Please excuse me while I be vain for a few moments.

Gah... I miss my car!

I never thought I'd say this, but part of me misses driving. Public transportation is definitely convenient, especially in Taiwan where the terrific bus and MRT system plus horrific traffic render driving the stupid mode of getting to places (not to mention the atrocious cost of gas). Driving has just always been a way of life for me, and while I enjoy the convenience of the MRT, there are definitely times I wish I'd rather drive.

Yes, even in Taiwan.

I'm just a daring driver, I suppose. If you've been with me in the car you might understand.

Anyway, I miss my baby. I've had a couple "babies" over the years, family hand-me-downs that have strong sentimental ties. Giving them up wasn't easy and I was definitely in denial when their number came up. Maybe that's why I've poured so much of my blood, sweat, and tears into keeping this one running.

It's also a family hand-me-down and I'm now pushing 220,000mi on this baby. Unless my parents take it out joyriding while I'm out of the country, the pleasure of reaching that milestone should be mine.

I've had a lot of free time to surf the web lately, and after you exhaust YouTube and get tired of reading Wikipedia (believe me, there is a point when that happens) you need something else to look at. I started daydreaming in my free time the last couple days at work about some pet upgrade projects to my baby when I get back. Part of me, especially after being able to drive around in brand new Acura for a little bit, is dying for the niceness and freshness, or just the excitement, of a new car. But part of me is still madly in love with my old car, its rock solid quality and the old-school class and charm it carries.

Maybe this is what marriage is like... hmm. (Sorry I just finally finished the first season of Desperate Housewives. The story's still bouncing around in my head.)

Moving onto my laundry list!

1. Foglights - I think my car would look so hot with a set of good foglights. I love it when you see a car driving during dawn or dusk hours with only their parking lights on and the foglights on too. There's just something that looks meanly good about it. And also the fact that my stock factory headlights are worthless at nighttime illumination. I had an '08 TSX loaner car earlier this summer with xenons and I can't go back, so foglights are the next best thing. I'm toying with an HID headlight upgrade too, but I haven't really looked into it. Might not be worth the money and effort as of now.

2. Remote keyless entry - My parents' cars have this. My loaner did too. That experience was the clincher. Now I can't live without the convenience! Should be a fun and practical job to undertake. Basic keyless entry systems are also dirt cheap these days since everybody's looking for something more high tech.

3. Rear backup warning/sensor system - So this was one I hadn't planned on before coming to Taiwan. I noticed that a lot of cars in Taiwan, including my uncle's, all come equipped with the backup sensors that beep when you're about to hit the other car. It's probably out of necessity since people parallel park bumper-to-bumper in the city. But now I've also seen how beautifully it works. I have a lot of trouble back-end parking my car when I'm parking in a garage or a parallel space beacuse I seriously can't see how long it is. I had an easier time with the minivan because the tailgate just ends, whereas my car's derriere sticks out a whole lot. I looked into it and it seems like a doable job, not too costly either since everybody wants to have a backup camera instead.

3. Cold air intake - Nestor had one on his old Civic and he's been trying to sell me on one for the longest time. I just want to hear the masterpiece of a V6 that's under the hood. The (bogus?) promise of a horsepower boost lures the lead foot I have. Better fuel economy wouldn't hurt either.

4. Leather repair kit - Almost 20yrs of wear and tear has killed the leather interior. I think the driver's seat is beyond salvaging, but the cracks from sun damage at the top of the rear seat along the back shelf should be able to be fixed. It makes me worried because if I want the car to last, which it probably would since I've seen Legends at the junkyard in excess of 250k and seen ones online with 300k or 400k, it would be pointless if it did if we had nowhere to sit inside of it. My only frustration right now is finding the right color. Nobody seems to have Taupe!

5. I also have to find out what's making the power antenna stick, but it works well enough as it is even if I don't. It just bothers me. I have car OCD.

Okay... phew. Thanks for letting me throw this out there.

I know none of you cares, but I had to tell somebody.

I'm pretty bad at this blogging thing. I admit that I haven't been at this in a very long time.

I just got back from a late lunch, this weekend has been very lazy. For which I'm grateful actually. Anyway, we made it back just in time before the rain started coming down (we rode bicycles around town). It's coming down pretty crucially right now. I can hear it banging on the roof. It sounds like a hurricane but I know it's just your average Taiwanese afternoon rainstorm. Makes me wonder what a real hurricane is gonna be like...

Taiwan's been a great experience overall. I think part of me expected it to be "connecting with my roots" until I realized I was rather in touch with my roots already. I thought I would be the typical American to everyone here, and while I think I still dress and act very much American, I've blended in more than I thought. I'm not sure how to feel about that. Part of me feels a wave of relief because being an American abroad is a very embarrassing thing... but part of me is also self-conscious. Because this means all those accusations of me being a fob back home are, well, somewhat true now.

Oh my goodness! This rain is insane. In the membrane.

So let's move onto the FAQ for Brian's trip to Taiwan.

1. How's work going?

Work is going wonderfully. This week our head researcher was out at some conference in Taoyuan from Tuesday to Thursday and my mentor was out to Pingtung the last two days in the week. This means whatever research we were assisting in ground to a halt. My mentor's grad student also arrived on Thursday, but she had nothing to do since, well, her advisor was at the other tip of the country.

For those of you with no Taiwan geography, like me before I got here, check Google Maps. Just kidding, haha.

Taoyuan is about 30min to 1hr south of Taipei? Roughly? And Pingtung is at the southern tip of the island somewhere many, many hours away by car. To put this into perspective, Taipei is at the northern tip.

This all meant that we had a ton of free time at work this week. At the beginning of the week we took a look at the soft-shelled turtles and worked on the protein purification, but our high speed (think insanely high speeds like 50000rpm or more) centrifuge broke and we couldn't continue with that. I watched a Korean movie (Innocent Steps) with my roommate at work which REALLY got me back into ballroom dancing. You should watch that movie, ballroom dancing is so hot, haha. I've decided to put that on my list of things to do before med school. Incidentally that's also when I decided to actually make the list of things to do before med school.

I also finished season one of Desperate Housewives FINALLY. Who knew Wisteria Lane was so twisted? It makes me wonder if a certain measure of MoCo life is represented because we definitely fit that affluent suburban profile.

2. What do you do at work?

I'm not sure if you guys ask this question out of formality or what, but I seriously doubt you're interested in what I do at work beyond the relatively fun part of performing necropsy on fish and other acquatic life. I'm actually able to identify the brain, gill muscles, intestines, heart, lungs, spleen, and liver when you cut open a fish, and on occasion shrimp and soft-shelled turtles (which I learned are not actually real turtles). Haha, I'm sure this is some sort of life skill. Unless you're a true nerd, you don't wanna know about how we perform DNA and RNA extractions from tissue samples, isolate and purify viral surface proteins, and inject fish with either the test vaccine or challenge them with viral strains.

3. What do you after work?

You know what they say, nightfall is when the freaks come out to play. Sike, haha. We're developing our routines and traditions now. I think now that it's been a few weeks of this whole work cycle, we're starting to hit our groove.

After work some people head back and hang out in the lounge at the dorm or (like me) we go back to our rooms and take a brief nap. I don't know what it is, but I get mad tired here in Taiwan. Like today I slept 10hrs last night, and then I took another 3hr nap.

Anyway, afterwards we get up to go out. We either walk around to the Old Street area or ride the bus into downtown. Haven't been out to the Wharf area yet with the other interns, though my aunt and uncle took me out there last night to check it out. It's definitely an awesome area and I can't wait to explore it on weekends. The view is breathtaking as the wharf extends along the river as it comes in from the Taiwan Strait.

So we go out every night for something yummy and hit up the bread shops to buy the next day's breakfast. Depending on how late we go out, we'll go grab drinks and roam the Old Street area night market before heading back.

Lately we've been hanging out in the lounge after we get back (they FINALLY turned on the internet). Can you believe there's no wireless (okay, that's believable because we just got wireless at UMD) but that there's only 2 internet ports!? C'mon, Taiwan. You can do better in technology.

On the weekends, I've only had one and I'm on my second one now, I have been coming back down to Taipei to stay with my uncle's family. Part of it is the wish of my dad to bond more with this side of the family and part of it is because it makes travelling around town more convenient. They live in central Taipei. I hate coming down here because I don't want to be a burden to them. They seem to insist on treating me to everything. One day I will have my revenge and buy them all dinner. I'm already working on phase one: I'm cooking spaghetti for them tomorrow night since you can't get a decent bowl anywhere in Taiwan.

Last weekend I went to 101 with some group 9 people before heading back to Danshui. On Saturday we met up again and went to the city zoo at which we spent 90% of the time indoors in the amphibian house or the penguin house, haha. Afterwards we hit up the Shenkeng night market for the famous stinky tofu and rode the Maokong gondola for some gorgeous views of the Taipei skyline at night.

The day would've been perfect except I forgot my friggin camera in my dorm! Grr.

This weekend... let's see. My aunt and uncle came up with my two cousins to take me to the Wharf area to check it out as I haven't yet. It's really nice, like I mentioned earlier. I do like the waterfront and God's given me one of the best areas in Taipei to experience it. Later today I'm going with my mom's side the family to take them around 101.

Hold on, lemon aiyu jelly break.

Okay! Continuing with the FAQ...

4. Meet any hot girls?

This is a very popular question asked by everyone. I'm going to put an answer out here not to gossip or to pass judgment on the girls here, I find that very insensitive and rude, but to end the rumors once and for all. And because Elyssa wanted something juicier to read than PCR, HPLC, and whatnot, so you can blame her.

I was supposed to go clubbing last weekend in Taipei but I was too tired that Friday night, and it turns out the "foreigners get in free" promo for July 4th turned out to be bogus anyway. There are gonna be plenty of weekends to go get my freak on, so I'm not really in a rush, haha. In the end I think it worked out because my roommate went and I heard his ridiculous story of this girl totally out-drinking him, him throwing up for 2hrs, and then passing out and getting a mosquito bite on his fingertip, haha. Talk about unfortunate.

Anyway, I see the same like 10 girls on a regular basis so everything's pretty much platonic there. Like I said, I'm not coming back home with a Taiwanese wife. Let me give you a rundown on why this is.

• A good half of the girls are the domestic Taiwanese vet med students that have been selected to do summer internships at our lab. They are the top vet med students from around the country. They need to score 80 or better at their national universities, which basically means a 3.5gpa or better in our terms. I don't mean to say anything against them because they are pretty cool, but most of them are your typical study-super-hard Asian girls that are uber shy around guys, no matter than I'm probably a good couple years younger than they are.

• The next half are the overseas interns that are here in Taiwan as a part of the same program with me.

• A few of other girls from my small group are all older. They all said it's a shame, but none of em goes for younger guys. Except the one cradle robber we have, haha.

And in conclusion, I'm not bringing back a wife from Taiwan! Sorry to disappoint?

I found out this week that I have a family wedding of some sort to attend at the end of the month. I think I'm supposed to be the family emissary since everyone else who's close to this second cousin or whatever of mine is in America. Anyway, I asked my dad if I should bring a date. You know... someone my age going to a wedding alone? Who am I gonna talk to? Who's gonna be my dance partner? Am I gonna be drinking myself to death at the punch bowl?

My dad freaked out and told me I shouldn't have a girlfiend yet, haha. Evidently he misunderstood but his reaction was hilarious.

I guess that's it for now. More next time!