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Make the most of your remaining summer...

Tue, 15 Aug 2006 21:58:08 GMT

Oh my do I have some updates...

I hope everyone is having a wonderful summer. Mine has been extremely busy, and you'll hear about it very soon, trust me. In the meantime, watch the sun rise one one of these mornings before school starts back up. It is soothingly beautiful.

I must go now... See you soon with an update in the next couple of days =)

Monday, April 17, 2006

Mon, 17 Apr 2006 22:56:16 GMT

Mystery!

There are so many stories to tell from this weekend. But first, I have a mystery to solve!

I got a message from my friend Amelia... except I'm pretty sure the message was written by someone else.

The facts:

1. The message was written between 3:30 and 4:00.
2.    I was in my room during this time.
3.    Amelia left the building at 3:00.
4.    Nobody knocked on my door this afternoon.
5.    The red message in Exhibit A is Amelia's real handwriting.
6.    The message in black on the bottom right was written this afternoon.

Exhibit A

Analysis:

* If Amelia wanted to talk to me, she would have knocked on my door. If she knocked, I would have answered the door. I did not hear a knock on my door. Therefore, our perpetrator meant to write the message and immediately leave the scene, unnoticed.

*    Notice how the [fake] signature in black desperately matches the [real] signature in red.
       1.   The tail and of the A curves inward.
       2.   m and e connect
       3.   l and i connect
       4.   The p is trying too hard to match the other one in red
       5.   The dashes were haphazardly thrown in... I'll bet someone was coming...

* Um, Amelia would not forget that her name starts with an A...

* The ns do not connect in wanna. The ss are not in cursive. The G is not feminine looking. The message was most likely written by a guy.

* No, I would not like to gossip...

* Guys think all girls like to gossip. Am I right?

* This message was planned and deliberate. If a random person wanted to say hi, they would have knocked, waited, then proceeded to leave the message. Again, there was no knock on my door.

I must go to dinner now. More evidence, exhibits, analysis and conclusions to come...

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Wed, 05 Apr 2006 01:56:31 GMT

Anniversary déjà vu

A famous speaker was here in our small town earlier this evening. Jared Diamond stood before the yellow velvet curtains and spoke about the rise and fall of recent civilizations in front of an overflowing auditorium. Students comprised 5% of the audience; the rest were mostly intellectual-looking older professors or professionals.

The guy really didn’t say anything substantial. It did not surprise me that he, like most executives or so-called important people, was really just another politician. The main points of his lecture consisted of general and irrefutable statements about civilizations:

1. “We must protect the environment…”

2. “The notion of globalization intimidates many emerging societies…”

3. “Globalization is actually an improvement in communication…”

What kind of educated person would not agree with that? The rest of the lecture was as generic and hypothetical as his main points.

You who did not attend this lecture did not miss out on much. He didn’t have anything new or insightful to say. The only real benefit to going was to see a Pulitzer guy in person, and [if you’re one of those people] to say you’ve attended his lecture. I appreciate having the chance to go to these things. However, I expected something more thought provoking than general politics from a discreet politician.

Well, I decided to be the change I wanted to see in that auditorium… so at 4:59, I left my seat to get in the aisle for the Q&A session. (That’s right – I have a question for YOU, Mr. Pulitzer Prize winning author… ) A familiar rush courses through me as I walk down the carpeted aisle toward the microphone. Several heads conspicuously turn twice; not only was I the only female getting in line, but I was the youngest one up there.

I look over my notes in my mini journal…

(To be continued)

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Sat, 01 Apr 2006 15:16:10 GMT

serendipity… or punishment

Monday, March 06, 2006

Mon, 06 Mar 2006 03:34:58 GMT

Visible.

The crying baby is getting her bottle. Maybe I’m making some Christian guy friends after all. I’ll reconcile my last post with some stories...

There was a five dollar prom on a special day at the winter conference. So my roomies and I were thinking, “OK, $5 prom – here’s my five dollars, let me into prom.” Actually, the $5 refers to the highest amount we’re allowed to spend on clothing. So the girls and I go downtown and find six matching dresses, three brown and three green. There was 1 dress that fit each of our different sizes; no more, no less. There could have been all size 13s or 2s, or half and half, or 5 or 10 of them… no, there was one special dress for each of us. The best part – they were $2 or less. It was clearly meant to be.

At the dance, a swing song comes on. Five of the guys were wearing matching orange shirts. One of them was R, a guy I know from ballroom dance club. I thought it would be fun to dance with him, so I sashay up to him and ask, “aren’t you in swing dance club? Why aren’t you dancing?” He says “I don’t really like the music. It’s too fast.” Fair enough. Though I must say, I felt a little rejected. Because that’s what you do when you’re dressed up at a dance and a swing song comes on… you dance.

I had a lovely special day, so I’m not complaining. Most of the guys were really nice to me and it was pretty fun. As for R, we vowed to dance together next time. No real reason to feel invisible.

Soiree is a formal night where the guys demonstrate love by escorting us to a nice place, serving us dinner, and entertaining us with a show and a dance. My soiree dress came from the $5 prom shopping outing with the six girls at the conference. On the hanger, it looked like a mermaid dress [as C called it], something you would wear to a crazy event. When I tried it on, the girls crowded around said really nice things (sighing voices…“wow, she can actually pull it off” and “you look like Malibu Princess Barbie ™”! and “that dress matches you” and “you should wear that to soiree). I liked the color, so I got it.

The dance was especially fun. I was mostly with the girls (I like to mix it up though). The second song they play is a swing song, and my new friend S comes up to me and starts talking right away. I thought it would be fun to dance with him, for some reason. So tell me, what was I thinking during our little conversation? …??? This is what I remember:

S: How come you’re not dancing?

J: (one shoulder shrugging) I don’t know.

Well hello.

S: You should be dancing to this!

J: Um, I’m not really into swing dancing.

We match. His tie matches the accents in my dress.

S: But I thought you liked this kind of dancing…

J: It’s not my favorite. It’s too fast and jittery for me.

My, what lush curly hair you have…

S: Well you should still dance.

J: There’s no real beat.

Oh, he has freckles… subtle freckles.

S: (smiling, blinking) Yes there is…

(he claps out a beat, ACTUALLY CLAPS IT OUT… [clap * clap * clap * clap * clap] )

J: I still don’t get it. I’m not getting into it.

Why isn’t he asking me to dance?

S: (still smiling and blinking… I think he’s also slightly shaking his head at this point)

J: Do you know how to swing dance?

Cause I do. Yep.

S: Well no, but maybe I can learn sometime.

J: Yeah. Maybe.

So… is he going to ask already?

S: Uh huh.

J: Welp. See you later.

Where did the girls go?

(I turn and sashay over to the girls)

OH, and I danced with another guy later… during that same song. And another guy when another swing song came on. I’m sooo smooth!

S didn’t actually ask me to dance with him though, and I’m not saying he was trying to do so. I’m completely used to guys asking. But I still could have grabbed his hands and shown him how it’s done. When he was clapping.

I’m not saying there’s something going on, but it’s more fun to tell the story that way. Well, at least my friends think the romantic slant makes the story funny.

Instead of complaining about being invisible, I should wake up and make friends with the people God places in my life. My overall point in telling these stories: I have no right to feel invisible again.

I’m having a good time. My brain should be fried and I should probably be genuinely stressing out about which direction I’m taking…

This is a good climbing song.

At the moment I see two options: move on or retire a year later. By the time I retire, everyone would be old and probably not have as much energy as me… Retirement should be fun, but there are no guarantees about my health or the state of my loved ones. But I can start making time for another such year.

On the other hand, I know I am having a good time right now. I have everything I need to study, and the option to learn even more. I love the people who live with me. I am never lonely yet I can always maintain my privacy and independence. Here’s a poem about how happy I am...

what a luxurious life

style to never have to

drive or

park or

shop or

prepare or

cook or

clean up or

even clean my own bathroom and pretty much

grow up

for another year.

No joke. I’m mature enough to realize I have the rest of my life for all of that. It will be fun to cook nice meals… but you can’t have everything.

I went on some challenging routes, but I’m still waiting for some pleasant soreness…

There are some very good opportunities in convenient places all around…

I wish things can stay the way they are right now. I realize this experience is temporary.

I am relaxed. People constantly remind me I should worry, but I think I end up putting them at ease.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Sat, 11 Feb 2006 05:37:44 GMT

Invisible?

I thought I liked not knowing what is going to happen. Without a strict schedule, I can plan to be flexible, take opportunities sent to me and use what I have at the moment to make things happen.

I don’t know where I’m going to be these next few years. Usually I feel a peace about it, as though God was using this time and uncertainty to send an opportunity my way. He gave me some special personal gifts. We all have gifts, something specific and different about us. I think I know what some of mine are, and I feel the need to use them in the workplace. Wherever that may be…

Speaking of personal gifts, I can do the worm. I did it yesterday. Some guys were trying to do it in the back of the room, but to no avail. I thought I’d show them how it’s done. It brought back memories; sometimes, people think I am interesting. For a few seconds, I wasn’t invisible anymore. That’s how Christians usually make me feel.

OK, so I know Christianity is supposed to be [and really is] about GOD and not me. But seriously, who joins several Christian groups and doesn’t make a single friend as a result? I have some Christian friends… maybe. It depends on your definition of friend. I am still thankful for my acquaintances. Some of them even go to those groups, but we met and get to know each other elsewhere.

At any rate, I think I try too hard to make Christian friends. Other than those few acquaintances, the rest pretty much ignore me. This is especially true of the guys. This is a problem because of 1) the general nature of this school and 2) I like having guy friends. But then again, I have been accused of giving out romantic signals, regardless of my feelings!!! Some of those guys really are full of themselves. This shouldn’t be an issue though.

I really want to be friends with certain people. Sometimes I meet people and feel some kind of platonic pull toward them. It is similar to strong attraction, when the pull is physical. It is frustrating, but I know I can’t blame them. It is wrong to force friendship.

If we have had stimulating conversation, challenged each other, had fun, helped each other and made life enjoyable, then thank you so much. I miss you.

Sunday, November 13, 2005

Sun, 13 Nov 2005 21:33:26 GMT

Fun With Dreams

You know I’m a peculiar girl. My friends and family keep reminding me about the situation. In a recent dream, this one guy I'm somewhat familiar with wrote me a poem. I accepted it like it was a normal occurrence. Hmm, there must be something special about this poem… so I start reading and realize he wrote it in iambic pentameter. Awesome! This was the style Shakespeare used, though I didn’t check to see if it was a sonnet. But why would he… put the card in a purple envelope? I remember how I felt about the poem, but I don’t recall what he was trying to say.

Unique girl that I am, I decide to tell this guy about the dream. I sent him a message (I'm awake – this is real life), completely disregarding the fact that it would probably alarm him a little. (I only mentioned the iambic pentameter.) The average guy would likely be a little scared (why is she dreaming about me?) and hesitant to talk to me again. But what does this special guy do? He writes me back… a poem in iambic pentameter! He even called me over that night when I was looking for a place to sit and cleared a spot at the dining table. “I made your dreams come true!” He was as amused about the situation as I was!!! I love when people are fun like that.

Do you guys, in your dreams, accept the bizarre and question the trivial? OK, the ninjas are coming after us so we must go now. Why is the other guy chasing after me always wearing that hat? It matches his cape. Is he trying to look mysterious? I wonder how his face looks…

Has a dream ever influenced the way you feel about someone or a situation? I came across a test that measures your bizarreness factor or something weird. One of the questions asked if you’ve felt different about a person (i.e. held a grudge or think about someone differently) because of something they did in a dream. If only that guy was a few years older…

Tuesday, May 31, 2005

Tue, 31 May 2005 02:11:59 GMT

Update: Miss Universe Pageant! Go Miss USA!!!

Current observations:

1) Miss USA is GORGEOUS. She reminds me of former Miss Universe Ali Landry (from the cute Doritos commercial!). She is the least super-skinny, and the prettiest contestant in my book.

2) Miss Canada has the best body though.

3) I think a brunette will claim the title.

4) My picks (after USA): Miss Canada and Miss Puerto Rico

5) I'm psychic. But not as psychic as my mother.

Now go watch Beauty and the Geek, and visit my blog after!

Ten Days! (earlier post made public)

… without the internet. I am fine. As my friend L mentioned, I didn’t even experience withdrawal symptoms. Maybe I’m not addicted to instant messaging, blogs, and the infinite information of the internet after all.

Here are some of the things I said – not related to – this time away from the computer:

“What are you doing tonight. I’m going to need a place to stay.”

I love my friends. They are so nice to me. Instead of asking what was going on, they insisted “Yeah! We’ll have some fun tonight.” Instead of freaking out about the situation (long private story), I was laughing with M and genuinely relaxing. Friday the 13^th was no big deal after all. Who cares if I broke a large mirror? D and MD let me store some things at their places. People were driving like crazy, but M did a very good job of avoiding three car accidents. We ate some good healthy food; Qdoba isn’t so bad when you’re hungry. We met up with some friends of hers to play tennis, and I was catching on really fast. I hadn’t played in several years, but it is so much fun to continuously hit the ball back and fourth! I bought scrumptious strawberries, and we watched half of a silly movie before falling asleep. This is the life.

“Excuse me, our film is taking over 90 minutes to develop.”

“Those are still going to be 15.xx”

“No, that’s the one-hour price.”

“You came back 20 minutes too early the first time you checked on them.”

[blank stare] Sometimes they’re on top of things and finish early.

“They’ll be ready in four more minutes.

“That’s the third time you’ve said that.”

“That’s not our problem, but we’ll charge you for singles.”

“You’re offering us 60 cents each for late service. Would you also

like to pay for the 50 dollars of groceries that are going bad in my car?

“[… more nonsense… maybe they were having a bad day…]”

“We don’t deserve this rude treatment. Don’t worry about the pictures.

We’ll take this to customer service.”

The three 20-something black dudes standing next to us sounded amused. Yes, I’m small and slightly Asian looking, but try and push me over. The people behind the counter were rude the whole time, which isn’t professional. I walked out with some free pictures and my dignity.

“Are those nun chucks?”

“Yes.”

Silence.

MD looked scared, but I resumed packing. Hmm, maybe I intimidated him into storing a box or two at his place.

I have to learn some Java now, then watch the Miss Universe pageant. I’ll be back with the following stories:

-My young date at some movie about wars in space

-Orientation… and the attractive engineer IMing me now (who I want to be friends with)

-Outing with good friend W

Sunday, May 08, 2005

Sun, 08 May 2005 18:55:10 GMT

Saturday

The tradition lives on. This morning I went to Denny’s with some guys from an old study group. It all started our first semester when N, S, P, and I decided to have a real breakfast before the Saturday math final. We would cram into a car at 6:00 AM and make it back to campus by 8:00. Since nobody had a morning final today, we went at 8:00 and had plenty of time for lively, idiosyncratic conversation. Somehow, without fail, the waitress serves me last every time we do this! But the boys were gentlemen, especially N, and this is always a fun experience. We no longer have math classes together, but they are persistent about keeping this date.

Later in the day, I felt like going on an adventure. M conveniently called earlier this afternoon. I’ll spare the details for now; there will be similar nights this summer, based on the friends I’ll be around back home.

Each person I saw today has something specific in common. They have all concluded and accused: You’re a player, aren’t you? Usually, I turn red and giggle. Who looks at me and suspects anything? That’s the problem – those who know me. They think some of my philosophies, lifestyle, and even taste in music contradict my [actual] loving intentions. This requires some specific examples to clarify, but now is not the time.

I have some major explaining to do in the near future.

Tuesday

I saw QB this morning at breakfast. He is somewhat of a celebrity to my father, especially after seeing him in Sports Illustrated. Sometimes I would rather not know about someone’s status, because I don’t want it to influence my behavior around him or her.

M comes over for dinner. She is chatty and we laugh quite a bit. My brother joins us in the booth. I ask him what he was doing tonight, and a bright red smile shows up on his face as he looks down at his tray. M and I immediately speculate about a date. “Who is she? Where are you taking her? What movie are you going to see? …long hair, her name is probably Amber.” After three minutes of girl chatter he amicably points out “You know, I was completely silent this whole time. I didn’t say anything, and you created these whole stories.” I’m glad he found us. Before leaving, he tells us “It was nice eating dinner with you. I’ll tell Amber you said hi.”

We never did find out what was going on with him. M says I need to be serious about prying into his life. But I respect his privacy too much to demand an explanation about his love life.

After dinner, we head west for shopping. We were having some trouble getting her new toy to work in her car, so I flag down a store employee in the parking lot. He turns out to be a guy I met on the very first day of classes.

*Memory time: we sat together during that first lunch at school. He liked to take computers apart and was from my hometown. Since we were both finished with class for the day, he asked if I wanted to “go back to his place” to watch a movie with his huge sound system. I didn’t sense any bad intentions, so we went to his suite. He had a 1000+ movie collection from his previous job. I met his suitemate who brought over Sobe drinks, and we watched his copy of the first Lord of the Rings. I would occasionally hang out at their suite, usually when I was with A, who lived nearby. A is my good friend from elementary school, and he met M at our middle school. We are all connected.*

With M’s toy fixed, we head to her friend’s house. I meet some guy who graduated from Mines five years ago. I discover from him that QB signed a contract to play for the Denver Broncos.

D called earlier this evening to hang out, so we made tentative plans to meet up for ice cream. M and I were having some quality girl bonding time at the bookstore, but D was already on his way to meet us. He didn’t talk much. I like to hang out with D. Sometimes I prefer being around talkative people, and tonight was no exception. It can be frustrating when he doesn’t say much when we’re hanging out. He’ll explain “I just want to be near you,” or “I’m happy to be around you, so I don’t need to talk.” M would think this is sweet, but it can be uncomfortable because I feel like I am ignoring him.

There is a facet of D’s personality that I feel I don’t know very well, but should. It is proving difficult to extract from his quiet behavior. Sometimes I do things to see how he reacts, to learn about him. He takes me so seriously. I might stop this if he starts getting hurt by these experiments.

M takes several wrong turns on the way home. Neither of us minded because it gave us more time for girl talk.

Monday

This mountain hill is turning green behind the misty atmosphere. It feels apple crisp: the air is still dry between the droplets of humidity, but the moisture still feels cool on the skin.

Today it only took some simple things to make me happy. My brother and I went to get Mother’s Day cards together. He was in a good mood. I made a quick and thoughtful selection; he said we got out of there in record time! Good sounding songs were playing on various sound systems, especially during lunch: The Blower’s Daughter, Collide, They, Against All Odds, and Four Seasons. As I was eating, a guy with eyes the same color of his light bright blue shirt showed me how to make Korean the priority language for a computer. He’s a white guy, so it was adorable to see the Korean letters all over his PowerBook’s menu. How warm hearted, especially for a computer person!

Sunday

The current foggy misty snowy atmosphere helps me feel childhood again. It also helped that M, my best friend from middle school, picked me up last night to hang out in her town 20 minutes away. She moved 100 minutes away in the middle of 8^th grade. We kept in such good touch, almost better than we do now. Breaks from school meant one or both of us traveled the highway to visit the other. We were usually with our parents, but now it is the two of us in one car.

“I love how we can’t see anything surrounding us. We’re driving on one big cloud like in heaven.” I might have noticed the symbolism this morning, but I was thinking about the vaporous oncoming traffic. As the lighted auras silently appeared and evaporated from sight, M continued chatting as I relaxed. Our friendship works well. It is so much fun driving around with her.

We are so different, but we have enough in common to sustain the friendship. Our physical and genealogical backgrounds are similar and we love being artistic, but our general tastes are not so similar. Last night, we ended up watching a movie about a couple who rediscovers their love through a journal, literally. M loves romantic movies, but I prefer a different genre [does it have a name...?] It was still nice to shake things up [like popcorn… we bought this Cinnabon popcorn you shake up in the bag].

We got emotional at totally different parts of the movie. She cries when the main couple breaks up, makes up, and dies together. I cried when the young man came home from The War, as the proud father finally greets his healthy son with a big hug. Watching The Notebook helps reveal that she’s idealistic and yearns for romantic love, while I’m patriotic and cherish familial love.

Seeing M really helped cheer me up. I’m glad we made plans to spend time together.

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 07:55:34 GMT

Happy New Year!

These past few months have been difficult. Some horrible things have happened. But I’m not going to write about them – why reinforce bad memories by typing them into your brain?

"Real love is a pilgrimage. It happens when there is no strategy, but it is very rare because most people are strategists." - Anita Bookner

This quote was lying in the back of a freshly printed magazine. Even for those of us who don’t believe in love… replace “love” with friendship and it is still a quality quote. How many friends do you really have? Real friendship involves:

1. Caring about each other

2. Spending time together and making an effort to do so

3. Common interests

4. Appreciation

5. Wanting to keep in contact and actually doing it

I talk to, hang out with, care about, and appreciate so many people, but we are not all seriously friends. Situational friendships [whatsoever] occur because they are convenient; it was fun to hang out with R or N around class and certain other activities or during meal times, but now we mostly say hi while walking past each other. Some people are fun to be around so I spend time with them. We kinda use each other for entertainment, but maybe we can still be friends.

Sometime last year I thought a very sweet and nice person D was my only real friend nearby. D is also smart, tall, dark, a super cutie etc. At any rate, D is my best friend here. We like to go out to eat and talk. This weekend we will go downtown to celebrate my birthday. We’ve known each other for almost five years now and kept in long distance touch even though we didn’t go to school together. Too bad we rarely saw each other last semester. The only time we would hang out was when I said I needed something – so it eventually felt like it was some kind of favor for us to spend some time together. That hurts my feelings , so I yelled at D about it over the phone several days ago. D immediately comes over and we go to a coffee place (neither of us drinks coffee) and D tries to explain the situation…

So we’ve been friends for all of these years… and he told me he likes me. That’s good, friends are supposed to like each other… I like you too!! Then he expatiated on how much he values my friendship and the time we spend together and how he would treat me so well if I was his girlfriend… wait a minute … he was avoiding me because he has a girlfriend?? He deserves to be with a really nice girl, and he is definitely ready for a girlfriend. So I sit there and try to smile at him through my dissipating fury, and how in the world is he simultaneously staring at me intensely and avoiding eye contact? He then tells me he was avoiding me because he wanted to tell me how he felt every time he saw me, but didn’t think I felt the same way about him...

The shock settles but lingers. This is hard for me to fathom. I have no clue when this started happening or why or how. He has always treated me so well. He takes me out to eat, drives me around, writes letters and bring me flowers on special occasions. Five years is a very long time to wait for someone - why does he decide to tell me this now? Was this all a part of his strategic agenda??

I am afraid of losing my best friend. Most of my close friends were guys. But most of those guys wanted something other than friendship, and they eventually told me how they feel. After telling them I want to be friends, they stop calling me immediately. No more fun time, talking or hanging out. I know guys can have fragile [or overtly dominating] pride, but it still em, hurts my feelings when they ignore me and don’t want to be friends. I feel kinda used. D is my real close friend though.

What is the difference between being close friends and being in a relationship? What can a boyfriend and girlfriend do together that the same boy and girl won’t do as close friends? Physical intimacy. Though this isn’t actually true in today’s sexually rampant reality… You can flirt with your friends, have good chemistry and be a part of an intimate relationship. There is no special ethereal [non-physical] bond that brings a man and a woman together. Too many people waste their time, energy, youth, and potential friendships to pursue some mystical quality we like to call love.

Infatuation, compassion, attraction, caring, lust, obsession, routine, convenience, fear of loneliness, desire, happiness, servitude, respect, trust, honesty, sacrifice, serendipity and commitment all exist in many types of relationships. However, love is more often imagined than realized.

Love your family and friends. Have love for your neighbor. Show yourself some love! But as for the so-called true love between a man and a woman…