bayarea
Watching Fourth of July fireworks has become a family ritual for us, as it has for many families in the United States. The location changes, and each year I try to find a place that will make the familiar show feel a little different. Two years ago, we watched from
tech
Last Tuesday night (5/19), I went to the Computer History Museum to hear Joanna Stern talk about her new book, I Am Not a Robot: My Year of Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything. This was one of those Bay Area events that felt almost too easy to attend.
concert
Not long after K-Pop Fireworks Night at Oracle Park, the real K-pop moment came much closer to my home. BTS came to Palo Alto. Technically, the venue was Stanford Stadium, not Palo Alto, and technically this was part of the BTS World Tour Arirang. But from our side
giants
The Giants are one of my favorite recurring topics on this blog, even when the team itself is not giving me much help. This season has been hard to watch in the usual torturous way of 2020s Giants baseball. Still, Oracle Park keeps pulling me back. Yes, that's
tech
Last month, I got an invitation to Stripe Sessions 2026, and I still do not know exactly why. Maybe it was because my title says Director of Engineering at Toss. Maybe it was because I have been spending too much money on AI tools, and many of those payments quietly
giants
Baseball is back now in 2026. Yes, we had the World Baseball Classic (Korea had extreme ups and downs, which was thrilling), and the Cactus League. But this past Wednesday was the real return of baseball. The 2026 season opened with a single game, just one, between the San Francisco
bayarea
The day after Christmas, we went to see the circus: Cirque du Soleil: ECHO. The venue was in very familiar territory: the parking lot of Oracle Park. The last time I saw Cirque du Soleil there was in 2019, for Amaluna, right before we all entered the long dark tunnel
bayarea
As a lapsed Catholic, I carried mixed feelings while visiting so many grand Catholic cathedrals during our recent Italy trip. It brought back my old emotions and an old ritual I had almost forgotten. When I lived in Korea, my family had a quiet year-end tradition: attending Christmas Eve
bayarea
Filoli is my family’s favorite destination. I’ve already written about it more than once (especially in my previous post, Nightfall at Filoli). Among all their events, the Holiday Lights have become our quiet Christmas ritual. We visited last year, loved it, and decided this would simply be part
giants
A few weeks ago, I renewed my Giants Flex membership. I originally thought it auto-renewed, but apparently it didn’t—until someone from the Giants called and nudged me. During the renewal process, I finally solved the mystery of the random 20% concession discount I received last season (yes,
bayarea
Filoli has always been one of my family’s go-to weekend stroll spots. The elegant historic house, the manicured gardens with seasonal flowers, and the quiet trails through ranch-style countryside always make me feel grounded and calm. But as good as it is, repetition eventually made me numb
bayarea
Fleet Week has always been a yearly ritual for my family — though, honestly, not always a smooth one. In 2022, I learned the name of San Francisco’s true nemesis: Karl the Fog. 2023 was a little better, and last year, we finally had a perfect day. So naturally, I
