The Wikipedia black out got the entire nation (or at least, the online community) to start paying close attention to SOPA and PIPA legislations and restarted the war on copyrights and online piracy. What the argument boils down to is that online piracy is bad because it infriged on the copyrights of the artists and resulted in lost of revenues for the creators of these works. What the entertainment industry is arguing is that their revenues are down because of the online piracy and without it, their profit would skyrock.

But is that really the case?

A friend of mine actually posted an interesting arguement – will the people actually go out and buy more of the items in question if online piracy never existed?

The entertainment industry wants to believe so. However, I sincerely doubted it. If you think about it, online piracy is a lot like getting free samples at the grocery stores or watching a hit movie on television. They are free, but chances are you will not change your buying pattern based solely on whether or not a movie is shown on TV or a sample is given at the grocery store. What I mean to say is that if you really love Tyson’s chicken fingers, you will buy the product irregardless of whether somebody is frying a batch of sample up at your local grocery store when you visited it. You will try the free sample if it is available, but if it is not something you are wanting to eat in the immediate future, you will not put it in your cart. Having the free samples available is definitedly not going to make you decided against buying it, and it might actually influence you to buy one if you decided you liked the taste of it. Likewise, if you are a fan of, say, Terminator movies, chances are you will buy the DVDs or Blue Ray discs even if you get to watch it on TV for free every so often. Not being able to see it on TV for free ever only works as an incentive for you to go out and buy the DVD if you are really interested in watching the movie in the first place. That being the case, chances are you will wind up buying the disc, even if you eventually get to watch the movie on network TV later.

The argument is this – the customers who are settling on the pirated version of songs, youtube videos, or pirated movies are probably not the population base that will go out and buy these products in the first place. These people are happy to be able to get their hands on these stuff for free, just like we are happy to get our hands on the occasional free samples or watch an old movie on TV when there is no other shows on. But if you taken away their ability to get these things online, they will still not go out and buy these items. In fact, you have now lost your ability to impress them into wanting to ditch out a few bucks to “own the actual copies” of sonmething that they really find enjoyable. Since they cannot sample anything, they are more than happy to find enjoyment somewhere else and not have to buy anything.

Part of the reason why the entertainment industry, especially the music industry, is losing money is probably not because people are not buying. Rather, it is because people are not buying what these companies want them to buy. Before the internet, our ability to choose which artist to support is limited to what we have exposure to. If the industry chose to mass market artist A but not artist B, we as consumers would likely not even know that artist B exist. As a result, we can only choose between buying Artist A’s works or not buying anything. But with the internet today, smaller artists who are not associated with big labels are increasingly getting heard. Now we have a choice to spend our money on smaller, less well known artists. We can choose to spend our money on smaller labels. We may even decide to support artists that’s strictly overseas instead of based in US. The total spending might be the same, but there are more choices, so the profits are smaller.

What it translates into is that the same amount of people, people willing to go out and buy these works, are still buying irregardless of whether or not they can get these for free through piracy. But they are not buying the same thing. Instead, they are all buying different products. Meanwhile, people who are not inclined to spend money on these kind of things are still not buying.

The problem is for the entertainment industry to realize that their problem is that the consumers today have lots and lots of choices nowadays. If they want to make a bigger profit, then it is time for them to spend more energy figuring out what the consumers want, not to start a fight with the consumers.

After 7 years, I finally finished book 1 of my trilogy. It has been a long time, but my defense is that I didn't write for 7 years straight. Instead, I kind of was writing for two months and then let the story sat for 2 to 3 years. But at least, book 1 of the story is down on papers.

One thing I found from the experience is that, writing a story down is very different from actually seeing the story playing out in my head. I guess I kind of figured that one out with my unsuccessful attempts at writing my other stories down. It is a lot different to see a scene played out in your head and to write the scene down. How do I describe the scene? How much time and energy should I spend describing the background, the scenery, the little bits and pieces? How much details should I dwell on the physical characteristics of the characters? How do I describe their actions? The silent time when the characters sat around thinking? And how do I fill in the gaps between the scenes so the story flow nicely? For me, making up a story is easy. All it takes is an idea. But writing the story down is much more difficult, because it required me to balanced all these questions out and think and rethink the scenes to hammer out what I want to say, and left unsaid.

Then there is the constant fear that my writing style is not good enough. That somehow, I have failed my perfectly good story and characters by doing a horrible job describing what they had gone through, the things they had done, and the things dear and important to them.

Yet, there is something very satisfying about finally finishing part of the story. Even if nobody ever reads it, it still somehow feels like an accomplishment of sorts. I had an idea and I followed through and put it down on paper. Even if I cannot get it published into neat little books, I can still pass it around to anybody who ever is interested in reading it. Not to mention that I now can gloat about me finally "wrote a book".

Anyway, here is to book one of my trilogy. And hopefully, book 2 will be done much much easier and hopefully a bit faster!

I am trying to follow the pattern to crochet a blanket. Since the pattern is not a very intricate one, I have decided to make the blanket a little bigger. Well, turned out, the blanket is going to be a lot bigger than expected, more time consuming. And I hate how the edges are turning out. I am not sure where exactly I did wrong. But I am thinking about needing to do other crocheting projects to find out if the same problem persists and trying to solve it.

Then the fact I am now crochetting got me into other craft/hobbies. I am wanting to take up sewing and stitching. Unfortunately, given the time constrain, neither of them will probably happen sometimes soon. What a bummer.

And since I am stressed from a very busy day yesterday, I decided to visit amazon.co.jp ---> bad, bad, bad idea!!! I have never completely given up on the idea of learning Japanese. Looking at amazon.co.jp made me realized that I can potentially buy some children's story book and educational materials and try to learn Japanese that way. It may never be great Japanese and I may never be able to actually communiate with any Japanese verbally, but I just might be able to get by reading all of their novels. But if I am to try to learn Japanese by myself, that is another time consuming project.

On top of that, all those plans and hobbies cost money. Materials for yarn, for books, etc etc.

I need more time....... and more money...... and way less interests!!!

Most of the time when I have vacation, I will drive up to South Carolina and somewhere during the vacation stop by to stay with my parents for a night or two. For the most part, this arrangement works out pretty well. I get to spend time with my husband, his family, our friends in South Carolina, and my parents.

Or so I thought.

My parents just informed me that they do not need or want me to stop by their place this week. That I should just drive back to Alabama.

This is, of course, part of my parents' "you are a horrible daughter and since you don't want us, we don't want you!" But it still hurts.

For the most part, I know I am not the best daughter ever. I am not very spontaneous. I am not really funny to them. I cannot just entertain them or read their minds and intuitively knows what they want or need. I lack patience. I am very independent and defiant. I don't talk much. And worse, I married an American who cannot speak Chinese. Won't even call them "mom" or "dad".

But forgive me for thinking that I am also not the worse daughter one can ever have. I am financially independent, despite my recent fiasco in manage my finances. I have a job. I have a husband who loves me. I love my parents. I called them every single days to let them know that I am safe and sound and to check on them. I tried my best to remember their birthdays. I tried to encourage them to take trips, do things that they are interested in doing, and maybe even try to find a couple other things for them to do. I try to be mindful of their personalities and health and not burden them with things I know they will hate - such as driving 5 and 1/2 hours to come down to see me or rant about my job and all the problems I have.

But apparently that's not enough. Not nearly.

And now they are making it very clear that they are very, very, very tired of dealing with a horrible daughter who just won't repent and change her ways and is now heading straight for hell.

But you know what, I am tired too. I have tried everything I can to make this relationship work. I have done the best that I can. Obviously, I am just not able to do. Much as it hurts me to, I cannot fundamentally change myself into a complete different person. I cannot let go of all of my friends and my husband and only listens to my parents. I cannot put only their needs on my list. And some of those things they want me to do for them, I am just not going to be able to do because that is not me.

It pains me that my relationship between me and my parents have come done to they don't want to see or talk to me anymore. I really wish it is otherwise. I really wish I can make them happy. But I guess there are some wishes in life you can never fulfill. And if my poor behavior with my parents is going to land me a one way ticket to hell, so be it.

I am very proud to report that, despite all of my ongoing problems, at least my budgets for the month of February is a success. For the first time in several month, I spent less than what I make. I also think I have sorted out my tax withdrawal now so that the HR department of the hospital is finally taking the appropriate amount out of my paycheck. Hopefully that means I don't have to write a check to IRS next year. However, it will likely take at least one or two more month before I can start seeing green on my bank account again since I will most likely need to pay taxes this year and such. But hopefully things will start to work out for the better.

I have to say that, keeping a budget is not fun. It is never fun to have to limit the amount of your spending. It just isn't. There are so many things out there to buy, so many products to try, so many things to tempt us into spending more and more money. Our desire is practically endless while unfortunately, our wallet is not. It is really annoying sometimes to keep on looking at something online but having to tell myself that no, I am not going to buy it right now. It is always a bummer to have to wait before getting something. But part of growing up and becoming a responsible adult is to learn to know one's limitations. I obviously cannot do everything by myself. There are things I am good at, things I am horrible at, and things I am mediocre at. Likewise, there are things I can afford, things I can saved up for, things I can dream about but not likely to be able to get in this life time. Working with a budget is annoying because I have to constantly limit myself in what I can do. However, working with a budget is also great because I am learning again that I can be satisfied with what I have and that I don't have to constantly acquire what I don't have to be happy.

I know I have complained and posted about my parents before, but I thought I will polled some opinions again.

My parents stopped by earlier this month for a visit. Technically, I did not ask them to. They kind of invited themselves over. I didn't think it was a hot idea since everytime my parents and I were under the same roof, there was always a lot of tension going on. On top of that, it is a 5 and 1/2 hour drive at the very best from Atlanta to Mobile. Both of my parents have some back problems and can't sit for too long. My dad is the only one who can drive, but his eyes are not too hot either due to his glaucoma. I am really not too thrilled with them driving down here. Then there is the fact that I have a really boring life and there is nothing down here to do. At least, not that I know of.

But since telling them no will just creat a bigger problem, I told them to stop by.

Well, I guess I pissed them off so much that they decided to leave a day earlier than planned.

Turned out, as suspected, my parents were not happy with the fact that Lewis did not call my mom and dad "mom" and "dad" when they arrived. They were also not happy that I have never invited them down to Mobile ever since my move (we also didn't invite Lewis' family). In addition, my parents took offense that I suggested that we might want to wait til around 2pm or so before hitting the seafood restaurant on Saturday to avoid a big crowd. Overall, they think I just don't care about them anymore. I am too cold blooded and too distant. And they want me to reflect on everything they have done for me and what I have failed to do. Now, my mom is apparently disappointed with me enough that she wants to just head back to Taiwan.

Well, first of all, I have to say that I see it coming. The older and more independent I get, the more tension there is between my parents and me. As I get older and perhaps got more Americanized, I guess I start to form ideas and opinions that deviates more and more from the traditional Chinese teachings and what my parents expect from me. More and more, I want to be able to make my own decision; to be able to have some breathing room without reporting everything to them; and to be treated more like an adult rather than, well, a 5 year old.

We also have very different ideas of how to show our affections. I am of the opinions that since I am grown and financially independent and capable of having an independent life, their job is done. So it is now time for them to finally go and enjoy all the things that they used to deprive themselves of for my benefit. They can now go travel, do whatever they want to do, enjoy life, and not worry about their daughter. As such, I tried to encourage them to go out and, well, do stuff. But they want to be with me. They expect me to ask them to be close to me, to hang around me, and to constantly express how much I miss them. Well, I am really not that type of person. I am sorry. I can never be that type of person. I am too independent. Besides, why will I want to torture them by constantly having them drive 5 and 1/2 hours just to come and visit me? It is not like I never go back to Atlanta ever again.

Then there is the real issue that my parents and I have very different opinions about what's a normal life style. A typically weekend when I am off usually starts with me waking up by he puppies around 6am, feed them, then crash on the sectional for 4 hours or so with the puppies before I am fully awake. My parents HATED that. They had issues with me when I was a student. They still have issues with me doing that now that I am working, probably because by going back to sleep, I showed how much I don't respect them and didn't want to entertain them. They also disagree on a lot of other things I do, from what we eat or don't eat for breakfast to whether or not we should wash the glasses in the sink right then and there.

Another point of tension is how much I tell, or don't tell my parents. Ever since becoming a neurology resident, I have been having issues. Major issues. Big enough issues that I almost quit. But I cannot tell any of my problems to my parents for several reasons. First, they are really happy that I have a stable job and working my way up a stable profession. By being a doctor, I practically guaranteed that I will always have a great income and life style for the rest of my life. Hence any thoughts of unhappiness and wanting to quit is me being stupid, period. Two, they have a tendency to worry, and then to solve the problems Chinese style. If I told them there is a problem, any problem, they will not settle into just listen and let me deal with it. Their love for me will make them start calling me every 30 minutes to either try to talk me out of my "problems" or "concerns" or try to minimize my issues for me. And frankly, that's not something I want to deal with at all. I got enough problems without my parents trying to tell me how much my issues make them worry and how insignificant my issues are. And I most definitely do not want to hear that every 30 minutes or so. I know they mean well, but that, again, is not the way to make me feel better. As a result, I feel that there are less and less things I can talk to them about. Most of the things that concerns me are either me being stupid or childish. But my life is just not colorful enough to have a 40 minute conversation with my parents about everyday.

Finally, as for the fact that Lewis doesn't call me parents mom and dad. I am not sure how the typical Americans are, but somehow Lewis doesn't strike me as a guy who will call anybody besides his parents "mom" and "dad". His parents died at a rather young age, and I think they both held a special place in his heart. As a result, I think he reserves the term mom and dad for his parents only. While I understand that my parents want to know that Lewis respect them and thank them for raise and educate me, I also respect my husband's wishes to reserve the term for his own parents. Besides, he is just not the type of guy to dwell on the terms. In his opinion, calling somebody a certain way does not necessarily equates to respect and gratitude. Vice versa, not calling somebody a certain way also does not mean not caring about the person.

I don't think any of us are necessarily "wrong" in this whole fiasco. But I really do not want to make my parents feel like I have abandoned them. I also feels a very deep sense of defeat and helplessness since I have obviously somehow made the matter worse and worse because I seem to have distant myself from them, being ungrateful for everything they have done, and not "care" about them at all. Maybe this is all a sense of guilt prompting me to seek others to justify my horrible behaviors and actions. Or maybe this is just a way for me to displace the blame away from me onto others. But if anybody has any good idea on how to make things better, let me know!

I love food. One of my enjoyment in life is to cook good food. Another even bigger enjoyment is to eat good food. Unfortunately, my definition of good food is not always healthy. In fact, more often than not, they are the most unhealthy food ever.

And then, every now and then, I will get this craving for some of the most unhealthy stuff ever. Sometimes it is some kind of sweet pastries, sometimes it is fatty breakfast comfort food, sometimes it is a specific snack, etc, etc.

Today, it is fried chicken.

I have no idea why, but periodically I get this strong cravings for fried chicken. For whatever reason, I will periodically wanting to sink my teeth into one of those crispy, oily chicken. As I eat, I can just picture the fatty acids get absorbed from my intestines, pass through my liver, get processed into cholesterol, and clogging up my arteries. And sometimes, the chicken don't even taste that good. I mean, it is not like tears of joy and deliciousness will flow out of my eyes everytime I eat those damn fried chickens.

Even then, I just cannot seem to get rid of those urges. Just like I cannot resist the urges forcing my to stop by McDonald's for breakfast with their oil laden hash brown, the urges to get a bag of chip and eat half of it, the urges to get some cheesecake the other day, and god knows whatever other urges that will pop up in my mind later.

Stupid brain, stupid urges, and most of all, stupid Judy....

Ever since August or September of last year, I was having problem balancing my spending. It has became a major headache for me because it is no longer an issue once in few month but a monthly issue. Even though I still have some savings at the bank, I cannot let the problem persist because I don't want the problem to slowly eat away whatever small amount of money I have at the bank. As a result, I have been carefully recording my spending ever since the beginning of this month.

Keeping a record of what and the amount of my spending has been a pain, but very insightful. For one, I have figured out what my problem was - I was too reckless with my desires.

For years, I have trained myself to be careful with my desires. It is not hard to do if you know you are completely depended on somebody for financial support and the said person will use how much money you spend against you every chance she has got. As a result, I have been very good at not buying anything over 20 to 30 dollars. I have learned that expensive purchases will have to wait until a month when things are not too bad. To carefully watch what I buy. To be able to tell myself that I really do not need that 200 dollar ipod, or an electric hot pot, or that new textbook.

Things, however, changed ever since I started working. For the first time, I have my own money. Ever since that realization, I have slowly became reckless. Nowaday, I will gladly pick up a 20 to 30 dollars item that I want without a second thought. I can even convince myself that I can afford things that may added up to more than 100 dollars or more easily. And let me tell you, there are a lot of them. A few books here and there, a few albums on iTune, a couple of video games, a couple of purchases from ebay, a piece or two of clothing, etc etc. Before I realize I would have already spend almost my paycheck.

Then there is food. Food also is a bulk of my problem. Back when I was in medical school or even college, I don't eat out quite as much. When I do, usually it is cheap Chinese buffet or a box of fried chicken that can last me almost a week with some salad and other vegetables. I could survive 2 to 3 days at least with some chicken breast and a 6 pack of ramen noodle. Chicken curry is also cheap and tended to last me through a week or so. But nowaday, I cannot stop my urge to go out and eat. Sometimes it is because of some cravings I have. Sometimes it is because I was too lazy to make new food after a long day. Whatever the reason, it is easy to convince me that I need to go out and eat or to order some kind of take out dinner. And these eventually added up.

The end result is, I am spending more and more money every month without realizing that I actually do not have the means to.

Limiting myself to a strict budget is very hard so far. Everyday I keep wanting to tell myself that I can go out and buy that CD set that I really wanted, or that piano score I saw on ebay, or maybe pick up one or two cute sweater or dress. But I have to keep telling myself no. It is one thing to not be able to save too much money. It is completely another to keep spending more than what I earn every single month.

I will not likely stop the bleed from my bank account soon since I still need to pay off my credit card balances from my reckless spending last month. On top of that, this year I might have to pay a sizable check to the IRS for my taxes. However, hopefully in a couple of month, I can stop the financial leak and maintain my bank balance, if not even saving a little every month.

I have created an Excel budget spread sheet for me earlier this morning. In the past I have never had to use one before since I was always able to keep a mental count of how much I spent roughly and how much more money I have left over to spend. In addition, I have always been able to save some money every month. But that has changed drastically since about August of last year. Every month, not only was I unable to save anything, I tend to overspend. It is not a big deal if it is just a one or two month temporarily thing. For example, expenses for the weddings, travel, new additions to the family (puppies). But it is not ok if it is a recurrent theme every month. And that is exactly what the problem is - a big "How The F**k did I spend this much money this month?!?!?!?!" every month. Even though I still have money in the bank, I need to have tighter control on how I am using my money. Thus the spread sheet.

Of course, part of the problem is that over the past few months, I have had to bring the puppies over to their vet every few weeks. While our vet keeps a very, VERY convenient office hours and is very reachable, it also reflects in the bill. Then there is the neuter and spay, which, while not quite as expensive as anticipated, are still not cheap. Finally, state of AL has this money scam operation to suck money out of the lowly residents who does not make much money at all yet and is technically still practicing medicine under attending physician supervision. But, then again, one should be able to foreseen these problems and plan accordingly. I can always tell myself that I spend too much money because "things happened". But the truth is, I am solely responsible for my financial health and any related issues. I can either ignore it and keep hoping the problem will fix itself and go away next month. Or I can put my foot down and say I have had enough months of not having control over my money, I need to do better.

I decided to put my foot down.

I know a very large part of my problem is desire. We all want things. In addition, our society also tells us that we want things. And that's not a problem as long as it stays only in the "I want it" stage. The problem is that a lot of people, including me, decided to act upon it and go from "I want it" stage to "I have it" stage. And even then, it is not necessarily a bad thing. It becomes a bad thing only when we fail to realize that we actually do not have the means to turn our desire into reality. And that's what happened to me over the past few months. The excitement of finally making some money and be able to afford things got the best of me and every month, I will allow myself to buy "a few things" to indulge myself. Even though usually, these purchases may not have been a big deal. But in light of other things going on, my indulges turned into part of the the reason why my budget was shot over the past several months.

And that's done.

I cannot do anything to what happened before. I cannot even do much to what happened this month. But I can make a difference next month. And I will.

Hopefully, with me starting keeping track of things and paying attention. I will solve the situation.

Since Lewis and I both love sushi, we have been trying to find a decent sushi place in Mobile, AL. One of the places around our apartment, Konnitiwa, turned out pretty decent. After going there for a few times, Lewis noticed that they also has suiyaki on their menu.

Suiyaki is really a type of hot pot. Hot pot is really easy and popular winter meal in Asia. All you have to do is heat up a soup base to a boil and then dump lots of food into it to cook and eat. Basically everything can go in there. Beef, chicken, pork, seafood, fish, shellfish, dumplings, vegetables, fishballs, meatballs........ It is one of my favorite food.

Since Lewis also seem to like it, we both decided to buy hot pot and a meat slicer from Amazon.

The meat slicer from Amazon is great. For about 100 bucks, I get to have my meat sliced paper thin. The clean up part takes more time than actually slicing the meat, which is great. Having really thin slices of meat is great for hot pot because the thinner the meat is, the quicker it cooks. So instead of sitting there and wait for the meat for cook for 10 minutes, you can virtually just drop the meat there for a few seconds and get it cooked.






The pot itself is not exactly what I was hoping for. Instead of a wok, it is more like a skillet, which is not what I was used to. I am sure it is all just an illusion, but having a skillet makes me feel that it can't hold quite as much as a wok. At least, that's what it feels like. Turns out, it definitely holds more than enough to feed two people.

Then it is time to get whole bunch of food to put in so Judy can put them into her stomach later.







Really hot food, really hot soup, really cold day. Hmmmmmmm, good times.