melaleuca mania!

Tea tree oil! It works! Kind of!

I'm kind of hurting right now since I haven't gotten a chance to apply some tea tree+lavender+jojoba oil mixture to my scalp post-shower in almost a week, but it was going pretty darn well. I'd say similar improvement in the psoriasis as the steroids, but a lot less of the paranoia of the chemicals and stinging. Then again, I don't know what the long term effects of tea tree oil are. Even so many days removed from my last oil massaging treatment it could definitely be much worse. TMI coming? My scalp hasn't bled from cracking in a whole week it seems. Definitely yay from me. I'm not cured, and you can't really be cured from psoriasis anyway, but it was a clear improvement from doing nothing but some medicated shampoos. The topical steroids do work better, but like I mentioned in a previous post, I wasn't comfortable using it daily given the warnings. I hope tea tree oil doesn't turn out to be carcinogenic or something.

just need that crunchy goodness

I've had this annoying and embarassing, yet trivial, condition for a while. I have scalp psoriasis. To average observer, it just seems like I have crazy disgusting dandruff. I've had it for 12 years now (with many diagnoses, but this one is most recent and consistent) and it's just become a way of life. The psychological effects and impact on quality of life are a whole different post about self-image and health problems in general. Anyway, after using prescribed and OTC creams, shampoos, topical liquids, and oils...still looking for something I can use and not feel paranoid about. My last dermatologist's philosophy was that if it works, keep using it. Even if it says on the label that you shouldn't use it continuously for more than a month. I dunno. I was not okay with it. Also one of the causes of a psoriasis flare-up is cessation of steroidal treatment. It's a lose-lose situation.

Anyway. Going on a natural product spree! Based on suggestions from friends and the internet:

SLS free shampoo - I'm trying out J.R. Liggetts shampoo bars. I got the Jojoba and Peppermint one. All natural and only contains oils and lye (sodium hydroxide).

Tea tree oil - for my skin maladies. Apparently tea tree oil is a wonder remedy for everything. Mostly trying it for my psoriasis, but I've got other skin stuff I mostly ignore treating to try it on.

Jojoba oil - as a moisturizer and a diluent for the tea tree oil when I rub it on my scalp. I've been using olive oil or petroleum jelly if anything for a long while now, so switching to another oil isn't too hard.

Other non-lotion moisturizer - Badger Balm! Adorable name, adorable tin, and works better on my cracked skin than anything else I've tried!

Fine, I admit it

Having a rice cooker has sort of changed my life. I bought it off of a friend who was moving. Initially I had my doubts, especially buying one using "fuzzy logic" because as I'm sure was the case in most Asian households growing up, you had some ancient thing with a 2 pole switch that somehow made rice, puddings, steamed vegetables, and whatever else. You could trick those things. Fuzzy logic (whether or not this term is correctly applied) rice cookers are a whole different animal. You have to tell it what you're making (some of them even have cake modes...which my friend and I tried and hey, it looked enough like cake! Imagine if we made it mixing with a whisk and not a fork and also when sober!) and then it'll magically cook it juuuuust right.

And I've been living without a rice cooker for years, being the bad Asian that I am. (Along with not playing the piano or violin.) I just make rice in a pot. What is so hard???

But hey, you help a friend out by buying his junk and you get junk you might use in return. Yay! Also I joked that with the fuzzy logic brain 'n all, it might be intelligent enough to become my new best friend.

And it has.

I haven't done anything crazy in it yet but make white rice and brown rice. Okay, I attempted to make steel cut oats twice, which sort of yielded goopy nightmares, but the oats that remained in the pot were delicious. (I should add that I've never made steel cut oats before and so they sort of astound me and I'm sure it'll just take some experimentation with the water ratio. Also the oats all remained in the pot...the goopy mess was the...oat water that had congealed?) The cake was at someone else's place so I can't count that. But combined with my normal stores of pickled vegetables I never get around to eating (kimchee, cucumbers in soy sauce, etc) I am in snacking heaven. It feels healthier too than some of my past snacking habits. (Until you factor in just how much rice I can inhale with the right sesame and seaweed seasoning and then I remember why I don't lose weight.)

And so, as with I later admitted with getting a real bed, I concede that a rice cooker is a good investment. Tending periodically to a pot of rice doesn't take much work, but setting a timer for rice to be done when you're back from errands is pretty clutch. And since my jaw has been hurting the past few weeks it's been nice to have large amounts of rice porridge (mixed with sweet potatoes! mm) as a staple starch around. You win, Asian-and-now-common-American-apartment-dweller wisdom.

running in circles

Hello world again!

I wonder who still has this blog on their feeds! So I am back, reflecting on my life, with no guarantees that I will post again. :-) I guess I converted to tumblr, but since apparently it's a bandwidth whore (hence not playing nice with use at work) maybe I'll spew my thoughts here again.

I have a lot of saved drafts, and a lot of more organized things to say...but perhaps expanding on that indication, this is a post about how I am woefully unfocused.

As I type right now, I am amid another flurry of work left to the last minute. The super last minute. I've been aware of this workload for a while, and I've had the past 3 weeks to work on it, but I just haven't. I can't really put my finger on why other than just being a pathological procrastinator. But I do know I need to improve on this. And I've been better this quarter at work than usual...but not quite the best. Why haven't I been able to improve myself at work as much as I'd like? I think it's because I'm also trying to be better at every thing all at once.

I fall into this trap so much that it's not even a trap, but a dysfunctional way of life. I suppose growing up being placed in specialized programs and then going to a competitive high school and an even more so college has led me to increasingly believe that I should be good at everything. I bitterly scoffed at people who delved into their studies and didn't do extracurriculars and got the same or better grades than I with less stress (for shame!) thinking I was the capable one. Some of my friends do still envy my logistical ambitions -- if I want to fit something into my schedule, it will fit. I may sacrifice a little bit of everything else, but I can and will go to work, see an apartment, get my teeth cleaned, help out at the tae kwon do school, go to my soccer game, and then meet you for your birthday party.

I've been skipping things as of late (the past year) with mixed results. I've mostly been stinging on the exercise and the social engagements, which might not be the best way to go. Either way, this has led to no improvement in my life regarding stress level, work production consistency, and clearly not my health and fitness since I've been exercising less. And now I feel guilty for not leading the jam-packed life I used to with zero results.

What I've forgotten is one of the fundamentals of learning which I now see applies to life skills. Master one skill, build a foundation, and move on.

Instead of trying to (currently):

• cook more and eat better
  
• exercise regularly (and meet my 10k race goal)
  
• work better at work
  
• declutter my apartment and life
  
• read books
  
• play more video games (this is a good thing, promise =P)
  
• take trips
  
• work towards my second degree black belt
  
• enjoy life and see friends in the area more than once a year
  
• write more music or at least finish some songs
  
• and the list goes on...(including some knitting projects for my niece...she'll be too big soon!)
  

I need to focus at fewer at a time. Often at 2am, I'll be awake, thinking I should do something. But what? I need to work, but I'd also really like to get started on cleaning out my dresser, and hey it's never too late to do a strength workout, oh but there's that book I wanted to read...
I just need to simplify what I want to do.

This will be hard, but I think it's for the best. Maybe I shouldn't be training for the 10k and working on my second degree black belt at the same time as compatible, as those goals appear to be, since at the moment, I only have so much time to exercise and it's hard to choose. Also I feel like reading books and playing video games take up the same-ish time slots in leisure home time. Soccer and tennis together was probably also a bad choice. Cooking more doesn't work when I don't get home until 10pm most nights exhausted. (Though I have been working on recipes on the weekends.) And most of all, perhaps work should take a bigger priority over all of these things (at least for a little while). I know there must be a way somehow to do it all at once, and do it well (I've had a taste of it!), but clearly this isn't working for me. I feel like I've spent the past year and a half trying everything and improving on nothing. I guess I don't have the same ability as I (at least think I) used to to send my life in a billion different directions.

Or maybe I do. But at this point trying to level up all of my skill sets at once makes for a long time until a stat boost. :-) And ya need little bits of encouragement along the way.

Now to figure out what to do first...

*edit - even just ten minutes after writing this, I've already had too many ideas to do everything at once. Don't know how to hold myself to taking things one at a time!

on a boat

Eating a brunch buffet! With my new phone I could attempt proj 365 but I won't. I'll just hope to post more. Hi everyone who still has me on their rss readers!

Don't you love how I run back to this blog now that the dating blog has died down? See ya at the end of the fiscal year.

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testing!

Well, it looks like I can e-mail from my phone but the whole (EASIER) MMS thing doesn't work. Just as well. This one doesn't count since it's from over a week ago. Leche likes Matthew Fox. Someone's meeting the foster cats on Sunday and will probably take them. Fostering cats is one of the best decisions of my adult life. They helped me, I helped the cats, everyone gets cuddly. When I'm not sneezing at them, that is.

growing up, cont'd

I used to think I had a grasp on the growing up thing, and I definitely don't miss college. So I thought.

I don't miss college how I think most people do -- the people, the relative carefree nature, always having something new to do -- but rather I miss the routine. Those who knew me knew I was always overbooked for everything. If it wasn't just the sheer nature of being a chemical engineering major, it was a cappella rehearsals and concerts, marching band functions (and parties!), tae kwon do practice or testing or tournaments, or working my shift at the library or heading to the lab to work on that project (and get money for it!). Engineers partied hard when they could, and otherwise were banished to do problem sets when others were going out.

In high school, my main activities were track, tennis, math team, concert band/orchestra and generally running amok in the courtyard. I unsuccessfully carried over these things to college (though I tried...I also wanted to do cheerleading or rugby) and picked up what I listed above. High school to college was a definite transition for me. And it felt pretty good to learn new things and I think I changed for the better. (Apparently that's when Diana rage died down.)

In my attempt to center myself in the real working world, instead of exploring and finding new interests, I've held onto my college ones. I sing with a guy and write songs and record them sometimes for kicks...I work and train at a tkd school...and though I couldn't get the marching band aspect, it seems I've just latched onto my apartment sports teams and I can't let go. I need season after season of whatever they'll offer -- volleyball, bball, softball, soccer, tennis so far. And goodness knows I make unnecessary effort to see live sports.

Who knows how, but I didn't realize this until today. I'm feeling a little stuck, in that young adult rut, and I think still doing these activities out of habit and not out of actual interest is keeping me from actually moving on from college and enjoying my new life. I'm tempted to wipe the slate clean, and pick up something new. I could be in a dance class or a book club by now. (Actually, bartending classes are first up on the list when there's time. =P) I think I was supposed to apply to law school around now. My bad.

grab a friend and grow up

when the Ikea directions tell you not to assemble something alone, just follow the directions. You trust the rest of the directions, don't you? Oh well. Somehow I managed to construct my used bed frame without much injury. Thank you, Woot, for giving me a box that was exactly the height I needed to get the frame together.

But enough of that. More importantly, I have a bed.

I have not had a bed since college. Not a real one, anyway. I've been sleeping on air mattresses, my futon...*ahem* and other people's beds. But now I have my very own (not so comfortable) bed. It makes me one step closer to being an adult.

I've been criticized for lack of bed, lack of "real" drinking glasses, lack of regular leftovers, lack of other furniture, lack of cleanliness?...etc. All of these times, it's been hinted that "damn, girl, you need to grow up."

Usually I ignore and justify. I say I don't *need* these things. And since I don't need them, it makes future moves easier. Why do we feel that certain things define us as adults? And why does it even matter? As if cooking, owning a cat, owning a house, and generally keeping house is distinctly grown up. I can see how it's good...financially sound...or perhaps gives you a feeling of independence and maturity, but I don't understand why exactly it matters. I feel the same pressures and ideas, but I don't know what to make of it. And in my head, I have a very specific and not universally applicable definition of adulthood: the ability to make good decisions. Most of the time. And when you don't, know what the good decision is, even if you don't go that path. (For example, right now I'm having tortilla chips and dip for dinner. Is that a good decision? No. But I know it.) And I think I'm getting to my definition of growing up.

Anyway, I own a bed. Happy now?

a Pececito

I found this on the internet. Happy Birthday, Warren!

(as I break my posting hiatus. Been busy/busy with other blogs. Oh. You know.)
I also recently got promoted (not a big deal, and a year behind most people). So that ~15% increase in work is gonna be GREAT. :-)

nice knowin' ya, I guess I'll be sleeping early tonight

Oh, Sparks. It felt like our love affair had only just begun. Sometime in the past year, my officemate introduced me to you, and it was then that I realized that this was a great, nay, the best and only way to start a night. With energy and a buzz.

But it seems your time here on Earth is numbered. I'll always remember you, and hope you somehow return.

MillerCoors to stop selling alcopop

pizza and drugs, 30 minutes or less

Pharmacies were always a bit of a mystery for me.
For some reason I loved the grocery store so I'd always go with my mom, and to the attached pharmacy as well. I guess my mom always did things with time to spare, or was just a very "we're not waiting for this" person, so the medicine always got picked up a few days later on our next shopping trip.

So I always assumed the pharmacies had to order the medicine we asked them for.

Though I guess this might be the case for some cases, the few times I've either filled one for someone who was sick or for myself, it's within 15 minutes to an hour. How to pharmacies have all of this stuff in such a little space? What madness must go on in there? And I overheard them talking...they fill about 120-300 prescriptions a day? Sounds busy. With a lot of room for error.

Big fat uninteresting update: Obama won the American Cup of Soul Stirring

Firstly, like all unfocused blogs, this one too must fizzle out. I think it was because I read an article 3 weeks ago which basically said...If you're thinking of starting a blog, don't. If you already have one, consider not having one. Something about how blogs used to be an amazing thing...anyone could write their opinions and anyone could read them. The blogosphere, the blogosphere!!! But unfortunately, big sites and “real” news sites have started their own blogs...and who can compete with reputable institutions?
Anyway, I think that was the gist. I don't remember and I can't look it up, because I'm in Dulles airport with no wi-fi! And hence, the big fat uninteresting update.

(*got the article!)

Things that have happened recently: duh.
Obama.

DC, voting 93% blue for the presidential race, was a crazy place to be that night. Screaming, dancing, jumping, honking, hugging, drinking and more all in the streets. I'm glad I got to experience that. It was a strange feeling though.

I definitely did not feel the raw emotion that others were experiencing; I merely fed off of their exuberance. At first I thought there was something wrong with being a democrat and not weeping, but it really just had to do with the company you keep. Or maybe I am different.

Talking to Beck last night, I was reassured that someone (namely, close high school friends and their friends) felt exactly the same way I did: Okay, Obama was the better candidate. That's cool. Damn, it got called early. I guess I'll go now. I had no desire to change my away message, facebook status, or to drive in the streets cheering. The only other time I had experienced such madness was in Germany during the World Cup. (Or perhaps when Yale finally won The Game after a drought?) Which then led me into a critical downward spiral in which I was mad at everything, and felt the need to become a rabid irrational ranting devil's advocate. Good intentions, but I may have come off a bit strong. To those in my warpath, I'm sorry. I get like this every election, and since my friends seem to all be democrats, I come off as touting conservative propaganda. I still believe that the most important Obama has done is stir interest in our generation in the power of democracy and voting, and also for gathering supporters in a manner like religion.

But that was sooooo yesterday.

Today: the US Presidential Election as sport.

Since the election is called a contest, there is no challenge in drawing this comparison with a sporting event. But as long as I'm ranting, here's why I came to this thought. I'm jealous of how deeply people are moved by his election to power, and I don't... “get” it.

My coworkers were chatting and brought up how they don't “get” sports. This does not bother me at all. I also don't get sports in that I don't get being a die hard fan. I am a general fan, and I do like watching them when they're on TV if I remotely like a team. I like sports because all you have to do is learn the rules...and then all of a sudden, all events of that type are open to your enjoyment and engrossment.

The election, to some, must've been the greatest, most easiest to understand sporting event there was. No, the issues to be dealt with were not easy to understand...but rather (for the purposes of only the presidential election after the primaries) the rules. Once the Dem and Republican nominees are set. there are no divisions, leagues, and wild card positions to keep track of, no cross referencing of teams whose offense will do great against this team's defense, and win even if they are far lower ranked. The election is a gigantic, drawn out, final championship game. A single several month-long dance off between two main competitors (and Perot, perhaps) in which you are the judge. Omgiosh. Yes. You. You know how subjective figure skating judging is? Technical score, artistic score...you choose whatever you care about (Did they stumble? Was it fluid? Was it an engaging performance? Did they do the right moves at the right times?) and you vote. There are debates to showcase some skills, but overall, it's just a feeling. Those are the rules. Go with your gut.

Once I realized that much, I realized that maybe the election just wasn't the sport for me. I like baseball and football since they're reasonably slow to multitask to without missing too many plays, basketball and hockey are good with beer. Golf is good, well, never, and tennis is good when I'm in the mood.

The presidential election wasn't it for me. And it is for other people. I guess I'll just have to remember that even the slight happiness I get when I randomly watch the underdog of any given baseball game win (so basically the Washington Nationals) is infinitely higher than those who don't enjoy it at all. And that maybe next time, I'll just chill with a beer with a few friends. Just like how I spend my favorite sporting events.

link/video/everything dump

Long overdue posts. I have drafts of text-y posts, but those aren't fun, are they? :-) Maybe some other time.

Everything I've liked, seen and rememebered, heard...

• 7th graders tell it straight. You can vote however you like. (via my officemate) I sort of wanted this election to be over, but I also want more songs like this.
  
  
  
  
• Top 10 Embarassing Halloween Costumes. Is the YPMB going to Halloween Parade this year? Or ever again?
  
  
• Gimme my Guinea! A new tumblr I made dedicated to guinea pigs. :-)
  
  
  

Other than that, my blogging equilibrium has shifted back to tumblr. Hmm!
I suspect it shall shift again. Like the seasons! Okay in a weird mood and sort of stressed about my schedule and stuff. Being out of town so much does not help with my docket! Well, helps in some ways, but not in others...the PTO production system makes no sense.

a tale which is written in a way that is not yet overwrought

I don't find time to read often, but I finally got to when I was at my sister's! This is The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon, published in 2003.

It's written from the point of view of an autistic teenager, as a very long and tangential tale unfolds from his point of view. This sort of pseudo-unreliable narrator style reminds me most of the movie Memento, and the multi-faceted use of footnotes to forcefully impose background information and the thought processes of the narrator reminds me most of House of Leaves. (Hey, I'm working with the little I have in my brain's library!) It's fairly pleasant though, as it's not overly done. I read it in about 2 hours so that says something. (Seeing as I usually give up on books when I have 20 pages left since I usually realize that I don't actually care what happens. And then I continue to "read" this book for a few more weeks.)

Read, please. And no, it's not all about dogs and that's not why I read it. Okay maybe that's why I initially read it.

checking in

Thought I'd say hi. Had a lot of ideas to spew words about, but I keep forgetting them! Sort of busy. Sort of decompressing. Mostly busy. :-)

Taking my second domestic trip via airplane ever! Other than a bit of jetsetting around Europe when I was in Germany, I've only taken 5 trips involving planes ever! This'll be a super short one though, compared to what I'm used to. (14 hours until touchdown in Asia? Where's my Game Boy?)

Delta as operated by Comair.



Though the article is 2 years old and is talking about the DC to NYC flights, the headline of the article this picture is from is "Comair flight late 100 percent of the time". Not encouraging. Here's to meeting more nice people at the bar.

I feel like a Chinese gymnast

I don't know if it's because I'm asian, because of my height, my voice, or the way I act, but I often get mistaken for a teenager, or at least questioned.

I'd get carded in college when I bought lotto tickets at train stations and was just about carded a few days after my 21st birthday for a free item giveaway (a Con Edison pen) at Yankee Stadium. Been carded for alcohol, but that's normal. Except for a few times in NYC and once at Whole Foods...that was strange. I've been respectfully asked by some TKD instructors and parents how old I am when I hint that I've been to college and they're shocked, and I've been not so respectfully told by kids that "you look like a child", "I thought you were 14", and "you look too little to be a college person".

But recently I feel like I've been getting younger. At the dentist's office, the way the hygienist asked how old I was when I was signing my forms was kind of funny. I guess I had taken the day off and I was in casual sneakers, jeans, and a colorful t shirt. My black belt exam was kind of funny with every other question from a stranger being "wait, how old are you?" and then them walking away. Today I was carded for buying a used video game rated M. (ages 17+) I think this guy was just playing by the rules...I already had my ID out when he asked this father in front of me if he was okay with the M rated game he was buying for his sons.

I think innocently buying a rated M video game and getting carded is a bit of the last straw. This is insane. Maybe I should start wearing makeup and generally maintaining myself. I should also stop shopping at Aeropostale (though in my defense? maybe? I only get sweaters and the plainest of shirts there...nothing with a logo or dumb print), Claire's (but they sell clip ons! I was also questioned if I knew they were clip ons...as if "you're too old for these"), and carrying a gross messenger bag.

But at this rate I'm going to leave my ID somewhere by accident, and not be let in for a PG-13 movie. Maybe I should make it a mission to get carded for the most ridiculous thing possible.

And just like childhood, I'll miss this stage of life when it's gone. :-)

oh, teehee, beeteedubs

I earned my first degree black belt last night. :-)
Even if my job doesn't work out (oof, shouldn't have reminded myself) at least I can say I achieved something in DC. (Even if it's just a silly milestone.)

simple pleasures

What a terrible/great picture.
Anyway, US Open is on. It's pouring outside, buckets. Though it's gonna stop in two hours or so, and I'm kind of sad about it. I kind of love the sound of drenching rain, knowing I am sheltered and am safe from it. And so I can work a tiny bit without thinking I should be outside. :-)

Absolutely Free

This weekend I did a small bit of grocery shopping and happened to see that these were on sale in the supermarket. (The featured item in the circular was a double fudge ice cream bar but I ended up getting the orange creme bar since it was all that was available.) I googled the product quickly before setting out on my excursion.

Absolutely Free ice cream - fat free, cholesterol free, lactose free...

Sounds delicious-free, right? Well, I expected the reviews or comments to have things mixed in like "Don't bother, just eat real ice cream" or "also free of TASTE" but they were all positive reviews. And yay for lactose free things. So I tried it.

And it was good.

It didn't taste exactly like ice cream, but how much can I ask for? It was a nice frozen treat, that very closely resembled ice cream and in Alex's words, "I've had worse things that do have lactose and fat in it."

80 calories a bar. I recommend it. I hate the term guilt free snack, but if you're the type to categorize your snacks, I guess this would be one of them.

wakin' up

Hello, blogger blog. Are you at all encouraged by the fact that I've been posting less? More work done perhaps? Maybe once I stop posting in the other blogs too. :-)

WEEKEND UPDATE of things posted here and here:

Hundred pushups - somehow, I made it to day 1 of week 2! Even if it took more than a week and some to get there. MEH. It's a small motivating factor that I might be held to do 50 pushups for my black belt exam in a few weeks. Also Warren has been keeping up with his pushups too!

Whitening mouthwash - Well, I haven't noticed any whitening, but I also haven't been using it everyday. Forgive me if the comments on the product page make it seem like if I overuse it or rinse for more than 30 seconds my mouth will disintegrate. But like I said the first time, bubbling action always feels good.

Journal keeping - the short bus rides I take that aren't good for reading like I want them to be are indeed perfect for journals! Even bought an overpriced 4-color pen over the weekend.