Hello

Hello, its my first entry of 2007. Its been a rather busy New Year so far for me. For New Year's Eve, I went to Wei-Ling's and Cyrus's New Years Party. That was quite fun. I spent most of New Years eve, drinking rum with some amount of coke with it, playing Cranium and Wii, and hanging with CWP$, DJ, Doris, Phill, Jen, Paul & Jen, and various others that I probably should have remembered but don't. Phill came into town so I hung out with him. For example, we went to Santana Row and saw Children of Men with Carl. It was a really good movie but not the most terribly uplifting one. If you want a light movie to cheer up your afternoon, it definitely wasn't it. In other news, Olga arrived in the bay area so I hung out with her (by playing Mexican Train Dominos where i got my ass handed to me by ringing up a whopping 102 on one round). We also met up with Noor and went to the city to see Rasika, who was visiting. Also Vishnu came into town this past weekend so I hung out with him. We had dim sum on the weekend even though he neglected to me until I actually drove to meet him and hopped into CWP's car. Wow, I just realized I dropped quite a few names just now.

Recently, work got super busy. It's ironic. I work at the best company to work for according to Fortune Magazine. The week they make that announcement, turns out to be one of the busiest and tiring since I started. Yeah, lots of people forget that while it seems like a party with all the perks we get, it is also a lot of work. I worked a couple of 13 hour days last week. Needless to say, that wasn't fun. One of the reasons is that due to project deadlines, I had to work on two studies at once. Which is not entirely out of the ordinary, but both of them were a lot of work. I am prepping a field study for later this month so I had to plan it and run the pilot this past week. I also got stuck with some duties that are supposed to rotate within in our team but for some reason, have rotated to me three times in a row. The only explanation I got from several of other individuals who should have had the duties rotate to them was "sorry, can't help, got another study." Well I have another study too but you don't see me ducking out of it. So I was in a pissy mood last week since apparently everyone was too busy to handle these duties and work on their studies but it is obviously okay for me to handle both. I also was perturbed that a few months ago, I postponed a study I was working on to handle these duties because the person who was supposed to handle them had, guess what, another study to work on. I think a few people in my group noticed I was pretty cheesed off about the situation. I got MLK day off and I am taking Tuesday off, my first day off since i started, to cool off, re-energize, and relax. In hindsight, the pace that i have been working at is unsubstainable and will probalby burn me out if I don't let up. So I plan on taking more vacation days from now on. Yeah, so this past week was I think of one of the few times when I didn't want to go to work, I mean...like really didn't want to go. As you probably guessed, I am still pretty steamed about it.

In other news, I already fullfilled one of my New Years resolutions. Put your tape decks on record, I went out on a date. So I can write off that resolution and don't need to go on any more dates for the rest of the year. Well to make a long story short, I thought the date went alright (we talked for two hours over coffee). However, the next day I get a text message saying that she got back to together with her ex. So here is a lesson to everyone out there: if you know any women who wants to get back with their boyfriends, just tell them to go on a date with me. Also I shouldn't go on dates with law librarians anymore.

To end this entry on a random note, I've been noticing this trend in books, movies, and tv. It happens when someone gives a long expository monologue or speech about something (usually about something profound and meaningful) that nearly, almost 99% percent make the point. Then there is a long pause, and then they or someone else follows up with a terse statement or one-liner which is supposed to wrap up or drive home the point. I started noticing in books but also noticed it in movies. In the Usual Suspects, the suspects are talking about hijacking this boat and there is a lot of back/forth about it, which ends with someone saying that anyone that goes on the boat isn't coming out alive. Q the long pause and then Stephen Baldwin says, "I heard its raining in New York." Booyah! Point driven!

I should use that technique in real life, perhaps on dates. I could go into a long, rambling monologue, which I normally do about something important (politics, philosphy, relationships, history, honesty, or whatever. The purpose of this long important speech like thing is to show off my obviously deep thinking conscience but in reality, it is a mere ploy to set up my snazzy long pause with snappy one-loner hence making it not profound nor meaningful since it is just a facade for a technique used repeatedly by obviously more talented and creative individuals.

Picasso said great artists steal

Booyah! I am getting the hang out it already. Anyway, its time to shuffle off to dreamland. Until next time, peace.