Emails

At this date and age, I believe everyone will have at least one webbased emailed account (Yahoo, Gmail, hotmail). Afterall, it's very difficult to maintain a loyal relationship with your ISP provider (earthlink, AOL) and it's a hassle to update your email address with all your friends, families, and acquaintenances each time you switch an ISP.

I have three of these webbased email accounts that I use on a regular basis -- one for when I sign up to questionable websites that I suspect they'll spam me to death; one for casual usage that I give out to friends; and the last one is the official business one that I only use for work (goes on resume) and school. Now that I've secured a job and that school is out, I rarely remember to check that one.

Interestingly enough, the last two times when I remembered to check that email account, I received emails that wasn't intended for me. I would like to mention that I used my real name for my official business email account. Receiving others' personal email is an eerie experience. It's like a quick peek into a stranger's personal life. A stranger that has the same, or very similar name, as you. Sure, we've all have mail sent to our houses that didn't belong to us. But these are not the same. These are names that you've never seen before, and will never remember once you've disposed of the mail. It's in an envelope. Very few people (at least I don't) will open them and read the content. An email is different. It's content so readily reviewing themselves to you and it's just that much more personal.

Whilst I almost never remember to mark "moved" or "wrong address" on the physical mails, I always make a point to email these strangers back to tell them that I've received their emails on accident. "Hello, your mail did not get to the person it was intended for," I'd say.

Personal Race Simulator

Wow! So we went to MicroCenter last week, and they have these two units of personal race simulators there to demonstrate Intel's newest chip. Everybody LOVED the simulator and wanted to buy that instead. And the store employees have to explain repeatedly that the units were not there for sale. I'm like, heck, might as well. If many people ask about a product (although most of us can't afford it), why not just sell them? Afterall, it's a capitalistic society, you can pretty much buy anything with money.

So I did a little search on the internet and found this:

 

And you too can have it for the low, low price of $20,000. And that comes with a 42" HD plasma. :D It's practically a steal. I just hope I hit the next lottery jackpot. I hope. I hope. I hope. 

My Hightech Home Life

So today was the first time (ever) Hubby and I sat down and talked about our finance. I guess with my beta personality (as opposed to alpha?), I tend to trust that "he" (whoever I was with at the time) will naturally know how to make the right decisions and take care of finance. But lately I've been wanting to agree on doing things a bit differently. And in all honesty, Hubby was never the his-way-or-the-highway kind of guy. So we were having this conversation that's SO like any other married couple I was scaring myself. I mean, afterall, we've NEVER really discussed about money before and that money IS the leading cause of all divorces.

But I digressed, the way we were doing things. We each sat in front of our laptop, logging onto credit card accounts and bank accounts, and sharing the excel files that created. I don't think it can get any geekier...

Oh, and after we finished with our finance planning. I made him logged onto my Gmail calender to block out all the days that he is going to be gone. We have separate email address so I had given him access to view AND change my calender events. We get any more high tech, we are going to have to use virtual simulators to hug each other. :D

Love to Cook?

My friend E thinks I like to cook. She couldn't be more wrong. It's not cooking that I like, it's the eating. I only cook when I don't want to go to a particular restaurant just for my one little craving, or when I can't find a place that serves it well. But every once in a while, I do like to challenge something different.

Remember that one time when I made the blooming onion? I even bought the blooming onion making afterward, which has yet to be used. Then I challenged P.F. Chang's lettuce wrap and that was a success. Next on my list are deviled egg, cheese fries (hardly can be called cooking, don't you think?), and Outback's honey wheat bushman's bread. Yum. :D Lucky Hubby brought a breadmaker into the marriage. ^_^

Money Has Nothing To Do With Happiness

http://finance.yahoo.com/columnist/article/moneymatters/7858

 

Of COURSE money has nothing to do with happiness. Sheesh. What were people thinking?

 

And a 600 lb obese woman is about as attractive as a Victoria Secret model, as long as you are not a super superficial person.

 

And obesity is just another horrible disease, like leukemia. It has absolutely nothing to do with fast food and an utter lack of exercise.

Extreme Commuter = The New American Dream?

A couple of days ago I read this article about Extreme Commuter on Yahoo. It was very funny because just the day before, I was toying with the idea of buying a house in Tracy, CA. For my non-California friend, Mike, who reads my blog, Tracy is only a measly 60 miles from San Jose, where I work. To put things into perspective for my non-US resident friend, Helen (if she ever come around to reading my blog again), the average speed limit on a US freeway is 60 miles per hour; meaning, if my driveway IS the entrance of the freeway and I travel at exactly the speed limit and my company locates right NEXT to the freeway exit, it'll still take me a solid hour to work. But that's just not realistic expectation when so many Siliconians has figured out the same thing that I did – the only way to afford a house AND to go to work in the Silicon Valley is to move to Tracy, or any other nearby area. To put things into perspective for all, I've been advised that the commute from Tracy to San Jose is 2 hours, 1.5 if you are VERY lucky.

 

And I am almost willing to do that. It's the American dream, right? To have a REAL house? A small to minimal backyard, no conjoining walls with your neighbors. Heck, that's not even a choosing criteria anymore. I'd be more than happy to have one of those gorgeous condos right next to my apartment complex. Went browsing for the "fun" of it, $1.2 million. Ugh. This is not even about if its WORTH the money. This is about, we DON'T have $1.2 million. As my realist husband had put it, I don't think we even make enough a month to cover that mortgage. Speaking of being realistic.

 

Ah, but I missed those days when Hubby and I could just shop around (houses) for the fun of it. Knowing that if we saw something we really like, we can *realistically* afford it. A real house. A brand NEW house. Get to choose all the options – fireplace in living room, island in kitchen, separate bath and shower, room for a pool table and exercise equipment… and most importantly, don't have to worry about "that's just more stuff to lug next time we move" when we purchase additional furnitures.

Minimalistic?

My cousin said he's a minimalist. Since I don't know any other person who claims to be a minimal, I'll let you decide. I guess it wasn't as noticeable when he was living in the Silicon Valley and renting a room from his friend. I just thought he doesn't need a lot of amenities, but then he moved to LA a couple of months ago, so get this: He go a 300 sq ft bachelor. A bachelor is an apartment *without* a kitchen. I guess kitchen is not really a necessity for a single guy who never cooks.

 

My cousin asked me to send him a video clip. So to me the best sensible way of sending a video clip over 400 miles is via the internet. Sure, it might takes a while, but who sits there and watches for upload/download anyway? So I asked him. He said he preferred to have a DVD instead. I was shocked that he doesn't have high speed internet. To which his respond was, "You were only half right, I don't have internet, period." His logic was that since he was online from work all day long, he doesn't need to have internet at home. Okay....

 

The DVD posted a second problem. I can either dump the video clip onto a DVD in it original format so it's only viewable via a computer, or spend more time figuring out how to convert it so he can just pop it into a DVD player and watches it on TV. Again, the latter sounds like a better option to me. He said watching it on the computer is "perfect" because "I don't own a DVD player." O.o Now if you remember, only a few months ago, materialistic me was telling hubby how DVD players are just disposable nowadays, because a $70 generic one and a $200 name brand one will both break down at exactly one year's point. My cousin said, "My TV is only 19", what's the point?" And here I have a 43" TV in the living room, a 27" in the bedroom, and still a 27" extra one lying around in the computer room....

 

Then he proceeded to tell me, "I've also unplugged the fridge to keep the apartment cool. Having cold water is not worth the electricity bill.".....

 

So, you tell me, would you call that minimalistic or just extreme frugalness?

 

 

My Nester Hubby

It's strange, even after he left the military, we are still moving around a lot. We've moved 6 times in the last 4 years, that's less than 1 year at each place. Two things happen each time we move: (1) I become very domesticated and will start making home cooked meals for the first few months, then it evitably slip to Hamburger Helper or Dining Out for one reason or another, (2) Hubby also becomes very domesticated. He expresses it by furnishing and decorating the place.

To be honest, neither one of us are all gunhole about this new apartment. It's third floor with no elevator (what's the big deal? YOU try getting a few buddies of yours to help move your bed, couch, and TV up 3 floors), its kinda dingy because we moved from our 1500 sf house to a 1400 sf house to this 1000 sf apartment, and it has this dingy WALL A/C that keeps the kitchen cool when you cook. Then again, it's all a matter of perspective. In light of most bay area folks with no A/Cs and rolling black out during last week's heat wave and 164 heat related death, the little dingy A/C is a blessing.

So anyways, I have been counting down to the day the lease end the day we moved in -- 242 more days to go -- and, frankly, I have no interest in unboxing any more than what I need to get by. And after the nightmarish move, I am extremely reluctant to buy any additional furniture, OF ANY SORT!

Saturday, Hubby wanted to go to Ikea, a place which we visit an average of every nine months. You got it, every time I give birth to a baby. No! Every time we MOVE. He was very insistent about buying a coffee table. A COFFEE table! What the hell for? We've been using these TV trays and they are doing just fine. On top of that, he also wanted to get a RUG to put under the couch and coffee table (yeah, if you actually remember my blog from San Diego, I had pictures of the rug that we bought back then, from Ikea...). It was a very colorful rug, because "we need some colors in our life." I have no guts to figure out if he really meant that. But because of the very colorful rug, I had to buy a very colorful lamp shade to go with the rug. All of a sudden, our dingy, not-too-great apartment actually became COZY!!

In addition to that, I came home to this SPOTLESS living room, dining room, and kitchen today. Our little apartment is actually WELCOMING. Wow! I was utterly amazed. Still am. Not that he's usually a messy person, but, where DID he put all the JUNK that were lying around ALL OVER the place?!?! LUCKY simply doesn't begin to describe how I feel. :)