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My trip to Iowa was relatively smooth. I stopped by Michigan City as I planned. However, every single store was closed! Oh well, it is better this way since I don't really need anything.

Apparently there has been more snow in Cedar Rapids than AA. On both sides of the streets there are piles and piles of snow, most of which are higher than cars. So it is risky to make turns. Fortunately it is so sunny and warm today that everything is melting.

I love spending my time at Barnes & Noble. Bookstores have both comforting and exciting effects on me. I wish I had time to read more books, at least all the interesting ones.

Many books are on sale. I bought "Garlic and Sapphires" by Ruth Reichl who is the chief editor of Gourmet. She has been the restaurant critic for The New York Times and Los Angeles Times. This book is about her "secret life of a critic in disguise" after her photos were posted in every restaurant in NYC. If you know how much I love food, you would understand why I chose it.

Sidenote: I have got my first 2008 quarter (oklahoma).

grateful

This morning I was wondering what my lunch might be. Since I am leaving on Wednesday, I did not cook this weekend (and I didn't have any time to cook either). Two minutes later, I got Jinli's email saying she had made me a lunch box! And I can have another one tomorrow!

In the evening I got a postcard in my mail. It was sent from Tokyo by the Taiwanese girl who worked for me for a couple of months. She went back to Taiwan the year before last year. Everytime she travels to some place, she sends me a postcard from that city.

Thank you girls, for the warmth you have brought into my heart.

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Lois: You're drunk again.
Peter: No, I'm just exhausted 'cause I've been up all night drinking.

food fest

Friday dinner: Chinese dishes from the Great Lakes Restaurant

Saturday lunch: Philadelphia cheesesteak sub from Penn Station in Westland
Saturday dinner: a giant burrito from Pancheros
Saturday after dinner: pineapple milkshake from Pizza Bob's (this was also the first time for me to have a milkshake)

Sunday lunch: beef rice noodle from Saigon Garden
Sunday after lunch: bubble tea from Bubble Island
Sunday dinner: Chinese dishes at a friend's apt

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1. We took many failed jumping pictures on Brian's birthday (Brian P. from the conversatino connection). Jumping pictures are those being taken while you are in the middle of jumping and Brian just freaking loves them. I have to admit that they could be pretty awesome when the timing was right.

2. Today I went to the church with a friend. After we sat there for ten minutes, I suddenly realized that it was very empty because there was no second service due to the spring break. Bummer!

3. I guessed right more than half of the major awards tonight. Too bad I didn't put any bet on it.

happenings

My current officemate Ying defended her dissertation yesterday. It went pretty well. She did a great job. We are going to celebrate her freedom tonight at the Great Lakes. Congradulations, Dr. Zheng!

Yesterday also happened to be Jinli's birthday in the lunar calendar. We went to Seoul Garden for dinner. And later Jinli and I saw "27 dresses" at Showcase. It was delightful.

This morning I got my eyes checked. The doctors said my eyes have relatively high risk of getting Glaucoma, so they need to run tests on me every half year to monitor the changes. However, they also told me that there is really nothing much they can do if I get Glaucoma. So, yeah, for now I am not going to worry about it.

I got some cool pictures taken though. They dilated my eyes and took photos of the nerves, which look creepy in an awesome way, or the other way around. Too bad I don't have a copy of those picturs.

Tomorrow is another friend's birthday celebration. It is funny that he has got the entire day planned, from the breakfast at 9 am (which apparently is not my schedule) to drinks at 11 pm. I admire his birthday spirit.

I plan to drive to Iowa next week since there will be no classes. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.

scrabble!!!

You might have known that I have grown some addiction to scrabble. I play it in Facebook, and I play it in real life with my friends.

However, last night my addiction reached a new level!

My friend Jinli is going to celebrate her birthday tomorrow. I thought it is time that I buy some games so that we can play after the dinner. So last night I went to Target and bought Scrabble and Apples to Apples.

After I got home, I thought to myself "hey, want to play some crabble?". Since I agreed with myself most of the time, I openned the box, set up the board and started a two-player game.

It was already 11pm, so I didn't bother to name the players and just called them A and B. Player A got some good letters, but she was too greedy to use them on blank squares. In the mean time, player B didn't have any luck. Her letters were impossible to play any words longer than 3 letters.

Therefore, the game kind of got stuck there. And I was so frustrated by both players that I stopped the game and went to bed.

Currently player A is leading by 10 points. It is only half way through the way, so it is too early to draw any conclusion. We will see how it goes tonight.

Narnia

When Lucy first entered Narnia, I was almost tearing up. Perhaps everyone has a Narnia in their dream, a place where we become the person we are supposed to be.

In Narnia we have a clear purpose and everything we do makes a difference. It is also true here in this world. But too often we are tricked into thinking what we see is all we are living for.

I can't wait to see the next movie!

an awesome day

Today is exactly what I needed. First of all, we had a sunny day! So there were many cars out in the street. Poor Michiganers! I can't wait to see more sunshine. But tomorrow is supposed to be bad again.

I had time to run some errands and do a little bit laundry. Then Jinli and I went to Costco. I bought the water filter I had been wanting.

Then in the evening, I went to Ali's house with some other friends. We had home-made lasagna and watched "Narnia" together. I liked it more the second time, because when I first watched it in the theatre, I couldn't help comparing it with the book. Certainly the book won.

Also, I loved the last night's show. Karen was great! I was so proud of her.

On top of everything, I have been feeling enormous peace with God in my heart, which is quite rare for me. I hope it can last for a while.

to be or not to be

The reviews for Jumper have been so negative that I am torn. Should I go to the theatre this weekend as I planned?

So it is a bad movie. But I love Hayden Christensen. He is so pretty!

getting better?

I am hesitating to say that because I thought I was getting better yesterday and then last night I was a mess.

I stayed at home today and finished a few homeworks for my professor's class. In the evening my officemate Ying came to give me some medicine, some ginger and brown suger. Yes, the ginger slices boiled together with brown suger is believed to be miraculous for treating the cold, although I am having the flu. (Thank you so much, Ying!)

Tomorrow I might rest for one more day. My spirit is fine. But I have used half roll of toilet paper today for my running nose. I don't want my colleagues to be disgusted by me. Speaking of which, "Charmin" extra soft paper is very good. My noise is not even hurting a little after so much rubbing.

a not-so-great weekend

It turned out that I underestimated my sickness.

When I woke up on Saturday morning, I felt a little bit nauseous due to the fever. I didn't give it too much thinking, since I had the same feeling on Friday. As I prepared to take a shower, I started to throw up.

Rushing back to my bed, I announced to my husband that "I can go nowhere today!" because we planned to have dim sum after I got up.

Things were getting worse as time passed. My throat was burning. I could barely speak. Luckily my husband was here to take care of me. He got me food, water and medicine. So I spent 90% of Saturday in my bed, except getting up to write a few emails and going the bathroom.

I am feeling much better today. I can move around and do stuff by myself. The fever is pretty much gone, but my throat is still very sore. So I might take tomorrow off as well.

sick

I am officially sick. No wonder I felt chilly all day yesterday.

Last night we made some dumplings. They were pretty good.

Jumper

The is the next movie I want to see.

Happy Chinese New Year!

My presentation went well last night.

My husband arrived safely. Though his original flights were either cancelled or delayed, he managed to get to Detroit around 1am.

I had 4 candies this morning.

I wish you all have a happy and prosperous new year!

addictions

I can be easily addicted to something. For example, games. Or coffee.

Today is the second day of my attempt to quit coffee. I was super sleepy yesterday, so I went to bed before 10:30pm. But I still feel quite sleepy now.

I am also trying not to play scrabble in facebook during my working hours.

where comes all the busyness

It is weird for me. All of a sudden I don't have any time for myself. I hope the past week was just a special one.

We celebrated Ciara's b-day last Monday and Rachel's b-day last Thursday.

I went to Conversation Connection on Tuesday.

A friend invited me to a meeting on Wednesday night.

Friday was all mine, which was good.

An old friend came to town so I had lunch with him yesterday. Then Jinli and I went shopping at Costco the rest of the afternoon.

Another friend invited me to have lunch today. After that, I came home tired and sleepy. So I took a nap.

Then it's Sunday night!

Well, next week will certainly not be relaxing, because things are already lined up. Urgggh!

Since I am not yet used to this kind of busyness in my life, I basically said yes to everything. If things keep going like this, I definitely need to train myself to make priorities so that it will be possible for me to have some alone time.

debating

Now the snow has almost stopped, should I go to school then?

hmm, maybe later.