An Ironic, Time-Management Waste of Time

On my new Dell netbook, there was a game called Purple Place.  I have no idea why it's called that or why the color purple??  There are three minigames included, memory, bakery and some weird design a face thing.  The bakery game really reminded of this online game i used to play call Cake Mania.  The goal was simple, just making cakes with the right color icing and top as ordered by customers, as fast as possible before they are pissed off.  It also included other little features like TV with channels that entertain your customers so they'll wait longer...cupcakes to keep them around, etc.  The money you make can be used to purchase more equipment, or update the ones you have.  It is quite additive.  I think it is really that "ke-ching" sound it makes when you take the cash that my head is really responding to.  Making virtue money apparently makes me happy too.  huh...what a concept. 

The strangest and the most ironic part is that this game, or rather series of Cake Mania, was categorized under "time-management"!!  Time-management games??  i don't know when other people plays this game, i know when i do it, it's basically a form of the worst time-management in the world, well, in my real life, of course.  while i kick ass at the game of managing baking time and icing time, in reality it is really the thing i do to avoid work and continue my life-long streak of procrastination.  I am a clinical procrastinator who kicks ass at time management, here is the twist, GAME!

are you lost?

i always thought people who sit around and wonder about their "path" in life, trying to "focus on myself", discover "thy-self" are self-centered, self-indulging...weasels.  and, i lost just a little bit respect for my skeptical self when that same thought popped into my head. 

everyone is moving on, or simply just moving.  i suppose there's nothing i can do to help it.  most people, well, let me rephrase that, everyone i know who has left or is planning on leaving, are leaving for good.  for the better. this sad excuse of a family-friendly town has finally wore us out.  they chose life! 

it's great to have a plan, or at least a start on one.  i am going back and forth, back and forth on what i should do.  should i apply this year?  should i wait?  If i do go on, there's no turning back.  or i really would like not to have to turn back one more round. while it's true that it's never too late for anything, really, time still doesn't go backwards.  i'd rather be "on time" if given the choice.  "on time" for all the things we are supposed to do. i guess technically i was "on time" for all my "social" rites of passages, graduation, marriage, job.  it still felt like a dead end.  everyone but me seems to be hopeful about my future.  i do feel lost.  rob always asks me do the thing that i would do if money is no object.  what if the answer to that question is... nothing.  whom exactly am i afraid to disappoint?  at some point that line seems gray to me, i am so used to feeling disappointed in myself when i think i have disappointed someone else.  is it me?

i hear women say all the time to their kid, "when i had you, my life was complete." so what? a screaming, pooping baby is the answer to everything? i suppose it's smart move, who can argue with the best "excuse" in the world?  it's such a tempting escape for me, just have a baby.  then my mind and all my time would be occupied, i won't have time or the energy to worry about myself when there's someone else to worry about. 

we all admire people who dare to be different, who dare to stride around living the life we were taught not to live. but almost everyone in this "category" still finds it hard to continue their stubborn streak.  are they really happy and carefree like the they paint themselves to be?  or is it just a front to put up to shut everyone up?

Pregnant people on water slides

I took my ma to splash village in Frankenmuth today.  It was so steamy in there...phew... it was fun, but it reminded me how much better Michigan Adventures in Muskegon was, well in the summer that is, and it costs about the same, $25 for half day.  The weird thing is, well, or so i was told...my mom and rob told me they spotted 4 or 5 really pregnant ladies in there, on the slides and everything... i've never been pregnant, so i don't know... but is that safe???  speeding through some tube ride crushing out and hit the bottom?

Taking showers at a swimming pool or something is always a dilemma,  if there's no individual showers with curtains and stuff, just a big open area with a bunch of shower heads... do you or do you not take off the swimsuit to shower??  If i keep it on, it felt like i'm rinsing the suit on me, not washing myself...if i take it off, and someone to walk in...the dilemma continues... do you say hi? what do you say when you are butt naked? "oh the water sure was nice?"  And let's say, you do talk, what if the other person isn't naked, should I apologize for letting all my junk in the trunk out in the open??

Afterwards we went to Jerry and Pat's in Auburn for seafood buffet... a word of caution:  the crab legs are great! the lake perch however, is a hit or miss...  my fav is this chocolate mousse thing, delish!

Butterflies

it was a beautiful day outside. We went out for a walk with the dogs this morning, did some house chores.  In the afternoon, I took my Ma to Dow Garden's conservatory where they have a live butterflies exhibit.  It was so humid and hot in there, some of the pictures turned out blurry because the lens had condensation on it. 

The smaller butterflies were more friendly and less timid than the bigger ones.  When it rested on a flower or something, we just offer our hands and they would walk right onto it.  It was really cool.  The bigger ones would not have any of that, of course.  They flutters around and refused to settle.  They were probably very annoyed. 

In the "breeding box", there were a whole bunch of pupa hanging, a couple of them, the adult butterfly just emerged or in the process of emerging.  A couple of the pictures, you can see the antenna and the head had just come out.  The whole emerging process is very very very slow. 

In one picture, you can clearly see it's a butterfly that just came out, it was hanging on the old pupa, and its wings were still curled, trying to straighten out. 

柜底的旧信封

这是我很久以前写给好友的一段话，他/她那个时候有些挣扎，希望现在好些了。 每每自己有挣扎的时候，就想到这些说给别人的话。。。顺便po出来自勉

憂鬱 低落 真的是一個很討厭，和讓人惱火的病症。 剛開始的時候，說病，又好像不是病。而周邊的人，甚至家人都會覺得是懶惰的藉口。 就好像沒有人理解，也沒有人相信一樣。 我記得我最常聽到的就是我老爸，和我外婆， 還有很多“多嘴”的家人，說一些什麽“嘿！你要是生活在50年前，沒有吃的，窮得沒有地方睡，就不會有什麽憂鬱症！” 哦！真得很叫人不知是哭還是笑。。。好想打人哦！

可是後來也麻木了，就跟自己說“就這樣吧，就這樣沒有知覺的，沒有感情的，行尸走獸一輩子吧！也許原來的 快樂，都是一場夢，現在才是現實。世界本來就不是小時候，或者是2年，3年以前想象得那麽開心的地方。” 可是每當有朋友，有身邊的親人，甚至是陌生人在的時候，還是會很努力的演戲，有時是一齣“我沒事，我很好的”爛戲，有時是一齣“我很陽光，很開朗的，很好 笑的”鬼戯。 其實心裏已經早就放棄自己了，還會默默希望會走在街上被飛機砸死，或是外星人綁架，一些奇奇怪怪的出路。實際上，心裏開始相信這個讓人很憤怒又很無奈的病 症，定義了自己的一切，也已段掉了希望，改變，欲望，渴望，甚至早上睜開眼的力氣。精疲力盡，接受了這個被扭曲的現實，“反正已經被打敗了，還掙扎什 麽”。

我聼過最好的解釋，就是一個憂鬱症患者看到的世界，就好像是正常人帶著一幅墨鏡散光在加深度近視的眼鏡看到的世界，是扭曲的，灰暗的，模糊的，再加頭痛， 眼酸。沒有憂鬱症的人，可能帶一下下，很難過，很不舒服，就自己摘下來了。而有憂鬱症的人，就好像被綁著手腳，沒有辦法摘下來，只能忍受一切，痛苦的走下 去，直到麻木，或是死掉。 但是生活和這個世界不是你我看到的，感覺到的那樣。 快樂和傷心都還是並存的，但是平衡的。 我們只是需要找到一把剪刀，剪斷綁住手腳的麻繩，就可以摘掉眼鏡，很原來一樣的生活。

找到適合自己的一把“剪刀”可能會花很多時間， [。。。] 重要的是不能放棄，找到爲止。 花個一兩年是正常的。 如果越拖就越麻煩，越痛苦，也越無力。人的精神會一點一點被消磨掉。這個病是和感冒發燒是一樣的，都要看病吃葯。 沒有什麽不同，更不需要自責，或覺得自己是不正常的瘋子。給自己一點時間一點空間恢復，不要害怕。

My Spring Mama

My Mama is flying in tonight to visit!!! yay!  i bitch and moan about my mom a lot, but then again which daughter doesn't? i miss her.  Someone was telling me that it's called "crazy-nice".  Apparently, that doesn't mean really really really nice, it means, it's nice, but drives you crazy at the same time.  I'm stubborn, think i'm always right, tend to tell people to do things my way, too smart for my own good sometimes... now imagine me times 100, you are now getting close to my Ma.

I finally kicked rob and his telescope project out of the guest bedroom last night.  The dogs were bathed for her arrival as well.  Now i need to figure out where to take her... i originally thought to take her skiing, but now it's raining...where should i go to find good snow??  now i'm thinking to take her to an indoor water park that has a steady 87 degree water, since she doesn't like getting into cold water even in the summer.  Any ideas, anyone??

On a non-related note, my spring break is half way gone already... all the work and tests coming up is looming above my head now... yuhhhh

the said and the unsaid

so what happens when the things we are suppose to "read b/w the lines" never gets read, or gets read correctly as intended?  is there a difference b/w embellishing the truth and hiding the truth?  i have, on several occasions, been accused of being too blunt.  people who embellished it in a positive way would say "straight forward", people who tried to hide it would say "honest". others who meant "less" than well would say "blunt, inconsiderate, rude" or my personal favorite, "cruel".

I suppose the truth does hurt...so why are we acting so surprised if the words we are hearing felt like a dart through the heart??  maybe our tolerance for the truth has been lowered to the point of voluntary denial.  god forbid if one of us should point out the elephant in the room! oh no! we have to talk around it, describe the elephant, and assume the rest of us would comprehend that description as an elephant, not a giraffe, or a dog, or whatever else that's not even remotely close to an elephant.  And boy, do we get mad when the truth is bluntly pointed out.  on paper, i'd say why gets mad at the truth?  it's like being mad at the air for having only 21% oxygen instead of like 90%.  it is what it is... in reality, my first reaction is always defensive, my first response is always to throw intentionally hurtful comebacks at your face.  sometimes, i hate to say it, it just feels damn good to make the other person cry like a little girl.  

My sympathy for the cry baby when arguing increases with the length of the argument as well as the cruelty of the comebacks.  I mean come on, it is definitely considered a cheap shot if you get teary eyed the moment i raise my voice.  making me look like the bad person doesn't make me less right.  it especially doesn't make me want to stop making you cry, since it's so obvious that the crying has been used as a weapon.  crying is for pussies, manipulative pussies.  and if you are so certain i am in the wrong, why the heck are you crying??  

Privacy is a modern invention

The latest house episode tonight was centered around a patient who was an avid blogger.  In the story, the blogger, Frankie, had documented almost everything in her life on the internet for all to see.  Forget about how plausible this is for a moment, though i'm sure it's doable... she commented at some point in the episode that we all would be more careful about what we say or do if we know everything was "on record".  In a way, she is what...? "policing" the people around her?? in the story, this woman had loyal followers on her blog around the globe...one of which even offered to donate his/her liver to Frankie.  I'm not sure if i believe knowing a person in the virtual reality alone actually counts as knowing.  Sure, we all had our AOL/Yahoo/whatever days, when we were 15 and had multiple "online" bf and gfs.  I remember there was definitely moments that i was certain my virtual illusion was true, that so and so was closer to my heart than the "real" people around me.  If i was really going for the thrill of danger, we'd exchange phone numbers and talk on the phone. for the record, let me just say, thank goodness i was not cut into pieces and dumped in a ditch somewhere.  The biggest problem is that we all try to present ourselves in a favorable way to others.  Trying to pick the right clothes to wear, the right things to say, the right gesture to make...when left to our own devices on the internet, with typed words alone, fabrication of ourselves must be inevitable.  If words are the only things we were held accountable, we can be anything we want to be.    

Taub said that privacy was a modern invention.  It's not the first time i have heard of it, but i can't make up my mind if i believe it.  I guess if we all live in small communities where everyone is in everyone else's business, nothing "private" can be really protected.  But after all we are still human being with thoughts and most of us can't read minds, so of course there's private things we can hide for ourselves.  Information about ourselves though, i guess, is a different story.  Where we live, what we do, how much money we have, what do we do when no one is looking... we tirelessly protect these things, we have laws and punishments, firewalls and passwords.  when it comes down to it, really, we have figured out, or have always known, information is power, information about someone can screw them over if used strategically.   We can protect all we want, but, if the intention to harm is there, it's just a matter of time when he/she screws you over.  I think privacy is just the part of us that is the most "tender", if you will.  The part that's the most vulnerable.  Privacy = the short cut to screw you over.

“过去了”

昨天晚上看奥斯卡颁奖典礼，其中有一段是纪念2009年所有过世的艺人。 你说这09年是不是有点儿邪了门儿了，老老少少的“过去了”那么多人。也只能说什么”生命很脆弱”一类的话，但又觉得有点儿太轻描淡写了。其实这里面儿有的人真的是够折腾的，另外有些也有点儿糊涂过头了,死得太可惜了。这三个是我一时印象最深的。

Natasha Richardson - 在魁北克滑雪撞了头，事发当时居然拒绝了医护检查，拍拍屁股就回酒店了！2-3小时之后开始闹头疼，这才上医院。 结果在撞击7个小时后就这么过去了！ 法医鉴定：意外事故。

David Carradine - 就更离谱了，S&M那么多年了，怎么那么不注意安全？又不是新手儿了，玩儿窒息自慰居然给玩儿完了，吊在曼谷一家酒店的储藏室里。 看来这和游泳死人是一个道理：淹死的一般都是会游泳的。 约有经验，就越过于自信，也没找个看伴儿, 这"惊险"变"危险"也定为事故了!

Brittany Murphy - 感冒转肺炎, 吃了乱七八糟一堆OTC的小药儿。没想到减肥控制体重，有严重的贫血问题。 所有的所有凑一块儿，心脏就“嘎巴儿”一下，停了！ 法医鉴定：事故。

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Treadmill Diary #2

Number of Days: 15
Number of Usage: 12

On the 5th day, my right knee started to give me trouble. it was a rather sad... or should i say, pathetic incident? after all, all i did was walking. Like, normal 2-2.5 mph walking! needless to say, i was more embarrassed at myself than anything else. guess it's gonna be more dreadful than i thought. i am what the chinese call "tiger head, snake tail"... i'm headstrong, impatient, and rarely finish anything i started... hobbies, books, blogs, diet plans, music instruments... parents and the "social order", sadly, had pushed me through school and back in school (otherwise, i probably wouldn't have finished that either). On top of that, i am "all or nothing". So for my treadmill plan this time around, i made sure to stay where i thought i was comfortable...urrrrhhhh... what a drag! anyhow, i whined a little, rolled my eyes at myself a little, and got back to walking slower and shorter duration. i also got myself a pair of walking shoes. apparently, there are specifically "walking shoes"?! come on, what happened to just dress shoes and athletic shoes? there are shoes of every sports now... i fooled myself, covered my ears and said, "new shoes are what's missing in my regime"... and ordered a pair of new balance 558 pink and white walking shoes. After all, finding the right things to wear is what..80%... of the effort? Today is day 15, walk #12. it was good, my right knee is holding up. Next goal: train my dogs to run on the treadmill!

Fastest or Shortest?

I am a loyal GPS user. No kidding. As i came out of the neighborhood McD drive through, my index finger immediately reached for "Navigate to" then "Home". My TomTom is my legitimate boyfriend outside of my faithful happy marriage. Lori, that is the name of my "navigator" lady. She gets quite loud sometimes and even nags at me, or so it seems. Reminding me to make a left turn every 500 yards, i often feel like i am driving with my mother suction-cupped to my windshield. Rob gave me the TomTom for Valentine's day one year. I know, my husband is a major dork. Probably why i had to marry the guy, so in comparison, i'd be the smaller dork of this relationship. It was probably the best gift i have ever gotten.

It's not that i am completely directionless, though some may disagree, just never invest my attention and brain gear towards it. Rob worries that i'd turn my brain off, when "Lori" is handling the road, and me ending up in a ditch, or getting hit in the middle of an intersection with the stop sign he swore that i had run. Do I really go through life completely oblivious? After the "attack of the purple bitch" (which entirely would be a separate entry), i had a new revelation. My senses are naturally heightened. I am actually "internally" observant. My "processor" however, automatically filter out everything and anything that's unimportant.

So anyhow, my favorite thing to do is to plan a route on the "shortest" setting. My TomTom take me to places i've been before but via a completely different, refreshing route. It sounds sort of stupid. But it's the perfect combination of the thrill of the unknown, plus the peace of mind that eventually i would get to where i wanted to go. If i get to unpaved roads, that's a bonus. Rob hates it though. Again, he's worried i would drive through a bad neighborhood and get shot. I suppose that's always a possibility. Probably not any higher than the chance that when i walk out the road, a school bus would run me over. Speaking of which, back in UIUC, there were probably 3 people got killed by the school bus while i was there...

It's nice to be worried about, though. Every time rob yells, "i don't want you to die", my heart would melt. Maybe i'm just too easy.

Treadmill Diary #1

Treadmill : Proform XP 690T
Source: Parents
Occasion: 26th B-day
Day: 3
Usage: 4
Favorite track: Lady Gaga- Summer Boy

It's been 3 days since i owned my first treadmill. In my crowded little apartment it looks humongous! I swear when i saw it at Sears, it seemed half the size. This is my first attempt to voluntarily start a self-indulge exercise schedule in... oh... i don't know... probably never! After my body crossed the 20th year mark, it had been thrown in to this wacko place where things start to show signs of wear and tear, if you know what i mean. This is insane...i'm a 50 years old trapped in a 20 something body...I am actually standing in the dairy aisle, next to some middle age mom, reading the ingredient on Activa! It is just sad.

My 26 b day is coming up, my mama and papa dropped a delicious offer on my lap - take dad's credit card and go shopping!! Needless to say, i crossed out the other hundred things i wanted in my closet, i promptly bought this treadmill. Let's face it, no matter how many times i decided to enroll in a gym, i am never gonna actually go on a regular bases. It is a known face that, I am, i hate to say this, but definitely a couch potato. Don't get me wrong, i love going outdoors, camping, skiing, or taking walk in the snow...but these still are occasional events. So now, with a humongous machines sitting in my living room staring right at me and my couch...i actually feel motivated to get on it. The neat thing is definitely that i can combine my absolutely favorite thing to do with my not-so-favorite thing - TV plus walking. Yep, i said walking. Not a fan of running under any circumstances...besides, i'm way too heavy for my joints to take that kind of abuse. Dad kept telling me this story about a mother who wanted to donate her liver to save her life's son. Unfortunately, at the time, she was obese and have a not-so-desirable liver. This poor mother walked off a ton of weight in 3 months and end up happily saving her beloved son. Oh No! My goals are never that ambitious. My goal is simple, when i pick up that remote control, i want to be on the treadmill, walking...nowhere. =) One step at a time, my friend, one step at a time.