You know, Korea is a very strange country
It’s one of the few countries where millionaires yell back at protestors “motherfucker do you pay taxes? Does your tax even count?” And then people online compare a millionaire 1:1 with a poor person and go “yeah he’s contributing to the economy alright”.

And a lot of people seem to think that rich people earn more because they deserve more, they spend more and keep the economy running, they invest in real estate and jack up land prices – so an all-around “good person”. (Until it’s a woman, and then she’s a braindead wasteful spender) A lot of people complain about high house costs but very few resent large property owners.

With a mentality like that it’s gonna make things just worse and harder for people to empathize with black peopl

at this 20-person work call yesterday, as an opening icebreaker, we were going around sharing what each person does for halloween
i was like “oh halloween is coming up soon, cool :9acosp_stormihuhwtf: ”

then that night in our family call my brother shared a vid of his son dressed up in hallooween costume
i was gonna say “oh they are practicing so soon?”
then i realized halloween was friday, not end of november

Preordered the Pixel 6 on October 19. Amazon indicates it’s shipping on 10/28, expecting delivery on Monday 11/1. I’ve been looking at the product page every day, seeing if the ship date moves (indicating backorders, which would mean that earlier orders ship first.. I wasn’t sure whether this would be the case)

| Thursday, October 28
| Package arrived at an Amazon facility.
| Baltimore, MARYLAND US

Oh wow I didn’t expect it to ship the same day as it’s released. This is pretty early, maybe I can get it over the weekend!

| Package arrived at an Amazon facility.
| Ontario, CA US

Same day arrival in CA! Nice!

*refreshing the tracking page every 4 hours at this point*

| Friday, October 29
| 4:21 PM
| Package arrived at an Amazon facility.
| Los Angeles, CALIFORNIA US
(delivery estimate changes to Sunday)

omg it’s happening! Maybe it will deliver on Saturday! Saturday delivery?

| 9:56 PM
| Package left an Amazon facility.
| Buena Park, CALIFORNIA US

Huh.. it went to Buena Park? Some items sometimes do this – they arrive in LA, then go to Buena Park, then it says “lost in transit or delayed beyond original timeline, contact us for a refund if you don’t receive the item by X day” (and then the item does or does not deliver with a 50% chance)

| Saturday, October 30
| 5:35 AM
| Package arrived at a carrier facility.
| Los Angeles, US

Oooh… is it gonna cut it in time to be on a USPS vehicle for Saturday delivery?

| 10:00 AM and no updates

Ah I think it missed the USPS window by an hour or two, and is now definitely slated for Sunday delivery.

I’ve never refreshed the delivery tracker this much in my life. And at the end of the day the phone is not such a big deal.. I’m probably just bored, although the current phone is slightly laggy.

Update: 11:00 AM

o0o

regarding squid games, i’m more concerned about the random “we have a just society here within the game. and you can’t break the rules of fairness” mini-arc. that random plot was unnecessary, was forced. and it didn’t get followed up on.

“fairness” is a big codeword among the right wing in korea after the 조국 corruption scandal of 2017 and the antifeminist discourse post-2015

we’ll have yet to see whether the director is a right wing incel in disguise a la attack on titan

Haha I dreamt that i was working with a team in a voter preferred language recognition project.. in a supermarket

> DerTora: Kid asked me what my korean name is 💀

Der = definite article in german language, male singular
tora = “tiger” in japanese
=> 그호 (that tiger) pronounced cuh hoe

> AlanJ: whats my korean name?

Anal= 💩
Jazeera =”the island” in arabic (traditionally refers to arabian peninsula)
=> 항도 (anal island) pronounced hang do

i understand why people would ask a lawyer to do their DACA app
as a non-expert, it’s hard to tell which things require expertise and which things don’t if you are not familiar with the field

imagine someone not trained in law doing like a unpaid wages lawsuit or idk.. whatever high level lawsuit
they would probably lose, and all their freinds would be like “you dummy, should have hired lawyer instead of cheapening out”
as someone not familar, it might be unclear whether their instinct of looking at the DACA app and thinking “doesn’t look too hard, maybe I can do it myself” actually is

a) a correct instinct (meaning: DACA is easy, just like doing your college app), or
b) a trap (meaning: DACA app might look easy but it’s a minefield full of invisible potential mistakes that can end up in your deportation)

because older immigrants think everything is easy
and think their only barrier is english
so they tell their children to do all kinds of shit, like filing taxes, submitting a govt project bid application, filing a C-corporation, who knows what else
those parents think DACA is easy, that you should do it yourself
and as a child who has seen your parents do many things themselves thinking it’s “easy” and fail and get scammed in the past
your gut instinct can be “uh my dad is saying this is easy… you know, maybe it’s not”
“my homie who didn’t go to college is saying this is easy… idk, should I trust their advice”
“this app looks simple. but is there anything in the process that I should watch out for that is not spelled out in the USCIS webpage?”

so if that “second guessing my instinct and my parents’ instincts” ends up being your primary driver,
then you will end up hiring an attorney to do DACA

for some other fields of life, this “better safe than sorry” attitude can be a lifesaver/headache-saver
you just happened to not be familiar enough with immigration to choose the cost-efficient path with DACA

===============
as for renewals:
if your attorney charged you $1,000 for a DACA initial
hopefully they will give you a big discount for the renewal. maybe like $200, idk
so now you are choosing between paying an expert $200 to deal with this and not having to deal with it yourself
and trying to figure out the app (which granted, looks much easier)
so eh, now we are at the “should I pay a CPA $100 to do my taxes as a W-2” level ¯_(ツ)_/¯

hmm so I wanted to open retirement savings this year

there are regular IRAs and Roth IRAs

• Korean financial advisor who I went to ask first about retirements: so you should get a Roth IRA, those don’t get taxed

• My latino financial advisor: dude that Korean advisor must have super rich clients who get income from renting out buildings they own. You don’t own any buildings right? So yeah for normal people who only make money from working, a regular IRA is better, because you get your taxes deducted now. Then when you retire you will have zero income, so it doesn’t matter if they try to tax you for your IRA income at that point.

• Internet: regular IRAs get taxed after you retire, Roth IRAs get taxed when you put the money into the Roth. So if you are gonna be making more money after retiring than at your current age, then Roth IRA is better, but if you are gonna be making less money after retiring, regular IRA is better (so agrees with my financial advisor)

• My CPA who is Korean: you are opening a regular IRA this year? Uh those don’t get tax deductions, Roth IRAs get tax deductions

Do these Koreans know something that my advisor doesn’t? Oh god are they doing some loophole or scamming the system

when i was a college student i saw those credit card ads posted on the college campus
and I thought that the APR was interest that had to be always paid as the cost of using a credit card
otherwise, why would they display the APR rate so prominently in the ads?
so I thought “so you spend $100 with your card and then afterwards pay with $112 out of your bank? thats.. unnecessary”
and never used a credit card until 9 years later

man i’ve been so out of habit of being outside
i’m like walking
and about to cross a street in a residential neighborhood
a car comes along
so I instinctively stop
and get distracted
thinking
in the meantime the car is completely stopped in front of me, waiting for me to cross
driver: “tf is wrong with this mfer he clearly intended to cross, and now he’s kinda looking into the horizon and not moving. should i just drive away?”
and like a good awkward 15 seconds later i’m like “oh”