US Customary Units: Conquered?

Here we go:

Volume

• 2 pints = 1 quart
• 4 quarts = 1 gallon
• 16 fl. ounces = 1 pint
• 8 fl. ounces = 1 cup
• 2 cups = 1 pint
• 4 cups = 1 quart

Mass

• 16 ounces = 1 pound

...I think, anyway. Why is this so difficult?

A Year's Accountability

1. Learn United States customary units.
2. Learn about the technicalities behind my camera functions.
3. Make a perfectly fluffy sponge cake.
4. Apply to medical school.
5. Learn NYC geography.
   
6. Have one of my recipes achieve 話題入り status.
7. Read 50 books, of which three must be The Lord of the Rings trilogy.
8. Learn Japanese geography.
9. Fall in love with someone who doesn't make me hate myself.
10. Watch 12 movies.
11. Travel to 5 completely new places.
12. Get drunk, if only just once.
    

The End of an Era

I usually try to not be so self-indulgent here, but all things considered...

1. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before?
   I got my own apartment and started living on my own! Getting a real job, paying bills, etc.--all the things that go with living on my own--were new to me as well. There were little things, too, but that is the main thing that sticks with me.
   
   
2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
   I don't think I made any resolutions, because I can't remember any... but I definitely did make a set of twelve for 2011. I did, however, reach a few goals, including my 100th つくれぽ on December 29.
   
   
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
   No--my friends and I are definitely not at that life stage.
   
   
4. Did anyone close to you die?
   Very thankfully, no.
   
   
5. What countries did you visit?
   None, but I did go to the West Coast for the first time. Also, parts of Japan came to me.
   
   
6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
   Love, or, more specifically, love that doesn't make me question myself.
   
   
7. What date from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
   March 31, 2010, for destroying so much of what had been constants in my life, and May 27, 2010, for forcing me out into the real world, diploma in hand.
   
   
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
   In a most typical and concrete sense, graduating from college and starting my first real job. On a more personal level, spring semester of my senior year is something I look back on and sometimes can't believe. I took four classes, worked in lab, planned the 40th anniversary of a benefit exhibition (and then some), made new friends, and survived the overnight collapse of a five-year de facto relationship.
   
   
9. What was your biggest failure?
   I don't know--not forcing my Godot situation, I guess. At the time I thought I was doing what I needed to do to protect myself from a dead-end situation--and I was--but I also failed to act on my emotions and to actually force a serious consideration of what was going on.
   
   
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
    Thankfully, no.
    
    
11. What was the best thing you bought?
    I'm not sure... maybe my graduation dress from Ann Taylor? I don't buy many things, and that dress was lovely and expensive.
    
    
    
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
    I think everyone who donated their time, services, and talent--especially at the eleventh hour--to the benefit exhibition reminded me of how good people can be, even when some of those closest to me were showing just the opposite. That will remain with me for a long time and remind me to similarly act with generosity and compassion.
    
    
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
    My Godot's, and Jisha's, probably in that order.
    
    
14. Where did most of your money go?
    Rent, I would say. I don't really spend money in general.
    
    
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
    That's hard to say... the Kids' Skate? Haha. Actually, most (if not all) of April 15-17, 2010. Spending time with のんちゃん, getting a job... I'm not sure. I don't get "really, really, really excited" about many things.
    
    
16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
    Ugh, who knows? I listened to so many key songs depending on the funk I happened to find myself in. Hallelujah, I'm Not That Girl, One Day I'll Fly Away, Troublemaker, Monster, and M all received disproportionate representation, but I'm not sure that listening to any of these songs a while from now will trigger 2010.
    
    
17. Compared to this time last year:
    a. Happier or sadder? I think maybe both. I spent a lot of time being upset about the way things in my life would ultimately end up, but was also happy because I was reassured that my emotions weren't completely unfounded. Now that that reassurance is gone, I am distinctly less confident in myself and what I believe, but logically I know that in the long run this is the point at which I become happier. Freedom can be addicting, and I am pretty happy with my life right now.
    b. Older or wiser? Again, I am probably both. The transition to 22 from 21 was fairly minor, so I am probably wiser than I am older, but I still feel the need to accomplish things and have these experiences during this period that everyone seems to call the best in our lives. I am wiser to how things find a way of working out in the end, but moreover I am wiser to how deceptive some people can be.
    c. Thinner or fatter? Ugh, I was on my way to becoming thinner, but then the holidays happened. I think I am tending towards thinner, though.
    d. Richer or poorer? Well, I have my own income now, but I'm spending most of it on rent...
    
    
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
    Do random things with my friends.
    
    
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
    Waiting for my Godot.
    
    
20. How will you be spending New Years Eve?
    I will hopefully see some of my friends, but I will primarily be basking in the two-and-a-half-hour glow that is 嵐 hosting 紅白歌合戦.
    
    
21. Did you fall in love in 2010?
    No. I was already in love, but I also slowly forced myself to fall out of it.
    
    
22. How many one-night stands?
    Hah, right.
    
    
23. What was your favorite TV program?
    Probably ひみつの嵐ちゃん, although I discovered I love 食わず嫌い and きたなシュラン／きたなトラン from とんねるずのみなさんのおかげでした.
    
    
24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
    Yes.
    
    
25. What was the best book you read?
    Sadly enough, I don't think I read anything that wasn't assigned. This past year has been a whirlwind, and I haven't worked on my To Read list since the summer of 2009.
    
    
26. What was your greatest musical discovery?
    Priscilla Ahn, probably, whom I found through thesixtyone.com. Other than that, I rediscovered, among other music, Hallelujah and the soundtrack from Moulin Rouge.
    
    
27. What did you want and get?
    Freedom, a job, an honors diploma...
    
    
28. What did you want and not get?
    I can't even begin to list... Well, closure, for one. Closure, an explanation, a satisfying ending. I wanted a real relationship with real love. I didn't get the fellowship that I wanted that I thought would let me run away from everything, but in hindsight I love the alternative that I have now. Of course, I wanted various things when I went shopping, but I refrained from pretty much all of it, but that's not really something I'll remember.
    
    
29. What was your favorite film(s) of this year?
    I don't really watch movies all that much... I watched Ponyo and thought it was cute, but I wouldn't call it my favorite. Julie & Julia was fun, but again, not a long-lasting classic.
    
    
30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
    For the past seven years my birthday has either fallen on AP Exams or finals. This year I spent most of my 22nd birthday writing a paper on carnivorous in the dining hall. Exciting, I know. I did go out for drinks though with a bunch of friends--nothing that long or amazing, but lovely nonetheless.
    
    
31. What would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
    I don't know--a confrontation with my Godot? I probably wasn't ready for one, though. Finding a non-Godot replacement would have been an amazing SCREW YOU. Maybe knowing with complete certainty that medical school is in my future would have helped.
    
    
32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
    I hope it was elegant and classy, even as I stayed casual. Several people have mentioned this to me over the past couple of years, and I found that incredibly flattering. I went for a lot of classic pieces, as usual, but also made a conscious effort to go for more immediate trends and less practical items.
    
    
33. What kept you sane?
    Gchat and Google Docs. More seriously (not that my appreciation for Google isn't completely serious), my schoolwork and my labwork gave me goals that helped me temporarily block out a lot of what was going on around and inside me. Knowing that I could always go back to my sister was kind of comforting too.
    
    
34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
    What? I don't think any of them.
    
    
35. What political issue stirred you the most?
    Let's see... I felt motivated enough to write a post on the validity of hate crimes as its own category, so I guess that counts. I am also still staunchly against affirmative action. I followed the DREAM Act near the end, and would have been much more "stirred" had it passed. Sometimes I don't understand liberals. At all.
    
    
36. Who did (do) you miss?
    I miss my relatives in Japan and basically everything about the country, and I really miss my Godot.
    
    
37. Who was the best new person/people you met?
    This is a difficult question with a multilayered answer... I appreciate so many of the people I met through the benefit exhibition this year because they reminded me that I can be loved and cared for. I look back and remember their incredible generosity towards patients they have never met and will never meet, and recall their kindness towards me in a time when work was the main thing that kept me going. They were the ones who first enabled me to construct a monologue in my head, for whenever the need might arise, that didn't end in anything self-destructive.
    

    "There are people backstage, right now," I would say, outside the rink, "who have known me for less than two days or have only seen me for a total of nine days in the past three years. But they care about me and they want me to be happy and they want me to be less stressed, and they came up with all of this compassion in such little time. So if after five years, you can't find it within yourself to care about me, even the slightest bit, then that is your shortcoming and not mine."
    
    Of course, I never did have the chance to say this.
    

    I also really value the friends I have made since starting my "real life." Many of them I had already known before, but my social network has widened and various relationships have become stronger.
    
    This is odd and ironic, but lastly one of the best people I met this year is my boss. Really. He is kind and patient, and that is all I need.
    
    
38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010:
    "The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more than any qualification I ever earned." -JK Rowling
    
    
39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
    "But love is not a victory march / It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah"
    

I Have Been Waiting for Godot

Blogging is more time-consuming than I realized, and so is having a constant social life. These forces came together in the past two weeks or so, and now here I am, facing the end of 2010 and not completely clear on what I last wrote. I will, however, attempt to catch up, especially as this incoming blizzard demands me to do little else than try to stay warm in my apartment.

Anyway, in sophomore or junior year of high school--I had the same English teacher both years so it's difficult to differentiate--I had to read Waiting for Godot. Like most, if not all, of my classmates, I was irritated by this play, the only redeeming quality of which was its length, or lack thereof. There was really no point to the plot, and if meeting with this Godot was so important, then why didn't the characters actually go after him? Why did they stay in the same place and expect him to appear, even after it became reasonably clear that he probably wouldn't? Do something, I mentally screamed. At the very least, don't make me read and analyze your nothingness.

The irony of my frustration now hits with the force of a 2 ｘ 4.

I was sitting on a crowded, snow-delayed train, on my way back to my apartment after a brief Christmas weekend back home. For whatever reason my past several days have been filled with these extremely detailed scenarios of what I would do, what I would say, what he would say, what I would be wearing, how I would act, how he would act, where we would be, of everything, if he were ever to come back and try to make things right. This monotonous train ride was particularly conducive to these pointless scenarios, and as I wandered in and out of sleep I started running through the details again. I have it all in my head and therefore am prepared if anything similar were to ever occur.

I realize and generally accept the idea that nothing probably will.

And all of a sudden, Waiting for Godot made sense to me. I have been waiting for my Godot for five years, if not more. I am the very characters that I despised, and I have been wasting my time leading that pointless, frustrating life. I would hate myself for this more than I already do, but my background self-loathing is already at its maximum level. Instead, I've developed a sort of sympathy for Vladimir and Estragon, and realize that, perhaps and hopefully, they are not as stupid as we then-teenaged readers assumed. Sometimes, even after you lose track of why, things are just too important to abandon, even after they've abandoned you or were never around in the first place.

There are a lot of things I don't want to be anymore, and most of all I don't want to wait for my Godot.

In the Midst of My Frustrations

"The server understood the request, but is refusing to fulfill it." -Online Banking

Well Good For You

"Well to be honest, my PCRs always work."

Made in Taiwan

Today at Trader Joe's, I noticed that the Asian employee (I could say "an" but I'm pretty sure it's "the") has a tattoo at the base of his neck. In small, black letters, it says:

MADE IN TAIWAN

Incredible.

Time Travel

Um.

Take My Hands and Guide Them

Last night, for the first time in so long that I can't even remember, and certainly for the first time in nearly exactly eight months, I had a different kind of dream. It may be that my subconscious has moved on, and you were left behind.

Fat Leaves

Um, so... while washing the lettuce--or, more specifically, the Trader Joe's Organic Romaine Hearts--for my lunch this morning, I glanced at the nutrition facts.


6 leaves and 20 calories in each serving? Sounded good to me, especially since I would be using hummus instead of salad dressing. And then, just for kicks, I kept reading.

0.5g total fat.

What? How absurd is that? By eating 6 leaves of romaine lettuce hearts, I intake 1% of my recommended daily amount of fat? Seriously, fat needs to be saved for foods other than those commonly enjoyed by both humans and rabbits.

Someone needs to explain this to me, because a precursory look on Google hasn't helped.

The Perils of Public Transportation

I think this old woman was trying to be nice...?

"Would you like to sit on my lap?"

The Thrill of Running from Memory

Over the past year James has told me more than once to step out of my comfort zone. I'd never really thought about my life like that before, but last night I bounded out of it and it was fabulous.

I walked down a dark street to a house I didn't know to a party where I only knew two people, and already I could see my mother's paranoid frown. I'd almost let that frown make me take the safer of my two options for going out, but something told me to just go, even though it was just a block away from where a break-in stabbing occurred just a little over two months ago and even though it was the very neighborhood that my parents had rejected for my potential apartment without even looking at the apartment itself.

I had a plan in mind that would allow me to go to this party and still make it back to my own place without being stabbed--and this is only a little bit of inherited paranoia, since people seem to be shot or stabbed left and right around here these days--but this also meant that my bus options resulted in me arriving obnoxiously on time. It could have been a lot more awkward than it was, but instead I got into a conversation about astrology and the philosophy of love, and I started feeling wonderfully pretentious in a reject-pretension kind of way, and I thought I could get used to this kind of existence that I watched my roommates lead for three years.

And then other people started arriving, and they looked and were nothing like anyone I actually know, but that was okay too. Out of the remnants of my natural awkwardness I ended up eating a little too much for this kind of setting, but somehow I blended in. When was the last time I was somewhere without another Asian? I remember, but it's exactly the memory I've been trying to run from for the past seven months or maybe even longer.

Someone offered to give me a ride home and so I got into a car with a guy I'd only just met two hours before. By now my mother's frown had turned into a shrill yell of disapproval, but somehow I knew that it would be okay. Besides, this is all the stuff that everyone is supposed to do at one point, and after the black hole that my past five years have become, why not? The car rattled and shuddered and smelled vaguely of who knows what, but it was wonderful anyway. Speeding down a residential street, not getting lost, even being pulled over and then being cavalier about it--I don't think I've ever done any of those things, let alone in the span of half an hour. Sometimes my memories would come creeping back, and I would think, What would he say now, huh? and at the moment it didn't really occur to me that he probably wouldn't care at all. Instead I moved on to thinking that I could get used to this--the unfamiliarity, the thrill of the moment, being carefree--and although it probably isn't a sustainable lifestyle for me I'm not done trying it yet.

I would have to look as I did and be unphotogenic and all that, but in the end, who cares, right? I danced in my apartment lobby.

Common Sense = 1/Education?

...Well, that's not quite accurate in this particular instance, but it's probably true in general. Anyway, I now count three people I have encountered in the course of my life who did not know The Wizard of Oz. Seriously, what? It's one thing to have never read or watched it (although I would seriously judge for that, it would be a severe case of pot and kettle, so I would have to refrain), but to have never heard of it? Whaat?

Awkward Elevator

This past week (and it's not even over yet) has been a series of physical disasters. Monday involved the bottom falling out of a glass bottle containing liquid agar. Tuesday meant that in my attempt to make pumpkin cake I managed to strew half-cooked pumpkin all over my carpet and send my month-old rice cooker into H01 error mode. Wednesday was what I am about to write about now, and Thursday--today--well, I guess I should throw that story in too.

So, yesterday. When I got on the elevator on my way to work, every button between the lobby and the sixth floor has been pushed, probably by some little kid who could reach no higher. Even though I knew this and know how wonderful elevator buttons can be to a child, stopping at each of these floors for nobody and then having to push the Close Door button quickly got both irritating and unnerving, like there should be someone but wasn't. So when someone actually did get on the elevator, I freaked out. And now there is a small Asian man on the third floor who thinks I am terrified of him. Yeah, my life.

Today may have been better. In general the elevators in my apartment are terrible, today was worse than usual as it completely skipped my floor and took me to the 19th. I wasn't paying that much attention because I was running late, so I rushed out and towards my apartment. I inserted my key into my door and tried to open it, and got a little forceful when the key did not turn. At this point I happened to glance up at the door and finally realized that this in fact was not my apartment. I always did want to start my day off with an unintentional attempted break-in.

The elevator at work ignored me too and went back down instead of going all the way up to my floor, which I also didn't notice until it was too late (yeah I'm not sure what's wrong with me), and I guess my irritation sort of scared this guy who had gotten on, because he almost let me hit my button first even though he had swiped his card. Oops.

Tomorrow, my life will be normal. Right.

Weird Encounters Are Genetic

So for whatever reason, I tend to have a lot of weird, random encounters with strangers or near-strangers. Take, for example, almost every job interview I've ever had. In the interest of not damaging any professional potential I might have, I'll leave those out for now. I also met a strange man who told me about his Korean lady companion who was suffering from stomach cancer that was quite obviously caused by MSG. Oh, and by the way, he writes a lot of poems, so I should stop by his place of work someday and pick up a volume. I suppose that is a story I could get into if I ever feel so inclined.

Anyway, I wasn't sure if these kinds of things happen to everyone, but now at least I know they also happen to my mother (even if it's just once):

Taxi Driver: Where are you from?
Mother: Japan.
Taxi Driver: Ah. I'm from Suriname. So do you play the piano?
Mother: No... but my children do.
Taxi Driver: Ah. All Japanese people play the piano. I know this because my girlfriend is Japanese. We see each other once a year! But soon we will get married.

10 Things I Cannot Deal With

Sorry, one thing about this blog that I've tried to maintain is to not become self-indulgent, but this week has been a little trying at best and now I need to make a list of the offenders.

1. Construction that starts at 9 PM. I'm sorry, I know that traffic is heavy and uncompromisable, since ambulances are driving by at all hours of the day, but starting a drilling project at 9 PM is just not okay. Drilling is annoying no matter what time it is, but 9 PM-midnight? I don't think so.
2. The infernal water dripping outside my window and onto the cooling unit. This started a few days ago and if I actually ever watched horror movies I would be convinced it was someone slowly trying to tap their way into my apartment. But no, it is water dripping from the story above (or maybe higher up and that). It drips and taps all. day. long. Where is this water coming from?! Am I the only person whose apartment is affected? Drip. Tap. Drip.
3. Heavy traffic that starts at 6:30 AM. Again, I know that ambulances are pretty much uncompromisable and that medical emergencies follow no sort of clock, but it would be much appreciated if I weren't woken up by cars and trucks at least an hour before my alarm clock goes off.
4. People who invade my dreams. This is no one's fault, I guess, because it's not like anyone can actively enter someone else's dreams (maybe I should watch Inception to get a better feel for this), but for once I would like to wake up not upset. If you have left my life, then you also need to leave my dreams. Or, conversely, if you are going to stay in my dreams, then you need to come back into my life, and properly.
   
5. Negative emotions. Apparently "having emotions is part of being a good person." Maybe that's true, but at this point it seems like an awfully poor trade-off. The bad people seem to have quite a lot going for them these days. I could always just stop thinking, but it appears that I can't actually do that.
6. People who talk too fast and too much.
7. People who yap loudly in an aurally offensive language next to my desk.
8. People who do not change their addresses in a timely manner. I do not want your junk mail or your catalogs. I do not want to receive your credit card bills and membership notices. I do not want to be held responsible for your mail. You did not decide to move overnight, so change your damn address.
9. Incompetence at HR. When I put in a mailing address separate from my permanent home address, it means that all mail should be sent to the mailing address. Therefore, my paychecks should be sent to my mailing address, and not, say, my parents' house in another state.
10. The government. Let's just say that my tax refund cannot come fast enough.

Hygenic Times

"Was that your computer in the men's room?"

Some Incestual Complex

So today I went to Olive Garden for lunch, which was fine. As we left our table and headed for the exit, I realized I had forgotten my scarf. I went back to get it, except it wasn't there. A waiter saw me looking under and around the table, and asked me if I were looking for something.

Me: Yeah... I thought I left my scarf at the table, but I can't find it so I guess I must have left it somewhere else.
Waiter: Oh, that table? We already found your scarf and sent it up to the front desk.
Me: Oh really? Thank you.
Waiter: Yes, we gave it to your husband.
Me: ...my husband?

I suppose I could have enlightened him on the state of my love life, but I didn't really feel like getting too detailed in the aisle of an Olive Garden.

Waiter (beaming confidently): Yes, your husband.
Me: I see. Thanks...

I go back up to the front desk, and my worst fears are confirmed: my dad is holding my scarf.

This makes absolutely no sense to me, especially since my mother was there too. Really? I know Asians are supposed to be hard to tell apart, but come on.

The Spotless Mind of Love

Found a Fabergé Egg During Move In?

One of the downsides to an e-mail address that failed to expire is being hit by a barrage of now-irrelevant messages as the semester begins. I deleted most of them simply based on their subject lines, but then one such subject line caught my eye: "Found A Faberge Egg during move in?"

What?

"If anyone found a faberge egg in storage during move in, please let me know.

Thanks!"

I don't even know where to start. Maybe this is a really stupid joke...?