ilubmoney

My sister Teresa visited me over the weekend, and it was fun-filled enough to where I think I need to chronicle it (both as just a pleasant memory and also as a reference for ideas on where to take out-of-town guests while they're here).

Warning: image-heavy post ahead.

( Saturday and the Death Cab Concert... )

( Sunday and San Francisco... )

( Monday and the English tea shop... )

It was such a great weekend. I'm glad to have this time now to catch up on things I need to do this week, including making this update. :) More photos on Facebook if you happen to have me friended there.

What are some good "meet the parents" types of outfits? I don't actually know how soon that's gonna happen, but I've just been in kind of a "new outfits" kind of mood and might want to do some thrift/vintage shopping soon.

I'm feeling the casual knee-length skirt/dress thing, and the mister says that looking "nerdy/geeky" would help my case (in other words, educated and non-threatening, hehehe).

I'm not worried about what to bring them like in the past--yesterday, I brought some white peaches for them and left a note because they weren't home when we stopped by.

Also, what did you wear when you met your significant other's/others' parents?

Images and links are welcome and encouraged in comments.

I gotta say, joining SparkPeople has been really helpful for me. The whole tracking business has been really helpful with getting me into the habit of going to the gym consistently for the past three weeks (and they say it takes at least 21 days to make/break a habit).

A couple of notes about my experience over the last few weeks:

• I gained about 5 lbs. since I measured myself about a month ago. I now officially weigh the most I have ever weighed thus far. When I saw the new number on the gym scale this past Monday, I freaked out a little and went home to grab my measuring tape. Funnily enough, my bust-waist-hip measurements are identical to what they were a month ago. Maybe I've gained more muscle mass, but I'm inclined to wonder if it's just more water weight due to my just drinking more water in general. I don't think the increased water intake has happened long enough for me to rule it out for my recent weight gain.
• I don't know if I necessarily feel more energy after working out, but I definitely feel more accomplished. Generally, I've been in a great mood, but I can't attribute that entirely to exercise and nutrition alone. :)
• I've concentrated the past 2 weeks or so on nutrition. Part of it was to cut down on dining out and save expenses that way, and part of it was just because I missed cooking meals and have time for it now. I definitely feel more aware about not just my general calorie intake but my general nutritional breakdown in general. I still have trouble getting enough protein, carbs, and calcium in my diet. I'd like to think I've been better about replacing sweets with fruits, though sweets haven't been cut completely (FBers know, but Albert brought me some ice cream cupcakes earlier this week <3).
• I'm still waiting to notice differences in my physical appearance. I notice small differences in strength and endurance when I'm consistent with my workouts, like my body is getting better at tolerating the discomfort of cardio and weights. I can lift slightly more than I used to a month ago, and my legs are generally making much more improvement than my upper body.
• I'm definitely learning a lot more about exercise and nutrition through reading their articles daily. Some of my favorite interesting/useful articles so far: "Workout ideas for couples," "20 Healthiest Foods for Under $1," "Optimism and the Power of Positive Thinking."
• My main goal is to get accustomed to the habit of getting to the gym and/or exercising, so I make my regimen as simple as possible.  I aim to do 20 minutes of cardio a day for 4 days a week, 2 days of strength training (in which I go through 10 of the exercise stations/machines, 2 sets of 15-20 reps at each station, more if I do crunches). 
• A good workout mix really helps me stay on track with cardio, especially if there's a song or two I love to dance to, but I lost my earphones recently and have had trouble on the treadmill this week.  Today I skipped out on the gym but did my cardio at home using two SparkPeople workout videos and a jump rope.  Pretty awesome workout, too.

Also, due to my renewed interest in food, I've rediscovered a love for making food.  Things I have cooked over the past two weeks:

• Japanese-style curry with rice
• Lasagna (with mushrooms, zuchinni, and chicken)
• Japanese-style rice omlettes ("omurice")
• Baked chicken drumsticks using Panko breadcrumbs for the first time
• Restyled "mac and cheese" using rotini, leftover fancy cheeses from a potluck (apple smoked gruyere, havarti, and shredded mozzarella), homemade breadcrumbs (also leftover from said potluck), and leftover chicken breasts
• Chicken pot pie (I bought a Betty Crocker mix for the crust and tossed in some leftovers for the filling; burnt the crust a bit, but because it was flaky, I was able to peel off some of the burnt layers)

Over the next few days, I plan on making Korean tofu soup/stew (partly for Albert's birthday), possibly chili dogs with homemade chili, and chocolate covered cherry cookies.  Recipe for the cookies will make about 3 dozen, so if you're in the area and would like some next week, let me know! :)

I recently joined SparkPeople to build better awareness of good health (exercise and nutrition). If you're on there, add me! My username is "ilubmoney."  My main goals on there are to tone up for summer beachwear and also to develop a general awareness of what I'm eating on a daily/weekly basis.  I've been on it for a little over a week now, and I think it's been working for me because I'm a sucker for point systems.  It seems to work for other people due its community-oriented nature; active users on the site seem very supportive of each other in general.  Also, I love how SP's got a lot of great educational articles on nutrition, fitness, and general overall health (I'm happy with the way they've integrated mental health, too; I'm a believer of the mind-body connection and its impact on general motivation).  They have tons of recipes, a great calorie and exercise tracker, and trivia/polls. 

Mostly, I like how setting up my account there put me through the process of creating concrete goals for myself that are doable and make me feel good about achieving something.  

Anyway, just passing the link along in case those of you who are trying to get back into shape want a little extra support.  SparkPeople seems like a great way to do it.

I forgot where I read this yesterday--have been trying to find the source this morning--but someone posited the following idea:

Women tend to get married when they meet the "right person." They wait until they meet someone who's compatible with them on a social and emotional level, someone who meets their intimacy needs.

Men tend to get married when the timing is right. When they are at a stable place in their careers, when they're in a good financial place, when they've completed their educational goals (grad/med/law school, etc.), they'll feel ready for marriage and will marry whomever they're with at the time.

I think both men and women need some combination of the two--chemistry and timing--for thoughts of marriage to happen, but each group as a whole puts different priorities on different parts.

Agree or disagree? Is this a trend you've noticed in your social circles? Discuss.

I think it's about time for a general updates post. Don't think I've done a public one in awhile.

Also, I'm guessing that the appeal of Twitter is that it's not as labor-intensive as blogging. I don't "tweet," but I do regular Facebook status updates.

Work
Some of you know that my school-based internship suffered from the recent round of budget cuts, and as a result, the counseling intern program in my district was cut. However, due to an unbelievable stroke of luck, I was able to secure a new internship in another school district close by. I'm still looking for other part-time work, though, especially to fill in the summer hours. It doesn't help that Kaplan recently decided to close their Score! centers, so tutoring hours have been slashed significantly. I've chosen to transfer to their new in-home tutoring program, but without the guarantee of hours, I have to keep looking for other part-time work.

Quite frankly, I'm feeling burnt-out from having to continually job-hunt almost every year. Girl's got bills to pay, though.

Personal
* Friends know about this already, but I recently started dating someone new. I'm not ready to write about Albert in a public entry just yet, but I can say that I am really happy. I've updated my LJ privately on a regular, daily basis, but since I started dating him, even those private entries have slowed down quite a bit. I laugh a lot more than I used to.
* I've been eating out quite a bit. In fact, I think I should probably Yelp more so I can track how often I'm trying new restaurants as part of my New Year's resolutions. I'm pretty sure I've exceeded 1 new restaurant every 2 weeks. Seems like it's more like (at least) 4-5 new restaurants each month for the past two months. I think I should adjust my goals to cooking new dishes once every 1-2 weeks.

Funny business
On a semi-related note, here are some links that made me laugh:
Luigi finally confronts Mario
How much do YOU love noodles?
Pete Johansson - Epileptic Girlfriend

Written on our kitchen whiteboard awhile ago. I have a roommate--who shall remain nameless--who tends to enjoy leaving notes and long emails when wanting or needing to address household issues. This was one such note.



I wanted to add, "So is passive-aggression," but it just seemed too... I dunno. Such things are not my style, not my style. :P

In honor of dementia's birthday, I told her I would eat a cake in her honor. Any cake of her choosing. She chose pineapple upside-down cake.

I knew I probably wasn't going to be able to find this cake easily at a bakery, so I decided to make one.



What is that bright yellow splooge in the middle of the cake, you ask? I discovered later that I might've taken the cake out a little early from the oven. Yeah, it's undercooked in the photo. But I put it back in the oven and ate it later. Yum!



And yes, I made two. I cheated with classic yellow cake batter from the box, so I had enough to make two.

Happy birthday, Demmie!

I feel the need to do a public post, but I'm stuck for inspiration now. Any requests?

Quick list of things going on aside from no-longer-so-recent filtered posts:
- Job-hunting and expanding the search beyond counseling positions
- Wondering what to do for Memorial Day
- Rock Band 2 goodness
- Eating out... a LOT
- Thinking about an updated, summertime wardrobe
- Making and eating an upside-down pineapple cake for Demmie's birthday (anyone have a good, easy recipe?)
- Thinking about summer plans, wanting to make a trip out to Philly this summer (and have the miles for it!)

What are you guys all up to? :)

This is sort of a follow-up post to the skincare entry. As part of my New Year's resolutions this year, I vowed to assemble a basic makeup kit and learn how to use it. And I have this week!

Kim took me shopping at Valley Fair the other week and helped me pick out the basics from Sephora, Mac, and Bare Escentuals. Here's a list of what I bought.

( Makeup Kit List, for interested parties )

Yes, it was an expensive shopping trip, but I thought it was worth it.

I'm all about the all-natural makeup. My skin's been great lately, so what I'm really looking for out of makeup is to enhance my natural features and just even the color out. I haven't done a lot of experimenting with the shadows yet, but I plan to do more of that soon. Here are the results of today's makeup experiment.

( photos )

I feel like Jenny when she first discovered makeup:

After a very long break from the last poll, I've finally been able to get around to today's poll. Most of these questions are credited to James and our recent email exchanges. :) Thanks, James!

Poll #1379017 "Which of these is better?" Poll #27
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

Which of the following is better?

About a month ago, when I was first getting into makeup, I realized that you really couldn't get away with using makeup to cover up bad skin. So I decided to make adjustments to my skincare regimen instead.

Now I'm getting a ton of compliments on how great my skin looks now. So I thought I'd just share with you what I've been doing and also get some comments back on what other people do that works for their skin.

Some background: I have combination skin. My T-zones tend to get oily while my cheeks end up super dry. Plus with bangs, I get some extra oil from my hair if I'm not careful. My skin cleared up better after high school, but it still hadn't been that great in my twenties.

So here's what I do now.

About once a week, I use an aspirin mask. I'm too cheap to buy typical beauty masks, so I now make aspirin masks as a kind of facial skin tune-up. Tutorial on how to make one is in the link above. Basically, you dissolve a few uncoated aspirin and add a little honey(to act as an adhesive). You can also add a little aloe vera. Apply, then leave the mask on for about 10 minutes. Wash off with warm water. The slightly gritty texture of this makes it good for exfoliating as you're removing the mask to your face. This step has been great for reducing the redness in my skin, and the exfoliation has helped with the dead skin, too.

The most key change has been my change in moisturizer, though. I'd been using this cheap one that I'd have to apply multiple times throughout the day to feel okay, but then I switched to Neutrogena's Healthy Skin line. It's really just the one tube, their anti-wrinkle cream* that has SPF 15 and acts as a daily moisturizer, too. I swear, my skin's feeling as soft as a baby's skin, and for the first few weeks I was using it, I couldn't stop touching my cheeks. Even now I still sometimes rub my cheek to make sure it's still soft.

I also suspect that a combination of these two steps/products have contributed to the lightening of my skin.

Also, drinking a lot more jasmine green tea might be getting more antioxidants and water in. Important for skincare!

I wish I had some good before/after photos to show you, but I don't have many before photos that don't get washed out from the flash (maybe a fortunate thing?). Plus the main issue I had before was the oily-dryness combination that you can see in some of my photos. Both have been reduced considerably (the dry/dead skin is nearly nonexistent now), and the unexpected benefit I got was improved texture. SO SOFT.

* Some of you may remember or know that I have had issues about looking younger than my age, and using an anti-wrinkle cream doesn't seem to help with that. BUT! I've been told that it's never too early to use anti-wrinkle cream, and the girl who's said this is BEAUTIFUL, so I believe her.

I've talked to a number of people about this. One has told me that Caress soap has been the only thing that's worked for her skin, and another has told me that Dial soap (the kind you normally use for hand-washing) is good to reduce acne.

What do you do? What products do you recommend for people with a similar skin type to you?

On a related note, I'm looking for products changes for my hair care. If you can recommend any for Asian hair, let me know.

I had dinner with a new friend last Friday at Shana Thai, a Thai restaurant neither of us had been to before. The popular pumpkin curry there was delicious and probably the best curry I've had in a long time. I took home the duck curry instead, which was also good but not nearly as good as the pumpkin.

I wondered what to do with the curry for awhile. I looked online for ideas on what to do with leftover curry, and one idea from Lunchinabox.net was curry gyoza. They recommended to just use the chunky bits of the curry to make the dumplings, but I decided I didn't want to waste the good liquid seasonings, so I added more duck meat and boiled sweet potatoes to make the curry chunkier. Aside from boiling time for the potatoes, the mixing, wrapping, and pan-frying probably took me about 15 minutes tops. So quick, easy, and delicious to make! :)

Next time, I'll opt for chicken instead of duck meat. When you've got that many seasonings going on in a dumpling, you just don't need the more expensive meat.

Edit:

In my work, I often see and talk to kids who struggle as victims of bullies. Most of them give the same answer when asked what to do when a bully confronts them: "Tell an adult." This is what they learn from almost all of the adults around them. But I'm not convinced that this is enough.

I would agree that when kids are really little, self-defense physically or otherwise isn't enough, and you do need an adult. But at what age do they learn how to stick up for themselves? Do kids ever really learn how to stick up for themselves? And what should they learn?

Sure, they could stick with the age-old "ignore them" when it's no longer cool to tell adults anything, but even that has limited effectiveness in many circumstances. Plus, using avoidance as a solution can carry on to adulthood, which is not bad in some circumstances but just isn't as good as assertiveness.

Then there's having to rethink assertive strategies for different types of bullying.
* Possibilities for physically bullying are simpler to navigate: you can stay near protective factors (safe adults, groups of peers, etc.), you can learn self-defense to protect yourself, or you can practice running really fast and GTFO.
* Verbal bullying is a little less simple, but the best solution seems to be being able to respond with clever comebacks or certain remarks that show the bully you're unaffected. (Side note: One such response that a second grader and I came up with was, "That's so old now." She used it on a boy who teased her often about something that happened last year, and he never bothered her about it [or much else] again. A teenage student tried this on a peer as well, and it worked in that case, too.)
* Relational bullying? That's a lot trickier, because a whole system of people is involved, and changing a system is more difficult than one or two individuals.
* Cyberbullying is a subset of relational bullying and requires a modified set of strategies as well (but it's not that difficult to protect yourself as a victim once you know all the basic security rules).

Just something that I've been thinking about lately and had been meaning to post about.

I just came back from a free early screening, and without giving away any spoilers for those who haven't read the graphic novel, I will say this:

Do not see this movie if you have not read the graphic novel. You will be confused.

If you have read the graphic novel, and you want to see the movie, come fully aware that, like Alan Moore and so many others have said, this comic was not meant to be adapted on film. That being said, take it for what it is.

I am glad to have seen a free screening of Watchmen, though. Thanks, Chad, for the tip! I would not have wanted to pay full price for this. Matinee... maybe. Rental, probably, but only if you get to see this in HD.

Added note- At the screening, they were passing out a number of free stuff. One of them was this little number:



What? Uh, yeah. Why do I have this? It's tough times, and I love free stuff. What can I say.

---

Edit @ 3/4 8:49am - I agree with Spill's audio review on Watchmen. For the few (or two) of you who care, you can find that review here.

My most recent drink of choice for several months now has been jasmine green tea. I've probably spent the past 6 months or so exploring various teas, but I always come back to jasmine green.

It's surprisingly not that simple to find those tea packets in a grocery store. American grocers usually carry green but not jasmine. Asian grocers carry both, but usually not combined. I think I discovered the TenRen brand a few months ago that carried jasmine green, and I've stocked up and have drunk it almost religiously since.

So what is it with the jasmine green?

I could chalk it up simply to taste, that I just like the taste of jasmine and green tea together. But maybe there's more to it. I drank a little jasmine tea when I was a toddler--thanks, Grandma--so when I smell it or taste it, it comforts me and reminds me of home. Green tea came from my adult years, probably when I kept hearing about the benefits of regular tea-drinking and the extra-special benefits you get from green tea.

So maybe that's it. Maybe I love jasmine green tea because it's good for me in so many ways. The green takes care of my body, and the jasmine takes care of my soul.

Saw this in a friend's Facebook profile after an ugly moment of pride. Thought I'd post it here to remind myself:

"To be aware of a single shortcoming in oneself is more useful than to be aware of a thousand in someone else." -H.H., the Dalai Lama

Sometimes we do pay too much attention to the things we think are wrong with us, but I think the flaws that are truly ugly are the ones we tend to avoid thinking about. Well... I don't like to confront them anyway. But I have to remind myself that it's good for me and that I need to face those really ugly characteristics in order to work towards being a better person... especially a better partner.

I'm usually quick to apologize to people. But I have a harder time with this when it counts the most.

Lyrics mostly for my own reference (they don't have them posted anywhere online). And just in case other people are also looking for these lyrics, I'm leaving this entry public. If you're interested in listening to this song, you can check it out on JonTroast.com or this YouTube link someone posted from his living room tours.

---

"The Most"
Jon Troast

Well I love the first part
Of the last part of the day
When things begin to close
Because I know there's one place
That's open all night long
And I love you the most

I love sleeping in and pillows
Pajamas and bathrobes
And fans spinning on the ceiling
I love scrambled eggs and pancakes
Brown sugar on my toast
But I love you the most

Well I can't stand being so far away from you
So I guess there's one thing I need to do

I need to find a way for you and I
To always be close
'Cause I love you the most

I love the sunny days with lots of rain
And puddles for paper boats
And watching the March wind
Take my kite up to the blue
I love the open roads and city streets
And highways down the coast
But I love you the most

Well I can't stand being so far away from you
So I guess there's one thing that I need to do

I need to find a way for you and I
To always be close
'Cause I love you the most

I love the nightlife and dancing
And meeting up with old friends
And talking about the old, old days
I love staying home
The last (download?)
Making stories of our own

'Cause I love you
Yes, I love you
Will you love me the most?

Will introduced me to this site, TED.com, that features "talks by the world's leading thinkers and doers." I loved two of the videos I saw and wanted to share them with you.

The one he told me about is the first video featured below in which Jennifer 8. Lee--yes, that's the number 8 as her middle name--talks about the development of Chinese American food and the cultural significance of Chinese food on an international scale.



This second one was the result of a very short link-surf from the first video. I'm fairly new to the general concept of foie gras, so listening to Dan Barber's story about ethical foie gras was both educational and inspiring.