We did start going out to eat Korean food much more often after he came back, though, so I suppose it worked out for me quite nicely :)

:(

"The momentum for a change in the national policy on abortion is going to come in the not-too-distant future," said Rep. Roger W. Hunt, a Republican who sponsored the bill. To his delight, abortion opponents succeeded in defeating all amendments designed to mitigate the ban, including exceptions in the case of rape or incest or the health of the woman. Hunt said that such "special circumstances" would have diluted the bill and its impact on the national scene.

Defeated exceptions that help preserve the health of a mother? What kind of monster would do that?!

I am staunchly pro-choice, but for the most part I see why the opposing side believes in its cause. I believe that they are interested in the welfare of another human life. But when something like this comes up, it makes me wonder what the hell they're really trying to do. I wonder if Roger W. Hunt would be so delighted if it was his daughter (I don't know if he has any but let's just say) whose health was jeopardized.

And...um...Vegas photos are coming soon :D

Need: pumps that my narrow heels won't slip out of when I am walking.

Need: to lose 5-10 pounds.

Need: to figure out when I will be able to see Brian next!

Need: to put CDs in my car where they belong (currently: Postal Service in Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Yeah Yeah Yeahs in Guster, Gusten in CD player, Alicia Keys all over the place)

Need: to start working...now!

It's only 8:30ish though. Maybe 10 more minutes....

Moving on...

It's been two weekends since I'd been at Nishi...which is quite a long time actually. The first weekend I was up north for v-day weekend and the subsequent week Brian was down. Anyhow, thanks to basketball season, it was the first time in over a month that I had anyone in my class (yes, I am a Sunday school teacher strange as it sounds) and it was time to get down to business the way I probably should have at the beginning of the school year. I asked the two girls why they came every week.

Now, I knew the answer to that question. It was, however, a question that I always asked all of the classes I'd taught in the past. It helps me assess the characters and attitudes of my students and gives me something to go on. Anyway, as I was saying, I knew the answer to this question: because they were made to do so by their parents. Which set them up for my next question: do you like being Buddhist? Response: Yes. Question: Why? One of the girls, the one who had spent most Sundays almost completely mute watching me with a sullen, bored, and almost contemptuous look on her face, immediately shot back at me "Because Christianity is too uptight."

As it turns out, this particular girl (let's call her M) has a friend who claims that she cannot be friends with anyone who is not Christian (she has not told this "friend" that she is not Christian) and another friend who more or less constantly imposes her own Christian beliefs onto her and has gone so far as to give her a Bible, which is currently sitting virtually unopened in M's drawer. As a result, this impressionable 13 year old is now convinced that Christianity (both Protestant and Catholic I'm guessing) is a religion that brainwashes its followers and is meant to dictate your life. After telling her that she may want to crack open that Bible someday, it being one of the most influential and highly referenced pieces of literature in history (I don't think she believed me), I tried to soften her view a bit by explaining that not all Christians are like that, but she seemed disinterested in most of what I had to say ;P You know 13...that age is a hotbed for attitude. I didn't beat the issue to death since their attention spans were beginning to fade, but the brief discussion left an odd taste in my mouth. I have been lucky never to have encountered such closed-mindedness in my circle of friends anytime in my 22+ years of life but I've seen it happen to others. My dad's exasperation at being told "I'll pray for you!"...one of the nicest people I've ever known being told that he's going to hell by his aspiring preacher friend...what's going on here? What good is all this proselytizing anyway? I mean, what it does is create people like M (who I hope will broaden her horizons as she gets older, for her generalizations are a bit too extreme in my opinion) who has clearly formed an extremely negative opinion of the religion as a whole.

Religion is a tricky thing...I think that religion exists to make people feel better about their lives. Each person needs to find something that is right for them, even if it's agnosticism. Problem is, many feel that what is right for them has to be right for everyone else. With that kind of thinking everyone is wrong in somebody's eyes. Fortunately not everyone thinks this way. Unfortunately, some still do. That's just my two cents.

On a lighter note...

Here are some more photos from NorCal. It's going to be a bit of a mishmash but it's better than nothing, no?

Day 1 Our Arrival

Aaron, April and I flew into Oakland on the last flight out of John Wayne. We were actually running a bit early (amazingly). That particular night consisted of a lot of wining and...wining. Went to bed relatively early since we wanted to get an early-ish start the next morning :)

Day 2 Napa!

The Car

We left sometime in the morning...not too late...I forget when. We had frozen waffles with honey and butter for breakfast =X. On the way over we played Mad Libs, a form of entertainment we first utilized in Hawaii this past summer :)

Domaine Carneros

The first winery we hit was Domaine Carneros, a pretty chateau on a hill that specializes in sparkling wine. It's a nice winery in Napa, which meant lots of limos, including a very selfish silver limo that decided to take up a billion parking spaces (see Aaron shaking his fist at it?)

V. Sattui

Ah, the land of the free tasting (not just wine, cheese too!) and extensive deli. They also have a nice picnic area with tables. A bit muddy, but what can you do?

Esquisse

*whew* Okay. That's enough for tonight. I still have one more day unaccounted for but this entry is horribly horribly long as it is. More later, maybe.

I thought for a few seconds. "Hmm...a seven I think."

"Seven? That's pretty good."

It was. It was my last summer as a student and I knew it. I was so "in the moment". I was happy and lucky and I knew it. I was living in my Newport Beach apartment with three absolutely lovely girls (although I believe one was in England at the time) just a short drive from some beautiful beaches and my boyfriend at the time was "behaving". The only thing really weighing on my mind at that point in time was a math class I wasn't doing too beautifully in. I only had three classes to take in the upcoming fall quarter and I was finally going to get a chance to tutor, something I'd been wanting to do for a while. Things were good and I knew it, and I knew it so I was able to appreciate it, a rarity for me.

Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and tell myself not to worry and that things will be okay.

I would tell my ten-year old self that middle school is going to be a bitch but that was as bad as things were going to get, it's all uphill from here.

I would tell my twelve-year-old self that a new school takes a little getting used to and not to worry, things will fall into place next year.

I would tell my fifteen-year-old self that things are going to get tough academically in the upcoming year, but the sadness will lift. You won't feel this way forever.

I would tell my 17-year-old self, unhappy as a result of college applications, that the whole college admissions thing will work out. Don't worry. Oh, and don't let that stupid boy get to you because he's bad for you. BAD.

At the end of each quarter I would tell my college student self to breathe, it's over. It really is. Now relax.

And finally, I would tell my freshly 21 year old self to a) appreciate your age. Once you turn 22 it's all downhill. b) lay off the sauce sometimes because if you don't, that 98lbs you see on the scale will be no more and boy oh boy will it be a fight to get it back down.

On the same token, I wish someone could tell me now, with full confidence, that things will be okay. Because sometimes it really feels like they won't be. Because I know that things don't always turn out well. People fall and people fail. I've been relatively lucky so far. It's not something to be taken for granted. I wonder...?

Brian is leaving today which makes me supersad. Long distance is a bitch.

What do you consider long distance? I would say that if it would be either inconceivable or somewhat insane for you to go out to your significant other's just for an hour or two for, say, dinner (or whatever) then it is long distance. If it is inconceivable or somewhat insane to go to your significant other's residence on a weekly basis it is probably long distance. Those are just my standards.

Translation: 50 miles is NOT long distance unless your fastest mode of transportation is a horse and buggy. Or your bike. Or your feet. But, again, those are just my standards.

No more Vosges posts; coworker and I just polished off the last of the truffles :(

are YOU strong enough to be my man?

i'm thinking about my doorbell.

So as it turns out I had to switch from SFTP to FTP for whatever reason...and because blogger was acting up on Friday my post and all those comments were lost. Oh well, shikatagani right?

At least it's publishing.

They've opened one at Puente so I don't have to drive superfar to pick some up for my mom's birthday. She loves those things and so do I.

choux creme == love

So one of my coworkers went to Vegas this past weekend...and brought back a yummy box of dark chocolate truffles for the office. I tried the Absinthe truffle. Tasty, but I couldn't taste the anise? For some reason he left the box (and all of the packaging) on my desk. I don't know why. My guess is because he's evil. I am tempted to eat the six remaining truffles.

Had a superfull weekend. Friday was spent at Diamonds in Brea with a jillion people that I don't know. Saturday we hit up the Loft which is an extention of Highlands. Sunday Brian and I spent in for the most part, not leaving the apartment until seven-something to catch a movie at the Spectrum. More on my weekend later...the server is not accepting connections for now ;P

Four jobs I've had:
1. Kumon assistant
2. PSAT workshop section leader
3. MRC bitch
4. Current: software engineer :D

Four movies I can watch over and over:
1. Closer (don't you just looOOove the cybersex scene? HA!)
2. Amelie
3. Garden State
4. Y Tu Mama Tambien

Four Places I've Lived:
1. S. San Gabriel
2. Irvine
3. Newport Beach
4. Tustin

Four TV Shows I Love:
1. Sex and the City!
2-4. Umm....I don't really watch TV actually....?

Four Places I've Vacationed:
1. Hawaii
2. Pittsburg :)
3. Florida
4. Remember the summer Tahoe/Vegas/Mammoth/SF/etc etc trips?

Four of my favorite dishes:
1. Korean soft tofu with a side of bulgogi MMMMM (I have a craving)
2. Japanese curry
3. Ravioli in some sort of tomato/tomato cream sauce.
4. Carne asada fries (it's been waaay too long...)

Four sites I visit daily:
1. Gmail
2. sitemeter
3. Yahoo! mail
4. me :)

Four places I would rather be right now:
1. At my warm apartment w/ the bf
2. Eating one of the aforementioned dishes.
3. Any of the aforementioned places I've vacationed.
4. Sleeping.

We got an omega delicious appetizer to share. Wild mushroom tortellini in a chardonnay cream sauce sooooo good. Unfortunately there were about five pieces so we didn't get much =X We should have gotten two. Oh well. I got pan-seared sole with pureed potatos and spinach with a lemon butter sauce. So. Freaking. Good. The boys got steaks and potatoes. I ate most of one of Brian's potatoes (oops). We all shared a walnut cheesecake with brandied cherries after dinner...I was so stuffed.

And now I want food again gahhhhh.

Brian is coming down today :)

Back to a mundane Monday. I am completely exhausted--my flight was delayed due to a problem with the electricity (we were all ready to take off when suddenly we stopped--and the "three or four" minute repair turned into a fifty minute delay) and I feel bloated from all the food consumed over the weekend. It was a good weekend, though :) It just went way too fast.

Coworker gave me a bunch of B-side and live Yeah Yeah Yeah tracks :D

A couple of weekends ago (Korean night at Luna and Opus) I saw Duane for the second time and very tipsily told him that his stuff is great and asked whether I could somehow get a hold of some of his tracks. He gave me the URL for a site where I could get his mp3s and I (amazingly) remembered it.

Go here and look up Duane Koh and download his stuff. Now.

Except I was 3801 and not 3900. Close enough!

I'm eating spongebobs right now. Yay.

aghhh i love just about freakin' EVERYTHING in the bingbang collection

helloooo piles of chains, piles of pendants, lots and lots of metal

too bad none of them are practical purchases...for someone like me, anyway.

someday, when i have a bit more spending money ;P

I haven't had too many interesting things to say as of late.

on the upside, we found a dart place in brea!

photos later...from my new sd450 :D

in due time. i'm working on it.

yay to the blue-eyed breeeezy who just moved into his new place *yarr*

and yay for cheap porkchops on tuesdays.

and YAY for napa next week <3

yesterday: dave and buster's w/ co-workers (plus coworker's low alcohol-tolerance designer friend) for beer, food, and pool.

d: maybe he had hot cousins.