bring it on!
I'm getting maaaarrrried. I'm getting maaaaarrried. I-I-I am getting maaaarrrried. [doing Elliot's "I-told-you-so" dance from Season 1Scrubs]

Let the party begin.

get me to that altar.
This is my last post before I drive up north to get hitched. My car is packed with things that in any normal situation, I would never have packed for a road trip to SJ. For example - a printer and a weird paper plate with bows and ribbons hanging off of it.

There's a lot of work to be done before the day and each day feels like 5 days packed full of wedding work, worries and drama.

5 more days. Dang, feels weird to write it. Well, not really.

so true
Wow. Speak and Spel1s are AWESOME.

You're a Speak & Spell!! You nerd, you. Just
because you were disguised as a toy doesn't
mean you weren't educational, you sneaky
bastard.


What childhood toy from the 80s are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

I really really wanted a speak and spel1 toy as a kid but my parents said it was too expensive. I guess they figured I could use the dictionary to spell my own words.

all dressed up and no place to go
This weekend, Minsoo and I headed up to northern ca for a wedding. We got to hang out with some people on Friday night, did some wedding stuff Saturday and then headed up to Berkeley on Saturday night for the wedding. I was excited to see some friends from my old work and to see my friend get married so we made sure to leave the south bay an hour and a half early just in case of traffic on 88o. We made it up to the Berkeley H1lls a half an hour early. Before we got out of the car, I checked my make-up and the invitation one more time. This is when I noticed that I had made a terrible mistake.


(please see below)





(the invitation) 

So yeah. I got it wrong. Not only did I mess up the day of the week, but the week of the wedding. I hate to be late to events, but man, being 8 days early is a little much. I was horrified. Luckily Minsoo thought this was pretty funny so he didn't mind this little mistake. He laughed at me the whole way back home. I just kept muttering under my breath that I had muffed it up.

I think this was a little divine intervention because instead of going to the wedding, we had more time up north to hang out with friends and laugh, mostly at my expense. We ended up tagging along on the Bethe1 young adult/college retreat to Monterey, which was a much needed time to just hang out with friends and mess around. I don't think that I would have allowed myself to take a break before the wedding, but maybe it was God's plan all along to give us a little vacation, I don't know. All I know is that messing up the wedding day made for a great story that our friends and family thoroughly enjoyed.

Less than three weeks baby.

the countdown begins
Finals are over, I'm still working part time and doing a side research project with classmates on slumlords in addition to continuing wedding planning. I know, I need to be slapped silly. I need to stop overcommitting myself.

30 more days until I don't have to plan anymore, I mean, until I get married. I can't wait.

7 more days until we start moving our stuff into the new apartment. Yay!

That's it.

please laugh at me.
i've gone insane.

i am sitting at my dining room table in front of an unfinished paper with books and papers strewn everywhere, crying as I watch t1c's wedd1ng story and drinking a corona (i'm all out of d1et coke, my drink of choice). it's 1:47pm on a thursday afternoon.

i am ridiculous.

i'll order one glass of whine...
I'm at my apartment, alone. My friend was here, doing a group paper with me, but she left to go to small group. My roommate is done with finals and left to go out on a date. Even Minsoo is going out tonight -- on a date with his roommate to see thebatman movie. And I'm here, starting on paper number #3. Blah!

Man, it sucks to I see my roommate (who spends most of his time at work, at school or in his room playing video games) getting all spiffed up for his date while I'm sitting here, dishelved from paper-writing, in the midst of a pile of books, with a bum toe.

Okay, my glass of whine is finished. I am cracking the whip and getting it done!

This weekend has been a whirlwind of events. I went to Hillary's wedding. I cannot believe she is a married woman -- and before I AM! I am envious. It was great to meet her hubby and hang out with them. I'm really happy for her and he seems like a really good guy. Yay for Hill --- not yay for the booty humid weather. Minsoo and I stepped outside the airport and both said: "gross." Anyway the weekend was cool and we got to spent tons of time with Beast. I haven't laughed that hard in a while. The only downside was the fact that I had school on the brain the whole time. I have three papers due and am not done with any of them. Oh well...

Another exciting event this weekend: Minsoo and I signed the lease on our first apartment together. It was crazy and awesome to get to do something marriage-related instead of only wedding-related. Our apartment is dang expensive (it's LA, after all), but it has has some cool features -- a whole f00ds across the street, a star$s ($=buck) at the other corner and a bl0ckbuster at the end of the block. The bus to campus stops on that same corner too. It's pretty awesome. Minsoo has to drive far, but at least we're not living in a ghetto neighborhood. Hopefully no more calling the cops like I did in Campbell. Wow, we're gonna be roommates! No more posting ads on craigsl1st for me, PRAISE GOD.

5 more day and I'm done with my first year at grad school. Just need to get through this...

i always forget.
I am the worst at remembering birthdays and other dates that don't involve some sort of day off work. This past week, minsoo came over to my apartment and brought me a bunch of tulips. I was surprised at this gesture until I realized why... oh crap. Our 5th year anniversary. Anyway, to make up for once again, forgetting, here is a an essay dedicated to the best fiance ever:

Why minsoo is the best fiance ever. A list By Wai-ling.
- My white girl friends think he's cute. [read: All the girls want to be with him.]
- My Male Asian classmate thinks minsoo (aka AAM) is so cool. [read: All the guys want to be him.]
- He buys me jamba juice when I ask him to. He stopped to buy me one after I had my toe surgery and was in the car whining in pain for an hour. It was green tea.
- He drives far distances to see me. Like the time he drove from SJ to LA to surprise me for my b-day.
- He helped me clean up asbestos.
- He helped me move out of 7 different places in the past 5 years.
- I asked him to wake up at 6am on two holidays to help at the meals on wheels project. It was cold, but he went with me anyway.
- I ask him to come and see my middle school kids show off their stuff at the afterschool project presentations. He obliged.
- I asked him to go to south central LA to take pictures of vacant lots. He did it.
- He lets me watch Ver0n1ca mars.
- Sometimes, I feel like I am mean to him. But he is nice to me.

The end.

i'm free, but not really
I've been freed from my antibiotics but am now bound to the graduate computer lab. I have two presentations due next week and three papers due the week after that. I'm still limping but hopefully my toe will get better soon. I will be done soon, however, these next two weeks look a little bit scary. In my head, I know I should be all stressed out, but I'm really not because I think I've become numb to all the stress. I'm hoping not to have anything else on my plate or else I might really crack under the pressure.

Also -- people, send me your RSVP cards!

changing pace
It's been just over a month since I heard about Lisa, my jr/high school friend who passed away of cancer. I just finished writing the sympathy card that I've been hanging on to for weeks. My whole apt fiasco and my toe threw me off and I really wanted to write a genuine card to her parents. In the meantime, I found a good photo to send to her parents, I had the chance to talk to some of my high school friends and do some more memorializing. One thing I learned from Lisa is that true friends are hard to find. I always knew that she was a good friend, but I was too caught up in everything else to really hang on to her friendship. She was kind of a social outcast because she was so honest and I think I sort of distanced myself from her because of the whole trying to be cool high school thing. I wish I had kept in touch with her. It makes me thankful of my long-time friendship with Summer, who's going to be my bridesmaid. You can't take those types of relationships for granted. You also can't replace friends who've known you when you looked your ugliest.

I am also somewhat reflective because my sister just left for her new job in Albuquerque. She stopped in LA on her way and during her time here, I realized how integral sisters are to one anothers' development (in both positive and negative ways). I am going to try and be a better, more prayerful, more patient and more understanding sister. This is a tall order, I know.

I just want to be a better person, in general. You know?

crazy (me and everything around me)
Things are crazy right now. Today I drove wrecklessly to campus on a bum toe talking on my cell phone trying to arrange my bridal hair appts and cleaning my apt before I move out while trying to remember what I read the night before so I was prepared for class. I ended up safely on campus, only to watch my lunch get cold while trying to limp to class and making hotel arrangements over the phone for the wedding. I CANNOT MULTITASK ANYMORE. I... AM... SO... TIRED.

So today when I got a letter from my school saying I got a fellowship, I thought I saw a ray of sunshine. However, when my mom read the letter closely it read: "The department of urban planning WILL RECOMMEND to the graduate division that you be awarded...."

What does "will recommend" mean? Does this mean I have to compete with more people? Do I get it or will I have to wait for funds to come through?

Why oh why do you have to tease me so?

Final project presentations are due next week. Gotta push through to the end.

more toe
Day 4 of antibiotics. I hate medicine. My foot still looks sort of gross. I've been at my parents house for almost 3 weeks straight, with a few trips to the doctors here and there. I'm glad the house has a lot of windows because I'd feel really cooped up. My co-worker and my classmate drove down here to hang out and study with me, which was really cool. I actually spent an exciting Saturday night doing my GIS project. Yeah, yeah, I need to get out more often. You tell my big swollen toe and my partial toenail that. Did you know that antibiotics, ahem, cleanses your system? Ughhhhhh.

On another note: 7 weeks until the wedding. YIKES. If I can just get through the next three weeks of final projects, It'll be all good. I should really just get all of the project done early...HHAHAHHAAHAHAHAHAH. who am I kidding?

probably too much information...
I went to the doctor yesterday because my toe looked gross and there was some oozing. Yeah, gross, huh? I was afraid that he'd tell me I'd need to take antibiotics and sure enough, he prescribed these 500mg pills to take 4 times a day for 10 days. Some people may find medication inconvenient, but I'm one of the few adults that cannot swallow pills. I wasn't very sick as a kid and so I never really practiced popping pills. Anyway, taking medication is not one of my strong points. It's embarrassing, but true. However, last night I swallowed the first pill in the first try! I know, I know, it's such a natural thing to most people, but considering these past few weeks, it's quite significant. Today I also swallowed two pills. Granted, I threw one up, but swallowing 2 is still swallowing 2.

4 pills * 10 days = 40 pills - 4 (2 taken, 1 thrown up, 1 spit out) = 36 more.

36 more to go.

sick toe
I spent the past few days recovering from my toenail surgery at my parents' house. I can't walk so I use one of our kitchen chairs with wheels to move around the house. I am glad they put in hard wood floors. My toe hasn't gotten better so I'm kind of worried, but I suppose it just takes a long time. It looks pretty disgusting and my toe will never be the same again, but hopefully I won't have the ghost of the pedicure spa haunting me again. It sucks to be moping around the house -- I haven't left the building since friday early evening and it looks like I'll be here for at least another day. I can barely take two steps, so driving is out of the question.

Ack. It's week 8 so only 3 more weeks to go before this quarter is over. I need some motivation.

it never ends
It's been 7 days since I noticed water gushing from my ceiling. Today, I went back to my apartment to check out the new carpet that the manager promised would be installed today. It was there, in all of it's new-carpet-smelly ugly brown patterned glory. I started to put things back in its place when I heard it -- the sound of dripping water on carpet.

Oh HELL NO. (as I wave my index finger in the air) There was water dripping from my smoke detector in my room... onto my new carpet.

I called the maintenance line (surprise! no one knew what was going on and they said it would be fixed tomorrow - oh no it would not, I told myself). I found an old message from the manager who gave me his cell phone number so I called him and he came right over.

So tonight, there is a large recycling container in my room catching the dripping brown water. I am at my parents' house.

Oh yeah and I'm having minor surgery on my toe. Remember the pedicure went wrong? It's coming back to haunt me. It never stops.

nice girls don't get their apartments fixed
There's this new book out called "N1ce g1rls don't get rich" and I've adapted that title to reflect my current situation.

My roommate is much more relaxed about things, but I suppose it's because his room wasn't affected and he hasn't faced this situation twice. I, on the other hand, have been calling all of the apartment management and letting them know that I am not pleased at the lack of progress in my apartment. Apparently word has gotten around about my displeasure because the maintenance guy called me twice to assure me of the progress in my apartment. In any other situation I might feel guilty for being so pushy, but in this case I am just glad that this time I am hopefully not going to have to pull out the lawyer card.

I think I've definitely learned more about asserting myself in these situations. Even if it's not a huge inconvenience (which it is!), I've found that unless I let them know that it is, they are only going to do what is in their best interest (which is doing the minimal on their own timeline) and try and placate me with temporary hotel accomodations and cooing "Honey, don't worry, it'll be okay." Um hello -- It's not okay to have to live in another place for over 5 days because of an accident and not be guaranteed pro-rated rent. It's not okay to not be informed everyday if anything is going to be done in our apartment if they weren't able to tell us the exact timeline of the process. It's not okay to honey-darling-sweetheart me ANYMORE. To quote Thomas (the little kid who wrote that note on my behalf), I don't play.

This time, I'm not playing nice girl.

update
I'd like to say I have an update on my apartment, but so far nothing has been done. AND I AM FREAKING PISSED ABOUT THIS. Typically, after 48 hours of messing up the carpet and having huge noisy machines drying the place, you replace the carpet pad and shampoos (if not replace) the carpet. But it's been over 48 hours, if I'm not mistaken and NOTHING HAS BEEN DONE.

I am freakin pissed. A few of my "highlights from this weekend":
- Wearing the same thing several times (I hope that Minsoo and Messy didn't notice. I'm glad Minsoo's parents were only here for one day). I had some clean underwear --thank goodness.
- Driving from redondo to culvercity with my gas light on. Gas is expensive, especially when you have to commute from where you're staying to where you live to check on the carpet and your messed up apartment where NOTHING HAS BEEN DONE.
- have people say, "you're kidding me!" or "you're right, you really are bad luck to live with" or "wow it's almost funny. but it's not."

So I guess I'm painting the picture that this weekend was all bad, which it wasn't. I'm thankful that my parents live nearby and that I got to spend time with (soon to be) both sides of the Family (Yu and Lee). I watched a lot of Ver0n1ca Mars, which I am now addicted to (though my "dealer" aka minsoo only lets me watch 2 episodes at a time), ate some korean bbq, tried on my HanBok for the weddin', got more invites back in the mail (send them in peoples!).

This weekend, aside from the nasty ass brown water coming through my ceiling, was pretty decent.

so envious...
of many people. For instance, I am envious of people who....
... have a place to live where water does not come out of the ceiling
... get lasik surgery.
... have money to get lasik surgery
... are finished with school
... have money. not a lot, just enough to not be in debt.
... have a place to live where water does not come out of the ceiling.

i woke up this morning...
To the sound of rushing water. Was it my roommate washing his dishes? My upstairs neighbors taking a shower?
NO IT WAS MY FREAKING CEILING RAINING DOWN ON ME. Um, yeah and the water is brown and warm.


I am not kidding. This cannot be happening --- AGAIN. [Yes,that is my roommate.] 

Mmm warm brown water