Reading Time: 2 minutes About 14 or 15 years ago when my old daughter was new born, I saved some money and put it into her 529 plan. About a year later, I wrote this blog post Some questions about 529 plan. I haven’t put in much new money into her 529 plan since the early days, and for
Reading Time: 7 minutes 谷歌翻译的中文版在这里。下面是英文原文（偶尔会有更新；中文版一般情况下不更新）。 WeChat app is a time sucker My better half (my wife) thinks I spent too much time on WeChat app aka 微信 wei’xin, and I agree after using WeChat for about 10 years. One of my new year’s resolutions is to use less iPhone, social media in general including WeChat. I mentioned a few
Reading Time: 5 minutes Or, put it bluntly, to combat my iPhone addiction 🙁 Why What do you do the 1st thing after you wake up? Hopefully you are not like me “yes you guessed it right, look at my iPhone and check the WeChat blah blah blah” 🙂 Sometimes I wonder if “I own the iPhone; or the
Reading Time: 3 minutes Travel Mishaps One of the most memorable moments in 2024, for me at least, we already checked out the hotel in HK and got on the taxi to the airport, then our 14-year-old said, “I left my hoodie in the closet”. We already checked out thus cannot go back to the room directly. Had to
Reading Time: < 1 minute Horrible news from New Orleans – CNN 的文章。 我没有去过新奥尔良。十多年前我去过离她不远的阿拉巴马州的海边orange beach 和gulf shore。这次的事情发生在凌晨3:16，在新奥尔良最有名的闹市/旅游区。 2001年9月11日，纽约世贸中心双塔（最高的两幢楼）被基地组织劫的民航飞机撞上去，爆炸并倒塌。当时我在美国，我已在公司上班将近一年。不久以后，小布什在国会通过议案后，开始了美国的 war on terror 反恐战争: 先是带着一帮北约小兄弟轰炸并入侵阿富汗。因为当时阿富汗的塔利班政府不肯交出基地组织的头本拉登等人。2003年三月，又是在国会同意以后，”war on terror” 又进一步：小布什命令美军入侵伊拉克。世界第一军事强国美军拿下阿富汗和萨达姆的伊拉克军队，没有悬念。本拉登后来也被美军杀死。但是”war on terror” 没有成功，美军最后在死亡几千人以后，撤出伊拉克和阿富汗。昨天，2025元旦，被新的伊斯兰极端组织Isis同化的退役美国士兵（去过伊拉克），开着卡车载着在新奥尔良搞恐怖活动。小布什的伊拉克战争跟一千多年前的十字军东征有何差别? 在我看来不从历史中吸取经验是不少宗教极端主义的共同特点-这当然也包括美国基督教极端主义，和以色列类似的宗教极端主义。 十字军东征 以下来自维基 -（拉丁语：Cruciata；法语：Croisade；伊斯兰世界称为法兰克人入侵；1096年－1291年）是一系列在天主教教宗的准许下的战争，由西欧的封建领地主和骑士对被他们视为侵略者的伊斯兰政权（地中海东岸）发动持续近200年的战争。 以下来自百度 – 十字军东征（拉丁文：Cruciata，1096—1291年）是一系列在罗马天主教教皇乌尔班二世发动的、持续近200年的、有名的宗教性军事行动，由西欧的封建领主和骑士以收复被阿拉伯、突厥等穆斯林入侵占领的土地的名义对地中海东岸国家发动的战争，前后共计九次。十字架是基督教的象征，因此每个参加出征的人胸前和臂上都佩戴“十”字标记，故称“十字军”。 PS: Is George W Bush the worst US president in recent memory? 另：美国的反恐战争和运动/行动如此的虎头蛇尾，甚至于类似于另一项轰轰烈烈的时间更长的反毒抗毒运动，是不是也有因为有一些利益集团并不希望这些利国利民的运动真正地成功呢？因为对军火集团，监狱行业（美国有世界上最多的犯人，和最庞大的监狱系统，其中有相当数量的监狱不是政府的，而是公司拥有和运作的）等利益集团来说，只有现在这样他们才能赚大钱啊。
Reading Time: 2 minutes Came across this article Opinion | No, You Don’t Get an A for Effort – The New York Times by Adam Grant. The NYT article is behind the paywall: here is his LinkedIn post. My 1st thought: Actually, once I did receive an “A” mostly due to my effort – please don’t try to extrapolate
Reading Time: 3 minutes The car and DIY channels that I subscribe to them and watch them often. Cars and DIY Waldo’s World: he is a young technician/mechanic/engineer who has fixed quite a few larger European luxury cars and other equipments (some are huge). I like his troubleshooting analysis, logics and approaches. Hint: not “parts fodder”. I watched some
Reading Time: 2 minutes I’m talking about the unlocked iPhones. Because I don’t think the carrier promotions are “cheap” in the sense they usually make the money back from the monthly fees, and then more. I can think of a few places, some are probably cheaper, but I am not 100% sure about the quality (especially the battery life
Reading Time: 2 minutes And personally, I am not happy with Mercy Go Health First some background. There are 3 urgent care places near where we live. In the order of opening: St. Luke’s urgent care (next to a CVS). Total Access Urgent Care (TAUC): an independent chain that has no affiliation with a hospital; they have X-ray and
Reading Time: 3 minutes Traditionally the United States likes to boast it’s a democracy and people voted for their political leaders. With the recent re-election of Trump and also with Elon Musk heavily involved in the last few months before the Nov 5 election, with his money and influence (think the X.com formerly Twitter.com). Also, it seems many tech
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