working...

Stuff I'm working on in the office. Rhino on Parallels, yesss. I was having fun splitting geometries and deleting and separating all the layers into different files. Renderings are looking good too. Sounds boring but it's a lot more fun when you're being paid, unfortunately. I've realized that my 3D modeling skills are sooo rudimentary, especially when I go on 3D animation forums for troubleshooting! It's a whole different world, and NOW I'm finally wanting to understand and figure out EVERYTHING about it. Go figure. At least I still have a year to not be a screwball architecture student. Here's to productivity! Now off I go...

waiting

Dear Sister,

BB perched herself onto the couch like this again after our walk this morning. It's as if she struck a pose and was merely waiting for the right person to behold her in all her glory. I bet she pretends she is a Greek god of some sort, draping herself over the edge and about to defy gravity. Anyway, Mom and I think she is too smart for her own good. Eerie and cool. That is all.

love,
H

fairy flowers

Flowers are nature's models. I pass by these pretty little things when I walk my poopies and I never have my camera on me to capture them. My sister even noticed these flowers over the weekend when she was walking them and picture-messaged them to me as I slept in. I went back to that house and even jumped up on their walled lawn (as an architecture major, I feel like I should know the proper name for this), creeper-style to sneak some snaps of the first flower shown. I like how in the freshly bloomed ones there's a purplish-blue streak along the center of the petal, and as it gets older it fades away. Flowers are so much like people in that sense! Crazy talk. In my family I'm a bit of the token "flower child" because, growing up I liked to learn all the names of flowers/plants and trees and I'd even get in trouble for picking something out of someone else's yard. My mom and sister like flowers, but when it comes to me I'm "obsessed" with them.

what did we find?

Dan and I weren't looking for anything in particular, really. Dan got a sweet haul of vintage pins for himself and friends and I just looked at cute things like the trio of brass quails, until I found the perfect warm, woolen mustard-colored scarf for $6 and the black leather motorcycle jacket of my dreams. After that wiped out my pockets, we followed our noses (actually just wandered around) to the tamales table and had a most delicious and rewarding snack. Going to the PCC Flea is the best way to start the month. I know I say things like that a lot, but I always mean it, especially in this case!

andrew's room

A quick glimpse of my friend Andrew's room. The item in the last photo isn't his, but rather something he handed off to his roommate at a time that he thought said roommate would need it. Helping indeed...

one hour to go

This was at 5:50 pm today. I can't wait til summertime (that is, if I am still working here - fingers crossed!) when it doesn't get dark til 9 pm or something like that, and it'll be daytime all day long. Work, work, work and THEN play.

WORK IS PLAY

SCREW YOU WALLPAPER MAG! if this were true for everybody, that'd be pretty cool. Actually, that would make the world a utopia, and you know how that turns out... I don't mean to give off pessimistic vibes. I just think the sentiment should be tweaked to something like "Work can BE like Play" haha oh god, my silly thoughts after a long day.

I'm worried about the future. Kids these days are horrible. They shoot their mouths off, are spoiled rotten, they're stupid, rude and ridiculous, but not in the cute endearing way. In a class of 12 kindergardeners only one charms me with his brightness, though he still irritates me at times. I know I shouldn't let little 5 year-olds get to me but it's the entire picture - the apathy or ineptitude of their parents to raise them right, will inevitably turn these horrible 5 year-olds into horrible selfish teenagers into horrible adults running the world. But I always forget that I live in a bubble full of spoiled rich people, and I always speak in generalizations - these kids will probably (hopefully) get better as they mature. So ignore, ignore, ignore me.

westie butts

About to go walk the monsters! Maxie pooped in the kitchen last night because he didn't want to go out in the (light) rain and out of shame he claimed a spot on my bed this morning. Then BB got possessive and jealous and began whining and barking next to my bed, wanting a spot up here too. They're lucky I love them so much, because I wasn't too happy about this morning's rude awakening...hmph!

$20 to-do's

This person is either an athlete or a dude-bro, or both. I liked it so much that I haven't spent it yet. Just kidding, I just didn't have the need to spent this sucker. I am in need of new socks though - I threw out 4 pairs in the last month that had gone threadbare at the heel :(. Note to self: get new socks this month.

I like colors

My favorite thing to do at Sephora is to paint every nail on my left hand with a different color as I wait for my sister to make her purchases. I realized I don't like painting my nails a uniform shade unless it is black. So now I have an excuse to get some new nail polish colors, since all I have at the moment is matte black and a pretty pale metallic gold shade. And I will wear them all on my fingers like a mismatched rainbow, because uniformly painted nails (on me!) bore me (unless in the black/grey family).

Today I was literally incapacitated by monthly female issues and had to leave work early. I was very embarrassed about this, but after talking to my sister about it she made me laugh by saying "At least they (my boss/co-workers) aren't women. Men literally are powerless when it comes to dealing with women problems :)." It was just embarrassing because it seemed like I had gotten my period for the first time, because today it was particularly bad. I am going to instill a regular exercise regimen into my schedule now, to prevent this from happening next time I get my monthly visitor. Sorry this is a little bit too much information. Being a girl really sucks sometimes.

happy march!

Even after my complaints on Avatar, I go to Blick with my mom today and am drawn to the colors that made up most of the color palette of the movie. It must have been the overwhelming effect of being immersed in 3D for 2.5 hours, yes. I won't lie though, if I had a chance to live in a forest like the one on Pandora, I'd go native without skipping a heartbeat. Bioluminescent flora and fauna, jellyfish-like "seeds" that land on you if you're lucky, GIANT land-based versions of Christmas tree worms that collapse when you touch them, and being connected to every living thing and trees of life! Either there, somewhere out in outer space or the deep sea for me.

I ought to be sleeping right now but I've gotten a surge of unnatural energy that's keeping me from catching some good Zzz's and rising fresh and early for work tomorrow. This is not going to be good, but Mondays are usually that way. Stumble off to a difficult start, regain footing towards the middle, and at the end of the week fall apart and start the cycle over.

pineapple fried rice

My stepdad told my mom this recipe, so this afternoon my mom, my sister and I all worked together to make it! I chopped ginger, garlic and green onions as my sister cut up pineapples and as my mom fried a few pieces of bacon. Fried the garlic and ginger in some of the bacon grease (this sounds gross I know, sorry), threw in the pineapples and rice, and topped it off with the green onions! I'm sure my mom seasoned it additionally but I can't recall...but it WAS delicious. And cooking with others is way more fun than cooking by yourself!

afternoon at the norton simon

Dan and I talked about Impressionist art last night, and how one can more fully appreciate works of art in that style when one sees it up close, in real life, because then you can see all the brush strokes, the use of color for shadows and light - essentially all the movements the artist made, the soul he/she poured into that painting, sketch or rendering. So this afternoon, in between showers of rain, we went to the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena to immerse ourselves in art! Any work by Van Gogh steals my breath away, but today I was most drawn to "Chestnut Gatherers" by Georges Lacombe. The colors! The flat style! (Sorry the photos don't really do it justice.) Upon setting eyes on this I wanted to wrap myself in this painting and completely immerse myself in it, to never come out. I was just in the right mood, of course. A fiery-headed woman in a yellow raincoat caught my eye, and her close proximity to some paintings completely enhanced the viewing experience for me. Dan and I went downstairs to the Asian exhibit and, passing it all by, found another exhibit dedicated to portraits, where they featured a wall of sketches/painting/studies by Picasso. Definitely a hidden gem. When I was younger, I sometimes took museums for granted, since my mom took me to so many so often. But revisiting these exhibitions with an older, more appreciative eye luckily helps invoke that awe and wonder I feared I would have felt only as a kid.

adventures in j-town

There's a funny little store in the Little Tokyo Plaza that I never remember the name of, full of curios - tools, kitchenware, bath time fun, useful things and fun things like toys, dvds, and figurines, and I can't resist going inside whenever I pass by. There are always new things coming in, along with the staples of bath scrubbies, pencil cases, and tea sets. Today it looked like there was a huge influx of Totoro and Domo-kun characters, all cute and fuzzy, nicely detailed and not too overpriced. I mean, Totoro and Domo-kun are always there, but this time around, in VAST quantities. After looking for gloves and a certain set of tools Y and I saw these adorable bath sponges! Here I only show a water droplet and an iridescent happy blob, but there was a banana, a panda, a fish, you name it! These would make me never want to get out of the tub, they are so cute. I felt like a kid again, which was very nice.

sushi with my sister

I was in low spirits at the end of today, probably due to hunger and definitely because I was cooped up in a tiny office with probably thousands of volumes of materials that needed to be categorized... it was draining! I picked up my sister to come home today but before we headed back we went to get sushi for dinner! I got a spider roll & spicy tuna roll, and a bowl of miso soup. Yum! With green tea to wash it all down and perk up my senses I was back to normal at the end of the meal, and ready to stroll around J-town with my sister!

happy birthday J.R.

February 26, 1932 - September 12, 2003

today's find of the day

Clint, you are so handsome, even now as an (almost) octogenarian! I wish I could have kept this little gem, but I think the person who had it at the office is going to sell it or keep it. I hope he keeps it (or lets me have it, hahaha).

yuzu tea

It's good to end dreary days like this with a cup of yuja-cha (which is what Koreans call yuzu tea), which is basically bits of the chopped up yuzu (a roundish yellow citrus fruit that originates somewhere in Asia...) mixed with honey and/or sugar, then plopped into hot water. It is delicious. The yuzu is sweeter than a lemon, though subtler, and highly fragrant. My mom and I are hooked on this stuff to the point that I get a new jar every week. Which sounds bad, but I like to think of it as fulfilling a weekly simple pleasure. I need to get a jar of it tomorrow, since this week's is pretty much cleared out. Anyway, to bed...

silly poopies

This is a section of money plant/jade plant/Crassula ovata (I looked it up) that my dogs brought in from the yard last night. We have several bushes of these plants and my mom thinks the poopies like to grab bits of the stems because they break off easily and might be easy to chew, or something like that. They just like to cause mischief! Anyway, this is sort of a recent occurrence and it's funny and baffling, but I hope they're having fun.

fruit monsters

Wanting a little break today from AutoCAD I opened up a package of freeze-dried fruit my boyfriend gave to me in a sweet care package of 'goodies for work.' In a bag of dried bananas and strawberries, I looked inside and saw faces! I made some monster friends, then ATE them. CHOMP! My boss looked over and laughed at me; I'm lucky that he knows me well, otherwise he would have thought I was being a slacker of all sorts of crazy. oh wait...