Sucks to be sick

It's 9pm on a Saturday night; I'm supposed to be dressing up to go to a club out by Silver Lake for a co-worker's birthday bash. Unfortunately I've been hacking up a lung and my nose is quite congested; part of the package from our trip up to Silicon valley / San Fran.

On the plus side, though, I'm playing with my new toy - A top-of-the-line Dell Axim X50v handheld PC with a bluetooth GPS unit. Frustrated with my absolute lack of directional sense (which can be fatal in the Greater Los Angeles area), I decided to get a GPS-enabled handheld using my hard-earned bonus - my firm was generous enough to award me $500 for passing my CFA.

So, instead of gettin' jiggy with the ladies, I get to spend my Saturday night trying to figure out why my Axim won't talk to my wireless router. That, and building up calluses attempting to play Hotel California.

Fun (hack cough cough spit).

Half the science, twice the religion

A funny animation outlining the newest scientific "theory"... Supernatural selection!

http://www.markfiore.com/animation/super.html

Another sketch

I think I did this one quite a while back. It's some musician guy from a discontinued library book I had. On a tangent - I have quite a love of discontinued book sales at the library; when I was young and my family was poor, that was how I built up my collection of "previously owned" books. In fact, I had an entire World Book encyclopedia set, except for half of C, JKL, M, and half of S. This is why I rule at Jeopardy, unless the subject happens to start with one of those letters.

Good grief

They say a picture speaks a thousand words; this is what kind of day I am having:

Every one of those "follow up" emails entails 1-5 hours of work. To say that "Favorite Folders" is a misnomer would be the understatement of the century.

Driving around

I've been around California again this previous weekend. I went up with my family to see an old family friend of ours up in Cupertino, which is about an hour south of San Francisco in Silicon Valley. Due to the fact that we only had the weekend, we didn't get a chance to do too much in the area - we saw the sea lions on Pier 39, and sampled some of the fine Chinese food in the area. I'll have more pics posted soon.

I'll need new business cards soon

I've forgotten what spring is like. For the last four years, I've spent every spring stuck in my room, poring over arcane financial jargon, and learning investment management "the CFA way".

Well, this will be no more, because I've finally passed the last level of the exam.

I PASSED.

And that's all there is to it.

Balboa Park

Balboa Park reflecting pool, San Diego

This was an awesome park, tons of museums, art galleries, and gardens all in one location. We took all day Sunday touring it. My favorite from the whole day was the Museum of Photographic Arts. A very small gallery, nonetheless, it hosted a Steve McCurry exhibit, which truly showed me the power of color photography. I think I'm going to spend some time doing some research with color theory now...

San Diego

A meerkat hanging out with her baby

I was in San Diego this weekend with my mom and brother. We did the zoo and Balboa park in two days; I took quite a few photos, which I shall post on my pbase account shortly.

The Right side of the Force

Are you left-brain dominant or right-brain dominant? For somebody who is swimming in technology and quantitative finance on a daily basis, I would have pegged myself as strongly left-brained, or maybe in the middle of the road. According to this test, however, I answered 15 questions that are right-brain dominant responses, and only 4 that were left.

So what are you? Comments welcome.

Mom and bro in town

My mom and brother are in town for the next two weeks. This weekend, we went out to Hollywood, Beverly hills, the Getty Center, Malibu, and San Gabriel (Chinese groceries, you know). My back is killing me from all that driving.

Dropped the sucker

I had a wonderful ride Sunday, out for two whole hours riding up and down the Pacific Coast Highway, followed by a blast down Topanga canyon - the Mecca of motorcyclists. Not a single incident, complete control the whole time. Then this morning, on my commute to work, I get cut off by a middle-aged woman in a BMW: I grab a handful of brake (stupid move), lock the front tire, and lay 'er down.

Total damage:

Bike:

• Scuffs on muffler
• Bent right handlebar (clipons)
• Smashed right turn signal
• Total repair costs: $50 + labor
  

Me:

• Bruised ego
• (Re)sprained wrist
• Cut on left hand from picking up the shattered turn signal and flinging it
• Total repair costs: $priceless.
  

The worst part of it? The lady actually got out of her car, asked if I was OK ("yeah I guess"), then asked if I wanted her insurance ("yes please"), got in her car, and sped off. Fucking bitch. If I wasn't checking out my bike I would have got her plate and the cops would've nailed her with hit & run.

At least my gear worked.