Maybe

I am not a cat person. I hate to admit it. I wish I was a better person and loved the little beasties, but they are needy, needy animals. Granted, my roommate's cat has been sorely neglected by his owner, but why does it have to cling to me? He wakes me up any time between 4, 6 or 7am meowing and trying to break down my door. Then, he winds around my legs everytime I try to take a step and I end up kicking him/stepping on him/tripping. I don't get it, don't people say cats are independent creatures? I remember my own cat sitting outside my window at 8 am on Saturday mornings meowing her little head off so I'd let her back in and then she'd do the leg winding thing too. Don't they realize that when we're walking, that's a bad place to be?

I'll also take the time to admit now that I'm not too fond of dogs either. Those things have way too much pent up energy. The only dogs I've ever particularly cared for were the bassett hound my neighbor owned when I was three (because back then, slobber didn't occur to me as gross) and the bulldog my ex's friend owned (because she was the laziest dog in the world and just couldn't be bothered).

And the hair. Cat and dog hair EVERYWHERE!

Gah! I want my sleep!

I realized today that recently I've been going through life feeling completely numb. I'm in search of something that will make me really feel something. I could use a really good cry, or a really good rant, a good bout of laughter.
I'm hoping that this week will change things around. I need some euphoria.

Busy!

I feel like for a few weeks, I have nothing going on and then all of a sudden there's so much that there's not even time to sleep. Maybe it's just the holiday season. I'm most excited.

What An A$$

Marlen and I plus extra-random-roomie-guy from-Wilton-that-seems-really-cool went to see a place today. The ad on craigslist is most beautiful. In fact, all of the ads by this guy are. However, the broker - Seth of Sunrise Realty - is A DICK. I don't use that phrase lightly. In fact, I never call people that. He, however, is in all senses of the phrase, a DICK.
When I called, he was very brisk and pushy. Marlen said the way he talked to her was downright rude. I stated our budget, but he kept trying to push us higher despite me constantly telling him what our absolute limit was. Then, I asked about the advertised place. Is it close to the L train? Yes. How is it a 3 bedroom? How much does it cost to split a master bedroom into two rooms?
Instead of stating clearly what he requires from people, he said, "You do realize you have to bring money." To which I replied, "Huh?" The way he phrased it made me feel like it was a drug deal of some sort. And it had to be cash, or a cashiers check or something along those lines. He wouldn't even show us a place unless we had the money to put down an immediate down payment.
So we decide, it can't hurt to see the place. I find out that this place is not on the L line. In fact, it is 6 crosstown blocks from the L line! It is however, right near the G. Then, after he told us to meet him somewhere, I call and he tells us to go to the building. Well, why didn't you just give us the address to begin with? We get to the building and he thinks my name is "Anthony" for some reason. We go up and he shows us around. He seems nice enough about it, but then he said that to put up an extra room would first require someone to be acrobatic - because there's be a ladder involved - or require some serious money. On the phone he said that to put in an extra room, it'd be $800. Then, once we were there, he said it was $800 per person! Well, why didn't you say that earlier, jerk...Michael was late, so I went down to get him. While waiting, a guy in the next building was just getting home and I asked him how he liked the place and he said that even after being there a month, their place was still unfinished. And then, when I went back upstairs, Marlen was in the process of discovering that one of the tiles in the model bathrooms was loose. I pick it off and we see some really shoddy craftsmenship. Aargh! So it's all a house of cards! We tell Seth we're not interested and he pretty much just bolts out the door without turning off all the lights and without even closing the door. Marlen yelled down the stairwell, "What should we do with the door?" and he said, "Just close it behind you!" Eegads! That's a fricken furnished model apartment you're just leaving. I could have gone back in and helped myself to that refrigerator. We had 3 people and a car. Hell, who wants a washer? But no, we were honest people, so we just closed the door and left.
God...what a dick.

The Things They Carried

Carrying a dog in your tote bag is an acceptable New York tradition. Little yorkies or chihuahuas with their tongues lolling at passers-by is a common sight. I was, however, unprepared when on the L-train today, I heard the mewling of a kitten from a purse. No, not a tote or an open bag. It was a zipped up leather purse and the kitten inside was crying. I suppose the purse is far more attractive than a kitty-crate, but in terms of humane, one should seriously consider a type of situation where the kitty could, I don't know, breathe?

Happy Post-Thanksgiving

Noodle pudding! Mashed potatoes! Peking duck! Yams!

Must...go...to...gym.

Happy Birthday, Marlen!

Today was Marlen's birthday. To make up for the past five years of absence, I decided I'd go all out. I got her a nice new Calphalon stainless steel stir-fry pan and a chocolate ganache cake from Whole Foods. We cooked a tasty dominican meal of moro and beef and invited over Marlen's boyfriend, Mark, as well as a girl that we could potentially live with. Large topic of conversation was how much Marlen hated the cat. Poor kitty. Though..the potential future roomie has a cat, which may not jive so well for her. After dinner, Mark showed me some tango music and then we practiced for a bit. He does far more complicated things than my tango teachers have done. Fun fun fun. Too bad Erica wasn't here, she would have really enjoyed this evening.

Sleep

I decided to go to bed early last night because for whatever reason, I was sleepy at around 10:30, and I figured I might as well get a good start to the week. So, I went to sleep. And then, starting at 4 am, the cat starts trying to get into my room. He pounds on the door, and then goes around to the kitty door on the side that I locked, and starts scratching, and then goes back and forth again. Then, he started meowing, over and over and over again. This morning when I went to the bathroom to brush my teeth, I let him stay with me. But when it comes to peeing, I can't have an audience. So I kicked kitty out. And he MEOWED the whole minute. O dear. Neediness. Blech. So...I didn't get a good night's sleep.

And on the L train this morning, there was a medical emergency. We stopped for 15 minutes at Lorimer and then another 10 minutes or so at First Avenue. People around me were most agitated. I saw it as an opportunity to get some "quiet" quality sleep time. Still, the medical emergencies - if you feel like you're going to pass out, could you at least do it on a platform instead of on the train so everyone can get to work on time? Alice was on the same train as me, so we comiserated on the elevator. Delightful.

Kitteh

It's been about a decade since mom gave Goose away, so I guess there are things about having a cat that I didn't remember.

Things I like - kitties that will crawl up and get all friendly when I'm lonely; kitties that do really funny things like sleep in a wierd position; kitties that sneeze.

Things I don't like - kitty hair literally floating through the air, kitty hair on my clothes, kitty claws and teeth on the plastic bags (Goose never did that, but the roommate's cat does...I try to take them away when I see him chewing), kitty claws and teeth on me (ouch), kitty meowing out of loneliness at 7 in the morning and trying to break down the door.

I suppose I could kitty-proof my room and let him in, but I'm lazy.

Nostalgia

I just picked up a violin today and played for the first time in... I don't know how long. I didn't realize it, but I really missed it. What's frustrating is that I seem to have completely lost dexterity in my left hand and the right is just as sloppy... It got a little better after half an hour, but I have a lot of work to do if I ever want to get back to where I used to be. It's just a lack of strength and precision when I hit the notes that's bothering me. At least my shifts are still pretty clean...
One of the girls I live with plays violin in a rock band - it looks like she took lessons a long time ago but stopped before it was really completely ingrained in her head so she has some thing and not others. Stiff vibrato, prefers to play at the tip even at the parts that really should be at the frog...whoo jargon! I gave her a mini violin lesson, but I don't know if she'll take me seriously or not. There is, after all, that nagging little voice in my head of my former violin student telling me I was a bad teacher.
Well, I'm thinking of bringing my violin over to NY along with my Pleyel duets. I think my old violin teacher will be pleased to see I can still sight-read without any problems. I guess that's the one thing I got out of all those years of not practicing.

What a great day. Welcome to a new era!

Freedom

Today, I moved into my new place! It's really great! My roommates are really cool! And we have a cat!

Cat, by the way, seems to have fallen in love with me. He walked right up to my face at one point (I was sitting on the floor and he was on the coffee table) and stuck his nose right onto mine. Cat kisses! And then he jumped off the table and started rubbing up against me and lay down next to me with his tail curled over my leg. And now, he's on my bed...on my blanket...and he just farted!!!! Yah...on my blanket...guess I'm doing some laundry now.

I inherited whatever Daddy has that makes cats adore him.

Bothered

This happened over a week ago, but it's been really nagging me. My mum had a dinner party and invited some people over, including my old violin student from 6 years ago. He's now a freshman or something in high school. When he got to the house, I went over and waved and said hello. Instead of saying hello like a normal human being, he decided to say, "My violin teacher says that you were a bad teacher." O. Um. O.
Granted he was really the first student I ever had, so not everything was perfect, but...why would he say something like that?

Nude Tights

There is something about wearing skin-colored tights. I didn't think it really made a difference whether I wore black ones or nude ones, but boy was I wrong. The outfit I wore today, I have worn several times. In fact, I wore almost the exact same outfit when I catered my professor's Christmas party last year, and I didn't get a second glance. The only difference is that today I wore nude colored tights instead of black ones. The catcalls, which I normally don't get, were numerous. I saw idiot truck drivers turning to stare instead of watching the road. Obviously not so good.
So... it all came to a head this evening. After the CMU alum event, tipsy me hopped on the 6 train to get to Grand Central. At Grand Central, I switch over to the 7. As I go down the stairs, I just make note that there was a group of hispanic teens hanging around the platform. I walk by them and go about 3/4 the way down and stand there waiting. A few minutes later, I become aware that their little group had moved down to surround me. Wondering and slightly suspicious, I move a little further down the platform. They move with me. I get more suspicious. Then the 7 arrives. I start fast-walking down to the very very end of the platform figuring that if they weren't really following me, they'd just get on the car that stops in front of them. Nope. I get on the very first car and there they are, right there with me. Surrounding me. One guy in particular, positions himself to stare right at me from about 10 feet away. A few stops later, he moves over to the pole that's directly in front of me. The whole time, I take out my newspapers and hide behind them. Fortunately, they all leave ahead of me. I stood around the manned booth in the subway station before heading out, and called every single person I could think to call on the way home. Fortunately, there was no sign of the teens. If there was, I would have turned right back around and asked for a police escort.

On the upside, I had a very nice evening. I went to the CMU alum event and made some new friends. I also, with the help of my nude tights, parted a sea of men as I made my way to the restroom. It's not everyday I can do something as dramatic as that.

Flippin A

WTF! I went onto Facebook this morning and all of a sudden, a million trojans started popping up on my computer! I tried clearing it up with the antivirus software, but it definitely didn't do the trick... Dad and I chatted about it and he said that most likely we'll just have to reimage. Not too sad, since it's not like I'm losing anything important...I will have to burn the music I bought onto a CD or something...Stupid viruses...

Full

On Monday, the company gave us bagels. On Tuesday, the company gave us sandwiches and salad from Cosi. On Wednesday, one of the senior associates made us all redbeans and rice on a whim. On Thursday, the company celebrated October's birthdays with three cakes. On Friday, it was the grand marathon of FOOD. The LCT3 team went out to lunch to celebrate the end of the Design Development phase. We went to Fleur de Sel, which was definitely not something I could afford on my own. I had:

Butternut Squash Soup with Coconut Foam and Truffle Oil
Some sort of delightful Cod dish with pearl onions and a butternut squash sauce
Orange Creamsicle with Vanilla Semifreddo and Citrus Salad
Cafe au Lait

We also found out today that we had dinner reservations. The current LCT3 is at the Duke and our big boss felt it was appropriate to go see the show in order to better understand what sort of space we'll be designing. And since it was around dinnertime, he decided to take us all out to dinner. It was a nice Italian place I've passed many times before, but have never looked into. I can't even remember the name of the place. I had:

Fried Goat Cheese with red and yellow beets
Pumpkin Gnocchi with crispy sage
Some white wine that began with Tx - very dry and fragrant

We also ordered dessert but were too pressed for time and ended up canceling the order. So sad - I've never had basil gelatin before - it sounds fascinating.

The show - CLAY - was surprisingly good. We all walked in very skeptical at the idea of a "hip hop musical." Our expectations were further lowered when we saw a photo of the performer in the playbill in a hoodie with the hood pulled over his face. However, this guy turned out to be such a high-energy, polished performer. Great movement, great presence, he was emotive and never let go of his character. And my god, he rapped for 90 minutes and never once took a sip of water. And he does this every night! It was a suprisingly good show which I think fares very well in the black box space provided. I was none too crazy about the idea of a proscenium set-up, but seeing the show, I could understand why this guy chose to arrange it as it is.
Big boss Hugh and his wife headed home after the show, but team LCT3 went down to Prince St for a few drinks and chatted about the show and other random stuff. It was overall a very fun field trip. And yes, I referred to it as a field trip in front of them and they totally made fun of me for it. They also made fun of me for the fact that I feel the need to raise my hand when I have something to say. I just like to establish that it's alright to speak before I do...

Sardines

Something's up with the 7 train. I get on in the morning and it's already packed. And then the train just sits in the station for another 10 minutes and it gets more packed. This morning, some lady got on at the third stop and just started screaming at some guy who kept apologizing and looking innocent. I wondered if a fight would start. At the best, it'd be entertaining. At worst, they'd stop the train and wait for the police to show up and make me late for work. Well, nothing happened, but then innocent-looking-guy decided to use the same pole as me and I spent the next half hour staring into his armpit. Delightful.
I can't wait to move to Brooklyn. It'll be a sardine can, too, but at least it'll only be 20 minutes as opposed to 40 minutes worth of armpit torture.

Movin' On Out

Last night I had two really good apartment search prospects and they both turned out to be fabulous in different ways.
The first apartment I'm going to term Urban Bohemian. It's a converted warehouse with beautiful gigantic windows. The girl who owns the place put up rooms with gigantic lofts. These lofts are huuuuuge - a little low on the ceiling and a little dark, but they also have little windows in the wall that look down into the living room. The decor is very hodge podge, lots of different rugs, textures, mixed up glasses and cups. I loved that there was exposed brick walls, warm colors and a decent looking hallway. The girls are kind of like the girls at CMU so I think I'll get along with them just fine. And there's a kitty!
The second place was a polar opposite in living situation - the apartment was painted completely white and very well decorated in a minimalist, light and nature friendly manner. It was a very beautiful aparment - sort of what I might aspire towards, eventually. I think the only thing is that the girl who lived there had a very clear idea in her mind of what she felt the apartment should look like and how it should run, and I don't think that would work too well for me in the long run. She does make a great butterbean soup, though.
Both apartments were really close to the subway and felt equally safe, and they were the exact same price and had the same amount of furniture. I'm going with apartment 1, though. I've always been fascinated by bunk beds, and now I'll have a huuuuge one!

Family Feud

I always thought of my family as somewhat zen despite the overall general negative quality we all exude (glass is half empty sort of deal). We don't generally get in fights in our own little family or in our huge, ginormous extended family. Recently, Daddy got yelled at by Gramma because he didn't sell off her stocks. In times of financial crisis, you don't sell off your stocks... Well, Gramma didn't understand and totally B****ed him out until he sold off all her stocks and now he's so mad he refuses to see or speak to her. Now everytime Gramma calls, my mum fields the calls. Even more awkward is that my parents came into town this weekend and mom told me specifically to pretend like they never came. This despite the fact that mom also dropped off a huge bag of my shoes at my aunt's place and I'm somehow supposed to explain how they miraculously showed up here when they never came to Flushing. I really don't like lying to Gramma...

In other words, I'm on the apartment hunt! Tomorrow, I'm going to check out an extremely promising place out in Williamsburg. Hopefully it goes through. Gramma is cool, but I don't like that she tells me to go to bed and shrinks my clothes in the laundry I don't want her doing.

Who?

Today I checked my "professional" e-mail account - the one that doesn't have any spam, just strictly job related stuff. I got some email from a girl who wants an interview for CMU. Um...Am I an interviewer now? And isn't New Haven a little far? Why the heck didn't CMU send me any notification?

Storm Cloud

I'm in a baaaad mood. Living with Gramma is really starting to get on my nerves. To top it all off, Gramma keeps washing all of my clothes, and shrinks them! A new white shirt I got not too long ago doesn't fit me anymore.
On the train this morning (running LOCAL which made me that much more angry), some guy's hand kept slipping down the pole and touching mine and normally I'd just be mildly irritated. However, being in the state I was in, I gave him the laser glare of doom (inherited from Daddy dearest) and he promptly backed away and found a different pole to hold. Nice.

Hell Hath Frozen Over

I just talked to Mom...and...for once she said something positive about me. Positive. Not followed up by something negative at all. Wha--? Who is she, and what has she done to my mother?

Granted, all she said was that I was prettier than any of the bridesmaids at some wedding she went to this Saturday. That's still something. Right? Right?

Radio City

Today I worked in Radio City! Open House New York asked our firm's founder, Hugh Hardy, to lead tours in the building, since it was he, in 1999 that was essentially responsible for the complete renovation of the building. They also needed several volunteers to shepherd tourists along as well as get drinks and such for Hugh. I ended up being a shepherd. I said, "We need to rejoin the rest of the group now, sorry," more times than I wish to recall. Sadly, the tour didn't go into the backstage area - I was hoping we'd go backstage at an opportune moment and I'd meet one of my favorite comediens, Margaret Cho. Not the case...ah, well. During the first tour, which I was on survey-handout duty for, I saw a limo pulling up so I hung around to see if it was her, as there were camera people everywhere. But no, some 14 year old girl in the sluttiest, shiniest dress ever got out and started to pick her underwear, right in front of us. Kathy and I nearly died laughing. I went off to go find food, but Kathy later told me that the girl was there for some sort of old black guy's music video. They filmed it once where she ran up to him and talked to him. Okay, well, that just sounds messed up to me somehow, having a little girl put on a slutty dress and run up and talk to some dirty old man on camera. Apparently, Radio City didn't condone the activity either and on the loudspeaker blared, "Young man, you are NOT allowed to film here, this is private property!" Mwahah. But anyway, to go back to the tour, it was fun. Hugh's a very good speaker - I suppose that's what got him to where he is today. And Radio City, itself? Lux - lush - rich - bold - warm - vibrant. Loved it. There were a lot of art deco stylings, of which I am a big fan, but Hugh explained to everyone that though they borrowed elements from the art deco movement that was big at the time, the actual style is more American Modernism, because in the overall project, there were too many simple, undecorated elements for it to be true art deco. Still reminded me of "the Hudsucker Proxy"...
Also, just now, I was in a Korean bakery getting a chocolate croissant (mmmmmmmmm) and the girl at the cash register saw my H3 tote and asked if I was an architect. I thought she just saw the OHNY pin on it, since OHNY is mostly architectural stuff. So I just smiled and said yes. Then, it turns out she works part time for Penny Hardy...some relation of Hugh? And they designed the graphics for the bag. Nice.

I Don't Want Average Joe for President

After listening to the first few debates, I'm fervently hoping that Obama/Biden will win the election. I don't understand what America's fascination is with Sarah Palin being "just like any other regular American." Sure, she's in touch with some of the struggles that people of the middle class go through. However, do we really want just another American leading this country? Isn't the point of choosing a leader to choose someone who can handle the big decisions better than the rest of us? Can "just another American" see the bigger picture and make the right decisions? I wouldn't trust myself with that, nor would I trust another average person. Who's the most informed? Who can think the most critically and decisively, objectively? An urban planner can see the ebb and flow of a city the way the average citizen cannot, and that's why we hire urban planners to design cities and make the decisions they make. Shouldn't we find a similarly informed person for any other office? Someone who is more knowledgeable about the scope of what he's going to be dealing with?

Shouldn't a shining city on a hill be achieved by aspiring towards excellence? We're never going to get there if we put the average American on the pedestal and repeatedly cast aside those who can take us further. It reminds me of the man making his wish to the genie to be smartest man in the world, then realizing that he didn't get smarter, just that the rest of the world got dumber.

Enjoy

I really like my job. They feed me. I learn things. I get to have the occasional bit of input. It keeps me busy. I do a lot more now than I did when I first started - I can definitely see a difference in the amount of responsibility they're giving me. O, and they let me be in the same room as the clients from time to time. So far it's a "Be seen, but not heard" situation, though at the last meeting I chirped up when they started talking about the amount of mirrors in a ballet room.
Today was Vanessa's birthday. The Lincoln Center team decided to all go to a place called Markt. It's a Belgian Cafe that serves all sort of Belgian beers and ales. Trappist ales included! When everyone else ordered a glass of wine or beer, I decided, heck, why not if everyone else is doing it. It was the most delicious Hoegaarden I have ever had, almost cinammon-y. I don't know too much about beers, but I think it was because it was on tap instead of out of a bottle that it was more flavorful. And since it was Vanessa's birthday, we didn't have to pay! Good because my meal would have been around $30 without tip...
Another funny thing - even though everyone was sent out to Revit training at the office, some of the higher ups aren't too familiar with the program due to the fact that they do very little of the actual documents. They just make the big decisions, mark up drawings and talk to the clients. Today, my boss decided to get into the model himself and was absolutely petrified. He had me stand next to him while he copied and pasted a copy of the central file to his local drive and resave under a different name. I suppose I was a little afraid of the whole central file idea myself, at first. Knowing you could possibly screw up the entire model by corrupting the main file makes one a little tense. Fortunately, Mercedes had just made an archived copy just the night before, so if anyone screwed up the current one, we'd have only lost a day of work. I am so glad I took Kristen's class in college.

Buffet

Tonight, Gramma and I decided to check out the East Buffet in Flushing. My parents were considering going there because of the good things they'd heard about it. All you can eat, which includes Peking Duck, steak, and steamed lobster for only $15 per person.
I'll admit, the Peking Duck was really good. The steamed lobster, on the other hand, was completely not worth it. First, people were fighting for it - literally fighting. A new tray would come out every 5 minutes or so and the moment the tray was set down, people would start swarming until it was empty, which took approximately 20 seconds. I didn't feel like fighting for it so I stood in line for the Peking Duck instead and watched the mayhem. It was ridiculous to see some people walk away with a plate piled high with lobster claws. Gramma decided to try for some lobster at one point and she made the mistake of waiting patiently while the tray was getting set into the buffet. I watched some guy pretty much shove her to the side while making a grab for the stupid lobster. Well, Gramma successful got away with a few pieces. I was a little disappointed with the results. The lobster was overly salty and it was stringy. Not too sure why people were so crazy about it.
O, and some little old lady shoved in front of me in the line for Peking Duck. She just wheedled in and refused to look at me. I don't care how old you are lady, you should at least say excuse me.
Dessert was good though, Gramma and I each had a little chocolate cup filled with strawberry and banana. Yum!

Observation

After a client meeting and watching "Cinderella Man," I wonder, who runs things? Where are the actual creators on the totem pole? The architect doesn't actually do the work, it's the associates and interns that do the actual designing, and yet they don't receive credit. At meetings, we all take the back seat while Big Cheese puts on a show. In "Cinderella Man," the fighter is down and out during the great depression while the people who set up the show sit back and relax in their cushy chairs.
It seems like the producers, the ones who do the actual work, are there to get stepped on. The ones who organize and talk and manage are the ones who will always reap the benefits. Shouldn't it be those who do the actual work who should be getting the reward for it?

Huh?

I woke up this morning at 6:30 am to someone pounding on our door. I shuffled on over in my muddled state and opened it to see the doorman and some little old lady. Doorman told me in Mandarin that there was a huge leak coming from the ceiling of the little old lady's apartment. I'm not entirely sure how to respond to that, so I just stand there. Then, Doorman thinking I don't understand Mandarin, switches into some other dialect and tries again. Gramma crawls out of bed and tells them to come in. We show them the bathrooms. See? We're not running any water, neither of us have even flushed a toilet since last night. It's not our water. Doorman and little old lady leave. I get ready for work since I lost that last precious 15 minutes, and Gramma with her insomnia goes to the living room to watch tv because she can't go back to sleep.

After three days of working from 9am till midnight, I was a little peeved.

Monogamy?!

After a few months of frustratingly long and boring commutes and not being able to play music out loud while building models, I finally broke down and bought myself an iPod Shuffle - the red one! I set it up on my sister's computer and everything was fine. Later, when I hooked it up to my computer, it said something about how the music isn't authorized on my computer and would therefore have to be deleted. At work on Sunday (yes, work on Sunday) I asked one of my coworkers what that was about, since everyone has had iPods for years except for my family.
I have a monog-iPod.
Shuffles have strange authorization settings that other iPods don't where if the new computer doesn't have the song on it already, then the song on the shuffle has to go, too. I knew that orange nano was calling me for a reason. I should've bought myself a sluttier iPod...

In other news, our central Revit file has corrupted and we're frantically trying to repair it. Fun!

I'm lonely.

Gym

I joined Crunch gym when Gramma told me I look fat. I don't really think I got all that much fatter, I just think that I'm not as toned as I'd like to be. But anyway, I digress. I took the hip hop class today. Normally, when I take hip hop, I feel very much like an awkward chicken. Fortunately, this hip hop guy is a jazz dancer, so it was something I could figure out.
Odd thing about gyms, they're filled with guys just checking girls out. Everywhere I walked, I could see guys blatantly staring - at me, at the half-naked tattooed girl that just passed by. It's like a hunting ground where overly muscular men look for suitably anorexic girls to salivate over. Fascinating. I'll stick to the dance classes. And maybe try out that elliptical machine...after I get something to listen to music with...

Happy Mid Autumn

Happy belated Mid-Autumn Festival! My gramma received a gigantic box of moon cakes and this Taiwanese mung-bean shallot and meat dumpling thing called Lu-Dou Pung. They're yummy.
Gramma and I went to a Japanese/Korean place for lunch. By Flushing standards, it's a relatively expensive place (What?! $9 for 6 kimchi appetizers, a gigantic bowl of food and a bowl of soup?! Preposterous!). I had bibimbap and Gramma had a seafood tofu thing with red bean rice. We had some nice conversation about random things. She can be a pretty cool gramma sometimes. The lady next to us ate an entire mackeral, soup, rice and appetizers. I figure the enormous appetite was because she was very pregnant and was eating for two.
Later, I met up with Julia, a nice lady I met at one of the alum meetings. She was getting her hair done in Flushing so we went to a Shanghai-nese restaurant that my parents love to go to. Fortunately, Julia enjoyed it a lot as well. There was lots of chatting, mostly about work and boys (I suppose man problems plague women of all ages) and then, since she could speak Chinese, I dragged her home so I could give her a couple moon cakes. We stood around and chatted with Gramma who she later deemed as a cool gramma. Gramma is most pleased.

Stranded

New York is a lonely city. You're surrounded by so many people, but because the culture is to turn inwards and people don't speak to each other on the streets, you might as well be alone. You make of it what you will, and you go out and try to meet new people. It's so tiring to meet new people. I'm glad I have Estee and my cousins. I'm glad I know Christina's around and Marlen's around somewhere, and some classmates that I talk to. I'm glad that some of the girls at work occasionally spend off hours going to a show or a dance class with me. I just feel this constant nagging and I fear it's a growing dissatisfaction with distance. It didn't bother me so much when I was in Pittsburgh and everything was fast-paced, draining and I lived with friends who I could chat and argue with at the end of the day. But now, just living with my grandmother who I have to hide things from and pretend to be a good little girl...I really need to get back into the swing of things somehow.

Today on the train, a little old Chinese lady and I were both standing. When a seat opened up, I waved her towards it and she laughed and shook her head telling me to take it. When another space opened up, she finally took the seat, knowing I wouldn't be stranded because of her. And then when we got off at the last stop, I helped her figure out where she was trying to get to. I suppose there's small things like that that make New York a little less lonely.

Flipped

On a whim today, and because someone at Meebo so conveniently provided the link, I decided to retake the Meyers-Briggs personality test. I recall taking it in high school, back when I was a homebody, and getting INTP - aka, the architect. How appropriate that I went to architecture school. Except that now, I realize that when they say, "Architect," they're referring to Howard Roark, Starchitect. Uh, no.
Well, to continue, I retook the test twice just now, once where there was no gray-area option allowed, and then a different test where the option existed. The first one, I ended up with ESFJ which is completely the direct opposite of INTP. Has college really changed me that much? The second test I took made a lot more sense to me (http://www.kisa.ca/personality/) and I ended up with ENFJ, and strongly so. Apparently ENFJ is called "the Teacher." I figure the description of it is mostly correct concerning myself, but I'd hardly call myself popular.

On another note, we had a forum discussion yesterday about the redesign of our company website. I strongly advocated the addition of a company blog that would exist in the form of a journal of various cultural activities attended by people in the firm. So far, the bosses seem to be really going for the idea. Score!

Commute

This morning, I thought I had it perfect. I left perfectly on time, made it to the station even faster than usual, got a seat in a nice corner. The express went smoothly until 61st-Woodside, when all of a sudden, we came to the stop and just sat there. The emergency brakes on the express train in front of us got stuck, so we had to wait and then reroute to the local track. Then, at the next stop, we came to a stop and just stopped. I wondered what was going on and why all the doors remained closed. Then, I realized that I was sitting across from the conductors booth and could therefore listen in on everything people were saying. Apparently, someone had decided to choose this morning's rush hour for his heart attack and it happened to be on my train. Crap. So, after 20 minutes and a stretcher later, we started back up again. And I ended up at work 15 minutes late. Crap.

Let the Schoolin' Begin

The public schools started classes today. I noticed an unusually large amount of people in the subways as well as walking around on the streets this morning. Darn...I guess this is what it's going to be like until June.
Cute thing I saw on the 6 train - in a forest of tall business men, a teenage boy in "gangsta" clothing tightening the backpack straps and fixing the glasses on his kid brother and then saying to him, "You think this is bad, wait till we get on the S-train."

Quick! Hide the Laundry!

Sitting here with my gramma, parents and uncle and aunt, I find that they sure do chat about the funniest things. They just had an hour-long conversation about the merit of tatami floors versus beds, and who had the most comfortable beds and which hotels had the better beds. They've since moved on to coffee makers and blankets.
Meanwhile I hid in the room and completely reorganized the closet and the drawers. Before leaving for the holiday weekend, I hid as much of my laundry as possible so my grandmother wouldn't decide to be the martyr-servant-grandmother who does all the laundry. Sure enough, the few articles I left in the hamper (for bait, to convince her I wasn't trying to hide all my clothes from her) were washed and tossed into the closet in various states of rumpliness. My parents show up, see that she did my laundry and of course, yelled at me for making gramma do my laundry....It's not like I went, "Here, Gramma. My laundry is dirty - wash it!" God...And in fact, it's preferable that she doesn't do it because we have different opinions on what can be put in the dryer and things inexplicably shrink. Worse yet, she also reorganizes all the hangers so pants are on the triangle hangers (wierd little bumps on the hip!) and my really nice dresses are on wire hangers and random shirts are hanging on the hangers with clips which are for the pants...no idea why she does that. I'm glad my mum wouldn't mix things up into wierd hangers, and considering I'm more anal than she is about my clothes, at least she doesn't wash things that I prefer to wash myself.

Um

Reading some old posts....here's a piece of an entry from August four years ago:

"O, another note (this paragraph is not as happy as the others, so feel free to stop reading), when we got home, my mom got a phone call from a sort of acquaintance/friend/client of hers and apparently they are having a bit of trouble right now. The trouble? Their three year old son was playing in the kitchen and managed to get his own left hand chopped off. Very sad, it is. Though, if we looked at it from a better angle - at least he didn't have too much time to become attached to that hand... "

Delightful. I don't even remember that happening. I wonder what happened to the poor kid. I should ask mom...

Argh!

I hate it when the 7 runs all local and they don't bother to tell anyone in advance.

Argh!

I hate it when the 7 runs all local and they don't bother to tell anyone in advance.

Secretary

I met the illustrious clients of our high profile secret project last week. It was sort of an odd situation. The room we were sitting in, as part of a historic building, was still very much styled as it was back in the 60s - that dim lighting, the walls a drab shade of off white, the carpet...let's not go there. And the clients, all of them were very distinguished looking white men in their 50s and up. And then there was me - the lone female in the room wearing a polka dot dress very reminiscent of a 1950s. Ironically, as the intern, all I did was sit further outside of their circle and take notes. If I was auditioning for the role of secretary, I'd say I was very appropriately dressed.

Affirmation

Every time I go to my parents home in Connecticut, I reaffirm that I love trees and breezes, and big houses with big windows.
I also reaffirm that I severely dislike loud children. SEVERELY. The neighbors seem to like to have barbecues every single weekend, and they'll invite lots of families with their kids. They'll play on the swingset and shout at each other. That's fine. But when they start to literally scream, like the shrill scream of a woman about to get eviscerated, then I start to feel a little high strung. And when that goes on for hours, I start to get a migraine. Yes, a literal migraine.
Finally, after the three weeks before I started work and the several weekends of it afterwards, I got fed up. Today I walked on over and put a bright big smile on my face. I introduced myself and apologized for intruding. They offered me some wine. I declined and told them I was "trying to get some work done." Of course, in truth, my work includes...er...playing video games that I haven't touched in a few months. But still, I just want them to stop screaming. One of the guests walked away saying, "Uh oh, we're in trouble now!" And the guy said, "OK, we'll move them over to tne farther swingset" (which they didn't) and then decided to criticize me and say, "Why don't you try coming over just to introduce yourself next time?" Douche. Bag. And the kids are still yelling, but at least they aren't screaming...
And I should add - I heard one of the guests saying while I was walking away, "We should get them to be as loud as we can." Okay, how old are you? You have children? What they hell kind of parent are you?

Shocked and Appalled

If NY is really the center of the universe, why doesn't it have a good cupcake shop? Everyone talks about Magnolia and Billy's, the local cupcake go-to staples, but upon closer inspection (and in a few cases, tasting them), I've discovered that they don't have nearly the quality of Dozens or Coco's Cupcake Cafe in Pittsburgh. For one, there's no variety. Magnolia only has chocolate and vanilla. Billy's most "exotic" flavor offering is Banana. Now lets review Dozens. They offer among other classics, lavender, pancake, root beer (and it really does taste like rootbeer), strawberry lemonade and more. Coco's also offers delicious vegan varieties such as green tea with crystallized ginger and chocolate coconut. Regular varieties include things like Orange Kahlua, Raspberry Cabernet, Mimosa and Cinnamon Bun. Come on, New York, where's your ingenuity?
Quality wise, it's very much the same in both places, though I do prefer how Dozens cake is somewhat crispy on the outside.
Presentation-wise, I also find New York bakeries lacking. New York bakeries will make their layer cakes lavish pieces of architecture. However, they seem to think that a dressed up cupcake involves just sprinkles. Toss a little confetti and top and we have a party! Where's the art? It's something any lackluster mother could throw together for a kid's birthday party.
Let us compare:





The first two are from NY, the next are all from Pittsburgh. Is that coconut on the presentation photo actually dangling off the edge? I can understand it if it happens in an even or a deliberate asymmetrical manner, but the topping is done so unevenly. And the icing on the set of four cupcakes does not speak of smoothness. Now look at the ones from Pittsburgh. I think they speak for themselves.
Everyone's all about cupcakes in both cities, but sadly, NY is behind on the times. Admittedly, there's some hope for the future - http://kumquatcupcakery.blogspot.com/.

Fun fun fun fun fun

Other than me getting rained in on Friday, this weekend was great. Well, Thursday I went with Eric to go see the Ahn Trio at Damrosch Park. Unfortunately about three songs in, it started to pour so we sat under our umbrellas for the duration of the show. On Saturday, I met up with Estee and her friends from Colorado and we went tango dancing in Central Park. The free class was taught by some lady from Dancesport who I didn't particularly care for because she was teaching everyone choreography, not how to dance with a partner. Estee and I were both disappointed enough that we decided to ditch the class and go back to where the more experienced people were actually dancing. I danced with a little old guy who looked like Hannibal Lecter, another little old guy who wore nazi paraphrenalia, another old guy who looked like just a nice grandpa and a little old Catonese man who was very informative. I noticed that everytime I have trouble dancing with someone, it's because they took lessons at Dancesport. I get the feeling I won't be going there for lessons. I'll stick to Baila Tango, where I'm going to go tomorrow night for another lesson, actually. After the dancing, we all went to a Mexican place called Caliente Cab where we had delicious guacamole and highly alcoholic drinks. Estee was nearly passing out by then. Then we went to a pub for some beer and I decided to end my evening at 3. I met up with one of my friends and stayed over in Brooklyn instead of going all the way back to Flushing. Safer that way.
So today, I met up with Estee again and we went to the Lower East Side. There was a small fashion show showing off the various retailers of the district. The highlight was definitely DeMask's collection. It's a bondage shop so they had a girl come out in an electric blue police officer rubber catsuit/dominatrix outfit. Then some poor guy came out with a wierd dog head mask on his head, and he had a collar that had short chains that ended cuffed to his wrists. I think he thought it was hilarious and was really working it. Good thing he had his mask on because he was probably dying of laughter underneath it. The next outfit was most definitely a gimp suit, and the crotch part was very...uh...prominent. Then there was some unenthusiastic girl walking around in a wierd straight jacket. Not my thing, exactly, but really amusing. All the other clothes were normal - lots of vintage, etc. They also had free juice, free hand massages and free eyebrow threading, all of which I partook in. My eyebrows are all nice and neat now! Ending the day, Estee and I went to TeaNY - Moby's tea house. I had a lovely coconut egg cream sitting outside on the benches. There was an odd looking couple sitting near us - a seedy sort of hispanic guy and a really pretty model type girl and her little dog who had a full body mohawk. We played with the dog and chatted a bit with the couple all the while thinking the guy looked familiar. I mentioned it to Estee who said that he might have been on some tv shows. Maybe he played some druggie on Law and Order....

Birthday Meme

Go to Wikipedia. Enter your date of birth, then pick 4 events, 3 births, two deaths, and one holiday.


EVENTS
1844 - The Bahá'í calendar begins. This is the first day of the first year of the Bahá'í calendar. It is annually celebrated by members of the Bahá'í Faith as the Bahá'í New Year or Náw-Rúz.

1871 - Journalist Henry Morton Stanley begins his trek to find the missionary and explorer David Livingstone.

1963 - Alcatraz, a federal penitentiary on an island in San Francisco Bay, closes.

1970 - The first Earth Day proclamation is issued by San Francisco Mayor Joseph Alioto.


BIRTHS
1685 - Johann Sebastian Bach, German composer
1958 - Gary Oldman, English actor
1978 - Kevin Federline, American dancer/hip hop artist (AHHHHH!!!!!)


DEATHS
1617 - Pocahontas, Native American, daughter of Powhatan
2004 - Ludmilla Tchérina, French ballet dancer and actress


HOLIDAY
Ostara - Neopagan festival of Ostara.

The Things I Never Knew

Gramma is a mahjongg fiend! She only just got home from a full day of the game, and she has appointments for all day playing on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It's great that she's got her own thing going on. I can only hope I'm that active when I reach her age. I'll try not to grumble about things as much as she does, though.

Blah

It's fun listening to the synchronized divers count off before they jump. The Canadians counted in French, and Chinese girls didn't use any intonations at all. The Chinese girls are absolutely robotic, it's amazing.

Gramma's on a cooking and cleaning frenzy. Last night she decided to buy potatoes because I randomly mentioned liking to cook them, but she had no idea what to do with them. Looks like she figured it out though, because she made an apple-potato salad much like what mom makes. Not bad. I also came home to some freshly washed laundry, which sort of disturbs me. I should go through the rest of my laundry to make sure I don't have any random things in the pockets so we don't repeat the chapstick disaster (Years ago, Gramma took some things from my room and threw it in the wash and the chapstick I left in the pocket ruined a few shirts. Mom had a good time yelling at me until I pointed out that I hadn't put the pants in the wash in the first place, so it wasn't really my fault. Victory and vindication. Mwaha.)

Coolness

They're filming an episode of Lipstick Jungle downstairs, apparently. I thought it was supposed to be like Sex and the City - why then, pray tell, are the women all dressed in metallic "I Dream of Jeannie" costumes?

Weekend

This weekend, a whole bunch of archies came to town. We went to the MoMA, PS1, a Japanese place called Ippudo..uh... The current exhibition at MoMA was great - prefab. They had actual prefab houses on exhibition in a side lot which we all walked through. Olafur Eliasson had an exhibition at PS1 which pretty much consisted of a giant mirror suspended from the ceiling, slowly rotating. It was so enamoring that we went and lay on the floor staring up at it for a grand total of an HOUR.
I escaped the archies to join Marlen and her boyfriend, Mark for some tango dancing. First time tangoing ever, second time I've ever tried dancing with a partner. I think it went well - Mark gave me a quick run through of some tango moves. Then Marlen and I attended a free beginners tango class where I danced with a Parisian man named Philippe who had danced a couple times before. It was hilarious at one point when he said in his super French accent, "It is forbidden to pass." Of course, he was talking about the rules of dancing in the circle. No passing, no switching of direction. There are a whole bunch of other rules. Only a man asks a woman to dance, never vice-versa. It starts with eye contact, the woman nods and the man approaches. And the code-word for, "I no longer wish to dance with you" is "thank you." And if you agree to dance with a person, you dance for 3-4 songs, at which point they play a completely un-tango-like song to indicate a change partner moment. Argentine tango...mm...rules... An old guy named Joe kept following me around until I agreed to dance with him, and it turns out he's very good at leading and taught me a few things that Mark didn't show me. There was another guy who insisted on a "close embrace" (that's what the hold is when the two partners are closer together) and being the total beginner that I am, I wasn't able to see his feet and didn't really know how to go along with it, so he kept stepping on my toes. Lots of fun, though. I'm going to go to a free tango class tomorrow!
Also, my cousin Ling and her family were over for Friday and Saturday. I was out all Friday so I didn't see them, but I spent the earlier part of Saturday with them. Ling, the sprightly little 7-year-old that she is, watched me put on makeup with many questions and then insisted I hold hands with her when we walked to have a delicious dimsum lunch. I wondered if people looked at us and thought I was her mother... On our way out of the restaurant, my aunt whispered to me, "Hey, that white guy just checked you out." I turned around and sure enough some white guy was staring at me. I just thought it was funny that my aunt pointed it out. O, and gramma's moved back in since Jonathan came back from Germany. Let the gluttony begin!
Speaking of hitting on me, today after I got back to Flushing after spending a few hours with a friend in Brooklyn, I decided to go get some snacks. Ariel, my boss at work, has dubbed me "Snack Queen" so I'm only trying to live up to my title. Anyhoo, walking along, someone suddenly asked me a question. I smiled and nodded and kept walking. Then he kept walking with me, and kept trying to get me to talk to him. I wasn't particularly interested so I just smiled and shook my head and tried to speed away. Except that its Flushing, and you can't speed away because there are too many d*** people everywhere. So I kept going, shaking my head - he asked if I spoke English, I shook my head. Asked if I was Chinese, shook my head. Japanese? Shake my head. Korean? Malaysian? Singaporean? Thai? (Thai?!!!) He tried to give me his business card - I don't get how he'd expect a girl who didn't speak English to call him...
O, and today on the subway I saw a beautiful mixed couple. I think they were both half Chinese, half whatever else. Both gorgeous. I hope I didn't creep them out, but I kept staring...

R.I.P.

My computer died! Dead, kaput!
Good thing my uncle's getting me a nice almost new laptop this weekend.
It's like immediately replacing my old dog with a brand new puppy. I'm so bad...

Elevator Stares

This morning in the elevator, this guy who stood in front of me kept turning around and looking at me. Repeatedly. I began to wonder if I had something on my face so when I got into the office, I immediately looked into a mirror. No, nothing on my face, nor do I look particularly haggard. My only conclusion was that he just wanted to keep looking at me. Guess NY men like me more than the French men do.

Weekend

Fun and busy weekend - I went out to see Fuerzabruta on Thursday with some coworkers where I met with one of the performers and went out drinking with him and his friends until 3 in the morning. Got home at 3:30 where my dad (mom and dad were at the apartment because they were leaving on a tour of Niagara Falls in the morning) yelled at me for being out so late on a school night. Poo to you, dad, I had fun dancing on a bar at Coyote Ugly.
Friday night I went out with Estee and her friend from Goldman Sachs. We were going to go watch Dance Brasil's free concert in Central Park, but when we got there right around start time, the line was way too long. Figuring we had no chance of seeing the show, we wandered down to Greenwich Village and had a delightful dinner at a Scandinavian Restaurant. I got to use my knowledge from Denmark to explain what nearly everything was on the menu - fun, fun! They had Smorbrod (open faced sandwiches) but I opted for the goat cheese and beet salad. What can I say, I love goat cheese. After dinner, we went down to Little West 12th to meet some of Estee's friends to go clubbing. Upon arrival, we found out that the group wanted to get a table - which is fine except that it cost $1600!!!! They seemed to think it was reasonable that we all pay $200 each. NOT. ON. MY. SALARY. So we left and went to the rooftop bar of the Peninsula Hotel which was also expensive and had no good places left to sit, so we decided to call it an evening.
Saturday I spent doing laundry and sleeping off Thursday night. I was going to go to a dance class, but when it started thundering and pouring, I decided to download a nice workout video from Netflix and follow along with that instead. Call me crazy, but I feel a little dumb doing a workout routine all alone in the apartment. Anyhoo, performer buddy from Fuerzabruta, Jon, gave me a call and we went to hang out in his neighborhood, Williamsburg. What a cool neighborhood... Marlen, can we live there? Jon and I had a long discussion about what I want to do with my life, and really, I didn't think about it until today, but I just feel frustrated. I felt pretty well established at CMU - I had my dance friends and my archie friends, I knew where I stood with everyone and had positions of responsibility. I liked being able to teach class and having that freedom to take dance classes whenever I wanted. Here, I just take orders (making copies on the copy machine, model building without any creative input...) and I don't get to impart any of my experience or knowledge. It's like I got here and just stopped. Well, hopefully things will pick back up again in a few months...
Anyway, Sunday I woke up with a finicky stomach from drinking beer on an empty stomach the night before, and hobbled my way over to a contemporary jazz class at Broadway Dance Center. It was fuuun. And today, my upper abs feel like I've been doing crunches all day, but I don't recall doing any at all. Must have been all the contractions we did in class. Mmm...dance...

Sleeeep

During a lunch meeting about an extra-curricular work thing today, I started nodding off. Apparently, during another meeting I nodded off a little too. I also started nodding off at my desk. And this is after getting a good 7.5 hours of sleep. Adding to this, I used to fall asleep in lecture like a champion - I mean, 5 minutes, pow, I'm out.
The moment I have to sit still and not do anything, I fall asleep. I used to think narcolepsy was exhibited the way the "Narcoleptic Argentinian" was in "Moulin Rouge," but after a co-worker's comment about narcolepsy, I looked it up online and realized that I just might have it. Apparently test number 1 is the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (teehee) which is a scale of 0-24. 10 and above means that you should already start seeking help. I gave it a go and got an 18. Uhhhh... And apparently, narcopleptics can fall asleep in half the time it takes a normal person. Which I think may apply...Maybe?
Sitting still and not getting to do anything...my worst nightmare...

Caffeinated

I think it's very possible that my company is killing me with kindness. Today along with my usual two cups of coffee, I was obliged to drink the free liter of soda I got at lunch and a super-iced cupcake which we got today to celebrate Big Boss Hugh's birthday. So...more caffeine than my usual intake and more sugar than my usual intake. It left me pretty much strung out for the rest of the day - I couldn't sit still and kept getting up to walk around and I pretty much sprinted out of the office just to sprint. I'm still really caffeinated and hyper.
And full...Auntie feeds me too much, too....

O, and I got discounted tickets to Fuerzabruta - and the performer who's getting them for me invited me out for drinks afterwards! I love NY!

Partying it Up!

This is the week of parties and gatherings for me. Yesterday was the office party, which was great. I had a margarita and a ton of vodka sours and loosened up enough to get into some good conversations with the boss-people. Ariel and Eli talked about the red light district in Amsterdam - I came to the conclusion that it's really like a vending machine, like those ones with the hamburgers and hotdogs, where you pay the money and the little door opens. Except you go in, instead...Then I talked to Patrick and he revealed to me that Daddy swears like a sailor at work! Daddy! I told him how I changed the Netflix queue when I saw that Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution" was at the top because it's kind of pornographic. Really, it was to protect Daddy's innocence. Patrick said, "Oooo, your dad's not so innocent..." Daddy, how could you?
I went to half of the after-party, since open bar and the lounge we were at closed at 8. We went from Park (the office party) to the Martitime Hotel and had some drinks at the bar. By then, I was quite tipsy, and everyone around me were cracking away at their private jokes. I just kept staring at Grace, who literally let her hair down after a few drinks and was working the whole flirtatious-Korean-dragon-lady-with-gloriously-long-and-wavy-hair look. I wish that I had gloriously long and wavy hair...The group decided around 10:45 to move on to Meracat or however its spelled. I, myself, could no longer keep my eyes open, not because I was smashed, but because all the horrendous air conditioning had made it so my contacts felt like sandpaper on my eyeballs. But, I heard that they didn't stay at the second place very long before dispersing - we still had work today, after all...
Tonight, housewarming party at Christina's (a best friend from the olden days). She lives near Times Square! I'll bet the place is way out of my price range. Ah well, the things I give up to be able to look at magnificent buildings I designed. And tomorrow, the NY Carnegie Mellon Alumni chapter is having a dim sum lunch here in Flushing...at the mall...Obviously this guy doesn't know Flushing, but I'll go anyway since it's just a few streets away. Maybe I can see Ken and punch him in the face. Now that's networking.

On a completely different note: On the way home, I heard the wierdest clanging noises in Lippman Plaza. On approach, I realized that it was a band of people in traditional Chinese dress. One had a drum, and another guy had some sort of trumpet thing that seriously sounded to me like bagpipes and another guy was dancing around with a funny hat that had a rope attached to the top which he kept swinging around like a helicopter. Fun times...O, and the song they were playing was "Amazing Grace." Um...

Apartment Search Horror!

Yesterday I went to go see a couple of places. One was great because it was in a diverse neighborhood with lots going on, and the lady I would be living with is very straightforward and the apartment is squeaky clean. Downside is that it's just a tad out of my price range. Well, I'm still strongly considering it, because I had really good feelings about the place.
The second place I saw was a nightmare. I figured since my gramma and aunt and cousins were all in Flushing, I could just live somewhere near them. I looked at one place that was listed as female roommates seeking another female roommate. Well, no, it was more like females plus the guy that lives in the living room and sleeps on the couch a few months out of the year. So, already, I'm thinking that it's not my thing, plus its really far away from the metro station. Then, as I'm leaving, the guy who owns the place (Mr. Couch) says that he's heading over towards Main St and would like to walk with me. Sure. Then we talk and he starts asking me all these questions. What sorts of things do you do? What do you like? I stick to talking about the bakeries on Roosevelt, I figure its neutral enough. Then as we part ways - me going to my aunt's, him going elsewhere, he says, "We should go check out some bakeries together some time." I later email him to say the place isn't for me and he replies that its ok, and repeats the bakery visit offer.
Eep...
So, today, I regale Jason at work about the tale, and then pretty much everyone in the office hears and Matt tells me I should report the guy to the rental committee/consurtium/triumverate/whatever for sexual harassment. I don't know if he's really all that bad. I doubt he asks out every girl that comes to see the place. But still, if its all female plus the guy on the couch, please, tell people that in the ad.
And really, if I was willing to sell my body for low rent and a place to live, I'd be living it up in some swanky bachelor pad in the East Village. Not Flushing...

Dancing in NY

So far, I've only been able to take dance class once a week because of house hunting and visitors, etc. I hope that in a few weeks, I'll be able to start going regularly. The one that I've been really keen on getting to every week is a Limon class at Peridance. Limon is very different - I've only had a teeny tiny bit of exposure to Graham and Horton technique. The big thing I can see in this style is that it's all about falling, not throwing or contractions. And there's a lot about breathing - everyone's breathing very rythmically the whole time, sort of like pilates. It's a beautiful style - I went to Peridance looking for ballet classes and ended up sitting and watching the last half hour of a Limon class because I absolutely loved the way everyone was moving.
I realized after a few dance classes that taking an open class here has a very different conotation from taking an open class in Pittsburgh. A lot of the people that danced in Pittsburgh's open classes were professional dancers, but a whole lot of them were just regular people who liked to continue dancing as a hobby. I figured that's the way it would be in NY. Not the case. I was chatting happily with a girl after my first ballet class and right before we parted ways she said, "It's so wonderful that you came to NY to pursue a career in dance!" to which I replied, "eh hahaha! Nooooooo... I'm hear for architecture..." And I realized in the Limon class I'm in, everyone!, even the older looking people that seem like working people there for fun, was a professional dancer...So wierd...
So, in the fall, when most normal teaching class schedules resume, I'm going to sign up for the wonderfully discounted gym membership my company provides. With it, I will get to learn to pole dance. Yah, you heard it. Pole dance. Like a stripper. :P

Survived!

Here I sit in the back room of H3 at the end of the second week. Yes, I've survived! So far no one's yelled at me, and it looks like I'm not going to get fired, so I'm just going to breathe a sigh of relief. It's strange being in the working world where the 8:30 start time is more of a guideline than a rule and you don't necessarily have to worry about showing your commitment by sticking around the studio into the wee hours of the night (in fact, my supervisor is often the first one out the door). In fact, whenever I stay a little later, usually because I'm waiting for a dance class to start, people that are still there say things like, "Don't form bad habits! Go home!" :D
So far, I've always been in the back room model building. The area is generally still under construction. They're moving more people back here eventually and installing a 42" flat screen TV and a Wii. For now, I get to rule my own 500sf and blast the speakers with whatever music I see fit.
O and the people are very friendly. Merton, procurer of all the modeling supplies I could ever dream of, says that because of my personality, it seems like they've known me for much longer than a couple weeks. That's a good thing, I think.
O, and half days on Fridays. I'm leaving at 12:30 to go to a Limon contemporary class and then I'm going to a pricy Japanese hair salon to get my hair cut. Long or short? Who knows...
And Morten's going to be here tomorrow!!!

Yesterday, being the first day of work, was horrifyingly slow. This morning, much to my chagrine, I found myself cleaning and organizing the model building space and some of the materials library. "This can't be what I'm doing with the rest of my life," I thought. Fortunately, after lunch, my real work started and I was model building for the rest of the day. Even had enough work to do that I left work half an hour late and have a tad bit more to finish up in the morning.
As for the company, I'm finding it perkier than I could have ever imagined. Everyone seems really nice, I have a great supervisor. They're really easy going - the key thing is to finish what you have to do for the day, but you can really surf the internet all you like, just don't put it on your billable hours. Also, there's company-paid outings - we're having some sort of big summer outing on the 24th. It's top secret at the moment, but in the past, it's been parties on a yacht or double decker tours led by Hugh Hardy (the big cheese). Also, days before holidays, work gets out at 3pm, and if I work after hours and have approval, I can get a free cab ride home. Jolly!
O yes, and today, we all got free delicious pizza for lunch. It was prompted by my supervisor, Ariel, who had me and all the interns doing hard labor all morning. He called the office manager and requested pizza for us, and then she decided to order a little extra for the office. Ironically, since we were all in the back cleaning, our little group was the last to know the pizza was here. Fortunately for me, people hate pizza with green pepper and onions, so I got to have a BIG slice of it. Yum!

Twiddle

I've been twiddling my thumbs since 8:30 this morning. First day of work always seems to be like that. I'm in a temporary station that is apparently occupied by a very fastidious person who likes everything in its place. I've been told not to take it personally when he disinfects everything when he returns. So...yeah. They're doing some renovations in the back room and when its done, people will be rearranged, and there are some interns on the way out. I guess when all that happens, I'll get moved into a permanent spot. A week too early, oops.
I found out a little bit ago that I'll be working for a guy named Ariel on a nifty black box theatre at a very prominent NY landmark. Should be fun. I am sworn into secrecy. And I'm hungry...Darnit, I even ate breakfast. At least there's free coffee. But yes, I have nothing to do, and until then, I'm just going to be sitting here twiddling.
O, and in a week, they're considering sending me out for some training in Revit. Michael, the guy who hired me, is going to go over the Revit curriculum to see if it's worth it. Must do Kristen Kurland proud...
Technically no IMing allowed here, but I keep looking at this girl behind me and she's been online shopping and emailing all morning. Surely an occasional IM is okay if online shopping is okay.
Real estate search is going well. Marlen and I discovered that the 180s in Washington Heights is absolutely perfect. I've fallen in love. All the other places we saw before were nice, but nothing got me quite like the apartment we saw yesterday. I turned to her and said, "Marlen, this is where I want to live." It had TREES outside and all the windows are inward facing so it's quiet. Perfection for $1425/m. We talked about it and decided that we can only afford it if the owner covers the broker fee. If he does, we'll actually save $300 in the long run. Otherwise, though, we're going to keep looking.

Aloooone

I moved into Gramma's place in Flushing today. Now I'm all alone. Living alone sucks... Marlen, get that job quick so we can find a place!
Otherwise, nice things. No more naggy mom, which is nice. And public transportation and dance classes abound. I can't wait to take my first dance class since May...
O yes, and of course, the mandatory countdown. 13 days!

Never Never

Tonight, my parents invited my uncle and his family over. Overall a nice evening with my second-cousins which I haven't seen in a while. Now that Angie is older, she's more interesting to talk to, and it was nice to chat with Yogi, who, for the most part, is elusive. We had a barbecue and then watched "I Am Legend" and "V for Vendetta."
My granduncle was also present. He's 83 and in the past couple years, he's gone from a somewhat grumpy, very sharp minded big man to a spare, very jolly and absentminded one. Apparently, he's in the early stages of Alzheimers. I saw him once before going to Europe so I was prepared for the fact that he wouldn't remember me, and, in fact, would need reminding every half hour. After a whole evening, we got into a little routine.
"Who's this lovely young lady?"
"O, I'm Ruby's daughter, the second one."
"O, that's lovely. Did you know you're the spitting image of your grandmother? Your mother's mother?"
"Um, actually, I look a lot like my dad, see?" [stands next to dad who smiles as I gesture from face to face]
"O, no, you look just like your grandmother. She was beautiful, do you know what she looks like?"
"No, we don't have any photos."
"O, all right"
At which point he switches to Taiwanese, I get wide-eyed, and walk about when Mom answers him. Then, the next time he sees me, he goes, "O, who is this lovely young lady?" Rinse and repeat.
One time he managed to retain the memory of me long enough to ask if there were hordes of boys chasing after me, to which I replied, "No, I'm too mean." And then another time he said I should be careful out in the big world because I'm so pretty.
Dad and I decided that he had a huge crush on his sister-in-law. Tee-hee!

Au Revoir, Paris!

It was a whole week that just flew by, I can't believe how quickly. About 5 days ago, I got a bit of food poisoning while eating some unwashed strawberries. Stupid me. Either way, the people at the pharmacy gave me something that I was very dubious about, but it ended up working in just one dose. I'm on the road to recovery, but my tummy is still quite tender. I can't seem to eat more than just a tiny bit at a time. Ah, well, at least I'm going to come home a little lighter rather than heavier.
I met a whole bunch of great people along the way at the hostel, and we all traded ideas about where would be good to go. I ended up going to the Louvre, the Musee d'Orsay, l'Orangerie, le Musee Picasso, Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, er....Galerie Lafayette, etc. I can't remember what else I went to, because I did a lot of walking (though far less after I ate those darned strawberries). Best meal I had there was the one on my second day in Montmartre at La Vrai Paris. Second best was the self -serve cafe in Galerie Lafayette. That's some fancy food there, and I would calculate that I had it all at about half the price it would be at a cafe because it was self-serve. But yes, Paris is lovely, I'm going to have to come back one day and make sure I wash all the fruit before I eat it.
On to Copenhagen and Morten!

Bonjour from Paris!

Bonjour! J'aime la vie a Paris! Well, mostly it's been a lot of walking, some glorious old buildings and delicious food. Uh...well, when I can afford it. People weren't kidding when they said that France was expensive, and more so now that the dollar is so weak. So far I've been mostly just assembling tasty little picnics of baguette, strawberries, salami and milk, or a Pizza and whatever tasty morsels I find along the way. I must say, egg on the pizza, quite tasty. So far I've only had one real meal - a goat cheese salad and a limonade. Tres delicieux!
[this spot is for the picture of the meal, when I get to a computer with a working USB drive...]
So far I've been all over Montmartre, the Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, the Louvre, the Grand Palais, the Deportation Memorial...more places...I'm going to the Orangerie with Sarah, one of the girls I met at the hostel, today at noon. Should be good. I like the hostel, everyone staying there seems to be really interested in travel and are very willing to make new friends. Still, I'm looking forward to Copenhagen and Berlin where I can just leave my stuff out instead of having to take all my stuff to the showers in a bag and live out of a suitcase. Really tiring after a while...

Bon Voyage!

I leave for Paris in less than a day! The long awaited trip, and no stupid airplanes flying into skyscrapers to screw it up this time around. Wish me luck!

Unexpected Guests

Today we weren't expecting anyone over. All of a sudden, mom's best friend pulled up. A couple hours later, some old friends that we hadn't seen in a very, very long time pulled up, too. Just dropping by, they said. The guy I remembered being a baby is now 6 feet tall, but the girls were just as great as they used to be. I just wish they told us they were coming so I wouldn't have greeted them in my pajamas. So embarrassing...I didn't even comb my hair this morning.
O, and I stepped on a shard of glass today. I don't know how it ended up on the kitchen floor, since mom said that we didn't break anything glass-like recently. Strange...

Ken's a F*** and he ruined my graduation

So today was nice, I had graduation. It was long, Al Gore was funny, I took lots of photos. Then, for the third day in the row, mom and dad helped me clean and pack.

And now, a letter:

Dear Ken,
Perhaps instead of yelling at me and thinking only about yourself, you should consider that instead of spending my own last days seeing friends, I was busy "doing my part" for the apartment. I got rid of all the furniture, cleaned the kitchen (and no, I don't blame Chang for all the mess, but I cleaned it once already not even a week ago so there wasn't much more than a light bit of wiping to do), cleaned the bathroom, and cleared out the hall closet as well as the kitchen cabinets of all of my things. I left those things in the kitchen for Brian and you to see if you wanted any of it because I couldn't take them and they were useful. I can see now that you only think that people are out to make more work for you.
Perhaps if you didn't want your mother to do be stuck cleaning up the place, you should have stuck around and helped instead of going out to play and leaving it all to her, seeing as I asked you to help, not her.
Don't you dare say I didn't do anything to help get the apartment cleaned. And don't you dare say that none of those plates or furniture were yours to deal with. I didn't buy them, they came with the apartment. If you had anything against them, you shouldn't have used them, and you used the furniture and tableware plenty. You didn't find people to take the apartment, you didn't find people to take the furniture, you weren't here when Brian and I spent three hours moving furniture because you were busy playing at the zoo. You weren't there the second day either when the second group of people came for furniture and I was the only when helping with the furniture. You never had to try to get Beth not to evict us because of YOU, you didn't have to worry about remembering to pay any of the bills, you never cleaned the bathtub or the sink, and before yesterday, you never cleaned the kitchen counters before. And don't say you cleaned the microwave, you liar, I scrubbed out the inside three times before I left.
If you had a problem with my lack of help, then why didn't you say something in the first place instead of calling me when I'd been gone for over an hour?
And don't think I'm an idiot, your half-assed email is not an apology. I'm not so stupid I can't see you still think I'm a lazy person who left your mother all the work. Stop being a selfish bastard and see what people have already done instead of expecting them to do more. And lastly? Go fuck yourself.

5th Year Exhibition

After months of looming on the horizon, the 5th year show finally happened. Wednesday night was a tremendous success. Around 200 people showed up, people enjoyed the lectures and from Zach, I heard that guests really enjoyed the food I picked out. Today was family day which was a little desperate for me because the caterer showed up half an hour early. Fortunately, the person with the key was just down the street and was able to run over and let me in just a few minutes. I think the families really enjoyed the food and there was more than enough left over so we took it all and gave it to the design firm that was on the first floor. I do hope they enjoy it as much as we did. So, other than getting the card and key returned to the rightful owners tomorrow, my responsibilities are done and I'm home free! Wheeee!

Countdown

5 Days till the gallery opens
9 Days till graduation
19 Days till Paris
28 Days till Copenhagen
53 Days till I start work at H3HC

Life flies by too quickly.

Random Award!

Yay! I got an award! The Senior Leadership Recognition Awards! What's if for? Who's it from? I haven't a clue, I just know that I have to drag my family to yet another reception on Saturday now.

Last Dance

Last night was my very last performance ever with Dancers Symposium. It's very sad... All the dances went well, except this one thing - one of my dances is pupput themed, and I was the puppeteer. We're supposed to do a bit where we pull each other around on strings, except that my strings wrapped around my puppet/partner's neck, so I had to let go. I think all of us agreed Friday night's performance was better for that one. All the others were great, though. High energy fun - I think I've finally mastered smiling on stage without pasting on my grin. O, and Rowena and the girls got me and Stacy flowers and told us that they liked our dance best. Yay!
After the show, we all went out partying. I dragged Brian along with me since he happened to be home. I think the clubbing experience last night could be best described as "sweaty." Everyone was sweaty, like pouring drenching, wet T-shirts sweaty. I mostly danced with my girl friends, and with one guy I know from a dance. Club dancing with guys...it's not so much dancing so much as dry humping to music...Oh well, all in good fun.
Oh, and one of my friends asked me about Brian because she thinks he's really cute. I told him to join Dancers Symposium if he wanted to find a girlfriend so much. Guess that just confirmed it. Too late now, though.

Dancer Things

So, on Sunday night, I sprained my thumb doing a handstand. Today is the first day where I could open a water bottle unassisted. So nice.
Also, Dancer's Symposium is this weekend so I've been dancing pretty much every night this week for a couple hours. I can't wait for the show...and for the rehearsals to be over. I have one tomorrow night at 11pm. It used to be normal, now it's annoyingly late. I turned old sometime during this semester.
Also, today was the last day of ballet. I was a little out of sorts because Jim decided to throw in some things that weren't part of his usual repertoire, but for once, I figured out the petit allegro (the part of class where you do a really fast jump combination). Anyhoo, class ended with everyone going up to Jim to give him a hug and a thank you. I got an extra "tremendous improvement" from him which really made my day. I'm glad he noticed.

Breathe Deep

Trees don't like to have sex when its cold. For the first time in a couple weeks, I can breathe without hacking up a lung.

the Food Fairy

So, Brian's gone for the weekend leaving just me and Ken at the apartment. I actually am really glad it's just the two of us since Ken's far quieter and doesn't make a mess (or at the least, cleans up any messes that he makes). Today we made dinner together - he made bok choi and rice, I made salmon with a coconut tomato sauce. Tasty.
So when I went back to my room after showering just now, I found that I was visited by the food fairy. By food fairy, I mean that Ken decided to make me a plate of hor d'oeuvres using some onion crackers he got from the Strip District and topping it with some leftover salmon and a little of that sauce. It was reaaally tasty. I'm actually thinking about using it for the 5th year exhibition since apparently I'm in charge of food for family night. Yay for food! Hope mom and dad won't mind driving me into the Strip to pick up supplies...

Oh, the Humanity

In my sheer desperation to keep myself entertained until shows return from the writer's strike, I've started watching...the Bachelor.
So, does the guy really expect to actually find a wife from a competition between 25 women? Looking back on the statistics, not a single guy has managed to make it to the alter. One fellow almost did and then the couple realized that once they didn't have all those fun dates set up for them, there wasn't anything there. Only one fellow was smart enough to realize that none of these women really worked. So, I can understand if a fellow's desperate enough, he might try speed dating and this show is like the ultimate speed dating, but are any of those women compatible? These Bachelor fellows are all investment bankers, entrepeneurs, things like that. How well does he work with a hot dog vendor or a make-up artist? And some of those women...I don't care what they do for a living, they're just plain..STUPID...
And would a girl really be okay with the guy at the end, knowing that he's kissed 24 other women during the time he's known her? And they all have to live together and interact while he's off in his little palace, only appearing to whisk a few of them off for a date. If it were a century or so ago, I'd think of it sort of as a harem. Geez, and the superficial little trials they have to go through to win...just because a girl's willing to try out rugby for a day doesn't mean that she's the one for you.
Speculating though, if I were ever to be a Bachelorette (career suicide!) and had to pick, I'd make all of them go to the ballet with me and then make them learn a little dance and perform it for me. Mwahahaha!

Annoyed

Mom annoys me. Everytime I call her and conversation goes into the realm of men, mom never has anything nice to say. Never. And it's about inane things like the government that a guy grew up under. He couldn't help it that he was born and raised in a different country! It's not like he asked to.
And everytime I tell mom to stop saying bad things about anyone who I'm friends or at all interested in, she completely denies it and says that she would never do anything like that. Well, mom, then why did you just say, "I don't like that he's still in school. He shouldn't be wasting his time like that." I don't have to defend anyone to you, it's none of your business. All I'm doing is visiting him and you want to go and change his entire life.
She's completely taken by racial stereotypes too. It's horrible to think that she disapproves of all of my friends simply because they don't fit her racial/cultural/economic whatever profile. O, all of May's friends are fine because they're white middle class people of similar intelligence to May. But my friends aren't okay because they're smart and are of all types of backgrounds.
This is why I don't like to call home.

Birthday

I think this year was probably one of the nicest and most memorable birthdays I've ever had. Waz put together a little wine and cheese think, and I brought the fancy hors d'oeuvres. I think during dance, the guys snuck over to Waz's to bake me a birthday cake...a pineapple upside-down cake is apparently what defines me as a person...I think it was supposed to be a surprise, but Ken stopping by the apartment, telling me he was at Waz's and going back there, and then leaving behind tupperwares with flour dust in them (which I washed), well, that was a big give-away. It's the thought that counts, and the cake was tasty.
At one point everyone sang happy birthday to me. It was somewhat embarassing as I assume birthday songs are supposed to be. I also got really really tipsy, as in loss of motor function tipsy.
Overall, the party was very nice. Rowena from dance was there because she and her boyfriend are good friends with Waz's boyfriend. I hung out with her mostly and then chatted with everyone else for a little bit. I really enjoyed it. O! And I managed to curl my hair for this fiesta, so its pretty and curly right now!

Bah!

The landlady-issue yet again rears its ugly head. She's showing our place to a girl from NY in a little over the week and asked us to clean the apartment and rearrange just a couple of bookcases. Ken, o lovely Ken, has decided that he simply won't budge yet again. For a moment I convinced him to move simply to get Beth out of our lives once and for all (this is assuming she sells the place) and then he talked to his parents. Apparently it's his parents, his PARENTS, that are telling him to be a stubborn little ass-hole.
So I've decided I'll move the furniture myself. Yes, little me. And if Beth asks for anything more, well...other than asking us to rotate a frickin bookcase for 2 hours every time she brings someone around...
I've also looked around forums online. I don't think she can legally evict us for not moving a couple of bookcases around, or if it gets to a point where we have to go to court, the judge would most likely rule in our favor. The thing is I don't want legal fees. If Ken wants to get into a legal battle that's worth more than our security deposit (and considering a lawyer is $200/h, that adds up fast) then he can do it. All I can say is I did my part, and I hope that I can take beautiful revenge on that bitch of a landlady when all of this is over. Even if it only means being as rude and condescending to her face as she has been to us.

I Hate Apple

I've been trying to solve this all semester: There are online listening exercises for the Italian class I'm taking and so far, the only place where I have been able to access it is in the Modern Language Computer Lab which is crammed and always closed. CLOSED! I've been working on trying to get the audio to play on other computers - really, any lab will do! But no, it absolutely refuses on any computer. It won't play on my computer, my sister's PC, my sister's Mac, or the computer labs at school. It's always either some stupid hidden firewall, or the plug-in is missing something. Really, how hard is it to have a .mov file that works? Or can't they just give us a CD or something?

Employ Me

I've been spending the entire month of February and it looks like the rest of March working on finding a job. I need a job, an architecture one! Hire me!!
It's not that bad, though. I went to a job fair last week and spoke to a whole bunch of firms, all of which were interested enough that they asked me to visit their offices at some point. I just sent out all but two thank you e-mails today though apparently I should've had them out on Monday. Oops... I hope one of them will hire me. I want employment...

I am Mercenary

Recently, the boys and I have been having problems with our landlady. She stopped by a while back wanting to take pictures of the place so she could put images up online, so as to sell the place. We felt this was acceptable, so we cleaned the apartment. Day comes and she's there staring at the place in horror and says it's absolutely unacceptable, and she didn't take any pictures. Granted, our living arrangements are a little dorm-like, and I, personally was willing to compensate, and move around a little bit of the furniture.
A few days later, I get an email from Landlady, and she says that she wants us to get rid of furniture, put things in storage and have Ken move his bed into MY room. I called her up, quite upset, and asked her if she realized that she was asking me to share a room with a boy. She said, well then, move into the small room and have the two boys live together. To which I replied that we're all in the process of finding work right now as well as taking the usual full course load at school. When are we supposed to find the time to move everything around? She was not willing to compensate, asking me to understand her situation when clearly she didn't understand mine. And then she threatened that she would have to charge an extra month's rent if she couldn't get the place sold by the end of our lease.
I did some research, and according to the state, and really, the nation, every tenant has the right to quiet enjoyment. Pretty much, so long as I pay the rent, I can live however I please in the apartment right up until the very last day of the lease. As it is, we're all moving out 10 days early.
Just now, I got an email from Landlady and she said that she's willing to compensate by having us make a floorplan of the apartment for her to post online. To which I replied (because at this point, I have no friendly feelings towards this lady at all) that we have to be compensated for our time and typical client billing for intern architects is $50/h. Let's see what happens...

Ringing in the New Year

Happy Chinese New Years. As far as new years celebrations go, this has to be a strange one. The hot water faucet in our bathtub has been leaking pretty much since winter break. I called Walt, the building maintenance man, a couple days ago when the dripping turned into a steady trickle. This morning when Ken went to take a shower, apparently he turned off the baucet but the water decided to kepp flowing. The tub started to fill eventually and soon he and Brain were bailing water like it was a sinking ship. I, at this point, had been in dance class for about half an hour and was blissfully unaware of all that was happening. So Ken ran downstairs to try to get ahold of Walt. "Big emergency" apparently means the doorman will only "try" to get Walt in ten minutes. Ken finally ahggled it down to two minutes and Walt came in saying he didn't have time for this, blah blah blah. I wonder what his reaction was when he saw the overflowing bathtub. Well, Walt came in and basically upended my room in order to get to the shutoff valve. I've been meaning to clean my room forever, so I guess this is the kick I needed...Good thing my computer didn't topple...
The funny thing is that in Ken's Chinese class today, the teacher mentioned that water is a symbol of wealth and good luck on Chinese New Years. I suppose this means that Ken's going to be way too rich in the coming year.

Clothed

I started Italian class on Wednesday. While I was waiting for class to start, a couple of guys walked in. I kept staring at them because they looked really familiar, but I wasn't sure why. When the teacher started talking to them, I realized that they were voice majors, and the reason I wasn't too sure who they were was because I've never seen them with non-form-fitting clothes on before. Wierd...
It also reminds me of another funny nakee-clothed story. May and I went to a figure drawing class in Manhattan. The nude model was an old lady who looked very similar to the old lady we always drew in Doug Cooper's class, except that she was the black version. Well, after the class, May and I went shopping for a few hours, got lunch, walked to a whole different part of the city, then decided to get on the subway to go to Ken's gallery show (which, by the way, was a big deal though he didn't really advertise - even my uncle heard about the show and he's a computer engineer from Connecticut). On the 1 train headed downtown, we were sitting there minding our own business when we suddenly heard a connecting door open and close and some lady started a speech about getting money for her 18 grandchildren. I look up and there's our nude model, fully garbed and panhandling for money. I look at her, she looks at me. I wave. She shrugs and goes, "Hehe, you gotta make a living, you know?" and hurries into the next cart. Ooops. Teehee...

Snow is blowing in the wind and the ground is covered in white. It's already dark and it's not yet noon. All I want is some yellow sunshine and the sound of birds singing in the trees. Is it summer yet?

Resolution

OK, so I really want to try to keep to this, and it's really cheesy that I have a New Year's resolution...but still, I figured I might give it a go. So this year, I'm going to cut as much crap out of my diet as possible - this means I'm going to make most of my own food. No more candy bars, no more processed cakes and stuff. If I have cake, it's going to be cake I bake myself and it's not going to be Betty Crocker, it's going to be from scratch so I can count how much sugar I put in. I thought about it and junk food always makes me feel like crap anyway, so why eat it? And since I don't have studio anymore, the chances of me having to stay late on campus for anything other than dance is much lower (so far as dance is concerned, the only day I have to stay late on campus is Wednesday and that's only till 9).
I'm also going to aim for eating smaller meals more often throughout the day, too (fat chance of that...I'll try though). According to Waz, this is healthier than just stuffing myself all the time. I think that with this and all the dance classes I hope to take, I should be in good shape.
I just hope when I start working this fall, I can maintain some sort of workout schedule. Is it bad that one of my search criterias for architectural firms is "near a dance school?"