spent the last couple of days in boston. lots of stuff has happened. we won jazzfest in montreal, i ate poutine (and i LIKED it!)--well, i didn't hate it...but if i had it available 24/7, i doubt i'd order it in restaurants. i took some pics of the stuff, but mostly, it just looks disgusting. i didn't think so while eating it...but the pics make it look like snotty boogers...eww.

other things that happened in montreal: i had my first kinder-surprise experience. the toy was a fake computer thingy that had a ball inside. ppl complain about the chocolate, but i think its pretty darn good. the canadian teams called a lot of fake fouls. and they travel like winter geese. whatever, we beat them squarely.

boston for the fourth was terrific. i saw a lot of fireworks in japan, but there's something about the fourth that lets you tap into the spirituality of them. like i felt so ensconced in the tradition and the goodwill of the event. maybe, too, being recently in canadia-land amped up my usually lukewarm patriotism. it is NOT ok for canadians to diss america. if you really hate us so much, stop taking our business. i mean really, set up a trade embargo or something. grow some balls; stand up to bush. instead, they're like this nagging mosquito. they require our blood to live, but they buzz incessantly about how much better they are (i think the claim is that they're much friendlier--except when they boo'ed a bunch of kids off an ice rink cuz they were from the US, right? and when they allow endangered baby seals to be clubbed to death, right? and let's face it, pot makes anyone friendlier--well, except meryl who gets paranoid). they're SO much better, in fact, that they need to sanction they're own culture thru cultural indoctrination and state regulation (i think radio stations are required by law to play a certain amount of music by canadian artists). everywhere you look, there's anti-US propaganda. we even saw a newspaper article crowing about how canadian donut shops sent krispee kreme packing back to the states (shame on them for trying to disrupt the proud canadian tradition of holy fried dough). whatever. i'm just tired of canadians criticizing US policy without knowing anything about us. they have no idea who george washington was, but they'll throw the war of 1812 in my face over and over again (apparently, canada won that war, even though they had yet to be GRANTED their independence in the wake of our hard-won independence). oh, and don't get them wrong, they're above fighting wars now...they're a loving ambassador of the peace now. sour fucking grapes, i say. they couldn't win a war against the UN. they couldn't win a war against the japanese peace force. wow, so much vitriol. i don't dislike canadians, but when they go on their anti-US tirades, i get nationalistic and fiesty. sorry.

back to the fireworks. the boston pops set the mood really well. there's nothing like good classical music to make your chest swell (except maybe boob jobs or indigestion). and i felt like such a little kid. so much awe and hope and glad, rolled into a ball and swallowed alongside the fried dough. and the best part? it's all man made. humans did that--made this beautiful technology that makes us happy. amidst all the controversy and the weaponry, at least technology made fireworks. if an ET were to find the remnants of our civilization, i hope they see our fireworks as a testiment to our lighter side. seriously, what's more benign. prosthetics? dentistry? medicine? these exist to keep us churning, so we can continue to be productive citizens of the world. i think fireworks are one of the few things that exist solely for happiness's sake (well, also maybe wood carving and chocolate dipping). yeah, so for the first time outside of ultimate and China, i felt like i belonged to something bigger.

this post is getting long. BUT, i hafta talk about the twinkie-dog. inspired by UHF (thanks dylan), we bought twinkies and easy cheese and sandwiched a hot dog betwixt and between. surprisingly good juxtaposition of salty and sweet. dunno if i'd do it again tho...i'm kinda morally opposed to eating twinkies. it's like killing an elephant or a tortoise. if it weren't for you, they'd last forever...

in other news, we:

• played 3 rounds of lasertag at good times emporium (i knocked out elvio's knee and it swelled up...apparently you're not supposed to run in those places for a good reason).
• got a large pizza for 4 bucks at the same good times emporium (we went earlier, left, and went back again).
• made magic sticks out of pvc pipes (they're gorgeous, and construction costs = $4...the real deal ranges from $25 to $50--depending on length and whether or not you're a "computer athlete").
• push started elvio's car (we had to push it up a huge hill and then push it back down because it wouldn't work in the parking lot--not for lack of effort on our part, we were thwarted by the speed bumps).
• restuffed bob (won by william the wonder from good times...but he was filled with that cheapo styrofoam crap, so we bought two pillows from goodwill and gutted them).
  

disjointed

nothing big, nothing new. but i miss school. i dreamt the other night that i was sitting in athena next to shuangy playing tetris. and then i saw kdob and gave her some rum. speaking of alcohol, FIVE of my friends are getting married this summer. well, one of them is my cousin in china (the rest = two from mit, one childhood chink friend, one high school friend). of the five, i only heartily approve of the two mit'ers (lori and kan).

tif (the high school friend) is settling. maybe. her boy is a fat, slovenly, crass drunkard. he's smart according to his lsats and his future (upenn law next year), but he has this awful need to prove himself. playing trivial pursuit with him was miserable. and i'm afraid his white trash past will make him a wife beater. whenever he gets provoked (as in ppl are teasing him good humoredly about, say, the mavs losing), he resorts to violence. he won't actually go so far as to hit someone, but he'll throw things and throw a tantrum. grow up willy boy. at the wedding shower, when he got a hammer as a gift, he called it a wife suppressor. in front of all her friends and family. um...classy. i didn't go so far as to threaten him (tif has enough burly southern men with shotguns behind her--according to their wives the guns are not for killing...only for shooting animals), but damn did i want to tell him i'd kick his ass. whatever. it's not really my place to disapprove. if he treats her well, that's that.

i finally saw eurotrip. made me think of yelena. very funny movie. i didn't think i'd like it so much. also saw da vinci code...it seemed they dumbed it down and left out a lot of the sacre femini stuff. what was up with the light up clues? it made me feel like i was in third grade watching arthur. and they turned sophie into a dumbass. in the book, she solves at least as many puzzles as the guy, but in the movie, more often than not, she's throwing her hands in the air, insisting she's not a guardian. ironic, in a movie centered around the female role in christianity.

did mcdonalds come out with a chicken biscuit in other parts of the country too? or is it only for the south. if it's only in the south, it's a pointless thing to do...they'll never beat chik-fil-a. NEVER! but if its for all 48 states, i'm so excited! saweet!

out of shape :-(

it's 1 mile from my house to the front of my subdivision. it takes me a good 19 min to run there and back. hmm...slow much? today it took me a full ten min on the outward bound, but i managed to salvage my 19 min constant by sprinting the last hill. luckily, guster came on my ipod (you know, the one with the bongos), and i chased keister all the way back home.

i tend to fail on the cardio, not on the legs. twice now, in the four times i've run it, i've had to sit down or lie down at the end cuz i feel like i'm having a heart attack. maybe its the humidity? but i never feel it till i stop. and except for the first day, when my quads hurt a little, my legs feel fine. like the muscles don't hurt much at all (the biggest pain happens to be the stabilization muscles in my feet, which is just me reaquainting myself with the piedmont). meh, boring post, sorry. i'm off to lunch with ravi and then tomorrow, he's gonna burn me on a five mile run (he's been running half marathons at 8 min pace)...that should pick me up.

the dentist

the lady who cleaned my teeth this morning scared the shit out of me. now don't get me wrong, this isn't the first time i've had to fudge my flossing history a little. i'm an old salt when it comes to de-guilting the guilt trips. the simple truth is this: i don't floss. not a little, not at all. it's just not who i am. but she just kept prodding: do you floss? no, not really. a little bit? no, not really? once a month? nope...not really...! and then she proceeded to lecture me for a good half hour about how my teeth were gonna fall out and how my mouth was gonna be the venice of mouths (root canals galore). i mean, really!

i think i believed her as opposed to all my previous "you need to floss" lecturers because she sprinkled her scare tactics with scientific facts. like how you need to be extra careful on the outsides corners of your upper teeth (near tooth number 1 and 16) because that's where your saliva glands are, and saliva makes plaque harden more quickly. i learned lots about bone structure and gum structure and why certain wisdom teeth need to be pulled while you're still young whereas others can wait. interesting, to be sure, but i think i would've preferred not to know.

will i change my teeth tactics? hmmm...who knows. they're always surprised by how good my teeth are despite the non-flossing. meaning there's no real danger, right? one thing's certain, if i do start flossing, it's because of my ongoing quest to become julia roberts (i can't wait to be caught flossing and accused of drug abuse. CAN'T WAIT!), not because of some cunning hygienist's propaganda. modern dentistry? pshaaww. they always make me feel like a horse anyways.

baby, one more time

dear blogger,

my apologies for the year of neglect. i made you promises, strung you along, but i spread my lovin' all over and when i got back, there's none left for you. but now, it's summertime, and the livin's easy (bradley's on the microphone with RAS-MG). i've kicked xanga to the wayside (boy its hard to break out of a cadence once you've established it). no more divided attentions. i'm all yours.

Lily

i figure it`s time i grew up a little, and started using services that are well designed. this is an attempt at a major overhaul of my life towards everything google, triggered by the release of google talk. because so much of my history is on xanga, however, i:m gonna try to transfer my xanga entries here. i don:t know if this is futile, or whether some good chinese parable will be passed down about me (like the guy who moved a mountain cuz he was tired of walking around it...nowadays, that:s called po4 huai4 huan2 jing4<--destroying the environment, but back then, it was exalted behavior).