Now that the weather has cleared up in LA, things are looking beautiful! Click on the pictures to see a larger size.
I love when the air is crisper and cleaner. LA without smog is fabulous. Everything looks so much brighter now!
Now that the weather has cleared up in LA, things are looking beautiful! Click on the pictures to see a larger size.
I love when the air is crisper and cleaner. LA without smog is fabulous. Everything looks so much brighter now!
I often get junk mail that tries to come off as legit, and half the time I have to laugh because their attempts are just SO pathetic. Take this one I got:
Seriously? You expect me to fall for that when you are using multiple fonts, no images, and don’t know more than two of the numbers in my account?! Besides, those two numbers aren’t even right. Ultimate FAIL. Plus, when I hover over the link, I can see that the address it would take me to is complete bogus, seeing as it’s hosted on realdragonhk.com. I’ve also never received such a plain e-mail from American Express, which always includes their logo (hey, every chance to build branding, right?) and uses HTML to create a nice layout that also shows me an image of the type of card I have.
I really hope that people are smart enough not to fall for things like this. And if they somehow do, I hope their spyware is good enough to catch these ridiculous sites and redirect them elsewhere. Honestly though, you’ve got to miss a lot of big, fat, and bright red warning flags to not notice. The next time you receive one of these, I’d advise you to report it and then delete it. Most sites have a fraud protection area where they give you an e-mail address you can forward it to – I know I’ve done so for this one, a fake IRS one, and I believe a Bank of America one. Certainly most banks and credit card companies are well aware of this issue and have set up appropriate channels for you to go through. That way, they can be alert of all the scams out there and get those sites flagged and removed ASAP.
One day I looked at my KOR hydration vessel to find it covered in bubbles.
How fascinating.
One day, Panda noticed a cricket on the wall. He immediately wanted it out, but I saw that she just needed a warm place to stay. Besides, being a female, she doesn’t chirp, so she wasn’t bothering anyone by being there. Plus, crickets are considered good luck in Chinese culture, so I figured it’d be nice to have her around the place for a bit. We eventually compromised by capturing her and keeping her in a ventilated container. Panda didn’t like the idea of her running around the place and I didn’t like the idea of shooing her away.
Well, what an intense night it was, what with an electrical transformer exploding underground, shaking the buildings in the Glenrock meets Levering intersection. Panda and I were happily enjoying our dinners when I swear, the entire building swayed a few feet and then snapped back to its normal position. For some reason, I thought it was something like a dumpster that got rolled off the roof. It certainly sounded like it, but the movement of the building only made sense in retrospect, when we found out that it was due to an explosion. The boom was louder than the sonic boom we’d experienced back in August or so (then again, that sonic boom came from veeery far away). At first we weren’t sure what to do and I peeked out the porch to hear car alarms going off. Panda called up a coworker and then reported it to the police, who’d gotten wind of it just minutes earlier.
As Apartment Coordinator, it was his duty to make sure his residents were alright and go find out if we needed to be evacuated or anything like that. So, we headed out to see what the commotion was all about. I went straight outside to take pictures, hoping to practice my photography skills in the dark! Out on the street, people were all gathered staring at the steam (and smoke?) rising from a manhole in the ground. Let me tell the rest of the story with pictures… (click pictures for full size)
What a night it was! I have concluded that I should definitely get a tripod to go with my future DSLR… but these night shots turned out so much better than they would have on a normal point and shoot. 🙂
Check out the Daily Bruin article that came out just an hour after the event, then the one written after more information was gathered.
The past week has been really hard on me, as the pressure to get a job grew and my parents and I had a tiff over my sleeping pattern and job search, among other things. So, it was an absolute blessing that Opportunity Green was holding a retreat over the weekend. One of the Board Members owns Casa Barranca, a fabulous estate out in Ojai. People who had contributed to the Opportunity Green Conference back in November were invited to either stay the weekend or swing by on Saturday or Sunday to hang out. Tucked in the hills of Ventura County, in a gorgeously maintained house from the early 1900s, I got to spend my weekend relaxing, enjoying nature, and chatting with some really amazing people.
And for more pictures of the weekend… I’m quite proud that some came out looking nearly like a DSLR took them, or so I think!
Jealous much? 😉
Some of the cool things that were at the 2009 Opportunity Green Conference! (Images linked to the website of the maker, if known.)
(It says FREE Metered Parking, in case you were wondering. And let me add that parking is LA is not cheap, so this is a rare wonder… probably only because all the college kids are gone for break!)
Today was my 24th birthday and I got to spend it with Panda and my parents. 🙂
I got up early in the morning, surprising my parents, since I love to sleep in. Well, I had a date to catch! Since Panda does not have his own transportation, I went out to pick him up so we could have lunch with my parents. I was allowed a day of joyriding in my new car for my birthday, after which the car will be stored away until I get myself a job. Call it sort of reward and encouragement at the same time. I got a chance to set up the Bluetooth connection and made my first call with it to Panda. He couldn’t even hear a difference! Excellent. Now I’ll never miss a phone call in the car since my music will automatically be muted for incoming calls.
So we drove back to my neighborhood and I called up my parents to direct them to the local Souplantation. I can’t believe we never knew about it before! But you know, now that I think of it, it looks awfully familiar and I think it’s been there for a long time, but we just never knew about it. So lunch was nice, with my dad and Panda doing most of the talking. My parents really enjoyed Panda’s choice of restaurant and it was quite healthy and filling. Plus, they had the cutest little ice cream cones! By and by, it was time to part and for me to head off with Panda for the rest of the day. We did a little strolling around the area before heading over to the dealership, since we’d noticed that the floor mats in my car were missing.
The rest of the day was very chill as we hung out and enjoyed each other’s company. For dinner, I had a hard time choosing, so we found something on Yelp that was near his home and headed that way. Unfortunately, the place was closed for some reason, but thankfully, he had just gone to a nice Japanese place just down the street the day before. We went there and had a nice time eating and watching the fish doing silly fish things in the tank in front of us. Nice place and nice food. To round out the night, we made a pit stop at cha for tea, my all-time favorite boba place. They offer games there for people to play as they hang out, drink tea and boba, and munch on some food. We’ve got a little tradition of playing Connect 4 there, so we sat down to a showdown.
All too soon we had finished our drinks, played many a round, and realized it was time to head back for the night. I dropped him off and drove on home, enjoying the feel of the Corolla one last time. I came back to dozens of birthday well wishes from friends on Facebook and a steadily growing number of votes coming in to help me towards winning a job interview for January 4th! It’s great to have support and it’s been a fun way for me to earn my foot in the door for an exciting job. With just one day left, I’ll do one final push and hope for the best. I do believe I can stay in the Top 5 and earn an interview, but just in case I’m still working hard to ensure it’s taken care of.
In honor of the “numbers game” that my parents keep saying job searching can be, I thought I’d play around with some numbers myself…
1 lifetime:
2 parents
3 cats
4 countries lived in
5 states of residence
6 cars our family has owned
7 major relocations
8 cousins (and a step-cousin) I don’t get to see enough
9 jobs where I’ve earned money (3 internships without)
10 years old when I started documenting my life like the packrat I am
11 (and a half) places I’ve called home
12 grandparents, aunts, and uncles living in Asia (plus a step-grandparent)
13 years of keeping a daily journal
14 schools attended from pre-school through college (some simultaneously)
15 European countries traveled over a 5-week spring break
16, an eventful age: took driving lessons, attended Leadership Academy, went to Australia & Hawai’i, and moved to California from New York
17 (and a quarter) years’ worth of education thus far
18, the last landmark birthday (21 doesn’t count since I don’t drink)
19 affiliations with UCLA organizations throughout my college career
20 (intermittent) years in this country
21 major cities traveled to over that 5-week spring break
22 countries traveled to overall (not counting the 4 I’ve lived in for some period of time)
23 airports I’ve been through
culminating in 24 years of rich experiences!
I’ve certainly got a lot of stories. As always, things in my life tend to be more exception than rule, so these numbers may be slightly off, depending on your criteria. You get the idea though.