This is seriously the only way I eat popcorn. I’ve never liked the squeaky texture of popped popcorn, so I rarely ever eat it. Popcorners offers the perfect solution – a nice crisp, condensed texture with the same tastiness! They have a most satisfying crunch that I love, much like a potato chip but with none of that grease. They’re a fun triangular shape and one of my favorite corn products. What a lovely way to enjoy corn in a brand new fashion. My favorite is their white cheddar flavor, which is light yet flavorful all in one. I’m a fan of a snack that is fun to eat and tastes great.
365great Day 314: Popcorners
Outward appearances
I often forget I am an Asian-American woman. Does it affect how people perceive my abilities? I’m starting to wonder.
For the most part, I go about my days without a second thought to differences in gender, ethnicity, age, or other factors. Everyone I work with is a different personality type in my mind, but I don’t consciously associate that with any other qualities. And likewise, I don’t think they treat me any specific way because I’m female or Asian. But then I read books about the Asian-American experience (particularly Asian-American women) and it gets me thinking if the way I’m treated is not just about my personality and behavior, but also largely affected by my appearance.
Do I not get the respect I thought I would because of my gender, ethnicity, or age? Or do I not because I’m silly and goof off so people don’t always take me seriously? Do certain people pay me a little more attention because of how I look or do they just like my bubbly excitement over little things? Would I even be able to parse out that information? Does it ultimately matter? At the moment, it does because it’s creating a psychological barrier for me. I suddenly lost confidence in myself and my abilities and the doubt I have is related to my gender and ethnicity. If I were a man, would it be different? Would I have more confidence in myself even as I failed? If I weren’t Asian, would it be easier to express myself and stand up for my ideas?I’m working to set myself up for success again and focus on attainable goals. It’s all too easy to be harsh on myself and judge everything I do as not good enough.
365great Day 313: Wrapp
I enjoy the Wrapp app because it offers a chance to get free money. People can gift you various amounts, sometimes at no cost to them and there is no obligation to spend a certain amount, so you just need to find something cheap enough in store! Panda and I gift each other $5 offers when they’re being promoted and are freebies. At Office Depot, you can get plenty of things for $5. At American Eagle… not so much. So it often depends on where you’re shopping and which brands are offering free money, but at the least you can get a discount if you were planning on purchasing there anyway. I got some shoes at Charlotte Russe on sale for an even better price by using the credit I had in my Wrapp app. It’s a great way to save at certain stores!
365great Day 312: boots
What better footwear for winter are there than boots? They keep your feet snug and warm and even manage to protect your ankles and sometimes your calves or knees, depending on their length. They may not be the most flexible and you certainly don’t want to run in them, but for trudging around in the cold, they’re a wonderful solution. I rarely used to wear them, but now I can’t be without them in the winter. I think back to my childhood wearing normal shoes in winter and wonder if that’s why I always felt freezing. I mean, your toes are bound to get numb after awhile if you don’t protect your feet enough. When I wear boots, I don’t have to worry about wind or snow making my feet icy cold. They’re great for protecting against that!
Furniture building
Today started off well, with little traffic on the roads! Since DC has so many workers who observe federal holidays, most people were off to MLK Day. When I got to work, it was a more troublesome story, with spotty internet and phone for the first hour. By the time I finally got service back, I began to discover that any phone calls made would be in vain since everyone I was trying to contact takes federal holidays. Sooo I got to work on our new Salesforce migration, making sure any data that didn’t make it over was in the system.
At noon, we met for a company all-hands so the CEO could tell us about our move to the new office space! I’d been hearing about it ever since I started and finally it’s almost here. In fact, one week from today we officially start on that side. How exciting! At 4, a bunch of us volunteered to go over to the new space to build furniture. Between desks, chairs, side tables, and stools, we had our hands full for the next 7 hours. I just finished up at 11 and I’m feeling good about helping out with our new furniture. I was too busy building for many pictures, but here’s what I got:
365great Day 311: external drives
It’s so useful to be able to store files on an external drive, whether a thumb drive or hard drive. It makes it easy to access certain files across devices quickly and allows for backup of important files. In my new laptop, I had the HDD replaced with a SSD, so I had the original hard drive sitting around. I recently got a case for it so I can use it to store all the older files I have. With 750 GB of storage space, my whole life’s worth of content can fit on there. It’s such a nice way to keep all my old files consolidated without cluttering up my current laptop’s hard drive. Of course, if I lost it or broke it I’d pretty much lose everything up until a year ago, so I’ve made sure to start backing up all that on various other storage options too. But for quick browsing of massive amounts of files, I prefer an external drive. I don’t need internet access like with cloud-based solutions and I can easily carry it around with me. It’s a great way to store my content.
UK Vacation Day 9 Recap
I took my time with this post since it was one of the most touristy and there are a ton of pictures. This was our true tour day of London – we started off by Buckingham, went through St. James’s Park, checked out some house guards and stopped by their museum, went through Trafalgar Square, tried a Thai place, found an M&Ms World, explored parts of the British Museum, found some gifts in small shops and waited around for free wifi, crossed the River Thames, walked through the Southbridge Centre and Jubilee Park, fed pigeons, and got tons of pictures of the London Eye, British Parliament, Big Ben, Westminster Bridge and Abbey. For dinner we tried to find a Bella Italia but were unsuccessful so we had tapas at La Tasca instead. All in all a busy day filled with walking that allowed us to see a ton before we headed out.
[Catch up with Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, Day 6, Day 7, and Day 8 recaps.]
365great Day 310: Pinkberry
Pinkberry was the very first frozen yogurt place I ever had and it still remains my favorite. I like their ever-changing seasonal menus and their always reliable original flavor. They don’t overwhelm me with topping choices, yogurt flavors, or permutations thereof like the buffet-style places that charge by weight. I’m also a fan of their app, making it easy for me to pay and rack up points. They even send me a free offer for my birthday every year! I will forever mourn the day they decided to discontinue their shaved ice offering, which was my all-time favorite item to order. Imagine a MASSIVE bowl of shaved ice, Pinkberry original frozen yogurt, a variety of fruits, and condensed milk drizzle. It was fabulous and oh so satisfying, but I guess ultimately not popular enough. What a pity. Nonetheless, Pinkberry still offers plenty of tasty treats that are great and I’m totally going to try their new hot chocolate sometime.
365great Day 309: Wurstküche
It’s good to have foodie friends. One of them introduced me to Wurstküche and I seriously got addicted for awhile. They make a mean sausage, no matter which way you go. There’s the standard bratwurst and then there’s wacky ones made with ingredients like alligator. Their selection offers something for everyone, whether you want vegetarian, meat-lovers, or something in between. My personal favorite is the Filipino, which is a little bit sweet and a nice contrast to a plain salty one. Load it up with sauerkraut like nobody’s business and I’m in my own personal taste bud heaven. It’s awesome. The restaurants themselves are also a fun place to go, with an industrial look and giant picnic benches so you might end up making some friends. It’s a casual cafeteria vibe that is oh so hipster and at certain times you’ll find a DJ playing music via a Mac. But really I just go for the food, because it tastes so great.






































































