random findings!

There's no real point to this post I guess... It's just about weird things I've seen recently.

Here's a huge paper mache ostrich I saw in Anthropologie.

I also discovered this interesting lunchbox while at the bookstore.

Since owls are my favorite animals, I thought this Christmas ornament from Target was cute :D

...As I said, there's no real significance to this post (or any of my other ones).

always behind D:

There's always so much to write about!! I think I'm going to try and get everything up to date today!

So on Thursday (12/17), I visited my high school! I finally got to see our senior present hung up on Main Hall too :D



Looks a lot better on a building than on the floor when we painted it :D

Also, I hung out with Sambo that day too! Whooo! We ate at this Thai restaurant since we couldn't originally find the Korean one. For some reason, I had an outrageous amount of change, so I thought I'd use it when we paid for our food.

That's just 25 cents worth of pennies.

Later on Sunday (12/20), I had a mini get together with Aileen, Emily and Sambo! We just hung out and watched Jurassic Park on the new HD TV my dad bought. It's so clear it looks like the dinosaurs are coming at you! :0

My wonderful friends also brought me some b-day gifts :D

That's all for this mini post, but I'll probably post more in 2 seconds or something.

my mom's a winner!

My mom bought my dad a pair of pants 5 years ago. Apparently, it took him 5 years to decide/realize he doesn't want/need them. So, I went to the mall with my mom to return them. I doubted my mom would be able to do it... but she proved me wrong.

Looks like being a winner runs in the family. (I wish I took a picture of the pants. They're rather ordinary and normal looking, so I don't really know why he didn't want them.)

Also, I made Vietnamese jello (suong sa) with my mom! Whoohoo!

It's probably one of the easiest Vietnamese foods to make out there, so it isn't anything to be extremely proud of. It's just fun to make (and eat). It came out funny looking 'cause of the lighting D:

I've been doing lots of mother-daughter bonding ever since I came home and it's been really fun :D While I was gone, my dad remodeled our old "computer room" into a "tv/board game/weird art room" and I spend a lot of time in there with my mom watching dramas/movies.

As most people know about my mom, she's a skinny little stick and always eats super healthy food, so her snacking late at night is pretty much unheard of. However, on the first day of our nightly tv watching (12/17), it was ALL her idea to munch on all this food.

Hungry much? Actually to be honest, she suggested and brought all that food up... but I probably ate most of it :\ (She's trying to make me fat I know it!! It's like a reverse diet... instead of actually getting skinnier, she's making me fatter so she appears to be even skinnier!! So tricky D: )

Regardless of my mother's foul play, she's the best!

you know it's the holidays when...

...people make funky socks!

With nothing else better to do, I decided to go look around the bookstore and I found some interesting holiday socks.



Reindeer, snowmen and...



...Santa WHOOOOO! (nothing like having a jolly elderly man on your feet to keep you warm through the winter nights.)

I find these socks strange, yet awesome at the same time.

And here's a random bunny puppet. Can you spot what is wrong with it?



That's right. The mouth of the puppet isn't actually at the mouth of the bunny. So, when you're talking and flapping that thing around... its ACTUAL MOUTH is not moving. That's really wrong, confusing, misleading and so many other bad things for small children.

Also, the bookstore has books (surprise, surprise!!), so I went to go check that out.



The fabulous cover and title caught my eye (it even has a weird bumpy texture) and I thought I'd flip through the pages and get a little preview.



Yes, I really want to read this book.

last few days at school... part 2!

I forgot to write about a few other things!

In order to use up our remaining dining dollars, Steffo and I went crazy and bought lots of cereal bars/water/everything. Here's an unusually long power bar that Steffo bought.



While waiting forever at the ticket office to find out if our suite mates wanted to go watch this dance show with us, we walked over to the school pharmacy. We were browsing at the various products and something caught our eye.



We were pretty enthralled at our discovery, but every time we touched a box... all of the other boxes would fall over and whenever we tried to stack them properly, they'd all fall over AGAIN. It took us a really long time to put all the boxes back in their original places.

And... I got a care package made by my high school from my parents! Whoo!



It's actually not anything super amazing. Just some food, school newsletter and a nice little pamphlet of messages from my senior teachers. I appreciate the thoughtfulness though!

AW YEAH! To celebrate the completion of our Japanese final exam, my Japanese class and I went to go eat Korean barbecue! ('cause we should be eating Korean food after a Japanese test) Now for a random picture of an enthusiastic classmate.



Also, my suite mates and I did Secret Santa :D It was really fun 'cause we haven't had the chance to hang out all together in so long! We were so busy with studying/midterms/papers that it was really nice to hang out. I was Brittany's Secret Santa and I spent a lot of time looking for a good gift to give her. I forgot to take a picture, but I bought her a design-your-own-calendar thing, white beanie, lip gloss and a friendship bracelet made by yours truly. Hopefully, she liked it! My Secret Santa was... Julia! She got me a t-shirt, 2 pairs of socks and a bracelet! I was so thrilled about being with everyone that I felt like not studying. (...wonderful idea! I had 2 finals the next day.)



Lastly, a picture of my best friends Stanley and Steffo getting cozy on her bed. <3



<333

last few days at school

This post will just be a mélange of stuff that happened before I came home for winter break!

So, it finally happened. Okay, not completely, but close enough. I almost had a real conversation with Steffo while she was sleeping. I don't really think she was answering any of my questions, but we were relaying words back and forth. Until the day comes in which I do get to have my real conversation, I'll be satisfied with this.

"Do I have to go talk to those people?"

"What?"

"The people... who are talking."

"Who are the people that are talking?"

"Or maybe...it's the one after that..."

"What?!"

"I don't know what I'm talking about... maybe it is the one after... I don't know..."

And then she fell asleep.

On a random note, Stanley came and visited! How rare. We're supposed to neighbors!! Whoohoo he made it into his frat!

(I'm his best friend and I don't even know what it's called!! Greek symbols confuse me.)

Spirit finger gloves!! AW YEAH!! Too bad they aren't mine. If I actually owned them, I might fail all my classes because I'd be so distracted by how oddly fascinating they are.

The day before I left for home (12/11), I went with Steffo to her Intervarsity Christmas Party thing! We played lots of random games and it was pretty fun :D One game we did was to make outfits out of toilet paper and vinyl. I'm not very good with that stuff, so I just sat on the sidelines and cheered my team on with great enthusiasm and vigor. Really, I did. I didn't just sit there and not support my team. That's very unlike me. Anyway, this is how it turned out.

I had a lot of fun after finals & I was kind of sad to come home because now that I was more free, I had time to hang out with people and do fun stuff D: Oh well, when I come back, it'll be a new semester and we can start the fun all over again!

gobble gobble

It's been forever since I last blogged D: Now that I'm home for winter break... I can catch up a bit!

I'll start from... Thanksgiving. My family is pretty large, so we usually have 2 parties for everything so... one for my mom's side and one for my dad's! Double the fun!! For some reason at my uncle's house, there were lots of grapefruits. That's not a very Thanksgiving-like food. Anyway, so we start peeling away and just eating them non-stop after our 5 rounds of dinner.

When I was a little kid, my dad used to scoop out the inside and put the grapefruit peel on my head like a hat. Reminiscing the old times, we asked my dad to make a hat, but then I thought we could be a little bit more innovative with my dad's fruit carving skills... and this is what happened.

For some reason, we're doing the YMCA pose. I'm sporting the curly French moustache. Next to me, my sister is wearing one of the melon hats. They don't really fit as well since she doesn't have a baby-sized head anymore... My dad has a Hitler-inspired moustache and my cousin on the far right has a Confucius moustache. Now that I look at our picture... this could look very racist/stereotypical/offensive. This is all just in good fun though!

There's still more to update about, but I'll save that for later!

"don't you hate it when..." #6 & australia

Today (12/01) while I was taking a shower, I went to go grab for the soap and I realized...

Don't you hate it when there's no possible way for you to ever finish a bar of soap just because you need to grip onto it somehow and using it to completion means there would be nothing for you to hold onto?

Yeah, me too. (Actually, I made it even smaller today (12/03) without breaking it or anything! Too bad I'm too lazy to take a picture of it now)

This goes for erasers too. How can you finish those?!

For the little bit of soap/eraser we don't use, we shouldn't have to pay for that part!!

EVERYONE, LET'S FIGHT THE SYSTEM AND GET THE REFUNDS WE DESERVE! (I don't even know what I'm saying right now. You can ignore this.)

Anyway, here's a strange little discovery I made...

So, I've had nail polish on for a while and it's been chipping off and making weird shapes.

I'm totally serious. The nail polish on my left index fingernail looks like Australia.

I wish there were more than 7 continents, so I could have a continent on each of my fingers.

contemplative thoughts

Still postponing that thanksgiving post... (where are those pictures?!)

Sorry, not a funny post today :\ (but a thoughtful one!)

Anyway, I've been watching this show about a girl being kind for the sake of being kind. Just impulsively acting on kindness and being thoughtful to others. Okay, that's not what the show is really about, but that's what I've been getting out of it recently.

Today (12/01), there was randomly this sample sale along the road at school and I thought I'd go take a look. I went into this tent full of photography and paintings and I saw these koi fish paintings that reminded me of my dad.

Before I was born, my dad used to paint a lot. He really likes scuba diving and just water in general, so in turn he also likes fish (...fish as friends, not food). He painted this huge painting of koi fish around my birthday a million years ago and to this day, it still is hanging above his bed.

I knew that I had to get one of these paintings for him just because I knew he would like it. Actually, I was caught in between 2 different paintings and I had a really hard time deciding. The artist asked me, "Which of the two paintings reflects your father's personality?" One was a heavy mix of black and red with gold fins and a gold tail and the other was mostly bright gold with specks of black and red.

Recently, he's been giving me a hard time about double majoring in IR and EALC, studying 3 languages and studying abroad. I know he just nags to me about it because he worries about whether I can accomplish all that I want to do, but it does get annoying that he seems to worry too much. His intentions are good and I know that he wants to support me in everything I do.

Despite the fact that he's been bothering me so much about what I'm confident in achieving, I know he cares and rather than being relentlessly hard on me and forcing me to do whatever he wants, he's been more like a light to help guide me down the path I've chosen.

So, I chose the bright gold one.

It may not look like a fancy painting, but I feel the detail and color really represent my dad and I hope he likes it when I give it to him on Christmas :D (It looks better in person!!)

I'm really glad I got to meet the artist of this painting because he is a really thoughtful man with a lot of insight on life (and he gave me a discount on the painting HAHA :X Shh my dad must not know). I plan to write about him in my next post!

And something more normal like my weird self...

I haven't gone shopping in ages and it's been a long time since I've found something that I really like!

Whoohoo! Weird lighting and a random bag with a funky owl on it :D

I seem to be really into owls... dare I say it? Are they my favorite animals?! MAYBE?! Oh yeah and green is my favorite color (as if nobody could tell). It's taking over all my stuff!!

And yes! That is a new GREEN cellphone with a GREEN OWL attached to it.

Good news! I now have a new phone, so people can actually reach me when I'm in my room now! Yay for having better reception! As you read this post, call me right now!! :D

"don't you hate it when..." #5

Today, I'll just write a random tiny little post, but Thanksgiving Part 1 & 2 were awesome! I'm saving that for later when I get all the pictures :D

I got a haircut today (11/28) after a million years and it's been ages since my hair has been so nice! Then, I thought of the dreadful impending truth of the reality of my situation.

Think back to all the times you've ever had a nice haircut...

(AHAHAHA WHOA. My hair has never been able to do that... I think. I just googled "beautiful hair" and that came up.)

Don't you hate it when you go and get your hair cut and it comes out all nice and pretty only for it to never look the same as when you first got it once you take a shower?

I know my hair hasn't gone back to its unruly state yet, so I shouldn't be such a downer... but WE ALL KNOW IT'S GOING TO HAPPEN. It's just a sad fact of life! D: Oh well, at least my stomach is very satisfied! :D

Hope everybody had a satisfying & stomach-filling Thanksgiving!!

interesting people

On Monday (11/23), I walked over to the library to return some books I borrowed for a film paper and... I ran into 3 guys. One of them was really big and looked like a prospective football player and the one who seemed like his father/uncle came up to me and talked to me really quickly and excitedly. It went something like this...

"EXCUSEMEMISS.CANYOUTAKEAPICTUREOFUS?MAKESURETOGETTHATTOWERBEHINDUS. OH,THISISTHEVIEWFINDER,SOYOULOOKTHROUGHTHATANDPRESSTHEBIGBUTTON. THATTAKESTHEPHOTO.THISADJUSTSTHEZOOM."

"Uhh, okay. 1, 2-"

"COMECLOSER.YOU'RETOOFARAWAY."

"..." Then, I managed to take the picture.

"THANKSSOMUCH.HEYLITTLEMISS,CANITAKEYOURPICTURE?"

"What? Umm, sure if you wa-"

"WHO'STHISLITTLEMISSI'MTAKINGAPICTUREOF? SHE'STHELITTLEMISSWHOTOOKOURPICTURE."

...and then he left.

It happened so fast. I'm still confused as to what just happened.

But well, now some random stranger has my picture.

Mmm, no. That's not how I really feel... I just looked that up on Google 'cause this post lacked visual aid :\

"don't you hate it when..." #4 & laundry machine impairment & conquest

NOOOOO... say it ain't so!

I've been wanting to see this movie... for the longest time... It's called The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus and every time I talk about it, nobody seems to have ever heard of it! Don't lie to me... I know people know this movie! It so happens, there is a special early screening of the movie at my school and I knew I had to get tickets! I don't care if I have a final that day and 2 finals the next... I just had to go see it (...plus it's free). So, I go to the website to reserve my tickets and... the event is completely booked.

Don't you hate it when you're probably the person most looking forward to The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus and from right under your nose, 250 people come out of nowhere and take all the available tickets?

(Hmm... that is oddly specific and nobody can probably relate to this particular instance so... let's just say whenever anybody steals something from you when you were so close to having it!)

Yesterday (11/22), I was doing laundry with my roommate and we learned 2 very important facts.

#1 - If you live in PAHRC, don't use laundry machine #34 unless you have quarters 'cause it's going to take your discretionary money. (Steffo lost $2 the other day because of that mistake.)

#2 - If you live in PAHRC, don't use drying machine #42/43/48 (see? you can't even tell what number that machine is supposed to be) because as this anonymous person kindly wrote, "This doesn't work. Not at all. Don't fall into the trap..."

Oh yeah! I forgot to write about this before, but Conquest (11/21) was pretty interesting. For one, the ferris wheel was spinning... extremely fast... UNUSUALLY FAST. I wish I recorded it 'cause I know I'm no ferris wheel expert, but something was very different about that ferris wheel.

Also, there were fireworks! Fireworks make me think of 4th of July (which I'm never here in America for since I'm always... just not in the country!) and Disneyland (which is the happiest place on Earth only because the people I go with are loads of fun and the atmosphere is great MINUS THE EXPENSIVE FOOD).

I can't wait for Thanksgiving Break! I'm leaving tomorrow :D

a random happening & sandwich making & photo scavenger hunt

Why did I just change my blog layout to the "harbor" template? 'Cause I feel like it. I'm in a harbor-y mood. It's been a few days since I blogged, so I thought I'd switch some things up. Try something new, you know?

I can't remember when I took this... but recently I saw something very interesting...

Yeah. I wasn't even sure how I was going to write about that. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? There you go.

On Friday (11/20), Steffo and I made sandwiches for the homeless! Yay for being good Samaritans :D

Just to be clear, those are pictures of me NOT eating a sandwich for a homeless person & NOT abusing mascot/best friend, Stanley. I worked very hard.

Later on Saturday (11/21), Steffo and I participated in this photo scavenger hunt at the National History Museum! I love scavenger hunts :D

That is a picture of one of our tasks: digging in a pit with a little blond boy in the bottom right hand corner. As you can see, we completed this task masterfully.

As expected, we came out victorious! Three-time championssss :D We won $10 gift cards to 21 Choices (To be honest... I've never been and I'm not all that interested, but winning is winning and I'm a winner!)

I think it's safe to say that I can put photo scavenger hunt as one of my fortes on my resume. Enough gloating, I'm going to suffer from more homework now D:

dance show & holiday cards for the elderly

Once again... writing when I shouldn't! I was planning to wait until after Monday which is when I'll be home free, but I just can't resist D:

On Sunday (11/15), I performed in this collaborative dance show with my group! It was my first actual performance on a stage (unlike...on the concrete...or the grass) since I started college, so it was pretty exciting. Also, it was really nice 'cause I got to hang out with my group and other ones too :)

I've been lagging behind on writing about the events in my life, but I've finally caught up!

Today, I went downstairs to go make holiday cards for the elderly with Steffo. To sum up how the cards turned out, let's just say she is really artistic... and I'm not.

This is Steffo's...

...and this is mine.

No comments are necessary for this post.

longest stomach growl ever & food tasting & hello kitty

I shouldn't be writing 'cause I'm really busy, but... here I am.

So, today I realized. I win the record for having a growling stomach for the longest time. ever. I effectively disrupted my film class on several ocassions and received many strange looks. There's not much else to say about that... so here's a picture to illustrate how I felt earlier today. Excuse the language.



On Saturday (11/14), I went with my friend, Annie, on a food adventure! We went to this cute little restaurant/bakery called Akasha. We paid $10 for like a whole bunch of different types of salads, desserts, cheeses, jellies...PRETTY MUCH EVERYTHING. it was very worth it!



Later, we went to Royal/T Cafe which is one of the few maid cafes in America and it also has space in the front for various exhibitions. It just so happens that last weekend was the end of Hello Kitty's 35th Anniversary exhibit! Basically, it had every type of Hello Kitty creation ever invented from clothes to jewelery and some even really strange things like electric fans and toasters.

So many...hello kitty-s...? kitties? I'm not really sure.

Damn, that's a blingalicious necklace and probably very heavy.

I have some more pictures, but I don't want my blog to be super long, so... for more pictures go to my facebook!

past & present

I haven't posted in a while, so I thought I'd think up of something I do now...and something I did before. A past and present type of thing!


Something I do now... I'm in this Anthropology class with this professor who is really nice, but... he's got this lulling, soothing old man voice that just puts me to sleep D: No matter what I do, I can't seem to stay awake for an entire class! I try and drink stuff with caffeine in it...I chew gum during class...I go to the bathroom and wash my face... nothing. Nothing has worked. So, I usually read my school newspaper and voila! There are usually sudoku puzzles in every issue, so I've been collecting them and saving them up for class. So, when I fall asleep, I can whip it right out and do it. Because I love sudoku.



I'm still collecting sudoku puzzles, but... they don't work either. I just love sudoku.


Something I did before... there was this like environmental-friendly survey I was doing and anybody who completes the survey gets put in a raffle to win some cool prizes! I pretty much didn't mind winning anything BUT the spa tickets... just 'cause it's inconvenient and I prefer food :D And as fate always has it... I win the spa tickets (FANTASTIC.)



Oh man, whole body vibration therapy, air therapy and infrared saunas?! Exactly what I wanted. Supposedly, they're considered the best prizes because they're worth the most...valued at $300. Why couldn't they just give that to me in cash?! D:

(If anybody is interested in taking these spa tickets off my hands, please let me know!)

My friend also did the survey and he won an awesome prize. It was too awesome for him to handle, so he gave it to me.



Coffee roast flavored lip balm? WOW, THAT'S MY FAVORITE. Actually, I have no idea why anybody would want to have coffee roast flavored lips... but I'm gonna use it anyway. And yes, that's a badger holding a magic wand with a stream of rainbow colors swirling out of it. What else can I say other than I love it?

what divine being is causing all these nonsensical happenings?

Last Thursday, I was going to go clubbing with my friend even though I was sick (with the crazy cough I still have!!). All of a sudden, I got a fever for like... 5 minutes, but by the time I got better, I lost my ride to the club D: Because of the random fever, I didn't want to go out all weekend 'cause I didn't want to get a fever while I was out. It's like something was keeping me home, so I could get better... :0

And now today, I found out that the concert I was going to go to with my friend... got cancelled! Actually, I was looking forward to this weekend because I was going to go to a concert and perform in a dance show. But since I was doing all those things, my whole weekend was booked and I have these super huge papers to write!! D: Now that the concert is cancelled, I have more time to write my papers... (I actually would prefer going to a concert over writing a paper, but this is still kind of to my convenience...) Is this some divine being's doing?! :0

HOW IS THIS HAPPENING?!

?! Not sure why I posted up a picture of Jesus 'cause... I'm actually Buddhist. Well, I consider Buddhism a philosophy and we don't got no gods, so...

Jesus gets to make a guest appearance on my blog :D

things that have nothing in common

At Target, I bought a pack of 4 tissue boxes and now I'm on my last one, since I keep blowing my nose all the time D: Something that bothered me is that all the designs on each of the tissue boxes weren't different. 2 were different and 2 were the same. Why is that? I wish I realized this sooner, so I could have taken a picture of all of them... but here's the one that has a double.

Yes, there are dragons on it. I'm not sure why there are so many dragons on it, but I thought this would be interesting to share. The other 2 tissue box designs had flowers, so maybe this is to balance out the feminine nature of the other 2 boxes with something more masculine. I'm actually kind of excited to finish this tissue box up, so I can buy another pack... I wonder what type of designs I'll get then.

On my way to dinner, I passed by my friend's room and saw that... she had this weird green cardboard monster thing just... sitting there, so I thought I'd take a picture of it. I had absolutely no idea why she had it at all.

Later, she explained to me that it's supposed to be the Stanford Tree Mascot and that it's actually a pinata, so on Game Day, we're supposed to beat it with sticks and feast on its candy insides. Hom nom nom. (Victoria, I still don't think it looks like a tree, but...I like what you're doing.)

While I was doing laundry with Steffo, we walked pass the study lounge and there was this guy on his laptop with his back facing us. This is what we saw on his laptop screen.

For those who are not able to identify what that object above is, that is an eyelash curler. I have no idea why he was looking at it, but I'm not going to judge. Maybe he wants more prominent eyes, who knows.