We found a new roommate. Another stranger. Genie's moving in to the apartment tommorrow. She's 23, and she's never lived with people other than her relatives before. I'm a little bit apprehensive about that.

I'll reward myself with a better living situation when I find a better job.

Seems like every other person I know that is around my age is heading back to school for another degree, getting married, and/or buying a place right now, or is planning to do one of those things in the near future. Some people have already done one or more or all of those things. All significant things, yet deceptively insignificant, since so many are doing them...

It's that time. Time for big investments. Big committments. Big promises. Gotta kick things up a notch. Gotta find inspiration. Gotta find a true calling. Gotta get out of the mid-20s rut. Gotta get ahead of the game, and come out on top when the economic is better. Gotta try to buy more time.

Reasons and motivations enough for everyone else... but where are my reasons and motivations? I don't have the means to buy a place yet, and being married would not provide me with any immediate benefits. If I want pick up the pace, shake things up a bit, lay down some foundations for future success, embark on a new adventure befitting my current stage in life, I've gotta look at the option of going back to school for another degree.

Since "everyone is doing it," they must all be on to something. I'm forcing myself to give it a more serious thought. Up until now, I haven't had a real urge to go back to school full-time. If money was not a concern, I'd be more than willing to go back to school full-time just for the sake of learning. I'd love to study biology again. I'd also love to study English, and get deep into the history of something. But because money is a huge concern, I figure that I should only consider going back to school full-time to develop my career, and to qualify me for more and better jobs.

However, business school, law school, med school, and the like, hold zero appeal to me. More importantly, I'm not smart enough to get into those kinds of schools. I'm lazy, and I have ADD. There's just no way I could ever get into the schools to my friends have applied to. Harvard, MIT... Gosh, if they all go to top notch schools, what could I ever hope to accomplish with less prestigious education? Some direction would be enough.

But I'd still be trailing in the rat race. Does that matter? Is there any imaginable, possible scenario in which *I* could ever obtain a Nobel or Pulitzer or other prize? Yes, folks, I'm going to find a cure for cellulite!

My brother might go to law school this fall. If he does, I have no idea how he's going to pay for it. Could my parents re-mortgage their little house in Castro Valley? That would basically be giving my brother the house, which is just about all my parents have. And I'm fine with that.

I'm probably better off taking job-skill-related classes after work, until I either get richer or smarter or... I don't know. I'll give this school thing more concentrated thought in the next few weeks. The current standstill must end.

Dad is getting his gallbladder removed today. Luckily, that's all that was bothering him. No hepatitis, no cancer. I'm so relieved.

Smile.

On Friday night, we went to the Maria Ann Hsiao Memorial Foundation's benefit dinner and auction. I have only one dress to wear, and it's not black. But I think I was alright showing up in rose and coffee chiffon. A few people said they like the dress, hopefully not with undetected disapproval or sarcasm.

I really like what the foundation is setting out to accomplish: "This Art foundation will foster artistic creativity among the youth in our community. Our hope is to touch lives and inspire artists by funding art programs, scholarships, and developing public awareness of the arts." I hope they achieve the level of success they hope to obtain.

I saw a lot of faces at the dinner that I hadn't seen in over 10 years. It was eerie. I didn't feel a desire to talk to any of the people that belonged to those familiar faces. It was enough just to see them, and see how they've changed or not changed. Aside from carrying around a few more pounds, most of them hadn't changed at all, which was the eerie part... and which, in retrospect, isn't surprising, since most of them are Chinese Christians.

Seeing how they've not changed made me feel even better about having changed as much as I have.

That one time in 8th grade that I was called despicable, it was by my English teacher, Mr. Daly. He was in the classroom doorway about to exit when he turned around, saw me, and said, "Wipe that smirk off your face, Y*m! You're despicable!"

A few minutes before, he'd called another student in the class a slut, and she'd promptly walked out of class to go tell on him. How and the why he was enraged in the first place, enough to call that girl a slut (which she really was), I cannot remember. It was something she did, and his response to it, as a Christian school teacher, was rather shocking to the class. We were all stunned into silence. But the moments before he stormed out of the classroom were so serious, and the mixture of anger, shame, and fear in the expression on his face was so ridiculous, that I couldn't help but be amused. He probably felt as if I was mocking him.

Mr. Daly was able to keep his job, and he apologized to me and to the other girl. She never really got over him calling her a slut. I forgave him. He liked me anyhow, since I was the only one in the entire class who didn't utterly hate him, and who took his writing assignments seriously.

We watched Annie Hall last night. I didn't think I would like the movie 'cuz it's "old", but I did.

But what's up with people seeing California as a state full of health nuts? Was that just back in the 70s and 80s? Or just the 70s and 80s in LA? I never picked up on that. Anything that happened around here at that time I thought was an America-wide phenomenon. Childhood ignorance.

I didn't see us as health nuts or happy-go-lucky weirdos or airheaded valley people who played all day in the sun. Back then, I hardly ever wondered about what people from other states thought about California. I hardly ever thought about people from other states period. I had cousins living in NYC, and before they moved out here, they imagined the whole state was a warm beach full of beautiful blonde women.

There's a line in the movie that Annie says to Alvy while they're sitting outside in the sun at a health food eatery: "Alvy, you're incapable of enjoying life, you know that? I mean you're like New York City." That is precisely how I felt about my New York City and my ex.

"May uh hep you?"

No.
You may not hep me.
I do not want to be hepped.
There will be no hepping happening here.

Go hep yourself.

Amanda and I selected someone to move in with us last Monday. He backed out on us this Monday. We haven't had any luck this week finding someone else to move in. The fish just aren't biting.

I haven't had good experiences with Craigslist users in the past few months. The worst one was a woman who bought an item I listed. She paid me through Paypal, and had me send the item to her in New York.

I sent her a gently used item in good condition, with no damage. A few days after she received it, she sent me an email demanding a partial refund and accusing me of knowingly sending her an item that is not functioning properly. I told her I would not send her a refund for an item that was in the same working condition as when I bought it from the store, and that was still functioning perfectly when I sent it to her. She responded calling me dishonest and despicable. Though I can't say I've never been called despicable in my life (just once, in 8th grade), I can say, in all honesty, that I'm one of the most honest people I know.

Trying to be reasonable despite her nastiness, I told her I would give her a full refund if she sent the item back to me, granted it is in the same condition as it was when I sent it to her. She replied with more nasty lines attacking my character, and said she doesn't trust me to refund her money if she sends the item back. She hoped I would feel guilty for a long time for doing bad business and taking advantage of her.

I didn't feel guilty because I didn't do anything wrong. All I felt was some fear of retaliation in the form of something like a bomb in the mail, or other usages of my name, home address, and email address to harm me. Well, what could she do... Nothing much, really. I maintain that she is just some bitter bitch with nothing better to do, who was trying to take advantage of me. But her trying-to-make-me-feel-guilty tactics didn't work on me. I've had so much exposure to those kinds of tactics in the past that I've developed strong enough defense mechanisms against them.

Spores.

I love that word. I think it's cute-sounding.

Spores. Masses of microspores. Pollen. I love the way pollen looks. Funny, furry, delightful, little, bright yellow, spherical bundles. They fall from the trees and litter the ground lightly like a thin, carefree layer of fuzzy, clumpy snow... easily crushable into a fine heap of spore particles.

I had pollen balls on the hood of my car this morning. They bumbled off when I started driving, and left behind a dust-like stratum of yellow, making my car appear an irridescent yellow-black color from certain angles in the sunlight.

I hate dust, but I like spores. I'm not allergic to spores.

Spores are so full of promise. Promise of more. Good or evil things to come. Mainly bad things. Like in video games, when the evil spores burst and release vicious parasites and monsters or toxic liquids and gases. Out of these seemingly harmless, nicely packaged, often tiny, yet prolific spores come all manner of pestilence and horror and malice that could seize the planet and destroy all of its life forms within months, maybe even days.

And that's just pretty darn cute... isn't it?

Before I left work, my brother IMed me about my dad.

Dad had some blood tests taken this week, and the results were abnormal. He's had stomach problems throughout the year, but his regular doctor just kept telling him to eat better. Korean man... should stay away from the kimchee, spicy foods, etc. Josh told me that one time the pain was so bad that my dad called 911. Why wasn't I told about that (and probably countless other things that would concern me about my parents) earlier?

Now the symptoms point to dad having gallstones, which would require surgery for removal. And that would be one of the better diagnoses. My uncle on my dad's side of the family died of stomach cancer last year.

So many different scenarios are running through my head now... what ifs...

I'm the type of person who would celebrate St. Patrick's Day. Why St. Patrick's Day, and not Hanukah, I can't tell you... because I don't know. I've just had more of an interest in Ireland in the past. I know next to nothing about the Jewish people, having been born here on the California coast (as if that's a valid excuse... I think it really is).

I know next to nothing about the Irish and Ireland either. But I went through this phase in college in which I bought and listened to Celtic music. I bought a large poster of a castle in Ireland, and I've only bought, like, 2 in my life. I was deeply moved by Braveheart and Rob Roy... well, everyone was because they were well-made movies. But have you heard of Loreena McKennitt? I have one of her tapes. Those were also the days of Enya and the old new age sounds that we all warmed down to in aerobics class.

Let me cut to the chase. I want to go out and drink tonite. Babe already went out with his co-workers. I don't have anyone to drink with. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr....

I found out today that my friend, Milly, just got engaged over the weekend. I'm excited for her!

I was wondering when it was going to happen, since it seemed like a when-not-if thing. She and her man are planning on getting married in more than a year, maybe even in 2007. Gosh... I told her we could all start planning our own 2007 weddings right now, it's so far into the future.

And she asked me to to be one of her bridesmaids! I feel SO honored and privileged. That a friend would consider me worthy of holding such an important position in such a significant event in her life makes me feel wonderful and validated and flattered. Ornery as I am, I must've managed to do a few things right in this life.

Amy is also engaged. She is getting married in May... to the "good friend" who pursued her throughout much of college and beyond, though he was unsuccessful for years. I would've never guessed she would give in and go out with him, much less marry him. Persistence really paid off. (Note to self: Beware of persistence.)

I remember, while we were in college, she and I and some other friends talked about which of us we thought would get married first and last. We all thought she'd marry last. We didn't think it'd be me. But I'm glad it's turning out that way. I felt sheepish back then, sensing they all thought I'd be one of the first. Now I find it nice sitting back and watching them all do the walk before me.

I received a second email from my ex with a file attached that contains a virus.

I haven't talked to my ex in more than a year, and about a month or so ago I got an email from him with "Hi" in the subject line, nothing in the email body, virus attached. Good thing I didn't click on that attachment or the one I got today in his email.

I heard that the company my ex works for often has problems with viruses, and I'm almost certain that's why I received the emails from him. But I didn't think I'd still be in his email address book, or that he still has emails to and/or from me on the mail server. 'Course, I'm not sure how these viruses work...

Evenso, I can't help being a tiny bit suspicious. Get even with your ex. Send her a virus that she can download on her new laptop. No... I don't really think he's capable of that.

OK. I'm just about over it. I feel better today.

I figure, can't take away from me what I never had. I never had those vacations. I never had those material goods. 13k (extra 3k for state) is my small savings over three months plus a few more months of wages, granted I hold on to this job for at least another half a year.

So what's to sweat about? I've still got a lot of life. After all, what's life without a little bitta liability?

Every night, a bird chirps furiously and incessantly for what seems like hours, just outside my bedroom window. It's still chirping when I fall asleep. It's still chirping when I wake up in the middle of the night.

There's only one string of chirps, so I assume it's a solo performance by the same bird every night. It repeats hundreds of different patterns of chirps, none of them exactly the same but similar. The string of patterns of sounds is kinda like a car alarm, but random and a thousand times more tolerable. I could listen for minutes trying to find a possible sequence, trying to listen for my favorite sounds and patterns. (After a couple of minutes, I fall asleep.)

I wonder what's going on out there... What type of bird is it, and what is it trying to accomplish at this hour?

***

This is the first post from my new laptop. It arrived via UPS a few hours after I found out about my federal tax issue on Monday. What a killjoy. But you know, that just means I'm going to have to find a way to turn the laptop into a straw-into-gold machine. This little baby is going to pay for itself, and then some...

Back in the poorhouse. Life, as I knew it over the last 3 months, is over.

No more poker. A lot less steak and sushi, a lot more tasteless home-cooked dinners. Wheat bread and turkey for every weekday lunch. No visiting Lia in Chicago or the cousins in Boston. No vacation in San Diego or Hawaii. No vacations, period. No new handbag. No new sandals. No more wardrobe upgrades. No sports equipment upgrades. No more whimiscal Amazon.com or Urbanoutiffters.com purchases. No spa and salon pampering. No glory.

Back in debt. It didn't kill me the first time. It won't kill me this time. I know what I need to do, and I will prevail again.

But excuse me if I'm grumpy for the next 6-7 months...

I've always preferred to suffer alone. Maybe not always. Maybe I just learned to suffer best alone while forced to do so on my own as Jennie the child. Maybe that's the only way I know to do it.

When I'm feeling sub-optimal, I tend to retreat from the masses and avoid friends. When the situation is particularly dismal, I try to push the closest friends away. I feel like running away from all that is familiar. I end up hole-ing up in my room at home, unashamed to assume the dejected posture and to let out the tears when no one else is there to see them.

I'm too proud and too kind to have the people I care about most see and put up with me when I'm depressed, especially when I'm not handling the situation gracefully. It's bad enough that they know I'm down, and it's worse that I know that they feel obligated to deal with my issues alongside me... and are most likely not enjoying doing that.

I wonder what would happen if I just did a 360... laid down my pride and sympathy and let Babe take on my unhappines and flustrations with me, as he would voluntarily do.

At least the lows of nowadays are a lot lighter than the lows of the oldendays. I'm able to smile and laugh heartily even while depressed. I've got DepressionLite v1.02.

It's the tax thing that's bringing me down...

Life is like a box of chocolates... it makes you fat.

I finally sold a piece of jewelry that I'd been trying to sell for awhile.

It was a gift from one of my ex-boyfriends. A thoughtful gift, though not what I wanted or needed at the time he gave it to me. Thoughtful, yet not really thoughtful. I would've been much better off with the money it cost him to buy it. I needed money for my next meal more than I needed jewelry. After he was out of the picture, there was no reason for me to wear it because it wasn't much in line with my style, and I could still use the money.

During and after I made the sale last night, I didn't feel as good as I thought I would. Every other time I've made a sale, I felt great... and lighter, like I'd just recycled or donated. Done a good deed. Made an efficient, environment-friendly, win-win transaction. But this time, the sale pricked my conscience a bit.

I'd been eager to cash in on that last tangible vestige of my ex, and I'd settled for a mere $83. I'd finally squeezed the last penny out of that relationship, and I got a pang of guilt instead of relief. I was surprised by the feeling, since I didn't have it at any point during the time I was unsuccessfully trying to sell the piece of jewelry.

Maybe I just felt bad because the thing was probably worth $120 or more, and I'd made a hasty deal that benefitted the buyer more than me. Or maybe I was expecting to feel victorious when instead all I got was yet another anticlimactic moment... (How many of those can one have... before one begins to expect them?)

I just finished using Turbotax online, and it says that I owe the IRS a bit over 10k this year.

Ten THOUSAND dollars.

Now wait a minute... there must be a typo somewhere... *checks, re-checks, and re-re-checks* Uh... nope. All of my 2003 wages are on a 1099-MISC, and I paid about 4k in estimated taxes already... so 10k must be the rest of the income taxes I owe plus medicare and social security. Fucking eh?!

Well I'll be damned. I am damned. 10k is most unexpected. The oversight of my century. May as well be 10 MILLION DOLLARS...

I think they should give the character Ryan from The O.C. an Asian female love interest. It would work. And Marissa really sucks. It'll be interesting to see how the show turns her into a well-liked character in the future.

The damn blasted dust bunnies were collecting on my guitar. So earlier this week, I put it away in the brand new guitar case Babe got me. I hadn't touched it in months.

Now that the guitar is lying comfortably in its plush, blue velvet-lined coffin, I want to make a promise to myself to take it back out again after this weekend. I also need to start running again.

Are are any commercially sold machines that effectively prevent the formation of dust? A machine kinda like a noise-cancelling machine. A gadget to cancel all dust. Stop it before it starts.

I guess any machine that could eradicate dust mites, like an anti-microbial air purifier, would work. But what about something that specifically targets dust? Are those types of machines sold to consumers like humidfiers? If so, exactly what should I be looking for, and where could I get one?

Here I am, an anti-bacterial-toting microbe-o-phobe... a stickler for efficiency and everything being in it's rightful place. And yet, there is always a nice matte or fluffy layer of dust on top of my perfectly arranged and organized things. Oh, the irony.

Dust bites.

Dusting is the part of cleaning that I hate the most. It's a never-ending task. Dust accumulates the moment I stop dusting. It taunts. It grays out the colors of things. When I dust my room, I have to turn it upside down, basically uprooting my life for a couple of nose- and eye-watering moments, to get to it all.

There was that one time I went over to my parents to sort and clean out all the junk in their den, and broke out in hives. I've always been allergic to dust. But that day, the dust didn't just bite me, it spanked me until my entire body was rashed to the extent that Benadryl was no use.

I want my revenge on dust... rid it from my life once and for all! [cue evil laughter]

I feel very different from who I was last year, 2 years ago, and 3 years ago.

Core person is the same. Fundamental wants and needs are the same. Everyday goings-ons and routine of actions and attitudes are different. Outlook is definitely different.

I feel as if who I am now is more congruent with who I was as a child. I am more me than ever. And that feels good and right.

I was telling Babe last night that I remember what I imagined, when I was a child, that life would be like when I reached the age at which most people get married and buy houses. Now that I've arrived at that age, I've discovered life to be a lot less boring, domestic, uptight, void of fun and over than I'd imagined. I still feel like a youngster (in an oldster body), taking life less seriously and more casually than I thought I would at this age. Do we all, my peers, feel that way?

Buy a house? Get married? Sure. Ok. Not such a big step after all. Everyone's doing it. It's what people do.

Though a lot has changed drastically within my generation particularly, I begin to wonder if my parents felt similarly when they were my age now. Did they and other adults their age also feel as if they were youngsters doing "grown-up things" that seemed a lot less serious and momentous by the time they reached the age to do them? What would they think about the fact that my complaint at this age, at this moment, is that I don't get enough audio and visual stim?

They'd be jealous. Someday I'll be jealous of the younger generations too. Can hardly imagine what their lives will be like...

In dire need of audio and visual stim... wouldn't even mind an overload for a couple of hours max...