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Life Life Tips Saint Louis

St. Louis Area Nature Trails

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For hiking or walking. Some are paved, while others are not. By nature I mean there are trees etc. around the trail. I am adding difficulty levels (categories) for hiking or walking. By easy, I mean it’s suitable for family. By moderate, I mean, the old or the young may have some challenge complete the whole trail due to distance, or the surface.

Easy

Gentry Park at Bridgeton: paved

Malcolm Terrace Park: some nature walk, 1 mile round trip from the pavillion (the longer loop).

Millennium Park: paved.

Stacy Park: some nature walk, newly installed in last few years.

Venable Park: full name is Dr. Phillip Venable Memorial Park.

Warson Park: Stacy Park: some nature walk, newly installed in last few years.

Chesterfield central park: all paved

Creve Coeur Lake (paved), the loop is about 3.6 miles. Gets popular in nice days (weather). Note many St. Louis county parks have the exercises equipment or station along the trail, sometimes my kids would like to play with them during the walk. The only thing we need to be careful is: sometimes an equipment could be broken – stay away from it. Don’t attempt to work on the broken equipment, and got hurt (then sue the county park division 🙂

Powder Valley: mixed paved vs gravel. There are a few short distance trails.

Longview Farm park: at Town and Country. Note the Quneey Park is not too far away, and it’s much bigger.

James McDonnell County Park: it has quite a few amenities, and it’s fairly close to where I live.

Moderate

Boot Leg Trails at Creve Coeur Lake: note this is a trail sometimes the bikers riding bikes. Most of them are mindful of the hikers, but in general try not to listen to AirPods (especially with the noise cancelling features) so that you don’t get hit by a bike. I think the Lost Valley in St. Charles are like that too.

Quneey Park: this along with the Boot Leg, are probably two popular longer trails in the St. Lous county. I recall I ran once at the park during the SnowBall series a few years ago (maybe year 2017 or 2018?). There are two popular winter run series in the STL area, the other one is Frost Bite. I am running the latter series last year and this year. Both are good. I had quite some memories over the years from the Snowball series, including once, had to run briefly in the Creve Coeur lake (paved) trail in the melted snow water: one gentleman fell unfortunately, and that’s the reason I remembered.

Lost Valley: St. Charles. We did a large portion of the trail during the rock runner morning run. Below is quote from Andy K. who is the organizer of Rock Runner

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  • Physical Address is: Lost Valley Trails Parking Lot, Lost Valley Trail, Defiance, MO 63341 (trailhead). 
  • Technical Level Yellow as the trail includes a variety of the following: single track, gravel road, creek crossings, dirt and semi rocky trails, switch-backs, moderate climbs and descents
  • For the History Buffs among us, here is a great link with tons of information and pics surrounding the unfortunate events in the 1940’s in the surrounding area of the park. Lost Valley area history  

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Mastodon: Jefferson County

More nature trails

I also maintain a Google doc that has more nature trails in the area. I intend to maintain that google doc as time goes. Probably hike (re-hike) some of those trails too.

During 2020 to 2022, we (as a family, many times with friends) hiked quite a few places, especially in the year 2020 and 2021 (due to pandemic, I guess the moms were worried about kids’s well beings, and they don’t like kids glue their eyes to the iPads all day). Unfortunately “gluing to iPads or computer” is the new normal now with the pandemic is largely behind us 🙁

In Summer 2022 I also joined the Rock Runner by Fleet Feet and got to hike or ran in some of the area nature trails.

PS: AllTrails has a nice website and app for the trails in the US. I used their paid app in couple years and they allow the map to downloaded so that even in the trails (a lot of times we don’t have reliable cell data), we can still have the map and GPS.

Categories
China Chinese articles Life

长江轮船🚢

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The picture is from 春节回家路上，你是否还记得那张旧船票？

再过几年，如果不出意外(knock on the woods)，我会送我的老大去上大学。希望是一所她理想中的学校。今年是我大学毕业30周年。也就是说我是34年前（也就是1989年夏天）开始去上大学的。我家在宁波，我的大学在武汉。那时候国内火车没有现在那么发达。但是那时候有轮船，有客运的海轮和长江轮船。宁波到上海一般是坐海轮或是火车，上海（十六铺码头）到武汉（汉口，忘了几号码头了）有长江轮。大学生坐火车有半票，轮船没有这个优惠。火车要相对快一些，但是有时候（很多时候）会没有座位。轮船较慢但是有床位可以睡觉。可以说各有利弊。其实还有飞机，宁波到武汉有运七(Wiki, Baidu))的飞机，很可能是螺旋桨的飞机。我没有坐过（因为机票更贵），但是我有镇海中学的同学坐过。

第一次去大学

我第一次去武汉上学是坐了两个/趟轮船，宁波到上海，上海再到武汉。我爸爸送我到上海。宁波到上海一般是坐/睡一个晚上。上海到武汉，长江逆流而上，是72个小时，大概是两天三夜。武汉到上海顺流而下大概是48小时。还有长江轮其实有两个分公司，江申号是上海的（上海简称是申），江汉号是武汉的。

轮船一般会有不同等级的仓位，一般坐四等仓较多。我有一次坐了回长江轮的五等仓。那一次好像是我表姐带着我去买票，她可能有点节省惯了，她建议我买五等仓，我就买了。

四等仓和五等仓

五等仓的一个房间人/床比四等仓就更多一些。四等仓我印象中是十二个人，五等舱可能是二十四人。还有就是五等舱是在最底层，机器的声音好像也响一些。我现在美国呆久了，我住的地方也有不少华人。我觉得华人有一点是有待改进的，那就是攀比和歧视。轮船的仓位也是有歧视的：我记得当时五等舱的同仓里面好像有上海知青一家人。男主人说：他们有些人认为我们是穷人（他用了穷鬼这个词），其实我们并不是没钱，我们只是想省钱。我觉得他的话也是有道理的。其实除了五等仓，还有一种叫散仓，就是给一个折叠床和被褥，一般可以放在船头。有一回，大概是1993秋天，我刚毕业不久，出差从青岛回上海坐海轮，没有床位，大家都坐了散仓。

我第一次去武汉坐了四等仓：我记得当时同仓有几个国家排球（青年）队的几个队员，湖北人，他们说的湖北话我基本上不懂。不过武汉/湖北话其实跟普通话较接近，到了学校以后很快就能听懂了。有一个小小的笑话，有个湖北同学，我们两个可能是到寝室最早的，他说：我的“鞋子”（孩子，湖北话鞋子听起来像孩子）（从窗口）掉下去了。

我印象中四等舱和五等舱的价格大概差别是十几/二十块钱（五十几🆚七十几）。我记得火车票因为是半票大概是二十七块钱。那时候十几/二十块钱对我来说还是值一点钱的：我印象中到我大四的下学期，我爸爸妈妈大概会给我一个月一百块钱的生活费（主要是吃饭的钱，加上零花）。我倒推一下，估计我大一的第一学期，可能一个月是五十块钱的生活费。

总的来说，坐船比坐火车还是舒服很多。因为火车，尤其在春运期间，不仅没坐的位置，有时连站的位置也没有。我以前在这两个博客文章里也讲过, search for “train” (blog post 1, blog post 2)。我记得，有一次，我从宁波回武昌，从南昌转车，经株洲，最后到武昌，总共大概站了十几个小时。那时候是绿皮的火车。我记得有一段时间，我站在一个东阳到武汉大学上学的师姐（88级），她给了我一个苹果，削了皮的。

餐厅

轮船上有餐厅，当然也不会很便宜。很多时候，我应该是吃方便面的。那时候好像还流行火腿肠。偶尔有时也会去餐厅买个饭。记得有一次同仓的有个在武汉上学的师姐（比我高一级的女生，她家可能是马鞍山的），她的男朋友也会上船，她见到男朋友自然很开心。

轶事

有一次，好像是冬天，有个人跳下去了，是白天（我估计这个人不是真的想自杀）。结果很快被发现，大船掉头，放下小艇把那个人捞上来，费了一点时间。

我为什么去武汉上学

有一个原因，我家里人，主要是听我妈妈说去北方要吃黑面包（馒头）。我们南方人本来就不喜欢面包，好像有个老乡去了北方（天津还是西安）回来说的。我估计，我妈妈可能希望我上学的地方近一些。结果我第二志愿报了武汉（第一志愿是上海某高校）。因为武汉是吃大米为主的。我有个山东同学，在老家主要是吃馒头（面食）。他们一帮山东老乡在校门口的饭店吃饭，问有没有饭，结果拿上来的是米饭，很是失望。那时候在学校里，听到苏南，上海，绍兴等地的话都是感觉较亲的。

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401k and Personal Finance Business Fun Fun Video Investing Life Life Tips Master Series

The 4 right hand men of Warren Buffett 巴菲特的四大金刚

Reading Time: 3 minutes

油管：my Youtube 2022 video for BRK HQ video below (narration mostly in Chinese)

Charlie Munger

We know Charlie Munger (Wiki) passed away recently, and he was the vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway: he had some influence on Warren Buffet’s investments over the years, including See’s Candy, Coca Cola and so on. Here is the free online book Poor Charlie’s Almanack (you can purchase the paper versions through the links here). Also, the last interview before he passed away with CNBC’s Becky Quick (1 hour 42 mins, YouTube link here). I still think Warren makes most investments decisions independently. though.

If you like to have a quick look, I listed some shorter videos of Charlie Munger’s classical moments here.

四大金刚 (google; baidu baike, Wiki) is a common idiom in Chinese, and I think it may be suitable to describe the current top 4 men who works for Warren Buffett. And I assume they take over most of what Warren does today, should Warren decides to retire.

Top Two (Duo)

Greg Abel (Wiki): current Vice Chairman of BRK, responsible for all non-insurance operations, which also means he is in charge of the BRK Energy (formerly Mid-America Energy), BNSF Railway, many manufacturing and retail operations ranges from BH Home Service (real estate agents), Brooks Running, Clayton Home, Diary Queen, to ISCAR, Nebraska Furniture Market (NFM), Net Jets, See’s Candies, to Oriental Trading, Squish Marrow and so on. Note there are many business people may have not heard of. As of now, Greg will be the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway when Warren Buffett retires, in addition to his curent Vice Chair title.

Ajit Jain: current Vice Chairman of BRK, responsible for all insurance operations, companies such as Geico (car insurance) to reinsurance business.

Warren asked Greg and Ajit to be on the stage in last few years’ annual shareholder meeting, and they answered relevant questions in their portfolio. This is a good move. I think also, once Charlie slipped his tongue during an Q&A, and he said Greg will keep the culture (or something similar). So the world knows Greg is the CEO heir apparent.

Investment managers (also a duo)

Ted and Todd are two former hedge fund managers that Warren Buffet hired about 15 years ago (exact date please refer to their Wikipedia links below, or you can google it). Quite a few people including $BRK.A and $BRK.B shareholders would question Warren Buffett’s age and they are worried what if Warren suddenly became incapacitated or die. Who is the heir apparent. This is a tricky question or problem, because very few hedge fund managers would give up their career, at the same time would basically be prepared when this inevitable happens. It seems in Ted W. and Todd C. Warren found the perfect duo for this job. This is somewhat like the duo of Warren himself and Charlie.

Berkshire began buying Apple stock in 2016 under the influence of Buffett’s investing deputies, Todd Combs and Ted Weschler.

Ted Weschler: Ted got a bit unwanted attention from his personal IRA investment. But his performance speaks louder than his words. Quote Wikipedia: in 2012, Weschler joined Buffett at Berkshire Hathaway, a year after Todd Combs joined as Berkshire’s first investment manager. As of 2019, he managed $13 billion of the equity portfolio and $8 billion in pension funds.

Todd Combs: in addition to his investment duty (along with Ted), note Todd is also the CEO of Geico (and technically for that role he reports to Ajit). Here is a picture of Todd during “invest in yourself 5k” during the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder meeting. Here is a picture of Ted, Todd and Tracy Britt Cool during that run. Note Tracy used to work for Warren as well, and she started to work on her own investment partnership in recent years. Maybe someday she will come back to BRK: if the right opportunity arises.

Board

Howard Buffett, Warren’s older son, plans to take over the Chairman role when Warren retires. Susan Buffett, Warren’s daughter, and a few others will be on the board. They may need to add one or 2 board seats because Charile used to be a board member.

One thing it’s interesting is Warren likes #pairProgramming, or #pairWorking, because he has two pairs of magnificent managers for CEO and investment managers job.

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Edu-and-Ladue-School Life Life Tips

Winter Camp and Some Holiday Tips

Reading Time: 2 minutes

OR shall we call it winter break camp?

I still think during the holiday season, it’s best to spend more time with the kids as they do grow up so quickly. Enjoy the moment when we can. I recall one of the best preschool teacher and administrator, also a Montessori educator in the area, Susie Dodge-Shelton, once said something like this, basically she said “hug your kids more” during holiday season. We knew Susie since year 2008 (?, I think), and knew her husband David who was the director of Hope Infant Toddler Community (HITC): HITC which is next to the Hope Academy in Creve Coeur (HACC, and Susie served as director for the CC campus for many years), there is a short cut between the two campus as I recall. Now they are behind the giant BJC west campus (there was more trees and greens in the front of HACC. They are both wonderful couple and educators. And I believe they are both happily retired.

With that being said, I am aware of winter break camps, and we have been to some of their equivalent summer camps in the past. Below is not a complete list, to be updated as new information arrives.

Camps

All American Gymnastics and Super Ninja

Basketball: Bobby McCorMack: noticed Dec 18 to Dec 20.

Forest lake tennis camp: Winter Junior Camp

NRG WinterCamps & Specialty Camps

The J

Maryville Holiday Drop and Shop: Dec 10 and Dec 17

Olivette (In The Center of It All 🙂

Below are some holiday tips

Don’t Let Stress Ruin the Holidays (copied/pasted from my employer’s benefit email)
Stress often goes hand in hand with the holiday season. There’s the pressure of buying the perfect gifts — and making sure you don’t go broke. Holiday party after holiday party can stretch you thin. And for many of us, missing loved ones who are not around can make celebrating difficult.
Many adults deal with stress, anxiety, and depression during this time of year. Here are several strategies to reduce stress during the holiday season.

  1. Lean into healthy habits. Virtually any form of physical activity can act as a stress reliever, so get regular exercise during the holidays.
  2. Know your limits for time and money. Consider saying no to some invites to avoid felling overwhelmed. Set a realistic budget to prevent stresses from overspending.
  3. Limit social media. Social media may increase potential negative effects on your mental health. Try to use time around the holidays to step away from your phone and enjoy in-person time with loved ones.
  4. Stay present and be proactive. If you feel tension or worry building, address it before it becomes all-consuming. Giving yourself a chance to catch your breath and refocus may help you feel better. #holiday #stress #health
Categories
Chinese articles Life Life Tips

What’s for dinner? 晚饭吃什么 – a series on what we eat and its impact on our bodies – I

Reading Time: < 1 minute

我的小女儿经常说的一个口头禅是如上的标题。这个好像也是my better half （aka 也就是我太太)有时头疼的一个问题。我觉得吃或者饥饿也是人的本性之一吧。我自己总的来说应该是没有因为经济的原因，在小时候饿过肚子。我太太应该也没有（她也是浙江人）。有一次我闯了一个不大不小的祸：小朋友玩捉迷藏，我好像躲在那个油菜的杆子后面，后来那家人说他们那个还有菜籽（可以榨油的那种油菜籽，canola oil), 我爸爸妈妈可能陪了他们五毛钱(no pun intended, for real)。那个时候我爸爸的月工资大概是50块钱，也就是我的错误大概是我爸爸月收入的1%。比我十三岁女儿最近的iPhone事故稍好些。那天晚饭我不敢回家吃饭，后来我的哥哥把我叫回去了。一般来说，再大的事不影响吃饭。那时候还有一个大人经常用来吓唬小孩的故事：浪费粮食，打雷的时候雷公会打的。后来在美国，我的美国host mom(她四八年生人，我不是住在他们家，但是他们对我刚来美国有很大帮助，以后会单独写），她的妈妈在她们小时候经常说：finish what’s on your plate, because in China and India a lot of pepiple are staving. 让我又想到小时候的台湾人民生活在水深火热之中，后来在美国碰到台湾人，好像他们也这么说。

我是七十年代初在浙江东北部农村长大，相对来说应该是较富的农村。但是还是很怀念过年或是暑假去我外婆（大舅小舅家的日子）。我可能是比较贪吃的人。我想起来，我五年级，我小哥初二，他有一次开玩笑说我肚子里有馋虫。我将信将疑，可能有点像我九岁的小女儿（四年级）不久前对圣诞老人的相信程度吧 🙂

还记得有一次，我在镇海中学上学，我大舅来镇海（城关镇），他的学生（我一般叫她阿姨，因为她也是我妈妈的朋友，我妈妈比我大舅小十几岁），叫我一起去吃晚饭。虽然当时我已经在学校食堂吃过饭了。我就去她家吃了个十二分饱 🙁

很多年以后，严格来说也就是在我年过半百的时候，我才慢慢意识到，在我现在这个年龄，吃饭最好最好吃个7️⃣分饱。亡羊补牢为时不晚。Better late than never.

小时候，好像总的来说，肉比较少，有时候好像要凭票。牛肉更少，好像生产队偶尔会分牛肉：我印像中一般可能是耕牛（干活的牛）可能老死了。顺便说一下，我骑过一次牛，我应该很小，还没上学，我的叔叔给生产队放牛（不是亲叔叔，但是比较近）把我放在牛背上，感觉牛背很高（多年以后我后来在美国骑过一会马，感觉有点类似）。公公（叔叔的爸爸）很能干，我现在还记得在他家吃的高粱饼的味道。我们那里一般大家不怎么种高粱，印像中高粱主要是北方种得多一些。偶尔我们也会到邻居阿嫂家蹭东西吃：比如寒假暑假里，我们爸爸妈妈要上班，阿嫂做得东西很好吃。当然，可能还有一个原因，就是跟”neighbor’s yard is greener” 类似的道理。有一次，还听说一个笑话。事情是这样的：有一家在做“汤锅”，就是没有馅的小圆子，另一家正好经过，就开玩笑说等一下做好了，就来吃晚饭吧。主人就说好的。我估计这个客人的智商可能跟我小时候的智商差不多，因为她们后来真的穿着漂亮衣服，去吃晚饭了。

为什么提到我的智商呢，其实严格来说应该是情商，就是察言观色的水平，英文叫read the room, or read/listen between the lines。就是有一次，我大概是我小女儿现在的年纪，春节期间去我爸的亲戚家做客，他的表哥家，我爸的姨娘（也就是我奶奶的姐姐）也在，他们拿出了所有的好菜。结果，我可能把我姨婆/大伯家的黄鱼给撬了。后来知道有的菜主人可能就一份，不能随便撬的 🙁 我的大哥小哥可能把我好好笑话了一下。我记得这是我去唯一一次去大伯家做客。我爸爸可能后来有去的：我倒不是觉得是因为我撬了不该撬的菜。我估计主要还是春节期间我们一般会去外婆（小舅家）住几天。也有去过外婆家旁边的姑婆家：应该是我妈妈/舅舅的姑妈，和我妈妈的表哥家。我记得有一次（我应该比我小女儿现在还小），我在公共汽车站，说口渴，我外婆就走到相对较近的姑婆家给我去倒了水喝。小时候去外婆家，坐车，走路都有。我小时候有时会觉得，如果我“聪明”一点（用现在流行的话来说情商高一点），我的肩膀上可能跟两个哥哥一样是三条杠（而不是两条了）。这个可能在现在看来很好笑，但当时是我真实的想法。我后来有一次还真的拿到了三条杠，可惜时间不长，因为我五年级很快转学了：也就“削官为民” 🙂

在我的外婆家（也就是大舅，小舅家）没有这个不能撬菜的讲究。八零后九零后出生的朋友们可能会没听说过”拿出来装样子的菜“：生活水平后来慢慢上去了。还有一个，后来也是听朋友提起，就是重男轻女，女生先不上桌。这个可能现在也好多了。外婆可能还是重男轻女的，比如说她会让我的表妹（跟我同岁）帮我洗衣服，等等，但是总的来说还好。春节在我外婆家的主要任务就是吃吃吃。我现在想起来她有时会问我们，早上，coffee time (宁波话想不起来了), 中午，点心时（下午三点左右），晚上各吃什么。

记得我小舅也是很会做菜。我记得几年前在他家还吃过他做的菜。小时候有一次夏天，我在他家，他发现我吃饭较慢。他说是不是因为菜不够好。有一次，他买了不少好菜，比如大虾啥的，后来发现我还是吃得很慢，他就知道我这吃饭慢的习惯了。

当然我的主要时间还是在自己家里。可能吃了不少海鲜包括各种鱼。当然过年的时候会更多一点。平时也有一些，我奶奶会买。比如马鲛鱼（Spanish mackerels），现在在这边日本餐馆，还有有一次在Share Sweet 有买到。

TO be continued… (下面部分，我会慢慢展开）

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民以食为天是什么意思: 我估计在中国古代能吃饱饭可能是比较奢侈的事情。“国以民为本，民以食为天，谚语，意思是国家把人民看作根本，人民把粮食当作生命，指统治者应重视解决人民所需的粮食。”

冰箱坏掉的日子： 最近几天家里冰箱坏了。

但我后来慢慢知道在美国也有小孩吃不饱饭的。其实来到圣路易斯以后就知道了。主要倒不是听了John Edwards 的speech: 我在2004年美国大选时在Delmar Loop 的Blueberry Hills 见过他。还记得2008年那一次有人开了宝马车去food bank领救济粮/食品的。

https://www.nokidhungry.org/blog/how-many-kids-america-go-bed-hungry

https://www.rileychildrens.org/connections/food-before-bed-what-to-offer-kids-and-when-to-hold-back (this is not economy or financial related)

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Ozempic (the new and hot)

西方最新减肥药（处方药）以下是我的一些推（或着严格来说是X）。肥胖是西方尤其是美国很严重的一个问题，有个数据说美国成年人有42%的人偏肥胖(Source: National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases NIDDK, NIH)。

(Update 12-31-2023) I happened to see this book “How Not To Be Wrong (the power of mathematical thinking)” by Jordan Ellenberg, thanks to my wife. On page 24, it talked about nicomachean ethics. Let me quote: Aristotle observes that eating too much or too little is troubling to the constitution. The optimum is somewhere in between; because the relation between eating and health isn’t linear, but curved, with bad outcomes on both ends.

Categories
Career Life Life Tips

Micro managers and micro management

Reading Time: 3 minutes

My wife who started working for a localization company since this past April, for the most part she was happy. But recently she started to talk about this exact issue of her leader (more a tech lead or project lead, not necessarily a manager). This reminds me of my own experience of dealing with micro managers and micro management. It seems to me, in her case it was mostly her lead is fairly new to the position, and he listened to the client especially a guy who was on the team and has since moved to the client company as an employee. I can understand to some extent. If I was in his position (being new and would like to please the client), I may do some of what he did. Basically he wanted my wife vetting the “slacks messages” with him before posting them directly, also he made some changes to the messages and it seems to my wife he made it worse (I didn’t see the messages, so this could be a bit subjective to say the least). But I do know my wife is somewhat technical and she used to be testing engineer (quality assurance) and she does find bugs and sometimes would discuss those with me. For example, recently she saw a text in the web page (website) was wrong, and she asked whether that text is pulled from the backend (database etc.)

I don’t have a lot experience like this. But I can certainly empathize. I recall at a small contracting company I had a project lead like she has now. In that case I was let go eventually and I found a new place. Another case, at a coal mining company, my boss was also new, and he would like to make sure that I do the job properly especially in terms of the pace. So he started to do some Xcode (I was doing objective C development work for iPad). But he quickly realized that I was not goof around, and gave me a longer leash.

I have seen two micromanagers in my last job. I didn’t work for them, and I did work with them. One manager, and I think he is probably 20 years senior than me (I am pretty old). And I think he is just old fashioned manager. He would stand there, and use hand gesture to the people who report to him: you, come here. And once he had a fallout with one developer (which looking back, we should not hire, I will write about the interview later). Basically he won’t accept the developer’s code. Essentially he was saying that code is junk (which again may have some truth). But the way he communicated was blunt to say the least, and I had to step in and play a peace maker.

Another case, the new manager in another city called a Zoom meeting, and in the meeting essentially he sided with one developer, and fought against another two. Such a rookie new manager mistake. We had to calm the manager down, and told the manager it’s not the right forum for this. But if the manager can think, that’s not the right attitude to handle any workplace dispute either.

This also reminded me one more thing. That is how we micro manage our kids. We are not helicopter parents, as shown in the new Netflix movie No Hard Feelings. But I think my wife now realized she probably micro managed too much on the girls sometimes 🙂

Categories
401k and Personal Finance Business Life Life Tips

Credit card rewards

Reading Time: 3 minutes
PenFed Credit Union is asking me to lobby the congress on rewards Credit Cards

Or rewards credit cards. Today I received an email from PenFed Credit Union and they are asking me to lobby the congress on rewards Credit Cards. I no longer have their credit cards, I used to have their reward cards, and earned quite a bit gift cards from them. Basically I redeemed the points for various gift cards.

Some background

On the Credit Card rewards, and the legislations to eliminate rewards Credit Card:

NerdWallet

WALL ST USES BOGUS REWARDS ARGUMENT IN CREDIT CARD DEBATE

The Truth About Credit Card Rewards

(NPR) The dirty secret to credit card rewards

Are credit card rewards at risk? Congress eyes swipe transactions

(YouTube) Legislation in Congress could end credit card rewards

Note I have a page on this website related to the Credit Card Rewards too. Also, it seems I talked quite a bit on credit cards in my blogs.

What I think

Honestly at this stage of my life I have got “free” iPhone from the credit card rewards, and I got free stay at the Park Hyatt at Shanghai Pudong. But I am ready to give up those perks for the common good. 1% cash back from discover debit sounds good enough for me (see below screenshot). I understand I may be a bit superficial in the sense, that I received quite a bit benefits from the credit card rewards and now I don’t care. I think I am not taking sides on this: it’s a good position to be. I do understand the impact of credit card fees on the smaller retailers. Here in St. Louis, we have a Chinese grocery store that used to accept only cash, and debit cards, somewhat like Aldi did until a few years ago. Grocers have quite low profit margin and the 2 or 3% credit card swiping fee (processing fee) is meaningful or significant for them.

Who wants the free cup from my new dental office, btw?

This is a free cup given to me by the new dental office – as a good well gesture I guess. But I really don’t need it. Recently I am in the mode of declutter, and hope to clean up the house a bit so that we have more real living space 🙂 In a way rewards credit card is the same thing, basically it encourages or nudges the cardholder to spend more, I heard one research is credit card users will in general spend 15% than the consumer who uses cash only. I noticed this cup is from a company I know (Ariel Premium Supply) and I know a few people working there. Compared to the credit card companies, Ariel makes not a lot of money, but I think Ariel is in the rewards business too.

More about the business of Credit Card: The Credit Card Game (full documentary) | FRONTLINE (Aug 15, 2023 #Documentary #Debt #CreditCard)

Full disclosure: a few years ago I worked in the loyalty and rewards platform for a major Credit Card co. and once I spent 2 hours trying to give a Card Holder (CH) 13 cents worth of points.

Categories
Career Chinese articles Life Life Tips Software development

My programming career in the USA series I : 我在美国做码工系列之一

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Yesterday at a WeChat group, I wrote 昨天在一个微信群里我写到: 我（My LinkedIn Profile 我的领英链接）在美国工作23年迄今呆过十个庙。。。 话说完后我想起来十个庙，与多数码工相比，也真是不少了，平均2.3年（2年4个月）换一个工作。还好只是换工作😂

又想起在罗拉时，有一回是参加大公司招新的大学毕业生的介绍会（一般会有免费的比萨🍕饼，对我这样的穷学生来说诱惑力还可以）。有一次好像是听Honeywell公司的老总(possiably Michael Bonsignore)：你们这些年轻人（当时我还不是大叔），从大学毕业到退休，大概平均会有七个工作。这个与他们那一代人一辈子，大概三十四十年的打工生涯，大多为一家公司打工的情况大为不同。

我记得两年多之前在找我现在这份工作时，我现在的大老板（也就是老板的老板，manager’s manager) 说小徐啊，你好像换了不少工作啊。他是印度人，不会说小徐，但是听他口气，他不喜欢 Job Hopper 或者说是经常换工作的人（言下之意缺少长性，或是知难而退？）. Job Hopper这个词在这里是贬义词。但是这个也是有点意思的问题。因为在美国做码工，要涨工资的除了升职，一个主要的方法是跳槽，不管是内部跳，还是跳外部。我想大多数上班的人，尤其是年轻人是会追求这个的，所谓升官发财。当然我现在已过了这个年龄，我现在如果找工作，不再过于看重这些。这是后话。另外一方面，一个码工如果要进步，就要不断学习。从这个角度来说，其实适当在内外部跳跳也是不错的锻炼机会。我的理解是两三年可以跳跳，换换，用英文来说是找到新的challenge. 退一步来说，比如我从software engineer 换成architect，后来发现会议，office politics 太多，就再换回来。也挺好。所谓的树挪死人挪活，我觉得是有道理的。还有一种情况，虽然是被动地换工作，但是找准新的更适合自己的方向，也挺好。下面是一个反例。

10 Years of same old same old

就着上面这个跳槽的问题。说一个极端的例子：比如说一个人在一个公司，做同样的事，做了十年。那么他/她是十年的工作经验呢，还是一年（假如那些事一年就可以学会的话）。其实你可能猜到我想说的意思：他这个应该算一年的工作经验。其实我想说的意思是：工作中要不断学习。如果觉得缺乏挑战，应该自己想想，有什么办法可以改变现状。我的直觉有一次我见到的裁员有点这个味道。

我前调一下上面这个不完全是仅限于技术性的工作。从职业发展来说，一个人随着年龄和经验的增长，一般来说最好也提高一下自己的沟通交流，领导才能。其实在家里也是如此（如何引导小孩）。只是耕种好自己的一亩三分当然也不错，但是有时候还不够。当然跟人的性格也有关系，比如说有的人就是在家里听老婆的，那也不错。或者说在单位就想做Individual Contributor (IC), 听领导吩咐，屁颠屁颠地去做，只要自己愿意/开心，也挺好。没有一定的定式。

我的第一份工作

是在学校找的。我当时是博士生，但是我感觉我的基础太差，最主要我当时很想出去工作了（我觉得做很多事兴趣还是相当重要的）。2000年，正好也是美国纳斯达克的最高点 （“The dot-com bubble burst in March 2000, with the technology heavy NASDAQ Composite index peaking at 5,048.62 on March 10 (5,132.52 intraday), more than double its value just a year before. By 2001, the bubble’s deflation was running full speed.”），我记得我在3月20日面试一家软件公司，并拿到Offer。我记得大概是1999年夏天，学校有不少研究生同学在圣路易斯找到软件开发的工作。记得九九年时的起步年薪大概是五万美元（或稍多一些）。我2000年三月开了五万五，老板挺爽快，给了我五万六。一方面是中大型软件公司，另一方面当时市场也不错。十年以后，我发现在圣村，软件工程师起步的薪水大概是六万的样子。当然2000年到2010年美国的通胀不算严重。

当时最大的问题是身份问题。因为我从学校退学，直接去工作，我需要工作签证（H1B）。学生身份（F1签证）是不能直接工作的。我的工作签证大概是当年五月份申请，过几个月批准，并从当年10月1日开始生效。这个十月份是因为美国联邦政府的财政年度是从十月一日到次年的9月30日。H1B签证很紧俏，一般都提前申请，一般10月一日以后很快会用完当年的年度。

后来我听说那一年有读英文或者音乐专业的美国人直接找码工的工作成功的。只要她/他们说”我想学“就可以了。这个有点相当于我们说的英雄不问出处的意思。不过几年以后，就有优胜劣汰，不想学的，或实在是烂泥扶不上墙的，就基本上就不在行业里混了。从机会上来说，这个行业我觉得还是很多的，除了编程序（码工，programmer, software engineer) 以外，一般还有QA (quality assurance），business analyst (BA, 一般是和business 联系写requirements, 有些地方也叫product manager PM), project manager 和program manager (也叫PM，感觉英文的简称有点坑叔）。

读音乐专业后来成为高级码工的人我见过一个，在2000年秋天在罗拉的UMSL extension 一起上过面向对象的设计课程的一个美国人。面向对象是什么其实不是那么重要。你就把它当成2000年的dot com frenzy (internet bubbles), 或者相当于现在的AI, chatgpt 就可以了。那些新的东西是有用的。但是同时我们必须认识到good old human intelligence, good old 4th grade math are probably more useful and long lasting. 说到那个音乐系的哥们，他后来是村里还不错的咨询公司的Principal Software Engineer. 记得他当时开个宝马三系，还有点拉风的- 基本上相当于现在的特斯拉(3/Y系)吧。我当时开的是91年丰田卡罗拉的手动。我自己是罗拉机械工程硕士，在读研期间上了几门计算机课。我在国内自学过一些计算机，考过国内计算机程序员水平考试（复旦大学负责主办的）。但是我的编程水平真正提高应该是我的第一个东家。

我昨天在油管上看到一个华人小老弟的一个关于找码工工作的视频，觉得不错，先放在这里。还有这一个，好像是亚裔的小妹（HOW I BECAME A SOFTWARE ENGINEER | no CS Degree, career change + advice. I agree with her on the part that money is not everything, which is pretty relevant for me at this time of my career. I guess it’s harder to say for her at her stage of career as she just got started, nonetheless it’s even more impressive when I think about it.）。 这两个视频都是英文。正好可以练一下英文，至少在我所在的美国中西部，面试一般还是英文。Btw, I found Travis Media has this video on interview and job search that’s very good.

Career Ladder

Title for (application or software) programmer or 码工，software engineer, application or software developer. Or just a coder at informal settings. 我可能以后会讲一下升职和常见的career ladder. 比如说奈飞的L5 是相当于谷歌的L多少。我想我们华人除了比小孩爬藤以外，在硅谷的华人码工不少会在意这个级别，因为级别与工资奖金💰是挂钩的。当然我现在的观点，钱不是最重要的因素，但是多刚刚起步的码工来说，一般因为家庭和职业的原题，这个还是比较看重的。我印象中有些老板也同意或说过类似的说法。

People who have impact on my career (not a complete list yet)

My American Colleague I – stlplace

My American Colleague II – stlplace

我的黑人同事Programmer, 他是我们公司最好的Programmer之一, 曾经上过MIT, 人也极好(Nice)

Also my LinkedIn articles

Odd and Ends

在美国公司办公室上班，中午是没有午睡时间的。有时候实在太困，我觉得有个办法。最好是一个大的minivan 或是较大的SUV，夏天的话停在树荫下，睡在第二排或第三排。不要在办公室桌子上打瞌睡，免得美国人会认为你生病了。或者是他们觉得比较奇怪：因为他们一般没有午睡习惯。现在在家上班没有这个问题了。你就直接说累了，休息一下。但是尽量早下班补觉，不要养成中午睡午觉的习惯。

Minivan 还有一个好处，那就是你可以在里面电话面试。所以推荐买Minivan。著名油管博主Scott Kilmer 也同意我的观点😂

Categories
China Fun Life Life Tips Saint Louis

Happy Mid Autumn Festival 中秋快乐

Reading Time: 3 minutes
杏花楼广式月饼 and 稻香村苏式月饼 from 亚米网

And eat some moon cakes. I just realized I wrote something about mid autumn festival way back in year 2007. I believe I was in Shanghai when I wrote this, and it was after we had honeymoon in San’ya, Hainan, China.

Time flies. Now we have 2 kids, and I don’t see any special mid-autumn festival logos on Baidu or Google home pages. But I saw one at Google Vietnam page. I did see this (浓情迎中秋) at Baidu 热搜。

For me this year, I bought some 杏花楼广式月饼 and 稻香村苏式月饼 from 亚米网 (yamibuy.com). We bought moon cakes at Costco in the past: not a big fan of those。我们以前经常在百利买加州的生计月饼（Sheng Kee bakery，我记得去过一次她家的Milpitas 分店. As the name suggests, this is a Hong Kong/Cantonese style, and I visited their bakery at Milpitas CA once many years ago）。今年百利可能卖完了，好像没看到生计月饼。

Local Bakeries in the STL area

I think when I was new to the US and studied at Rolla. The fresh baked mooncakes at the WeiHong Bakery (味香饼家) was a treat. Now it seems there are other choices (not mooncake), such as The Foundry Bakery: and recently I added it to my Authentic Asian Food In The STL Area post. I just heard from an Indian friend that their Naisu Milk Bun 奶酥面包 is fantastic. Before pandemic I go to a Korean bakery near Olive and 141 once a while too. Last but not least, the La Boone Bouche at Olive and Tempo drive is so busy nowadays.

A meme on mooncake

今年中秋月饼卖不动了?月饼订单减少了3-4成 | 文学城

Baidu Zhidao: 上海面包店有哪些牌子 Note many bakeries in Shanghai makes and sells mooncakes (a mostly seasonal item). Below are the list.

克莉丝汀 – I remember once I got 美式咖啡 from there, there are quite a lot Christen’s Bakeries in Shanghai. About 10 years ago, I found when I visit China, it’s hard to get black coffee (not instant coffee). I am a coffee drinker, and I found the places that I can always get good or decent American black coffee (pot coffee, basically we make them via grounded coffee at many American homes), is McDonald’s and Starbucks (not many small cities have McDonald’s and Starbucks). And add the Christen’s Bakery in Shanghai too.

静安面包房

85度C: this is a chain started in Taiwan. I recall visited their store in one of those places (Lan’xi or Quan’zhou). They are in California too.

苹果园

香特莉

季诺

可颂坊 (the link is their mobile website): I recall seen or being there before 1997. Baike 百度百科 link here.

元祖 (Wikipedia): another chain started in Taiwan. I went there once, and it surprised me that their products are quite expensive.

牛奶棚

瑞莱新侨

面包新语

马哥孛罗

迷迭香咖啡面包

红宝石

喜来公社

宜芝多

星巴克(Starbucks) 也有月饼: no need to say more 🙂

Traditional Brands
以前印象中有杏花楼 （上海杏花樓酒家- 維基百科，自由的百科全書 ）和新雅（粤式餐厅 – 新雅粤菜馆新雅粵菜館- 維基百科，自由的百科全書 ）月饼 – 月饼为其核心产品，其中“新雅广式月饼”为“上海市著名商标”[6]

Last but not least, a bit explanation on the Mid Autumn Festival on Wikipedia. Since I left home for college, I rarely had opportunity to be back to my parents home on those holidays, though. Again 2007 was probably one of the years that I was in China for the holiday. For that matter, it’s the only year since 1998 that I spent significant amount of time in Shanghai (and China), and I wrote quite a bit on my observations on my blog. This is just one example.

PS: my 13 year old liked the 杏花楼的玫瑰豆沙月饼。

Categories
Life Politics

My random thoughts on the 9-11 anniversary

Reading Time: 2 minutes
Photo taken at the Simmons Bank at Olive and Warson Roads, 09-11-2023

Today I saw the flag was lowered at a local bank, and I knew it’s the 22nd anniversary of Sept-11, 2001, and I still remember that day. That morning, I was watching TV before going off to work, and it appears to me something hit the twin tower, and there was helicopter responding to the accident. Note it was before both the towers came down. I went to work, and quickly saw all the coworkers glued their eyes to the TV, and I knew something real serious happened…

At the time, I lived in an apartment that was very close to the STL airport. And in the next few days all the airplanes were grounded, and I couldn’t hear the airplane sounds I used to hear before 9-11. That evening (9-11) was also a bit panicking as people started to line up to get gasoline (I didn’t join). Also, my company had a large layoff a month after 9-11 (that was a co-incident, as there was a layoff plan before 9-11, the attack just made the layoff worse due to the economic outlook).

I recall a lot of things after 9-11, Here is something from the History Channel. I recall President George W Bush said “Go shopping (and support the economy)”. The two wars (Afghanistan, which started in late 2001; and Iraq, which started spring of 2003). Also, the airport security was totally revamped. Came across the below tweet from President Obama and he ordered the assassination of the head of al-Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden (On May 2[a], 2011).

Also this piece from an ordinary guy: I Sheltered In An Apartment With A Total Stranger On 9/11. Two Weeks Ago, I Finally Found Her

We lost a lot good people that day, and there are lots of memorials for them, such as this one.

Tweet in Chinese below (also in Wikipedia Rick Rescorla): I recall reading articles about him in the past.

There is an error in the Chinese translation above, Rick works for Morgan Stanley not JP Morgan (摩根斯坦利，不是摩根大通）。Also this Rick’s action just reminds me of the movie Titanic: during extreme time, there are usually heroes (put other people’s life 1st), and there are also people who just care for themselves.

PS: I talked about the 9-11 at the Monday class at Webster U. And many students were very young when it happened. But they were aware of it and similar attacks in their home country (India).