Lunch with other Cal Bears

Thanks to Deep and Reshma for setting this up. A bunch of us UC Berkeley folks got together on Wednesday and had lunch at Claim Jumpers. It was actually pretty cool and fun to see some familiar faces. We all talked about… work. Haha. It was weird telling each other our experiences and where we see ourselves in the future. The people that found time to come included Deep, Arjun, Jeffrey, Lexin, Krishnan, and Reshma. There were 7 people altogether: 6 guys and 1 girl. There were also 6 software engineers and 1 marketing. Guess who was marketing. You’re right if you said the girl.

Speaking of food, last night I decided to cook lasagna. No, not home made. I actually bought the frozen Kirkland Signature lasagna at Costco. Got home around 7:45. The instructions said to put it in the oven for 115-125 minutes. For some reason, I thought I was going to be able to eat around 9pm. Maybe cause I was thinking 115mins was 1hr and 15mins or maybe I was thinking it was 7 and +2hours equals 9pm. Either way, I didn’t get to eat until it was 10pm. I’m not sure if that was a deciding factor in how delicious the lasagna was, but it was darn good! Most Kirkland Signature stuff I’d have to save are above average and should not be considered a generic brand. Ungsunghero and I had a long discussion on what what types of products we’d use a generic brand and what generic stuff are just as good as brand name stuff. The only 2 items I can come up with that I see generics equally as good as brand name was medicine and gasoline. Kirkland Signature was brought up because there’s many many Kirkland Signature products I used, but I wouldnt for generic brands. Anyway, back to the lasagna. I was only able to eat about 25% of it, maybe less. I have so much left overs. hahaha. Oh well, the microwave’s going to like me for the next few days.

Here I’m actually going to tangent into 2 different categories. I’d talk about microwaves first. Microwaves are so cool. You know what? They condense what takes an oven 12 minutes to cook into 4 minutes of high microwave power. That’s a savings of 2/3 of the time. I was also looking at my chicken wings and that condensed 25 minutes to 5 minutes which saved 4/5 of the time! One time I was told when I was small, was NEVER to stand in front of a microwave when it’s on due to the radiation. Is there any truth in that? Do microwave radiation really leak out of the microwave? If they do, it wouldn’t necessarily be coming out from the window only right?

The 2nd category I wanted to talk about was Costco. Several interesting things I found today when browsing Wikipedia. It all started several weeks ago when I couldn’t remember the name of that big department store we used to go to in Pasadena. It was a fun place to go to. The only gripe my dad had against it was it was so far. While ungsunghero and I were talking about Target (that’s another whole ballpark which I don’t feel like getting into), I suddently remembered the name Fedco. I wasn’t too sure if I was right. Googling it didn’t help much either. So I wikied it and bingo! It actually went bankrupt back in 1994: Fedco (Southern California). Membership-based department store—including grocery, and in some locations, furniture—that served middle class. Went bankrupt. Circa 1950-1994. and was under the list “Defunct U.S. chains not acquired by extant chains or liquidated”. But right above that was something interesting which led me to investigate Costco so more:

  • Fedmart (Southern California) First mass-market discount retail/grocery chain Sol Price founded. Was headquartered in San Diego in the 92111 ZIP Code. Price voluntarily closed the chain. Price later founded Price Club based upon what he learned from his Fedmart days. Price Club has since been merged into Costco. Circa 1965-75.
  • In 1997, PriceCostco changed its name back to Costco, under which the company currently operates. Costco has also changed the site of its corporate headquarters from the city of Kirkland, Washington, to Issaquah, Washington. – The first Costco (in Kirkland) is actually the Costco I go to. Unless there’s 2 Costcos in Kirkland…
  • Costco caps its profit margin on most products at 14% and allows itself slightly higher margins only on its Kirkland Signature store brand (a name derived from its previous headquarters in Kirkland) with a strict 15% profit limit. – I actually knew the name Kirkland Signature was derived because the Costco was their first HQ, but I didn’t realize the profit margins were capped. But even capped higher that the other products, Kirland Signature items are STILL SIGNIFICANTLY CHEAPER.

Random Crap:

I was checking out this movie: The Game of Their Lives. IMDB users gave it a 7.6. It’s a documentary about how the North Koreans got into the World Cup (soccer). I haven’t watched it yet, but during the skim through of it, I found a really nice scene. Enjoy!

Forlorn Lover Leaves Ring in Unlocked CarAn anonymous gift-giver, apparently depressed over a lost love, left a $15,000 diamond engagement ring in somebody’s else’s unlocked car in a commuter parking lot. The ring came in a box topped with a white bow and accompanied by a note, which read: “Merry Christmas. Thank you for leaving your car door unlocked. Instead of stealing your car I gave you a present. Hopefully this will land in the hands of someone you love, for my love is gone now. Merry Christmas to you.

Superman ‘too big’ (from rayalome) – The new Superman is giving movie bosses a headache – because of the size of his bulge. They fear Brandon Routh’s profile in the superhero’s skintight costume could be distracting, reports the Sun. Hollywood executives have ordered the makers of Superman Returns to cover it up with digital effects. Haha. Did you also know they had to digitally resize Lindsey Lohan’s breasts in Herbie: Fully Loaded because mothers during screening were complaining they were too big? Maybe next time when they audition for the next Superman, one of the questions they’ll need to ask is, “How well endowed are you?” I don’t think they can ask how long his *cough* directly, can they? Would that be sexual harassment? Here’s some shots of Superman in his skintight costume:

supermansuperman

2005 Offers Fresh Tales of the Bizarre – some really funny stories!

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