big yippee of the day: academic triumph

i actually went to a professor's office hours today and i got some great and helpful insight into my project for the class. for all you IS kids...i got some ERD help. :) i also had a midterm for classics 101, a vocab-type class and i kicked butt on it...at least i think i did. i felt i had the latin stems and meanings committed to memory. i feel like the dad from my big fat greek wedding who was always taking words back to their greek origins...except i can do it in latin, yahoo!

and remember that spanish drama class i'm in? the one where i just thought it was soooo hard? well, turns out, it's not so bad. i even contributed in class today. we're reading a play by lope de vega called fuente ovejuna, which is a place/city in spain. the essence is that there's this commander (aka dictator) guy who is the big villain. we were reading a short scene between him and another character, Laurencia. basically...he was trying to put the moves on her and not in a smooth way; he very forcefully commanding her to obey him in whatever capacity he wanted. so anyway, he says like four lines and those four lines happen to be a metaphor. anywho, we were working in small groups of three people and i called the prof over because i wanted to run a thought by him, and he just happened to find that thought to be very very interesting. i think i was preening. :D and to top it off, my classmate mauricio told me it was a very profound thought - and it only matters because he's like a smartie, which caused to me to continue the bask in the praise of my peers. ok...i think my esteem is high enough now.

ok...and the last highlight to my day was the Bible study with steph lin. so...it's not a small group, since it's just me and her. anyway, i think it went really well! we chatted and got to know each other and did all that typical get-to-know-each-other thing and shared some prayer requests and prayed. oh...and did an overview of what we'd be studying together, which is the book of Esther...great book. y'all should read it. i'm thinking after we're done, we should rent the veggietales version of it. :D

i found out yesterday that my friend justin is going to be deployed to kuwait. he's just not sure when. right now, he's just waiting for his call, and once he gets the call, he's got just 72 hours to tie up whatever he has to here in seattle...including school, work, family, and friends. it's a little scary...he's a marine reserve. and it was news to me because i prefer to ignore the impending war that looms over this nation, but the reserves are being called up. and it's even scarier because marines are like the first ones in and last ones out. kind of puts all of my crap into perspective.

the bestest medicine for feeling crappy: milk and cookies

every fiber of my being is crying for rest and sleep...or at least for this week to be over. this is midterm week. blech. a paper, from which i am taking a break, two midterms and a quiz - this is my life for the week.

but on a brighter thought, i start my small group - very very small group since it's just me and one other girl. we're going to study the book of esther, so that should be pretty cool. oh, and koti hu is coming to aacf this week, so tell your friends :D

friday: worked...what a horribly long day. and then watched chicago! it was awesome! i'm extremely impressed with the talented singing by the actors...and the dancing too.

saturday: worked...another long day. met with my IS mentor from deloitte consulting. went to bellevue starbucks and listened to shawn mcdonald play. hung out at hi-d land.

just learned about awesome game - apples to apples. must buy.

holy celebrity-sighting, batman!

brace yourselves people. i have just come from a Q & A session with KEVIN SPACEY, yes...THE Kevin Spacey of The Usual Suspects, Seven, American Beauty, etc - fame!!! is that not just insane?!?

ok...so jessica isawa calls me last night around 10pm asking me if i want to go to a free screening of a new Kevin Spacey movie at the HUB. i'm like...of course...i love movies and i love free, so having the love of free movies - i totally wanted to go. she then told me it was going to be at 3pm and i was bummed because i have class until 3:30 on thursdays. so i declined, not wanting to skip class and all since it is a 2-hour, twice weekly class. and she mentioned that a VIP associated with the movie would be there to answer questions after the screening, and that it might be Kevin Spacey himself. i was thinking how cool that'd be, but also that it seemed a tad unlikely. so as of last night, i wasn't going. so earlier today, jessica and i had planned to meet up for lunch and when i walked into the HUB, people were already in line at 11:45am for the 3pm screening. it suddenly hits that Kevin Spacey is really coming to the HUB. so...after some inner conflict and struggle, i decided to skip class - which...i still feel kinda bad about. BUT, the thing is, this is like a once in a lifetime chance, and jessica had two tickets - one for her and one for me. and this is only a big deal because i guess the tickets were given out yesterday and not this morning like she thought. and when she went this morning, they told her that the giveaway was the previous day. BUT they did happen to have TWO tickets left! i don't know how to categorize that, but it put me over the edge of deciding in favor of the movie.

so, we waited in line from 12:45pm until screening time and we got emily chu and june nishimura to join us and when they finally let us in to the auditorium, we ran for some decent seats, which i think we got. so we saw the movie, The Life of David Gale and afterwards, Kevin Spacey came on stage and it was just sooooooo cool!!! he was totally funny, sarcastic, cracking jokes and telling stories, and answering questions. And he appeared to be pretty down to earth, well, at least that's what it felt like to me. it's funny listening to the people who asked questions, most of them would preface the question with some gushing of how much they love his movies, work, etc and then toss in "i'm an aspiring actor and so..." like seriously, who isn't an aspiring actor? yeesh. the questions were of the usual variety, probably stuff he's answered a bagillion times, but he made the answers fun and entertaining and added to them, which was great. at this point, i doubt there are a lot of original questions out there to even ask.

anywho...i suppose that i could've come up with something, but just ditching class to go there was enough "carpe diem" for one day. :) we were like 30-40 feet away from him, and granted, it's not close, but hey, we were all in the same room with the guy so that's pretty dang awesome. and i think jessica got some photos, so i'm getting double prints of those... *crossing my fingers that they turned out well*

and the movie was good too. really intense and graphic at times. the basic premise is that a philosophy professor who is also an advocate of getting rid of the death penalty finds himself on death row awaiting execution for rape and murder. it flashes back between the past and present to tell his story and it has so many levels and there is so much humanity and even commentary about the human condition and about how it is that people end up at point b from point a. i have to see it again just so pick apart some of the issues, ideas, and themes. it's totally a movie that you'd end up talking about as you're walking out of the theater because it provokes thinking about issues like capital punishment, etc. it's a great story - not because it's happy and makes you feel good, but because it's gritty and maybe controversial and shakes up our cozy little worlds.

i'm dazed.

career fair - usually an event that is completely depressing

i went to the uw minority career fair [though i did see quite a few non-minorities...at least they didn't look like minorities to me - and no, dating a minority does not automatically make you a minority]. it was suprisingly ok. i didn't leave feeling a ton of self-pity, which is a major step up from past career fairs. even if the recruiters were lying through their teeth about potential jobs and opportunities for me within their company, i still feel pretty good. at least they didn't just tell me that there were ZERO opportunities available - because that would have been very, very, very sad. this actually gives me a ray of hope, and even though it might just be crushed anyway, it's still nice to feel the possibility of it all. i did feel slightly cheapened at having to toss myself out there in the job pool and having to schmooze my way through the fair - but if it lands my foot in the door, it'll be worth it...i hope.

this weekend, i went to sambica for aacf's winter retreat 2003 - the three little pigs, which are faith, community, and leadership. all good themes that we can never learn too much about. i'd forgotten how important it is to be part of a community. i was so busy doing all my stuff that i was juggling that there wasn't much time to spend with other people. it was really refreshing - not only because the whole point of a retreat is to draw away from our daily life of toiling away, but because i enjoyed spending time with friends that i feel like i've lost a little touch with. it was also encouraging to see the new crop of aacf kids who are just crazy-enthusiastic about sharing Jesus with their friends...and strangers too. :) it makes me feel old and tired - because somewhere along the line, i lost that zest. the best thing about recognizing my own weaknesses is that they can then be fixed.

few and far between are my blogs as school gets underway. my first week was alright since i'm still trying to find my groove, ya know? i can say that for the most part, it's not too bad - except for this one class, spanish 440: drama of the golden age or in spanish, el teatro del siglo de oro. the prof is coo, and i understand him pretty well for the most part, but he speaks fast and jumps from subject to subject pretty quickly too, so it takes so much concentration to keep up. and the reading is crazy difficult. so like, taking a shakespeare class in english isn't exactly easy right? the language of the plays are different and there's the whole iambic pentameter thing...imagine taking a class in a second language where the written works aren't even modern day prose (which isn't easy either) but rather antiquated spanish and written in forms of lyric poetry. yea...exactly. this class owns me.

the other thing is that all the other people in the class are smarties - i think they've all studied abroad for at least 6 months and some are even hispanohablantes (native spanish speakers) so i have no desire to speak up in class. if i can get away with saying as little as possible i'll be happy. now...some people when presented with this type of challenge, would study harder and try harder just to keep up. so...my method would be the opposite of that...something akin to giving up. hmm...they say that these kinds of things are telling and given that, i'm not so much liking what my method says about me. eh...

in almost anyone's childhood experiences, there will almost always be the kid you remember that was the know-it-all, or again in spanish, el sabelotodo. and generally, with the know-it-all kid, the thing is that they don't know it all, but just think that they do - which sucks for them because there's less room for growth and learning. so...i remember those types of kids from my childhood...and big surprise, i still find them - in class, at the law library, etc. and while most times, it's seriously not worth my effort to argue points in those rare moments when i am actually right, there are times when i get a perverse satisfaction of saying "ha! i'm right and you're so wrong!!!" accompanied with a touchdown-like dance to rub it in their face. is that bad?

[thursday at work]

Rude Old Guy: 97 Pacific.
Me: 97 Pacific? You mean the Pacific Reporter?
ROG: 97 Pacific.
Me: Right. Let me check on that. Well, it looks like the Pacific Reporters are located in the Reading Room. [I point out the handy signs that label the various books...very visible]
ROG: Those are the 2nd series.
Me: Well, off the left of those, there's a sign that reads just "Pacific Reporter."
ROG: Those are the second series.
Me: My mistake. Let's take a look at the map.
ROG: They must be in the basement. [which they are so not...]
Me: They look like they've recently been put in the corner on the upper deck of the Reading Room. [i point it out]

the rude old guy walks away all huffy. but you have to understand that his whole attitude and body language was such that he thought he had some right to be served like he was someone really "important." then he has the nerve to come back later at noon and ask about basement retrievals when the sign clearly reads that the next trip is at 3pm. yea...and he all tried to be nice about it, as if that would magically cause someone to come back from lunch just to get the book. and as soon as i told him that it wouldn't be possible to go at that moment, he was visibly enraged - like his composure slipped - but he did the whole "i'm really a nice old guy...really i am..." routine to see if he could get things to go his way. too bad i can see right through him. apparently he's known around the library for his unbelievably rude behavior and treatment of staff. i was told that that's him on a good day. much like the guy in my spanish class from last quarter that i wanted to serve a beat-down to, my right foot was itching to give this guy a good, swift kick to the head. it wasn't that he was just rude - because at the law lib/law school there are tons of rude people that i encounter, but it was that he felt he was superior to all other people, that we're all here for the sole purpose of serving him or catering to him - it was his arrogance that was the kicker. [course, we're all arrogant on some level - but he was having the big ego...much like russell crowe.

i'm just been informed that "addictive personality" implies that people are addicted to my personality. but that's not what i meant. i meant that i seem to be prone to having addictions. :D

it's my first day back at the law library and big surprise, some old guy was like crazy rude. more on that later since i'm about to leave.

i'm a junkie and i think i might have an addictive personality [and obsessive too.]

i'm all about DVDs. i went to best buy and i did not come home empty-handed. and...i love all types of media...tv, music, movies, etc. i like to collect stuff. not anything in particular, but whatever happens to strike me. in high school there was a phase where i bought make-up. i never really used any of it, but if i saw something, i'd buy it. maybe the underlying addiction is shopping and spending. but it's only on certain things - not just anything.

oh...and this tiny, tiny mole popped up on my foot. it wasn't there yesterday...i don't think. but now it's there and it's all i see...it's like enrique's, but a way, way smaller. and...my right eyelid is folding all funny because i didn't sleep enough. today was not a pretty day. but tomorrow is another day. :D

i'm back in seattle as well as back in school. even though i only had one class today, there was all this anti-school sentiment within me. ah well. it's weird being back because i'm not sure what i should be doing. i don't have a routine yet - so once again, i'm all confused. but give me a week or two...

i take it back - i'd probably chew my own arm off if i was forced to move back home and live with my parents.

i'm not opposed to happy couples. really - though i'm sure some of my friends will find that a little hard to believe. i'm just slightly opposed to change - in the sense that it feels like i'm losing a friend, rather than gaining another friend in addition to my current friend. make sense? it's because of the whole sharing thing - because yes, sharing is good, and necessary - but change and sharing just happens to takes my stubborn self longer to adjust to than it does others, which is probably because i'm totally selfish, and at least i can admit that. but alas, this is a part of the whole growing [pains] process - yippie. so maybe if i start looking at it as getting to have another friend, then it won't be so hard to get used to. :)

i can add another scenario for the "if winter quarter is like autumn quarter" thing - i'd probably chew my own arm off.

i'm currently watching a group of people play risk, yes...risk and it's really amusing - but i think it's only amusing because of the mix of people who are playing. there seems to be a whole lotta funny that just can't be explained, but has to be witnessed.

my time at home is quickly coming to an end, and school starts up in just a couple of days, and darn it, i'm not ready to go back. it's like...NOOOO!!! [think homer finding out that donuts and beer have been eliminated from the entire planet.] arg...i love just sitting around and having nothing to do - of course that whole deal would get tired after awhile, but after spending all of autumn quarter just barely surviving, it's kind of nice to veg. i'm seriously hoping that this quarter will be way more chill than last - i might not survive if it's just as crazy. ok...that's a little extreme. it's more like i'd be like an animal that's been caged and starved and taught to be mean.

after a short stop to costco earlier today, i've found the reason why my vision's been all wiggy. it seems that my Rx on my lenses have been switched - and i don't know if it was my own error when i wrote the order, or whether it was a lab error. i guess i'll find out when i go to work on next friday.

ARRHHH! and my parents are all like "blah blah blah grad school blah blah blah" and i'm like..."i'm never going back to school...i'm never going back to school..."

my parents seem to have normal friends. the dinner was fine, though our original plan to drive separately did get vetoed. and we had a bit of an adventure finding their house...i felt like chevy chase and family searching for wallyworld. it was a little ridiculous how long it took us to find the house. note to self: check address and directions online - do not rely on dad's sense of direction. when we got there, it turned out to be more than just a few people...it was like a whole phatty party of adults - and their kids got to stay home. we made nice with the kids of the host friends and watched some football and 2+ hours of the iron chef - and as fun as the iron chef is, it might have been one episode too much. [i'm definitely securing the two vehicles thing next time.] and my big nagging fear that this was just another ploy of my parents to marry me off turned out to be unfounded. hooray! the dinner host family had three boys - high schooler, 5th year college kid, and college grad. so, we weren't subjected to odd conversations by the adults - we had the kiddie table.

the guy in college actually goes to rice down in texas and he actually knows the people that i went to high school with who went to rice - talk about small world. and the grad was an almost prototype asian kid who played some musical instrument and was in the PYP so he knew my neighbors tim and alan. trippy. and they were really into the food network - i had no idea that channel had such a following :)

and in another weird turn of small world events - the mom of some guys i sort of knew from high school was at the dinner, along with aunty margaret and uncle phillip from the church i went to when i was in jr high/high school, before i left for college. it was like the randomest gathering. but all in all, it wasn't the nightmare that i envisioned it to be, so it was like a pleasant evening.

happy new year everyone!!!

i spent my new year's eve in two parts - the first part of the evening was spent running through downtown portland on a photo scavenger hunt with a digital camera, and our team won! [good job jeana and george!] our prizes were gift cards to starbucks - hello caffeine :D and the second part was just hanging out for a low-key evening at patty and joany's house out in clackamas. we had pizza and watched movies - xxx, the movie with vin diesel, and barbershop. i would say skip over the vin diesel movie and just watch barbershop, which was totally hilarious. i think the rest of the party crew is still over at the wong's house playing risk... haha...aren't we just outta control? if alternate realities existed, i wonder what it would've been like to see all of us as crazy party people... i think if i hadn't already committed to going to the scavenger hunt/movie/pizza night, i would've stayed home and read or crocheted or something - i am so boring. :)

it's weird to think that it's 2003 now. goodness the years just pass faster and faster. well, with a new year, i should probably make a list of some kind about all the things that i'll resolve to do, but never really get around to doing. does anybody actually keep their new year's resolutions anyway?

i just found out that us kiddies have to go out to dinner with my parents tomorrow night because some friends of theirs have invited us out to dinner at their home in lake oswego. our only stipulation is that we drive separately from the parentals so that we can make an early escape as soon as we've eaten. there will be zero tolerance for hanging around post-dinner, just in case my parents have weird friends or something. and i still haven't figured out why we have to be there - but if there's even a hint of parading us kids around like we're trophy children [because we're so not], i'm outta there.

ok, be safe and merry kids.