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..

mommy kindly pointed out to me in an email last week that i never update my blog.

.. do you feel like i’ve fallen off the face of the earth? it’s okay. sometimes i feel that way, too, and then i’m like whoa, but i’m right here. but i feel like i’m nowhere. does that make any sense?

in my 2 months off from blogging, i went to japan over christmas and taiwan over new year’s (western new year, not lunar new year). i’ve also been immersing myself chin-deep in schoolage. in just a few short months i’ve gone from semi-blissfully ignorant to being well on my way to being a real optometrist, it seems. they’ve really intensified the curriculum and i don’t get half the amount of sleep i used to anymore. i never got around to uploading pictures from taiwan, but i did put some highlights from my trip to japan in an album that’s now linked on the sidebar widget on this page. we had a really great time.

what am i into now? mitsubishi has unveiled a new vehicle, the i miev sport air. it’s an electric car that can go for 100 miles on just being charged for 7 hours by a common household outlet. i know i complain about my mini being too small all the time, and this car is even smaller, but it’s so eco friendly and adorable. i wouldn’t mind switching.

the i miev sport air. i'm even digging the color.

one time while my friend elaine was in taiwan, she started playing yahoo taiwan games online with her aunt. that was all great and stuff while she was there, but personally i would’ve dropped the habit upon returning to california. elaine is not me. she shows me these games and we try to play them even though we can’t read all of the instructions. i’m glad, though, because now there’s one that i really like! i think it’s about a jailbreak monkey. he has to climb up a 200 story building to.. escape, i guess. i wouldn’t know because i have yet to reach the top. here’s a link to the flash game..  help me play, and tell me what floor you get up to in the comments, or, if you reach the top, tell me what happened! here are the rules: use the arrow keys on your keyboard to move the monkey. the people walking inside the buildings won’t hurt you, but if they stop in front of an open window, it means they’re about to close it. you don’t want to be below the window they’ve stopped in because then they’ll close the window on your fingers and you’ll fall down. the big gorillas that are climing on the outside of the building are trying to catch you, so avoid them at all costs. don’t let anything fall on you, either. you can move sideways onto a closed window, but you can’t move up or down onto a closed window. the blue button is the start button. and i hope you’re all as amused with the signs on the building for “baskin 51 roddins” and “coco-coco,” among other things.

last night, bei-kun and i went to the lakers vs bobcats game at the staples center. i had a test this morning, but i miraculously managed to study for it a day early, so i could go. it was a really good game that went into double overtime, but kobe got fouled out of the game during the first overtime, so the lakers ended up losing at the end. it’s too bad.. if they had managed to win and keep the bobcats under 100 points, everybody in attendance would’ve gotten gift certificates for free tacos

here we are during halftime. we had really close seats!

i really enjoyed playing with my shakey, noisy thingys. i almost brought them home but then.. the thought of clutter was too scary.

do you see what i did there? wearing my lakers-colored scco sweatshirt to the game in an attempt to fit in with the rest of the crowd? yeah. yeah. i decided that i <3 andrew bynum and i wanted to get a rhinestone studded bynum tank top, but it was $65. i don’t want a $65 tank top. so instead i ate a mcdonald’s ice cream cone and a hot dog, which is practically $65 when you buy it at the staples center, anyway. haha j/k. kinda.

a few weeks ago, charles and i went to eat at katsuya in hollywood. his boss gave him a gift card last year, but we never managed to make time to go. well, i’m glad we finally did. i like the design of the place (it’s really cool!) and i enjoyed the food and the atmosphere. here’s one of my favorite dishes of the night.

kobe style beef sauteed with wild mushrooms.

so good! i hope we go back sometime soon.. and i’ll try to update my blog more often.