50 packs as well. It comes down to $2.50 per piece. I already received it, washed it, and started using it. I think one person can use one mask per day, just like undergarments. Use Code “SAFE20” for Extra 20% Off.

    Also, some kids (and their families) in Ladue school, started this stl mask project: the money raised will be donated to operation food search.

    I noticed some special purpose masks such as masks for running as well. Those cost a bit more than normal ones (see below), as cotton ones could easily cause sweat.

    Last but not least, I think custom made or the name on mask can have some values, especially for teachers or healthcare workers. I found Etsy have some (adult personalized mask, adult custom name mask, and reusable kids mask).

    (Update 07-20-2020) Found this deal on surgical masks at ebay. I ordered 300 🙂 Note I am still not big fan of one time use masks, but I plan to donate some and save some. Recently I found out I could misplace masks at home or in the car, so that’s the main use of one use masks.

  • CAGR compound annual growth rate of one of my IRA account

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    This IRA account was a bit unusual, as I took some meaningful losses earlier on. Then from 2017 (maybe a little bit more earlier, but I only have the balance history since Jan 3, 2017), things started to look up. In last 3.5 years, the CAGR is about 54.54%. My bigger winner during this time was $HUN, and more importantly $OKTA. This is the chart.

    And the formula to do it via Google chart. Basically I imported the CSV (downloaded form broker website) into google sheet, and used the default chart, and added the formula for CAGR compound annual growth rate. Last but not least, one may adjust the formula a bit (maybe retype it), in my case, I used this formula: power (end value / beginning value, 1.0 / number of periods) . The ^ symbol (at least as I copied and pasted) seems have some issues, so I used the math power function, which is same as the ticker ^ symbol here. The period is year here, as I was looking for the annualized return.

    Last but not least, this does not depict the full picture of my personal investments. I made some dumb mistakes here or there, and also, I put most of my 401k money in stock mutual funds (some in S&P 500 funds).

    (Update 07-21-2020) The annual return is 13.34%, as shown in the chart. There was two meaningful drops in last 12 months. For comparison, the S&P 500 was up 9.25 % in last 12 months and Berkshire Hathaway was down -6.65% in the same period (yahoo Finance chart here).

    In retrospect, I did not do well when I trade too much. One reason for more trading is since last last year, TDAmeritrade stopped the trading fees. Rohinhood was free since its beginning (2015?) and I did decently well in its early days. Then I got into sort of slump. This is similar to my main trading account (IRA at TDAmeritrade), I did well in 2017 and 2018, perhaps early half of 2019 too. But was just so-so in last 12 months (again refer to my chart). Update: actually I did not do very well in 2017 (+25%), but I did exceptional in 2018 (up 100%), then followed by 50% in year 2019. Overall still decent.