Blog

Short blog posts, journal entries, and random thoughts. Topics include a mix of personal and the world at large.

Get back to work

San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie has ordered city workers to return-to-office for four days per week. (Why not the full five?) The rationale is that more face-to-face interaction will increase productivity (not advocating, just writing what is stated in the article). More days in-office will boost spending in the downtown core.

This thread in the San Francisco subreddit is breathing in a huge amount of cope. Lots of advocation for the positives of working from home. Lots of admonition for the impending congestion and traffic increase. This one post hilariously says they are being forced to buy $20 lunches downtown when reporting for work in person. Who the French can afford to eat-out for lunch every single workday (non lawyer and tech-bro edition)? Pack your own lunch from home like an adult.

Anyways, this return-to-office order isn’t a referendum on the merits of working from home. (The are positives and negatives.) It’s a referendum on optics. San Francisco can’t plead with the private sector to refill the suffering downtown core - to boost the surrounding economy - when its own workers aren’t being asked to do the same. Employees paid for by the taxpayers should be first in line in helping whatever revitalization plan the city has.

There’s jealousy involved, too. Those who cannot work-from-home are envious of those who can. The problem that public service workers have is that they are beholden to voters. If enough people are angry at your privilege, someone like President Trump will win an election, then demand all Federal workers to return-to-office.

Heck, unionized public workers who’s already in-office full-time ought to make a complaint in the name of fairness. Why do others members of the union get to work-from-home, and you cannot? Shouldn’t all worker’s contract terms be the same?

Paper or plastic

One month into year 2025 and I hope I’ve gotten all the sickness out of the way. Earlier in January I had a bout with the common cold. Just now I am recovering from a stomach virus. That certainly should be it for this year in terms of illnesses. Please, I cannot handle any more away time from lifting weights. I can imaginarily see the gains melting away in front of my very eyes.

Due to the stomach virus, I was on a semi-liquid diet for about a day. Fruit smoothies to the rescue. The location on campus gave me a paper straw for it (thanks a lot, San Francisco). Predictably, the straw utterly disintegrated before I was even halfway done with the smoothie. Happy to save the environment by not being able to finish my drink! If we are serious about this paper straw business, someone has to invent a stronger solution for thicker dinks. (Shark Tank opportunity, I reckon.)

Coincidently, President Trump plans to sign an executive order overturning President Biden’s pledge to ban plastic straw usage in federal agencies. Those lucky bastards! The masses shouldn’t have to suffer with an inferior product in order to make some virtual-signaling environmentalist happy.

I agree plastic waste is a problem. But how do you propose a fruit smoothie be served without a sturdy straw? Sippy lids works for thin liquids, not milk-shake levels of consistency. Give customers a (compostable) spoon? Who wants to “drink” a smoothie with a spoon? You know what, perfect solution: ban smoothies altogether. No need to solve a problem if the problem doesn’t exist anymore.

Sorry, I’m cranky from being sick. Nothing will make you value health more than suffering through illness.

That's not very nice

It’s not everyday you get woken up at 6:00 AM to a tornado warning. Actually, it’s the first of its kind ever in the recorded history of San Francisco. Though I wonder how far back that stretches. What did they do for alerts before the advent of the cellphone? The emergency sirens dating back to World War II, I suppose.

The tornado warning advised to “Take shelter now in a basement or an interior room on the lowest floor of a sturdy building.” Seeing that it was early Saturday morning, most of us were already indoors - asleep. Good news for me, my room is already the bottommost floor of the house. So what did I do with the warning? Sent a screenshot of it to my friend group-chat, and then promptly went back to sleep.

I think the proper thing to do was to get up and hunker down? I don’t see what difference it would make. If a tornado actually materializes in our vicinity, that in it of itself will promptly wake me back up. You know what? I now understand how folks in tornado and hurricane alleys refuse to heed warnings and stay put. Just like soldiers going into battle, you never think you would die. Despite the mathematical probability staring at the face.

Along with the tsunami warning from last week, it’s been a wild time for San Franciscans. Let’s hope it’s not one of those precursors to a giant earthquake. They’ve been telling us about the next big one since I was in elementary school - three decades ago.

To close or not to close

There was another Presidential debate this evening, and I could not care less. Between this one and the last debate, we’re no longer voting between two senile old men. That in it of itself is a win. Whatever happens in November is whatever. Besides, living in a California means the electoral votes will go to Vice President Harris, regardless of how I vote. It doesn’t materially matter.

Locally in San Francisco, I will have to vote on banning cars on the Great Highway. For those who don’t live here, the Great Highway is a long stretch of road running alongside the western beachhead. The road has been closed to traffic on the weekends already, but now people are petitioning for full time closure.

It seems wrong for me to vote on a thing where I have zero skin in the game. I hardly ever go to the beach (it’s not really a beach weather kind of town), and I don’t use the Great Highway to commute. I think the biggest opponent of banning cars are those who commute on the road. Make sense: I wouldn’t want to deviate from my normal routine either. Plus, it’s simply math: other arterial roads will see an uptick in vehicle traffic, and perhaps congestion.

Proponents of shutting down the Great Highway wants to turn it into a public park. I’m dubious of this one two fronts. One: who the heck is going to pay for the renovations? I thought San Francisco government is in a budget crisis. Second: there’s already a public park there. It’s called… the beach! For a region so much in need of more housing, if we’re going to shut down an entire road for good, let’s turn it residential.

I remain undecided.

What are we doing

It is absolutely embarrassing for the city of San Francisco to have your football team’s first round rookie get shot whilst shopping downtown. In what looks like an armed robbery gone sideways, the incident reinforces the image of a lawless hellhole of a city that Fox News would like its audience to believe. Giants legend Buster Posey was right: San Francisco’s seedy reputation (perceived, factual, or otherwise) might indeed be a deterrent for free agents to sign with local sports teams.

Because if I am going to be paying over half my salary in combined State and Federal taxes (thank you for your service, millionaires), I definitely would want to feel safe.

Ricky Pearsall getting shot will only serve further pause to future free agents. Pearsall didn’t have a choice - he was drafted by the 49ers as an amateur out of college. Fortunately for him, he is going to make a full recovery. The bullet did not hit any vital organs.

With that out of the way, the blame for this mess is on everyone who are in positions of power in this city for the past few years. Mayor, supervisors, police, non profits, judges, et cetera. We can’t have nice things because those in power are actively choosing to not have them. Breaking the law must have consequences, even if the offenders are minors. A slap on the wrist simply because they are underage is not acceptable. We can’t let an entire class of teens terrorize the community with impunity. And If you really can’t charge the kids, sue their parents or guardian for supreme negligence.

The apprehended Pearsall’s shooter is reportedly a 17-year old male from nearby Tracy. There’s got to be at least some prison time, right?

Consequences must follow

What really grinds my gears is going to Target and finding the thing I wanted to buy is locked up behind plexiglass. The introverted me will definitely not call for an associate to unlock the damn cabinet. Target often leaves me no choice but to buy the same item from Amazon. Sure I would have to wait two days to get it shipped for free, but at least I don’t have to beg someone to allow me the honor to make a purchase.

It’s a real shame that it has to be like this. Those tasked with making and enforcing laws have abdicated their duty to the public. When criminals can steal with impunity, the law-abiding majority suffers. The few ruins it for the many. We all have to take our shoes off at airport TSA checkpoints because one person nearly snuck a shoe bomb through one time. We all have to pay higher auto insurance premiums to cover the few who do not.

There has to be sufficient punishment to act as a deterrence. America cannot be like Japan: the orderliness, the cleanliness, and the utter lack of common crime is because of the Japanese culture. Lacking that, government must then create strong incentives. Take a look at China: pretty crimes are nonexistent, not because the population is overwhelmingly benevolent like Japan, but it is because there’s surveillance cameras everywhere. Who would be stupid enough to steal anything? Especially in a country with a somewhat arbitrary judicial system.

Not that I am advocating for mass surveillance here in the States. I’m just saying we cannot get to Japan from a bottom-up cultural standpoint. We must catch and punish those who do not follow laws. There’s no room for laxity. Oh, you can’t afford that red light ticket because you’re poor working class? Easy: don’t run the freaking red light in the first place. Choices were made, consequences must follow.

My fellow San Franciscans: you ever go to other parts of this country and be amazed that merchandise at a Target aren’t locked up behind glass? I have. It’s fantastic and sad to see at the same time. The powers at be in San Francisco are actively choosing to not have nice things.

Vote local

Who I vote for to be the President of these United States really doesn’t matter. Not because the California delegates will vote Democrat regardless (all those tech bros voting for Trump is kind of just pissing in the wind), but because whoever is the President doesn’t really affect me much materially. Now, who is going to be the mayor of San Francisco - that’s the most crucial race as it pertains to my life.

Because the citizenry might elect the wrong person, one who turns out to be super tolerant towards homeless camping on sidewalks, and petty theft done by teenagers. It was only a few years ago when we recalled a district attorney who didn’t want to persecute criminals. Imagine that! That’s like firefighters coming to the front of your burning home and just standing there. The fire has rights too, am I right?

The current San Francisco mayor - London Breed - knows it’s an election year so she is stepping up efforts to clear homeless encampments. The Supreme Court of the United States did our city a solid by allowing municipalities to ban people from sleeping in public spaces. Where will the homeless go, you ask? How about your house? If you’re so concerned about their wellbeing, why don’t you give up your resources?

See: it’s easy to virtue signal when you don’t experience any of the downsides. I bet the residents of the Tenderloin district is happy to finally see some enforcement action towards the homeless problem.

The local elections matter tremendously. Act accordingly!