Countdown 6 hours until Self-Control timers goes to 00:00:00 (aka facebook time). I suddenly have a strong urge to go on facebook. There's no legitimate reasons for me to go on, but my fingers have developed the habit of periodically typing facebook into the browser bar and now the withdrawal is making me go crazy. What a stupid reason for staying up late on a Sunday night but heck, sleeping is for losers anyway. So, as of now I'm finding refuge on here and trying to be productive at the same time.

So much work.

Chem lab report due soon but I can't work on it now because mother earth picked a perfect time to strike an earthquake on Japan, which wiped out the SDBS server and now all us poor lab students can't access the IR/NMR database as reference to verify if we correctly identified our unknown compounds.

Organic II test Wednesday: will completely destroy me for sure seeing as even Xuexia is having a hard time with the practice test.

251 homework: MUST... maintain... B- average. Fuck I refuse to spend so much time on this course and get a C or worse.

Tumblr

Yes, I converted Tumblr. :\

http://amzikins.tumblr.com/

Will probably still keep blogger running though.

New Years Resolution or whatnot

1. Stop bitting and peeling my nails

2. Enjoy life: started following football Sundays again since break started. Watching the Pats game while noming on wings and fries makes me feel like a kid again, but it's a nice change for a while.

3. Run a quarter marathon: originally my goal was to go for a half marathon by seeing as I haven't ran in a long time, that might not be a feasible goal. So for now, striving a quarter marathon... by the end of this summer.

4. Be more tolerant of my mom, and her bible ramblings.

5. Be more organized. I made a google calendar this morning as a start :)

6. Make new friends, keep in touch with old ones: text greetings spammed my phone after Christmas morning and New Years and it's nice to know that friends haven't forgot about you. Thinking back, I haven't done as much as I should have to keep in touch with people, but this will change next semester :)

7. Not fall on my butt so much the next time I go skating.

8. Stop eating three dinners a day.

9. Go somewhere outside of Pittsburgh for spring break.

10. Self-perfection: as the Odyssey assignment says: perfect what you're good at rather than focus on what you suck at. I just finished my cultivated self assignment this morning. The assignment was to gather stories from your friends of instances where you exemplifying your best traits. From the stories I got, the consensus was that I'm caring, selfless, logical, focused, dedicated to work, cheerful, reflective, dedicated to service, and curious, so I guess I better work on perfecting these traits.

11. Survive.

11 resolutions for 2011, let's see how this works out.

Haircut fail

since i don't feel like typing the whole story..

[12/21/10 6:57:00 PM] Amy : thanks
[12/21/10 6:57:05 PM] Amy : i was trying to save my hair
[12/21/10 6:57:11 PM] Amy : i got a perm today
[12/21/10 6:57:18 PM] Amy : but they permed my whole head
[12/21/10 6:57:21 PM] Amy : even my bangs
[12/21/10 6:57:28 PM] Amy : and now it looks like i have an afro
[12/21/10 6:57:42 PM] Amy : so i was looking at videos on how to straighten hair
[12/21/10 6:57:51 PM] Amy : and i just tried it
[12/21/10 6:57:55 PM] Amy : but i dont think it works
[12/21/10 6:57:57 PM] Amy : :(
[12/21/10 6:58:03 PM] Amy : so im stuck with the afro
[12/21/10 6:58:05 PM] Ayris: o_o
[12/21/10 6:58:06 PM] Ayris: lol?
[12/21/10 6:58:17 PM] Amy : oh thanks
[12/21/10 6:58:34 PM] Ayris: D:
[12/21/10 6:58:36 PM] Ayris: well
[12/21/10 6:58:37 PM] Ayris: sorry
[12/21/10 6:58:39 PM] Ayris: it's sort of funny



tried flat ironing the bangs again today



It's a little bit more tamed now. :)


This was at the top of my news feed on when i got on facebook today
I just had sex, and it felt so good...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQlIhraqL7o

If I were rich...

I would probably find myself in the streets of Miami wasting away my days. It's a horrific thought, sure, but in all likely cases, that would be what happens since I can't be trusted with too much luxury. I was just thinking about what I'd do if I had suddenly won the lottery one day and became a millionaire. Either money would corrupt me or I would lose it all overnight just as easily as I lose my wallet. Yesterday, Jessica (the girl from London) and I were talking about her life as the daughter of a billionaire. She has vacationed in every continent except for Africa and South America, had dinners with the president of China, seen Paris Hilton while shopping in New York, she owns three houses all in different countries, and probably has enough money to feed an entire city, but she doesn't seem at all comfortable talking about the benefits of being rich. The two things she did stress was her brother's clubbing obsession and her father's habit of smoking 3 packs of cigarette per day. I wonder if all the rich had some flaws. It would make sense that rich people are more susceptible to bad habits since they're not under financial stress and so they don't have the need to stay professional or sober or well-educated or whatever, and it's just so much easier (not healthier, but easier) to live life like its the 20s. So yeah, back to what i was saying about wasting my life away in Miami. We visited Miami 3 years ago? And the only thing I remember from there was all the drunk people coming out of clubs at 7 in the morning and i think if i were rich, i would eventually end up in one of these places cuz of my lack of will to stay in school/work for admission into medical school/whatever track id thought id be going into.
Speaking of school, grades came out yesterday.... 3.69qpa and A's in all core courses. I think not sleeping for the entire finals week has paid off. My only regret is not leaving time to study for data structures and going into that final with a caffeine high thinking id ace it without knowing anything we learned over the last month. Also, I would really like the idea of installing shower rooms in the library for the poor kids who need a place to cram for finals but don't want to walk back to their dorms at 5 in the morning. Jessica told me that in London, they have 3 weeks of break to cram for finals and alot of people live in the library for those 3 weeks with their sleeping bags and toothbrushes and it's so much more convenient for them to do so because they have shower rooms. A school like CMU were all the students are tortured by academics would really benefit from something like that.

--------------------------------------

More restaurant reviews:

Pittsburgh:

Uncle Sams:best subs ever
Aladdins: decent if you're into mediterranean
Bangkok Balcony: portions are too small but delicious
Pamela's: great breakfast place
Rose Tea Cafe: comparable to bangkok
Quaker Steak and Lube: only go if you're going with Graham/someone who will devour wings like they're animals.
Primanti Brothers: bleh. personally, i don't like the idea of stuffing fries inside burgers
Eat Unique: interesting
Szechuan Express: yay for cheap Asian food!
Sushi boat: okay
Korea Garden: decent but expensive
Little Asia: their pad thai does not taste like pad thai
Star of India: bleh. comparable to... Taste of India...
Qdoba:okay
Dave and Andy's: must go eat their ice cream... so good!!!


Boston:

Not Your Average Joe's:is really not your average joe's: great food. Their bread is delicious.

Beer Works: i like the decorations/atmosphere, best steak ever, go there if you're in the mood for pigging out, not good for vegetarians. all the beer is freshly brewed from the restaurant

girl from london

So a few days ago my mom called me and told me on a short notice that a girl from London will be coming to live with us for a few days over winter break. No details were given, I had no idea who she was or why she'll be living with us and at that time I was too burnt out from finals to bother asking for the details. Anyways, her flight was supposed to arrive at midnight yesterday, a few hours right after I get back from the mellon, but her first flight got delayed and she missed her connecting flight, so we ended up having to pick her up this morning. Apparently, this girl had been awake from at least 48 hours due to traveling and jetlag, but even then, she was full of energy and ready to soak in all the excitements of Boston. As a result, my mom and I ended up shopping with her for 7 hours today. Over the course of our hanging out today I learned a lot more about her background. She's a recent graduate from the London School of Economics and her hometown is in Hong Kong. Her father is an investor, hence she's visiting U.S. in her father's behalf to talk to my mom about developing an area nearby here that used to be a golf course. Her mother passed away to cancer and ever since then her father as been looking for cancer research company to invest in and after finding out about my dad's research he wanted to connect with my dad as well, but since he has been super busy lately, the daughter as been dispatched to us to spend a weekend here on the account of her having a week long vacation after school ended. Aside from the business talk, she's a very outspoken and friendly person with a ridiculous passion in shopping.

Claims from Our Shopping trip:

Her:
4 pairs of boots from UGG ~$400
1 mini wallet with a "moneyclip"? $150
3 dresses from BCBG ~$300
2 coats ~$300
1 dressy shirt ~???

Me:
1 sweater $19.99
1 dress $49.99
1 cinnamon pretzel $1.50

Mom:
1 sweater for my daddy $40

A comment on the wallet: that thing is smaller than my palm and it looks just like any other ordinary wallet except its thinner and it has a clip that you can attach your cash to. She found it inside one of those glass display cases and the first thing she said was "woahh I need one of these, and it's so cheap! Only 150 dollars!" I can't imagine how rich she is... O_o

I asked her about the prices in London and she said that everything is more expensive, but then again the stores she go to are probably only meant to be for billionaires. The tradeoff is, the tuition for London School of Economics is only 15000 pounds per year for international students. And apparently, their vacation time add up to 6 months per year. What the heck CMU?

Oh yeah, when my mom first told me she's an Asian girl from London, I thought she would look and sound a bit like this

http://www.youtube.com/user/cutiemish#p/u/15/aE7RIdelhCU

but it turned out that her English accent isn't British and she's not child-like at all. Instead, imagine a 23 year old Meryl Streep with a mixed South African/Chinese accent.

Tomorrow will be day two of shopping and then we'll visit the Harvard campus because she wanted to get a taste of the Ivy League. After that, my break officially starts with reading 100+ pages of publications about machine learning and pancreatic cancer, starting the assignment for Odyssey and applying to internships. Next week, all the Boston students are coming back from finals so I'll be pigging out at a friend's house and watching a movie during the weekend. Fun stuff! Yay for break!

Closure

There's always that tiny bittersweet feeling that accompanies the end of each chapter of our life. Our team just gave the team project presentation today and that is officially the end of Lab I. I had fun, despite the frequent frustration we've had with the experiment. I'll surely miss the smell of ether and of course, the post-lab dinners with the group. Chinese is officially done as well, and it is weird to think that next semester there will be no more morning coffees with A.Chen and sleeping in Chinese class. There is no more tutoring with the East Liberty kids since I will have no time to tutor next semester but instead have my life consumed by 251 and research. I'll miss the kids: D'Ambrose, Dom, M., Heaven, Mykya and the hyperactive Christian and I'm only naming these people because they are the people I'd never want to forget but I know I'll forget at some point and cry over the fact that I have terrible recollection of names. But anyways, I wish the best for them and hope that they'll all stay in school, and of course, Mr. Brown who always teased me for being a Pats fan and for looking like my Asian counterpart, Jiwon, whom sadly I still haven't meet. Perhaps someday when I'm old, I'll write a book about all of them because each and everyone of them at East Liberty are such memorable people and as cliche as this sounds, they deserve to have their stories told.

Yesterday, I got a text from someone I haven't heard from in a long time, in a way it did mark the end of something that would have otherwise continued to be on standstill. I don't really know whether I'd rather prefer closure than uncertainty. Looking back, there are so many things that could have gone differently and so many things that could have been made clearer. I remember Vivian's philosophical argument about what matters is not how things ends but it is about getting rid of any misunderstanding of events leading up to the ending. It's tragic that I don't have the capacity to think like Vivian. I guess for me, the fun is in the mystery of not knowing, and trying to stick an eye into every nitty gritty well of someone's life ruins the fun. Also, it doesn't help that I'm a shy person and isn't bold enough to have done things differently.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I've figured out something that's tragically wrong with me. The more I get to know someone, the more boring they become, and of course people can say the same about me. But, as they say, the only way to get to know a person really well is to interact with them on a day to day basis... but by seeing someone too often you're exposing yourself to the danger of getting bored of that person, or vice versa, the other person gets bored of you. So should there be a need to limit the amount of time you spend with any particular person? Or would it be better to solely interact with strangers so the conversations never gets old? That's really sad to think about. There's always rare exceptions to this, the image elderly couples holding hands for example... that's a picture I'll always be envious of.

That's it for the post. I don't know why I tend to blog about such depressing things. Maybe there's a stronger need to put depressing things into writing whereas happier memories are only worthy of a mental acknowledgment. But that's it, once last post before drowning myself in textbooks. Let the finals studying commence.