cindy's world

Found another photo of me with long hair. This is from when Brad and Val visited me at work in August, 2005. It’s not a very flattering picture of me at all, but I like the way my hair looked.

Think I’ll give this short hair one more cut, highlight, and then let it grow out. Or maybe I won’t color it and I’ll let it grow out now until I trim all the old color off and have my natural dark dark color going. It’s been a long time since I’ve had my natural hair color.

Mr. W is still playing Zelda, I’m still fixing photos on my blog. Neither of us work on Monday, it’s, like, President’s Day or something.

I had so much fun today! After lots of experimental private time this morning, Mr. W and I drove out to The Pike in Long Beach and met up with 4 of the Northern Cal people who had come down to attend their friend’s wedding: Mike”Wilco“, his fiance Christi, Greg, and his fiance Cheryl. We had Japanese food at a sushi/teppan restaurant, and I don’t remember the restaurant’s name, but I’m pretty sure Mike took a photo of it on our way in. The table conversation was funny and entertaining. Jimmy and his fiance Sabrina were at another beach some cities away and offered to bike to us after they finish lunch, but Long Beach was too far and they had a flight to catch, so I missed them this trip. I told Mr. W that if Jimmy and Sabrina had met up with us, it would’ve been 3 newly engaged couples and us. He said, “And if we were engaged, it’d be 4 engaged couples!” “But we’re not,” I said. I don’t know why I burst bubbles like that. I should just smile and nod along. I made Mike take a group photo of us at the edge of the pier, “so I can post it on my blog.” It’s all about pleasing the readership. Mike made fun of my dedication to blogging, I may have said something derogatory about the fact that he blogs so rarely now, and the conversation somehow led to his threatening to delete my entire blog. Blog administrators have waaaay too much power, I think. After the group photos were taken, he walked ahead of me, throwing over his shoulder, “I’ll send these photos to you the next time I blog.” “HEY!!” I protested, cuz that could mean I wouldn’t see it for weeks. Heh. All in good fun, tho.

In the evening, Mr. W and I attended my aunt Jessica’s New Year’s Day dinner at her house. Aside from my aunt and uncle, my parents and us, my cousin Diana was there with her boyfriend Doug, and they brought Diana’s dog, a perky happy Jack Russell terrier named Mr. Burns. For a large part of the evening, the dog was on my lap napping. Dinner was delicious — broiled lamb chops, braised oxtail, creamed broccoli soup, steamed cabbage and snap pea salad, mixed brown and white rice flavored with chicken broth, with dessert fruit chocolate fondue. Because Doug, my dad, and I (to an extent) are all clowns, dinner was a lot of fun, too. It was nice to see my cousin and her boyfriend again after almost a year. It’s funny, they’re like 10 minutes away from Mr. W’s house where I’m at a lot, but we never make plans to hang out when I’m there. Instead, we used to make plans when I’d drive all the way down to Irvine from home.

Right now, things have settled down again. I’m blogging on Mr. W’s laptop drinking tea, Mr. W is playing Legend of Zelda on my Nintendo GameCube, also drinking tea.

Oh, I just remembered. Christi and Mike said they were probably gonna do post-wedding activities in Hawaii instead of pre-wedding activities, so they’re going to be staying in Hawaii after the week of their wedding, as opposed to before. That’s perfect, cuz that’s the week I’m gonna be able to have off! Christi’s reasoning was logical. She didn’t want to have to worry about being sunburnt, scraped or bruised from scuba diving/hiking/island sports for her wedding day, so the fun should be after the ceremony. Yay!

Since it’s almost 10pm here, on the East Coast it’s already now the Year of the Boar. Bye-bye, Year of the Doggie! Tonite Mr. W and I met up with my parents at my maternal grandmother’s house for New Year’s Dinner. My grandma was all excited to host the dinner, and made a ton of dishes. Mr. W ate all the Chinese food like a Chinese person. My grandma was a bit concerned at first that he wouldn’t eat some of the dishes, like the red-roasted pork knuckles. My parents told my grandmother proudly in Chinese that Mr. W is game to try anything, and that he’s easy to feed. The only thing Mr. W won’t try is the Taiwanese “stinky tofu,” and the dried anchovie snacks.

After dinner, we sat around and talked about Chinese New Year traditions. Like how kids were allowed and encouraged to stay up late on New Year’s Eve (tonite) because superstition has it that the longer the kid stays awake that night, the longer life the parents will have. Parents give the kids new clothes so that on the 1st day of the new year, they wear new for new. The first person to fire off firecrackers in the new year also brings prosperity into his house, so they watch the clock for midnight. As soon as midnight tolls, everyone runs outside and lights firecrackers, and the sound can be heard everywhere in Asia at approximately the same time. The lower generation people (kids and unmarried young adults) also get red envelopes of money from the older generations; you go up and wish the elders a happy, healthy and prosperous new year, and they reward you by handing you an envelope. The envelope is to contain new uncirculated money, which you’re supposed to tuck in your pillowcase that night and sleep on it for 15 nights to bring in wealth for the new year. My mom gave both me and Mr. W a red envelope, like we’re kidlets (to borrow Jordan’s word, which I really like). Mr. W placed his in his pillowcase, and I was about to do the same, and then I stopped and said, “Hey, wait a minute…does it even count cuz this isn’t really MY pillowcase?” He said, “Oh well, if it brings in money to my house, I’ll turn it over to you.” I said, “Okay!” and tucked it in the pillowcase. My dad told us about another tradition for New Year’s Day. People don’t eat heated food, they have cold dishes all day and/or eat the leftovers from the feast of the night before. There are different folklores for this, one of which is that the god of the stoves and fires, who resides with the family, flies off to heaven that day to report back to the big god(s) on your family’s behavior, and you send him off nicely asking him to please bring positive information to the heavens on behalf of your family. “But what does that have to do with not cooking that day?” I asked my dad.
“Because the Chinese believe there are gods for everything, and the god for the fire and stove is away in heaven reporting about your family.”
“So then why can’t you cook?” I asked.
“Because the family wants him to say good things for them when he reports.”
“But WHY can’t you cook? I don’t get the connection,” I insisted.
My mom butted in. “He doesn’t know,” she said. She turned to her mother, my grandmother. “Why do we have to eat cold dishes on the first day of the new year?”
My grandmother waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t ask me about lore, I don’t know a thing about any of that stuff.”
Dad said, “When China was in war, the emperor was also out fighting, and at one point the army was losing and they were freezing and starving. The army cook had no food to cook, so he sacrificed and cut off some meat from his own thigh to make into a dish for the emperor, so that the emperor wouldn’t starve to death. They eventually won, and afterwards the emperor found out what the cook did for him. He was so grateful that he made the cook a general and gave him an army to command. So New Year’s Day, people don’t eat hot food, to remember what he did for the emperor, in honor of that cook. So they don’t cook.”
Here’s my reaction: “… WHAT??? What does that have to do with the stove gods going to heaven to report your family?”
Dad said, “I”m just telling you a different story, a different legend, for the same activity.”
“Oh.”

Aside from all the Chinese traditions, I was trying to remember the story of the New Year itself, and I couldn’t. Despite the fact that I had written a screenplay around it in high school and acted it out. It had something to do with some monster or dragon invading a China village, eating its youth. Something about how it killed and ate an old woman’s only son, and she cried about it so hard in the street that an old bum stopped by and wanted to know what was going on with her, and he gave her some magical advice on how to kill the dragon when it came back that night for her or something. And something about wearing red to confuse or distract the dragon, or maybe it can’t see red or something. Something about making dumplings, the chopping sound scaring the dragon, and the firecrackers scaring off the dragon or something like that. Uh…and that’s why today we eat dumplings and light firecrackers. Uh, yeah.

Okay, I’m a disgrace.

I’ve been missing my long hair. Remember these photos?

My hair now’s finally just long enough to tie up in a ponytail so that my neck and face can breathe at the gym, and for some reason it seems to be growing excruciatingly slowly this time. I miss my long hair, cuz it’s so much lower maintenance. But today, Mr. W bought some hair dye for himself (he likes to play with hair color), and in the dye aisle, I remembered all the stuff I used to do to my own hair with these products. I wanna play, too! I want to highlight it again, but in order for that to look the way I want, I need to cut my hair another 2 inches. Oh, what to do? I think I’m gonna cut it again. Hopefully it’ll be long enough to tie back in time for Mike & Christi’s Hawaii wedding. I don’t wanna snorkel and swim with hair floating all around my mask.

I *just* got the vacation schedule!! I’ve been steadily falling in seniority since the day I got here, since everyone they transfer over has high seniority. I think it’s so unfair to pick vacation in order of County seniority; it should be position seniority. Cuz brand new baby clerks who are supposed to be MY relief clerks are picking vacation ahead of me, so that I’m still shackled to my desk while THEY’RE going on vacation, just because they started working for the County as, like, a janitor in 1960! Seriously, #1 on the seniority list started in 1968. And a new clerk who JUST transferred here this month and plopped on #2 in seniority has taken 11 WEEKS of vacation for this coming year. There’s virtually nothing left for the rest of us!

Luckily, I’ve got 2 other clerks who have been kind enough to ask what days I need off for Mike and Christi’s wedding, and they’ve taken it for me, expecting to drop it so that as long as I’m on the wait list, I’m gonna get it. And I’m #1 on the wait list for those weeks! Yay! And the weeks for China just happen to be open, too.

Ass was the theme around lunchtime today. I felt the soreness in my butt all too distinctly when I got up to walk to my car at lunch. I was, however, comforted by the fact that the pain was equally distributed between the two butt cheeks. That means I did my workout properly yesterday. Driving to the gym minutes later, Sir Mixalot’s “Baby Got Back” came on the radio. A huge smile appeared on my face and I involuntarily started wriggling my butt to the music in my car. It was like driving around back in high school! Except with a much better sound system in the car, and a more painful butt.

“So fellas (YEAH!), fellas (YEAH!),
Do your girlfriends have the butt? (TELL ME!)
So shake it, shake it, shake that healthy butt,
Baby got back!”

I had to make some training and membership inquiries of the sales guy for Vanessa, so after finding him, I sat down at the desk with him for about 10 minutes as he explained the newest packages to me. He mentioned that one of the girls at the gym right now has a bet with him to see who can lose the most body fat percentage by the end of March, and that when she’d come by earlier, he’d deviously offered her chocolate, which she refused. He said he walked by where she was doing bicep curls with her trainer, and he joked, “Forget the biceps, work her out on her glutes!” She’d retorted, “Don’t worry about my butt when you oughta worry about your gut!”

Since I was late getting to the gym and made even later by talking to the sales guy, there was 20 minutes left before my usual time to leave the gym when I stood up from the sales table. I briefly considered just turning around and going back to work, but I couldn’t do it. I haven’t missed one noontime workout since I came back on Wednesday, and add to that one belly dancing session last nite. So I changed as fast as I could and did 30 minutes on the elliptical trainer, making myself so late that I sacrificed my after-workout shower. Oh well. If someone can smell me, they’re too close in my personal space anyway.

My sore ass nipped me every hurried step from the parking structure back into the courtroom.

My mom cracked me up today. We’re emailing.

Mom:
AUNT JESSICA INVITE YOU AND [Mr. W] OVER FOR NEW YEAR DINNER ON SUNDAY NIGHT AT 6:30 PM, DIANA AND JENNIFER ALSO BRINGING THEIR’S BOY FRIEND OVER. OH, YOU ARE GOING TO WEDDING, RIGHT?

(I don’t know why both my parents want to write in all caps. It’s like I’m 6 again and always being yelled at.)

Me:
no, no wedding. I don’t know the people getting married. We’re free Sunday
night, we just have brunch with the Northern California friends on Sunday in
the day.

Mom:
OH, BOY! YOU ARE GOING TO GAIN WEIGHT! WHY DON’T YOU GUYS COME OVER TO HELP US MOVE FUNITURE AND CLEAN UP ON WEEKEND!

(Their home remodeling is due to be done by Chinese New Year this weekend, and after that will be the big cleanup and furniture moving.)

Me:
we’d already planned on doing that. And I’m working out again. I don’t care if I’m still sick, I gained weight in the last 2 weeks of not working out!

Mom:
DRINK SUGAR FREE ORANGE JUICE, PLEASE!

It seems that a girl (we’ll call her Gina, cuz I don’t know any Ginas) told my girl friend that her boyfriend’s brother is now dating a girl who is “a fat, crazy, Vietnamese lady”, and Gina is concerned that the brother is going to cheat on her. I guess Gina thinks this because she considers the new girlfriend not attractive enough to keep a man. My girl friend had this to say about that: “I told her that there’s no guarantee that he won’t or will because my ex cheated on me with a woman (that he subsequently married) that I felt was inferior to me and I’m sure you could say the same about [the girl who my ex cheated on me with].”

My opinion on cheating men now is that I’ve found they don’t cheat because they’ve found “the one” outside of the relationshp. These cheaters cheat because they’re cheaters by nature. The exceptions, the ones who’ve found “the one” outside the relationship, will break up with the relationship to be with the person they really want. The affair chicks are almost never loved the way the girlfriend or the wife is, and the cheater normally does not leave the relationship for the affair. The side dish is just being used. That being said, if Gina’s boyfriend’s bro is the cheating type, it doesn’t matter how unattractive or attractive the girlfriend is, he’ll cheat. If he’s not, he won’t cheat, and if he finds someone better and leaves her to be with the other person, they weren’t meant to be together anyway.

I’m not saying there are no exceptions to this. I’m sure there are love stories about some guy realizing the person he’s supposed to be with is his girlfriend’s best friend/sister/mother, blah blah, and everyone was behind this and supported it and now they’re one big happy messy family. But what I wrote in the former paragraph is the general rule as I believe it now with regards to male cheaters. I believe that women cheat for a whole different reason altogether. Generally.

V-day: I went over to Mr. W’s armed with a freshly baked banana creme pie from my favorite bakery. Mr. W worked up a sweat in the kitchen opening containers of BBQ babyback pork ribs and roasted whole chicken from Costco. Oh, and he also made mashed potatoes, and by “made,” I mean he dispensed hot water over potato powder and stirred it up. And he made salad, and by “made,” I mean he opened the Costco container and poured the pre-tossed salad greens into a big serving bowl. Dinner was delish; both teenage kids were home but they opted out on the banana creme pie in favor of Costco rice krispies treats. Kids… Oh, and we went to bed early, like at 9p. No V-day nookie. Mr. W was tired. I’m sure all the slaving away in the kitchen exhausted him. (I’m not complaining — I didn’t cook, either.)

Work: Today we did our first civil harassment hearing. It went okay. The plaintiff got his restraining order granted against a chick who’s stalking him. She didn’t show up. Later on in the day, I was reviewing a future harassment hearing. A woman is requesting a restraining order against another woman. The defendant is accused of following the plaintiff around in her car, calling and cussing her out, threatening her, throwing rocks at her house, breaking her car window and her brother’s car window. Seemed pretty crazy, until I read what the plaintiff put in the question about “How do you know the person you want the restraining order against? Please explain.” The plaintiff wrote, “I dated her husband.” Well, hellO!

Bellydancing: Nothing remarkable. Nothing eventful. I felt clumsy but picked up on the routine as we went. At the end of class, as we stood in a big circle holding hands and spent a minute to give silent thanks for the things we are grateful for this day (this is how we end every class with this instructor), I went thru my usual list of being grateful for my health, for being able to take a dance class, for the health of my family and friends, and added to it gratitude for having Mr. W in my life and for my closeness with my friends, especially my girlfriends, even the ones who live far, far away. And for my car.

Relationship: I had a sit-down with an acquaintance over a quick meal of Daphne’s Greek food. She told me about a guy she’s been dating. Unfortunately for her, “dating” describes the relationship less accurately than “booty call.” The guy calls her up maybe once or twice a month. They don’t socialize outside of each others’ houses. When she invites him to do something with her and her friends, he comes up with some excuse and turns her down. He never invites her to events with his friends. He claims to be busy every weekend with his buddies. They don’t plan dates in advance; he just calls to see if she’s available, like, “right now.” He was nowhere to be found on Valentine’s Day, her birthday, and went MIA November through December (Thanksgiving, xmas, New Year’s). She has to think twice before calling him because she was the last one who called and invited him to do something, so now it was “his turn” so that she doesn’t scare him off by being too forward or pushy. She’s on eggshells when it comes to wondering when she’d next see him again. She has to be careful what she says around him in case he finds she’s getting too attached and backs away from her. She’s floored when he’s nice to her, like kissing her goodnight and being sweet for a whole evening. It’s awful!
I remember when I was in her situation, back when I either didn’t know better and didn’t recognize the signs early enough, or when I didn’t have a high enough self-esteem, or when I had tolerance for lame men. I don’t know what my problem was. It sucked, being nervous and afraid to call, afraid to ask but wondering whether he was seeing someone else, sleeping with other girls, because he sure doesn’t act committed to me. Wanting to welcome him by throwing my arms around his neck but afraid that would scare him off. Wanting to put my hand on his thigh, and after finally finding the courage to do so, feeling him not only not reciprocate, but stiffen under my touch. Always second-guessing, second-guessing. He didn’t call today, did I scare him off? What might I have said or done wrong yesterday to make him back off? Now I have to back off to make it okay for him to come forward. Pretend I don’t care for him as I do. Pretend he’s not important like he is. Altho the 2 guys who made me feel like this (well, mainly just one, the other one wasn’t nearly as bad) both decided they wanted to be with me and in the end it was I who left them, having gotten just exhausted from the stress, I would never again put up with this bullcrap as long as I did before. The way I see it now, I am worth more than that. If you don’t like me enough to do something about it, you’re just gonna have to miss your chance. You can admire my ass as I leave you behind. Both guys learned that the hard way, and they came running, but I was not going to be at someone’s emotional beck and call anymore.
I knew the truth, and didn’t want to tell the girl, but the truth is, he’s only with her when nothing else better comes along for the evening. He won’t even commit an evening in advance to her because just about anything else is a better option to him than her. He’s probably dating and sleeping with other women. He knows she’s that into him, he’s just playing dumb so he won’t feel responsible for breaking her heart. He’s spending all his holidays and his own birthday with people he places more importance on than her. She says they’ve made a little progress in the past year, but if it takes that long for just “a little progress,” he does not and may never like her enough. He has no respect for her and her time because she is always available to him, and she cancels her plans for him, altho he does not reciprocate in kind. She will always be #2.
I called Mr. W after talking with this girl, and dumped a bunch of love in his lap over the phone. I am so glad I am with him. I am so glad he didn’t play stupid games with me, to “keep her on her toes.” I am so glad that whatever affection I feel for him, I can give to him, and he will drink it all up with open arms and give me a kiss in return. There is no second-guessing myself, what I mean to him, how he has taken something I said or did, and no “uh-oh, I may have accidentally crossed the line when I said I like him, he’s suddenly quiet and withdrawn.” There is no substitute for peace. I am most grateful that he saw he has what I needed, and convinced me to try him on for size. I may never take him off.

In a recent post where I’d posted a highly intellectual conversation between me and James (*cough*), Jordan commented that if we posted OUR conversations, we’d lose credibility. I disagreed, since most of my and Jordan’s conversations deal with scholarly topics such as biology and anatomy. For example, there’s this one today via email:

Me:
So is there any day you’re not working this week? Aside from today, I see.

Jordan:
I had class today…. a bunch of inservices from 8-4. So… like, do you have elongated nipples or like, irregularly long ones?? I need to know.

Is the rumor true???!!!

Me:
What are elongated nipples? How about I just send you a photo? I don’t know if I’m normal cuz I haven’t examined other people’s nipples.

And then I thought, hey, I have a better source for an answer here! Mr. W was online, and he’s seen tons and tons of nipplage in his day. So I IMed him:

me: Do I have elongated nipples?
Jordan wants to know.
Sent at 2:11 PM on Wednesday
[Mr. W]: What the heck…..no, What is that?
Sent at 2:14 PM on Wednesday

Huh. I guess I don’t. There ya go, Jordan. I’m resourceful. 🙂 Altho…now I’m wondering whether my mom has elongated nipples. ACK! Stupid Jordan!! That’s just wrong! (I bet you’re all thinking about all the Asian women you know, now. You can blame Jordan.)