on mothers and their motherly concern

I love my mom but I have a complicated relationship with her (as we all do with our own moms, I feel like). Without plumbing too deeply into our history (which half of you know anyway), allow me to complain that she is driving me up a wall in a very shallow, very Standard Mom way tonight.

I'm more or less done packing for Singapore (aside from things like my computer, which you may have guessed) and am readying myself to be up at 4:30 tomorrow to head to the airport to spend the next 24 hours of my life on a motherfucking plane (hopefully without the motherfucking snakes) or in airport terminals. My mom, in momly fashion, is paranoid about everything. She is positive that I will somehow die before I reach Singapore, or maybe once I get there, because my feet will be cold on the plane, or I will be unable to sleep on the plane, or I will be unable to pay for a trolley to haul my luggage through customs.

"When you go through customs, can you wheel along both your bags?" (This because she thinks I have the strength of a wounded gazelle - or less, probably, since often wounded gazelles can still manage to run a bit. She thinks I have the strength of gently deflating balloon. Fwwoosh, said Mei.) "Maybe you should get a trolley. Oh, airports have trolleys! Make sure to get a trolley," she tells me. Then she remembers how airports try to leech every cent they can out of you. "Oh, wait, what if you need Singapore money to get a trolley? You're only carrying USD. If you have to, convert some money at the airport and then pay for the trolley."

Oh, Mother, I never thought of that!

"Do you know if you have to pay for a trolley in Singapore? Should you convert some money before you go?"

One, how on earth would I know, and two, it's too late.

Seriously, thank you for your concern but your stress is stressing me out. I don't mean to sound unappreciative of her concern because, yeah, it would suck if my mom was like, "Daughter? Going halfway around the world for four months? Doesn't ring a bell. Have fun walking to the airport tomorrow morning!" But honestly, mothers.

You know how they are.

I promise I will not die of dehydration on the plane. I promise I will not take out my money and put it in plain sight on my body and beg for someone to steal it from me. I promise I will not mortally offend J's mom's ancestors back fifteen generations. I promise I will call (via Skype, anyway). I promise I will write (via email). I promise to not die or get beaten by canes.

Love,
your not-completely-incompetent daughter Mei

welcome to your year

Happy New Year!

I don't really celebrate on new year's eve because I'm always in NC and it's always...quiet. A bit isolating. I love my family, but we're not exactly the type to party and drink in celebration. I would do it with friends, but really I have no close friends here except A, and she has her own circle of close friends here because they live here year-round. I just visit. So I usually have a quiet new year's eve, but it's all right. New years tend to depress me a little bit because they remind me of the wasted opportunities in the past year and all that bright shining hope in the new year - that usually ends in disappointment by the end. Because I am still not as proactive and carpe diem as I should be.

But let's not get into that! I had a good day yesterday - I went to visit A in the afternoon in Apex and we hung out. She had a late lunch at Panera while I clasped a vanilla latte to my chest in the raptures of the addicted, and then we whiled the hours away at Borders.

Every time I visit Borders, I wander past the YA shelves and am aghast. Rows and rows of black-bound books with fancy colored font, all about vampires and werewolves and supernatural romances. Those that aren't are about rich boarding schools and fancy parties with lots of drama. And what remains is all historical fiction (i.e., RPF AU or spin-offs of Jane Austen and her works). Apparently, boys have nothing to read. Slim pickings include zombies and GI Joe novelizations. I am left more determined than ever to write a new best-selling YA series involving a prestigious boarding school full of rich girls in pretty dresses having drama about their supernatural boyfriends: vampires, werewolves, leprechauns, centaurs, god knows what else. Yes, it will be highly successful, can't you tell.

Anyway, after leaving Borders, I returned with A to her house and helped make dumplings. Handmade, homemade, etc. The best way to do dumplings, because the frozen stuff does not compare - and I'd know. I ate so many frozen dumplings surviving the last few weeks of school/exams.

Insert thoughts here reflecting on the differences between her family and mine, but they are not bad differences - they are merely differences.

But that is for another time. For now, a new year. Let's be optimistic! My resolutions for 2011 are:

-Have fun in Singapore.
-Be proactive about what I want to do post-graduation.
-Write something original of significant length.
-Be grateful.
-Be happy.

gift of sunshine this Christmas

So now I'm home for the holidays, after bidding St. Louis adieu until commencement in May. I managed to return safely to NC after a harrowing 14+ hour drive, moving all my shit back with m in preparation of Singapore for the spring semester. :D Party on, dudes. Last semester is going to be so much more about food and drinking and traveling and seeing people than it is about law. But I've totally earned this, right?

Strangely, perhaps, the nostalgia hasn't hit me. It might yet, or it might wait until I'm actually back in the Lou in May before plaguing me with fond memories. I will miss seeing the people there while I'm in Singapore, of course, but for the most part I am just excited about being in a new part of the world.

Though I'm not even thinking that far ahead right now. Right now, I am focused on the holiday cruise I'm going on tomorrow with family! We're leaving out of Charleston and headed down to the Bahamas for five days. A sunny and warm Christmas, I hope, to go with the sunny and warm winter I'll be spending in Singapore. I am all up for this. Cold weather, I've had enough of you, thanks. I will not miss the cute coats and scarves all that much.

After I get back, I'll meet up with M and A at least, then be just productive enough to wrap up some last-minute things and pack for Singapore.

For now, I am looking forward to sunshine and fruity alcoholic drinks. Happy holidays!

it's like trying to ford the damn river

I've finished packing all my clothes and books (save the textbooks I plan on selling back) and have come to the conclusion that owning clothes and books is a pain in the ass. Or at at least the transportation of them is. Why has no one invented teleportation yet? Why is that not recognized as a real word? (I have many questions.) I also keep looking around and noticing things that will need to be packed that I can't currently do anything about, e.g., my lamp, my sheets/blankets/pillows, and bathroom things. Sorry, I actually sort of need those at the moment. I am legitimately concerned about whether I can shove everything into my car at this rate. If worse comes to worst though, I should be able to store some things at J's place until we can come pick it up in May. Argh, stress!

Honestly, I am much more stressed now than I was while doing exams, which is weird because 'm not actually on a deadline since I can choose when I'm leaving... Still...

I am half-afraid one of my tires is going to blow out on me while driving back, but it might be paranoia speaking. I'm taking the southerly route so there shouldn't be much if any snow (also I should be on giant interstates anyway), but (insert irrational panic) should I get my car's oil changed and get a check-up before I go?! I'm also tempted to leave at, like, 3am and just miss out on the traffic since I'm going to have to drive in the dark regardless. This way I'll end up at home earlier too.

Oh moving in the winter, I hate you. Let's never do this again.

Now I will inhale some coffee because, yeah, caffeine withdrawl headaches are a sad part of the life of an addict, i.e., me. Also I will eat some food and watch some Top Chef because it is that or have a needless stress meltdown. Option B is the wrong answer here.

catching up on catching you up

News from the exam front:

I received my score from my MPRE this week and passed comofortably: I am sufficiently ethical to practice law! Granted, that is not a very high standard. Which is probably more or less indicative of the reality of things, as I am not very ethical anyway. Ethics only get in the way! Sort of like laws. If we didn't have laws, as J said today while we were studying, we would have no crime! Easy solution. In any case, my scores were sent to NY because if I take a bar exam, it will be for NY, which is most internationally applicable (and is accepted for working in DC as well - handily done, DC; I approve).

So here is an adventure in exam-taking: yesterday's exam, Evidence, I took in the morning. It was a three hour thing with short answer and a multiple choice section - not the funnest of ways to spend three hours on a Tuesday morning, but since when is law school fun? I finished the test, pressed save+exit on my exam software, and then every student's exam nightmare became reality: ExamSoft, the exam program, blandly informs me there was an error in the saving+exiting process and that my computer would now reboot. Upon reboot, I was advised by the program to seek proctor. We have no aid to give you in your time of despair, is what the program essentially said to me, heartlessly.

The error? Your exam file can't be found!

My face? Something like D: Actually.

So I got to spend the next hour chasing down proctors, computer technicians, and the registrar, only to end up calling ExamSoft and having them remotely access my computer and alter the back-up file of my exam from the back-up format into the accepted format, then upload and submit that.

Good times were had by all.

By which I mean that once I got to lunch (an hour late), I decided this exam adventure warranted delicious sushi and some alcohol. I was successful in achieving both, at least. But it's over and it's fine: I didn't end up frantically typing made-up rules of Evidence and filling in bubbles at random for nothing.

In food news? I had some brie with fig jam on crackers a week or so ago: so fucking delicious I couldn't get it out of my head. How delicious does this look? It is about 100x more delicious to eat.



Some recipes. Yum. Get me some and I will live off this for the rest of exam period.

everything all the time, stolen from the world

This is the year I stopped writing.

forever on a path of no return

Oh, look at how good I am about maintaining a blog: abysmal. Can I lay the blame on this being my last semester here in St. Louis? 3L year is apparently hell on motivation, as in I lack any whatsoever.

Overall the semester's going fairly well, though. Dealing with the logistics of being in Singapore next semester, keeping up with Liverpool, and maintaining the utmost celebrity crush on Tom Hardy, who is too much of a paradox to exist as a real person (an amalgamation of everything I never thought I'd like in a guy but do when it's him). Also, Joseph Gordon-Levitt is highly relevant to my interests, but mostly in a shallow damn-he-looks-good-in-a-suit way.

Clearly my mind's been on law recently...

In that vein, I took October trips to visit L in DC and then to visit C in Chicago, meeting up with L and L. Good times were had. Memories were made. No law was learned. And yet I'm totally okay with that.

Just another two weeks of pretending I care about school until Thankgiving! Flying home to NC to see family and eat until I burst; looking forward to it and also HP next Friday!

coasting on these august waves

So the reason I've been so AWOL since coming back to NC is that the day after I get home, on Friday, a ton of my mom's old college roommates and classmates have come into town for a 30 year reunion type thing. She and J's dad know the same people, so it's an assortment of random Chinese people come from all over the US (Cali, Philly, STL, Toronto even...) to congregate here for the weekend to catch up and then head out to the beach for three days. So that's been busy and loud and full of Chinese! I've helped entertain some (actually exercising Chinese skills, omg, they are so rusty) and have otherwise hid out some too.

We then headed out to the beach for a week: Emerald Isle, NC. There was a house and it was full of people and the beach was lovely, the water was warm, and much food and relaxation (and mahjong) was had by all. I am now home and ridiculously tan and whining about skin cancer to all who will put up with me. It was a ton of fun though. FB contains all my pictures.

In some other updates -- my brother's voice has dropped! What is this growing up business, really? Still, J's little brother John (now seven, attending second grade, utterly adorable) remains my surrogate little brother. He's a total sweetheart and he makes me ridiculously happy. I sort of wish I'd been older and better able to appreciate my own brother's cuteness at that age; when he was 7, however, I was 16 and surly about him in the way of all teenage girls, I suppose. Now it's his turn to be the sullen teenager...

Also, I finally got around to reading and finishing The White Road by Lynn Flewelling and I enjoyed it much more than Shadows Return. But mostly it makes me crave the first two books of the series but I suppose I am glad that the series is continuing. I am also excited for Lorna Freeman's The Flames of Reckoning, though that will be ages before it's complete, much less out for public consumption. :(

In movie news, I watched RockNRolla, a ridiculous Guy Ritchie movie about London gangsters with British accents, heists and intrigue and action, and Tom fucking Hardy. His part was minor but I sort of rolled over in glee every single time he was on screen. He was fantastic as Handsome Bob. I wanted to hug him a lot when I didn't want to lick him, I DON'T KNOW, MY HORMONES ARE OUT OF WHACK WHEN IT COMES TO TOM HARDY. God. I want a sequel to this movie. (Or "This Means War". Right the fuck now.) On a more serious note, while Tom Hardy didn't have a huge role in the movie, I think he did a very good job acting and getting into his character. I will get on his and JGL's other movies soonish!

I was going to watch Velvet Goldmine today but instead watched EPL: Liverpool v. Arsenal. Cole got redcarded during his debut, ahh, I hope he is all right physically; Stevie played and looked absolutely fit; Nando was subbed in late in the second half and everyone sang his song (which delights me because fuck yeah TORRES TORRES); Agger might have gotten a concussion; and poor Reina scored an own goal in the 90th or so minute to equalize after a long Liverpool lead. ;__;. But I have faith in my team! And, yes, I suppose I've acceded to the fact that they are my team now. I will work on being a proper fan.

Ugh, I don't want to think about the RL I must face in a week, heading back to STL to pack and move and prep for the fall semester. This semester will be wretched busy with classes and work and Note editing and MPRE-studying (fucking ethics, how do they work) and form-filling (to hash out visas and applications and things I will need for my spring exchange to Singapore!!!).

But for now, I am content in these last vestiges of summer break.