NOOOOOO!

NYTIMES CLOSES THEIR URL PAYWALL LOOPHOLE. Noooooooooo!!!

Amazon 2-Day Prime vs. Daiso

I primarily buy my things from two places these days. Amazon 2-Day Prime or Daiso, the $1.50 Japanese Goods store.

Things I bought from Amazon.com in the past two weeks.
Fabric Steamer
Digital Camera
Curling iron
Hair waver
Hair protectant
Teeth bleacher
Cheez its
Febreze
Hand weights - 2 - 5 lbs

from Daiso:
Metal-less hair clip: aka giant hair barette
Clipboard
Two champagne flutes
Nail buffer
The perfect sized white bowl to beat eggs in
A knife sharpener
A glass tupperware container
Stationery
Earphones
Sticky hooks
Clothing clips

I recognize both these habits could be a problem!

I have been fascinated by this before!

I just stumbled upon a great new Tumblr: Things Fitting Perfectly Into Things. It's short but sweet!

Thanks thingsfittingperfectlyintothing.tumblr.com.

Brilliant. I advise you to take a peek. 

Quotables

"Not all those who wander are lost." - J. R. R. Tolkien

Confession.

I still use Windows Media Player. :-\ Don't make fun. I like technology that was popular in 1998. 

You're gorgeous.

I must set a goal in order for me to allow myself to purchase these two dresses. I saw the first in-store. This baby cost $198 dollars, more expensive than the $170 rug that I need to go in my room, and the same color. 

jcrew.com. This dress reminds me of the Darjeeling Limited.

A rug would provide my room with warmth, and cover the bare space that would finally make my room feel like a home. I shouldn't buy this dress. Then! My wandering eyes, in conjunction with my wayward hands feasted themselves upon this! $398 and based on the works of Piet Mondrian, if Piet lived by way of Martha's Vineyard.

katespade.com

Oooo. $398 is how much money I'd like to spend on a digital camera, so that I can take gorgeous photos instead of staring at the ones that my phone takes everyday and feeling unsatisfied! Shall I possess these beautiful dresses the only way I can - via my blog? Oh sigh of sighs. 

In a sentimental mood

If I write this song down online, I won't forget about it and have to search for it again. I've been listening to awesome top 40 hits for so long that I forgot that I love a few other types of music as well. My first love: CLASSICAL MUSIC. Every Chinese girl took piano. I took it for 15 years and what I took away from it was a love of classical music. I'm good at the technical stuff but I could never be spontaneous or move into jazz.

Jazz. When I think about jazz, I always think about this song. It haunts me sometimes until I search for it blindly online, wasting time and time. I find it - listen, then I become obsessed with it again. The last time I listened to this song was at least 4 years ago. When I search for it, I always think it's a Gershwin song, but silly me. It's John Coltrane and Duke Ellington.

It's sentimental, beautiful and sexy. Listening to this makes me loath to go back to Top 40 stuff!

Finally. JT4EVER.

In case you've been living under a rock, Justin Timberlake finally released something that I can play on repeat in the office.

 

Thanks buddy.

Challenge Accepted

Monica's arrival outside at 5:20 allowed me to literally run out my office door. I felt like an asshole leaving her outside, so I ran down. We stopped by the Station Cafe on Pacific to grab a quick coffee before jumping on our bus to food. There was a cute barista behind the counter, but aren't they always?

At one point, I asked Monica when she was coming over to stay at my place and he answered instead. I fought the urge to give him my card.

After a brief, cheap, and delicious dinner at Sun Kwong, I made Monica rush home with me to take a whimsical challenge. I'm trying to make it sound light, but two Asian girls sitting at home in a room in front of a laptop while the Jeopardy song plays is hardly cute.

Thanks to that Blue Bottle coffee, I'm up blogging about this now.

Yep. It's that time of the year. Apparently these past three days have been days where Americans can go online and take the online Jeopardy screening. As a quiz bowler, I jumped at the challenge. Unfortunately, I've done a lot of things to dull my skills as a quiz bowl enthusiast since 2004. Less than a decade ago, I would have been a bloodthirsty fiend over this opportunity.

Tonight, I was able to take it a lot more casually with Monica. When the question of who the composer of Tosca was, I happily typed in Puccini. Still got... some of it. Twelve short minutes later, it was over.

I'll let you know if I ever hear back, but I'm not holding my breath. Whew. 

Thursday morning, is it still morning?

Jesus. It's 11.11 and there's 0 mg of caffeine in my body. The only thing that could make this better are coffee, Monica, and perhaps a Mission hot dog.

10 Things that I noticed in the past 24 hours:

1. When you're on the bus full of people on your morning commute, don't talk on the phone about how people from that specific area suck, and that people in the Marina are cooler.
2. Also don't mention that you have like.. 73 resolutions. That will definitely make everyone look at you.
3. If you have a nasal poindexter voice (and you use it loudly for over 20 mins on the bus on the phone), people will dream about punching you all the time.
4. My addiction to caffeine is severe and possibly fatal for someone that is not me.
5. I really need to get some contacts soon because I just sort of lost my last legit pair of glasses and the only ones I have are the super hip ones that are even beyond hipster; they are ridiculous.
6. Cough drops are delicious and make your throat feel good. Do not misplace these.
7. The realization that a vacation is no where in the horizon is heartbreaking. Does someone want to go to Hawaii or Las Vegas with me? I'm open to both of those things. ALL THE TIME.
8. People who puke on the street, suck.
9. Blogs with GIFs never fail to entertain me.
10. Thinking about ten things is too hard for me this morning!

Monday morning highlights

I just found my favorite pair of earrings. There was free Starbucks coffee at work today. I think I may be able to survive the week!

LACMA LACMA

Two days pre- New Years Eve, I arrived to take on the streets of LA with Lucas. The holiday season meant that traffic must have been slightly lighter.

I arrived in sunny LA on the 30th. I woke up at 5 am in the morning and flew across the country next to a PHD student studying parkour on the West Bank. So cool. It's not often that you get young good company. I feel sort of bad for them because I know that I passed out and probably snored like a snuffleupagus. Eeps. I got off the plane and in true LAX style, they re-routed our gate so that I came out on Terminal 6, not Terminal 5 where all Delta flights usually come out. Poor Lucas waited for me outside Terminal 5 and I was super lost and frustrated! This face was waiting for me in LA. Ladies, LA Lucas wears man cardigans and they are a hit. The sunglasses are mine. That expression... 100% priceless. Please excuse my puffy face in all of the following photos.

Highlights of our first trip. Lu and I went straight from LAX to LACMA.

mouth full!

While we were sitting at drinks/lunch, we saw Mark Valley. He was the original love interest for Anna Torv on Fringe. He also had a show on Fox a view years ago called Human Target. I enjoyed showing Human Target to my 7th graders. Forty minutes and full of action? Who could ask for more?

from imdb. 

LACMA - the Los Angeles County Museum of Art has a beautiful combination of modern, classical and a lot of large structural pieces that invite human interactions. Inside, we played a bunch of games that I enjoy at museums including, title this piece, caption this piece, could my hand fit into this?, etc. Instead of analyzing Caravaggio's use of chiaroscuro, we looked pieces of Mondrian and Duchamp and retitled them ourselves. Get real. People who take themselves too seriously at museums amuse me. Lucas and I obsessed over a piece of alphabet art, where the tiny sign said, Please do not touch. I immediately wanted to poke and touch. We stared at it so hard, musing on the feel of the pile of letters that the guard came over and spoke with us in detail about the habits of adults who touch the letters in spite of the sign. I'm glad we're not the only ones, but the piece itself is made entirely for temptation. It's touch-level, not eye-level. There's just a tiny obnoxious sign that incites the feeling of wanting to bury your face into a pile of letters. UGH. Things that like that drive me wild - THEN, the guard, that sneaky wonderful man, grabbed a letter and handed the baby e to Lucas and then to me. The smooth surface was pleasing and a lot lighter than I anticipated.

After running around for hours, Lucas and I took all the requisite photos that people take at LACMA.

the light posts and our, smiling but freezing face. 

contemplative

kids love this. there's a finger in there and that's just how i likes it. 

Farewell 2012

Oh. 2012. How crazy this year has been. Last year around this time, I worried about whether or not I wanted to play poker. If there was going to be power. Whether or not I would be able to get out of drinking with my local teachers so that I could hang out with my friends and wear face masks. I thrived in the sun and wear a charcoal face mask that made me look a little bit inappropriate. There were naps involved. I celebrated 2012 by hanging out with a bunch of 14 year olds at a discoteque.

There were hot showers, but not every day.
There was power but not every day.

Now I worry about whether or not my heels are high enough or too high. Whether or not my dress should be shiny. How am I going to not miss my flight the next day?  What do I do if I do miss my flight?

 What a contrast!

Here is a song that I'm currently obsessed with.  May you enjoy it in both 2012 and 2013.

Mic Check 12-12-12

Hi Friends who read my blog. Happy 12. 12. 12. day! I miss you. I will write soon. I promise.

Blog by numbers

These are thoughts and things that have happened to me since the last time I blogged.

65: the number of people I need to call on the phone everyday. If I call more, I feel awesome.
64: is 8 times 8.
60: minutes is an hour. I can't watch TV for more than an hour before I fall asleep.
50: pages of the biography that I read every day on the way to work
50: bucks, the cost of a cab from the airport to my house
48: hangers in my closet, about 100 too short
46: days since I last blogged
45: hours I spent working last week
44: minutes, the length of time I just spent on the phone talking with Lucas
40: the number of times I've listened to Don't You Worry Child by SHM since Monday
31: hours to fly back and forth from Dubai for this year's KO
30: minutes is how long it takes to get from my bed in the Mission to my desk in Telegraph Hill in the mornings
25: minutes I spoke to Lindsey on the phone before she told me she was pregnant!
23: minutes it takes me to walk from my office down to Anthropologie to check out the new sale items
20: minutes, the length of time I interview an applicant for my school
13: number of hangers I have hanging on my rolling rack in my room
12: the number of times I refresh Salesforce a day
11: the time I usually fall asleep with the lights on.
10: hours slept total while in Dubai
10: hours slept while on the plane back from Dubai
9: minutes it takes me to walk from my office to my new favorite Chinese restaurant: Z&Y
8: hours I spent cleaning today
7: things that I have on my list to buy at Ikea, that I'm probably never going to buy
6.66: the amount of money you pay if you buy two instant udon, a bag of cheetos, and a bag of shrimp fries at Walgreens in San Francisco
6: the number of people in my office
6: episodes of Downton Abbey I haven't watched yet
6: hours spent looking at Ikea, Dwell, casasugar, Target Home, Zarahome, Pinterest for ideas for my room
5: photo albums that I haven't edited but plan on doing so
4: people who are applying to my business school because of me (as of right now)
3: times is the number of times I've done laundry this month.
3: average number of cups of coffee I drink a day
3: average number of beers I like to drink in the office on Friday
2: celebrities I saw at LAX, Bryce Dallas Howard and Lance Reddick from the Wire/Fringe
2: black jackets purchased in 2 days
2: number of seats I had flying to Dubai
2: the number of roommates I have
2: times I've changed the layout of my room
1.5: numbers of seats I had flying back from Dubai
1: trip to Ikea
1: wedding in Half Moon Bay, it was beautiful.
1: move to San Francisco from Shaojie, by way of Atlanta
0: the number of times I've dared to look at my credit card bill this month

Sorry, it's been so long! WELCOME BACK TO MY BLOG!

Nail To Do!

First seen from one of many nail blogs that I read, this super cute 19 year old's blog has presented to me a nail idea that I definitely want to do, as soon as I start my job and I'm in the office and I'm not at career fairs. So... in mid- November, around Thanksgiving, I will be paint my nails in this way and I'm so excited!

Oh after a little bit more observation, I saw that she posted a tutorial! Here it is:

Click to enlarge! How smart is this! I can't wait to do it!

September is the best month of the year.

Let me count the ways:

Every year:

1. My birthday is in September. (September 24, what what!)
2. I usually have an affinity for other people who are born in September, many of my friends are born in September.
3. Fall TV starts in September.
4. Autumn, my favorite season starts in September.
5. Pumpkin lattes start in September.

This year:

1. I start working in September.
2. My cousin is also getting married in September.
3. I saw Tom in DC in September.
4. I re-discovered that airlines give cute drinks from baby bottles on airplanes.

The only things that would make September better:

1. Restaurant week also occurred in September.
2. Some sort of huge annual sale in all the stores took place in September.
3. If I got paid in September.

Addicted to Downton

If I could constantly shake my fist, I would. ITV has been so wiley about the start date of Downton but apparently more searching has led me to uncover an unofficial start date of September 16th in England. It hasn't been officially posted on the ITV website and after searching up, down, and through the website, I'm desperate enough to cling to this date as the true one. Sure, the release on PBS isn't until January, but who's going to let a six hour time difference turn into six months? Don't be absurd. This is 2012. I'm not waiting until 2013. :) Also, I've found that the edits from PBS Masterpiece are never appreciated. I want my Downton as long as possible!

If you love Downton too, let's start talking in about 2 weeks.

How to leave rural China in style

Have a layover in Beijing and celebrate it HANGOVER style.

I didn't go to bed before dawn for the first four nights I arrived in civilization.

NIGHT 1

I arrived in Beijing from Lincang, dropped off my things, pinned back my hair and ran down the street via scary pedicab to meet with fellow revelers: Laura, Axel, Monica, Andrew, Sarah, Jonas, her bf who bought me menthols, Greg, Annie, and many many foreign strangers at the old faithful meeting place, First Floor. We rejoiced by eating Biteapitta and I quelled my bursting cravings for some baba ganoush. Sure we met some new friends, but after we finished our drinks there, we wandered around the Workers' Stadium before deciding on going to Latte. We made it up the gauche elevator before I was denied entry because I made the mistake of breaking my foot and taking care of it. The lady at the door literally denied me based on my disability then SHOVED me backward. Who shoves someone for the same reason that I've been denied entry into the club?

Through begging, Laura convinced Mo, me, Axel, and Andrew to pay 100 rmb cover to go to MIX and relive her college highs. I grumpily paid the cover before deciding that since I had already paid 100 rmb that I might as well enjoy myself. We drank a nasty shot of something disgusting that burned something awful and like magic, I was obliterated. This combined with Andrew's ability to leap up in the air RIGHT before the drop of a song... got me super excited and ready to dance the night away. Then, I captured the eye of a few Chinese girls who had access to Chivas and soon, it became a Chivas night. The best kind of night. The five of us ran up and down the floors of MIX, blocking exits and dancing in the way of many paths before settling on the pop music dance floor. Many goodies and oldies were played and we ended up exiting MIX at dawn.

I managed to convince a pedicab driver to drive me a very long distance by resting two glow sticks in the shape of an t over my face, the same shape as a ten in Chinese: see 十。 Apparently getting such a low price is unheard of and soon, I found out why. THE DRIVER WAS CRAZY. He kept trying to impress me back moving very quickly with no hands on the handlebars and no feet on the pedals. Much of Gongti was drunkenly walking and probably did not like their peace disturbed by my screams. Then, the driver asked me if I was sleeping alone. I answered by leaping off the seat of the cab and walked as quickly as my leg/boot could move.

NIGHT 2

Eat a delicious meal at a izakaya, a place that I would have picked and was happy to go to. Walk a mile in an effort to find a cab. Chug a Long Island while everyone else takes a shot. Befriend a guy by name of Merlin, ask him politely for the glasses on his face, take lots of pictures in them. Drink beers. Never meet the friends you promise to meet until the bars close where they are. Continue drinking, drink water. Go to 7Eleven. Love life. Wake up in time for NIGHT 3.

NIGHT 3

 

I unapologetically made my friends watch the Euro cup final where Spanish creamed Italy. Monica woke up from a nap and arrived by ten. She was sad until she saw how into it the other fans were. They were insane, the streets were filled with people.

  

They had life size cut outs and freshly bought ADIDAS/PUMA/NIKE fan shirts. It was amazing. I sat outside starting at 9 pm, to watch a game that started at 2:45 am, and ended up getting home around 6.  

 

This is what Sanlitun looks like at dawn. Peaceful, deserted and nice! I walked home in the fresh, unpolluted morning, and took a small nap before....

NIGHT 4

Sadly, I don't have any post-able photos from night 4. I went to Wudaokou for the first time, ate delicious pizza with May and the gang. I went to Propaganda for the first time. Another bar next door that's just like it but with better music... a place called WU bar, where we danced crazily alone on the dance floor for hours before peace-ing out at, you guessed it - dawn and returning home. 

MORE NIGHTS

The following nights, my last nights in China, for the foreseeable future. I'll let the photos say it all.  

See ya later, China!

Best response ever.

I need to stop making pronouncements like this. What I'm about to post is clearly an inside joke and perhaps you have to know both me and JB to know why this is awesome. I don't care. This response to my post has made me smile, almost laugh at loud - for about a week. I think it's worth sharing.

Click here if you want to learn about the many uses of Pedialyte.