Filed under: ARRGH
I keep effing up at work. They’ve been watching me like a hawk. I think the boss man has it out for me, because the only times he has ever seen me is when I stop to talk to someone or when I am in the break room, so it seems like I serve no purpose there. Stupid bad timing. Ugh.
Okay, I’m just wondering, when did it ever become okay to assume that all Asians are Japanese and that talking to them in Japanese is ultra impressive? If someone ignores you when you’re speaking to them in Japanese, it probably means 1) they are not Japanese, 2) you’re an ass hat, and 3) you’re a “racist prick,” as Allison so eloquently put it. I endured a whole month of this abroad because it seems that Europeans find it to be a pickup line, but I didn’t expect such ill manners so close to home in the supposed “melting pot” that is the US of A.
While trying to enjoy a chocolate milkshake at In-N-Out after Club Bang! in Hollyhood, this creeper–let’s call him Upchuck–started looking at me and gave me a nod so I just nodded back and gave him a thumbs up. He noted that the sunglasses perched upon my head looked like they were from Back to the Future, so I told him that’s exactly where I got them. His drunken idiot friend slurred to me, “I like your stockings,” referring to the neon yellow stockings I had donned for 80s dance partying. A-hole that I am, I slurred back to him, “Thaaaanyooou.” I thought it was pretty clever at the time. haha. I don’t think he really noticed anyway. I turned back to my pals to enjoy my milkshake and some conversation, but this idiot starts saying strings of words in Japanese to me that he probably learned from the one Asian person he’s ever encountered in his life or from anime. I shot him a dirty look and just ignored him, turning back to my drank. He just kept going at it until Allison commented aloud on what a douchebag he was being. This seemed to be offensive to Drunken Idiot and he just couldn’t understand why she would say such hurtful things. Upchuck decides to chime in and blurt out what jerks people in LA were–while he was in a restaurant full of Los Angeleans–apparently because they do not engage in friendly conversation when addressed in Japanese.
My knights in shining armor got upset something awful and there was sort of an east coast vs. west coast fight about to go down (even though everyone else has lived in the east but me) because these fools were from New Hampshire, here in LA to celebrate Drunken Idiot’s 30th birthday (they claim he turned 18 but I find this to be highly unlikely). They kept saying they were just trying to enjoy Drunken Idiot’s 18th, all while spitting up burger and really stupid insults only an ignorant rich kid fresh out of high school would come up with, I guess. When the commotion calmed down a little, my dear friend Allison decided to throw in a “Shut up, you racist prick.” haha. At this point, it just got awkward for everyone else within earshot, which was everyone. People kind of inched away as the guys went at it and I kind of just sat there laughing because it was all so ridiculous. Drunken Idiot kept asking why he was racist because I guess it’s normal to talk to all Asian people in the same language in their gated community. He actually stumbled out of his seat thinking it would be more threatening and I was getting really annoyed because this guy was just so ignorant he didn’t know he was coming off as a big loser so I tried pushing him away from us and telling him to sit down. He was so drunk he could barely stand so I didn’t think it’d be a very fair fight anyway. It was something so stupid to be fighting over. Being the bigger people, we finally decided to leave. They kind of followed us and after we crossed the street, they stood on the other curb yelling nonsensical things. If they really had the balls they would have crossed the street because the light was green and the little walking man wasn’t going to stop them, but they continued to yell from a safe distance. I was kind of glad because I’d rather not have to bail my friends from prison. As interesting of a story as it would have made, it really would have put a damper on our night.
So if you’re one of those asses who thinks to themselves, Hey I know these two Japanese phrases pretty well. I think I should use them with every Asian I see because I assume they will all understand, just like how they all know karate, don’t think I don’t know how to pull the race card and cause a scene in public.
But anyway, Bang was fun. haha. It’s not as 80s as it is scene but it’s got interesting people and doesn’t play crap. I don’t really recall seeing anyone in 80s attire, so we fussed about clothings for nothing. What I liked most was that people weren’t grinding on each other as much as they do at freakin’ high school dances and other clubs I’ve been to. I’d recommend this club for those who find other clubs to be mildly disgusting and those who are not yet 21. Just don’t forget to grab some cash because they don’t take card. :[
Hello all, I am finally home after over 24 hours of Delta hell. I haven’t flown with a lot of airlines, but this one seems to be the worst by far (that flies from or in the US, at least). I feel that EF College Break is to blame for part of the nightmare, but most of it is on Delta. Our flight from Madrid was delayed three hours, but not only that, we were a little late to getting to the airport thanks to the genius planning of EFCB and so were the very last people left standing at the check-in counter. Half our group of seven were put on standby and so they sat in limbo for the next three or so hours. This particular flight was okay and service was pretty good, but flying into JFK, we had to sit for about an hour to get to the actual gate after landing. The delay of our arrival not only caused delirium, it also caused us to miss our connecting flight to LAX. Tucked away in the back of the airplane, we began to be obnoxious Americans, most likely pissing off all the Spanish folk around us. We sang bits and pieces of patriotic songs, talked about what American things we were going to do upon our return and how Europeans (namely Parisians) had wronged us. I sincerely love Europe, but there are just some things that stopped me from enjoying my time there occasionally, ie paying for water and restrooms, and paying too much money for ridiculously small portions of food, to name a few. Despite the fact that we went to very touristy places, some merchants were just plain rude, even when we attempted to speak their tongue and tried to be polite according to our tour guide’s standards (I’m talking about you, Parisians! The only reason I’m not saying that French people perpetuate the stereotype that they are rude people is because the people in Nice were total opposites). Other than that, the places we traveled to were beautiful and rich in culture in history, so I did indeed enjoy Europe and shall miss it dearly..but not so much the people.
Anywho, so we were late getting in to JFK because the weather was bad and there were a lot of planes lined up to get to their gates. Who ever heard of airstrip traffic? Ugh. Only one person in our group had a seat on the 6:30 flight and he had 10 minutes to get to it, but seeing that all flights seemed to be delayed, I’m thinking he made it ok. The rest of us were put on the 8:30pm flight, though only two people had seats and the rest of us were on standby, but luckily we all made it, and for the first time ever, I got two seats to myself! 
This flight was also delayed (and apparently tucked into the very end of nowhere or something because we had to walk so far to get there from customs and I had to carry my stupid duffel bag full of bricks, which I’m sure will result in me getting scoliosis. More about this in a bit.) and then it took about another 2.5 hours to take off after we left the gate, because there were approximately 45 planes waiting in line to take off. Redonkulous, mang. I wanted to shoot myself because I don’t really like being on airplanes, or in airports for that matter, and because I wanted to go home and away from that mess. I didn’t want to leave Europe but once I got to the airport in Madrid and my European adventure was officially over, I just wanted to get home as fast as I could, but Delta wouldn’t have it. We finally landed a little before 2am and I could not wait to just get my suitcase from baggage claim and get home.
Ok so, I don’t know what the weight limit is usually but Delta’s was 22.6 kg (which they lie about because the sign at check-in says 23), which is 50lbs. If you go over this, you have to pay 80 dollars. I’ve never had a problem with weight limit, so I’m thinking they have a lower one or something compared to other airlines. My stuff was weighed and it came out to be 26 something kgs so I was like..ah, holy crap. This lady in front of us told us she went over one kilogram and they gave her the choice of either paying or going to the very end of the line to repack and line up again. Either choice is ridiculous, but she chose the latter. Who the heck wants to pay that much for one extra kilo? I thought I was screwed for sure, but because of all the problems at the check-in counter, I started pulling out a bunch of things and stuffing them into my half empty duffel. I had over 3kg worth of weight to shed from my suitcase to add to the weight of my duffel, so you can imagine why I’m almost sure I will get scoliosis from carrying it.
Because of Delta, I have formed a love/hate relationship with the song “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz…but it’s more like love stained with memories of despair. The song came on when we first landed at JFK and it was such a perfect song to end the flight with. Then we sat for another hour, at least, long enough for us to hear it more than once. When we were sitting and waiting those three hours for our second plane to take off, chunks of the song were played over and over again because the flight attendants couldn’t get the entertainment system to work. I still love it, but it will always remind me of that day..
But yeah, be excited, my two readers, for I am home!
Only a couple hours in and out of the sun and I am now as pink as Pepto Bismol on my shoulders and a slightly lighter on my chest and back until where my strapless dress ends. I look sort of like I’m wearing pink overalls and then there’s normal skin color in the middle where my large head luckily cast a shadow, providing shade for my poor epidermis that so rarely sees light that it blushes in its presence. I sunburn really, really easily because pretty much every day of the year I am in a t-shirt and jeans and very little skin is exposed. On the few occasions that I show anything outside of my farmer’s tan, I get burned like a mofo. Not only that, but it shows up really slowly. At first I’m only a little pink and then several hours later, long after I’ve left the evil rays of the sun, I turn a ghastly shade of hot pink. It just sort of sneaks up on me. I don’t think my shoulders have ever only been a little sunburned. Go big or go home, the sun seems to feel. Lucky me, I get to have charred shoulders while abroad. How will I ever hook my British boyfriend now? No one likes crispy shoulders. Oh well, our lovely photos with the grad were worth it. 
Pictures soon to come! Congratulations on your graduation, Roomie!!! I’ve been waiting to say that to someone for years because it’s been a while since anyone I knew graduated.
Really though? I was only in the sun less than two hours! Goodbye o-zone layer. Remember to wear sunblock, friends! Especially if you don’t want to have leather skin when you’re older. I’ll have leather shoulders for sure. They’ll be like shoulder pads. They’re gonna come back one day and you’ll all be jealous because my shoulder pads are built-in.
So I’ve been using Ubuntu off and on for about a month. Off, because it wouldn’t start up anymore if I didn’t defrag on Windows beforehand, because Ubuntu wasn’t given enough space to grow and my hard drive was kind of getting full. I was excited at first because I felt like I was being freed from the monopoly that is Microsoft, but Ubuntu sometimes causes me much stress. I’m not the type to stress out a lot, but Ubuntu’s done it. I don’t know if it’s just me, but my Firefox on Ubuntu is a mofo. When I right-click because I want to open a link in a new tab or window, sometimes a Save Link As window pops up or a Del.icio.us favoriting window pops up or my computer just laughs at me. Many a time have I merely hovered over a link without clicking anything and I have been directed to that particular page. When I try to write a post as I just did earlier, my text decides to repeat itself over and over again randomly so my post seems more repetitive than usual and not intentionally. Oftentimes, in the middle of my typing (this happens in Pidgin, too), out of nowhere a link will be pasted in the middle of my text. This embarrassed me a little when I sent an email to one of my professors and did not realize that Ubuntu had pasted the link to my del.icio.us in the middle of my text. It’s really odd because I don’t know what the pattern of it is, because I try to re-type what I have typed to see what it is that triggers a pasting of a link that I did not copy and it never works. Yesterday, Ubuntu was frustrating me because I couldn’t get my DVD to work in VLC player, even though everyone says that it will play DVDs. I was hoping I could install less stuff if VLC could play it, but I ended up having to install packages of codecs and junk and several other media players and finally Kaffiene pissed me off the least so I’m keeping it. On top of all this, my adapter to charge my laptop is being a son of a B and works but half the time it’s plugged in. And my cooling pad sucks major butt, working possibly only 1/100 of the time it’s plugged in. I feel like technology’s been against me lately.
As cool as Ubuntu is for the tech savvy, I have pretty basic needs and if my programs continue to be botched, I may not make the switch over to it after all. 
And another thing, I can’t watch ABC shows on Ubuntu without having to install some extra shizz! This I do not blame Ubuntu for. I think this is just the network being a d-bag.
Filed under: ARRGH, Adventureses, hobbies, vacay/travel | Tags: jury duty, kites
Okay, so it’s time for an update! I will start off with spring break. I didn’t really do much, but I did do all the things on the list besides rearranging my room. I flew kites one windy day. My fish kite flew very easily, but my new kites, though made of fancier materials than my old kites, seemed to only have like 20 feet of string so they couldn’t catch as much wind as my fishy. I went with Friendest on a hunt for kite string, only to fail miserably. Apparently, no one carries kite string alone. Our kite string hunt is to be concluded…
I had work every single day of my break besides Sunday night, because it was Easter and I guess Hell doesn’t stay open on Easter. Rumors had been floating around these past couple months that my position was being phased out due to the company no longer being as popular as they once were and losing monies, but they won’t ever admit that. We found out last month exactly what day we were getting the ax, May 3rd, and then one day during break, they told us we were being removed over a month early. I was a little unhappy that they told us with such short notice but at the same time pretty relieved. Later on that week, it occurred to me how much I wouldn’t miss that job and I probably would not keep in touch with anyone there except maybe one or two people, even though I have been there the longest. At the end of the week, my manager texted me and said that we were actually getting removed the Monday after the upcoming one, so I had another weekend of work to dread, which was this past weekend. I was so excited because it was going to be my last day of work there ever, but all of a sudden, my bubble was bursted. Towards the end of my supposed last day, I found out I’m being held captive for another month. Apparently, my manager “forgot to tell me.” He forgot to tell me that my job is never going to die, that this is actually my own personal hell. I’m thinking they are going to keep telling us on our alleged last days that we have been given an extension, so that I will continue to think, Oh well, what’s another couple of weeks? You can’t see this, but I am shaking my fist.
Anyway, with my kind of luck, I was called on the very last day to jury duty. I had only had about two hours of sleep and, with a purse full of reading materials, games, and Enchanted on my mp3 player, was dropped off near the courthouse a little before 8am Friday morning. I was confused about what to do, but the rest of the potential jurors and I were eventually herded into this large waiting room, where I would waste a large chunk of my day pretty much doing what I would’ve been doing at home during most of those hours anyway: sleeping. I situated myself on an uncomfortable but cushioned bench and waited and waited. I fell asleep (because I can pretty much sleep under any circumstances) almost instantly after attempting to read, occasionally waking up to hear what the guy on the PA system had to say. Each time a group was being called, the whole room tensed up. We all waited to hear our own names, hoping that they would never be read. Those who were called looked defeated, as if someone had just kicked them in the groins. When we were let out for lunch, I followed the rest of the cattle out the building and expected to somehow figure out which bus would take me to Little Tokyo so I could get some curry or ramen but found myself very disoriented. After all, though I do not live super far, I’ve really only been downtown a handful of times. I walked around in circles and upon giving up very shortly on hopes of Japanese food, I decided to go to the LA Mall. It took me quite a while to figure out how to get in because I kept arriving on the rooftop park area no matter what I tried and saw no food court in sight. I had to call my sister to ask her how to get in and after several more attempts, I finally found the entryway to Unauthentic Ethnic Foods Central. I spent my lunch on that rooftop park area that taunted me earlier and ate my salad gleefully, but eventually I had to return to the courthouse. I slept through the rest of it, waking up occasionally to see if I was picked and luckily, I was not! Yays. This one guy nearby was so excited at the end of the day that he jumped up and high fived everyone around him. It was quite obvious that he didn’t want to be there, because in the morning, I saw him walking in and grumbling, “Jury duty sucks!” And every single time they called names, the annoyance he emitted was almost palpable. So I was free from jury duty, and not only that, I was also one of the first few people called to leave. Yays! Somehow, I got stuck in the stairwell, though, and I kept trying to figure out how to get out. The first floor door seemed to be stuck and the second floor door wouldn’t even open, so I had to walk up to the third floor and take the elevator down. I wasn’t sure which was was north when I got out, so I just took the first bus I recognized to get home, but for some odd reason, it didn’t take me home. It stopped several miles early in Alhambra, even though that bus is specifically supposed to go to Arcadia, so I sat outside the Renaissance theater until Friendest came to get me. We went for celebratory drinks at Boba Express and I did not have to worry about jury duty anymore. I’m free for a year! Yee!
That was pretty much the rest of my break. It was nice to not be in school but it was way too short. I love vacations. This summer shall be a lovely one!
Unfortunately, this took longer than it should’ve, so I shall continue my updating (hopefully) tomorrow. There will be pictures too! Yeah! And by the way, both our bathrooms are occupied and man do I have to pee.
Um, don’t try to start something with a girl and then disappear and sporadically resurface. It’s not as mysterious and appealing as you may think it is. And it gets kind of old after, say, one time? As strange as it sounds, the whole disappearing act does not help to build a relationship, and it may, in fact, hinder it. And don’t be too surprised when she decides to stop answering your texts and calls. Just a little tip for those of you who think withdrawing is a great idea. Absence does not make the heart grow fonder when it comes without warning and there was little to miss to begin with.
I spent about a year fighting with the financial aid office to help pay for school and what do I get? A miserly number that I’d prefer not to disclose. Let’s just say it’s not even going to cover two quarters of tuition. All this bother with paperwork upon paperwork and I am rewarded with so little. I mean, I’m glad I got something, but this kind of loan is the kind that any student can get, so I could’ve gotten this much money without having to bring in some new obscure document I had to ask my parents to dig up, as if they aren’t busy enough, every other week. I think it’s a lot tougher on parents who are self-employed because the numbers fluctuate so much and all the office sees are numbers. They don’t care about your situation, because numbers prove everything, don’t they? Sure, you can take a second mortgage out on the house, but who wants to add to their debt? Financial aid people are part of the freakin’ problem, the reason why everyone in America is so easily swallowed by debt. Everyone’s borrowing money that doesn’t exist. Doesn’t that seem a little nonsensical to you? And on top of that, why is school so expensive anyway? What are these random stupid fees? Each of my classes charges an extra 24 to 30 bucks and for what? The three pieces of papers that they have given me all quarter? The amount of breath the professor uses up on each individual student? And why do I have to pay a seismic fee for Ackerman and Kerckhoff? I don’t even go to those places! And yet, with all these seemingly useless fees they slap on us and probably profit from, tuition still keeps going up. I miss free public education.
Quick note before I sleep: School fees are up the butt and financial aid is still lagosaurus on my funds. We are not amused!
Filed under: ARRGH
One of the worst places to get distracted is the post office, because you end up spending more money than you should when you’re sending out media mail and the post office automatically charges you for priority when you’re not looking. Ugh. Then instead of making money off your Half.com sale, you lose an extra 19 cents. NOO! That totally could have bought me…a tiny pack of Chiclets or whatever they’re called. I used to see them at the market all the time at the register. That and these bars of chocolate with a little boy on them, I think. But those may have been 25 cents. I guess I should be grateful it wasn’t a whole quarter that I lost because then I’d forfeit my hypothetical chocolate.
