cindy's world

When talking about visiting SeaWorld, what most commonly comes to mind is the world-famous killer whale, Shamu. Here is the new killer whale show, “Believe”:

I’m not sure if this is Shamu or Baby Shamu, but I like the unique bent top dorsal fin.

You know the first 12 rows of these shows are labeled the “Soak Zone?” Here’s why:

Take a bow, the show is over!

Guess where we were seated:

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At Jordan’s request, here’s a photo of me in the tiara that I was vacuuming in a couple of nights ago. This photo is from my surprise birthday party thrown by my coworkers.

They ACTUALLY put 30 candles on the cake. Took me 2 breaths to blow ’em out.
Photo courtesy of coworker Sandy.

First off, I’d like to apologize for your stumbling on such a grotesque photo. I’m sorry. But I had to post this. Sorry, also, for the stupid elastic band line around my waist, and the underwear line on my lower hip.

Those of you who shop at Asian merchandise stores may be aware of metal hula hoops covered with a light layer of colorful foam — hoops that are so large and so heavy that the claim is loss of inches from your waist as you revolve it around your body. My mother fell victim to such a lame purchase.

So you already know I visited my parents over the weekend. While there, I saw the bright colors peeking out from behind the loveseat in the living room and could not resist hula-ing. My mother showed up after a few minutes of my “ow, ow, ow”ing spinning this heavy hoop around my waist. “That’s too easy for you,” she noted, “You should turn around in a circle or stand on one foot or jump.” I did all three. With the hoop still revolving painfully around me, I made the poor decision to listen to the last suggestion made by my mom to move the hoop up and down on my body. I let it drop to my hips and instead of rolling easily, it instead skipped over the part of my lower abdomen where there’s a slight concave before the protrusion of my hip bone, and it banged straight into my hip bone, twice. “OW!” I said and stopped the hula hoop. My hip hurt the rest of the evening. This morning, I noted it was still tender to the touch, and could see a slight pink discoloration. At the gym at lunchtime, the bruise had become visibly light purplish in some areas. Just now, I looked again and here’s what it’s become in a period of 24 hours:

The blood had to seep through a layer of rippling lower abdominal muscles (HAHAHA) and an even thicker layer of fat to show up underneath the skin as this blotch. That’s a lot of blood. As I was complaining about feeling like my left ovary is falling out, my bailiff said that people are gonna think Mr. W beat me. I told him, “Who’d beat someone on their freakin’ HIP BONE?” Mr. W, when I told him about my bailiff’s comment this evening, said, “Who’d believe your lame story about getting that bruise from a HULA HOOP? Of course they’re gonna think I beat you.”

Maybe we should re-evaluate all those presumed victims of domestic violence and their presumed phony stories of getting a black eye from running into the wall, or falling down stairs, or from hitting their face against a door knob.

I gave Mr. W a Motorola Razr V3 for his bday, which led to much of the weekend spent with him playing with his phone via his laptop via the Bluetooth connection. He transferred address book entries, downloaded and cropped MP3s to transfer to his cell via Bluetooth to use as ring tones, transferred photos he took while in Alaska and some from Disneyland to use as caller ID tags or phone wallpapers. Such is the life when one dates a techie. I’m happy he’s enjoying the features on his new phone, even tho it did bring about a slew of cussing about the defects of networking. Well, that was bday present #1. Bday present #2 is a 2-day pass to Sea World. We’re going this Saturday. Luckily, the 2 days don’t have to be used consecutively, so we have until the end of May next year to go again. I’m really looking forward to Shipwreck Rapids floating river ride, R.L. Stine’s Haunted Lighthouse 4-D show, and the Journey to Atlantis water coaster ride. I’m only slightly concerned with getting my stuff wet. My bailiff, who went to Sea World this past Saturday and brought me back a map and schedule, suggested I just bring a plastic Ziploc bag to hide the camera and electronics in when necessary. Mr. W gets to play with his new camera and maybe, just maybe, we’ll have photos as impressive as Jordan’s (who recently went to the Sea World in Florida).

For the life of me, I can’t remember what we did on Saturday, but on Sunday, we went to an amazing champagne brunch at the Anaheim White House with the very generous gift certificate that Navy Girl Vanessa gave me when she moved out of my house. We’d never been there before, but the food and presentation were so impressive that he said, “How do I get rich so I can eat like this all the time?”

And then after brunch, Mr. W and I went to visit my parents, where we hung out for like 7 hours before going out to a Taiwanese dinner with them. Yummy greasy “street” food! Ah, childhood memories…

Last nite, I redeemed Karen’s birthday dinner offer. I met up with her at her Santa Monica apartment, so that I could also visit Dozer…

who is my cat Dodo…
‘s older brother.
Scottish Fold cats are very inbred and therefore have genetic vulnerability to many health problems. Don’t make me get into them. We love the Do-brothers, as Karen called them once. The above are the 2 most recent photos taken of the brothers, thru my new cameraphone. (rest mouse over the cats to make them chase it! just kidding, it’ll just bring out a caption.)

We had dinner at a new Spanish tapas restaurant called Tasca in Beverly Hills. Her best friend Jose of nearly 2 decades met up with us there. The chemistry between the two of them is hilarious. They are so night-and-day, but so in sync, that they totally play off each other. The earliest example I can think of is when Karen wore a Windex T-shirt to school in high school, and Jose happened to be wearing a plain white T-shirt. They looked at each other, and Jose took a big marker and drew a window on the front of his T-shirt. And the two walked around together all day like that. (I may have gotten the details on that story confused, so feel free to correct me, Karen.) Anyway, dinner was fun and delicious. We all took turns ordering small plates, and ended up sharing something like 7 small plates and 2 desserts. The Argentinian owner was very nice and service-oriented. Karen assured him we’d be back.

Thanks for the birthday dinner, Karen!

Mr. W assembled a really amazing slideshow with special effects and rotating photos and Louis Armstrong singing “When You Wish Upon A Star”, with the photos he took (and doctored on an advanced version of Photoshop) of my 30th at Disneyland’s 50th. I’ve got a CD-Rom for everyone who attended, but here are some random photos. It’s really too bad I was bloated that day, but it was so hot I couldn’t wear enough fabric to cover up…
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Bet you can’t tell that Sandy and Alex (white t-shirts in the middle, top row) were photoshopped in from another photo:

That tattoo was not on my arm. It was photoshopped in from an image at the entrance to the building of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride:

Yes, we spent money on Pirates headgear. Sandy’s cowboy hat and my tiara was a gift from Sandy’s boyfriend, and my Pirate Princess mouse ears hat was a gift from Mr. W:

Vicky’s wearing a San Diego Rock-n-Roll Marathon ’06 t-shirt. Thanks for your support for her very first marathon, ever! Ignore all the pink I happen to have on, I swear I’m not normally a “pink” person. The rude Happy Bunny tank, a gift from Vanessa, says “A makeover? You should be run over.”

Some of us walking. All of us drenched after Splash Mountain. Everyone in this photo is with the group:

We’d separated, and Mr. W and I went exploring on Tom Sawyer’s Island. Here is some other portions of the group riding Tom and Huck’s raft to get to the Island:

Me waiting at the shore to greet them on the Island:

Ah, the many variations of headgear. Mark got me the paper birthday hat that has another set of pop-out Mickey ears. So in that photo, I had 6 ears. “I have many (y)ears on me ‘cuz I just turned 30,” I told people. It was a very good day. =)

I had a great time at Disneyland! Mr. W and I got there right when the park opened at 8a; the crowd was thin, and we (along with my gym trainee and her son) managed to hit all the rides we’d wanted to in 45 minutes, i.e. the revised Pirates of the Caribbean, Indiana Jones Adventure, revised Space Mountain, and Buzz Lightyear’s laser shoot-at-targets ride.

REVIEWS: The Pirates ride is revised by making it more Jack Sparrow-themed. The pirates talk about Jack Sparrow, and Jack Sparrow mechanical dolls make 3 appearances throughout the ride. But other than that, it’s pretty much the same. Oh, and it’s wetter. As far as the new Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest movie goes, apparently this 2nd Pirates movie was just the interlude to the 3rd Pirates movie. There’s no payoff in the end. The entire movie was pretty much just a set-up to announce the 3rd movie. Johnny Depp, as usual, was entertaining and completely dissolved into his eccentric character.
The Space Mountain ride is updated in that the red pulsating laser beams that twirl around the coaster as you make your first ascent is gone. Other than that, it’s still completely dark inside save for the “stars”, the coaster still does a lot of drops and spirals. The music is still 70s “techno” meets 80s detective show theme songs, like “Simon & Simon” or “Hawaii 5-0”.

The hour-long scavenger hunt was successful. The winner, my bailiff and his girlfriend (who had annual passes to Disneyland for years and used to go 2x/month) got 8 out of the 10 items. One they didn’t get was a cameraphone photo of them rubbing Aladdin’s Lamp, because that show wasn’t open and they didn’t think to grab a fake lamp at a store for the photo. The other one they didn’t get was to get a cameraphone photo of them with an employee named Cindy. They ran around asking employees whether there was a Cindy who worked there, and they kept being redirected to different stores until they got a definite confirmation where a Cindy works. They ran into that merchandise store and the manager pulled out the work schedule and that employee doesn’t get on shift until later that night, way after the scavenger deadline would be up. I can’t believe that in all of Disneyland, there’s only 1 Cindy employed. So anyway, they won $80 cash. The 1st runner up, my trainee and her son, got 6 items and $40 cash. My childhood friend Vicky, who got to Disneyland late when the scavenger hunt was already in full swing, said that she was at the Carnation Cafe on Main Street hanging out while waiting for me to go fetch her, when she looked across the way and saw Esmeralda, the automated fortune teller doll, at the front of the Penny Arcade. She decided to walk over there and get a fortune. Right before she could, however, she saw some people run up to Esmeralda, read frantically from some colorful piece of paper, and get a fortune. She saw over their shoulder that the paper had something about “Cindy’s birthday” and “Treasure Hunt” on it. Haha!

The 50th Anniversary Fireworks Show was amazing. I wasn’t that interested at first, since parades and shows had always been the perfect time for me to hit all the rides with shorter lines while other people were clustered around the streets waiting for the shows. Well, I still did that with Navy Girl Vanessa, her boyfriend, and our jujitsu friend Josh; while the rest of our party were holding up the perfect spot for the show facing the Castle, the four of us rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. That in itself was a hilarious experience. Vanessa’s boyfriend and Josh were deeply involved in a conversation about martial arts and self-defense on the streets, so Vanessa and I sat together on the train with the guys behind us. As the coaster went, for about 30 seconds all you could hear were the roar of the train on the tracks and the screams of the other passengers, then it quieted down, and from behind us drifted, “…So anyway, when you’re grappling…”. They continued the conversation in totally normal voices in pieces in between coaster roars and other people’s screams! It was sooo funny to overhear.

Anyway, I was a bit nervous about mixing work people, childhood people, and jujitsu people, but it worked out really well. Everyone got along, and people were arriving and going home at various times but when we were at Disneyland, we all generally stayed together (except during the scavenger hunt and lunch). The 4 of us early arrivers stayed until midnight when the park closed. Oh, and Mr. W and I got annual passes, so we’ll be back. Good times!

This is probably the best birthday (month) I’ve ever had, with last year’s birthday up north coming a very close second. Oh, and the birthday celebrations still continue… Josh is going to pull people together after jujitsu today to take me out for my birthday drinks. I guess I’m going to jujitsu today! Vanessa promised to, too. And other friends who were unable to join us at Disneyland offered belated birthday meals and drinks, which I’m going to take them up on. Vanessa had always advocated “milking” your birthday, but I didn’t expect to milk it to this degree. Haha!

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I had a low-key July 3rd evening. We watched a city firework show from the rooftop of a building, just me, Mr. W, his daughter and her girl friend, my gym trainee and her son. Later on, a coworker of Mr. W’s showed up with his wife. We laid a couple of sturdy army blankets on the edge of the roof and laid on it on our stomachs, peering over the edge at the many many people at the Independence Day event below, and sitting up staring into the night sky for the fireworks show. We brought fold-up chairs, cheese and crackers, wine, chips and dip, and a sushi platter. There was oohs, aahs, and inappropriate jokes. Okay, the inappropriate jokes came largely from me. All right, exclusively from me. I had a good time.

I keep saying San Jose when in reality, the time spent in SJ was very short compared to the time spent in The City, i.e. San Francisco. Early Sunday morning, Diana and I drove to Brad’s house and got there punctually at 8:30a. I got to see his house, meet his beagle Chloe (who tricked me into bending down and petting her and then she knocked me over and jumped on me and gave me French kisses), and meet his roommates. Then he drove us to meet up with other athletic friends of Diana’s at Crissy Park near the Bay Bridge to go to Muir Woods and do a hike. We got to Crissy Park at 9:30, the agreed-upon time, and I marveled at how punctual everyone else was who all pulled up to the lot about the same time, despite the necessary detours made because a major street, Market, was closed for the Gay Pride Parade (SF is so colorful, and not just because of the rainbow-colored flags adorning the buildings). A group of 8 on-time Asian people! Unheard of!

The original plan was to do a 5-mile hike through Muir Woods down to Stinson Beach, hang out at the beach, and hike 5 miles back. Partway through the hike, however, we realized that it was taking too long, and Brad needed to get back in time for his volleyball game and I needed to catch a late flight.

So we did the shortened version: a 6 mile hike which had us tripping over tree roots, poking at nasty 6-inch banana slugs, falling on our bleeding palms. My calves are STILL sore.

At one point, the 8 of us were in a row winding around a narrow mountain path, and Brad suggested that we should all sing something. No one had any ideas on a song singable that we all know. I suggested Sir Mixalot’s Baby Got Back, but only 2 of us knew most of the words. So we trudged on in silence, until somewhere ahead of me, I heard the whistling of a tune… it was “Heigh-ho, heigh-ho, it’s off to work we go,” from Snow White and the 7 Dwarves.

Another funny thing to stick out in my head was when I was the last one in the row, and for some reason they’d all stopped. I stood there a second and thought, “What if I wasn’t looking up when they stopped?” So I took a large and sudden step forward, said loudly, “OOF!” and smacked into the back of Brad’s backpack. “WHAT the–?” he said and turned around really fast. I was laughing so hard I was doubled over, and he said, “You scared me!” And then turning back around to face the front again, he said, “Whatever, it’s YOUR camera in the backpack.” Oh yeah, that reminds me, Brad didn’t bring a backpack and I was using Diana’s rather large backpack, so he put his stuff in mine and gentlemanly offered to wear it. I was the only one without a backpack, and it was nice. Everyone else was dripping in sweat from the excess weight and material on their backs. I bet that’s gonna be the last time Brad uses someone else’s stuff to hold his bottle of Gatoraide.

Dwaine met me at the airport and we went back to his house, where my car was parked. He’d had a great weekend, too. At his house, we raised a glass of wine to great weekends with great friends to give us perspective about what life’s really about. And then he continued to drink a few more glasses…and a few more…while I sorted through some mail he had piling up and we told each other jokes (actually, “performed” jokes was more like it) in front of his lit fireplace…with the air conditioning on. At 3am, I drove home, marking the end of a weekend in which I never went to bed before 4am.

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We slept in on Saturday morning at Diana’s house in San Jose. By that I mean that I got up at 7a, went back to sleep, got up again at 9:30a and brushed my teeth, moseyed on into Diana’s room at 10:30a where she was just opening her eyes, and we hung out and chatted and then got ready to start the day. It was kind of like the ol’ college days if we both had late classes.

We called up Mike and made plans to meet up in the early afternoon. Mike and Christi were busy packing for their 9-day trip to Hawaii and running out of time as they were flying out the next morning, so I was really happy they made some time for a pearl tea meet at a really cute little outdoor shopping plaza. It was a lot of fun watching Mike’s brain gears turn when Diana would say certain things. Nothing goes over his head. We caught up on everyone’s lives, hypothesized on human behavior, and laughed a lot.

After we separated, Diana and I went to her gym to change and get ready for the night’s festivities. I’d like to note that MAN, is her gym hoity toity. It’s not my casual ol’ 24 Hour Fitness, it’s the exclusive Club One.


We jammed from there to Diana’s friend Phil’s house, and he drove us from there to dinner in San Franscisco’s Circolo restaurant, where we met up with Jimmy and Sabrina, already waiting for us there. Very nice place, very delicious food, very fashionable gay waiters. I had the spicy tuna tatare appetizer, Chilean sea bass w/sesame tempura veggies, and the most amazing peppermint ice cream cake dessert with a side of chocolate gelato. Yes, and a mint mojito. This place had a lot more crushed mint leaves that I keep sucking up through the straw, but I believe it was tastier than The Melting Pot’s mojito. Dinner was well worth the $67 a head it came out to. Poor Diana didn’t have dessert; she can’t stand minty stuff, and the peppermint cake was so minty I commented at dinner that it was like brushing my teeth. Everyone else agreed.

After dinner, Jimmy and Sabrina split to go watch The Lake House while Phil, Diana and I walked up the street to watch the Asian comedy troupe, 18 Mighty Mountain Warriors. Hilarious show. Lots of Asian “inside jokes.”

When the show was over, we met up with Jimmy and Sabrina again at a restaurant/lounge-turned-bar/club after hours, a middle-Eastern themed place called Medjool. I’m sorry if you guys think I look skanky; I figured that if I’m not gonna wear this in my 20s, I’m not gonna wear it in my 30s.

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