Category: thisnthat

the title is a reference to a cheeky song by british girl-pop group atomic kitten. I’m not sure if they’re still around anymore, and I don’t even know why I thought about it, but I was trying to think of a way to explain the strange feeling I have right now about the incipient new school year.

so i’ll say it. i’m nervous. after months and months of screwing up in school, I am actually coming close to getting my act together. after years of awful awful grades, i pulled A’s and B’s this summer (it’s amazing what can happen when you go to class!), and I’m hoping to keep that up this year. I have one more year left — I won’t be done until fall quarter — but I’m thinking of picking up an anthropology minor with that extra time. that might be some sort of justification to my taking foreeeeeeever in school?

and here i am, the night before classes start, and i can’t sleep. i’m restless, nervous, wondering if i’ll be able to cut it in these classes. i don’t *feel* smart. in fact, I feel dumber than I was when I first got to college. i look at some of my earlier writings and compare them to the stuff i churn out now for my classes. I think I struggle even more nowadays to put together a coherent sentence than I ever did when I was younger, and I no longer have easy answers for anyone, including myself. growing older doesn’t feel like i’m growing wiser, but rather that i just know less than I thought I did.

is that wisdom? who knows. at any rate, a friend and I were recently discussing a not-so-great experience both of us had with a student organization. I had gotten out before things had gotten too bad; she had stayed in and been summarily stripped of her position, despite her immense contributions in spite of very poor health. she reacted with a lot of anger and frustration… basically how I felt after my bad experience at the daily bruin. “why are things this way? it’s not fair!” and she was right… it wasn’t fair. I personally didn’t think it was very fair to her. A part of me thinks that it probably wasn’t fair to me either, but it’s not really so clear cut. what’s fair anyway?

the thing is, everyone here is learning, and people don’t always do what’s “fair.” They do what they think is right at the time, and it may or may not be the fair thing to do, but (hopefully) everyone learns from their actions. I learned a lot from the mistakes i made during my sophomore year — I learned how *not* to handle a position of leadership and the importance of keeping one’s mouth shut (though not the actual skill… still working on that), as well as the need to give a little and treat people like people, not as duties. People grow and change, and we have to resist our desires to box them up for our own ease of existence…

this is something i haven’t perfected yet either, although i survive on the graces of people who are willing to see that in me. but i try.

a friend once wrote in my high school yearbook, “you are proof that people ARE dynamic, and that they CAN change…” I didn’t know what to make of it at the time, but I have faith in the message, although I am ambivalent about its application toward me. people grow and change, sometimes for the better, sometimes not. and even though it’s sad sometimes to see innocence shattered, knowing that redemption is possible is a truly inspiring and exciting thing.

so here i am, penning what feels like “UC Personal Statement Part Two: The Second Four Years” the night before classes start. I’m nervous about a crowded campus; about running into not-quite-friends and acquaintances and having to explain myself; about navigating the human traffic jam that is UCLA during the school year; about being overrun by the new first years and their inspired attitudes. I’m nervous about traffic on the 405, and if i’ll make it to class on time. I’m nervous that my professors for the quarter will be horrible and unreasonably demanding and sink my newly-rising GPA. I have four more quarters to go — it seems like an eternity! I’m curious as to what’s in store. I’ll be 23 when I graduate. 23!! I’m the age of a lot of those Miss America pageant contestants, good gracious. And they seem OLD!

and yet, we are ALL so young… from that incoming freshman to the aging hippie driving the land rover to even alheimzer-ridden ronald reagan. so much yet to learn!

oooh.. i think i’m getting dizzy. good night.. and wish me luck. =)

I’m back in, baby!! :D :D :D

My grandpa is about as tall as me; my grandmother is even shorter. They’re in their 80s, but they’re still as spry and lively and funny as they were decades ago. My grandparents love to laugh, even though they’ve been through so much hardship. my grandparents born in the countryside, born into lives of hard farm labor. they grew up, came together in an arranged marriage, had children, survived the nanking massacres. they eventually left china for taiwan, amidst the communist takeover. they’ve watched their three children grow up, have children of their own, seen the world spin in circles around them, and yet they can still “hang.” they are living proof that if you can stick through the bad, things will be all right at the end…

i’ll see if i can get a pic of them up soon. :)

if you haven’t seen this yet, run run and take a look! vcsclip.mov this is SOOOOO COOL!! it’s a little compilation of a bunch of old school atari vcs games with a spiffy little soundtrack. watch it watch it watch it!

what an AWESOME AWESOME game! this is the game that got me hooked on Lucasarts stuff in the first place. but since it was made in 1994 or something for DOS in Windows 3.1 or Windows 95, there are lots of problems with running it on a newer machine. I was trying to run my copy on Windows XP and Windows 2000, only to find there was no sound and no voice (well, not quite no sound, but really really awful beepy sound). As it turns out, in newer versions of windows, dos’ ability to control the sound card/soundblaster is severely inhibited. solution for indy: download scummVM.

… and I don’t just mean in terms of security. if you’re looking to fly on most of the major airlines, expect a lot less convenience, much less tolerance for being late/missing your flight, tighter rules on flying standby, and a myriad of other things. there’s an article on cbs market watch here you can look at for more details.

btw, if you haven’t noticed, I’ve changed the color scheme of the site. :) please reload your browsers if you can’t see the new blues!
I also fixed some of the more recent web links to open in a new window when clicked. sorry i’ve been so lazy about doing it in the past~!!

i’m attempting to study for my final in my history of electronic dance class (read: rave class) but it’s really hard because i’m playing with bits of my website! -sob!- i’m so useless.

so here’s another update. this time it’s ALL ABOUT FOOD~!

Nate and Al’s. so after our respective mad paper writing rushes for soc1, julie and I decided to hit the road and grab some grub. we hit up a place called “nate and al’s” in beverly hills (which is seriously sooo close to ucla), a jewish deli. apparently, the food network did a special on the place, and julie decided she had to go. and me being constantly hungry, I had to tag along too.
&nbsp &nbsp the food was excellent! we each had a cup of soup – she got matzo ball, I got chicken noodle – and half a corned beef sandwich. first off, the chicken soup was really really tasty, and you could really taste all the veggies that helped flavor it. mmm. I was totally floored by the corned beef sandwich. i’m normally a pastrami kind o’ girl, but the corned beef they had there was completely melt-in-your-mouth yummy and not as super-greasy as pastrami normally seems to be. the potato salad that came with it was also surprising — usually sides are just an afterthought, but nate and al’s really made the most of a little dish. it was really creamy and really rich, but not as heavy and potato salads tend to be, and spiced just right. I was floored. plus, the price for soup and really huge sandwich was about $23, fairly reasonable compared to some other delis, and plus we got more food! the service was also really good. all the waitresses seemed like they’d been working there forever, so you had a really classic diner sort of feel. they knew the menu, and knew how to give good service and were not just saccharinely polite the way some of the younger waiters/waitresses are now. i’m defintely taking this place over Jerry’s Famous Deli from now on! you need to go there too~!

Al Gelato I’m a huuuuge gelato fan, and i finally got my fix at the local gelateria, al gelato. this is also in beverly hills on robertson. I had pear and passionfruit gelato while julie got the chocolate. my pear gelato was really really tasty, passionfruit was a little too sweet, but chocolate was DECADENT. SOO GOOD! head there if you can! it’s definitely one of the “can’t miss” places in la. :)

… not that I actually think you’ll want to comment on any of my posts, but if you do, you can~!!
thanks rich for introducing me to this~! yay!

in my head this morning: hi-five – kissing game
(olllld school!)
currently spinning: coldplay – a rush of blood to the head
joys of the day: seeing rich, jack, and steven on campus today while i’m supposed to be working on my paper for my history of electronic dance music class. thank you, rich, for the kind words on yer blog!!! :D wheeeeeeeeeee~!!!!! i think yours is spifferific too~!!!
stresses of the day: this is finals week. I have a paper due tomorrow, a paper due wednesday, and a final on thursday. oh maaaaaaaaan!
worry of the day: that I won’t get it all done!

I was stressing about my paper for my soc class so julie and I went to go talk to my professor after class. so I went off on my professor about all the different theories and how I wasn’t sure about what they were and how to apply them, etc etc and I started rambling (like i do in this blog and on the class discussion board… *groan*) and he stopped me and said, “Don’t think too much.”

dude, what does it mean when your professor tells you not to think so much? -head thunks on table.-

my mom called when I was in class, so I called her back after and proceeded to whine about my consistent inability to write papers. oh sure, I can ramble on like the best (or is it the worst?) of them… I just don’t end up with any sort of point to anything i’m saying! she laughed at me. I whined and said I was too much like my dad (guess where I get my rambling tendencies from?? dude, I sat through sooo many lectures, wondering what the heck he was getting at. I think I’ve learned to speak around points now too! *SOB!*). she told me not to worry and just concentrate on a few things and just… write.

geez louise. I can’t write worth beeans. I have no idea what I’m going to do to focus myself and keep from writing some rambling pseudo-opus with the length of War and Peace, a book, by the way, I’ve never been able to finish reading. then again, you’d be surprised how illiterate I am (well… maybe you wouldn’t be surprised…)

anyway, I’m gonna try to get back to work. wish me luck. -sob!-