Here comes the dress

I did it. I finally picked out my wedding dress and placed the order, with a hefty, 50 percent payment.

I would post a picture of it, but I can't seem to find a photo of it online anywhere, and I couldn't take pictures at the bridal shop.

BTW, if you live within driving distance of San Jose, I highly recommend Elegant Lace Bridal. They have a lovely selection of dresses, and the service was excellent. My first visit there I spent almost two hours trying on different dresses. The saleswoman kept bringing me beautiful dresses she thought I'd like based on the styles I told her.

The dress I finally picked is a strapless Angelina Bridal Couture dress, style #7007, in a natural, off-white silk (love it!) with buttons down the back. Sigh. Simple, elegant and it makes me look like I have hips.

Four months and it's mine, all mine!!!!!

OMG! MY EYES! My eyes!!

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

A sporting weekend

Well, it was quite the sporting weekend.

Lance Armstrong won his seventh Tour de France, and the win also marked his retirement after 14 years of professional cycling.

The U.S. men's soccer team won the Gold Cup championship, beating Panama in an exciting penalty shootout 3-1 (I'm not even a huge soccer fan).

The funny thing? Both sports are immensely popular around the world, except in the United States where American football, baseball and basketball reign supreme.

San Francisco: A love/hate relationship

Love: "Where are you from?" means "What city/state did you move here from?" and not "What race/ethnicity are you?"
Hate: Non-Asian guys with Asian fetishes (Not that this is anything new, but the guys here sort of freak me out sometimes. They can tell I'm Korean and say hello in Korean.)

Love: Walking in the city and not being the only Asian amidst a sea of white people
Hate: The vast number of skinny, "pocket-size" (as my friend Ji-in likes to say) Asian women

Love: Walking down my block to eat Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean food ... and sushi ... and dim sum ... and ...
Hate: Walking down the street and having dust and dirt blown onto my contacts (Ouch!)

Love: Warm, sunny days at Ocean Beach
Hate: Warm, sunny days turning cold and damp as the fog rolls in over the city

Love: Victorian houses with bay windows
Hate: Rental and real estate prices

Love: Finding a new, trustworthy car repair shop run by Asians who aren't going to rip me off
Hate: Having to find a new doctor, dentist and optometrist

Love: Lying in the sun on green grass during January
Hate: The lack of green lawns and huge backyards

Love: Not having to deal with -30° windchill
Hate: Missing the vibrant fall leaves of the Midwest

Love: Funky little neighborhood boutiques and gift shops
Hate: Lack of shopping malls (Gimme a break! I grew up in the Midwest, home of the first enclosed shopping mall. Malls here also have parking lots that are horribly laid out.)

Love: Working somewhere where I can IM and am not the only minority
Hate: Driving 20 minutes to travel 3 miles to work (I know! I should stop using a gas-guzzling, polluting automobile, but I love to drive and can't stand the hour commute by bus.)

Love: Yelling at stupid, inconsiderate drivers who run over bicyclists
Hate: Drivers who don't signal and don't stop at stop signs, as well as impatient drivers (Buddy, if I could move, I would!)

Love: Meeting new people
Hate: Meeting new people

Love: My new (well, not so new now) co-worker who loves watching television, shopping and celebrity gossip as much as I do
Hate: Missing my best friend who loves watching television, shopping and celebrity gossip as much as I do

Love: Being 2,036.5 miles away from my family
Hate: Being 2,000 miles away from my friends back home

Other hates: Public transportation and the lack of parking

Other loves: Watching a major league baseball game in an open-air stadium, the dahlia and rose gardens in Golden Gate Park, Escape From New York pizza, Brothers wood charcoal Korean barbecue restaurant, bougainvillea, palm trees on city blocks

And I thought Midwest drivers were bad ...

They aren't half as bad as drivers in San Francisco.

Living in San Francisco for the past year and a half, I've honked my horn here more times than I ever did while living in the Midwest.

Drivers here don't know what a stop sign or a four-way stop is. They roll right through the intersection without evening turning their heads. They drive as if they're the only ones on the road. These days, I can't assume that a driver will stop or see me stopped at an intersection. This has saved me from numerous fender benders.

Drivers here don't know that a red light means stop before turning right. They roll right around the corner barely slowing down at all, which amazes me as the cross traffic has a green light. I've had a few cars pull out right in front of me in an intersection. One driver luckily had a bus lane to pull into to avoid hitting my car. Another whipped out, not caring at all that he almost hit me. A third car was driven by this woman who had kids in her car!

San Francisco drivers don't understand that a solid line means do not cross. The city has multiple turn lanes that are designated with solid white lines to avoid any confusion, but some people don't seem to understand the simple concept of staying within the same lane while turning the corner.

Drivers here also don't signal their turns or their lane changes. The worst incident occurred the other week when my fiancé was riding his bike home from work. He was riding along when a Porsche made a right turn without signaling, cutting him off. To avoid crashing into the car, he tried to turn and stop but instead found himself thrown over his handlebars, taking a tumble on the pavement. The driver stopped to make sure he was OK (we've heard stories in which drivers have hit people and continued driving on their merry way), and luckily he escaped with only a few cuts and bruises.

Lately, I've realized that I've become my mom when driving. I used to laugh at her when she'd drive and yell at other drivers on the road, even though the other drivers couldn't hear her. I've found myself cursing up a storm at the drivers here. I've also learned to give as good as I get. Impatient drivers will honk and yell at you, especially when the traffic ahead of you is not moving and you don't pull into the intersection because you know the light will change and you'll just end up blocking traffic. I just shake my fist at them and yell back. I once had a yelling match across driving lanes with a balding white guy in a red convertible. Jackass. Can't intimidate this little Asian girl.

Needless to say, my blood pressure goes sky high when I'm driving here. I know, I just have to chill. One day I may run into a driver with a gun and a nasty case of road rage.

San Francisco has these narrow driving lanes that used to freak me out. Now, sometimes I'd like to just reach over and slap some drivers silly.

Chocolate is the miracle food!

More good news about chocolate ...

"Dark Chocolate May Sweeten the Way to Health"

Now, you'll have to 'scuse me as I gotta go get me some dark chocolate.

The White House flip-flop scandal -- The horror!

To wear or not to wear flip-flops to the White House to meet Shrub ...

"'YOU WORE FLIP-FLOPS TO THE WHITE HOUSE?!'"

Personally, I know that I would have mortified my mother if I wore flip-flops to the White House. I was raised to dress up for church, weddings and special occasions -- oh say, for example, meeting the president of the United States.

However, it is unfortunate that the team's accomplishments are being overlooked with the focus on their footwear and that this story made front page headlines when there are other more important events and issues to cover.

Rowling's rolling in the pounds

According to AP, J.K. Rowling's newest book, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, sold about 9 million copies in the United Kingdom and the United States ... the first day it was on sale!

"Half-Blood Prince" -- hmm, does that mean the character in the book is hapa?

Come here, my little pretty!

Heard something interesting on NPR last weekend. A woman was conducting research in China and learned that many people there believe that the Chinese children adopted to the United States are used for organ harvesting.

This actually didn't surpise me. Back in college, our university paper used to do gag editions during finals. One "article" told the story of a student who had woken up in his bathtub to find his abdomen slashed on both sides and his kidneys removed. A friend from Hong Kong got totally freaked by the article until I explained the special edition of the paper. She explained that stories of organ removal for harvesting on the black market are common in China and Hong Kong.

But, getting back to the Chinese adoption/organ harvesting topic ... If the Chinese believe Americans are harvesting Chinese adoptees' organs, doesn't that make the Chinese human suppliers for organ harvesting if they continue to put their children up for U.S. adoption?

Chocolate time?

It's 11:07 a.m. Is it too early to eat chocolate-covered peanuts?

It's 11:29 a.m., and now there's an empty bag of chocolate-covered peanuts sitting on my desk.

Nope, guess not.

Welcome to Korea!

I traveled to Korea in June 2002. That was the summer the World Cup was in Korea and Japan. But that's not why I was there.

Upon arriving at Incheon International Airport (ICN), I saw the following advertisement on a baggage cart -- one of my first memories after arriving in Korea.


That ad brought a smile to my face at time when all I wanted to do was break down and cry. But I didn't, not in front of a group of strangers. After traveling more than 6,700 miles, I was physically and mentally exhausted -- but excited as well. I had finally come home.

What the f***?!

The following is a job posting for a "Proofreader/Associate Editor" at The Doctors Company, a physician-owned medical malpractice insurance company in Napa Valley:

"Provides answers to routine inquiries and other information as appropriate; processes check requests; maintains office supplies for department, including ordering, stocking and processing invoices for payment; answers department phones; processes incoming and outgoing mail on a daily basis; organizes and maintains filing systems; types routine correspondence; schedules appointments, maintains calendar, makes travel arrangements; enters, modifies and extracts database information; compiles reports as assigned; responsible for planning, implementation, monitoring and report assembly and distribution for special projects as assigned; within authority granted, develops project tracking mechanisms, identifies affected departments and components and works with cross-departmental staff to ensure they are correctly implemented; performs other duties as assigned."

The list of minimum qualification requirements was twice as long as the above description, and the only references to proofreading and editing read "excellent written, oral and telephone communication skills; good editing and proofreading skills with attention to detail."

What an insult to proofreaders and editors! What the company needs is an office grunt, and I told them so.

Hypnosis anyone?

Have you ever been hypnotized while being counseled or in a therapy session? If you have, please write me and tell me about your experience.

Thanks!

Soul food

No, I'm not talking about grits and corn bread. I'm talking kim chee, radish kim chee (깍두기), galbi (갈비), soon dubu chigae (순두부 찌개), and other Korean food.

It's said that taste is one of the strongest senses tied to memory. I wish this were true.

I don't have many memories before I was 4 or 5 years old. I don't remember eating Korean food at all, although as a toddler I must have eaten it every day until I was 3½ years old. Perhaps my umma (엄마) fed me watered-down kim chee as a baby. I don't remember.

I do remember falling in love with Korean food all over again when I was older, though.

My parents had taken me to a Korean restaurant before, but I just recall eating the barbecued beef. It wasn't until freshman year in college when I met some international Korean graduate students that I was properly introduced to a full Korean meal. We had 불고기 with lettuce leaves and 쌈장, not to mention kim chee and other 반찬. It was love (again) at first taste. The attraction, I think, was mutual.

After I figured out where I could buy Korean groceries (which may not seem difficult today, but there were only like two Korean grocery stores in the area at the time), I'd buy kim chee to eat at home. I could have lived off of kim chee, particularly the radish kind (it has that crunch factor), and rice during college.

Unfortunately, for two years I lived at home with my parents and commuted to the university. One night I brought home a jar of kim chee. I untied the plastic bag and unscrewed the lid. I was in the process of scooping out some kim chee when my mom came tearing into the kitchen, panicked. "What is that smell?!" she asked. She thought the smell of kim chee was some sort of gas fume.

After that and an incident in which my mom threw out my "stinky" kim chee just when it was reaching the perfect stage of fermentation for 김치 찌개, I left my kim chee eating to restaurants or friends' homes.

These days, I'm always up for eating Korean food. Unfortunately, unless I want to eat alone, I only eat it at most once every two weeks it seems.

My fiancé: "What should we eat?"

Me: "Korean?"

My fiancé: "Mexican?"

Me: "Korean?"

My fiancé: "Nah, I don't feel like Korean," or "We just had Korean."

How can you not want to eat Korean food??

I recently discovered that a Korean restaurant down the street from where we live just changed management, and I am so excited! We had eaten at the restaurant before, but had been disappointed with the 반찬 and hadn't gone back. Under new management, however, I'm happy to say they have a wonderful array of 반찬, including my favorite 미역채 (you'll have to excuse the spelling if it's incorrect -- I don't normally spell it, I just eat it), which I hadn't found in San Francisco since I moved.

My goal is to visit every Korean restaurant in San Francisco. On City Search, I counted 25 Korean restaurants in the city. I think I'm at seven so far.

Since moving to the Bay Area, I've been able to enjoy all sorts of different cuisine, from Indian and Pakistani to Eritrean. My favorites are still Korean and sushi, though. (And fortunately, I live just down the street from an excellent Korean restaurant and a great sushi place.)

One day I was eating at a restaurant and picked up a pickled cucumber from a side dish. (Wouldn't that be a pickle, you ask? Well, it wasn't quite a pickle.) After biting into that cucumber, I almost cried. The taste and texture were so familiar that they triggered an emotional reaction. I don't recall ever eating it before, but something told me perhaps I had eaten it as a young child.

The same thing happened in college when I ate some of those plump, juicy Asian grapes. I swore I had eaten them as a child in Korea.

I wish more Korean food could help me recall my lost early memories. I'd eat it every day.

Hello, snubfin!

These days, it's more common to hear about an animal becoming extinct, but a new species of dolphin, the Australian Snubfin, has been discovered near the Great Barrier Reef ...

"New dolphin found at Barrier Reef"

American women rock!

How funny is it that two Americans will be in the Wimbledon women's singles final match over the Fourth of July holiday weekend? And, it's not Williams vs. Williams.

Twenty-nine-year-old Lindsay Davenport, who currently holds the No. 1 ranking in the world for women's tennis and is the top-seeded women's singles player at Wimbledon, will play 25-year-old, No. 14-seeded Venus Williams on Saturday at the All England Club.

Davenport won the women's singles Wimbledon title in 1999, and Williams is a two-time Wimbledon women's singles champion (2000 and 2001).

Let the fireworks begin!

You go, girls!!

Two tickets, please!

I just read about a new documentary, "March of the Penguins," that I'm going to have to see. Check out these babies!

I've heard that penguins mate for life, but some researchers say that's not always the case. Check out this article: "The Coldest Profession: Antarctica's Red-Light District."

Here's another interesting article on the mating habits of penguin: "They're in love. They're gay. They're penguins ... And they're not alone."


Addition (August 12, 1:50 p.m.):

I finally saw this documentary last week, and I give it two thumbs up and highly recommend it. Currently, I have the "March of the Penguins" wallpaper screensaver on my computer. You, too, can download images from the documentary at the Warner Independent Pictures Web site.

I need a copy editor

Geesh, just reread my last post. I need a copy editor for my blog. Feel free to e-mail me corrections.^*

I found this post on compound-modifier hyphens by Bill Walsh:

My point is that compound-modifier hyphens, or the lack thereof, affect the way phrases are pronounced as well as the way they're read by those of us who can do so without moving our lips.

And here's another post by Walsh on using multiple hyphens.

I'm such an amateur copy editor. I'm not worthy.

Gotta love Reuters ...

On the 29th, Reuters ran an article titled, "Study shows radiation causes cancer but rarely," which stated the following:

A low dose of about 100 millisieverts of radiation -- the equivalent of 10 chest x-rays -- can be expected to cause cancer in one out of every 100 people, the report finds.

The next day Reuters ran a correction, or should I say a corretion?

CORRETION: Study shows radiation may cause cancer

Last Updated: 2005-06-30 15:15:23 -0400 (Reuters Health)

[In June 29 WASHINGTON story headlined "Study shows radiation causes cancer but rarely" please read in fourth paragraph "... the equivalent of 1,000 chest X-rays ..." instead of "... the equivalent of 10 chest X-rays ..." A corrected story follows]

First of all, it's bad enough to confuse 10 chest X-rays with 1,000 X-rays, but to post your correction with "CORRETION" is just too much.


*I may or may not make your suggested corrections. Gimme a break! I didn't say I was a good copy editor. I'm only human, and usually sleep-deprived. I do not guarantee that this blog is free of punctuation, spelling, grammar and usage errors. Check out my links for other blogs and reference sites.