101 FUN FACTS ABOUT JENNY!

Whenever I'm asked about Jenny, I'm always at a loss for words to adequately describe that extraordinary, interesting, talented, generous and loving person that graced my life. So, I thought I would put together some facts about her. Looking at them now, they're still not an adequate description. But, maybe this list is a start. So, here are 101 facts about my amazing wife.

1. Jenny never smoked a cigarette.

2. Jenny was the Managing Editor at the UCLA law review

3. While in Pittsburgh in the early 90s Jenny got a dog named Teddy, which would go on to also live in Poughkeepsie, New York, Santa Clara, California and West Covina, California

4. Jenny was 5’7”

5. Jenny once had a recipe published in Sunset magazine and earned a coveted staff recommendation.

6. Every day, Jenny played word games such as Spelling Bee, Wordle and crossword puzzles. She was good at all of them, too, usually achieving placement in the highest category.

7. Jenny often used Alexa's Jeopardy and Name That Tune, as well as word games as enticements to get her two sons to do activities with her.

8. In the 90s and early 2000s Jenny regularly ran 5K races.

9. Jenny worked out with 3, 5 and 8 pound weights every day.

10. Through activities such as patent prosecution, making licenses available to other parties, setting up collaborations and generating IP, Jenny used her legal skills for more than 20 years to advance medical imaging technology and to fight cancer.

11. Jenny was within one quarter of completing her masters degree in mechanical engineering when she decided to leave Pittsburgh for Los Angeles to go to law school.

12. Jenny got her little brother to do chores around the house by saying, "I'll time ya!"

13. Jenny used her dog, Teddy, to lick stamps and envelopes when she was in Pittsburgh.

14. When Teddy needed to be punished, Jenny put him on top of her refrigerator.

15. Jenny went on a bike trip through Switzerland and northern Italy.

16. Jenny passed the California Bar Exam on her first try.

17. Jenny read more than 40 books per year. Since 2009, she read the vast majority of them on a Kindle given to her by her father-in-law. It was the only device she ever used to read books. Otherwise, they were hard copies borrowed from the library.

18. Jenny customized her backyard garden to attract hummingbirds and she did so successfully.

19. Jenny cooked dinner for her family six days a week.

20. Before her kids came along, Jenny took community classes with her husband in pottery and gardening.

21. Jenny could type more than 80 words per minute.

22. On a typical night, Jenny would go to bed sometime just after midnight. Then, she would wake up before 5:30 in the morning. On most days, she took a half hour nap.

23. Kohl’s and Old Navy were Jenny‘s two favorite stores to buy clothes for her family.

24. Back in the mid 90s Jenny used a combination lock for her locker when she was at law school. She would use that same lock for her bike for as long as she rode it. Her husband uses that lock for his bike today.

25. Jenny almost never drank coffee.

26. Jenny once tried out to be a contestant on Jeopardy. Though not selected, she did captain a trivia team that won the 2001 Silicon Valley Asian Law Association trivia contest in San Jose.

27. Most mornings, Jenny would have oatmeal for breakfast. Sometimes, she would have cold cereal. However, never eggs.

28. Though Jenny liked music from the 1970s and 80s, it was classical music that she most frequently streamed from morning till night on her Bluetooth speaker.

29. Jenny preferred the Beatles to the Rolling Stones, the annual FIT test to a colonoscopy, and the Marvel universe to DC.

30. The most common categories on Jenny‘s Instagram feed were fashion and animals.

31. On the day Jenny was born, three track and field world records were broken in Mexico City at the 1968 Summer Olympics, Jacqueline Kennedy married Aristotle Onassis, and the number one song in the US was Hey Jude by The Beatles.

32. Pre-COVID, Jenny would occasionally bike the six miles to her work. Her employer even reserved a bike locker her for her. For her birthday, she got a bike rack so that her husband could pick up Jenny and her bike when he came back from his work.

33. Jenny only showered at night.

34. In any given year Jenny’s plants and trees regularly produced three different types of citrus, tomatoes and persimmons.

35. Jenny returned well over 80% of the shoes she purchased online. She was almost always happy with the way they looked. However, the problem was poor fit. The size 6 shoes were often too narrow and the 6 1/2‘s were too long.

36. Jenny could tie other peoples’ shoelaces with her feet.

37. For her honeymoon, Jenny went on an Alaskan cruise. She enjoyed it. However, she had little or no desire to ever go on a cruise again.

38. Jenny was a UCLA football season ticket holder.

39. Jenny used to work at the student bookstore at Vassar College.

40. Jenny planned every single day of every single one of her family‘s vacations.

41. On her first date with her future husband, Jenny had Straw and Hay, a pasta dish, then a sharing of a Key lime cheesecake at the Cheesecake Factory. This was then followed by a viewing of City of Angels starring meg Ryan. Throughout the date, including the end, Jenny made no mention of wanting to see him again.

42. When walking on a flat, paved surface, Jenny maintained a consistent 100 steps per minute pace. Plus or minus 2%.

43. Jenny regularly showed up to neighborhood events to exchange seeds, seedlings, cuttings and plants with other local gardeners.

44. As an IP attorney Jenny had many roles. But, what she was recognized for most often was her extraction of licensing fees based on her company‘s IP portfolio.

45. As an attorney in the late 90s, Jenny frequently hosted poker nights for her colleagues.

46. Jenny brushed her teeth twice each day. With an electric toothbrush.

47. Two Costco services Jenny consistently used until the week they were permanently closed down were their photo printing and printer-cartridge refilling.

48. During COVID, when Jenny needed to be on camera for work, which was frequently, she wore a button-down blouse with exercise pants.

49. When Jenny got married, Jenny told her husband it was the happiest day of her life. Ask her 20 years later, though, and she would say her happiest day was when her twins were born.

50. Jenny procured more than 90% of her family’s fruit, by weight, from local sources.

51. Jenny’s celebrity crushes included Rick Springfield, Ralph Fiennes and George Clooney, whom she once saw in person.

52. Though she grew up in Poughkeepsie, Jenny would never return there as a married woman.

53. Going back to her first Blackberry, every mobile phone in Jenny’s possession was provided by her employer. So, Jenny never paid a penny for a smartphone or its service.

54. Jenny described pregnancy as being even more uncomfortable than actually giving birth. It was because of this discomfort that Jenny did not want to have any more children.

55. The A’s became Jenny‘s favorite baseball team because she wanted to pursue an interest that would bring her closer to Tyler, long a diehard Oakland fan.

56. Jenny’s one non-negotiable, when it came to purchases over the Internet, was free shipping.

57. Passing the Patent Bar, not to be confused with the California Bar Exam, is required for patent prosecution. When Jenny took the Patent Bar in the late 90s, the pass rate was only about one-third. Still, Jenny needed only one attempt to pass it.

58. Wherever possible, Jenny would use the Instant Pot to cook dinner.

59. Jenny exhibited the highest brand loyalty towards Audi, Kohl’s, Old Navy and The Container Store.

60. If there was a plant that Jenny took care of that was (1) inside the house and (2) yielded flowers, then that plant was invariably an orchid.

61. Jenny’s favorite way to wind down at the end of the day was to watch either a Netflix food show or Saturday Night Live clips with her husband.

62. When the kids were selecting musical instruments in elementary school the number one consideration for Jenny was portability. Dylan Chow chose the trumpet. Tyler, the viola.

63. Jenny loved the opera. But, thankfully, she did not subject her family to this passion of hers very often. Her favorite opera composer was Puccini.

64. Jenny listened to KDFC every weekday morning. And, she loved to play Blind Date: A Mystery in History.

65. Jenny did not drink alcohol more than a half dozen times per year. And, when she did, it was usually wine and never more than a few sips.

66. Jenny‘s hot drink of choice was tea. And, she preferred loose leaf tea to that prepackaged in a tea bag.

67. All of Jenny’s watches were analog. All of Jenny‘s necklaces were gold.

68. In 2008, Jenny got laser eye surgery which brought her vision to 20/25. Though she still wore glasses for night driving and to watch TV, she never needed reading glasses.

69. Jenny’s nicknames for Dylan and Tyler included, respectfully, "Skinny Joe" and "Buttons". She often called her husband "Brown Friend".

70. Jenny enjoyed, and was very successful at, taking plant cuttings from relatives of an older generation and propagating them and watching them thrive in her garden.

71. Jenny would’ve been fine with signing a prenuptial agreement. Her future husband brought that prospect up with her. But, unbeknownst to her, he was only kidding.

72. Jenny never used more than one pod of detergent, no matter how large the load of laundry. She preferred to let baking soda, sun-drying and maybe the occasional vinegar pre-soak do much of the work.

73. Doctors without Borders, Fistula Foundation, Partners in Health, and Child Advocates of Silicon Valley stand out as Jenny’s favorite causes. However, she frequently made charitable donations elsewhere. Before doing so, she would always check them out on charity navigator.

74. For the first 10 or so years of their marriage, Jenny and her husband regularly gave to universities. However, she eventually soured on such giving because of ever-expanding athletic budgets, ballooning endowments, perceived misuse of computer equipment by students and not really knowing where her academic funding was actually going. Hence, she and her husband eventually stopped giving to universities.

75. It was Jenny who gave the name to Dylan’s favorite bed buddy and homework helper. a panda who goes by “Li Ping”.

76. Jenny‘s most trusted review site was Wirecutter, run by the New York Times.

77. Jenny avoided processed foods as much as possible. However, she had a weakness for chicken nuggets—the kind shaped like dinosaurs.

78. Whether it was for breakfast, lunch, dinner, a snack or to do the crossword puzzle, Jenny always took the same place at the dining table. It was the one that gave her the best view of her garden in the backyard.

79. Before giving birth, Jenny hardly ever had swollen ankles. Since her pregnancy, however, the problem would never go away. So, throughout the day she did floor exercises focused on elevating her feet. While doing so, she'd listen to podcasts and take in the occasional football game. It was also the chief reason she needed foot / ankle massages from her husband. :)

80. From a time before meeting her husband and throughout the more than 24 years they were together, Jenny had only two primary cars: a Nissan Altima and an Audi A4.

81. The two online news sources worthy enough for Jenny to pay a subscription were the San Jose mercury news and the New York Times.

82. The hiking trail Jenny frequented most was at Rancho San Antonio.

83. One recurring financial decision that Jenny always left to the discretion of her husband was how much to tip the server.

84. Jenny’s official first name was and always has been “Jenny” and not any of variation thereof.

85. Jenny was an accomplished pianist and even played the accompaniment for Dylan during his trumpet recitals. Often, to wind down the evening, Jenny would play Chopin, Mozart, or Beethoven while the family got ready for bed.

86. Whenever Jenny had a cold drink it was almost always water. Once in a long while, though, when she went out to a restaurant she would have a lemonade. However, it would have to be homemade, not the stuff made from powder.

87. When Jenny worked at Varian, what her colleagues saw was an exceedingly competent IP attorney. However, what they didn’t see was that she spent scores of hours doing research poring through papers and instructional media outside of business hours. She so intensely craved mastery of the technology that formed the basis of the licenses and patents that fell within her scope.

88. Any ice cream flavor that Jenny ate needed a texture to it such as in chocolate chip or Moose Tracks.

89. Aside from her mechanical engineering and law school textbooks Jenny’s library is dominated by the giants of literature, such as Hardy, Updike, Tolstoy, Salinger and the like.

90. In addition to the obligatory piano, Jenny also played violin when growing up. In fact, she Performed in Europe with her high school orchestra.

91. Though she preferred the digital variety, Jenny did use two hard-copy calendars in 2022. Both of them featured birds.

92. Jenny‘s maiden name is Ko. When spelling it out over the phone, she would start with “K as in kangaroo…”

93. Unbeknownst to many of her friends, Jenny used Invisalign. It took dedication, but the treatment was remarkably effective. Jenny was by and large a happy customer.

94. Jenny used three completely different methods to try to propagate a dying decades-old umbrella plant originally cared for by her mother-in-law. Only one method worked. which involved using root hormone on a stock. It’s now a healthy, full fledged umbrella plant in its own right.

95. For activities on her birthday, Jenny almost always left it up to her husband and sons to come up with ideas. The lone exception was for her 50th birthday, when she decided the family would go zip lining.

96. Father’s Day and her wedding anniversary were the two dates each year that Jenny regularly requested family photos to be taken.

97. Jenny gave birth in Santa Clara at a Kaiser hospital, which would be torn down not long afterwards.

98. Nearly all of Tyler‘s required 50 hours of permitted driving we’re done with Jenny next to him. Jenny would get up at 6:30 in the morning to accompany her family’s earliest riser on his rides.

99. Jenny volunteered 30 hours for Dylan‘s Eagle Scout project.

100. Jenny’s family never purchased a lemon. The hundreds of lemons Jenny used in her cooking and drinks were all obtained from her two lemon trees.

101. The name Tyler was the one name Jenny was sure she wanted to give to one of her boys the night they were born. Jenny believed that Tyler seemed more a name for a younger twin rather than an older one. So, Tyler was actually named before Dylan, who took another day or two to name.