Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Goodbye, 2008

It's that time of year again. The list from the beginning of 2008 was carried out pretty well, with at least a 50% success rate. Here's a list of what I'd like to see happen in 2009 for myself. See you in OH NINE!

1. Get new DSLR and new point and shoot
2. After getting #1 done, take more pictures
3. Fit into a size 30" jeans again
4. Recycle/reuse/conserve more
5. Be healthier in general
6. Stop renting
7. Go out more
8. Drink (it really is socially crippling to not drink)
9. Smoke less
10. Make more lists

Below is the worst animated GIF I've ever seen in my life.

Thursday, December 18, 2008

On turning 30

Just over an hour ago I turned 30. For the first time on a birthday I felt like I'm getting older. That'll probably change tomorrow morning when I go back into work and do the same thing I was doing before my birthday. But tonight I'll just sit in front of the computer, try to do some work and contemplate 30 for a bit.

UPDATE: It's morning and I've contemplated and yeah, it's like any other age. BUT 30 did bring me this, the MOST ADORABLE birthday wish ever.



ONE MORE UPDATE: I was just sent this. SO cute.



Sunday, December 14, 2008

Early birthday!

I'm taking a break from the China Diaries to report a perfect early birthday. This morning Patrick woke me up with a breakfast in bed. Eggs, ham and tasty toast. He also crocheted a beanie (!!!!) for me (see below).

After breakfast I was taken to the California Academy of Sciences, which I have been talking about on a regular basis. It was a great mixture of old and new. The T-Rex skeleton, the African Hall, the pendulum and the PENGUINS were there. Penguins pretty much are the bestest things on earth. A few new additions to the Academy included a living roof, a shark and ray pool, a new planetarium and a rain forest. The rain forest is by far my favorite new addition, where birds and butterflies zoom around freely. The only thing that sucked REAL HARD was that my camera crapped out again and I lost all the pictures I took at the Academy. Fucking shit fuck to that, man.

We went to Park Chow for lunch since it was right there on 9th Ave. If I had to give it a Yelp rating, it would get three and a half stars. The spiced apple cider and calamari were good, but my Thai-style noodle entree was a soupy mess. Patrick thought his eggplant parmesan was "mediocre," and this from someone who LOVES his eggplants.

Afterwards we went to San Jose to join Micah and Kelsey for a romp at Christmas in the Park and dinner at Johnny Rockets. I love that my old co-workers are still there because I get hooked up! We ended the night with hot chocolate and some Rock Band.

Thanks for an awesome day, monkey!

(Since I lost all the pictures I took with the DSLR, all photos were taken with my phone.)
Sleeping on MUNI
Saturday morning on the N. Everyone must have partied real hard the night before.

Patrick made me a beanie
New beanie made with love

Astroman
Astroman Patrick

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Rain forest. It'll frizz your hair, 4realz

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Anaconda. It dont want none unless you got buns, hon.

Mediocre food
So-so Thai noodles and eggplant parm

Thursday, December 11, 2008

China diaries, pt. 2

The adventure continues...

Day 5: Xian
It smelled like there was a fire going on somewhere in Xian and it was close enough to smell. I was pretty damned sure of this and even Googled "xian fire"...but I was wrong, I think. Maybe the Chinese government was just covering it up? I don't know why they'd do that, but then I also don't understand why they felt the need to superimpose FAKE fireworks into the Olympics opening ceremony coverage. Anyway, it smells like a fire for the next couple days.

The first place we visited was "The Tomb Mound of the Qin Mausoleum" according to the sign. It was pretty much a tomb in the shape of pyramid with lots of trees to make it look like a natural mountain. There were some picturesque views from the top. Also at the top were lots of poor locals trying to sell whatever they had: fake jade bracelets, fake ancient coins, and Chinese combination locks. They are aggressive once you've shown interest in anything they're selling. One woman followed us half way down the pyramid/tomb/mountain until we bought here 15 yuan something or other.

We later went to see the terra cotta warriors made for the emperor of China, which I've always wanted to see first-hand since my first art history class in college. There weren't as many as I had thought/hoped there would be. The ones that were there, however, were pretty fucking cool. The detail that went into everyone sculpture was amazing.

Last stop of the day was the bathhouse made from hot springs that housed some emperor's favorite concubine. This was a former residence of Cheng Kai Shek.

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Walking up the Qin mausoleum

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Terra cotta army

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Soldiers posing in front of the statue of a concubine

Day 6: Xian/Luoyang

Day 6 and still smoggy. I hadn't seen the sun in two days. We took a five-hour train ride from Xian to Luoyang, home of the peony festival. In Luoyang we drove to Shaolin Temple, where young monks are taught martial arts and also the setting of a favorite movie when I was a kid.

We also visited the Giant Goose Pagoda, but that might have been in Xian. I'm not sure; I think the smog is getting to my memory at this point.

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Giant Goose Pagoda

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Prayer cards

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Some lucky German got a "player" card

Day 7: Luoyang

Ugh, the day of the runs!! I went to the bathroom 6 times in the morning. I think it was the weird fruits that my grandma bought at the dirty train station in Xian.

We went to the Longmen Grottoes where individuals and royalty alike carved shrines with buddhas into the limestone along the Yi River. While we were there, a group of women were performing a fish release ritual. They were chanting for a while and the fish they brought were in plastic grocery bags flopping around. Not surprisingly when they finally released them into the river, a good amount of the fish went belly up. :(


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Grottoes

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Fish in bags

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More grottoes

Day 8: Luoyang/Zhengzhou

OMG! The sun came out!! I was so excited to see actual blue skies. It was still pretty cold, though. That morning I found some Imodium AD I always pack when I travel but had somehow forgotten about the day before. Thank god for that because my grandma had some stuff that warned about blurry vision and drowsiness. That's no way to enjoy a site-seeing vacation. I think those saved my life. Also, I found out that Anh Cua, our tour guide, had 11 cars and a few homes. That's when I stopped feeling bad that he was paying for so much of our trip and even considered asking for loans.

I forgot where we went that day, or if we actually did anything, so here are a few random pictures.

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Pagoda Forest at the Shaolin Temple

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All of us in front of the Shaolin Temple

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Lots of buddhas

Saturday, December 6, 2008

China diaries, pt. 1

It's almost kinda maybe a homecoming since, you know, I've never set foot in China, but my forefathers/mothers have. Initially I hadn't planned to go, but decided to make the trip to China after all. Luckily, Lark travels all the time and suggested I sublet my place while I'm away. Subletting was definitely a sound financial decision as it helped pay for most of the airfare.

To make a long story short, China has breathtaking natural and man-made sites to see, the food was disappointing, greasy and sometimes unidentifiable, and the air is smoggy. I took daily pictures and brief notes daily on my beloved iPhone and this is what I ended up with:

Day 1 - Fujian Province/Xiamen

SFO to Hong Kong to Xiamen. Flying into Xiamen, I could only see the peaks of the tallest mountain tops—everything else was hazy at best. From the airport my sister and I were picked up by my aunt and grandma who had arrived a week earlier. With them were a van-load of distant relatives. The first stop we made was to a restaurant in a small town where my grandma grew up. We ended up eating shellfish I'd never seen before and I swear I ate tubeworms.


Touching down in Xiamen
Touching down in Xiamen

Family grave site
Family grave site

Cow!
Neighbor's cow

Day 2: Beijing

Flew into Beijing hoping that the air would be clearer and was disappointed. It was also nutshrinkingly cold. Thank god for thermal underwear. Our tour guide, or Anh Cua ("uncle") took us for a walk around Tiananmen Square area for a bit. The Forbidden City was closed so we kept wandering. Street vendors sold starfish, scorpions, pupas on stick. As tempting as that was, we ended up eating at palatial restaurant where we had a Peking duck with its own serial number.

Crickets and scorpions on sticks
Crikets and scorpions

Palatial restaurant
Peking duck restaurant where the servers just stood around waiting for patrons

Hotel room balconies...the colors changed constantly
Balconies of the hotel we stayed at; the colors were constantly changing and must have been real fun at night for the building across the street

Day 3: Beijing

We went to the Great Wall where the memory card in my camera stopped working. I was completely bummed out and gave up climbing the extremely steep wall. I had to start using my aunt's horrible Panasonic point-and-shoot which was better than my iPhone (or nothing at all). There were lots of vendors at the Great Wall, all of whom were extremely aggressive and tried to sell me things in Chinese which I didn't understand. Our driver made me nervous so I couldn't watch the road while we were in the car. I learned that lane markings were to be used as a rough guide and by no means mandatory. After the Great Wall we drove to the nearby tombs of the emperors of the Ming Dynasty. The tombs were deep, deep underground and there were LOTS of stairs.

Late in the afternoon we made it to the Bird's Nest, which was pretty crowded. Huge screen TVs played bits of the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.

Another shot of the Great Wall
Shot of the Great Wall of China

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Posing at the Bird's Nest

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We also made a stop at the Summer Palace

Day 4: Beijing and Xian

For some reason it went from really cold to pretty warm in Beijing the next day. It might have been because we hiked the Forbidden City from beginning to end. It was a massive walled city which housed Mao's mausoleum. MASSIVE. The architecture was definitely beautiful, but it got repetitive after the third or fourth building.

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Tiananmen Square

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One of the buildings in the Forbidden City

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Dragony turtle

Sunday, November 30, 2008

In other shopping news...

...Audrey will no longer be the lucky recipient of these mittens:

black friday

the day after thanksgiving, i went to macys at 3:30am so i could get a pair of limited edition crocs winter boots for $59.99



when i saw how beautiful they were in person, i got a pair in orange and electric blue as well! my favorite part about them are the random pieces of wool lining the plastic and suede.

p.s. audrey is so cool and i am so lame

Thursday, November 13, 2008

My recent obsession with the Emanuels, particularly Rahm

With Rahm as Obama's Chief of Staff and Ari being portrayed by Jeremy Pivens in Entourage, the brothers have been getting lots of attention. The brothers fascinate me because 1) they're super successful/intelligent siblings that remind me of Salinger's Glass family or a more functional Tenenbaums, 2) they scare the bejesus out of me and 3) Rahm is foxy in a psychotic maniac kinda way.

During a Charlie Rose interview with the three brothers (Zeke, the oldest, is a bioethics director for the U.S. National Institutes of Health), you can see Rahm waving his hand with the stub of a middle finger around. Supposedly it got cut off while working at an Arby's, but I'd like to think that he lost it doing something much more heroic and dangerous.

UPDATE: There's a post today over at the HuffPo about Rahm Emanuel roasting Stephen Colbert! Awesomeness.

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Regarding Prop 8

This morning I checked the results for Prop 8, hoping that there was a chance it had failed. The margin was a lot smaller, but it still passed.

I'm at a loss to understand the amount of hate it takes to want to change a constitution specifically to discriminate. While walking home from BART last night, Patrick and I saw some kid jumping up and down shouting "YES ON 8, MOTHERFUCKERS!!" He didn't look old enough to vote. Why would it affect him aside from validating his hate? But that's beside the point of this post.

An overwhelming feeling of camaraderie overtook me during the course of this election. Everyone I knew pumped their fists for Obama because it was time for a change. But presidential election aside, people were also rooting for the failure of Prop 8. I was so touched by the amount of support from close friends, family, co-workers and total strangers. Even celebrities and big corporations gave their support for a cause they thought was worthy of their attention. Though I don't have as much at stake in the failure of Prop 8 as the people who have fought for their marriages, it was still a very personal matter at the core.

Getting texts and calls from my friends asking about the status Prop 8 last night meant the world to me. The disappointment in the faces of my happily married straight friends as they found out Prop 8 was winning meant the world to me. Reading all the posts from people voicing their outrage of Prop 8 meant the world to me. I'm honored to have these people in my life and feel that with this much support.

We lost this battle, but won one as well last night. One step at a time.


One day I'll get a chance to make many horrible marriage decisions like Britney.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

America wins

Living in America's not going to be so bad, I think. The blue states won; we won. I'm genuinely proud to be contributor to a great moment in American history. Tonight was awesome and inspiring. But, you know, when you've got Oprah endorsing you, how can you fail?

Also, Michelle will need to hire a stylist.





I voted today

And so should you if you haven't. Plus, you get free donuts, ice cream and coffee. If you don't do it for your country/future, do it for the free food...you fucking mooch.

Done!

Sunday, September 21, 2008

The California Academy of Sciences

I read an article on SFGate.com about the opening of the new California Academy of Sciences today and I can't wait to visit it for myself. I'm really excited about the swamp, rain forest, and living rooftop exhibits. The sustainable design is wonderfully sci-fi, most notably the rooftop where there are living plants which acts as insulation against weather for the Academy.

The coolest thing of all, however, is the penguin exhibit. This exhibit has always been a favorite of mine. PENGUINS! The new Academy outdoes itself this time around with a live, streaming cam feed of the penguin habitat. That's right: STREAMING. How awesome is that?

Below are some photos I found on Flickr. I'm definitely bringing my camera.













Bonus photo:
penguins

On a side note: Lysol wipes are amazing! I used one sheet to wipe off my dirty keyboard, scanner, table, and even the garbage can before I threw it away. I've got a full canister waiting for me and I can't wait to use them.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

David Foster Wallace

In the last day, three of my friends1 alerted me to the suicide/death of David Foster Wallace. First it was shocking, then it made me extremely sad. I own two of his books and have only read one2. Today I will start the other one.

RIP, DFW. You've been a good to me3.


This is the first image of DFW I ever saw, the one on the back cover of ASFTINDA.

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1. I've shared DFW stories with Audrey, Tristan and Ross. Maybe we should all go see the John Krasinski's film together. 

2. I started my relationship with DFW some time back in college when I got an offer in the mail from QPB (Quality PaperBack) for 5 or 6 books at a dollar a piece. Even though I had never heard of DFW before, I thought A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again: Essays and Arguments was a charmingly long title so I bought it. Why not? It was only a dollar. I also order some art reference books that I've never attempted to read. Once I received ASFTINDA, it sat on my shelf for a loooooong time. I didn't quite have the ambition to tackle the lengthy book, most of which was set in tiny, tiny type via footnotes. 

After reading it, there hasn't been a televised tennis match where I don't think of DFW. Last year I bought Infite Jest when it was released at a reduced price of only $10 (!!). It hasn't been read yet, but I will make time for it.

3. DFW's stories have kept me company while waiting to be called for jury duty and rekindled my interest in David Lynch which led me to buy his films at inflated prices on eBay.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

It's been a while

Work, and life in general, have kept me away from my blog, but I'm back.

Since my last entry, I've been (predictably) addicted to my iPhone. I've been downloading apps, uploading photos, and Twittering (which helps me stay up to date with friends like Ross and Nicole!).

To those who have to interact with me on a regular basis (e.g., Patrick), I apologize for ignoring you in favor of my iPhone. True, it can't give me the same companionship that friends and lovers can, but it has Bejeweled 2 and texting.

On that note, I'll take my leave. There is freelance work to do and it's a resolution of mine to tie up the loose ends on these projects. TTYL

One more thing. Patrick posted a YouTube video of Fatass.

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Fun with predictive text

Patrick sent me a head-scratcher of a text tonight. Wonder if he's getting Romania and Slovakia, too.

Patrick's ridiculously confusing text

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Music I can listen to without getting bored

I've been listening to the new Girl Talk ablum, Feed the Animals a lot recently (thanks to my new iPhone!) when I'm wondering around the city. I never really cared for mash-ups until I was introduced to Girl Talk's "Night Ripper" album. But even then, I don't consider it mash-up, per se. He's kind of like a pop DJ Shadow. It was perfect for me. There's enough going on in every song to appease my ADHD tendencies, there's throwaway pop songs as well as classics, AND Rick Astley is involved. It's multi-genred music goodness for those with short attention spans. Check it out.

girltalk

Monday, July 28, 2008

Audrey don't know no style

This chat spawned from this Flickr photo I posted.

audrey don't know no style

First link
Second link

Sunday, July 27, 2008

A Sunday afternoon WTF

So I was reading SFGate.com and there's an article about Gavin Newsom's wedding to a rich, blonde bimbo. Ok, so it's SF Gate and I guess Gavin Newsom is the mayor of San Francisco so it's kinda almost relevant to write about his wedding, right? But, uh, did they have to get former SF mayor Willie Brown to write it? The article reminds me of Gizmodo's liveblogging of an Apple event, except it's not entertaining and there's no iPhone hype afterwards. Oh, but Huey Lewis played at the wedding! That was pretty exciting.

Here's a sample of the article:

The theme of the wedding is "Out of Africa," Montana style.

So I had to get a new outfit for the wedding: white silk and linen sun blazer, white Riviera collar shirt, Brioni khakis and brown-and-white spectator pumps.

Robert Redford would be proud.


Bravo, Willie!

SRSLY, SFGate, WTF?