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Friday, July 25, 2008

So much to do before Mickey Mouse

So, we are leaving in 5 days and I am already stressing out. We have to get up at the ass crack of dawn to get to the airport early. There is so much to get done. I have started to pack but it's hard to pack for me and the little one. I have to remember to bring lots of extra stuff. I still need to go to Target and pick up some odds and ends. Arggghhh.
I am really looking forward to this vacation too. It should be really fun. My two younger cousins are going with us and they never get to go on vacation with us. We get to spend about 3 days in Orlando. I know that's not enough time to do everything we want but it will have to do. After that we get to go on our cruise to the Caribbean. I am most excited about the private beach. Just laying out on the sand and playing in the clear blue water watching the fish swim towards you.
Okay, I am beginning to relax a little just thinking about it.
It totally sucks that Sal can't go with us AGAIN. The only bad thing about this is he has to work and can't come. Oh well, at least he can go to Hong Kong at Christmas time that's more important anyway. He gets a vacation from his wife and kid.
I am also stressing because the weather over there has not been the greatest either and I really want good weather. There was a hurricane a couple of days ago in Texas (hope those people are okay) and then it's been raining with thunder and lightning storms in Florida. I hope it clears before we get there. I know I shouldn't complain but I already did.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

Being my mother’s daughter

My mother knows how to do everything and she does is better than anyone. I’m not saying this to brag, I’m saying it because it’s true. If you happen to be her teacher she will far exceed you and you will end up being the student.

I don’t know how to cook a fabulous dinner on the fly. I don’t know how to sew a dress without a pattern. I don’t know how to knit a sweater in a flash. I don’t know how to create something out of nothing.

It is really hard to be the daughter of someone who is so innately perfect. She doesn’t even have to put much effort into the things she does. It’s like breathing for her.

I wanted to learn how to cook but it was her kitchen and no one was allowed in it. She kept it immaculate and you were not allowed to touch anything. The closest that I came to cooking in her kitchen was fixing myself a bowl of cereal or reheating something in the microwave that she made. My mother can look at a picture or try an entrée at a restaurant and be able to make it. We went on a cruise last year and they made this pasta dish with shrimp and it was delicious. When we got home she made it and it taste better.

I wanted to learn how to sew but her sewing machine was not to be touched. It was a factory machine and too advanced for me to learn on. My cousin is getting married in a few months and her wedding dress needed to be altered. My mother looked at it and said I’m not sure how I’m going to be able to do this let me think it over and then let you know. It was going to cost my cousin over $500 to get it altered, which was more expensive than the dress. The next morning my mother says, okay I know how to do it and less than 8 days the dress was done, and it was all done by hand. It was very intricate it had a bodice with ribs and a lot of beading.

The one thing that I can do that my mother doesn’t really like to do is bake. I can bake anything and thankfully it does come out pretty darn perfect. I am the, self-proclaimed, Martha Stewart of baking among my friends. Baking makes me happy and is relaxing. Everything that I bake and bring over to my mother she finds something wrong.

She comments so:

Banana bread: “Okay, la. I don’t like cinnamon.” The next time I bake it, I omit the cinnamon and she says it’s good but it’s too buttery.

Chocolate chip cookies: “Okay, la. I don’t like the chocolate chips too sweet.” The next batch I change it to dark chocolate chips and less sugar. It’s still too sweet.

Coconut Jam cookies: “These are the best cookies you have ever made.” (OMG) she liked it I think I’m going to pass out.

I finally got her approval for something. I thought okay I may be on a role. Let’s get her sponge cake recipe. She makes this awesome sponge cake that I love. Everyone in the family loves this cake. I always thought it was her recipe but it turns out to be my Aunt’s Mother’s recipe. Anyway, I finally got her to give me the recipe and by recipe I mean she took out a bunch of things she uses to bake and described approximately how much she put into each. Obviously, she is a cook not a baker. Baker’s are very precise in their measurements. So, I being an avid baker translate all of her measurements and turn them into real measurements. It took me 3 tries to get the cake perfect.

I bake the cake and bring it to her house for her to try. BINGO!!! I did it she says it tastes even better than her cake.

OMG!!! I waited 32 years for her to tell me that. Okay, maybe it wasn’t 32 years, since the first 5 or 10 years don’t really count.

Don’t get me wrong there are many perks to being her daughter. I always get a great home cooked meal. Anytime I needed a fancy dress she could whip me up a custom dress in my exact size. When I wanted to redecorate my room she would sew a custom table cloth, pillows, and curtains to match the new sheets. If I buy something and it doesn’t fit perfectly she will alter it to do so. I am privileged.

I wouldn’t change her for the world but it was hard to grow up and feel like I was never good enough. I could never reach her high standard and perfection.

I finally feel like I am good enough. I am validated and all it took was a sponge cake and coconut jam cookies.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008

How do you feel about adoption of children by same sex couples?

People who are in straight relationships are able to get knocked up at any time. whether they should or not. You have people who should never be allowed to have children having them, abusing them, leaving them in garbage cans, killing them etc. Then you have two people who really want a child and will love the child who can't physically have one. Shouldn't this be about two people who want to love, care for and raise a child in a healthy home, than about what their sexual orientation is? There are plenty of children who are in the traditional mother/father male/female homes and are being abused, neglected, or worse. I don't get it. What is the big deal? People act like a same sex relationship is like the common cold and you can catch it or pass it to someone from the touch of a door knob. Stop being so ignorant people. Do you think that someone in a same sex relationship would choose the struggles they receive from society over a "traditional" relationship? We are all part of the human race and there are a lot of children in the system who just want to be loved, why wouldn't you want them to be in a happy home.
I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!
The Plank Award goes to...

Today was the day of the plank off. (for those of you who don't know what a plank is, it's a Pilates move where you are holding yourself up like a push up but with your forearms and toes. you hold your body up off the floor for as long as you can usually 30-45 seconds and then repeat)
So first of all I woke up late. The morning was not off to a good start. I woke up at 9:48 am; I needed to be at the gym at 10:00 am. Whoops. So I was totally rushing. I forgot to put on my body bugg and ty wouldn't answer the phone. I was freaking out. I was going to be really late because I still had to drop Matthew off with my grandmother too. Okay
10:08 am in the car on the way to the gym. I get there and realize that I was only 15 minutes late. That’s not too bad. Okay so here we go. We both get into position on the yoga mats.
On your mark, get set, plank.
30 seconds... Joanie is going strong, ty a little shaky. he is noticing that i am doing really well. bad sign for him.
45 seconds...Joanie still going strong not even a little quiver. Ty a little shakier.
(Mind you I have totally been practicing. that includes doing these planks with Matthew sitting on my back. making it way harder to hold up the pose. he's 36 pounds)
1 minute: Joanie is feeling it but not really that bad. Ty is even shakier.
1 minute 30 seconds: Joanie is starting to feel pain in her shoulders and arms. Ty super shaky. At this point I start to really tease ty. Just give up and fall down already. Come on you can just say what a great trainer you are to have trained me to do so well. Besides don't you want to tell everyone that a girl beat you. Ty is not happy by this. And holds the pose.
2 minutes: woooo hooo we made it to 2 minutes. I am totally shocked and proud of myself at the same time.
2 minutes 15 seconds: just give up ty you know you can’t hold it any longer. (joanie is saying this because she is really tired and wants to stop)
2 minutes 30 seconds: who goes down?????

Ty!!!!!
Joanie is the winner. Yeah. I beat him. I was really worried too. I think I could have held it a little longer maybe to 3 minutes but I figured since ty went down why torture myself any longer.
So this is just the beginning. Ty has now set a new challenge for 2 weeks from now.
we still have an hour training session. I really didn't think this through. He gets an hour to torture me. So what does ty do because he's a sore loser? He made me work abs for an hour. Every exercise we did for the rest of the session worked abs.
I think I’ll still beat him in 2 weeks because the wiifit has a plank exercise that is timed too so I am gonna keep practicing. and i'm addicted to the wiifit.
You are going down again in 2 weeks ty.

Sunday, July 06, 2008

The 4 day weekend.

This weekend seemed really long and busy. It was actually pretty nice because Sal had a few extra days off. So we got to spend more time with him. As usual I worked out on Thursday. The day started early for me. I went to the gym and worked out with Ty and somewhere during that hour, I decided that I would challenge him to an exercise competition. Am I crazy? I think so. Well, I said that I could beat him in a Plank-off. That sounds horrible. Basically it's a Pilate’s move. It kinda looks like a push up but you are on your forearms and your toes parallel to the ground. So you hold this pose for usually about 30 seconds or more. What was I thinking challenging my trainer to do this? We'll see what happens on Tuesday.
Wall-E: We decided to go watch a movie and bring Matthew to his first Movie. We figured it's a kid movie if he is a little noisy so what; there are a lot of kids there. (Although I DO NOT want to be one of those parents who has NOISY kids in the movie theater) Anyway, like I said we hardly go to the movies and I can't believe that they are so expensive. They didn't remodel the movie theater. It's still dirty and nothing has been changed. Why on earth is it so expensive? On top of that a kid’s movie ticket is only $0.50 Cheaper?????? WTF! Also, the last time I remember going to the movies matinee was supposed to be about half the price of night time tickets and they aren't. I don't get it. How about they not pay the movie stars like $20 million to be in the movie so we don't have to pay $40 to watch it. I'm annoyed now thinking back on it. The movie was really cute Matty was pretty good. He wanted to sit in his own seat he loved the previews but got kinda bored in the middle and I had to tell him to sit still. For being a 2 year old he was good.
Fourth of July: Nothing spectacular went shopping and ate. Didn't watch any fireworks because it's too noisy for Matty.
Saturday, Was a painting day. Dorinda bought a house a few months ago and we were painting it this weekend. It wasn't too bad. We painted her kitchen and nook area this deep reddish brown. It took her awhile to decide that she really wanted to do that. I said just do it, and she listened. After we initially finished she was still a little hesitant but she will learn to love it cause we are not going to prime and paint it a new color. Hell to the No.
So, after we finished that we had to go to my friend Jenise's birthday party celebration. We went to the Improv in San Jose. The comedians were okay. There was this Iranian guy I think his name was Ali. Totally gay and he was pretty funny. Then some very strange guy who kinda creeped me out. Then this girl from Mad TV Nicole Something she does great impressions of movie stars especially Renee Zellweger. Then the guy who plays Stewart on Mad TV, Michael McDonald. He was funny too but the one thing that I notice the most was how much these people use the F-word. Every other word was the F-word. Don't get me wrong I am no Saint and I cuss a lot too but when they are supposed to be telling jokes it shouldn't always be about cussing. I don't know that just kinda was a put off. Since we were there for dinner and a show we were able to head home around 8:30. I couldn't believe it was that early and Dorinda and I didn't feel like going to hang out at a bar with a bunch of drunken people so we headed home.
We actually decided to go to this Chinese Dessert Cafe 37 C. The food is okay but the service stinks. We ordered our desserts and sat there waiting forever and then when they brought it out it was the wrong thing. The weird part is the woman even asked me twice when I ordered by the Letter if that was the letter that I wanted. So we got to the cafe way before 9 and we didn't leave until about 10:15. We were at the cafe for more than an hour. I did a double take at the clock because I couldn't believe it. Ah well. We had fun talking.
This brings us to today. Sunday. So, I go to boot camp every Sunday morning at 8. I dread it because I don't like waking up early. I really wanted to flake too but I really, really want to lose 30 pounds. So, I drag my fatness out of bed and get ready. I drive the 6 miles to the park where boot camp takes place and realize that besides Ty and his girlfriend I am the ONLY one that showed up. Okay. So, Stacey is in Hawaii (ARGHGHHH), Jenise is probably still sleeping off her drunken state (see above it was her birthday), but Patrina????? She left at the same time we did. Did NOT go to the bar so where was she???? HMMMMM ah yes, when I call her she is still sleeping. Then the other lady I don't know didn't show up either. So here I am feeling like a third wheel on this boot camp workout. The only thing fun was the fact that we got Ty to do the exercises too so he was out of breath along with us.
I get home after an hour of working out and Matthew and Sal are still sound asleep snoring. Must be nice. I shower and get dressed to go finish painting at Dorinda's. We start going and then it's clearly lunch time we are all starving and we keep saying okay let's get lunch what do you want...Blah blah blah. That went on for quite a while. I was STARVING. (I was bad and didn't eat breakfast only my morning latte) We realize that its 2:30 and we really need to eat so we go and get the healthiest meal ever. In-n-Out. Woo hoooo. Horrible, I know. Well the girl standing out in the hot sun can't seem to understand our order, never repeated it to us and when we get to the window to pay, that girl reads out a completely different order. The only thing right was the number of fries. Anyway we finally get back and inhale it.
Matthew: He is only 2 years old and he lets me know when he wants to go to bed. He was watching Little Einstein and it was about 9pm. He gets up turns off the TV. Comes over to me and says Mamma Sleep. I am so surprised by this kid. Yesterday, he stayed up a lot later and I figured it would be okay since I didn't want him waking up when I did to go workout. I told him this is the last one, no more when this episode is over it's time to sleep. Even before they finish the end song, he gets up turns the TV off and says okay Mamma Sleep. I swear I couldn't have asked for a better kid. Love him so much it hurts.
I think I've bored you all to sleep (if anyone's reading) Time for me to sleep too. It's been a long day and weekend.