I'm the tubby kid for whom food brings so much comfort....

As I write up this entry, I think back on this past week and the only real words that come to mind are "long" and "frustrating". It's odd because this negative impression of the past seven days' happenings has been formulated entirely from yesterday's events. What a way to ruin the week eh? Hopefully, as I continue with this post, I'll remember that Monday to Friday were better days than Saturday?

I guess Monday wasn't such a good day. With the stress of midterms, and my decision to change "career paths"...it sort of turned out to be a day that felt like I was being swallowed whole by burdensome feelings of uncertainty. I kept asking myself the same question - "What am I getting myself into.....??"

I slept in on Tuesday and woke up to study for most of the afternoon. I went out the door around 4:30 p.m. and got to campus just in time for my Chem test. Stupid rushhour traffic. *grumbles* I met up with Kevin and Brian @ PS2 afterwards, and we went back to the house. We made tacos for dinner!

Zin came over Wednesday morning to help me start the "re-modelling" process of my room. We disassembled the second bed in my room and cleared out the contents of the drawers that sat below the bed. I discovered that after all these years, I DO in fact have a phonejack in my room. ARGH! Anyway, we headed out the bank first so that I could deposit some cheques, then headed to GAP BV. I picked up two pairs of the Ultra Low Rise for $30 each! Woo-hoo to employee coupons! We headed to Subway for lunch afterwards (lunch being at 4 p.m.?!) and then picked up a bunch of stuff at Canadian Tire (phonejack, doorbell, ladder, halogen light fixture, etc.). We headed back to my house to wire and install the phone jack, then drove out to Square One. There was an accident on the 407, so traffic was slow for a bit. I got a whole bunch of stuff from GapBody! Again, YAY to 50% discounts!! Next, we hit up PJ's. I got a huge bottle of AquaPlus water conditioner for 6 bucks!! What a good deal! I also wanted to get the heater for my tank, but didn't. Oh well. Zin picked up a pretty RED betta, and a very neon-y green tank. Famished, we raced back home and made fried rice with some of the leftover chicken from last week's trip...along with some leftover veggies and whatnot. I didn't get home til well past curfew cuz I needed to pick up milk from the gas station....which was actually pretty scary, come to mention it. I was in the Petro, standing at the cash, paying, when 3 "hak yun" walked in and started hovering behind me. Oh man...that kinda got my heart racing.........

Thursday arrived, and I went to YUBC pretty late. Well, that's because I decided to make soup-filled dumplinsg for lunch, and heat up peanut butter squares for dessert (with milk!!). That's when Karen came home, so we talked for a bit before I finally went out the door. Kevin and Brian had their Mandarin test to write, so they left early. Sopheak and I closed up and we all headed to the Student Centre for food. I didn't know what to get initially, until Kent and Sanli came back with frozen yogurt. :S I just couldn't resist. Kevin and Brian showed up around 5:00 p.m. and we left to go get ourselves some fruity frozen yogurt from Tastes. It was pretty darn COLD eating frozen yogurt and walking across campus to Ice Gardens. *brrrr!* We headed to Food Basics and took forever getting groceries. That place was so ghetto....... :S We raced to T&T afterwards to pick up a few items, and rushed back home in time to catch the O.C. at 8:00 p.m. We finally made food at 9 - chicken fingers, chicken and onions, and mashed potatoes. We had to finish up the leftover chicken, and I had a huge hankering for chicken fingers (after purchasing them from the grocery store)....and I really wanted potatoes. Weirdly enough, we didn't even end up touching the huge bowl of potatoes. I also fried up the rest of the "year cake". We watched SFU while eating a plateload of chicken.

Iola came to get me before YUBC. We got to Tait, I signed her in, and we played until 3:30. Kev, Bri, Iola and I then left to hit up bank(s), then Timmy Ho's, then LAT. When we arrived, Miss was already closing up practice...at 4:30!!!?! We used to always go until 6:00 p.m., if not later! Like...WHAT?! At least she let the four of us play for about 30 minutes. She tried to bribe us with tubes of "free" birds if we were to come back on Wednesday to coach. LOL! Iola went home after that, and we headed back to the house. Lots of people were over, and Terry was celebrating with Linda in the kitchen for her birthday. As they occupied the kitchen area, I went upstairs and re-organized/re-modelled the room with Kevin. The kitchen eventually became vacant, so I cooked dinner. The green beans were way too spicy for my liking. Ahhh! Sucks to my cruddy non-existent spicy tolerance. The beans were also too "squeaky" for Brian. LOL! Apparently the Chinese long green beans squeak when you chew them?! We also had pork with pickled cabbage, and garlic nappa. I eventually went home, and didn't sleep til 7:00 a.m................

I didn't wake up til 1:00 p.m. or so on Saturday. All plans got pushed back by roughly 2 hours. I showered, Karen ironed, I did the dishes, Kev arrived...and we finally headed out. First stop was Fairview Library. Karen picked up a bunch of reserved stuff...again. Then we hit up BV GAP, and I picked up my very last schedule and paycheque. Said some goodbyes to people and such.....but forgot to post up a note in the lunchroom. Oh well. Maybe I can do that sometime later on. We then headed to Yorkdale to do some more GAP shopping. Karen picked up a bag, and Kev picked up two more polo shirts. We then went to PJ's, where Karen bought me a heater (for the fishies!) as a SUPER late Christmas present. I also picked up a thermometer, and a heater guard, and those crazy magnetic algae cleaners. We then hit up Highland Farms on Dufferin to get some chicken for dinner...as well as some Camomile tea for Karen. Next stop was Noodle Delight, to grab food for Kent and Sopheak. We finally went back to the house to start dinner, settle down, etc. As dinner cooked, we had the meeting, which seemed to go on forever. It was redundant and consisted of the same stuff as every other meeting we've had in the past. Honestly, it was getting so frustrating to the point that I wanted to get up and just leave. It finally finished, and I went upstairs to spazz about it with Jo and Karen. I got dropped off at GoForTea but was really in no mood to talk to people. That changed eventually though. Bubbletea was too busy, so instead we went to the Chinese dessert place at FMP. We were supposed to hit up Demetrie's after that, but decided on wings instead. After wings, we headed back to Christine's to chill for a bit. I got in around 2:30, and started to set up the heater in my fishtank. I fell asleep sometime..............around......3 something? 4 something? I can't remember. I just know that I dozed off sitting there watching my fish.

Today (Sunday) has been a pretty pissant day as well. I'm sort of bumming around the house, Joe is being a jackass, Karen's not home, and there's a load of stuff that I ought to do but haven't done yet. I probably should get to it now. The laundry isn't going to clean itself.

A new era

I swear I didn't steal that line from the O.C................

So I dropped BIOL 2040 last night because I hated the course too much. Sure, you may sometimes have to work through things that you hate, but there is no point in me taking this course anymore. I had a very long talk with Karen last night, and I think I'm going to diverge away from the path of Biology. It's going to be a pretty big change, and it leaves me with a feeling of uncertainty. Nonetheless, I need to explore other options. There's more out there for me, where I can apply myself, than just Biology textbooks and fruit fly lab experiments.

So, as of this summer, I'm not taking any Science courses. I'm going to work, and research, and find out what's out there in preparation for September. When the schoolyear starts up again, I'm going to be taking stuff that has absolutely nothing to do with Bio. I'm not scrapping it entirely, but it's being put on hold. I'm on hiatus from Biology.

It's pretty frightening...straying from what I originally thought I wanted to do. It's funny considering I don't know what I want to do, and yet I know it's not Biology. Anyhoo, nothing's ever set in stone. It's risky to think that I'm going to spend a year's worth of time and money "exploring"....but right now it is the lesser of two evils.

With that, here's to a new era *cheers*.

(that ALSO was not from the O.C. *ahem*)

...and WHAT a Reading Week it was!

So Reading Week has come and gone, and it topped all previous ones! Well, the ONE whole other Reading Week that I've experienced (last year - 1st year). LOL!

My last post blogged up until Monday's events, which happened to be the first day of Reading Week (RW for short from now on), as well as Valentine's Day.

On Tuesday, I decided to stay in for most of the day and just bum around in my PJ's. Joe finally came home from school, and we decided that I would make dinner that night. We had braised chicken drumsticks in an onion, garlic and shallot sauce, "choy sum", and...other stuff? I can't remember anymore. I was then called out to an impromptu Exec meeting to discuss tournament stuff. That wrapped up around 10 p.m., so Zin and I spent the rest of the time planning out details for the trip.

Zin came over on Wednesday morning around 11 a.m. We packed a bunch of stuff into my badminton bag, grabbed the cooler, and headed back to the house. We transferred all my stuff into the club's Pointfore bag (borrowed it for the trip.........), then packed all his stuff in as well. We proceeded to pack all the food, etc. After cooking up some dumplings for lunch, we loaded up the car and were on our way by 3:00. It took a bit over an hour to get up to Wasaga, and the weather was quite good. We checked in to our room and unpacked all the food, figuring that living "out of the bag" for 2 days would be okay (in terms of laundry and whatnot). We headed out to the local IGA after settling in and picked up a TON of groceries (that we totally did not finish by Friday). Oh yea....I haven't even mentioned where we went. So we booked a Jacuzzi Suite up at Saga Resort for roughly 2 days, just to get out of town and away from everything. It was a much-needed two days of kicking back to relax. The in-room jacuzzi was so much fun!! I turned into a human prune watching DVD's and TV in there for hours, but it was AWESOME - especially with bubbles in there!! :) We cooked up some MASSIVE steaks on the outdoor BBQ that night. I've never eaten a steak that big before - it was about the size of a badminton racquet head!!! I've also never BBQ-ed outdoors before in the WINTER. That was pretty interesting. :) We grilled up some mushrooms and zucchinis with the steaks, and also had carrots and mashed potatoes. There was SO much food. After dinner, we vegged for a bit, and then Zin made his apple pie pizza for dessert. Again, watching TV in the jacuzzi is so fun! American Pie and Magic Kitchen and STAR TREK! LOL!

Thursday "morning" - as in, around 2 p.m., we had french toast and breakfast sausages for "breakfast". We were supposed to have shepherd's pie for lunch, but that would mean that dinner would be at midnight! Instead, we just decided to skip "lunch" and have dinner at a "normal" hour. We watched Top Gun after lunch, and then while Kev was preparing the chicken for roasting, I did the dishes and then hopped into the jacuzzi again. Yea, I was too tempted and couldn't resist. :( We watched "Running Out Of Time" (Andy Lau) as the chicken cooked, and the O.C. as we got ready for dinner. That chicken was HUGE!! It was a $17 chicken....holy cow. :S We also cooked up some mashed potatoes and garlic nappa cabbage....just so that dinner would seem less heart-attack-ish. LOL! After that we watched some random TV before watching ER at 10:00 p.m. on NBC. After that, we decided to watch one of the movies that I'd gotten him during Christmas - Love Battlefield starring Eason Chan. Oh MAN, it was such a depressing movie. I felt so cruddy after watching it. Good thing I had peanut butter squares to cheer me up. :) We called it a night after that cuz I was having so much trouble staying up. I even fell asleep partway throughout Love Battlefield. Well, it was also close to 5 a.m. when we went to bed.......so yea, it was LATE already. :S

We woke up, showered, packed everything, and checked out around 11:15. We drove down to the FROZEN beach and took some videos and pictures, and then started to head back into town. We stopped in Barrie for pitas at The Pita Pit. They put green peppers in my philly steak pita, and I had one heck of a time trying to pick them out. *grr!* We got back to Toronto, unpacked everything, cleaned the kitchen, and Kev took a nap. I played NHL 2005 until he woke up, and we headed out to pick up trophies and go on a shopping spree at the BV GAP. I also submitted my resignation letter! That's right! The Toronto Symphony Orchestra called me on Tuesday and offered me a permanent part-time position!! Woo-hoo! So yea, I'm finally leaving GAP, after being there for over 1.5 years. We were gonna run more errands but decided to wait til Saturday because we were both starving. We headed back to the house to make shepherd's pie and watch Six Feet Under. A bunch of people were over for poker night as well.

Ed came over on Saturday morning to pick back up his demo racquets. We chatted for a bit, and then Grace came over to pick me up for dim sum with Kev and Sopheak. We didn't want to wait forever at Market, so instead they chose New Century Plaza. We ordered like.....2-4 of everything because everything else was sold out. There was, like, no variety to lunch. :S Anyway, Emily treated me to a jumbo mango slush from TenRen's after that cuz she won $100 at the casino. LOL! We all went to Fairview afterwards to go fish-shopping for Sopheak. I ended up buy 3 danio's, 4 guppies, and 1 plecko for myself as well. Aiya. I went home, set up the fish in their tank (with my other baby guppy), and headed out again to pick up stuff for the tourny. We grabbed water from Home Depot ($3.97 for 24), and carrots and celery and cookies from Loblaws. We also grabbed birds and door prizes from Lee's. Emily cooked dinner for us back at the house. After eating, Sopheak, Grace, Kev, and I prepped the veggies for the tournament snacks.

Jason picked me up on Sunday morning, along with Shirley and Anthony. We headed to York and the tournament began. I played doubles with Emily and mixed with Kev. Emily and I placed 3rd for Women's Doubles, and Kev and I placed 2nd for mixed. We headed to Boston Pizza for dinner afterwards and had lotsa fun. The food sucked but the company made up for it. Kev and I shared the Boston's lasagna, which tasted like Chinese food/vegetable soup to me. The bacon double cheeseburger pizza just tasted like normal pizza to me. The New York cheesecake wasn't cold enough - imagine room temperature cheesecake (i.e. not cold) *shudders*. The Chocolate Brownie Addiction was SO huge *sarcasm*. Grace was gracious enough to give me a lift home in the crazy snowy conditions. I was incredibly tired from the tournament and passed out around 12....and didn't wake up until 12:30 or so today. I even had trouble staying awake to change into my PJs. The minute I sat down on my bed my eyes already began to close. I was so exhausted. I'd already fallen asleep after the tournament on a pile of jackets. I fall asleep WAY too easily. LOL!

Anyhoo, this blog is now insanely long, and I really hafta keep studying for my two midterms that are due to kill me tomorrow.

Back....for now?

Once again, it has been a while since I last posted. This time though, it hasn't been because I've disappeared from the Blogger scene. I simply haven't been online. That's right. You heard me. I have not been on MSN. HOW out of this world is THAT?! Hah. After all those years of being glued to my seat for countless hours as I chatted away with people, I think I've finally hit the point where mad-MSN-ing has been exhausted. It's best to reach me on my cell (preferably drop me a text message) if you want to find me. I have 25 more minutes out of 200left for this month, and it's only been 15 days - not even since I have free weekends and evenings! AH!

So, yesterday was Valentine's Day, and a very nice one at that. Zin came over around noon with a surprise bag of goodies. We hung out at my place til 3 or so, then headed back to the house and watched a few hours of the O.C. We were then supposed to have an early dinner, followed by an evening show of the movie Hitch, starring Will Smith. Neither of us were really hungry though, so we stayed in to watch more O.C. instead. We had a late dinner at A Taste Of Japan out in Woodbridge. mMmm! Sushi and teppanyaki goodness!! Back to the house we went for 2 more episodes and ICE CREAM. :)

I got home around 2 p.m. on Saturday and vacuumed the house, followed by my Grandpa's birthday dinner. Everyone decided to skimp on the red pockets this year. It was weird to not have my mom around for the dinner. It was just my dad, Joe, and myself. Well, at least it was good food.

On Sunday the 13th, we all went downtown to play in the XTSC Badminton Open tournament. Brian won 1st for Men's Singles, and came in 2nd with Kevin for Men's Doubles. Emily and I won 1st for Women's Doubles, and Nhi and Ivy came in 2nd. My abs and sides are sore now......We headed out to Montana's for dinner, and went back to the house again for an Exec meeting.

Last Friday, the 11th, was the long-awaited dinner party. Emily and I cooked up a gazillion things, with Grace and Kevin as awesome sous-chefs! We made garlic cheddar baked lobsters, sweet and sour garlic shrimp, lasagna, a bean sprout medley, garlic brocolli, fried eggs, pineapple chicken, strawberry banana smoothies, and bean curd dessert. Fun times! It was pretty interesting when Kev, Terry, and I tried to wake Emily up from Kev's bed. She....is literally....OUT COLD...when she sleeps. Terry decided to make fun of how I cup water in my hands to rinse my mouth after brushing my teeth when I don't have a cup to use. Is there really a RIGHT way to do so? I mean, it certainly wouldn't be sticking your head into the sink to practically eat the faucet.....heh.

That's all I can remember for now in terms of backtracking. It's good to be back and typing again.