crystal.dot.me

I couldn’t really figure out how I felt about Obama winning the Nobel Peace prize. I went trolling to read a few articles at the usual suspects this morning, NY Times, Huffington Post, etc., till I came upon this article from the Washington Post with an excerpt that perfectly described how I felt about the situation:

“The Nobel Peace Prize award to Barack Obama seems so goofy – even if you’re a fan, you have to admit that he hasn’t really done much yet as a peacemaker. But there’s an aspect of this prize that is real and important – and that validates Obama’s strategy from the day he took office… America was too unpopular under Bush. The Nobel committee is expressing a collective sigh of relief that America has rejoined the global consensus. They’re right. It’s a good thing. It’s just a little weird that they gave him a prize for it.”

Ah exactly how I feel. Good job and making the world love you. Did you really deserve it? Maybe not, but does the world not hate as much now? Yes. Phew.

I know I haven’t posted in ages but I thought I should somehow document random useful stuff that I couldn’t find myself on the internet.

Recently I got Dish Network which meant that I acquired DVRs and satellite boxes. You have to plug them into either your phoneline or ethernet port so that the boxes can call home to Dish to make sure everything is legitimate (this seems to be the same with DirectTV also) or else you pay $5.99 a month. Sure the TV by the router in the living room was no problem, right into the ethernet. The TV in our bedroom was another story. Our phone jack hasn’t worked since the house was remodeled and we were way too far from a router. We could run cords but it wasn’t exactly ideal. I thought about bridging a router to communicate back with the router in the living room but couldn’t find an extra one laying around.

Then fate brought a solution. I got a Linksys gaming adapter for about $30 from Woot (refurbished) made for wirelessly connecting your Xbox. You just set up your router settings with your computer (passwords and such), after that’s done you plug in your Xbox and voila it’s connected. Apparently it works with anything that has an ethernet connection, computers, PS2s, etc that you want to wirelessly connect . In my case it worked perfectly for the HD satellite box. It’ll pay itself off in 5 months.

So there aren’t any ginormous new beginnings for me really, but I’m starting off the year technically unemployed, actually self-employed. I’ve decided to go full time in business for myself and devote a large chunk of my time into my own business.

Which brings me to my second new beginning, I won’t be writing here very much, not that I have at all. I’m thinking of splitting my time between two blogs. The first one being business related. We’ve dubbed the collaboration Plus 1  (or is it Plus One?). Regardless it’s going to specialize web design and politics, so I’ll be posting on our progress, trips and tricks of the trade, how-to-network and how some twenty somethings manage their lives using the power of the internet.

Why Plus 1? Well on campaigns your goal, obviously, is to win the majority of the vote which is usually “fifty plus one” perecent of the vote. I know it’s technically incorrect since you can win with just 50.3 but I digress. I’m hoping that my skills plus his design skills coupled with some business savvy and networking can really make inroads in progressive politics. Furthermore Plus 1 is bland enough that other businesses won’t be scared of using us for their own websites. So far it’s been pretty successful and I’ve worked pretty hard on this project in the last week everyday with full attention. So I’m hoping to keep it up even if means I have to hide out at Starbucks awhile.

The more personal blog, I haven’t decided to do yet, but Hung and I wanted to start something about ourselves, more relationship focused and maybe dabble some of our interests. I guess we’ve got this notion that we give out pretty good advice and we just want to stroke our egos a bit. This was formulated on the ride to my family’s house for Christmas so obviously it’s not ironed out. Anyway keep your eye out and until then I made a tiny portfolio website for myself: http://crystaltran.net.

And lastly, wooo January 20th, 2009! Inaguration Day!!

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted. Since then we’ve elected a new President, freed chickens from their crates in California, and then re-banned gay marriage, all of which I had some small part in. During the six weeks my office was open and manned we made approximate 20,000 dials to voters for Barack Obama, Yes on Proposition 2, and No on Proposition 8 and Proposition 4. Eight’s result was the biggest heart breaker. I made a short reappearance into politics for this job and I enjoyed every stressful sleepless minute of it.

I already miss my office and the completely fantastic and WONDERFUL people I met in it. I’ve experienced a lifetime of graciousness, generosity, dedication, diligence, and stress in about six weeks from so many involved in the campaign. I already miss it even though I don’t miss not sleeping. The beautiful things about working in politics is that the effects of you work are often tangible. You know how many people you’re talking to, what you’re saying, how they’re feeling, it’s a very hands on occupation. Furthermore its rewards are intrinsic and the gratification you feel everyday is unmatched by most jobs.

Before this post gets to lengthy, I’m back to being a civilian now, taking a break. I just went on vacation to Miami to visit family, thinking about the next step in my young career, and making jambalaya tomorrow for dinner. Life is good, I am still riding high from the victories we did succeed in.

As for my feelings on Proposition 8, there’s a lot for me to say about it and why I think it lost, but I will leave it with a few sentences. First, I think the ban on gay marriage is something that is temporary, whether it be the courts, or public opinoin. I feel that at the very least, in a few decades we’ll look back on this and say “Why did we ban this in the first place? Why are the private lives of others so important to us?”. To me personally, marriage is a means to create families, and families are the backbones of our society, providing the support and love needed for so many individuals. Anything that encourages families is only going to help society. Alienating groups from society just gives them ambivalence to the majority around them, and it’s just not constructive. Furthermore marriage is not going to change someone’s sexuality, just because they can’t get married doesn’t meant that my neighbors aren’t gay. Really, it doesn’t change that at all.

There are a lot of reasons on a political and strategic level as to why I think Prop 8 passed, but one of the biggest things is that I think a lot of people took California’s progressive image for granted. Because of that they stayed home, didn’t talk their neighbors, their friends and family, and tell them why. The grassroots movement needed bodies, they needed people on the phones, and knocking on doors, and the sense of urgency wasn’t there. I hope the next time around that this doesn’t happen, and that others don’t take their positions for granted. Things do not win or get defeated by themselves without a strong base of activist and supporters.

I figured most of you know that I moved to the San Gabriel Valley last summer, but another move is on the way. About two weeks ago my Mom sold my house, a house I lived in since 1993. I’ve been coming back and forth before the CDP office opens up in Monterey Park that I will be bossing over in time for the November election.

It’s crazy all the old stuff we have around in the house, I found letters and yearbooks from elementary school. Old paintings, invitations to birthdays, Mami Otaki’s address when she moved from Laguna Niguel back to Japan and she gave me a Domokun card with a her new address in it. I didn’t even know what Domokun was. I of course have lots of toys and relics from Mew Mew and Murphy and of course Dave leaving me a little sentimental.

So with that news I leave you a poem I wrote for my Mom on one of my “Meet the Masters” bamboo painting projects from 2nd grade.

My Mom

Mother
So forgetful
So gentle, so caring
Who is trying to lose pounds
My mom

How’s that for tact? For those of you that are wondering, my Mom is moving to West Covina temporarily while she shops around for a new house. She has plenty of time as she is taking the rest of the year off.

I was shopping my Wii Ware channel today because I like to look at all the games I could buy now that my parents didn’t let me buy when I was 10 (and that I could download on an emulator). One of these games was a new Homestar Runner game which I expressed mild interest in as it rekindled memories. Hung on the other hand, HAD NO IDEA WHAT HOME STAR RUNNER WAS.

How could anyone who went to college between the years of 2001-2003 not know the procrastination machine that Homestar Runner was during finals, papers and midterms. I didn’t even know what to say, how could such a pivotal piece of internet pop culture escape him when he is only three years older than me? Maybe he was too busy being cool and picking up chicks instead of watching the trance sketch with Strong Bad.  It’s okay now though, we’ve gone through and revisisted Trogdor and played Samauri Showdown which is not a euphemism for fornication.

I’m not sure what it is, but I love grass jelly. It’s strangely bland and herbal tasting, but add a little bit of simple syrup and it’s so delicious and cheap! One can runs about 89 cents and they offer green, black, and yellow kinds now. I prefer the green but black is a close second.  I have yet to try yellow which is ai yu jelly from Taiwan and made from “the seeds of a fig plant” according to Wikipedia. Maybe it’s the FOB in me but between that and durian ice cream, I will eat them both up.

I’ve always wondered what the green jelly was made of and I’ve seen mini-plastic packs of it in Little Saigon that resemble the canned green jelly I find. I shall pick it up next time in town and let you know if it indeed a fresh version. The black kind is made of some Chinese herbal plant though to have cooling properties but what’s the green jelly made of? Regardless I consume it. Do not consume it if you’re a lady afraid of getting pregnant, the black grass jelly as a high estrogen content (as does soy).

How to make grass jelly:

Chill your can of grass jelly, I prefer green but black is good too. Cut the can of jelly (better if you can find it fresh somewhere in your local Asian specialty store) into 1 cm cubes.

Combine 1 cup of sugar with 3 cups of water to make a syrup. You can make it a 1:1 ratio of sugar and water and then add ice cubes if you’re too impatient to chill the mixture afterwards. Enjoy or pour over some shaved ice. Yum.

Hung and I discussed what has become of us, the liveliness that consumed us when we first me has given way to boring-ness. I read about events that go on in Los Angeles on a weekly basis and decide not to go to them, the parking, the traffic, the hipsters. Meh, I stay at home like a grouchy old woman. Too cheap and lazy to go elsewhere I find things to do outside of TF2.

What we did last Friday night:

• Started a composting pit in the yard. Yes I dug holes for food waste, so I can eventually take up gardening this plot of land.
• Contemplating vermi-composting to be quasi-hippy (already shopping for a commuter bike).
• Cleaning our room. Re-organizing closet space
• Buying feather shuttlecocks to play at the badminton club.
• Going to the 99 Cent store
• Going to Ralphs.

It’s funny how co-habitation has made a boring weekend tolerable, during college I’d be screaming to get outside, to do something, to go somewhere. I’m sure $5 gas is also convincing, but there’s a type of stability that this relationship brings, that it must help me quash that void somewhere. Somehow being together makes it okay to stay-in. That and the thought of Hung finishing his studies so we can do the things on our list:

I want to get married, I want to provide you the guest, with an open bar. I want to have children, I want to own a home, and I want to add a center speaker to my Polk home theater system. I want to go to Europe, to see a World Cup, go to a winter Olympics, and go to Hong Kong to eat dim sum. I want to get some new lenses, go on road trips, take my nieces out, and the list continues…

That said, this weekend I won’t be home, but I’ve been really dying to take a crack and cleaning the shower doors in our bathroom. Alas, next time.

Gookies?, originally uploaded by fishsaucey.

I really should have bought some. I wonder if they’re a Korean favorite…no?

In cased anybody missed Aanjae’s First Birthday part all the way out in Lancaster, here are the pictures from the event. I semi-lied about my blogging but I’m making an effort here. Next post: my life as a badminton superstar, ok well not superstar, but Hung and I just started playing. Mon-Thurs 8 AM – 10 AM, yep. Have a sexy new racquet now too!