About myself

Out of a fit of curiosity, I decided to goggle myself by my actual name. (Apparently someone has done this before and I was wondering what he might have found.) Some things were expected, ie my resume which is linked to my old homepage and it is good to know that I was indeed added to the official CFM and CMA lists. But some of this was shocking; it’s like an autobiographic history lesson. Apparently, sometime in my past, I had signed a petition for a mixed Asian action channel. I don’t even have any desire to subscribe to the anime channel through my cable provider. However I definitely made my name in the anime world back in the day. Also evidently, I was featured in a couple ASU publications. I don’t remember any of these articles existing. I don’t even remember the photo being taken for one of the articles. And I forgot to take down some inventory that I had put up for sale on half.com over a year ago. But luckily I’m not as popular as some of you out there, who are making names for yourselves. And as far as I can tell, none of those photos that I posted, when the internet just started, ended up as porn as my mom was initially afraid of. Now that I think about it, what happened to those high school photos with my face censored out by the talented Nick K.? Ah well, I guess some things were lost out there.

Contemplations

Where are you?
Where are you going?

Are you happy?
Is happiness all that matters?

If only you knew, what would you do?
What could you do?

Do you know me?
As I know you?

Can you see me?
What do you see?

If you believed, what would change?
Could you change?

Does it exist?
Why does it exist?

Can you imagine?
Beyond reality?

Do you have faith?
Do you know the truth?

Where is life going?
Where has it gone?

Thoughts

I am battling pre-legal-dependency urges as I step back into my parents’ home. I see their bulk filled pantry, courtesy of Costco, and think: wow look at all that food, maybe I could take a couple bowls of instant sesame noodles and a six pack of drinks back with me. They have also stocked up on a boatful of toiletries that could be useful in my home. There are only two things stopping me. One, I don’t feel like carrying a heavy suitcase full of groceries. Two, I realized I’m not in college anymore. It’s interesting to see how I tend to fall back into old habits when I return home back to phoenix. Afternoon naps, lying around watching marathons of anime, and relying on my parents to take care of me. I guess this is called being lazy in general.

However, I do feel more obligated to contribute to the household. I am trying to be more considerate and make an effort to contribute to household chores. In the past, my parents had to constantly remind me to clean counter tops after I made a mess cooking or even to do my own dishes, so I have matured in small ways. They are still rejecting my immaterial monetary contributions to their livelihood. Instead of being able to help with the two mortgages and series of remodeling expenses, I will be providing small impractical presents that they will hopefully enjoy. ^_^ Yet since my parents retired and are more financially limited than they were in the past, I wonder when do I grow up and truly help take care of them.

The Gift Plan

After a prolific amount of autumn birthdays, I have now found myself in the midst of Christmas. Inspired by the holiday decorations around the house, the bell merrily jingling on the dog’s collar, and the abundant advertisements sent via mail, TV and internet, I was re-energized for gift giving. Running to the mall and Christmas fairs almost every weekend, searching the net and e-bay, I got a multitude of presents that I tried to put some thought into. [To the people who are now receiving checks from me, it’s not because I didn’t want to put thought into it, quite frankly either you need the money to pay rent or you want stuff I could never afford.] However during the sales and Christmas cheer, my idea of a $10 per present budget quickly flew into the void. I saw my credit card bills and realized that my budget did not quite recover from the continuous birthdays throughout October and November. I also just realized that there are more birthdays come February and March. Which means two things…one, some of you might be only getting lunch or drinks on me when I see you over my vacation and two, I need to come up with a plan for next year. Here are some ideas:

1) Have some sort of pot-luck/gift swap party, so we only need to get one gift for everyone at the party, even if it includes non-mutual friends. (This one we had discarded this year due to the complexity of the arrangements, but I might suffer through it next year.)

2) Give everyone a “Andrea lottery ticket” meaning you get a raffle ticket from me and the lucky friend gets $100, which by the way the odds are better than a real lottery ticket.

3) Get everyone a real lottery ticket for $2, along with a candy cane as a consolation prize.

4) Realizing that all the ideas above don’t really put much individual thought into the presents, I could also do a budgetary x-mas plan. Meaning, I list all my friends out and give 2-3 present each month telling them not to open until x-mas. In this way, I can eliminate excess storage and be able to streamline my expenses over the year. I can also proportionally budget slightly more presents in the beginning of the year, in case new unexpected friends or other types of obligation giftees arise during the period or to overcome lumps in the budgets due to excess birthdays. Or even better, if I arrange to give the x-mas gift in cohesion with birthdays, I will probably be able to reduce gift expenses by at least 25-50%.

5) Suck it up, try to earn more money or keep eating ramen, and all will be good.