A Weekend of Parties

Before I get to the fun stuff, a summary of what I did this week. I wrote term papers. That was all I did. And I still have more to do.

As a result, this weekend I cut loose. My weekend of tame partying began at Professor Roddy's house for the first Medieval studies dinner of the year. Rather than making Salmon as I normally would, I decided to be a little adventurous and cook squid again. Now we all remember what happened last time, right? Explosive bowels for two days, remember? I sure do. So this time I decided to take EXTREME care. Not only did I buy pre-cleaned squid, but I washed it again, and soaked it in salty wine to inhibit bacterial growth. Then I fried it. Now, in my last experience with frying, I lit my kitchen on fire and had to call 911. This time went far better. And the squid turned into the best fried calamari that I have ever had. Too bad it was cold and soggy by the time I got to the dinner. Here is the dinner.
Dinner was entertaining. I realized that I speak far too quietly. Every time I tried to enter into a pre-existing conversation at dinner I was interrupted. Oh well. Here we are trimming Roddy's tree. This is a proud Medieval Studies department tradition and is just one of the reasons that you should become a major.
On Saturday I woke up at 8 o'clock and began to prepare for my "Thanksgiving 2 BBQ" which I was throwing in honor of some of my international student friends. I had ambitious plans for the meal. For meats I planned the following: Chicken, Salmon, Squid, Octopus and Beef (all left to marinate in their own coustom made sauce, save the beef patties). For starches: fresh Cibatta Bread, Rice-A-Roni (a triple batch), Hamburger Buns, and the fried rice that Sung-Eun brought. For Vegetables: Kim-chee. Unless you count pumpkin pie as a vegetable (which I do). Here we are preparing the BBQ.
Lighting the BBQ.
Admiring the BBQ.
Acting stupid in the BBQ.
So anyway, once the BBQ got hot enough nearly everybody moved outside to help grill the meat.
Here are the chicken and squid. Both were fantastic. The best I have ever made. I am getting better at this BBQ thing. It was my third time making squid, and I plan on making it again. Maybe with great frequency. It was soooo good. And soooo cheap. The cheapest thing on the seafood aisle of Nugget, except the Octopus.
After grilling we all moved in side to assemble our meals. All of the food was fantastic, I thought.
Amazingly, even though we started with a lot of food, by the end of the night ALL the food was gone.
Videogames were played.
Birds were seen.
This picture has a fun story behind it. It is not every day that you get to pose with an awesome, new furnace!
More videogames were played.
I also learned the names of some of the Korean songs that I have been listening to. But that has nothing to do with this picture, in which videogames are still being played.
I don't exactly remember what the deal with this picture is.
Oh, but here is Takaya putting the solid slab of burned rice that was at the bottom of the Rice-a-Roni pan on his head. He hadn't even had any alcohol!
Very fun evening! I greatly enjoyed it. We'll have to do it again some time.

Thanksgiving Weekend at Home

So, as it is Thanksgiving weekend, I am in Hawaii. Since we moved to Hawaii there has only been one Thanksgiving when we were not in Hawaii, and I consider that Thanksgiving a total dud. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday because it is the only time of year when (almost) everybody is home (this year we were missing Lisa and Vanessa).

Anyway, Oriana and Josh met me at the airport. Then we went to lunch. I took this picture after Oriana had locked Josh in the bathroom. I had been locked in with him, but I was able to escape much more quickly. This was Wednesday.
On my urging, my mother decided that her next car should be a Prius. Here is the addicting little screen that tells you how efficent you are being with your driving.
On Thursday I went and excercized with my mom and Lynn White. Here is me posing with a BATTERY POWERED chainsaw!
Thanksgiving table pre-food.
Family and friends sitting around cooking.
More of the same.
Me, Oriana and Nick.
Uncle Jim with the Turkey.
Nick, Kira, Me, Emma, Oriana and Josh.
Table with people and food.
Hmm. So that was Thanksgiving. Then on Friday we went to the Harry Potter movie as a family. I am not a Harry Potter fan, so I watched it with mild ammusement, but not with the enthusiasm of some of my other family members. That seems to have been all I did on Friday. Hmm.

Anyway, so on Saturday Ryan came over and we went Kayaking. He decided to pee in the bushes at the beach so I used my paddle to catapult sand into his pants. I tried to make a quick getaway, but hurt my foot in the process. Then we hiked to the point by my house, where I took this picture.
On Saturday evening everyone came over for my father's 50th birthday. Here he is blowing out 50 candles.
And here he is with the shorts that Ryan gave him in anticipation of his post half-century weight gain.
I head back to Davis tonight, which is why this post is so brief. I want to get it done with so that I can do other things.

JET Application... Complete

So, you know how in movies there is sometimes that sequence where our unlucky hero suffers a series of misfortunes as the clock to some important deadline slowly ticks down. Well, it actually happens. Here is how it went (contains realistic swearing).

The mail was scheduled to leave at 4:30. If I wanted my application to get to Washington on time, today was the last day I to send it and still be safe.

3:50 and I am just leaving Roddy's office with corrections for the final draft of my personal statement (started working on it in mid-September, went through 6 drafts). I run to the computer room to make connections and print it out. 3:52. Line. Shit. At 3:59 I finally get on the computers and make my corrections. People see that I am editing a paper rather than just printing one out, they start to grumble. 4:09 and I am done. I start to run across the quad to the Coffee House to make copies of my passport, transcript and letter that says I'll be graduating. I get there at 4:11. I realize I have only a quarter, enough for 2 copies. I try to insert a dollar. Damn machine won't take my dollar! Fine, just 2 copies then, and I'll get change made at the register. Oh crap! The machine is broken. 4:15 and start to run to Campus Copies, but hello, there is a working printer by the door. I make my copies. 4:20 and I run over to the Coral to get some paper clips. What the...where are the paper clips? "Excuse me, do you have any paper clips?" "Yeah they are right...oh...no, I guess not. You'll have to go to the bookstore." Crap. 4:23 and I run to the bookstore. Paperclips. Cool. Gold or multicolored? No time you fool! Buy them both! Shit. OK. "How are you today?" "Um, I'm a little rushed." "That'll be $2.98." "Um, 3. I don't need change." 4:27. Oh Hell. Run to the Post Office. "Mail leave yet?" "No, it leaves at 4:30." Good. Quick, collate. Application, statement, transcript. Wait, this isn't my transcript. Oh here it is. Wait! This isn't my statement of purpose! It is the old version! Crap, I remember getting my copies from the printer. Oh. They're in my bag. Here we go. 4:29. Quick. That looks like a mail truck out the window. Oh no. Don't think, just collate. Wait, actually, think but use your thinking to collate. OK. Now paper clip it all together. That's it. Shit. Golden or multi-colored paper clip? NO TIME! Pink is fine. Alright. Final check. Good, I think that is it. "Can you ship this to Washington D.C. the fastest most expensive way possible?" "Um, well we can sent it Priority Mail and it'll be there in two days..." "Good. I'll do that." "OK here is the form, but hurry, you can see the mail guy walking to pick it up." Like I need to be told. OK. JET Program, 3454 M... no. I have to write Massachusetts!? Just write it! OK, done. "Here you go."

And the package was placed in the bag 1 second before the mail guy picked it up. I walked out of the post office and felt the muscles in my back melt in relief.

So now it is temporarily out of my hands. Hope for the best, but no point in worrying. I go to Hawaii tomorrow. A welcome vacation.

Pictures I Stole From Takaya's Camera

So I drove Ralph to Costco today to return an MP3 player that he had purchased. On the way there, Takaya called us and informed me that his camera was still in my car. We looked and found it... and then went nuts. The following are either pictures that were taken with Takaya's camera yesterday, or pictures that Ralph and I took today to fill up his memory card. Hee hee. This one is yesterday before we set out for S.F.
Me with fruit.
Ralph and I, need we say more.
The Thinker, The Drinker.
Why would you ever need this much Soy Sauce!
A man with candy never seemed so scary.
I plan on returning Takaya's camera tomorrow. I eagerly await his reaction.

Speech Contest...Finished

So, I made it through the week with all my mental faculties still intact. But allow me to explain. For about 5 weeks know I have been preparing for the Japanese Speech contest. I wrote two 3 page Japanese essays before I wrote the final speech. The final speech went through 6 drafts. It took me two weeks to memorize. Sakakibara Sensei, Takaya, Koki and Manabu all spent hours of their time helping me. I listened to the speech all night for 3 nights in an attempt to remember it. For the last 3 days, all I have done is practice this speech. Yesterday, I was able to do it from beginning to end for the first time, and today I performed it.

This was not a fun week. But it was a good experience. I learned two things about myself. The first is that, when it comes down to it, money, recognition and ranking do not matter to me. What does matter is that I not disappoint people who have invested their time and emotion in me (i.e. care for me), and that I maintain my own honor. I realized this because, at the point when it looked like my speech was not going to come together and I would be unable to remember my lines, I was not worried about the embarrassment that this would cause me or the loss of the prize, but about how sad everyone who had helped me would be. I suppose this is also why grades have never been very important to me, but I continue to do well in my classes. The second thing that I learned is that I can really pull things out of my ass if I need to. I have already had too many times in my life where I am suddenly able to summon a large amount of charisma. I have got to run out sometime. I am very worried that I rely too much on my ability to make something I do better based on a tapping of charisma. I worry that I will become lazy, and depend on this rather than doing the quality of work I want to do.

So, I went to San Francisco, found the place, and then suffered through 2 hours of the exact same nervousness that I used to feel before Cross Country races. Observe the left hand clenched in a tight fist.
Anyway, so the speech went great, I hear. You see, I remember standing up to walk up to the podium, and I remember sitting down after the speech was finished and having everyone around me say "great job", but all I remember about the speech itself was the horrible feedback that I kept getting from the microphone. Luckily Takaya took this picture, so I know that I did, in fact, do the speech.
Well, that is all I have to say about the speech contest. I didn't win, but I didn't really expect to. I realized about 3 days ago that my theme and style, while it would be very popular with the younger and less serious members of the audience, would probably not impress most of the judges. I am mostly happy that my speech didn't end in catastrophe. Besides, I took more valuable things than prizes away from this speech contest.

Well, so afterwards, Takaya, Koki, Minoru and I went to Japantown to eat Japanese food. Then, on the way back to Davis and ate Krispy Kreme doughnuts.By the way, the verdict is that Krispy Kreme is far superior to Mister Donuts, Japan's biggest doughnut franchise. All that remains now is for me to prove to my Korean friends that Krispy Kreme is better than Dunkin' Donuts, Korea's biggest franchise, and my unusual desire to prove the superiority of an American junk food which I don't even eat will be satisfied.

Bitter Means Poison

Well, here is the update on last night's meal. Bitter means poison. I don't recommend eating $1.99 squid. I woke up at 5:30 this morning and have gone to the bathroom 15 times since then. This really sucks.

But hey, after having salmonella, regular food poisoning is a walk in the park.

Legal Low, Sugar High

So, today was eventful. But it didn't begin that way. The highlight of the first part of my day was discovering that I was nearly done with my JET application. But after noon, things picked up.

As I was going out the door to clean my car, I saw that I had mail. I opened the mail and discovered two letters from a company calling itself Check Game Solutions Inc. saying that I owed them money and that if I didn't pay them they would do something about it. Well, I don't know who this company is, and this is the first I have ever heard of me owing money. The part that made me even more worried is that they had my full name, checking account number, address and phone number. In short, all the things necessary to steal my identity! After thinking a little more I think I have a theory, though. Remember when I wrote about that guy who came to the door trying to sell me on the idea of donating money to buy children's books for hospitals, and I finally agreed to pay the lowest possible amount, $23? Well, after he left I read his invoice carefully and, in fact, he had sold me what I think was a boating magazine! I cancelled the check within minutes of writing it. Well, apparently, the company that tried to screw me into buying an unwanted subscription for a boating magazine that I never received anyway now wants me to rewrite the check and pay them $23...plus the $30 of processing fees that the collection agency wants. I have never had this kind of thing happen before, and I am ashamed. I plan on filing a police report. I don't know what will happen. I all can say for sure is, the next time someone comes to the door, I am apologizing to them for my next action, and slamming the door in their face.

Well, an hour after learing of this unfortunate occurrence, my day picked up. I met Sung-Eun and three of her friends in the MU parking lot and we drove to Fairfield in order to visit the Jelly Belly Factory! Here is the balloon outside the factory entrance.
Maybe a little tacky, but hey, also grotesquely cute! The next picture is most of us posing with the Jelly Belly VW Bug that is right in front of the entrance.
Here are the girls with their "candy makers hats" which we were required to wear inside the factory.
And me, Sung-Eun and Lindsey with our purchases after the free tour.
Finally, a picture of jelly beans, because you can't go to a jelly bean factory and not take pictures of the jelly beans.
So what is my verdict on the Jelly Belly Factory? Holy cow! You have to go if you've never been! It was a great tour! And you can't beat a tour that is free and ends with free samples of candy! Parking is also easy to find! I can't believe I didn't go before now. It also happens to be very close to the Budweiser factory, so next time I go, I am taking that tour as well. Also, being with Sung-Eun and her friends did a lot to cheer me up from earlier in the day. And they gave me a Korean name: 지태, I think. They said it meant "Wisdom T". I should have asked for "Vitamin T". Have you met your daily required value of Vitamin T?

Post Script: After writing this entry I decided to go to the store and get some dinner. To my amazement, squid was only $1.99. So I bought some squid, cilantro, green onions and a lime; then went home and cooked it all up. Well, it turned out to be the worst meal I have ever made. When I bit into the squid it was first way too sour, but that went away in an instant, replaced by an atrocious texture that made me feel sick. What actually made me sick was when I tried to swallow the squid, only to find that is was also so bitter that it initiated a gag reflex. Did it look good? Well, in the pan in looked beautiful, but as it cooled the ink (which I must not have removed compleately) turned the enitre dish pencil grey, and the over cooked green onions made it look like toxic sludge. Still, not wanting to waste food, I ate the whole thing. Needing something to wash the bitterness down, I decided to make myslef an egg. However, we have no milk, only yoghurt...you see where this is going. Well the flavor of the eggs is not that bad, but I decided to stir it with chopsticks (with which I do most of my cooking). The result is a batch of eggs that looks like couscous and tastes tart. If I get the urge to cook any time soon, I'll be sure to just chow down on some crackers and open a can of tuna.

Mono Lake Trip...Again

So, a brief review of the week up to the fun part. Midterm, dinner with friend and parents, met some people, organized some things, yada yada.

Then Saturday came. Well, once again I was responsible for transporting people to and from Mono Lake. The good thing was this time I got to take THREE of my own guests (Ralph, Manabu and Takaya). So we set off at 8:00 am with the afore mentioned folks and Ken in the car.
Here are the passengers of my car posing with my arm and the Mono County line sign.
Unlike last fall, this year we arrived at camp with ample time to set up tents and cut wood. So we went for a long hike.
One of the many places we stopped because of the view.
Beautiful rocks.
Me, in a cave at the top of the mountain.
Well, we returned to camp, started a fire and cooked. Made smores, looked at the stars, told humorous antecdotes and spoke Japanese. Well, I spoke Japanese. Finally, around 11 o'clock, with plummeting temperatures, we decided to hit the sacks.

Unfortunately, since they are living out of suitcases while they are here in the US, Manabu and Takaya did not have sacks. I asked them earlier in the day if they had sleeping bags, and they cheerfully replied that they did not, and not to worry because they would be OK. The weather report predicted 20 degrees F. Knowing this, I made them buy polar fleece blankets in Lee Vining earlier that day, but I expected that would not be enough. In order to keep Manabu and Takaya alive, I had decided to cram them into the tent with Ralph and I so that our body heat would slightly off set their lack of adequate sleeping bags. As we all crammed together in the tent, feeling rather awkward, I remarked "This is a good experience" to which Takaya replied "Yes this is very gay experience" (meaning to say "good" of course). Laughter. The next funny line came immediately afterwards, when Ralph repeated the phrase that Manabu and Takaya had taught him and said "oppai ga ooki ne, tobe tobe". Manabu then, finally translated what it meant, and said "You have very big boobs don't you, let's jump". 5 minutes of constant, unstoppable laughter followed. After 5 minutes, we all quit laughing at the exact same time and went to sleep without saying another word.

The night went well at first. But around 3 o'clock the temperature dropped off dramatically. Manabu and Takaya started to be very cold, so I gave Manabu an emergency blanket, which he wrapped around his feet (not the proper use). Takaya and I began searching for the handwarmers I had bought for just such an occasion, but our searching in the dark in a 7x7 tent filled with 4 men was not successful. Finally Takaya gave up and just tried to sleep. I slept relatively well, and woke up at around 5:30 to start the fire that I knew we would be needing to thaw people out. Lighting the fire was an interesting experience, as the matchbox and logs were both covered in frost. As I expected, in the morning people sprinted for my fire.

The drive home was uneventful, except for the fact that Ralph and I realized that there may be a business opportunity which might be ideally taken advantage of by a partnership between the two of us. We must investigate this further, but from what we talked about, it seemed like an idea so crazy that it just might work!

So all in all, my 6th and last Mono Lake trip was a good one.

New Housemate

Well, mom and dad, you probably shouldn't read anymore of this post. Just leave the site now. I'm warning you.

So, I have a new housemate. But sadly, she doesn't pay rent. In fact she is a pest. Really. She's a rat.

As I walked into the garage last night I saw a rodent the size of a large squirrel, but with a tail of skin rather than fur, run up a metal wall and into my ceiling. Closer inspection revealed droppings in various locations throughout the garage. Great. Yesterday we removed anything that might be digestible by rodents from the garage. Today I bought a trap (The humane kind. The last thing I want is an injured or poisoned rat crawling somewhere inaccessible and dying, have you ever smelled dead rat?! It's terrible!). I have been eagerly anticipating catching her. Maybe it is about time that I got a pet cat?

Mom and Dad, if you are still reading I highly recommend that you stop right now.

I think she's living in your couch.

Very Full Week

So, this week finally ended. It was a very, very full week. Here is a list of what I did. Please note that I have left many things vague because they will likely be the subjects of later writings...which will be in purple.

Sunday: While researching English paper, discovered very depressing fact. Re-wrote Japanese speech for the first time (my first "speech" was a good story, but had no thesis, like much of my writing, and life). Did research for Thursday's discussion. Played a little of the "Star Wars" RPG that Diego runs.

Monday: Disocvered re-write of Japanese speech was no good either, started from scratch a third time. Ranted about racism in English class, but not well, since I was still emotional about the very depressing fact.

Tuesday: Did more research for my discussion, wrote tons of notes. Finished English paper. Class all day. Went and played basketball with Chih-I, one of my PAL partners.

Wednesday: Spent entire day beginning, and finishing, a 4 page research paper for my History of Science class. Except the times when I had to be a Roof Helper.

Thursday: Midterm in FST10. Paper is History class. Did 4 hours of preparation for my discussion. Had discussion (it went well, although, for the first part I was really nervous and I ended up using maybe 1/8th of my 9 pages of notes). Met cool people after discussion. Treated Kira to dinner on her birthday. Hung out with Kira until 10:40. Returned home to find that my house was being used to prepare for "Davis is Burning". Tried to help out, but failed.

Friday: Rewrote Japanese speech for the third time. Finally got it right. Took Sung-Eun, my other PAL partner, to the thrift store in Woodland, where we shopped for my costume for "Davis is Burning". Went home and helped Diego prepare for the show (he was the MC!). Lost track of cellphone. From 7:30 to 11:30 I served as one of the official camera people for "Davis is Burning". While leaving I heard a large group of rowdy people I did not know saying they had heard there was going to be a "kickin'" party at my house, which was news to me. I immediately went home, turned off all the lights, and watched several cars cruise at slow speed past my house. I was not pleased that this rumor began, but I may have given my roommates too much of an earful when they called and asked if they could bring a few people from the real party over to our place. Stayed up till 3:30 to apologize for slightly freaking out, but fell asleep before anyone got home.

Saturday: Woke up worried that I had ruined my roommates' evening. Went to work the Medieval Studies booth at Preview Day. Came home at 1pm, slept on the couch until 5pm. Wrote this entry.

So as you can see, it was quite a week. Next week is full also, but it cannot compare to this last one. I feel like I just drove over 7 speed bumps at 65 miles per hour.

A Trip That Should Have Had Pictures

So, today Ralph and I went on a trip to Great America. I had bought some extra tickets that Mary had and was going to sell them to Adam, however, after great difficulty contacting him, and realizing that Great America would soon be closing for the season rendering the tickets worthless, I finally decided just to go, and knowing that Ralph liked rollercoasters, I invited him along. Well, we got there, parked and found out that the tickets were no good anyway. They were intended for use only on a certain day. I don't know how Mary got us in before. But then again, Mary seems to me to be highly skilled in areas about which I know nothing.

Not to be dissuaded, Ralph and I decided to go to San Francisco instead. Ralph had never been to my 2 favorite places in San Francisco: China Town and Japan Town. So first we decided to go to China town. I was actually fairly disappointed in China Town. Something seemed different this time. It seemed like some of the smaller shops had been driven out of business and had been converted into jewelry shops. I don't know if that was it, but something seemed missing. Anyway, cant say I had a bad time in China Town, because I bought one of the most amazing paintings that I have ever seen. Here it is, the Monkey King.

Such an amazing picture, in my opinion. And it is HUGE. Streches from the floor to the ceiling in my room! And since I showed such an interest in it, the shop keeper gave me a discount off the artificially high price! Actually though, I paid the exact right amount for it. So now I have a huge picture of the #1 Chinese hero in my room. I know it will never happen because I'm white, but the greatest dream of all in my desire to act in east Asia would be to play the Monkey King.

Here is me as the Monkey King on Halloween, 2003. My best costume ever.
Alright, enough of the really impossible dreams. Back to my day. We then went to Japan Town. Japan Town is always nice. Had some ramen and donburi. Went to the Kinokunya Bookstore. Bought up to volume 7 of Slam Dunk, which I plan to read when my schedule calms down a little. Then we drove to the Palace of Fine Arts, walked around, decided the Exploritorium was a little too expensive, drove over the Golden Gate Bridge and went to Costco. It was a fun day, since Ralph is such a great guy to hang out with. He always has something interesting to say...even when you are not listening because you are trying to drive in San Francisco.

What Am I Thinking

I realized today that I now have 4 projects that are non-class related that I have committed to doing. 1) Roundtable Discussion, on Thursday of next week. 2) Preview Day, the Saturday of next week. 3) Japanese Speech for speech contest, application due Friday of next week, to be performed 3 weeks later. 4) Application to JET, which I want to have done by the end of November.

Strangely, I'm not worried.

Oh, by the way. I have been trying contacts for the last week. I hated them. The left eye was OK, but I might as well have not put in the right eye. The prescription was that wrong. I fumbled around all week not recognizing anyone and feeling very uncomfortable in public because I could not see what was going on around me. But I got a better prescription today, and now the right eye is almost fine. Still not used to contacts, but getting there.

Nothing but Philosophy This Time

Proving, once again, that life is what you make it, I just taught my best astronomy class. Why was it the best? Because I woke up this morning and thought "What have I done at Davis that anyone cares about? All I have wanted to do was make other people's lives better, and the only life I have made better was my own." Probably not true, I hope at least, but still a depressing thought. So I just decided to teach the best class I had ever taught. It was amazing how the sudden breaking of habit made such a change. But I find that has been true a lot recently. I stopped eating processed sugar, and now I don't even crave it. I stopped driving my car to get groceries, and now I hardly drive my car at all. I stopped worrying about how astronomy has been getting less and less fun, and suddenly I was able to make it fun.

Now if only I can stop worrying about my own personal growth. It is suprising how always thinking about if you are becoming a better person or not will actually make it harder to be one.