Rainbow Birthday Jell-O

My mom gave Haley a list of things that she could make me for my birthday. She chose rainbow jell-o. I'm excited.

I Miss This

Holiday Plans

Only two more weeks...

Dec. 21-29: SoCal
Dec. 30-31: Cancun/Isla de Mujeres, Mexico
Jan. 1-2: Valladolid, Mexcio & Chichen Itza
Jan. 3-4: Coba & Tulum, Mexico
Jan. 4: Cancun, Mexico
Jan. 5- Back to NYC

Wow.

(picture taken by Caroline)

"Our stories are singular but our destinies are shared." - President-elect Obama

"If you're conservative and angry, get over yourself." - Fox News commentary after Obama's speech

Lost In Beirut

I just found this song a day ago and I can't get it out of my head, especially the haunting horns.

Oh What A Week!

This past week was one of the most fun times I’ve had in the city. It wasn’t because of some crazy party bender and it wasn’t because I was going to a bunch of huge events; it was because I got a chance to see so many of my friends in one weeks time and just catch up with all of them in a very relaxed way.

Sunday
On Sunday, I had brunch at Essex with one of my frosh, Devin. I haven’t seen Devin since November and I was disappointed that I was not able to make it back to Williams for graduation. However, it was good to see him and get the rundown of his senior year, how the rest of the entry was doing, and his future plans.

One thing that was kind of embarrassing was finding out that some of my freshman didn’t graduate this year. I’m not embarrassed that they didn’t graduate; I’m embarrassed because I sent them all a congratulations e-mail for graduation that basically said: sorry I can’t be there, but congratulations on graduating (I’m assuming you all graduated, right? hehehehe). Oh well, it was an innocent mistake. I do, however, feel a little bad because I think I may have contributed indirectly to my freshman not graduating. During my junior year (their freshman year), I don’t think I set a very good example in terms of completing my schoolwork and going to class. I think, to some small degree, that rubbed off on some of them. But I take solace in knowing that all of that is somewhat balanced out by the fact that my entry also produced their class’ valedictorian! Congrats Priyanka!

Another great thing about brunch was that we ran into Vero and Elena at Essex. That’s the thing I love the most about NYC: running into people you know in the most random places, in such a huge city!

Later that night, I went over to Korey and Margo’s new apartment in Brooklyn for a “family dinner.” I had not been over since they had finished renovating/fixing up the place and I was pleasantly surprised. They did a really nice job turning the place into a warm and inviting home, with nicely painted accent walls, tons of furniture, photos, new track lighting, etc. That atmosphere really helped make the “family dinner” feel like, well, a family dinner. They invited a bunch of people over, mostly Northwestern peoples who I’ve met over the years, and it was a fun time. Margo and Korey cooked a great meal which included cheese platters, fresh guacamole, potato salad, chicken satay, stuffed, vegan-friendly peppers, shrimp and crab cakes, cheesecake and a vegan-friendly chocolate cake. We ended the night by going to their roof which had a great view of downtown Brooklyn and Manhattan, similar to the view from Korey’s old place. The only sad thing about the night was seeing the kittens, Francoise (sp?) and Maxamillion, who were really drugged up and out of it since they had just been neutered earlier in the day.

Monday
Monday night was a throwback to my senior year. Evan and I went over to Dani’s apartment in Harlem to try and revive our old tradition of poker night. (Dave was supposed to come as well, but he pussied out because he was stressed about work; the NY Times so owns him right now.) Dani cooked us dinner which, as usual, was wonderful. Dinner included a refreshing salad, a pasta salad, lemon and zucchini chicken, and strawberry shortcake with homemade whip cream. One of the things I really miss about college is living with Dani. We had a lot of fun times at Susie Hopkins and cooking was a big part of that. Lately, I’ve been able to convince Dani to cook more food which has lead to me freezer being full over wonderful homemade pasta sauces. Now I just need to get her to make me some of her delicious Irish soda bread.

After dinner, we pulled out the cards and played poker. During senior year, we were pretty consistent in getting a poker game going almost every week. We had a great group of people who would come over to play. Sadly, a lot of them are not in NYC so we are working on trying to form a new group. Playing poker with 3 people just doesn’t cut it.

At first, I was killing everyone; Evan even had to buy back in really early. However, my luck soon changed and I was struggling just to stay in the game. Before we knew it, it was already 1 AM. We were all getting pretty tired, but how can you end a poker game without at least bankrupting one person? So on what turned out to be the final hand, I went all-in having two pair, aces and kings; I thought I had it. Dani went all-in with me too. But then Dani flips her cards over…4 aces. What a way to end the night.

Tuesday
Tuesday afternoon, I got a call at work; it was Sean, one of my frosh. Like Devin, the last time I had seen him was back at Homecoming in November. Sean was going to be in the city that night and wanted to grab dinner and drinks. Before dinner, he came by my apartment to get a quick tour (which doesn’t take long since I live in a studio). Then we went to Brother Jimmy’s to grab some beers and BBQ.

I was really happy to see Sean and catch up with him. Sean was definitely one of my favorite frosh and one that I spent a lot of time with, mostly because he lived right across the hall from me and because we were always so terrible at getting our work done and as such, we were always up until 4 AM in the common room together, frantically reading and writing.

The other connection that Sean and I share is that he was my only frosh to become a JA. I think he really enjoyed that experience, just as much as I did, and I’m glad he did it. He’s just such a laid back and likeable guy, and I’m sure his frosh appreciated that.

Wednesday
Wednesday was a brutally hot and humid day in NYC. It was so bad that we even had a power outage that hit Manhattan, Queens, and the Bronx. This shut down some of the subway lines making the running subways that much more packed with sweaty, smelly people. So what do you do on a gross, hot day? Go get a big, hot bowl of Ramen!

So, probably not the best idea in the world, but I had dinner plans to meet up with Crystal and we both really wanted to try Momofuku which is a noodle shop on the Lower East Side. It’s usually pretty packed so we figured that any chance to eat there without waiting in line was worth it. Turns out, most people are smarter than us and decided that hot soup on a day like this was not a good idea. We were able to grab a spot at the counter right away.

Dinner was good, but it was less about the food, and more about catching up with Crystal. I hadn’t seen Crystal in a long time, even though we’ve both lived in NYC for the last year. In the last few months, I’ve ran into her at some parties, but this was a great chance to really talk with her and hear how things were going.

Right now, most of my friends are in a very exciting place. Most of us are 2 or 3 years out of college and have been working. This is the prime time for changing jobs or going back to school. I’m sort of in a similar boat so it’s always nice to talk to other people to get their perspective and to hear how they are planning their careers/lives.

After dinner, I had some time to kill so I went to the Barnes and Nobles in Union Square. The scene was hilarious. I went to the third floor to grab a few magazine to read. The entire floor was packed with people sitting against the walls, reading magazines, and enjoying the free air conditioning. I settled into a nice spot and before I knew it, I had passed out. The heat was just that bad today.

Once I woke up, I booked it downtown to meet Jessica. We were going to see “The Banquet” at IFC for the NY Asian Film Festival. As I was waiting in line to get into the theatre, someone came up to me and yelled my name. I turned around, and for a moment, I had no idea who this person was; then it hit me…it was Cindy Lin! I hadn’t seen Cindy in at least 4 years and then, of all places to run into her.

Cindy has been living in NYC for many years now. I knew that she lived her, but II just never got around to calling her. The funny thing is, I was going to the movie with Jessica, who also knows Cindy. Crazy Minnesota people meeting up in the West Village in NYC. Anyway, it was good to see Cindy and we all have plans to get together for dinner soon and also to get Kathy Chen to join us well. The more Minnesotans, the merrier!

Friday
On Friday night, I met up with Vero, Kerel, Victoria, and some other girls down in the East Village. We grabbed a few drinks at Swift, which was fun, but then Kerel and I split off and headed to the Highline Ballroom for the Pharoahe Monch concert. Opening for Pharoahe were The Cool Kids, Polyrhythm Addicts, and Black Milk.

Expecting the show to not start on time like pretty much every hip hop show I’ve been to, we got to the Highline a little before midnight. Unfortunately, they had already started and I missed The Cool Kids open, which I was pretty bummed about. However, we still got to see everyone else perform. The energy in the room was crazy. Pharoahe Monch is not a mainstream artist which means that if you’re going to pay to see him perform, you really want to see him perform. That’s probably the best part of going to underground/indie concerts.

Pharoahe had a live backing band which really made the difference. A lot of Pharoahe’s beats have a heavy rock influence so having a live band really suits the songs; plus the band was just having a great time with it. Pharoahe is also one of the most energetic performers I’ve seen and he quickly passes that on to the crowd. One highlight of the night was Styles P walking on stage to do his guest verse for “My Life.”

After the concert, it was close to 3 AM already, but Kerel and I still had to make it to late night so we hopped a cab downtown to Automatic Slims to meet up with Vero and everyone else. I love Automatic Slims. It’s a small bar with not a lot else around it, but it’s always good time with drinking and dancing. We stayed there for another hour or so, but then everyone started getting tired and we decided to call it a night….a very fun night.

Oh Snap!

This sounds stupid, but I have never been able to snap my fingers. This week at work, I was pretty bored so I practiced snapping. And now...I can snap my fingers. I'm much better at snapping my left hand, but my right hand is coming along.

No More Pencils, No More Books (Again)

I said it last February, but now I'll say it again: I'm done! No more studying for me, at least in regards to insurance. I completed my last ARM (Associate in Risk Management) test today and passed! So now I guess I should be an expert in insurance since I'm a CPCU (Certified Property-Casualty Underwriter) and an ARM. In reality, it really doesn't mean much except that I guess I could argue for a greater pay raise because I'm just that much more "educated" now.

Happy Birthday Haley!

See you this weekend to celebrate!!!

Thank You Justin Timberlake

for paying for my plane ticket to Cali. I had tickets to his last show at Continental Arena in NJ, but instead of going, I sold them off and made a nice little profit that paid for my ticket to SoCal this week. Well worth it since now I'm sitting in the sun relaxing!

Found Money

So the other day, my parents call me up and tells me that I need to close an old custodial account that he opened for me years ago. Originally they thought that there was a decent amount of money in the account. Turns out, there's $79 in it. Not sure what the account was supposed to be for, but now it can buy me a meal in NYC.

Then today, my dad sends me an e-mail:

Hi Eric,

I just got a phone call from the police department of University of Minnesota.
You had a wallet lost in 2001 and still there.
The person called, her name is Leanne and her phone number is 612-626-****.

Wow. I vaguely remember losing my wallet at the U of M back in high school when I used to go there for class, but that was so long ago that I'd completely forgotten about it. I had already canceled all the credit cards, got a new license, etc. But lo and behold, 6 years later, there is still money in the wallet and Leanne, as nice as she is, wanted to make sure I got it. And it's not like there was $5 in the wallet. There was $57. That's another dinner for me!

Thinking back, I rarely carry $57 in my wallet nowadays, partly because I rely more on my credit cards, but still, I was ballin' back in high school!

You take your girl and multiply her by four, now a whole lot of woman needs a whole lot more

This song makes me happy right now:

Mika- Big Girl (You Are Beautiful) via Sound Gymnastics

Things That Make Me Happy

Honestly, one of the funniest shows ever is "The Loop" that was a mid-season replacement on Fox. It only aired 7 episodes this year, sadly, but it got renewed for next year so that will have to hold me over. If you haven't seen it, I've uploaded the first episode. You can download it here (its a Winrar file. Just click the link and it should download.)

My god, Rome is so beautiful. I don't have much to say right now cause my internet time is running out, but this place is absolutely beautiful. I saw Nicky and Jordan the other night, then I saw Lindsey Beal and her family the other day and last night, I got lost for hours just walking around the streets and different piazzas. Oh man, one more day and then to Florence!!!

Shit! I'm in Amsterdam. Well, I'm in Schiphol Airport on my way out of Amsterdam to Rome!! I can't wait to get there, though my flight just got delayed for 1.5 hours which means I will be wasting away at this computer at a fuckin' 1 Euro per 5 minutes of internet use, but its worth it. I realized how spoiled we are in the US with Internet access everywhere. I thought Phil had a connection in his room, but it turns out his computer lab is like clear across town. Anyways, these last few days have been just a big haze, jumping from Amsterdam to the Hague then back to Amsterdam and running into so many Williams kids. It was crazy, just having 7 of us in Phil's room last night, sleeping on the cold ass tile floor. But its been worth it and I've spent way more money than I ever wanted to, but whatever, I'm on vacation so I might as well enjoy it while I can. So I'm off to Rome in a couple of hours where I will visit all the wonderful places Sil suggested and hopefully meet up with Nicky and Jordan and the Beal family!!! And then its off to Florence with Nicky and Jordan to meet up with Jennie and Chae and god know what other Williams kids we will run into. Rak, where you at?

Something that makes me happy: the music video to Norah Jones' "Sunrise"

man i love my frosh...when I'm actually in the entry (which almost like never), i get to see this amazing, thoughtful side of them...damn...

The new ACE E-Board is shaping up nicely. One more committee left to finalizes. So excited!!!!

A Story to Make You Happy