Just Peachy

"You’re not losing a husband.  You’re gaining a hundred pounds!" -Molly Kagan (Debra Messing)

All right, all right.  I’m a TV junkie.  Watching TV is what I do when I’m not thinking, breathing, living dentistry.  And last week, USA indulged my TV addiction by premiering "The Starter Wife."

I love it.  It’s a great show.  And Debra Messing as Molly Kagan is a funny and charming character.  Too bad the show is only five weeks long.

Two-minute replays of the first two episodes here:

http://video.usanetwork.com/player/?id=114589
http://video.usanetwork.com/player/?id=116983

Watch it, watch it, watch it.  I can’t wait for next Thursday.

Enough said.

Let me just say this:  technology is not always a great thing.   Before anyone protests and starts pointing out the numerous benefits of technology (and saying that without technology, this blog would not be possible ;p), yes, people, I agree one hundred percent.  But for now, let me whine.

I was working on an essay today, and the computer I was using just went nuts before I could save my work.  I had to restart the computer, because Word and Internet Explorer just…froze.  No big deal, right?  I mean, there is such a thing as AutoRecovery for such an occasion.  Unfortunately, in this computer, it wasn’t switched on.

So I re-typed the whole thing, hitting "Save" every few minutes so at least I can recover most of my work when the computer acts up again.  The computer behaved long enough to let me print and save my work on the desktop.  And then it decided to become a brat again.

Again, no big deal.  I got it all saved up in the hard drive.   All I needed to do was restart the computer…and remember that this computer had DriveShield installed on it.  This means that it reverts to default settings every time  it is restarted/turned off.  As a safeguard.

As my classmate Amir, would say, bloody hell.  Actually, Amir says it so much better: he drags out the first syllable and says, "Blllooody hell."  It looks like I will be re-typing my work for the third time. 

–

In addition, computer-adaptive tests suck.  Yes, I’m still getting over the stress of GRE.  People tell me GRE is a really big deal for most people, and they study for at least six months, and how long have I studied for it again?  In the past, I gave an honest answer to that question:
    Celle: Uh…five weeks.
    Person talking to me (who probably studied for one year for the GRE):  What?!? 
        Were you at least studying FULL-TIME in those five weeks?
    Celle:  Uh…only at night and on weekends, if we don’t have conferences.  And
        during presentations at Eastman.  Those are the only times I’m free.
    Person talking to me: (shakes his/her head sadly) Well, good luck.

    After many, many instances of that, I learned to just shut my mouth and smile to avoid answering their questions.

–

There was a time that I thought thumbdrives were the greatest thing in the planet.  I didn’t own one until I got to Rochester, and it didn’t take long for me to depend on my trust 2GB Memorex.  I loved the little thing, and wouldn’t leave home without it.  I put everything important into the thumbdrive, and occasionally, I would even back it up.  I actually invested on a 500 GB external hard drive for this purpose.  I back up  most of what I own.

Lately, I was so sleep deprived, having finished the last two final exams of the semester, and working on two presentations for EDC.  Presentation 1 went off without a hitch.  Presentation 2 due the next day.  All pertinent data and PDF articles saved on the thumbdrive?  Check.  Presentations saved on the thumbdrive?  Check.   Save copies of the new stuff in my hard drive?  Well, maybe later.  I’ll back everything up when I’m done with the presentations.  I finished at 3:30 am, so I decide to give in to much needed sleep over backing up my stuff.

Day of Presentation 2 comes, and the thumbdrive malfunctions.  Our IT guy said it could have shorted.  "But it was working FINE AT 3:30 AM TODAY!!!" I wailed.   "Regardless," he said.  And he delivered the sad news: there appeared to be no way we can retrieve the data.

Great.  Lovely.  Absolutely.  Bllloooody hell.

I watch him as he slowly pricks her finger.  He checks the reading, then painstakingly write the numbers down on the notebook that he keeps for such purposes.  He then sets a cup of coffee in front of her, then settles on a chair beside her to enjoy his own coffee.  I don’t notice if they engage in conversation, I’m not sitting close enough.  Besides, I don’t think conversation is needed at this point.  Their body language convey everything.

They are both old, eighty-ish or so.  The hair on their heads are both white, their bodies hunched, their movements deliberate.  She is not moving that much, she seem detached from her surroundings.  I watch his every slow arthritic movement.  They finish their coffee.  He helps her up, wraps her scarf around her neck, and zips up her coat to keep her warm.  He carefully helps her sit back on her wheelchair.  He puts on his own coat and scarf.  He lays a blanket on her lap, clears their table, and slowly gathers their things.  Finally, they walk away.  I stare after them, and continue staring long after they have disappeared from my line of sight.  And I sigh wistfully.

Tough questions, the ones that you have there.  Unfortunately, I don’t have all the answers.  I wish I do.

But this is what I’ve learned so far:

1.  Tough questions may sometimes have no answers.  The problem with tough questions is, their answers are the most important to us, and we have no idea where or how to find them.  Or if they even exist.

2. Tough decisions are tough because we want so badly to make the right ones and/or we’re so afraid to make the wrong ones.  We feel that these decisions are as irreversible as the purchases we made at SM years and years ago, in those pre-Megamall days when they printed "No return, no exchange" on their receipts, so we better get it right, or there will be hell to pay.  Figuratively.

I remember reading an interesting article saying that, when people are given the choice to reverse a decision (like returning a purchase to exchange it for something else), people tended to take making their choices lightly, knowing that they can always take it back if they realize they don’t want it.

3. Choices always get harder to make when feelings are involved, and nearly impossible when that darn four-letter L word gets into the picture.  Whom do you love more?  Whom do you love less?  To begin with, when you make decisions that conflicts with the interests of the other, does it mean you love that person any less?  Does it mean you love others any more? 

I learned that there is no one love that will encompass everyone and everything.  The way you love your husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend/partner is different from the way you love yourself or your family/friends/pets/Louis Vuitton bags, etc., but one doesn’t necessarily mean more or less than the other.  You can love them equally, but differently.  There are many different kinds of love, and all of them are the good kind. 

4.  When you make one of those either-or choices, you almost always have to give up something.  The most important thing is not to give up what makes you most YOU.  Go with the decision that makes you feel more like yourself.  I think that’s how we are able to live with the consequences of these irreversible decisions.

5.  The power of prayer works.  That’s how we get the wisdom to help us do the right thing, and the strength to endure the tough times.

Please don’t take them as advice, Uncle Pops.  These are just things I’ve learned in life.  Despite all that I’ve learned, I remain an optimist beyond redemption, who believes that everything will work out in the end.  And if they don’t?  To me, that’s what ice cream and malls are for. 

Good luck, Uncle Pops.  I wish everything works out for you. =)   

I’ve been swamped with work lately.  I have been functioning on two hours of sleep every day, trying to squeeze as much work as I can out of the hours in a day.  And still I find that my ever-growing pile of work never dwindles down.

So, now I’m on strike from working.  I absolutely, absolutely refuse to lift one finger to work on one million papers that I have to read and write this weekend.  I’ve decided to go down memory lane and read my old e-mails. 

(CELLE’S CONSCIENCE:  So, that’s how you call procrastinating now?  "Going down memory lane???"

CELLE:  Yes.  So shut up.)

I’ve always wondered about just how much Yahoo’s 1GB of memory is.  As I’ve found out, it means saving all the e-mails you’ve ever sent and received (and everything else you didn’t delete) since time immemorial.  That is a lot of e-mail.

I’ve had a great time looking through everything, and reading my old e-mails.  I laughed so hard at how I was years ago, and at the stories people told me.  It’s funny how reading something can suddenly jog your memory.  Suddenly, I remember everything that happened these past years…as my friends told me, and as I told my friends.  It made me realize how much I miss my friends and family and my old life.  Above all, I realized just how much I’ve given up by deciding to live in a different country for a while.  I will be missing some three years of my life with my friends and family.

I’m having a great time here, and I’ve made lots of new friends.  I’ve met a lot of interesting people.  But I’ve learned to believe that there are great friendships that you will make in your lifetime, and if you think you’ve made them already, then you can’t expect to make the same great ones anywhere else.  The dynamics is just very different.  True, sometimes life can surprise you and throw one or two great new friends your way, but chances are, the ones whom you’ve shared experiences and made memories with, are the best friends tht you’ll have in your lifetime.

Some overly frank (read: rude) person told me recently that I need to lose weight because "she can’t see my legs anymore.(?)"  Huh-whaaat???  My reaction exactly.  Except maybe I laughed a little.  But Johari window and all that, I decided to see if I can still fit into my pants/jeans/clothes that I used to wear when I was a "thin" person.  Surprise, surprise…I easily can, and with room to spare.  And the weighing scale reads 103 lbs.  Brava, my dear rude girl.  Now it’s my turn to give you friendly advice:  get your eyes checked, or shut your trap.  Just because you very consciously count the calories that you stuff in your face doesn’t mean we have to.  The only time I know I went on a diet was when I bought a gown for a formal event months ahead…and two weeks before wearing it, I found it being to tight at the chest.  Needless to say, that was a crash diet, and was the most torture-filled two weeks of my life.  And it was one I’m liable not to want to experience again.  So I just eat what I want, as much as I want, and so far, I don’t have the same issues that you do.  Didn’t I just hear you say you can’t fit into your pants?

I recently overheard this conversation between two Filipino people, one of whom probably thought I was a Vietnamese lady who did people’s nails for a living (that is another story…more on that later):

Guy:  Alam mo, di naman sa pag-aano, ha…pero bakit di ka magsuot ng mga fashionable na damit?

Girl:  Huh?

Guy:  Tingnan mo ‘yang jacket mo…di ba ‘yan din yung suot mo last year?

Girl:  Actually, may sasabihin ako sa’yo.  Kaka-tanggal ko lang ng tag nito last night…

I tuned them out then, because to be honest, I don’t think I can stop myself from butting in and teaching this guy some lesson in manners, or hitting him with my shoe.  The guy is wearing a white short-sleeved dress shirt, a sweater vest, and pants.  Not exactly fashion plate material.  Trying way too hard to look preppy, if you ask me.  But they didn’t ask me, and they weren’t talking to me, so I just kept quiet.

This is the part I don’t get.  I don’t understand why people don’t think first before opening their mouths.  Hello, "Cogito ergo sum!" I also don’t understand why people who should just stand there and take other people’s crap.

There’s a lot of things I don’t know:  pump gas into a car, drive an automatic transmission vehicle, understand why Americans complicate their lives with Daylight Saving Time, cook a decent meal, do the laundry, and all other things that are otherwise essential to a person’s survival.  I used to think that vital parts of my education are severely lacking because of these reasons, but I sure am glad, no make that delirious, that others have more deficient education than I have.  Because obviously, they weren’t taught manners…and if they think they were, then there’s a huge gaping hole in their Johari windows somewhere.  I just hope I won’t be hearing more of these…or I would be really glad to stick their rude *ss on those window holes.

I love animals.  I have a soft spot for them.  I am particularly fond of dogs.  I can’t resist them.  Having said all of that, let me come out clean by saying I don’t have the same feeling for cats.

I am living in a house with two lovable, lovable dogs, and two cats, one of which I traumatized the first time I moved to the house with all of my stuff, the other one hates me with a vengeance I didn’t know cats possessed.  The fact that the dogs are females and the cats are males is probably moot.

Cat number 1 sauntered in my room while I was in the process of moving.  I had so much stuff around me that my first night at this house was just spent trying to make space for everything, and keeping them in their places.  I guess Cat number 1 was expecting to see the old occupant and the old occupant’s furniture/stuff/scent all around, but instead he found me and towers of my things that threatened to collapse on him any minute.  Needless to say, he bolted out of my room so quickly, and has kept his distance since then.

Cat number 2 is an entirely different story.  Like Cat number 1, he was expecting to see the old occupant of the room, and having seen me, decided to just barge in anyway by pushing my door open everytime.  I don’t really know how he does it.  I can’t imagine him putting all of his 1.5-lb body weight on pushing on my door.  But I’d really rather think that than imagine the other possibility — that somehow, some way, he manages to reach the knob and twist on it enough to open the door.  Considering that the cat is only less than 2 feet long, that is a scary thought.

A couple of times that my door sqeaks and creaks at night or when I’m home alone, I jump out of my skin before I tell myself that it’s just the cat.  I think I’ve gotten much better at it that I don’t jump anymore, I just get…startled.  I actually pushed my laundry hamper and my desk chair against the door to protect myself from cat invasion.  But Cat number 2 still got past my barricades anyway, and managed to plant himself on my chest on the dead of the night.  I felt a heavy weight that woke me up from sleep, and found myself staring at two pairs of cat’s eyes.  Yes, he managed to convince Cat number 1 to join in on scaring me to death…although to give him credit, Cat number 1 kept a respectful distance by staying at the foot of my bed.

My latest encounter with Cat Number 2 took place while I was just changing my sheets.  I was home alone when he succeeded in pushing (God, I really hoped he just pushed on it) my door open, hiding under my desk, scratching me on two places on my legs while I was trying to coax him to come out of there, scooting over to the floor under my bed, scratching himself near the two SpaceBags that I keep there, giving me mental images of the vacuum seal of the bags being torn open by his claws and him getting caught in all that poofy-ness (I don’t really know how I can explain that to my house mate if he gets hurt), and throwing suspicious and insolent looks on my way.  After a few minutes of making myself nauseaous by chasing him all around my room, the cat figured he tortured me long enough for the day and walked out of my room after one last insolent look.

Then he decided to follow me around — in the bathroom, he sits at the window while I shower; in the kitchen, he walks around me; and in the basement, when he suddenly thinks about walking ahead of me while I was coming down the basement steps with my load of dirty laundry, tripping me.  I hobbled around my sore ankle for a few minutes, comforting myself with thoughts about how to get even with Cat number 2.  Cat-lovers, take note — I just ENTERTAINED the thoughts, I didn’t actually put them into action.

Right now, we’re at a stalemate.  Because I’m still such a wuss when it comes to animals, I’ve contented myself by theorizing that Cat number 2 just wants attention.  Obviously, I pay more attention and spend more time playing with the two lovable, lovable dogs (did I mention that they’re lovable?), terrorizing me was probably just his way of demanding his fair share.  So now, while obviously, dogs will have a special place in my heart, I guess I have to make room for cats, too.  Because after that incident in the basement stairs, I really don’t want to do anything to piss this cat off.  Besides, my scratches are still raw and hurting. 

To everyone who watches "Without a Trace:"  Do you know the Latina girl who just joined the FBI in the show last season?  What is it with her and her overly straight hair???  And why does she keep flipping it or smoothing it or calling attention to it??  Was it written in the script to do just that?

Latina girl:  (deliver lines, flip hair)

Another person/character in the show:  (deliver lines to Latina girl)

Latina girl:  (reply, smooth hair, make sure to call attention to the fact that    it’s s-t-r-a-i-g-h-t)   

To be very honest, I don’t really follow this show.  It’s just one of those things that I end up catching because it’s a convenient time for me to watch TV.  It’s such a waste that the show I get to watch in those rare times have annoying characters whose names I can’t even recall.

On the other hand, "Grey’s Anatomy" is a completely different story.  I can’t really understand why I started watching this show.  But I’m hooked.  It’s on reruns until the next season starts on September 21st, and I can’t wait.  I remember thinking when they were promoting the show last year that this was going to be another one of those medical dramas — ER, Scrubs…I mean how many more shows do we need about the lives and loves of the doctors in the hospitals???

I digress.  But yes, I’m taking back every sarcastic, "Oh, no!  Not another one!" thoughts I had about "Grey’s Anatomy."  It’s a great show, even if I can’t figure Sandra Oh (Christina Young) out.

Lastly, why do the powers that be behind most crime dramas feel that they should have a blonde girl on the cast?  "Shark," "Without a Trace," "Close to Home," "CSI," "CSI:Miami…"  I’ve nothing against that, really.  It’s just something I’ve been wondering about.

Never assume that because something looked/sounded good in theory, it will actually be so. 

I was actually very excited about living in a different country for two years, so I can take a shot at being independent.  The idea filled me with excitement.  Until I had to clean the bathroom of my apartment, that is.  I’ll spare you the rest of the details, but let me just say that that was the first thing I HAD to do, if I didn’t want to get bladder and kidney problems from trying to hold my pee in.

If there’s one good, well-meaning advice I can give anyone who’s planning to live on their own, it’s this:  never do it until you’ve learned how to clean the toilet/bathroom.  Until you’ve figured out which end of the toilet brush to use, stay at your nice, comfortable home where someone is always around to make sure your bathrooms are clean.

I’ve long since moved to a different apartment, and two months down the road, I think I’ve gotten the hang of cleaning the bathroom.  It remains my least favorite thing to do, and so on that note, let me amend the title of this post.  Reality doesn’t really bite, it chomps your head off.

Two days ago, I saw a pair of goldfishes swimming lazily around a small fishbowl, and I found myself wondering:  how do these fishes breathe?  What happens when they use up the oxygen in their little fishbowl?  Can they swim to the surface and gulp in air?  Can they even handle atmospheric oxygen?  I thought fishes take in oxygen through their gills, and that oxygen is dissolved in water.  If by any chance they can swim to the surface, can they actually INHALE?  And through where — do fishes have nostrils?

I got a really great grade in Zoology 101 (Comparative Zoology), but if my teacher could read this post now, they’ll probably take back my grade and demand that I re-take the course.  In my defense, it’s been awhile since I took it, and more importantly, so many things (good and bad) are going on in my life that I’ve lost temporary use of my brain cells.  At least, I hope it’s temporary.

That’s why I decided to watch the fishes that day — to be able to do something that required very little mental activity.  I just don’t want to think for a while.  I think too much, such as it is.  A lot of good not thinking did me — now, I end up with a load of questions that I couldn’t answer.

When I regain complete use of my brain, or when everything is right again in my life, I will realize that my questions were really stupid, and that I could have easily found the answers by looking them up.  Hello, Celle, "Google?"  But I won’t, because I’d rather drive myself crazy trying to think up answers to these questions than try to sort out the events that led me to fish-watching in the first place. 

At a recent conversation I had with a good friend, she told me how down she was feeling.  She hit the nail on the head when she said, "Celle, you know how life is like a wheel?  Well, my wheel is turned all the way down right now."  That is exactly how I was feeling.  Only in my case, so many things are going right, but so many things are going wrong as well.  And so I tell her, "We’re in the same boat.  Or to be more accurate, our wheels are probably part of the same car."  I just wish the car would start, and the wheels will start rolling so our lives would go back normal.