somehow, i couldn’t find the inspiration to write a blog post until right this moment, 2:20am. why am i not asleep, you ask? my semi-nocturnal roommate came home late, once again, and then wanted to watch a movie because i have no class tomorrow and she doesn’t have class until 2pm. while we didn’t end up watching a movie, we watched a dvd of our high school dance team days. haha, those were the days. it’s really too bad neither of us dances anymore, because i think we do both miss it. we need to form an scco dance crew.

i’ll regret not being asleep right now in the morning, but what can one do? there are discussions to be had.

i’m finally done with fall quarter! words cannot express my joy as i leave behind what had to be the most dreadful scholastic experience of my life. magically, i don’t have any proficiency retakes to do, so i’m lucky in that i can really stop thinking about everything. life, once again, is good. this is enhanced by the fact that most of our professors are away at a conference this week, so it’s been an extremely chill first week of a new quarter.

this has been bothering me for a while, but why does google chrome semi-suck? it’s one of those things that i really WANT to love, so i keep using it, but i just keep encountering problems with it. for example, the picasa uploader doesn’t even work with it very well, and they’re both google-born! i open internet explorer everytime i need to use picasa. (don’t even get me started on mozilla, i never could stand the fox.) other sites i can’t seem to open and use correctly are the timesheet website for logging my work study hours and the time warner payment site. it must be noted, however, that one badass aspect about chrome is that you can type in google search words directly into the url bar. i’ve gotten used to it, so i keep trying to do that on charoll’s mac.. needless to say, it doesn’t work there.

in the past week, i think i’ve read over 2,000 pages.. the entire vampire academy series that’s out so far. it started because i needed something to entertain myself with while i waited in line for 5 hours with heang to meet weezer last friday (we were first in line), but then i got so into the series that i couldn’t stop and now i’ve read all the published books. i honestly have to say that i think this series is better than twilight (please don’t burn down my house, angry fans). the world richelle mead created is just so much better. thanks for the tip, bevular!

me & heang meeting rivers cuomo from weezer. he didn't say ANYTHING!

charolls and i still haven’t decided whether we want to visit london/paris or australia for winter break. i think the problem is that they both sound rather appealing to us, and they’re such different vacations. if we go to london and paris, it’ll be wintery and cold and full of history; if we go to australia, it’ll be tropical and fun. that’s what’s really calling out to me — the great barrier reef and the rainforest. i really wouldn’t mind europe, either, though.. but who would?

i absolutely love taylor swift, but what the heck happened in her CMA performance this week? i caught it on youtube after-the-fact and i was shocked by how bad i thought it was. it was a lot of head/hair swinging, bad dancing and off-pitch singing. i felt kind of embarrassed for her because i usually enjoy her performances, and this had to happen on a night where she just swept away all the best awards. i think she’s probably been too busy, what with hosting SNL and all her appearances lately.

here are some pictures from a trip i took to sf in october, after my 12 station proficiency was over. i was lucky and took it on the earlier date, which left me with a free weekend to play. there’s this floating boat sushi restaurant a block away from charles’ apartment that we finally went to try. i definitely don’t like it as much as kula in irvine, but it was fun to go to anyway.

ah, here i am with my fave, salmon roe! you're mine!

so deliciously juicy and salty, mmmmm!

<3

we went to safeway to get some ice cream, but came across a blizzard in the freezer aisle.

craving crab, we went to fisherman's wharf, where i consumed an entire crab. *burp*

feeling crazy, we walked from fisherman's wharf all the way back to union square, instead of taking the bus. here we are on our epic journey. ow.

other than that trip, october was pretty uneventful. school’s fault. we did celebrate philip’s birthday on halloween, though. lawry’s was delicious, as always.

kim (lana's sister) and lana outside the restaurant. charles abhors using the flash, which is why some pictures come out so dark..

jen & me getting full off meatballs and chips while we wait for our table. philip tricked us all into coming half an hour early.. don't trick the punctual people!!

enough to make even a vegetarian drool

those pictures, and the following ones were taken with charles’ brand-spanking new d-lux leica camera. i’m soooo jealous. that camera is totally drool-worthy, with all its functions, HD video capabilities and geeky fresh look&feel. charolls, if you’re reading this, i still have plans to both steal it and label it with one of my 姓名貼紙. beware.

i got to spend some time with the fam last weekend. it was so fun! i’ll end with some pictures of them. we took christmas card photos for bev & johnny, but i’m not going to post any of them here lest i ruin the card for everyone. they were adorable, though.

i decide to sit in jack's chair and engage in one of his favorite activities: pretend-reading.

for a second there, charles was really worried that i had turned flamingo.

although i'm not releasing their holiday photos, i figured there was nothing stopping me from posting my own family photo. hahahahahahaha

just a great picture of jack, courtesy of the rolls.

love funny-looking atari.

facts of self-discovery: i can’t take very good pictures, even if i try hard. and i’m pretty not creative.. i would go so far as to say i’m anti-creative. having me around will probably take creativity away from you. but it’s okay because i’m funny.

goodnight, world!

it may not have been the best choice, but i decided to try to have a nice weekend 6 days before my 12 station proficiency (a 2 hour long test that basically tests us on everything clinically relevant that we’ve learned in school so far). at the present time, i’m glad i did, but we’ll see if i still feel that way on friday at 4:30pm.

last wednesday was my sister’s birthday. sadly, she had to have one of her teeth pulled, but salvaged the day by getting a new cell phone, the samsung reclaim. it’s a pretty nifty device that’s made out of recycled materials and has a full slide-out keyboard. i’ll never understand why she didn’t get my phone, which is about a billion times better , since she already has the plan for it, but.. oh well! i will remain the coolest member of the family.

on saturday, we went over for a belated birthday dinner with the family. it was nice to be there and forget about school for a while.. this is definitely the worst quarter i’ve ever experienced.

charles managed to snap this awesome picture of jack..

jack made sure the train ran over the zebra as he exclaimed, "oh, no!" over and over again..

still love atari..

little derek is turning out to be quite a good baby.

i definitely miss the perks of living with my mom, especially now.

interestingly enough, one of jack's favorite games is to pretend to go "night, night."

love this one, too. atari's a great body pillow!

i didn’t take any group shots, but i’m sure bev’s got some of those and they’ll be coming on her blog. i miss my family.. and charles.. hopefully i’ll have more time to spend with all of them once fall quarter is over. i have high hopes for the rest of the year.

now to share some thoughts..

charles showed me this music video and i think it’s the greatest thing ever. hook me up with 8 girls for a reproduction.

has everyone heard about google wave? i’m still waiting for my invitation, and i’m getting impatient. i really wanna try it out. if you don’t know what it is, here’s an explanation that i think is pretty good..

i don’t know if it’s just the pain of this quarter speaking, but i feel like the more optometry school i go through, the less i may actually want to be an optometrist. it’s not that i’m finding the topics less interesting or the profession less worthy.. i think i’m just learning more and more about myself and even though i actually still think i’d make a pretty good optometrist, it doesn’t really bring a big smile to my face to think that that’s what i’ll be doing for the rest of my working life. i got to thinking, and so much of life is about investments. i’ve invested so many years into this career already.. not just the 2 i’ve been in grad school, because it started so much earlier than that.. so no matter how i end up feeling, the need to get a return on that investment weighs greater than anything else. i don’t know if it’s sad or smart that the driving force for our choices is a ROI. i really want to turn the education i’m receiving into something i’m going to be more passionate about in the future, which is why i think i want to teach in addition to practicing after i graduate. there’s a lot to think about.

okay i think that’s enough procrastination for now. i really do tend to blog more when i have a ton of stuff to do for school.

aah! summer’s nearly all gone and i totally didn’t update my blog!

the big news is.. i turned 24! okay, that’s not really news, but i guess that could be considered the big event of the summer, right?

it's still completely proper for 24 year olds to celebrate birthdays at disneyland.

i guess my birthday could make room for jack’s birthday.. and derek’s birth!

little did he know that mere days after this picture was taken, he'd have a new little brother to compete with!

and those events could all be trumped by.. my 6 year anniversary with charolls. it’s been one hell of an adventure, but i wouldn’t trade it for the world.

why sf, why?

i just finished a 7-day break from school. exactly seven days. they didn’t give us a week off with a weekend buffer on either side.. it was thursday-wednesday. how messed up is that? it wasn’t very much of a summer, but i got a few things done.. and had time to go to the beach one afternoon!

laney & me

elaine's found herself her own mini-beach.

best friends, old and new

i also spent some QT at bev & johnny’s house and jack is sooo freaking adorable these days (albeit ridonkulously loud). i shall share a few moments through the spyglass of another life.

am i going to hug the dog?

YES!

this is how atari begs for food.. dejectedly.

haha, this next picture comes with its own story. jack is 2, and 2 year olds speak with telegraphic speech (thank you, 7060: pediatric optometry), which means that he mostly makes sentences with just 2 words in them. common sentences are “more [fill-in-with-something-jack-likes]” like “more train?” or “more bacon?” so my mom was on this chair and her foot stuck out and she stuck it in the back of jack’s shirt so that he would get caught on it. jack thought this was HILARIOUS. he kept running away, saying “wahh!” (in chinese, it means like.. oops or oh no) and coming back and asking my mom for “more toe?” and making her stick her foot back in his shirt. he did this about 50 times.

"more toe??"

alas, it is not always fun and games. jack has real big-brother responsibilities now. aside from sticking pacifiers in derek’s mouth when he’s crying, jack can also..

feed the baby!

"i hope you don't put up the sheep picture."

b f was having too much fun reading jack’s books.. and now it’s back to the grind. i better get to sleep.. i have contact lens clinic at 8am tomorrow O.o

oh, also during my break, i saw these in the mall..

almost tricked you!

they’re totally not MBTs..

it’s been..

10 weeks since i last updated my blog.
9 weeks since the scco talent show.
8 weeks since the britney spears concert.
7 weeks since i got engaged.
6 weeks since the class of 2011’s end of the year banquet.
5 weeks since my cousin daniel came to visit.
4 weeks since the end of finals.
3 weeks since charles moved to sf.
2 weeks since i began working in the eye care center at school.
1 week since i got my palm pre.
4 days until i see charles again.
5 days until i move into my new condo.

been a little out of the loop.

me & my FIANCÉ at our end of the year banquet at the discovery science center

more to come.

she lives, people! haha, i can’t believe how long it’s been since i last blogged. after mommy came home from taiwan, i guess i lost that sense of having to share something with someone specific and i got busy and lazy and all of that. i also recently got a twitter account, so that’s been eating up some time. i guess that’s a better place to see what i’m up to these days, since this microblogging business is so much easier. i’m basically glued to my cell phone, anyway.

speaking of cell phones, i’m SO excited for the release of the palm pre! it’s rumored to be making its debut late this month, but i honestly don’t think it’ll be out until sometime in may, at the earliest. sprint’s 2nd generation instinct just made its way onto the market, so they’ve gotta give that one some time to make a splash. i have the 1st generation instinct, and i really can’t tell the difference between the new one and mine.. and my phone can’t even hold a candle to what the pre looks like it’ll be. these are exciting times!

you know i live for my gadgets

so, i don’t have much time before i’m off to yoga tonight, but here are some things that have happened in my blogging absence..

charles turned 24! for a couple months i can gloat about my youngness until i turn 24 and cry.

winter quarter ended and spring quarter started. surprisingly enough, i survived the dreaded 2nd year winter quarter completely unscathed.

charles is going to be moving to san francisco, probably in may, for work

and here’s a story about my day today:

my mom walked into my room at 7:31am. i know the exact time because right after she spoke, i grabbed my phone to look at the time. she said, “didn’t you say you have some kind of a test this morning or something.. ?” i said, “OH MY GOD!!!!!!!” because indeed, i have vision therapy lab tuesday mornings at 8am, and we have quizzes right at the beginning of lab. you can’t make up missed quizzes. due to the traffic at 7am, i need to leave at 7:30 sharp in order to get to class on time. i literally rolled out of bed, put on the first clothes i grabbed, picked up my books and stuffed them in a bag, my mom handed me my lunch and i was OUT THE DOOR. if anyone wanted to see how i look right when i get up.. today was the day. i made it to school and proceeded to get full points on my quiz, so i guess that was worth it. i wonder why i didn’t wake up.. i guess i should change my alarm tone. i’ve probably gotten so used to it that i just didn’t register the sound.

okay, i’ll try to post more later..

omg! the craziest thing happened last night!

so i was in my room, minding my own business when i realized that there was an annoying car alarm that had been going off for a few minutes outside. i went to my window to check things out and.. a car was on fire. at the time i first looked outside, it was really only the front tires and engine area. i ran into charles’ room to get a less obstructed view (damn trees) and by the time the fire truck came, the entire car was ablaze. it was crazy! there was another car parked right next to it, but i couldn’t tell if it got damaged. i have no idea how it started. apparently my community just loves them fires.

yup, that's a CAR!

fire truck on the left.

exciting stuff, people.

so i took my ocular health procedures final proficiency on monday. i won’t find out how i did on it for a while, so keep your fingers crossed for me. i’m hearing all these rumors about failures and retakes, but i’m trying not to listen until everything is definite. i’m supposed to be studying hard for my 6 finals to come in the next week and a half now, but i feel like my brain is already on vacation. no more, please!

last sunday, i went to pv with charles’ family and we had brunch at the ocean trails golf course. it was so yummy! i ate so much i wanted to throw up after, but it was worth it. they had these pre-cracked crab claws (for those of you that don’t know, crab is my favorite seafood, i like it better than lobster) and all u had to do was grab it by the tip of the claw and take a bite. i must’ve eaten like 15 of those alone. haha. i didn’t wanna be too dorky and take a lot of pictures, but i did get one of me and charles by the window.

ocean trails.

why does my face look so fat in that picture?

one last thing.. so apparently there have been cases of exploding cell phones killing people in china. that’s really scary. i’m practically surgically attached to my cell phone.. i use somewhere along the lines of 100 text messages a day and if my phone were to explode, i’d be dead for sure (or my hands would fall off at the very least). yikes! be careful, people! if your phone starts ticking.. run! haha.

i’m back, and so soon!

i’m happy to report that i passed both my slit lamp and gat (goldmann applanation tonometry) proficiencies at school on friday. i was worried because i got the rumored toughest proctor, but i passed, and that’s all that matters. now onto the next week.. one week at a time, people.

our test that was originally scheduled for tomorrow was moved to wednesday, which meant we have a semi-free weekend! of course i’ve started studying anyway, but there’s no mad rush to cram all through the weekend. last night was jen’s friend shirley’s birthday party. a small group of her close friends went to dinner with her, but we all met up with them at area in hollywood afterwards. i hardly ever go clubbing, but i would say it was one of the nicer ones i’ve seen. we had fun! i’ve put the link to the album on my sidebar, but here’s a few pictures from the night.

look, it's an eye!

we all came in one car.. we were waiting for the others to arrive.

first drinks of the night!

here we all are in front of our tables..

i think elaine got a little tired..

hopefully if school eases up, we can go out more often.

i feel like i haven’t seen charles in forever. he went to vegas with his family this past weekend, and he’s on his way back home right now. i hope he comes to eat dinner with me tonight!

before i get back to the grind, i wanted to share this article that david showed me the other day. some people hacked into a road sign in texas, and i thought it was pretty funny..