^{Updated Oct 21, 2025}

What I’m working on, focused on, etc these days. Based on the /now page movement created by Derek Sivers.

Life, work

Moved to Cork, Ireland at the beginning of May. Still looking for a day job, while I play jazz gigs around the area in the meantime. Am reviewing data analytics stuff I learned during the pandemic, aiming to possibly get some work in tech.

After teaching Chinese full time for my last 2 years in NYC, I’d love to continue that path; however I’m not sure the opportunities abound here. I’m considering a masters degree in teaching Chinese as a foreign language to develop my CV more in that area at some point.

Cork is a nice, walkable density of a city. It’s a pleasant place to be and feels easy to meet people and find community. We’ve met lots of wonderful new friends through the running group and choir we joined here.

Music

Played trumpet on I Am A Singer in China again this summer for about 6 weeks (episodes 2-7). Playing jazz gigs more often. Practicing trumpet actively again, something I wasn’t doing when teaching full time the past two years.

Occasionally creating electronic music.

Health

I’m on week 3 of the “Couch to 5k” protocol right now, which gets you from not running regularly to being able to run without damaging yourself (I’m mainly concerned about my knees) over 8 weeks. The running group we’re in meets twice a week, so that makes it easy to stick with this process.

Have started doing Pilates and yoga first thing in the morning with youtube teachers. Going to yoga class once a week now.

Learning

Still using Duolingo, but have put Greek and other new languages on the back burner while I focus on Japanese for a while. It’s a fascinating language and I’m making fast progress since there’s a lot of connections with Chinese.

Also continuing to hone my skills as a Chinese language teacher. Have been taking classes in TPRS. Not sure how this will fit into my life if I get a tech (or other unrelated-to-Chinese-teaching) job, but I’m considering teaching a weekly class just to keep in practice.

Reading

The Book of Love by Kelly Link

Cory Doctorow’s email newsletter

RTÉ and other Irish news outlets

The Economist (less and less)

Trying to read less about US politics. Have mostly stopped reading US news sources, but I do peruse the headlines that I get by email.