My evening opened up unexpectedly last night, and so I headed over to the willyouBhere Hepatitis B awareness event and concert at the University of Houston. I was hoping to meet David Choi so I could thank him personally for giving me permission to use his cover of "Over The Rainbow" in my skydiving video; however, I would have had to body surf over / push and shove through the throng of screaming girls that mobbed him after the event. Yeah, didn’t happen. I DID however get to briefly shake hands with Paul Dateh and snapped a quick pic with him before security kicked us out (props to Nancy for the quick trigger finger):

Um, I look way too happy in this photo, and all I can say is ... that boy's silky smooth voice made me melt in my seat and utter obscenities that hopefully were not recorded by digital camera video recorders surrounding us.

All in all, a great night of entertainment. Also enjoyed watching singers Jessica Sanchez (her voice sounds way older than a 14-yr-old!), Michelle Martinez, along with Youtube comedians / personalities KevJumba, HappySlip, and dance crew Kaba Modern.

Just wanted to end this post with my skydiving video, if you haven't seen it already. One of the greatest [short] experiences of my life. Thanks again David Choi!

It just so happened that our table at Cafe 101 consisted of 2 girls, and 2 guys - BOTH sporting unique hats. How rare is that?!

 
Sheng listens as Kirk tells us how he feels about health care

The last time I'd spoken to Sheng was over five years ago, and I remember asking him what he was doing, and he replied, "I'm a [ insert job name ], but I'm going to be a comedian." And that he did. "Hats off" to him! (Sorry, couldn't resist.)

He's coming to do a charity comedy show in Houston Tuesday, September 22nd at 7:30p. Pre-sale tix are $20, with 2-item minimum purchase at Laff Stop. Proceeds help survivors of Typhoon Morakot in Taiwan that wiped out entire villages with mudslides. If you've not heard of Tzu-Chi, they're a very active group and famous for being on the frontlines in time of disaster; they don't just collect money and sit on the sides. They are in there getting down and dirty and getting stuff done.

Hope to see you folks there!

For our last day in New Orleans, we went on a tour of Laura Plantation. Mrs. Jang was right when they said they had a lot of very interesting stories on the tour. We also visited neighboring Oak Alley Plantation, which was more picturesque and great for photos. That evening, Leon, their son, who my brother and I have been friends with for a long time also, drove all the way out from Baton Rouge to join us for dinner. He invited us to visit the LSU campus on our way home, and we thought, why not?

We missed you, Howard! [ see all photos ]

Leon was kind enough to be our personal tour guide around LSU. We'd been there a looooooooong time ago for a table tennis tournament, but definitely did not tour the campus in detail like we did that day. Leon also told me that visitors to LSU were supposed to engage in a ritualistic activity before leaving LSU ... so of course I went ahead and did it (I asked my dad to join me, but he declined):

Yeah ... I pretty much regretted doing that. My body really ain't what it used to be. I was nauseous pretty much for the rest of the day. Ugh!

Thanks to the Jang family for hosting us in Louisiana. Come visit us soon! :D

My parents had been wanting to visit some family friends who live near New Orleans for a while now, and the opportunity arose pretty recently. They asked me to join them (my mom claims that I make it more fun for them, haha), so off we went.

Me 'n Mom being silly in front of the Mississippi

Day 1 was just driving (~6 hrs / 370mi). That evening, Mr. and Mrs. Jang explained in detail the tours we could go on the next day. My parents entrusted me with planning our itinerary, and so they were basically forced to do what I wanted to do. :) It consisted of a walking tour of the French Quarter (my first choice was actually a bike tour, but ... I think I'll have to do that with other like-minded people, heh), and then a swamp tour. THAT was awesome. :)

Gator Vid 2 / Gator Vid 3 / Gator Vid 4

While headed to Jackson Square for the walking tour, a lady who saw we were blatant tourists told us she was headed that way and kindly walked with us in that direction. She told me a little about herself and how she'd moved from Arizona to New Orleans, and that if we had a chance we should go check out the Garden District. If we wanted to take a horse carriage out there, she highly recommended a man by the name of Marlin Malloy. "That's my ex-husband," she said. "Now I don't recommend him as a husband or a father, but he's a damn good tour guide, and you know he must be good if I'm recommending my ex-husband to you!" We shared a laugh, and parted ways. Never got to see if I could find Mr. Malloy amongst the horse carriage drivers and tell him that his ex-wife had recommended me. :)

I have never been interested / good at history, but I actually learned a lot about Louisiana history on all the tours we took. So excuse me if my captions are a little long-winded, I'm excited that I learned a thing or two on this trip. :) See the whole story in ze pictures!

I know what you're thinking. I've probably just jumped the gun, jumped to conclusions, didn't really give them a chance. Well, this is my story of what happened on the evening of Saturday, August 8th, and you can derive your own conclusions.

After having a major blast at Alice's wedding, a bunch of us still were not sated and headed out for post-wedding clubbing. Friends brought friends, and we ended up with a group of 12 people, 11 Asian (9 dudettes, 2 dudes), and 1 Caucasian (yay for Tree Frog for being the token white guy!). An initial group of 4 ladies had gotten there first, and were turned away from the door after a brief dialogue:

Bouncer: Are you with the private party?
4 Ladies: No ...
Bouncer: Sorry, if you're not with the private party, we can't let you in, there are too many people.

While waiting for us, they observed that non-Asian people were being let in just by showing their IDs and without the same questioning.

We arrived, and we were turned away with the same dialogue. Still in disbelief, we decided to test the system. We asked token white guy Tree Frog to try getting in. And sure enough, they let him in without even asking him if he was with the "private party".

So, we butted heads with them some. While doing so, people came and went, and after some time, Tree Frog asked, "Look, if it really is a numbers issue, I've seen about 10 people leave, and we have about 10 people in our party. What's up with that?" No answer. Management was talked to, and they kept mute as we spoke of their unfairness. Another group of partygoers, a mix of whites, Hispanics, and Asians, was also turned away while we were giving the manager of piece of our minds. One of the ladies in the initial group was surprised because she'd just been to Blue Label the night before at an all-Asian party. After a while though, we just weren't that direly in need of giving them our money anyway, so off we went.

And while my remaining clubbing days are numbered, I won't be tapping Blue Label Lounge for business if I have a choice.

Aside from that, I was glad we were able to have a post-wedding hurrah for Alice and Chun. I was definitely buzzing very well. :) [ to the pictures! ]

* I suppose one remaining possibility is that if there actually WAS a private party going on there, that it was hosted by someone who had a thing against Asians.

Highlight of my weekend: we made ice cream from scratch (save milking cows and harvesting eggs from chickens)! But first, my favorite shot of the weekend:

Yes, Sammy the pomeranian got a "lion cut" for the first time. This dog is incredibly cute, and is still incredibly cute, but his new haircut made me laugh out loud. And then for some reason watching him poo just made me crack up uncontrollably. Sorry Sammy! :)

After a lot of hard work in the blazing heat (mostly thanks to Uncle Charlie and Jason!), we finally got our ice cream. It was SOOOOO good!!!!

[ see the rest of the pictures! ]

Oh, and let's not forget the video clips. This is the first of the short series of videos that we took, from the Round Top parade, from ice cream making, and from playing with sparklers at night. By putting your mouse over the video you can click on the thumbnail on the right to go to the next video.

... a total stranger takes a picture of you without your knowledge almost 10 years ago and then posts it on a website with other weird photos that are made fun of.

I'd never heard of AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com until Henry pointed it out to me (um, thanks?!). HAHahhahah oh man. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this on the website. Not exactly work safe (depends on your industry, I guess), so beware when you click through the photo to the site.

So I guess I should explain what is going on here. :) Old Calgary buds Reema and Winnie were showing me around San Francisco - had to be between 1999 and 2002, while I was an acupuncture student in Cali - and took me to the Palace of Fine Arts. So we were walking around taking pictures and there, on the green, was this dude posing for a professional photographer. Before my friends could stop me, I ran over and asked if I could have a pic with this guy, thinking that this was too hilarious! I still have the original pic where me and this dude are facing the camera; it's a bit strange to know that someone secretly took a pic of us from the side, and has hoarded it until now!

I remember asking him why he was taking pics there; I can't for the life of me remember his answer. I believe he said his name was "Blaire"; I never remembered to look for him on the internet after that.

Not that this REALLY explains anything except for my penchant for wanting to take pictures of everything I encounter. Be sure to read the caption and the comments underneath; so funny! Man. Yep. The Internet "big-time". Thanks(?!?!) AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com!

Whoa ... who are these hardcore fans of iHaTePiNk.com who were spotted in California last weekend ... ?

Yup, I cut my hair short right before I went. That 10" will be off to Locks of Love shortly. I'd been wanting to chop it off for some time now, and I finally had enough hair! :D If you can't tell, I'm the one in the light pink shirt, and with the bluetooth headset in my ear (D'oh! Forgot it was even in there!!). :P To my left is my lovely cousin Min; she and hubby Peter (and adorable son Connor) were so kind to have us at their beautiful home for the weekend. The shirts were her idea, a random gift she totally surprised me with one day in the mail.

Thanks to Tree Frog for doing a fabulous job of sifting thru the tons of pics and coming up with a summary of our brief time in California. [ see the photos! ]

Being at a kiddie birthday party usually makes me almost want to have my own kid. Until one of 'em poops in a diaper or gets fussy and starts bawling. THEN I leave the premises feelin' pretty good that I get to leave it. Will I ever be a parent? Time will only tell. SHOULD I be a parent? Er, I think most people would resoundingly vote no. :)

Slices of the day:

 
 

Me with the birthday girls and their lovely mum 'n dad. I'm making a face - as usual - but this time very much unintentional. But no one will believe that. :)

[ more photos ] (beware of cuteness overload!!)

So through some gratuitous connections I got to watch Gladys Knight perform at the Rodeo Friday night, from the PRESS BOX!! Well, technically it was Gladys Knight and Beyonce's little sister. I didn't know her name until I got there, man have I been totally out of the loop with the popular music these days (old fogey alert!).

We did have to watch some of the pre-performance rodeo. I recall going a year or two ago and not liking the feeling of man asserting himself over animal using violent (and what I deem to be unfair) means as if to prove superiority, nor did I like the encouragement of little kids to do the same. I remember it feeling like a very testosterone-driven event that simply used animals for sport. I felt the same way this time.

Anyway! Solange and Gladys were really fun to watch! Here's Gladys in her heyday singing my two favorite songs of the night:

It's so fun to watch those Pips get their dance on. :D

And a more recent performance by Gladys. This is pretty much what she looked like at the Rodeo. What a darling woman, so self-assured and so in love with her craft. I totally understand why she is the "Empress of Soul". Her performance brought tears to my eyes (old fogey alert the second!!). I hope I can be as self-assured at her age when I get there!

Elaine and I survived the Dallas Muddy Buddy 6-mi run/bike! (Well, to be very clear, *I* merely survived it - Elaine's in really good shape so I'm sure this was not too bad for her.) To commemorate this accomplishment, I've put together a slideshow to cheesy music, as I am often prone to doing. Enjoy!

Muddy Buddy 2008 from Caroline Chen on Vimeo.

My personal goals were to seriously 1) complete without dying, and 2) to not stop. I had to walk the bike a few times over rough / steep terrain, but otherwise, I did it! WE did it! :)

Thanks to those who came out to share our "last meal", to those who trained the last 3 months with my Royal Slowness, and for all the well-wishes!

============================

Training equipment / tools:
- Champion running shoes, 4+ years old, were thrown out after the race
- Hella-old Walmart special mountain bike (Elaine's nice bike was used for the race)
- MapMyRun.com, a great way to track your workouts and provide motivation for the days you just don't want to run
- fear of dying on the day of the race

The conclusion to my little four-part series.

And so, the storm hit us almost exactly one month ago today. And today, there are 4 men on my roof banging loudly away, making me fear that at any moment the ceiling might cave in and a construction worker complete with hammer, hardhat, and neon vest might fall into my bedroom. Hahaha and no, that would not be a turn on.

Apologies to those who can't get my abysmal singing voice out of their heads. Muahahahaha. Soon all will be ihatepink.com zombies! World domination is imminent!! :)

Ike Mockumentary, Day 4 (FINAL): Waiting from Caroline Chen on Vimeo.

Didn't have power nor running water all day. Not knowing when things were going to return to normal was making me unsure. And so, I forced myself to take my mind off of possible impending doom by doing some "undercover" work on my apartment's hurricane "emergency" line, and then heading out on my trusty bike after the rain to see what was going on in my immediate surroundings.

Ike Mockumentary, Day 3: Ike Hits from Caroline Chen on Vimeo.

I suppose I'm one of those that boring people who place less emphasis on form than function but ... using cloth to "protect" your windows just seemed pretty ... useless. Or maybe I should say, pretty, but useless?

Ike Mockumentary, Day 2: Suspense from Caroline Chen on Vimeo.

Some of you may remember the "REALLY IMPORTANT NEWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111111!!!!!!" series that I did ( part 1 | part 2 ) three years ago when Rita blew through and got the media's panties all up in a bunch. Well, when I got news that Ike was coming through, I immediately thought: "I wonder if enough interesting things will happen to be able to do a series on Ike?"

Well, the answer was no, but you know me - when bored, I'll either make things interesting or make things happen. :) To make full-screen, mouseover the video and click on the little icon beside "vimeo" that looks vaguely like 4 arrows pointing outward.

Ike Mockumentary, Day 1: Prep from Caroline Chen on Vimeo.

Semi-useful news tidbit: If you still don't have power since the hurricane but see that your neighbors have power, call 713-207-2222 [ source ].

Presale tix at the Teahouse for $10! [ more info ]

Sweet. I think I discovered their "Dim Sum Girl" through Will. I can't find an original Dim Sum Girl video by the Notorious MSG; instead, here is a hilarious lip-synch done by some sisters in Hong Kong that had me roflmao for realz:

Had a good day at work, created my own camera bike mount (pics to come), had dinner with the parents, rode 15 miles with a friend, cooled off afterwards with her and her pug (more pics to come).

I felt really good after the 15 miles, but apparently my legs turned to rubber. Peep the video of what happened when we were riding home after the ride. Please excuse my deafening laugh (careful with the audio), I think I must have been in shock. OR maybe I just sound the dorky in real life and don't realize it ...

So every once in awhile I'll get on my bike and ride around and enjoy the sunshine while I run some errands at nearby locations.

I am thankful for the presence of REAL bike racks at Target! And of course for the fact that they sell toilet paper ...

I borrowed the handicapped parking marker at Unnamed Location 1:

I used the shopping cart corral thingy at Unnamed Location 2:

I think this was some sort of "no parking" sign at Unnamed Location 3:

Funny graffiti along the way:

And I'm so proud of myself! I didn't use a single plastic bag yesterday! I just put my goods straight into my backpack. This of course still gives the illusion of shoplifting, so I am thinking how to overcome this.

Jumpin' off swings,

Jumpin' off planes,

And jumpin' on bridges.

My legs sure were sore that weekend. :)

Peep the skydive pics, and the skydive vid, remixed by yours truly, and lemme know what you think. :)

Eda, Yusuke, Violeta and I (and little Sophie too!) went to check out Fotofest 2008 for one day, hoping to catch photography during the Cultural Revolution in China. Instead, it was a lecture on the history of Chinese photography in general, so we started meandering about the museum, and revisited the light tunnel, where I was almost exactly one year ago with Chi-Wei:

"Gimme!"

It was my first time meeting Sophie. Very cool. :)

Last weekend, Tree Frog invited us up to his family's ranch house in a little town between Houston and Austin. For a city girl like me, I was a bit apprehensive since I mean, c'mon, how do you live with ZERO internet?! :)

Well, I am proud to say that not only did I survive without internet, but I even had offline, real-life fun! :) The crisp air was refreshing. We were surrounded by green grass, blue sky, and clear water. The puppies that came along seemed to enjoy the large expanse of roamable land. I learned to ride a 4-wheeler with manual shift (I can't drive a manual car to save my life). I rode a tractor lawn mower. We ate Tree Frog's mom's freshly homemade brownies. We rode in the back of a pickup truck. We jumped around on bales of hay. We slept in tents with only thin layers of sleeping bag separating our bodies from the ground (and then there was the tent that had not one, but two Aerobeds? Heehee!). I'd forgotten what it felt like to not HAVE to be anywhere, and to kinda just do ... nothing in particular, except focus on chillin'. :)

 

Thanks to those who came out (especially those that battled severe disorientation in the dark to come join us)! Enjoy the pics. Lots of epic memories in this one. :)

... More like, "Wonderful Weekend". That's just the song I'm humming in my head at the moment while writing this here post.

Man, what a weekend! Played cards, ate at two restaurants I'd never been to before, got a deep tissue massage (by a man with strong hands and an exotic accent to boot, heh heh heh), watched Booty Call for the first time (LOVED IT), and shot fun pics at the "Seven Wonders" in the Houston theater district.

My legs are sore from running back and forth to set the timer on the camera and jumping as high as I could for multiple mid-air photo attempts. :)

[ more photos ]

The Anti-Valentine's gathering was a hit for the most part.

You know, I think I've only had ONE Valentine's Day date ever. As in, an actual outing ON February 14th. Here's how it went down:

It was a fine day back in the stone ages, er, I mean, college. A handsome younger lad that had started hanging out with our group of friends, I'll call him "J", had asked me out for Valentine's Day dinner. At 8:00am (!!!) he showed up at my dorm room door, with a stack of envelopes, and a single rose. Each envelope was labelled "9:00am", "10:00am", "11:00am", and so forth, for the whole day up until midnight. I was instructed to open them on the hour, each hour. Not wanting to ruin any surprises for myself, I did exactly as told. Romantic idea, no?

Well, 'twas not to be. The notes contained in the envelopes started off cute, slightly sweet, as would be fitting for our level of acquaintance. But then they started to become extremely random in nature: the one that still sticks in my head to this day is the note that read:

"Don't pick your nose too much,
it will cause nosebleeds."

This is a re-enactment of the accompanying illustration. I exaggerate not.

Dinner was lovely, with normal conversation. Only upon finishing did I realize that ALL OF OUR MUTUAL GUY FRIENDS, the losers (yeah PH, AL, JW, I'm talkin' to you guys), had been sitting there, a few tables over, spying on us the entire evening. Uh, I guess it was a good thing I hadn't felt the strong urge to jump J's bones in public? Any semblance of a date ended there as the whole gang headed to Einstein's and played video games. Which WAS pretty fun.

Anyway, fast forward to last night:

Thanks go out to Jon for picking a place with NO vegetarian choices except for bread, coleslaw, and french fries. :) Light flirting with the waiter had him asking me to come back Sunday where he would toast the bread in a special way, just for me ...

More light flirting again at Starbucks; I asked for the opposite of the fat free "skinny latte", and the cashier came up with the fattiest combination possible, labelling it as "Special Drank". Hee hee!

A happy group of Anti-Valentine-ians, camping outside Starbucks singing various Christmas carols and cartoon theme songs together. We definitely could have been mistaken for a bunch of drunks. :)

• Locations I was at: 4
• Distance Driven: 102 mi / 164 km / ~2.5 hrs
• Shoes destroyed: 1
• Pairs of shoes that happened to be in car so I could continue to get my dance on: 1
• Pictures taken: 254
• Drinks imbibed: 0
• Warm light 2650K-temp CFLs (compact fluorescent lightbulbs) purchased: 4

Seriously - finding warm light CFLs (apparently anything below 2700K is considered "warm") has rocked my world. Environmentally friendly, economical, AND feels like warm incandescent lighting. AND ON SALE TOO ($3 ea, rather than $6+ elsewhere). [Insert exhale of contentedness] ... my living room finally feels warm at night. Suh-weeeet.

(I don't get why warm CFLs are anything BELOW 2700K to be considered warm ... shouldn't it be, the higher the temp, the warmer the feel?)

I need to stop scheduling so much in one day. I'm gettin' too old for this. ;)

Here's a pic of us girls surrounding Jon to make him feel special. I think the special treatment is putting him on the verge of passing out there. I promise it isn't because I passed gas. :)

That first post of 2008 was pretty drab. Thought I'd toss in the first pics of 2008. Here we are on a rooftop in downtown Austin:

A friend told me about high-dynamic range imaging (I haven't done any reading on it yet), but here are my preliminary experiments:

Ringin' in 2008 with both new and old (circa 1989!) friends in an amazing way.

I got a good start to the holiday season this weekend. As usual, click through for the complete set of pics and the hopefully witty comments.

Delicious-looking hotpot! I did not partake, but enjoyed a most excellent vegetarian pasta dish.

Decorating trees in the middle of the night on the side of 360. :)

In addition to making lots of new friends, I met up with Masako, whom I hadn't seen for at least five years!

Austin downtown on Congress at sunset, festively decorated for the holiday season.

Well, I loved trick or treating as a kid. I just recently saw Hallowe'en, the old movie, at Master Pancake Theater in Austin, which had me twitching with fear between laughing my head off. Yeah, if *that* freaks me out, then there's no way I'm will be able to stomach other more recent stuff. My most recent fond memory of watching a scary movie is with Fri, in the middle of the afternoon, sun pouring in, huddled together in Ed's bed, watching a Korean or Japanese version of The Ring ... and both of us still shivering with fear. Hahaha, we are so weak. :)

A dog dressed up as a mummy.

The people at the Scion Fright Fest were really getting into it.

Close-up of the hand and feet on the grill. I'm glad I'm a vegetarian ...

Hahahahahah. Nice.

My Corolla dressed up as a Matrix.

Me at my best.

So J.Ma and I headed out to Austin for a brief jaunt.

Note to self: never change drivers at Columbus because that is where you are supposed to get on the 71 from I-10. I is moran. Well, on the upside we discovered the cities(?) of "Swiss Alp" (yes, just one "alp") and "Schulenberg"(sp?).

Highlights (click through for the full set o' pics):

Me jumping for joy because we went to the WRONG PLACE for the Maker Faire!

Finally finding the Maker Faire, we found a van decorated entirely with ... cameras! Oh, and these convex mirrors.

We went to watch the Master Pancake Theater. The Rocky Horror Picture Show was showing at the same time. I got a pic with the best-dressed couple!

What is UP with all the pinkness! Notice that the number of ladies' port-o-potties WAY outnumbers the men's.

I met cute doggies ...

... and Ashley's kid for the first time. He let me hug him! Aww!

Much gratitude to the 2 strangers who pulled over and helped me put on my spare tire. I clearly did not possess the muscle (nor sheer body weight) to even make the screws budge.

Grr. Theoretically knowing how to change a flat isn't enough sometimes ...

I've finally found an internet cafe where I can relieve myself of my internet drought.

Let's see if I can do a brief recap of my days so far here ...

Day 1: arrived 5:30am. Performed a few karaoke songs at Grandpa's house as soon as we got there courtesy of Uncle 2's portable karaoke harddrive enclosure loaded with Chinese MVs. Forced myself to stay up until 10pm to get over jet lag quickly.

Day 2: travelled from Grandpa's (northern TW) to Grandma's (southern TW) via regular train (5 hrs). Had stinky tofu hotpot as soon as I got there. Booyah!

Day 3: more stinky tofu. Booyahhh!!!

Day 4: .. can't remember

Day 5: rode around on a bike and probably got heat stroke. Felt kinda sick.

Day 6: karaoke'd from 10a - 5:30p. NONSTOP. 200kuai a person, unlimited nonalcoholic beverages. My grandma even joined us for our karaoke madness. Holy crap. I won't be able to karaoke again for months, hahahahaha. Saw Die Hard 4 with cousin and friends. Awesome.

Day 7: acupunctured self. Felt somewhat better. Howard arrives. More stinky tofu hotpot. Felt lots better. :)

Day ZERO of travelling was already challenging. Flight from Houston to Los Angeles was delayed for 3 hours, causing us to miss our flight to Taiwan and wait at LAX for 7.5 hours.

And what a great 7.5 hours it turned out to be. Min and Peter brought Connor up to see us, and Lily Jr. came out bringing REAL MCDEAL Chinese food. I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!

I'm currently hanging out with Grandpa and relatives here. The dynamics are interesting, as we have my very young cousins all the way up to my grandpa who is 90 this year.

There are computers for every member of my uncle's family right down to the youngest:

We went shopping because although I brought my DSLR, I managed to forget ALL my memory cards (me = moron). We also browsed the 10 Yuan store ($10 NT = $0.33 USD).

Oh, and I was singing karaoke as soon as we got back to my grandpa's. My 2nd uncle and aunt are serious about their karaoke - it's an external HD enclosure built for just this purpose that they carry around with them everywhere. OMG OMG OMG, hahahah!

When I started my day, I had ten things on my to-do list. By the end of the day, I had proudly finished these first ten things, but ... in the process of finalizing things, another ten items have been added, to be finished within the next 7.5 hours. Whee.

I'm glad I had time to grab lunch with Esther. It was so good to see her. She laughed as she tried to navigate through my to-do list: "It's a jungle!" Compared to her careful handwriting and organized note-taking, yes, my wayward chickenscratch is indeed something to wade through. At least it's organized to me. :)

See you in oh, 31 hours or so. :)

The bro has left the mom and myself back at the studio while he's taken the dad out posing as his "intern" for a half hour or so, and wasn't able to take all of us. Thought I'd take the opportunity to post a few pics from the past few days:

I broke Crystal's camera and left Howard and Crystal to fix it. :P

Oh, they're back... I think we're about to head out... check the gallery for more pics!

Running across a bridge @ Toledo's Botanical Gardens: Mom's shoe got stuck, but what was hilarious was how she stopped and said, "Caroline, I know you want to take a picture of this!"

North of Detroit, Michigan, at the tip of Lake Huron.

Crossing over into Windsor, Ontario: Imitating Rose's imitation of inanimate objects.

On a hill @ Lake Erie: That's meeeeeeeeeeeee!

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh (with random kid with afro)

Crunch-time at the studio before the newscast.

Howard demonstrates proper mic-holding technique to Dad before taking him out as his "intern" to some pre-game interviews. Yes, that is a stuffed beaver he's using as a mock microphone.

It's good to see extended family (we didn't get to see all of them, but I am grateful for the ones we could see). Four generations present here:

Proud grandparents:

First ever in-car diaper change (and fastest too!):

Wii sillyness!

*yawn* Off to the bride's house to get my makeup and hair done:

Video of me giving the groom a hard time (a Chinese custom):

My fave catch of the day:

Wedding paparazzi. The ringbearer (above) and the flower girl were excessively cute:

The newlyweds and me (like the color of my dress? hehe):

Beware the fake eyelashes that almost touch my eyebrows:

In the tunnel connecting the two buildings of the Museum of Fine Arts Houston.

After that last one where I stepped off the beaten path and into the warp zone, I got yelled at by security. Just can't take me anywhere! :)

We checked out the Masterpieces of French Painting 1800-1920 exhibit (the only American venue for this exhibit). I didn't think I would be cultured enough to enjoy it, but I really got into it. :) They have some of the images online, but there were many, many more there on display, and the accompanying audio gave a little more in-depth information about some of the paintings, such as how Van Gogh painted Cypresses whilst staying at a mental institute, and that he'd tried to commit suicide by eating his own paint, and thus was not allowed to paint for awhile. My fave was Joan of Arc, striking a deep chord of sadness within me. My least faves: some Modigliani pieces near the end of the exhibit (closer to the 1920s period) where the women looked distorted, one of them to the point of looking like she had a goiter growing on her neck ... ahem yes, anyways! Overall, it blew my mind to see the paintings up close and see the individual brush strokes of color that when viewed from afar came together as a coherent, realistic image. Man, if only I'd seen an exhibit like this during my art history class. I would have enjoyed that class a WHOLE lot more!

Oh, then I made Chi-Wei pose under this sign:

I wonder if the tiny chairs and tiny tables lend to the enjoyment of street food somehow? Maybe just brings you closer to the action?

Anyway, we're leaving in a couple hours. I will miss my relatives, my friends, the plentiful engrish, the ridiculous media, and most of all, the stinky tofu. (Above: me and my dad chowing down on the yummiest stinky tofu EVER in Kaohsiung. It was so nice and stinky, the sauce was pungent and spicy, and they piled on the marinated veggies. All for less than a buck apiece for each heaping serving. DUDE!!)

Scene: at an herbal shop here in Taiwan, telling the shop owner what herbs I wanted to make a formula for a friend. I was there with Annie, who translated for me the herbal shop owner's Taiwanese. (I only know Mandarin Chinese.)

Herbal Shop Owner (HSO) (looking over the list of herbs): OK. Please write down your name and number here for accounting purposes.
Me (a little hesitant): Uh, OK.
HSO (looking me over): I have a nephew who lives in Tennessee who is looking for a wife. You're speaking English with your friend here ... you're from the States, right? How old are you?
Me (shocked and unable to respond properly): Err ... I'm 28 ... and um ... well, I live in Texas, and Tennessee is rather far from Texas, sir.
HSO: But it's in the United States, and that's where he is.
Me: Well, the United States is pretty big, sir - see, if this is the U.S. (drawing a big circle in the air), then Tennessee is here, and Texas is here.
HSO: Ah ... so it's like mainland China?
Me: Yes, sort of like that, yes sir.
HSO: Well, he's looking for a girl who's tall and skinny like you.
Me: Uh, well, uh, haha, well sir, I know I'm kinda skinny, but I'm definitely not tall.
HSO: Sure you are! You're taller than I am! (He steps around the counter to stand beside me, and indeed I am taller than him by like 1 cm.) My nephew is like 10 cm taller than me. And he's a [insert profession here, I can't remember what it was]. He is having a hard time finding a girlfriend over there.
Me (just trying to think of things to say ... and just wanting my herbs so I can get out of here!): Oh well sir, um, I'm glad you think I'm worthy. (What the hell was I thinking?!)
HSO: You guys would be great together. I can give you his contact information, and you two can be friends.
Me: Oh, no thank you sir, that's okay. Well, thanks for the herbs (FINALLY!!), bye!
HSO (as we're literally running out the door, shouting after us): Hey!! He makes 400,000 a month!!!

Me (in English): Girl, I'm feeling weak. Can I get a warm drink somewhere?
Alex (also in English): Sure, um, hmm, they'll have 'em at a 7-11. But, I don't know where they are around here ...
Me (in Chinese to some random people): Excuse me, do you know if there's a 7-11 around here somewhere? (The key part of the blooper here is that I said "7-11" in Chinese as well, like pronouncing the individual numbers, "qi1 shi2 yi1")
Random people (in Chinese): What?
Me (louder, trying to pronounce more clearly, in Chinese): Is there a 7-11 around here? A 7-11? (How are they not understanding such simple Chinese?! My Chinese isn't THAT bad!!)
Random people (with totally confused looks on their faces): Hunh?
Alex (intervening): Oh, she means a Seven-Eleven (pronouncing 7-11 in English).
Random people: OHHHHHHH there's one right over there.

=====

Alex: They call them just Seven-Elevens here, or people even just call them "Seven"s. For example, "Where's the Seven?"
Me (stunned): OK. I feel stupid. There I was almost shouting "7-11" at them in Chinese like they were retards.

[ Chinese website (cuter) ] [ N. American website ]

=====

Onto my mission for today - I want to get my stuff all moved over to my uncle's place, somewhat slightly closer to the "action". My goal is to get there without fainting. Feeling much better though. Onwards with my strict Super Supau diet!

So I landed in Taiwan on Friday, participated in the obligatory drinking for Alan's bday, and then Saturday toured around some and ate whatever vegetarian street food I could lay my hands on. Come Sunday, starting bright and early (5 am-ish) I came down with sumpin' truly terrible - basically, it was a 19+ hour ordeal all day fighting unwanted and violent fluid loss. I shall leave out the gory details. I have trained my non-TCM friends in some modalities (no, not the actual act of needling - I have yet to trust any non-TCM friends with needling me), and they have been so so kind in playing nurse to my weak Americanized @$$. (Oh yes, the s*** and @$$ jokes will be going for awhile.) That's me at the right, laying face down, getting some treatment.

Today I thought I was feeling better and was going to do some sightseeing - Tina hooked me up with all these great Taipei travel tips before coming here - but I was sidetracked by light-headedness and general malaise. I *finally* went out tonight for a bit, fulfilled my wish to ride the MRT system by myself, but after running one errand, I promptly went home and, sick of my pitiful condition, asked my friends to take me to the hospital. I have been prescribed, if you can believe it, Super Supau (a type of sports drink), and no food for the next 2 days, along with some meds. Lovely.

Looks like my mission to gain lots of weight and eat stinky tofu at every turn has experienced a major setback.

Some pics are uploading here. Don't know why the comments aren't showing up. Grr. Will fix that later. I'm gonna let 'em upload, finish up tonight's dose of Super Supau, and hit the sack.

I saw Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna ("Never Say Goodbye") this weekend with my Indian connection. (No, I won't even pretend to know how to pronounce that; I purchased tickets by pointing at the poster and asking, "Is that the latest Shahrukh Khan movie about the extramarital affair? Three please!")

It's 3.5 hours long, including a short 5-minute intermission. But man, I loved it. I am totally taken by the Bollywood song-and-dance thing. So far there has only been one Bollywood movie that I didn't like.

All the actors and actresses in the movie are hella fine. Shahrukh Khan is the classic hottie; Preity Zinta is, well, really pretty (SRK and PZ are in the pic to the right); as is Rani Mukherji (girl at left). Twists in the plot all the way until the end. Made me sad and pensive afterwards because it made me think about love, even though the movie's thesis seems to be that true love conquers all. Argh ...

Oh, and if you plan on seeing it, don't read the Wikipedia entry for the movie - it gives it all away. (Does writing this make you want to read the Wikipedia entry? Heh)

Side note: I forgot to say how I usually resist going to movies with friends, since with what precious time we have, no actual bonding / catching up occurs. (On the other hand, watching rented movies at home is awesome since you can be as loud as you want, eat whatever, etc.) But I'll make an exception for Bollywood movies. Not only did I enjoy the movie immensely, especially bonding was our unanimous hissing at the kids to hush up. Not that I needed to hear the movie (I was reading the subtitles) but c'mon - the dude and the chick are about to kiss and make sweet passionate love - and there are kids running around and screaming their heads off. Parents, either get yourselves a babysitter, or get your kids to shut the bleep up!

My favorite photo from the weekend (stolen from the sexy V). We had to flirt with the Crome bouncer more than I would've liked, but hey, he was kinda cute in a Russell Crowe-ish kinda way, so it wasn't SO bad. :P

I haven't been clubbing in forever. My hair and makeup and clothes and shoes (basically, my extreme makeover) was courtesy of V. That was fun! Thanks girl!

Boo! I'm alive! :)

Last post, I was gearing up for "IT". "IT" meant my friend Wanda's wedding up in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. I survived:
- photo duties
- wedding slideshow duties
- toast duty

I had fun, in a masochistic kind of way. :) By the end of the night, the camera was getting SO heavy, so I put it down (gasp!) and strutted my stuff on the dance floor, in my bare feet. I haven't strutted my stuff in AGES. It felt good. :)

Post-wedding, you could say I got digital burnout. I needed to process the pics, but didn't feel like it. Well, I have to, so I'll be getting around to it sooner or later. I'll post up something real later, but here are a few of my favorite shots that day:

having the maid of honour* and close friends pose with the groom

jumping for joy

groom getting a head start on some butt gropage while dancing

*Hey, the wedding was in Canada, eh?

Thanks to Eddy for the tip! Vienna Teng is coming to town again, Sunday, August 6th, 8pm, probably to pimp her newest album. It's $16 a head, with a hefty $5.15 "convenience charge" per ticket. Since there is no advantage to ordering tickets together (doesn't save on the convenience charge, doesn't guarantee sitting together), I won't be doing any organizing (phew!) and just be giving everyone a heads up on the concert via Evite. Yes, my pretties, this means you'll have to buy your own tix. :) You can do it online or in stores. No savings at Ticketmaster outlets - I'd say just get 'em shipped then (I think there's a free shipping option). I've become a big fan of 1) not wasting time driving somewhere, 2) not wasting gas driving somewhere, 3) not wasting breath and sanity dealing with rude customer service people. Ah yes. The joys of internet transactions!

I'll be sending out an Evite to people, just to get an idea of who's going.

Details on Vienna's website here.

Buy tickets now by clicking here.

Some pics from her last visit here.

Hmm. Vienna has spikes of glowing light emanating from her head in this poster.

Update: OK, I just tried to purchase a ticket. In addition to the $5.15 convenience charge per ticket, there's a $4.93 "order processing charge" that is apparently PER order. So maybe there IS some advantage to purchasing in bulk. Well, it'd be worth it if 2 or 3 people purchase together. Anyone wanna piggy back with me on the order?

I came home from my little excursion last weekend with a cold and legs massively covered in red bug bites. My best friend right now is a bottle of Benadryl anti-itch gel. MUST ... NOT ... SCRATCH!!!!!! AHHHHH!!!!

Pics (and a video clip) here from the Vienna Teng show May 9th here in Houston at The Mucky Duck (again). This time we had the biggest table in the house, hee hee (yay for Evite!). There was some organizational ability needed just because 1) by the time I found out about the show there were only 4 days left, 2) I ended up with 20 people coming (WAY above my expectations!), 3) the ticket pre-purchase could only be done in person, and 4) I'd gotten mixed up about when the show was going to start. But in the end, thanks to Will going and grabbing tickets for me, everything went without a hitch. Otherwise, I would've gone mad. :)

Hope everyone enjoyed it as much as I did, and to those who didn't go, these pics will just have to tide you over until she next comes to town. Her new CD is available for pre-order. Her first two albums, Waking Hour and Warm Strangers, are both available on Amazon.com, complete with sound samples. Will has already picked up both albums; anyone else? :)

Small world this is. Turns out Dakao knows Vienna's best friend's brother. Ah yes, knowing everyone within 6 degrees ... And, turns out Vienna remembered me from meeting her a couple years ago through Eric (I really didn't expect her to, after a gazillion meals with tons of "warm strangers", I'm sure) and we ended up exchanging some friendly banter after the show.

While I'm plugging away - hey NY and L.A. peoples - she will be performing at a venue near you in June! Go see go see!

Last chance for VT ticket reservations with me would be Tuesday, May 9th, 10am. I'm lovin' the last-minute eVite responses. Hope I can get the tickets that morning! You won't regret going!

I am pooped.

That hot shower was MUCH needed.

Goodnight!

My whirlwind tour of SoCal went something like this:

Thursday, Nov. 10:
3:30p - arrive at LAX
5:30p - finally pick up rental car after waiting for 2 hrs (Rent Rite is cheap but argh, it was frustrating)
6:30p - dinner with friend (Rowland Heights)
8:30p - meeting up with friends at friend's home (Anaheim)
1:00a - getting back to cousin's place to sleep (Aliso Viejo)

Friday, Nov. 11th:
8a - meet in Buena Park to run errands with bride-to-be
12p - casual lunch with bride-to-be's parents and relatives
2p - run errands for bride-to-be (Buena Park)
3p - meet up with friend for coffee (Garden Grove)
6:30p - spontaneous dinner with friend and his wife since they happened to be in the area
8:30p - salsa dance lesson at Cal State LA and free dancing (LA?)
11p - out for snacks and food with friends (San Gabriel)
2a - get to friend's house to sleep after missing the exit several times (Rowland Heights)

Saturday, Nov. 12th:
10:30a - breakfast with friend and his wife (Fullerton)
1:45p - meet in Buena Park to carpool to wedding reception location to help set up
3p - start help setting up at restaurant (San Gabriel)
5:40p - get dressed for wedding reception
6p - wedding reception begin
11p - clean-up; head back to Buena Park
1a - back at friend's place to sleep (Rowland Heights)

Sunday, Nov. 13th:
9a - breakfast with friends (Irvine)
1p - 9p - hang out with cousin's in-laws, witness her brother-in-law's daughter learn to ride a bike without training wheels for the very first time (Burbank?)
11p - 2a - hang out with cousins (Aliso Viejo)

Monday, Nov. 14th:
SLEEP IN UNTIL 10:00AM (MUCH NEEDED)
10:20a - breakfast at home with cousins while practicing Chinese together
11:20a - meet Mr. Syndromes for the first time and have boba (Laguna Hills, Irvine)
2:20p - check out friend's new apartment (Laguna Hills)
2:50p - leave for LAX
3:50p - majorly stressing in traffic on the 405 freeway
4:15p - return rental car; got one day free after talking with manager about pickup frustration
4:25p - shuttle arrives
4:35p - arrive at airport
4:40p - arrive at gate, all sweaty and gross
4:55p - depart LA

Next time I will leave earlier. Yes I know, I stressed myself out for no reason. Thank goodness it all worked out.

I really felt like I got a lot done during this trip. I got to see and spend time with loved ones (and meet some new people too!). Thanks to everyone who set aside time to hang out with me and/or provide accommodations! Feelin' da love ...

Oh, the pictures. Tons 'n tons of pictures. Ahhhhh ...

Oops. Passed out from exhaustion last night after a long day at work (yay, but tiring). I have 3 hours to pack and get my act together. Here goes!

Dude, I did it! I finished a 28-mile bike ride participating in the Tour De Doughnut!

I only ate 4 doughnuts. I think that's probably the upper limit at which they still taste good.

Ow, my arse.

I was too tired to go to the Hallowe'en parade, so I just went to a little costume gathering tonight.

It was nice.

I gave a girl a lap dance as an upcoming birthday gift for her - as per her request.

Someone threw up at the end of the night but it wasn't me. Whoa.

I'm now peeling everything off and showering and washing all this gunk out of my hair and getting all the makeup off my face so I can just collapse. Into. Bed.

Yay for an extra hour of sleep.

It has been a trying couple of days. I have reason to believe I left my brain at home before I went to Austin ...

missed IH-35 on the way up to Austin to Wei's place. How the hell did I do that?!

got a parking ticket downtown for being 8 minutes late to my parking meter. My walk-in appeals hearing did not help.

locked myself out of car. Did not know where keys were, if they were in the car, or what.

friend Sharon was telling me she was going to buy a bus ticket to come back to Houston this weekend. I went with her to purchase her round-trip bus ticket. Only 30 seconds after she purchased it did it occur to me that she could easily just ride home with me.

on my way back to Houston, when getting on SH-71, had a TOTAL brainfart and went WEST instead of EAST!!! Wasted 2 hours going the wrong way in bad traffic before realizing what I had done. What. The. Hell.

left my hoodie at Sharon's house after dropping her off and going in briefly to say hi to her parents.

The silver lining:

missed IH-35 on my way up, but turns out I did not stray too far and easily rectified the situation.

found free parking on University Avenue today.

Oscar came home from work just to help me out. Movers passing by spent time trying to help me out. Really felt the love. And while Oscar was helping me out, he got a call saying their offer on their new home was accepted!!

1 minute after checking with the apt leasing office lost 'n found, a couple of ladies found my keys laying around in the grass and turned them in!

the bus ticket purchase is good anytime in the next year.

because we went the wrong way, we got cool pics of bad traffic and weird things in the back of trucks. And had plenty of time to chat.

I'll be able to retrieve my hoodie tomorrow when I go check out my Sharon's dad's sunglasses shop for the first time. And hopefully pick up some cool shades for my tiny noggin.

just felt really loved because so many people took time out to chill with me. I even got "serenaded" by the wonderfully talented and candid Howard (Chi-Wei's bro) - I love it when people play stuff for me (Windows Media Video, 2min 44sec, 5.3Mb).

overall just loved the radiating energy of being around younger people on campus, bonding with kids who are now all grown up, and catching up with Wei.

Three hours of driving almost nonstop in a lot of total darkness listening to nothing but the drone of the road rolling under me and my munching of Doritos is strangely therapeutic.

So, to the few people I still know in Austin, I'm around for a couple days. So if you see a little Asian girl who looks about seven years old, possibly on rollerblades, taking goofy pictures of herself around UT, that'd be me.

A friend just invited me to participate in The Tour de Doughnut - "The Sweetest Bike Ride in Texas!". Hahahah.

From the website:
"The Tour de Doughnut is a unique bicycle race where riders embark on an appetizing 28-mile journey beginning at the Katy Mills Mall with rest stops along the way serving as many delectable doughnuts as you can eat.

For EACH tasty donut that a rider consumes, the rider is awarded a tempting 5-minute time credit.

Eat enough delicious doughnuts, and you can finish the race before you even started!"

So, being the nerd I am, I broke out the spreadsheet and calculated how many doughnuts I'd have to eat to make my bike ride come out to zero minutes, going by my 5min/km rate that I was going at while riding all the time in China.

I would only have to eat 45 doughnuts for my 28-mile journey to come out to zero minutes.

...

As much as I like Krispy Kreme doughnuts, I'm gonna have to give a big EWWWW to that.

Dude. Hallowe'en parade with prizes (thanks Angie for the tip!). Gotta start thinkin' about a cool costume that won't break the bank. Hmmmmmmm.

My legs hurt - I'm hobbling around like I'm 200 years old. My arms hurt when I try to massage my legs. When I pick my nose, there's dried mud up in there. When I swab my ears, there's dried mud up in there. When I wipe my ass ... actually, it's pretty clean up in there.

But who cares ... because I FINISHED THE MUD RUN!!! WHAZZZZZZAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!

OK pplz, here are the pics (and a video too!) from the mud run! =) Much thanks to Dave for going and taking all the photos for us!

I'm in Conway, Arkansas! =) Hugh and Mimi put my name on the marquee! Hahahaha. Pics to come. I've been eating nonstop. I have challenged them to put the pounds on me. Tonite is when I'll actually be helping out in the restaurant (Mr. Stirfry). Muahahahahaaaaa ... they'll be sorry they ever let me

Just got back from Tahoe / San Jose. I'm so tired and sore. Anyhoo, we went to Northstar Resort. Weather was sunny! Conditions were kinda slushy, but that made falling a lot less painful. =) I kinda got some "skillz" this time around, so check out my pics page with action video. =) And here's my first panorama attempt, taken of the San Luis Reservoir on the way home:

I 1) cooked, and 2) exercised. Wow, what's wrong with me. =) Biked 8 miles total in SoCal traffic =) Attempted monkey bars and chin ups with dismal results and young children laughing at me, but I will try again!!! Must get in shape for the Annual Camp Pendleton Mud Run. So I'm crazy. Don't you know that by now? =)

2 days ago marked 3 yrs that Pooh has put up with me. Yay! I didn't post up here because I think that Pooh checks my webpage more often than he checks his own, and thus would have gotten wind of what I'd done to his webpage. Thanks to all those who signed his guestbook, he got a big kick out of all of your humorous comments! If you haven't signed yet, do it!
I briefly checked out the Getty's Museum today. It was cool! My favorite piece was "Eternal Feminine" by Paul Cezanne ... cuz the central character in that piece is ME, baby! (except I'd be clothed, thank you very much)
EnVaDoR, my gracious host for this webpage, has outdone himself again with his case-designing antics. Check it out! Crrrrrazy!

Went skiing at Mammoth Mountain today by myself. It was so awesome. So all of those who didn't go ... too bad! MUAHAHAHAAA!! heheh. The drive sucked, but after getting there everything went SMOOTH. It had just snowed the night before so there was tons of fresh ungroomed powder... nice weather ... AW YEAH. Got a lift ticket cheap from a lady who'd just bought it but after one run had injured her ankle! And being by myself, I became much more extroverted than usual. I found myself chatting with my lift chair-mates, and even hung out with this guy for a couple runs before I accidentally lost him. (Pooh asked me if I was having to fend the men off with a stick the whole time, hehehee). Boy did it feel good to be skiing again!