Category Archives: Journal

CES 2013: The experience

I already made a separate post about what I saw at CES. I also wanted to write about my experience. First, the food was delicious. We had lunch at the Burger Bar, and I had a buffalo burger. I don’t eat buffalo very often, and it was definitely tasty. Now there was a down side. Either that buffalo made me very sick, or something earlier did, but I was fine before I ate the buffalo.

I started to have an upset stomach at CES. At one point I was looking at convertible laptops/tablets when I completely lost my balance. I grabbed on to my friend for balance, apologized, and waited to regain my balance. When I did, I started to walk toward my group to tell them I was going back to the hotel. It should have been a 30 second walk. I few seconds later I started losing my balance again, so I stopped and leaned against a display. Eventually I reached my friends, told them I was going to go back to the hotel, and asked them where the restroom was.

I started to make way to the restroom as I began to lose my balance again. I walked with my hand against the wall to keep my sense of direction. Then my vision began to get blurry, and a white spot appeared slightly to the right of center. It spread, and after a few seconds, I couldn’t see at all. I leaned against the wall for a minute as my vision came back. I began to wonder if the convention staff would kick me out thinking I was drunk. Why wasn’t I worried about my vision? I don’t know. Anyways, eventually I made it to the bathroom, and I won’t go into any more details. However, the two days in Vegas were pretty bad.

Let’s go back to food though. I was feeling a little better that night, so I still went out with the group. We ate at the Bally’s Steakhouse. They brought everyone shots to start before even taking orders. The food itself was delicious. I had lamb chops, broccoli, macaroni and cheese, and a salad. Like the buffalo, I don’t eat lamb very often, so it was delicious.

That was Thursday. It’s Sunday now, and I’m still not feeling 100%. Luckily I haven’t had the vision problems again, which was the part I was most worried about.

CES 2013: The show

The Consumer Electronics Show 2013 was last week, and it was my second year attending. Like last year, I swear the most common products weren’t very innovative or new at all. Every corner of the show seemed filled with speakers, headphones, iPhone and iPad cases, and iPhone and iPad docks.

Of course, there were some other things too. First, thanks to Windows 8 there were a variety of new form factors of laptops/tablets. These included slide out laptops/tablets, laptops that fold over backwards, and laptops with screens that swivel within their frame. To be honest, they felt similar, and none of them felt 100% right. I suspect we’ll see some more iterations on these until something catches on.

I also saw the ability to turn many devices into things that were a bit superfluous. I want my devices to do their jobs. While adding additional functionality seems like a benefit, if I already have another device that does that job better, then I don’t need the new one.

TVs were big this year too of course. A variety of companies had 4K TVs. You can definitely tell the difference between 1080p and 4K, but it’s no where near worth the price yet in my opinion. Of course, I just got an HD TV for the first time, so obviously I don’t care about that very much. Sony had a TV on display that used glasses to show two separate images to different people. This allowed people to play a two player PS3 game on one TV with each player seeing a full screen. That seemed cool (but not worth wearing glasses). Sony also showed off their Vitas. It’s a nice little device, but the controls just don’t feel good to me.

The only thing this year that really impressed me (although not new this year) were OLED TVs. They have such a vibrant, clear picture. I’d rather have a 1080p OLED TV than a 4K non-OLED TV. However, some companies were showing 4K OLED TVs. Now that’s cool.

“Thin It to Win It” weight loss competition

Today marked the end of “Thin It to Win It,” the weight loss competition we’ve been having at work. I won! I lost 41.5 lbs over 18 weeks, which was a 21.2% change in my body weight.

I was already trying to lose weight, but the competition made me work for it harder. Here you can see the my weight change since I started tracking. I marked the start of the competition. My weight definitely started dropping faster!

The second half to the competition was body fat. It was based on percent change in percent body fat. I had a 32.9% change in percent body fat, but I came in third actually. My friend Mario beat me at 36.4% change in percent body fat, but the winner had a 49.6% change in percent body fat! I’m not sure how accurate the device is, but as long as it’s wrong for everyone equally, I guess it’s okay. For the people who knew their body fat percentages, it seemed higher than it should be. Again, consistency was what matters.

All in all, I went from 195.5 lbs at the start of the competition to 154 lbs today! I needed to be 163 lbs to be in my normal BMI range, so I’m securely in that range now.

I feel like I didn’t change that much. I was still full, and I still ate a piece of candy almost every night. I think the big difference was that I made sure to stop eating unhealthy things that I didn’t even enjoy, and I ate more fruits and vegetables. I also proved that I wouldn’t need to go to a gym. That’d be boring and too much work. I jogged in my neighborhood and exercised in my room. I purchased one dumbbell.

I thought about celebrating by going and eating something terrible, but there really isn’t anything I cut out of my diet that I want to start eating again. Tonight I’m going out for sushi, something that I ate regularly on my diet (and before). However, I think I might have some sake, which I wouldn’t have had on the diet. Also, pancakes this weekend!

Drawing games with Alex, Darnell, and gem

Yesterday we played some games at a going away BBQ for Alex and Darnell. We each wrote a sentence on a separate page. Then we passed the papers and drew the sentence we read. Then we folded the papers so that only the drawings were showing. After passing, we had to write a description of the picture. This just continued until we got bored. Here are our results.

Next we changed to a different game. We each took turns drawing a segment of a picture. We couldn’t look at the previous segment, but the lines would be extended down slightly so that the next person could see where their section connects. Confusing to describe, but you’d probably understand if you’d just scroll down and look!

Disneyland with Alex and Darnell

Following the weekend excitement of Temecula, I met up with Alex, Darnell, Devin, Lorena, Gracie, and John for dinner and drinks Monday night. Gracie and John had to leave, but I went back to Alex and Darnell’s room to stay the night and go to Disneyland the next day. The woman working the desk at the La Quinta, Erica, was super friendly and excited to see we were carrying in Apples to Apples. We enjoyed the game, and Devin did very well despite being half asleep.

The next day we spent the morning in California Adventure. We went on the Ferris wheel, California Screamin’, and had lunch.

Of course, we had to play Toy Story Mania too. I beat gem, but her animal was better.

We met with Daniel and Mallory and headed into Disneyland.

Lots of fun was had in Disneyland, including meeting ASIMO. While having a slow machine do simple tasks I could more easily do myself isn’t useful right now, it’s definitely cool technology.

High five!

After Disneyland we had dinner at the House of Blues before returning to the hotel room to hang out a little. I was pretty worn out when I got home, but it was great fun. Now I just wait for the parties this weekend!

Wine Tasting in Temecula

Because Alex and Darnell are back visiting in California, we went wine tasting in Temecula over the weekend. Here we’re at Leonesse Cellars, the first stop on our tour. We had a pretty full van – Alex, Darnell, Alex’s parents Hal and Mary Margaret, Darnell’s parents Devin and Lorena, Mike, gem, Gracie, our sober driver John, and myself.

We got to try the grapes that were destined to become wine. They were tasty this way too but different than the grapes you’d buy in a grocery store to eat.

Our guide took some time to explain the process itself and showed us the large tanks.

Then we went inside for the actual tastings. I didn’t know anything really about wine, but our host spoke for a few minutes on each wine. It was a lot of fun.

The Wilson Creek Winery was much more laid back. They also had a port served in a glass made of chocolate. It was interesting!

We picked up a pizza to eat in the van on our way to the next winery. The Maruice Car’rie Winery had terrible service. Luckily it was photogenic!

By the time we reached the Black Market Brewery, I had had enough to drink. I talked games with John before heading outside to chat with Mary Margaret.

We had dinner at Public House, a pub with fun, live music. The plan was to eat appetizers and have drinks, but a few of us wanted real food. Hal got us a table at the restaurant so he, Mary Margaret, Alex, Mike, gem, and me had a nice dinner. I had some tasty chicken stuffed with peppers.

In the evening, Mike, Alex, gem, and I had fun conversation in which we decided the van was its own nation, Vanica. It very quickly evolved into a corrupt state with a religious figure, John, used to keep the front passengers in line. Art imitates reality.

A post like this doesn’t really do the trip justice. What was great was talking with friends. I miss Alex and Darnell, and it was wonderful to see them again. They have good taste in friends, so seeing our mutual friends is also fun, and they both have amazing families too.

I had a blast!

Edit: I forgot to add that those meanies made me dance at the Public House. Oh well. It wasn’t so bad!

Nana’s 90th Birthday

Last week was my great-grandmother’s 90th birthday. We met at my mom’s house Saturday around 6:45 to drive to Vegas to surprise her. During the car ride I got to enjoy some Super Mario 3D Land and podcasts, which was fun. We visited with my grandparents for a bit before heading to the restaurant. Along with my aunt and uncle, their kids, my other uncle, and his daughter, we all hid and yelled surprise when Nana got there. She’s 90, but luckily she didn’t have a heart attack.

After dinner we all went back to my grandparents’ house. There was a delicious looking white cake with strawberry filling, but I didn’t eat any. We talked for a bit, but there was a super loud football game on TV with a lot of yelling (because what’s not exciting by people arbitrarily placed into teams and running into other people), so I escaped to another room to hang out quietly.

We went back to Nana’s house to sleep for the night. She spent quite some time explaining different rules and information she thought we’d need. This included the fact that we shouldn’t open a window because then someone could just come right into her house! Also, all the overflow drains in the house were taped-over. She doesn’t like bugs.

She did show me photos of her husband, who I never met, and his medals from World War II. That was very cool!

In the morning we got up at 6:15 and hit the road my 6:30. We were back early enough to have plenty of time for activities at home!