2 Days, 1320 Hours

And the time to hubby's deployment is counting down. Right now I am at a whether-the-glass-is-half-empty-or-half-full mentality. I can either look at it as "it's only 7 weeks" or "it's seeeeeeveeeeen weeks." In all honesty, even for individuals with separation anxiety, 7 weeks is not that rediculously long, at least that's how I think right now anyway.

In a strange sense I am kinda looking forward to it. The seven-weeks deployment represents the last obstacle between his military life and our civilian (normal) life together, where he'll be home every night.

Yesterday was my last day at my temporary job that I have held for the last seven-and-a-half months. I am not sure if it's a good thing or not. In a sense I liked the job a lot, but it does get boring sometimes (is there any jobs that doesn't get that way?). Pretty soon I'll be job-hunting, AGAIN.

Many a times I've asked myself what I really want to do, job-wise. I've done tissue procurement for two-and-a-half years. To me that's my contribution to the well being of mankind. But now I am looking at similar type of work again, namely, non profit organizations. As my husband had once said, unlike most I actually work for job satisfaction. Never had I seriously considered becoming a doctor, but I would most certainly enjoy a job in which what I do will actually have some (positive) impact on some others' lives. For example: Grameen Foundation (no regional office in California that I know of) or World Food Programme. I've added donation links to their site from my blog. Not that I really think any one will go from my blog to theirs and make a donation; it's just a token gesture.

My Religious Coworker -- II

Today we had another one of our "little conversations." The conversation started out strange off the bat. My religious coworker P said to me (and I have no idea what brought that on), "Live everyday as if it is your last." Now I have heard that saying before, even heard a funnier version of it: Live everyday as if it is your last, cause one day you'll be right. And I have always taken that as a joke. I mean, true as it might be, what am I suppose to think of it. So I laughed. Big mistake. She was *serious* about the comment. I mean, hello, she's a Catholic, why would I even think that she was joking? So she went on to tell me, "No, really, my friend lost her husband last week blah blah blah..." and how she went to wake her husband up in the morning and only to find out that he has passed in the night. So that was very depressing talk and I was about to end the conversation and go do something else.

Said lady went on to say to kiss your kids and kiss your husband in the morning and pray for them blah blah blah. At which point I felt that I had to say something, again.

I said to her, "My husband and I are atheists."

After a pause (we were actually typing to each other on the company equivalent of AIM), she responded "I understand" in a very tolerant manner.

I felt that I need to drill the point in, so I escalate the conversation up one notch, "We don't believe that there is a God."

And once again, "I understand." In a way that really means "even though you are WRONG I can see it from your point of view. NOT!

Not backing down, I responded, "I am glad you understand."

With a short pause, she said, "I am not judgemental." Um.... the way she said it is problematic in and of itself. It's really no different than someone saying how they are "non-judgemental" towards homosexual folks. The statement itself had already lumped them into the "weirdo" category, but I am tolerant. Like hell you are. (Kinda like how Mr. Bush said, "I believe that people of color can self-govern" huh? No, I'm not a racist, people of color (though less intellectual) are entirely capable of self-governing. Riiiiiiiight.)

So I said, "I am not judgemental towards those who have a religious belief either."

And she quickly changed the subject.

On hindsight, I should have drove the point home during this encounter.

Blogger's Comment System

I feel bad for saying this. I've always been using Blogger.com and like it very much and still do but boy, does their comment system SUCKS! And I mean SUCKS with a captial "S." Okay, with all caps. It is so unintuitive it's not even funny.

First you click on the "comment" link, and it takes you to an entirely different page where you can only see part of the original entry and none of the other comments and asks you to log in (granted, there is an option to leave a comment anonymously). Even after you log in, your email address and your blog URL do NOT come up automatically (or even an option to include those). Once after you've finished with leaving a comment, it does not take you back automatically to where you started. It only gives you the option to return to the page with only the entry that you commented on. I mean, what's the point? Don't you think I would want to read the next entry now that I am done commenting on the previous (most recent) one??

Holy cow!! Given that the comment thing didn't appear till the latest update, you would think they've learned something from the other existing ones. Granted, beggers can't be choosers, but I just get so frustrated everytime I try to leave a comment. Half the time I ended up just skipping it and going onto the next blog/entry. So if you happen to read this, use HALOSCAN for comments!!! At least until blogger.com comes out with a better version of comment system.

Okay, that's my rent for the day. :)

Turning Asian?

The Birch Aquarium also have your garden variety of sea cucumbers, abalones, and cuttlefish. I've fed hubby abalone while we were in Hong Kong. (When our friends in HK took us out for seafood, I made a point of showing hubby all the tanks with the different edible seafood varieties much like in an aquarium.) Evidently hubby had never seen a real (live) abalone before. Upon the sight of one, he mumbled to himself, "So this is what an abalone looks like..." To which I replied, "When you can point to creatures in an aquarium and say, 'I've had this before' you are well on your way to turning Asian.

Birch Aquarium

Dragged hubby to Birch Aquarium yesterday, it's one of the last places I wanted to visit in San Diego. I love aquariums, more so than zoos, especially visiting different ones. Each aquariums always tend to have something the others don't. The Birch Aquarium has a few different species of jelly fish which even the Monterery Bay Aquarium doesn't have. And to top it all, it has an entire section dedicated to sea horses. You can even see baby sea horses. :) Have you ever seen a leafy sea dragon? They are very cool looking. Hubby thought it was just another piece of drifting seaweed in the tank. :)



Photo credit: Jeff's Nudibranch Site and Coral Reef Gallery

Treat to the Eyes

My purchase of the AmericanStyle magazine was my introduction to arts and craft. Despite the fact that most of the pieces I don't understand and even more that I simply can't afford, the vibrant and vivid colors and designs are definitely a treat to the eyes. I guess the bottom line is: fine art is like a gorgeous woman, it's captivating, dazzling, and mesmerizing. Even though one might not be able to verbalize why it's a great piece, it takes your breath away.

Take a look at this sea anenome paper weight by Robert Eickholt:

Or this sailboat piece by Dino Rosin:

I think this vase by Buzz Blodgett will look GREAT in our new house, even though hubby said, "I can't tell what it is" when I first showed him the picture:

All the aforementioned pieces can be purchased from Art Glass by Gary Gallery.

My Religious Coworker -- I

So I had this devoted coworker, P. She's a very nice person albeit that fact that she's a devoted Catholic -- now I made this statement for a reason. She likes to pray for me a lot and by that I mean "excessively," over any thing and every thing.

"I moved this weekend."
"I prayed for you."
"My husband is looking for a job."
"I'm praying for him."

Huh?! We all know that God doesn't quite work that way, assuming that is one to begin with.

Really, I respect other people's believes. As I have said in one of my earlier blog, some people need to have a faith, something to hold on to, a meaning of life even if it's a make-belief. More power to them. But by the fiftieth time someone prayed for me AND made a point of telling me about it, I am starting to find it a bit irrating. After all, isn't "I'm praying for you (to my God)" a sly way of saying, "My God is the real one"? Albeit the fact that I don't have a specific religous belief, this is starting to get on my nerve.

I mean, it doesn't even have to be God. Anyone who talks about any one subject incessantly will eventually get on my nerve. For example, a girl I used to work with had this one temporary job that she worked at for some three to five months that she absolutely loved. And any and every conversation with her has something to do with this said job. Is there nothing else in her life worth mentioning other than this job that she once held? Regardless of the subject, if certain someone is constantly talking about her husband or her kids or her dogs it will get onto my nerve equally.

The particular subject of God just has an additional touch because they always have this air of "rightousness" about them. The first two friends I made at this (temporary) job were D & P. The first time the three of us go out to have lunch together, D said to me, "P is very religious." I supposed what she was really trying to tell me is, "Please don't say anything that'd offend her as far as her religion goes." At the time I thought it was odd or her to make such a comment. Evidently D knows me a lot better than I do, because now I am finally getting to the point that I feel the need to make a point about my "religious" belief (or lack thereof) every time she clarifies hers.

Finally, the last time she said "I prayed for you" I responded in a very polite and joking manner, "it's very nice of your to pray for an atheist." When she stopped praying for me (or stopped telling me about her praying for me) for the two weeks that followed, I thought I have finally gotten my point across. Boy, was I wrong.

(to be continued)

Yet Another Pipe Dream

Another project that I've always wanted to do (okay, ever since the invention and our possession of a DVR, digital video recorder) is to be able to have a collection of all the funny commercials that I've seen and like and put them all on a DVD. :D But I doubt I'll ever have the attention span to go about doing that. :)

Another Artist -- Ricky Frank

As I was reading my AmericanStyle magazine, I discovered yet another artist -- Ricky Frank. I think his works are absolutely georgeous, maybe one day I will be able to go visit a store with his work. :)

Below are some of his work, if you like them, do go visit his site:

Seven Days, 1320 Hours

Seven more days left in San Diego (I am taking the cat, whatever barebone furnitures we have left in this tiny apartment of ours, and the SUV and heading back north to good ol' Sacramento again next Friday) then 1320 hours apart from my husband. It is going to be rough, especially for me since our longest time apart in the three years we have been together (3 years on the dot on October 1, 2004, the day my husband will be leaving on deployment) was four days. This is not going to get any easier so I will be counting down the hours in my blog, day after day after day.

In a strange way I am looking forward to the day. I am getting sick of living on barebone furnitures. Never imagine it's so hard to not have a couch to plop on when I come home from work, or a TV to watch while we eat. Heck, forget about the TV, not even proper chairs to sit on since anything left here have to be able to fit into our gas-guzzling SUV.

The other reason is that hubby has had a few fairly promising lead on civilian jobs in the greater Sacramento area. This deployment is the last thing that stands between our lives now and our lives that will only commence upon his return and I can't wait. Neither one of us can.

Yesterday I had a vision of my future life -- our dream house. As I have came to realize after our move to San Diego, the house is the single most important thing in my life (well, okay, after the hubby, after all, my life is only meaningful because he shares it with me).

Criterias for this dream house of ours:

Spacious
Lots of windows allowing lots of sunlight
Kitchen with island (no sink in the middle of the island, unless it's a supersized island)
Three car garage for the hubby

Eventually we'd like to have our home theater put in too!

For that decisions have to be made and so do sacrifices. I would also like to squeeze out more time to read and cook instead of idling sitting in front of the computer and eating out all the time.

Seven days and 1,320 hours to go.

Blogging and Writer's Block

First off, can one *have* a writer's block writing a block? I mean, don't you have to have something published to call yourself a "writer"? :D If not, then anyone that can scribble on a piece of paper can be self-proclaimed "writers." (For the record, I HATE, I HATE putting commas and periods INSIDE of quotations. GRRRRRRRRRRR. Damn the English language.)

For a while there I was blogging as avidly as I had been -- writer's block. Now I realize how silly that is. It's a blog. One can literally write anything, except for those who has a blog with a, ahem, theme. You can put in your blog the most mind-numbing details about your life, or share parts of your personal that should you spouse find out that you were sharing that on the internet he or she will be filing for divorce. Lately, I have to rein myself back from putting pure crap on my blog. :D

I guess when I started blogging I was hoping I would be able to draw in readers, not people who found my blog because of some typos on my blog (i.e. stafford wives and shek2) or some random malfunction of the search engine. After trying for seven months, I think it's safe to conclude that I will probably never draw in some 10,000 visitors a day. After all, with the exception of my friends and acquaintances, strangers are as interested in the tidbits of my life as I am in theirs. So screw it, from now on, I am only going to write for that ONE person that matters the most to me in the universe -- myself.

Artist -- Mark Yale Harris

Mark Yale Harris is my latest obssession. (Do keep in mind that I'm also the out of sight out of mind type of people. :D)

So I went back to Borders again today with hubby cause after buying Dark Tower VII in hardcover he also wanted it in audio format. Ut oh, you may say, but I didn't leave the store with some toy in my hands this time -- a rare occurence. Instead, I took my time and browsed the magazine section (only got through half of the section before hubby dragged me away :(. I gues it never quite registered with me that there are so many magazines out there that I have never heard of, or imagined they exist for that matter. I walked out with "American Style," "The Economist," and "Boulevard" -- apparently a magazine with collections of short stories, poems, and even film symposium even though it really looks like a book.

While taking my liberty to browse the vast collection of magazines that Borders have, I discovered this artist and sculptor Mark Yale Harris. I borrowed some pictures from his website:

Fastfood


Lunch


Bear tango


Tidbit

And my personal favorite:

Got it

***
Holy Cow!! This whole time I didn't know I can justify the text!!! Duh!

Blonde Justice: Public Service Announcement

This is kinda funny.

The New Look :D

I finally got tired of my old blog design. I guess all those broken links that I never got around to fixing didn't help matters much. One day I'll get around to adding the links and such back on.

I discovered another hilarious blog today while randomly blog-hopping (that's what I call the blogger.com link to other blogs). I am afraid to add links to my blog. No, not that they won't link back to me or anything, I rarely ask for a return link anwyay. But it seems that everytime I add someone to my link list, they stop blogging. Hmmmm. Could it be ME?

Anywhoo, new blog on the block:

The Good Fight...

Don't forget to click on that picture of the map that he has on his blog. Then follow to this link:

The World According to...

I'll try to put some of the pictures on here too... that is IF AND ONLY IF I ever get around to it...

Me, the Spoiled Child

Mike seems to think that adult cannot attain the pure happiness form like kids can (check out his blog). I beg to differ. My mental age is about 7 and I refuse to grow a day beyond that. :D Lately I feel particularly like a spoiled child -- the kind that goes home with a toy in their hand everytime they leave the house, those kind. Hubby bought me this couple of weeks ago:



It's name is Shiver, but I just call it "bear." I bring it to work with me and when things get remotely stressful I play with it. :D

Yesterday we went to Long's Drugs (where I saw the copy of "Man on Fire") and I fell in love instantaneously with this:



Today hubby went to Border's for his book seven of Stephen King's Dark Tower series, and I found this:



I just HAVE to have the sailor bear since hubby, too, is a sailor. Too bad it says "USS Ronald Reagan" on the bear and not hubby's boat. :(

All my loots together:

"Interesting" is Quickly Turning into "Weird"

Went back to Blockbuster with hubby yesterday. This time I saw a guy who looked like the guy sitting in the car the previous day, except this time he was standing outside. I wasn't 100% sure if he was *the* guy since we didn't have any movies in our hands so he didn't ask whether we have "Man on Fire." I thought it'd be interesting to look for the movie since hubby and I had a free coupon from the other day.

In front of the shelf there stood a guy. He was systematically flipping down every single covers of "Man on Fire," first the DVDs then the VHS. Said gentleman then went up to the counter (in defense for Blockbuster, they do have some VERY friendly and helpful employees at this location) and told them he had flipped ALL the covers they have and made sure there's no chance he would have missed a copy. He proceeded to desperately asked for a VHS copy at least. But what could the Blockbuster girl do other than offering him a coupon for a free rental? Guy disgruntlely agreed to that terms but said, "I had to make a phone call first." Then walked away to make his call (to his wife? lover?)

See for yourself!!



Gee! What's with this MOVIE?? Almost reminds me of one of those mindless comedy shows. One would almost think somebody left than jackpot winning lottery ticket in one of the copies!!

I asked hubby to get another free rental coupon just for kicks but he didn't want to. Boo! I wanted to go back to Blockbuster again to see if I can witness yet another sequal to this blog entry but the party-pooping hubby has once again rejected my suggestion. Boohoo!!

Ah well. On a different note. There's a copy at Long's Drugs rental section today. :D

What if...

Are you one of those "what if..." person? I am. I think about it all the time, "what if things were different this way or that." Or more like "I wish (things were different when....)" And most of these "what if" and "I wish" have to do with my husband. I felt that I have wasted a lot of time when I was finishing college and immediately after I got out of college. So here goes the thought:

I wish I had known my husband when I was in college.

But that would post the next problem that follows. My hubby was 12 1/2 when I was 18!! (Yeah, for those Math wiz out there, I'm 5.5 years older than my husband. And don't bother calling me a cradle robber. I know I'm one. And proud to be one. You are just jealous.) So I had to chuck that idea and move onto the next one:

Maybe I can meet him when HE was 18.

Umm... now we are at least LEGAL. But I've seen his picture when he was 18. It'd be hard press for me to find him attractive when he was 18... not to mention that I was already 23 1/2. So I had to, once again, modify my wish. (If I only had 3 wishes it'd be used up right about now.)

I wish I can start my life over again (around 16 or so) except I get to keep my intelligence that I have now.

That would seem like the perfect plan except that had I had my intelligence now, I would, of course, made a lot less stupid mistakes than I actually had. For starters, I'd have told my dad to go f* himself a lot sooner. And everything in life being like a domino effect, I would have ended up somewhere entirely different than where I am now. Meaning that I most likely would not have met my husband....

So yeah, after all the "what if's" and "I wish's," I am just glad I ended up where I am now. :)

Fountain in the Desert 沙漠裡的甘泉

I bummed into this website accidentally. It's been years since I've read poetry in Chinese, this site is no doubt like fountain in the desert for me:

沈睿 詩選

Digital Wish-Making

Hubby told me to make a wish whenever I looked at a digital clock and all the numbers are the same. (The other version I heard was only at 11:11, but heck, better more wish than less, right? :) Since I work an office job now and I use the clock on the computer, I seem to run into the digital wish-making situation a lot. I usually just wish for something small. A part of me (though atheist) feels like if you ask for something impossible, you are just challenging the "spirit" that you are making a wish to, and thus annoying the entity. :D (Once upon a time I had an 8-ball. I never had one when I was a kid so I was really happy when I got one as a gift in my adult life. But I would never ask it questions that I afraid the answer would be "no." Nor would I ask the same questions twice. That, too, would be construed as "challenging the spirit." :)

Among all the miscellaneous wishes that I've had, I guess it can all be summed up in this poem:

死生契闊，
與子相悅，
執子之手，
與子偕老。

Rough translation:

Life and death and separation are serious matters,
but I still want to say I want to be happy with you,
hold your hands,
and grow old with you.

I guess that's really a lot to ask for. Holding hands and growing old together really has a lot more implications than it seems. It means that we'll live long AND be in a happy relationship for the most part. And that in itself is not easy to accomplish.

Hubby and I both like the ending in Robin Williams's "Bicenntenial Man."

Movie Reviews: The Prince & Me, Whole Ten Yard

So I just watched the movie The Prince & Me with Julia Stiles. Yes, I prefer stupid movies to serious movies. My preferred movies of choice are along the line of Legally Blonde (part II was crap though), Uptown Girl, Bring it On, Two Weeks Notice. Yeah, all the B-line romantic chick flicks. Not that I don't like serious movies, but watching those require concentration. At the end of the day, when I finally got around to plopping down on the couch and pop a DVD in the player, I think my brain deserves a break. That would explain why Tom Cruise's Last Samurai is still sitting on our make-up target plastic "night table" while we've already finished watching "Prince and I" and "Whole Ten Yard."

Mind you, when I get a B-lined chick flick, I was exactly expect to see an Oscar Award winning movie either.

The Prince & Me

(Don't read on if you haven't seen the movie yet and intend to watch it)

Sort of aim towards a relatively younger crew of audiences. More kiddi-ish than I would like. Though hubby actually summoned enough attention span to finish watching the entire movie with me, much to my surprise. I like it that she realized at the end that being Queen of Denmark. It would be entirely out of character if she'd be contended in a role like that after wanting to the whole time to become a Doctor without Border. I was slightly disappointed at the "ending ending" that implies eventually she'd go back to the prince. I think that's very unnecessary, but how else do you expect a romantic comedy to end eh? Even though it's a kiddy movie, I think it's okay to teach the kids the difference between fantasy and reality. For all intents and purposes, she didn't make a bad choice for returning to US. I think kids nowaday have enough intelligence to handle a movie without a happy ending than just the Disney princess series.

Whole Ten Yard

Definitely not as good as Whole Nine Yard. But I thought I'd mention it here because it actually exceeded expectation!! The trailer made it looked like one of those completely idiotic part II (i.e. Legally Blonde, Bring it On), it was actually a half-way decent movie. If you enjoyed Whole Nine Yard, you should give Whole Ten Yard a try.

Interesting

I just saw something interesting. I won't say it's the strangest thing I've ever seen. Though I can't recall off the top of my head, I'm sure I've seen stranger. There was a guy sitting in his car outside of Blockbuster and asking every single person heading into Blockbuster with movies in their hands whether they have "Man on Fire." In case you have no idea what that is, it's a new movie with Danzel Washington that just got released on DVD last Tuesday. But boy, that was some dedication. He even has a BOOK with him. He went there PREPARED. Had I wanted to see a movie so badly and neither Blockbusters or Hollywood Videos have them (I might even drive around a few of them, or call around), I'd just go and buy one. Yeah, there's certainly some perks associated with going to work at 8 AM five times a week!!

I was so, so, SO tempted to ask him the real reason behind his urge to watch the movie today.

On Marriage

Shortly after I got engaged, a coworker of mine asked me if I had the opportunity later on to trade in my ring for an upgrade, would I do it. Interestingly enough, hubby had actually offered (without solicitation, mind you) that he'll upgrade the ring for me in ten years time. But my respond to both hubby and the said coworker was: No, if we have that kind of money, there's so much more we can do with it, for example, go on a vacation.

Then he revealed to me the motive behind his question. He read about this study which sampled recently engaged women from different social-economic and education levels whether they'll later on trade-in their diamond engagement ring for an upgrade. 85% of those who replied "yes" and 15% who replied "no" ended up divorced in the 20-year study. So I guess I passed the single question test. :P

So is the ring the single most important factor that dictates the success or failure of one's marriage? No! It is, however, a pretty good indication of some hidden issues at the beginning of the marriage, or maybe even the inability for the couple to communicate with each other.

And I quote an article titled Old-flame Web sites fuel divorce rates: "LONDON--Web sites that reunite and reignite old lovers are helping push up England's divorce rates, according to a United Kingdom-based counseling service...Northam said other factors were pressure at work, the changing roles of women and a decrease in the stigma of divorce."

I'm sorry, but as a woman of the modern age, I say if a man can't deal with the changing roles of woman, that's just too bad. (I just have to get that in there. :) As to the decrease in the stigma of divorce. Well, that only says that less people are staying in a marriage because of the stigma. Can you really consider a marriage maintained merely for that reason a "success"?

It's almost interesting to think that the blame of an increase in divorce rate can be transferred so conveniently to the internet/old flame webiste. Perhaps the denial of personal responsibilities are not unique in America. Before we blame the internet etc., one must understand that the dating site(s) are merely the means, not the source of the issue we have at hand. An unhappy marriage is the source. Killing off the means for individuals to find a new lover will surely encourage people to leave their original relationships. But if they were happy, they won't be actively seeking for an "old flame" in the first place.

If the society must interfere with the whole divorce issue (i.e. providing/encouraging counseling services), they should focus on the preventative measure. You see, a failed marrige (by the time people are seeking counceling) it's like a patient who has been diagnosed with cancer -- whilst it might not to entirely too late, it's fairly late. Preventative measure will be pre-marital counseling (which I understand some religions already require couples to attend those prior to the wedding).

In my humble opinion, too many couples get married for the most bizarre reason(s) or lack there of. I've personally encountered many couples who fought and fought while they were still dating. One week they are contemplating about splitting up, next week they are engaged. Ugh. Tell me you don't think an union like that are pre-disposed to failure. And the fact that the wives tend to get knocked up within the first six-months of the marriage probably doesn't help the matter any.

So if the society must interfere (I don't personally care about divorce rate, but the general consent seems to think that high divorce rate will hurt "family value" -- much like homosexual marriage would, I suppose. Don't you know that when gay couples get married, it would somehow mysteriously influence the bond between hetersexual couples?), I think a better measure is to encourage people to at least give it A thought before jumping into the holy matrimony. Remember when I said people give buying a fridge more thought than having a kid? Well, they give about as much thought about marriage -- "I can't find better." "I have to get married." "She is pressuring me into it." Granted, there's always loneliness and the need to nest.

One must understand that getting married is NOT a necessity. For reasons beyond understanding, the society pressures people to get married (then have kids ASAP). Getting married, much like having children, is a life-style choice, not a necessity. To some, myself for example, it's a great thing. I love going home to the same guy every day. I love that I know I have a built-in date for all company functions and that we grow to know the preferences of each other in everyday lifes. But I am sure for some others, going home to the same person day after day after day is their worse nightmare. So why force them into it?

But I digressed. What I am trying to say was simply that failed marriage is not due to "outside temptations," but a myraid of issues that people normally choose to overlook at the beginning and sometimes even before the marriage take place.

In a CNN special show it investigated the society's view on infidelity. It concludes that 50% marriages involves an extra-marital affair of some kind and 50% divorces are due to infidelity. Looking at the outstanding figures, one must be open to the possibilities that perhaps mankind are not made to live a monogomous lifestyle. After all, Darwin's survival of the fittest theory suggests that it's best for one not NOT stick to one partner (only counts if you reproduce lots, with all partners). So in addtion to the pre-marital counseling, perhaps we should also add sessions for people to be ready for "life after a divorce."

Why lie to people when a monogomous, life-time relationship is more of a luxuary instead of the norm? It's sort of like sex ed and giving out condoms to high school/junior college kids -- you know they are going to do it, might as well encourage them to do it safely. So why not prepare individuals for a possible divorce -- a mean for dependent women to go on after their husbands left them, or a mean to allow women to leave their abusive spouse when needs be. Or just the courage to leave an already failed marriage instead of staying miserably married. It's always better to be prepared than to be blindsided, right?

Formosan Exile

So during one of my blog hopping activity, I discovered this blog:

Formosan Exile

It's about this Canadian guy and his (Canadian?) wife teaching English in Taiwan. It's very well written and very funny. This is my favorite bit:

I left early for class, and had breakfast over in Neihu is a little hole-in-the-wall place by the lake. The prices are good, there is no view of the lake, and mind your head on the air conditioner on the way through the door.

Bacon and eggs and coffee are possible for breakfast now. “Egg” is “dan” (like the name), “one” is “yi” and “two” is “er”. However, just to bugger up the foreigners, you must add a “quantifier”. There are many different quantifiers to learn, but the default one is “ge”. You must say “liang” instead of “er”. The first part of breakfast is therefore “liange dan”. “Hao” means “I understand” not “how do you want your eggs done?”.

“Bacon”, amusingly, is “pagan”. It’s Sunday, I’m Christian, but I ate it anyway. “b” and “p” are very similar in Chinese, as are “k” and “j”. This is how “Peking” disappeared” to become “Beijing”—taking my favourite joke about Peking Tom (the Chinese voyeur) along with it. I don’t know the quantifier for “slice” so I just say “yige pagan”.

“Coffee” is a snap—it’s just the English word pronounced in a Chinese way. Caf?. Options are ‘bing” or “re” (ice or hot), and “shao, chung, or da” (small medium or large). Blast me if I can remember the quantifier for “cup”. Breakfast is therefore “liange dan, yige pagan, yige shao re caf?”.


I think the blurb was hilarious but my white hubby didn't care much for it. Perhaps you have to know some Mandarin to find it amusing. :)

I, Robot v Jurassic Park??

So as the date of my hubby's departure from the Navy draws near (yeah, so close that he's counting down by the days), he's starting to interview with civilian companies to prepare himself for the REAL WORLD.

Among all of the companies that he's applying for are Parata and Genentech. So the going joke now is, "Are you going to work for U.S. Robotics (I, Robot) or InGen (Jurassic Park)?" :)

Babies

So hubby and I have preliminarily decided to not have kids (I say "preliminarily" because I'm still sort of straddling the fence on the subject). Now I don't hate kids, at least not yet. I know of people who actually dislike kids, sort of like that episode of the Simpson's. My boss C is one of those people. She would ride business class on Am Trek to avoid kids, and get annoyed when parents let their kids into the business class, or noisy kids at restaurants.

Our reasoning for not wanting kids is very simple, we enjoy other materialistic stuff in life that money can buy and having kid(s) will strongly cut into other fine enjoyment in life -- travel, movies, dining out, time together, and general materialistic goods such as a large house, nice car(s), home theater etc. Selfish? Sure, if you are Mormon we are most certainly the most selfish creatures on earth, although I fail to see how we are selfish by NOT having kids. Open the newspaper and go like a week back and read all the filler news also, then tell me how many parents out there really shouldn't be parents at all. At least I am well aware of the fact that I do not want the responsibilities that come with having a kid and decided against it.

Want an example about what I am talking about?

Mom pleads not guilty in car-trunk abuse case

Now I am not against folks having kids. I know to some individual it's the single most important thing in life. Their kids literally complete their lives, by all means, have as many as you can afford.

According to a statistic, it is shown that Americans spent more time on choosing a fridge than choosing a job. I think Americans (and probably many cultures that I cannot speak for) spend even less time in deciding whether to have a kids, if at all. I've seen so many people rushing into having a kid as soon as their are married either because (1) their biological clock is ticking or (2) they've always viewed it as a natural step in life that follows marriage. Personally I think it's unhealthy for couples to have kids right away before spending some quality time together as a couple first. But that is just my opinion.

In the Asian culture, couples have kids at a relatively early age (early 20's, much like the Mormons), then give their children to their parents (the children's grandparents) to raise till an older age while they continue to work on their career or just generally enjoy life. I don't personally like much about having one's folk raise one's kids, but evolutionarily speaking, I guess that's a pretty good method -- reproducing at a younger and healthier age and thus having healthier offsprings.

And you also lose friends when they have kids. You see, once you get married you want couple friends. It became odd to hang out with single friend, and god forbid, I hang out with a friend and husband yesterday when hubby was at an all-day job fair. Boy, was that awkward. Once your couple friends have kids, the kids will take over their lives. I never suggest to hang out with friends with kids after work; they simply have more important tasks to attend to -- spend time with the family. And on the days they bring their kids out with them... well, holding a conversation of any kind is hard, let along an intellectual one. As more and more of our couple friends joined the group of couple with kids, hubby and I will be needing to make new kidless couple friends. After we move back to Sacramento and hubby leaves the Navy, we'll be (or more precisely, I'll be dragging him) going to some child-free meet ups. And among them, the following two:

ChildFree Meetup at Sacramento

and

No Kidding, Sacramento Chapter

Blogging

One must think I've been experiencing writer block, actually that's far from the truth. I've been getting these GREAT ideas but just didn't have the time to write them down. You see, with three weeks left in San Diego, I am training a new girl at my temporary work place to replace me. Whilst I enjoy the company of the new girl E a lot, it's impossible to blog with someone else around. No, she doesn't look over my shoulder nor does she cares what I do when it's slow at work, she's just awfully chatty... like a normal girl, I guess. So I think I can take this rare opportunity (alone at home with cat!) and pre-write a bunch of entires and post them daily. :D Am I smart or am I smart? :)

Temping and Whoring

Many a times in my life I have to resort to temporary agencies for employment -- summer vacations during college, some jobs to tie me through till I get my first "real" job after college, relocating with my hubby, etc. etc. In my opinion, temping is a lot like whoring with the temp agency being the pimp and us the workers being the *ahem* escorts. They (agencies/pimps) actively solicit the clients (johns) and to pimp out the temps for money ($). But you know what? Coming from arguably the most capitalistic place in the world -- Hong Kong, let it be pimping, whoring, or temping, as long as I am able to whore myself out and make all the dough, nothing else matters. It beats sitting there night after night after night with no johns.