Hi, I'm Adam.

Adam Parkzer   •   31   •   Las Vegas, USA   •   5'10" (178 cm)   •   152 lbs (69 kg)   •   Korean American

Although I am best known for my various public appearances as a personality, I am a businessman and entrepreneur by trade. Pri­ma­ri­ly, I help run Tem­po, a game development studio, multimedia production company, and esports franchise; I am the Direc­tor of Cor­po­rate Op­er­a­tions, o­ver­see­ing le­gal, fi­nance, and hu­man re­sources ad­min­is­tra­tion. You can find more details on my curriculum vitae.

Having formerly been in law enforcement, my main interests include criminology and forensic psychology. In my free time, I like to write, train martial arts, pursue investment opportunities, and de­vel­op new prac­ti­cal skills. I used to be a competitive gamer, but now I just play casually.

The easiest way to get to know me better is to read about INTJs on the Myers-Briggs Type In­di­ca­tor. I'm split between Investigator (Type 5) and Chal­leng­er (Type 8) on the Enneagram. My CliftonStrengths Top 5 are De­lib­er­a­tive, Learner, An­a­lyt­i­cal, A­chiev­er, and Com­pe­ti­tion. I score highest in Well-Being, Self-Control, and Emotional Stability on the SPI-27. My top per­sonality trait on both the Big Five and HEXACO-PI-R is Con­sci­en­tious­ness.

I don't use social media much anymore, but my profiles are @Parkzer on Twitter, Adam Parkzer on LinkedIn, Parkzer on Last.fm, Parkzer on Twitch, and Adam Parkzer on YouTube. If you want to write me a letter or send me a package, you can ship it to PO Box 2222, Las Vegas, NV 89125-2222, USA.

Below, you can find my blog where I document my adventures, organize my thoughts, and share snippets of my life. You can browse in re­verse chron­o­log­i­cal or­der, or you can sort by these popular categories: Travel | Hiking | Food | Finance | Cats | Best of the Best

 

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Hello, Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California

If you remember from last year, I generally only spend the winters at the Tempo headquarters in Long Beach, California while I wait out the inclement weather in other areas of the country. It’s nearing spring already, so it’s about time for me to set off; while I’m still in town, my friend David (who you might remember from previous blog posts as the greyhound rescue owner) wanted to take me to the Aquarium of the Pacific.

It was a nice aquarium, though I think they let way too many people in, because it was completely crammed shoulder-to-shoulder with visitors. Many of them were children, so there was the occasional ear-piercing shriek as well. Because of this, we spent a lot more time there than we originally expected—I still wanted to get my money’s worth, so I was patient and waited for the slow-moving lines so I could take a look at everything.

Here are some photos from my visit—not necessarily my favorite ones, but the ones that turned out the best:

 

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Hello, Wind Wolves Preserve in Kern County, California

There’s been an insane amount of inclement weather in California lately. It’s been raining a lot at the Tempo headquarters where I’ve temporarily set up my home base, I’ve heard that the California mountains have gotten literally several feet of snow, and I just barely missed the San Francisco Bay Area flood­ing really badly before my trip to Oakland.

The last time there was this much precipitation, there was a superbloom, which is a phenomenon where a ton of flowers bloom at the same time, es­pe­cial­ly from seeds that laid dormant for a while. In hopes of seeing one of these superblooms for myself in-person, as well as to visit a friend in the area who is planning on moving tentatively permanently to Puerto Rico, I made a quick trip an hour and a half north of Greater Los Angeles into Kern Coun­ty.

After entering the Wind Wolves Preserve, we followed some signs and drove over to the Crossing Campground and went on a short hike.

This campground had an unusually fancy bathroom.

We got to the end of the trail, where we got a nice view of Bakersfield to the north.

In this area of the preserve, we did see some open fields, but they weren’t covered with wildflowers—there were just a few flowering bushes along the sides.

We ventured over to a different area in hopes of having better luck, which we sort of did. Unfortunately, my timing was a little bit off—it did look like there were a lot of flowers blossoming out in the fields, but they weren’t quite at full size. According to Google Maps, this area is usually pretty barren, so I guess it is good news that there was even a lush field of grass at all, let alone any flowers.

Although rare, one of the perks of doing things together with a friend is that I get to post pictures of myself too, rather than just photos exclusively of things around me.

I wouldn’t say this was a particularly successful trip, but it wasn’t a complete failure either.

As a consolation prize, here are a bunch of cows that were ex­tremely confused why I got very excited and parked my truck on the side of the road to take a picture of them.

 

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How I keep my assets safe from bank and brokerage insolvency

I have gotten a lot of messages today—far more than I expected, from both friends and co-workers—regarding today’s breaking news of Silicon Valley Bank’s insolvency. If you’re not familiar with what happened, an oversimplified summary is that Silicon Valley Bank overleveraged their assets and were un­able to fulfill customer withdrawals, creating a feedback loop of panic and further withdrawals, resulting in the California Department of Fi­nan­cial Pro­tec­tion and Innovation shutting down the bank and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation taking over operations.

Before I get into things, I want to point out that neither I nor any of my companies were affected by Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse. Neither I nor any en­ti­ty over which I have financial oversight had a Silicon Valley Bank account, and no funds were lost or locked as a result. However, it is devastating to hear that many tech startups had their entire treasuries in Silicon Valley Bank and lost everything. What is even more concerning is that Silicon Valley Bank had an extremely high percentage of customer deposits—allegedly over 95%—that were not covered under FDIC insurance.

In short, FDIC insurance protects up to US$250,000.00 in deposits per insured bank, per owner, per account category. As you can imagine, tech startups with venture capital funding likely have far more than $250k in funds that they hold in their bank, which means everything over $250k was not insured.

With that being said, there are a lot of well-written resources available online that can explain FDIC insurance, as well as the similarly-purposed Se­cu­ri­ties Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC) insurance. I recommend conducting your own research before continuing so you can have a background ba­sis upon which to analyze my post. The purpose of my blog post is to provide an example and explanation of how I apply this information to my per­son­al financial situation.

As a disclaimer, I am not a registered financial advisor, and even if I was, I would not be your advisor. This information is being provided strictly as an anecdote to provide insight into my life, and it does not imply that you should blindly copy my strategy. If you have any questions or need guidance with your own financial situation, make sure you consult a certified professional.

 

  1. This is less of an actionable step and more of a way of thinking, but I believe that stuff is better than money. Money is nothing more than some fancy cotton paper, metal coins, or a number on a digital screen. “Stuff” is everything else—things you can use to live your day-to-day life. You can’t eat money, but you can eat food. You can’t ride money, but you can ride a bike. You can’t live in money, but you can live in a house.

    Obviously, I do not waste my money recklessly, and I am careful to ensure I do not overspend on depreciating assets (like cars). However, because I have enough of a savings buffer, if I ever encounter a situation where I can either (1) purchase an item that will be very useful in my life in many cir­cumstances and will generally retain its value, or (2) save even more money, then I will usually err on the side of making the purchase.

    The best example of this is real estate. Although I personally do not own a physical property at this time, I always keep an eye out for good deals and closely monitor real estate trends. If the biggest banks unexpectedly fail or the value of the dollar goes to zero, there isn’t much that can give you more peace of mind than owning your own house and having guaranteed shelter.

    Just make sure you appropriately consider property insurance coverage from a private carrier, if applicable.

  2. I keep most of my assets in… well, assets. As long as you are not just holding your money at your brokerage in cash, and are instead actually pur­chas­ing stocks, securities, and funds, then your SIPC insurance coverage is US$500,000.00 per owner, per account category. For the sake of not need­less­ly compromising financial structural information about my companies, I am going to just focus on my individual self in this blog post, but keep in mind that if you own companies, each duly-formed company counts as its own separate “customer.”

    I personally hold brokerage accounts on Fidelity and Vanguard. On Fidelity, I have an individual brokerage account and Health Savings Account. On Vanguard, I have two individual brokerage accounts, a Roth IRA, a SEP-IRA, and a Traditional IRA. On Vanguard, my two individual bro­ker­age accounts count as one single account type, but all the retirement accounts count as separate account categories. As a result, with $500k in SIPC in­surance coverage for each account type at each brokerage, if I spread out my money optimally, I can get $3 million in potential coverage.

  3. I have checking and savings accounts with both Discover Bank and U.S. Bank. Although checking and savings count as one account category, the fact that I have my money spread between two separate banks means I have separate FDIC insurance coverage for both, totaling $500k across the two. I can further increase coverage by creating revocable or irrevocable trusts, as well as by creating joint accounts with other people, but for now, I only have the two basic accounts.

  4. I have brokered certificates of deposit through Vanguard. Certificates of deposit (CDs) usually aren’t the most attractive investment vehicle, but with interest rates soaring lately and the stock market’s near future still uncertain, CDs have recently become a much more reasonable option. Brokered CDs are CDs that are owned by a different financial institution but purchased through your brokerage firm.

    As you saw above, the fact that I have distributed cash between two banks increased my FDIC insurance coverage. In theory, I can open even more bank accounts for even more coverage, but at some point, it becomes a hassle to keep track of all your different bank accounts. Instead, you can purchase brokered CDs through a single account and keep everything organized on one screen with one single log-in, thus taking advantage of the offering bank’s FDIC insurance coverage without having to have a direct customer account with them.

    You can get a wide range of CDs—as short as 1 month for funds you may need soon, and usually all the way up to 5 years if you want to take ad­van­tage of the high interest rates and don’t need the money for a while. Vanguard has brokered CD options from reputable institutions like JP Mor­gan, Charles Schwab, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo, just to name a few. In theory, you could use this trick to get as much FDIC insurance cov­er­age as there is banks offering CDs on your brokerage’s platform.

  5. I have been annually purchasing the maximum-allowed Series I Bonds to take advantage of their high interest rates as a result of recently-spiking inflation. Although these don’t have FDIC or SIPC insurance, they are fully backed by the United States government.

 
There are a few things to note here. First, don’t panic if you have more than the SIPC insurance limit in assets in a particular account at a particular bro­ker­age. Your assets are still your assets, and they are probably still out there somewhere. SIPC insurance only needs to kick in if your assets are actually gone due to misappropriation or other misconduct by the brokerage and cannot be recovered.

Next, at some point, solely optimizing for insurance coverage will quickly give you diminishing returns in terms of priority. For example, if you are using highly stable and reputable financial institutions and they all become insolvent with several millions of your dollars, then at that point, you probably have bigger worldly problems than worrying about the extra amount of your money that wasn’t FDIC- or SIPC-insured.

Finally, the intensity to which I have prepared for doom is a definitely on the high end. I don’t think I’ve gone so far as to reach the point of insanity by optimizing it to this degree, but you usually don’t have to worry this much about your money potentially disappearing into thin air. Make sure you don’t enter a state of paranoia by overestimating the gravity of this situation.

 

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Hello, Gladstone and Shoreline Park in Long Beach, California

Ever since arriving in SoCal after the most recent leg of my road trip, I haven’t really been getting out to do much. I’ve gone on a few out-of-town trips since then, but while in SoCal, I’ve mostly just been staying put indoors—a stark difference from going on tourist activities, hiking, and exercising at the ho­tel gym during my travels.

When I do go out, though, it’s usually because someone invites me to do something. Prompted by one of my friends and former co-workers, I de­cid­ed to head over to the downtown Long Beach area near the convention center to make a visit to the aquarium.

Unfortunately, it seemed like there was an event going on and there was an unusually high volume of tourists in the area, so the aquarium didn’t have any walk-in tickets available, and the next open time slot wasn’t for another few hours. Instead of waiting, we de­cid­ed to stop by a restaurant and walk around the bay.

 
The restaurant we chose was Gladstone’s. They started us with a very large portion of free bread.

As the appetizer, I ordered a half-dozen oysters. The size of each oyster was unexpectedly small, so the portion size wasn’t very satisfying. But, at the very least, they didn’t pre-season the oysters and instead put all the sauces on the side, so I was able to eat the oysters plain and enjoy the deep, rich, un­tar­nished fla­vor of just the oysters themselves.

My friend ordered a Caesar salad with chicken breast.

For my entrée, I selected Hawaiian swordfish.

I feel like it’s difficult to prepare swordfish in a way that makes it particularly unique, but I feel like this restaurant still did a decent job at it. The sword­fish tasted like normal swordfish, and the texture was great—it was a good mixture of firm and tender that you expect from nicely-cooked swordfish. However, the uniqueness came from the rice, which had a subtle but noticeable tang to it, which was well balanced by the slight bitterness of the broccolini.

 
Here are some shots from Shoreline Park and the surrounding areas near the restaurant:

 

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Hello again, Bullet and Kaya

As part of my week-long visit to the Seattle Metropolitan Area, I had another chance to petsit for my friend and co-worker Erin.

I first met her dogs in September 2021, then petsat a few times since then; I posted more photos of them back in July 2022 and August 2022. I hadn’t seen them in over four months, but I was happy to be reunited and take care of them again while Erin and her husband were out traveling.

Bullet is usually the one who likes to be in front of the camera, while Kaya is generally more shy, but this time around, Kaya was particularly photogenic.

I had to capture this last photo with my phone instead of my camera so I wouldn’t miss the moment, which is why it’s a bit lower in quality; on the day that Erin was returning from her trip, the dogs somehow sensed her impending arrival and perched up by the window waiting for her to come back.

 

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Hello, Shiro’s Sushi in Seattle, Washington

After recovering from my week of travel in the San Francisco Bay Area, I took a trip to the Seattle Metropolitan Area again to visit some friends.

While there, I met up with my friends Doug and Dani and went to a sushi restaurant for an omakase experience. There weren’t enough reservation slots a­vail­a­ble for actual omakase with the chef, so instead, we booked a seat at the regular tables for a chef’s choice four-course sushi meal with 19 pieces of as­sort­ed sushi. We also ordered a few appetizers.

Just as a disclaimer, this is my first time using my new camera for close-up macro shots since getting my old camera stolen while in Oakland, California; as a result, some of these photos are a bit blurry while I get accustomed to some of the settings, though I am already progressively getting better.

 
The first course consisted of albacore tuna from Oregon, shima aji (striped jack) from Japan, kanpachi (amberjack) from Japan, madai (sea bream) from Ja­pan, and kurodai (black snapper) from Greece.

After our first course, two of our appetizers were ready. The first was black cod kasuzuke broiled with Shiro’s original recipe.

The photo makes it look a bit small, especially because I accidentally angled the shot in a way where not much of the fish is in focus, but it was a sat­is­fy­ing­ly large filet. It tasted great—it was so tender that just poking at it with chopsticks made it fall apart, and the texture was fantastic.

The second appetizer was assorted vegetable tempura. Because it was something that was fried, it felt a little out of place eating it between fish courses due to the oils bringing out more of the “ocean-ey” taste in raw fish. It would have been nice if it came out first or last, but we still had plenty of ginger to cleanse our palates before the next course.

The second course had six pieces: katsuo (bonito) from Japan, botan ebi (sweet shrimp) from Alaska, sawara (king mackerel) from Japan, hotate (scal­lop) from Japan, Atlantic salmon from Canada, and sockeye salmon from Alaska.

The shrimp nigiri also came with a shrimp head. I wanted to seize the opportunity to get a picture of my head next to the shrimp’s head… though the pho­to didn’t really turn out as interestingly as I had hoped.

The actual botan ebi was delicious—it was thicker than most oth­er shrimp I’ve tried, the flavor was stronger and richer than usual, and the texture was very satisfying.

Our third and final appetizer came out—Shiro’s chawanmushi, steamed egg custard with shrimp, chicken, whitefish, shiitake mushroom, and mitsuba leaf topped with Hokkaido sea urchin and salmon roe. It had a lot of flavors going on at once, but most of them were complementary. As you can prob­a­bly guess, the sea urchin was my favorite part of this dish.

The third course was called “Bluefin Tuna 4 Ways,” and as you’d expect from the title, it was four different variants of bluefin tuna—one akami, one chū­toro, one otoro, and one prepared in a special way with a marinade.

The otoro, or the “wagyu of the sea” as some people call it, was as melt-in-your-mouth as you’d expect from tuna belly. The specially-prepared and mar­i­nated tuna was also surprisingly tasty; tuna is generally known for having a fairly basic, simple, and straightforward taste, but the marinade added in a nice bit of supplementary flavor to the fish.

The fourth and final course was negitoro (chopped fatty tuna) from Mexico, uni (sea urchin) from Santa Barbara, unagi (freshwater eel) from Japan, and tamago (egg omelet).

Although sea urchin is one of my favorite types of sushi, my favorite out of this particular lineup was actually the freshwater eel—it was a lot more fla­vor­ful and tender than what I usually expect from eel.

The tamago was very disappointing. It wasn’t prepared traditionally; there were no layers of egg, and it resembled a dessert more than it did actual ta­ma­go that you’d expect from a sushi restaurant.

After we were done with our appetizers and tasting menu, the waiter brought out a special order menu in case we wanted a second portion of anything, or if we wanted to try anything we didn’t get to taste during the four-course meal. There was one item on that list that I had never had before and that I had also never seen on a menu before, so I figured this would be a great opportunity to try it: ankimo, or monkfish liver.

It tasted very similar to kani miso, often nicknamed “crab brains.” Kani miso is not actually entirely brains—it’s just a mixture of the crab’s organs and oth­er innards. The texture was also very interesting, and difficult to describe—it was both firm and supple at the same time; both powdery and solid at the same time; both dry and pasty at the same time.

Although I probably wouldn’t go out seeking monkfish liver at a restaurant as one of my top dishes, it was actually pretty good. The unfortunate part is that it seemed to be a bit pricey, and apparently it is also only seasonally available during the winter according to the waiter, but if this is included as part of a “pick your own” kind of sushi experience (like revolving sushi or something), I would definitely have it again.

Dani and I wanted to split a Shizuoka matcha ice green tea, but they ran out, so we just drank water. I also wanted to try the mizu shingen mochi—rain­drop jelly served with kinako (soybean powder) and brown sugar syrup—but they didn’t have any of that left either, so we passed on dessert.

Here is a breakdown of what we paid:

Chef’s choice four-course sushi meal ×3  $ 255.00
Black cod kasuzuke  $  18.00
Assorted vegetable tempura  $  16.00
Chawanmushi  $  20.00
Ankimo ×2  $  26.00
Tax (10.25%)  $  34.34
Gratuity  $  75.00
Total  $ 444.34

Overall, I thought this was a decent restaurant, especially considering that the price per person of US$85.00 is a bit less than what you’d probably expect from a high-end sushi restaurant.

For me personally, I think the chef could have done more with flavor storytelling. I feel like the objective here might have been to give a unique, stand­alone character or “plot” to each course, so each “category” of sushi was able to have its own plate. This is definitely a valid way to do it, but it was dif­fer­ent than what I was expecting going into this—I was hoping for a bit more flavor micro-progressions piece-by-piece, as opposed to going purely off macro-progressions.

With that being said, a side effect of this above point is that, I think this restaurant would be especially good for sushi beginners. None of the nigiri pieces from the four-course meal were particularly adventurous or pungent, and I think one of the only “hit-or-miss,” “love it or hate it” items was the sea urchin. Having each plate broadly categorized by theme is also probably less “chaotic” for someone who just wants to have a good time eating good fish.

 

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