Life as I Know It

I think it's been an incredibly long time since I've bothered to write in my blog. In fact, it's been about a month. I have no idea how a month just passed, but it has, and it's scary. I'll try to catch up on things that have been happening, but I think that most likely, I'll forget something...

Studio: working on the "New Orleans Community ReIntegration Center" with Brian is good so far. We seem to be at a good place in the project and seem to be in relative agreement as far as form and function concern. Little fights appear over things such as structure. I blame it on him, of course.

Roomie Search: At the beginning of March, I entertained the possibility of living with Estee, but she backed out because she wants to live ALONE. Why would anyone ever want to do that? I did for a summer and it was depressing, I tell you. Depressing! Anyhoo, after momentary panic, I managed to find not one, but two roommates. Yes, starting on May 15, Ken and Brian will officially be my roommates. It should be good.

Spring Break: This year for Spring Break, I decided to bring home Waz. I figured she can sort of shield me from my mother and her incessant lecturing. It worked out quite well. I spent most of my days with May, and Waz spent most of her time in CT unconscious. We got to see my new house and mom took us on a little tour of suburban America (Waz fell asleep during the tour). In the end, Waz came away with two important revelations: "Your mom is very loud," and "Your dad is very reserved." I think that's pretty accurate. Then we were off to NYC.
Day 1: Emergency room for Waz - I, being a know it all, forced her to go see a doctor about a UTI. Getting a kidney infection is a sure-fire way to ruin your break. We called my cousin Ni-ni at work at around 10:30 and she said we could catch a ride back to Flushing with her. She showed us a nice little Japanese restaurant just outside her building where we stuffed ourselves with donburi until Ni-ni and her little sis, Lily, showed up. Then we went to their home where Lily, still in high school, stayed up WAY late and we all watched an episode of "The Black Donnellys."
Day 2: Hanging out with Ken and Mike C. We woke up early, had a "small breakfast" at my favorite NanBeiHe in Flushing and explored Flushing mall where I nearly died of happiness when I found out a store there sold Cop Copine, and nearly died of sorrow when I found out that since they were unofficial retailers, everything was about double price. Then we took the Chinatown Express and met up with Ken and Mike for dimsum, walked on the Manhattan Bridge, explored Soho and went to dinner at a Texan BBQ place near NYU. We waited there for Waz's physics teacher from high school, who arrived pretty late. We all chatted for a bit before Mike and Ken got going. Then, Waz's physics teacher took us to a sake bar practically right next door to Cooper Union. I was tempted to break in to the building to see what their studios were like. Ken attests to the fact that their spaces are much smaller than ours. I suppose that's some consolation. Evening ended with us getting home around midnight and Waz meeting my aunt who greeted her with a "OOOO, you're so skinny!!!" (which, I would like to note, was the exact greeting my mother used).
Day 3: MOMA with Waz. Ni-ni got us free tickets and we explored the museum for three hours and then played around in the store for another hour. We met up with Ken in Soho to see the Hess exhibit at Fuse Gallery and then Ken's dad was kind enought to drive us down to the South Ferry. We rode on that for about an hour, taking many many photos of the Statue of Liberty. Then we wandered the entire southern tip of Manhattan forever. Ken took us around Battery Park, Winter Garden, Stuyvensant, Ground Zero, Wall Street - we finally ended up in Little Italy where we ate a wonderful Italian dinner while people were filming an episode of "The Sopranos" across the street. Later, Ken's dad drove us up to Times Square. Ni-ni was still working so we entertained ourselves at Virgin Records which was surprisingly still open at midnight. Then we rode home with Ni-ni.
Day 4: Waz had to leave real early. REAL early and neither of us were feeling particularly well rested. After she left, I went back to sleep, woke up and typed out my resume and cover letters. I couldn't get them printed, unfortunately, so I had to wait on that. I managed to make it over to Archi-tectonics after searching half of Chelsea and was rudely greeted. Fat chance of ever working there, I think I'm too friendly for them. Then I met up with Nestor at Whole Foods, the one I worked on, and he walked me through everything. It was a wonderful bit of reminiscing and it was cool to get to see all the stuff I designed actually made. Nestor, his employee and I went back to their brand new, spacious office where I said hello to Fabian and met the new girl. I sort of stuck around a bit until my other former boss, Jonathan, showed up, at which point more reminiscing ensued. I noticed that when greeting them, both my bosses kissed me on the cheek, Euro-style. Is that the new NY way? After that, I wandered over to Rawlings where I dropped off another resume and coverletter. Hopefully I have more luck with that one... Then, I bought some gelato, hopped on a train and went back to blissful, sleepy CT, which I quite enjoyed.

My Birthday: I convinced Ben to take me somewhere nice for our Birthdays. Somewhere REAL nice. We couldn't last weekend since his family was celebrating his, my and his gram's birthdays all at once, so perhaps this weekend. For me, he got Dreamfall. For him, I bought a glass from Urban Outfitters, a business card holder from MUJI, and a cute little voodoo doll I like to call winkie because of something on the doll's pants. Ben likes Winkie best too. My birthday started off on a poor note this year - I taught an extra recitation from midnight to 1:30am and then worked until 3 am, and I had a cold besides. But, the actual day of my birthday was good. I cooked taro nian-gao and egg drop soup for Ben and he actually enjoyed it, much to my relief. Then we watched Rounders, which was most entertaining though I was tired enough that I nodded off for parts of it. All in all, a good birthday, though.

So, I suppose that's it? I suppose so. I feel like everyday is just work and dance, work and dance, and I collapse in a pile of exhaustion around 2 every night. I suppose 2 isn't that bad. I think I'm getting old...