the things i do for family....

 A couple weeks late, and somewhat bad timing (midterms anyone??) but Happy Belated CNY guys!!

It took HOURS, a crap load of butter (like a lot), baking late into the night (seriously, my housemates thought I was crazy) and sweatshop-like conditions (you have not seen my kitchen) = 200++ pineapple tarts. Did I mention I made two different types of tarts?? I had to sacrifice precious homework time (okay lah, in my schedule it's homework time, in reality it's surfing the web aimlessly time) so Charlynne, you betta appreciate this!!! If you ever wanted to know what a labor of love looked like, this is it! Pineapple tarts!

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it really was just all about her :)

Seriously, Lilah is so cute in that chubby asian baby way.....She totally made me want a baby or pester charl for one....at least while I held her....when I gave her back, the ovaries stopped working overtime, rational thinking returned and reality set in - maybe I just wanna borrow her for a couple of cuddles instead :)

Merv sadly doesn't know what to do with unsuspecting babies.

Charl, contemplating babies??

Aaaahh, SO SMALL AND CUTE! I want one tooooooooooo....but only on loan.

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and the crazies have left the building...

Fanime is over! yay! The rest of the con was not as mellow as Friday night and that sucked but overall, it was a pretty mellow con compared to last year. Not sure if I'll be back next year but if Charl is graduating, I might make it.

The bbq at Henri's was great too. I'm glad we got to see them and Mei-Hsia's fam too. The littlest Lin is sooooooooooo cute! ~ mellow and very wriggly :) And Anya is a spunky, energetic handful, as usual. I really can't believe she's already 5 and the baby is now 7 months. Time really does fly. Man, I feel old-ish.

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LA in less than 48 hours

Santa Monica Boulevard

A little late (like 2 weeks) but better late than never. This has been sitting in my drafts section for a while and all because of the stupid pic upload thing that bloger has. it's dumb. i hate it. but i guess i'll have to try again. Here's our hectic LA weekend!

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girl's day out - SF

So, meeting up with the girls in SF the other day was awesome!! As usual, we were late and the queen got misdirected. lol. But lunch was great as was hanging out after. Best of all, the SEA travel plans are coming together nicely!!

We'll see how this first trip goes. if it works out well, it's gonna have to be made into an annual thing. yup. Do you hear that girls? Somehow, we'll have to make sure it becomes an ongoing adventure no matter where we end up :)

Man, I wish we could meet up more often.....makes me miss those carefree college days. I didn't realize it before, but I really really miss having a bunch of girl friends to hang out with.

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O.o

So, today ....definitely a day for surprises.

First, Merv brings his budding romance home....some warning might have been nice cos I totally looked like a bum on the couch. urp. Anyway, she's nice. Very his type :D

Also, UW sent me a rejection email. Boo. But not that unexpected since prolly everyone else on the waitlist with me was more qualified than I am.

Charl just walked in the door with the mail 10 mins ago holding a small envelope from UH and everyone knows that small envelopes = rejection but, UH said YES!! Like WOAH. Really, really unexpected. Seriously. And this totally fucks up all my plans and back up plans. None of them ever took into account that UH would say yes. Especially since they never got my transcripts. Wow. I'm kinda stunned right now.

I'm not sure what to do now.....Hawaii is expensive. Very expensive. Not only fees but living costs as well. I don't know if I can afford it. Crap. I've got a coupla weeks to consider it but I have no idea what to do. Have to send out mass consulting emails now. Wark!!

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love is in the air~

Lolz. Merv just got home from a date and really, when I ask how it went, I don't want any details other than 'fine' or 'not good' or whatever. NO DETAILS PLS! ewwww. As far as I'm concerned, all my sibs are like the immaculate virgin - immaculate and virgins (but without the whole pregnancy thing going on). This will hold true even if they are married with 10 children. *puts fingers in ears* ~ lalalalala canthearyouimnotlistening ~ So, am now slightly scarred for life but somehow, I'll survive.

His story is actually kinda funny but totally expected (for me at least) considering where he works. This (semi-regular) girl came into the Starbucks he works at and asked for his number. lol. Yeah, he got hit on at work :D haha. But I've seen it happen alot when I did my starbucks stint so I wasn't all that surprised. Meanwhile, some of his friends are lamenting the fact that they are surrounded by what these fellows term 'non-eligibles' at work and how they never meet girls. They should just go work in a coffee shop.

Besides that, something must be going around this week cos my sis ended up on a date she didn't really know was a date until much later. 2nd valentines day coming around??

Man, it's totally sad that I'm living vicariously through my sis AND my bro. Of all ppl, my bro! Where's cupid when you need him to shoot you in the ass with one of those damned arrows?!? It might help if I wasn't a penniless hermit living in isolation but, eh......with my luck, I'd get a creepy, crazy weirdo so I guess I'm better off where I am - alone on the couch. lol.

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the young and the old

We got to see our new (first? second? ) cousin today :) She's sooooooooooooooooooo cute!! She's got that chubby asian baby thing going on and her poof of hair could give Donald Trump's (fake? real?) combover a run for its money. She was totally mellow and kept blowing raspberries which was cute in a slobbery way. We didn't get to hold her though since she spent most of the time sleeping :( But it was good to catch up with Mei Hsia and her family. We got to see the new house which has a great back yard and Anya is so much bigger now. I can't believe she's already 5! ...man, I remember when she was this tiny little wriggling bundle. Despite all the pink she wears (I think that might be her mom's doing), that kid is something of a tomboy.

The rest of the day was spent vegging out on the couch with my sis and watching painfully bad sitcoms (to me at least. I'm not a lover of sitcoms). But we did have something interesting happen - the cops knocked on our door a while ago. For a moment, my sis thought the neighbours had set them on us (although why she would think that is beyond me....we weren't home the whole day) and I guess they probably thought we set the cops on them....heh heh. I wish. But no. It turns out that a little old lady with Alzheimers two houses down went missing around 5pm (Charl thought they were talking about Flora for a moment but then was like, noo....we just heard her calling for her cats just now....). Anyway, regardless if it was a little old lady we knew or not, it's the kind of situation where you just go... Uh-oh. That is not good.

i wish we could help out but there isn't anything we can do that the cops aren't already doing. I hope they find her soon cos it's really cold and dark out now and that's kinda sad.

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What a way to start the new year

Well, it's two weeks into the new year and I can't say that it hasn't been interesting.

Despite the unexpected death of our grandpa just after Christmas, we managed to get to Van's in SF for New Year's since Wen was visiting and they wanted to go somewhere that was not suburbia. It was tons of fun with fun 'gay boy approved' music (I don't care what that weird straight boy said. Pop is the way to go :D), dancing, booze, hookah, the prerequisite shady Russian dudes and best of all, GREAT FRIENDS to share it all with. I've never actually partied with my sis so it was fun! The rest of the week was spent taking Wen around and running errands up.

Grandpa's funeral was last week on the 8th and was pretty quick and simple. A kind of mishmash where East meets West. My aunt came in from Texas and made us ferry her around to take care of all the details. We were honestly kinda peeved that she made us run around and all that since everything was pretty much take care of. Said she didn't want us to feel left out. Our response? We would have LOVED it if she just took over and we didn't have to keep going up to Marin. Didn't tell her that, of course (good little asian kids that we are). but our dad agreed with her (and she wouldn't take no for an answer)so, my sis and I dropped Merv off at work at 5am and drove up to Marin, spending a good part of it napping in the car before we had to meet them at 9am. Okay, enough with the ranting and onto the funeral.

It was a dank and slightly miserable day - equal parts fog and drizzle. We went to the funeral home first for our private family goodbyes then Merv (Charl and I volunteered his services since he wasn't able to be there for the family bonding moments we had with our aunt) lit the incense stick and asked grandpa's spirit to follow us to the cemetery.

Got everything set up for the viewing in the chapel and when all the usual suspects showed up (apparently I was the only one who didn't notice Uncle Ray's bling shoes), we got things started. My aunt went up and gave a little speech; mostly to thank people for coming and helping grandpa when he was alive. My dad was texting us his speech (he couldn't email/fax it for some reason)and I got a nasty look + reprimand from Jeannette since it looked like I was fooling around in the back. Seriously?!? I would have loved to smack her but settled on a nasty look back. Grrr. I had to appreciate the irony of the situation though. Jeannette giving me a lesson on decorum. Hah! Whatever. Anyway, I went up to make dad's speech and the phone rings. Oh dad. It was embarrassing and funny at the same time. I asked him if he wanted to be put on speaker phone but he said no so I read his speech out. I thought it was touching since it was more of an eulogy and was somewhat wistful. I added in my two cents on behalf of the grandkids then asked if anyone else wanted to speak. Uncle ray, unable to resist, went up to the podium and put in his two cents as well. It was kinda funny and at some point he lost me but at least he tried.

The procession then moved to the gravesite where those big red chinese candles and joss sticks were lit and hell money (including prints of a thousand usd) were burnt as the casket was lowered. Carnations were thrown in and that was that. Like I said, an interesting mix of East and West.

I guess the best thing that came out of a crappy thing like a funeral is that family comes together, no matter how much they dislike or are indifferent to each other. It's sad that grandpa passed away but we have managed to reconnect with the various family members.

It's mellowed the old people out a little bit to realize how entirely mortal they are. The grudges seem to have been pushed out of the way a little and I think we're back in the family loop now. Maybe. The crazy aunt doesn't seem so bad anymore, just a little lonely and I just realized how much my dad has changed in the last few years. We also went out for drinks with some of our distant cousins and got to know them better which is awesome.

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When my brother makes me want to kick a puppy or something.

Arrrgh. Okay. my brother is an idiot. How hard can it be to manage basic finances?!?!?! Seriously, he's 26 and isn't responsible enough to keep track of his finances or even keep his priorities straight. I don't understand ppl who think that whenever they have some extra cash, they should blow it on unnecessary and often expensive items. This seriously frustrates and stresses me out when I have to think about it. My sis and I have come to the conclusion that I will never be able to share a place with my brother without her or someone else playing interference since certain aspects of his personality drives me bonkers and will probably lead to fratricide or at least a lot of broken crockery since I will need something to chuck at him. I honestly think I will hit him with a rolled up newspaper (like i've seen people do with bad puppies) if he continues this way.

I really am quite fond of him but high school ended a loooooong time ago and he needs to realize that. He's 26 and should have grown up years ago. I truly hope he does because he can't rely on everyone else forever.

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And the madness starts.

I was up researching funerals till like 4.30 am before having to head up to Marin to take care of the funeral arrangements....well, to get them started at the least. I'm officially googled/researched out in terms of funeral prep.

What did I learn?

Well, there's a crap load of different caskets (btw, did you know Costco and Wal-mart sell caskets??), there are waaay too many components to planing a funeral and I'm probably going to get fleeced in the process (reality check, I officially know that we ARE getting fleeced!) since funerals.....are crazy expensive!!! WTF man. Expenses for American burials are astronomical compared to other countries. I really hope my dad's sibs don't back out on their part of the cost cos if they do, we're screwed. They want most of the works so it's close to $10 000!! OMG. WTF BBQ !?! I'm obviously in the wrong business.

Anyway, talked to the funeral director, the cemetery ppl and picked up grandpa's stuff from the nursing home. Now all I gotta do is confirm the arrangements, inform and coordinate with my dad and his sibs about the arrangements and costs, hopefully get the money transferred asap, get documents signed, close accounts, set a date, etc. Gah. I've got a really bad headache. Sigh.

highlight? sibling bonding time - my sibs and I went to watch Sherlock Holmes (which was pretty good) and had dinner up in Marin while we waited for rush hour to end.

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Oh crap. Talk about bad news.

I just got a phone call from a second cousin about my grandpa passing away :( This kinda sucks and makes me feel guilty since we haven't been up to Marin to see him in a while and I was just thinking of going up there and dropping in. crap.

Truthfully, I think I feel even worse that I'm not more broken up about it. Maybe I'm emotionally retarded or I'm just cold like that. I dunno. I suppose it's more the fact that we never really got to know him. Before coming to the states for uni, we only saw him once when I was 9. Although, out of all the grandkids I've probably had the most contact with him since we did share a house for a few months when I lived in Marin and I did make an effort to see him every few weeks when he got admitted into the nursing home. I think it's sad that he died alone and I feel very bad that it happened that way. No one, no matter how much people dislike them, should have to die alone. Uncle Ray probably knew since he's the attending physician but he probably thought we didn't care and couldn't be bothered to see him before he passed away. I feel he should have called us and allowed us to make that decision when Grandpa got admitted to the hospital and then later on, the hospice since hospice care is usually the time to call in family to see them for the last time. Whatever it is, grandpa has passed away and I'm going to make sure that things go right for him now. Sigh.

Since I'm the one who's been here longest, I'm automatically the person in charge; representing my dad since he won't be able to be here for the funeral. What the heck do I know about death and funerals?!? I've only ever been to one and we weren't related. I've been googling funerals, their costs, procedures and all that. I had to call my dad, mom and my dad's sibs, Uncle Raymond and Aunty Florence. Honestly, I dunno how much they care. My family is very dysfunctional. On both sides. How we got this lucky in the family lottery, I will never know but I can't help being wistful about the great relationships my friends have with their own families. My sis was just commenting on how ppl usually only have shitty relationships with one side of the family while the other is normal but somehow, we have crappy relations on both sides. It's part of why we're so determined not to let that happen to us. We'll see how this goes but I have a feeling it's going to be fairly trying to sort stuff out especially going in blind like this. I guess I'm just going to hope for the best and get all the advice that I can.

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oh halloween weekend. so uneventful.

Basically, the GREs were kinda crap. My amazing procrastination skills meant that I ended up with 2 days worth of studying and last minute cramming. Urm. Lo and behold, I find out that it actually takes more than that to do extremely well on them. Can't say that the results were what I wanted (when I slept for part of the cramming, I dreamt of scores well into the high 700's) but I ended up doing fairly well. I guess. Apparently the essay results come 10-15 days after the test. If I score high enough on them, I'ma gonna keep the scores. If not, I might be tempted to try it again only because I'm freaking out about what a couple of professors told me about admissions. Gah. It'll pass but right now, I'm a little distracted by visions of my applications being rejected because my score wasn't high enough especially since so many more ppl are applying for grad school these days. That and my professors have gone MIA online. I may have to go up to campus and hunt them down like a creepy, desperate stalker in order to get my recommendations written in a timely manner.

The rest of the weekend was pretty uneventful. I purposely took the GREs on Friday because I thought I would be playing in a rugby 10's tournament the next day. I figured I might as well take it before in case of a concussion or some other injury that would most probably produce even crappier scores. To my dismay, I find out the week of that I need proof of health insurance. It makes sense and all but I don't have health insurance right now since America is messed up and refuses to make it possible for most people to get insurance without paying an arm and a leg (and possibly my first born child) for the most limited service they can provide. Seriously. I worked in a medical clinic for a couple of years. I know first hand how much joy they take in rejecting claims and procedures. So, I didn't end up playing and instead sat at home in my suburban neighbourhood waiting to give out candy to kids who never showed up. yeah. So now I also have lots of candy I do not want to eat. Meh. My brother thinks it's because we didn't decorate the yard with coffins and pumpkins and have lights leading up to our door. Well, someone should have told us! But then again, after watching CSI, Criminal Minds, Law and Order, etc, I wouldn't really want my kids getting candy from strangers either. So, the only solution I can think of is to slowly feed the 5-10 pounds (I think it was 5 lbs) of candy to my sister :) That or do the old ppl thing and just give it out next year....which is pretty gross if you think about it. We might be better off with the first option. Unfortunately, feeding my sister candy will lead to conversations about fatness and muffin topping like this one:

my sis: ......fat ler ...need to go jogging soon. Wanna go with me tomorrow?
me: ...errrr.... (*huffs* she should totally be aware of my aversion to running of any kind unless it is to chase after a ball or food)
my sis: Look, I've got a permanent muffin top.
me...huh?? No such thing la! Since when are muffin tops permanent? It's cause your jeans are too tight, dumbo.
My sis: *pulls open her jeans top* No. See. I muffin top even without jeans.
me: that means your underwear is too tight. Do you muffin top when you're not wearing anything?
my sis: huh??? *looks at me like i'm mentally deficient*
me: look, if you go in the bathroom and you're not wearing anything, and you don't muffin top, then it's not permanent. *is pleased with self for (what seems like) logical explanation*
my sis: *stares harder at me* .....

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bah.

I guess today doesn't really qualify as terrible or horrible but it definitely was a no good, very bad day.

For some reason, I was a few minutes late for work even though I left at the usual time. This was followed by a day of cold winds (of course I left my extra jacket at home) and sheets of sand blowing in our faces (which I later brought home in my ears, hair and clothes). I was also late for practice since I managed to get lost in Palo Alto (how? I will never know. Especially since I've been to the field more times than I can remember!). Then I find out that two days of digging in a trench and pretending to be a contortionist should not be followed by rugby practice. Because if it hurt before, it hurt even more after. Not good.

But the pilsbury dough boy and my sister made it all better. I think it's cute when he gets poked in the tummy and giggles in the ads. And my sister always looks at me then giggles just like him. Usually when I poke her in the tummy too. Did I mention that tv is now a good friend of mine?

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Rant: Some people make me so mad!! Grrr

My sis recently went out to a club with some of her coworkers to celebrate a birthday. Here's the thing though; I really don't like her manager - I think she's flaky, selfish, lazy, dumb and someone who creates unnecessary drama. And I've only said hi to her in passing. Once.

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Malaysia, oh Malaysia.....sigh....

Recently, a friend of mine put up a link to this youtube video that had me cringing. (I'm not gonna put a link up here cos I suck at things like that. Go google it you lazy bums!) It is an interview with Miss Malaysia Universe 2009 - JoannaBelle something or other. Seriously, watch it. I particularly like the version with subtitles. I just can't believe they picked this person to represent my country! It finally makes sense why I get comments like:

"Wow." *shocked look* "You speak really good English."

"So, where did you learn/how long have you been speaking English?"

"Wait, you're not from America??"

"Malaysia eh, do you guys still live in trees?"

"Malaysia? Where in China is that?"

Watching the clip, I am quite tempted to tell them that we are indeed a small province in Southern China. Hah. Also, one of her answers has pushed me into a self-doubting abyss where I now question my identity since I didn't know we had ower 50 tribes.... *wails* which one is mine?!? How will I define myself now??

No, seriously. I'm being a little dramatic and sarcastic there but I've actually been trying to figure out the whole tribe thing (she must have gotten it somewhere) and it's been bugging me since I heard it. Anyone have an answer?

On the bright side, representatives from other South East Asian countries are just as bad or even worse than JoannaBella :) I can honestly say that (even though I'm not all that nationalistic) this is one loss to Singapore that Malaysia does not mind. In the category of "I can't believe this idiot is representing my country," Miss Singapore World 2009, Ris Low, wins.

Okay, I'm done with my little PMSy rant.

Here's a little something to break up an otherwise monotonous week:

Just the other day, I randomly got in touch with my inner teapot while cooking dinner and so, I performed the "little teapot dance" for my sister. Twice. *grins* I thought it was great! She.....wasn't so impressed...haha.

my sis: *shakes head and sighs like I have no hope/will remain a "special" child forever*
"Is this what you do everyday when we're not at home??"
me: errr......no lah. *insert sheepish laughter*
my sis: Don't lie. You know you do it. You probably practice it.
me: eh, where got. *does a weird little monkey dance in front of the tv*
my sis: oi! don't dance! The neighbours will see you! Crazy!

hahahahahaha....I love utterly random insanity! :)

Btw, dinner was a little burnt but I managed to salvage it with my awesomeness :):)

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