christine's brain: Archive

Startuphood and Parenthood

Last month, I had the honor of having my writing published on TechCrunch. I was overwhelmed (in a good way) at how much the piece resonated with readers, especially parents and/or entrepreneurs (or some who were both). And without further adieu, here it is: Startuphood and Parenthood: Not for the Faint of Heart Parenthood is the closest thing I’ve found to entrepreneurship. Looks cool from the...

Jan 20th

1 note

Reflecting on 31

Above: A slice of red velvet cake (my favorite kind of cake) 2011 has been an exciting, transformational year for me, to say the least. In July, we became parents when our sweet little boy Brendan joined us, making us a party of 5 including our canine kids Nickey and Snowball. You could say this has been the Year of Brendan. As I turn 31 today, here are a few life lessons I’ve learned...

Dec 24th

1 note

Nov 17th

Prevent The Need For A 24 Hr Plumber

Last night, we had the unfortunate task of having to call a plumber over to fix our drain. Water and gunk had overflowed from the bathtub drain and our toilet was also leaking water from the back, causing a mini flood in the bathroom. We’d noticed some signs of a problem before (occasionally the bathtub would drain slowly, etc.), but it always seemed to clear up on its own. So we let it...

Nov 17th

1 note

Nov 6th

14,201 notes

Nov 2nd

1,366 notes

Oct 13th

2,489 notes

1 tag

Life Lessons from Carrying Gingerbread

In just a few weeks, my life will change forever. Even though I’ve had ~9 months to prepare myself psychologically and emotionally for this huge upheaval in my life, I realize that nothing will ever truly prepare you. You can read all the books and get advice from all the people in the world, but until you actually experience it yourself, you won’t truly know what being a mother and...

Jul 1st

6 notes

Jun 26th

Jun 24th

818 notes

Jun 12th

1 note

Jun 12th

Saying No

Thick skin is an entrepreneur’s armor. Given how tough it is to get your ideas off the ground and run a startup, it’s no surprise that rejection and failure happen more often than not and that founders should be used to hearing “No.” The problem? You don’t always hear “No.” Talk to any entrepreneur who’s gone fundraising and s/he will talk about...

May 19th

2 notes

May 3rd

Apr 14th

Mar 17th

Feb 25th

Feb 22nd

Dec 26th

3 notes

Dec 3rd

2 notes

From Mighty Dog to Underdog

For the last few weeks, I’ve been marinating on an idea for a blog post about going from a big company to the startup world. It didn’t come out the way I wanted, so I shelved it. Yesterday, Michael Arrington published a post entitled “Are You A Pirate?” that talks about entrepreneurs and analogizing them to pirates. It helped re-jigger my post, so I re-jiggered. And...

Nov 2nd

It Gets Better

When you’re a kid, it’s not easy being different. But, as many are standing up and sharing their story will tell you, it gets better. One from Googlers: No kid deserves to be ostracized for being different. As a kid, I remember being picked on for being the only Asian kid. At Girl Scout Camp, I was hurt when the other girls made fun of me and didn’t want to share...

Oct 20th

Blogging is like oxygen... or exercise →

Jotted down some musings from my experiences w/ official/corporate blogs, both currently at 500 Startups and at Google. Take a gander.

Oct 13th

Know Your Cultural Fit

Having a clear company culture is critical. It is important for teams to work in harmony and, as a result, make the company successful. It is also important in attracting new employees as you begin to grow. Google and Zappos are examples of companies that took culture very seriously from the beginning, being explicit about their cultural values. This undoubtedly had significant impact on their...

Oct 7th

I Hate Poorly-Run Events

If you work in consumer internet/tech, you will know that there is a ton of noise that can easily distract you from your work. These distractions (some of which are good and some of which are bad) come in the form of launch announcements, news, geek gossip, idle gossip, tweets, blog posts, and of course events. There are tons of events happening 24/7/365. You could conceivably attend an event,...

Oct 5th

Oct 2nd

Watch

A fun ’90s playlist. Enjoy :)

Oct 2nd

Sep 24th

2 notes

One of These Things Is Not Like The Other

In recent weeks, “women in tech” has become a hot button issue and taken over the blogosphere. One camp has raised hell over the lack of women founding startups, being in top positions at said startups, getting access to VC funding, and speaking at conferences. Others argue that women who feel this way should spend more time trying to start a company than complaining about not being...

Sep 7th

Sep 1st

“Fear is tricky. It can disguise itself as being rational but it is not. Fear is...”

– http://bit.ly/aP8Xx9 via @viralogy

Aug 25th

Just discovered Trackpad Handwriting

你好嗎成美 Just wrote that w/ the Trackpad Handwriting feature on my MBP. I “write” each character on the mouse trackpad, characters are detected, then I select. Very cool. One challenge I found was that I would have to look back and forth from the trackpad to the screen to see if I was writing the character properly. Would be cool if what I was writing showed up in the track pad...

Aug 22nd

Awesome dialogue of lions & tunas

T: “If we were in the wild, I would attack you. Even if you weren’t in my food chain, I would go out of my way to attack you! If I were a lion and you were a tuna, I’d swim out in the middle of the ocean and freakin EAT YOU! And then I’d bang your tuna girlfriend.” A: “Ok, first off, a lion? Swimming in the ocean? Lions don’t like water! If you placed it near a river or some sort of fresh water...

Aug 22nd