Along This Trail
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MICHIGAN’S U.P. WHERE THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE IS SOMEWHERE
On average, I find myself returning to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula every couple of years, usually for a camping trip or a scenic road adventure. I’ve visited many of its well-known destinations over the years, including Tahquamenon Falls, Mackinac Island, and the Keweenaw Peninsula during peak fall color season—an experience deserving of a post of its…
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250 Years of America Through the Lens of the Accounting Profession💙🤍❤️
Every profession has its own history, but few mirror the development of a nation as closely as accounting. The July issue of the Journal of Accountancy features a special commemorative section celebrating the 250th anniversary of the United States by tracing the evolution of the accounting profession alongside the nation’s history. Rather than presenting accounting…
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A Long-Overdue Trip to Beantown
When I completed my Master of Science in Computer Science in 2024, I wanted to celebrate in a way that felt meaningful. Rather than taking a typical vacation, I chose to make a pilgrimage to a place that has long represented the pursuit of knowledge itself—Boston. Looking back, it almost felt symbolic. Growing up in…
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What Started as a Craving Ended as a Journey to The Big Easy
One joke I often hear is that there is no such thing as American food. When people are asked to name a typical American dish, the answer is often “McDonald’s” or some other form of fast food—usually only half-jokingly. In many small American towns, the local dining scene often revolves around a Chinese buffet, a…
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From Information to Knowledge: Building a Personal AI Knowledge Base
Over the past few weeks, YouTube’s recommendation algorithm has repeatedly suggested courses on building AI agents. Many of these courses, particularly those created by Chinese content creators, focus on using large language models to automate research, organize information, and create personal knowledge systems. While exploring the topic, I came across a video titled “How to…
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Internal Controls Over Generative AI: Moving Beyond the Framework
Generative AI is rapidly finding its way into accounting, auditing, finance, compliance, and operational processes. As organizations begin integrating these tools into day-to-day activities, a familiar question emerges: How do we maintain effective internal controls when the system generating information can produce different answers to the same question? While reading the June 2026 issue of…
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How an MIT Student Used AI to Learn a Semester’s Worth of Material in 48 Hours
Can AI help compress a semester of learning into a weekend? Perhaps not literally—but it can dramatically accelerate the path from information overload to meaningful understanding. Recently, I came across an intriguing post describing how a graduate student used Google’s NotebookLM to absorb a new subject in roughly 48 hours. Rather than asking the AI…
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One Song That Took Me to The Lone Star State ⭐
Many years ago, I watched a Mongolian singer perform Amarillo By Morning on YouTube. That performance introduced me to George Strait and, in many ways, to Texas itself. I have always enjoyed folk music regardless of language or culture, but one thing I came to appreciate about American folk traditions is how they evolved into…
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Romanticized Oyaji Gyagu (Dad Jokes)
In Japanese, there is a term called oyaji gyagu (おやじギャグ), literally “dad jokes”—the kind of puns that are so corny they make everyone around you groan. They are often built on wordplay, loose associations, or accidental similarities in sound. Last night, while scrolling through YouTube Shorts before bed, I came across a clip of a…