it's amazing how you can be surrounded by friends and yet feel more lonely than ever. and these days, that is exactly how i feel. ever since the day i've felt as if some part of me was missing and i'm still searching for a way or just something...anything... to heal it. but slowly i've come to realize over the past week or so that what i'm looking for will never be found. perhaps i shouldn't say never. one never knows. of course some times are better than others but yet, it's always there. a void that can never be replaced. i find myself in situations where i want to be around people but at the same time i don't. i merely just want their presence. i find myself daydreaming about what ifs and what could have been. i lived in a fantasy world where nothing changed but deep down, i blocked it out. my rock and my stability are gone...and i was never able to realize or appreciate it. that's the hardest part.

i've always wondered what the proper etiquette was for keeping old memorabilia from ex-boyfriends. some people i know just throw everything away which blew my mind because that's some pretty nice gifts there. girls normally receive some type of jewelry like a necklace or bracelet during the relationship and to just throw it away? it's still perfectly good. me...i keep everything. it doesn't even have to be jewelry. one of my favorites was when stan and i finally won the lifesize porky pig from the arcade. it took us forever. going everyday after school just to get our free tokens and playing the same game over and over again. but it was all worth it. of course now it just takes up space in the bathroom but who cares...i get a smile everytime i look at it (remember, if you ever come to visit in san diego, do not pick it up by the head...only under the armpits!)

i keep everything i've accumulated over the years in a box and sometimes if i'm bored i'll go through it and it brings back memories of how cheesy and foolhardy i used to be. not to say all that much has changed over the years.

i went to the doctor yesterday. i have tonsilitis. so now i'm on antibiotics and this syrup thing that knocks me out. i like it...i sleep much better. you should try it adam. i was supposed to get something else to numb my throat so i can swallow better but the pharmacy ran out...oh well...i need to eat less anyways.

i've never felt so horrible or tired after a vacation. it all started when i fell on my way to pizza house my last night in michigan tearing my jeans and got a scrape on my knee. it wasn't very big, evidenced by the fact that chris started laughing when he saw it after hearing all my complaining, but it hurt and it throbbed. a lot. i had trouble tying my shoes, kneeling and walked with a limp for a couple days. then while in kansas i woke up one morning with a 103 degree fever and my whole body ached and i was sweating like crazy. so i drowned myself in advil, took a cold shower and it went away after a couple of hours. then i developed this swollen lump on my neck which still hasn't gone away and it hurts when i swallow. i think i'll make a doctor's appt soon.

chris took me to gardner, kansas today...the place where he grew up. as we're driving by his old neighborhood he kept going wow...this and that wasn't here before. it's so developed now and as i'm looking i just see trees and haystacks and maybe one house every once in a great while. this is developed? then he started telling me how him and his brother used to walk or bike down this 5 mile road just for the hell of it. as you can imagine, there's not much to do in a town like gardner. the funnier thing was when he took me to the next town which is literally like four or five blocks long. you can stand in the middle of the street and look one way and see where the town starts and then turn your head and see where the town ends. there's only one cop, one bar and no malls or movie theatres to its name. i just can't imagine growing up in a town like this. the pace of life here is so slow...i get all antsy just being here. everyone drives 15 mph less than the speed limit and it drives me nuts. and their idea of bad traffic is hilarious in itself...i'm thinking come to cali and see what real rush hour traffic is like. this only further solidifies that california really is the dream place to be.

so i'm playing monopoly with chris and his mom while his dad keeps bringing over different kinds of meat for me to try. elk, deer, buffalo and frog legs. if i had to pick i'd say buffalo was my favorite but i'd rather just stick with regular meat. then he brings over these hush puppies...hush puppies? what are those? i've heard of them but never actually seen or ate one before. chris said it was made out of cornmeal so not wanting to be rude, i try some and they're actually quite good. so i eat some more and as we're sitting down to dinner he kept asking me which one is your favorite? i say buffalo first and then hush puppies. he asked me again...which one is your favorite and i'm thinking didn't you just ask me this? his next words are those aren't really hush puppies they're turkey balls. i freeze. what?? please tell me you're kidding. all the while chris and his parents are dying laughing and i'm still trying to figure out if he's kidding or not. then i take another look at the so called hush puppies and why yes, they're round. i didn't quite know what to do...i had eaten about 10 of them already. so now i can say i've had turkey balls. great. well, all i can say is chris better becareful when we go to china this summer...they do eat some pretty weird stuff over there. maybe jon and i can gang up on him together.

dancemix is over. there's not much more to say that others haven't blogged about. it was nuts how many people flew in. even james and victor was there. i was back in the college mode of sleeping at 7am and waking up in the afternoon...it was great. we basically crammed everything in the weekend i was there. after-party which was a little weird since it's been a while since i've gone to a college one and a fight actually broke out right in front of me while i was waiting in line for the bathroom...lame...didn't really appreciate getting hit either, karaoke with 20+ people crammed into a room...it got so hot i had trouble breathing for a while there but watching martin was worth it...he's hilarious. the only thing was i wished i got a chance to talk to people more. there were so many people all the time you kind of just waved and said hi across the room and that's about the extent of it. i did get to go to connie and chrissy's restaurant for lunch..the bread really is the best i've had in a long time. plus it was nice just to hang out with everyone who had flown out to cali during xmas last year with the exception of suave louis of course...pulled quite a little suprise by showing up. my trip was over way too soon but at least i'm on vacation for another week...off to the land of toto again.

vi took me on my first motorcycle ride today. at first i was scared out of my mind and had butterflies especially when i only wanted to go around the block but we ended up going on the real roads and the freeway even. i felt like we were in a bike club or something because there was me and vi, yuan, lon and rob all on bikes. my favorite part is when we go really fast on a straight-away and my least was when vi started doing s turns for no reason and when we had to lean a lot turning right. i think i screamed a little too loudly and held on a little too tight cause vi said he had trouble breathing but hey, it was my first time. and for some reason, whenever he would brake, i'd knock my helmet against his. oh well…i’ll do better next time.

this weekend was lots of fun though. i finally got a chance to hang out with carolyn and enid and had a girl’s nite out and got caught up with all that’s been going on. vi’s been up here for the past week for training (although he gets out in time to take a nap in the afternoon before i’m even off work…not very much training i’d say) so it was nice having someone over since vu’s been in portland for work. but he came back thursday for the weekend, loc drove up from la and a couple of his friends flew in from seattle just to hang out. it was like a big sleepover weekend. it was great. saturday we went to space 550, the theme was bikini girls due to spring break…it wasn’t that impressive but then again, i'm not a guy. the bathroom and coat check lines were ridiculous, tons of asians of course…we’re just everywhere up here…

then sunday we had a bbq and then at night everybody left. i hate the feeling when you’re surrounded by a ton of ppl and then boom…everyone’s gone. the house is too quiet, i don’t know quite what to do with myself so daniel came over and we watched this horrible chinese movie that vi rented.

and oh, one more thing, there was this guy over the weekend who recently proposed to his girlfriend a couple of months ago…she had a fat engagement ring. it was the nicest i’ve seen…two point something carats total and really shiny. he was telling me how he had to sell his bike and his professional pool table to buy it…and i’m thinking, if i was a guy would i do that? is it worth it? i mean, here she has so much money on one little finger when he could have had more toys to play with. i guess that’s one downer to being a guy. i think if it was me i’d go for the toys but who knows. All the girls were oohing and aahing over her ring though…that must of made him and her feel good.

i can't sleep...this sucks. so i decided that maybe if i blog i'll get tired more easily. daniel came over last night and we were bored so we decided to play with this kit that reads your blood sugar level for people with diabetes. i got it from one of my clients and i was kinda curious as to how their product worked. basically there's this contraption with a needle on the end and you prick yourself and put the blood on the test strip and then boom, your glucose level appears. the selling factor is that it's painless and you don't need as much blood as other testing kits. however, i think there's something wrong with me because it didn't work...not enough blood came out. it worked for daniel pretty quickly though. we tried it three times on my right arm and then twice on my left arm. now that i think back on it it seems pretty dumb to prick yourself over and over again. oh well...it was entertaining...i just hope i don't get little scars.

friday night me, yuan and tri drove down to fullerton...the purpose? club rubber...but we ended up not even going. turned out it was the 6th anniversay that night and it was packed...by 10pm they had reached max capacity and shooed everyone away so we just went back to vi and eric's place and partied there. it was pretty dope complete with laser lights and a fog machine.

but what i really wanted to blog about was these cafes they took me to. first off, this entire weekend was a sausage fest. 13 or so guys and me. so saturday we went to these two coffeehouses where basically the girls wear nothing and walk around serving you drinks. the first one we went to, cafe lu i think, the girls were wearing white bras, white shirt, white skirts, white underwear. see-through everything. they reminded me of those ghosts in scary chinese movies where they always have long black hair, pale faces and red lips...i thought the waitresses were going to take their heads off and start brushing their hair or something. scary.

and then the second place we went to the girls were wearing bikini tops and see through short short white skirts. i just couldn't fathom it...the cafe was basically filled with all guys and all they do is sit around, play chinese chess and stare at these girls. isn't there better things to do with your time? although the green bean shake was really good. i've learned that guys are so easily pleased...i honestly thought i was going to get knocked in the head more than once by this one girl's huge boob job. but it was pretty interesting...i've determined that the only prerequisite you need for working at these places is long hair, big boobs and the ability to walk with huge heels.

this guy is great...i've never heard of a heeby guy and sheebie girl before...i'm still not sure i would be able to identify them but at least i know they exist now.

i called in sick to work today, something that i'm hoping chrissy did too since she's way sicker than i am. i woke up feeling horrible and with a little prodding from tri i decided to just stay home and rest. felt a little guilty at first since it is busy season and we're not really supposed to ever be sick but since my senior had given me permission if i got any worse i figure why not. but then as the day went on i felt much better. have you ever noticed how your cough and fever is always worst right when you wake up? anyways, i realized that staying home all day while everyone else is off working is not very fun. i was bored as hell, watched a ton of tv, slept so much that it was giving me headaches and finally towards the end of the night i was dying to just get out of the house so i went to vicky and clayton's houswarming which was nice since i hadn't seen a lot of those people for a long time. in the future, maybe i should take some pointers from jon on the art of sleeping in and doing nothing. ha...what a low blow on my part :)

the client that i'm on this week is in san francisco. the city city. the commute up takes about 2 hours which is ridiculous. at first it's not so bad driving up but then after i realize that i've listened to an entire cd and then some and i'm still not there...i start getting annoyed. which is about the time i hit embarcadero and the one way streets, the bus and carpool only lanes, the confusing cable car and the pedestrians who won't let me turn. yes i know they have the right of way but there's just so many of them. plus, as if it wasn't hard enough trying to make sure i'm going the right way while reading the street signs and my yahoo maps all at the same time.

it's only my second day here but i just can't see why anyone would want to live in the city. yes it's nice being able to just walk out and grab lunch but parking is horrible, especially if you can't parallel park too well, and it's expensive ($20 dollars a day!). the streets smell like pee and are full of bums, although as i was playing don't step on the cracks with myself, i noticed that the sidewalks have glitter imbedded in them which makes it look quite nice in the sunlight. and i noticed that the business people dress a lot nicer here than in san jose and a lot of girls wear the dark rimmed glasses to make them look smarter...which i decided actually does work. maybe i should invest in a pair. but i'm so glad i chose san jose when i was trying to decide which city to live in and i'm perfectly content with coming up to the city every once in a while to shop around and then at night for the clubs.

friday night i went to go watch paul oakenfold at the backbeat with daniel, curtis and sanford. i've noticed recently that my clubbing circle has shrunk. enormously. everyone else is either burned out or just want to chill...which is good and everything but for some reason, recently, i've been wanting to go every weekend. i'm just glad the "party crew" is always up to go...otherwise where would i be? it was my first time to the backbeat and i was pleasantly surprised that there was such a nice club in san jose complete with plush walls. the even better part is that it is less than 20 minutes from my house. i was pretty excited all week to go watch him since everytime i've seen him dj at past events he's been pretty dope but for some reason, i wasn't all that impressed this time. maybe my expectations were too high since everyone else seemed to enjoy it but i left a little disappointed. but to make up for it, the night was really fun. the place was pretty packed but not too crowded to where there was no room to dance. so definitely well worth it.

then yesterday enid and i went on a shopping spree...or to put it more correctly i went on a shopping spree. enid's my shopping buddy and i love going with her since we like the same stores and she's very honest in giving opinions. plus she knows my style and what i would wear so it's great. i think every single time we've gone together i always end up spending more with the exception of maybe just once. there's just too many cute things out there but this time, i felt pretty guilty afterwards since i know i really should be saving my money for more important things and i tried to come up with a justification for spending so much but i couldn't. so now i'm debating whether i should return most of it but i really don't want to. if it makes any difference, most of the stuff was on sale. i figure it will be my gift to myself for busy season...but then i thought that was what my trip to michigan and kansas was for. dilemma dilemma.

i'm being a sheep once again but after seeing it on jon, james and greg's site...i just had to see. what does this mean?




Which Star-Crossed Marvel Lover Are You?

i passed! the cpa exam...well, not passed completely. only two parts but that's good enough for me. i still can't believe it. after waiting three months and then some for the scores to come...it was driving me nuts. plus, it didn't help that enid and chris both found out that they passed before i did so i'd feel even more like a dufus if i didn't. talk about pressure.

i guess all those weekends flying down to la and waiting and studying at the airport paid off. i have to admit i was really nervous before i found out since i actually studied this time and i kept thinking, what if i didn't study enough? i shouldn't have slacked off towards the end. or since i'm not in that "study" mode anymore can i still do it? plus, you know how after an exam everyone talks about the answers and i thought for sure i messed up. but the hard part is out of the way now and up next, tax in may...what a great day :)

i am s-o-r-e...but it was well worth it. i haven't had this much fun snowboarding in such a long time. everything was perfect...saturday, it was nice and sunny and the snow was pretty good too. and then that night it started snowing so we woke up to fresh powder. it was so great...my s turns were finally coming together, falling didn't really hurt and everybody stayed together on the mountain. and curtis and i along with everyone else even went down a double black. and let me just say, vi and his brother andy are dope. they got so much air on their jumps and i was thorougly impressed. i wish i could do that.

the nights were fun too. there were 23 people in the cabin and i felt like i was in an extended version of real world or something...everywhere i went there was people. people in the bedrooms, in the sauna, in the hot tub. everywhere. we played this game called the statue of love which became a little x-rated but was funny. and as we were playing mafia i was trying to tell them about kaiser soze and the doctor but i think i just got myself confused as well.

all in all, a terrific weekend. i'm so glad i got to go. and i think i even got a little tan on my face. if only i didn't have to work today, then it would of been perfect.

last night vu and I had our first sleepover party. vi came up from la in the afternoon and then jay, linda, liz and kevin came up later that night and all slept over. the occasion? snowboarding at tahoe of course. I can’t wait…my first time this entire season. at first, when vu told me that jay and some of his friends were going to spend the night I thought for sure it was going to be a sausage sleepover but nope…surprisingly it wasn’t and another thing that was surprising was that we had all gone to san diego state. anyways, i’m all packed and got my board and boots in the car, my earmuffs (two different pairs! i can’t wait to wear them…they’re very cute) and i’m all set to go. i just hope there’s good snow…and then curtis and i are off for the drive up. It should be dope.

i proceeded to lock me and chris, who flew in from kansas, out of my place saturday night. the front door has one of those locks that as soon as you twist the handle on the inside, the door opens but lo and behold, if you close it, it remains locked. who knew? so there we were, tired as hell with no way to get back in. i felt terrible. i called everyone who i thought might have a key and of course, the one person that does (yuan) is on his way to go snowboarding. so chris takes out his credit card and starts trying to open the door while i try to take the screen off the window to see if it's unlocked when two policemen walk by...and don't say anything. hm...that certainly makes me feel safe. so finally, i told chris that this one window was vu's bedroom and just as he's about to go climb up on the roof to try to get in, he realizes that it's actually the neighbor's house. oops. but everything turned out all right as chris proceeded to climb up on the roof to the other window (while i'm holding the water coolor for him to step on hoping i don't make him fall) and thankfully it was unlocked and he could crawl in...all this without anyone calling the cops or anything.

but anyways, i also discovered that i don't think i know how to smoke properly. chris and i stopped by a cigar shop one night and as he was buying one the salesman says why don't you get one too? so you can join him to smoke? they come in different flavors. so i'm like uh...all right and picked out a cute skinny vanilla one. on the way out, he said remember to not inhale. not inhale? how is that possible? as i tried to smoke it later that night, after our little locked out situation, i realized that i didn't know how to puff without inhaling. but then i don't think i was inhaling properly either since i didn't feel anything? the only good part was that the vanilla tasted sweet if you licked your lips afterwards. i decided that cigar smoking is gross. even worse than cigarette smoking, it's all the bad parts times ten. smelly hair, clothes, fingers. yuck. not worth it.

i went to go to a recruiting event yesterday at berkeley with david (who is so proud of cal it amazes me...cal license plate, cal jersey, cal hat, still goes to all the games...) and two other people. it was for the asian business association. i've never actually gone to one where i had to present and i hate giving oral presentations. flashback to speech class in college...just not me. it certainly didn't help when i showed up that i saw students in suits all dressed up and a formal looking powerpoint to boot. the minute i get there david is giving me instructions on what to say, stuff to mention and with butterflies in my stomache i tried to remember everything but i had no idea what to say. the only good thing was that there were other people up there with me. i'm not even quite sure i made sense...i rambled a lot i know...talked fast, made some futile attempts at jokes and after a little while up there, i was like hey, this isn't so bad...it's actually kind of fun because amazingly, they actually seemed to be listening. or at least they did a good job pretending to be.

but i think my favorite part was after we spoke and they came up to talk to us. i remember when i was going through recruiting i hated having to be the one to initiate conversation and it was a little weird being on the other side but it was fun talking to all these random people. a lot of them were freshman which amazed me that they were so young and already attending these things and i passed out my card to whoever asked...it was pretty fun. i'm glad david asked me to do it.

afterwards, david treated us all to steve's bbq at the food court and even got us boba. it was a nice little capper to my evening.