My Global Entry status expired earlier this year, and given we had no idea when we would get vaccinated at the beginning of the year to be safe enough to get on a plane, I didn’t jump to renew it before the expiry date. When we finally did become fully vaccinated in May, Chris scheduled my Global Entry interview (part of the application process, even with renewals, unfortunately), but there were long waits and the earliest we could get was the last week of June. The plus side is that I didn’t need to go to the airport to do the interview in person, and instead, I was able to do a Zoom interview with a Customs Border Patrol officer. I did this on Sunday, and it lasted about 10 minutes with the usual routine questions (verify identity, employment, previous countries traveled to, etc.). The officer said I was approved, and it would go into effect immediately. I asked him if it would be as immediate as applying to my domestic flight this Thursday, and he said yes.

So I checked into my flight this morning, and when the AA app generated my boarding passes, the TSA pre-check symbol did not appear. Red flag. I thought he said this was immediately in effect? I double checked my TSA pre-check number, checked the website to ensure I was definitely re-approved. Everything looked good. So I called AA and asked them to check for me. After 15 minutes on hold after verifying my full name (no name changes, right?), date of birth, and Global Entry number, they got me back on the line and asked me to delete the current boarding passes and regenerate them after refreshing the app. Phew — thankfully this worked, and my TSE pre-check was reinstated. I would have been really pissed if I had gotten this interview done and was approved, and somehow there was a “waiting period” for it actually go into effect.

The experience of going through a regular non-priority, non-pre-check line in May was NOT fun. Chris kept making fun of me and calling me a pleb because he was able to get his Global Entry renewed in time for that trip. I never want to go through that again. Who wants to voluntarily take off their shoes and separate all their electronics and toiletry bag…?!

One of the quirkiest things I found while doing research for our New Mexico trip was the discovery of Pistachioland, which is located in Alamogordo, New Mexico. I wasn’t sure this would be en route to any place we’d be going to, but we happened upon it while on a highway yesterday, and I knew we had to stop in for at least 20 minutes. Pistachioland is known for having the world’s largest pistachio statue; this may not be a particularly difficult feat, as I’m not sure anyone else in the world attempted to outdo this… It also is a piece of land that grows tons and tons of pistachios and sells pistachios in every possible flavor you can imagine, along with other pistachio products.

While there, we not only took our customary pistachio statue photos, but we also did some taste tests of the pistachios on offer. Of course, Chris chose the red chili pistachios to purchase. We were actually shocked that tastings were even possible since we’re technically still living in a pandemic. The shop was being pretty liberal, though, and they had signs saying that if we were fully vaccinated, we didn’t even need to wear our masks. In fact, a lot of shops around New Mexico had signs like this. We also got a Pistachioland magnet to add to our travel magnet board and tried out their pistachio almond ice cream. Unfortunately, it was how I imagined it: artificially colored bright green with very little actual pistachio flavor. Americans really do not show enough love for pistachios the way South Asia, the Middle East, and Italy do.

Pistachios are my favorite nut, so it was exciting to be able to say I’ve been here, though I wouldn’t go out of my way to visit.

Our first stop in Albuquerque after landing and dropping off our bags at our hotel was to Sadie’s, a well known New Mexican restaurant that is a bit of an institution. They are known for having classic New Mexican fare, delicious margaritas and other mixed cocktails, as well as massive portion sizes. Chris ordered a beef and queso quesadilla like dish, and I ordered a breakfast burrito since all I could think about food-wise when thinking of New Mexico was breakfast burritos; we also got a side order of the famous green chile stew. It’s debated that either the city of Santa Fe or Albuquerque first invented the concept of a breakfast burrito. Regardless of which city can claim it first, I love breakfast burritos, tacos, and anything resembling them. How could you possibly reject eggs, fried potatoes, salsa, avocado, your choice of bacon, sausage, or Mexican-style meat, all wrapped up neatly in a flour tortilla?

While I knew to anticipate larger portions here, it didn’t really hit me until our server brought our plates over, which came complete with huge side portions of beans and vegetables. My breakfast burrito was likely 2.5 to 3 times the size I had envisioned in my head; there was absolutely NO WAY I was going to finish this all on my own. I made it through half of it while also eating some of Chris’s dish, and we ended up wrapping up a decent portion of food to go. Good thing our hotel room had a refrigerator and microwave for us to store food and eat it later. This would all make a very tasty breakfast the next day.

American portion sizes are always huge when you compare them to food portion sizes across the world, but when you’re in the South or Southwest part of the U.S., they always take portion sizes to the next level!

This morning, we woke up bright and early to catch a 6am flight to Albuquerque, New Mexico, via Chicago. I was curious how the experience would be both at the airport and while on the plane, and for the most part, it actually seemed pretty good. There were signs requiring mask-wearing throughout the airport, along with huge vats of hand sanitizer. Upon boarding the plane, we were handed packets of hand sanitizer wipes. And anytime someone was not eating or drinking and had their mask down, a flight attendant was quick to remind the passenger that it was a federal aviation requirement that they needed to have their mask covering both their nostrils and mouth at all times when not eating or drinking. I’d say overall, it was well done.

While the in-flight experience was good, I would say that the pandemic period created a bit of memory loss when it comes to quality customer service for the gate agents. I was on the upgrade list to get to ABQ, and when I walked up to the desk, I asked about the wait list for the first-class upgrades. The agent was really curt and rude, saying that first had already checked in full. I told her I was on the upgrade list, and she said I wasn’t on the list. WHAT!!! She didn’t even know my identity before claiming that I wasn’t on the list! Eventually, I did get upgraded, and I did not thank her when she handed me my new boarding pass. Her crappy service did not deserve thanks.

I felt like I was having a futile and insipid argument with a United flight attendant, except this time, I was having a difficult time with an American Airlines gate agent who failed to recognize my Executive Platinum status and likely drew quick judgments about me merely because of what I looked like. I find it very unlikely that she would have treated me that way if I were a middle-aged or white-haired White man.

Other than breakfast burritos, enchiladas, green chilies, Los Alamos/the Manhattan Project, and Pueblo art and culture, the first thing I think about when I think about New Mexico is the Georgia O’Keefe Museum in Santa Fe. I studied 1.5 years of art history, and Georgia O’Keefe is one of the very few modern American artists that I actually liked. She was most famous for her New Mexican landscape and macro flower paintings. She is also, very likely, one of the most respected (and well paid) female artists of all time. And her macro flower paintings… well, they were very very zoomed in, as in, they actually look like vaginas. I love flowers. I also love and appreciate the natural beauty of vaginas. So, it was no surprise that I would like Georgia O’Keefe’s work.

Well, unfortunately because of the COVID-19 pandemic, all museum tickets must be purchased in advance, and when I checked two weeks ago for tickets, they were all sold out until the middle of June. So much for trying to support one of the most famous female artists of all time.

I can’t believe I’m going to New Mexico without seeing the Georgia O’Keefe Museum….

For the last four or five years, I was on planes at least every other month, if not every month. It was rare to go a quarter of the year without getting on a plane at all. Plane travel was just normal, whether it was for work, pleasure, or a combination of both. And I always looked forward to flying and the experience of being in an airport. Most people dread plane travel and airport time; but I always loved it. Flying always felt like it was giving me purpose. I’m GOING somewhere, I thought.

Well, the pandemic obliterated all my travel plans last year. My last time on a plane was in February 2020 for my then company’s annual kickoff in San Francisco, plus extra time with family and friends. The kickoff was fine; the friend time was enjoyable; the family time was pretty horrendous and frustrating all around. That’s how I remember my last trip I took that required plane travel.

So now, 15 months later, we’re booked to take a five-day weekend to New Mexico, beginning this Thursday, and I cannot believe I’m actually getting on a plane again! It will be interesting (or frustrating) to see how airports and plane staff are handling the pandemic precautions and cleaning, and a very new feeling to even be traveling for any reason to another state. New Mexico will be my 45th state; Chris has already been, but we’ll be seeing other parts he didn’t have a chance to his first time. I’m looking forward to the warm weather, the arts and culture, the outdoors, and the breakfast burritos and green chilies. Bart will also be excited that he can travel again, too; he’s been pretty bored collecting the occasional bits of dust on my dresser in the last 15 months.

Since we had a car yesterday, we also decided to make a needed stop at Costco. We go to Costco about once per quarter, and so it was finally time to come back and stock up on staples such as toilet paper, meat, nuts, frozen items, and of course, fresh fruits and vegetables.

I had almost forgotten how much I love visiting Costco during the holiday season. Growing up, I always went with my parents to Costco, and the period between Halloween and Christmas was always the best time to go because Costco would have the most elaborate holiday setups, from Halloween costumes to Christmas decorations and gift sets. I love the endless rows of Christmas chocolates and cookies they have, plus the elaborate meat and cheese gift baskets they always have lined up. Even though I personally never buy them, simply seeing them always gets me feeling happy and a little giddy. When at home, occasionally my dad used to indulge and get a few Christmas chocolate or cookie tins; our favorites were always the Belgian chocolate biscuit tins. But with Chris and me, it seems a bit too indulgent to get these items… especially since Chris is pretty happy with his Arnott’s biscuits. There’s no way I’d never eat all these myself before they became stale.

One pleasant surprise we saw in the produce section were rambutans — my lovely red-haired, hard-shelled Southeast Asian fruit. These actually were not grown in Asia, but actually in Honduras, and the shells looked more reddish-brown color rather than the usual magenta-deep red hue. I can’t wait to eat these!

Chris and I took the day off from work today and rented a Zipcar to do a day trip to Connecticut. Since we used a Zipcar twice during the summer for some day trips, I suppose Zipcar wanted our business back, so they offered Chris a $50 voucher to use through the middle of this month, so we decided to take advantage of it. While we are in the first week of November, the autumn leaves were intense and gorgeous along many of the roads and highways that we drove through. I just love this part about living in the Northeast; you don’t get these colors out in California for sure. I still remember always seeing fall leaves on TV shows and movies growing up and always wondering, “How come we don’t see that here in San Francisco?”

We did a mini food tour of the New Haven Little Italy area today by going to three different New Haven style pizza spots: Sally’s, Pepe’s Pizzeria, and Modern Apizza. Until about 10 years ago, I actually had no idea that New Haven was famous for pizza. “New Haven style pizza” is also known as “apizza,” which the New Haven take on coal-oven fired, thin crust Neopolitan pizza. The name “apizza” comes from the accent of the immigrants who settled in this area from Italy. While I loved all four of the pizzas we got (from Pepe’s, we got two different types!), my absolute favorite was definitely the Pepe’s white clam pizza. While I’ve definitely had white pizza and clam pizza before, I’d never had a white clam pizza that was THIS FRESH. The clams were insanely fresh; they just screamed of the ocean with their seafood-y flavor and their saltiness. And the white pizza base was just perfect – just a little cheesy, very garlicky, and a lovely, crunchy, charred flavor.

My cousin loves this pizza and told me that we could actually get the pizza delivered to New York City via Goldbelly. Honestly, that’s not a bad idea…

When we were in Indonesia in December-January, we got to try Luwak coffee, or Kopi Luwak/civet coffee, twice, once in Jakarta and once in Bali. The concept seemed a bit strange around what is reputed to be the most expensive coffee in the world. The concept behind it is that many years ago, Indonesians noticed that a native cat called the Luwak (or civet in English) loved eating coffee berries, but would not be able to fully digest it. As a result, they pooped the berries out whole, but in that process, the coffee berries were fermented going through their digestive track. Always the resourceful ones, the Indonesians took the berries, disinfected and treated them, and attempted to make coffee out of them. Lo and behold, the coffee ended up being smoother, more robust, and fruitier as a result of going through the civet’s digestive track. They found a new industry: Luwak coffee!

While the coffee was quite good, it wasn’t good enough for us to want to buy it (and pay the very high price for it), so we ended up not buying any of the beans to take home. This week, I finished editing a YouTube video showcasing my first experience drinking this prized coffee. “CAT POOP COFFEE,” we called it.

Out of curiosity, after I posted the video, I did a quick Google search on civet coffee and was a bit appalled at what I found. Many articles have been written about how civet coffee/Kopi Luwak is basically like olive oil, in that over 90 percent of the “Kopi Luwak” on the market is actually fake; no cats pooped these coffee berries out. And what is arguably worse, the civets that actually do eat these coffee berries are oftentimes mistreated and force fed coffee berries, similar to what is debated to be done with ducks in order to make fois gras. So the warning of the articles was all the same: when going to Indonesia, stay away from Kopi Luwak.

Maybe I should have researched that more deeply prior to going. But hey, live and learn, right?

The thing about issues like this is that in countries like the U.S., meat eaters get all crazy about eating animals they deem cute and cuddly, like rabbits or whatever arbitrary animal they refuse to eat, but they don’t think about the entire meat processing industry and how poorly animals are treated, given very little space, no room to exercise and live natural lives, forced to eat food that is not normal, and then killed after just a few weeks of life. I’ve seen photos and read quite a bit about how terrible the meat industry is here in the U.S. Do I still eat meat? Yeah. But I don’t turn a blind eye to the practices and pretend that these animals are given glorious short lives whereas animals like civet cats or ducks making fois gras are tortured. It’s all really the same thing. You can take it for what it is and eat what you want, or just remove meat completely from your diet.

A little part of me does try to be a better consumer, though. I try to buy meat, dairy, and eggs that are organic, as I’ve read that it’s more likely these animals will be fed and treated better, not to mention given space to move around outside. It’s hard, though, living in this country where the “laws” are so loosely interpreted, and food companies can just choose bullshit labels like “free range” when they don’t actually mean anything in the real world. The USDA’s definition of “free range,” for example, is that birds must have “outdoor access” or “access to the outdoors.” Well, that doesn’t mean much at all because that could easily mean that the animal have fresh air coming out of a “pop hole,” with zero full body access to the outdoors and no real space requirement. That is like if I said, as a human, “I have access to the outdoors” when what that really meant is that I had to stay in a dark, windowless room all day and all night, but I had a 6-by-6-inch square that was carved into the room to allow me THAT MUCH light and air from the outside. Pretty “free-range,” huh?

This is the third year I’ve come with my current company to the Silverado Resort in Napa for our annual go-to-market kickoff. Each year, it’s been a lot of socializing, learning, overstimulation, and I’ve left drained and exhausted. I can’t remember once when I actually was on my own and did much thinking or meditation on anything. You’d think that if I were in such a peaceful and beautiful place that I would have made time for myself, but year after year, I’ve forgotten.

This year, I have a comfortable one-bedroom suite that is about a ten-minute walk to the mansion and ballroom area where all the events happen. While walking back from a team dinner and some socializing at the bar, I stopped to look up at the night sky and realized that the moon was extremely brilliant and clear, plus the entire sky was like a huge canopy of twinkling white lights. It was a clear night, and all the stars were vivid, bright, and extremely visible. I could even see Orion’s Belt clearly — I do not know constellations at all, but this is the only one I know (it’s pretty simple to keep track of since it’s just three perfectly aligned stars).

It’s crazy to think how sucked into our day to days we get that we rarely stop to look up at the stars. In New York, we aren’t this privileged to have an unpolluted night sky; being able to see a single star is virtually impossible there. But in Napa and even San Francisco, the stars are so clear and vivid unless it’s a cloudy night. I was probably looking up for only about five minutes, but it felt really good nonetheless to finally take this view in and really appreciate it for the first time in these trips.