busy in a good way.

december is going to be one busy month.

december 1: cambridge systematics holiday party. we started the month off with aaron's company holiday christmas party. not too shabby. it was held at the mit museum, which is pretty much your typical gallery space, but with a lot more science, instead of art. great photography pieces though. i'll admit i didn't actually take the time to walk around and really look at the exhibit, but the panoramic images all over the place of mountain ranges and whatnot were pretty cool. food was awesome. drinks were free-flowing. people were nice. fun times were had. finally got to meet the person who helped everyone connect the dots to realizing there were, in fact, two camsys/cube 3 couples in existence. still weird.

december 3: transition workload over to new malls project. deadline forthcoming.

december 7: work deadline for a student housing project in minnesota, mn.

december 7 - 9: yet another whirlwind adventure in post-sandy ny with the j-twin. likely with some christmas shopping in the mix.

december 8: get-together at the ktoad's new digs. unfortunately, won't be able to make this one due to previously mentioned whirlwind adventure.

december 8 - 15: hannukah celebrations with the magics.

december 9: hannukah/housewarming party at danny + becca's place. hopefully, i can make it back for this one.

december 13: 8pm showing of the slutcracker at the somerville theater with corey + gail.

december 14: 8:30pm showing of THE HOBBIT at the boston commons!!! i'm excited. can you tell?

december 15: 6:30pm cube 3 studio casino holiday party! time for my company's holiday party at one of the partners' house up in nh. and let me tell you, it is niiiiice. also super excited for this one. on the same night, at 8pm, is the oldenburg glögg party. glögg is apparently a mulled wine concoction that you set on fire before drinking it. also excited. hope we can make it after the cube 3 casino party.

december 20: get on a plane back to hong kong for christmas and new years!!! absolutely can't wait for all the delicious nommage that's going to be happening over those two weeks. it'll totally be worth emptying out all of my vacation time for this one trip. :) plus, it'll be aaron's first trip to hk. again, excited. :D

december 22: big kwan family gathering #1 in celebration of winter festival. jess also lands in hk this evening to join in the festivities.

december 25: big kwan family gathering #2 in celebration of christmas and grandma kwan's birthday! also, 2pm showing of the nutcracker performed by the hong kong ballet. this show has always been a holiday tradition. while everyone else shops and then congregates for pre-dinner mahjong, jess, mom and i sneak away for the nutcracker. but this year, aaron will be joining in the sneaking. and we're apparently in for quite a different show this year. the show has been revamped and redesigned to what looks like a darker telling of the story, so that'll be an interesting change to watch.

december 31: (likely) big kwan family gathering #3 for the new years countdown. new years in hk can get a little crazy every year (anyone remember the super riot in lan kwai fong that one year that got a bunch of people killed? yea. i don't want that...), so it's probably safer to celebrate and welcome the new year from the safety of our own home.

of course, there will be extra little shenanigans intermingled with those plans, but those are the big things that have been planned out in advance. then, that's it for the rest of 2012! and then...onward to new shenanigans in 2013!!!
such as:

january 5: jess, aaron and i hop back stateside and back to our lives and jobs and deadlines. le sigh...

january 11 - 13: aaron and i head back out to madison, wi for red eye! yay seeing more friends for more overnight ultimate shenanigans!!!

who has two thumbs and is excited? this moi. :)

www wednesday #3: blast from the past.

it's come to me to do another www wednesday on multiple occasions, but it keeps happening on a non-wednesday and then i forget by the time the next wednesday comes around. it's actually quite frustrating...but then i'd forget about that too.

but now it's wednesday!!! and i remembered!

+ what are you currently reading?
the wind-up bird chronicle / haruki murakami
so i really should have finish this book by now. i just keep getting distracted by long nights of work and busy schedules. it's actually been quite good. aside from the more apparent quirks of reading a book so obviously translated from a different language, there are definitely notes of differing cultural characteristics. i'm not sure if that's just how it got translated or the genre itself, but murakami's writing style has made it an interesting read. it's almost a softer way of writing. not so aggressive about pointing out and explaining every aspect of what's happening. it's actually somewhat like tolkien's works, another translated pieced, in that a lot of the language is more imagination provoking than direct guidance of what the reader should be thinking at any given point in the story. current plan: finish it.

+ what did you recently finish reading?
catching fire / suzanne collins
really getting ready for the second installment of the hunger games trilogy coming to theaters over thanksgiving 2013. super excited! already can't wait. :)

+ what do you think you'll read next?
the very hungry city / austin troy
this is my nerd read for the season. "urban energy efficiency and the economic fate of cities", the very hungry city is an analysis of urban civilization today and the rising levels of energy demand in the many growing metropolises around the world. troy expands on such issues by explaining what such rising demands could mean for people in the future, and what potential solutions could be, instilling the importance of early action in order to cut off any negative effects for civilization before it's too late. perhaps not the most positive of reading options, but i have to say that the basis for this kind of analysis definitely sparked my curiosity. i'm all for green planning, but also admit that i'm probably lacking in knowledge of the arguments to back up the why. very much looking forward to this read.

"good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life." - mark twain

who let me become an adult?!

so this may have been a slow realization on my part, but who the hell let me become an adult?!

seriously. i gradually came to the realization the other night that, pretty much since i started my job, i have now been paying my own way through life. obviously, there was some residual help from my parents just until i got my feet under me and could actually get on my way, but otherwise, everyday finances like rent, bills, shopping allowance when i've felt the need for it has all come from my own pocket. what?!

what happened to the days of my mom checking in every semester to make sure i had enough money for food?? what happened to the begrudging process of having to contact my parents consistently throughout the school year to inform them that they would once again have to help me shell out cash to pay for more even more art supplies and textbooks? what did i mean i needed even more money for more cardboard and hot glue sticks?!

then there are the ultimate expenses, aka. the wonderful club sports budget at cmu. oh, you guys are driving to god-knows-where for a tournament? here, just use the school club sports budget. oh, the next tournament bid is $375? club sports budget. though some ultimate funding did come from the parents: oh, your cleats have blown out halfway through the season and you need to make an emergency run to get new ones? yea, turns out no one told me that the days of "...oh, that's okay. thanks for letting me know. just put it on my card..." are over.

i don't actually remember the last time i asked for pocket money because i wanted to go to the mall with my friends on the weekend. maybe high school? college was more a semester-long budget situation for daily necessities. what i got was what needed to last until i went home over christmas. anything shopping money or cash for non-essentials was earned from any on-campus jobs i could scrape up. the more i think abut it, i actually approve of and appreciate that whole situation. it was a smoother way to transition me into paying for my own extraneous shit without immediately dumping me into the deep end of dealing with all of the financials that being a college kid living off campus with a certain level of freedom entailed, which surely would have given me a heart attack five times over...per year of college. i wonder if there was a record for the most heart attacks endured within any given period of time. i bet i could've beaten it. thank god i didn't have to do that. i'm pretty sure i came close quite a few times and that was enough for me.

now, instead of checking in with the parents, the situation is more base on the concept of "let me check with my bank account". oh, you'd like a new pair of shoes? let's check to make sure your bank account is having a good day first. oh, you need to pay rent soon? better make sure your bank account is happy with more of that whole "getting paid" business. these happy levels predictably now fluctuate on a two-week schedule defined by every other thursday, as my personal financials slowly work their way up to "real person status".

the realization that this transition had happened pretty much came when i was time to buy plane tickets to fly back to hong kong for christmas. after chatting with jess for awhile, it came up that i felt bad that even after i had graduated and started my new job, our parents were still paying for my plane tickets home. my ever-so-level-headed sister then smartly pointed out that even though mama and papa kwan were covering the $1750 for roundtrip tickets between boston and hong kong, they were, in fact, no longer shelling out approx. $50,000/year for school now that i had finally graduated from my five-year program with a professional degree. so really, i cut down on my expenses for them by a solid $48,000. i'll take it! the goal now is to hopefully be in decent enough shape next year to be able to afford my own plane ticket. y'know, on top of that extraneous stuff i had previously mentioned that i plan on being able to purchase with my big-person money.

going christmas shopping today, i had a moment of "oooh...i want this! should i get this?...", in response to which, i got the somewhat standard answer of, "...::shrug::...it's your money."

it is my money.

that. is. terrifying.

"oh, you're going out for brunch?...yea, that one's on you too."

giving thanks.

job.
B.
home.
family.
friends.
ultimate.
health (ish).
kitties.
bunny.
boston.
madison.
mudderburn.
cmu.
mellons.
food.
socks.
hugs.

thank you.

:)

thaaaAAAaaank yOOOouuu, siiIIIiiiIIR!

something in my office building...sounds like a whale...

wp8

i can't wait to get a new windows phone. unfortunately, my options are either to shell out $200 now and have a ton of fun immediately, or wait until I'm eligible for a Verizon upgrade in March and get some of those $$$ knocked off the price (but have to keep staring at that sad crack that goes across the entire screen).

also, the more i read about the new surface, the more i want one. is that sad? like...i really want one. and theoretically, i can totally afford one. i think i'm going to challenge myself though. wait at least until after christmas. if i still crazy-want it then, i'll reevaluate the situation then.

also, i can apparently upgrade my laptop to windows 8 for only $40. worth it? even more to consider.

blamo. kudos to microsoft. i want all of the things. all of the things that just don't come across as quite as gimmicky as similar products from different brands.

all of the aminals! :)

we got kitties!!!

Meet Pistachio, or just 'Chio for short.

And Basil! :)

as you can probably tell, chio is significantly more outgoing and friendly compared to basil. we were originally only going to get one kitty, but then realized that since we'll be travelling sometimes, especially when ultimate season rolls around again, it'd be good for two kitties to be able to keep each other company. also, these two were just such a good pairing.

chio had been living on the street, but was being fed by a local taxi driver. unfortunately, the taxi driver couldn't take him home with him and take care of him, so he was brought to the shelter. basil was also a stray, but he just showed up on his foster mom's back porch one day. basil didn't warm up to anyone or any of the other cats much until he found chio's crate. he apparently sat in front of his crate until he got let in, and he never left chio's side after that. since it looked like chio was helping basil come out of his shell so well, we very well couldn't separate them. plus, chio was just SO friendly! so now we have two kitties! and basil has slowly been getting better and better around us. he doesn't just hide in the dark anymore. he comes out for meals, and explores the apartment with chio. he's even started playing with the toys and knickknacks lying around the apartment.

the best moment so far has been when i woke up one morning with a strong urge to turn over in my sleep, before realizing it was harder than normal to flip over. in my groggy state, i slowly realized it was because there was more weight than usual on my legs! i just figured it was chio so i paused to see if i could move without waking him. then the weight started shifting...there were two weights on my legs! basil had come up to snooze in the crook of my knee! and chio had snuggled up on the other side of my leg. alright. it was decided. i didn't move and proceeded to lose all feeling in my right arm. then mr. aaron "fidgety-when-sleeping" magil briefly sat up to turn himself over. this apparently scared the shit out of basil, who then bolted off the bed and god knows where...dammit, magil. le sigh. oh well...here's hoping they do it again soon. :)

for now...more kitty pictures!

chio: "what....what are you..? and what are you eating??"

look who's curiosity outweighed his scaredycat-ness!

chio + basil | sitting back and observing.

"any idea what that is...?"
"nope...also, your butt smells..."

most adorable snapshot to date | kitty snuggles!!!

he actually fell asleep like this...on my hand...

the hipster effect.

B-irthday cele-bro-tions!

it was aaron's birthday on thursday!

i had a plan.

thursday, september 20

thursday itself was pretty meh, unfortunately. aaron ended up going to a lecture with corey + gail, while i went and did my own thing at the gym. turns out, as much as i wanted to spend his birthday with him, i wasn't so much interested in a computer science lecture. apparently, i didn't miss much. i met up with them afterwards in david square and had dinner at the foundry. here, i also would not have missed much. the food itself was decent. i definitely enjoyed my wild mushroom flatbread. unfortunately, the service was mediocre at best. the waiter seemed to have forgotten about our table for awhile, he completely forgot about the appetizer that was ordered, and then seemed completely disinterested in helping us out upon realizing that we weren't there to booze it up. lamesauce.

friday, september 21

shenanigans begin! we went to work as normal. what i sneakily hid was the fact that i was going to be leaving work early to pick up aaron's birthday surprise - one andy spaghettios!!! :D this would've worked a lot better had we not then found out that someone back in madison (who shall remain nameless, but i am still quite angry at) had revealed the secret surprise to aaron a few days before hand. bull. shit. a month's worth of ninja secrecy work, down the drain. brought andy back to the house and opened the door to, "andyandyandyandyandyyy!!!". cue thumpthumpthumping of the birthday boy running to the door. it was adorable. much hugging ensued. corey came over for some pre-scheduled throwing and drills, before we all showered and headed back to cameron ave for dinner and hang out time.

did andy get shorter? | markma.

also, andy got aaron a slap chop for this birthday. first experiment? fortune cookies.

saturday, september 22

my present to the birthday boy - alpine ziplining!!!

up in the white mountains, we went and took a ziplining tour through canopies and down the mountain with the longest zipline spanning about 1600'. it was fantastic. this specific tour also had dual ziplines for you to race each other. i lost the first time to winston. i blame the fact that i got completely preoccupied with the flying part and totally forgot about the "curl up into a cannonball to fly faster" part. don't worry. i got it right the second time when i raced aaron. we flew pretty even - had i had longer arms, we could've higfived - until about halfway. cue the tiny asian cannonball. i won. and celebrated. fistpumping and all. winning!

on the way back, we stopped at the tilt'n diner again. had [too much] delicious food. had a waitress continuously give andy shit throughout the meal. ha.

andy found this cookie on the way - it was bigger than my head.

this is manny.

this is andy licking manny. 

katie zipping away!

the ktoads racing!

andy getting ready to fly. 

birthday boy coming in!!! 

here comes katieeeee!!

sunday, september 23

started the day watching moulin rouge just because, for some reason, we were all in the mood for it all weekend. we soon had to drop andy off at the airport so he could get back to madison. :(

we then went and hung out with john soh who was in town for the weekend with the cmu fifth year trip, and showed him around cambridge/mit. we got all nerdy visiting eero saarinen's mit chapel.

birthday shenanigans ended with a birthday/rosh hashanah dinner at the magic's, more cake and happy family time - a lot of which was spent watching baby phin's antics around the dining room.

i think that can be called a success. take that, "meh"!

next zipline excursion has already been planned for next march, ie. my birthday. interested? hit me up. :)

in case you need persuading, here's video i took during the longest zipline on the tour. enjoy!

test post.

from my new blogg app.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

computer edit: blogg app could use text effects...

twenty-one miles, two wheels, a picnic lunch and mancala. and puppies.

a la the outdoorsy fix from the last post, aaron and i biked the minuteman bikeway today. we started at the bike stop in arlington, ma and traveled down to arlington center for town day, and then biked back up and past the bike stop to the end of the bikeway at the historic bedford depot. we then stopped for a relaxing picnic lunch of sandwiches we'd made this morning, bacon chocolate and a few rounds of mancala. we then wandered around historic bedford for a bit - they're apparently big on trains - before getting more air in my tires at the bikeway source and heading back down.

total mileage: 21 miles. as a first attempt, i'll take it. there were actually quite a few bikers out and about today, as well as an impressive number of rollerbladers. people seriously still rollerblade nowadays! who knew?!

it was pretty fun. a nice, short trip to make while getting exercise and going somewhere new. i hadn't really used my bike past commuting places, so just riding it for the sake of going for a bike ride was a different experience. but it's something that i've been meaning to get into, and what better time of the year to try it than the end of summer? with the weather cooling down, but before it starts to turn gross and gray, i figured, why not?

plus, going to arlington's town day also meant seeing a bunch of cool stalls, buying a new handmade ceramic mug and seeing a ton of puppies.

overall, it was a nicely productive, but still relaxing day.

quote of the day
[at a lemonade stand set up on the side of the bikeway in lexington. (yes, kids still do that nowadays, too!)]
(quite young) kid #1: "one cup of lemonade for a dollar!!!" (what happened to 25 cents?? stupid economy...)
(even younger) kid #2: "two for twenty cents!!!" (um...)
(much older) aaron: "quick! they're having a fire sale! let's turn back before it's too late!"

loved it.

the minuteman bikeway through the lexington depot. wikipedia.

tomorrow's agenda
brunch with danny + becca at the painted burro in davis square. i'm excited.
cleaning the apartment, like whoa. seriously. it's like all of our belongings just exploded everywhere. and seeing as next weekend will be quite busy, and someone actually has to try and sleep on our couch, we should probably clear the shit out of the there...wish us luck.

hello, fall. i'm doing it wrong.

so, recently, now that summer is over, my brain has inevitably chosen this moment in time to go on an outdoorsy kick.

and i'm loving it.

the past month's outdoorsy agenda
+ ran my first 5k race as part of the cube 3 studio team. somehow ended up with a decent time and being the fastest woman in the office. i'll take it. for now.
+ get my rickety old schwinn fixed up and good to go for bike rides to alewife/friends' houses/anywhere to minimize car usage whenever possible.

i love my crappy, old bike. :)

+ spending labor day weekend on the cape with friends and just enjoy the sun, sand and (five bajillion) snails. no really. they apparently just cover the entire bay floor. it's a little gross.

pretty...

+ going camping up at dolly copp in the white mountains, nh last weekend with liz morrison, aaron and liz' friend deb. pretty fun considering the downpour that decided to come down that night, and the bear warning for the area that weekend. we drove up saturday morning, somehow taking six hours to get there. stopped at the tilt'n diner on the way (deliciousness). got there, set up came, made camper's stew (more deliciousness) and (obviously) s'mores (even more deliciousness). i learned that hatchets are friggin' awesome. made more nommage in the morning - eggs, hash brown, coffee/hot chocolate - before packing up camp. we then hiked up to lonesome lake for a picnic lunch before heading home.

lonesome lake.

upcoming outdoorsy agenda
+ taking my fixed up, old schwinn (my bike needs a name), fixing up some lunch and biking the minuteman bike path to the end in bedford with aaron.
+ as a special birthday treat for aaron, going ziplining up in the white mountains on a canopy tour with alpine adventures. i'm super excited for this one.
+ hopefully, more biking adventures. i like having it back and functioning. it's a little sad that i don't work somewhere i can just bike back and forth from. as much as i like driving, the 40-min commute to an from work (on a good day) is just not what i pictured doing as part of my first real-person job. plus, it would just mean working closer to cambridge/somerville/home, in general.

as much as i could do without the ridiculous bug bites i got out on the cape, i really do like being outdoors.

sunset at sunken meadow beach | eastham, ma (cape cod)

so many (dead) horseshoe crabs!

walking with the birdies. :)

mmm...campfire...mmm...s'mores...

low-tide sunset with five bajillion little snails.

the hypercube.

welcome to cube 3 studio. and my new love of photosynth.

peaceful.

carnivale!!!

pizzburrrrr!!!

last weekend was cmu's spring carnival. as my first year as an alumna, and seeing as i don't actually remember having a normal carnival, i hauled butt down to good ol' pittsburgh.

good weekend, good food, good people.

delicious fusion sushi from seviche.

seriously. this was amazing. i also had a hamachi ceviche with this meal. it was delicious. holy cow. love ceviche.

mmm...breakfast crepe from crepes parisienne.

some art installation in cfa.

it was paper rope. i just wanted to climb it.

we then checked out the maya lin exhibit at carnegie museum of art.

i think my favorite parts of the maya lin exhibit were the negative models of the caspian and red seas, and a figure ground of the colorado river made out of silver. the latter was very striking against a white background. the first two were just seriously awesome looking models. good to know what the bottom of said seas looks like. unfortunately, as a special exhibit, there was no photography allowed. so...you should look it up.

we did get to hang out and wander around midway a lot more though. the theme this year was as seen on tv, so understandably, multiple cartoons made their appearances in booth-form.

SAE's frozen banana stand à la arrested development.

the peanuts booth by mayur-sasa.

inside the alice in wonderland booth.

some of the other booths: 
ASA's looney tunes,
sigep's spongebob, 
and the acme labs in the flesh.

after awhile, i realized i was too old for this s***. so i hung out with anna and smingle for the most part, and played a bunch of chill, no pressure ultimate, in the money mellons alumni game and the hot metal women's hat tournament (fouling fedoras ftw!). the mellons were seriously the sweetest and the best and got me one of their reversibles that they ordered this year. i was definitely jealous when i first saw those. and now i've got my own. thank you, money mellons!!!

oh, college.

then it was time to peace out back to boston and the job search. and a second interview with cube 3 studio *fingers crossed real hard*. this part was definitely not my best flying experience.

the itty bitty propeller plane.

so this flight was terrifying. a) the plane was tiny. b) the left propeller was right outside my window. not exactly what i want to be watching while the itty bitty plane vibrates its way to cleveland.

overall, still a fun weekend. once again, very much delicious food-filled, starting with dinner at seviche and ending the trip with a good old smashed potato pizza from fuel 'n' fuddle.

hey guys, we should hang out again sometime. :)