It's Beginning to Look Like Christmas!

Just returned from: Las Vegas, NV

It's Christmas Eve, and Mr. Weatherman is telling me rain and snow (in the mountains... please, I'm from LA) are coming!!!

عيد ميلاد سعي (Arabic)
Merry Christmas, mate! (Australian)
Boas Festas! (Brazilian Portuguese)
圣诞快乐! (Chinese)
Joyeux Noël! (French)
Fröhliche Weihnachten! (German)
メリークリスマス! (Japanese)
즐거운 성탄! (Korean)
С Рождеством! (Russian)
Feliz Navidad! (Spanish)
Maligayang Pasko!!!! (Tagalog)
Noeliniz kutlu olsun (Turkish)

I Left My Heart Somewhere in the Tasman Sea

Just returned from: Melbourne, Australia

Pros:

• The air is clear.
• The water is blue.
• My greenbacks made me rich!!! ($1 USD=$0.65 AUD)
• Vegemite isn't that bad. (Small quantities only.)
  
• I love TimTams and Shapes. (And at $1.79 each, it's even better!)
• For the most part, the people are halfway decent. (One exception: People who publicly embarrass others in front of large groups. I'm not naming anyone specifically, but you know who you are...)
• Aussie BBQs are fun. Food fights after Aussie BBQs are fun too.
  

Cons:

• I ate a kangaroo and was later called a cannibal. (read me)
• I ate one too many dim sums and Four'N Twenty Meat Pies for my own good.
• People talk funny there. (My American accent isn't THAT weird.)
  
• People drive on the opposite side of the road.
• Water flushes counterclockwise. (There is some truth to the Simpsons.)
• Spring is in November. (That's just wrong.)
  

Gotta Love American Politics

(Sorry... The video may only work from the States. Something about copyright laws.)

A Sigh and a Hug... (Here We Go Again)

"Why can't we get all the people together in the world that we really like and then just stay together? I guess that wouldn't work. Someone would leave. Someone always leaves. Then we would have to say good-bye. I hate good-byes. I know what I need. I need more hellos." --Charles M. Schulz

When Will It All End?

Every four years, a little thing called the Olympics happen. Right before it all begins, I couldn't even care less about it. Then, slowly, I get sucked into the excitement and spend the next 16 days glued to my TV watching sports and trying to find out the results before it's shown "live".

So, yes, I did cheer for Michael Phelps with thoughts about my abandoned swimming career and what could have been. I tried to guess the ages of the gymnasts as they fling, contort, and flip their bodies in the air. I sympathized with Yao Ming and his little minions when they were annihilated by the Americans. And, yes, I even took in a game of the ever-exciting sport of handball.

13 days down. 3 more to go. Then, I can sleep again. I can't wait.

Hmmm...

"Confusion is a word we have invented for an order which is not yet understood." --Henry Miller, an American author and writer

My New Home = My Car

"Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for - in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so you can afford to live in it." --Ellen Goodman, an American journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist

Life Is Like an Onion...

...You peel off one layer at a time and sometimes you weep.

I definitely feel what Carl Sandburg was feeling when he wrote those wise words. I spent most of the day moping around after saying goodbye yet again. The count is now up to 4 this year alone with more on the way. It's a vicious, vicious cycle I'm stuck in. Why can't teleporting machines really exist?!?!

(Farewell Mickey Mouse and Optimus Prime. It's been swell...)

Lemons for Sale

When life gives you lemons, you're suppose to make lemonade, right? So what should you do if the heavens open up and drops an entire lemon orchard right on top of your head?

I'm trying hard not to dwell on my problems and think of the positive. Things happen for a reason, right? I just want to know when the insanity is all going to end!!!

I guess I should just take my lemons and be grateful they aren't watermelons or durians (poop fruit). I'll make a pie with my lemons. I like pie. I also like lemon slushies.

In a World of Frustration

Now, I completely understand why the Brits head out to the pub after work every night. Working sucks! (Well, in my case, management sucks! I'll leave it at that.)

How the Hell Did It Already Become 2008?!

Another year, another set of resolutions. Here goes mine for the year:
1. Get me one of those things called a job (well... a real one... although, 3 years of slacking off has been fun)
2. Actually attend one wedding that I've been invited to
3. Do the mud run again (and do it under 1:45)
4. Occupy another country
5. Start writing again and accept the fact that there will be rejections attached
6. Reconnect with long lost members of the 張 clan
7. Apply for the Amazing Race (haha... I made a funny)
8. Stop looking like a college student
9. Think first, act second
10. Floss more