Celebrity Crush

Celebrity Crush

I'd like to think that I more mature and grown up now, so it's a little surprising that I still have "celebrity crushes". That seems so high school or even at most undergrad. But here I am....past high school, past undergrad, and even past grad school...developing this celebrity crush for JOSEPH GORDON-LEVITT. I first saw him on 3rd Rock from the Sun, at which point he was sporting a girlie hairdo, but even then, I noticed him and thought he was pretty cute. [[just as a side bar, I am always good at spotting cute guys sporting girlie hairdos, like Orlando Bloom as Legolas on Lord of the Rings! Everyone thought I was crazy but I knew he was a really cute guy under all that hair!]] Then he just made random appearances on TV and movies like That 70's show and 10 Things I Hate About You. I might have those shows and movies out of order, but that's the order I saw them in...anyway...it wasn't until I saw 500 Days of Summer when he really started catching my attention. Then he was on Inception, which was AWESOME. That hallway scene where he was suppose to be suspended in zero gravity was AMAZING! [[Another sidebar: he looks GREAT in a suit]]. Now he's in Dark Knight Rises and he's gonna be Robin!! I think all together, he's a great actor that can play a variety of roles...and he's pretty easy on the eyes too!

Well, as always, I hope my rambling on about something in blog had a point, and this time, it does. So the main reason I brought him up as my recent celebrity crush is because I had this fantastic dream about him last night!! I think I was moving apartments and he was helping me move because somehow he's my "friend". I know! How did that happen?? Anyways, somehow we were left alone while we were moving my stuff and somehow we ended up making out! So details are very wishy washy because 1) it's a dream and 2) it's not real and #3) who cares?? The main point is that I made out with him!!! Needless to say, I woke up a happy girl. Today seems very promising :)

**Look at how he's rocking the vest suit.....*drools**

The Mindy Project

If you haven't heard about this show, I do encourage you to watch it! I don't normally endorse shows unless I think they are pretty good, and this one is pretty good! I don't want to give a poor synopsis of the show and not do it justice so I'm going to put the work on your shoulders and just expect that you will look it up and watch it. It's on hulu and you can catch a trailer of it here:

Just in case you are super lazy, you have no excuses to not watch it now. I know...I know...I'm so considerate.


Labor Day Weekend: 

I'm so excited about this LONG weekend! YAY! I wish everyone a fun long weekend too! I'm sure it'll be good and I'll blog about it later!


I'm off to having a good day........thanks to Joseph Gordon-Levitt! :)

Clingy

Clingy

My brother recently revealed to me that he thinks I'm too "clingy". He mentioned that I text him excessively, I get too excited when I see him, I call him too much, I gchat him too often, I skype him unnecessarily, and he feels like i'm latching onto him for dear life. He told me he wants some space.

O_O

Wow. Did my brother just break up with me? What's going on here? I'm so confused.  O_o
I guess I'll tone down my "clingy-ness". I'm pretty much still baffled and speechless. I'll comment more on this when I recover from the shock.

Santa Monica Pier

Loved this place! I really wanted to visit this Pier ever since it was featured on this older HK soap I was watching from many years back! I'm glad I finally got to visit it! It really reminds me of Santa Barbara, which I also LOVE! I bet the pier looks even nicer at night! I'll have to make a trip out there at night sometime!

500 Days of Summer

For those of you that watched this movie, you might know about that bench that Tom and Summer sat on where Tom talked about how much he loved architecture.....well, this weekend, my brother and I FOUND IT!!! It's in Angel Knoll Park! Not a great part of town. It's adjacent to a bridge overpass, so it has that shady quality about it. It's very small and there are homeless people sleeping under the trees there. The bench is old and scratched up and the view really isn't that great. I've got to say, the movie made that park and that bench look so special/cool but in my opinion, it really wasn't all that jazz. I'm glad I found it, but I'm also glad we left right after we found it. I didn't feel comfortable there. I almost felt like someone was going to mug me.

Omg, I just realized I'm so in love with Joseph Gordon-Levitz *smiles*

Exploring LA: One Bus Stop At a Time

Exploring LA: one bus stop at a time

Who said you can't explore LA because of all the crazy, impatient, law breaking, maniacs that just want to run you off the road??

Since my friend came to visit me this weekend, we hit up the Century City Mall, Santa Monica Pier, and ended our day on Sawtelle all by BUS! Given, we had to search for the bus stops and then wait for a bus to arrive (most of the time they were not on time), I still had fun exploring via the bus system. I think it's just nice to not have to worry about traffic or hitting a person/car. And certainly, it feels nice not to have drivers honk at me for driving too slowly and slowing down to give the right of way to a pedestrian.

Century City Mall wasn't all that jazz. My brother told me it was so upscale and everyone gets so dressed up  to go shopping there but I found it to be a very typical mall. Not that big, or at least, not that many stores that interested me. At least it was pretty easy to navigate around this mall.

Santa Monica Pier was amazing! I really like the pier area and the street shopping along the beach! There was another mall there and  a lot of window shopping along the streets that parallel the beach! There was some sort of Sri Lanka street fair going on so a ton of street venders (FOOD BOOTHS) and a stage set up for entertainment. It was very nice to get out and enjoy the hustle and bustle of the street fair!

Sawtelle I've been on many times and tried a lot of different restaurants here. I think this area because it's very concentrated with a variety of different types of cuisines. We ended up going to a Japanese curry house (which I think this area has the most of).

Classic Movies:

As of recent old, classic movies have struck my curiosity. Everyone's always making references to them and raving about how iconic some of these movies are, so I took the liberty to watch some of them just to see what all the fuss is about. I started with The Graduate and more recently I watched Breakfast at Tiffany's. I'm very much baffled as to why they are so iconic and amazing. Throughout most of the movie, I felt very bored and not entertained. And I found the theme and content to these two movies largely weird and....just weird. Some of the scenes to the movies were just so random. I don't know if I am just not trying hard enough to understand the movies or if these movies are just beyond my time or if I'm just too spoiled with modern day movies that dazzle you with CG, but I'm really not appreciating what classic movies have to offer me. Maybe I'll try a few more...but I really doubt I'm going to reach an epiphany with these movies.

                       

Love: 

There is so much truth in Shakespeare's words:

"The course of true love never did run smooth", "Love goes by haps; Some Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps", "Love sought is good, but given unsought is better"

Well said, well said.

Weekend!

Weekend!

I'm super excited about this weekend! It's gonna be a blast because I actually have some solid plans to do something fun with PEOPLE! Ok, so that last sentence made me sound like such a loser but it's almost true. I get so tired from work throughout the week, all I want to do is veg on the weekends and not have to socialize with friends or family. I just want to sit and watch TV and think about nothing. But this weekend is going to be different! I'm going to try to be productive and get some of my thesis drafted, hang out with some friends AND hang out with some family. I know...that sounds awfully ambitious for someone that's used to being a couch potato for the last few months....but....um....actually, I have no come back for that...maybe excitement will fill me with limitless energy to get all those things accomplished??

Baby Bunnies Round 3:

I was just informed that one of our bunnies just gave birth AGAIN! This is the third time we've been blessed with baby bunnies, I really hope they don't die like the other litters! Last I've heard, they are doing well! We haven't touched any of them this time and we've successfully isolated the mother/babies from the rest of the bunnies. I don't wanna count my eggs before they hatch but it sounds promising this time!

Hulu's New Face: 

For those of you who watch Hulu and care, they have a new user interface. Is that what it's called? New lay out? Just go check it out at   <<< new.hulu.com >>>

Really?!?!

Really?!?!

I got really offended today with a patient and here's how it went down:

Patient: I have a stiff neck condition
Me: Oh, I know, I reviewed your chart, you have ankylosing spondylitis.
Patient: Oh! You know what that is? I'm so impressed!
Me: -_-

Really?!?! Why would you make the assumption that I don't know what that is?? I might not know how to spell it correctly, but I sure know what that is! Just because of that comment, it launched me into a 5 minuet explanation of what the condition is and any form of the condition's manifestation that requires immediate attention!! Take that patient who thinks I don't know what ankylosing spondylitis is!! You just got told about your condition that you already have!! That's what you get! *waves fist*

Just in case you are wondering: This is a baby angrily waving a fist.

Thank Goodness for Interns: 

These last couple of days have been super rough because we haven't had any interns to give any exams. Meaning, a slightly reduced schedule, but we are essentially down 4 doctors. It has been so hectic trying stack patients, seeing one patient after another, working at maximum capacity, falling behind with complicated cases, failing to cut off patients that just won't stop talking, and then still seeing 7 angry patients still waiting to be seen because I'm 2 hours behind!!

I'm glad that is all over now because the new interns came, got oriented/trained and things are finally more calm and back to normal now. *sigh of relief*

The interns are like aloe vera to my sunburn :) 

How do I apply this to this picture?

Guess which bunny I am...........

It's a trick question because I'm the one that ate their butt and their ears!! Hahaha!

Entertainment News:

Train's New Song!!

Train just came out with a new song: "50 Ways To Say Goodbye". It sounds very melodically similar to a song in the Phantom of the Opera. And it's not just me because I looked up the music video on youtube and most of the comments (I say most because I didn't read all of them) made a comment about how it sounds like Phantom of the Opera. I didn't really like it at first, but after listening to it a few times, it's kinda growing on me. I mainly just think the lyrics are kinda funny (like pity laugh funny) and the music video is entertaining. I like Train, they have some really good songs, but I wouldn't crown this one a top 10 all time hit of theirs.

Kristen Stewart & Mother:

The saying "like mother, like daughter" doesn't apply to Kristen Stewart and her mom! Kristen's this aloof, cold, expressionless actress and her mom looks like this casual, laid-back biker chick. You would think that being Kristen Stewart's mom, meaning there's a 99% chance paparazzi's will tail you and snap photos of you for millions of people around the world to see, would be enough motivation to dress up a little and put at least minimal effort into looking slightly presentable. But guess not...I guess that's one thing Kristen did take after her mother....

            

I can't believe there is a "source" that reported: 

 "She says she truly loved Rob. She says he was her soul mate, but she blew it and now she is scared that she has lost him forever. She is pretty much inconsolable." The source added, "Kristen hasn't showered or changed or washed her hair in several days. She is laying around in her T-shirt and shorts and eating ice cream. She really wants to believe that she can win back Rob, but I think deep down she knows that isn't the case."

What a load of crap! If she really felt like that then she shouldn't have and WOULDN'T have cheated. I roll my eyes in disgust. *eye roll*

Spice Girls Reunion Tour: 

What's this? Am I hearing rumors that the Spice Girls are going to have a reunion tour? I think it's in the works since their performance at the London Closing Concert...*ahem* I mean "ceremony" was so successful! When I first heard about this, my first thought was, "Wow, Victoria Beckham is really going to do a reunion tour? Can't imagine her wanting to do that..." and then almost immediately, the talk show host (on the radio) said "the tour will most likely go on with or without Posh Spice". Ha! I knew it! Today's Victoria Beckham is no longer a Spice Girl. She doesn't belong with that crowd anymore. It's so obvious. It's like playing those 5 year old puzzles "Which of these do not belong?". 

Look at how happy everyone looks and then there's Posh Spice's cold stare. 

The Drive from Hell

The Drive from Hell: 

The drive from LA to SD was BRUTAL last Friday! An unexpected black out at the clinic meant I got to get off of work at 2pm on Friday. Thinking that I would beat the traffic, I hit the freeway and started driving to SD. Little did I know, I was gonna hit traffic leaving LA, hit traffic again in Irvine, hit traffic somewhere between Irvine and the border patrol and then finally TRAFFIC ALL THE WAY FROM THE BORDER PATROL BACK DOWN TO SD!!!! Driving 15 miles per hour, stop and go the WHOLE WAY! I was on the 5 freeway for 4.5HOURS!!! Let me remind you that the drive from LA to SD should only be 2HOURS long! That is CRAZY! There were points on the drive where I thought about driving on the shoulder and get out of the traffic, hitting every car in front of me so they will move out of my way (makes no sense, I know, but I was pretty delirious), and I even thought about just getting out of the car and running all the way home!! I think I spent about 2 hours just hysterically crying hoping that someone up in heaven will pity me enough to clear the freeway so I can get out of traffic!! I would say this is the WORST traffic I've ever encountered, but sadly enough, I'd been in WORSE. The infamous 5 HOUR traffic jam earlier this year when the 5 freeway was closed due to a brush fire was slightly WORSE than this. I say SLIGHTLY. 

Legal and Licensed:

I PASSED!! I got my license!! YAY!! Finally can sign my own prescriptions! Feels nice to say that! 

Ellen: 

My brother got tickets to go to the taping of the ELLEN SHOW!!! YAY!!! I'm so excited!! I hope she's gonna have an AWESOME guest or some AWESOME give-away!!!

All Cut Up

Mom's, can't live with them, can't live without them: 

Is it just me or does your mom drive you up the wall sometimes? Mine has been causing me so much grief lately, makes me wonder, is it her or is it me?? Has she perfected the art of guilt tripping/annoying me or have I just become hypersensitive to her perpetually unpleasant nature, making every encounter with her incredibly agonizing.

Just a few examples to demonstrate my point:

1) I've noticed that a lot of my clothes have holes in them lately. At first I didn't make anything of it but then I realized I do my laundry at home. For some strange reason my mom thinks that the washing machine isn't good enough for my clothes and she chooses to hand wash my stuff. I've seen her hand wash things and she always puts an excessive amount of elbow grease into it. She uses this really tough scrub and she's just going at it like she's trying to fight off demons. Once I recalled that, it was like putting 2 + 2 together, and it hit me that she might be scrubbing giant HOLES into my clothes. So I called her, in the most gentle manner, just explaining the situation to her and trying to reason with her to just let the washing machine do the work. She laughed it off at first, but when I said, "well, if you don't stop scrubbing holes into my clothes, I'm going to stop doing laundry at home" she just LOST it! She got all offended and started ranting off about how I have all these adverse feelings towards her now and nothing she does can please me nowadays. She sounded like she started to tear up and then hung up on me. I called her back to apologize and ask her if she's still mad at me and of course she starts guilt tripping me saying things like "I am not mad, I don't have the authority to get mad at you, I'm just your old mother, I just need to learn to shut up and be obedient to you...blah blah blah" and then she hung up on me. **UGH!!!**

2) My mother has these random needs to know where I am sometimes. So, naturally, of course these random needs fall in the hours of when I'm WORKING. So she calls my cell phone. No answer. 10 missed calls later, she calls my work phone. No answer. 3 missed calls on my WORK PHONE later, she freaks out. Then makes my brother text me. No answer. 5 text messages later, she makes my brother call me....you see where this is going. It's escalated to emergency status this one time when I was in Arizona, where she called my Dad when he was at work and got him all worked out. Then made my brother look up hospitals in Arizona and call them to look for me. If it wasn't because I called her back during my lunch break, she was about to make my Dad drive her to Arizona and look for me. I know......CRAZY. And of course, when I get mad at her for over-reacting, purely because I care about her and don't want her to worry so much about me, she CRIES and starts to guilt trip me again, calling herself a horrible mother. And of course, I cry every time I make my mom cry and it's just a HUGE MESS!! And you know how the whole fiasco ended?? I felt bad and I called my mom back and offered to call her EVERYDAY. Yes, so I call her EVERYDAY now....

3) My parents have always relied on me for almost everything. For sorting through mail, for filling out forms, for raising my younger brother...you name it. It's a lot of responsibility but I don't mind doing it, because I like to help my parents. I assuming that anyone that loves their parents would be willing to help their parents make their lives easier. But I don't like it when I feel like it's forced upon me or when my Mom guilt trips me into it. I don't understand why she doesn't think that saying things like:

"Amiee, your family really needs you, you are really important to us, you must help us!"

"Amiee, you must always keep in mind that you have an OLD mother and an OLD father to take care of, you have to stay strong and take care of yourself so you can care for us when we are older" 

"Amiee, you know your father and I are going to live with you when we retire, we can't live with your brother, he's going to have a family and I wouldn't want to intrude on his life" 

"Amiee, it's up to you to teach your brother, your brother only listens to you, he doesn't listen to his mom or dad, so it's up to you to raise him" 

"Amiee, when you start working, I'm going to transfer our house mortgage payments to you so the payments can come from your account"

"Amiee, when you start working, I can finally retire"

My mom's convinced that telling me these things should make me feel more important and needed, almost like giving a sense of purpose to my life. "I live for my parents and I should continuing living for their sake." That's totally CRAZY!!! Why does she think that telling me these things helps me and makes me feel better about myself?? I don't understand. It just makes me feel suffocated and pathetic. Like I'm just a tool or their little pet. I always react to her comments with anger, but I think really deep down inside, I'm just hurt. I'm hurt that she constantly reminds me about these things like she's afraid I'm going to abandon her or something. I don't know how to express the amount of anguish and pain she inflicts on me when she says these things to me. She has so much power over me, too much power. I'm just afraid one day she'll know and abuse her power. Maybe she's already started....I just hope she doesn't throw me over the edge one day....

Swamped: 

No interns, no techs, only 3 residents, 38 patients, you do the math.  We were SWAMPED today. Some patients waited 2 hours to be seen, many rescheduled! We could just not keep up with everyone that showed up! And with no techs helping us today, there was just no way we could work out way through everyone! I didn't know if I felt worse for the people that re-scheduled because they took too long or for the people that waited >2hours to be seen! But now that I think about it, it's probably the people that were seen today because we were so swamped, I didn't even have time to figure how what was going on with the person because I cut them off every half a sentence that came out of their mouth and performed the bare minimum to get by the exam. It wasn't until AFTER they left and had more time at the end of the day to review their charts did I realize there were so many things that I had missed and I really shouldn't have let the patient go. Today was a mess! Tomorrow's going to be the same thing. God, Jesus, Buddha...please help us. 

All Cut Up: 

From all the commotion today, I somehow managed to slice up my two index fingers. I have two cuts (thin, sharp, and deep) on my left index finger and 1 cut (very deep, wide and blunt). I don't know how this happened but all the cuts are perfectly positioned where I would wrap my floss around my fingers so I can floss my teeth after I brush...so I guess this means no flossing for a while...ouch to my fingers and double whammy to my teeth! Sorry plaques, you are just going to have to wait for my cuts to heal! 

"We are never ever getting back together"

"We are never ever getting back together":

Taylor Swift's new song: "We are never ever getting back together" debuted recently on the radio. I have to say this is the worst I've heard her sound on a recorded song before. She sounds like she's singing the song live. Anyway, after I got past how badly she sounds, I focused on her lyrics...

"I remember when we broke up the first time
Saying this is it, I've had enough, 'cause like
We haven't seen each other in a month
When you, said you, needed space, what?
Then you come around again and say
Baby, I miss you and I swear I'm gonna change
Trust me, remember how that lasted for a day
I say, I hate you, we break up, you call me, I love you"

And you've done it again Taylor. I can see why you are a teenage pop sensation. Your lyrics always seem to echo my life. The feelings that I can't express in words, you express through lyrics in a song. I'm not a huge fan of how this song sounds, so I probably won't dwell on it, but her past songs have always sounded really beautiful and have had such meaningful lyrics as well. 

 I can't say how long I've dwelled on "White Horse" and "Back to December" because I felt like I was living through the songs. If I could only write songs and meaningful lyrics like Taylor Swift, then I would be famous just like her. Cash in on all my dating woes to make them slightly less painful. Too bad God skipped me when he was passing out those skills...not to mention he skipped me when he was passing out the "pretty" gene too. Darn...some people have it all...*glares*

Potluck: 

Had a potluck today for our weekly Wednesday afternoon seminars. Good thing too because this was the LONGEST seminar we've had yet. It lasted around 4.5hrs! We only quit because the lecturer got tired of talking, but he actually wasn't done yet!! There were 15 pages of a CONDENSED outline of notes he passed out to everyone. He only got to pg. 13. That's so crazy! Having the food there was a blessing and a curse. It was nice to eat lunch.......and then dinner. But I ate so much I had really bad food coma. 

I probably slept through 20-30% of the lecture today. I know what you are thinking..."That's so horrible! Missing 20-30% of the lecture!!" But based on my track record, which is sleeping through 90% of lectures...I didn't REALLY well today! I don't know what it is about being a dark room and looking at words on a powerpoint presentation projected on a screen...it just puts me right to sleep. But at least I was able to stay awake for MOST of the presentation today. That's pretty good for me. 

Robert Pattinson: 

I've never been a Robert Pattinson fan or a Kristen Stewart fan but this whole scandal about her cheating on him is so interesting that I can't help but get sucked in. I feel awful for him and I can totally imagine how he's feeling right now. I feel indifferent towards Kristen Stewart, I've never liked her so this certainly encourage me to join her fan club or anything but who am I to judge her for her actions when I don't even know the whole story. I'm sure what I hear through the media has been skewed or filtered in one way or another. Anyway, long story short, instead of studying for my law exam (4 more days to study!!), I think I'm going to look up Robert Pattinson's first interview with Jon Stewart. What a nice way to procrastinate... 

Closing Ceremony London 2012

Closing Ceremony:

Skimming through the Olympic Closing Ceremony made me realize it was more of a giant CONCERT than a ceremony. The highlight of the "Closing Concert"? THE SPICE GIRLS!!! So I've never been much of a Spice Girls fan, so it was very surprising to me when I got SUPER EXCITED when I saw them take the stage!!! I don't know why but I didn't know Posh Spice or Victoria Beckham, was a Spice Girl until fairly recently!! I have always known her as the cold, serious, stylish wife of David Beckham. When someone finally told me she was Posh Spice, I was shocked!! I mean, think about it, The Spice Girls are always so energetic and upbeat and here's Victoria Beckham, so subdue and elegant. Doesn't seem like she could ever be a Spice Girl, but what's fact is fact. So of course, during The Spice Girls reunion performance, I was constantly looking for Posh Spice and not to my surprise, she was the one standing off to the side, striking a pose here and there while all the other Spice Girls rocked the Olympics arena with their vibrant energy!! I'm going to revert back to my sixteen year old self and squeal with excitement!! YAY for Spice Girls reunion!!

See...everyone else looks happy/eccentric but she looks so non-chalant...

Come on Posh Spice! At least TRY to look like you belong in this awesome girl band!! 

Electricity Woes:

I got my electricity bill today. Get this. I live by myself, in a dinky studio. I'm already overpaying for rent and now I'm slapped in the face with a $50 electricity bill!! WHY?!?!? Again, let me reiterate. I live BY MYSELF! And I'm not even here on weekends!! Heck, I'm not even here during the day!! I only turn on ONE energy saving light bulb at night!! Why is it soooo expensive?!?!?! LA is ridiculous!! Who can afford to live here?!?!? Oh yeah......hot shot celebrities that make BILLIONS of dollars each year! I really don't belong here. Pretty soon I'm gonna have to start harvesting my own organs to pay for rent/electricity. I can forget about eating because that's more of a luxury. *sighs*

The Countdown: 

5 more days until the law exam...another day wasted.......hopefully I get some studying done tomorrow......

Smelly Air Freshener

Smelly air freshener: 

My parents came to visit me last week and my mom brought me what I thought was an air freshener but after  opening it and letting it sit in my poorly ventilated apartment the whole weekend, I realized it's really a GIANT MOTH BALL!!! I got back to my apartment this morning, opened the door and almost died of the fowl smell! It still wreaks! I WREAK! I smell like the giant moth ball now! If you didn't see me walking by, you'd probably SMELL me and mistaken me for an extremely senile old lady that hasn't done laundry in the past 3 months!! I've been non-stop febreezing myself since I got off work!! Doesn't seem like it's helping...if I suddenly stop blogging for more than 1 week straight, I've probably been moth ball poisoned. You can find me passed out in my poorly ventilated apartment. Please send someone to collect my corpse. 

This is totally me...except the "B.O." is really coming from the GIANT MOTH BALL.

Embarrassing: 

I just realized that most of my friends think I've been constantly studying for my law exam coming up but in fact, I really haven't. I have to confess that I've been spending most of my time sleeping or eating. I really haven't invested much time in studying. Why? Is it because I want to fail? NOOO...it's because I've tried to study and it's seriously more boring than watching molasses move or grass grow. I don't understand half the legal terminology and I certainly am not retaining any of it when I just struggle through the words. Meanwhile, all my friends are under the impression that I've been studying forever for this monster of a test, because I've miss lead them by incessantly worrying and speaking about it. So what does this mean? This means that when I fail the law exam, it's going to be painfully embarrassing to tell anyone about it because no one's going to know the truth that I've been procrastinating and not studying, but instead, everyone's going to think I'm retarded because I've studied so long for the test and still can't pass it. Horrible. 

"What Up Moon Pie?"

Grandma's say the darnest things: 

I updated my family on how my cousin and his family were doing after I met up with my cousin for dinner the other night. I told my family about how my cousin is dating a girl now and they are thinking about getting married. This is how the conversation went down:

Me: So she's mixed, half white, half black.
Grandma: Really? *confused look*
Me: Yes.
Grandma: What do you mean half white and half black?
Me: She's mixed, like may be her dad is white and her mom is black or vise versa.
Grandma: So what does she look like?
Me: I don't know what she looks like, I've never met her.
Grandma: So.......does that mean half her face is white and half her face is black? 

Wait........REALLY?!?!?!? Did she just ask that question?? I honestly didn't know if she was kidding or not. But when I looked at her, she had the most honestly puzzled look on her face that I knew her question was not a joke. At that point I really didn't know how to respond. So my family responded for me. Everyone burst into laughter and when we were all done laughing, my mom broke it down for her what it means to be a mixed black/white person. And we even gave her examples like Leona Lewis and Obama.

This is a great example of why you should not spend 99% of your day sitting at home watching Chinese soaps all day long. Because if you do, you end up asking questions like this.


Crazy HOT!: 

I don't know if I've just spent way too many chilly summers in Nor Cal but I am DYING in this So Cal summer so far! I can not seem to stand the heat down here!! In the words of Carly Rae Jepsen: "This is Crazy!" As much as I don't want to admit it, I think I got used to the cool breezes in Nor Cal and the gentle sunshine that only shows up every few days or so. Down here in So Cal it's seriously like 100 degrees everyday! And if it's not 100 degrees, it's intense sunshine that will give any self-respecting elderly Caucasian Grandma skin cancer within 10 seconds of exposure!! What have I done to you Mr. Sun that you have to send down your death rays at million degrees per second from 7am to 7pm EVERYDAY?!?! I've never been this fearful of sweating or developing a raging case of skin cancer....or worse, juvenile-onset cataracts and macular degeneration!! Or perhaps some wicked pingueculas or pterygiums!! This is it, I'm not going outside unless it's absolutely necessary, and when I mean absolutely necessary I mean on an emergency basis, like if my house was on fire and it was cooler to be outdoors instead of being indoors. I'm gonna rock the indoor A/C and just wait it out this summer until winter comes to save my butt.

Wow, I bet you anything the 22 year old me would have never guessed the 26 year old me would ever say anything like this! Maybe it's the heat stroke talking or maybe I've just lost it but Nor Cal summer doesn't sound so bad right about now...


"What Up Moon Pie?"

Just a Big Bang Theory should out because I LOVE THAT SHOW! Woot woot!

Early Lunch Break

Taking my Lunch Break Early

My brother is staying with me for these last couple of days because he came to visit me. It's nice to have him here because I get to spend more time with him and it really does remind me of simpler times, like when we were little kids, and all we did was play barbies or watch cartoons together. We were always really close and got along pretty well. When I say we got along, I mean, I told him what to do and he would do it. Now that he's older, he's not always that obedient anymore. I've lost most of my authority with him, but that's understandable. You can't put a tight harness on an 18 year old and expect him to obey your every command. But all in all, I still really enjoy his company, even when he's acting like an annoying, angsty adolescent. The feeling is mutual with him....but only when I'm home to spend time with him. The problem here is that I have to go to work from 7am-5pm or 6pm. So most of the time during the day he excessively calls or texts me due to extreme boredom. So yesterday, I decided to take him with me to work and have him walk around the area while I'm at work. There are many shops around the area and UCLA is right across the freeway. I thought that would have been a good use of his time to explore UCLA at least. I'm not sure what he ended up doing, but it wasn't entertaining enough because I was flooded with texts and calls about what he should do next because he's so bored. So around 11:00am, he came back and asked me for the keys to the car so he can sit inside and perhaps take a nap. So, around 11:45am I took an EARLY lunch break....sshhhhhh...don't tell anyone. I felt bad about it but clinic was slow that morning and I'm sure no one noticed? Since time was limited, we ate at the canteen at the hospital, which has decent food. We shared a foot long "subway" sandwich and a salad. Again, it was nice to spend some time with my brother.

   

Bolting for the door

When people say the word "worldly", no one ever thinks of me. I've pretty much been pretty sheltered and there are a lot of things I don't know really know about the world and things I don't understand. Most of which involves things like drugs, alcohol, gangs, etc etc. You get the point. So when I say, I got a patient yesterday that I was pretty sure was "high", then you can pretty much assume it was SUPER obvious. Blood shot eyes and mildly incoherent responses/comprehension. Anyhow, I knew something was not right about this patient. So I was already a little apprehensive about him, when suddenly during the middle of the exam, he literally starts screaming and shaking his hand wildly about. I was startled, as expected. He stopped after a few seconds and told me there was a bug on him. He said he flung it off and resumed back to normal. At this point, I was very skeptical if he was just hallucinating or if there was actually something there. I didn't see a "bug" so I just ignored it and continued. A few minuets later, he did the exact same thing. Only this time he yelled even louder and flung half of his body around (limbs included). At this point, I was so scared I was ready to bolt for the door. I was almost sure that he was crazy and he might hurt me. Just when I was about to run for it, I saw him fling off a moderately sized beetle. At which point I was relieved to know he was NOT crazy...just high, but not crazy. 

Nor Cal Kids...

I met up with my cousin last night for dinner. He's from SF, but moved down here for school. He's a very nice kid and last I remembered, he had pretty nice skin. But yesterday when I saw him, he looked like he got punched in the eye, and his skin was peeling all over his body. I was a little concerned, so I asked him about his skin lesions. He wasn't sure why he looked like he had a black eye...weird...but he said that he was peeling because he can't handle the sun here in southern California. He started explaining how little sun exposure he got when he was living in SF. He would go days, months without seeing the sun because of all the fog. Now in southern California, he's getting so much sun, he's getting constantly sun burnt. I know it's mean, but I couldn't stop laughing after he told me this. Nor Cal kids can't handle a little So Cal love...hahahahahahahahah!! I gave him good advice after I laughed at him.....

The Death Number: 44

44

So this is my 44th blog post. So you know what that means.....DEATH! No...I'm just kidding...well, I hope so anyway. The number "4" has always been this taboo number for Chinese people because when you say it, it sounds like "death" in Chinese. So having the number "44" is like double death which is double no good! Like I have blogged previously, it was right after I purchased something that totaled to $444 and then got a discount for $6.66 that my poor bunny died. So unfortunately that my bunny took the blunt of the infamous "4" curse. But I'm thankful that he took one for the team. So given how superstitious I am, considering I have this real life example, I'm going to quickly by pass this blog number and start a new blog, which will be blog entry #45. Bye bye 44th blog entry! It was nice blogging about ya!

Simple Happy Moments

Simple Happy Moments 

My parents and my brother came to visit me yesterday. They bought take out and brought it over to my apartment to eat with me. I have minimal furniture, not even a dining table or enough chairs for everyone to sit in, so we just ended up eating on the floor. It was just the four of us, sitting around each other in a circle with a large pile of food in the middle. There was no TV distracting us or acting as background noise, like how we normally eat at home. It was just the simple life, and I've got to say it was one of the happiest dinner moments I've ever had with my family. We actually talked to each other and paid attention to each other, as oppose to when we are at home and everyone's eyes are plastered on the TV. It made me really cherish that moment of us being together and just enjoying each other's company. I don't know how many of these moments I can actually recount having. Throughout most of my life growing up, my parents rarely ate together with me. They always had to work so hard and were almost never home. And when they were home, it would just be either my mom or my dad, but not both. And nowadays, since my  mom lost her job and she's home all the time now, there are more moments where they are both home but rarely would we ever eat dinner just the four of us without the TV on as a distraction.

You know sometimes when you watch TV, and there are always those shows that show a really poor family sitting around together eating and they seem so happy and then they show a really rich family and most of the time they are never together, they do their own stuff, and they seem so unhappy and yelling at each other most of the time....I didn't really buy into that because I always thought money eliminates problems, money shouldn't cause problems, but after last night, I'm beginning to buy into it. I'm not saying we are rich are anything, but compared to when we first immigrated to the states, we are more well off. We can at least afford a few luxuries here and there now (like ordering off the combo meal menu instead of the dollar menu at a fast food place or buying the softer name brand toilet paper). It's nice that we can enjoy a better life and not worry about if we can afford to eat for our next meal, but I guess I wouldn't mind reverting back to the simple life once in a while so I can be reminded of what's really important in life and why life is so beautiful.

Needles, poke, bleed.....

Seminar was at Sepulveda VA again yesterday and part of the seminar training yesterday was to practice injections...on EACH OTHER. So of course, the attending doctor shows us the procedure once, and then we are partnered up, gather all our materials, and we poke each other! My partner poked me first, everything was fine until she withdrew the needle and I started to bleed profusely. I wouldn't stop bleeding and there was a river of blood everywhere. Even the attending said I was bleeding a lot. Good thing it wasn't too difficult to stop my bleeding, but boy was it scary watching myself bleed a river. Ok, river might be exaggerating a little bit, maybe a small stream. 

I injected the needle into my partner and found the vein. I withdrew the needle and she barely bled. (Lucky!). Then we went into other rooms and watched other residents practice the procedure on each other. One of the other resident was so scared she was shaking as she approached the vein with the needle. She shook so hard that I was getting nervous for the person she was injecting the needle into. I don't know how you can find a vein shaking that much. She proceeded to puncture the skin but because she was shaking so much, she didn't puncture through to the vein and ended up just poking the other person a little bit. She had to try again and poke him a second time. Poor guy. 

Sweaty Inspiration!

Sweat

I saw this quote that was quite inspirational for people that are working out right now:

"Sweat is just fat crying"

If it's not inspirational for you, it's at least worth a chuckle or two, haha

The skill to interrupt 

I need to learn how to acquire the skill to politely interrupt people when they talk. I think partly why I take so long for each exam I give is because I just let people talk on and on about their problems. And pretty soon they bring up their children, their grandchildren, their pets, their hobbies, their jobs, and etc etc, until I've even lost track of what time it is or how long they have been talking. 

Having never been granted with any graceful social skills, I always struggle through exams when I get a talker. While they drone on and on, instead of thinking of some way to cut them off, I spend my time day dreaming about what I would like to eat for my next meal, or what I should do after I get off work...and then when my mind finally checks in again, I am so shocked the person is still gabbing on that I plaster a "deer in headlight" look across my face and sometimes roll my eyes. At this point, I really pray and hope they did not catch me rolling my eyes at them. 

While I'm at it, I should probably learn to stop talking so much myself. When I conclude my exam, I tend to spend a crazy amount of time explaining people's illnesses to them and I even go into detail about them in a pathophysiological way throwing in all sorts of medical terminology that I'm pretty sure half the people don't understand. So again, waste of time. 

All in all, long story short, I need to speed up my exam time by cutting out unnecessary chit chat. 

Happy 1 Month!

1 Month 

I've been so busy I hadn't even noticed that it's been a month since I've started work. Yesterday one of the students made cookies for us to celebrate that we have survived 1 month at work! That was really sweet of her! One of my colleague's posted a picture of our names posted on the wall right outside our office to wish each of us a happy 1 month. Everyone made it such a big deal and a happy milestone but honestly, I'm just thinking, "omg, it's only been ONE month?? Feels like it's been a year already!" Seriously, between reading articles, studying for the law exam, mismanaging patients (kidding...or so I hope), and sleeping/eating, I hadn't really had much time to ponder about the passing of time. But since I've been keeping busy, time seems like it's flying by really fast. I don't really feel like I've learned much since I've started the program but that's how I noticed things always working out. I never feel like I learn anything until I work somewhere else  and through my interactions with other doctors, I start to realize I've subconsciously picked up a few things here and there that has helped me make better clinical judgments from time to time.  Hopefully this is the case here too.

3 More Dead

3 more baby bunnies have died in our hands. The mother bunny abandoned the babies and refused to feed them after the 3 baby bunnies were born so my brother and I decided to try to feed them ourselves. They all either choked (because they apparently don't have a gag reflex) or they suffocated because the milk went into their nose (which is seriously located right up to their mouth, so it's practically almost the same hole!) All THREE babies died in my hands!! That's horrible!! That's up to 12 dead baby bunnies now. I'm starting to think we are not qualified to raise bunnies anymore. I can't believe how fragile these baby bunnies are! This is ridiculous! There is seriously nothing we can do to help them survive! We just have to leave them alone and HOPE and PRAY with good faith that their mother will take care of them and feed them so they can make it past their fragile baby lives!

Too many temptations

The residency coordinator is really good about keeping us happy and well fed, she always brings in baked goods and buys us snacks...which is a blessing and a curse at the same time! Blessing because who doesn't want a tray of cookies sitting there waiting for someone to snack on them or some brownies to chew on while your pondering a case, or a nice piece of cake to sweeten up a long day's work? No one, that's the answer. But this is also a curse because although my taste buds are kept happy and there is always "love in my tummy" there it's not very pleasing for my "diet and weight loss" plan. I wish I could just resist those sweet treats! The horror of my binge eating tendencies! They have found my kryptonite! I guess it's not meant to be...I am not meant to fit back into my skinny jeans. The weight I gained is here to stay! 

I'm afraid this is going to be me one day.......

I don't know what is sadder...being too fat to reach for a pie, or being so fat and still wanting to eat a pie or my grammatically incorrect use of "sadder"? 

Visiting the set of Grey's Anatomy

I've never been a fan of the show or even watched the show, but yesterday I got to visit the hospital where they film Grey's Anatomy! I'm trying to search through all these youtube clips of  the show hoping to catch a glimpse of anything recognizable from the hospital that I was at yesterday. I was able to identify the "bridge" where they always walk across. There's the "lunch area" where they eat. And an office or two. That's pretty cool! I'm pretty excited/impressed even though I'm totally not a fan! The hospital is pretty nice but it looks even better on camera!  *thumbs up*

The front of the Sepulveda VA 

That famous bridge!!