Notes

I often give too much importance to arbitrary things without asking myself why I do that. One of those things recently was the idea that I’ll go deeper into music lyrics. I’ve liked music from as long as I can remember. However, for the last year or so, this idea to go deeper into the lyrics of the music I listen, and that it were a waste if I didn’t do that, has been so overwhelming that I’ve mostly stopped listening! Most of the times when I do want to listen, I start thinking about what I am going to listen and whether I have the lyrics open in parallel. ...

It’s high time I leave Amazon: I’ve been here for ~8 years now. That’s a lot for an environment as stressful as that of Amazon. The culture in other companies is going to be very different Amazon’s, and I should be experiencing that in my short remaining career. I can earn a lot more than what I get here. In the worst case, I can always come back to Amazon. (But I really hope things don’t come down to that.) Next steps: ...

Serves 1. Prepare the matcha: (This will be the base for everything else.) 1 teaspoon (= ~2 g) matcha in a big bowl. (You may want to pass it through a sifter but that’s too much work.) Pour 2 ounces of water. Should be steamy but less than boiling. Mix the two in W or M motion (not circular) until you see froth on top. Latte: Froth 6 ounces of milk. Add the matcha base, 1 teaspoon honey and froth some more.

Links: https://www.vfsglobal.com/one-pager/india/united-states-of-america/oci-services/pdf/new-oci-minor-checklist.pdf Someone sent the following list of requirements but I haven’t verified it yet: Uploaded: 1. CURRENT PASSPORT – My daughter’s US passport 2. CURRENT INDIAN PASSPORT OF PARENTS/GRAND PARENTS/GREAT GRAND PARENTS/SPOUSE – Indian Passport of both the parents 3. ADDRESS PROOF – My Driving License 4. PARENTAL AUTHORIZATION (IN CASE OF MINOR APPLICANTS) – Notarized authorization signed by both the parents 5. LEGAL STATUS OF PARENTS (IN CASE OF MINOR APPLICANTS) - I 797 of both the parents 6. RELATIONSHIP CERTIFICATE – Birth certificate of my daughter 7. MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE – My marriage certificate Mailed: 1. Notarized OCI application form 2. 2 photographs 3. Self-attested Driving license 4. One notarized passport copy of my daughter 5. Original US passport of my daughter 6. Self-attested copy of my daughter’s birth certificate 7. Self-attested Indian passport copy of both parents 8. Notarized parental authorization 9. Self-attested marriage certificate 10. Filled in New OCI Checklist – For Minor (Not signed and without thumbprint of my daughter on it).

Boil half gallon or so milk using the “Yogurt -> Boil” function on the Instant Pot. (The lid should be closed.) Let it stand at room temperature for ~25-30 minutes. Desired temperature: 110-115 F. Thoroughly mix 2 tbsp yogurt. “Yogurt -> Medium” for 10 - 12 hours. (Probably the latter.)

I recently setup a Samba share on a Raspberry Pi on my home network. As part of that, I used a 5 TB Western Digital My Passport Ultra as the storage layer. I wanted to encrypt it since it’s going to store a lot of personal content. That way, I won’t have to worry about leaking any of that data if I lost the disk. The following post lists down the Linux commands I used to turn on that encryption. And while I tried this on a Raspberry Pi, the commands are generic and should work on any Linux system. ...

At $550 a year, Chase Sapphire Reserve is pretty expensive for me, especially when we aren’t going to travel or eat out all that much (or probably even if that weren’t the case). - Maybe not. After the $300 travel credit, think of the remaining $300 or so (i.e. $250 plux taxes) as purchase protection and travel insurance. Some alternatives: Fidelity: Free, with 2% cashback. (So, no need to track categories or anything.) Foreign transcations aren’t free. While I can have the money go directly into a Fidelity account, don’t think I can have it invested too automatically. So, a bit of hassle. No Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver, so major blocker. Alliant: Flat 2.5% cashback. (That’s pretty high.) All other goodies such as no foreign transaction fee, rental car collision coverage etc. $99 fees 2nd year onwards. Check if they allow another card for Sneha for free. If so, that’d be cool. Current card from First Tech: 1.6% cashback for some categories, 0.8% for others. So, pretty miserable. Free though. Current Chase’s Freedom: 1.5% cashback. It does have it higher in some categories. It may be a bit of hassle to track that. Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is secondary whereas Sapphire’s is primary. Amex Platinum: Travel rewards highly coupled with Uber and they’ll likely go to waste for us. Overall: ...

Note: Grind setting on Baratza Encore: 10-12. Water temperature: little over 200 F. TODO: Fill in rest of the instructions next time.

Note: 1:16 water to coffee ratio. (I usually do 30g coffee with 480g water.) Grind setting on Baratza Encore: 18-20. Water temperature: little over 200 F. Steps: Wet the filter with hot water and throw that water away. Put ground coffee on the filter. Bloom the coffee with water for ~45s. Use 2-3 times (but closer to 2) the amount of coffee and ensure you wet all the coffee. Slowly pour rest of the water. First, make concentric circles and immerse all the coffee, then finish off with a middle pour. Shake the Chemex just a little and then let the coffee brew. Warm up the coffee cup, using hot water, before pouring coffee in it. The entire process should take 3-4 minutes. Adjust grind setting accordingly.

Techniques Coffee connoisseurs recommend only the following ways to make coffee: French press: Aeropress, which I use right now, is pretty close to this. Pour over. I’ll try it next, using a Chemex. (An alternative is to go with a Hario V60, but the Chemex looks better.) Espresso: expensive, so maybe when I am older and have more money to spare! Resources Reddit wiki. Guide to brewing: Brew Methods. Coffee Geek.