Category: Story
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Breakthrough at 99 Ranch
99 Ranch is a pan-Asian grocery store in the U.S. What sets it apart from traditional American grocery stores is its fish department. While most American supermarkets sell pre-cut fillets, 99 Ranch features a wide selection of whole fish. The staff stands ready to prep the fish to your liking—cleaned, head removed, or even fried.…
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Losing Rhythm
I have been tracking my morning habits on and off for two years. My morning routine has three things: a few minutes of light exercise, a few minutes of meditation, and reading/writing. In my journal, I write an X every time I do these things. I fell off the routine over the last 30 days;…
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30 Years of Pool
For a while before the pandemic, I was into playing billiards. This hobby came to a halt when covid hit since all the pool halls were closed. In early 2021, a pool hall called Samwon Billiard in Oakland Koreatown was reopening. I texted Kevin, my pool buddy, to see if he was interested. Kevin and…
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Secret Broth Ingredients
There is a family-run Vietnamese restaurant not far from my house called Super Super Restaurant. I have been going there for years. The owner, his wife, and his kids work at the restaurant. Super Super’s menu has less than 20 items. Pho noodles, banh mi sandwiches, and rice plates are the classics. Their #1 noodle…
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The Cost of Delicious Lentils
Earlier this week, we went to an Ethiopian restaurant nearby. Like our last visit two years ago, Shita, an Ethiopian woman in her fifties, greeted us with a warm, soft smile and hurried back into the kitchen. She was the only person working. Taking phone orders, cooking, serving — it was all her. The chickpea…
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Me? They’ve Got Me Wrong
Most people know Michaelangelo as a famous painter, but not many know that he was also a poet. In fact, he wrote a poem how uncertain he felt about painting. Giovanni, come agitatefor my pride, my poor dead art! I don’t belong!Who’s a painter? Me? No way! They’ve got me wrong. The Complete Poems of…
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The Headaches We Don’t See
I went on a bike ride with a friend the other day. He started a company 8 years ago. His company has been growing over time, and he now has a sizable team. Recently, he has hit a rough spot. He has been working with a large customer who promised 50x his existing business over…
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How I Nearly Lost $196.24
I received two texts Monday morning. 6:34am: “Wayfair: You are unsubscribed from all SMS alerts.” 6:32am: “Thank you for placing your order with Wayfair. Reply Y to confirm your order. If you did not place this order, reply N.” I was puzzled. Did I sleepwalk and shop for furniture in the middle of the night? I opened…
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15 Minutes a Day
Anthony Trollope was a 19th-century English writer. Throughout his life, he published over sixty books and an impressive collection of letters and short stories. He did that on top of a full-time job at the postal services. His childhood and young adulthood didn’t appear promising: But things began to turn in 1841. Trollope transferred to Ireland…
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What Didn’t Change After A Decade
This past week, I organized my room and came across a stack of old notes from a decade ago. It appeared I journaled for about three months before picking it up again six years later. I was taken aback by what I privately wrote, in Chinese, on August 23, 2014: A blank piece of paper.Don’t…
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Disrupt a 20-year Pattern
In the last 20 years, I started many projects. I had a dozen blogs with less than ten posts. I had a podcast in 2006 with five episodes on computer-related topics. I lost count of how many journals I had bought. These projects were nowhere to be found three months later (sometimes only two weeks).…