What happened to my freezer?...

Getting home after work, I decided to finally open up the freezer to use the ground beef that's been in there for 2 weeks+. A little rice, some tomatoes + beef, looking forward to a nice meal.

Getting home, try to open up the freezer, only to find the door stuck!? There goes my grand plan... Trying to get it to open .. turn down the freezer temperature, trying to pry it open, looking online for other great tips... half an hour later, I give up and figure I would just call the help number the next day.

Carrying on and making some quick pasta, watched a little TVB, and then voila, freezer opens up again. Guess all it took was to watch some TVB... lol

Interesting thought though, what would happen if the freezer does freeze over. Would a person have to drain the fridge? Hrm...

Wine, Macaraoni and Cheese

Note to self:

On its own...
Wine - good
Cheese and Macaroni - good

Together in one pot... Not so good.

Courtesy Warning for Running a Red Light...

Apparently a couple weeks ago, a camera decided to snap a few photos of my car.

The system looks pretty cool though. Before and after pic, and the license plate. Pretty neat.

But I think the system forgot to account for the law that you can make a right on red... good thing it was just a warning!

My First Lecture in 2.5 years...

Result: same as 2.5 years ago.

Knocked out within 10 minutes... ... ...aiiiiiiii... hope the camera didn't catch me in the act

After making all that effort to get there too...
Next time, next time I will last the whole lecture!

Random Solicitation Day

So as my first assignment, I had to make a little design and paper, and then get user feedback on it. The requirement was that these users had to be strangers to me, and so our prof suggested we go to a coffee shop and ask people.

So today, I went about doing this. Originally I had lined up a scribe for this activity, but they decided to bail last minute. But needing to get a job done, I grabbed my gear, and went.

Went to the library, Starbucks, and a bbtea shop...

Result: Success! Was alot easier than I thought it'd be. Though I did get one 'No' when I solicited a person, 3/4 ain't too bad. It's all about watching facial expressions and gauging their level of boredness with their current task. hahahaha.

I think with this course, I probably have to do this again in the near future. So my random adventures continues... ... ...

And So It Begins.... 6 hours of reading later.... still reading

Life of a student:
1) Procrastination and more procrastination... ... ...
2) Reading reading reading...

The good thing though - at least most of the content so far is semi-interesting.

Reading continues ...

Mson's Bus Adventure + Revisiting the Academic Life

Arriving back last night after a 2 hour flight delay, today I officially restarted my academic life, pursuing a Master's degree. The course seems pretty interesting, but getting to the class today itself was more interesting...

The sequence of events
Knowing that the traffic will be crappy, I decided to try out the bus system for the first time. Printed out some bus routes and all, I went about to the bus station. As I park, I see the bus number I want to go on just arriving, so I started walking towards it, only to see it drive away. $#*()&#$... ga... But tis ok, since it comes every 15 minutes anyway. Here I stand, thinking how lucky I am that the bus drove by, because now I know where the bus station was (the bus station was actually right along the highway - cool eh?)

So bus comes, I get on, only after 30 seconds in it did I realize that I got on the right bus number.... but wrong direction! lol. So yes, I just wasted almost 15 minutes of my life waiting for a bus that I shouldn't even be on - suddenly I don't feel so lucky anymore... ... ...

Getting off at the next stop, I go back to the correct bus station in the right direction, and off I go! The bus ride itself, once I am on it, was pretty smooth. I get off a the right location, and having missed the original connecting bus, with 15 minutes left before class started, I soldiered it up and walked towards the building.

Getting to the building 2 minutes late, here I thought 'awesome, I am here'. So I go into the room I thought the lecture was at, sat down quietly to not disturb the class. Noticed a few things here...
1) Really nice lecture room and not the usual dungeon or crabby tables -- didn't think much of it... guess UWash is well funded
2) The table by the door had a bunch of something about 'law' on it -- probably some class before left them there
3) Prof not making sense -- happens all the time right?
4) Alot of females in the class ?!?!
Hrm.. as I confirmed point #4 after putting on my glasses, I then double checked the lecture room that I was suppose to be in.. And lo and behold, I was in the wrong lecture room! Confirming w/ the nice lady next to me that I was indeed in the wrong class, I then hunted down the room I was suppose to be in.
(FYI: The class turned out to be Environmental Law - seemed like an interesting class)

So with that, I finally arrive... 15 minutes late to my first lecture in 2.5 years.

The return trip was much less eventful. Overall, the bus experience wasn't really too bad. Would probably not mind doing it again if I had to.

Xmas Holidays in a Nutshell

Back after almost 3 weeks. The past 3 weeks was pretty nice. Ate lots, drank lots, saw some people that I haven't seen for years! Took a more relaxed approach this time around, and tried to find some time for myself and stay home more. Turned out nicely because I wasn't as exhausted as I usually am after trying to do EVERYTHING while I am back :D AND I was able to swing by the AGO!

As always, every time I return to TO, things always seem a little bit different than the last time. This time was no different.
The feeling this time I guess can be described as 'distant'. Not distant in the sense that the people I know and I have started to feel distant, but more that it doesn't seem like I am part of the city anymore. But I guess that's with good reason, since I am really only back there 30 days at the most a year.

Come to think, in another couple years, things will have changed quite a bit more, people will shuffle around more, lives will have continued to move on, and what I remember and cherished of TO will start become a sweet memory.

Well, I guess vacations are always nice :).

blooooowfish and the boot

Today I booked off my evening so I can try for the first time in my life, blowfish. A fish I came to know about when I watched Simpsons wayyy back, today I finally get the chance to try it.

Supposedly a little bit of poision from this fish can kill 2500 mice. It has 5 layers of skin, and I think every layer is edible! Pretty cool eh?

We started off with a sashimi plate - that had both sashimi and 2 layers of its skin. Then we had a piece of sushi of it (which was really yummy), then a hot pot, and then the remaining broth was used to make 'pau fan'. The 'pau fan' was really
good I thought - I am always tempted to say it was actually sweet!

The taste is hard to describe. I would almost say its like beef without the blood - if that makes any sense at all. It did feel very healthy eating the meal though. It felt very 'clear'..., only thing was it was a tad expensive (ie. good to do once or twice, but not something I would do every week).

Still feeling hungry, we then headed back to good ol' Redmond for some happy hour oysters. Filled out our stomach, then I drove allll the way back across to go to a german bar. And then that is where I saw.... the Boot! Yes, the boot, the bubble, the bubble!!! Without waiting, I orderd one and off we went :). 2L of beer, in one container, THAT is THE one drink!

Who'd thought - of all places, I would eat blowfish and drink the boot here.

K w/ Booze - Finally

Inciting people to action, today we got our hands on a liquor license, and booked a room to sing... in Seattle!

Started off at this place called BBQ Chicken. Had some ramen (aka Instant Noodles) and some pretty decent fried chicken. Chicken and beer, ahhhh... made me think of the Cali days!

Afterwards, the main venue of the night came. Armed with liquor and wine, the 5 of us sang, drank just like old times. We even had chicken wings in the room from the BBQ Chicken place.

The only quirky thing was that apparently, we had to reserve the dice ahead of them - booking a room does not guarantee that there will be dice. Had we known, we'd bring our own... hahahahha.

It was great though being to just sing and, well at some point, yell... lol. Haven't done that in quite awhile. $35 a person wasn't too bad at all for a fun night of reminiscing of old times.

(yes, 3 drink limit definitely broken here... again)