[Super Duper Fantastic] ISFP/INFP. 4w5. World Explorer. Super Hero. Rose-colored Glasses.

I got together with the elementary school folks for dinner tonight, and it’s really strange how we really don’t know each other all too well, and yet here we are reconnecting. AND we get along. JB was in town for the week from Texas, so MC and DH sent me a message.

We ended up having dinner downtown [Colibri] and just catching up. The rest of us had caught up in the past, but it was our first time seeing JB in a very long time. It was actually funny bonding with her over how we were so mistreated by a certain classmate back in the day. DH is getting married. He proposed back in April. Such a romantic story too! *sigh*

I love that we’re all grown up now and that we communicate with each other just fine. I need to make these reunions more than just once or twice a year.

Side note #1 [Related]: Everyone looks the same. It’s so bizarre. Large versions of the same faces.

Side note #2 [Unrelated]: I went and got a mani/pedi tonight with a friend. I’m definitely not the girly type, but wow, it turned out so well. I know where I am going when the cousin’s wedding comes up next month! I remember being a little tiffed that we weren’t part of the planning process, but it’s not as if we’re that close now anyway. I’m just recycling a dress I wore in the past, getting nails done, and throwing on a pair of shoes that don’t make me look like the Jolly Green Giant.

She’s okay now. It was just a scare.

So a family emergency this morning is throwing the weekend off balance. Something happened in the early morning with the mom. While it was lucky that both my sister and I were at home, we were asleep and basically unaware until within the same house, I received a phone call from her. It’s not even that big of a house, but my bedroom is in the very front of the house while hers is in the very back. My sister is in the next room, but sleeps like a log.

Nothing serious, thankfully. We visited the ER just in case.

We have to face reality. We’re not children anymore. Our parents are not staying young forever. People get old, as do their bodies. We need to be prepared for this.

Took a few shots this Saturday with the Nikon. Luckily for me, I have a sister who doesn’t mind being the occasional model for my experiments. She also has fantastic ideas if you leave your camera in her hands. Yes, I did mess around with these in Photoshop. Guilty!

We started off the day messing around in the kitchen. I took a cooking class the night before [company-sponsored] and was trying to make one of the recipes for a potluck during the day. Alas, the food didn’t turn out as good. Oh well. At least I am even bothered to try! Brought the finished product to the potluck, stuffed my face with everything else, and then spent the afternoon wandering around the Richmond District. A former colleague’s girlfriend recently opened up a boutique, so we stopped in to check it out. We tried having dinner rather early and ended up ordering way more food than we could finish. We wrapped two of the three dishes to go.

A relaxing, random Saturday.

It has been raining, off and on. I’m actually loving it. The only part I might not enjoy is having one less arm to carry everything. They need to get me an umbrella that will just float over me at all times. That would be fantastic.

Despite my last entry, it appears that now MH and I are “dating,” whatever that means. It was posed to me in the most informal way: So uh, are we like dating or something now? Cuz I mean, sorta seems like it… Yeah, that’s how I remember it. Perhaps it was a bit more eloquent than that, but I was under the influence of a couple shots of Fernet. Oh well, why the heck not, right? I have my reasons for hesitation, but I will play it by ear and just see what happens. I’m not really certain what this entails. I need a handbook or something! I’m not really into the guy in the romantic sense, but heck, what better things do I have to do? Oh wait, yes… WORK. Nah, I do like the attention.

Anyway, the weekend was a relaxing one. Spent most of it with Donna. Despite living in the same house, we hadn’t seen each other in awhile or spent much time together. It was good to just hang out with the sister once again… I hate being so busy because it really cuts down on family time.

In February of this year, I wrote the following:

July 2006 – Maternal Grandfather at age 96. He’s with grandmother now.

November 2006 – Paternal Grandmother at age 83.

February 2007 – Paternal Grandfather is in the ICU after a car accident right across from our house, at age 88. Critical condition. Decisions are being made.

Fuck. All in one year – 4704 on the lunar calendar. Starts with four, ends with four. I should have known. [Four is an unlucky number in Chinese culture.] Three more days until the new year…

I still miss them all.

I hate having to grow up. I hate that we don’t sit around the table anymore. I hate that there aren’t many movie nights anymore, where we wrap ourselves up in a blanket on the couch. But I am thankful that I can still live at home. Seeing them in passing is better than not seeing them at all.

I am glad that I haven’t picked up and moved yet. I am relieved that the parents aren’t asking me to.

Parents are finally coming back from their 1.5 week long trip to Hong Kong and China. No longer will my sister and I have to fend for ourselves! It was a rough time – not. We were out quite a bit [it's such an easy city to go out in], so it wasn’t a complete disaster. There was one night of cooking [my sister's, not mine!], which actually turned out quite well.

Seriously though, one day I will have to live on my own. I will need basic survival skills! I can at least 1) fry an egg, 2) do my own laundry, 3) wash dishes, 4) make French toast, 5) use a rice cooker, 6) make Jello shots… I’m not such a great catch, yet.

Any other basic skills I should master before I even bother stepping foot out the door?

I am participating in the home version of Holidailies – Holidailies at Home! I believe I’ve totally failed as I didn’t update during the first two days of December. However, I am going to backdate this. I am such the cheater!

No, really. This weekend has been quite busy. Friday: bowling [broke 100 both rounds!]. Saturday: brunch at Tartine, dinner and movies [V for Vendetta and Transformers] at the sister’s friend’s place. Sunday: brunch at Barracuda, retail therapy, books, dinner. I was feeling a little anti-social this morning, but got over it pretty quickly. Guess I just needed a kick out of bed!

This year, I feel as though I have really been bonding with the sister quite a bit. Sometimes it’s a bit too much – to be hanging out with each other ALL the time.

However, it is such a good feeling to finally open up, to be able to comfortably [sometimes] verbally communicate my thoughts to someone [usually topics that I like to internally process for quite some time], rather than just to blog about it. I’m hoping that some day I will be able to do that with other people as well. It will be hard, but I am working on it.

It was her 24th birthday this past week. I somehow managed to plan a surprise party. It actually worked out – YAY!

Last Friday, I attended a health fair sponsored by my workplace. They were offering screenings for glucose, cholesterol, blood pressure, and osteoporosis. Most importantly, they were offering free five minute massages. So of course, I was all over that!

Turns out my glucose is fine, and I’m not at risk for osteoporosis. It was definitely a weight off the shoulders, considering how my grandmother was diabetic, and I’m fairly skinny, so I would have been at risk for those. My blood pressure, on the other hand, is a bit low. I still need to figure out what that means!

What worries me the most, however, is the cholesterol. It’s a little high, especially for someone at my age. The good news is that while total cholesterol is high, the HDL (good cholesterol) is relatively high too. As long as the HDL is up, it means LDL (bad cholesterol, associated with heart disease) is not AS high.

So what’s going to change? I am not planning on running to the doctor to get prescribed Zocor, Tricor or Lipitor. Instead, just to be on the safe side – more fiber in the diet and a bit more exercise. I want to see if that changes anything before I go change my eating habits. I’m not ready to give up good food (especially greasy brunch food) if I can help it!

So when I got home, the first thing I did was proclaim loudly, “Daddy, this is all your fault! My cholesterol is high, thanks to you.”

I know. That’s the wonderful daughter that I am.