Tahoe this weekend

Time to bust out my snowboard this weekend. It's a weekend up in tahoe in a rented cabin. Luckily one of the girls is coming back on sunday as well, so I won't have to drive all the way up and back myself. Oh crap, that reminds me I need to check to see if my snowboard will fit in the back seat of the car. They seem like a bunch of fun peeps, from my exchange of emails regarding the cabin, so it sounds like it'll be fun.

My oldest sister called me up today, and scolded me for not writing back to my niece. Apparently I'm at least two letters behind, and her project is due sometime next month. Time to get on my ass and get it done, as well as my taxes. I'm still procrastinating on that. My sis reminded me that we haven't gotten together with my other sister and done anything with just the three of us for, I think literally 10 years. We really should do things together to remind us that we're actually related. Sometimes we forget about things like that. I also reminded her that we still haven't made any plans for our "Family Vacation" that's coming up in July. We're supposed to go to hawaii, but we'll take any vacation destination that has a deal.

Weekend full of cars

Saturday was the Norcal Evo / 350z meet at Lemans Karting in Fremont. about 100 cars showed up to hang out, look at cars, compete in the gokarting competition, and drool over the models. I decided to go compete in the gokart competition. Unfortunately I arrived a little wait, didn't make it in time to get a practice lap, and I never saw the track before in my life. I had to rely on my past autocross skills where you always see a new track, and you plan your line by walking and looking at the course. I was able to make it to the final round, but was no match for the veterans of the track who were lapping it more than half a second faster than I was. I managed 7th place in the finals, despite being black flagged on the semi final round and coming in almost dead last. Here's some sample pics of what you guys missed out.


Right after the meet, my friend had a birthday party also in Fremont for their 2 year old daughter, Lily. I met up with all my old friends I've known for a long time. This is my circle of friends that are ALL either getting married, married, or married with kids. This also includes my first girlfriend who was there with her husband. The guys got together and mentioned that all the girls just went to vegas recently, and that we should too. Oh boy, here goes another money draining vegas trip.

H, one of my female friends, and her gang of sisters tried to hook me up with somebody's godmother's daughter. The only requirement of them trying to hook me up was that she was single. Not really trying to learn what I like or would even prefer. Ah well, can't blame them for trying, even if it wasn't thought out at all. I really need somebody more ABC and outgoing, rather than the typical shy not born here asian. That's just my type.

Sunday was dyno day at EIP in San Jose. Unfortunately my car was overboosting on the dyno causing some knock and power loss. I didn't make the 260hp I did on the GST dyno. I was quite disappointed, but I did receive my MAP sensor and just got it installed so I can now log boost. My new hobby is figuring out how to get the ECU to control boost and do it smoothly on my own. I almost have the boost setting and curve to where I want it.

Vasovagal Reaction

From the wikipedia entry Vasovagal syncope

Vasovagal syncope is the most common cause of fainting. There are a number of different syncope syndromes which all fall under the umbrella of vasovagal syncope. The common element among these conditions is the central mechanism leading to loss of consciousness. The differences among them are in the factors which trigger this mechanism.

Typical triggers for vasovagal syncope include:

* prolonged standing or upright sitting
* stress
* any painful or unpleasant stimuli, such as
o giving blood
o watching someone else give blood
* prolonged exposure to heat
* sudden onset of extreme emotions
* hunger
* consumption of marijuana
* consumption of alcohol
* nausea or vomiting
* urination ('micturition syncope') or defecation
* swallowing ('deglutition syncope')
* sexual arousal
* abdominal straining or 'bearing down' (as in defecation)

People with trypanophobia ("injection phobia") may suffer from vasovagal syncope from the sight, feeling, or even thought of a needle.
People with vasovagal syncope typically have recurrent episodes, usually when exposed to a specific trigger. The initial episode often occurs when the person is a teenager, then recurs in clusters throughout his or her life. Prior to losing consciousness, the individual frequently experiences a prodrome of symptoms such as lightheadedness, nausea, sweating, ringing in the ears, and visual disturbances. These last for at least a few seconds before consciousness is lost, which typically happens when the person is sitting up or standing. When they pass out, they fall down; and when in this position, effective blood flow to the brain is immediately restored, allowing the person to wake up.

So why am I quoting the wikipedia? A few weeks ago, when I was really sick after vegas, I had some food poisoning (Ok, maybe I gave it to myself by eating some cheese that may have been in the fridge for too long). In the middle of the night I had a horrible stomach ache, and headed to the bathroom. But I feinted along the way. I think I landed in the closet at first because I saw some marks on the door from what I think part of me hit, then somehow made it to the bathroom tile. I think I came to about a minute later. Did my business in the bathroom then felt alot better. It's not the first time this happened from a bad stomach ache, but I thought I really should get it checked out by a doctor. Especially since I now live alone, and there was nobody around when I feinted.

So I decided to see a doctor about this. I went to Kaiser (I'm on the kaiser plan right now) and the doctor, which was a female asian doctor around my age, (I wonder if she's single) said I had a vasovagal reaction, which is very common feinting episode. Such as in all those stories where girls feint or when people feint at the sight of blood (great, she just said I feinted like a girl). After feeling a bit embarassed, all thoughts of trying to figure out a way to see if she's single stopped. In fact, I really haven't told anybody about this recent episode yet except for my ex-gf, I wasn't even going to blog about it. The doctor said it's not really a big deal, and said if I feel it coming on, I should try to sit or lay down so I don't hurt myself on the way down.

Gym buddy

Saw my new gym buddy at the gym yesterday and today. Now my workouts take even longer because I end up talking to him when I should be lifting weights. But at least it's not as boring. I need to get him on my IM so we can IM each other so we can sync up our gym schedules. I convinced him to start running outside when the weather is nice, so we'll start hopefully on thursday.

I worked out yesterday on chest alot. I'm still not at my tip top condition, I had to ratchet all the weights down, and couldn't lift my max like I normally do. Today I'm sore from the workout yesterday, and will probably be even more sore tomorrow. Geez, I hate starting from square one, where I'm sore after every workout for a couple of days. This marks my second regularly scheduled workout, so hopefully by my third workout, I'll stop being sore. I weighed myself on the scale today, 178lbs with towel. Down from my peak of 185. That would be pretty good if it wasn't for the fact that I'm sure some of that weight was some muscle mass along with the fat. But at least my waist looks better now. My love handles are starting to melt away, and I'm getting the lines in my abs back. I've been watching what I eat, trying to eat as much protein as I can, and not eating too much. I also just ran out of my whey protein today, so I went online and ordered a 5lb container of whey protein from amazon, french vanilla flavor. It seems to be helping when I take it, I seem to be adding more muscle mass with it than without.

My friend is renting a cabin up in tahoe in two weeks, so I'm planning on going snowboarding with a bunch of people, most I've probably never met before, so this should be fun. Hopefully there'll be some girls going so it won't be a total sausage fest.

Another good friend of mine's asked me to participate in the Miss Asian American pageant as a escort, escorting all the contestants around and stuff. He's been doing it for the last few years, and I've declined the previous years because I didn't want to give up my weekends for months, so I could spend more time with my GF. Well since I don't have that problem anymore, I'll be doing it this time around.
As my friend said "You're going to be meeting 23-24 year old girls, is that going to be a problem for you?"
Me - "Uhm, let me think about that for a second." (Dramatic pause in classic thinking pose) "Nope, not a problem."

They can't keep their hands off my wii

Frantically cleaned up the living room floor area in preparation for my car friends to hold a meeting / bbq. We're talking about entering the 24hoursoflemons race in tracy. We found a miata with right front damage that somebody is going to give to us for free, and we've decided to enter the race in oct. We're going to get the miata towed to one of our group's house where he has space to store and work on it. We figured some of the cost to fix up the miata, add a roll cage plus other parts and spares would cost us around $350 each member (nine total). Drivers will require an extra $100 for entry fee plus their own helmet and fire suit. I figure it's going to cost me about $600 to enter the race! Eeek, time to start saving.

But before everyone showed up, they all got hooked on playing with the wii and wii sports. I had force "the kids" off the wii so we can have our meeting. Heh, people really love my wii when they come over.

One of the guys brought his HID flashlight. Holy crap that thing is bright. We shined it outside, and we light up my neighbor's living room who is down the driveway, across the street, behind a house, behind the forest, up the hill. He then pointed it at my ceiling in my living room with all the lights on, and it was like a night and day difference. It's like the sun came into my living room.

Great weather

Wow, we've been having some great weather lately. Of course I haven't been taking advantage of it, since I didn't go running or even to the gym yesterday. Instead I went home and found my neighbor tearing apart his rear brakes on his audi, and asking for my help in getting the rear brake caliper piston back in. I gave him a hand, apparently he didn't know he had to turn the piston in order to get it back in the caliper. Luckily I came by, otherwise he would have been stuck and would have had to tow it to a garage to get repaired.

But today I'm heading outside for a run after work, then spend some quality time with the weights. I was sore for a good 4 days after my workout monday. The weather is absolutely perfect outside. Unfortunately my gym buddy doesn't work out on fridays, ah well I'll catch him next time.

This weekend, I'm gathering up my car friends and having a meeting / bbq / party at my place this saturday. Time to make use of the grill. It'll also kick my ass into gear to get my place cleaned / tidied up enough to have guests over. Then it's tax gathering sunday. Then off to tahoe the next weekend. Hopefully there's still some snow left up there.

I am finally not sick!

2 weeks after my vegas trip, I'm finally feeling great. No more coughing, though now my allergies has kicked in since we started having this really nice warm weather. I even went for a long hike / run out in the back trails behind my house. Went to work out on monday for the first time in two weeks, and I'm still sore all over from that.

2 weekends ago, I went to go get my car tuned. One of my old friends I've known for the past 5 years has now started ecu tuning evo's as a profession. I decided to head up to the shop GST and get my car tuned on the dyno, while asking him a million questions on how to tune the ecu. Net result is a gain of 30 hp and 30 lb/ft of torque for 260whp and 260lb/ft torque. That translate to somewhere around 310-320 hp to the flywheel (the numbers manufacturers quote on the brochures) I'm confident enough that I can start tuning my own car now, but still learning. In fact, that's my new hobby, learning everything I can about the stock ecu and ecu tuning. The car is wicked fast right now, and I'm enjoying it every day.


My ex-gf from taiwan (not the recent ex) decided she wanted to visit some friends in CA, and asked if she could stay in my spare bedroom. So she's scheduled her visit sometime next month, and it looks like she'll be visiting me for 2 weeks, with a week in between while she heads to LA to visit more friends. Oh, and she does read my blog.

Good lord, I bought about 5 boxes of girl scout cookies, and read the label. I just ate about 900 calories worth of cookies in one sitting. But it was really good! Looks like I need to start hitting the gym again. And since DST is now active, I can run outside after work again. It's been really nice outside lately, so it's good weather to start running. I also found out one of the guys I see in the gym at work actually works for my company. All this time I thought he worked for one of the other companies that share our building and gym. I think I've convinced him to work out together, so I think I've got a work out buddy.

I am alive, barely.

Ok, this cold has been kicking my ass all over town. That coupled with major work and nighttime downtimes, even when I took time off work, I ended up working from home a good portion of the time. I haven't even been keeping up with my favorite blog reading! Yah, it's been that bad.

But I'm finally on the return path of being better. Hopefully by this weekend I'll be able to start going to the gym again. I haven't worked out for almost 2 weeks now. I'm going to be so sore when I do get back to the gym.

Did I mention how much I hate the new Daylight Savings Time that went into effect this year? Argh, I hate you bush, for signing that. That was the majority of my work the last couple of weeks, was DST patching, planning, testing, researching, and then dealing with the fallout of stuff not working correctly after patching. Hopefully by tomorrow night, the last patch will be in place and I can finally take it off my plate, while a SOX (Sarbanes Oxley) critical and sensitive application gets upgraded. That means tons of paperwork and procedures which slows down my work. I also have to make absolutely sure I cross my t's and dot my i's and hope the sox rules don't change after I finish it.