misadventures in babylon

20 semi-random reasons i heart portland (oregon)

2010-07-15T03:20:00.000-07:00

20. it snows and we have all 4 seasons
19. no sales tax!
18. saburo's sushi house
17. MANY, MANY happy hour places
16. rose festival every june
15. sushiland
14. saturday market + elephant ears
13. zajiang mein
12. gas is $0.25 cheaper per gallon even though someone else pumps it for you
11. traffic isn't that bad
10. when traffic is bad, alternate/local routes exist to save time
9. fabric depot
8. breakfast places and interesting eateries
7. both the beach and the mountains are 1.5 hours away
6. street food carts/stalls all over the place
5. MAX lightrail system
4. watching blazers games on TV without forking over $168 for NBA league pass
3. going to the rose garden to see the blazers
2. awesome summer weather
1. family - i guess they kind of have to be #1, no? :)

near the end of another school year

2010-06-10T12:35:00.000-07:00

i've almost finished my 4th year of teaching. if i get past 5 years, i'll have beaten the statistic that says most new teachers quit within 3-5 years. before i started working, i thought, "wow, that's such a short time! how come people quit so early on in their career?" during my first year, i'm pretty sure i thought about quitting every day for the first month. as the year progressed, it was every other day, and by the end, i was mostly ok. the second and third year were totally fine. nothing like year 1. enter my 4th year, where i switched from teaching 4th graders to 2nd graders. the jury is still out on whether this past year was worse than my first year. after this year, i'm not sure if i'll make it past the 5 year mark.

let me say that for the most part, it's really not the kids. though if you've heard my rants, you might be inclined to think i hate some of my kids. i really don't. i would like to shake some sense into 5 of them...and their parents. i know i'm not good with change, but this year was more change than i deal with. i switched to younger kids, so i wasn't prepared for them as an age group. there was a lot they didn't know yet, and yet so many things they wanted to talk about that there just wasn't time for. sigh.

i wasn't ready for how involved and hands-on (read: needy) their parents were. i'm all for parent involvement, but in healthy ways, where they help (not hinder) the kids and me. actually, the kids were more needy too. if you know me, you know i don't do well with needy - as a general rule of thumb. so, that was hard. the parent factor was REALLY BAD. as a school, we had a dictator as a principal and it took us half the year to get rid of him. he was all about micromanaging and he was incompetent. and, 12 of us were laid off again and we didn't find out if it would be rescinded until the end of may. so, that was stressful. good news, the lay offs were rescinded. we're all hoping this doesn't happen for a third year in a row next year.

summer vacation will be good for some reflection. TEP was all about self-reflection as an educator and i know i haven't done it much. to prevent a repeat of this meltdown year, i need to take time to figure out what went wrong, what went right, and how it can all be better. i'm looking forward to going back up to 4th grade, staying in the spanish dual language program, and teaching content in both languages by myself. and bonus, alicia is going back to 4th with me. our dream team is partially united. all we need is heidi and we're set. but since i have a smaller class and alicia only has 12 kids, we're thinking about combining them for a lot of the extras - science, PE, health, and social studies. even though i raged about this year and couldn't wait for the end of day bell to ring, i'm looking forward to next september already. teachers must be masochists; we yell, complain, cry, and can't wait for the year to end and then we can't wait to jump into the mess all over again. but only after a 2 month recovery time. :)

asian pop stars

2009-12-09T23:43:00.001-08:00

i'm watching the results show for "so you think you can dance" and the wondergirls are performing "nobody", which is still pretty darn catchy.

the only reason this merits a blog post was that on monday, i was walking by one of my 2nd graders and he was singing "i don't want nobody, nobody but you..." he's my super high functioning filipino austistic student and it was super cute and funny. then today, he's sitting in his square on the rug and punching the air declaring, "i'm manny" (pacquiao) in case you weren't sure who he was talking about. how much do i love that there's a filipino athlete for him to look up to? i just had his conference with his mom today and she was telling me how the night before, he was asking his dad who was better, manny pacquiao or john cena.

totally unrelated - the same student's mom was telling me that when he was little, he couldn't handle being out and around people, so they enrolled him in a social skills therapy class to help him. so now, they have the opposite problem. he talks to everybody. i guess his mom has a ton of relatives and so they were at the mall recently, and the kid walked up to some random vietnamese lady who he thought looked filipino and took her hand and greeted her (in some traditional filipino way, according to his mom). she had to apologize to the lady who was confused about why a random child grabbed her hand. his explanation, "i thought she was family."

going back to asian pop stars, specifically korean pop stars, i found out that one of my 4th grade students from last year was just signed to some 5 year recording contract with a korean record label. they're grooming her and sending her to tumbling classes, vocal classes, etc. and, in the contract, there's a surgery clause, as in if they want you to get some kind of plastic surgery, you have to do it. umm...she's 10 right now. so while it's awesome that she's so talented, i'm horrified at the thought that when she's deemed old enough, some person will tell her that she's not pretty enough and will then proceed to dictate that she must have plastic surgery. that is so disturbing.

t-minus 7 school days and counting until i am officially on vacation. vacation cannot come soon enough.

carwash calamity and bad words and jokes

2009-09-15T23:46:00.000-07:00

i think i need to sleep more than 5 hours a night. i got gas yesterday and then drove into the carwash near my apartment. the directions said to turn the side view mirrors inward and to put the car antenna down. i turned my side view mirrors in, and then wasn't really thinking about my antenna being up, even though my radio was on. total brain fart. i drove home and parked in my garage and while i was getting teacher junk out of my car, i noticed my antenna was bent in a 90 degree angle. crap. and in trying to bend it back, the metal snapped! arg. it was hanging by the cord inside. luckily i had just gone to the 99 cent depot in culver city and had packaging tape in the car (i should probably get some electrical tape until i get it fixed) and taped it up and tried to give it some stability so it wouldn't go flying off while i drive around. it looks so GHETTO.

after lunch today, a couple of the kids had issues they needed to tell me. AR told me that AM hit the playground ball that was in his hands while they were waiting in line and he was really upset by it. and AM said that while they were in line, AR said a bad word to her. i heard the story about the ball, and then made AM apologize to AR. then i asked AR if he said a bad word. he said no, AM said he did...back and forth a couple of times. i asked AR again, if he said a bad word, and he said, "i didn't say a bad word; i said f--k." my response: "..." "so AR, that is a bad word, a very bad word. it is a word we never use at school because it is inappropriate and rude. it is not the kind, polite, and respectful language we are supposed to use with one another. i'll call your mom after school to discuss this." omg.

yesterday, one of the sweetest boys in my class told me "knock knock" jokes at recess and lunch and said he had more jokes. i told him to save it for after school because i just don't have time to hear all the things they want to share during teaching time. so after school, he started telling me the joke very innocently, and it turned out to be a totally racist joke involving the "n" word as a sound effect. how do you start telling a 6/7 year old why that joke is so not ok to ever repeat because it's racist? i didn't have a chance to really get into my spiel because his dad came. i explained to dad and dad was totally sorry and explained that RG hangs out in south LA with his abuela on the weekends and gets exposed to the african-american/latino racial tension that hasn't fully moved up to k-town. or at least, it's not as intense...yet. sweet kid. broke my heart that his world is a little more tainted with exposure to those kinds of jokes. i'm pretty sure he felt terrible. sigh.

my dad e-mails!

2009-09-14T20:02:00.000-07:00

a few weeks ago, i sent my dad an e-mail just for kicks because i set up an email account for him and he was starting to learn how to use a computer at a class with other chinese folks. just today, he sent this back to me:

"The computer class is very good. I am still learning."

i am impressed with the pops.

first day of school

2009-09-09T21:05:00.001-07:00

posts have been few and far between. with the start of a new school year, it seemed like a good time to try to blog more regularly.

this morning, i woke up early and felt panicky - almost like i was a first year teacher again. i switched from fourth grade to second grade and so it sort of does feel like starting all over again. i had a brief moment this morning where i kind of wanted to throw up - from nerves, not from being sick while in tokyo.

so, i met my new class today - 18 second graders and 1 more coming tomorrow for a grand total of 19...so far. it can pretty much change day to day for the next few weeks. the kids short and cute. they talk a lot and have to go to the bathroom...A LOT. and while they are cute, i'm oddly afraid of them. i have no idea what to expect from them and what they're supposed to be able to do. for example, i gave them a math pre-test today, and the first question had 8 discs and the kids just had to bubble in the number 8 to show how many discs were pictured. uh...what? i guess i'm tripping out because i'm used to teaching linear algebra, long division, integers, and multi-digit subtraction/addition/multiplication. so questions like "how many ducks are pictured?" (7, in case you're wondering) are throwing me off. i kept going, "why don't they know 11-6?! is it because we only have 10 fingers so the 11 throws them off?" i bet the kid with 11 fingers is thinking, "this is so easy!" just kidding, none of the kids have 11 fingers, i don't think.

i'm going to work up to just treating second graders just like i treated fourth graders. hopefully, they won't start crying. that would be bad.

1 day down, 179 days to go...

pseudo re-tweet

2009-06-10T21:37:00.000-07:00

via taylor swift's twitter...i really, REALLY like this quote.

"I kind of like it when the guy has the upper hand. I have so many upper hands in my life... If you're a strong female, it can get old. You get to the point where you don't want to wear the pants. I just want to wear a really nice dress." - Katy Perry

forgettable 4th grade?

2009-01-24T23:40:00.000-08:00

last week, minjue and i were in the car talking about going to the museum of tolerance on MLK monday. somehow, we got on the topic of her time in germany when her dad was a visiting professor. she mentioned that they'd learned about the holocaust in school, which led me to ask her what grade she was in during those six months. she said she was in 2nd grade, her younger brother wasn't yet old enough for school, and her older brother was in 4th grade. she also said that they didn't like school so their parents let them stay at home for the time they were there. minjue said that she didn't miss much in terms of education and i agreed because 2nd grade is basically 1st grade redone with more words and slightly bigger numbers.

as for her older brother, this is what she had to say:

mj: what do you learn in 4th grade? nothing!
me: uh...you know i teach 4th grade, right?
mj: ack!!! (she continued to freak out...)
me: ahahahaha

i don't know what 4th grade is like in virginia, but californian 4th graders have to learn a lot. (i must justify my job somehow...) they learn algebra in the form of linear equations (y=mx+b). they learn all about california history (with a social justice agenda where we de-emphasize the "cool" factor of missions and focus on the atrocities done to the native peoples). they learn to write expository research reports, persuasive letters, literary analysis, and narratives. they learn to analyze literature (themes, symbolism, foreshadowing, etc) and SAT vocabulary. ok, they don't actually learn SAT vocabulary, but i use it to expose them to more vocabulary. darn it, my kids learn a lot...i think... to be fair, i think kids today are expected to learn more much sooner than when i was in school.

procrastination update

2008-11-30T23:26:00.000-08:00

it's 11:26pm and tomorrow begins a week of parent conferences that i don't feel ready/prepared for and so instead, i've decided to procrastinate and update the blog! anything to put off grading their science notebooks. grading = BOO.

since the economy is on the downward spiral, i have been doing my part, as a responsible and caring citizen, to stimulate the economy. as j.yee would say, lord and behold:

while at costco, the box wouldn't fit upright into the back of gilbert's 4runner. i was seriously sad when we walked back towards the return line. later, i was deliriously happy when the costco guys said it was okay to transport it on its side, glass facing up. that deserves a w00t.

i showed AMAZING restraint and waited until black friday deals were released, on the off chance that a better deal might surface and save me some money, but there was nothing worth venturing out at the butt-crack of dawn for. (can i end with preposition there? oh well, moving on...) the kwon clan (grace & joe + babies javier and eduardo - still in the belly) came over yesterday and set it up for me. i did nothing except drool over the TV. joe did 99.9% of the work. handy friends. yay.

also in honor of stimulating the economy, i went to target today to return some things and get lots of closet organizer and storage things. i spent hours re-organizing my closet and giving my room a good cleaning. anyone who's seen it in the last year knows it was NOT GOOD. i no longer have to be ashamed - i can leave the door to my room open. yay!!! now i just have to maintain it. boo.

next on my list is to take time to update photos from the last 12+ months. whoops.

summer vacation

2008-08-03T23:50:00.001-07:00

i've been on summer break for...6 weeks now. i still have a month left. i need to update my photos over the last year.

right now, i'm in seattle. it was a little dreary the last couple of days, but forecasts say it's sunny and 80s all week long. awesome.

memorial day weekend

2008-05-26T22:34:00.000-07:00

i didn't go out of town, but somehow i managed to keep busy.

friday - as soon as school let out, well, as soon as i could get out of school on friday, heidi (my 4th grade buddy teacher) and i went to disneyland to meet up with some other people. it was super fun, as disneyland always is.

saturday - moonie is in town so we met up for lunch along with some other folks in hollywood. i remember now why i dislike going to hollywood - way too many people and cars. i think it took 30 minutes to go from sunset & vine to hollywood & highland. boo. i went running/walking with jeff and then we went to minjue's to have beef stew from a crockpot. it was yummy. then it was lots of wii fun at grace and joe's - wii fitness exploring and lots of mariokart. i suck using the stupid wheel.

sunday - i drove out to pasadena to meet up with one of wendy & josh's adoptees, joe, to have lunch and then drive him to john wayne airport. i can now say that i've been to all the major airports in southern california (i think...). in between, i got to meet a couple of new people - totally hilarious - and go to scoops ice cream in west hollywood. delicious homemade gelato/ice cream. i had raspberry jasmine and a scoop of chocolate guinness. it was very, very good. after i got home from the airport drive, i wanted to rest, but ended up going with susan to her friend's birthday bonfire at dockweiler, where i think i almost froze to death and caught a cold. it was fun though. i haven't roasted a hot dog on a skewer in a long time. after that, we caught a late showing of indiana jones at the arclight in sherman oaks with grace and joe. seriously...so not as good as the previous three. utterly disappointing. and then i passed out as soon as i got home.

monday - since i caught a cold, i woke up at 9 and stayed in bed watching k-dramas until 1. i know...very unproductive, but oh so fun. plus, i'm kinda sick. then, i drove up to grace and joe's and we went walking around balboa park, which is like a poor man's greenlake, but with a WAY better kid's playground area. it was AWESOME. if there hadn't been kids around, i'm pretty sure i could've spent a couple of hours there. as it was, it would have been awkward fighting small children for the swings. i finally got to see the fuss about topanga mall. it's ginormous and nice. i feel that if it has a neiman marcus coming, it's pretty upscale. i think we only made it through half of the mall. i did run into the lees there, so that was a nice bonus. as was the chocolate croissant (chococro as they call it) at st. marc's cafe. and, i finally watched an episode of "so you think you can dance?" - how have i missed this show for the past 3 (or is it 4?) seasons?!? it's now on the tivo list.

and now, the weekend is over. 18 teaching days left and it's summer vacation. so excited.

home happenings

2008-04-10T23:58:00.000-07:00

mom

i just talked to my mom and caught up on all the random ongoings at what susan likes to call the "insert last name-pound." my mom has finally mastered the dragging and clicking of the mouse. she's on her way to becoming computer savvy for the sake of instant access to k-dramas. my brother has bookmarked specific sites for her and she's loving it. she's also learning just now addictive internet access can be.

years ago, she tried using a mouse to watch k-dramas, but it was a no-go. as a solution, she made andy find the site and start the episode for her. but after an episode ended, she'd wake him up to click the next one for her. hahaha...he was cranky about that.

i discovered that she has the k-drama that heidi recommended at home on dvd. i like that my love of tv has created a commonality for us. tv bridges gaps.

dad

my dad has played basketball weekly for as long as i can remember. i think in the last few years, it's gone to twice a week. months ago, somebody, maybe my brother or wendy, somebody, told me that my dad got in a scuffle with another middle-aged dude. i think it ended in my dad kicking the guy. kicking! he's 55! he's kicking people! i guess the other dude fouls excessively and does not call his own fouls and he just plays all sorts of bad - i guess he doesn't really know organized basketball. so anyway, i guess my dad had had it.

fast forward to this last tuesday. my brothers were at the lakers-blazers game at the rose garden (courtside! i saw them on tv on the LA broadcast) and were not witness to the on-court craziness. i guess home-dude had been committing bad fouls all evening and also on my brother's friend (also my dad's friend/neighbor's nephew) - possibly one too many times. i guess dad decided to say something, words were then exchanged, which somehow led to the other guy hitting my dad's face. i don't know if it was a punch or slap or something else, but either way, it didn't sit well with him. so, i guess his rage-o-meter spiked and was about to take a retaliatory shot when he was restrained by the same friend/neighbor. while he was held back, the other guy took a second cheap shot! so...my resourceful and angry father used his head - literally. he head-butted the guy! other dude's head started bleeding.

my stinkin' dad is 55 years old. i do not condone his behavior, but i still want him to kick the other guy's ass if he does find himself in a fight - is that wrong? and, i'm not above using the story as blog fodder.

blog roll call

2008-04-08T22:51:00.000-07:00

i've abandoned former favorite celebrity news blogs in favor of sports and blazer-related blogs. some of my faves:

true hoop - total blazer fan

blazers edge

rip city rising - showcasing a nifty comic supporting lamarcus aldridge as most improved player

ball don't lie

garbage time all-stars

envious

2008-04-01T00:23:00.000-07:00

even though the NBA season is drawing to a close, i've just discovered this guy's blog as he travels to all 30 arenas this season. i loved looking through his pictures/post about his time in portland, at the rose quarter. i've been to exactly 1 game at the rose quarter - a play-off game sometime after (right after?) high school. if i ever move back, i'm joining my brother as a season ticket holder. but mostly, i just liked looking at portland through somebody else's perspective and was very happy to find that he liked the city just fine. :)

two weekends ago, i was fortunate enough to tag-a-long with minjue and enjoy the blazer's win over the clippers from a exec suite at the staples center. so amazing - deliciously free food and a great view of the game.

american idol

2008-03-26T21:05:00.000-07:00

so my roommate susan got tickets to a taping of the results show a few weeks ago. after school, i rushed home, only to drive back to cbs studios next to the grove. we stood on the sidewalk and didn't make it in. as a consolation, they gave her priority tickets to a future taping. that taping was today. i have parent conferences all next week (30 of them), grades are due, and i have portfolios of student work to put together, in addition to the normal amount of school stuff i have to do. to say that i'm swamped and stressed is kind of an understatement.

anyway, this was probably the worst week to get these tickets, but i left school earlier than in a long time and made my way over to the grove. the studio looked the same as the last time i went (2 years ago for a dress rehearsal of performance night with alexandra), except now only the VIPs get to sit. the rest of us stand in the pit for the whole 2.5 hours. so, ryan is still a small guy, but taller than i thought - we estimate 5'8" maybe. randy is thinner and shorter than i imagined. paula is tiny. she was hard to even find in the crowd. simon needs to wear an undershirt and button a few more buttons. some pseudo-celebs were in the audience:

kimberly locke (season 2) performed a new song. she looked great.
former contestants onstantine (season 4) and gina (season 6) sat next to each other.
natasha bedingfield was front and center behind the judges table.
rapper (lil') romeo - ok, i didn't recognize him, but since he had a bodyguard with him, we assumed he was somewhat famous. i heard somebody whisper, "romeo." then later, on my way home, i was thinking he kind of looked like master p. i just googled him, turns out he's master p's son! susan couldn't get over the bling around his neck. she claimed it was a jewel-encrusted keropi. somehow, i don't think that adds to his street cred.
the boy that plays justin (betty's little brother) on ugly betty was there. he's a cutie.
AI producer/director Nigel was running around.

and they don't count as pseudo-celebs yet, but booted contestants david (former male stripper according to my other roommate susan) and danny (a waifish looking boy) signed autographs for the teenybopper set.

i think that's it. i have to say, this show makes it super awkward for the bottom contestants. they are made to sit apart for the duration, though they get called over to the couch of safety during commercial breaks. when i watch on tv, it's like whatever. but seeing the person 30 feet away from you sweating it out is kind of sad. chekezie was booted from the show. poor guy. he seems like a pretty nice person. we really did feel super bad for him. oh well. i wish good things for him.

i also left the taping with a tiny crush on the australian guy - the accent helps, as does his singing. plus, he's a cutie too.

movies

2008-03-03T23:22:00.000-08:00

i just saw a commercial for run fatboy run with simon pegg (of hot fuzz and shaun of the dead. it's so going on my list of must see movies. that, and penelope.

separately, i still heart the blazers. here's something random i found amusing. blazers meet braveheart.

dumpster diving

2008-02-13T15:48:00.001-08:00

so, i'm sitting in my classroom entering my students book orders. earlier, i was looking for a $10 coupon for scholastic and i couldn't find it in the folder i keep all the order forms and payments. i thought back to this morning and recall throwing some stuff out. boo. the custodial staff had already come by to empty out the trash cans. so what do i do? i find her and ask to dig through the big garbage bag. she gave me gloves when she saw i was about to just start rifling through the bag. after 5 minutes, i gave up. then, i remembered that heidi (next door) probably got the same coupon pack so it should have the same promo code. she let's me borrow her code and as soon as i sit down at my computer, there is my february coupon staring at me. DARN. i dug through trash for no good reason.

i blame my head trauma from sunday. i didn't think of the heidi back-up until after i'd been digging through the trash. but really, i completely overlooked the coupon sitting right next to the computer in the first place. and naturally, kids were walking through the hallway wondering why the teacher is on the floor looking through the garbage. i am so a product of my frugal upbringing. bah.

weekend

2008-02-10T20:56:00.000-08:00

last week, susan made spring rolls from scratch. she didn't use up all the filling last time, so on saturday, she made the rest. there were a bunch of peels leftover, so we decided to try and make crab puffs. ok, i call them crab puffs, but she calls them crab rangoon. crab rangoon does sound a lot fancier.

all fried up. they were REALLY good.

susan's chinese new year spring rolls. also VERY GOOD.

so after we went to the farmer's market that morning, we got hungry mid-afternoon. the cafe laurent chocolate almond croissant held us over until we fried up everything. here's susan sitting with all our fried goodies plus sushi rice and "sushi land crab salad" (it's a portland thing).

and here's me icing the left side of my face. i played flag football today and was part of a little collision. subert told me to ice it because they could see the swelling. suck. if it bruises, i'll have a good story for the kids tomorrow. i'm using the blue ice packets that people put in their lunch box. i'd rather use my rice bag, but i think it has to stay in the freezer for a bit longer.

and, i've been checking cnn.com repeatedly, watching the gap between clinton and obama get smaller and smaller. he's only down by 27 delegates. yay for voting.

little brothers' birthday fun

2008-01-29T20:54:00.000-08:00

this was an IM from andy:

andy: no xmas present, no bday present
andy: <----- sad face

i did get him a present, though it was late.

in honor of both brothers (mike and andy) having birthdays earlier this month, i'll share a few funny moments about each of them.

mike turned 24 a few weeks ago, and divided by 6, that makes 4. so here are 4 short stories.

when he was little, like under the age of 6, he used to be really scared of fire. whenever there was a birthday cake with candles, he'd duck under the table and hide until after the candles were blown out. i'm pretty sure we have a bunch of pictures with all of us around the cake and mike hiding underneath.

i came home from UW on a break and i guess i'd gained some dorm food weight. i walked in the door and the first thing mike said was, "you ate my sister!" jerk. though i admit that was a pretty good one.

a few years ago, i was home on some break and was making food. i told mike (or it could've been andy...i can't remember, but we'll just say it was mike) to wash the rice. he looked and me blankly and said, "what do you mean wash the rice?" i was like, "you know...wash it and get it ready for the rice cooker." he said, "you have to wash rice?!" all those years in college and he just cooked the rice straight from the bag + water...no washing.

most recently, my family came to LA for my graduation. they rented some kind of car, a dodge i think. anyway, i was driving us somewhere and on the radio dash, it read "trunk ajar." mike says, "what does that mean, ajar?" i told him that it meant that the trunk was slightly open. he says, "in what language?" we (except my mom, because she has no idea what's going on) look at each other and say, "uh...english" and start cracking up.

andy turned 22 last week. 22-2=20. 20 divided by 5 is also 4. 4 stories about this punk.

when he was little, he was total mama's boy and a brat. i had gotten a souvenir mini mug and saucer from BC from my trip with wendy, chris, and their parents. andy was fascinated by it, so i put it on the top of my bookshelf, out of his reach. next thing you know, we hear a huge crash. he tried to climb up to get it and ended up toppling my shelf and breaking a bunch of porcelain paperweights (like my cute ballet shoes). he wasn't hurt, but i was so mad. i made sure my mom punished him - she had him stand against the wall and hold his arms straight up above his head as he cried the whole time. every time he tried to put his arms down, i made my mom come back in to enforce the punishment. he was 6.

he wrestled in high school and was always cranky, trying to make weight. my mom always tried to make him eat, which made him more cranky, like seriously PMS cranky. anyway, one season, he got ringworm. i incessantly made fun of him. he hated that, but i had my fun.

during his senior year, i drove him out to forest grove (or was it cornelius?) to pick up his letterman jacket and as we were looking for parking and a space opened up, andy says, "what frugal timing!" i looked at him and was like, "you know that's not how you use frugal right?" now every time we find parking, i say, "what frugal timing!" he tries to explain that it was on purpose. sure it was.

last year he turned 21. he woke up with his face all scratched up. i guess he met with the pavement sometime that evening. he told our mom that it happened in basketball or flag football or something. she believed him.

happy birthday kids.

wacky weather

2008-01-27T00:53:00.000-08:00

it's been raining on and off this week like seattle/portland. i have to admit that i kind of like it. however, what i do not like is how so cal drivers react to the rain - they can't drive. it took me 45 minutes to get to work on friday morning during light rain. that's just ridiculous. it almost doubled my commute time. LA is not built to handle rain. Case in point - my school's main lobby area flooded from the rainwater seeping in through the double doors and caused some damage to the flooring.

i went to target earlier and during the drive there, i listened to the sound of rain drops hitting the car. the entrance was super crowded with people waiting for someone in their group to bring the car up because they didn't want to walk in the rain. it made me laugh. LA people are funny, albeit unintentionally in this case. and now, sitting in my apt, i hear the rain hitting the windows. it's great.

latest obsession

2008-01-14T21:30:00.001-08:00

my time at home as launched a new obsession. forget pop culture news. these days, i'm reading a sport blog, mostly having to do with the blazers. but, i've recently discovered gilbert arenas's blog, because he mentions the blazers, and i have to say, it's pretty entertaining.

i used my internet search skills to find a new jersey radio station broadcasting the blazers vs. nets game because i couldn't find a live stream anywhere (and because i don't have NBA TV) and then at half-time, kept refreshing my blackberry until i could make it home through traffic to get the radio broadcast again. i told my brother this, and he laughed at me.

anyway, blazers won. and i just watched the sonics lose out to the lakers in OT. boo.

-----------------------------------

this morning, the kids were walking up the stairs and one of the kids, edward, tells me that his mom told him he's not black. i stopped walking and looked at him. he said, "my mom said we're asian." edward is korean-american. i swallowed my laugh and said, "edward, why did you ask your mom if you were black?" his response, "because you said we're not white." great...good one teacher. i clarified with edward that not being considered "white" just meant that we were minorities/under-represented people group (whichever you prefer as i know some from my ucla cohort do not like the term "minority"). i told him that not everything is black and white. i also told him to tell his mom that i did not tell him that he's black. edward and i had a pretty good laugh about it. now he knows he's asian-american.

bye bye 2007, hello 2008

2008-01-05T14:08:00.000-08:00

i'm on my last few days of break before starting work/school (i never know how to refer to my job as i work at a school) on monday. i was home in portland for 2.5 weeks and had all the time in the world to do the many things that were on a list. and of course, i didn't do any of them. winter break = unproductive. and i'm ok with that. here's what i did do:

was delayed at LAX for an hour and a half and got into portland well-past midnight
went shopping...tax free
sewed for the first time since home ec. in 7th grade (not counting the two scrunchies i attempted with my dad's sewing machine in high school) and made 2 rice-filled heat/cold therapy satchels
learned about fabric stores bolt and fabric depot and started a fabric stash
christmas eve service at village baptist
christmas day extended family potluck
saw juno, atonement, and i am legend
went to skamania lodge for mike's work brunch with the entire fam, where his coworkers, who are our parents' peers, proceeded to network me with their high school daughters prepping for college applications. they were 10 years younger than i am, which actually made me feel old. i work with 10 year olds and they don't make me feel old, but these two high schoolers did. sigh.
video games: rock band, viva piñata! party animals, guitar hero, ds games
read books by henri nouwen (in the name of Jesus and still reading the return of the prodigal son)
watched dvds with andy and mike - 4 brothers, resident evil: requiem, ocean's 13,
blazer games - 13 game winning streak! my affection for the blazers has been revived.
ate...a lot - sushiland, pho, broder (euro breakfast), old spaghetti factory (finally!), thai elephant, cpk, hosoonyi's, nak won, and buffalo wild wings (andy, mike, and i felt disgusting afterwards)
read a lot of blazers news, blogs, sports sites (espn and yahoo! sports, etc) catching up on blazermania
annual post-christmas potluck/white elephant gift exchange (which i didn't participate in...anyone who's seen my apartment here knows i have too much junk and therefore, cannot take on anyone else's junk)
caught up with friends
finally saw wendy and chris in all their pregnant glory - awesome. saw wendy and josh's baby room and did research shopping with wendy and chris at babies 'r us
played games - settlers of catan (i won a game) and apples to apples. no bean game this time around.
visited the well church on sundays

there are probably things i'm missing, but oh well. currently, i'm listening to the blazers vs. jazz on streaming radio on the laptop. i thought i had nba tv, but i was mistaken. boo. the best i can get is yahoo! sports game channel text updates and radio. sigh. no love for blazers in LA.

majesty among the mundane

2007-12-24T22:57:00.000-08:00

tonight, i went to a candlelight christmas eve service. we worshiped with songs, what we've come to think of as "christmas carols", a bit of narrative about the birth of Jesus and the conditions surrounding his birth, and some sharing from the pastor. the theme was about how ordinary everything was that night - ordinary, everyday sheep; ordinary people; ordinary circumstances and setting. and yet, in the midst of the ordinary, something very extraordinary happened - God broke through and entered the this world as a baby. there was majesty in the middle of the very mundane. the pastor used this story from the washington post, pearls before breakfast, to illustrate the point.

i hope we all take time to sit at the feet of the Jesus that broke through the mundane and bleak to bring salvation to a messed-up and dark world. please don't let us miss out on Jesus, or diminish the significance of who he is, because we're too busy or otherwise preoccupied with ourselves and our own junk.

winter break

2007-12-19T01:57:00.000-08:00

i am finally on winter break. the last week before break was super stressful - so stressful, that i developed a stye! i'm sure lack of sleep didn't help. i got into portland just past midnight yesterday, after a series of mini-delays, and i was greeted with cold and rain. oh, how i've missed this weather.

since being on break and at home is all about relaxing and doing fun things, i've started to learn how to sew. my first project - an eye pillow for my sty. wendy showed me how to make a heat therapy rice bag with a washable slip-cover. i can now independently make as many rice bags as i want. next up, craft apron for teaching use.

holiday program

2007-12-12T20:18:00.000-08:00

sometimes i wish my classroom was like survivor...where kids are voted off the island.

we're in the middle of pulling together our winter holiday program. this afternoon, my class was part of the audience watching the kinder and 1st graders perform. they would not stay quiet - talking, playing around, and goofing off throughout the show. another teacher commented on how we should just equip each kid with a buzzer and send them a jolt when they're messing around. sigh.

after school, i took two of the girls to pinkberry in larchmont. one of the girls earned the most awards certificates in class, but couldn't go on the museum trip last weekend. as an alternative, i took her and a plus one for dessert. while we were walking to pinkberry, heidi spotted dr. karev from grey's anatomy. that ups my celeb sightings to...4?

last weekend, susan made a whole bunch of caramel/candied apples as favors for her birthday party. we have slowly been slicing up the leftovers and they are delicious. the sugar de-stresses me just enough.

acronyms

2007-11-25T22:19:00.000-08:00

last wednesday, i did a thanksgiving project/craft with the kids. i had them make turkeys out of construction paper. on each feather, the kids wrote things they were thankful for. as i was reading through them, i saw this one: "I am thankful for my BFFE..." i asked her what BFFE stood for because i couldn't think of anything for the E. she was like, "you know, best friend for ever." it made me laugh. i explained that forever was one word, so just an F, no FE.

the aftermath

2007-11-23T14:50:00.001-08:00

we had enough food to feed 20+ people. susan's coworker and her friends brought extra dishes - 20 twice-baked potatoes halves, creamed corn pudding, more green beans, deliciously expensive mac and cheese with balsamic reduction, and pumpkin pie. we stuck all the food on the table and ate on the floor of the living room with our paper plates and plastic picnicware. we run a no frills operation. :) i spent time "de-nuding" the turkey, as may puts it. all the yummy dark meat was carved off and saved in plastic containers. i resorted to plastic gloves to hear off the rest. i'm pretty sure i threw away some good meat still stuck on the bones. oh well, it wasn't worth the effort.

after dinner, we sat around and entertained ourselves with the wii. watching tall white guys boxing, bowling, and playing tennis was way amusing, though mario galaxy is disorienting after having eaten platefuls of thanksgiving foods.

later, we moved onto board games - apples to apples (awesome word association) and taboo (go a-team...er, team a).

now we have a refrigerator full of leftovers and we will slowly make our way through. let the weight gain commence.

more photos here

food prep

2007-11-22T01:04:00.000-08:00

somehow, what we thought was going to be a small dinner is now a full-scale dinner party. susan and i went grocery shopping yesterday and it was crazy out, with traffic and other late shoppers. tonight, we spent hours cooking and baking things so that we have less to do tomorrow.

our menu:
molasses butter turkey
roasted sweet potatoes
corn bread souffle
stuffing
green beans with toasted almonds and lemon
green salad with feta cheese
cranberry sauce with marmalade
spinach cheese puffs (courtesy of grace and joe)
other potato dish (courtesy of susan's friend)

pumpkin cookies
homemade carrot cake
flan

cooking

2007-11-19T22:01:00.000-08:00

one of my resolutions for my 2nd year of teaching was to leave school earlier. eh...i've just recently begun to leave before it gets dark. so hopefully, i'll be able to figure out how to leave before 4pm everyday.

another resolution has been to start cooking more. we have a staff potluck tomorrow in honor of thanksgiving so i decided to try and make risotto. i found a recipe for shrimp risotto with baby spinach and basil. it turned out pretty good! i was initially worried.

guppies

2007-11-12T16:47:00.000-08:00

one of my students gave me guppies, three of them to be exact. as a class, we settled on some names by popular vote: mini, yoshi, and fish vader. names are also given in size order from smallest to biggest. i had to bring them home this weekend for fear of the guppies starving to death over the long weekend. i just looked up information on guppy care and it looks a lot more involved that i imagined.

fall festivities

2007-10-31T23:08:00.000-07:00

with school in full swing, i've been too tired and busy to update. but, instead of grading some writing assessments, i decided to upload photos of the halloween festivities from past few days. there was creative pumpkin carving and a parade of costumes. the upper grade definitely attempts to find the most fun out of any event. love my co-workers.

check out more pictures here.

one month down...

2007-10-03T22:20:00.001-07:00

so one month into the new school year, and i have not kept to my goal of leaving school/work before 4:30pm. boo. seriously...in the next two weeks, i'm going to transition. for all my type-A tendencies, i'm terrible at prioritizing and working efficiently after school. i know i spend too much time chatting with friends/co-workers and catching up. it's not my fault i have awesome people to work with.

my kids are funny... and i have lots of pictures to update...all of that will follow...sometime.

field trip friday

2007-09-15T01:48:00.000-07:00

i took the kids to the la convention center for the WIRED nextfest education day to see the exhibits. the kids LOVED it (as did the parents)! i am super fortunate to have parents who are really on top of things, as well as friends who were willing to come out and help (thanks to my new roommate susan and gilbert too). the kids were pretty worn out by the time we got back to school. i'm thinking the walk from the metrorail station back to school after the convention center may have put them over the edge of exhaustion. but lucky us, we got a sheriff's escort all the way from the convention center back to the station closest to school. awesome - especially considering how crowded it was on the way back. i left with 28 kids and i returned with 28 (2 kids were absent...sad, because they missed out) and i call that a good trip.

i stayed at school a bit to grade some stuff, and just organize. eh...things are all over the place. i left to attend a fun-filled evening of a justin timberlake taped concert viewing. hahaha...so hilarious making non-fans to endure it. then, it was game time with scene it - boys vs. girls. us girls were super behind in the first game, but we came back and won the whole thing. second time, we just kept the lead and won on a question where we had to guess the movie based on a scene where the actors had been removed (an invisible - if you've seen them) and thank you "bill and ted's excellent adventure" - we totally won. the whole evening was basically like hanging out with kristie, shiv, and the seattle games/teenybopper gang, except with random la/la transplant folks. it was so fun! i *heart* games.

celebrity sighting!!!

2007-09-09T13:01:00.000-07:00

i just realized that i finally saw a celebrity! friday after school, some teachers, the principal, and i went to pinkberry in larchmont. while we were sitting there eating, this couple walked in and got in line. i kept thinking, "hmm...that girl looks so familiar, like the girl from ugly betty..." but i wasn't sure. i'm watching old episodes of ugly betty right now as i cut apart my laminated materials and it is her! i just imdb-ed her and she was with her husband at pinkberry! she plays amanda on ugly betty.

now i feel like i really live in LA.

faux postage

2007-09-09T00:55:00.000-07:00

susan and i were addressing an envelope with checks for jermaine's birthday gift. we still have the superhero stamps (worth $0.39). so of course, since postage has gone up, i bought a bunch of $0.01 stamps to bring up the postage to the required $0.41. just now, i walk into susan's room, only to here her say, "these stamps don't stick very well" immediately followed by seeing her lick the back of the stamp. i've just watched her lick the paper sticker backing. i start laughing and fall onto the floor, which causes her to come to the realization that she's just licked the paper backing to self-adhesive stamps. so awesome.

end of summer

2007-09-03T23:35:00.000-07:00

labor day weekend always seems to mark the end of summer...at least the end of summer vacation for teachers. i spent the last few days of break helping grace and joe move to the valley (it is insanely hot up there, even at 11pm), attempting to get my check engine light to go away (it came back on again...), "studying" meaning that i spent hours cutting up laminated objects as amy actually studied for med school classes, dumpling b-day party, boogie boarding at the beach, watched "dedication" (a funny and unconventionally cute movie), went swimming, and hung out in torrance doing buddy laminating (to make it more fun) and dinner/movie. brian, alexandra and i both agree that we must be aging since we're all tired before 10pm.

i forgot... while we were at the lakeshore in carson, i ran into a teacher that i'd met during my student teaching time with 2nd graders in east LA. he's an alum of the same program alexandra and i just finished. he told me that his teaching buddy and his 4th grade class was just on the sci-fi program "who wants to be a superhero?" how crazy/cool is that? i just watched the first chapter of the episode and sure enough, i recognized the 4th grade teacher from my student teaching time.

one more day and then the kids come back! it's equal parts exciting and scary.

poor time management

2007-08-28T17:25:00.000-07:00

i'm sitting in my classroom right now. i realized that i didn't do all the things i wanted to get done today. why? because i've been "wasting" time. i've probably spent more time talking to people and catching up than doing work for my classroom. oh well. i guess this means i'll be staying late for the next 3 days. sigh. but, it was so nice chatting with my friends/co-workers. i sure missed them this summer.

jarbling temporary substitute

2007-08-27T00:50:00.000-07:00

with jessica and tim married and currently in europe on their honeymoon, the jarblings are few. but luckily, there are other folks to fill in the time until the yees return to the states.

earlier today, i had lunch with may & jon, and karen (my dad's cousin) & her hubby bryan. after dim sum, we stopped by costco and then went over to may & john's to hang out and play cranium. we decided on boys against girls. the girls were clearly winning when we were presented with the following datahead question:

selectaquest: which woman was the first to appear on a US postage stamp?

a. susan b. anthony
b. betsy ross
c. martha washington
d. queen isabella of spain

as we're discussing the possible answers, these are the things that come up:

may: who's susan b. anthony?
karen: she's on the dollar coin
me: uh...i think she's an author?

[the guys look aghast that we do not know who she is... in my defense, i knew she was an important historical figure, but i just couldn't remember why...]

karen: betsy ross...isn't she a singer?
the rest of us: ahahahahahaha...
me: she sewed the first us flag...
jon: you mean diana ross.

obviously, we didn't get the question right. then later, karen was reading a word worm card for the guys. it was a lexicon card and the guys had to decipher the definition of the word canard. so karen is reading the card and she begins reading the first possible definition: illicit lover. this is only hilarious because she reads it as "ill-lick-it lover" and the guys are like, "what the heck is that? and since i'm reading over her shoulder, i burst out laughing and she hands me the card to read the remaining choices.

[edit - additional details from bryan]

It was even funnier when the girls drew a card that required singing. The girls decided Karen was going to act it out. After I handed the card to Karen, I said in a girly voice, "Who the heck is that?" Then a few moments later we heard karen cry out, "Who the heck is that?"

The next best moment was the girls drew another singing card. We all knew it was a famous singer or band, but than Karen asked for a rules clarification, and asked if she can just pretend to be the animal. May was like, "Animal? You choose The Monkees or something?"

I should also point out that soon after Steph left, the guys quickly tied it all up :)

blackberry geek

2007-08-24T12:58:00.000-07:00

i am so proud of myself right now. i figured out how to set up my blackberry to be used as a modem for my laptop when i can't pick up a wireless signal. :D

i'm sitting at the autoshop office working away on my laptop with internet connection. yay!

good luck? doubt it.

2007-08-17T10:46:00.000-07:00

yesterday, i went to a concert at the troubadour. the detroit cobras (a band i'd never heard of until gus invited me to go) played, with two opening acts before them. before heading out to the troubadour, we ate ramen at kinchans on sawtelle. on the walk back, susan noticed something on my left shoulder and tried to brush it off, only to realize that it was bird poo. i got pooped on by a bird! gus said it meant good luck (according to jewish grandmothers). already, i was skeptical of this supposed good fortune to come.

the first act was a band called the willowz (because pluralizations with "z" give you more street cred?). i didn't like them much on-stage. i got home and listened to some stuff on their myspace and liked it better, probably because i could actually hear and understand. my peeve is when i don't find the live music more enjoyable than studio cd. i thought they were somewhere from the south or middle america, but turns out they're from anaheim. hmm...i wonder where they picked up the accents...and their "rockstar" affectations, which were kinda...not that cool.

next up was dan sartain. i couldn't understand a thing he was singing either, but i liked him and his pseudo-rockabilly guitar-stylings. but the time he was done, it was close to 11. throughout though, i think i blanked out into sleep for short moments.

and then it was the cobras. i liked them, despite not being able to understand anything. on the way out, gus said they must have had problems with the sound at the troubadour. makes sense...i don't think my hearing is that bad.

some photos:

new things!

2007-08-16T18:02:00.000-07:00

with jessica & tim getting married this weekend, we've finally come to terms that she's moved out. and in doing so, is taking her old rotary phone (which i'll not miss - do you know how impossible it is to call any sort of customer service with a rotary phone?) and her vacuum (also will not miss as it doesn't actually vacuum much up). basically, we'll just miss her. :)

so, susan and i needed a new vacuum. last night, before watching bourne ultimatum, i stopped by target to buy a new pink-ish bissell. behold the beauty...

and today, susan caved and bought a flat panel LCD 37" TV. i *heart* it. a lot - as does she.

watching movies and TV will be that much more exciting now!

updated photos

2007-08-15T21:00:00.000-07:00

i uploaded a whole mess of photos dating back to january. this is what i do on vacation. :)

click here.

also...i finally got to see:

live free or die hard - excellent.
becoming jane - the somewhat fictionalized back story to pride and prejudice, which i love in any form, be it the BBC 5hr mini-series, the 2+hr keira knightley/matthew macfadyen remake (which i watched today), the original book, bridget jones's diary (and sequel), bride & prejudice (the bollywood version), and all other homages to one of the most beloved jane austen books. who doesn't love mr. darcy?
harry potter & the order of the phoenix - good, but not as good as the book. read people.
bourne ultimatum - awesome, but now i must go and read the books.

poisoned! false alarm

2007-08-14T14:27:00.000-07:00

~~i think i've been food poisoned. boo.~~

ok, i may have jumped the gun on that one. i feel a little better now.

holy sandwich, batman!

2007-08-13T02:50:00.000-07:00

the title of the post makes no sense, except to say that i had a deliciously good sandwich at a schlotzsky's deli in bakersfield on saturday. that, and my love of batman. before saturday, i'd never been to a schlotzsky's, and had only heard of them.

that's us posing in front of the food court directory. the verdict - schlotzsky's makes one darn good sandwich. and what's more, i just discovered that there's 3 in oregon! only one of them is near the portland area. i also realized that i've driven by it many times and never realized it was "the schlotzsky's" that's been talked about. oooh...i should tell my brothers about it, as they would LOVE it.

a few more photos here.

on this fun day trip, it was also discovered that mj doesn't dislike all chinese food, just the stuff she's eaten up until this point (except dim sum). molly's parents treated us to dinner at their friend's restaurant. for me, it was almost like being home and eating my parents' place, except not awkward because it isn't my parents' place. it's a weird thing i have about eating at my parents' restaurant.

racism and injustice in america

2007-08-10T10:15:00.000-07:00

i just got this e-mail from one of my advisors from UCLA.

Dear friend,

I just learned about a case of segregation-era oppression happening today in Jena, Louisiana. I signed onto ColorOfChange.org's campaign for justice in Jena, and wanted to invite you to do the same.

http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/?id=1979-226266

Last fall in Jena, the day after two Black high school students sat beneath the "white tree" on their campus, nooses were hung from the tree. When the superintendent dismissed the nooses as a "prank," more Black students sat under the tree in protest. The District Attorney then came to the school accompanied by the town's police and demanded that the students end their protest, telling them, "I can be your best friend or your worst enemy... I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen."

A series of white-on-black incidents of violence followed, and the DA did nothing. But when a white student was beaten up in a schoolyard fight, the DA responded by charging six black students with attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

It's a story that reads like one from the Jim Crow era, when judges, lawyers and all-white juries used the justice system to keep blacks in "their place." But it's happening today. The families of these young men are fighting back, but the story has gotten minimal press. Together, we can make sure their story is told and that the Governor of Louisiana intervenes and provides justice for the Jena 6. It starts now. Please join me:

http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/?id=1979-226266

The noose-hanging incident and the DA's visit to the school set the stage for everything that followed. Racial tension escalated over the next couple of months, and on November 30, the main academic building of Jena High School was burned down in an unsolved fire. Later the same weekend, a black student was beaten up by white students at a party. The next day, black students at a convenience store were threatened by a young white man with a shotgun. They wrestled the gun from him and ran away. While no charges were filed against the white man, the students were later arrested for the theft of the gun.

That Monday at school, a white student, who had been a vocal supporter of the students who hung the nooses, taunted the black student who was beaten up at the off-campus party and allegedly called several black students "nigger." After lunch, he was knocked down, punched and kicked by black students. He was taken to the hospital, but was released and was well enough to go to a social event that evening.

Six Black Jena High students, Robert Bailey (17), Theo Shaw (17), Carwin Jones (18), Bryant Purvis (17), Mychal Bell (16) and an unidentified minor, were expelled from school, arrested and charged with second-degree attempted murder. The first trial ended last month, and Mychal Bell, who has been in prison since December, was convicted of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery (both felonies) by an all-white jury in a trial where his public defender called no witnesses. During his trial, Mychal's parents were ordered not to speak to the media and the court prohibited protests from taking place near the courtroom or where the judge could see them.

Mychal is scheduled to be sentenced on July 31st, and could go to jail for 22 years. Theo Shaw's trial is next. He will finally make bail this week.

The Jena Six are lucky to have parents and loved ones who are fighting tooth and nail to free them. They have been threatened but they are standing strong. We know that if the families have to go it alone, their sons will be a long time coming home. But if we act now, we can make a difference.

Join me in demanding that Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco get involved to make sure that justice is served for Mychal Bell, and that DA Reed Walters drop the charges against the 5 boys who have not yet gone to trial.

http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/?id=1979-226266

Thanks.

----------------------------------------------------

i was stunned when i read this, yet not surprised - which maybe is the tragedy. please help the "jena six" by speaking up, signing up, and notifying everyone you know.

please don't think that because this isn't happening to you that it doesn't have anything to do with you. it has everything to do with you because it could happen to you if we do nothing. where there is hate, intolerance, cruelty, racism, injustice, and inequality, we have a duty to do everything we can to fight against it.

let us not be silent.

all shook up...literally

2007-08-09T01:00:00.001-07:00

i'm pretty sure i just sat through a super brief mini-earthquake. things were shaking. stinkin' los angeles. i was momentarily freaked that it was going to get bigger, but it stopped. good grief.

wonder

2007-08-04T01:41:00.001-07:00

His timing is always perfect.

almost over

2007-08-01T19:30:00.000-07:00

my time at home is pretty much over. it went by amazingly fast, though that was probably due to having friends visit and going on a whirlwind tour of the pacific northwest. there's lots to blog and pictures to post, but i'll save that for later.

i am proud to say that i finished reading the last harry potter book.

lots of full circles.

visitors from another land

2007-07-23T01:00:00.000-07:00

this past weekend, i've been lucky enough to have friends come and visit where the wonder that is oregon/the pacific northwest can finally be understood. since i haven't truly lived in portland after graduating from high school, it's been so much fun to "rediscover" the city that i was born and raised in. i *heart* home.

credit card debt...boo.

2007-07-19T23:25:00.000-07:00

it's been over 2.5 years since i've upgraded my phone. according to t-mobile, this makes me eligible for what they call "the big discount." so yesterday, i went to the store at washington square and bought the samsung stripe for $30. but after taking it home and trying it out, i didn't like it much. enter grace and joe - my geekdom gurus. with a few prods, i was persuaded to believe that i needed a blackberry. behold my new purchase:

i've never had a "cool" phone before. it's scary how much i like having the pearl, even if i have no idea how to use it to its full potential yet. but at least now, i can make phone calls. a couple of hours ago, i couldn't even find phone numbers. yay! progress.

the other side

2007-07-19T10:42:00.000-07:00

catching up with my friend from high school involved checking out a great tapas bar, toro bravo, and then going to a birthday party for pica at holocene. being at pica's b-day party @ holocene cemented the fact that i'm a total granny, in case i was still on the fence. it was loud and full of people. that was enough to make me crave being at home/bookstore/coffee shop with a book. even so, i was thoroughly entertained by the following:

2 white guys in skinny pants doing "pop 'n lock" - poorly
a black guy in flannel - it just seemed wrong, but possibly only found in portland?
white people dancing - my roommate once told me that white people dance a particular way - she was right. my co-worker from seattle said the same (she is white), and she told me about what she calls "the white man's underbite" which only appears in dancing.
music (i use the term loosely) by these guys - it was difficult to take these guys as seriously as they took themselves. i couldn't understand/hear a thing they were saying; it was just too much, but i did think they were unintentionally hilarious.
hip-hop guys - they were pretty fun, if you ignore some of the lyrics.

after all that, my head hurt...a lot. i went home and crashed. i so can't hang with the hipster art crowd - it's too exhausting to be all sorts of "different" - too much effort is involved.

media update

2007-07-17T15:27:00.001-07:00

movies to watch:

once - indie movie/musical with a great soundtrack
transformers - self-explanatory.
ratatouille - clever and fun

summer tv:

psych
burn notice

music:

once soundtrack
james morrison - quickly replacing my previous music crush - jason mraz
pink
mandy moore - wild hope
jon mclaughlin

dragging my feet...

2007-07-17T12:19:00.000-07:00

i'm supposed to be packing right now. i do not like packing. instead, i'm playing around with simpsonizeme when i should be packing. sigh.

w00t part 1

2007-06-17T09:11:00.000-07:00

as of yesterday, i'm no longer a graduate student! i now hold a masters in education! now, 10 more teaching days and i'm done with my first year as a 4th grade teacher. mass pictures to follow.

another day, another jarbling

2007-05-31T22:50:00.001-07:00

jessica is chatting with her friend and husband online and asking about their trip in china:

jessica: "did you guys ride around on those ricochets?"
her friend's husband: "AHAHAHAHAHA!"
jessica: "what's so funny?"
HFH: "you are! it's not called a ricochet!"
jessica: "then what is it called?"
HFH: "i'm not telling you. wait till i tell jane about this!"

so then jessica asks me what those things are called, where you ride around in a cart and a person is pulling you... i tell her it's called a "rickshaw" and she asks me how it's spelled. then she says, "so then what's a ricochet?" "it's when things bounce off stuff."

rescuer of the geeks: part II and other stories

2007-05-30T23:38:00.000-07:00

so a few weeks back, i rescued a stranded jeff. his motorcycle battery died somewhere in santa monica. last week, his car was stolen and then subsequently recovered by LAPD. it was being held for investigation/fingerprinting until yesterday. i was called upon for my access to AAA (from the time that my transmission died after a volleyball game in north seattle and my whole team stayed with me to wait for the tow truck) to help jeff tow the remains of his car back to his apartment. after the impound released his car, this is what we saw:

most of it was gone! they took just about everything they could from the car, including his crockpot that he'd just gotten back from mj! the first thing the tow guy said when he saw us was, "DA-AMN!" it was hilarious. fortunately, he was pretty knowledgeable about cars and his assessment says the car was probably stripped down in a warehouse where they had the time to take car to unplug and strip the car in the nicest way possible. i'm not sure if jeff found that very comforting.

they took the back bumper, which means they also took his "real men love Jesus" license plate holder. they were kind enough to leave the "Jesus" fish though.

-------------------------------------------------

so, i'm 98% done with my thesis. i turned it all in, and i'm just waiting on the second reader to provide tell me if i passed. my primary thesis reader e-mailed me this week with the following comments:

i'm so relieved! it feels wonderful to be *this* close to being done with grad school. it's about 2.5 weeks from graduation and only 22 more school days until i'm done with year 1! summer vacation is SOOOOOOOO close.

----------------------------------------------------

jessica e-mailed me earlier to tell me that there was a problem with her bridesmaid dresses and how she had to look for new ones and here's the excerpt:

"The reason why this email is entitled "boooo" is cuz I finally heard back from the bridesmaid dress shop in downtown and they lady told me that due to a manufacturing problem they are not able to get the dresses I ordered in the sizes I need by my wedding date. Argh, I guess it's back to the sketching board for me."

that part in bold italics is the latest jarbling.

jarbling alert!

2007-05-22T23:53:00.000-07:00

instead of packing, jessica wanted to quiz me about some stuff. in the midst of her line of questioning, she said i was making things seem a bigger deal than it was...

jessica: "you're adding flames to the fire."

now, i knew we had another jarbling, but i could not think of the real idiom. i had to wait for susan to get home. we had to tell jessica that it was "adding fuel to the fire."

seriously...where will i get jarblings once she's married?

freedom!

2007-05-20T02:24:00.000-07:00

after spending all of today working on my thesis...i am 96% done. the other 4% will be completed after my thesis readers make their final edits/comments and it goes to the binding stage. so after spending almost 10+ hours sitting in my apartment, i had to go and do something fun. i finally got to see hot fuzz. it's been so long since i've seen or read anything british that i almost forgot why i love british humor. from the makers of shaun of the dead comes this fantastically wacky spoof on the whole cop movie/action genre. loved it. love those crazy brits.

must listen to:

amy winehouse
the soundtrack to wicked
jon mclaughlin
ray lamontagne

must see:

wicked the musical
hot fuzz

must read:

i'll let you know...now that my thesis is basically done, i can read for fun again!

must do:

open up my sewing machine!
and go to magic mountain...or some other amusement park equivalent
graduate in 4 weeks
finish up my first year of teaching in 6 weeks - so looking forward to this
go home for a little bit

photo update!

2007-05-14T22:05:00.000-07:00

it has been awhile since i've posted any photos and updated about what i've been up to... my thesis has taken up a lot of time...otherwise, i'm just too darn tired to update. but, here it is...

april was all about birthdays. minjue celebrated by fulfilling a childhood dream of going to chuck e. cheese. here she is trying her hand at skeeball. i'd like to mention that right before she started playing, she declared that she was super goodat it. she threw balls that flew every which way. you be the judge. :)

in all fairness, it was discovered that she'd only played one time before she made her declaration.

so there were tons of games to play for tickets. here is kay after winning a bunch of tickets... she how happy she is?

and here she is again with a bigger pile of winning tickets...she literally hit the jackpot on a game! i think she ended up trading for lipgloss for her and bekah along with some other stuff, like stickers or something...lucky kids.

so the big mouse came over to take a photo with birthday minjue. i don't think i've ever seen a more awkward birthday photo that this one with minjue and chuck e. cheese. i think she was super creeped out. but she did get one memorable birthday out of it!

i finally got to see wicked a few weeks back. it is my absolute favorite musical. i loved the book, but i have equal love for the musical. i went with tim, jessica, and tim's friend and his date. i want to go and see it again. i've been listening to the soundtrack non-stop ever since.

somewhere along the line, i also became a rescuer of stranded geeks. here is a geek with a motorcycle in need of a jump-start. sadly, even with a jump, the bike only made it as far as the end of the block. it had to be left behind, but the battery got a ride home to be charged.

i had brunch with minjue and her visiting friend dorothy. we made homemade ice cream sandwiches with mj's birthday present from williams-sonoma. the sandwiches were delicious and super fun to make with the brownie like cookie part and mint chocolate chip in the middle!

after brunch, we all carpooled to drop dorothy off at the airport and then make it to san gabriel to see sam in the king and i. on the way to LAX, minjue bought some cherries from a lady on venice. in giving the woman a $20 bill, she was only supposed to get $15 in change. she accidentally got the full $20 in small bills and the bag of cherries. she accidentally "stole" the fruit. we had to turn around and have stacy run back with the $5 so the lady wouldn't think she got ripped off.

and finally, i went to my first sporting event in LA - a dodgers game. one of the teachers at school organized a staff outing and it was super fun. we sat in the section with unlimited food - dodger dogs, nachos, soda, popcorn, peanuts...it was awesome. i could only stomach 2 dodger dogs and 2 orders of nachos, with some popcorn and soda, but one of the other girls ate 4 dodger dogs...plus everything else. during the game, we made enough of a ruckus that andre ethier waved his glove at us. afterwards, it was fireworks night, so they let us all onto the field. so very cool.

and that's the end of the update.

security only comes with chains

2007-05-11T22:22:00.000-07:00

jessica bought a wii and she said she was going to leave it in san diego so they don't have to move it around so much while they are in transition before their august wedding...

jessica: "until then, i'm keeping it under lock and chain."

of course, tim told her it was "under lock and key" and she doesn't think it works. a chain is more secure, and if it's lock and key, the key is with it, so anyone could open the lock!

i love the rationale.

kids' writing: part 2

2007-04-26T23:17:00.000-07:00

instead of writing my thesis, i decided to scan some work from my kids. i am so seriously avoiding my thesis...procrastination at its best. every thursday, my students have a comprehension "test" about the story of the week. it's a mix of short answer and multiple choice. it's almost a guarantee that there will be at least one amusing response per week. a few weeks ago, we read a story about a guy who explored the arctic regions and students had to respond to the following question: "Would you like to live in the Arctic regions? Explain why or why not."

here are some of their responses.

according to the first kid, guns are necessary for survival in cold weather against wild arctic animals.

sometimes, kids will say things in class dicussions that have very little to do with what we're actually talking about. sometimes, they do that with their writing too. the second kid talks about skateboarding, magic tricks, and going down a big slide. i'm not sure what to say... i mean, i showed them pictures of glaciers, greenland, arctic regions. i'm still trying to figure out where magic tricks came from. he really is this random in real life.

both of these kids understand that the arctic is freezing cold. most of the kids say they would rather not live in the arctic because of the climate. it's always funny to see kids' reasoning. the potential of eating raw meat "grouses" one kid out. the other one has already figured out that while he certainly wouldn't choose to go to the arctic, he wouldn't mind wishing something else there.

still others would rather go to the arctic and live in freezing cold weather than come to school. the idea of sledding and building igloos is a much bigger draw than coming to class. truth be told, i'd rather go sledding and build igloos too.

there are a handful of kids have a lot of "personality" and sometimes, it shows up when they write. this particular kid aspires to be an actress. she already has the "drama queen" thing down - "i'm to young to die!"

the rest of these are just randomly amusing...

the second to last one - this kid thinks girls = disaster.

the spectrum of emotions

2007-04-01T23:15:00.000-07:00

i'm not sure if i knew that i could feel the whole spectrum of emotions in a matter of one weekend. i got to watch blades of glory on friday night with my roommates, which was pretty darn hilarious. it was pretty much a fun, light, and care-free evening with fish tacos homemade by gilbert snuck into the theater for me.

saturday morning was dim-sum and enjoyable time with friends. later that afternoon, i went to a memorial service for grace, an amazing woman whose life was marked by fruitfulness and God's presence, as evident by the 1000 or so people in attendance. the first thought (i'm sure it was the same thought of many others) was to wonder if my life would be remembered or marked in the same way. how tragic that i didn't think it would, at least not right now. the next thought was how inspired i felt to live that kind of life, marked by the presence of God and bearing such fruit. my thoughts then turned to the church, how it should be so undeniably filled with God's presence and fruitfulness. i went from sad, to inspired, and back to sad in realizing how far i, and the church, am from that vision.

afterwards, i couldn't stop thinking about it all. i didn't know her well, but for the times i was around her, it was so easy to see that she indeed had this radiance, that came from God, just as the pastor described. because she reflected Jesus so beautifully, people were drawn to her, but you know, really to Jesus. that's the prayer i have for my life and church, to reflect Jesus so beautifully that people are drawn to Him.

so what does all that look like? i thought i knew, but on days like today, i'm not so sure. when the message at church makes me cry and God takes the opportunity to pinpoint my own selfishness as well as the ugly side of my own anger - regardless of my feeling like it's righteous. we are so very wretched, yet called beloved by God. how can we look at each other in any other way than how God sees all of us? the difficulty is to truly care and love others as God does - to deal with and treat people as he does, even when he is angry with us and upset at us because of disobedience.

there seems to be much to think about.

kids' writing

2007-03-26T16:56:00.000-07:00

the 4th graders are taking their end of unit writing assessment which has them write an article for the school newspaper describing a medical condition and the ways that homeopathic and modern medicines can be used to treat the illness. here are some funny things kids wrote (unedited for spelling):

"Kids over 5 and under 18 are onerable" - i think he meant vulnerable.
"German chamomile is originally from Germany, as you can tell by the name. This remedy is commonly used by peole with chicken pox in Germany."
"...but some signess are if you are coughing, and also if seenzing or if your weak and also if you have bugers..." - we're working on his spelling, as well as his long run-on sentences...
"Also you can use yago to exesice breathing." - i don't know yago, but i do know yoga...
"You could alose use chines herds like digehantang or put a bag over your moth." - writing a letter backwards can change "herbs" to "herds" and then change the whole message of the sentence
"When you take all of the stuff like take a good, dring tylenol, and drink Dimtop you feel better and you could do fun stuff, go out to partty's." - sometimes it's like deciphering a new language. what kind of parties do kids think we're going to while they're sick anyway?
writing about a sore throat - "It hurts cause everytime you swallow something it's like somebody very little on your tonsole hitting it every time you swallow something." - a very apt description of a sore throat

students' writing ranges from tragicomedy (unintentionally funny, and sad that they're writing this way at 4th grade) to hilariously brilliant. reading their thoughts on paper never ceases to surprise us with what they misunderstood and what they very clearly understood and later framed into their own articulate wording.

lost in translation

2007-03-26T00:42:00.000-07:00

i guess tim and jessica were talking how there's not a need to go over something again and again, so she had said, "you don't have to beat a dead cow." tim told her the phrase is "beat a dead horse" and jessica went on to explain that her phrase came from another phrase, "stubborn as a cow," to which tim explained that it's "stubborn as a mule." jessica normally blames her 4th grade teacher, but this time she's pinning it on her parents, from whom she heard a mandarin idiom that literally translates "to be stubborn like a cow" and how she remembers it that way because her dad is the most stubborn person she knows and was born in the year of the cow.

tim classified this as a 3-parter - the mixing of the two idioms + the correct usage of the mandarin one.

we've suggested that they use these mixed idioms as their wedding table identifiers, rather than the standard issue table numbers.

insightful ninja turtles

2007-03-25T01:15:00.000-07:00

so growing up, i loved watching the teenage mutant ninja turtles. my favorites were always raphael and michaelangelo. i'll skip the reasons why for another time.

i think it might be safe to say that i was one of the few people who teared up during an intense fight/argument scene between leonardo and raphael in the new ninja turtles movie; i actually had to take my sleeve to fight a couple of tears away. what struck me was how intense raphael's feelings were - it was equal parts love for his brother and anger towards him for leaving them. it seems like such a dichotomy of feelings - love and hurt/anger, yet he's only hurt/angry because of the fact that he loves and values his brother so much. there's a life lesson in there... loving something a whole lot and then being incredibly upset when you're disappointed by that which you care about/love and the frequent inability to deal with the disappointment. in a rash moment, it can make you want to lash out, hit some things with a large, blunt object, though these choices inevitably lead to remorse and contrition, not to mention further damage, sometimes irreparable.

anyway, a seemingly mindless kids' movie made me think - worth the price of a movie ticket.

some kind of earthy matter

2007-03-21T19:11:00.000-07:00

jessica declares, "i'm not going to be an optometrist anymore! i'm going to look for a new job. it's time to turn over a new stone."

tim and i are like, "umm, you know it's a new leaf, right?"

jessica: "i swear it's a conspiracy! because, who hides stuff under a leaf? it's so flimsy! you know, because they hide treasure under a stone."

you can't make this up! life is great.

kumar!

2007-03-20T07:35:00.000-07:00

this is how i know i'm not as stressed as the first half of the year: i'm looking up a pilot for a tv show that's being filmed right now next to school in k-town on imdb called "the call" and it stars kal penn of harold and kumar fame. dude...i'm so walking over either at lunch or after school to see if i can spot a real celeb. nifty.

rko - i'm going to be trying to find your twin. :)

it's due to slang

2007-03-19T23:58:00.000-07:00

i love coming home to something funny and comedic...

according to jessica, you are well-hearsed when you're knowledgeable about something or just really well-prepared.
me: you can say "well-rehearsed"
jessica: yea, it comes from "well-rehearsed", but because it's "slang" you don't need the "re" so it's just "well-hearsed."
the rest of us: uh...i think it's well-versed, to be well-versed in something
jessica: oh well whatever.

wrestling move or anti-apartheid activist?

2007-03-18T22:51:00.000-07:00

so the other day, i was at home and susan asked me to name the wrestling move where you put your arm under that of your opponent and bring it around the back of their head. i was like, "half-nelson?" and she started laughing. of course, i asked her why it was funny. she told me that earlier, jessica had said to tim that she was going to use that wrestling move on him, but she called it a "mandela." that made me laugh...a lot. i was told that jessica had tim look it up on wikipedia to because "mandela" could've been slang for the wrestling move. ahaha...good times.

a teacher's worst nightmare

2007-03-08T21:43:00.000-08:00

ok, there are actually a number of nightmares that teachers have, but one of them is oversleeping and being late to school. so, yesterday morning, i was pretty sick. our office manager gave me some daytime theraflu. midday, i was ok, but by the end, i felt hot...and was perspiring a lot...not good. i had class in the evening and got home around 8:30pm. i sat at home, rested, drank some meds, and fell asleep. sadly, i had failed to set my main alarm and my cell phone alarm was not enough to wake me up. so...i overslept and didn't wake up until school called! BOO! i freaked out when i looked at the clock and it said 8! anyway, they were worried because they knew i was pretty sick yesterday and were ready to call a sub. i got to school a little over an hour after the day started, but good thing jenny had them working on math problems from the text.

at lunch, i was talking to the other teachers and almost all of them have a similar story, which made me feel better and not as big of a dork. still...arg. may this never happen again.

happy little trees

2007-03-07T00:01:00.000-08:00

today, my class had to take a state writing test. since we've been drilling them with writing for the last 3 weeks, we decided that the rest of the day (after the test) should be fun and relaxing, like a celebration of their accomplishment. we passed out drumstick ice cream cones after lunch and did some art. i taught the kids how to paint a landscape, right after jenny taught me how during our lunch. here's my attempt:

i kind of felt like bob ross. i wanted to tell the kids to paint some happy little trees. anyway, while they were painting, i heard one of the girls say, "calm down your horses." i laughed quietly, then called her over to let her know that the phrase is "hold your horses" but that my roommate also says "calm your horses." jessica felt redeemed, i think, when i told her the story.

in addition to feeling very bob ross, i felt very disheveled, a total mess. during recess, i went to the workroom to get paint, only to have it spill on my shirt because of a loose cap. later, i dropped chocolate ice cream on my shirt. i had planned to meet grace after school to go to santa monica to get some sand for her class project. i did not feel fit to be out in public, but didn't get a chance to change. as we were crossing the street towards the pier, a random older white dude in a SUV on a cell phone yells out, "gabrielle says hi!" right at me. so, i smiled and waved at him - "hi" right back at you, gabrielle. my stained shirt might have made me look like a target...

friends doing cool stuff

2007-03-05T20:05:00.000-08:00

i'm a little behind the times. i think it was in the summer that quest church in seattle held their annual faith and race class. these guys i know (aacf co-core, friends, neighbors, surrogate big bro) made this video:

the vid stars:

mel - "who am i?"

simon - "i'm a foreigner"

jon - "i can't speak english"

dennis - "i know kung fu" - you are still so missed...

gar - "i'm a ganster" - to be fair...i thought you were a gansta too when i first met you :)

fongster - "i'm a bad driver" - i'm not familiar with his driving...but his track record with flag football injuries to others isn't so hot...

chong - "i love math" - and jar jar binks :)

g-sak - "i am American" - i hope japan treats your ex-pat self well!

the video is a great reminder of stereotypes we deal in each and everyday and the struggle to break out of these molds. plus, it makes me miss the days of "guerilla" filming. chong and gar shoot some footage here!

jarblings

2007-02-26T23:55:00.000-08:00

i love having roommates, especially when we have fun incidents like the following:

jessica is very upset with her brother because he plans on getting a new dog, when they already have a family dog that she ends up taking care of... and so jessica is telling tim how mad she is and what she'll do to her brother if he goes and gets a new dog. next thing i know, tim runs out, and asks me the phrase that you use when you want to say that anything goes in a fight...

me: uh...no holds barred?
tim: ahahaha...
jessica: whatever!

of course, i am curious about what she said instead. jessica had said that she'll shoot her brother - no bars hold. her justification is that no bars will hold her back from shooting her brother.

ahahahaha...

visitors!

2007-02-25T22:48:00.000-08:00

wendy and josh are in LA! we've been eating and hanging out - it's so fun! it's like having a bit of home here. and i love that i'm getting to share this part/phase of my life with people who know me in a different context.

tonight, they got to come and visit my church and i was so excited for them to come. i really love my church. obviously, we are aren't perfect, but it has been the environment that has helped foster so much growth for me this last year. this adds to the love i have. and tonight, at least for me, was just another reminder of why i feel such a big pull towards it. i was totally moved by the sharing of the amazing people that i go to church with and get to call friends. i love that wendy and josh felt blessed by being part of the service tonight and that they were given time to share their heart and their ministry, though they were pretty much strangers to exodus. that, in and of itself, moved me. and that we prayed for them - even more so. i'm not sure i can even express in words what i felt tonight. i just know that my heart was bursting with such joy and encouragement and sense of love and being embraced.

EDIT

2007-02-16T20:06:00.000-08:00

ok, i totally thought that jessica had copied the valentine's day card she gave tim. i just found out that in the original card, the answer was just written. she came up with the pictures herself! this makes it infinitely more funny. but, it might only be funny if you know jessica and tim.

and in case you've tried, but haven't been able to figure it out, you can highlight for the answer:
[2 hearts + beat + ass + juan = two hearts beat as one]

misinterpretations

2007-02-16T18:07:00.000-08:00

i had to teach my kids metaphors this week as part of the language arts lessons. some of them had funny interpretations. here are a few:

sentence: that car from the 1940s is a dinosaur!
interpretation 1: the car is mean and ugly.
interpretation 2: the car is really big.

sentence: the hat was a pancake after she sat on it.
interpretation: the hat was hot and flat.

sentence: john's brain is a computer!
interpretation: john is a robot.

happy valentine's day

2007-02-14T20:55:00.000-08:00

holidays are insane when you're a teacher. the kids find it really difficult to contain their excitement. all day long, it was about when they would get a chance to pass out their cards to one another. i didn't think that so many of them would actually do the whole card thing. even a bunch of the boys brought cards. too cute. i received an insane amount of gifts and chocolate. two of the girls (really, their parents) sent beautiful tulips and flower bouquets. my friend becca jokingly suggested that we ban all holidays (except the ones where we get a day off) because of the "hyper" factor. i had a target shopping bag full of stuff.

by the numbers:
6 - number of mini-mugs i know have
4 - number of heart-shaped boxes of chocolate given to me
1 - box of lindt truffles
2 - bouquets of fresh flowers
3 - fake flower gifts
too many to count - valentine's day cards (you know, the kind you used to give out as kids...) and random candy

one particularly funny card from a kid (the class barber...if you remember that story) - he signed it with his name, and then "your main man" - i cracked up! i showed the office staff and they were dying... it was too cute/funny. poor kid... in a few years he might remember this and be mortified.

so i got home today after class and jessica and tim are doing their gift exchange. jessica's gift involves this elaborate question and answer game about their relationship, plus a bonus "puzzle." she saw the puzzle/riddle in a card at the store and thought that it was funny and the kind of humor that tim would appreciate. instead of buying the card, she just re-drew it:

it's insanely funny when you figure out the answer to the riddle...it could also be potentially in poor taste (you'll see what i mean when you figure it out...) i could not stop laughing...i thought it was worthy of a scan and a post. jessica would like everyone to know that she DID NOT make this up - she saw it in a commercially available greeting card made for the occasion. anyway, tim figured it out almost immediately and jessica says, "you figured it out so fast! you're so smart! how come you're so smart?" ahahaha...

and an unrelated funny story about math: i was teaching about lines and angles yesterday. i asked the kids if they'd heard of those two things. here's the conversation:

boy student: "i've heard of them, but you can't see them."
me: "what do you mean you can't see them?" and then i realize what he means...
me: "oh! you're thinking about angels! that's different from angles..."

i spelled out both words on the board, so the different in spelling and pronunciation would be clear...the kids and i had a good laugh about that one.

...and so it begins...again...

2007-02-11T22:02:00.000-08:00

tomorrow, i go back to school. i've been on break these last 8 weeks. these last 8 weeks have been so fantastic. i got to do a lot of things, like:

be part of shiv & gar's wedding
go home and spend a few weeks with fam & friends (christmas + new year's)
puppy-sit russell
hang out with friends in seattle, portland, and LA
have quality time with God
start a 40-day fast from all TV (i know...it's torturous)
sleep/rest/eat/read/have a life
catch up with friends
go to a taping of leno
go to hawaii
learn fun new games
go shopping (brick & mortar and online)
get my sunny disposition back
share at church - audio clip - exo-fast day 20 - i'm the third person
be a person again

and i had to do things like:

write the first portions of my thesis
go to class once a week for UCLA (and 1 saturday a month)
pay my credit card bills...BOO

did i mention that i am one lucky girl with great friends? i'm lucky enough to have friends who willingly came to my school to help me set up my classroom (of course, there was the lure of a free lunch) and just get random stuff done. also, awesome friends timmy and judy found a sewing machine at an amazing price and procured it for me just in case i wanted it, which i did. i am now the proud owner of a singer sewing machine from my favorite store - yep, you guessed it - target.

i'm more excited than stressed about going to school tomorrow. at dinner tonight, i didn't feel any anxiety. normally, sunday dinner is when the anxiety kicks in. i'm going to take this as a good sign. i really, really want these next 4.5 months to be different than the first 4. i want to be different - i want to be more and be better - for both myself and for the kids. wish me luck... we'll see how i am after school...

and i know i haven't posted about hawaii...i really am going to, but it's been busy these last two weeks... so until then, you can read about it from kepi, aka jeff. you'll have to scroll through to find links to pictures from the first 3 days and his commentary.

break #5

2007-02-06T14:29:00.000-08:00

i'm still sitting on the floor of my living room working on the thesis. outside, it is still warm and beautiful. i hear the buzzing lawn mowers and feel the breeze coming through the balcony's screen door. both of these things remind me of growing up - summers in portland. it's a happy feeling. i'm basking in it.

*basking*
*basking*
*basking*

ok, i am done. back to work.

cabin fever

2007-02-06T11:44:00.000-08:00

it has been oddly warm the last few days for february. yesterday it was something around 80 and today, in the mid 70s. i look out my window and it's beautifully sunny. i would much rather be at the beach than cooped up in my apartment writing my thesis, which does happen to be coming along kind of nicely. still, i'm getting antsy sitting in front of this computer screen trying to write intelligent and revolutionary things.

i want to go to the beach.

on a different note, i've been meaning to post pictures and write about hawaii, but like i said, i've been trying to be all academic and smart. i'll get to it as soon as i finish this portion of my paper.

break over - back to work... boo...

[edit]
this is the conversation i just had with my brother:

mikey: steve nash injured
mikey: this is bs
me: so no RAW?
me: wait...who's steve nash?
mikey: steve nash of the phoenix suns
me: oooh
me: oh...white guy?
mikey: the 2 time reigning mvp
me: with long hair
mikey: yeah
me: i was thinking steve austin.
me: hahahaha
mikey: P
mikey: hahahaha dumb

my excuse - my brain is fried from writing!

aloha

2007-01-31T21:33:00.000-08:00

i got back from hawaii last night. will post pictures and stuff about the trip later, after i move all my web stuff to a new server.

on TV!

2007-01-23T19:17:00.000-08:00

i came home yesterday and watched the very beginning on the tonight show because sam said he saw us in the audience. in very, very, very slow-motion, i caught a quick glimpse of the 3 of us. it was a "blink and you'll miss it" moment. i think the only reason we were identifiable was because of sam's bright green and yellow sonics track jacket. if i knew had to get a screen capture, i'd post it.

in heavy rotation:

kt tunstall - eye to the telescope
mat kearney - nothing left to lose
snow patrol - eyes open
the shins - chutes too narrow

buried in:

the unschooled mind - howard gardner
mind in society - l.s. vygotsky
educational psychology - l.s. vygotsky
vygotsky and education - l.c. moll
forever in blue: the fourth summer of the sisterhood - ann brashares
the divine romance - gene edwards

enjoyed watching:

rocky balboa
dreamgirls
little miss sunshine
the holiday

would like to be watching:

heroes
24
prison break
gilmore girls
veronica mars
grey's anatomy
scrubs
ugly betty
the oc
american idol

i'm so procrastinating... back to the thesis...

the tonight show!

2007-01-22T19:09:00.000-08:00

i spent half the day in burbank at nbc studios, watching the taping of the tonight show with jay leno. dan and sam went at 6am this morning to wait in line for tickets that get passed out at 8am. they were the only ones there until 7:15, when the next person showed up. i didn't have to show up until almost 2pm. thanks guys! since they waited literally all day, i brought them panda express for lunch (at their request), which has never looked so delicious to me. seriously.

anyway, they let us into the studio around 3:30pm. while we waited, we watched a series of clips of past musical performances, one of which was russell crowe and his band. they weren't great and he kept making jazz hands/spirit fingers. jay leno came out a little earlier and joked with us a bit and sam had the inside track that a certain key phrase meant that we could ask to take pictures with him. i heard jay say it, but froze - like a deer in the headlights. sam, on the other hand, raised his hand and got to take a picture with leno! very cool. jay also asked sam what he does and joked with him a little
about what he plans on doing after finishing at talbot. sam said pastor, and jay said, "or fast food." ahahaha...

the guests were jennifer garner (who was seriously adorable), ty pennington (seriously ADHD...), and musical guest bow wow (who was surprisingly good). i'm going to TIVO the show tonight to see if i can catch any of us on TV. we were sitting just behind the first two rows in the center of the studio, so there's a good chance. so exciting!

tricked!

2007-01-18T17:03:00.000-08:00

so yesterday (the day after my snow-induced nostalgia) i left my apt to meet my thesis support person/advisor in k-town. when i left the westside around 1:30, it was pretty clear, sunny, etc. when i was driving back home two hours later, i noticed that the ground was wet and that it was still lightly sprinkling. how odd, i thought. i get home and park my car and start unloading my books, etc from the backseat and as i turn to walk into the building, i see something out of the corner of my eye. so i turned back and took a second look, and the stuff on the ground looked suspiciously like snow! then i looked over at the hood of my neighbor's car and i saw more snow!

i was shocked! i thought, it snowed while i was gone! i was like, did it just snow here so i wouldn't feel like i was missing out on home snow? i was so excited, but sadly, had no one to share this excitement with in the immediate vicinity. but lucky me, 5 minutes later, jessica came home and i made her run downstairs so she could see the snow. she kept saying it was ice and i kept insisting it was snow. just then, our neighbor came down to the garage and i asked him if it was snow. turns out, there was a hail storm! and it was the slushy leftovers of hail. jessica laughed at me. i had really convinced myself that it was snow. but in my defense, it looks like snow - even if it did defy southern california weather logic.

-------------------

in other news, pammy told me that the post office was selling superhero stamps. since buying stamps is on my list of "to dos" i walked to the post office and mailed out stuff and bought cool superhero stamps, even though the postal lady tried to convince me to buy the valentine's-themed stamps.

home

2007-01-17T01:58:00.000-08:00

earlier today, mikey sent me these pictures of home. apparently, a winter storm hit portland and dumped 6 inches of snow on the city. i haven't seen snow like that in awhile. and seeing the pictures made me miss home more than i have in a long time. mikey got a snow day and didn't have to work. this is a picture from his room window, looking at our neighbor's house. it is so much snow! i've been complaining about the cold temps here and i realized that i've indeed become wimpy and grown accustomed to warmer weather.

this is the backyard covered in snow. if this had happened while we were all still living at home, i'd have dragged mike and andy out to play. i'm pretty sure we still have our old sleds in storage somewhere in the garage. and secretly, i've always wanted the pool to freeze over so we could slide around on it like an ice rink. picture it - it would be so much fun!

mike sent me this last one he took from his window. the school bus is directly in front of my parents' house and apparently, it started sliding backwards down the hill and slid right into the truck! mike said the truck eventually pushed the bus up onto flatter ground. i'm not sure what that bus driver was thinking with 6 inches of snow. most cars can't make it up that hill when there's just a light layer of snow on the ground, let alone 6 inches. and i found out my crazy father decided to go to the bank - he made it there and back just fine, but still...

when i was in high school, maybe college, it started snowing as my dad and i were driving back home. when we got to our neighborhood, the snow was just starting to make a visible layer on the ground. my dad, in his troublemaking humor, decided to swerve all the way up the hill, leaving tire marks everywhere, making it look like the hill was extremely slippery and treacherous when it really wasn't that bad. a couple of hours later, we all went out to eat and we saw 4 or 5 cars parked at the bottom of the hill, where my dad's tire tracks started. he had a good laugh. it was pretty funny.

and speaking of funny, here's a link to a video that both mike and kristie sent me about the craziness: bumper cars

there is a group of oregonians that have moved here in the last few years. every now and then, we try to get together for dinner and catch up. it's been awhile since we hung out - i think the last time was at the end of september. since ruth was in town for work and dan is getting ready to move back to portland, we had bbq in cerritos and hung out at guppy teahouse to catch up afterwards. the picture is missing john and hannah, plus jane and friend. they left before i remembered that i had my camera. usually, getting together with oregon friends and catching up doesn't make me homesick, but today it did. it's probably because i just spent a few weeks up there, but i haven't missed portland/seattle like this in awhile. i tend to miss home when i get confused or feel sort of lost.

i'm still on vacation, so i suppose i'll have lots of time to ponder my sudden longing for home.

frozen over

2007-01-14T12:27:00.000-08:00

it's been really cold the last few days. i know it can't compare to the snow in seattle and portland, but by LA standards, it's pretty darn cold. last night, i was going to my car and the sprinklers had been going. there were droplets of water frozen to my windshield all over the passenger side. in my experience, that only happens up north. it was so cold that my roommates even turned on the heat in the apartment.

and sadly, the seahawks just lost to the bears. BOO!

you know you're sick when...

2007-01-08T11:21:00.000-08:00

...you start to hurt everywhere.
...your snot turns green.
...your snot randomly liquifies and drips out of your nose without warning.
...you have to roll up balls of tissue to stuff up your nose as a snot plug.
...your nose matches that of rudolph.
...you can't remember which meds you took when and when you can take your next dose.
...you feel both unbelievably cold and hot at the same time.
...you can't sleep through the night because you have a fever of 102 degrees.
...you drink airborne and theraflu like water to something dying of thirst.
...your voice turns gravelly and you sound like a dude.

put all of that together, i'm telling you, it's attractive.

cold season strikes again

2007-01-06T01:54:00.000-08:00

how is it possible, that even on vacation, the plague of teachers everywhere - the common cold/flu, still managed to find and infect me? i was feeling absolutely peachy until dinner, when i started to feel a little off. two hours later, i realized the chills and body aches were caused by something other than the weather and traveling.

boo.

revisiting the past for thought

2007-01-05T10:25:00.000-08:00

every now and then, i'll reread old blog posts. sometimes, i cringe. once in a while, i find something good i'd forgotten about, like this:

"i heard a friend say that the more in tune you are with God, the more the things that you want will only be what God wants - so all the things that you used to want for yourself will be replaced by infinitely better things that God desires for your life. in short, all you'll want is what He wants for you."

i think that's from about 4 years ago. am i more in tune with God after 4 years? i sure hope so.

good-bye 2006, hello 2007!

2007-01-01T18:47:00.000-08:00

happy new year!

after sitting in the car on the way to light illegal fireworks when the clock struck midnight, shooting each other in the face with nerf darts at close range, and watching little miss sunshine, i got home to see my parents in the kitchen. it's moments like sitting up in the middle of the night and snacking and talking about random things and hearing stories about my parents' childhoods that i really enjoy. it doesn't happen too often. and while my mom continues to try and throw every available chinese boy with remote potential at me, i have my dad on my side to get my mom to chill out and leave me alone.

while at home, i've been introduced to two new games - bohnanza and dutch blitz. playing games with the cousins has been fun. even better, we like ganging up on andy because it's highly amusing.

----------------------

it usually takes me awhile to adjust to being at home and with my family. and just when i'm used to being here, it's time to leave again in two days.

adventures in puppy-sitting

2006-12-30T22:59:00.000-08:00

yesterday, i got together with ruth and her dog athena, a hungarian vizsla. russell and athena had a playdate at the dog park near ruth's house. russell is a small dog, as evidenced by the photo. that is only half of athena. they had a fun time at the dog park running around and playing around with the other dogs. russell was definitely one of the smallest dogs, but he played really well with all the big dogs, until this one short-legged dachshund-looking jerk dog kept biting at russell as russell tried to play with him. the other dog was pretty aggressive - though scrappy russell held his own. we promptly removed russell from the play area and took him for a walk. since we was insanely dirty, i dropped him off at petsmart for a bath. he came back all clean and no longer stinky. love it.

i've been taking him around my neighborhood for walks. it is amazing how total strangers will just come up and introduce themselves to you when you have a dog. seriously, i think i've met more people in the neighborhood in the last few days than i have in all the years i lived here. here he is sitting on a rock near my parents' garage. right behind is his potty lawn.

russell is a face-biter/face-licker. when you play with him, he likes to jump up at your face. my brother andy likes to play around with russell. earlier this evening, he was playing with russell and getting him all riled up, knowing that russell likes to go for the face. sure enough, he suddenly jumped up and bit andy on the nose, making a small puncture - circled to the left. i felt like it was an "i told you so" moment; andy was not so amused.

with all the activity, this is what russell looks like around 9pm. pretty darn cute. more pictures can be found here. the only thing that is not cute is when he farts in his sleep, which he does a lot. then he is back to stinky russell.

puppy-sitting

2006-12-29T01:52:00.000-08:00

i'm watching wendy and josh's boston terrier puppy, russell, for a few days while they're at a crusade conference (the hotel doesn't allow dogs). taking care of a puppy is almost like taking care of a baby, except russell doesn't nap, and there's no swing to put him in to occupy him for awhile, nor can i stick him in a baby pen. and, i'm still debating whether i prefer picking up puppy poo or changing diapers.

i'm totally exhausted, but we had a good day. i'm coming up with ways to exhaust russell, like taking him to this big, fenced-off dog park wendy mentioned.

merry christmas!

2006-12-25T02:07:00.000-08:00

as i'm on vacation, i've finally been able to update/upload my photos. lots of stuff has been going on since august and here are a few of them:

i finally got to see the hollywood bowl - it was awesome! and the sound of music was pretty good too with smallville's jonathan kent playing captain von trapp and arrested development's jeffrey tambor as max.

judy and timmy got married! plus, judy and i both started teaching in our own classrooms.

there were a lot of birthdays to celebrate in september and october: emily, timmy, me, naomi, and judy. here's me and my roommates + gilbert and tim outside of bcd tofu house after my birthday dinner. i'm holding fuji apples from joe - as he said it, "to make up for the ones you didn't get from your kids."

bridesmaid for shiv and gar - easiest gig as a bridesmaid to date. it was great catching up with friends that i hadn't seen in quite some time. being back up here and seeing friends and hanging out makes me miss it all so much more than i already do.

more photos here.

sheep for ore?

2006-12-24T02:47:00.000-08:00

after months (potentially years) of resistance, i finally gave in and joined the craze of playing settlers of catan. i will admit, i've mocked it to no end. i remember watching christine, kelvin, noah, and co. play a few years back and thinking it was a weird game. the exo-crew has been really into the game recently. i found out that most of my friends/family in both seattle and portland have been playing it for awhile now too. i suppose it was inevitable. i have to confess, it was pretty fun. i suppose we all mock what we do not initially understand.

i also learned that this game is from germany and won a few awards for "best game." incidentally, another game i recently played, ticket to ride is also from germany and i think it won the same "best game" award. those crazy germans and their oddly enjoyable games.

crazy - in one week

2006-12-21T01:03:00.000-08:00

last thursday, i was getting ready to leave the apt for LAX to catch my flight home. susan suggested i check my flight online to make sure it was on time. i looked up the flight info and nothing came up. not good. after some more frantic searching with zero results, we started to suspect that it was cancelled. stinkin' united. and as i start calling customer service, they call me and leave me a message that my flight is cancelled - less than 2 hours before. i was super mad. more so when the lady on the phone told me that the next flight to portland was the next night. she offered to get me to medford. i had to explain to her that medford is not at all close to portland - that it is about 5 hours away by car. i explained that flying to seattle would make more sense than flying to medford. she replies by putting me on hold and finding a flight to seattle early the next morning. i explained to her that getting to seattle wasn't the point - i needed to fly to portland.

as i checked other airlines, i found out that alaska was still planning on flying out, so i made united refund my ticket and i bought a last minute ticket through alaska. by then, it was just a little past 8 and the flight was at 9pm. tim and jessica helped me get my bags stashed in susan's car while i tried to print out my boarding pass. susan got me through 405 traffic to LAX 20 minutes before take-off. i ran in and luckily found out that the flight had been delayed by 20 minutes. i had enough time to cross through security and my bag would definitely make the flight. did i mention that my checked bag exceeded the 50lb limit? boo. i had to pay $25 extra for the 8.8lb overage. i blame my mom and dad's request for 2 all-region dvd players from focus plaza in alhambra. anyway, the flight was really turbulent, or so i gathered by the clapping and cheering from passangers upon landing in portland. i slept through everything. what can i say? i was exhausted from a full day of teaching plus the hassle of a cancelled flight. i guess portland had 40mph winds. my dad picked me up past midnight and i had to go with him to the restaurant before i could go home. most of the area around the restaurant had lost power. my dad had promised that it wouldn't take too long, but it did. i was so hungry that i started to eat the fortune cookies. so sad. i finally got home around 2am and had real food. this is the craziest travel ordeal i've ever had. i hope i have no more like it.

------------

i drove up to seattle on friday afternoon and on the way up, it was snowing - somewhat blizzard-like, from jantzen beach to a little past vancouver. seriously...snow had gathered on my hood. it was really weird. and, in seattle, they had 80+mph winds, and most of the areas had lost power. actually...half of mercer island is still without power as of today. it was insanely cold for many people. i got to have dinner near the u-district and we stopped by capitol hill for dilletante's desserts before crashing at pam's house - where power, and more importantly, heat - returned just after 10pm friday night. sadly for chris and david, their power returned...and then went back out. but it did come back for real the next night.

------------

saturday morning was getting together with the bridal party and having manicures and pedicures. and then it was getting ready to attend dennis's memorial service. saturday was a day of such contrasting events and emotions.

the memorial service was wonderful. from the shared reflections from friends and family, it was so obvious that dennis was loved in abundance and that he had had such influence and impact in so many people's lives. he has given so much joy and fun to so many of us. he's greatly missed.

the evening was occupied by the wedding rehearsal and dinner. a pretty straight-forward and quick rehearsal. after dinner, most of the bridal party headed to the hotel where the reception was being held. shiv + gar and company (out of town fam/friends) had rooms there. we played ticket to ride, a fun game of strategy and building your own cross-country railway. somehow, i think the exodus would enjoy it - even if there isn't an aspect of trading ore for sheep. :) i got to crash with shiv in her really nice suite.

the next morning was all about getting ready for the wedding. we commandeered the bathroom to do hair and make-up. mama and papa wong brought us sustenance in the form of deli meat, cheese, bread, cherry tomatoes, clementines, and grapes. we were not starved. our first stop was pictures at seattle u. it was freezing. the fountain on campus had a layer of frozen ice. we were told to think thoughts of hawaii and look warm. :| it was FREEZING. after awhile, we lost all sense of feeling, so it was ok.

the wedding was beautiful. i teared up when shiv and garrett exchanged their own personal vows and when they hugged the parents. actually, even in the beginning when shiv's dad "gives her away." the reception was super fab too. they had a photo booth - a la amelie - and great food. it was so nice to see a bunch of friends all in one place. my favorite quote of the day came from one of the photographers in reference to shiv and gar - "they're weird...but they work." hahaha...probably because garrett makes crazy faces and expressions all the time and shiv's got a couple of her own as well.

----------------------

the last couple of days were just spent catching up with people. having dinner with melissa and crashing the boxwave christmas party at the westin, having my eyes checked, being offered my old job back during my school breaks, dinner with pam, che, jason, and kristie, hanging out at chris and david's very cool townhouse. very fun.

during this time, i am called several times on tuesday. i call back to find out that my mom had to go to the ER monday night/early tuesday morning for abdominal pain. turns out that it was just acid reflux/heartburn/indigestion. so...really, not a big deal at all. but, being the crazy people that they are, they call me to find out when i'm coming home and to have me drive back sooner because my mom needs someone to "take care of her." i'm still not quite sure how it makes sense in their crazy minds, but apparently it makes more sense for me to drive 3 hours to get my mom a glass of water than to ask my brother, who is upstairs...less than 30 feet away. and, she got mad at me when i asked her to clarify and explain what had happened. yea...i don't get it either.

i've decided that the only way i can feasibly move back to the northwest is when my mom drops the crazy. this probably means that i'll never be able to move back. bummer. i love my parents...really, but they are C-R-A-Z-Y. i'm hoping it is not passed on.

just one more day...

2006-12-14T00:28:00.000-08:00

by this time tomorrow, i will be back home in portland. tomorrow is my last teaching day of the first semester. looking back, 4 months of teaching - half an academic year - have gone by so quickly, though living through it day to day seemed like it took years...

earlier, during my UCLA class, alexandra and i were talking to steph k. about how she could meet the korean guy friends of one of our co-workers. steph, who is cantonese, had this to say, "no, our flags have to match."

----------------------------------------------

here's dennis in top form - best man at a wedding in july with one of the cutie bridesmaids.

in the last couple of days, different dennis stories have been popping up in conversation and the one that sticks with me and captures one aspect of dennis's personality is this:

a couple of years ago, i got off of work and drove over to chris and dave's to hang out, eat, etc. when i buzzed the apt and walked up to the door, it was slightly ajar (i think). i pushed the door open to find a dimly lit room with candles and cheesy "slow-jam lam" music. chris and david were nowhere in sight. instead, there stood dennis. i walked in and yelled for chris and david to come out of whatever place they were hiding. all three of them started cracking up. i have to admit, it was a funny and unforeseen greeting. slightly mischevious and good-natured - just portions of the amazing whole person. he was also the best "what if..." game player - who weighed every decision quite seriously.

it is a such a huge testament to who dennis was when there are so many great stories and memories that friends have to share. he really did add so much to each of our lives - his friendship made it more interesting.

in loving memory

2006-12-12T07:00:00.000-08:00

after school, i received messages that dennis wasn't doing very well. a few hours later, i got word that he'd passed away.

after a 1+ year battle with cancer, dennis entered God's rest. he's been fully restored and we can take heart in knowing that he has received the fulfillment of the hope we have in God. please be keeping his family and friends in prayer during this time.

countdown

2006-12-03T21:36:00.000-08:00

9 more teaching days to go...

some things never change...

2006-11-27T22:36:00.000-08:00

my brother tells me that it's snowing up in portland. friends in seattle say it's snowing up there too. darn it...i want it to snow here! then, i won't have to go to school/work tomorrow. too bad snow days are unlikely here. boo.

thanksgiving!

2006-11-26T21:02:00.000-08:00

thanksgiving morning started off with a flag football. 'twas quite fun. afterwards, the orphans went and started prepping for dinner. we ate so much food. we had turkey, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole, garlic mashed potatoes, cous cous, corn bread stuffing, sauteed string beans with asparagus, salad, somen salad, and poached pears. oh, and of course, sangria. i think we were all in pain after dinner. seriously. and then it was time for apples to apples! fun game! there are pictures, but they won't be posted until i go on vacation...3 more weeks of teaching and then it's sweet, glorious vacation!

friday morning, i woke up and got ready to drive up to san jose to meet up with shiv for her bridal shower weekend. i got to downtown sf around 5:30 and went shopping while i waited to meet up with them for the macy's tree lighting at union square. it was insane with people walking around. but i managed to find them and we saw the tree, ate, and then went home. at shiv's parents' house, we stayed up watching grey's anatomy and she and jamie got me hooked on survivor. i've since developed a mini-crush on yul.

saturday was breakfast with the wong family and then a tiny bit of wedding sweatshop work - i made 3 (or was it 4?) oragami flowers for the centerpieces at the reception. we had the bridal shower at a teahouse in menlo park and it was so much fun! there were games, food, presents, and a whole lot of fun. and then it was the long drive back home. i made it back in 5.5 hours with 2 gas stops and a food stop. i was so exhausted. so this morning, i stayed in bed watching survivor until 1pm. :) and i don't want to go to school tomorrow.

ok, only 15 more days and then i'm on vacation. let the countdown begin.