http://kolinateng.com

I’m not a huge baseball fan but even I can appreciate the nice waterfront view at AT&T Park and Gilroy Garlic Fries.

Thanks Lockheed Martin!

Worst tablecloth ever for this puzzle.

I consider myself overbearingly sentimental and probably emotionally volatile to a fault. Because I’m self-conscious of this (and, subsequently, self-conscious of being self-conscious), I’ve tried, unsuccessfully, in the past to stifle that part of myself. Instead, defense mechanisms kicked in and as a habit, I now approach emotionally-charged situations with the polar opposite reactions—sarcasm, general avoidance, and inappropriate laughter. This typically does not bode well for, say, a marriage proposal.

But, I am happy to report that I was neither sarcastic nor did I avoid Reid’s proposal last Saturday, August 7th. I did, however, giggle uncontrollably. What can I say? I’m the queen of awkward.

Reid and I had discussed our future extensively for awhile, so I can’t say I was too surprised when it happened. I even suspected that it would happen on that particular day, which made me incredibly anxious all morning while Reid was unfazed and out happily biking with friends. He had made an early dinner reservation for us at Alexander’s Steakhouse, which was the major tip-off that he would propose—Reid likes to announce special news over good food and wine—but I had no idea when he would actually pop the question.

Well, it didn’t happen during dinner. Our host asked if we were celebrating a special occasion; “No, just having a nice dinner out,” Reid answered.

…Uh, what.

It didn’t happen after dinner either. He even insisted on ordering tea after dinner (he never orders tea), and then insisted on stopping at Yogurtland (he never wants yogurt that much)—certainly he didn’t plan on proposing at Yogurtland? Nope, he played on his phone per the norm while I felt silly working myself up for an entire day.

When dusk finally fell and Reid had prolonged my agony as long as he possibly could, he drove me back to my place. By this point, I was ready to shower, change into some pajamas, and inhale my stash of dark chocolate as consolation.

However, when I reached the front door, the walkway and porch were lined with flowers and candles, and my favorite John Mayer song* was playing softly. That’s where I stopped, uttered “Oh, my God”, and then preceded to giggle through the next couple hours. There was no long speech accompanying the proposal for me to transcribe here, but he simply asked me to marry him, and I very simply said yes—to which he responded, “You haven’t even seen the ring!”

Well, fine. I SUPPOSE I’ll accept this incredibly nice ring that is worth more than all my worldly possessions combined.

Inside, the hall to the living room was glowing softly by candle and stringed lights. THAT definitely was not Reid’s doing, but I had a good suspicion who was behind it all. I rounded the corner to the living room, and my closest friends were waiting: Linda, of course, Eric, and Kent, and Nancy.

And surprise Number Two, Kim flew in from L.A. to be a part of it!

Flowers, candle pillars, floating votive candles, bread, crackers, cheese, and chocolate-dipped strawberries covered the dining room table, and we opened a bottle of 2006 Cakebread Chardonnay reserve that we had been saving for a special occasion. And then my friends, knowing my habit of changing into pajamas whenever I’m at home regardless of company,  announced, “Pajama time!” I pishposhed at such an idea during this occasion, until I found out that everyone had brought pajamas.

Never have I been presented with so much love and fondness (and such an extravagant gift!) from any man and any friends as I did that night.

This is where things get mushy and I have trouble blogging about them. This blog post is Reid’s impassive response to my indignant “You proposed to me but you blogged about BIKING?!”, so if he’s not going to get all mushy, I’m not either :P

Okay, just a little bit. I love you, Reid! I promise to love you, forgive you, ignore your weird manly habits, and direct Internet traffic to your sites.

Wow, where have I been? I’ve just completed my first month in my position at work where overtime seem to be the norm on my team, and particularly for myself as I get up to speed in my new function and role. I’ve had little time to myself even at home; I must have 3000+ items in Google Reader to read and I’ve probably missed every viral video in the past month.

And I, you, Internet.

Earlier this week, Linda roped me into watching a pre-screening of The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, courtesy of MOViN 99.7 because St. John is so fierce. In case you missed it, Jezebel is liveblogging the movie–it’s like I’m there in real time! And in case you’re unfamiliar with Twilight, The Oatmeal has a pretty good summary.

I felt a little dirty just looking at Taylor Lautner, who was wearing a shirt for all of maybe only 3 minutes during the whole movie. Isn’t he like, 15 years old?

Edit: Jezebel has the best commenters. This one takes the gold:

Dodai I really wish you had been able to plan ahead not just to have booze and snacks, but also to try to smuggle in a vuvuzela.

I like brewing tea with loose leaves but it’s a hassle trying to avoid the floating leaves in my cup whenever I take a sip. Solution? Makeshift tea steeper with a coffee filter and some binder clips!

I’ve tried it a few times in the past and kept telling myself I would give it a real shot. After no action on my part for a few years, I finally signed up for a one-month beginner’s course today. I start on Wednesday, June 16 if anyone else is interested in joining me!

This picture of my new recreational sport will give my parents new heartburn.

I’m now a quarter-century old! Remember when in high school, popularity was measured by the number of balloons received on your birthday? Yeah, I wasn’t me. BUT LOOK AT MY BALLOON NOW. Take THAT, you popular girls.

In celebration, Linda gifted me with the most obnoxious balloon she could get her hands on–at work, no less. I spent a good 30 seconds trapped in the security turnstiles with it when leaving work, and then spent another two minutes or more wrestling this behemoth of a balloon into my car on a really windy afternoon.

Balloons aside, everyone knows that Facebook wall posts is now the true measure of one’s popularity, and I am now 230% more popular than I was last year*. So, that’s an improvement! I’m sure the fact that Facebook has blown up like crazy in the past year has nothing to do with it.

*Yes, I counted. Again. What can I say? I’m an analyst and I’m driven by metrics.

Is it weird to ask my readership to save their toilet paper rolls (the paper core) for me? I’m up-cyling trash into wall decor!

I can consistently do one pull-up a day–the fruit of my labor of 5 weeks of P90X.

There are two reasons UC Davis alumni go to Picnic Day every year:

1. You are an alumnus looking to reminisce,
2. You are looking to party like you did in undergrad, or
3. You REALLY like the Doxie Derby (and who wouldn’t?).

The best heats are the ones with the totally lost and confused dachshunds. Photo by Reid.

To be fair, #2 is probably be a subset of #1, but partying with undergrads is reeeeally weird. We steered clear of  that.

For me, being in Davis means that I should buy a Memorial Union burrito, a one-dollar 750mL mug of coffee, and complete half of the daily crossword puzzle. I might even go to the Games Area and yell at drunk frat boys for playing Human Bowling Ball down the slick bowling lanes. Being in Davis as an alumnus feels strange. It’s not “home” anymore, even though you used to know all the shortcuts around campus and the best place to take an undisturbed nap. You feel like a visitor and you wonder when downtown Davis got so rowdy with fist-pumping frat boys. And you also wonder who those unfamiliar people in the Wushu club are and if they feet the same sense of commaderie with their club members as you once did.

Aye, there’s the rub. Wushu defined my time at Davis, and 3 years later I still have trouble letting go of the one competitive sport I ever enjoyed. It was the first time I ventured alone outside of my comfort zone to try something new, worked to excel at it, and actually stuck to it regardless of who else was doing it or what others thought of it. It’s not really Wushu in of itself that I am attached to, but the fact that I loved what I was doing and was proud of the effort I put into it and the results I got. I just don’t have the energy nor motivation to dedicate the time that I would need to reach a personally-satisfactory level, and because being unable to is frustrating, I quit altogether. As you might guess, with the nostalgic sentiments appearing on this blog every so often, I still wonder about that decision.

For old time’s sake, here’s the last Picnic Day demo I participated in from 2008. Yours truly at the 0:59-seconds mark. It’s not my best, but the shoddy zooming makes it look more exciting than it really is. Plus my hair looks kinda cool.

Last weekend, Reid and I had dinner at DOSA and ordered the 7×7 list item #67: paper masala dosa. While it was good, it wasn’t spectacular, which is what I would expect from the end-all-be-all list of SF foods to try before I can die satisfied. This forced me and Reid to re-evaluate how we would rate the 7×7 items. “Would we recommend a friend to go out of their way to eat this?” is the new question. No, but I wouldn’t be adverse to coming here again, provided that we have exhausted the remaining 86% of the list.

A friend had recently asked how my 7×7 100 foods endeavor was going. DISMALLY! I replied. Okay, I didn’t shout. But we’re almost one-third through 2010 and only 14% complete; this projects to roughly a 37%-completion by December. Reid and I haven’t been keeping up due to the fact that 7×7 updated its list for 2010 while we were already 12% into the 2009 list in January 2010. The fact that we had already tried some items off the 2009 list that didn’t make it onto the 2010 list was kind of discouraging. You can’t UNCROSS things off a list! We will have to RE-EAT EVERYTHING… which is a good excuse to eat another Roli Roti porchetta sandwich now that I think about it.

Also discouraging is that now I have to update the existing list on this blog. Or I could just not.

The end!

Say what you will of John Mayer and what you know of him from controversial tabloids, interviews and his incessant tweets, but wow—the man is a brilliant musician.

Reid and I had the opportunity to attend his Battle Studies concert at San Jose’s HP Pavillion last Friday, and I was enraptured the entire time he was on stage. The concert was much less theatrical than, say, John Legend’s Evolver concert; Mayer doesn’t strike me as a showman despite his penchant for inane ramblings woven into his set lists and his whole set is centered around the music.

He was right when he said during the concert that it was amazing that you could have 15,000 people in a stadium enjoy the music of one person’s acoustic guitar. The heart of the matter is that regardless of who John Mayer is and what he says or does, the music he plays is kind of amazing.

(That said, I am tickled pink that Mayer makes what my friends and I call an “o noes!” face when he sings. D: O noes!)

I’ll leave you with one of my favorite John Mayer songs which he unfortunately did not sing at the concert. Slow Dancing in a Burning Room is the most bittersweet song I know; the mental image conjured from the title alone evokes the emotions surrounding the music and lyrics. I particularly like this recorded live version; it sounds much more raw than the studio-recorded one on the album.

I thought Jay-Z and Alicia Key’s Empire State of Mind was catchy, but then all the parodies started coming out, proving the original to be less than.. original.

Darth Vader’s Galactic Empire State of Mind:

The New Dork - Entreprenuer State of Mind

The best, of course, is Arden and Justin’s version: “In Tahoeeeeeee… These lights will expire you, in Tahoe, Tahoe!”

Oh, and while we’re at it, here’s the Star Wars spoof of Ke$sha’s Tik Tok… just because.

You didn’t think I fell off the P90X wagon, did you? DID YOU?

WELL, then. Yes, you’re kind of right. There was one day in Week 3 I was wasted after work and another where I simply couldn’t bring myself to do “kenpo”, so I ran 2 miles instead, which is 2 miles more than I run, ever.

Week 4, the “Recovery Week” was a bust as well. I don’t have a good excuse for my laziness, except that it was awesome.

But hey, I’m back on the wagon! I’ve been able to complete the workouts with more intensity and more reps than I was able to in the past month. My progress with Ab Ripper X is a high point, considering that I couldn’t complete any of the reps without at least one break in my first week. I’ve also been vomit-free since ‘93 Day 3, so, you know, that’s usually a good sign.

I haven’t seen differences in the mirror, except in exceptionally creative lighting setups (Whoa, is that a bicep?!), and I don’t want to subject anyone to my pastiness so I’ve refrained from taking progressive pictures of my totally bodacious bod. You’ll just have to take me for my word when I say I’m gaining weight, but not shedding any fat—probably the result of slack restrictions on caloric intake. Damn. On the upside, I was able to complete a 2-mile jog in 30 minutes last week, which is kind of amazing for me.

Yes, that is 4 MPH. Yes, I could probably walk it but I was totally jogging it like yeah.