One day my paycheck will match my dreams...

Let's See If This Works

2009-02-20T05:16:00.001-08:00

I've moved my site over to www.legalmisfit.com

My Playground

2009-02-08T14:23:00.000-08:00

Vegas seems to be my backyard...the funny thing is that the further away I move, the more times I seem to go...
Here J-Unit and I are at Hoover Dam. Really, I added this picture because it looks like I got cleavage. The water looks nice though, no?

Showing off my Asian-ness

Its even funnier getting a non-Asian to do it

This is Z-Stmts driving J-Unit and I around. She's a lot tougher than she looks. The car--not so much. I can't remember the last time I was in a car where I had to roll down windows manually as well as lock each door individually. I'm not sure why we bothered locking them--who is gonna want our Aveo? (As you can see, Z-Stmts made the best of it)

The weather was very nice at Hoover Dam. A bit chilly, but incredibly sunny. Here's a pic of the Colorado River (about the only thing I learned was that the Colorado River was a force to be reckoned with, so the Hoover Dam was commissioned during the Great Depression to put the water to go use).

I can't remember why there were angels, but supposedly if you rub its toes, it'll bring you good luck in Vegas. Let me tell you through first hand experience, that's a load of crap.

Saturday night we went to dinner off the Strip, at Swish. Its a shabu shabu place. What does that mean? Basically I paid to cook my own food. Fantastic though! Too bad I can't make food this yummy in my own kitchen...

It Just Doesn't Add Up

2009-01-25T10:44:00.001-08:00

I went bowling last night at AMF Pleasant Valley with the BF and his old co-workers. Seeing as how I completely suck at bowling, the fact that I bowled 5 games is pretty damn impressive. The first two games were unforgettable.

But look at this:

The 125 is me!!! 'A' is for 'Asia.' I was representing my peeps. Anyway, the important part is that I broke 100! This is the third time I've done it, and I'm sure the last.

What's really amazing was the next game where I got 4 strikes!!! 4 fucking strikes bitches!! And I didn't break 100. Sigh...I dunno how that happens.

I had forgotten how much fun bowling can be. Especially when the lights go down and its Rock n Bowl. Of course the fact that the place darkened, combined with me playing 3 games previously meant that I did nothing but sucked at the end. I thought that my arms would be sore the next day, but surprisingly, that wasn't the case. Probably due to the fact that my ball was only a 9 pounder.

Winter Wonderland

2009-01-20T05:59:00.000-08:00

ITS SNOWING!!! I've never lived in a place where it actually snowed! I've seen snow, but that's about it. And now its snowing!!! School has been canceled for far far less, but this year maybe they think people have finally learned how to drive in snow. Me? Hell no. I'm Asian and I'm female. Putting me on the road in this condition is a stupid and deadly trifecta.

Across the street is the neighborhood pool, but the land it sits on is slightly elevated, making it a soft hill. Perfect for sledding. I wake David up and ask him where his sled is so Jessie and I can go down the hill. 'I don't have one' is his reply. WTF??? So no sledding for me...sigh...

Here's Jessie running around in the backyard. She went totally ape shit, but that's probably because she had to do her business and couldn't figure out where the grass was. Basically, she couldn't sniff out the correct spot to lay her goodies.

This is the cul-de-sac and my car. Totally nuts! You can't even see where the driveway ends and the grass begins! I declare today a hot chocolate and pj day.

Bad Influence

2009-01-13T05:36:00.000-08:00

I've heard that once people get into a relationship, they tend to "let themselves go" and gain a few pounds. I'm sad to admit that that's true. I don't think its necessarily because I don't care how I look anymore or whatnot, but the sheer fact that there always seems to be other things that need to be done that are more important than slaving away at the gym. That and since I'm busy with the avalanche otherwise known as school, I'm reduced to eating out a lot. Or eating nothing, which has happened a few times. Neither are healthy, I know.

The BF and I have made it our New Years resolution to lose weight. Well, its actually broader than that-just to be healthier. Since I have Fridays off, I should go to the gym. But did I? No. I had to study. And then I decided to be Martha Stewart and do the whole cooking thing. I never realized how hard it is to prepare meals. I had to troll through all the grocery weekly ads to find whats on sale, make a list, and make sure I go to the cheapest place (there are 3 grocery stores near BF). I got boneless pork, chicken breast, mushroom, asparagus, squash, pomegranate, and a whole bunch of other stuff that somehow added up to $50. Obviously there's still room for improvement on the whole budgeting thing. At least we're not eating out as much.

So I've cook twice in 4 days. Not bad. And it was edible. And I'm alive. And the BF is alive. Overall, a success! I'm going to try to do this at least 3-4 nights a week. It really all depends on my class load. But seeing as how I'm all out lazy and read the morning of instead of the night before, I really don't have an excuse.

In addition to eating healthier, we're walking in the evenings. Its a little hard now since it gets dark at 5 ish, and its cold (its supposed to be 12 degrees this weekend!). Why else? Because of me OUR DOG IS OVERWEIGHT. Before I took my BF's life over by storm, Jessie was healthy. She weighed the correct amount, yada yada yada. Enter me.

I have this propensity to buy her all sorts of goodies. Especially ones that are shaped and decorated (because she understands this). I like getting her bone shaped doggie biscuits dipped in carob, dipped in peanut butter, dipped in just about anything. And she just inhales it all. I got her treats that are shaped like bacon and eggs, peanut butter balls, apple and cinnamon biscuits, etc. She's basically tried it all. I declared her birthday two weeks ago and got her a doggie cake.

The result? In the 7.5 months I've known her, Jessie's gained 10 POUNDS. We put her on the scale at Petsmart before her bath, and she's a little over 9 lbs heavier. We have to walk her now. She's right on track to the Freshman 15. Actually, she walks me. Its ok-its good for both of us.

Vegas Baby, Vegas

2009-01-06T11:15:00.001-08:00

If I had the money, I'd enter in the MBA Poker Tournament in Vegas Jan. 16-18th. However, the gambling gods have different plans for me. That and I royally suck at poker. Nevermind though, I'm going Super Bowl weekend! I will be out of Vegas by the time Super Bowl starts, but I will be there to party. And hopefully expand my budget. Expand, not contract. Well honestly, my bank account can't shrink anymore.

I went to Vegas over Christmas. Its not quite the family feel-good holiday hot spot, but it was fun. The main thing I did was play craps. I won more money than anticipated. Hooray for me for even leaving Vegas with a profit. And the one thing I learned about gambling is that its impossible to win money playing low minimums. I spent an hour playing at the $5 table and walked away with $30. I spent 30 minutes playing at the $10 table and walked away with $150. Too bad its already spoken for. And damn you to the little Asian lady who bet $10 on me and walked away with an extra $500--I demand a cut of that action!

For my communications class on Thursday, I have to present on a "process" for 3-5 minutes. In all my infinite wisdom, the only thing I can think to present on is how to play craps. Not sure its a process, but its something I know about. Good enough, no? We'll see when I get my feedback. What I should really talk about is how to spend money. I seem to be an expert at that. With an extra emphasis on things I neither need nor afford.

So Super Bowl weekend is also my birthday weekend. I'm scared. I'm going to be 29. My last year in my 20s. I'd like to list all my accomplishments but none come to mind just yet. Everyone tells me that the 30s are more enjoyable than the 20s, but I secretly think it is because they are in their 30s, and if they could go back to their 20s, they'd do it in a heartbeat. I'd actually hate to know what my parents think. Bet they never imagined they'd still be partially supporting me after undergrad. I find myself using the phrase, "oh when I grow up I want to..." Peter Pan Syndrome Victim #48362419 here. I've thought about making a list of things I want to accomplish in life, but then it seems too Bucket Listy, and I don't want to feel like I'm going to croak any day now.

Christmas at Biltmore

2009-01-02T05:16:00.000-08:00

Immediately after my last final, the BF and I went to Biltmore to see the Christmas extravaganza. It was nice, although not as done up as I had hoped. And still...no pictures allowed inside. No wonder it's not an Asian tour stop. The big tree in the dining room was a sight to see though. It had to be over 20 feet tall, and unlike mall trees, it was actually one tree, not 30 perfectly put together. The Estate had to buy two of them because each only lasts about two weeks. So when its time to change the tree, they only have one night to remove all Christmas ornaments, take down the tree, put up the new one, and get all the ornaments back on. Once again, too bad I couldn't take a picture of it.
This is a pic of the front of the house. I really thought that the house would be outlined with Christmas lights. Obviously that wasn't the case...maybe my tastes are tacky or something.
Here's a pic of the house from the road that leads to the garden, winery, and outdoor center.

The next day we took the Segway tour. It was way better than riding on a regular Segway because these were off-roading Segways. The tires were super fat and seemed all-terrain like. Here's us in front of the reflection pond. The pond is crazy because it had to be far back enough so that the whole reflection of the house fit.

At first I was scared shitless of hoping on the Segway. Even though we had an instructor, it wasn't like he had the ability to stop me if I went careening off course. We started off in Turtle mode, where the fastest is 6 mph. That was practice mode. When it came time to go on the course we got upped to Rabbit, where the fastest is 12 mph. That rocked. By the end I was a Segway fiend, but it took a while to get there. At first it was hard for me to balance. The machine is pretty big, and I had a hard time controlling it in the beginning. To go forward, you lean forward. To go back, you lean back. So when I was going forward and tried to stop, I would lean back a little to far and start going backwards. It took me a minute to realize it, and then another minute to figure out that I had to lean forward slightly to stop. By the time my instructor told me I was going backwards and I actually stopped, a good 30 feet were between us. Good thing quick thinking and reflexes weren't required to operate this bad boy. Either that, or good thing no one else was on the trial at the same time we were... Although I think the Segway rocks, I can see why it never really caught on as the new travel medium. The ones we rode cost $5,500! Ouch if we broke it!

After the Segway, we did the Landrover Experience Driving School. This is my second time, and luckily I got the same instructor (he remembered me!). Since it had been raining the few days and hours beforehand, we had to take a different route. Why the instructor didn't want to use the winch was beyond me.
I've told the BF many times that I 'need' a Range Rover. And he always rolled his eyes at me. But this time...wah la!!! He loved it! (Even the heated steering wheel).

I got the last ten minutes of the lesson and ended up in Superbowl sized mud pit. It took around 8 tries to get out of it.

We've decided that when we make enough money (or win the lottery), we're getting a Range Rover. Our dog would look fantastic with her head sticking out the window. I guess this will happen after I finish school, get a job, and bank out the ying yang.

The Bear

2008-12-29T07:19:00.000-08:00

I went to the Rockets vs Jazz game a couple of nights ago. (I heart Yao Ming). Here are some pics that my bro shot:

And then here are the pics that I took:

Oh yeah, Rockets won in double OT =)

Senior Citizen Discount

2008-12-09T05:08:00.000-08:00

As much as I try to deny it, the truth is smacking me silly in the face: I am getting old. Not physically (no wrinkles and I'm under 30). Not mentally (mind is sharp as a tack-I hope). But I'm in terms of my lifestyle. I can't remember the last time I stepped foot in a bar that wasn't for a networking event. Hell, I can't remember the last time I stayed up past 10:30.

Last weekend the BF and I stayed in. I bought a puzzle. 1000 pieces and I finished in less than 24 hours. (Did I mention that I'm under 30?). While at Walmart looking for said puzzle, I came across Yahtzee for $5. That went in the cart too.

There was an article on Yahoo! recently about TV shows. The highest rated 'unhip' show is NCIS, which consistently ranks 4th, but doesn't even make a blip on the radar with viewers ages 18-49. So either its extremely popular with SAT studying students or extremely popular with those nearing retirement. The BF and I watch it religiously.

All we need to do is jump in on his father's weekly bridge game at the neighborhood church and we're set.

Oh, and we love Scrabble.

Disgruntled Student

2008-10-28T03:16:00.000-07:00

Dear Microecon Professor:

Two words: you SUCK. Oops. Make that three. You SUCK ROYALLY. I'm not sure what you thought you were teaching, but I can pretty much guarantee you it WAS NOT micro econ. What's the point of giving us Mickey Mouse problems during class and reaming us in the ass for homeworks and then further kicking us to the curb for finals?

There were two questions on your final that actually pertained to class. The others? The trappings of your own imagination. And who the fuck gives us a problem so hard that out of 280 students, only 5-10% are supposed to complete it? What's the point of testing us over something you haven't taught? And when you were totally demolished last year in student feedback, why put yourself through that torture again? Are you a masochist? You know you have the worse rep out of all professors, so why add to that? Just a heads up-it doesn't do you any good.

Thank you for my 'P' though. Its good to know that the As I got in undergrad were not in vain.

Sincerely,

Legalmisfit

Nature-esq

2008-10-19T07:27:00.001-07:00

I know I haven't written anything in a while. It's hard with school. Not only is there a time constraint (blog or learn linear regression? oh the choices), but there's also the fact that I don't want to offend anyone or write something that I'll later regret (which pretty much emcompasses everything). Tomorrow is the first day of the new quarter. I did the undergraduate thing on the semester system. Let me tell you-its much different. The most frequent question I get asked is, "how do you learn enough to go through a midterm in 4 weeks and after another 4 weeks finals?" The answer? I don't. The quarter system involves a lot of cramming, and even more of the "next quarter I'm not going to fall behind and let this happen again" business. I pretty much know I'll start to slack after week 1. Its pretty much a given. Although I can't fathom going back to a semester system, I can't really say I've learned as much as I've wanted to under the quarter system.But on not better things...The day after my last final or "fuck you" final, I high tailed it out to Biltmore with J-Unit.

This was trip number 2 for me, but a lot more fun because J-Unit is more adventurous and more fun than my parents. I plan to go one more time with the BF when the Christmas festivities are in full swing. Somehow, knowing that, I got suckered into a 12 month pass. It gets worse later. But the 12 month pass got J-Unit a 15 buck discount on her admission price, and 10% off food and souvenirs. Somehow this made it worth the extra 40 bucks. No cameras were allowed inside the house (how un-ASIAN), so I have no interior pics to share.

However, the real fun was our outdoor activities. Forgive me for thinking that my 12month pass got us discounts on the outdoor activities. Because I didn't learn the first time around, I ended up upgrading my 12 month access pass to an "Explore Biltmore" pass for outdoorsy stuff. We rented mountain bikes. It sounds harmless, but the last time I was on a bike Bush Senior was in office. Surprisingly, all those sayings about riding a bike after two decades pretty much holds true. The first 10 minutes were a bit rough I have to admit. I actually didn't think I was going to make it back up after going 50 yards down a wrong path. The paved path and going downhill-NO PROB. Actually the first 30 minutes we thought we were the shit. Well, I thought we were the shit. And then all hell broke loose.I want to tell the worker bee at the bike rental desk that looks can be deceiving. She told us that we should make it up to the house with no problem. Oh there were big problems. The one and only one being that I wasn't fit enough to ride uphill. I had to walk my bike up most of the way. Is this why I rented a bike? I think not. Going back was a breeze. Except for the steep downhill section, where I was having difficulty balancing saying a last prayer and hoping that I don't hit a rock, fly off, and crack my head open. Mountain biking was a good intro to our outdoorsy activities. At least we've been on a bike before. Kayaking was next. I'm not a fan of non-shower/tub water. Meaning, I don't swim, I don't go into ponds, lakes, or any of the 7 oceans. Here is our Missing Persons poster: Just in case we fell and got lost. Although there's only one way to float along a river, J-Unit and I still have a high chance of getting lost. We're that good.I was scared shitless of kayaking. How do I know how to steer or go forward? They gave lessons on going backwards, but the opposite direction seemed to be more important. Strangely enough, kayaking is intuitive. Not to say its easy, but its easy enough to pick up the basics. What our 5 minute crash course instructor failed to instruct us on was upending ourselves from rocks. The noise of grating over the rock was like imminent death. How much would it suck if I died of starvation or dehydration because I'm too fat and my arms are too weak to be able to dislodge myself and my kayak from rocks?? I can't even begin to fathom the embarrasment. And because we are that good, J-Unit and I got stuck on rocks probably on average once every 1.5 minutes. A fish struggles by flailing and flapping around when taken out of water. The only way I could figure out how to get myself unstuck from the rocks was the shimmy back and forth and side to side. I'm sure it was a sight to behold, but I was desperate. Already we were way beyond everyone else, but on top of that, the guides told us they would get worried if we didn't make it to the end within 2 hours. Most people are proud when they graduate, get a promotion, buy a new house. I was proud when we made it without falling into the water and without anyone rescuing us. Trust me-that was an accomplishment.The next day we did the Land Rover Experience Driving School. This was the main reason why we wanted to go to the Biltmore anyway. Let me just say that it was AMAZING. I think everyone should try it. Like the instructor said, it was definitely the most fun I've had at 5 mph.
Talk about adding to the list of things we "need." A freaking Range Rover.

What I Covet

2008-08-29T08:47:00.000-07:00

There was a point in time when I liked the "finer" things in life. Lacoste sportswear, LV purses. A pair of Louboutins. These are things that I'd actually save up money for (except for Louboutins. Still waiting to magically afford my first pair).So this is warping effect of b school: I have an hp 12c calculator. For those who don't know, its a total geek calculator. For the most part I don't know how to use it, but I love it. Well, of the roughly forty five buttons and hundred different functions packaged in, I can use about 6 of them. Its not nice odds, but I learn a bit more everyday.What makes this calculator so much cooler? It can store formulas and functions. Mine can't do that. =( So of course I want this now.What happened to the days when I drooled over this?But then the other day I noticed that a classmate had the PLATINUM hp 12c calculator. What's the difference? Its PLATINUM!!! Functionally, it's the same. But man, how I want this new calculator.This would be bad enough if it was the end of it.But its not.A classmate got the hp 17b II financial calculator.

What happened to the good ol' days when I drooled over this?

Directionally Challenged

2008-08-06T15:38:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I buy two similar products just to have them. Case in point: I own a 30G iPod. I love him. His name is O'Malley. I jam to Bon Jovi and Britney Spears in the car and at the gym. A month ago I was in the Apple store and realized that a Shuffle was only 80 bucks (because I'm also trying to save Africa from AIDS). I figured it would be good to take to the gym, especially since I want to start running (or jog, or powerwalk). I could use O'Malley, but I talked myself into buying a Shuffle because it was lighter, and I can just clip it to my t-shirt and away I go. For the record, I've used it twice.

Sometimes I just need to suck up and buy two similar products. Case in point: I met a classmate the other day for dinner at a restaurant neither of us have been to. I'm cool with going to new places since I have a Magellan. Well, for the most part getting to new places should consume far less fuel than life pre-Magellan. So I put in the destination, and away I go.

I find the restaurant on the first try (which is an amazing feat), and around 100 feet further there's a parking lot. Its actually a parking lot for the restaurant, a bar, and a grocery store among other things. I think that's what killed me.

15 minutes later I'm still walking up and down the sidewalk. I can't fucking find the restaurant. The same restaurant I saw 15 minutes ago that was next to the damn parking lot. After 5 more minutes of walking, I admit defeat and ask a couple walking by where the restaurant is. "Oh-all you have to do is turn around, walk back where you came from, past the parking lot, and its on the other side."

So what do I need? In addition to a GPS unit for my car, I need a handheld one. Stupid doesn't even begin to describe me.

The One That Got Away

2008-07-07T05:33:00.000-07:00

It started off with:

Me: do you have a fire extinguisher?
Bf: No...

But quickly disintegrated to:

Me: hey! Why aren't you studying?
Bf: Well its hard to concentrate when you're cooking and ask me if I have a fire extinguisher

And ended with:

Bf: (looking at my cooking) hummm...maybe I should get a fire extinguisher

I like to take pictures of the meals I cook. Its proof that well...I can do something that resembles cooking and the results are something that resembles something edible.

Last night I cooked. But I don't have a picture to show for it. It's sad.

It was supposed to be chicken with a honey-cilantro glaze with oven roasted veggies. It turned out 3rd degree burned chicken with a honey-cilantro glaze with over cooked-wilted oven roasted veggies.

What's sad is that this was the first time I've ever burned chicken. Also, this was my first attempt at cooking for Bf. What a disaster. Now he thinks I can't cook (which is true), and probably thinks that the pictures of previous meals I showed him weren't mine (not true). The chicken was so burnt that I don't think poor starving children in Ethiopia would eat it. It was so bad Bf offered to cook tonight.

The Countdown Begins

2008-06-21T13:34:00.001-07:00

Man. You'd think that after what my Bf said about me in my last post, he'd tread cautiously.

Wrong.

Since I've entered her life, Jessie's been in heaven. Although she's not allowed, Jessie snoozes on the couch. We know this b/c there's dog hair on the couch. Hummm...wonder how that got there. But when I'm around, she gets on the couch. Even though Bf doesn't allow it. I do, because its easier to pet her when we're both on the couch versus me on the couch and her laying down. It puts a crick in my neck.

The bed is also off limits. She gets away with it every once in a while with me, but Bf's not fond of it. Something about how she needs boundaries, and they're all disappearing now that I've arrived. Whatever-I tend to tune him out after that.

Oh hell, ever since I started spending the night, Jessie's been upstairs in our room. Bf used to leave her downstairs and put the kiddy gate at the foot of the stairs so she couldn't get up. Hence why she would sleep on the couch and then get off when she heard him coming down. But now he's moved her cushion and blanket into his bedroom and she sleeps there everynight. Even nights I'm not there. See how I'm slowly but surely changing him? HAHA!!

She's gone to the bathroom inside the house, and Bf gets really mad. She's trained to not do that, but you know...shit happens. Literally. We're really good at letting her out before we head upstairs, but the other night we forgot. Oops. So she did her thing right outside his closet door.

Bf woke up because Jessie was acting crazy, saw what she did, and had to clean it up ASAP. Then he took her downstairs, put her in her crate, and started stuying in the kitchen, but supposedly Jessie was whining so loudly that Bf was afraid it would wake up, so he let her out.

I slept through it all. I slept through her acting crazy, through Bf turning on the closet light and cleaning up her mess, through her whining downstairs. But that's not the point.

I mentioned how I was surprised that I slept through everything. I'm not a light sleeper, but usually noise for a substantial amount of time will wake me up. And what did my loving and caring Bf say?

"Yeah, you were totally out. And there was some weird noises. I wasn't sure if it was you or Jessie farting."

Anybody see D-Day coming?

Foot in Mouth

2008-06-19T11:33:00.000-07:00

The reason I'm attaining a higher education is because I don't have model looks to rely on. That being said, I'm not skinny. Well, let me clarify- I'm not skinny compared to the average American, but I am skinny compared to a sumo wrestler. You get my drift.

I have a gym membership that I think about going more often than I actually go. My stomach isn't flat and hard, and my ass isn't tight and bouncy. When its all tallied up though, I'm not too too shabby.

I like screwing around with Jessie and try to dodge her. Usually this comes in the form of her chasing me around Bf's house. It totally gets her riled up and for the next hour she's literally stuck by my side. Last night she was chasing me around, and when I stopped, she jumped on me. She's trained to not jump on people, but when she gets excited, she forgets everything. When she jumped on me, her right paw lifted up my shirt, and she scratched me from the bottom of the boob diagonally across my stomach.

Ouch.

Later I lifted up my shirt to show Bf what his dog did to me.
"Look at this!!!"

His response? "Cardio will take care of that."

I think the look of utter shock on my face hit him hard and he realized I was referring to the scratch mark, and not my stomach flab.

Welcome to relationships.

Maytag Man

2008-06-18T06:43:00.001-07:00

This is the first time in years that I've lived by myself. I would rather suffer through 3 root canals and a 10 ingrown toenails than live by myself. Needless to say, I don't do it when I don't have to. But...I am living by myself now. Which means I have to buy everything myself from scratch. I just bought a sofa last weekend, and will be getting a dinette set this weekend.

My fridge should be stocked, since no one will stock it if I don't. However, currently an old bag of grapes and a Brita filter reside there. Nothing else. I would grocery shop, but I am lucky enough to find a guy who is willing to house me, feed me, and let me play with his dog. I really am never home.

However, before all this, I had the lofty goals of cooking myself. I bought a brand new set of pots and pans, and went to Costco and bought enough Cascade to clean a few rounds of cruise ship dishes. After the dishwasher was loaded, I turned it on, and nothing happened. Now since there's only a dial on the dishwasher, its not like I had much to fiddle around with. So I popped the door open, and all the dishwashing liquid had already fallen out. Fantastic. So I unload everything, head out to the leasing center, and fill out a maintenance form. Simply put: dishwasher does not turn on.

Went and ran errands.

Came back, and the maintenance form left on my kitchen read: need to flip dishwasher switch.

Huh?

Since when did dishwashers have a switch that needed flipping? See? This is what happens when I live with someone else. All this stuff is already done and spoken for. No worries. Re-load dishwasher, made sure switch is flipped, put in more dishwashing liquid, and off it goes!

Three days later I find myself in my apartment for more than half an hour, and decide to unload the dishwasher, as well as do a load of laundry and break down boxes (this is about as domestic as I am going to get). Opened the door, and shit-the bottom of the dishwasher is filled to the brim with water. WTF. Half an inch more, and it would have spilled out onto the kitchen floor.
After I unload the goodies, I head out to the leasing center, and fill out another maintenance form. Simply put: dishwasher flooded.

So now the problem is that I have to run the sink disposal at some point to make sure there's no excess water in the washer. Huh? I am baffled. Do I run it before I run the dishwasher? While the dishes are being washed? Afterwards? I have no clue. Maintenance claimed it had to do with the sink being backed up, which will backup the dishwasher. Which I find scary because hello, I havne't done anything to back up the sink. I haven't cooked or eaten anything because I don't have clean pots or pans (duh), or clean silverware, and don't even own a set of plates yet. Maybe the person before me was grinding body parts in the sink...

The Nanny

2008-06-10T16:21:00.000-07:00

My family works. There's no way around it-no ifs, ands, or buts. As a result, my brother and I have been brought up with a strong work ethic (him more than me) and a need to pull in a paycheck.

Now that I am a full time student, the money goes out but a paycheck never comes in. Trust me when I say it sucks. I am attending "math camp" for the months of June and July. I suck at math, and don't want to be in the "sink" position when the fall quarter begins. Needless to say, the first few days are slow, and its mainly administrative stuff. So, to preoccupy my mind from a)not having a car b)not having money and c) slowly but surely going insane, I hang out at bf's pad. He's not there (thankfully fully employed), but its alright. I keep Jessie company. Ok, well, Jessie keeps me company.

But in entertaining her, I've realized how much I feel like a nanny/stay-at-home mom. I even told BF this, which got a funny look, but...eventually, a laugh (I am a riot). I started off the day washing dishes and cleaning the kitchen. The kitchen layout is such that there is a vent right under the sink where my feet are planted. Its cold. Sadly, the air conditioning unit just downright sucks, and while my feet are growing icicles, the rest of the house is plain hot. A side note-its broke 100 degrees the past few days, which is unheard of in this part of the country at this time of the year. Usually, these temperatures hit around July-August. Not early June.

Anyway, so while I'm loading up the dishwasher, I decide to go out and get kitchen rugs. One for the sink, and one to put in front of the stove. So I get my things ready, load Jessie up in the car, and off we go. Holy shit it is hot as all hell. I feel like I'm in an inferno surrounded by heat and...well...trees. Jessie's my copilot (although she sheds more in shotgun than gives worthwile directions), and I hate to leave her in the car for an extended period of time, so I haul ass in Target, and then out of Target, and we're back home.

Jessie's a 70 lbs. labrador retriever with a huge personality and a propensity to lick. Everything. She thinks she's a lap dog, and one of her favorite pasttimes, I've noticed, is getting right up in my grill and panting. Even though she's adorable, her breathe stinks. Its hot, and smells of dog food. Constantly. I shouldn't be complaining about her panting. All hell breaks loose when she starts licking, because her bad breathe clings to my face, neck, arms, and legs.

The only solution I could come up with is to take her to Petsmart and have them brush her teeth. Well if I do that, I might as well take her in to get a bath. So off we go to Petsmart. I drop her off, and have two hours to run all my errands. After I pick her up, we cruise around the neighborhood. She likes it when I roll the window down so she can stick her head out the window. We've done it before, but because of cars behind us, we end up going roughly 50 mph, which is a tad bit too fast for her. She likes it when I cruise at school zone speed. After doing that for about 20 minutes, we head home, and it is dinner time.

When did taking care of a dog become a full time job?

A Whole New World

2008-06-09T10:11:00.000-07:00

As I slowly settle into my new life, I've noticed a few things. The most prevalent is that I am way too high strung. This is probably a product of living in a huge cities my whole life. Out here in BFE, the pace is much slower. I'm talking much slower like watching paint dry. Hopefully this will help me slow down, and take time and smell the roses.

Here's another thing: why do people complain about rush hour here? Let me tell you-rush hour is anything 20mph and under (basically, school zone). Anyone in their right mind would not consider 45 mph 'rush hour.' Please. If that's the worst it gets out here, I'm never leaving.

I love trees. But not when it causes me to get lost. And boy do I get lost. A lot. But its not my fault- in LA, I got by because of major landmarks, buildings, and signage. Here's there's absolutely nothing but trees. I can't tell the damn difference between one one-way road and another. Its all the same-they're all windy and lined with trees. Half the time I feel like I'm driving from one end of BFE to another. I don't know how other people do it, but its near impossible for me. The bright side is...wait...there is no bright side. I mentioned to someone that there are so many dense pockets of trees that it would be easy for a killer to hide a body. Somehow I thought it was very feasible, but I received a strange look. Hummm...

This is Jessie. Isn't she a cutie pie? This is one of the few calm moments she's had, although she's half sitting on my legs. She's my friend's dog, but I'm trying to take over. Slowly but surely...
I've spent a lot of time lately with her, and have the battle wounds to show for it. Two bruises on my right knee, a bruise on my middle finger of my right hand, and scratches on both my arms. She has totally manhandled me.

Part Deux

2008-05-09T07:26:00.000-07:00

Here are the remaining pics from my celebrity-house-stalking and Catalina Island weekend.
This is Hilary Duff's home.

Jennifer Aniston's home. I don't particularly care for the style of the roof or the green color. I think it is UGLY. But hey, I can only say so much since I can't afford 1/4th of the ugliness.
Tom Anderson's new home. He's the millionaire founder of MySpace. You know..he's everyone's friend. Almost like Elmo...

Does this home look familiar? No? What-did you not grow up watching tv? This is the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air home!!

I'm on the pedalboat here. And I know you can't see the pedalboat, but believe me, J-Unit and I were on it. And you see how close to the water I am? I'm heavy. I'm quite amazed the boat didn't sink.

Los Angeles

2008-05-04T21:26:00.001-07:00

J-Unit visited last weekend. I wanted to go on the movie star's home tour. I understand that the general consensus is that stuff like this is cheesy. Well, I can't really refute that. But...instead of you having to fork over $32 to go on the tour, I'm going to post some of the pics from the tour. The ones I don't put up on here are simply the result of us not having the intellectual capacity or foresight to write down the names of all the celebrity homes we snapped pics of.
Reese Witherspoon's house (although I am Asian, and like to take pictures, I am not good at it. This is not one of those instances where practice makes perfect. In my defense, however, the bus was moving...)

Paris Hilton's house

Dr. Phil's house. Isn't this house gorgeous? Dr. Phil owns this house. Here's what he did with his career (follow these steps and maybe one day you too will own a nice ass mansion)
1) Have disciplinary sanctions imposed on you for unethical and inappropriate behavior by the Board of Examiners of Psychologists.
2) Fail to complete conditions imposed by said Board, and not have a license to practice psychology.
3) Enter the weight-loss business with the "Shape Up" brand that does not stimulate weight loss.
4) Pull said weight loss products off the market so the FTC does not further investigate in your shananigans.
5) Engage in the "Britney Spears intervention"

Simon Cowell's mansion in progress.

We also went to Catalina since I've never been. The island is absolutely gorgeous. Look at all the yachts. J-Unit is going to own one one day. We decided that she would work on getting a yacht and I'd work on getting mansion. Ask me in 10 years how far I've progressed on this dream--it'll be amazing feat if I can keep the same address for more than a year...

We took a tour of the Casino. Back then a casino was a social gathering place. Imagine my initial disappointment when I realized there would be no blackjack, slots, or craps. Nonetheless, the Casino is an awesome place.

This is the theater. There's a ton of amazing facts about the theater. Sadly, I don't remember any of them. Oh-the gold stars on the ceiling are actually real gold-not gold colored paint. Also, this is the only place in the world with its original organ (bottom right). Did that make sense? Probably not. Moving on...

This is one of the walls of the theaters. Although it is incredibly beautiful, sitting in the theater, I felt like I was in hell it was so red. Instead of frightening me, though, I just fell asleep in the middle of the presentation.

I have a bunch more pictures (I am, afterall, Asian), but I am tired and no longer want to upload pics, so they'll have to come out at a later date. I do, however, want to address something that happened last night that absolutely pissed me off and reminded me how asinine and uncaring some people can be.

I went to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall last night (it was hilarious and I highly recommend it-there are even schlong shots for those interested...) and sat in the row above the handicapped section. The handicap section is not really a section, per say, but one seat marked handicap, and four seats next to it. Those four seats were taken. Before the movie starts, a girl in crutches approaches with her friend and an usher. The usher asks the guy (I will call him Douche Bag, or DB, for short) to move so the girl and her friend can sit there. DB and his friends get up, but don't want to move. Their reason? Only that one particular seat was marked handicap, the other four weren't, so they shouldn't have to move. Oh fabulous. Are you shitting me?

I realize that there probably weren't four empty seats available together anywhere else in the theater, but I don't understand why DB was such a DB and the four of them couldn't split up into twos, and just have two people move. So the girl in crutches sat there and her friend had to sit somewhere else. What an absolute ass. We would have moved, but we were five and six seats into our row, and there was no way she would have made it to our seats with crutches. So while I'm not one to wish ill on others, I sincerely hope DB breaks his leg, pulls a tendon, gets blessed with five ingrown toenails simulanteously-anything to put him in crutches, and then waltz into a situation where others don't give a damn about his condition.

There's a Disease With My Name on It

2008-04-22T14:00:00.000-07:00

As part of the process of getting myself ready for b school, I have to show proof of immunization. I have no clue how to read the immunization form. There's numbers and subscripts all over the chart that I can't decipher. The bad thing is that the numbers are 0, 1, 2, and 3. Really, it doesn't go higher than that. Looking at my past immunization history (which is disjointed and a bit on the chaotic side, with part of it in Chinese), it seems that some doctor or clinic missed something along the way.

The first shot I needed was TD. Or DT. Whatever. Its the tetanus-diphtheria shot. No biggie since it only runs for 10 years and the last shot I got was back in 1992. I'm ok with that. But...I needed 2 measles, 2 mumps, and 1 rubella shot, or two MMRs-which is the wicked trifecta. Somehow, I am missing one mumps shot. I have no idea how that one happened, since the shots are usually given together. According to the clinic, most people get their first MMR shot after their first birthday, and then another one basically whenever. I have the 'whenever' one back in 1992, but I don't have the one after my first birthday. How my undergraduate school (UT) and my law school (Santa Clara) accepted me without one of the shots is beyond me. Oh wait. Measles, mumps, and rubella aren't all that prevalent in the United States.

Will someone please tell my b school that? The MMR shot alone costs $125. The tetanus shot $50. And then an administrative fee of $25 (folding one sheet of paper in half and writing my name on it with the two shots I received). All together? $200 bucks. The MMR vaccine is what they call a 'live' vaccine. Which means that a few days after my shot I should expect to be a bit sick. 200 fucking dollars. And I could probably go to some third world country and get a dose of MMR just by breathing the air.

My Story

2008-04-15T10:40:00.000-07:00

Work knows I will bid them farewell in a month or so. They've known from the get go that I applied to b school. The other day I got a request from someone in marketing for my 'bio' to put on an RFP (request for production). There's a million things in the world I would rather do (stab my eyes with an ice pick) than write about myself. So I emailed my coworker back and told her that I'm leaving in a few weeks, so I'd rather not do one.

She emailed me back saying that the RFP is for April 2008, so I kinda can't get out of writing one.

Fabulous. However, I did see the bios of other coworkers. The difference is that I have not been working for a long enough time. Everyone else has put in 5 years here, 10 years there, blah blah blah. Me? I've been in compliance for under 3 years.

Here's what I got so far:

"Legalmisfit is the Compliance Associate for XYZ and likes meat on a stick."

Oh What an Experience!

2008-04-07T07:29:00.000-07:00

This past weekend was Experience Weekend at UNC. Basically its a time to check out the school, the potential classmates, the professors and much more. Its also a time for the school to woo any students on the fence about attending.

Although the weather was utter crap and my brain was functioning at 8%, I had a blast and fell in love with UNC. Its a fantastic institution, and my classmates are fun, smart, and overall great people. I can see myself spending the next two years here and loving it.

Even watching UNC get clobbered in the Final Four was fun. It was brutal, and I have never heard the crowd go so crazy when UNC was behind by 12 points, but hey, it was fun.

My flight out to RDU stopped in Phoenix. I was hungry enough (and smart enough) to get off the plane and hunt for food (the Phoenix to RDU route was 5 hours). I wasn't smart enough to put away my ID and...duh--there it goes. I spazzed for about a good hour until I realized that because I never clean out my wallet, I had my expired driver's license. Score!!!

My hotel was just a hotel. Ok-it wasn't anything fabulous, but for the price, it was good. I went downstairs to the lobby and reported that I had no hair dryer in my room. And yes, I looked in the bathroom, the closet area, and all dresser drawers. Couldn't find it. Later that night, I realized it was one of those that are built into the bathroom wall. 1.5 feet from where I applied make up. Maybe my brain was actually functioning at 3.5% instead of 8.

A Different Kind of Prosperous

2008-04-03T07:37:00.000-07:00

There are plenty of people out there that think I'm going to be rich. One day. I don't agree or disagree. I will say that I'm nearly 30, own a 5 year old car, own a ton of stuffed animals. What I don't own is a home. Maybe I'm on the road less traveled to my millions...

Sometimes fortune cookies give great fortunes (You are well liked by many people). Sometimes I get command cookies (Make your bed every morning). And other times, they're just shit fortunes all the way around. Two days ago my fortune read, "Your wealth will be great health."

Like I said, sometimes its just shit fortunes all the way around. I have to admit, I'd rather be 'wealthy' with evidence of a fatty bank account (or offshore Swiss bank account), and not by simply...still being alive. I have high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and probably a whole host of other bad things (I'm too lazy to sit there and read every item on the list at the doc's office so in one fell swoop its all 'N/A'). These are my health problems and I am ok with it. Part of it is my diet. Part of it is genes, but I accept that. What I can't accept is being broke the rest of my life.

Needless to say I didn't eat the fortune cookie. That's the only way I know to reject it.

Leaving on a Midnight Train to Georgia

2008-03-25T14:36:00.001-07:00

The thought of driving coast to coast is not a pretty one. So yesterday I decided to price out how much it would cost to have my car transported. In one fell swoop I don't want to put so many miles on my car, and risk flat tires and other mishaps (I've gotten more flat tires than I care to remember).

I gave two websites my info for quotes. Remember, this was yesterday. As of 4 minutes ago, I've gotten 29 emails from various companies offering to move my car. 29!!! And that's not even including the phone calls I've received. Am I everybody's last hope? Why the fuck won't they leave me alone? Even car salesmen aren't nearly this bad! But I can tell you one company which will definitely not be getting my business: the one that addressed me as MR. In conclusion, moving companies are fast moving up my 'shit list' ladder. They way they're going, they're going to out-pace the ABA in terms of the number of unwanted emails. Now that's saying something.

Now I'm scared shitless. I haven't started packing, although I've entertained the notion on more than one occasion. I still have to sell my bed and table, and donate clothes that I bought when I had an apparent lapse in eyesight. I have two months before I move. In between now and then I will:

-spend a weekend in North Carolina
-spend a weekend in Vegas
-spend a weekend in Texas
-spend half a week in DC

Of course I have to fit in packing in between all these cross country jaunts. You say it can't be done? I second that...

One Man Band

2008-03-24T07:47:00.000-07:00

Whenever a long weekend approaches, I make a list of all the things that I want to get done. I figure that if there's an extra day to do everything I need to do, there's no way I can't finish.

Wrong.

At the end of the long weekend, nothing on my list ever gets marked off. Nothing. Some things I had to do this past weekend: grocery shop, clean out closet, hook up Blue Tooth, laundry.

What I actually did: read. sleep. Rock Band. Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

I'm somewhat decent on the guitar. Mind you, I still jam on Medium. I tried hard, and FAILED before vocals even started. My excuse for not going past Medium is simple: I want to enjoy playing. When PS3 becomes a chore, that's when I walk away. So being the bad ass rocker chick that I am, I finished the solo tour on guitar. Instead of running down my list of things to do and actually doing one of them, I decided to try the drums.

I nearly passed out.

On Easy. When I'm on, I'm on. But when I'm off, I am most definitely off. I felt a sweat bead or two roll down the side of my face. My breathing became more rushed. I panicked. Drums was like an anxiety attack waiting to happen.

Fortunately my roomie arrived and saved me. So I switched to vocals. I'm not bad when its girl songs. But when its boy songs, like KISS or Beastie Boys, well, my roomie basically summed it up: You need to grow balls.

The Good Fight

2008-03-23T07:31:00.000-07:00

I've never made any bones about it: people in LA are superficial and materialistic. Its the culture (or lack thereof) and the way of living. But every once in a while, I run across people who are kind and selfless.

My last Wish Kid, Blake, had his going away party this weekend at the Hard Rock Cafe at Universal Studio's Citywalk.

That's him, his brother, and some friends playing limbo. The best thing about this Wish was that a great company, Verifi, sponsored it. Not only did they sponsor Blake's wish to go to Hawaii, but they also sponsored the party for his family.

And their company came out in full force too. So my hats off to Matt (CEO), who is an incredibly gracious and kind person, and his company, for giving back to the community and making my Wish Kid's wish come true.

That's So Hollywood

2008-03-17T07:27:00.000-07:00

My cousin was in town this weekend. I took her to Kitson. I hate Kitson. The sales associates are lazy and snobby. The perfect combination for getting no where in life. I walked out with a super cute Harajuku jacket, only to find out that the zipper was warped and wouldn't unzip all the way. Now I have a 84 bucks worth of store credit and will one day have to grace that stupid place with my presence.

Sadly, we didn't see anybody famous there. Or at The Ivy. Although I had a hard time looking sideways and walking. And how many times can you cruise on by by foot and not be noticed?

I introduced my cuz to Pinkberry. Which I find funny because there is no Pinkberry in Houston, so she can crave it all she wants and will never get it-hahaha! Although we can't afford Rodeo, we troll the area for celebs, and guess what?? Camped out in front of Gucci is a white Rolls Royce Phantom. And 10 paparazzi. Holy mother of meatloaf there's a celebrity inside! I pressure my cuz to hurry up and finish her frozen yogurt (in the end she ate the fruit instead-I totally don't get that since fruit is plentiful in Houston...) and in we went. Oh-I forgot to mention that we knew who the celebrity was. Get this: Janet Jackson's older brother.

No-not Michael Jackson. Don't we all wish it was him. So that left Tito or Jermaine-neither of which I would recognize anyway. But in we went. In we went with my cuz carrying her FAKE GUCCI. Its one thing to carry a fake Gucci into a Gucci store anywhere. Its a whole new ballgame to ago into the Rodeo Drive Gucci with a fake Gucci. I give her mad props.

That's us at The Grove-Asian style. We have absolutely no shame. For the first time I went into American Girl Place!!! I didn't get anything...but you know I wanted to =D

Karaoke for the Cool Kids

2008-03-10T08:43:00.000-07:00

My roomie has a high tolerance for bad singing. Maybe he's as tone deaf as I am. When I sing, I hear Bon Jovi's voice. But of course the voices in my head are more melodious than what everyone else hears...

For three hours last night, we jammed on Rock Band. I started off as guitar because that's what I played Saturday night. I'm not very good. But my middle name is Progress. The first time I picked up the guitar I forgot that I had to strum. I was too worried about getting the colors right. (This is multi-tasking and sometimes I'm just not good at it).

Everybody else I play with can either do the 'Medium' or 'Hard' levels. I am comfortable in 'Easy' mode. It only requires the use of three fingers. Once I introduce Mr. Pinky, it all goes to shit. Mr. Index, Middle, and Wedding Fingers don't play nice with Mr. Pinky. And the end result is that I seem to not have rhythm or know the primary colors.

Last night after a brief stint as guitarist, I ended up lead singer. Roomie was a drummer named Bertha.

We totally rocked out.

I am Courtney Love.

1) without the blonde hair
2) without the drugs
3) without the smoking
4) without the disastrous pathetic life

I sang Courtney Love better than Courtney Love could of.

The flip side was that the crowd was less than pleased with my rendition of The Clash's 'Are You Gonna Go My Way.' And I got booed for Bon Jovi's 'Wanted Dead or Alive.' Same for Radiohead's 'Creep.' Eh...can't be good at everything.

I wonder if a taping of this will get me into the American Idol auditions...

Aged Like Fine Wine

2008-02-27T10:02:00.000-08:00

I always thought that when I'm a parent I'd be one of those cool, hip parents with the cool hip house where all the kids would want to hang out at. If I have a daughter, I will take her to the (equivalent of) Hannah Montana or Backstreet Boys concert. She will get her first Barbie before she turns 28. And if I have a son, he'll get drum and guitar lessons. If he wants, I'll take him to the (equivalent of) Hannah Montana concert.

Today I basically threw myself under the bus.

The topic was whether or not a school should implement uniforms. I think I'm cool. I think I'm hip. I think I understand the younger generation.

Really? I'm just delusional.

I vote for uniforms, and to hell with a kid's freedom of expression. Have you seen what kids are wearing today? Holy shit! Skirts are shorter than my undies! (and for the record, I DO NOT sport granny panties). I'm not a big fan of guys wearing pants so baggy the belts are to keep the jeans at the knees.

When did I become such an old fogie? Have I really become more 'sensible'? Am I just a hop, skip, and step away from talking about the merits of a minivan over an SUV?

Pray for my unborn children...

Regression Progression

2008-02-25T07:52:00.000-08:00

I told my dad way back in the day that I mentally matured at 16. I'm 28 and man-did I have insight back then. Every time I think I'm immature and need to grow up, J-Unit comes and saves the day. She's the only other person that 'gets' me, but that's just because she's like me. Here are some pics from our weekend.

First up...

Dinner Thursday night. I'm not sure why in the whole restaurant, we decided to pose with the cross at our table. Trust me, we didn't all of a sudden get religious. The restaurant?? Pink Taco.

We went to SeaWorld San Diego on Saturday. When J-Unit flew out here, San Diego was not in the picture. During work on Friday I thought that we should do something fun and spontaneous. SeaWorld actually was back up. I tried to find us cheap Vegas flights a day before departure. Yeah--that wasn't going to happen...

This was one of the shows we saw. I like this picture because the orca on the left reminds me of me: lazy slacker that just wants to be fed.

We didn't get the memo that this really wasn't put up for posing...but J-Unit's got it down pat.

She didn't want Big Bird to be left out.

Big Bird's really Asian.

He lets people pose with him when he's not filming Budweiser commercials.

He's camera shy.

His fifth leg.

The doggy trains Clydesdales.

This is about the most adult thing we did all weekend. Anheuser Busch is a big sponsor of SeaWorld, so they have a Brewmaster's Club. We went beer tasting. Almost like wine tasting but not--similar yet different.

You like big butts?

I Would Walk 500 Miles

2008-02-25T07:24:00.000-08:00

This weekend J-Unit was in town. It was a last minute kind of thing. Spontaneity is pretty much my middle name.

J-Unit took the Asian honors by taking a million and a half pics. Me? I took 3.

We stayed at the Westin at Horton Plaza. Dinner was in the Gaslamp Quarter, which was literally a quarter mile away from the hotel. But with both of us in 4 inch heels, there was no way we were walking more than 2 blocks. So we get my car from valet, drive the 5 blocks over, realize there's not restaurant valet, but there's a general parking garage. After we're going down the ramp, we realize its 20 bucks to park the car. No way Jose. High tailed it out of the garage, valeted it at the hotel again, and cabbed it back to the restaurant. I think if we walked across the hotel parking lot, it would have taken us 5 minutes to get to the restaurant. So...0.43 miles took us driving my car to the restaurant, driving it back to the hotel, and then taking a cab back. We are brilliant. At least on the way back to the hotel it was raining, so it seemed half a notch less pathetic that we cabbed it back.

Saturday night we ate at Cafe Sevilla, which is a rustic Spanish style restaurant. This is my gazpacho, which is my favorite soup. Weird eh? Since its vegetarian. I really dug the presentation. Usually when I make soup for myself I eat it straight from the pot. Classy.

This is our main course. J-Unit got the seafood paella, and I got the meat paella. Oh yeah baby! There was a ton of meat. Imagine my surprise when I went digging around in my dish and found a chicken drumstick!!! Yummy. And my sangria. That was basically my fruit allotment for the entire weekend.

Shorty Swing My Way

2008-02-20T14:50:00.000-08:00

My spam box and I have a nice working relationship. I give him shit I'm not interested in (going on Carribbean cruises, getting saved by Paul the minister, extending the length of my non-existent penis), and he makes sure I don't receive any more of these wonderful offers.

But someone has out-smarted him. That someone happens to be the ABA. The freaking ABA. American Bar Association. What the fuck. They are incessant. Every damn day its something: ABA wants your opinion on tort reform, ABA wants to recognize ten outstanding women lawyers, ABA this, ABA that. I dinged one as spam, thinking that was the end of it.

OMG they are out to get me. They are on me like a fat kid after the dessert aisle at the buffet. But the ABA got smart. They stuff my gmail inbox with news from their various divisions. Do you know how hard it is to fill a gmail inbox? The darn thing keeps on growing, and the ABA keeps on sending out more superfluous crap I'm not the slightest bit interested in. I wouldn't be surprised if ABA 'newsletters' hit my inbox faster than my inbox can expand (Gmail: you guys need to fix this). But--with their so called 'divisions' you can't get rid of them. They have 'divisions' for everything: Asian lawyers, Hispanic lawyers, women lawyers, lawyers right out of law school, lawyers who don't practice law, lawyers who want to shoot themselves because they do practice law. Its mindblowing. I somehow got subjected to the torture of the 'Young Lawyers Division.' My latest email from them is the midyear roundup. The midyear roundup congrats lawyers on their excellent service to the community (ha)legal profession (ha ha), and...the kicker: 'reputation for legal ethics and professional responsibility. HAHAHA.

This email thing is like regular mail. When I move, Esurance and the Victoria's Secret catalog follow me all on their own. Like little puppies following their owners. Awwww. But my credit card bills? No way. Lost like a white kid in the heart of Harlem.

2008-02-19T10:54:00.000-08:00

This isn't my dog, but since I don't allow comments, no one's going to dispute me. So...this is my dog. His name is Toby.

And his girlfriend Penelope (I had no say in that one).

Here he is again. Trying to eat my face. We get along like that. I guess my breathe smells a lot better than my cousins.

All That and a Box of Chocolates

2008-02-15T11:01:00.000-08:00

I got my new Blackberry Curve today. Yippee!! I feel so hip. So IN with it. So posh. My Verizon phone is on the fritz. Sometimes it'll work-sometimes it won't. Depends on the day, the hour, the barometer reading-I have no idea.

Usually I'm one to just dive in and start using new things instead of reading the owner's manual ie all my other phones, my car, my laptop. I like to learn by doing, not by reading. But this is different. This is my new baby. The instruction manual will teach me how to set up email, send txt messages, take pictures, surf the web, schedule appointments. What does my new Curve not do? Nothing. It even has GPS!

This phone is so damn snazzy and sleek, why the fuck can I not figure out how to turn down the keypad volume?

My Brain: On Hiatus...Indefinitely

2008-02-13T08:51:00.001-08:00

Last night after running errands I decided to pop into Borders to see what's new. The answer: a lot.

Of course of all books to peruse, I choose "Shopaholic and Baby." It's pure chick lit. I'm happily reading away when a guy sits down at my table and proceeds to talk to me. His mouth is moving but I can't make out the words that are coming out. Its not that I'm not interested. Its more like I can't focus. So when I see his mouth stop moving, I know that's when I need to nod my head and act engaged.

"Blah blah blah blah blah."

"really? that's crazy!!"

"blah blah blah blah blah."

"uh huh."

"blah blah blah blah blah."

"i totally agree."

I did catch one question, which pretty much signaled the beginning of the end.

"so what book are you reading?"

"Shopaholic and Baby."

"oh..."

Well you know what mister?? I'm a rockstar. And I mean ROCKSTAR. Not groupie. I'm going to a top tiered b school! So don't you dare fucking look at me like I'm a ditz. My five remaining brain cells will stop ricocheting off my skull long enough to kick your ass.

I Ain't Sayin' She's A Gold Digger...

2008-02-11T21:52:00.001-08:00

The only thing worse than having shameful guilty pleasures is roping someone else into them.

There was a point in time that I watched quality tv: Daily Show, the Colbert Report, Family Guy, Cash Cab. Hell, there was a point in time when I didn't watch tv, but read. Well...needless to say those days are long gone. In reality, I don't watch that much tv, but what I do watch is just downright pathetic.

Roomie tapes The Millionaire Matchmaker for me. For us. Its horrible reality tv that we can't pry our eyes from. The Matchmaker is a hypocrite to the nth degree, and she's fascinating. All of her guy clients are millionaires that are looking for true love. The women are non-millionaires looking for true love. Or a free expensive meal (I vote for the second one). But...Miss Matchmaker says that the girls can't be gold diggers. HUH? What the fuck is the reason why girls sign up to date millionaires if its not to dig for gold? Isn't that the main point of this whole shebang?

And what's sad is the sorry state of these millionaires. Granted, humans are flawed and quirky, but still...most of the guys are over 40 and are eager to get laid. Eager like prom night. Miss Matchmaker is trying to set them up with a bombshell with intelligence that can be brought home to mom. Funny. I always had the notion that intelligence was a rare commodity and not highly sought after anyway. Not sought after like a good lunch hour lipo and boob augmentation anyway.

Upton Sinclair: you are officially on hold. I'm too busy letting my brain rot away to bother with your books.

Reporting to Active Duty

2008-02-07T07:39:00.000-08:00

Although its not on the list of top 100 things I would ever tell people about me, the wonderful state of California decided back in 2006 that I met their substandard requirements for practicing law and thus, I have my license.

Its got its perks. I'm still confused as to what they are.

My membership card is pretty sweet. Its plastic-but doesn't quite work like a credit card. I'm supposed to sign the back of it like a credit card. Also confused as to the purpose of this-who is going to steal my bar card? A lawyer who all of a sudden finds himself in a moral dilemma and needs to call the ethics hotline?

Well, if you want to 'steal' my bar card, I keep at my cube, in my pencil holder. It doubles as my ruler.

Slap that MD next to my JD

2008-01-30T20:49:00.000-08:00

LEGALMISFIT: wow. maybe you have super sinusitis

J-UNIT: that's what i'm thinking and i'll need to have super drugs. You should give me ideas so i can discuss with my doctor. omg - he's so going to drop me as a patient. i told craig that i needed to watch more house episodes and he was laughing and said "yes jen, you need to refer to episode 15" and i'm like 'dude my life is like a house episode cos they keep running tests and don't know what's wrong but unlike house, this has lasted way longer than one hour"

LEGALMISFIT: LOL and do you have a gimpy doc working on you?

J-UNIT: no but i've been sent to two other places to get tests done

LEGALMISFIT: oh- bird flu!

J-UNIT: OMG it better not stupid chicken with salad for lunch

LEGALMISFIT: are you going to get better before they diagnose you?

J-UNIT: doubtful cos now i have a slight cough and my nose is still stuffy and my ears feel like i'm on an airplane and i can't pop it. it's just pressure

LEGALMISFIT: what if you sneeze really hard?

J-UNIT then my head feels like it's going to explode

LEGALMISFIT: but it doesn't relieve the pressure?

J-UNIT: like i have to look at the tissue to see if there's brain matter. nope

LEGALMISFIT: gross

J-UNIT: pressure is still there

LEGALMISFIT: how will you know what brain matter looks like?

J-UNIT: dude i want to go weigh myself to see if i lost weight this week well i'm assuming grey? i'm basing this off of that show american dad and how the alien with the big brain head is grey

LEGALMISFIT: oh ok, i agree with that but let's hope its not part of the brain that you actually need that's coming out through your nose

J-UNIT: well since i haven't seen grey then i'm not concerned
but if i do, i'm putting it in a ziploc bag and going to the ER

LEGALMISFIT: make sure to label it

J-UNIT: seriously they should totally do a house episode on me
i will and i will make one of those tamper evident seals too

LEGALMISFIT: J-Unit --brain matter--dislodged from sneezing--1/30/08

Age Ain't Nothing But A Number

2008-01-30T20:35:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to put this picture up for a while. This is the Make-A-Wish Barbie. For the past several years, Mattel has partnered up with MAW to help children with life threatening illnesses. This year Mattel has made a limited edition Make-A-Wish Barbie. And I got one as a MAW volunteer.

I'm on the cusp of 28 and just got my first Barbie.

He Got Game

2008-01-08T00:13:00.001-08:00

J-Unit: dude, the koala bear looks like he's trying to feel you up
Legalmisfit: well...what a disappointment for the koala

Let Me Blow Your Mind

2007-12-03T22:44:00.000-08:00

I'm not romantic. Shocking.

RL: I have to tell you something. I really really really like you.
Legalmisfit: Hummm. I'm going to have to sit on that for a few days.

1/2 a week later:

RL: Why is it that you have that way of taking my breath away?
Legalmisfit: I dunno. Maybe you're really asthmatic?

Random Act of Kindness #83972

2007-11-27T08:35:00.000-08:00

I don't sit in the emergency exit on airplanes.

I should, because that window seat has the most legroom, barring there's no seat in front. But I push aside my selfish tendencies for the rest of the 180 passengers on the plane, and take another window seat.

Why is this a random act of kindness?

Because I sleep on flights. I sleep on a flight like a bear hibernates. Does Southwest still serve peanuts? No clue. Haven't gotten a bag in years. For all I know drinks aren't allowed. I'm talking I zonk out before 3/4 of the passengers are even on the plane, and I don't wake up till the plane taxis in.

I sleep through all weather announcements.
I sleep through the safety pow-wow (although I have stayed awake long enough on one flight to know that you have to manually inflate your own life vest.)
I sleep through the raising and lowering of landing gear.

Its the last one that scares me the most. Who the fuck sleeps through landing gear? Apparently me.

So Sunday night I get on the plane and immediately start sleeping. I wake up, and boy am I surprised that there is someone in the middle seat. I look around and its a completely packed flight. Then I look out the window, and we're on the runway. I'm thinking, 'shit-slept through the whole flight AGAIN.' I take off my seatbelt, and the lady next to me is looking at me weirdly. Oh. Seems we never took off. We're just camped out on the LAS runway. Hee hee.

I go back to sleep.

Wake up.
Look out the window.
Still see runway.
Turn to the lady and say, 'humm...we're still in Vegas?' 'Nope. Now we're in Los Angeles.'

High Five

2007-11-26T10:53:00.000-08:00

My weekend in Vegas was nothing short of AWESOME!! First and foremost, I placed at a poker tournament!!! Granted, the buy in was only $25, but there were 4 tables and I made it to the final table!!
For the majority of the hands, I didn't realize I won until the dealer pushed the chips in front of me.
For the majority of the hands, I was scared shitless.
For the majority of the hands, I was a poser. Every once in a while when I get the poker itch, I watch one of the WSOP tourneys on tv. There's always a guy or two that wears the hoodie, the shades, and the headphones. This time, I was that guy, sans shades. On the one hand, it was working because duh-I was winning hands. On the other hand, it wasn't working because I didn't know I was winning hands. Once, the dealer even said to me, 'Honey-you need to take that shit out of your ear and pay attention.' Yeah. Brutal.

BUT I PLACED!!!!!

Annie Duke be afraid. Be very afraid. I have no strategy. I'm basically comedy for the rest of the table.
One guy was trying to stare me down. Trying to get in my head. Let me tell you that's a bad idea. It's a waste of time. I'm a newbie at poker. I don't know enough to think about what hands can be made, and what cards the other players have. No. I'm not that advanced. What was I thinking about the whole time? Dinner. What a waste to try to read my mind.

I also saw Cirque Du Soleil's Love show. Which was the bomb. I can't say enough about how truly awesome it is, except that you HAVE to see it. My excitement during the show was equivalent to my excitement at Disneyland. It was THAT good.

I lost money at craps. But let's not speak of that since I did lose money, and I don't like focusin' on the negative.

2007-11-23T10:37:00.000-08:00

That's Sampson. He's one of the coolest dogs around. I want a dog. Like him, but not nearly as hyper.
I'm off to Vegas. Wish me luck! B school apps are expensive and I sure as shit could use some money.

2007-11-17T16:42:00.001-08:00

J-Unit visited me. With her by my side, I blew money like there was no tomorrow. I bought a wool coat. A WOOL COAT. I work and spend the majority of my time in Santa Monica. SANTA MONICA where its in the 70s in November. When the fuck am I going to get the opportunity to wear a WOOL COAT?

That's not the worst of it. I actually bought two. I know, I know. I haven't stumbled on a day to wear one of them, I'm not so sure both are going to be used. I have walked around my bedroom with them on though. But I don't think that counts for anything.

So imagine my surprise when we went to the BMW dealership to kill time beefore her flight and I didn't walk out with a new car. I know...shocking.
We saw this beautiful, absolutely gorgeous 5 series BMW sitting on the lot. Supposedly the owner totally went to town and got every damn option available. The only thing left to do was put an M5 engine in it. His company shipped him overseas, and the car couldn't tag along, so there it was on the lot. For 10k under what he should have paid. GORGEOUS. Too bad I wasn't in the market for a sedan.

Too bad I didn't have the nearly 60k to spend on a car. So I do the next best thing. Tell everyone I know about it hoping that someone will bite.

And someone does! One of my coworkers.

Legalmisfit: OMG it was specatular! It had everything on it-its just one step below an M5. You've got to see it! Its silver, only has 500 miles on it, and is going for 57 and change.
KT: I'll swing by this weekend and see if its still on the lot and take a look at it.
Legalmisfit: I get a ride in it if you get it!!!! I'll even call the dealership right now to see if its still there.

I call the dealership. The guy tells me there is no silver 5 series BMW on the lot, and there hasn't been one on the lot for a while. I say, 'Hell no-I was just there a few days ago and it was on the lot. Maybe it sold.' To which he replied, 'No-I'm looking on the computer and a silver one hasn't been sold within the past week.' I'll skip all the minor details, but basically, after 5 minutes of a somewhat heated argument, he tells me that the car he thinks I'm talking about is actually white. And going for 59k. The 2k part I don't give a shit about. But seriously, how do I mix up silver and white? I chalk it up to the fact that it had just finished raining and the whole car was littered with raindrops. Made the car look silver when it was white. This is nothing short of an egregious mistake, so I txt J-Unit.

Legalmisfit: Dude-that 5 Series was silver, right?
J-Unit: Ummm...no. I think it was black.

This makes the whole silver-white debacle look petty, right? So I had to go back and tell my coworker, KT, that no, it isn't silver. No, it isn't white. It's black. He replied with something I'm not going to repeat but along the lines of feeding him misinformation and being blind.

Hummph.

Oh-by the way, I look hot in my wool coats. Well, as hot as I can possibly look seeing as how the important parts are completely covered.

You Stupid Girl

2007-11-04T00:27:00.001-07:00

I think your idiocracy is rivaled only by your laziness.

My First Time Ever

2007-10-22T08:21:00.000-07:00

Oh all you lurkers-get your head out of the gutter! (I know who you are!). Last week I worked a charity event. It entailed me helping models dress for a runway show. This was a bigger deal than I thought. Volunteers were asked to wear comfy clothing, being that we're dressing models, we should not be in stiletto heels hobbling around. Ok cool-I wore a long sleeve, jeans, and Converse. I figured there'd be a back entrance. NOPE. Walked the damn red carpet. So I'm not sure what was worse-the fact that I thought I looked like a slob, or the fact that when I walked, all the paparazzi put their cameras down and the lights went out. Fabulous.

The main concept of being a dresser for a model is that they can't dress themselves. Literally. With their hair and make-up all done up, they can't risk getting foundation or lipstick on the collar of their tops and whatnot. This is what they didn't tell us about dressing models-if you have kids, you're going to be a pro at it. Try putting a top on a model when she's trying to put on earrings. I wanted to yank her arms out. This was after I wanted to throw up. Models are deathly skinny. You don't realize just how skinny until you're standing two inches away. You don't realize just how skinny until your nose is half a centimeter from their knees because you're trying to tie their shoelaces for them. How skinny was model? My model's first outfit included silver hotpants. No joke. And a silver jacket that barely covered her non-existent assets.

These models are 6 feet tall. Without shoes. And their calves are the size of my wrists. I wanted to throw up. But I'm smarter than that. That and I just bought some Ben & Jerry Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream.

Ye Shall Know The Truth

2007-10-18T14:12:00.000-07:00

I love all those one hit wonder songs. They're sappy. They're catchy. They're all right up my alley. So up my alley that I have 38 of VH1's Top 40 Worst One Hit Wonder Songs. I had them before the show aired.

Yesterday I was yapping with one of the IT dudes and I mentioned how shocked I was that my new i-Pod did not have any Milli Vanilli songs. For some reason they didn't make it from my old laptop to my new laptop, and subsequently didn't make it into my new i-Pod. So today, he BRINGS IN his Milli Vanilli CD. Yes!! Someone owns it!!! As a tribute, I've played the CD the whole day. Not the whole CD, because lord knows they weren't that good. But I had 4 songs on repeat. Their only famous 4 songs. But that's 3 more than a one hit wonder.

So here I am in my cube jamming to 'Blame It On The Rain.' Life is good. General Counsel (GC) walks by, stops three steps pass my cube, turns around, and starts laughing at me (I'm actually quite used to this now). We wax nostalgic about Milli Vanilli, and he says, 'Rob and Fab.' Whoah-you know their names?? Yes! I had their CD when I was a kid!! Once again, this is GENERAL COUNSEL talking.

Not to be outdone, the Chief Compliance Officer walks by, and informs us that she WENT to a Milli Vanilli concert way back when because her kids wanted to go. It was a show with Paula Abdul and some other washed up 90s star.

And this is why my group gets along so well.

2007-10-11T08:36:00.000-07:00

You can pinch his cheeks. 5 bucks for one, 8 bucks for both (College ain't cheap).

2007-10-10T13:00:00.000-07:00

What exactly are 'nutmeats'??

Tabula Rasa

2007-10-03T11:03:00.000-07:00

For the past few days I've been having a crisis. Not a mid-life crisis because I can't afford a Porsche, but I guess it'd be considered something similar. It all started with the Dodgers game last week. The Dodgers game I went to and had a blast at. The Dodgers game where I was on the outset of celebrity.

It was a foul ball. Most people sitting in the area where foul balls are prone usually bring a glove. I didn't. First and foremost, because I don't own a glove. A close second is the fact that even if I did own one, I wouldn't catch the ball anyway. Whenever something scary is about to happen, I usually close my eyes and start humming. Trust me, it's hard to catch a ball when your eyes are closed and you're rocking. Its hard to catch anything besides weird stares.
But the section I was sitting in was behind a net, which serves the distinct purpose of ruining pictures and saving our lives from foul balls.

Except this one. It was in the latter half of the game, and the foul ball went up high and looked like it was coming down in my section. Fight or flight. What do I do? Grab my purse, stick it over my head and start chanting to myself. I know people have gotten hurt big time from attempting to catch a foul ball with their bare hands. I can't imagine the damage it'd inflict on a noggin. My noggin for that matter. And this being a baseball game? The seats are somewhat akin to an airplane. TIGHT FIT. There's no where to run. I can't dive onto the floor (I seriously contemplated that at the beginning of the game) because there's about 1.3 inches from my friend's knee to the back of the seat in front of him. So I shrivel up and chant underneath my purse.

Here's the thing: I always thought that in life or death situations, your life is supposed to flash before your very eyes. Trust me-I perceived this as one of those situations. HB and LG didn't think so. In fact, they were laughing at me. I was a one woman side show...
But anyway, so I was scared. Scared shitless. I DO NOT want to be beaned by a baseball. What if I go into a coma? I don't even know what kind of medical insurance I have. I assume I have medical insurance. Which hospitals are good? What if I get brain damage? So many questions so little answers. This I chalked up to a 'life or death' moment. What do I expect to be running through my head? Oh I dunno-maybe good memories? I'll even take some bad ones to mix things up. But NO. Nothing. No memories, no good throughts, no questions about the pearly gates (assuming I go up and not down). My mind was BLANK.

My conclusion: I haven't done anything worthwhile with my life. I'm almost 30, and I have a couple of degrees behind my name. I can't drive, don't know cardinal directions, and love ice cream. That about sums me up in one sentence. Hence, my crisis. As I was telling my coworkers, even Britney's done enough to last two or three lifetimes. I haven't done enough to fill up 10 seconds worth of time while I'm waiting to see if I'll get clocked with a baseball.

Sad.

I've done a ton of work with the Make A Wish Foundation of Greater Los Angeles. While that's fun and all, I think that that's basic. I firmly believe that everyone should do some kind of community service to make society a better place. So, I haven't done anything significant. Like cure AIDS. Or save someone from drowning. The only thing I've done is help an old lady across the street. And throw out the kitchen trash on a periodic basis...

A dash of ambition, two shakes of luck, a swirl of delirium

2007-10-01T12:53:00.000-07:00

From: Legalmisfit
Sent: Monday, October 01, 2007 10:25 AM
To: EA; CT
Subject: RE: lunch tomorrow

Yeah—I’m trying to lose weight too. Don’t believe me? Ask Clint.

While we’re on the whole losing weight topic, here’s my new goal: to get Britney’s body (pre-marriage and subsequent downward spiral) before Britney does.

I know-lofty goals.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EA's response???
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: EA
Sent: Monday, October 01, 2007 10:32 AM
To: Legalmisfit; CT
Subject: RE: lunch tomorrow

I think that’s awesome. My goal is to make Beckam look like a couch potato… Talk about lofty goals

Think Blue

2007-09-30T14:20:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I went to a Dodgers game. My work thought that my coworker LG and I did a good job, well...at our job, so we got rewarded with some kick ass seats at a Dodgers game. When we got our tickets, the Dodgers were still in the running for a spot at the playoffs. We were stoked.

Oh boy-what a difference two weeks makes. By the time our game rolled around, the only way the Dodgers were going to go to the playoffs was if they won every game AND Arizona loses the rest of their games AND San Diego loses the rest of their games AND Colorado loses the rest of their games. Hold on...the Dodgers still probably don't have a chance.

Oh well.

But here's a pic of LG and I at the game. This was how close we were! 13 rows from the bottom!!!

Here's the thing about baseball games-they're actually not boring. Its a whole different world when you're at the game than when you're camped out in front of the tv watching. So LG and her sister left during the first or second inning (I can't remember which) to get food. They come back and the Rockies have scored two.

Legalmisfit: We're losing
LG: OMG what happened?!?!
Legalmisfit: I dunno. I was too busy looking for David Duchovny.

Yes, that was our actual conversation. And David Duchovny really was there. I have to give credit to HB-he's got hawk eyes. Me? Not such much. I didn't even believe him at first. So I'm going to add him to my list of celebs I've seen.

The parts of the game I saw were good. This meaning, yes, I wasn't watching the whole game. But I have A.D.D. so much can't be expected of me in the first place. Between looking for David Duchovny, eating a Dodger Dog, eating garlic fries, trying to find the damn malt guy (note to the uneducated like me-malt IS NOT ice cream), getting whiplash from trying to find the wave, and eagerly anticipating the 7th inning stretch, I really wasn't concentrating on the game. But it was fun and I had a blast.

Fight or Flight

2007-09-07T12:41:00.000-07:00

You know that civilian who will run into a burning building because he see grandma on the second floor trapped? Or the guy who will run into the street to save a dog when a car comes barreling down? Well, I am neither of those.

My brain and body aren't equipped for 'fight or flight.'

A decade ago I visited my brother up in Washington state and we went white water rafting. I distinctly remember the instructor telling us not to hold onto anyone if they're falling out of the raft. On the raft floor are flaps that you put your inside foot in so you won't fall completely out. So if you grab onto someone by their arm, he runs the risk of dislocating a joint. Ouch. I remember the instructor telling us this before we began rafting.

Halfway through we hit a pretty big wave. Lo and behold, my brother starts flying out. Of course his foot is secure in the raft. And of course I lunge and grab his arm. I'm holding onto him for dear life. And of course I remember the instructor telling everyone not to do exactly what I am doing. But duh-I'm not letting go.

I CLEARLY DON'T FOLLOW INSTRUCTIONS.

Last night I cooked for the first time in my new crib. Roomie wasn't around, and I told him that I'd get a fire extinguisher, but I didn't, which means I had to be super careful. I did, however, buy a small bag of flour. It had the capacity to put out a match.
I like searing chicken first and then dumping it in the oven to finish cooking. Especially with white meat-it keeps it from drying out. Before I start cooking the chicken on the stove, I go to see if I know how to work the oven. It has all over three knobs, but trust me, these things are difficult. I don't know when to preheat, but I think now is as a good a time as ever, so I turn the temperature to 350. Immediately I smell gas. Not gasoline like at Shell (that smells good), but the natural gas smell. Uh oh...and then there's a little ticking sound going on. I'm not sure what it is, but it can't be good.

I think most people would have immediately turned off the oven and ran. Either or. Both would be fantastic. Me? What do I do? I stand five inches away from the oven and count each tick I hear, similar to counting sheep at night. After counting to 45, I'm bored, so I walk to the stove, poke my chicken a few times with the pasta scooper, and throw it on the stove.

I'm surprised I'm still alive.

You Know I'm Bad, I'm Bad-You Know It

2007-09-03T20:04:00.000-07:00

I've ordered a knife set and a spice rack from Amazon. It shipped Friday, and should get here by the 17th. I don't know why anything shipping from inside the US to another place also inside the US takes more than 2 weeks, but hey-I don't make the rules here. I got the spice rack because I was appalled that Roomie didn't have one. The apartment apparently doesn't come equipped with salt and pepper either. Well, now that I think about it, the spice rack doesn't come with salt and pepper. So I guess in two weeks I'll still be in the same boat. Hummm...
I sprung for a knife set because Roomie doesn't have one of those either. When I asked him, he replied, 'I have a knife or two.' Oh boy. One day I was digging in a drawer for said knives, and almost walked away sans 3 fingers thanks to his uncovered bread slicer =(
So knives and spices it is.

I tell Roomie that I bought these things when we're out at lunch. My life is so mundane that buying spices and knives is considered news. I give him hell because he doesn't have salt and pepper. And he responds with something along the lines of, 'I'm a guy-I don't cook. That's your job!!!!' So I fired back, 'Boy-I can poison you so fast...'

So let's now assess my two week stay here:
1) I've warned him of a possible fire as a result of my culinery skills
2) I've threated to poison him

I see the wheels in his head turning, wondering what kind of mess he got himself in by signing me on.

Black as You Wanna Be

2007-08-27T13:48:00.000-07:00

Here's the thing: I love video games but I suck at them. I'm not big on violent gory stuff too. Or maybe I just love the idea of video games. Actually, I just love Yoshi and all the Mario Brothers characters (minus Daisy and Peach). Since Roomie is more mature than I, (or maybe Mario is seen as childish) he plays the 'adult' games complete with gore and carnage.

He's got a subscription to Game Fly, and this week, the game was Def Jam Icon. The sleeve mentioned something along the lines of 'starting a record label and signing artists.' I thought it was like a journey-similar to Donkey Kong. HELL NO. You're suppose to open a can of whoop ass on your opponent to the beat of the music. I think that's the part where EA was trying to integrate the music aspect of Def Jam into the game more so than its predecessors. Hubcaps spin and twinkle to the beat of the song. Roomie fought Luda. He fought Redman. He fought T.I. He fought Young Jeezy (who the fuck is Young Jeezy?)

Here's the amazing thing: after an hour, Roomie was kicking ass and taking names! He's the whitest white boy I know. I'm Asian and have urbandictionary.com favorited. Neither of us understood half of what was said. Maybe it was the Ebonics? Maybe it was the poor grammar? It was just incomprehensible.

So there's the option of building your own gangsta rappa. Or fighter. Whatever. I'm impressed with the amount of detail put into building your own person. Everything was adjustable. From the color of the eyes, to the shape of the eyes, to how high the cheekbones were-absolutely everything was changeable. And in the middle of it Roomie asked, 'How black do we want him?' Yes, even that was an option. Our guy (named aptly: Playa) did so well that he got $1,000 to go buy clothes. We're trying to sign on more people and get richer so we can afford to get him a grill (priced around $35,000). I'm not sure what the goal of the game is, but now I'm hell bent on getting him a grill. That's how we roll.

Denied

2007-08-22T07:59:00.000-07:00

I love my new home. Its very comfortable, and by that I mean its nice but not over-the-top. Its tastefully decorated, lots of open space, and comfy. The thing I love about the complex is that someone was nice enough to steal three shopping carts and keep them in the garage. I know-it seems ghetto until you realize that without it, you're going to make 4 trips up and down to get all groceries in. Since I'm in the process of moving, I have much more than just groceries. So here I go loading up the cart. Groceries at the bottom of the cart. Then I have a garbage bag fully of dirty laundry that I threw in. Over the sides of the cart I draped the dry cleaner I just picked up. On top of that was a bag of toiletries, and a bag of miscellaneous items. This cart was chalked full of stuff. Across the garage I go. Up the elevator, and down the hallway. None of the flooring is carpet either, mind you. Its looks almost like huge brick pieces. I know I'm going to do this again tonight and tomorrow night. I'm seriously thinking of investing in some ear plugs it was so damn loud. The safari animals in Africa probably woke up.

Too bad I was so excited about my new place-otherwise I would have just felt homeless. I totally had the look down: dirty jeans, hair unkempt, huge part of my life wheeled in a shopping cart.

This is going to be my downfall in my new home: I can't get in. The lock doesn't turn for me. I had this problem when I first picked up keys, and two days ago when Lisa and I dropped off some items during our lunch hour. 5 minutes I'm fiddling with this lock. The door will not fucking open! So now here I am, sweating profusely, near tears, and my shopping cart is somewhat warped and threatening to roll away from me. AND I CAN'T GET IN!!! (notice how I'm already calling the shopping cart 'mine'?)

I call Lisa and ask her how to open my door. Her words, not mine: 'You have to be gentle with it-slide it in slowly and out again a couple of time, and maybe wiggle it around some.' (what are we talking about??)

Either way it didn't work. So the only thing I can think of doing is trucking the shopping cart back down to the garage. What a way to announce my presence. Off I go again clanking and baning down the hallway. At this point I'm not sure what to do. Oh-on top of all this I NEED TO PEE.

Finally I break down. I go introduce myself to my new neighbors and say, 'hello! I live next door and can't get in. Can you please teach me how to work the lock?'

I can't remember the last time I was so excited to be inside. Oh wait-probably the last time I had a tall cup of coffee and then ended up sitting for 45 minutes in traffic.

My roomie came home much later. I informed him that under no circumstance was I to leave the town home again. I'll deplete my checking account, savings account, stocks and mutual funds (in that order). Once I'm down to only having enough for a month's rent, I'll put in my 30 days. His response? 'Cool!'

New Home

2007-08-18T19:32:00.000-07:00

I signed the lease to my new digs this afternoon. Exciting. I can't wait to move. My new roomie, E-Dawg, is showing me around the building, and we're discussing, among the communal things, what he has and what he needs.

Me: Do you have pots and pans and bowls and that kind of stuff?

Him: Yeah. It should be enough for us.

Me: Ok. Good. I don't know how to cook, but I like to try once or twice a month. Do you have a fire extinguisher??

Him: ...

Me: I don't want to burn down your place...

Him: Oh-I like the way you think

I was tempted to ask and make sure he had fire insurance and that it'd cover stupid acts like me attempting to cook. But then I don't want him to kick me out before I've even moved in.

I Spy

2007-07-25T07:24:00.000-07:00

Last night I had dinner w/ H and L from my old job. I left that place after oh...6 months. My job description: watching paint dry. Only H has been a trooper and has hung in there for over a year.
So we met up at Cafe Brasil, which is a hole-in-the-wall Brazilian restaurant. The food is awesome. And Chris Tucker was there! He looks a lot bigger in person. By bigger, I mean buff. Maybe its just his voice, but whenever I see him in movies (which is just...Rush Hour), he seems scrawny. Not in real life! But this was uber exciting. My two younger cousins can't believe that I worked in Beverly Hills for 6 months and didn't see Paris Hilton or Lindsay Lohan and the gaggle of paparazzi that hover inches away. They weren't impressed with me seeing Larry King or Jamie Lee Curtis. Oh well-you can't win 'em all.

Vegas Baby! Vegas!!

2007-07-22T21:35:00.000-07:00

I told myself that as a goal, I'm going to get my passport stamped every year. So where's the first place I go after vocalizing my new goal??? Vegas. Yeah...

But this was my annual company party. And boy, can my co-workers party. Big time. They go all out.
The top pic is a shot of the strip from the club Mix, which is the 64th floor of THEhotel in Mandalay Bay. My company had tables set up with all you can drink alcohol. This is actually from my camera. That's how much the view ROCKED. Sadly, I couldn't hang with the drinking. Because...

Before Mix, we had dinner and drinks at Border Grill. And when I say drinks I mean drinks with a capital S. I started off with a margarita.

Didn't care much for that drink, and since the alcohol was free, I got a Grey Goose Cran. Uhhhh...yummmy. I followed that with a shot of Petron. And then another shot of Petron.

Shortly afterwards two lemon drops. Those sneaky bastards. I was good. For about ten mins. Things went sour fast. REAL FAST. I had to high tail it up to the hotel room and make nice with...well...you know.

Although Border Grill is inside Mandalay Bay, its quite the hike from the hotel elevators to the restaurant. Like a 5 mile hike. I swear months had passed by the time I made it up to the room. I swear I spent no more than 5 minutes up there, but when I made it back down to Border Grill, there was an APB out on me. I walked back to my table, sat down, and got the stink eye from the hostess. 'YOU!' He glared at me. 'YOU!!! We were looking all over for you!!!' I think I really scared the shit outta the guy. Poor guy. Had the whole hotel looking for me. I guess its not such a hot idea to down 4 shots in 25 minutes. Kinda fucks with your brain. Guess that's also why the hostess let me walk out with a huge bottle of flat water.

I had to take a nap after dinner.

One hour later, when my mind unfucked itself, it was off to Mix.

There's another pic but I don't think I'm not allowed to post it. Something about scandal or whatnot...well...you know...what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

For best results, use the right fingers

2007-07-17T07:04:00.000-07:00

I've never taken a bowling before. How hard can it be? Swing your arm back, then swing it forward and let go of the ball. That was my strategy. These were the results. ('L' is Leese-one of my coworkers)

A whopping 54!!! One of my coworkers so eloquently put it, "Wow. Its actually kind of hard to score that low..." It IS hard to gutter 4 consecutive times!!
I'm going to chalk up game 1 to me not bowling for roughly 3 years. This was the Game 2 score. Much better!

81!! And I started off with a spare! Wheee! Here's the thing about the way I bowl-its slow. I'm talking molasses slow. Paint drying slow. So slow that you can put a load of laundry in the washing machine, and then hang dry it slow. The lane to my right was occupied by two kids, I'm talking middle school-high school age. Bowling etiquette dictates that one person bowls at a time. So I'm up at the same time one of the guys is up, and he nods in my direction to let me go first. I bowl. Then he bowls. His pins realign and he's about to finish out the frame. MY BALL IS STILL ROLLING. WTF. This is why I suck at bowling. The ball all but stops right in front of the pins.

Speed wasn't my only problem.

Nor was it my biggest.

My other coworker joins us. He is Mr. I-Used-To-Bowl-In-A-League. Oh it shows in the score. But...after watching him bowl his first frame, a lightbulb turns on. I've been bowling using my index and middle finger! This is probably why every time I bowl I've broken those fingernails. And subsequently, why I think the 10 lb ball is way too heavy. So once I started bowling with the correct fingers (my form was all fucked up and will continue to stay that way), my score improved yet again!!

So close yet so far away from a 100.

Lifestyle of the Poor and not so Famous

2007-07-16T10:18:00.000-07:00

Television has never been a big part of my life. I didn't grow up with cable, so back in high school, MTV was like Santa Claus-I'm sure he existed, just never saw him. I didn't have cable throughout the three tortuous years AKA law school. That wasn't so bad. What was bad was that I didn't even get regular tv programming except for one channel. NBC. Needless to say, I watched A LOT of Law and Order. And the Olympics. OMG I just about watched every damn event (yes, even underwater basket weaving).

Because of this, I've never felt the need to splurge on a tv. Or an entertainment setup for that matter. I'd rather read a book. Which is why my tv setup looks like this:

You can see this from the submarine window of the apartment. Talk about theft deterrent system and TV in one. Oh-and the bottom tv doesn't work. It's merely a tv stand for the top TV.

Not going for incognito eh?

2007-07-12T10:02:00.000-07:00

When I'm doing my thing on the can, I like to read. And judging by the fact that other people have books and magazines in their bathrooms, its a common thing. Understandable. Here's what I don't understand. Why do people take magazines and papers with them to the public restroom? You might as well have flashing lights around you and bang on a gong announcing that you're going to be letting out a stink bomb. Why why why? When you stink up a restroom in public, you're suppose to blame shift, and make like someone else let loose. Don't roll up a packet of papers and freely wave it around! This mainly goes towards men. Women can be discreet by carrying a purse in. But guys??? Come on.

2007-07-07T17:23:00.001-07:00

Go ahead. Try to find a baby cuter than me.

So Close...Yet So Far Away

2007-06-27T09:29:00.001-07:00

Here's reason #72960 why my next car will have navi:

I had to go to a store last night that I've never been to. Its fine with me because all I need to do is Mapquest the location and off I go. The directions say to take the 170 North and exit Roscoe. I leave at 6:45pm, which is still daylight out, and although there's traffic, it shouldn't be a big deal. Besides, its only 9 miles away.

There's a little bit of traffic, but its more than bearable. I'm jamming to Madonna (back when her music was enjoyable and she had better things to do than write children's books, or say, posing nude), and inching along the freeway. Pass up the exit to my gym, and think I'm getting close. Pass up 5 more exits, and still think I'm getting close. Come upon the 'Pasadena-next 6 exits' signs and realize, 'HOLY SHIT-this isn't right!!! In sheer stupidness that only I can achieve, its dawns on me that I was on the wrong freeway. From the get go. I was suppose to take the 170 N, but instead hopped on the 134 E.

So, here's a map of my scenic route. The little green arrow (the southern most of the three points) is my humble abode. The yellow dot to the northwest is my destination. The red dot all the way to the east in BFE is where I ended up before it hit me that I was on the wrong track. I can't even say that I made a wrong turn, because I kinda fucked up right after I left my hood. 134. 170. You say tomato, I say tomatoe. This is one of those times where getting 1 out of 3 just doesn't cut it.

This is probably why I can't do well on the math portion of the GMAT. I can't even play Sesame Street and realize 134 is not the same as 170.

How to Look Bad While Trying to Look Better

2007-06-19T09:04:00.000-07:00

One of the things I hate about going to the gym after work is that everyone else on the planet is trying to do the same. At the same damn gym I frequent. I'm not a fan of waiting for a treadmill or elliptical machine to open up. I don't like hopping on an exercise machine right after someone hopped off. It's the same train of thought as waiting in line to use a public restroom. Gross.

So I decided that I would hike up to Griffith Observatory as a workout at least twice a week. Its a great ass and thigh workout, which is excellent since my badonkadonk seems to grow exponentially with each passing breath. I've gone every Saturday and Sunday for the past two weeks. Eventually I'm trying to build the strength/energy/stamina/guts/neurosis to walk up it twice. Every time I'm next to my car stretching, I think, 'Ok-Legalmisfit-today's the day you're going to hike up it twice! No giving up or wimping out!' Five minutes later, sounding like an asthmatic kid, I think, 'Yeah-who are you kidding. Let's just try to make it to the top without dying/passing out/or dying, passing out, and rolling off the trail.' Hope springs eternal, I guess...

I'm not skinny. In no stretch of the imagination am I skinny. Oh wait. If being a female and weighing 250 lbs is average, then yes, I am skinny. But I wouldn't go so far and say I'm gargantuan either. Hefty? Chunky? Fat? More likely than not. (this is depressing) So I can't understand why people more round and robust than I pass me up on the trail. Not just one person. More like 5. Is there chocolate cake at the top I'm unaware of? I don't think I'm slow. Ok-maybe I am slow, but it's a pretty damn steep incline. So how are these people who are clearly heftier than I going at a faster pace?

That's not even the worst part. OLD LADIES PASS ME UP. I'm not 15 years old and think that anyone over 21 is old. I'm 27 and consider anyone pushing 65 old. The old people passing me up? There's at least a generation gap between us.

I'm baffled.

I've Got the Magic Touch

2007-06-13T07:56:00.000-07:00

Some people have talent. Others have crazy amounts of talent. Michael Phelps can swim faster than a swordfish (I just Googled it-swordfish is one of the fastest fish, if not the fastest). Michelle Kwan looks like a ballerina on ice. McGuyver can make a bomb out of an eraser, a feather, and belly button lint. Paris Hilton has made a career out of lacking any talent. And then there's the kid who memorized the first 400 digits of pi.

Here's my talent: I can break things. Not anything and everything (sadly, I'm not that omnipotent). But if an object requires electricity of some sort, chances are I can wave my fingers and break it faster than Lindsay Lohan can wreck another Mercedes. Lemme run through a quick list of things I've broken:

1) A Mac at the computer science lab in college
2) The Mac to the right of the first one I broke
3) The Mac to the right of the second one I broke
4) The antenna on my first car
5) The antenna on my dad's current car
6) 3 iPods

The latest victim? My laptop Marshall. I'm not sure if he even turns on anymore, so I can't even crack jokes about getting the blue screen of death. Seeing that ominious sign would be a step up. Now Marshall sits in my backpack waiting to get repaired. I have begged IT to look at him and tell me if he's a lost cause or if I can continue to hold out hope.

Just so you know...you can go ahead and blame me if we're cruising in your car and all of a sudden it goes dead.

Take That Twice Cooked Pork!!!

2007-06-04T07:53:00.000-07:00

This is what I learned this weekend:

Oven: kitchen appliance used for baking or roasting
Dutch Oven: a heavy cooking pot, usually of cast iron or enamel-on-iron, with a heavy cover.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered they were two different things. Previously, the only definition of dutch oven I knew was from Roomie: when you fart and hold your partner's head under the cover.

I bought all the ingredients to make pot roast. Its suppose to take three hours of cook time, and probably 30 minutes of prep time. I logged in an hour's worth of prep time. So I'm happily washing the veggies and whatnot, and Roomie informs me that we don't own a dutch oven. Hummm...
Then she comes up with the genius idea of using the slow cooker. Brilliant. The only thing is that I found a recipe for pot roast using the slow cooker, and let me just say this: starting at 4pm it would have been done around midnight. But we figured that's as good an idea as any. Since we were trying to speed up the process so that it wouldn't take a mere 7 hours, I browned the meat in a pot over the stove. After 10 minutes, I dumped it in the slow cooker with carrots, celery, onions, garlic, mushrooms, rosemary, and thyme.

In the meantime I studied (supposedly) and worked on my fitness (according to Fergie Ferg). Three hours later, took the lid off slow cooker and said, 'DAMN!! It doesn't look hearty!!' Roomie asked me why I wanted something hearty when its 90 degrees outside. I had no clue, but I was really after some blizzard weather hearty meat.

The slow cooker ain't lying when it makes the claim that it cooks slow. NO JOKE. I cut open the meat and its red. Blah. About this time its 9pm, and I've been at this since 5, so needless to say I'm hungry and impatient. We decided to stick the pot roast and all its glory onto a pan, throw some foil on top, and finish cooking it in the oven for an hour. And the picture below is the result. Yummy! Seriously, it was yummy. The picture doesn't do my three times cooked pot roast any justice. The picture looks like a mini moat with floating carrots...

Tacolicious!

2007-05-21T10:33:00.000-07:00

This was one damn good layered taco salad. Ok-it was really just decent, but the standards I judge my cooking by are significantly lowered. It just has to be to level the playing field. But anyway, from start to finish, the recipe claimed that this was a 45 minute meal. It took me nearly 2.5 hours. And that's not including the trip to the grocery store to get all the ingredients (where I proceeded to have a spazz fest in front of the butcher because I didn't know what ground chuck was or what a proper substitute for it was).

My True Calling

2007-05-15T07:35:00.000-07:00

So if roughly a million other people come up with the same brilliant ideas as mine, does that idea lose its brilliance and gets relegated to the status of being a good idea? If a tree falls in a forest and no one hears it, does it still make a noise??

I figured on Mother's Day everyone should be taking their mom out for brunch and a day at the spa or a day shopping. Thus, it would be the perfect day to hit up Disneyland. I've obviously given children way too much credit because Disneyland was PACKED. A thousand moms got hosed. But anyway, this is the picture of Nico and I on the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters ride. My score puts me at Level 5- Ranger First Class!!!! I'm doing my part to save the universe from the evil empire Zurg. We'll forget for a minute the fact that the ride stopped twice which helped my score immensely...
Good to know I'm good at something. Always need a Plan B in case a career in finance isn't in the cards...

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

2007-05-02T07:36:00.000-07:00

Growing up I used to watch this show. It was touted as the fun way to learn geography. I'm sure this show, along with my elementary and high school education have taught me generally where countries are located.

Through the UCLA extension program, I'm going towards a certificate in International Trade and Commerce. It's definitely not all that and more. One of the courses I'm taking this quarter is titled, 'Doing Business in Europe.' This is taken verbatim from the course syllabus:

DOING BUSINESS IN EUROPE is a 12 week course designed to introduce various participants to approaches, opportunities, and risks of doing business in the markets of the Western and Eastern Europe, primarily Germany, France, United Kingdom, Ireland, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Norway, and Finland, Greece, and Turkey. The course focuses primarily on the member nations of the European Union.

I should sue the program for false advertisement. Let me re-hash what I've learned about doing business in Europe after 4 weeks (a quarter of the way through the quarter)

1) The Swedes are the most educated group of people

If you read that line and you didn't know it before you read it, you owe me $181. That's about what 4 weeks of this class has cost me.
I sit in class for 3 hours every Tuesday evening bored out of my mind. I think gouging my own eyes out with an icepick would be a more pleasant experience. Studying for the bar was more interesting. Yes, read that again-studying for the bar was more interesting!

Last night we discussed the roles of various religions and how they effect business policies. Fair enough. However, we had already discussed religion last class. So this class session, we broke into groups of 3-4, had to pick a country, and talk about how the various religions affect business decisions by companies in that particular country. It sounds like a good plan. Until you realize that the class is made up of students (students in the sense that no person has more than a year or two working experience, not student in the sense that we are students taking this course). And I already learned the first class that no one has any experience working in another country or working for a company in that company's global relations/sales department. Basically none of us bring anything to the table. Which is fine. That just means that it cannot be as interactive as the professor had hoped, and as the students, we rely on him for information on doing business in Europe.

So, with none of us having any global working experience, we can't really say how religion shapes the business practice of a company doing business in Europe. Nevertheless, we trudge on. Here's the kicker. The first group picked as their country India. The second group picked Japan. My group picked France. The last group picked Russia. Now tell me when Japan and India were officially recognized as European countries?

Welcome to Chevy Nation

2007-05-01T15:36:00.000-07:00

This is the Chevy Cobalt. It is not only a car, but also doubles as a patience tester.

Nico's friend came into town, and had this for a rental car. Its unfair to knock a rental car, because hello-that's why they are rental cars to begin with. But this one was extra special. Extra special as in the-key-won't-come-out-of-the-ignition special.
It was stuck at In-n-Out Burger.

A: Oh shit-the key's stuck
Nico: What???
A: The key won't come out of the ignition
Me: (hee hee)

A: (turns car back on)
(reverses car)
(re-parks car)
(attempts to take key out)
A: It's stuck!
Nico: (reaches over to turn the key)
Oh my god-you're right-it won't come out!
Me: (laying across the back seat dying)

8 rounds of turning the car on and off...
7 reversals and parking in THE SAME SPOT
6 rounds of cursing later...

The key miraculously came out!!

Here's a list of the things we did try to get the key out

1) turned the car off with the A/C off
2) turned the car off with the A/C on
3) turned the car off with the radio on
4) turned the car off with the radio on
5) turned the car off with foot on brake pedal
6) turned the car off with foot off brake pedal
7) turned the car off with handbrake off
8) turned the car off with handbrake on

Next next stop was Griffith Observatory. It was fabulous. It was gorgeous. It was a freaking surprise hike. Cars are not allowed to drive up during the day. People are not allowed to hike up at night. Guess when we showed up. It wouldn't have been so bad if I wasn't in jeans. If I had my sunglasses on. If I was sporting real sneakers and not Chucks. The view was gorgeous. The view of the smog that is...

Nevertheless it was an awesome workout. I think I'm going to hike up to the Observatory every weekend. I think I'm insane. But, no joke, its a great workout. Imagine my surprise when I woke up Monday morning and didn't have buns of steel.

Back at our apartment came another round of 'the key is stuck! the key is stuck!'
This time it was street parking. So...after...

4 rounds of turning the car on and off
5 rounds of reversing and pulling back into the same spot
5 rounds of cursing
2 fake outs (people thought we were leaving only to watch us lurch back and forth)

...the key was still stuck. The woman whose house we parked in front of was eying us suspiciously (but wouldn't you?). So what did we do? Drove around the block and re-parked at the same spot. The key came out. Good thing the neighbor didn't. I'm not sure exactly how we were going to explain our car problems. It was a riot though. Its been too long since I've laughed so much. All I was doing was laughing. Oh wait-I had one idea; drape a jacket over the steering column and hope nobody looks in thinking, 'I wonder if that jacket is there because the key is stuck...'

Soup

2007-02-21T08:15:00.000-08:00

I made soup last night. Supposedly it was Irish Beef Stew. Supposedly.
It took three hours from beginning to end, and trust me when I say that I will not be making that again.
I'm not sure what went wrong, but little went right. Hence this blog is sans picture of stew.
I've emailed Nico aka Roomie to see if she is still alive. Cross your fingers. Its been three minutes and I haven't heard back from her yet. But I'll start fretting if I don't hear back from her in three hours.
I guess one of the problems was the excessive amount of thyme I added. Its not my fault though-all the other spices had the 'control' top-you know, the plastic top with holes for easier measurement control. The thyme is the only spice without that plastic covering, so needless to say much more than one tablespoon was added. Probably much more than two tablespoons. I think half the container let loose.

The other problem was the fact that I used half beef stock and half chicken broth. Not intentionally. Once again-its not my fault. Once I went into Ralphs I had to go pee. BADLY. So I blazed through the aisles picking up potatoes, tomato paste, Worchestershire sauce, and beef stock. I didn't bother checking to see if the container behind the beef stock was beef stock or not. I just assumed. MY BAD.

After browning the beef, I added the first container. Then I added the second box. The coloring of the second box was much darker than the first. Imagine my surprise. My shock. I yelped. But what can I do, right?

Roomie still has not emailed me back. Shit

Job Fair Ka-put

2007-02-20T10:08:00.000-08:00

One of the millions of reasons I loved childhood was the boundless opportunities life presented. It was the time where I could declare myself to be an astronaut on Monday, a doctor on Tuesday, a scientist on Wednesday, a ballerina on Thursday (sans my non-lithe figure), and a circus clown on Friday. Life was chalk full of opportunities.

The downside to growing up is the realization that not everything is possible, and as you progress through life, you're suppose to narrow your career choices down. In other words, focus on one career path. Basically dashed dreams. Right now my title is Compliance Associate (as you can probably deduce, it wasn't any of my Monday-Friday career paths either). There's no way to describe it in plain English so I'm not going to bother trying. I've batted around the idea of working at a bookstore or Starbucks if I'm ever in the situation where money is not an issue (just to point out my lack of progress, from the day I got my first job to the present, money has always been an issue).

I'm old enough to know that I have to actually do something to become rich, but young enough to believe that the way to go about that goal is by playing the lottery. J-Unit sent me a link to a Starbucks game, 'Be the Barista!'

http://www.epicurious.com/promo/starbucks/indexs.html
(for some reason I can't get my links to work)

Its a time game where you have to make various drinks. Its suppose to highlight the hundreds of variations to a Starbucks drink, but in all honesty, it highlights my inadequacy and lack of coffee knowledge. Its a damn good thing I'm nowhere near winning to lottery. I got 1 out of 8 drinks correct. So far I've played this game 5 times.

All Grown Up

2007-02-11T08:37:00.000-08:00

Supposedly...
I spent my birthday-Super Bowl weekend in Vegas. Had a blast (as always).

This is the crew at a bar in Mandalay Bay. From L to R: Nico, Bob, J-Unit, Marky Mark, me, Paul.
I couldn't quite figure out what the bar was called, but I think it translates to 'Red Square.' Or at least that's what we called it (maybe it was the whole Communism theme going on).

Mark and Nico. I think Mark is wishing for some other kind of action.

Mark again. Really, no need for an explanation.

I'm not even sure how to explain this one. This is at the Bellagio hotel in the garden area. I have no clue what the garden area is called, but they decorated it for Chinese New Years. And this is the picture I have to show for going there.

To sum it all up: won at blackjack-the $5 table at Palace Station and the $3 table at Slots O Fun (hey-we po' folks can't afford tables at the big fancy-smancy hotels!), lost at bingo, lost at craps, and lost a dollar on a slot machine. Oh...and lost betting on the Bears :( But...nonetheless, only lost around 25 bucks!!!!

Isn't bowling like golf?

2007-01-29T21:07:00.000-08:00

Sunday afternoon was the annual Bowling for Wishes at Pinz. I've started volunteering for Make-A-Wish, and its one of the best decisions I've made. I was put in charge of manning the check-in table along with 4 other volunteers. During my break, I went to bowl a frame. Lane 1 was set aside for all Make-A-Wish volunteers. Granted, I haven't bowled in years, but I didn't think I would have sucked as much as I did.

First time up-I gutter balled it 2 feet down the alley. The second time? I hit one pin! The back left corner! Which, of course, is one better than gutter balling it a second time. Sadly though, the toddler next to me hit two pins on his first try. I got schooled.

Friendship for Sale: Criticism Included

2007-01-25T08:37:00.000-08:00

This is Jason Anderson. I'm sure 99.9% of America has heard of him. Has heard him singing. Has seen him juggling. Wished that he had more common sense than he's displayed recently.

So he sucks. At singing. At juggling. At trying to do both simultaneously. For some reason his friends and family can't muster up the courage to tell him that he's doing nothing for himself by auditioning on American Idol.

Million dollar ideas are constantly percolating in my feeble brain. Or, more aptly put, ideas are constantly percolating in my brain that I hope will make me a million dollars. You can buy my friendship. I haven't figured out the cost structure or pricing plan-that'll come later. But I'll be the friend that points out when you have food stuck in between your teeth, when your skirt is nicely tucked into your undies in the back for all the world to see, and when you suck at singing so you don't humiliate yourself in front of millions of people.

What more can you ask for?

Secret to My Success

2007-01-15T18:13:00.000-08:00

So people have this irrational notion that because I passed the California Bar, I'm somehow smart. There's a fallacy with that thinking. Namely-it just isn't true. No, I didn't spend countless hours studying. No, I don't know law, and if you get stopped by the police and thrown in jail, I will be just as lost as you. But I will tell you what I did, and whether it helped me pass the Bar or not, its up to you to decide. Here we go, in no particular order:

(1) prayed (to a few higher beings-I was trying to cover my bases)
(2) drank Pedialyte each morning of the Bar (for the electrolytes, not the runs)
(3) watched Wheel of Fortune each night of the Bar
(4) watched Clifford the Big Red Dog each morning of the Bar

I would love to say that I studied my ass off and was well prepared. But that would be flat out lying. Passing the bar is purely luck. It depends heavily on what food you ate the night before, what god you prayed to, what subject you studied last, whether or not your brain decides to function...I can go on ad nauseam. If there was a Real Property essay on there, would I have passed? No. Same goes for Civil Procedure (I still don't know what that is), Evidence, and Remedies. Its actually quite amazing California decided to pass me. I barely wrote a thing.

So all in all, there is no secret to passing the Bar. Its as simple and complicated as that.

I love Jack Bauer

2007-01-14T21:13:00.000-08:00

So here is a guy who spent the past 20 months being mercilessly tortured in a Chinese prison. The President of the United States decidesto leverage the US's power to free him-to turn him over to terrorists inside the US in exchange for a different terrorist. To say the least, I'm sure this is very stressful for Jack. On top of it all, Fayad has now turned to torturing him in vengeance for his brother's death. Miracle of all miracles, Jack escapes. So let's recap:

(1) 20 months in a Chinese prison tortured everyday
(2) set free, only to find that he's being turned over for another group to kill him
(2) target practice for multiple terrorist groups

And what's the first thing he does when he escapes? Puts coordinates into a high tech phone to find an exact location to save someone. Unbelievable. I've had my new phone (Motorola KRZR) for over a month and I can't even figure out how to use 1/10th of its features.

Takes A Licking...Keeps on Ticking

2007-01-05T14:20:00.000-08:00

Man, I thought the email from Dad was harsh. This is the email I get from Brother this morning,

So here is my email for today. What special dinner did u make last night. U know, I am not gonna go to LA until u learn to cook something good cuz I can cook crap here for myself. No need to fly 3000 miles to eat crap.

Brother

Does anyone want to adopt me?
I feel like I need to cure cancer or save Africa from AIDS before I'll get any kudos from any family member. Just for the record, the only reason I don't have an email from Mommy up here is because she's not hip to the workings of the internet just yet, so emailing is a process that, with her, is slower than snail mail.

Unconditional Love

2007-01-04T13:28:00.000-08:00

I sent my dad the picture on my last post of the pan fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and veggies. This is a milestone in my life. I've been living by myself (or, not with my parents) for 7 years. I'm on year 8. I've cooked maybe 5 meals. 3 of them happened to be this week. So needless to say, the fact that I'm cooking is just astounding (my roomie is still alive and kicking, which earns me brownie points). Anyway, I sent the pic in an email to my dad to show him that I'm finally growing up (or that was the point of the email anyway). This is his response,

Legalmisfit,

I have been cooking for you for so long. May be it is time for you to cook a full dinner for me next time when you come home. I will settle for just mash potatoes, chicken, and some vegetable.

Dad

HUH??? I was expecting an email praising me on my accomplishment and how yummy the food looks.

Nope.

This is monumentous! Three short years ago I couldn't even follow Shake-n-Bake instructions. Learning how to cook is nowhere on the list entitled, 'Things That Are Expected Of You Because You're Asian.' (some items include: graduating high school, graduating college, graduating grad school).

Now what?

Oh-here's a pic of Roomie with last night's dinner: Blackened Chicken Breast and Frozen Veggies.
(at least she looks happy that I'm cooking)

1 Day Down, 364 More to Go

2007-01-02T07:36:00.000-08:00

I went to the gym AND cooked a meal yesterday. It wasn't a wimpy workout at the gym either. I was about to leave when a Bon Jovi interview came on (I love Bon Jovi), so I stayed on the Stairmaster for 20 more minutes. The interview was a full hour, but let's face it-as hot as I think he is, I won't last an extra 15 minutes on the Stairmaster.

I cooked some sort of panfried chicken, and made mashed potatoes from scratch!

I also threw in some veggies, but that's unimpressive since they were frozen and I think I overcooked them anyway. Doesn't my chicken look good? Or at least halfway decent? Somewhat edible??? I was supposed to make fish. That's what the recipe called for anyway. It wasn't until after I mixed the batter together that I realized the fish was still in the freezer (SMOOTH), but there was thawed chicken. So chicken it was. I think I under-seasoned the chicken (what can I say? Chicken is denser and bigger than fish), and over-seasoned the mashed potatoes. I sent an email to my roomie to make sure she's still alive (if she doesn't respond in the next hour, I'm going to spazz). Ok...her 'Out of Office AutoReply' sent me back a message, but that's not the same thing...

Here's further evidence that I'm turning over a new leaf...while watching The Colbert Report, I flipped through recipe books so I can cook Tilapia tonight. OMG-I'm being domesticated (in the learning-how-to-cook way, not in the getting-potty-trained way).

I'll mention New Years Eve party if and when I see the pics of Nico and I floating around randomly in cyberspace.

I've taken to reading at least 30 minutes everyday to broaden my horizons. I'm also trying to stop limiting myself to a particular genre. In the process, I've succeeded in scaring the shit out of myself. Currently I'm reading Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer. Its about the history and the principles surrounding Mormonism. Its a fascinating religion, both corrupt and captivating. So last night I read a few chapters before going to bed. BAD IDEA. HORRIBLE IDEA. I had a nightmare that I was forced into a plural marriage, and the only thing I could say was, 'I'm Asian! I'm Asian! I'm Asian!' That was my staggering defense to getting hitched to a 65 year old man. Thank goodness I'm so educated.

Baby Steps

2006-12-29T08:36:00.000-08:00

I cooked chicken and green beans last night. Wasn't up for cooking fish, but I did marinate it so I can cook it tonight (wait-are you supposed to marinate fish?). Trust me-the chicken was way more appetizing than it looks in the pic. And I'm a bit miffed because I took a pic of dinner last night and somehow it disappeared off my camera. I had it on a plate with silverware and all that jazz.

So this pic was taken two minutes ago. Its the leftovers. In Tupperware. Taken in my cube. I'm grateful that a) most people are out for the holidays b) my boss isn't here wondering what's wrong with me because I'm taking a picture of food instead of working, and c) everyone that did see me take this pic already knows there's something a bit off about me.

I'm mashing potatoes tonight. This should be interesting.

Wanted: Fire Extinguisher

2006-12-28T10:04:00.000-08:00

My parents decided to orphan me over Christmas. In all honesty, I can't really hold it against them. I already went home for Turkey Day. I think the only way they could ensure that they wouldn't have to see me again so soon was to haul ass out of the country.

So I spent the holidays visiting Jared and Sharon. Those four days can be summed up in three words: 'ice cream' and 'sleep'. Oh wait-I cooked two meals. Within 24 hours. Shocking. I should backpedal a bit and re-hash my old goals (which obviously have flown by unaccomplished). When I moved to LA, I told myself that I would cook at least one meal a week. In a few months' time I should have enough recipes down to be able to whip up something on a moments notice. I figure I eat 2 meals a day (plus around 10 snacks, but I'm not counting those), so that's 14 meals a week. All I have to do is cook one meal a week. Sadly, that proved to be a tad bit ambitious. In three months, I've cooked two meals. And I can't remember what they were, except that both included meat of some sort and the results didn't quite look like the picture accompanying the recipe.

Needless to say, cooking two meals in a 24 hour period is completely unheard of. But I did it! Christmas Eve I made pizza. From scratch. Can I repeat it? Negative. I made the crust from scratch. Of course I wasn't paying attention to the amount of each ingredient (that would be giving me way too much credit), but I made the crust!

For toppings, I added cheese, chicken, spinach, more cheese, onion, tomato, and then more cheese. Here's a pic of it: I'm very proud of myself because let's face it-a year ago I didn't even know where the oven light was. Also, all of us are still alive and kicking.

There's even proof in the pic that I made it: the crust is not quite a circle, not quite a square...
The next morning I made French toast. Technically not as impressive because Jared added the milk and I put more stock in dinner than breakfast. But let me reiterate: all parties who consumed my cooking are still alive and kicking.

My 2007 New Years Resolution is to cook one meal a week. I'm making it a New Years resolution because in general no one keeps their resolutions anyway, so I won't feel so bad for breaking it. Also, if I cook a meal a week for two weeks before quitting I'm already leaps and bounds ahead of my past resolutions (not to cuss-I broke that 5 minutes after I made it).

I'm making fish tonight. Wish me luck.

Coming Out of the Dark

2006-12-27T12:58:00.000-08:00

Yes, I can hear Gloria Estefan's song blaring in my head. But this is cause for celebration. After living for three years without television, I finally got cable!! Well, it wasn't exactly three years. The first year of law school, I got NBC. That's it. So it was all about the Olympics and Law & Order that summer. Then, 2nd and 3rd year law school, nothing. I was living off of Netflix.

However, last night, I came back from Christmas vacation, and had cable waiting! Well, that's not exactly true. I fumbled around with the remote for a good ten minutes. That's not my fault though. My old remotes had maybe 15 buttons between the three of them. This one remote has 100. Between turning every damn thing on and then inadvertently turning everything off, I'm surprised there wasn't a huge dent in the wall.

My first foray into the exciting world of cable, and what do I watch? VH1's Lifestye of Rich People, blah blah blah. Let me break it down for you-its a show to make the common folk like me feel like I'm poor. (By the way, according to the California real estate sector, I'm hovering precariously close to the poverty line. Oh wait-that's wishful thinking. I am below the poverty line!!) Now I'm thinking about how I'm living in poverty and that makes me sad. I'm going to go jonesing for sweets.

Why Am I Here?

2006-12-23T09:46:00.000-08:00

This is what I've realized after one weekend with J-Unit in town: I need a kid to validate my existance. J-Unit came into town December 6th- 11th.

Thursday night I took her to my company Christmas party. Mind you, this was a Christmas shindig only for employees ie no +1 allowed. But honestly, when have I ever followed the rules? The party was at Nic's Martini Lounge in Beverly Hills. It's a pretty cool place. In the back is the vodka tasting room, aptly named Vod Box. J-Unit and I donned fur coats (faux, much to J-Unit's chagrin) and I downed 4 shots of vodka, and didn't pass out. Amazing. I also had a strawberry martini before entering the Vod Box.

We went home where I subsequently passed out on the couch for two hours. Figures.

Friday night after work Nico, J-Unit, and I headed out to San Diego. J-Unit got us two free nights at the W Hotel. It was an incredibly cool hotel. I especially like the part where the lobby is turned into a 'club' at night. Didn't even have to leave the building!! Maybe the girl taking the pic was super close to us-maybe we all have big heads. Regardless, this is at the lobby/club at the W Hotel

Saturday we went to the San Diego Zoo.

Here's a pic of us outside the hippo exhibit:

For going to the most famous zoo in the world, I have an inordinate number of pictures with fake animals...
Here's some fun facts I learned at the Zoo (it is suppose to be educational in edition to being fun):
1) Giraffes regurgitate EVERYTHING
2) Zebras are black with white stripes (oh wait-I have a picture of a real zebra!)

3) In order to keep polar bears in San Diego, they have to put them on a diet of veggies and fruits so they don't gain weight and get hot and fat (or something along those lines). Here's a pic of Nico and I outside the polar bear exhibit

Sunday we high-tailed it out to Disneyland!
We rode all the cool rides: Indiana Jones, Buzz Lightyear, Space Mountain, Pirates of the Carribbean, and Thunder Mountain (or River, I forget).

This is Nico and I on the famous Mad Hatter Teacup ride. J-Unit didn't join in the festivities because she didn't pay good money to yak after a ride.

Here's a pic of me playing the piano on the way to meet Mickey. This is where 5 years of piano lessons have gotten me:
And this is our group pic with Mickey. For some odd reason, no one was as excited as I was. Hummm...