cindy's world

When I was a lot younger (like in junior high), my mom told me that the human mind is a remarkable thing. “Have you noticed,” she said, “When you’re asleep and you really have to pee, in your dreams you will run into all kinds of problems in finding a toilet, so you CAN’T pee? Like you can’t find a bathroom. Or when you finally could, all the stalls are taken and there’s a huge line. When you finally find a stall that’s empty, turns out the door’s jammed and you can’t get in. And then the toilet seat cover won’t come up. All sorts of bizarre things will happen to prevent you from peeing because your brain, on some level, knows that you are really asleep so it won’t let you pee.”

I told her that I’d never dreamt I had to pee urgently, because if I had to pee that badly, I’d wake up and run to the bathroom and pee. She said, “Watch, one day you’re gonna have a dream like that and notice that.”

Very soon thereafter, I was indeed asleep when I had to pee. But my dream immediately opened up with me already ON the toilet seat, pants down, ready to pee. I thought, “I shouldn’t pee, I should wake up.” And then I remembered what my mom said. “Oh, wait. I’m not gonna be ABLE to pee. Let’s see what happens in the dream if I’m not able to pee.” So I relaxed and pushed a little.

And wet my bed.

I woke up in a huff as soon as the first drops hit and angrily stormed off into the bathroom to clean myself. And to pee. My mom lost some credibility that night.

After work today, Vanessa and I hooked up to assemble James’ belated birthday present. I’d sent out an evite last week to James’ friends to meet up for a belated birthday dinner on Wednesday evening at Taps Fish House & Brewery. Vanessa and I figured we’d go above and beyond the hostessing of this event by making him a basket of treats, too. Here are some clues as to what we assembled for him.

* There’s a magazine in the collection. To help with his…”hobby.” He probably wouldn’t read it for the articles, tho.
* We included a bottle of performance-enhancing supplements.
* A rapid hand-jerking back-and-forth motion is required to take full advantage of some of the goodies.
* There’s wood involved.
* There are many little packets that you tear open to use the contents.
* There are lots of products meant to make you swell. Real big. And hard. Like a real man.
* Some products may result in frothy, milky fluid production.
* There’s plastic to wrap the wood in.
* We even included a cloth to put around the hips, you know, to catch the drippage.
* There are multiple single-use packages of long items for inserting into moist holes.

We can’t wait to present this big collection of goodies to James! We know he could use it! We just regret that we couldn’t get the inflatable sheep, but it’s on backorder. 🙁

Happy Monday! This is from an email forward I received today.

~ * ~
Last week was my birthday and I didn’t feel very well waking up on that morning.

I went downstairs for breakfast hoping my wife would be pleasant and say, “Happy Birthday!”, and possibly have a small present for me.

As it turned out, she barely said good morning, let alone “Happy Birthday.”

I thought… Well, that’s marriage for you, but the kids…. They will remember.

My kids came bounding down stairs to breakfast and didn’t say a word. So when I left for the office, I felt pretty low and somewhat despondent.

As I walked into my office, my secretary Ann said, “Good Morning Boss, and by the way Happy Birthday!” It felt a little better that at least someone had remembered.

I worked until one o’clock, when Ann knocked on my door and said, “You know, it’s such a beautiful day outside, and it is your birthday, what do you say we go out to lunch, just you and me.”
I said, “Thanks, Ann, that’s the greatest thing I’ve heard all day. Let’s go!”

We went to lunch. But we didn’t go where we normally would go. She chose instead a quiet bistro with a private table. We had two martinis each and I enjoyed the meal tremendously.

On the way back to the office, Ann said do, “You know, it’s such a beautiful day… We don’t need to go straight back to the office, do we?”

I responded, “I guess not. What do you have in mind?”

She said, “Let’s drop by my apartment, it’s just around the corner.”

After arriving at her apartment, Ann turned to me and said, “Boss, if you don’t mind, I’m going to step into the bedroom for just a moment. I’ll be right back.”

“Ok,” I nervously replied.

She went into the bedroom and, after a couple of minutes, she came out carrying a huge birthday cake, followed by my wife, my kids, and dozens of my friends and co-workers, all singing “Happy Birthday.”

And I just sat there…

On the couch…

Naked.

I know it’s a negative Asian stereotype to say we squat, but here are some photos I discovered in Mr. W’s laptop alone…

At a park local to my work, one lunchtime, July 2006:

In San Simeon, July 2006:

Around San Simeon Pines Lodge, July 2006:

more beachside later that day:

At the Huntington Library & Botanical Gardens, hunting for turtles, October 2006:

In Hawaii, a cliffhanger squat from behind, November 2006:

WHY are there so many photos of me squatting?!
At least I’m not *really* squatting here:

Here’s what I look like when I’m NOT squatting:

Just thought this was funny cuz Mr. W handed a guy (brotha’ from Philly, early 20s, on vacay in Oahu) the camera so he can take a photo of US in front of Diamondhead. Here’s what he took:

You all know about my hidden captions, right?

Phone: ring, ring.
Cindy: *whispering* Department E.
Mr. W: Oh, you’re still messing around over there?
Cindy: *whispering* I’m not messing around! We’re still on the record in trial. I’m working. There’s a difference.
Mr. W: I’m about to go home. You coming over right after you get out?
Cindy: *pause*
Mr. W: Hello? Are you coming over?
Cindy: *whispering* Actually, I was gonna go home, even tho I have no reason to…
Mr. W: You have no reason to go home, or no reason to come over?
Cindy: *whispering* Well, both. ha, ha.
Mr. W: I’m not enough of a reason?
Cindy: *whispering* A Riesen is a candy caramel coated with chocolate.
Mr. W: Oh. Well, I can stop by Rite-Aid and get a bag of Riesens. And then I can give them to you, and that way you’ll have a whole bunch of Riesens. But you’ll have to come here to get ’em.
Cindy: *giggling* So you’ll give me lots of Riesens to go over there? *looking up in alarm* *whispering* Oops.
Mr. W: *laughing* Yeah. I’ll see you over here.
Cindy: *whispering* Okay.

I got my 2007 Houston Fire Fighters calendar today! Whoooooooo!

Uh. I mean, I got my receipt for my $18 donation to the Houston Fire Fighters Burned and Crippled Children’s Fund in the mail today. *side glance*

I let my reporter open the envelope to brighten her day. The result was a hearty suggestion from her, “Let’s all move to Houston and start a fire!” Yeah, bonfire in a hay barn! Let’s roast marshmallows! You’re all invited!

You know how the Brothers Grimm’s fairy tales are so…50’s? Poor abused and neglected pauper girl gets swept off her feet by a prince who sees the “true beauty” behind the dirt and marries her and pays off her credit card debt and she’s spoiled forevermore? Made you wish you had a guy to clean up after you, huh? Of course that’s not real, that’s a fairy tale!

I got this updated version via email yesterday:

~ * ~

World’s Shortest Fairy Tale

Once upon a time, a guy asked a girl, “Will you marry
me?” The girl said “No” and she lived happily ever
after and went shopping, drank martinis with friends,
always had a clean house, never had to cook, had
closet full of shoes and handbags, stayed skinny, and
was never farted on.

The End

~ * ~

I was rifling through my CDs at work and was surprised to find a CD-Rom where I’d saved, among other things, old photos that were on my last work computer. I looked through them and wanted to post this series, cuz I forgot how funny they are. Rest mouse pointer over photos for captions!

This is me with the Northern Cal gang at some beach up there for Wilco’s July 4, 2005 barbeque. I never remember what beach it is. I wanna say Santa Barbara, but I think that’s wrong. Santa Cruz? Some UC town.

Brad discovers that Diana had fallen asleep on the beach blanket.

Brad and Jen take advantage of the perfect opportunity to beat Diana up.

The slaughter continues.

Tah-dah! Jen’s declared the winner over a knocked-out Diana.

Brad takes the camera so I can get in on the action, too. Jen and I help BBQ utensils reach their full potential.

We didn’t have a flag, so we had to claim Diana as our conquered land with a beach umbrella. Diana wakes up just in time to protest before our big plunge.

This is what happens when people hang out with me. Ensuing antics. Photographic evidence.

Dodo was audacious last nite. Twice, he tried to go onto my super duper expensive chenille La-Z-Boy, causing me to yell, which in turn caused him to dart off with a guilty “rawr!” and settle down on the carpet. Twice, I walked into my bedroom to find him lounging in the middle of my bed. The boy knows he’s not supposed to be on furniture! As it is I let him hang out on the backs and arms and the middle section of the tri-sectional couch (which I will be soon rid of as I take over my parents’ cream leather couch). So in the middle of the night, feeling bad for the forlorn looking kitty gazing at me with wide round eyes, I got my sacrificial chenille sweater, folded it up, and put it on the floor next to my bed. He happily took that over, kneaded it while purring loudly, and slept on it like it were a pillow. So I got my little taste of heaven around 4am. The cat’s purrs dissolved into the increasing volume of a rainfall. Thus were the sounds around me as I was lulled into a deep comfortable sleep, curled up between flannel sheets underneath a heavy cotton Chinese comforter. As I drifted, I pictured all my neglected plants and flowers happily drinking up rainwater. I’m sure I smiled in my sleep.

That is, until the stupid nightmare where I dreamt I was on a large ship to go to China, and somehow my family was also on the cruise, and during the family banquet, Mr. W was missing and I was thinking he didn’t want to do the formal banquet so he must be enjoying the gambling floor or something in his sloppy clothes. I called Jordan to tell her to put on her formal dress and to invite her to the banquet, and when she picked up, she said hello and presumed I’d called looking for Mr. W, and I heard a shuffle as she handed him the phone! I demanded why the hell he wasn’t at the banquet, that’s the whole reason we’re on this freaking cruise, and he said because he’d wanted to see San Pedro and apparently, Jordan was on her way out to explore San Pedro and so he just went along with her. I was livid. (I also didn’t even know we were docked at San Pedro.) I yelled at him so loud that I had to leave the banquet hall to avoid the curious looks from other guests, and I walked out into the hallway and yelled so loud THERE that I got more looks.

This morning, I’m mad at Mr. W and at Jordan. Hmmph! Of course, Jordan can redeem herself by posting on her blog so that we can have something new to read. 🙂

Mr. W and I went to my parents’ newly remodeled house on Sunday evening to help them put away a few things and do some finishing touches, paint touch-ups, etc. The place is amazing, by the way. They ripped up all the carpeting in the house and put down either marble or rich deep floorboards. All countertops, sinks, toilets, tubs were redone; all tiles in the restrooms are new and very artistic. Each bedroom and bathroom has a new color and design scheme. The windows were replaced and the blinds have been removed with French wood shutters put in their place.

While I was up in my parents’ new bedroom upstairs lining shelving paper inside their drawers and cabinets (we are still Asian, after all), I saw that they have a new state-of-the-art glass digital scale. I stepped on it and it registered 127.9. I was not happy with that reading, so I dragged the scale into the bathroom, closed the door, and proceeded to lose weight. I peed myself dry, shed the clothes, and then stepped back on the scale. 125.9. There, that’s an acceptable number! Satisfied, I got dressed and came back out, and bumped into my mom in her bedroom. Sheepishly, I told her I just weighed myself. She said she was going to weigh herself, too. I put the scale down on the ground, and she stepped on. Immediately, she stepped off and handed me a small pair of scissors she’d been using to cut the contact paper. She stepped back on. I laughed at her, and confessed what I’d done in the bathroom. She said, “It’s okay, your dad does that, too!”

Genetics are strong, I tell ya.