I was talking about this phenomenon with a friend when we were driving a couple hours on vacation and it made some sense but also didn’t make sense. Like if I am going faster than the speed limit, I would expect my estimated time of arrival on the navigation app to decrease, but it didn’t change. After reading a few articles and talking to AI, I guess it makes sense why it didn’t change. Apparently the slow parts of the trip, like traffic lights, congestion, etc. can eat up the time savings. Also, the navigation apps have historical data about the speeds of cars and current traffic data that can help power the estimated arrival time. Finally, it’s not like I’m always driving over the speed limit – my speed may change above and below the speed limit at various points in the trip. With this in mind, it gives some justification on why I usually arrive to places later than what the navigation app mentions. Like I usually drive the speed limit and if everyone on the road currently and historically are driving faster than the speed limit, then the estimated arrival time would have to adjust accordingly.

One tradition that is relatively familiar to me is getting a cake and singing “Happy Birthday”. However, I wonder what people used to do before the song was created. After looking it up, the song was created in 1893, so it has been around for a while. After some more searching on the internet, seems like cake and candles were still popular for birthdays, while the songs were from greetings, poems, or local songs. Some people I talked to mentioned that they eat foods that represent longevity and wish for health and wealth. I think it’s pretty cool that there is a universally recognized birthday song. Are there any birthday traditions that you like in particular? Are there any universally recognized traditions that you participate in? Are there any traditions that should be universally recognized?

I went to the barber today, yes the same barber with the innovative technology, and she mentioned a story about a new customer and their journey in finding a barber that they like. The new customer ended up liking this barber, but during the story, she mentioned that Caucasian barbers tend to cut hair to maintain or extend the head shape, whereas Asian barbers cut hair to create the head shape. I am not sure if it is true or not, since I rarely go to Caucasian barbers, but I thought it was interesting – I didn’t realize there were different metas or different hair cutting philosophies.

What if there was a game show where the contestant had to answer facts about themselves in order to win? The facts would be sent to the show by friends and family and would need to be verified, but if they are able to answer them all correctly, they would win.

When I was walking to my office, there was a sliding door that took a while to open. Then, I thought it might make for a good insult or diss. Like someone is so forgettable/low presence/invisible/insignificant that even an automatic sliding door does not open for you. But then, I feel like you could say that the door’s sensor is just faulty, so 🤷‍♀️

How do you signal that dishes are dirty? Is there a spectrum?

For me, the thought process goes like this:

1. This dish is relatively clean but not clean enough to go into the cupboard. So, I’ll leave it on the counter.

2. This dish is dirty, but I could use it again if I’ve got nothing else handy. So, I’ll leave it next to the sink.

3. This dish is dirty and I’m not going to use it until it’s washed. So, I’ll put it in the sink.

However, there have been times where I put the dish in the sink but then realized that I could have used it again. But now that it has entered the sink’s domain, I am not able to reuse it until it’s cleaned.