Just turn the other way.
Jul/090
First off, Happy Fourth of July for all of you in America. My mom’s coming down to visit me (in fact, she’s on the Red Line coming from Chinatown as I type this) and to check out a new Asian mart that she’s found in Rockville. It’ll be a fun adventure because we’re not exactly sure which bus to transfer onto once we get there, but oh well. Hopefully I’ll be able to see fireworks with Brendan (and possibly two of his friends) later after my mom goes home, since she unexpectedly told me this morning that she has to work tomorrow morning. I haven’t gone to seen fireworks since I was 10 or 11, so I’m excited about that. Brendan has a few ideas as to where to take me, one of them being the National Mall down in D.C., but that might be way too hectic for my liking. It really depends on what his friends are doing with him today.
Secondly, check out Aria’s new release, our Morning Musume dedication. We created it in honor of Morning Musume being at Anime Expo this weekend. Everyone sounds awesome!
Thirdly, I just spent a good fifteen minutes trying to figure out why the case where I keep mini-tools wouldn’t close. I just kept opening and closing, only to have it not go all the way shut. Why? Because I had the tools on one side turned the wrong way, so they were clashing with the tools on the other side.
And you’d think I’d figure something like that out sooner, now wouldn’t you?
Birthday done well.
Jun/093
First I would like to say that I’m all right. I’m assuming many would have heard about the Metro collision on the Red Line a few days ago. I thankfully had not boarded the train at that time since I decided against leaving work early, so I was still on the platform waiting for a train when that happened. It’s scary, since it’s the worst collision (and 2nd) in the Metro’s 33 years of operation. I got to meet really cool people by taking the buses (H4 to Georgia Ave, 79 to Silver Spring station, then metro train from Silver Spring to Glenmont). They’re partially operating the Red Line; Silver Spring to Fort Totten is closed down, so you have to take a shuttle bus to get past that point. It was definitely a scary experience, though. Everyone was frantically calling people; my roommate’s brother called me because he couldn’t reach her on her phone (she was in one of the dorms on campus that has no reception whatsoever and had told me beforehand she’d be there).
But that’s not the point of this post. Yesterday was Brendan’s birthday. All we (his family and I) planned for him seemed to go smoothly. I was over at his house Wednesday night, so I was able to wish him a happy birthday at midnight, which was cool. We were playing the Sega Genesis pack for the XBox 360 until 4am. I went back home at that point, and then woke up at 7am to get ready. His mom, his little sister, and I went to H-Mart near my apartment to buy food for him: dumplings (he loves the mini-buns/dumplings a LOT), mochi ice cream (chocolate and green tea), ramune (strawberry, melon, and regular), and a few other not-as-notable items. It was fun looking through and trying to explain some of the food items and their uses to his mom and sister.
His mom and I went to a local Pepco office so I could get my account information straightened out after the shopping trip. The security guard there actually talked to the two of us. He had asked at some point while I was still waiting in line with his mom next to me if I was her daughter, and she explained that I was her son’s girlfriend. The guard then said that I should be living with my mom, etc. As I was talking with the lady at the counter, Brendan’s mom decided to wait near the back of the office, where the guard continued talking to her. I didn’t hear all of their conversation, but it seemed like he was wondering why she brought me, and other stuff. I think he assumed that I was living with Brendan (which I’m not), and Brendan’s mom thought that he was assuming that too, so she was trying to explain how I was going to their house for his birthday, etc. He was talking a lot about his daughter (I think?) and how worried he’d be for his daughter, etc. It was interesting.
I tried waking up Brendan when I got to his house, but he was definitely tired out from last night. He wouldn’t let me go though so I took a nap with him for an hour or so. We ate lunch, I gave him his presents. He knew about the TV Games Plug and Play Pacman thing I got him, since I wanted to make sure that he’d want it, and we were going crazy with that when we found batteries to put into it. Most of the games on there were ones that our friend Mac has on two of his game consoles, so we’ll be practicing in order to make sure he doesn’t kick our asses at the games anymore.
Brendan also liked the jade necklace of a dragon that I had asked my cousin in China to send to me. He was actually ecstatic about it, saying, “wow, this is really extravagant…I think it’s the first time anyone’s gotten me something from the other side of the world!” Though he also made it a point to say that everything we buy is technically “made in China”. He kept on telling his family about it after I tied it on him; partially to show it off, partially to embarrass me…a lot.
We were watching .hack//SIGN for a bit, trying to get through it since we’ve been meaning to do a marathon, and were going great until Brendan accidentally knocked over the XBox 360, which scratched up the second disc to the point that it couldn’t read part of it. It was sad. We decided to play the Sega Genesis games instead because of it. We were having fun unlocking things like the original Phantasy Star game and Golden Warrior Age (or something like that). I also discovered Hexic under the game library and was playing that for a good while. Brendan played after I had died and reached the last level, though didn’t complete it. It was awesome though.
Then Brendan’s mom and I started cooking; I steamed the dumplings and cabbage while she made stromboli and pasta salad. Everyone loved the dumplings (we had the pork and nappa cabbage dumplings first), and the stromboli was just delicious – lots more cheese than you’d expect since Brendan requested for a lot of cheese.
After, we played more games, and I think I fell asleep at some point. I woke up around 4am and went back to my place. Now I’m awake and doing work from home instead of going in today.
Despite it being his 21st birthday, he did NOT get drunk/wasted, like everyone wanted him to. Which is good. We had lots of fun without the drinking anyway.
I would say that was a fun day, wouldn’t you?
Coffee can be painful.
Jun/094
Every now and then, I drink coffee at work. My supervisor likes to make two cups of coffee, and sometimes he offers me a cup when I’m in the room while he’s making it. I usually don’t drink coffee except for when he makes it because I can tolerate the coffee that he makes. I also add lots of cream and sugar to the coffee. I’ve been noticing, however, that each time I drink coffee I get increasingly more pain afterward. My stomach starts to feel like it’s gently clawing at my side. Granted, I only get a pain similar to a light case of cramp and nothing else, so I don’t really care as much, but it just seems weird.
Could it be allergies to coffee beans or something? Has anyone else felt this way before? Or something similar to this while drinking coffee? Maybe it’s the amount of sugar/cream I put in to dull down the taste combined with the coffee…I’m not sure.
In other news, last week I recorded something for a karaoke competition on a forum I frequent. Most of the people were joking around, so I didn’t try terribly hard on making it great; as a result, it’s definitely not my best recording, but oh well. I sang “Hare Ame Nochi Suki” by Morning Musume’s sub-unit Sakuragumi.
Back from the dead.
Jun/091
Long story short: my friend Reikon who has been hosting me got me my own hosting plan, so now I have my own CPanel access and whatnot. I broke Wordpress trying to transfer everything over, so I’m starting over. I was going to wait until I could create my own design, but I doubt I’ll ever have the time to really sit down and do that until I can get my laptop fixed.
So life has been treating me well, for the most part. There have been problems here and there, but most have been resolved now.