um

I am so awesome it hurts sometimes.

another perfect day

Today, I grabbed a burger at In-n-Out, cursed out five other cars on the road, and grabbed Korean BBQ with a friend for dinner. Road rage and great food--a perfect Los Angeles day.

lovesick

I can't believe this. After waxing poetic about Los Angeles for years only to find myself bored to tears after moving there, I now find that I don't want to leave Manhattan ever. The thought of leaving tomorrow makes my stomach clench. At least my suitcase will be twice as full as it was when I came.

I suspect that when I get married, I may have a problem with fidelity.

a perfect day

Today, I bought new shoes in SoHo with my New York girl friends, wore them out to dinner with my New York gay boyfriends, then got them soaked in a New York thunderstorm. Shoe shopping and rain--a perfect Manhattan day.

hero season

What's with all the dudes saving children from burning cars??

Beyond that, what's with all the people who happen to be around to FILM it??

dry heat

It just sounds dirty.

another celibrity death

The Taco Bell chihuahua died of a massive stroke. But what really shocked me was that "he" was a girl. I guess "Yo quiero Taco Bell" wouldn't have sounded as good in a chick voice.

old korean ladies

Today, while I was picking up my lunch, I saw two old Korean ladies walk in to the restaurant, clutching each others' wrinkled hands. Then, on the way back to work, I saw three old Korean ladies jaywalk across the street, scurrying (in the way that only little Asian ladies can) past the green traffic lights. On the other side of the street, an old Korean lady walked down the street wearing bright teal pajama pants and holding a bright pink parasol.

All of these things made me happy.

exhaustion

I was so tired tonight that I spilled water on myself while reading the news and didn't even move to clean it up for a full half hour.

group road rage

As we were exiting a parking garage near Santa Monica pier, a car stopped to let another car back out of its spot. Immediately, the driver in the car behind the one that had stopped pressed his horn and held it down, letting out the most obnoxious, useless honk to ever be honked in the history of honking.

"What, asshole?" shrieked the girl who had stopped her car. "I'm letting this guy back up, you jerk!"

"Yeah, douchebag," chimed in the driver who was backing up. "What's your problem?"

Within seconds, other drivers were also yelling out their windows at the guy. Various shouts of, "You're a prick!" and "What a douche!" echoed throughout the parking structure.

It was a beautiful LA moment.

family

My father's brother lives out in Los Angeles, but he and my father were not on speaking terms for a long time. After I moved out here, they finally reconciled, and they saw each other for the first time in 16 years last month, when my parents came to visit me. It was great--suddenly, I had an aunt and uncle right around the corner. So tonight, my aunt and uncle invited me over for dinner. I was a little nervous about going over there alone because, though we're related, they are basically strangers to me. It's hard to know how to act--you can't be too polite, but then you can't be too familiar either.

Luckily my uncle took care of that real quickly. Ten minutes into the dinner, he said, "So, tell me--how did you get to be so fat?"

Ah, Uncle. You really are family. I told him my mom had sent me a weight-loss hypnosis book, and he was appeased.

uterine vaccine

My mother called me to see if I had gotten "that vaccine, the one for your uterus."

"What?" I asked. "What are you talking about?"

"You know, the vaccine for your uterus."

The major problem here was that I did not understand the Korean word for uterus, and she did not know the English word for uterus, so we were throwing out random English organ names (ovary? liver?) until she finally explained that it was "the Baby House."

"Ohhhh, the uterus," I said. "There's a vaccine for your uterus???"

"It's new," she said. "Everyone is getting it. You have to get three shots. You should go get it, I'm going to make your sister get it too."

"Do you mean the HPV vaccine?" I asked.

There was a pause. "What's HPV?"

"It's an STD," I said.

"AN S-T-WHAT???" she screeched. "They said it was for your UTERUS!"

I didn't tell her whether I had gotten the vaccine or not. I think it's better this way.

nightmares

I keep having nightmares about Michael Jackson. I dreamed, for example, that someone was killing him by stabbing him with a toothpick in the heart over and over again. I am either really deranged or extraordinarily artistic to be coming up with such metaphors in an unconscious state.

That or I am watching too much coverage of his death.

weight-loss hypnosis

My mother sent me a Korean weight-loss hypnosis book. Basically you're supposed to listen to this CD while looking at these pictures in a book over a period of 20 days. The best picture so far is one of a fat man hanging from a hot air balloon by a really thin rope. The hot air balloon is floating over the ocean, and the rope is about to snap. The instructions ask you to pretend you are the man in the picture. Meanwhile, the CD is playing ominous music, and a man is saying in the background, "You are about to fall.... You must get lighter.... It's dangerous...."

I wish I could say it's working, but the day I discovered my laptop was stolen, I was so stressed out that I ate two chocolate bars at work and made my friend watch me eat an entire sausage pizza and half an order of chili cheese fries. Maybe it only works if you're on a hot air balloon.

mormons

Two Mormons knocked on my door to convert me. One was this really hot white guy, and the other was a short Korean guy with an Australian accent. Not interested, I said, "But I had a lot of Mormon friends in high school."

"Really?" they asked. "Here?"

"No," I said. "I went to high school in Atlanta."

"Atlanta?" asked the Korean with the Australian accent. "That's weird. How'd you end up there?"

I looked at him silently for about three seconds until he realized that he was a Korean Mormon from Australia.

The other guy was really beautiful though. I am starting to understand why Mormonism is supposedly one of the world's fastest growing religions right now. The hot missionary tactic is brilliant. For a split second, I totally considered converting and having seven of his Mormon babies.