Big Apple X'mas 2006

So as most of you know, I spent my Christmas and New Years in New York City for a total of 10 days. I flew in on Midwest Airlines for the first time (very reasonable only $180 roundtrip!) and was quite impressed. Not much waiting at the airports and the seats were a little wider with a 2x2 formation instead of the usual 2x3 AND they served freshly baked cookies..Yum! Anyway Flew from KC to Laguardia on Sat 12/23 and return trip was on 1/1. The weather was absolutely amazing the whole time I was there, around mid to high 40's. I barely needed my heavy jacket.


At our fav asian dessert place enjoying a mango custard. The pics were used to taunt KK who LOOOOVES this stuff ;) Enjoy KK...

Main reason for the trip was to get my passport renewed at the M'sian Consulate. That almost didn't happen when the massive earthquake off the coast of Taiwan disrupted telecomunications/internet to most of Asia, therefore preventing my passport from being "activated". In the end, the very kind officer told me he'll just give it to me and try to do an offline update. I was definitely glad since that would save me a ton of headache. Other than that, Linli and I hung out a bunch, did some shopping and ate our hearts out. As usual, I skipped out on most of the touristy things.


L: The compulsory subway pic and R: Diesel jeans on SALE!! But this is not the pair I bought ;)

Took a little break from shopping and chilled at this GREAT new chocolate place; Max Brenner (Chocolate by the bald man) It was fantastic with 10 different kinds of hot chocolates and dishes with added cocoa. We both shared a Hazelnut praline crepe, totally delish!


I managed to hang out with YeeBien for a day. She took the train down from Conneticut for she also had renewed her passport and need to pick it up. It was good seeing her, and she looks great!

While in NYC, I hung out with alot of Andreas' friends which was very interesting. I got to eat some Greek food (At Xmas party and Yanni's Bday) and even got to go to a Greek night club! I felt a little out of place and the music was definitely unique ;) I met alot of Cypriots and I'm not usually good with names but the few I did remember were Yanni, Andreas, Tim the dentist who cheats at Taboo and his wife Isabella, George aka GG and Philip the dancer! Also met Andro's personal trainer friend, Marcos, from Czech who is absolutely dreamy whom we ended up going to watch Night at the Museum (which is not a very good movie) with and also played Taboo and spent a night of intoxicated karaoke.


L: Drunks at karaoke, Fang and me R: Faye, me and Marco


L: LMAO, Linli and I laughed so hard when Andro just randomly ripped off his tshirt in the middle of a poker game, LOL R: In the Wall Street district, beautiful day and not too many people

On the final weekend which was the New Year's weekend, we managed to squeeze in a Broadway performance. We ended up watching Spelling Bee which was funny and entertaining. Andro, Linli and me also went to a Family bar which was alot like Freddies except a little more sophisticated. The drinks were pretty pricey though. Linli and Andro also threw a NYE party at their house where we drank champagne and played Taboo and Catchphrase.

Pics of NYE party at Andro&Lin's. We were taking japanese style pics...retarded =)


It's almost 2007! Popped champagne and we made a toast...

All in all, my trip to nyc was amazing. I managed to renew my passport, shopped a little (new diesel jeans and tons of underwear from H&M), pigged out on all kinds of cuisine, met up with Alex (friend from Fridae) and hang out with my most awesomest friend Linli ;)
Here's the perfect picture to sum up my trip....the t-shirt says it all...

Happy Holidays

Hey guys, blogging from NYC :)
Just wanted to throw in a quick note
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!! For those travelling, be safe.
I will post more photos when I get back to good ol COMO. So far my at my trip I've managed to:

• Ate Czech, Thai, Malaysian, Chinese and Greek food
• Attended Greek Xmas party
• Watched movie "Night at the Museum"; blaaah....wait for the DVD
• Shopped till I drop; Diesel jeans ON SALE! H&M underwear frenzy
• Dropped passport off to be renewed. Terribly inefficient!

More to come soon!!! Oh no my vacation's half over, I don't it to end...

Projects I'm currently working on...

Books:


Books I'm currently reading

Not sure how or why but I got into reading two different Biographies right now. I'm almost done with The Confession by James McGreevey and just started listening to My Life audiobook by Bill Clinton. I wanted to read about Governer McGreevey because so far he's the highest government official to be outed and I wanted to read about President Clinton because he is definitely the best Commander-In-Chief since I've lived in this country. There are many parallels in these two books, both men were incredibly driven and motivated. They knew exactly what they wanted and exactly how to achieve their goals. I also understand that they are both politicians, so I take most of the "politics" in these books with a grain of salt. It's just a great read to motivate oneself to wanting to achieve bigger and greater things.

The book I just completed before I started with the two biographies above was Life of Pi by Yann Martel. I learned about this book through Dave who read it because of Wes. It's an interesting book, quite philosophical and symbolic. There's a surprise ending to the end of the book. After the author is done telling you the story, he lists a bunch of questions (to be asked at a book club, I presume) but the questions are very interesting. It's a pretty light read, I would suggest it to anyone who just wants to curl up in a couch, drinking a cup of hot cocoa, and read during these winter months. I give this book 3.5/5 stars.

I have not been so good at documenting all the books I've read. I hope to mention, even if briefly, the books I've read on my blog to somehow remind me of the material I've come across. There have been countless books that I've read that I have very little recollection of. One example would be The Green Mile which I hope to re-read because from what I can remember, it was a great book.

***NEW MATERIAL ADDED 12/11/06***

So this is another book I read earlier this year, Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. This is another really good book that I definitely recommend. Here's the excerpt from the book's cover:

"By the time she turned thirty, Elizabeth Gilbert had everything a modern, educated, ambitious American woman was supposed to want - a husband, a house in the country, a successful career. But instead of feeling happy and fulfilled, she was consumed with panic, grief and confusion. She went through a divorce, a crushing depression, another failed love and the complete eradication of everything she ever thought she was supposed to be." "To recover from all of this, Gilbert took a radical step. In order to give herself the time and space to find out who she really was and what she really wanted, she got rid of her belongings, quit her job, left her loved ones behind and undertook a year-long journey around the world, all alone. Eat, Pray, Love is the chronicle of that year. Gilbert's aim was to visit three places where she could examine one aspect of her own nature, set against the backdrop of a culture that has traditionally done that one thing very well. In Italy, she studied the art of pleasure, learning to speak Italian and gaining the twenty-three happiest pounds of her life. India was for the art of devotion, where, with the help of a native guru and a surprisingly wise Texan, she embarked on four months of austere spiritual exploration. Finally, in Indonesia, she sought her ultimate goal: balance - namely, how to somehow build a life of equilibrium between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. Looking for these answers on the island of Bali, she became the pupil of an elderly, ninth-generation medicine man and also fell in love in the very best way - unexpectedly." "A memoir of self-discovery, Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment. It is also about the adventures that can transpire when a woman stops trying to live in imitation of society's ideals. This is a story certain to touch anyone who has ever woken up to the unrelenting need for change."--BOOK JACKET

I think it was very appropriate that I read this book at this point of my life as I am too almost turning the frightful age of thirty and share very similar discontent for life in general with the Author. Sounds harsh when I say discontent, I guess the better word is I feel like there's more I can achieve but have yet to do so. Anyway this book in a way has motivated me to want to learn new skills (languages, musical instrument etc) and much, much more. I give it 4/5 stars. Go read it and let me know what you think.

***END OF NEW MATERIAL***

Music:

I also checked out a bunch of beginner music books from the library. I think that for me to be more "complete" as a person, I need to be able to read music. I would really like to be able to read some music and be able to play basic piano which I've also checked books out for. I'm thinking about investing in a little eletronic keyboard but we'll just have to see how long my current interest will last me. Deep down inside, I've always wanted to be able to play a musical instrument. It's one of those things that I keep putting away and say I'll do it someday. Well hopefully I am serious enough to follow through with it this time as it definitely will not be easy and takes a very long commitment. Would love to hear of any advise you have for me in comment section...

Language:

I have also always wanted to be able to communicate in more languages. The two that I've been trying to learn, half-heartedly, are Spanish and Mandarin. Today I found a very interesting site that provides lessons in these and many others. This website belongs to the Foreign Service Institute, FSI. I've tried out Unit 1 of Spanish and it looks promising so if time permits, I think I'll continue with the lessons. They are quite effective and best of all, this site is completely FREE!

Snowed In

Woke up as usual on Friday morning and noticed I received a text from Justin.
"Are you going to work?"
I replied
"I dunno but I'm going to try"
He calls a second later and tells me to go look out my window. I crawled out of bed and looked out my window and I went "OH MY GOD!!!" There's no way anybody is going to work. I turned on the TV and looks like Columbia's been buried in 18" of snow!

Unbelievable!

Called my boss to confirm and work is indeed called off! Wooohoooo!!! I NEVER get snow days but I guess the snow was just too severe. Both I-70 (that's right Interstate 70!) and HWY 63 were shut down. Later heard that the Governor of Missouri declared state of emergency. This is the most snow Columbia has seen since 1995!


L: The front of my house completely buried R: My backyard again buried in 18", with the Sun just about to rise.

Spent most of the morning just watching the news and catching up on the TV shows I've missed. I was also amused to see my opposite neighbour, apparently very determined to go somewhere, try for almost an hour to move their little Camry. They pushed, they shoved, they accelerated back and forth and after an hour, they were still stuck on the same spot. At that moment, I realized I'm not going anywhere for the day.


L: Piled all the snow to one side measuring almost 3' R: I'm very proud of my shovelled driveway :)

After lunch, I went across the street and borrowed a shovel from my neighbour. Hooked up my MP3 player, made a hot cup of tea and spent the next 2 hours shovelling snow from my driveway. It was kind of fun but tiring as hell heck and my back was a little sore the next day. True enough I stayed home the entire day, I guess taking the advise of just about every newsperson on TV and radio who was going "If you do not absolutely need to be outside, do not go out!". Later that evening, Joe who was back from Michigan (he must have brought the weather with him) came over and we got to hang out.


L: Car handled pretty well in the snow & ice R: Walked around downtown and MU after lunch.

The next day, we attempted braving the roads. This is the first time I'm driving in the snow in my BMW, seems to handle the roads very well with the 4 wheel drive. Some of the roads were plowed but the city still seemed to be in disaster mode. We had lunch at Chinese Wok, very surprised businesses were open but the owner told me they were open on Friday too! Such dedication. After lunch we just walked around downtown and MU campus, it was very pretty to see everything covered in pure white snow. After the walk, we went to Walmart and there were so many people, one would think it's the last day of Walmart's operation of worst still, war time. Each of the check out counters had a line so long it stretched all the way back to the clothing department. I guess snow days=good business :)

Reminder: Notice my little chat tool to the right, do leave a short note ;)

P/S: What do you think of the pictures taken with my cell phone W810? Seem to produce pretty good pictures.

Turkey at The Lou

So I drove in to St Louis on Wed after work and got in at around 9:30pm. Drove directly to James' because Dave was already downtown and wanted to meet up and go out that night. Hung out with James which was fun and later went to Culpeppers to grab something light to eat, we split a veggie burger :P After eating Dave was already at the Loading Zone so we walked over and met up with the rest of the crew. It was PACKED! Apparently the night before Thanksgiving is the most popular night to be out. Never knew that :) We went to Novaks after LZ and danced and had a really good time.


Family singing Xmas carols and playing musical instruments, hmm very very interesting...;)

The next day, barely getting much sleep I had to jump out of bed and into the shower. We had to be at church. Dave's Mom, Sherry, was the church organist and Dave was playing the trumpet. It was interesting and they played rather well. After church, we went over to Dave's Aunt Karen's house for Thanksgiving dinner. The food was good and the family was welcoming. We ate and drank so much we passed out in the guest room. It was a good time, it just got a little strange when everyone hung out in the family room playing musical instruments and singing christmas carols. We didn't do much after we left Aunt Karen's, we were supposed to go watch a movie but Dave was feeling cheap so we ended up at Emily's house watching a really stupid movie, Equilibrium starring Christian Bale and Taye Diggs.

We were planning this elaborate shopping schedule for Black Friday but decided to sleep in instead ;) We left the house at around 11 and got to Bestbuy and still managed to get most of what I was looking for. A 2GB memory stick for my cell phone for $40, MI:III $7.99 and My Bestfriend's Wedding for $2.99! Even at 11:30pm, Bestbuy was full of people and the lines were absolutely crazy. But it was kind of fun joining in with the all that craziness. John G came over to hang, we walked down to the Mississipi river and then went to have dinner at Maggiano's. That night we went out again to Freddie's, Novaks and JJ's. Met tall Chris, counselor Mark and Irish Barra for the first time, cool people.


Friday night having fun at Novaks and acting a fool

Saturday we didn't really do much in the morning. James dropped by on his way back from visitting his folks and we hung out a little. Dave went to hang with Em and I followed James and had dinner with Jerod, Ryan, Jason and James at Outback. After that we met up with the rest of the crew at LZ. Met Phd Craig. Was tired from the last two nights of partying but Jerod and James kept buying me shots and as I got more drunk the night got more fun :P After LZ, we went to Freddie's and then on to the Complex. It was one crazy crazy night and I had a lot of fun. Two people that were crazy flirting with me, Bill and Doug. We stayed at the Complex till closing and then went to Ryan's. We ate some trail mix and passed out for couple of hours. We then drove back to James and passed out there.


Completely passed out at Ryan's after partying at LZ, Freddie's and Complex.

The next morning, we went to Metropolitan Community Church. It was an interesting seeing so much family attending service. It's just good to see that there are services like this available in bigger cities. After church we had brunch at this really cool Mexican restaurant sitting outside in light sweaters! The weather all throughout Thanksgiving was absolutely marvelous. Went back to Dave's packed and left for Columbia. The traffic coming home was just horrible but made it back safely after a completely crazy, fun-filled Thanksgiving in StL.

Happy Turkey Day!

I know, I know...I've been really bad this month with keeping up with new posts. What can I say? I've been busy. I had an old friend, Joel, from Arizona visit and he stayed with me for a full week. He had to defend his thesis while I had the honour to spend a whole week entertaining him, fun! He didn't have a car so guess who had to chauffer him around town? It's all good though, not sure when I'll ever get to see him again. Then this past weekend, H2 came back to visit. It was just a weekend trip so I didn't get to see much of her but it was still good to see that she's doing well.

Also I've installed a little chat/scribble box on the right column, be sure to go check it out and leave me a note!

So tomorrow will be Thanksgiving! And it will be 33 days away from Christmas and 39 days before the year ends. Amazing. I will be spending this year's Thanksgiving with Dave's family in St Louis. It'll be my first Thanksgiving with them. The past four years I've celebrated Thanksgiving in KC but since H2 is no longer around I thought I'd make a little change to my yearly routine. But I will definitely miss the homemade turkey with a Malaysian twist, eating so much we can't move and then going out for a late night movie only to fall asleep in the theater, putting up the Xmas tree the next day with Tze and last but not least enjoying the very good Turkey leftover curry noodles. Ahhh....the memories :)

Anyway Happy Thanksgiving y'all and definitely eat till you drop!

Mid-term Elections 2006

Finally the elections are over! Hopefully we'll see less of those cheesy "...and I approve this message" ads. I have a feeling that we're not that lucky though, we'll probably be bombarded with the next Presidential ads soon.

Anyway I live in a "hot" state this election year, along with Montana and Virginia, that has gained attention from the national press. Missouri's Claire McCaskill (D) was going up against Jim Talent (R) and I must say this is definitely a good year for Democrats. I got a little worried before bed as Talent was leading but KC and StL's votes were not counted and those two cities pretty much carried McCaskill to her victory. Some of the bills that passed in Missouri were

• The Stem Cell research and
• Increase of minimum wage
• Tobacco tax was unfortunately shot down. I personally think they should tax the heck out of those things as it a) doesn't affect me and b) would probably encourage people to smoke less

This has been a great week for politics. I am overall happy with the results as that would be what I would have voted if I was allowed to. I'm also glad that the Democrats have taken control of both the House and the Senate! Another great news is that the first woman, Nancy Pelosi, will be Speaker of the House. This position is 3rd in line of Presidency so you can see that it's no small feat. To top it off, Nancy is an extreme liberal from San Francisco! So hopefully she'll bring better cause for gay rights. And one final victory (I should not celebrate on other people's misfortunes but this is one exception) is Rumsfeld resigned as Defense Secretary! He'll be replaced with ex CIA chief, Bob Gates. What I think really happened is that Bush had to do something as it was obvious the American people were dissatisfied with what was happening so Rumsfeld was a pawn in this game of approval ratings.

Anyway, enough about politics. What's been going on with me? Hmmm let's see, Dave came in to Columbia last Thursday for an interview. We went out to Soco Thursday night, nothing too eventful there. Now Friday was a little bizarre. I guess the stars and moons were aligned to create the perfect bitchfest. All three of us were major bitches but we soon realized it and dropped the attitude. We just stayed in and chilled at Justin's. I had Papa Murphy's pizza for the first time and watched two old and bizarre movies; Shine and Mummy Dearest. They were quite strange! Justin insisted we watch Mummy Dearest, apparently that and Steel Magnolia are like a rite of passage for gay men. I had never seen either up until recently and didn't think they were that great. Anyway Mummy Dearest was about the life of Joan Crawford. We all loved it when she'd yell "I'M DAMN MAD!!!" so now that's a phrase we'll be using among us ;)

So the next day, Dave planned on driving back to StL. I made a last minute decision to ride back with him and ride back with Carrie since she was already there. That night I met Jen and Grant Alter for the first time and James, Carrie, Brad, Dave and I had dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory. It was fun. We met up with Wes and we all went to Freddy's and I met up with Dwan. Later went to JJ's. Had a very interesting night overall*, I had dim sum with Dwan the next morning. I was so tired and sore* I pretty much slept all the way back while riding with Carrie. And that wraps up my weekend...

Side note: I finally got Halloween pictures from John G so I'll be posting that soon. They're GREAT!!

My Birthday Pics

Well as promised here are the pictures from my 29th Birthday. Next assignment's to upload pictures from Halloween where Justin and me were cowboys from Brokeback ;)


Birthday dinner at Murry's. Total suprise from James!

Goofing around before our food arrived.

Ice Cream cake TIME!!! Mmmm YUMMY :P
I didn't want to cut into such a pretty cake. But it eating beats looking ;)

Mandatory group pic after dinner

After dinner, we rocked it out at Soco

End of the night. Finally got to bed at 3am!

If you want to put a story to these pictures, read my post for that night.

Homecoming 2006

Dinner at Sophias. From Left: Dave, John, Carrie, Me, Scott, Jana and James

So this past weekend was totally a riot. James had his annual Homecoming ritual with his friends Scott, Carrie and Jana. Dave on the other hand, didn't really have any plans, so I managed to convince him to come along for the ride. They all got into Columbia on Friday right after I got off work and dropped Dave at my place. We later met up for dinner at Sophias. After din din, the group kinda split. Dave, John G and me went to Justin's and pretty much did nothing (well I consider pigging out on ice cream nothing) while the other group ended up at the Penguin bar having a jolly good time.


Up at the crack of dawn and freezing our behinds off, damn such team players

The next day we woke up bright and early for the Homecoming parade. We got downtown at around 8:30am and downtown was already packed with all kinds of people. I was really feeling the team spirit being all decked out in a Mizzou tshirt and sweatshirt eventhough I didn't go to school here, such mockery! ;) We saw majority of the floats go by and later had lunch at Shakespeares. Mother nature was definitely not kind, the weather was absolutely marvelous on Friday and Sunday but on Saturday (the day of the games) it was cold, cloudy and it rained all freaking day! Thank god I wasn't standing in the stadium getting drenched.


L: Before the game at Shakespeares pizza R: After the game keeping warm at Heidelberg

Justin, Dave and me just hung out at the Heidelberg while the rest stood in the rain watching the game where umbrellas and alcohol were NOT allowed, BOO! I guess it was all worth it since Mizzou won =) After the game they came and joined us the Berg and just hung out for a little more. Everyone was getting tired and cranky as it has been a long, long day; especially since we had to be up so early AND had to endure the cold, the rain and the wet clothes.


L: Before hitting Tonic R: The club was packed and we danced nonstop

So we went home took a nap, woke up all refreshed and was as good as new. We were ready to party all over again. Met up at Carrie's, started drinking, and continued on at Tonic where it was packed. All the businesses downtown were busy with people from the game, totally crazy. We had a good time at Tonic, Scott got us all a Yeagermeister shot and that really messed me up. I got quite buzzed and acted a fool all night long ;)


L: We were all drunk R: Rocking out to Carrie's little speakers, LOL

After the bar we went home to Carrie's and the party definitely continued. We had more to drink and totally rocked out to the tiny speakers. Some of us ended up in some compromising pictures and Jana got a good lap dance from James and me. LOL. People get silly when they drink...


L: Brad, James and Scott at Flat Branch R: One last group pic at Carrie's before James and gang left for the Lou

The next day we met up for lunch at the Flat Branch. The weekend was winding down and you could tell from our faces that we had a blast of a weekend but having to go back to work was going to suck big time. I had definitely not expected a weekend like this. It was fun but I was definitely hurting the next day.