The Valentine’s Date

Finally! I just finished back-to-back midterms, so I’m done for the next couple of weeks. Which means I have time to blog!

Over the past week, I’ve begun to be stricter with myself. I’ve been able to work out routinely, avoid junk food, and make time for reading every night before I sleep. I’ve also been studying like crazy. However, I didn’t feel so stressed out during the week, which I think can be truly attributed to working out. It feels so good. I will say that after the tests, I just want to die, but that’s beside the point. I can’t wait to graduate to free up more time, maybe get a gym membership and actually go, and research about nutrition and the body.

Now, this may sound contradictory, but I want to fill you guys in on some really good food I discovered over the weekend. It’s called crawfish fried rice and it’s a dish from my sister’s co-worker’s restaurant. And it is so good, my mouth is watering. Since I live at home, I have a very dependent lifestyle- whatever my parents cook or bring home, I will eat. This isn’t always necessarily healthy, but I am avoiding things that I know are unhealthy like fast food and junk food. Crawfish fried rice is cajun fried rice, onions, lettuce, sausage, and small pieces of crawfish. It’s like Boiling Crab with rice!

Sunday was the Grammy Awards, one of the best award shows out there! My favorite part was when Kate Beckinsale (who was randomly there) presented Katy Perry and said “she can shoot fireworks out of her boobs”. LOL. I liked the Beach Boys + Maroon 5 + Foster the People, the Foo Fighters, Kelly Clarkson and Jason Aldean, and Nicki Minaj’s performances.

But I thought I’d chime in about a few things because it’s healthy to argue, speak up with my opinions, and listen to others’ opinions (no matter how wrong they are, hehe).

Paul McCartney: People are getting so upset and outraged over the fact that people don’t know who he is. What did you expect? They’re kids who don’t listen to the same music you did. Get over it. Everyone has different taste in music and music is so fluid that its popularity changes constantly. Some people think they’re so cultured because they listen to old school stuff and not the chart-toppers. Who cares? Get over yourself, you pomp. Enjoy your music and let other people enjoy theirs.

Chris Brown: I believe that everyone deserves forgiveness. However, I just don’t think Chris Brown is sorry for what he did. I respect the opinions of those who cannot forgive him and at the same time, I respect those that are able to still appreciate his talent. Unfortunately, I read the report that detailed the things he did to Rihanna that night, and it’s appalling. I don’t support him, but I don’t think he should be unable to do anything ever again.

Monday (yesterday), I was studying, when suddenly, my laptop was acting strange and my iTunes got deleted and then all of the sudden, Tumblr stopped working. I don’t know what I’m more sad about. I’m so obsessive-compulsive that I have to have all my music organized. Now everything is deleted so I have to reorganize everything. I guess this is a good opportunity to delete music I don’t listen to and make everything extremely organized. Yay! I’m excited now, but it will take a long time. I also handed in my letter of resignation to the Tumblr Gods. I’ll be back one day…

Today is Valentine’s Day! And you may be wondering from the title, WHAT?! But don’t you worry about it…

I do think everyone should be surrounded by those that they love on this day and be happy. I see stuff online saying “A girl should be treated like this every day” or “You call it Valentine’s Day, I call it Tuesday”, which is so stupid. Just because you’re not celebrating with a significant other doesn’t mean you need to get dramatic and be so against it. Today is about celebrating the love, to actually take time out of the year to show it. Instead of being a sad single person, go enjoy the day with your friends and celebrate that way. Instead of being cynical and bitter, you should accept the fact that this day is for couples who want to express their love for one another. Or just ignore it altogether and treat it like a normal day. After all, we don’t celebrate every holiday there is.

As for me and the rest of my night, I finally have time to catch up on shows (namely, The Walking Dead), download the Mass Effect 3 demo, download some music, finish editing my photos, read, and have a fun time. So excited to relax!

I’m not beyond hate or judgment, so don’t take this as I think that I’m better than everyone. I’m just trying to take a more enlightened approach to things in life. Work on yourself before you try to change the whole world.

The Skid Marks

Wow, I haven’t done one of these in a long time. Mainly because I don’t eat at the commons anymore so there aren’t fortune cookies in my everyday life. But I got one from Panda Express yesterday. PS Happy February!

IF YOUR DESIRES ARE NOT EXTRAVAGANT, THEY WILL BE GRANTED

So it’s saying that if I stay simple then I can get what I want. I find this to be logical and a bit obvious. After all, if you’re not reaching for greatness, you will remain mediocre. However, I can see the other side of this, where the positive spin is that if you aren’t greedy, you will be happy.

Hm, I know they meant the latter statement as the main fortune, but I couldn’t help but to think the former statement as the first thing that popped into my head. The word “desires” in this fortune is rather ambiguous, which leads me to my general confusion about the statement. I would like to take this both ways as a reminder to myself: don’t have extravagant physical desires, yet do have extravagant goals.

So. Generally, I get into a lot of near-death car experiences. This is in slight part due to the fact that I drive really fast. But mainly, it’s due to the incompetence that surrounds me. I have been trying to work on my road rage, though. And by “trying to work on”, I really just mean trying to relax when I realize I’m going crazy in the car by myself. At the same time, I feel the need. The need for speed. And by that I mean that I liken myself to Ryan Gosling’s character in Drive at all times. But seriously, it’s not one of those situations where I can say, “It’s not you, it’s me”. No. I am one with my car (she’s my Eidolon…Gestalt Mode! OMG I’m still in FFXIII mode). It’s really you.

Anyway, I usually don’t discuss these stories (mainly because it will just sound like me complaining or repetitive stories of me trolling people who tailgate, etc.), but this one was intense. This morning I was late-ish to class, so I was going down the freeway at a decent speed higher than most. And so this person stuck in traffic in the lane next to me decides to swerve into my lane. I pumped my brakes, but I guess at the last second, they didn’t realize I was there, so they start swerving back into their lane. But it wasn’t a clean swerve. I think the car in front of them had not moved at all, so this person was basically swerving back and forth in the same spot and the screeching was really loud and they were moving fast but at the same time, not moving at all. And then the seconds passed and I moved past them in slow motion.

Too bad the story has nothing to do with the fortune cookie, otherwise I would have been all like DUN DUN DUN! But wait! As my 12th grade English teacher Mrs. Jewel Kamita would tell me, “Can you just pull things out of your ass and find connections that aren’t there?” YES I CAN. So my sole desire at that moment was get to class on time (this is probably a problem in itself for most of you because no one else seems to care to be on time…and this sounded really passive aggressive but that’s not how I meant it…I just feel I’m the only one that is psychotic enough to always have to arrive to class ahead of time and I’m really paranoid, so I have to be extra early on test days). And since it was a relatively simple (read: non-extravagant) desire, it was granted! I got to class a few minutes early without dying in a terrible accident. Phew. Knock on wood.

I don’t know if I explained that well at all. Just know that it was exciting.

Drive.

The Dragonfruit

Yesterday, we celebrated the New Year, even though we were almost a week late. I don’t know what the reason was, but it doesn’t matter what or when I’m celebrating with family…as long as I see them to enjoy their company. It was hot out, but I of course had to wear my hoodie to cover up the tattoo. Matthew and I also bought  The Hundreds hats because they were having a 50% off sale. I finally got the hat I wanted! Spending money before we got any? Yes. A lot of Asian food. We played board games and app games and had a fun time.

I feel like children are sometimes smarter than I give them credit for. We can actually hold a pretty stable game of Pictionary even though the age groups varied so drastically. Time went quickly.

But something amazing happened. And I’ve never heard of this happening before. I was playing Fruit Ninja and in the middle of the action, a lone dragonfruit glides across the screen in slow motion. My brain didn’t even realize it was a unique fruit until after my finger slashed it up. But anyway, after I cut it, the screen read “Ultrarare fruit +50″. What the fuck?! Okay, so I guess I’m the only one that was actually excited about this. I thought it was pretty cool.

This weekend, I put off doing homework in lieu of other stuff. This was in part due to the fact that the homework wasn’t pressing and I could put it off. It was also due to my newfound desire to play old videogames. After playing Arkham Asylum, I was looking at my (rather small) collection of games. I pretty got all the trophies I wanted for all of them. Except one! Final Fantasy XIII.

On a tangent, I kind of miss the days when I could spend hours after school playing videogames. I would put hundreds of hours into a game and be able to do everything and play it many times over. I don’t really have that luxury anymore and although it’s depressing, it has also allowed me to (1) explore other avenues of fun and (2) stop wasting money I don’t have on new games. I’m still waiting for Arkham City to go down to $20.

Anyway, back to Final Fantasy XIII, a game that occupied a lot of time on this blog, a game that I got almost 2 years ago and I remember I was so excited for it that I had to have it right away. And then I also bought Pokemon: SoulSilver around the same time. Gosh, all that money gone…As for FFXIII, I only beat it once and then grinded until I maxed out all my characters and then left it on the shelf. Unlike with other games (more specifically, other FF games), I didn’t feel the urge to replay it again for a multitude of reasons. But I did still have a few trophies that I thought I might be able to get. I finally got one that was plaguing my subconscious for the past 2 years- Adamant Will. Yes, I finally found a good strategy to use to slay a Long Gui! No one understands my excitement. So then, I decided that I should go after the other trophy (the one where I get 5 stars on all the missions). Sadly (because it won’t last as long as I thought) and not sadly (because I should be spending my time more wisely), I am almost finished with all of them. They were easier than I thought, I don’t remember why I didn’t attempt them. As for the last trophy, I will sadly not be going for this one (the one where I have to get all the items or something). It would take too much time and I would have to start over (without New Game+, what the fuck) and be weak for a majority of the game. I tend to be a trophy whore, but I’m not that hardcore.

So yeah. That’s what I did all weekend. No more games for me!

I also had a dream last night about something apparently really awesome and then I remember saying in the dream that I can’t wait to blog about it. But then I woke up and didn’t remember what it was and then I also realized that something amazing didn’t actually happen. Aww man, dream blog beats real blog…

Update: I just spent the last 5 hours trying to get the last couple missions. So difficult! But anyway, yeah, I’m L’Cie Paragon. Jealous? You shouldn’t be. That was a waste of time. Okay, now I’m done. Phew, that will hold me for a few more months before I have to hold and use a PS3 controller again.

The Year of the Dragon

Happy Vietnamese New Year! The new year came early this year, so I guess the year of the cat was cut short. This is going to be a great year for me, I can already tell. Wow, year of the dragon. Gonna be as great as the new millenium, right? I get to turn 21 this year too (along with billions of other people, but whatever), so that’s pretty cool. Looks like I just typed “year” a lot.

I played games for the first time in a long time. Of course, since I can’t afford new games, I just played Arkham Asylum (I played this during the new year of the tiger too. Yup, still impossibly difficult), and the FFXIII-2 demo. So excited for new games soon…maybe…I realized that I put a lot of my leisure time into reading, which is a nice alternative to gaming.

I also started wearing my last pair of contacts I have before I go back to the optometrist next month. I realized I’ve been wearing glasses a lot lately…for the past couple of months. They’re so comfortable and I guess I only need contacts for cutting my hair (which I did this weekend, too).

Saturday was gloomy. I studied and then went to the Getty with APO. So cold. So much art. So cold.

Sunday was another story.

I don’t know the exact moment where I decided I actually wanted to get inked, but it has officially happened. I had a list of ideas probably around the time I turned 19, but I never got around to deciding officially. During the year of being 19, I decided I wanted a quote that I try to live my life by as my first tattoo. Earlier this month, I started designing what I wanted it to look like. It changed drastically from its infancy- I started out wanting on my ribs, but then I thought the quote by itself would look plain. So I wanted to add a design to it. I added a dragon and moved it to my back. As I was looking at dragon designs, I found one that I thought was really cool, and decided it would look better larger and by itself (as my next tattoo).

So I moved my quote to my bicep, and combined with my other tattoo idea: bats. I started finalizing the font, the design of the bats, and the placement of the bats around the words. Last week, my sister and I went into White Lotus tattoo to show them our designs and get our price quotes. We went back a day later to set an appointment.

And we arrive to Sunday. I was pretty nervous, and as a first-timer, I didn’t really know what to expect. But I had the support of 3LP (NLP?), so all was well. Fast forward past the brutal waiting time. The first poke of the needle was pretty intense, like teeth-grinding, eye-closing intensity. It was around the inner elbow, so I guess that’s why it was so painful. And then everything else was pretty fine except the part closer to the armpit also hurt and the bottom-most part close to the back of the arm. It hurt more than I thought it would, but it wasn’t unbearable. My hand got really numb, which was a cool feeling. I always like the out-of-body feeling of numbness. Anyway, I was pretty much zoning out of all the conversations and just looking up into the light. I found my mind wandering to wondering which part of the tattoo he was working on at the current moment. My hands got sweaty throughout the ordeal.

It was over in about an hour. He said that it was a pretty precise font that he may have messed up if I wasn’t so still. I was surprised I did stay so still, as I thought I was probably shaking. But when I looked at the finished product in the mirror, I was so amazed and happy at the way it turned out. It is so beautiful. I do have to applaud people who get large, detailed, intricate tattoos and sit for hours at a time…and even more, those that get them in sensitive body areas.

The next few weeks will be crucial in taking care of it and having to maneuver around my parents. To reveal or not to reveal? When would be a good time? How should I do it? I can keep it hidden for the most part, but we will see.

Anyway, I cannot wait to get my next tattoo!

The meaning behind the tattoo (here comes the cheese!):

My life motto is to “be your own hero”. It mainly has to do with self-actualization. I think it’s great to have people who you look up to- heroes. I have many. But at the end of the day, I have to do what makes me happy; I want to be proud of the person I am. I try to be my own hero every day. Getting it tattooed where I can look at it every day in the mirror just emphasizes it for me. The bats have a lot of symbolism. For me, mainly it’s about the fact that change/adaptation/transition/growth is nothing new to life and I love to embrace change, whether it comes by chance or whether I strive to change. I always try to change for the better. Overall, it’s a subtle homage to Batman, one of my heroes. Like Batman, I would like to know my fears and address them rather than run from them. Also, the font is Gotham bold.

Gosh, I love my tattoo. And I know I will love all my future tattoos as long as they represent something important to me. My arm is sore.

Like right after it was finished.

The Immortals

A highlight of the weekend was, sadly if you think about it too long, watching the movie, Immortals. It thrust me back into my love for Greek mythology. Sometimes, I can forget some of my interests when dealing with real life. Hmm. Makes me think. Also, did you know that The Hunger Games trilogy, like this film, is also based on the Greek myth of Theseus and the minotaur? Cool story, bro.

The first week of school wasn’t too bad. I’ve just been getting used to the schedule. So far, things have been pretty chill because there are no tests. I’ve missed seeing people I know on campus, saying hi, and sitting with people in class. Yay for school, right?! I’ll be singing another tune in a couple of weeks! But thank the gods of Olympus for this three-day weekend…it’s kind of like weaning myself off of winter break slowly.

Some pretty major shit has gone down in the past week.

I got into Public Health Sciences as my new major. Promptly after it was approved, I applied for graduation this summer. It’s very official, and there’s no turning back. It’s pretty set in stone, but I’m going to the counselor to make sure next week. It’s kind of a weird feeling because I’ve been planning for this for a year now, but it’s now done. Now, it feels like everything is happening so fast. There is no time ever! ..I’m sure you guys have probably heard all this from me over and over in the past few months. Please excuse it all, I’m just pretty excited/anxious.

I put other hobbies aside for the moment to design my first tattoo. There were a lot of drafts and a lot of drastic changes, but I’ve finally settled with what I want. I already have the rough designs for my second, third, and fourth tattoos as well! I’m going to get addicted to inking myself…but only on the left side! I’m keeping my right half pristine, I’ve decided. It’s weird, every time I think of a new tattoo, I think how cool it’d look on the left side of my body. I really do believe that tattooing is so beautiful if done correctly, so I want my body to be a canvas for beautiful ink to stay forever. I’ve been wanting tattoos since I turned 18; it’s been a long time coming, but finally, I’m planning on getting it within the next couple of weeks.

Since the world my undergraduate career is ending, I also started inventorying my old textbooks. And I’ve become addicted to online selling almost as much as online shopping! I had a stack of high school AP/SAT/ACT/IB test-prep books that I plan to donate to the library. However, I am keeping my biology/chemistry textbooks from college that may be useful in the future. What I plan on selling is all the books from GE courses. It’s crazy how much books cost. I spent ~$500 on “useless” textbooks, used them for a quarter, and now have them laying around to sell. I put them up on Amazon, and so far, have had a return rate of ~50%, selling the majority of them within the first 24 hours (which surprised me, as I didn’t think any of them would sell). The return rate is pretty sad, but hey- any money back is good, I guess. It just sucks when a newer edition has come out and the book you bought is now worth nothing. Mainly, the books from my favorite class have quickly been sold. This class is Classics 45A, all about Rome mythology. It was a lot of reading, but it was so fun. Good memories. I sat around reminiscing for a while…

With the recent earnings from selling books, I finally purchased a…new laptop battery! It will be here soon. But can you just imagine…no more slaving away by running to classes, being super early, and being alone…just to sit by an outlet! Oh, the sacrifices I will no longer have to make. Yes, this is a big deal to me because it’s annoying that my laptop only lasts 7 minutes without being plugged in. Something dire may happen where I will need my laptop but it will have died. Luckily, it hasn’t happened yet. But anyway…this battery lasted a solid 3.25 years, so I’m happy about that. Let’s hope this new battery has long life.

Life feels pretty great right now. It’s moments like these that I want to keep with me for the rest of my life. I feel like I am accomplishing stuff.

The First School Day of the Year

It’s funny how the first day back at school already brings so much stress. It is sometimes hard for me to focus on the now, as I’m always planning ahead for any complications. This causes me to be so stressed out. Everything’s pretty much hitting me so quickly. I guess I let myself forget everything over break…

I finally checked my grades today from last quarter. They were good, but my GPA barely went up. And I had a panic attack because by the time I graduate, my GPA won’t be competitive at all. I’m so worried. And no, I’m not going to stay at UCI for another year taking “easy” classes to boost my GPA, because in the end: it won’t do much and it’s a waste of time and money. People who want to boost their GPA by staying and taking random classes are stupid because for grad school, overall GPA doesn’t matter as much as major-related GPA. My science GPA sucks. I should have tried harder. I have also been conflicted with taking the easier classes and teachers over taking classes that I want to take even though they are challenging. My GPA suffered and will suffer, which sucks. But I’m not in college to take useless classes just because they’re an easy A. It’s an internal conflict that has external repercussions.

In addition, I applied to change my major finally. I’ve been working at this for a good year now, I think. Inception seems like so long ago. Hopefully this all works out. Once it’s official, I can apply for graduation. And then I have to talk to a counselor to make sure everything is on track.

I had one class today. And it’s probably going to be my hardest class this quarter (or ever?). It’s already stressing me out and I have so many tests this quarter in all my classes, and everything overlaps and I’m going to die. And then I have to worry about getting textbooks…get older editions for cheaper? Order online and wait for it to get here? I already have so much reading and I will be behind for a couple of weeks. Tests start in a couple of weeks. Shit. I’ve been planning out my weekly schedules so I can make sure I’m on track and routinize everything so I can get used to this schedule.

And I have to apply to jobs still to get a job this quarter. Don’t even get me started on this.

I’m graduating soon (hopefully). There’s a lot of stuff I still want to do while I’m still around. I hope I have time to fit in all this stuff and stop to smell these hypothetical roses before it’s too late. I don’t want my youth to pass me by. On that note, I feel like taking more than one year off before I go to grad school. I think that’s what I want to do, because I shouldn’t rush things. On top of that, I’m graduating soon and there’s so much I need to do before going to grad school. I don’t know how my parents will feel about this.

I’m so fucking stressed out with all this stuff running through my mind. It’s too late to redo all this stuff, so I got to look forward and hope for the best MAKE IT ALL HAPPEN. I think it’s time to get that inspirational tattoo I’ve wanted.

Just a little bit of problems to start the quarter. Sigh.

The Beginning

This is my first post as a 20 year old. What a milestone! I feel…so old. Just kidding. I feel pretty much the same, though I did have some nice revelations over break…perfectly in time for the new year. I guess I can start my resolutions on Monday because that’s when school starts. I know, so soon right? The first week of the new year doesn’t count because it’s the last week of break, so clearly, I will fail at all resolutions.

The first week was already recapped in the last post, leading up to my birthday, a day which I really enjoyed this year. Who knew that not doing anything would be so peaceful and nice. There were a multitude of reasons why I didn’t want to do anything this year, but anyway.

Being mellow on the eve of my birthday led into sitting in the car and talking (with Amadeo and Alan) then sleeping until 6 am, after which I high-tailed it back into my bed and slept. And then I woke up in the afternoon to evening time…which I guess is like 4 pm. So then, for the rest of the day, I just put my iTunes on shuffle and drew (my Drive drawing) until the end of the weekend. What a relaxing weekend it was and what a beautiful moment to feel in the zone for a full couple of days. I feel like it would be a nice tradition to take my birthday off, escape reality, isolate myself, and just have me time for a whole day for hobbies and reflection. That would be nice…except for next year, which shall possibly be Vegas!

Thanks to Alan for getting me new and beautiful gold guitar strings and to Kathy for getting me a chrome Batman emblem to put on my car. Also, thanks to Christian Bale for being in the wonderful movie, Flowers of War, a new favorite.

Overall, nothing extraordinary over break. The second and third week were spent with friends. Catching up, having long talks, doing stupid shit, and having a good time. That’s what break’s all about! The weeks went by pretty quickly just hanging out and planning the next hangout, etc.

The weekend after my birthday was Christmas weekend, half of which was spent at my aunt’s house. Who knew the food could get better than Thanksgiving’s feast? So good to just eat and sit with family. I got some money for Christmas. After I got home, I decided to just play LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4 and finally beat everything…my first 100% Trophies! I played into the wee hours of the morning and then hung out with Kathy and Dhruv on Christmas night.

The weekend after was New Year’s weekend, which was spent at Alan’s, being chill with Alan and Eileen eating shrimp tempura until…POP goes all the balloons! Although the mark of the new year is something completely relative, I think it helps set another milestone for me and mark a new beginning that I can look forward to.

This week was spent shopping and reading and stressing out and watching shows that have come back. After I went home from Alan’s, I started reflecting about the break and how I did not do all the shit I needed to do. And then I started freaking out. And then I read a lot. And then I refined my list of all the things I wanted and since I had some money saved up, I decided to get some new clothes. I’m not sure why, but I wanted a wardrobe update, so I compiled a list of things I wanted…and I got most of it! There was a lot of actual browsing, trying stuff on, buying, and returning. I have never spent that much time shopping each day. It was strange. Of course, bargains are always exhilarating. I’m poor again though because I couldn’t stop.

The night of the first day of the year came quickly. And it was the last time I would see Ryan and Eileen…forever the rest of break because they were headed away from home. On Friday, I woke up early for Dim Sum with Alan, Amadeo, and Kathy, hanging out for the last time before break ended. On Saturday, I finally got to hang out with Anthony! YES. I’ve been waiting too long. Talking, talking, talking, reflecting, speaking hypothetically, and pondering life and the future. We are basically twins and always have a great time. I missed you buddy and hope to see more of you this quarter!

I spend my last hours reflecting. So much to do before I graduate. For now, I ponder resolutions…lately, I have been adding resolutions to my list randomly throughout Fall, so I haven’t really sat down and made an explicit list of things to do. There’s always so many ways to grow as a person, and that’s really my resolution. Sigh. Life goes on.

Passion. Adventure. Change.