catching up

In total recap: finished with my GRE (fist-pump hells yea!), went to the wonderful DISNEYLAND (woot woot!), and now is wasting away me weekend being a fob and watching dramas. Sweet...

While the trip to SoCal was quite exhausting, even though B did all the driving, I would love to go back. Road trips are so fun! All the bonding, the food, the fun... I want to go further away next time. Hopefully to another state! And speaking of road trips, B's on his one-week-long trip up North to visit schools. I'm crossing my fingers and praying for safety and for good news later!

learning curve?

So I have been practicing my butt off this weekend and at last, I am seeing improvement! Yay! I have approximately 7 more days till exam time and I hope I will be ready for it. I'm going to push myself to practice and practice everyday until then. The only concern I have at this point is that I'll lose my concentration during the exam. Maybe I should wake up super early each morning to prep my brain and get it use to functioning...

I can't wait to be done and focus my energy elsewhere. Like knitting, dramas, running (maybe... haha), and looking up programs for grad school! I can't wait to move on with my life and explore and try new things.

On a side note, while I was trying to find a TVB drama for my brother, I stumbled onto a drama that is about to air tomorrow that looks very tempting to watch! Anything that's crime or related to fighting, I'm all for it. And especially since it's airing tomorrow, it's going to take a lot of self-control to download, but not watch it. I'll save it all up for later and once the test is over, instant reward! :)

the month of awesomeness

This month is going to be the month of awesomeness, or at least the start of the many more awesome months to come. Not only is it the month of Trick or Treats, it is also the month of GRE testing (boooo!) and Disneyland! I can't wait to get my GRE test out of the way and begin my trip to Southern California. However, just thinking about the GRE is nauseating. I am so ill-prepared. I need to put on my game face but it is so hard to focus. All the plans and preparations for the SoCal trip has already been finalized so I should be able to concentrate but now, all I can think about is how many more days till the test date and how much more I have yet to learn and absorb. I've been trying to do more math problems but seriously, I just suck at math. Hopefully, with this last week, I will do enough math problems to feel better about it and read and memorize enough vocabulary to do decent - not that decent is what I'm aiming for...

I'm going to send my tutor an email with all the math problems I have issues with and hopefully she'll be kind enough to reply back with explanations. Here's to studying hard for one last week!

waiting for winter

It's nearing the end of September and I can't believe we are still in the mid-high 90s here in Davis. I'm ready for the coldness of Winter, the bulky sweaters and jackets, and oh my, definitely the soups and stews! I want to try my hand at making clam chowder, chicken pot pie, and even a Thai soup that looks so scrumptious I can eat it off the page! My brother told me I should try to make it right now anyway, despite the weather, but I don't know...

I also started a new scarf for myself with the blue yarn from Caron and it's going pretty well so far, with the exception of a slight curling on the edges. The design is coming through nicely, which I am greatly pleased with. In addition, I bought a Kaplan Vocabulary deck for the GREs and I must admit, it is a lot easier to study with actual, physical, flashcards rather than using the flashcard website. I can carry the deck anywhere. It is extremely portable and compact!

As for everything else, I'm experiencing a cautious optimism? I'm trying to just keep my head on straight, focus on the GREs and get that done with, and let everything else fall into place. I can only hope and strive for the best, cross my fingers, dot my I's and cross my X's, etc. So yes, cautiously optimistic is the phrase I would use to describe my mood for the time being. Maybe even slightly tinged with apprehension?

september sucks

This week has been yet again, another disastrous week for me. I know this is more complaining on my part but I can only keep it to myself to the point of exploding. I feel like I'm sailing on the most ill-constructed boat ever, rocking back and forth on the water, unsure when or if I'm going to fall overboard. I'm craving for stability and the more it eludes me, the more frustrated and unhappy I'm becoming. I'm at the point where I cannot mentally focus on anything but trashy reality TV shows like The Rachel Zoe Project. Anything where I can turn my brain off is good for me. When my brain is on, my thoughts continually wander back to certain topics and events and it's like the replay button is stuck, looping me with conversation snippets that just makes me want to cringe and cry. I need a hard slap on the face to compose myself.

I want to go shopping so more and just spend on shoes and nail polish. I want to buy many more pairs of heels but it sucks when I have no where to wear them to, nor anyone who will appreciate them on me. Right now I can say that September is the worst month of all. I'm so emotionally drained that I feel physically ill.

saturday shopping

I was reading another blog earlier (Happy Fun Time) and was struck by how different the writing was compared to mine. I typically type down exactly what I am thinking, whereas the other blog sounds a lot more formal, more structured, more educated. (boo me...) Maybe I should brainstorm topics for the my blog and then go about writing it as if it was an essay, complete with examples and explanations. Hmm... that's a thought.

Today my family and I went on a semi-shopping spree. We originally planned to go to Michaels (for more yarn!) and then to Costco for food and gas. I saw Joannes Fabric and made a quick detour which lead to us Marshalls and Nordstrom Rack. There were so many shoes at Marshalls!

Score! Can't wait to wear these. Check out those heels...

Afterwards we went to Sizzler for lunch, yummmm! We are so stuffed that there is no room for dinner! Clam chowder soup, oh my goodness. Be still my beating stomach.

A small portion of food we consumed at Sizzler.

Ice cream! With M&Ms and Oreos! :)

On a side note, I saw my first train crossing in Davis last Tuesday while I was waiting for my GRE class to start. Clarification, I saw a train crossing and blocking traffic.

I thought it was pretty neat and decided to take a picture of it. Numerous cars got tired of waiting and made U-turns to leave. Speaking of which, I should really do my Test 3.

a convoluted mess

It's interesting to see how up and down my week have become. I started nice and high on Monday, and now, heading into Friday, I feel like I'm wadding through mud, stuck to the floor with stormy clouds above. Quite a scene huh? Okay, maybe I'm being a tad bit dramatic. I find myself frowning a lot today. I just want to throw my hands in the air and proceed to bury my head underneath my pillow. But I shouldn't. I shouldn't do this, I shouldn't do that, what should I do? And yes, I know I shouldn't have such a defeated attitude but I feel lost, once again. I just wonder how we will rebound back from it and when. I know I shouldn't be focusing on it because I have other things that I should direct my attention to but it's so gosh darn distracting.

I must stay positive! Think happy thoughts! At least fake it?

Labor Day Weekend

My Labor Day weekend can be summarized with a couple of words: hectic, laughs, smiles.

It was a bit crazy driving back home just to drive away the very next morning with 3-4 hours of sleep. Thank goodness my dad provided me with life's best energy source - COFFEE! And having my brother wish me a happy and safe trip to LA definitely made the morning way brighter. The plane was unexpectedly tiny! I was definitely worried for a while because of all the noise the plane was making when the gears was going up.

It was really fun hanging out with B's family and watching them interact with one another. My family functions really different in comparison so it was nice to see and be a part of something different for once. It was also interesting meeting the rest of his family and his cousins/nephews/nieces. The wedding was also really nice and touching. I nearly teared up because I thought it was so sweet and simple. Yeah, I get teary-eyed quite easily...

I didn't take that many pictures but I'll for sure remember this weekend for awhile. These are some of the memorable places and things we did: went to Rosco's Chicken N Waffles (a higher-end KFC in my opinion), a fancy Chinese restaurant that served shark fin soup (this was quite a debate afterwards, whether it was actually shark fin soup or something else...), a yummy Indonesian cafe (I want to go again!!), Wolfgang Puck catering at the wedding, and Manhattan beach (too bad the weather was kind of crappy). Oh, and I also brought back some desserts from the Indonesian cafe and it was delicious! B said that Indonesian food is a bit fattening, which is super unfortunate because it tastes so phenomenal that I want to have it every day and would have to sacrifice my waistline for it. Food, or waist. Hmm.. tough decision.

It was only 3 days but it was a well-needed vacation, even though I was running low on sleep. It's hard getting back to work mode when your body and mind just wants to run the other way. Now all I'm looking forward to is a trip out of the state, maybe to Hawaii again? That would be pretty sweet.

sweltering, melting

The weather is so crazy right now! It's night time and I feel as though the temperature hasn't even dropped one bit. I can't wait to get back to the bay where all the fog and chillness is.

Yesterday B, The Professor, and I went on a little field trip to find these little creatures down below.

Burrowing owls! Also known as Athene cunicularia. Did you know that these particular owls are most active in the day? Yes, I wikipedia-ed the information. And that's all I know as of yet. Maybe I should have asked The Professor more questions while we were staring down the owls. I was too busy feeling miserable in the oppressive heat in my jeans, cursing myself for not bringing an extra pair of shorts to change into. Unfortunately the sun was glaring straight at us while we were taking pictures of the owls so this is the best picture I've got. (We brought a friend's better quality camera but the battery died after like 5 photos - major fail!) I definitely want to go back and take better pictures, preferably with a camera that's fully charged.

a warming sunday

Last night was quite eventful (understatement!). B and I went to the Sacramento River Cats game against Fresno (go RC!) with my bosses and co-workers. It was a pretty fun night full of food, candy, and just plain baseball! We had a minor rough patch (another understatement...) prior to the game so I'm glad (more like relieved) that we managed to put our game faces on and tried to enjoy the rest of the night. I really wish we had brought the camera to capture the beautiful fireworks at the end of the game. We had a great view and great seats, and great company! Go Davis Sequencing! Performing sequences for you, and for the tomorrow! Yeah, I made up the last line - that's not our slogan or motto whatsoever. I'm hoping I can grab a copy of the pictures from Dan tomorrow. Crossing my fingers! On a side note, it was quite the chilly night. I'm glad we brought sweatshirts and jackets, though I kind of wish we had a blanket to cover our shivering legs.

As for today, the weather picked up again today and went from chilly (on Saturday) to a pleasant degree of warmth (almost borderline HOT). It was suppose to be a simple Sunday. My definition of simple? Do a bit of house cleaning here and there, do my laundry, crack open the GRE book, hang out with the B-myster for a few hours, and call it a night. Midway during my chopping and prepping for lunch, the B-myster's parents were in town and I got treated to Thai for lunch! YUM! I felt bad for being a tag-a-long but man, the Thai Iced Tea is unbelievable. I just kept slurping away. Food? What food? All I need is this yummy orange concoction. :]

After a nice and filling lunch, it was back to my place time to put our brains to work. While B-myster was taking advantage of my Princeton Review materials, I was busy trying to memorize the endless stream of vocabulary. It never ends I tell ya. I still can't believe B got such high-scores on the first test. It blew my score wayyy out of the ocean. I need to work harder and beat him. Too bad studying is such a pain in the butt. Motivation is easy to find, but difficult to keep.

stretched taunt

Sometimes I feel like I'm pulled at every angle. Not by people but more towards responsibilities and emotions I suppose. A few weeks back I enrolled in a Princeton GRE review course that meets up every Tuesday night for 7 weeks. I anticipated a whole buttload of homework and no surprise, you ask and you shall receive! The GRE manual and ETS book is always nearby, tucked away in my bright green tote bag. So I have been devoting a lot of my time to the class and trying my darn hardest to stay on track in terms of homework and coursework. Luckily I always have a few hours at work to just scribble away so that has been extremely helpful since I seem have a knack at being unproductive at home. But I still want to have fun. I still want to go out at night and have a nice dinner. I want to go places on the weekends and not think about the long list of vocab words I have yet to memorize. And, this is going to sound awful, but I want to knit. I want to knit my stress away in the form of scarves and hats and whatnots! My creative outlet is feeling quite repressed at the moment.

All this is driving me nuts. Every time I go out, I pray for a satisfying night that will leave me feeling content. And when it doesn't, I get super grumpy because a little part of me is whispering sarcastically, "well wasn't that fun... you could have spent that whole time being more productive instead!" This, in turn, causes me to go sink into my pit of funk where everything just simply sucks. GREs, I dislike you! I dislike the person you have turned me into.

coffee on my mind

Recently I have been hooked, addicted, obsessed, with coffee. Just this past weekend, my friend Paula and I checked out a local coffee "hideout" in SF called Blue Bottle on Linden. It's so small and is literally out of someone's garage in the middle of an alley. I ordered a mocha (for $4.50) and the foam/whip design was so cute! It was one of the main reasons why we, more like Paula, chose this place. I'm really glad we got to check it out. The mocha tasted more like hot, dark chocolate - very delicious! There was a park nearby and we talked, sipped coffee, and watched kids and dogs walk by. I hope I have many more days like that in the future.

Blue Bottle can be considered a hidden gem. Hidden from plain view, hard to find parking. I'm not an expert at coffee tasting but the taste of the Caffe Mocha was quite different from the ones that I have had in the past. It was more chocolate, but not in an overly sweet way. The price of the drink, in proportion to the size, was reasonable - comparable to the price of Starbucks. There were not a lot of selections but sometimes that might make it easier for the customer to choose. I noticed while we were there that they served espresso shots in tiny mug cups. And once they were done with the drink, they just handed the cup back. I like! :D

I would love to go back a second time, if only parking was easier. Another drawback was that it is so far from my house. I wonder if there are any nice coffee shops nearby my house.

weekend getaway

This weekend was AWESOME. It was such a nice treat from the craziness of the past week. On Saturday, I woke up at 6am to this beautiful sight. The colors were just so awe-worthy.

Around 2 hours later, we arrived at Pt. Reyes and went through one of the dirtiest and muddiest hikes yet. My shoes were slipping and getting sucked. The biggest surprises during the hike was on the way back, there were cows (huge ones!) blocking the trail! Too bad I wasn't fast enough to capture a picture of Brian running towards the cows, and scaring them off in the process. In addition, the first bed of water we saw in the beginning of the hike had subsided later on in the day, leaving mud and splotches of trapped water. Then we proceed to hit up the beaches.

At this beach, there were a lot of rock formations and we can even saw a lot of stratification. That was cool - seeing the layers of rock that has been there for ages. Of course I would not of realized all this without Brian pointing it out (duh).

On Sunday, we went yumcha at a place called Rice Bowl Restaurant in Sacramento. It was a decent place for dimsum but taste-wise, New Canton is still more favorable. Then we drove in circles (!!!) trying to find the local Ranch 99 and when we finally found the address, it turns out that the stated address, the location at which the Ranch 99 website posted up, was an EMPTY BUILDING. Oh. My. Gawd. It was so disappointing, but at least I was with good company. Plus, the hours or so nap that we took afterward makes everything better.

Good hike, food, nap, run, and company = AWESOME POSSUM! (Thanks for taking me Brian!)

the dump

I am finding myself in quite a rut. It is times like these I wonder why I choose to remain in Davis. The fridge in the house that I am staying at recently broke, and the repairman can only come by on Thursday, the earliest. I already had to throw out a lot of my meat and backup food because they had gone bad already. Tonight I managed to whip up a quick pasta dish (crossing my fingers that the tomato sauce in the fridge is still good, else food-poisoning here we come..) with some remaining ingredients lying around (onion, garlic, Parmesan cheese). On the downside, it's not as fun cooking for myself, versus cooking for someone else. There's no joy, no entertainment, no satisfaction (except for no longer being hungry, which is a plus I suppose). I would have rather gone out to eat, if only I could find a dinner companion. And here lies my woe. In this small town of Davis, CA, it consists of primarily college students, college students that flow in and out like a steady stream. Once pass the graduation date, the friends you've met, the people you are so familiar with, just flows on by. I feel like the leaf that got stuck in-between rocks and grounded by gravel. Sometimes I feel quite alone, and I wonder what am I doing here when I can be back home surrounded by family. I wonder, is this worth it. From the years I've spent in this town, I have come to the realization that I am a social creature. I need to constantly interact with others to feel happy, and only on occasion do I enjoy my "alone time."

yay for weekend!

Tomorrow is BAGEL FRIDAYS! Yay. I can't wait to take a big bite out of those delicious blueberry bagels. Add a generous helping of honey almond spread and that is PERFECTION right now. Hopefully I'll be more productive this upcoming weekend, not to say that last weekend was unproductive. I actually had a very laid back and fun weekend! I had a lot of good eats. Yum. :) AND, I went to the Farmer's Market for a brief minute and for the first time, in all my many years here in Davis, bought something!

Tada! May I present to you, my very first purchase.... APPLE JUICE! The vendor was selling it $1 per bottle, how could I have resisted? The one of the left is mine and after being so kind to share a sip with Brian, he decided to buy one as well! It was quite frozen when we first drank it - there was a big block of apple juice ice in the center, and it took a while for it to thaw out completely. But yes, so delicious! And it wasn't even overly sweet like the apple juice you buy at the supermarkets (aka Safeway). The only downside was that if you look very very closely at the label on the bottle, it's.. unpasteurized. Yup, drink with caution. Well Brian and I certainly threw caution to the wind and gulped these babies down like no tomorrow. Then we proceed to take the longest nap ever. Ah, bliss.

food on the brain

I should really be heading to bed, but I can't seem to tear myself away from all these wonderful (and saliva-inducing) food blogs. Seeing all the bright and delicious dishes in all its colorful glory just simply makes me want to cook. I've decided to start a recipe notebook (more like an old notebook from my studying days) to keep all the recipes I have attempted in the past, as well as those I would like to try my hand at. So far I want to give my chicken tetrazzini dish a second go. The first time I made it, it was so good, in a surprising I didn't know what I was doing and eyeballing ingredients and oh my god yummy kind of way. Hopefully the second time will be just as good, and maybe less buttery. Yes, I know butter adds to the flavor but when I reheated leftovers, you can clearly see some oil separating from the sauce. Yuck. As for new recipes, I would love to make a creamy risotto! I would give myself a huge pat on the back if it comes out half-decent. My stomach's already rumbling from thinking about it.

happy soon-to-be february!

This was one of the most relaxing and productive weekend that I have had in a while. Saturday was the most chill - woke up, went to the mall, had lunch with a friend, was stuck wandering around the parking lot looking for my car, then ran 2.5 miles. What a glorious day. I didn't realize that sometimes it feels so nice to just have time for myself. But then again, the next second I'm wishing I had people around to go to dinner with and such and such. Can't always win them all. :)

I'm somewhat excited to be going back to work tomorrow, but it's for a purely selfish and sinful reason. There's chocolate. A lot. Of. CHOCOLATE. YUMMM. Don't you just love Valentine's day? A good reason to self-indulge and perhaps even overdose on sweets and cavity-inducing chocolates.