Sunday, November 30, 2003
Post Thanksgiving Day Musings. Another Thanksgiving day come and gone. I think that Thanksgiving has different meanings for a lot of people. Historically (and generally speaking), it's a day to celebrate how the Pilgrims survived in the colonies (with the help of the Native Americans). But in reality, the Native Americans were eventually betrayed as the New Worlds began to develop. Nowadays, people sort of look at Thanksgiving as a day to be "thankful for what you have." (Although I like to give people the benefit of the doubt and know that they are probably already thankful for their blessings on a daily basis).
Sometimes, I do think holiday gatherings are contrived in the sense that people are obligated to spend time with family and friends when sometimes in their hearts, they're just not feeling it. Nevertheless, I don't think people have lost sight of what certain days should mean. So during the holidays, people grin and bear the burden of the prepations, the commerciality, and the materialism involved in such holidays. In any case, I think it's important to spend the holidays in a way that you feel comfortable with. So this is how I spent my Thanksgiving weekend:
Wednesday: we got to leave work early at 3:30 pm. Ah, the perks of government. The hubs and I watched Lord of the Rings: Fellowship, that night.
Thursday: We went to Queens to spend Thanksgiving lunch with my family. My cousin Gian was visiting from Illinois. He's on his last semester at SIU (on a tennis scholarship) and drove down (a whopping 16 hours) to NYC with 2 of his girlfriends who were very nice. My Tita Baby, Tito Manu, and cousin Nitin were also there --which is good because we hardly ever see them despite them living in Edison, NJ. Great food. Then we drove back to NJ to Mark's aunt's house in Leonia for dinner with his side of the family. Great food once again. (But surprise, for the first time in years, I didn't eat too much!) We played Mario Kart Double Dash all night there. I also met Jack, Mark's newborn, 2-month old nephew. He was so round and little! Then everyone started to "hint" that maybe it should be our turn. Really, I'm very eager to start a family. My only thought at this point is that I just started my job, and would like to be there at least a year and change before I go off for maternity leave. Otherwise, I would certainly go for it right now.
Friday: Cleaned up, did chores, did nothing special. That night though, we watched LOTR: Two Towers!! I must say, I remember a lot of the lines by heart, and it's only the 3rd time I've watched it. I also watched a lot of the special features...yes I know, I'm a geek...
Saturday and Sunday: More chores and cleaning up. This house thing sure does suck. There's so much to clean up still. I wish we had a nice, brand-new, spacious home. (Actually, for the price of the home, we could get a really nice, big, new-ish home deeper into the suburbs of NJ.) But I like Fort Lee and wanted to be in an area where I could be near the city and public transportation. So instead, we have a fixer-upper that we have to fix ourselves. I like our house, but I just want to fast-forward to where everything is in its' place and we have done the renovations that we want. Like replacing all the windows, the kitchen remodeling, and the second floor expansion. It takes a lot of time to make your house into a home. On the bright side, our living room looks halfway decent.
Holiday Gripes. I think my next blog will be a list of pet-peeves during the holidays. But I gotta sign off. There's raking to be done.
POSTED BY KAT AT
11/30/2003 01:23:00 PM |
Thursday, November 27, 2003
POSTED BY KAT AT
11/27/2003 11:01:00 AM |
Friday, November 21, 2003
Random Friday Morning Thoughts. I was driving to work today and found myself thinking about the past. Actually, I think about the past a lot and dwell on things that I have no control over. As they say, what’s done is done. In any case, this morning I was thinking about things that-could-have-been. I’m sure you’ve all done it –that is, think about what your life would be like today if only you didn’t do something or did something or made a better decision way back then. For me, one of my biggest regrets is staying in a situation that I knew was not healthy. Yes, boys and girls, this morning’s blog is about exes (among other things), but I’ll only touch on a small point of it today. Okay, I have not really told this to anyone, but I keep dwelling on the fact that I missed out on my college life because of my past relationship. I missed making a lot of college friends, going to football games, going out to pubs/bars with other college kids, learning more about my professors, meeting new guys who go to the same college as me, even the walk of shame! and other random little things. To an extent, yes I did most of the above, but not enough of it. To this day, I only have very few friends that I met in college that I consider a close friend (and vice versa). Basically, I think I squandered the whole college experience. But like I said, what’s done is done and I can’t really do anything about it. More later.
Among “Other” Things. Last night, I went to a work-related dinner/reception for the Human Relations Commission (HRC). My supervisor and section chief are both Executive Members and they invited other prosecutors to tag along. Basically (from my understanding of it), the HRC is an organization whose mission is to promote diversity, cultural understanding, and improve race relations in Hudson County. They do this by helping other groups create programs within their own communities. For example, the funded this high school organization called ERASE (Erase Racism and Sexism Everywhere); ERASE had programs like World-Day, etc in their school to try to help students understand and appreciate different cultures. During their speeches, I realized something about racial identity that I never really thought about before: you’re only an “other” if you are a minority in a country with a majority race (generally speaking). Pretty simple really. This of course, I knew about (being a minority myself), but I never really thought much about it. This totally explains my own actions like joining a Filipino Students club at school, or working for an Asian American non-profit organization. When I was younger, I had wanted to learn more about my culture within the context of a larger framework of racial identity in the United States. But now, I’m so over this whole dialogue on race and ethnicity for the most part. To me, I’m Filipino, period. And I live in America, period. I was never one to say “I’m Filipino-American” and I don’t particularly like the use of that hyphenated term. I think attaching the term “-American” is a misnomer (within the Filipino/American identity context). I think it’s being misused and attached in order to promote the idea that one should be considered “American” in terms of using it as a status symbol (by some people), or of being patriotic, or of having allegiance, or being adoptive of the cultural and socio-economic idealisms of this nation. I personally don’t think you need to say “I’m Filipino-American” in order to convey the notion that you have ties to this country. Yes, I live in this country and I appreciate a lot (but not all!) of its ideals and the opportunities it has given me. I don’t think I need to “prove” that I’m American enough (or patriotic enough) for anybody by attaching “-American” next to my ethnicity. Hm…perhaps I may be going off in a tangent. In any case…essentially, I think you just have to be comfortable with your own sense of identity period, whether if it’s through your ethnicity, your hobbies, your gender, whatever. That’s just my own opinion.
TGIF. I am so tired already. I don’t think I got enough sleep, and I know that I’m going out tonight to a party. One word: coffee. I also wanted to go to an acquaintance’s show tonight, but it starts at 7 pm. I don’t get home until 6 pm and I know I won’t have enough time to go home, change, then go out again and be there by 7 pm. Perhaps next time. But I’m looking forward to tonight because I haven’t gone out dancing and socializing with my friends for a while. Whooohooo!
POSTED BY KAT AT
11/21/2003 12:08:00 PM |
Sunday, November 16, 2003
Winter Laziness. Sometimes, I feel like writing tons of material on this blog, but you know how you just get lazy and brush it off? Sometimes, just the whole prospect of trying to form coherent thoughts and typing them out into consecutive sentences is just plain taxing. So you know what, I won't bother organizing my thoughts and will just type whatever comes to me for the next 10 minutes. I think I'm being lazy since it's cold out and all I want to do is bury myself under a throw, wear sweats, and watch Alias on DVD. Man, I must say, that show rocks. Last week, after work, I watched the Alias Season 1, Disc 1 non-stop for 420 minutes. I think that was on Monday? Talk about being a couch potato! Otherwise though, there's really nothing going on that's new. But oh yes! I must tell you about my horrible day at work this past Friday when an attorney (my adversary on a case) condescendingly asked me "Excuse, but are you even an attorney? I mean, can you even appear in court?" I was bloody appalled! I mean, I introduced myself as being the attorney for the State, then proceeded to talk to him about the case! Who the hell was I supposed to be if I wasn't the attorney on the case? Secondly, he replies by questioning my capacity as counsel. Then thirdly, he smugly say "Oh sorry Claudia" even though I told him my name three times!! Bloody bastard. Okay, and that was the least of my problems. While we were in court on his case, I acted like a blabbering idiot, thereby reinforcing his notion that I must be some wanna-be attorney with an IQ of 10 who doesn't know what she's doing....Okay, okay...this is all coming out convoluted, and really, this should be on my work blog, but like I said, I'm lazy.... So here's my cringe-ingly embarassing tale:
Okay, after the introductions, we go in front of the judge (who is this fabulously wonderful, warm, and very patient lady). After stating our names for the record, the judge asks me "What is the state's position at this time?" Well I reply like an ass and say "Well your honor, we have extended an offer to the defense at this time, but he wants to like, make a motion to suppress evidence and I really don't know why, because...whatever." Yes, I trailed off just like that and said those words just like that. I mean, I sounded like a moron. The defense's whole issue was this e-mail that was entered into evidence, except that we were supposed to give him this evidence 2 weeks ago (as opposed to 2 days ago when he actually got it. So, he was moving to suppress the evidence for being late). I should've just let the judge finish talking and let it go. But no, I further dig my ass into a whole by saying "well your honor, to be fair, it's not like his client couldn't have printed out the e-mail himself. It would've made it much easier." Okay, the split second I said that, I realized the State had the Burden of Proof --which I DO KNOW, so I quickly added "I mean I know we have the burden of proof, but it just seems the attorney could've gotten the evidence if he really wanted it so bad." Not quite the best follow up argument. I'm just replaying the whole scene in my head and I can't believe I sounded like a freaking dunce!! Especially after that attorney already questioned me about being able to stand in court!! Argh...Perhaps I let my emotions get the best of me. In any case, I felt so incredibly low and I was just happy that it was over. Now, the case is set for trial on Dec. 5th and I'm so going to BRING IT in court!! Bloody embarassing. And now, since that happened, I'm so scared for Monday (yes, tomorrow) when I have my first trial. I'm so scared I'm make a fool of myself again! Argh. Do wish me luck!
POSTED BY KAT AT
11/16/2003 07:41:00 PM |
Sunday, November 2, 2003
Halloween Hoopla. So this past Halloween went by smoothly. The hubs worked from home this past Friday while I actually went to work. So he was the one to give out the Halloween candy and got to see the kiddies in their costumes. By the time I actually came home ('round 6 pm), there was only one group of trick-or-treaters that I got to hand out candy to. Then that night, the hubs and I went to a friend (of a friend's) party at Kanvas. This was my get-up: an enormous afro, a shiny disco-ish black top w/ a fushia colored tube top underneath, three necklaces that were 70's-ish, flared jeans (couldn't find my bells!), a military jacket, and sunglasses. Okay, I was trying to look like Cleopatra Jones or Foxy Brown, but came off looking more like a Civil Rights activist. I must say, the 'fro is pretty versatile. Next year, I will definitely use it and either go as a sleazy disco man (as in that guy from the Simpsons who tried to seduce Marge) or Erykah Badu or even an old-skool basketball player.
The party itself was cool. We left the house at 9:55 pm and got to the party in less than 20 minutes. Absolutely no traffic on the West Side Highway (which was not what I expected). The party was not as crowded as I had expected it to be, and we basically chatted with friends that whole night. At some point, however, I had to take off the 'fro since the little booth we had just got so hot.
Wash and Learn. We tried out the washer today. It's actually spinning as I type. It's front-loading washer and the hubs and I spent about 15 minutes just staring at it. In particular, we were concerned that it wasn't lathering enough. But this is our test-run, so I guess if the clothes come out looking dirty, we could always do it again.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIKEY! Today is my little bro Mikey's 13th birthday. Wow. He is officially a teenager!! We're going over to have lunch with him today and celebrate.
POSTED BY KAT AT
11/02/2003 11:08:00 AM |
