Tag Archives: small things in life

Reading on Kindle is like dating on Tinder

Finding a book on Kindle is like finding a guy on Tinder. You have to make quick, uninformed decisions based on woefully inadequate amount of information.

To extend this bad analogy further: reading the book “reviews” on Amazon to determine whether a book is a good fit is akin to asking a guy’s flock of birds whether they’d hang out with him. Case in point: Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy got 4.4 out of 5 stars on Amazon.

Unlike Tinder however, once I’ve downloaded a book to my Kindle (whom I’ve named Marvin), I feel I’ve made a $9.99 and up worth of commitment – I have to see this through to the end. Reading has become an obligation and the stake is now unnervingly high in which book I choose to date.

I’ve had a bad dating streak lately.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette. I found the most popular guy annoying as hell and felt extremely guilty.

Mr. Mercedes. It’s my own fault to assume that since I loved Lisey’s Story I am a Stephen King kind of gal. ikr?

The Buried Giant. My bad for thinking that I was smart enough because I was able to appreciate The Unconsoled. So why the f* couldn’t I decipher the deeper meaning this time around? It’s not me. It’s you. You changed!

They’re not necessarily unworthy books, they’re just not for me. Ok, some of them I did find fingernail-on-chalkboard annoying and made my way to the end just so I did not have to listen to the whining — Looking at you Hausfrau and The Daylight Marriage. There were dates whose names and faces I can’t remember. Even ones I tried to forget. For some of them I’ve even gone so far as to expunge the record of us ever spending time together – deleting the copies from my Amazon account.

What made the bad streak even worse? None of these were one-night stands. Nooooo. These were dragged-out lengthy affairs because I have the opposite of a commitment issue.

After three months of slugfest I finally finished Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake. It occurred to me why someone once told me that I can’t say I am a Queen’s fan if I only like A Night at the Opera; The fact that is my favorite album is irrelevant. I adored The Handmaid’s Tale, Alias Grace and The Blind Assassin. Atwood’s writing remains brilliant and her vision of what the future could bring, thought-provoking. It is just not my cup of tea.

When I finally finished Oryx and Crake and saw the other two books in the MaddAddam trilogy waiting at the corner on Marvin (my Kindle), I thought, “Ok, let me power through these two books then I can start reading all these other books [I’ve also foolishly swiped right for].” It felt like a burden. A bitter vegetable. I slunk down in my seat, hating this whole thing.

Then I remembered: I am an adult now. I can eat desserts first. Heck, I can eat only desserts if I want to. Heck, I should eat only desserts. I should only go out with guys I like and I can change my mind even if I’ve swiped right. [apology for mixing the analogies…]

I picked up Marvin and deleted all the “I may get to that when every other book dies” books.

Then I went to the library.

Nothing beats actually seeing and flipping through the real things.

Seriously people: No Christmas decorations or music yet. Bring Back Thanksgiving!!!

32 Replies

I first published this post in 2009 and reposted it in November 2010. Every year, as early as towards the end of October, I found myself aghast coming face to face with Christmas merchandise and sometimes even MUSIC when the leaves are still sporting brilliant red and yellow.

Seriously? What the F people?

What about Thanksgiving? You know, the quintessential American holiday? The way I see it, FAUX NEWS should be carrying this “Bring Thanksgiving Back” flag if they talk about being the TRUE Americans all the fucking damn time.

The following is my now annual (so it seems *sigh*) tirade against the demise of the significance of Thanksgiving in the face of overwhelming commercialism…

Yeah tirade! Aren’t you glad that I am back in more ways than one?!

I started campaigning for a forced postponement, a temporary deferral, of celebrating Christmas until AFTER Thanksgiving Day ~~four~~ ~~five~~ six years ago. I even registered for the domain name: BringBackThanksgiving.com (which is still available… I am sad to confirm… Any takers?) I stopped paying for it after two years when I realized that with a full time job and three boys to take care of, I simply did not have the capacity to deal with Microsoft FrontPage. (Yikes. Do you remember the days, the days before Blogger, WordPress, etc. when one had to use a software such as FrontPage in order to have one’s own website? *shudder*)

“Curb your enthusiasm!” I beseech you. “As you recover from the sugar high from all the Halloween candies. As you dispose of the spider webs, the goblins, the mummy tombs, the rotten carved pumpkins.”

Please, oh, please don’t switch directly from Orange and Black to Red and Green. However tempting it is when you move all the Halloween boxes down to your basement and see all the Christmas boxes beckoning at you. The smiling Santa with the chubby cheeks. The snowman. The reindeer. Resist the temptation: Didn’t Jesus die on the cross partly to teach us this lesson? Be strong for the sake of your children.

The children need you to show them that, Yes, you believe in the meaning and significance of Thanksgiving Day. Yes, it is important that we take one day out to deliberately remember and show gratitude to all the people who add meanings to our lives, to all the material goods that we are blessed enough to own. To strangers who give you a smile in the street and thus brighten your day. To strangers who by merely doing their jobs are making the world a better, safer place.

My heart aches upon seeing houses adorned with Christmas lights right after, sometimes even before, Halloween. Of course I am not intimating that the homeowners are therefore not thankful. No siree. I am simply dismayed that the significance of Thanksgiving, the arguably ONE holiday that we should all be able to agree on and celebrate, is undermined sandwiched between Halloween and Christmas.

(I admit: I may be putting my foot in my mouth by saying this. I have no clear idea how the native Americans take this holiday though I suspect there must be a lot of conflicting feelings. Do they sometimes wish that Squanto were not so kind as to assist the pilgrims? FWIW, by reading “Thanksgiving: A Native American View” and “Teaching About Thanksgiving“, I am convinced that Thanksgiving is indeed deeper and bigger than just the Pilgrims and the Indians… I hope I do not offend should anyone of Native American descent stops by this post…)

I blame the turkey.

You heard me right. It is the turkey’s fault. In terms of merchandising, turkeys are just not as attractive as say, bunnies, chicks, Santa Clause, snowman, reindeer, and so on. I have not seen any child hugging a plush Turkey toy lovingly.

turkey

To be honest, that red thing hanging down the throat freaks me out. Pardon me for being crass, but it always reminds me of testicles. I don’t know why. But it does.

Many, especially Hallmark (bless their heart!), have tried to turn the turkey into an adorable icon: but seriously, how adorable can you make a turkey?

Turkey for eating

Even more sickening is that in these cutesy depictions of turkeys, they are all forced to celebrate the event in which they will be slaughtered, cooked and eaten! The abomination!

No cute icons, no easy way for merchandising. No easy way for merchandising, no rampant commidification of Thanksgiving. No rampant commidification of Thanksgiving, no shelf space at your local drugstores and grocery stores.

(I am grateful for no longer being in the academia which affords me the opportunity to posit theories full of holes and preaches them on the Internet with no qualms… I am like Glenn Beck on an anti-Turkey path…)

But with your help, we can stem the tide. We can start it from inside of our homes.

Perhaps we can all start a tradition of having each one of the family members mention one thing that they are grateful for, every day, in the month of November. No matter how small or how trivial.

Perhaps we can start a quiet movement to resist the Red and Green color scheme from popping up inside of our own houses. Until the day after Thanksgiving.

On the morning of November 26 this year (because November 25, Black Friday, is reserved for Competitive Shopping, or most likely, nursing a stomach ache and hangover headache), I am moving up the Christmas Tree from our basement first thing in the morning. I am really looking forward to it. And to optimize my effort of transforming my house into a winter wonderland for Christmas, I shall keep the decorations up until after Valentine’s day. Thank goodness for the lllloooonnnngggg winter here. That is, of course, until one of you starts a campaign for bringing back Valentine’s Day…

Old Soul

14 Replies

My 8 year old, Mr. Monk, is on a “Back to the Future” kind of mission lately.

He’s acquired two rotary phones earlier this year for a buck each at a garage sale. Probably my fault for I might have explained to him, with too much excitement, how we used to hate folks’ phone numbers with too many zeros and nines.

Click click click click. As you dialed that dial all the way around. Impatience grew. Why can’t they have a number that’s 111-1111? You know what I am talking about. If you don’t, ask your grandma about it.

I have also told him that it would be a great idea to have a rotary phone in the house as it does not require electricity to work and will come in handy one day when we lose power yet the phone line still works. (And what do you know? We did lose power for a whole day and his rotary phone did save the day)

After the rotary phones, he’s been obsessed with what he calls “things from the olden days”. The other day he came home from the neighbor’s house with an gigantic outdated cordless phone. “They gave it to me for free even though I offered to pay for it!” I wonder why. This one is truly a big chunk of lead weight.

You may have seen this photo floating around the Book of Face:

First of all, Mr. Monk totally knew the answer because I have told him the story one too many times. (Huh. I am seeing a pattern here…) It was almost like a sign because on the same night when I first LOL at this picture, we acquired a Sony double decker complete with high speed dubbing action from Craigslist for $20. After I casually mentioned how much it would mean for Mr. Monk to have a good ol’ boombox that can also RECORD, the man offered to drive 20 miles on the same night to bring it to us. Mr. Monk was beyond excited. He stood by the window waiting for his new old toy the way other kids waited for a new puppy. It was fascinating to watch his fascination as I explained to him, and my 13 year old, how each of the buttons worked and how to prevent from taping over the cassette tapes by accident. (Many a tears were shed for such accidents…)

Here’s him posing a la Say Anything at my coercion…

We have been listening to the 80s music in this household, and this time it is NOT playing inside my head. Mr. Monk seems to have taken a liking to Pet Shop Boys… I notice repeat plays of “Left to My Own Devices” almost every day… Oh what have I done?

The Husband asked, “Do you think we should tell him about record players?” I gave him The Look. But it is probably just a matter of time since at our Goodwill store, there is an entire table stashed with records for $1 each. I will keep you all updated.

Although I managed to not come home from Goodwill with any records, we did come home with this:

For two bucks? A good deal. That is, until I found out that films cost about $3 each and hard to find. This is a great contrast to how we snap away when we take pictures with digital cameras. Since the marginal cost is zero, we tend to ignore the pictures once they are taken. Somehow though, the old photos without digital copies seem to occupy a more special place in our hearts. I think Mr. Monk is right in wanting to bring ~~back~~ forth that sliver of magic that comes with pre-digital technology. There is something to be said to be able to hold something in your hand.

Tangible.

That is one of the new words he’s learned.

p.s. This post has been approved by Mr. Monk himself on the condition that I tell you he is not just an old soul. “Just tell them. I am of the past, present and future.”

A flower for me

63 Replies

As I walked out the train depot, I saw his familiar face from afar. He has taken over the position from Mr. Jim, the white-haired veteran whose presence has been a staple at this corner of the corridor connecting people to the bustling city life.

I used to give something every time I walked by Mr. Jim, before he retired, until he said to me one day, “You don’t have to do this every time you walk by me you know?”

I looked at him puzzled.

“I mean, you don’t need to pay to get out of jail every time you pass by me.”

I laughed at his witty reference to the game Monopoly and his prime guarding position. “So I can just pass go?”

“Yes sweetie. I know your heart is in the right place.”

Now it is the new guy’s job to be holding that telltale locked red tin box outside the train station during morning rush hours. New Guy. That’s what I call him inside my head. I have not asked him his name yet.

It was easier for me to ask Mr. Jim for his name because he’s in his 80s, I think, and there was no risk of my curiosity and may I say good manners being mistaken for some sort of brash romantic advance. But the new guy is younger, well, younger than 80, and I did not want to give any wrong impressions. Mr. Jim loved to hold my hand while we talked and I let him flirt with me because I enjoyed seeing the sparkles in his eyes when he laughed.

I have noticed that less people stop to chat with New Guy as they had done with Mr. Jim. I am not sure whether it is because of the missing front teeth that strike people as unsettling. Or perhaps at merely middle age, he has not earned the right to hang that sign above his head that says “I am very old so yes it is ok to talk sweet nothing to me.” I also noticed that very quickly New Guy added a suit jacket and a fedora in addition to his original ensemble consisted of a pressed white dress shirt and tie.

Not wanting him to feel unwelcome in the midst of the ecosystem of harried suburban commuters, I make a point to say hi to him whenever I see him even though I no longer stop to chat.

This morning I stopped to put a folded dollar bill through the slit on the top of the red tin box.

“How are you doing?”

He smiled and I could see the gap in his mouth where the front teeth should have been. It no longer looked unsettling. It felt familiar now. I saw that his smile was genuine through his eyes which warmed my heart.

“Oh. Wait. Take this.” He held up a flower to my face. “Put it in the button hole here,” he pointed to the lapel on my trench coat, “Someone gave it to me but it won’t fit in mine.”

“How come it doesn’t fit in yours?” I took the flower from his outstretched hand and leaned closer to look at his brown tweed jacket.

“Because it’s sewed!” He laughed. I laughed too because somehow it was amusing.

“Well, cut it open or something and I will bring a flower for you next time!”

He looked surprised and then quickly became a bit bashful. “Nah. You don’t have to bring me a flower.”

“We’ll see about that. Thanks for the flower!”

I could almost break out into a song when I was walking towards my office building, with a flower in my hand. All this time I thought I was doing him a favor, turns out it’s the other way around.

I cannot wait for spring to come.

Defiance

13 Replies

If you are out and about this past week, it will take a lot of resilience to not be carried away or affected by all the pink and red hearts, the flowers, the chocolate and candy in pretty pretty heart-shaped boxes wrapped in red ribbons tied into perfect little bows, the flowery typeface all over shop windows and billboards. On my way home on Friday evening, the second I stepped in the train station, I sensed the collective nervous energy from the crowd. People were swarming in front of the Fannie May counter, all of them men. The same with the flower stand. As I walked through the train to find an empty seat, I saw many, men, awkwardly trying to keep the flower bouquets upright and in check.

I have to confess: With all the talk of “Bah Humbug! I don’t care about Valentine’s Day. Won’t people please shut up about it already?” my heart was caught in my throat and tears began emanating from behind my eyes, stinging them, when I settled into a seat and noticed a balding middle-aged man in a pedestrian outfit in front of me holding a lovely rose bouquet.

Luckily for me, it so happened that on the same day, I discovered at the CVS right outside the train station one of the best inventions known to women, especially commuting women, Juice Box Wines. I was also not without a box of chocolate in my possession because Mr. Monk, my 8-year-old, had asked me that morning, “Mommy, would you give me a box of chocolate for Valentine’s Day?”

I was disappointed when I asked, half jokingly [ONLY half!], The Husband before he left for his month-long trip abroad, “So, you are going to send me flowers right?”

“Are you crazy? That’s a total waste of money!” He said, NOT joking at all. “They are expensive and they won’t survive longer than a week.”

Fine. I knew I was not married to Mr. Romantic when I entered the deal, and I tend to agree that flowers ARE expensive and impractical. [It just seems easier to tell myself that.]

Isn't she sexy?!

To be honest, I am kind of relieved that once again he’s not here for Valentine’s Day. I would have been the person that planned everything and stressed myself out. Without expectations, there will be no disappointment.

His absence makes it a non-event and I get to do whatever I want: So I decided to ignore it but not before I went and got myself a Valentine’s Day present, and The Husband was more than happy to take the credit: “See? Isn’t that an awesome Valentine’s Day present? Much better than flowers?” I had to agree.

All’s well that ends well.

Ants

34 Replies

I have been thinking about ants a lot lately. Or rather, the absence of ants. It probably has a lot to do with all the holiday-related activities happening in this house: cookie baking, frosting, sprinkling, gingerbread house decorating. Every time when I see Mr. Monk walking around with a sugar cookie that he has added frosting and sprinkles to, I wince and say to him, “You are lucky we don’t have ants in this house.”

After saying that, I then half expect the ants to show up just to teach us a lesson. Hubris! I live in its shadow.

Moments like this remind me that one of the things about living in America I am most grateful for, in addition to the awesome return policy in most stores, is the lack of ants. The lack of paranoia that a single piece of crumb would attract a horde of ants within five minutes. And there are a lot of crumbs in this house. My kids are like crumb machines; their mouths, as what mothers in Taiwan would say, are like a chipped bowl.

Growing up in Taiwan, I was always wary of leaving crumbs on the floor partly because my mother was vigilant in covering up food and picking up crumbs while yelling “The ants will come and move you back to their colony at night!” and partly because swarms of ants really creep me out. Like the flying German cockroaches, ants are common in houses (i.e. apartments) in Taiwan, at least the places I lived in growing up. It does not matter how clean your house is, they still show up uninvited.

I remember watching wayward ants move along the cracks on the wall as I studied late at night. I followed their trajectories, mesmerized. The wall must be immense from their perspective, like traversing a desert plain. How do they find their friends? Sometimes I would set up “road blocks” by holding my ruler against the wall, forcing the lone ant to change her direction. Again. And again.

Now that I started down the memory lane, I realized that one of my most vivid childhood memories was also one of my greatest childhood traumas:

My mother came home one day from her job at the hotel with a rare treat: a piece of Black Forest Cake. A hotel guest had given my mother the leftover from their party. I had never owned something so extravagant in my life (at that time): The cake was fancifully decorated with delicate chocolate shavings with a cherry perching on top of a tower of whipped cream. It was too beautiful to be eaten and I could not bring myself to cause the cake to disappear. I left it out on the dinner table so I could admire it in all its glory and take my time to savor it later.

I fell asleep before I had the chance.

As soon as I opened my eyes the next morning, I remembered my cake! I put my face right next to it, Ah, CAKE! but noticed that the chocolate sprinkles were moving around…

My father ran to the scene following my scream. He took a lighter and got rid of the ants covering the entire cake. “Here. See? Your cake is ok again.”

“NOOOOOO!!!!!” I was inconsolable. “It is NOT!”

“Look! It tastes just as good.” He took a spoonful of the cake and put it in his mouth to show that the cake was still edible.

All I could do was cry as my father kept on taking a bite off the cake to convince me to try.

I can’t remember how long it took me to recover from the shock. But to this day, whenever I remember that scene, I can still feel the overwhelming sense of regret. If only.

As a grown-up, when I am at a bakery or a coffee shop, I can’t help but order a piece of Black Forest Cake if it is available. But somehow it never tastes as good as the piece that I had never tasted.

Bring back Thanksgiving! Please, no Christmas decorations until Black Friday…

35 Replies

This is a post originally published last November. For some reason, ever since September, a lot of people have searched for “turkey” and landed on my post from last year, skewing my stat counts since I know all of them got the pictures of the turkey and left without even looking at my blog.

Tis unfortunate. Not because I am vain (well, I am) and I want to treat the increased page views as real numbers (well, I do) but because I really wish more people will heed the plea, not just by me but also by some other bloggers, for example, Midwestern Mama said, “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas… And frankly, its pissing me the fuck off!”

The following is my tirade against the demise of the significance of Thanksgiving in the face of overwhelming commercialism…

Yeah tirade! Aren’t you glad that I am back in more ways than one?!

I started campaigning for a forced postponement, a temporary deferral, of celebrating Christmas until AFTER Thanksgiving Day ~~four~~ five years ago. I even registered for the domain name: BringBackThanksgiving.com (which is still available… Any takers?) I stopped paying for it after two years when I realized that with a full time job and three boys to take care of, I simply did not have the capacity to deal with Microsoft FrontPage. (Yikes. Do you remember the days, the days before Blogger, WordPress, etc. when one had to use a software such as FrontPage in order to have one’s own website? *shudder*)

I blame the turkey.

turkey

To be honest, that red thing hanging down the throat freaks me out. Pardon me for being crass, but it always reminds me of testicles. I don’t know why. But it does.

Many, especially Hallmark (bless their heart!), have tried to turn the turkey into an adorable icon: but seriously, how adorable can you make a turkey?

Turkey for eating

Even more sickening is that in these cutesy depictions of turkeys, they are all forced to celebrate the event in which they will be slaughtered, cooked and eaten! The abomination!

But with your help, we can stem the tide. We can start it from inside of our homes.

Perhaps we can all start a tradition of having each one of the family members mention one thing that they are grateful for, every day, in the month of November. No matter how small or how trivial.

Perhaps we can start a quiet movement to resist the Red and Green color scheme from popping up inside of our own houses. Until the day after Thanksgiving.

On the morning of November 27 this year (because November 26, Black Friday, is reserved for Competitive Shopping, or most likely, nursing a stomach ache and hangover headache), I am moving up the Christmas Tree from our basement first thing in the morning. I am really looking forward to it. And to optimize my effort of transforming my house into a winter wonderland for Christmas, I shall keep the decorations up until after Valentine’s day. Thank goodness for the lllloooonnnngggg winter here. That is, of course, until one of you starts a campaign for bringing back Valentine’s Day…

Sundays in My City – Small Things in Life

45 Replies

I sometimes wonder whether this whole brouhaha over “small things in life” is not a conspiracy started by people who did not have an exciting life to begin with.

Oh… *Rubbing hands together* Let’s make them believe that the small things in life are far more grand than the BIG things. This way they would not pity us for the lack of excitement in our mundane existence, and instead, they would be jealous of our ability to cultivate an appreciation for the mundane, the boring. The City Mouse will envy the Country Mouse. The urbanites with their late-night parties and cultural affairs and social engagements will put back their sneers towards the suburbanites. The sophisticates will look at their ennui and wish they have our kind of boring life instead. Excellent.

To be honest, being a working parent, BORING WEEKENDS are what I look forward to… I have worked my ass off during the week, what do you mean I am in charge of entertaining the kids on the weekends? So yeah, is there a conspiracy? You be the judge…

Nothing happened on this long Labor Day weekend. We live in the burbs and we don’t have cable and I did not find time to read the newspapers and I was kind of banned from my laptop (aka the Internet aka Twitter) so it is as if the world has stopped existing.

The most exciting thing that’s happened around here has been the opening of a new grocery store. I am not kidding. More than three people told me, on separate occasions, “Have you checked out _____ Market?” They made it sound as if this new store were the Second Coming (in both senses). So we checked it out.

OMG freshly made pizza! OMG sandwiches made from high quality meats and cheeses! OMG freshly squeezed orange juices (“Like the ones I saw in València!” my too-well-traveled husband exclaimed)! OMG bakery stocked with gorgeous looking cupcakes, giant cookies, lavishly-decorated cakes, European-style pastries, plump donuts! Please note our family’s total disregard for what this grocery store is actually famous for: Fresh produce. Thank you.

Say what you may about the Great Conspiracy. This weekend we got to have our cake and eat it too.

And we made a brouhaha out of the accidental rainbows (which regularly appear every morning) at the breakfast table.

The DOUBLE RAINBOWS have nothing on this, as we all know, “A rainbow in the hand is worth two in the bush”!

Russell: Sometimes, it’s the boring stuff I remember the most.

From the movie “Up” which we watched again this weekend. I told you: it’s that kind of boring weekend.

Hope springs eternal

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Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar;

Wait the great teacher Death, and God adore.

What future bliss He gives not thee to know,

But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.

Hope springs eternal in the human breast:

Man never is, but always to be, blest.

The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home,

Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

Essay on Man by Alexander Pope

Living in Chicago teaches you that even though there seems to be no end to the miserable winter, spring will arrive eventually. And when it comes it is the most glorious, blissful sight.

It teaches you to appreciate spring when it finally arrives overnight, without warning, because it soon disappears as stealthily and as suddenly as when it comes.

It teaches you to be grateful to the wonders that are unfathomable yet are within your reach.

It teaches you the strength of human spirits and will, part of which depends on our ability to forget the physical pains and sufferings that we went through even while we have vivid memories of the ordeals. Of which, child birth is a prime example: if we could remember the pain physically, we would have all stopped at one child.

The Internet has changed forever what we take pictures of…

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… even more so now that Smart Phones are becoming ubiquitous. For the better… or for the worst?

To a certain extent it has changed WHEN and WHERE we take pictures. The way we interpret the world. The way we caption the things we see. Now every snap shot that comes through my daily life ~~deserves~~ demands a caption of its own. A running commentary, subtitle of some sort.

Got to go?

Need a job?

Bookstores are fun!

"Mom, that's you!" "Awww. You guys..."

Sarah Palin's new movie?

The Absence of Alternatives

My therapy sessions…