Friday Night Lights

Hong Kong is in Paris. So I'm at home watching prime-time television on a Friday night. I don't own cable. Only a digital converter box, subsidized by the federal government. In fact, wasn't this program an initiative of the W. Bush administration? That might explain why my converter box sucks ass. I call it, "government cheese".

When I do watch regular TV, I mostly watch programs on NBC, FOX or KCET/PBS. Occasionally the CW during Top Model cycles. Tonight I'm watching ABC which, in my opinion, sucks ass also. It is Disney, after all. Yet I'm riveted by tonight's line-up. First I watched WIFE SWAP. Dude, for those of you who watch WIFE SWAP... how trippy. As you can glean from the title, the wives swap homes and families. The twist, however, is in the rules. During the first half of the show, the wife/mother has to live by the family's rules. In the second half, the family must live by the wife/mother's rules. I know it doesn't sound ingenious, but watching WIFE SWAP emoted very strong feelings in me. I felt uncomfortable the entire time, yet couldn't stop watching. It kind of felt like watching a gang bang.

Next I watched WHAT WOULD YOU DO? hosted by John Quinones. Man, I would love his job. I love that Candid Camera shit. I'm all about that, yo. The concept is what I personally call "human/social experiments" or simply "social science"... with a hidden video camera near-by. Yes, caught on tape. But not to humiliate people, I find that rude. It's about furthering the understanding of our culture and communities through the study of social psychology, and coupled with practical, real-world application in a natural but somewhat controlled setting so to evoke an uninhibited response. If you can't tell, I'm totally serious.

Tonight's show was excellent. It's like WHAT WOULD YOU DO if an attractive drunk woman asks you to breathe into her breathalyzer so her car would start? WHAT WOULD YOU if you witness a soccer coach overwork and berate a dehydrated and soon-to-collapse wimpy red-headed student in the park? WHAT WOULD YOU DO if you're in a pharmacy and overhear a fragile old lady say she's unable to pay for her diabetes medicine? WHAT WOULD YOU DO if you see a restaurant manager sexually harass a waitress? What if the waitress dressed like a slut? Yeah, they changed up the circumstances too. I LOVE that shit.

I was really tempted to get this from Target

Google Q of the Day: How long can beans soak before they grow killer mold?

Unfortunately, no answer on point. However, I found a pleasant secondary source entitled, "Edible Bean Disease and Disorder Identification."

Google Q of the Day: How many cups are in a quart?

Yes, once I saw the answer was four cups, I said to myself, Duh.

So finally I am making the infamous vegetable bean soup in a crock pot. If you were following my posts, you would realize my beans have been soaking for two days. Is that bad? I just got so busy last night...

But I'm back. Sort of. I now see my idea to make vegetable bean soup in a crock pot was impulsive and poorly-planned. However, my aversion to waste unused food is greater than my general disinterest to assemble this soup. I mean, how much longer can these beans soak without growing some sort of killer mold?

My First CSA Package

Not sure if you could tell from my previous post, but I am beginning to garden. So far, I love it. Yesterday I spent the whole day working on my flower bed, now a mixture of cacti, succulents and perennials. I moved the asiatic lilies indoor with hopes of salvaging what are left of the lilies after the squirrels have feasted on the bulbs. Squirrels are not as cute as they seem, especially when they eat your flowers and leave a mess for you to see. They just don't give a fuck.

To me, gardening is trial and error. I have no time or interest to read or learn about gardening. I am one of those people who prefer not to read instructions. I can indeed read and comprehend instructions, however, and I am also quite good at following them. But I'd rather not. It feels too time-consuming and repressive.

Due to my general disinterest in instructions, rules and some laws, I decided to wait for my father Yip Yee to visit and provide a vital tutorial before I start my salad and produce garden. I cannot wait. In the meantime, I am participating with a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) for my local, seasonal and organic fruit/vegetable needs.

The produce pictured above is from South Central Farmers' Cooperative for $15 a box! It is a great deal and I love supporting the now famous South Central Farmers. Yet I felt very, very overwhelmed. I do not cook and, to be honest, I couldn't even identify some of the vegetables, at least in its raw form... Blu-Tooth volunteered to assist me and calm my anxieties. Together we determined that the package contained beets, carrots, green onion, spinach, cilantro, kale, broccoli, collard greens, three types of lettuce, and one additional leafy green vegetable we could not accurately identify. I added the spinach and green onion in my udon for dinner and it was lovely. The produce really looks and tastes fresh. Additionally, I have begun to prepare a vegetable and bean soup for the crock pot. Official assembly will commence tomorrow evening after the beans are soaked overnight. I refuse to let any of this produce go to waste!

The only negative aspect was that the package contained no fruit. Because of this, I've decided to also try CSA California for my next patronage. I will keep you posted on any and all new developments. Isn't this like so cool?

Google Q of the Day: What is eating my asiatic lilies?

Apparently EVERYTHING eats lilies -- squirrels, chipmunks, rabbits, deer, groundhogs, mice, moles, slugs -- the list of malicious masticators is virtually endless!

Hong Kong commented that it's probably not a deer.

I am dismayed. What will happen when I set up my salad garden!

The Zen Mind

I also choose a theme every new year. This theme becomes my mantra, a conscious and directed way of feeling and living for myself. In 2008, my theme was BALANCE OXIDANTS WITH ANTI-OXIDANTS. In 2009, it was EMBRACE ZEN.

This year I'm going to EMBRACE ZEN again, because the art of zen cannot be accomplished in a mere 365 days. Along with this renewed commitment (I just decided today), I viewed my new 2010 wall calendar in the kitchen, a Chanuka gift from Hong Kong. Admittedly, when I first received the present, I overlooked the theme of the calendar and automatically assumed the passages alongside the Japanese calligraphy art were just cheesy Confucius-type-but-Japanese inspirational quotes. I didn't pay much attention, and instead thought the calendar was just part of Hong Kong's fetish with all things Japanese.

This morning while eating baked Ruffles with tomatillo salsa for breakfast, I finally paused and read January's entry, 16 days later -- "When you are very honest with yourself and brave enough, you can express yourself fully. Whatever people may think, it is all right. Just be yourself. That is actual practice, your actual life."

What a great quote! I must admit, I feel inspired. I actually feel better. Did I just experience a zen moment? I flip the calendar around and discover it's entitled, THE ZEN MIND.

Whoa. This is a sign for sure. Hence, I shall modify my theme to EMBRACE THE ZEN MIND. So here's to 2010 and embracing the zen mind. Wish me luck.

Happy new year!

Is it appropriate to still wish people a "happy new year?" Around the office, when I see someone I haven't seen since December 31st, I greet them with happiness of a new year. They seem to appreciate it.

This year I made a resolution I already broke. Fortunately, being Chinese, I have a second chance to redeem myself on February 14th (yes, Chinese New Year falls on Valentine's Day this year). My resolution is to blog every day. I have a month to get back into the habit of blogging. I hope it's like riding a bicycle.

Perhaps my last poem ever

Dedicated to Joe Mak for his birthday on July 14th.

J oe is my BFF ("Brotha Fo Fun")
O nly his
E SL

M akes me laugh
A loud and proud (usually it's aloud and in private)
K ikikikikiki (female fob giggles)

I apologize. I know no one else is going to understand this posting, except Joe Mak. This is what the general populace describes as "an inside joke". And it is an inside joke, indeed! Kikikikiki!

Guess what this is

Here are a few hints:

• It has the same letters as GOD, but unlike God, this could be your best friend.
• It rhymes with COG, FOG, HOG, JOG and LOG.
• It's the reason why there's so much crime in China (because they ate McGruff!)
• It taste like beef brisket, but with a lamb texture.

First person who guesses correctly gets a pair of chopsticks in a silk wrapper.

Booyakasha!

Happy Year of the OX!!

GONG HAY FAT CHOY!!

Tomorrow Barack Obama will be the President of the United States

My Obama doll with Ur and Peter's Obama bobblehead

I cannot wait. In the meantime, enjoy this song I discovered at 4 am in the morning at Kramerbooks in Dupont Circle. I actually can't find the newest version so this is the old one that encourages you to vote. Thanks to all who have.

Best MLK day EVER

Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day!

Yesterday, 2 million spectators, Christy and I congregated between the Washington Memorial and Lincoln Memorial to watch the start of the inaugural ceremonies for President-Elect Obama.

The two hour event featured speeches and music by many high profile celebrities, a majority of them were African American, such as Denzel Washington, Jamie Foxx, Queen Latifah, Mary J. Blige, Beyonce, Stevie Wonder, Usher, Forrest Whittiker, Samuel L. Jackson, Tiger Woods, John Legend, Herbie Hancock and more!! I thought to myself, wow, this must be the first time ever that so many African Americans were asked to perform and celebrate with the incoming president... and, as a result, this must be the first time it's so much fun! I mean, Jamie Foxx did a shout out to Chi-town, even hollered Chicago's area code "312" at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. How awesome is that? I am so happy that we finally have a black president. Let's keep it real and keep it going!

Our Puffies and We

You need to have a Puffy in cold weather. You will die without one. Here's DBB and I modeling ours. It is the best purchase I made this winter. I love it frankly. I brought it to Washington DC with me and thank God I did.

Best Food Court EVER

can be found at the Yuyuan Gardens in Shanghai. Here's a little video of the splendor and it keeps going... I should have kept recording but I would have ran out of space!

Here are more pics. Beautiful huh?

Here is what I ordered:

And of course I don't waste food:

Me so happy:

Pictorial of how XL and DYY became BFFs

Pictorial by: Design Director DBB.

Entitled:
"Friendship Has No Boundaries, Shares One Language, Sings in Amazing Chinese Unison."

Also known as:
"No Cab in Sight at 2 AM While Zero Degrees in Shanghai, Fuck that Shit, Let's Stay Home and Party."

XL, DBB and DYY wish all you bitches a happy new year!

Ancient Chinese Secret straight from the Motherland

Despite being a person of Chinese descent (and Cantonese to boot!), it is a known, accepted and sad fact that I do not know how to spit up (aka "hauk") mucus and/or phlegm. Throughout my life, I either blew my nose or remained stuffed up, while admiring my brother's expert hauking skills and clear passageways. Interestingly I accepted my lot in life and never questioned my inability to hauk... until a few weeks ago when Divinestyler rocked my world. He was the first person in my life who actually explained the act of hauking to me: essentially, one would inhale the mucus upward into the nose and then downward through the back sinuses to the bottom of the throat and up the throat again by spitting a loogie out of the mouth. It's a basic circular motion.

I responded with wonder... and also with disgust. I was like, Joe, are you serious? That sounds fucken gross. That must be why I've never tried it... somewhere in my girlie subconscious, I must have suppressed even the desire to learn how to hauk. And now that I know, I refuse to do it. Yuck.

But both my primary care physician and friends disagree. They all say it's important to remove the mucus/phlegm before it turns into something worse. No one can tell me exactly what that worse would be... but if you think of hauking in a survival-of-the-fittest context, I would not evolve. I would just die off. And that's not cool.

So you think the Ancient Chinese Secret for ridding phlegm is hauking? WRONG. That's the harsh unnecessary unsanitary old school way. The aristocrats in Shanghai drink pig lung soup. Yes, you read it correctly... pig lung soup. Why would one need to hauk when there's plenty of pig lungs everywhere to consume! Be Chinese and don't waste any part of the animal, you know? Especially if it's medicinal, i.e. get rid of phlegm.

I did indeed boast to friends prior to my trip that I had planned to eat all the funky meats available (eg. dog, cat, raccoon, snake, whatever) in Shanghai and Hong Kong before returning to the US as a devout lacto-ovo-pesco vegetarian for the rest of 2009 after Chinese New Year.

Pig lung was not on my list of funky meats, but DBB said that it's good for eliminating mucus... he noticed my phlegmy cough once I arrived to his apartment in the French Concession. So I said what the heck. And you know what? It wasn't so bad. It tasted like bland gelatinous fat.

So I had the soup for lunch today at 4 pm. By 1 am this morning, the phlegm was gone! For real! It's crazy dude. The medicinal value of pig lung -- one of the many ancient Chinese secrets I will discover during my stay in the Motherland. I will share them with you all if you believe. But you must believe.

Pig Lung Soup yo -- Shanghai, China

Jesus Christ Superstar

In celebration of Josh's belated birthday and Jesus's upcoming birthday, we went to see Jesus Christ Superstar -- the live musical. I watched the film version like 10 years ago and remember really enjoying it. I mean - the story of the new testament in song and dance... what can you not love? Now that I've seen the musical, however, I am surprised to feel that the movie was better.

I suppose it should be a treat to have Ned Steely perform our show. Ned is the original cast member who played Jesus in the original Broadway musical in 1970. But dude. Just look at the picture above. Grandpa Steely is an octogenarian trying to play a 32 years old Jesus. It was the most awful casting ever. The age difference was even more apparent when 70's electric guitar singer Ned sang in duets with Judas, who was played by a thirty-something African American gay man with a soulful R&B voice.

Speaking of Judas, who is my all-time favorite apostle as you all know, I had no idea that his dissension with Jesus was because his uncompromising dogma. Judas was a fucken ideologue dude. I always knew he was more than just a traitor, that his dissolution from Jesus was from a deeper disappointed place. But goddammit. Ideologues are so annoying. Still, I'm going to overlook what would normally be a fatal flaw. My admiration for Judas remains. He's still the best apostle ever. Judas was the only one who really questioned authority, even if the authority was the son of God. Peter, Paul and the rest... clearly Jesus' bitches.

"Oh yeah, I got a cool black guy to play me."

Mandatory Quarantine

For the most part, I have been home-bound and isolated from the rest of society due to pink eye. The doctor said I'm highly contagious and should not return to work until Thursday. For a hardworking cheap chinese laborer like myself, three days away from work is a long ass time. Though I need the break so perhaps it's a blessing in disguise? Of course I worked remotely still. But calling into meetings wearing pajamas and without showering is somewhat gratifying to me. I think I enjoy working from home. I also learned that, if by any chance in the future or at Armageddon, I am detained and/or forced into mandatory quarantine or solitary confinement, I believe I can do it.

I entertained myself by baking cupcakes, watching back-to-back episodes of The Wire, gardening, flipping through magazines at Rite Aid, eating junk food, organizing my guestroom, napping, surfing channels and the internet for anything Blagojevich-related, reading about Michelle Obama. It is from reading her biography that I realize that Michelle and I have much in common. As if we are kindred spirits.

Both Michelle and I love Barack Obama. We are both public-interest minded lawyers. We both grew up in the South side of Chicago to working-class families. We both attended Whitney Young H.S. We both went to prestigious colleges. Michelle went to Princeton while I attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (it's ranked #2 in the nation for engineering...). Michelle's senior thesis is entitled, "Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community". This was the controversial thesis that caused people to call her a "black militant" just because she critiqued the lack of support and services for black students at Princeton.

Reading about this reminded me of the final paper I wrote for my Asian American Jurisprudence class in law school. I wrote about how the interests of Asian Americans were subordinated by the interests of other ethnic minorities in a perceived (or actual) zero-sum game manipulated by The Man. I used the LA Riots and the cabdriver situation in NYC as examples. Although I still stand by my arguments, I would be horrified to have my law school paper scrutinized and misinterpreted by like everyone. Totally, completely horrified. I remember having to do an all-nighter to write that paper because I had procrastinated all year. I would hate people to judge me on a paper I wrote when I was cracked out at 23 years old. Poor Michelle had to defend herself for something she wrote for a class in college at the age of 21.

Ten years later, I wonder where my paper is... and could it destroy me or my credibility? I assume one physical copy is with Professor Kang while an electronic copy is on a floppy disk somewhere. Maybe it won't resurface when I get my appointment from Obama? Let's hope.

My next post? Perhaps similarities with Gov. Rod Blagojevich? He and I probably have more in common actually.

PAY TO PLAY, BITCH! No one rides for free.

Pink Eye = WMDs

Yes, it is true. I have been slowly assembling an army of cybersoldiers in preparation for robot uprisings and armageddon in general. However, now that I have been demobilized by pink eye, I now believe I should assemble a guerrilla group of bio-terrorist combatants also. I would recruit my two nephews, who transferred the highly contagious virus to me by coughing indiscriminately in my food and my face, all the while staying cute and lovable, disarming me and my better judgment to maintain some distance away from their bio toxic germs. I can't believe I allowed those little fuckers to get me.

Since I am not as cute and lovable as my nephews, my friends are not as disarmed and have maintained their better judgment. Even though I promised not to cough into anyone's food or face, a couple of us made the right decision for me to leave a baby shower early and quarantine myself so I don't spread the infectious disease to the expecting mother and unborn child. In fact, there was another pregnant friend on the scene so I finally left because I couldn't bear the responsibility of something later going terribly wrong. It's not like you can deny spreading pink eye at a party when you're the only one with discharge oozing out of your eye sockets. Thank god I had my sunglasses on. Although no one could tell, I started feeling paranoid. I was reminded of a Bloodhound Gang episode (from 321 Contact) about pink eye. The story was about this school cafeteria employee who had contracted pink eye, yet neglected to wash her hands before she prepared sandwiches, causing a number of teenagers to become ill. She wore sunglasses the whole time to cover her itchy, irritated red eye. But the Bloodhound Gang found her habit of wearing sunglasses indoors, in a dark cafeteria, to be a bit odd. I don't remember exactly how the Bloodhound Gang busted her, but I do remember the moral of the story is to wash your hands frequently... and to never contract pink eye.

Twenty-five years later after watching such an important and informative show, it is clear I have not learned from my childhood lessons. Or perhaps bio-terrorists (ie. children) are far more powerful and deadlier than they were when I was growing up? All I know is that none of my peers growing up ever had pink eye or lice or mono or peanut allergies. But now I have one of the four. OMG. I need to assemble a guerrilla army as soon as possible! In the meantime, I will be an army of one and follow what this guy does.