Time to get serious!

Seriously. I've been on academic cruise control for the last three and a half months. I think this kat needs to whip herself into shape for the home stretch. I may have to push myself to the point of exhaustion, like so:

[Biding time in Hong Kong's main airport]
I don't think I'll push myself that hard, so I'll probably go into all of it more like this:
[Happy little things from Nakhon Sawan]
That looks more reasonable...

...

Balls to you, Alex. This ranks highly in Cute Explosion.

Pie Nirvana

I took a crack at making my first pie crusts yesterday evening and now, I think I've discovered a new, latent addiction: pie making (as opposed to pie buying and pie eating- addictions I haven't completed all 12 Steps against).

I never realized how much butter is actually in pie crusts (shh!) until I made a few shells. Nonetheless, I churned out four pumpkin pies (someone, stop me!). After I got tired of that, I decided to make miniature blueberry and sweet potato pies using my muffin tin.

[Thank you, Kamille's iPhone]
Baking baking! As you can see, one of my pies burst in the oven. A violent sight it was...
Mini sweet potato pie! *Note the holiday saucer*
I'm such a sucker for tiny things. The slices didn't end up this deflated, but taking a picture of this slice was super difficult; it lost its innards in the process.

Are the days of muffins and cookies numbered?!

Yowza!

Folks, this hasn't happened in a long, long while. Fletcher/Riverside in Los Angeles.

I was still donning hideous amounts of eye liner, t-shirts with cats on them, brown corduroys, and poo-colored Vans when gas was priced like this. Eep!

My dad's such a baller

After years of searching, my mom unearthed the scrapbook she had made for my dad during their time together in the Philippines. I briefly skimmed the newspaper clippings and found an article by Carmen Estipona (October 1970) from The Paulinian entitled "The teacher is a Botany chief."

There's a photo of my dad in the article, and he looks so dashing! I asked my mom if she had met him when he looked like that, and she regurgitated, "No!" Ah, my parents' shared ambivalence is, for lack of a better word, charming.

Anyway, in the article, my dad was asked about his thoughts on marriage. He responded, "Because of my career at present, I have not yet considered the matter seriously, although I am looking forward to that day when I will have a family of my own." He was 37 at the time. [The apple really doesn't fall that far from the tree..] He then quoted the poet, Allen Tate:

"Tomorrow let loveless, let lover tomorrow make love;
O spring, singing spring, spring of the world renew!
In spring lovers consent and the birds marry
When the grove receives in her hair the nuptial dew."

Man, how was my dad ever so fresh and coquettish?
--
My mom also found my 4th grade in-class journal. Here's my August 26, 1997 entry:

"Dear Diary,

Your choice! Okay since it is my choice I will tell about my pets. I have three pets a rat, a fish, and a bunny. People say my pets are strange mostly because of the rat. My bunny is named Castoff because I got my bunny on the day I got my cast off. The rat's name is Modem because my brother loves computers and called him Modem. Now the fishes name is Bob, but we don't know how we got that name. So I told about my pets because it was my choice."

GO CHOICE! hahah

Glad to be home..

Thankful for: KOST 103.5 and the incessant holiday music (old skool, please... none of this new synthed stuff!)
Ate some: turon, tilapia + steamed rice + garlic-vinegar dip, Hershey's Symphony bar (the obsession begins..)
Drank: a really awkward iced green tea latte from Elysee, a cafe in Westwood. It tasted like the milk left in a bowl after Lucky Charms consumption. Blegck.
Thinking of: Team Kickass buddies, travel, food, the new move, and family an ocean away:

When Mike and I got to Marungko, we had to make a round of all the Cruz homes. This was just one household! A return is imminent..

I'm using this short break for a baking EXTRAVANGAZALISHITIONIZAWOAH!

In case you've never heard...

angry asian man: my daily dose of ire and esteem.

=D

I'm so excited to go back down to L.A. Great food, off-the-wall family, holiday decor up the wazoo! I'm hitting the 5 around 7:00pm tonight and then... FILIPINO/HOLIDAY/CARB-FILLED FOOD GLORY!

Who wants HONEY?

When Mike and I were on Koh Samui, we decided to do some "BIG GAME fishing." Mike is of the fisherman breed- he was inclined to do anything fishing related. After about two hours of moving back and forth on semi-still waters, Mike caught this fella:It looked really weird. I mean, really. Really weird.

I, too, caught fish of comparable size.
In fact, I caught ones just like this guy three times.

wait for it...
VICTORY!

For Team Kickass..

"We Only Come Out At Night" and "1979" by Smashing Pumpkins. It's a Mellon Collie sort of evening anyway. hmmm :)