Back To Work But First...

Internet, I have been awful at keeping my blog lovechild updated with all of my escapades and doings in the world and for that I sincerely apologize. Put simply, the wrap up to this semester at NYU was like trying to clamber up an angry seizing rhinoceros's back and then standing on one leg while wearing a stiletto heel. I was tired, addicted to caffeine, and then severely lacking on sleep. About a week after the semester has officially ended, I am all better now! I've kicked the caffeine addiction just in time for 2010, I am well rested and ready to kick some verbal ass! Caffeine withdrawal, by the way, gives you these really bitching headaches kinda like how it would feel if people were stamping on your brain like they do for grapes when making wine only much less fun sounding. Take home message? Don't do drugs kids!

So... Where to begin with my slew of updates? Well I suppose, I should start with a clarification. As I never really concluded my suburbia segment, I should really start by mentioning the fact that between my last update and this current one, I had returned to NYC where I had absolutely no fun whatsoever. I was completely tethered down to work namely, 2 papers, 1 midterm and 3 finals over the span of 3 weeks. To those of you who are confused by the fact that I had a midterm during the final week of school, know that I was also equally confused but had no way to reason with my arch-nemesis Fake Jesus. Not to be confused with Raptress Jesus. There is much to be said about my long drawn out battle with Fake Jesus and our historical fight, "Saiyan L & The 1632 Battle of Logicians" will probably need an entire blog devoted to its full re-telling.

But anyway, I digress. My list of crap to do when I got back to college was exhaustive. Hence the lack of updates which I am once again, apologetic about. But anyway, I'm now done with a rather heinous semester and am back at home in suburbia land. I've learned from my past idiocies and I will be preferentially taking planes home to Not New York until they make teleportation devices commercially available. Maybe I'll even get to see the world's first genetically engineered flying pig.

I shall name it Squishee and he shall be mine!!

Internet, it is freezing in suburbia land. We have about two feet of snow and if I open the door, I can feel icicles forming on my extremities. Even though I may sound like I'm complaining, I'm not really. I say this fondly because the feeling of freezing to death outside is a bit nostalgic. Being home is indeed a good thing.

Especially because I've forgotten how much fun it is to hang around my dear mother. Yes. Fun. You did just read that correctly. Now I'm definitely not best friends with my mother, so its not fun in that sense. It's fun to hang out with her because it is just incredibly entertaining to put her into situations where she is forced to talk about sex. I know this sounds weird because no one likes the sex talk with their parents but...let me explain. She NEVER gave me the sex talk. Her version of it was, "ABSTINENCE" and then she shoved her fingers into her ears and went "LA LA LA" very loudly. This woman just does not want to talk about sex. I swear, if I wasn't old and a Biology major, her answer to the question "Where do Babies come from?" would be something like, "Well....you see, babies come when two people fall in love and..magic. OH LOOK THERE ARE DEER OUTSIDE. I WONDER WHAT THEY ARE EATING. LOUDLY DO I WONDER ABOUT IT."  None of this, by the way is an exaggeration.

Recently, I had the pleasure of putting her into one of those delightful situations. We were in the car, and the radio was on. I believe it was some loud electric guitar concoction and my mother said, "Kids have horrible taste in music these days." I asked her about her preferred taste in music and she said she liked listening to Korean ballads. Personally I don't really like listening to ballads of the Korean variety because all of the songs sound exactly the same but I politely nodded and asked if she liked one of the recent-ish ballad, "Like I got shot by a Gun" by Baek Ji Young. No! She said. Something about the graphic imagery made her feel uncomfortable. (Come to think of it, this may explain why she refuses to talk about sex. SHE HAS A DIRTY MIND.) She then continued, "Baek Ji Young also had that major scandal...." before she trailed off into silence.

Internet, this immediately rang several happy bells in my head as, for those of you that don't know, Baek Ji Young's scandal involved a sextape. I HAD to know what my dear mother would have to say about this. "What scandal?" I asked her innocently. An odd look flashed across my mother's face before she said, "Well it's only a rumor, there's no point in talking about rumors right?" My mother wasn't going to get off that easily so I persisted. "Well just tell me what the rumor is then. What does it involve?" She hesitated and then said...."Well...there were...photographs taken of her and her...boyfriend." Internet, unless you were living on a planet where being with a boyfriend was illegal then I don't know how this could even begin to sound scandalous. Evidently my mother had the same thought because she quickly changed her statement to "her and her boyfriends." All I can say is wow.

Quick Update...

Internet I have returned to the interwebs!! I hope all of you had an excellent Christmas/holiday and I hope you have all successfully bribed Santa into bringing you extravagant gifts this year.

I shall return to update you all further.
But in the meantime... bed.

Suburbia! (without a car): Adventures in a Foreign Land

Internet, it has been a while since I have made my triumphant return to NYC. So why didn't I say anything about this? Well, the unfriendly reality is... finals are fast approaching and school has basically kept me from updating this blog for a few days. Actually, what really kept me from updating this blog was the fact that (like a true procrastinatrice) I got no work done over thanksgiving break. Why you might ask? Because I was once again, a naive fool. Let me explain. Being home in suburbia land and also being car-less is the equivalent of house arrest which usually leads to doing work purely because there is nothing else to do besides watch the wind blow leaves around in the backyard. Quality Entertainment just like the pilgrims had!

But this break... I spent entirely too much time outside in the freezing cold away from my beloved centrally heated house. It was actually sort of like the entire planet was scheming against my rare desire to be productive. Seriously, I'd be like, "Mama Raptress. I beg thee pardon for today I must study."
FOOLISH FOOL! She would snarl back at me. YOU HAVE RELATIVES IN CANADA YOU MUST VISIT.

Internet, I had no idea I had relatives in Canada-land. I would like to know why I have never been informed of this fact and why they have so conveniently popped up out of no-where. "And while we are in Canada," Mama Raptress continued, "We shall do things. TOURISTY THINGS."

I have to confess something here. I am so against doing touristy things because it will inevitably involve going to see Niagara Falls. Internet, I am tired of the falls. Sure it's an amazing landmark and you do gape at the massive drop for a bit but the novelty kind of wears off....oh about.....THE THOUSANDTH TIME YOU SEE IT. Internet, I have seen the falls in the spring, summer, fall, winter and without its underwear on. It has gotten to the point where the falls should really consider filing a restraining order against me for blatant voyeurism.

I should stop ranting about this however. The falls are quite nice (the first time), and if you get the chance to see it, do it from Canada-land as the view is much better from there. Around this time of the year,  they put up a bunch of Christmas lights to make the falls look more festive and less like a potential death trap. Pictures were taken by my new(!) camera and hopefully the quality has improved significantly for your enjoyment.

This is a shot of the falls when there were no lights shining on them and as you can see (or maybe not) there is a lot of water.

FESTIVE MULTICOLORED WATER!! Be amazed by the power of gravity!

I guess I should also mention something obligatory about the CN tower which we also saw.

Personally I have been desensitized to tall phallic buildings after spending 4 years in NYC.

I suppose it was kind of interesting meeting my relative in Canada-land, seeing the falls for the millionth time and seeing Disney shaped Christmas lights. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you: The highest form of entertainment in all of suburbia!!

Be awed.

Suburbia! (without a car): The Third Installment, Black Friday Madness

Though I am a few days behind in posting this, I would like to say a belated Happy Black Friday! I hope all of you survived shopping mall armageddon with minimal bruising or battle scars. For all my distaste for suburbia land, I will say one thing nice about it. Shopping Malls. Or on Black Friday, contained boxing rings. Everything that people say about humans being the most developed and civilized organisms on the planet goes straight to hell on Black Friday but at least in the suburbs, it stays inside one nice plot of land. Makes the clean up much easier or something.

Actually, I should be more specific so I don't make all of the denizens of Not New York, NY sound crazy. It's not the entire shopping mall that goes insane, just the people in electronics stores. It starts out kind of innocently, you know, you plan on buying all the marginally cheaper merchandise you need. You step inside though and you see the crazy mass of people who got up an hour earlier than you. That's when you start panicking because...what if..(horror of horrors) your future purchases aren't there anymore? THANKSGIVING WOULD BE RUINED! All those calories in your thighs were for nothing!! You start running over to the appropriate aisle, praying fervently your future stuff is still there. It's not. It's at this moment then that you're like  you're like screw the plans! I must buy anything that is cheaper than it was 24 hours ago. THAT IS THE ONLY WAY THANKSGIVING COULD STILL HAVE MEANING. (Of course you justify this by pretending they could be christmas presents or something)  And then later, since you've been already standing in a ridiculously long line, you start thinking...BUY EVERYTHING! KILL ALL WHO STAND IN THE WAY! And that Internet, is the stream-of-consciousness of someone who walked out of Best Buy on Black Friday with 3 unnecessarily large flat screen TV's.

On the other hand, I have finally retired my ancient grandpa camera with a new one which I ended up purchasing in my revised picture of hell: Best Buys run by the not-so-bright on Black Friday. Let me explain. I was pretty lucky and my camera was still there when I got to the mall. Not so luckily, there were already people there at 4AM and the line was MASSIVE. So far this is all sounding normal for Black Friday. Now, for the ridiculous part. There was only ONE cash register open for anyone purchasing cameras. ONE. I actually have no words for this. I'm struggling to find them but I can't. Instead, I present you with a visual of what my face may have looked like at that moment complete with inappropriate caption!

Suburbia! (without a car): The Holiday Installment

Dear American Internet, let me just say this:  Happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all ate mountains of food and passed out immediately afterwards due to a massive food coma. As my white great uncle said to me while helping himself to a large serving of lard (gravy), calories do not exist on thanksgiving. (yes, you read that right. white grand uncle.)

It was great eating home cooked food and red meat. Yes, red meat not turkey meat. Personally I don't like turkey and neither does anyone else in my family. Yes, turkey is an American tradition but does tradition have to taste so awfully bland and dry? That by the way was a rhetorical question. In any event, we decided we were going to be mavericks and eat roast beef instead. And let me tell you all, it was dericious. I will probably post pictures of this at some point in the future and write more on the topic but for now I need to return to bed. Food coma and early Black Friday shopping calls....

**Updates!! (As promised by my slacker self)

I guess I should say a few words about my actual thanksgiving dinner. This year, we actually had relatives come over. This may sound a little strange to the people who have friends and family over every thanksgiving. This is actually strange for my family partially because we live in the middle of nowhere of Not New York, NY where it snows until the end of April and a good time means driving in a car and admiring everyone else's Christmas decorations. I wish I was not kidding. Alright, I am exaggerating ever so slightly but the ratio of seriousness to kidding around borders on almost alarming. Anyway, so this year my great aunt and great uncle came over for thanksgiving and they brought with them.......

DOG!!! I love this dog. He is ridiculously well behaved and just like me will do all sorts of things for food especially if it is red meat. Just as long as it doesn't involve actually obeying any commands. His usual tactic is to follow you around if you are holding food and STARE YOU INTO SUBMISSION. You WILL give him the meat and he will certainly not sit for it. You will also leave thinking that he is a good boy. He is that good at manipulating the human mind.

This was our thanksgiving turkey cleverly disguised as a large hunk of roast beef prior to sticking it into the oven. I guess you can also see parts of my lovely kitchen stove. Let me tell you, that is a rare privilege. It usually runs away the second someone approaches with a camera.

AHEM. Internet, bear witness to the first appearance of an incredibly shady character. INTERNET SAY HELLO TO MY SISTER'S ARM AND TORSO. Talking about her will require a separate new blog post where all her infinite wisdom shall be shared undiluted by my own comparatively witless commentary.  This was our "turkey" coming out of the oven after being roasted in a fiery pit of flames for several hours. It is difficult to see this but the roast beef is actually sitting on top of a dish with a picture of a turkey on it. Blasphemy never tasted so good! Now although the picture hints at this, I have to mention that my thanksgiving dinner was schizophrenic. Half the dishes were American and the other half were Asian. Internet, although my taste cortex was overwhelmingly ecstatic with all the delicious food, my brain was confused because I'd be eating gravy one minute and then kimchee the next. All throughout dinner, it was screaming STOP THE CULTURAL KALEIDOSCOPE OR I SHALL FORCE YOU TO CONVULSE TO THE BEAT OF THRILLER ON YOUR FLOOR. I ignored that warning. The dog thought I was playing a game.

In all seriousness though, my mother cooks amazingly well and outclasses me in every basic cookery technique. Except for one. Like any true college student, I have mastered the art of boiling water to perfection and exploiting its many usages that range from making instant ramen to unclogging clogged toilets.

Suburbia! (without a car): The First Installment

Internet, this is just day one of my return to suburbia land. Already it has proven to be a most illuminating journey. I must share an important lesson with you that I learned today and it is this: Don’t ever leave the city. Actually, let me amend that. Even if you want to leave the city, THE CITY WILL NOT LET YOU. It’s like the kind of annoying boyfriend that clings to you when you least expect it. Kind of like a parasitic chewed up piece of gum on the underside of a school desk; you never know its there until you accidentally touch it. Actually, I have to admit that my analogy isn’t entirely correct. It’s not that the city doesn’t want you to leave, it just makes it exceedingly difficult to do so. So the correct analogy would really be the manipulative bastard boyfriend who hides your car key while you’re in the bathroom and then miraculously finds it after hours of fruitless searching. 

But once again, I can’t place the blame squarely on the city. No, it’s also partially fault of the sinister evil force that calls itself Amtrak. Let me back up for a moment here to explain something. Usually I go home by plane but because I was a huge slacker and only started looking for tickets 2 weeks before thanksgiving, price tags on plane tickets started looking more like the price tags on the Ipod touch pre Black Friday. Now to be economical, I decided this year would be the year to try new things. Amtrak and an eight-hour train ride home couldn’t possibly be so bad right? Oh the naïveté.

I think the day just started off poorly. I woke up and it was raining. Anyone who knows anything about living in NYC will know that it is close to impossible to get a taxi when it is raining. Its like everyone in the city is the Wicked Witch of the West’s cousin or something because the minute rain starts falling from the sky, everyone is inside a taxi avoiding the rain like it’ll melt their skin off. Or give them an STD. I don’t know. In any case it was a pain in the ass just trying to get to Penn Station while juggling all of meine luggage.

Once I actually got to Penn Station though, I thought my pilgrimage would be much smoother. Internet, that was stupid thought number 2. Penn station was pandemonium. People were running around like their underwear was on invisible fire. Now I am admittedly a noob when it comes to Penn Station. I have no idea where anything is in that ungodly underworld. Now despite the somewhat negative image outside people have of New Yorkers, they are generally a friendly industrious populace. Internet, today New York had its period or something because, holy crap, everyone was snarky. Even the people who could not possibly be on their period, namely Y chromosome carriers and the elderly, were PMSing like no tomorrow. Seriously, I just wanted to yell, ALL OF YOU STOP OVULATING.

When 1:15 rolled around, I was a happy camper. It meant I was going to FINALLY get on my train to suburbia. But then at the crucial moment when we should be starting to board… over the intercom I hear, “Ladies and Gentlemen, we apologize. There will be a one hour service delay for the train with service to not New York City, NY.” My articulate response: Fuck.  The retrospectively funny thing is that Amtrak never really gave us a reason for the delay, which makes me think it must be something either shady or hilarious. Maybe the train operator got drunk and they were giving him IV fluids to sober him up. Or maybe a passenger started freaking out about THE SLANTED TRAIN TRACKS AT YONKERS. (Seriously why the fuck are the train tracks at Yonkers so slanted?! Any more angled and it would not be an exaggeration to say that the train would have plunged into the water. )

Anyway, I was going to be a good sport about the delay. After all, everything from planes to parturition gets delayed and I was armed to the teeth with Nietzsche and Dan Brown. But you know who was not a good sport about the delay? The rest of Penn Station. You would think Amtrak just told everyone instead of tickets, they would require everyone’s first born child for boarding. Now I initially felt sorry for these Amtrak people….until it turned out that they were the ones ovulating the hardest. Ask them a question and you may as well have just asked for finger amputation surgery. You would think people in the service industry would have better manners but apparently, they also went to the same diplomacy school as my brain and famous alumnus Montgomery Burns.

To be continued when I am not so tired

Announcement!

Internet, I have an announcement to make. As usual, this year I will be leaving New York City so I can spend this Thanksgiving with the wonderful people who made my existence possible. I am of course talking about my father, Meta-Lincoln, and mother, Raptress Jesus.

Let me tell you, growing up with these two as parents was not an easy feat. I will however say, we never had arguments at home. Ever. I mean seriously, have you seen my father's mecha arm!? You disagree with the man and then all of a sudden there is a smoking hole in the wall an inch from where your face is. That kills your desire to argue faster than the time it takes for....I don't know... the stench of Abercrombie to reach your nose before you can even see the damn store. For those who are fortunate enough to not know what I am talking about....there is a new Hollister that opened fairly recently on Broadway. I swear, you can smell that place a block away because it is the one place in NYC that doesn't smell like cancer and urine of dubious origin. That arm is probably why I was such an awkward unsocialized child in high school. Seriously, try asking your friends to hang out at your house when your dad can blow off their knee caps for not bowing at the proper Confucian angle of inclination! Daddy taught me proper Asian manners....and by proper I mean proper for life in the Han Dynasty.
 
I am told that ordinarily when your dad is being unreasonable with you, most people go complain to their mothers, and say something in a super nasally voice like, "Mom.. Daddy's being unfair~" (aka. "WOMAN! KEEP YOUR MAN UNDER CONTROL!") I, however, never grew up with that luxury as my own raptress mother would snarl and snap incoherently at me. If you've never had a raptor threaten you, let me tell you it is a terrifying experience. Plus they have weird breath that no amount of floss, Listerine or Clorox will remove. Come to think of it though, living in constant fear as a child is probably why when I got to college my amygdala was like, "BWAHAHA FREEDOM!" thus dooming my sense of self preservation forever.

I am also of course, for the most part joking about my parents.(Prizes for whoever figures out which parts are true!!) I was raised by two extremely normal people and I'm sure being that they are normal, neither of them would take it as a compliment to have an entire blog post about them floating around the interwebs. Especially if that blog post happened to be written by Saiyan L. Maybe one day though, haha.

ANYWAY, my parents aside, I wanted to announce my mini blog series on life away from the city, away from college and the civilized world. I present to you: Suburbia!...(without a car). In other words, house arrest. Happy holidays to all!

Return From Azkaban

Internet, I declare my triumphant return! My return to being a lovable bum that is. No one is happier about this fact than my inner child who has once again gone rampant with the dopamine happiness laser beams which is a source of tremendous confusion for my amygdala because everything has stopped being so terrifying. That includes the NYC taxi driver who almost ran me over with his manic driving while I was walking home. I mean, the cab basically stopped abruptly in front of me, honked like a mad man and all I did was blink and then I continued talking to my mother on the telephone. Something is VERY off with my sense of self-preservation. Meanwhile, my inner Asian is rocking itself in the corner in its personal sandbox/Zen garden. The combined recklessness of my reckless lifestyle and reckless lack of studying is making it very anxious.

The past few days while I was neglecting my lovechild Blog, have been a oscillatory mix of awful and brilliant. My life is a freaking sine curve. It starts off at zero, and then progresses upwards and then just when you think your life could have a vertical asymptote, BAM! Your life goes plummeting down the drain along with the dubious contents of your toilet. Of course, once you've hit the lowest of low points, your life graph starts swinging up again, only to repeat the process ad infinitum. It's frustrating. I won't bore you with the details of the downs. Just know that it involved a broken phone that mysteriously worked only when I was within a foot of a Verizon Wireless Store, a fantastically well written essay on the importance of clinical equipoise, why the lateral geniculate nucleus is super special awesome and how the bubonic plague was actually spread across Europe by the vegetarian vampires from Twilight that fed on infected rats and the occasional human when they were too weak to resist temptation. YET ANOTHER REASON TO DISCOURAGE THEIR GROWING POPULARITY!

There were several highs this past week as well mostly from going to see a Dir En Grey play at the Gramercy Theatre on 23rd St. Internet, I rarely ever rave about my personal tastes. (Lies!) But to anyone reading my blog who has not heard of Dir En Grey, they are vis-kei/J-Rock band from the country that brings you high tech toilets for "your superior furushingu experience," disgustingly cute anime characters and perversions of disgustingly cute anime characters.

The toilet switchboard has more buttons on it than a primitive TV remote. But more importantly, look at the picture of that poor girl on the bottom left! SHE IS BEING ASPHYXIATED BY HER GINORMOUS BREASTS! We probably couldn't even hear her screaming because the sound is muffled by HER GINORMOUS BREASTS! Come to think of it... that may be the point. Ew. Moving right along.

Dir En Grey had an amazing concert in New York City and as always my crap extremely trustworthy camera that was excavated from an archaeological dig in South America ran out of batteries and so I resorted to using my phone to take pictures instead. I was fortunate enough to be sort of near the front. By fortunate, I mean I survived t he pushing and shoving of a throng of vicious fan girls who thought that the presence of an inch of space between people meant that they had enough room to squeeze their entire body into it in the attempt of getting closer to the stage. Maybe there would be enough space if these girls could liquefy themselves but I don't think the fan girls have evolved the power to exist only in two dimensions just yet. My amygdala does not like this idea.

At one point, a girl jammed her sweaty hand on my stomach. During songs she would try and claw her way in front of me using her fingers. Internet, I tolerated this shenanigans for about 30 seconds before screaming "ARE YOU SERIOUS?" in her ear. The hand disappeared so fast. By the way the screaming in the ear thing is not as cruel as it sounds because the music was so loud that we were all going to have permanent hearing loss by 35. Screaming was a required means of communication that just happened to be a bitchy indulgence. All in all, fans were surprisingly well behaved except for the ones who acted like if they got to the front, one of the band members would fall in love with them and take them away to some exotic island where they could live together forever speaking only in broken English loan words. I can picture the conversation now. Hunger would be indicated by "Hamubagaa!" The desire to stimulate the island's failing economy would be, "Shoppingu!" And if they felt like being festive and throwing a party they would just say "Meri Kurisumasu!" Scintillating!

Anyway, pictures. These are just 3 of the pictures I liked best of Die (guitarist) and Kyo (vocalist).

I would just like to point out 2 things.

1) Kyo (center and right) is standing on the equivalent of a rock star's milk crate.

2) THERE IS A GINORMOUS BLONDE HEAD.

That is all.

Edit: I lied. That was not all. If you would like to listen to one of my favorite songs by Diru click here

Halloween, where art thou?!

Internet, it has come and gone. By it, I could mean one of two things. The first possibility is my sanity which I fired back in the 1850's for being an absinthe drinking bum after its return from a vacation in Paris. The other is one of the few times of the year when furries can come out in their fursuit regalia and the ordinary world just thinks they just have far too much time on their hands. Prison escapees also spend this day looking much less conspicuously like prison escapees. Ladies and Gentlemen, I am talking, of course, about Halloween. Welcome to my several-days-late obligatory Halloween blog post.

Personally, I love-hate Halloween. It's one of those pseudo-holidays that cycles between awesome and terrible. See it was terrible at first when I was wayyy younger because I lived in a far away land that did not celebrate Halloween. It was only when I moved to Halloween celebrating territories later because of an series of events involving a oxygen harvesting crime syndicate and an air tank cartel that I singlehandedly took down at age three (long story), that I realized, not only did I get to play dress up...I GOT FREE CANDY FROM STRANGERS. Anyone who has gone to an anime convention with me knows that it is my personal mission to get as much free candy and other sweet stuffs from as many random people as possible. Internet, I know no shame when it comes to this. I have declared all out warfare on the entire cast of Axis Powers Hetalia because Italy refused to share his gelato with me.

Be ye not fooled by the extreme girlishness of this dubious "Italy" character. He is a male.  Evidently a severely bulimic male considering the girth of his waist and thighs in relation to the copious amounts of pizza, gelato and pasta he must surely ingest.

Anyway, going back to my mixed relationship with Halloween. Several hundred cavities after the first bite of free candy, you start to question your ways and you begin to think the unthinkable. Could I have outgrown Halloween?! (This is especially true when you are a pre-teen and you are desperate to prove to your parental units that you are all grown up and are quite capable of making adult decisions about adult things like mortgages, pre-nups and the cute boy next door.) The next few years of Halloween then become super lame because you spend it trying to prove to yourself for some godforsaken reason that you are above dressing up and getting candy.  If anyone reading this is still young and impressionable, let me save you a lot of time and worthless deliberation. YOU ARE NOT.

I finally came back to my senses this year. I started dressing up for Halloween again. Internet, some people need a 12 step plan to quit nicotine, my inner child needs one to quit costumes. Every time there is an occasion to put on a costume, my inner child starts firing dopamine happiness lasers at the rest of my cerebral cortex so that it is forced to shut up and be trapped hostage in an alien world of unicorns and sporadic dancing to Caramelldansen in a blonde wig fueled by a cocktail of Red Bull and Holy water.

But besides dressing up, there are other things that are fun about Halloween that can be appreciated by children ages zero to one thousand. The decorations! Some restaurants, for example, will put up some skulls, fake spiders and cobwebs to frighten their paying customers into paying the bill. It's a subliminal message. You see, the waiter or waitress will hand you your check, smile and say "Thank you" only what they're thinking is, PAY OR YOUR DECAYING FLESH SHALL FEED OUR FAKE SPIDERS.

Now Internet, I am going to be truthful for once. I don't like spiders. I'm not afraid of them persay, but I just don't like them. I don't trust anything that can still sorta hobble after you hack off a leg or three. This threat is very effective on me. But this year, I went to a restaurant with a friend of mine and found this:

If you couldn't tell and once again I would be surprised if you could because my camera is as old as a trilobite fossil... there is a black BIC pen hanging on the cobweb. As if my dislike of spiders weren't enough, now even the pens masquerading as terrifying Halloween paraphernalia are going to haunt me in my sleep.

Sleeping and Vampires

Bah. Sleep. Who needs it anyway right? Internet, this week marks a new low for me. I already get barely enough acceptable amounts of sleep as it is but this week may just take the cake with a calculated average of 3 hours of sleep a night for the past 4 days. By the way, what the hell does the phrase 'take the cake' actually mean anyway? I mean, who is taking all the delicious cake and more importantly why is that person not me? What is this injustice?! I would like to suggest that in the future, if anyone wants to use delicious cake to prove a point, I will be the designated taker. My stomach will gladly take it off your hands. As a hint, I really like strawberries and cheesecake. Mmmmm.....

That picture is a outstanding representation of how energetic I feel right now. Every cell in my body, is screaming TAURINECOCAINECAFFEINE!! Especially the dark circles. They're screaming the loudest. They must have cell megaphones or something.

By the way, while I am sharing with all of you, the hidden joys of sleep deprivation, my brain is jabbing me furiously in the pain cortex. It wishes to express its sincere displeasure. But you know what?  I am cool with my brain doing that. I am all for bodily democracy because I believe in organ autonomy and organ rights. However, I wish my brain would at least initiate polite conversation instead of making my right knee cap feel like someone is slow roasting it in a concoction of 14M hydrochloric acid, 98% alcohol, zinc over a solid state palladium catalyst and Brisk lemon tea. Admittedly, I am not a diplomat and my idea of diplomacy is "stop bitching and call me in the morning anytime after 2pm" but when someone says something you don't approve of, shouldn't you at least talk it out first? Compromise over some English tea and biscuits? Well apparently, my brain forgot that lesson and decided to go straight for a pre-emptive strike on my by-standing knee cap. I think my brain graduated from diplomacy school alongside its colleagues Stalin, Mr. Burns, Kim Jong Il and Kanye West.

But I do have to admit that for my complaining about my brain's complaining, it's not entirely wrong.
I googled all the side effects of not sleeping and have compiled a list of symptoms which I have listed here for your viewing pleasure and or educational benefit. At the top of the list: Tiredness due to increasing sleep debt. You know how literary folk often write flowery sentences like,"the graceful placement of her favorite fresh cut daffodils on the linen tablecloth calmed the resentment disrupting her mind and replaced it with feelings of quiet joy" when they really mean, "There are flowers on the table. Girl decides to quit her bitching"? The statement "tiredness due to increasing sleep debt" is a scientist's way of saying, "you are sleepy when you have not slept." Can I just say...best discovery EVER? Other obvious symptoms include constant yawning and declining ability to concentrate or focus. I think this list is pretty accurate but the good science folk missed a few key symptoms.

For instance, the most common side effect is a sudden inexplicable dislike of all things cute and perky. This includes baby pandas and baby carrots because they are evil. You may also experience an irrational fear of the muffin man. But most significantly in the extreme cases of sleep deprivation, you come to realize that it is perfectly okay if you never find true love because your soul mate and personal Disney have been combined into one irrationally beautiful mattress, comforter and pillow set.

<3 I LOVE YOU <3 *insert high pitched fangirl squeal*

Anyway, despite all these shenanigans, I have to say that I am amazingly functional with little sleep and my days and nights have actually been reversed. This made me realize something. On top of being a secret Saiyan as well as a cake eating detective, I must also be a secret vampire. Not one of those Stephenie Meyer monstrosities that sparkle in the light like a drag queen's tacky sequin dress. I mean, the badass ones that die when you stick a stake through their hearts. Just like everything else. But don't assume I dislike everything about Twilight (only about 99% of it). There is one part of the Twilight verse that I like because according to Meyers, my eyes are not dark because I am Asian. So screw Mendel and his pea plants, MY eyes are dark because I am a starving vampire. RAWR.

2 Bad 2 Incomprehensible

Internet, it's that time again. I have a Microbiology exam and a Logic exam in 2 days and as I don't yet feel sufficiently screwed enough to make myself study... It is time to do what I do best. Procrastinate.
Actually, I am lying slightly when I said I wasn't doing anything productive. You see, I was studying prior to this post until the song "Tokyo Drift" by the Teriyaki Boyz started playing on my ipod.
I have no idea what possessed me to put that song on my ipod, but I am terribly ashamed of having it there for two reasons. Number one, any artist or band who still think its cool to misspell things like 'boys' on purpose are terribly mistaken. They must be slapped. That stopped being cute around the time when typing LiEk Th!s stopped being cute. Actually it stopped being cute the nanosecond someone came up with the idea. Secondly, Teriyaki Boyz? Really? Do you really need to name your band something that makes it sound like a cheap fast food chain that sells mediocre Japanese food but still pretends to be culturally relevant because you serve green tea instead of water as the default beverage?

Alright, so I'm just kidding around. Mostly. I'm feeling generous. So I'm going to give the Teriyaki Boys (yes Boys, not Boyz) the benefit of the doubt. I'm going to pretend that at their launch party, when they electronically submitted a request to Kinkos for banners and posters, they accidentally hit 'z' instead of 's' and then clicked submit.  To this day they probably rue that moment. I like this explanation. It lets me think that they aren't purposely trying to look stupid.

Having said all that, to their credit, Tokyo Drift is an extremely catchy song but it has one fatal flaw. I have no idea what the hell they are saying. Before anyone points out the obvious here, I do realize the song is mostly in Japanese and my rudimentary Japanese doesn't help with comprehension BUT I maintain that I should at least understand the English parts of the song. I can't. So what did I do? I looked up the song lyrics on google. Now keep in mind this is the first result that pops up on google.

Apparently, I am not the only one who has trouble with this song.

Awkward Introduction

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And Now, Legality

To butcher a Jane Austen quote, it is a truth universally acknowledged that in every college class there must be one poor bastard who shows up looking slightly more ridiculous than usual. You will immediately recognize these people because they will usually meet one or a mix of the following criteria:

1) Disheveled or unwashed hair
2) Mismatched clothing
3) Smeared make up (Now applies to both boys and girls!)

However, what immediately gives these people away is the reek of last night that follows them around like a unwanted cloud of perfumed ass and beer.  E'au de yesterdays mistakes. Sounds like a best seller! So when these delightful people are around, you go to class, but really, its like you're going to a bar instead which explains your sudden unexplainable urge to drink apple martinis.

Usually I watch these people from afar but Internet today, I was that person. When I got up this afternoon the first thing I thought was the fundamental question asked by inebriated college students everywhere: WHY is it so difficult to stand up? That should have been the sign to stay at home. I did not stay at home. Being a super awesome Asian I actually went to class. Nothing can stand in the way of getting an education! Even if that obstacle is me! Funny thing is, I was delusional enough to think maybe no one would notice if I tried really hard to look presentable. WRONG. I should have realized this when the guy I sat next to started to slowly migrate his belongings to the next seat over.

At this point you may be thinking... Today is Columbus Day so you shouldn't have had class you lying verbose Jezebel! So let me first clear up that misunderstanding by explaining how NYU operates.

On the rare occasion that NYU peeks its nose up from bookkeeping its growing real estate business and remembers its secondary venture as an educational institution, NYU goes, 'Oh shit! We actually have to fulfill a quota of school days to receive our tax benefits!' They then presumably looked at the calendar and made a youtube worthy 'Oh Fuck' face because they realized...they were short by just one day. What can be done to remedy this terrible situation?!

Now this is how I imagine this went down. In a giant conference room with an obnoxiously long oak table that seats twenty people, two men went through a master list of solutions. Now they can't exactly add one more day before Christmas because we already have exams until Christmas Eve's Eve. So they realized...if the only reason class would not be held is because of holidays, the only solution is to ERASE A HOLIDAY. Now the issue is.... which one? Thanksgiving? Columbus Day? Christmas? Ah,  the decisions!

I think we can all see how it went from there. They couldn't get rid of Thanksgiving because that would be un-American and un-patriotic. Both of these things are very bad for NYU's future presidential campaign. NYU 2010! No longer just a graduating class! They couldn't get rid of Christmas /Hanukkah/ Kwanzaa because all hell fire would be unleashed because then no one would be home to receive presents! Or observe the religious event whichever euphemism for "we don't want to work for a week" works better.  So really, by simple process of elimination, Columbus Day got the axe. They wouldn't say that though. They'd credit it to going green somehow.

The Eve Before Legality

I don't know how time has managed to pass so quickly but it needs to stop so I can think for a minute. I need a twix moment. Internet, I am turning 21 in approximately one hour and seven minutes. It's 10:53 pm EST). 21!! That means I've been alive (presumably doing something significant) for over two decades now!! Insanity! Maybe someone will give me a Nobel Prize in Medicine/Physiology for my extraordinary efforts in hoping to discover the cure to cancer by my third decade. And maybe they'll give me one for all the extraordinary effort I put into being the bundle of joy that I am. They can call that the Prize for Badassery. I don't know about the necessary qualifications but hey it sounds just about as legitimate as the Nobel Prize for Literature. Burn. Haha, I kid. I love to read but I just can't imagine the conversations the nominees at the committee must have. The science people would be like: "So, I discovered a new target for retroviruses so we can develop more advanced drugs to treat HIV/AIDS. Why are you here?" And the literature people would be like..."Oh...I'm here because I write real pretty and stuff. Yeah..." And then there would be a huge awkward silence and everyone would make excuses to leave like, "Oh this conversation was delightful but I think that plant over there is puking. I should go hold its hair back so it doesn't get vomit on its new black dress." and then pretend that exchange never happened.

ANYWAY, to get back on topic. 21. You know what? I never make a huge sentimental deal about birthdays but for some reason this one felt slightly different. Mostly because as I was doing my Logic homework, I had this realization that after today, I could never again enjoy the delights of an illegally purchased drink. The things I used to take for granted! After I realized that, I just had to have one last one for old times sake. Sort of like Jesus's last supper only on a much smaller but equally significant scale. You see, Jesus had a last dinner with his disciples to spread on final words of wisdom. This last drink is the equivalent of telling my liver with tears glistening in my eyes, 'Man, you and I, we go back. You were there for me when I needed you the most when my ear became an alcoholic. Thanks for all your hard work. I love you man.' and my liver would smile politely and do a terrorist fist bump with me but secretly be thinking, 'I need a new host ASAP.' And next thing I know, I'll see ads for liver transplants on Adsense. My liver is the Judas of my body.

So, here it is in all of its improperly focused glory ladies and gentlemen. The final drink. Picture taken courtesy of my terrible camera.

In case you couldn't tell (I would be surprised if you could), its a bottle of grape flavored soju. I was convinced for a while that this thing was not in fact alcohol and that the world was playing a practical joke on me because it tasted uncannily like Grape Fanta. Only when the familiar sleepiness kicked in did I realize... I was a fool for doubting! So today I bid farewell to the rush of adrenaline you get as you walk up to purchase alcohol at the counter. Farewell to the days of praying that I looked older than my 14 year old face. Today I say a fond farewell to the days of being 20.

Anatomy of a Phail Poster

Ahhh... the fire alarm. I forgot how they consistently alert me of my impending death by burning. The only problem is, in college more often than not, they're just overzealous bastards who just want to remind me that they still exist. They're like the Jack Russell Terriers in the world of electronic devices. You know, you stop paying attention to them for just a second and BAM! You have to start shopping for a new couch. Only instead of eating your couch, the fire alarm starts screaming at you and you just stand there blankly, wondering where you went wrong. NYU's fire alarms are particularly obnoxious. Not only are they freaking loud, they also have some added strobe light effect that kind of makes you feel like you're at a club. A weird anti-club where everyone's trying to get the hell out.

Anyway, the fire alarm went off a few days ago. Not too bad really, except that it was at 5 in the fucking morning. Adding to my displeasure, it was the morning of my neuroscience exam. Since I wasn't fully awake, I acted in a rather Pavlov-ian manner. I grudgingly got up and scrambled around for my glasses to evacuate the building. It was right around when I had my hand on the door handle that my brain started functioning properly. In addition to the alarm screaming, my own brain was now screaming WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING? GET BACK TO BED RIGHT THIS INSTANT!  And so I did. I recklessly returned to bed. I figured if this fire were real, someone would tell me. Or something like that.

Anyway the morning after the fake fire I found this curiosity posted to the wall by the elevator.

This poster is actually rather interesting and I think it merits a few minutes of time to contemplate its meaning.  First, what on earth does that last line mean? "Thanks for being such good sports last night." What was there to be a good sport about? If we didn't escape the building, we would have died in the non-existing fire. So if they really mean, "Hey guys, its nice to see that none of you want to burn to death...KEEP IT UP!" then yes, I agree. Self preservation is a good quality to have though apparently I lack that quality.

 As a final point, I'm confused by that rather interesting picture of a snowman holding a flaming broom. Is that supposed to represent us college students? Because if it is...what is NYU saying about its students? Is it A) that we are creepy snowmen with arsonist tendencies? Or B) Snowmen expressing surprise and cursing our lack of foresight while watching the alarming rate at which the flame is moving down the broom close to our equally flammable twig arms?  Thought provoking? I thought so.

A Semi-Return to Reality

I meant to post something sooner but never got around to it until now. So why now on a random Tuesday 2am? The answer is simple. I have a neuroscience exam in two days. So by the laws of procrastination and self indulgence, I am now blogging away happily. Now don't assume that I don't feel guilty about not studying. There is a part of my brain that just wants to be a good industrious Asian student and I think it is sobbing loudly into a Kleenex in the background. I say I think, because I'm honestly not too sure. You see, I have terrible hearing due to centuries of alcohol and heroin abuse which eventually landed me in ear-rehab and started my love-hate relationship with electroshock therapy. It was a very dark moment in my life and I don't want to elaborate on it too much. The point is, I won't be able to hear the crying until 12 hours before the exam. So until then, it doesn't exist! Denial is a beautiful thing.

Hire me PLZ!

Internet, you know what? I came to college thinking that I would leave 4 years later with a degree in Biology. Now for the most part, I have exceeded my plans by also finishing minors in Chemistry and Philosophy. However, I realized today that that wasn't all. Being a massive overachiever, I have also added a new area that I think I can safely call myself an expert in: unclogging toilets.

You would figure that with all the tuition I have to pay, NYU would be able to afford some decent toilets that don't take unionized breaks on the order of say...every 15 flushes but apparently, I was being hopelessly naive and I thank NYU for correcting my elitist toilet standards.
I have seriously found myself actually testing the damn contraption before using it. It is that bad.
It is an awful situation and this is the second dorm that I've lived in where we've had this problem and I've only lived in three dorms. So to all the people who like numbers, that's 66.6%! A shockingly high number in politics. Toilet politics.

Anyway, now what is truly awful is when other people leave it clogged and they don't tell you about it because then you get a shit flood. Let me tell you, that is a fucking nightmare in a bathroom that is about the size of a pathetically sized closet. I've decided I'm sick of this so being the resourceful college student that I am, I started watching youtube videos of people using every method possible to fix toilets without actually buying a plunger which then turned into a delightful detour of laughing at other people's misfortunes. I can feel (smell?) the bad karma already.

The point is, I am now an expert at fixing toilets. So if you know anyone who needs to hire someone with a major in Bio who can also make you feel that much more at ease about the perils of using the bathroom, let me know.



And also, I realized, this is the first blog post I have written and I have chosen to write about toilets. I am classy.