From the news

90% of the time I am on SFGate I read the TV schedule for sports and nothing else. Well, it's an exception today. Quite a bit of eye-catching business news:

• Facebook ads boost condom brand in Indonesia This one actually sounds more like an ad for Facebook then a news report. Turns out FB ads boost other brands too, as mentioned in the article, like Nestle. So, FB is smart enough to show a still image on dumb phone and an animation on smart phone. That's really news-worthy. The most interesting (and sad) quote is this: "Companies like Nestle are seeing sales flag in developed countries like the United States, as people get more health conscious, analysts said. The growth areas for those businesses are in developing countries" You can draw your own conclusion here.
• Port of San Francisco bears down on Sinbad’s Looks like the SF waterfront area around the Wharf and the Ferry building is going through quite a bit of changes. Sinbad's might be gone next time I'm in that area (Well, I've never tried it). And I heard that the pier for Alcatraz ferry might move too.   
• Yahoo closing China office According to the article, the Beijing office has served as a research and development center for Yahoo. Yahoo is looking for new ways to trim expenses as it comes under pressure from investors who have called for cost-saving measures. I thought offshoring R&D IS the way to save cost! No?

Career day and DiSC

I work for a very large company. People move in and out and around a lot. This week the HR department organized a career day for the IT folks. Maybe they think a lot of us are not very mindful about our career development while focusing on technology too much. I don't know. The workshops on interviewing skill and resume writing come at the right time though. I've learned a few good terms/concepts:

-Elevator pitch: it's how I could describe to a stranger (like the CEO I might run into at the elevator) what I do in 60 seconds.

-STAR: situation task action and result. That's how I should describe my work experiences in terms of projects I did.

-List accomplishment instead of responsibility 

-prep matrix: for each requirements in the job I apply for, relate it to one of my previous projects.

-DiSC are 4 behavioral styles. D is dominance. This type of person is strong-willed, like challenges and take risks and be competitive. Their activity to relieve stress is sports. I is influence. This type is very sociable and optimistic. Their activity to relieve stress is socialize. S is steadiness. This type is loyal and tolerant. Their stress activity is rest. C is compliance. This type is perfectionist and like things to go by the book. Their activity is to be alone. If you know me well, it's pretty obvious which type I am :D Each job also has its behavioral style. So it comes down to whether I could be flexible enough to match mine with the job. Of course it's easier if they match.

Strange radio experience

For those who drive a lot like I do, there are plenty of interesting experiences with different radio broadcasts for sure, like hearing the same songs back to back on different stations. Or hearing music from a CD you just played at home before you leave. What happened last Sat was kinda unusual: we were on our way to the Math show at Foothill College and my son said he enjoyed rock and roll so I switch from my "default" Jazz station to the next preset, which is rock, and the DJ played Guns'N Roses' "Patience." It is an interesting single, the first one off "Lies," an half-fake-live and half-acoustic album as the followup to the hugely successful "Appetite for Destruction," a metal instant-classic. The racial message in the song "One in a million" from the same album caused a great deal of controversy back in the days. When we came back to the car from the show, guess what was playing on the radio? "I Used to Love Her" from "Lies!" And it's another controversial song from the album. The reason was pretty obvious: the next line after the song title was: "... but I have to kill her" :P Anyway, I don't think it happens too much all these times I listen to the radio.

SF's #1 radio station in 2014

I bet not many people would have guessed it correctly: it's KDFC, the classical music station, who is supported by listeners and beat out all those corporate-owned stations (soft rock KOIT at #3, news KCBS at #4, and sports talk/Giants baseball KNBR at #5). Personally, KDFC is #2 behind my beloved jazz station KCSM. I am happy for KDFC. It went through some tough times (it was previously owned by Entercom and the mothership decided to drop the classical music format so the folks working there formed a new station and had to find new radio frequency and financial supports from listeners. For the record, its music selection was way better than its commercial days) Looking back to 2010, the top 5 stations were KCBS, KGO, KOIT, KQED and Wild 94.9. (KDFC was close to the bottom of Top 10)

A breakup caused by a violin

It's not a breakup of 2 partners in a romantic relationship but a string quartet. And it's not any violin but a Bergonzi violin worth US$900k before Y2K. I wanted to write about the story of the Audubon Quartet way back. Basically, three members of the quartet wanted to kick out their first violinist David Ehrlich because the latter promised the services of the quartet, free of charge, in order to secure donations to pay for a $900,000 violin without consulting or notifying them. The quarter is not a no-name either: They were the first American string quartet ever to win a first prize in an international string quartet competition, starting with the International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France in 1977. The issue ended up in court. The first violinist won, with a $611k judgement. The bankruptcy court almost had the cellist and the violist sell their instruments to cover it but then a settlement was reached to reduce the amount and an investor stepped in to pay that amount and become owner of the instruments. He then loaned them back to the musicians for 10 years (this is the 10th year!) Audubon actually continued with a new violinist until 2011 when they disbanded.

Baseball weekend

As a UT alum, I receive a few email newsletters and was told months ago that the Texas Longhorns would be playing the Stanford Cardinals here in Palo Alto last weekend. I was well prepared to go, taking my kids and meeting a few other alumni over there. Coincidentally, it's also the pre-season opening weekend for my son's little league (his first) We planned to go to team practice at 11 and bike over to Stanford for the game at 2. Too bad our bikes got flat tire and wasn't able to make it there at 2. It's already the end of 2nd when we finally returned home. Fortunately I remember from Stanford's website that it would be streaming their games live! So we started watching and relaxed in our comfy sofa (with drinks in our hands!) It was a 4 game series and Texas already lost the first 2. However, they had a big 1st inning and got a 3-0 lead and hung on to its lead 'til the bottom of the 9th. Both teams made lots of good plays. Glad to have watched it, even though it would have been better live. We watched the Sunday series finale as well. Texas got a huge 1st inning again (including scoring twice on bases-loaded walks!) and won the game easily.

The GIMP User Experience

This could be the name of a blues rock band but I'm talking about the actual GIMP User Experience here, which for most are not that great. I have been using GIMP for years. I actually learned Photoshop from college and have been using a licensed copy until it's too old and I don't bother to install on newer machines. So I applied everything I know from Photoshop to GIMP and that kinda works well except the UI of GIMP is really quirky. Just read this article about GIMP's UX maintainer has stepped down and there's hope that the new guy will advocate a better UI. Let's keep our finger crossed.

The K-Cup controversy

Most of my friends know I'm not a coffee drinker and I would have no idea what K-Cup is if they didn't install a K-Cup machine at work. (The sign above said clearly that purchasing K-Cup is the responsibility of the employee. Well, do I still have the responsibility if I don't drink?) Anyway, as a curious guy, especially for tech, I fulfilled that responsibility and bought my own K-Cups. It's easy to use for sure. The ones I bought tasted not bad (though I put in a lot of condensed milk :P) However, I read quite a few negative pieces of news about it lately. First, the technology is proprietary so other coffee companies tried to "reverse engineer" to come up with compatible "cartridge" of their own brand of coffee. Of course the original K-Cup maker is trying to defeat this. Second, the inventor was recently interviewed and said he regretted about inventing something so environmentally unfriendly (the plastic is hard to recycle) He doesn't even use it! He thinks it's expensive and he could make better coffee without it anyway :P

Got the blues

With the moods at work these days, the best suited music would be the Blues. Previously I mentioned the newly available (on Rhapsody) Led Zeppelin, whose music was rooted in the blues. Another British blues band which was much less well-known (doesn't even have a Wikipedia page!) but I enjoyed a lot was The Hoax. I "discovered" this band after I got hooked with Stevie Ray Vaughan's electric blues. Like SRV, these guys are all-white but they got the blues. I bought their critically-acclaimed debut "Sound like this" but then they kinda dropped off the radar after 1999, until their reunion later in the next decade and finally put out 2 new albums. (I just read about them on the latest UK Guitarist magazine)
Their music is kinda hard to find but thanks to Youtube:
At the end of the song, the singer reminded me of the legendary Hong Kong singer Johnny Ip (葉振棠)
P.S. This is my 800th posts on this blog. Another milestone reached :)

Sports highlights: NASCAR@Daytona, Pirelli World Challenge

I guess among all these different sports, it's the best to be a junkie of auto racing because I've got races to follow all year long. Even in December there's Race of Champions. And I still got to watch re-play of the Global RallyCross races which finished a month before. And of course some races that I recorded but didn't watch until I have nothing else. Those included the races from Pirelli World Challenge. Its "selling point" was races being ~1.5 hour long without the need to refuel and change tires so it's all about driver's ability to drive and pass without pit strategy involved. I agree and that's why it's one of my favorite series. And you get to see the fastest and most expensive sports cars in the world, like the Ferraris, the Porsches, the Maclarens, the Bentleys, the Audis and the Cadillacs, as well as the more affordable Kias, Ford Mustangs and Chevy Cameros, which race in a different class but on the track at the same time. And the road to championship is simple: the point leader wins it all. Even with the simple rule, the champions were decided in the last race with lots of drama, which is totally different from NASCAR who tried very hard to tweak its system to "generate" drama.

Speaking of NASCAR, believe it or not, we're already 2 weeks into the new 2015 season. I guess the biggest change to the Sprint Cup cars is the reduction of horsepower, which is supposed to make the races more competitive. It's still hard to tell after 2 weeks 'coz the Daytona 500 (at least in the recent years) features tons of lead changes no matter what and Jimmie Johnson had no trouble holding his big lead towards the end of the Atlanta race. I guess the most memorable scenes from NASCAR's season opening weekend at Daytona were still the crashes: Kyle Busch broke his leg and foot during a hard crash in the Xfinity race and polesitter Jeff Gordon's car were doomed on the last lap in the Cup race (his last Daytona 500 before retirement) which gave Joey Logano the win under green-white-checker rule. (Logano deserved the win to a large extent 'coz he ran well overall) Joe Gibbs Racing has to use a replacement driver in Matt Crafton (the reigning truck series champ) to drive Kyle Busch's #18. As unpopular as he is, I think most fans are still sad to see him getting injured so bad. And his older brother Kurt also lost his seat because of domestic violence related suspension. There hasn't been a Daytona 500 without either of the Busch brother for a long time!

高雄暢想

在我那堆好像永遠讀不完的舊雜誌中,不時都會發掘到意外驚喜,例如兩年前的台灣古典樂刊MUZIK就介紹了這首由新加坡作曲家羅偉倫為高雄市立國樂團成立廿周年時寫的作品:

還見識了排笙這件我相當陌生的樂器呢.

Music discovery

I wrote a post about Podcasts recently. That got me interested in subscribing to a few and started listening to them, which I haven't done for a while. The Cool Jazz Countdown has a good combination of smooth jazz and traditional jazz. I have many sources on the latter (e.g., Downbeat magazine, KCSM radio) but not the former. It really experienced a sharp decline. I discovered Eric Darius (who played a sax version of the mega-hit song "Happy" on his album "Retro Forward")

The metal podcast MSRCast introduced me to these 2 bands:
Triosphere

The melodic death band Mors Principium Est has a name that no one can pronounce on the podcast. It's actually Latin for "death is the beginning."

It might sound strange that I "discover" Led Zeppelin just now. Well, my beloved Rhapsody music streaming service just have the entire catalog of Led Zeppelin available! This is huge 'coz I think the band has resisted this for a long time but finally made the deal (must be lucrative) Rhapsody is heavily advertising their latest "crown jewel." This band is definitely among the Top 4 most influential bands (along side the Beatles, Pink Floyd and the Rolling Stones) IMO. However, I don't own a lot of their music and only know their biggest hit songs. Why? Here's the story: I became interested in rock ~1988 via hair metal. Believe it or not, some cited Led Zeppelin as their influence. So naturally I bought arguably their most famous album Led Zeppelin IV, which contains their most famous tune "Stairway to Heaven." And guess what? I was hugely disappointed: I expected every tune to be as hard rocking as "Rock and Roll" but the only other tune rock enough was "Black Dog." I barely like Stairway since it took forever to reach the climax, i.e., the electric guitar solo. I couldn't stand the even-more-acoustic "Going to California" at all. It will take a few years until I was actually going to California for good. I finally revisit this album on Rhapsody after more than 25 years, and could appreciate the bluesy and acoustic side of Led Zeppelin. I guess my exposure to acoustic jazz/electric blues and finally acoustic blues during all these years helped. I especially enjoyed the 2 DVD set of live performances titled Led Zeppelin from 2003. Yep, I have definitely become a fan after watching that, even though I still couldn't remember the names of their songs. Now I'm "digging deeper" beyond their greatest hits with Rhapsody's "Deep Cut" playlist and I realized Led Zeppelin's sound was actually closer to the Beatles and the Stones than the harder rocking Deep Purple or Black Sabbath!

Guitars made with wood from Detroit's abandoned homes

Just read about these guitars from the latest issue of the Acoustic Guitar magazine. And found that the magazine has already posted a video about this last year. It seems that the guitars made with wood that came from Reclaim Detroit, the non-profit that dismantles Detroit's abandoned housing stock for re-use actually sounded pretty good. And you can't beat playing instruments with such history behind it! According to this source, another company/luthier has been working on electric guitars using such wood and priced at ~$2000. It would be a perfect match playing music from Detroit Rock City!

iCar is coming

By now it's probably not news that Apple is in the process of developing a car (likely an electric car. Maybe a self-driving one like Google's?) Well, if it's anything like its computer products, one should avoid the 1st version or x.0 update for its cars. Gotta be serious about cars with bugs.

Acceptance speech for Oscar's Best Original Song

... and the Oscar's went to the track "Glory" from the movie "Selma" Next? Controversy!

(Source: watch the video at Time.com)

In his acceptance speech, Common linked the civil rights movement to similar movements in France and Hong Kong. “The spirit of this bridge connects the kid from the South Side of Chicago, dreaming of a better life, to those in France standing up for their freedom of expression, to those in Hong Kong, protesting for democracy,” he said. “This bridge was built on hope, welded with compassion and elevated with love for all human beings.”

John Legend got more explicitly political in his speech. “We say that Selma is now, because the struggle for justice is right now,” he said. “We know that the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country today. We know that right now, the struggle for freedom and justice is real. We live in the most incarcerated country in the world. There are more black men under correctional control today then were under slavery in 1850.”

Well, by supporting Hong Kong's democracy movement from last year, Common has pissed off a lot of pro-establishment folks in HK and China.

And John Legend got his share of criticism too. His stat regarding jailed men was correct in terms of absolute number but he should have compared the percentage of population instead.

Grammy classical

This is part 2 of my coverage of Grammy on this blog and it's about another "minority" genre: classical music (read part 1 for jazz here) I bet few of my classical music loving friends cared about the awards. In fact, someone wrote an article about why classical Grammys don't matter. His main point was that most fans are not familiar with the recordings and tracks being nominated, unlike their pop music counterparts. I guess he has a point.

However, his numbers aren't quite right: he wrote that a recording with a 2000 sales figure would be "gigantic." According to this, Billboard reported that, for the second year in a row, the top-selling classical artists were the Benedictines of Mary, Queen of Apostles, a community of nuns from rural Missouri. The sisters’ "Lent at Ephesus" and "Angels and Saints at Ephesus" – collections of ancient chants and hymns – were the first- and second-best selling traditional classical albums of 2014 (the traditional classical category excludes crossover releases, according to Billboard). "Lent at Ephesus," which was released on Feb. 11 by Decca, sold about 34,000 copies this year and spent 38 weeks on the chart.

Anyway, I think fans should use Grammy as a way to check out what recordings are critically acclaimed and try something new (compositions or interpretations of warhorse pieces) instead of listening to the personal favorites over and over. For example, I checked out the best contemporary classical composition winning piece: Become Ocean by John Luther Adams. I think minimalism lovers would enjoy this dynamic piece. And classical guitar fans shouldn't miss the best instrumental solo winning album: Play by Jason Vieaux. (I saw him live years ago at the SF conservatory performing his own arrangements of Pat Metheny's music. Very talented player) One could hear more new compositions on In 27 pieces - The Hilary Hahn Encores, which were commissioned by the award-winning violinist.

Condemning racists/soccer hooligans

With so many conflicts happening in the world these days (including the near-weekly HKer vs mainlander/smuggler protests) it's easy to forget racism is still an issue in Europe. This just happened yesterday when Chelsea played PSG in a Champions League match: a group of Chelsea fan pushed away a black man who was trying to get on a train in Paris. And they actually chanted "We're racist" No shame indeed. I'm sure Chelsea wouldn't want its image to be tarnished by these thugs.

The President's day vacation

It's actually my sister's vacation.  Her 1 week visit included the President's day long weekend.  My plans for her has become kinda predictable:

Food
Home: I made her the now-famous (among our friends and family) "So Steak" of which the recipe came from my good friend.
Chipotle: she has never tried burrito-in-a-bowl (less carb) before! I suggested the new flavor: tofu (which Chipotle introduce in response to shortage of meat last time I heard) It tasted no bad. Just kinda feel like lack of substance though.
Cafe Epi: this will forever be known by our family members as the restaurant that charges $12 for 3 eggs and ham and bacon that I ordered for my son! Maybe I shouldn't have assumed that they would charge it for the same price as a 3-egg ham and bacon omelette. The restaurant did provide a justification: they use less ham and bacon in an omelette than having them as a side order. I don't necessarily disagree but I think the kids will remind us to avoid going there.
The Counter: this restaurant is probably famous for the burger-in-a-bowl style. I also enjoyed coming up with strange combinations of toppings.
Archetype: we went there for dinner in Napa, which we seldom do (usually leave before 4 to come back to the bay area for dinner for some reason. The traffic condition actually seemed better after leaving Napa after dinner) To be honest, this restaurant was not our top choice: we got recommendations for other places but they were all fully booked on the Sunday night of the President's day long weekend, except this place. We like the food there a lot actually, especially the duck. 
The Sea: my buddies celebrated their anniversary at this nearby restaurant recently. We went there for our year of the ram/daughter b-day celebration dinner. My buddy recommended lobster risotto, which was very good. The dessert (Souffle + macaroon) was awesome too.
Five Guys Burger: she's a fan of the In-and-Out. So I took her to its "rivalry" IMO Five Guys' burgers are a bit better than In-and-Out's and thus justified its slightly higher prices.

Wine
Domaine Caneros: this winery is known for its good sparkling wine (and pinot) and more importantly, great for taking photo. It looks like a chateau in France. We had a great time tasting outdoor, enjoying the wine and the great scenery.
Dariousch: this is another winery perfect for photo-op. It's as if we traveled to ancient Greece/Rome with all those columns. 
Girard: we left Dariousch ~4. That's when most other wineries (e.g. Joseph Phelps, Inglenook were about to close for the day) Thanks to Yelp and Google we found this winery which was close enough and didn't close until 7. Their $25 tasting was not cheap (and the portions were not big) but the quality was pretty high.

Napa Valley Distillery: this is not exactly a winery. Compared to wineries, it's a rarity in Napa. In fact, it's the first distillery opened in the city of Napa since Prohibition! The distillery and its retail shop in the Oxbow market are actually fairly new. Spirit tasting was only allowed after the required law passed recently. I like their Brandy Cordial and the East India cocktail a lot.

Coffee
Philz Coffee: by now she's familiar enough with the neighborhood that she could drove there herself :) This brand is expanding quickly. I guess it's only "rival" would be the equally ambitious Blue Bottle.
Fraiche Yogurt: last time she visited we took her to the Blue Bottle stand inside the AOL building but sadly that's gone. Rumor has it that the old Borders book store location on U Ave will become a new Blue Bottle retail store. For now, Palo Alto folks could go to Fraiche Yogurt for their cup of Blue Bottle (and of course fresh yogurt)
Cafe Venetia: it's still voted #1 (at least by me) for the best cafe in Palo Alto. Can't beat the setting. And according to my sis who actually drank coffee, it's high quality.
Coupa Cafe: it's still the #1 place to pretend you're an up-and-coming Silicon Valley high-tech startup entrepreneur. Well, the cafe itself does utilize one "high-tech gadget" that sits on every table to sense your smartphone/tablet and allows customers to place order without leaving their seat. 

Shopping
Ferry Building: I seldom go on a Saturday and it's indeed very busy. Long lines for Blue Bottle coffee, frozen yogurt and ice cream. My sis bought her Scharffen Berger chocolate as well as coffee beans. 
TCHO: This chocolate maker used to have their big store at the current location of Exploratorium between Pier 39 and the Ferry Building but they moved across the bay. Their SF presence has reduced to a stand inside SF Shopping Center. Still, we bought what we wanted :)
Livermore Premium Outlet: This is relatively new and this was the first time I've been there. Strongly not recommended because of how hard it was to park! I actually parked way outside and rode my bike in. That said, there are plenty of bargains even for a guy like me. I bought a pair of New Balance. There were also an Under Armour and a Columbia for your athletics/outdoor adventure needs.
Chinatown: it was New Year (Ram) Street Fair. First time I've been to one. It's a popular event!

Music
Keiko Matsui at Yoshi's: my sis is a big fan of piano and I figured this is her type of music: smooth jazz/new age-ish that was neither too watered-down nor too hard-core. Even for a guy who is mostly into modern or traditional jazz like me, it's very enjoyable performance: good playing and good melodies. I especially like the saxophone player who played soprano on 2 tunes. Matsui was a classy lady which also showed her sincere and friendly side. No wonder her career lasted so long with so many albums released!

The "offseason"

I'm referring to this period of inactivity for American football and NASCAR (Before I knew it, NASCAR has become my most-watched sports!) I re-read some of my old posts and found a few interesting points:
I wrote a mini-review of 2004 trends in the world of sports. That's also a year Brady (barely) won a SB. Brazil (barely) defeated Argentina in Copa America. Greece (barely) won the European Cup. I was moaning the lack of superstars and plays dominated by defense. I guess I was too harsh to Brady as he led his teams to 4 more SB and won 2 (not all of those teams had a lot of talent) so Brady definitely qualified as an elite QB. Of course, defense is still as important as ever. The defense-less Brazil fared poorly in the 2014 World Cup. On the contrary, the eventual winner Germany has a much more balanced team. This team may not have any FIFA player-of-the-year since it's more about team work. Still, there were quite a few stars from European power house Bayern Munich (e.g. Thomas Muller, Mario Gotze, Toni Kroos) and the all-time WC goal scorer Miroslav Klose.
I also wrote about major competitions on odd years: Ryder Cup used to be one but not any more. The aforementioned Copa America switched between odd and even years. There'll be one this year and also one in 2016 (to celebrate the centennial anniversary. It's a big accomplishment to have a tournament lasted 100 years :) Cricket World Cup is still an odd year event. I'm looking forward to its start this weekend!

This could be a very good baseball team

Talking about the San Diego Padres, which is in the same division as the SF Giants. They have just added James Shields, who helped Kansas City reach the World Series last season, to their roster. And prior to this deal, they have already got Matt Kemp, Justin Upton, Wil Myers, as well as Derek Norris, the former A's catcher who I think was pretty good. The rest of NL West should watch out!