why Mom can't go to Costco alone

There's a reason why I can't let my mom go to Costco alone. I decided to represent this with a short dialogue. This is the kind of dialogue that goes between me and my mom ALL THE TIME, translated into English from Konglish. unless she is angering at me, of course.

Mom: These are the right bars, right?

Me: uh….no.…I said NatureValley Bars. These are ZBars.

Mom: WHATTT

Me: …That’s why I told you to buy the bars when I’m there. Or to call me.

Mom: I did call you. You didn’t pick up.

Me: …you called my cell phone. I can’t hear that. We also have a home phone.

Mom: ……………………..whatever. I’m returning them the next time I go to Costco.

Me: No, I’ll just eat them instead or something.

Mom: No, I’m returning them.

Me: It’s fine, I’ll eat them.

Mom: NUUUUUUUUUUU I NEED TO RETURN THEM.

Me: But I’m hungr—

Mom: NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU.

....in addition to the ZBars, my mom brought home bell peppers (as I predicted), two boxes of apples (as I predicted), 5 jumbo lint rollers, bananas, and chocolate for our neighbors. She also bought a pair of headphones I wasn't supposed to see and a box of pomegranates! Good job, Mom, the pomegranates were unexpected. :)

rust, anyone?

Rust makes me think of being disappointed. It's like a shiny nail that's turned all brown and is falling apart gradually (chemistry students, unite!). It's like you expect a beautiful carmine sort of flower, and once it blooms you find out it's been half chewed by aphids and whatnot and is in the process of decaying. It's like picking out an awesome apple at QFC (people don't seem to pick apples off of trees nowadays...) and turning it over to see an ugly, ugly bruise. Rust is upsetting.

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GUYS. We're ALL Prism flavored!

I was surfing the interwebs when all of a sudden I saw an ad. For 5 gum.

Prism flavored.....an electric watermelon.

I'm still feeling sorta blah creativity-wise, but i've just been getting over it by doing chem homework, and seeing this ad just made me feel a lot better.

But really. Who thought of that name? What do prisms have to do, in any way, with watermelons? or electric ones, for that matter? How do people make those associations?

It kind of makes me think of those ridiculous internet/magazine quizzes. like, Which celebrity are you? What is yo' animal? Who is yo' Twilight love match? (wow, ew).

...If you're mostly A's, you're THIS. If you're mostly B's, you're THAT. If you're mostly C's, you're NEITHER, and consequently very-very, very very very very VERY unacceptably lame. You should change yourself so you're either mostly A's or mostly B's, got it?

But it's not just those quizzes. People in general, I think, have the tendency to try and label themselves under certain categories. It's supposed to refrect yo' chaaaaractaaar and sho' yu de weeeei. Even at camps, I've heard random questions like, If you were a FRUIT (just imagine you were!) what FRUIT would you be?....or maybe you are actually a VE-GE-TA-BLE?!?!? If your name was a CITY, what CITY would you want? Rrrrrromantic, like Paris? Byoootiful, like Bellevue? Sketchy, like Las Vegas (i see what you did there, buddy)?

It's not exactly a bad thing to want to put a label on things, I guess. But I also think it obscures things. It makes people focus on a single aspect of something, rather than looking at the whole. If we looked at things holistically, there'd be no way for us to label ourselves like that. There would be no words. But, I think, there would be stories.

From what I've read of the workshop stories, so many of the characters are so filled out, so real, so 3D. And it's not from direct description. It's from their experiences that I witness in the stories written about them, and sooner or later, while I'm reading the story, I feel like I'm almost reading a huge character sketch every time, because I get to know the character so well! But if you asked me to describe the character, I wouldn't be able to find the right words at all. The feelings that the stories evoke......they're somethin' else. No words to describe the thoughts and sympathy they grow, Prism flavored or not.

Running Dry

I'm starting to freak out, which is stupid, considering I have about two months (A LITTLE LESS, ACTUALLY, OMGGGG) to write my story. Stupid, stupid. And really I shouldn't be worrying about my nonexistent, far off story because I should actually be worrying about my UW app, which I haven't started, despite the fact that it's due the day after tomorrow. Anyways, I always seem to be worrying about dumb things, in a dumb order of importance.

Sometimes, I even manage to worry a little about my inability to set my priorities straight! Brilliant, eh? I know. I'm a brilliant kid, and you're jealous. -.- just kidding.

I'm in a really blah sort of state right now. My whole life is blah, college apps are blah, and my short story has accomplished the amazing feat of being blah without even existing.

But seriously, I have NO IDEA what I'm doing with my story, and I am quite, quite quite quite concernnned that I'm going to be this blank by the time January rrrrrrolls around and my story is DUE. ICK. These stories I've been reading for workshop are BRILLIANT so yeah, I feel especially clueless now. It's amazing how unique people's ideas are, how their stories are fiction, yet so them. How does that happen? How do bits and pieces of ourselves sneak in, slip in and pop up in random parts of our stories?

So anyways....I'm going to start writing random ideas, bits and pieces, NOW. TODAY. TODAY IS THE DAY......for what? I have no idea about that, either. But the brainstorm needs to start brewing ASAP. Right now I admit it's a bit of a noob-tropical storm out in the middle of whatever the lamest ocean is (which do YOU think the lamest ocean is? ha).

So. Don't read this next part, if anyone was reading this in the first place.This is my storm-in-the-making. And hopefully, if my creativity-drought ends, by January I can make it something that can reckon with the likes of Poseidon (I wish).

Some things I want in my story.....mabes:

• weird quirks. People can be so strange.
• Fortune cookies
• Food in general?
• Those faces I always seem to imagine when I see car headlights...
• colors?
• superheroes?
• letters?
• I can't decide if I want a happy ending or a sad one. both of them seem difficult.
• Setting: our everyday world? a high rise? the city? a park? a single room? a door? a not-door (window)? a desk?
  
• a dentist
• A single, yellow canine in an otherwise white and flawless smile
• markers

wtf this is such a random list. what am i doing!?! This isn't helping. And I'm beginning to have trouble ignoring the webassign tab on the left side of my browser and the UW app tab next to it, and the fact that I have a college interview tomorrow.

So far, I've only been able to make decisions on what I don't want to write. I don't want a love story, or a story placed in the country, or one with many characters or dialogue. I'm looking for something simple and maybe slightly strange in my messed-up, upside-down mind. I'm thinking I still need a longgggggggg while before I can sort things out.

....Therefore, WEBASSIGN GO T_T

Bloodtypes EVERYWHERE

My mom and I have weird conversations during dinner. Yesterday, she was telling me about guessing one's personality based on bloodtypes. Although I was skeptical, suddenly I was seeing bloodtypes all over the place, guessing bloodtypes, and trying to figure out what I was (because sadly, even doctor's daughters don't know their bloodtypes sometimes -_-. My dad can be so fail sometimes).

I'm still not quite sure if I believe what my mom said. I don't totally disbelieve it, either--I've inherited superstition and a dislike of skepticism >.<

Anyways, I think I'm an A. therefore, A's FTW.
yeah. that was completely objective.

Okay. I admit guessing personality by bloodtype is ridiculous, but I don't want to eliminate the possibility. What if it's tied to some other ridiculous gene that communicates a person's sensitivity, thought processes, extro/introversion, etc?

Huh. I don't like that idea either, now that I think of it. I don't like the idea that personality depends on genetics. I'd really just like to believe that people have complete free will, that there's no factors that determine who someone is, that all of it is just innate, and that we're all in full control. I just want to think that there's a little bit of magic involved in how a person works, that there's something special that distinguishes a human from a dead, empty carcass--not just that one's alive and the other's not, but that there's a soul in one, and not in the other. I like hoping that afterwards, there's something that all people can look forward to and hope for, that life doesn't just end here, that the magic that makes a living person's eyes glow with meaning doesn't just crumble away once the sense of alertness leaves ones eyes, and the eyes grow dull and thoughtless.

How did a ramble on bloodtypes end up like this? I'm always so unfocused and shooting off on weird tangents.

....it must mean I'm bloodtype A.

jk. :)

Heffalumps and Woozles.

I was having a conversation with David Cannon about Halloween, which turned into a conversation about Pooh Bear.

And then i got a link to a video that forever changed my perspective on pooh bear. And Heffalumps and Woozles, for that matter.



...I don't remember Winnie the Pooh being this scary. I wonder if I never noticed because at the time I was five. I watched a Sailor Moon episode and realized all of the bad guys are complete creepers, too.

How do children not notice such creepy things? Maybe my mind has just been corrupted.

I also worry and wonder who made this video.

Nevertheless, I think I can forgive the Pooh Bear team for this mind-freak, Pooh Bear's still awesome because I still have a million Pooh Bears attached to my back pack.

Video Games...in My Sleep? AHJDSJLASASJDKL

I don't really like blogging about how life's been going and all that crap, I feel like blogs should be more for like...thoughts? or particular topics that's the central focus of the whollllllle blog, but what do I know? Also, i'm a hypocrite. And if you tell me you're not, you're a hypocrite too....(ummm that sounds circular...but I hope that made sense).

Anyways, I realized how sadly college has already been eating my life from a dream I had last night!

Warning: I have weird dreams.

I've been really interested in the concept of lucid dreaming lately. This link basically lays out the gist of what lucid dreaming is, and how people practice it! I really want to be able to dream lucidly....it kinda makes me feel like...I'd be playing a video game, except I'd be IN THE VIDEOGAME.....IN MY SLEEP. People can do whatever they imagine in lucid dreams, the sky's the limit!...literally. If you want to fly, you can fly, instantly. Because you're aware that you're dreaming, and you can control everything you want, however much you want.

...Maybe it's unrealistic that I'm hoping to use lucid dreaming to do the impossible.

Too bad.

So...I've been practicing strategies to lucid dream. Basically, this consists of me spending random moments of the day feeling stupid while I look at a wall and try to change it's color with the force of my mind. It's like using a totem in Inception, just less cool. If the wall changes color, OMG YOU'RE ACTUALLY DREAMING AND NOW YOU KNOW. If the wall doesn't change color, you should stop. You're awake, and looking at the wall with so much focus makes you look like a dork.

~So if this becomes a habit, it increases the chance that you'll look at a wall while you're asleep/dreaming and that you'll try to change it's color while you're asleep. Which is what I did last night!!! and the wall REALLY changed color from yellow to green and purple and I freaked out in my sleep, because I realized I was dreaminggggg.

Apparently people unpracticed in lucid dreaming are super stupid when they're dreaming. In my dream, my mom, who has been yelling at me about college apps for what feels like forever (why so azn, mom?), was STILL YELLING at me about them. SO then, my brilliant dream-self reasoned that since my mom was still freaking about college apps, and not being nice or letting me do whatever (aka play video games, watch TV, fly, walk on the walls, etc), I was actually AWAKE. Yes, I convinced myself that somehow, even though the wall just changed color, my mother's anger proved that I'd been imagining the color change, and that I was actually awake. So I literally forgot that I was dreaming. T_T

My dreams SUCK.

They're either completely lame and boring, or I'm always being chased by zombies and trying to kill them with a black baseball bat I got in second grade that I keep in my closet. And then the zombies come attack me and overwhelm me, and I die, because my mom's too busy cooking the rice or calculating taxes or rearranging the furniture to help me.

...why does this happen?!?! I must say I really, really hope dreams are NOT a reflection of a person's life at all....

I wish I played videogames.....

....Just saying.

I REALLY WANT TO PLAY TWILIGHT PRINCESS WTF

I noticed over the last few days I'm an incredible dork. I was listening....to the sound track of Twilight Princess because I want that to be the first video game I play!!! And I liked the music a lot.....I think it's because it just gets me in a positive mood, and makes me feel like I'm in the video game, almost.....dorky, I know. But a lot of the time, I love video games, or cartoons, or books, and stories because it gets me out of my life and into a whole new world. Because that's the point of a lot of fantasy, right? It's a good reliever of stress, and gives people a time to just imagine, and be in an ideal world, where they can have ridiculous powers, or be able to believe in magic, or do things they wouldn't be able to achieve in real life...and when I draw, or write random things, it's kind of the same thing...because I make up a whole 'nother place in my head, right?

So I think videogame graphics, or cartoons, etc can be really counted as a true form of art.... For a long time, I kind of looked down on art as an idea. It didn't really compare, I thought, with being something like a doctor. While doctors saved people's lives, artists just made pretty pictures. But that's so incorrect...art is what happens when people express their thoughts, and good artists can bring people into their own worlds, and make people believe in what they believe in, love what they love, and see things how they see things. Doctors save lives in the physical sense, but art saves lives in the mental sense, I think.

But there are times when playing games, or watching a cartoon, or looking at fantastical landscapes and whatnot kind of make me sad. It makes me slightly crestfallen when I look at those sorts of things, and then realize that while in the imaginary world people are off taming dragons, and fighting monsters, or whatever, I need to turn back to my desk and finish my AP Stats, Quiz 5.1.

Oh homework. You thrill me -.-

Or I listen to....like, the Sailor Moon theme song, and I get a flood of memories of wanting to be Sailor Moon when I was little. And then I check the time, and it's 3 in the morning. It makes me wonder if people have the time in their lives to live in two separate ways, two separate places--one life in the mind, far, far away, another life right where gravity holds them down, right side up, stuck to solid ground that seems to get...too real sometimes.

And being a child is so much more awesome, when it comes to these things. Children have the wonderful ability, I think, to completely immerse themselves in different worlds. It's so easy to believe things :3. But maybe length of childhood, or the ability for one to control one's childhood doesn't have to be the same for everyone. With practice, consideration, deliberation, and care, it's a skill that can be cultivated over time. Growing up doesn't mean you need to forget how to believe in ridiculous things, even if it's just for a little while.

Oh hey there

I haven't legit posted in this blog for a long time. All of the posts have been stuff I've written for class, or assignment posts. I kind of want to keep a steady flow of voluntary posts in here too...BUT SCHOOL HAS DECIDED TO FIGHT MEEEEE. yeah.

I think I like this course more and more as it goes on. Truthfully, I was kind of dreading it before the school year started. I opened up the letter from school and my heart dropped down to my stomach when I saw "Writing Fiction." I can write literature analysis. I can write journal entries (cause no-no-no-no-nooooooooooobody else can see them). But fiction is a whole nuther planet, darling. And the idea of sharing my creative writing just made me cringe. Literary analysis is more professional, it's based off of another person's work. But something that I bring life to myself seems....much more likely to appear deformed, wrong, weird, boring, dull to others. I'm still dreading the writing workshop. I have no idea what kind of short story I'm supposed to write. I'm used to responding to prompts and whatnot....As you can probably tell, my writing gets pretty incoherent once I decide to write voluntarily and RRRRRamble away to the stars!!!

oh dear. unbelievable.

This is also sort of how I am with my college essay. I don't know how i'm supposed to write this darn thing. And it's awkward when I need to share it with other people for edits. It's supposed to be such a personal, "this is me" sort of piece, but the more people look at it, the more they ogle it, I feel like i need to make it less and less and less personal so I can shield myself from their laser-eyes.

I wonder when I stopped writing fiction. That last sentence implies that at one point and enjoyed and consistently wrote made-up stories....which i did! I was cleaning out my desk, and I found my book of ridiculous stories from when I was 4 or 5 or 6. Haha, it was amusing. but haha, if anyone saw it I think I would be quite, quite humiliated.

My stories were crazy (awesome)! But i am not posting them on the internet. Oh-no, no-no, no-no-no-no-nooooooo. I suspect my stories reflect my state of mind at the time. I also suspect, from the sort of drawings I still draw on the computer, that my mind has not left it's childish state.

...I like my mind that way :)

I should be doing Chemistry.

I should be doing chemistry. But LOOK WHAT I'M DOING INSTEADDDD

I keep on thinking of things to write about. And then I keep on forgetting what they are.

I really hate forgetting things.

It's the main problem I have when I journal. while i'm writing furiously, I forget the things I meant to say. Especially because i handwrite the entries. Although the Internet is amazing and wonderful, I really DO think there's something magical about handwritten things. Not only is the content meaningful, but the handwriting makes the writing a visual art form also. While people generally maintain a consistent handwriting, it still changes slightly depending on a person's mood or condition. I think that sort of element in reading something adds a whole new dimension. Which is why I love writing letters. Is the handwriting sharp, or round? Does it run perfectly straight across the page, or slant downwards or wobble up and down along the printed lines? Where did the writer mess up? why are things scratched out? What did the writer mean to say? It's all in there, for handwritten letters.

Getting a handwritten letter makes me think of the sender, writing at there desk, scratching things out, or drawing doodles along the sides. And then I realize that there are other people who like handwritten letters for the same reason as I do--the heart and effort that goes in--and the world feels a little less lonely and little more hospitable.

So the price for all that is my ideas. Ideas!!!DSA:FA:L I think of them in the most inconvenient places. and I have nowhere and no time to write them when I'm walking to class during passing period, or in the car, or crossing the street (I should hope not for the last one). So I repeat the idea, over and over in my head until the idea loses its original charm and I get distracted. Then the idea never hits the paper. It never stabilizes. It's gone, and the thought that something can be blasted into oblivion like that, wasted, sorta creeps me out and makes me frustrated when it happens.

I had other things to write about after this.

But guess what, I've forgotten them already.