Five years ago today I started working full-time at the company of my dreams. As I am still there, I have already been labeled a lifer, and I'm perfectly fine with that. Loyalty is way underrated these days, if you ask me. Actually, you didn't, but I said it anyway.
The fact is, we do some pretty amazing stuff, and I'm still thrilled to be a part of it every day. Here are just a few highlights from the past couple years.
John Piper is coming to speak at my church this Friday, the same day that I fly to Minneapolis, his hometown. This is not only trivial coincidence, but brutal irony. I love John Piper. Moreover, he'll be enjoying 50°+ weather in Seattle, while I'll be picking frozen boogers in 28° temperature highs. Nevertheless, I'm excited to visit Minneapolis for the first time and to celebrate with good friends at Wedding #1 of 2010.
After the wedding, I'll be boarding a short flight to Chicago to celebrate my dad's birthday. There the temperatures will reach a balmy 35°. If six years in California wore down my cold threshold, three subsequent years in temperate Seattle have dealt the final blow. I've been wussified. But whatever. I still look forward to a great, if freezing, weekend at home in the Midwest.
You know what else is cool? I used to hang out with this guy. And by "hang out," I mean I was occasionally paid to keep an eye on him. (Is it still called "babysitting" when they're ten years old and you're chatting with them about robots?) That was ten years ago. This Tuesday I'll be cheering for him and Team USA.
Today I found myself entering the name of a coworker into my cell phone. His name is Mansoor, but Sony Ericsson's built-in dictionary assumed that I meant Manpons. Um, right. Sounds like something for me to put into my manpurse, in the company of my iPad (with wings).
No doubt, Urban Dictionary already has entries for all these. And so much more.
Poor Mansoor...
I'm not actually still in Japan, though by the looks of my last post, one might begin to wonder.
2009 was an intense year. It wasn't as bad as 2008 or previous years -- no one died among family and friends this year, hooray -- but it was definitely breakneck speed at times. A year ago, I wouldn't have planned to travel so many miles (Japan and Alaska both for the first time!), attend so many weddings (nine, almost ten), work so many hours (68 in one particularly grueling week), catch up with so many old friends (ah, Facebook), and lose so much hair (2010 resolution: Rogaine?). Oh, and eat horse (somehow forgot that one while blogging from Japan). I guess it was a year of surprises. The only unsurprising statistic is how little I blogged. Goodness, I can still see the post from a year ago on the front page.
In a matter of hours, we draw the curtain on a decade that I've taken great pleasure in calling the Naughties. Coming up are the Teens, I guess? Sounds so adolescent...and awkward. So promising, yet pubescent. It's gonna be great.
Happy New Year.
Now in Tokyo. Still haven't come down with whatever disease is plaguing my sister, but am probably nursing a few million germs by now. Incubation will likely finish right around the time I board my flight home. I can already imagine the other passengers rolling their eyes at me in disgust. I will laugh if I contract swine flu...and then I will cough a little from laughing so hard. It would just be too ironic.
Asahi was pleasant, but Tokyo is much more English-friendly, and the subway system makes me happy. Meanwhile, a childhood friend of my mom hooked us up with a condo, internet access, spare cell phone, copious antibiotics, and her personal translation/navigation services, which makes this portion of our trip a whole lot easier. She simply rocks, as does my mom for having such great friends.
I'll wrap up with some thoughts from the past few days...
Apologies and pardons.
What would seem like profuse and unnecessary self-deprecation back in the States is nothing short of a national pastime here. I could get used to this!
Playing Japanese tourist.
Super fun in Japan, as there is no shame in whipping out the camera anywhere and everywhere.
Export/import industry.
Renders souvenir shopping almost pointless, as there are precious few things one couldn't just buy at Uwajimaya back in Seattle. My friends at home wouldn't know where their gifts came from. Either sad or awesome, can't decide.
"Vacation" with the family.
A bit of an oxymoron, it would seem.
Blue screen of death.
Even scarier in Japanese. Can now relate with the parents and their experiences with technology.
Japanese toilet paper.
More prone to tear longitudinally than across the transverse perforation. Whatever. Will wipe with streamers if necessary. Which brings us to my final thought...
Bidets.
Oh, wow. o_O
For those of you who happen to be cursed gifted with a visually-prone imagination like I, you are welcome.
It was time to fly, and so I did. For dirt cheap. I flew on the airline whose paint schemes I've always liked, whose ad campaigns I truly respect, and whose slogan I totally stole for this blog. Ah, United. Thank you for being so desperate to stay afloat that I could fly to Japan for only $645.
So I'm currently in the provincial town of Asahi, about an hour outside of Tokyo, visiting with my mom and staying with my sister who's lived here for the past couple months. Hooray for vacation, good times with the family, and, of course, good eats.
As if my recent 401K performance weren't insulting enough, some of the depressing figures in my latest mailed statement were printed in Comic Sans -- that ugly, overused font that mimics children's handwriting.
Seriously, what is this? A note from my piggy bank?
Just a few thoughts to kick off a new year for my blog. For those of you wondering how I'm doing, maybe these random snapshots will help you piece together a picture of my life at the moment. I don't care if it looks like a Picasso.
Hosting family and friends for the holidays can be draining, but always fulfilling and ultimately enjoyable. Definitely a cheer.
Unfortunately, the momentum of cleaning up my house didn't extend far into my disaster zone of a bedroom. This would be a jeer.
Cheer: We enjoyed a white Christmas.
Jeer: Home Depot is still sold out of snow shovels.
Cheer: I enjoyed returning to work in the new year, and I'm still loving this job...for as long as I have it, anyway.
Jeer: The bad economy, and ensuing layoffs to be announced at my company. We'll see what happens to me.
Cheer: My vision apparently improved the slightest bit possible over last year. I celebrated and bought an awesome new pair of glasses. Hooray, titanium.
Jeer: Said awesome pair of glasses cost me way too much. That's what I get for shopping at a store named "Eye Society."
Cheer: I've started running again these days.
Jeer: After the extended holiday break, run = sore.
Cheer: A new season of 24. Featuring a 767 and an A340! Okay, maybe not featuring...
Jeer: No more episodes of "Pushing Daisies." (I still despise ABC for canceling it.)
Jeer: I have no more cheers.
Jeer: I'm finding more white hairs on my head. They apparently grow in symmetrical pairs on both sides of my head. (I guess it's a cheer that I still have hair to speak of.)
Jeer: My inbox stands at 111 unread emails.
Double jeer: My spam folder contains 666.
Okay, I lied, I can think of one more cheer. Megan, a friend from church, got me The Book of Whale Insults for Christmas. Let me close with an excerpt from this gem of non-fiction reading:
It's funny how sometimes it can feel like time is flying by, while simultaneously dragging on forever. It's probably just a matter of perspective, like running through a forest. The trees whiz by, but the forest is never ending.
And with about the same speed and simultaneous sloth went the year 2008. It's been exhausting and I'm glad it's on its way out.
I look forward to 2009, if for no other reason than the proverbial fresh start. I think one of my resolutions will be to spend more time on hobbies. There's something to be said for the rejuvenating quality of spending time, energy, and effort on activities for leisure. I've learned that sleeping through the weekends or staring at the television aren't much more than coping mechanisms. (Although I still hate ABC for canceling "Pushing Daisies"...apparently the show was too brilliant for the general American audience.)
Anyway, if I succeed with this resolution, I might just blog a little more regularly. Imagine a new year full of entertaining, witty, and brilliant blog posts. Now hold that thought. For another blogger.
I'll do what I can.
Happy New Year.
This is my first post of 2008. Man. I've been so busy, I feel like I've gotten behind in life.
And then Daylight Savings comes and very nearly gets the best of my ignorant self. (Thank goodness for late Saturday emails from those who are more responsible than I.)
I'd lament the fact that I'll now be waking up to a darker morning, but we all know that I hardly get up early enough to notice any difference.
I didn't realize people would find the squirrel picture as amusing as I did (typically the case...for most things), so I figured I might as well share my other picture of the vagrant squirrel.
Try to ignore the weed garden in my backyard.
Check out how high it actually climbed on the screen! And this was one bold rodent. I tried scaring it from the other side of the window, and it didn't even flinch. It just stared back at me with its beady, defiant little eyes. (See previous squirrel picture.)
In other news, it's a good thing I took my car into the shop yesterday. Though it cost me $240 (yay, BMW), I was able to run errands without fear of the falling snow. Crucial errands like buying a snowboard! With a navy blue and lime green design, it was seriously one of the easiest purchase decisions I've ever made.
O, Christmas tree?
Living in The Emerald City of The Evergreen State, it's no wonder that people are a little disappointed in this scrawny shrub. In fact, it's already been dubbed the Charlie Brown tree. You can read about how it got to be so ugly here.
Cue Psycho music.
Not quite as repulsive as the black squirrels that terrorize the Stanford campus. In fact, almost cute. Almost, that is, if it didn't look so intent on finding a way into my house. Gah...
So I'm back in Seattle now.
Tonight I watched a friend play a nun in a local production of "The Sound of Music." The entire musical was very well done, I thought. My favorite part was when Liesl climbed into Maria's bedroom, after her torrid midnight rendezvous with the postman/closet-Nazi Rolfe. She was drenched from the rain, and as she climbed awkwardly through the bedroom window, I was reminded of a scene from "The Ring," when the antagonist climbs out of the television, wet locks and all. I laughed.
There were several other funny moments (intentional or not) throughout the musical, but I'll just share one more. At the very beginning, as the pit orchestra started playing, it was apparent that not all the sections were playing in tune. And after hearing a few, mmm, jazzy chords, I had to look down and stop myself from laughing out loud. A friend seated next to me (also a musician/pitch snob) was doing the same. But while we merely smiled in condescending judgment, a Chinese woman behind us actually voiced her thoughts out loud. Some of the sentiment is lost in translation, but she basically muttered, "Aiya, how could the music be so bad? This is worse than a children's band." Ouch. It really wasn't that bad, and the pitchy punishment didn't last.
Speaking of outspoken Chinese people, I had a great time in Hong Kong and Chengdu. Even though my race was questioned constantly by the people I met. "Are you Korean? Japanese? Surely not Chinese..." And this would be after I spoke Chinese. Sad.
Here's a small selection of photos from my trip.
This was the seafood menu from one of my dinners in Hong Kong:
(Click on it to view the full-sized picture.)
On the bottom right: "Crispy yuppies topped with golden garlic, chili & onion." How appetizing...I always wanted to know what yuppies taste like! Also note the "Crispy soft shell crabs with Szechuan red pepper." I would've preferred "crab" singular, but what can you do? I ordered it anyway.
Behold, said crabs:
Look how it dwarfs the Bank of America building to the left. (I am not making political commentary here.)
After Hong Kong, I flew up to Chengdu, China. And what's a visit to Chengdu without seeing the local pandas?
"Mmm, bamboo..." This one was a bit of a messy eater.
And here are the red pandas. I personally would have named them "raccoon foxes," but what do I know? Cute little monsters.
Eating...sleeping...yeah, that's the life.
Now time for me to take a lesson from the pandas.Only when jetlagged might I be mistaken for an early bird. Local time is 6:54am and I feel as though I've slept in. I haven't decided whether to rejoice or mourn.
No complaints for now, though. I know the jetlag from flying back to the States will be far, far worse.
A "Cathay Delight" kiwi and coconut juice cocktail and scallop hors d'oeuvre. Even the neighboring glass of water looks good.
And all this was after, yes, the pre-flight champagne.
I decided to stop taking pictures, lest everyone identify me as that guy who had clearly never before flown international business class.
I've been a ball of snot for the past couple weeks. Besides the events surrounding my last post, this may be due to the pollen in Seattle. I'm not surprised, because I do have a history of allergies to a variety of airborne plant sperm.
On the other hand, I could just be sick from all my recent travels. I know from my college days that I have an immune system about as effective as that of an agar-filled petri dish. So what's the deal? Is my immune system hyperactive or retarded?
No, I'm not done ranting.
Besides my water faucet nose, I also have a water slide throat. One that feels as though some kid slid down it in a sandpaper raft. Ahem. (Ouch.)
I do look forward to the end of this. My octave-lower-than-usual speaking voice was fun for maybe the first hour at work today, but it quickly got old. Plus, I'm flying down to Stanford this Wednesday, so I assume my fellow passengers would appreciate it if I weren't coughing up a storm. That's like the third most annoying thing on a flight, right up there with screaming babies and silent-but-deadly gas-passers.
Speaking of all this, my like-minded roommate shared this image with me last night:
A while back, I promised that I would introduce to you more of the new friends I've made in the Seattle area. And then you heard no mention of them for two months. Really, I can make friends. Look!
This is Sarah, the friend who left her three dachsunds at my place once upon a time:
Today is Easter, a celebration of the most significant person and event in the history of the Christian church, and I gotta say, Mars Hill Church sure knows how to celebrate.
This weekend was also the culmination of two months of rehearsals with the Mars Hill choir. On Good Friday, we sang "Lacrimosa" from the Mozart Requiem. It's a great piece that isn't hard for a classically-trained choir (most of us have sung the piece at some point in the past). So our singing on Good Friday went by without a hitch. Well, with just one exception. That was when a fog machine started generating smoke a little earlier than any of us expected, blowing the stuff right into our singing faces. It's a good thing we were behind an opaque scrim, or else people would've seen me trying painfully not to laugh at the sheer absurdity of the situation. All this, while we sang about a day of weeping. But, anyway, Friday was Good.
Then there was our repertoire for Easter Sunday. We got asked to sing gospel-style backup for Mars Hill's resident funk band, The Brothers of the Empty Tomb. Now that was interesting. You must understand, there is not a single black person in our choir. In an earlier rehearsal, our director even did an impression of Kip Dynamite (brother of Napoleon) singing "I love technology"...as her impression of us. Sad. But, thank God for blessing The BET with an awesome lead singer and a world class guitarist (you can read about them on pages 6 and 19 here). With their energy and skill, it wasn't hard to get into the music today and actually move with it! It was awesome and fun.
So, yeah, Mars Hill is still working on diversity. In fact, look here:
Behold the diversity at Mars Hill. 
