Git in ma bellllaaayyy!

The past couple of weeks, I was taken over by my inner fat kid. I don't know if I've ever told you guys this, but I CAN EAT. Or at least I used to be able to eat a lot. I've become very self conscious of myself so I'm finally learning the importance of portion control, but don't be fooled; I still love food. I just eat less of the junk and more stuff that's better for me.

The latter half of January was Dine About Town in San Francisco. While I was down in LA for college, I always missed out on Dine LA week, so when I found out about San Francisco's version, I immediately told SB we're eating at (at least) one of the fancy restaurants.

I also told my colleague we should go out for lunch and try one of the participating restaurants. We made a reservation for a three course lunch and a small pack of us made it out to the nearby restaurant where I feasted on a yummy beet salad with goat cheese (I love cheese), their famous sweet and savory ribs with meat practically falling off the bone, and some creamy chocolate gelato. And it was just the beginning because that weekend, I made reservations for lunch on Saturday and dinner on Sunday.

Lunch was a bit disappointing so let's just forget about that. The churro was the highlight of the meal, but probably only because I have such a deprived sweet tooth since I cut back on pastries. I miss you, cookies...

Dinner was great. We ate at a French restaurant. I regret not taking any pictures of the food that night, but every thing was on point: the crab salad, the shrimp, the iron flat steak, the scallops, the semi-freddo, and of course, more gelato. Just in case you guys were wondering, yes I ate the semi-freddo and finished SB's gelato. I told you I can eat! He also shared all of his food with me. For some reason whenever I offer him what's on my plate he always declines. Whatever, more for me...

After the weekend of dining out, we flew down to LA where I made reservations for Dine LA week. YEEESSS! Finally! I get to experience Dine LA and you'd think by now I was done with expensive fancy three course meals. Hells no. I quickly made a reservation for LA Market, where the winner from the past season of Hell's Kitchen now works as the head chef. My little sister, who wants to go to culinary school and watched Hell's Kitchen with me, became very jealous. The apps and desserts got demolished and all I could take a picture of was this:

By the way, I had to angle to dish because I started digging in before remembering to take a picture. I only wanted to take a picture so I have something to show my little sister.

I also got to meet the head chef, Nona. I was completely star struck.

It was ridiculous how shy and quiet I got. SB had to speak up and say to the chef, "Oh, she's been wanting to ask you a question..." I had a blank look on my face because I couldn't remember what I wanted to ask her. My mind was too busy racing and thinking and trying to act cool so again, he spoke up and asked her about the tattoos on her arms. We had a quick chat and she had to run back to the kitchen.

After dinner, I called my little sister to tell her about my dining experience at LA Market. She gave me the whole "Whatever..." attitude, trying to act cool and like as if she doesn't care. I know she was jealous to the tenth power. At least.

It's been a fantastic affair with food for the past couple of weeks and it's time I ended it. I think I've gained 10 pounds from eating out so much. Time to get reacquainted with my running shoes.

What's up for 2011

** I started this post in December and am finally finishing it up now

I'm already out of foolproof ideas so don't ask me how to get started; it's all uncharted...

I remember being SO excited for 2010. This was the year I took the MCAT for the first time, started applying to medical schools, met an awesome guy at the bar, and landed a salary paying job WITH BENEFITS... I was starting my career and my adult life.

Now, I sit here as the year is coming to a close and I feel no sense of accomplishment. I feel more lost than ever with what I'm doing with my life. I sit here still with no acceptance to any schools, not enough money to finally move out of my mom's house, no idea what the next step is besides waiting. Wait for someone to accept me into medical school. Wait to save enough money to gain back my independence. Wait to figure out what being 20-something in a time like this is suppose to be like. Am I suppose to have my career started by now? Am I suppose to have a family before I enter my 30s? Will my eggs "go bad" by then? What am I suppose to be doing with my life? What's my next goal?

I have no fcukin' clue.

And surprisingly, I'm okay with it all. It's just so different. For the first time, I have no idea what the new year will bring. I don't know what's the next step. When I was a kid, the next thing was always to survive the next grade level. After high school, it was college. After college, it was to find a job. And now a year and a half after graduation... what's next? ::shurgs... completely lost look on face::

I'll try to come back with a more uplifting story. Not that I'm depressed, I'm just flowing through life right now. I do have some big plans. There's an LA trip planned for next month. SB and I are going to visit our homelands this summer (Philippines and Vietnam. My FIRST time traveling outside of the country!) Life is good. I guess the next thing in my life is learning how to just live and stop stressing about having some goal or constantly trying to achieve something.

Amusez-vous bien!

Things are going... just flowing along...

If you follow me on twitter, you know that I received my rejection letter from Pomona this week. Sad, yes, but it's okay. I interviewed at another school last week and they should be getting back to me soon. That interview didn't go great, but there's still a chance I could get in. Also, I'm on hold for an interview for a school in Arizona. I sent in an appeal letter and three new letters of rec, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for ONE more chance to interview. Hopefully, third one's a charm ;)

I'm reaching the point where I don't know what I want to do anymore. I thought these interviews were suppose to solidify my choice of going into medicine, but instead it's just left me feeling... eh. But here's the thing: I don't know if I'm feeling this way because I have some kind of defense mechanism in me activated and I'm not willing to face the fact that I'm just not cut out for medicine. Like a form of denial... Or maybe I'm giving up, but just don't want to face it and feel like a failure.

There is a glimmer of hope; I haven't been rejected from all the schools yet. I'm good enough to not be rejected right off the bat, but my app isn't impressive enough to be granted an interview right away. I've emailed a bunch of schools asking for an update and all of them who have replied said that my file is still under review. I think they're waiting to see the whole pool of applicants before they reach a final decision for me, so until then all I can do is wait. And waiting sucks. And feels like lost hope. Delusional, almost...f*ck.

Okay, okay... It's the holiday season and let's not end the year feeling down in the dumps now. I finally paid my credit card off in full! I can probably pay off the rest of my student loans in the next couple of months! Everything at the Banana Republic Outlet was 50% off! My boyfriend is coming back from his homeland! I have $260 worth of credit with Virgin America! Trip to LA? Trip to FL? Let's not forget my colleague's wedding next month! Lots to feel good about.

A colleague introduced me to Mayer Hawthorne... a white boy who sings Motown! This is so far my favorite song from the man:

This song never fails to cheer me up so I hope you all enjoyed it. Happy holidays every body!

It's just not for me.

Travelling for work sounds like a glamorous thing. Not everyone gets to do it. Only the privileged. It can take you places you’d never think of visiting. Like Upton, New York on Long Island. It’s not bad here, but it certainly is no New York City.

My work takes me here twice a year. I get to stay at a former military base, meet new people, and watch cable TV (I don’t have cable TV at home.) The first time I came to the east coast for work, I spent two weeks here and lost nearly 15 pounds of weight due to the lack of food available on site. The only reason why I enjoyed myself was because SB flew across the country to hang out with me and we ended up going to a Janelle Monae concert in NYC. We also met up with an old friend of his and went shopping. The work itself was complicated as I pricked myself with a contaminated needle, extreme time points in the middle of the night, and the beam was malfunctioning. But overall, a pleasant trip thanks to SB.

This trip was supposed to be a short one. I was supposed to fly in, zap the mice, make sure everything is ok, and fly back home. That is not happening. There was a fire in the control room. After that, another part of the beam started leaking fluids. I’ve had to cancel two flights, and after that I’m still not sure when I’ll be able to fly home. I changed my flight to the latest time Virgin America is leaving JFK on Friday so at least I would be flying home in comfortable white chairs with purples lights and an entertainment screen. I’m crossing my fingers that I everything goes according to plan and I don’t have to cancel another flight.

I can handle those setbacks. I’m really bothered about everything because it’s SB’s birthday on Saturday. I don’t know if you guys remember, but he took me to Vegas for my birthday and I have nothing planned for his birthday. There’s a boxing fight that night, so he might want to stay in and rest before he flies off for his annual trip to his homeland. I don’t know yet. I just know he’s the first person I want to see/hug/kiss when I get home.

I am so scared that I will turn into one of those people who put work in front of everything, before family, friends, and what really matters in life. As much fun as travelling for works sounds, it’s just not for me. I’d want a stable job where I can settle down and start a family. I don’t want to be travelling the world for work as someone else watches over my kids. If I travel, I want it to be for pleasure and to spend it with my loved ones.

And just in case you were wondering, yes I cried when I talked to SB for the first time on the phone when I realized I had to cancel my original flight home. And then I cried again after I got off the phone with him when he told me how his best friend bought him dinner for his birthday and how he’s out shopping with his family.

Quick rant, then it's back to work.

Lion: R U still at home?

p-huong: Yup. Still working on apps.

Lion: Jesus!

Sorry for the lack of updates, folks. I've been fairly busy at work (you know, lazy project manager, lazy technicians, supervisors covering for their own behinds.)And of course, applications. I applied to 30 different medical schools, a good mix of allopathic and osteopathic schools. For those who are not familiar with the process, I have to submit a common primary application that gets sent out to all the schools and then the individual schools invite me to fill out a secondary application (that is if they like me or if they just want to take more money from me.) After the secondary application, if the schools are still interested in me, I'll get invited for interviews. The application process itself will take a year... primaries open in June... secondaries get sent out late summer/early fall.... interviews start in the fall and continue through spring of next year. It's nothing like applying to undergraduate programs.

So that's why I get SO unbelievably annoyed when I get comments like that from my best friend. Yes, O. M. EFFIN' G. I am still working on applications. I am still waiting to hear back from schools. I am still waiting (and praying) for interview invites. It's a lot of hard work and needs a lot of attention. I just can't write bull shit essays. Sure I can reuse parts of essays, but do you realize how many essays the adcoms read? I need to stand out. I need to put my best pen to the paper and write my ass off. I have to get creative and not bore my readers. I need SUPPORT FROM MY OWN FAMILY AND FRIENDS. Instead of texting "Jesus!", how about a "good luck." Or better yet, include a smiley face to make me feel better because really, that's all it takes to make me feel better.

Hope everyone had an amazing weekend :)

Vegas: Take III

We had lots planned for the couple of days that we'd be spending in Vegas together. I wanted to lounge around the pool and eat at Serendipity's. SB wanted to do some cheesy couple stuff like go on the Venetian boat ride and take a ride to the top of the Eiffel Tower. He also wanted to eat at a buffet, watch an NBA summer league game, and of course, go clubbing. Out of that entire list, we did only two things: eat at two buffets and went to a few clubs. We didn't have that romantic boat ride. I didn't get to see Vegas from the top of the Eiffel Tower. We saw a couple of basketball players walk around the casinos, but never made it out to the arena to actually watch them play and despite the 100+ degree temperature, we didn't come within 50 feet of a swimming pool or sip a frozen hot chocolate.

The trip may sound like a failure, but I actually had a lot of fun.

- We got heavily intoxicated. I even blacked out one night. On another night, SB was so drunk, I had to drive us back to the hotel, which was very interesting in itself. He tried to seduce me while I was driving in which I responded by yelling at him, but then started laughing because he had this ridiculous I'm-so-drunk smile on his face.

- We danced the night away. I'm so glad I'm with someone who actually likes to go clubbing and dance.

- We took some pictures. As a couple, we suck at taking pictures. We usually forget to bring a camera along or if we do, we always forget to take pictures. This time we made an extra effort so that we could have some photographs to remember our first get-away to a city where we both don't know anybody. I was stupid and I let him take the pictures and most of them came out blurry because his hands weren't very stable and I didn't want my perfectionist side to come out and take the camera away from him.

- We went shopping. It's also nice being with a guy who doesn't mind shopping.

- We ate a lot of food. TWO buffets. Enough said.

And that's how turning 23 started to look good, not to mention our first night back in California was just as fun. Hope everybody had an amazing weekend!

First night back from Vegas. Bootie.

Lots of Good Things

Much has happened within the last month, but I didn't feel like writing about one specific event so I guess I'll just give one big update. I have been writing, but all the posts are half finished and didn't seem worthy to be finished or published. That or I'm just heavily paranoid that med school committees are going to Google my name and find this blog so I'm too scared to write about specific details about the application process (I'm scared they'll find a post and take it as how I really wanted to answer those secondary questions.) Usually when you Google my name, you get my LinkedIn page and my Facebook profile. All the other hits are from other people with my Vietnamese name. There's even a psychiatrist in San Jose with my exact name!

A while ago I wrote about moving up to San Francisco. I think it's time to admit that I'll never move up to the city. The cost just isn't worth it, especially with this new living arrangement I have; I sleep over SB's for half the week. It's really nice because I get to spend more time with him, I get to sleep in, and I get to avoid that hour train ride home. Win. Win. And win.

Things with SB have been going very well. I even got his best friend's approval! SB told him about my b-ball skillz and he basically said I was a keeper because I ride a motorcycle, watch college football, and have a pretty good jumper. BANK.

I've made some changes to my lifestyle. I cut out bagels and beer from my diet in addition to cutting back on pastries. I'd cut out baked goods completely from my diet, but my baby sister is always baking. I never stay past 5:30 at work, so now I get home in time to fit in a run around my neighborhood. I believe I said this before in a very old post: I want to be a hip grandma surfing with her grand kids, so I'm trying to take better care of my body. That and I don't want to be like my mom when I get to her age. It scares me to think that I got half of my genes from her. Don't get me wrong. I love my momma. I just don't want to be exactly like her.

I finally took Francesca to the shop. I got an oil change for her, a safety check, and a new headlight bulb. She runs much better now. I also took her on the freeway for the first time! It was scary and exciting at the same time. I was so tense. I felt that if I loosened any muscle, the wind would have knocked the bike over. It is possible to take a 250 on the freeway, but I admit I'd feel much safer with a bigger bike. When I wear down Francesca, I'll probably buy my next bike straight from the dealer. No more hand me downs.

Okay, now I feel like I've wasted your time because let's face it... my life is getting lame. I've got a good flow going in life. Good things are happening, just nothing too exciting. Oh wait, did I mention that SB is taking me to Vegas for my birthday? And to make this post better, I've decided to share a picture. This is me way back in the day. My head isn't so square shaped anymore.