Can't escape my genes

I have been miserable for the past 3 weeks. Unexplained stomach aches and bathroom troubles I won't go into details about. And then I figured out that I had sudden onset of lactose intolerance. That blows! I love dairy.
I read somewhere that like 90-99% of all Asians have some form of it or other. Someone at work remarked that most of us develop it by their 20s, that I got an extra decade or so to enjoy dairy.

The Motherland

Dear gentle and not-so-gentle readers, I'm off to the sin city of the east, my birthplace, Bangkok Thailand.
I used to be one of those "great" and "understanding" girlfriends that questioned when other girlfriends prohibited their beloveds from going to bachelor parties or having one. Well, ladies, I got my comeuppance. My wedding was in Thailand. No way was I going to let my Asian fetish husband have a bachelor party in Bangkok. Back then, the dollar was worth a little more than it is today, so a bevy of talented sex performers or sex geishas who could open beer bottles with their vaginas or write Happy Birthday from their crotches could be had for cheap. Sorry Josh, that your "bachelor" party even degraded to the point where a female friend tagged along.

Addicted to umami

Excerpt of definition of umami from wikipedia:
Umami is a Japanese word meaning "savory" or "meaty" and thus applies to the sensation of savoriness—specifically, to the detection of glutamates, which are especially common in meats, cheese and other protein-heavy foods. The action of umami receptors explains why foods treated with monosodium glutamate (MSG) often taste "fuller". Not only do I love junky soy burgers, but I can't get enough of MSG. I need a daily dose of it, in either sour cream and onion flavored chips or Thai instant noodles. I don't know why MSG has a bad rap. It occurs naturally in things like yeast or seaweed. I think some companies are trying to obscure that they use MSG equivalents by using disodium guanylate or disodium inosinate. Like Utz potato chips or Lipton instant side dishes. I haven't yet seen a product that uses these ingredients with a flagrant "NO MSG" label.
But anyway, I don't give a fuck. Please label "YES! LOTS OF MSG" or "UMAMI FOR YOU".

QUICK - Go see Ben Scaccia in Local Story!

I recently saw Local Story at the Access Theatre. The play is running until 12/20 so go run and get tickets or buy them at the door. Afterwards, go eat in Chinatown!
I really got into the plot. I can't watch TV or movies, they're too slick and irrelevant for me. Small productions are the way to go, they're going to monopolize my very large entertainment budget of like $20 per month.
The actors are all so well cast in Local Story. I have to plug our very own Ben Scaccia. He did some really convincing nerd trying to be a cool kid virgin-smoker sputtering bit. Ben and Leanne, if you're reading this, I'm going to see every play you star in. I've loved every role Ben has played.
After the show was over, Josh and I hung around because we wanted to talk to Ben a bit. Before Ben came out to meet us, some of his co-stars were already milling with the crowd. I like that. I like the intimacy of meeting the artists and I feel cool knowing that I know one of the actors.
As for the rest of the cast, it's a little weird to see them off stage because they were so convincing in their roles. Because the first experience I have with them is in an acting role, when I meet their real selves, the real selves are actually the actors to me. It's kind of like when you're a kid and you see your teacher at the mall. You get so freaked out to see them out of the usual context.
Ben -- GREAT WORK!! We had a great time watching and rooting for you.

Shameless marketing

Whoa! Read this article on how invasive ads are becoming...
An excerpt -- "How soon will it be until in addition to the do-not-call list, we'll have a 'do not beam commercial messages into my head' list?"

Fashionably insensitive and looking ageless

In a previous post, I gave examples of my sometimes avant-garde or ridiculous (you pick) get-ups. Well, I forgot to tell you about my other half. His glasses are detectably uneven and he owns (and wears!) an ill-fitting pumpkin-spiced color alpaca overcoat that he insists is pimpin'.
My pookie is also preternaturally well preserved in terms of his looks and clothes. It is so spooky to see pictures of him from 10 years ago or so wearing the same t-shirt he still wears today and looking exactly the same - age 22-24. It's not fair -- How can someone who shuns sunscreen look younger than me, totally high-SPF sunscreen obsessed? How can a goddamn t-shirt be wearable after 15 years of use?! If this trend continues, it won't be long before I have to drudge through stupid May-December jokes about how I robbed the cradle when I married him.
Meanwhile, I've changed and aged tremendously. I'm in the midst of cleaning and organizing my closets...and I bemoan having to throw out the preposterously small garments that were cut for a pixie. Should I save some of those things for my 2 yr old daughter to wear in a few years? It's so laughable that I don't even believe that I was ever that small.

I'm a total embarrassment

Mr. Rochester would probably keep me in the basement. I like to wear mis-matched bright colors. I combine trends. I own fluorescent pink imitation Crocs. I wear them with everything because I think they match everything. I have slouchy fuchsia leather elbow gloves. I fold hems of jeans hem up like 10 inches. If worse comes to worse and I don't have anything to wear, I think lingerie on top of white dress shirts are acceptable. I asked my mother-in-law to knit me a pair of arm-warmers. She and my father in-law thought I was joking.
I kinda feel sorry for my kids that I'm a total embarrassment, but I can't help it and in a strange and twisted way, I'm proud.

Asian parent sex trauma

Why do Asian parents insist on telling their kids what seems to them like harmless white lies about where babies come from? Many Asian friends have told me a recurring theme, that their parents told them they were found under a bridge. I guess my crazy, over-achieving parents overshot a little, as they told me I was found in a garbage can.
I have to be sure to give Sadie the proper and truthful "white" upbringing on where she came from. I'm curious which, if any American actually told their children they were brought in by a stork?
So I'm believing that the Asian way is at best untruthful and at worst harmful to some children's delicate psyches.

Stick it to OPEC

I've been giving my husband a lot of flack for his unconventional driving tactics that I thought were ineffective. Not only that, they seem unsafe and can be embarrassing to me.
As it turns out, there's support for this madness and even a term - "hypermiling" and it's probably effective.
Hypermiling = Driving with the goal to save gas (to increase mileage)...
For examples, he tries to avoid braking, shifts into neutral while going downhill, coasting/timing for greens at upcoming stop lights, etc. (Can you pls do this when the two babies are NOT in the car?!)
Check out these record-breaking hypermilers. Thanks Ari for the link.
Only people who can be so extremely focused (like my husband) can do this. I'd probably crash into other cars if I tried.

Suburban deals

SUPERMARKET
Tropicana OJ 96 oz for only $3. On top of that, if I spend $20, I can get $5 off my next shopping order. AND they will TRIPLE coupon...even a cheap person like me can't get it together (who the heck cuts coupons?) or figure out how to fit all this shit into my house. Hubby helpfully suggested we have more kids or get another fridge.

DEPARMENT STORE
Can you believe that I got this satin, down/feather filled coat with fur trim for like 60% off? Lord and Taylor was running a "Great Gifts" sale, so it was 40% off. I found a coupon online for an extra 20% off. And then I opened a charge and got an extra 15% off. I thought about stealing one in every color and length.

Unofficial past time of Thai people

For some reason, Thai people love to draw similarities of one object to another. When Josh and I hired a guide for a cave that had plentiful and impressive stalactite and stalagmite formations, one of the guide's joy was to tell us what he thought each looked like. Chicken, he'd point to one and so on and so forth. He even pulled my then fiancé aside to tell him about the one that he thought looked like a vagina. Also on the island of (Goh) Samui, one of the tourist attractions (determined by the Thai chamber of commerce?!) is dubbed Grandmother and Grandfather rock. What are they you ask? They are natural and giant rock formations that have eroded to look like external male and female reproductive organs.
Thai people also love to say that Thailand (the land mass) is shaped like an axe. I learned about this before I knew Italy was a boot. I wonder what other imaginative parallels I could draw had I remained in Thailand to complete my education.

I really heart fake meat

Fake meat has come a long way since I was a vegetarian in college. I had the most delectable spicy vegan chicken cutlet today, thanks to the good folks at Boca Burger. A little salty (560mg of sodium per serving) and fatty but none of these qualities stopped me from having two patties.
Big thumbs up! So satisfyingly junky tasting!!!

I even lied to my doctors about taking vitamins

Pregnant and nursing ladies everywhere, please don't be a smart-ass like me -- take your vitamins!!!
Even though I come from a family of vitamin worshippers, I was never a believer. What they're really taking are emotional vitamins, I thought. I just didn't believe that vitamins were well absorbed into the body. In addition, I resented that most cereals are fortified, so a quick read of the nutrion label is very deceptive. For example, inherent iron is so different from fortified iron. Nutrients should come from eating right, I argued. If you check out some multi-vitamin labels, you'll see over 100% of your daily recommened for water soluable vitamins like C. Who needs 533% of Vitamin C if you eat right?! It's so easy to get vitamin C in food.
I didn't even believe in pre-natal vitamins. Big scam feeding into our insecurites, eat right and all will be fine, I asserted. Vitamins can even be evil, I preached. Too much vitamin A is toxic. What if I had a supplement with vitamin A and proceeded to eat polar bear liver or any kind of liver. I might be potentially screwed. I even came up with a mantra to overlook vitamins and doing so kept my life simple - nothing to buy, nothing to remember, nothing to worry about. The mantra - If vitamins were really effective, then we could subsist and thrive on just water, white bread and vitamins. I was pretty sure this solution was not a simple and cheap cure for malnourishment in Africa.
But recently I've changed my tune. 3 years of being pregnant and nursing have really depleted my reserves of iron, calcium and who knows what else.
As it turns out, there is some truth to my past eschewal of vitamins. For example, most iron supplements are very poorly absorbed and they cause constipation. They should be taken off the market and goddamn cereal makers should remove iron, vitamin c and other nutrients that are either easy to get in food or hard to get. It's so deceptive to think that eating a bowl of Total is going to give you quality iron. A really effective iron supplement is liquid Floradix. It really helped my anemia and did not cause constitpation. But then again, when I was diagnosed with anemia, I focused on eating a lot of iron-rich foods. Iron is a tough nutrient to get if you deplete your stores (which can last for years). Amazingly if you deplete the iron stores in your body, you need like 6 servings of beef or oysters to fulfill the daily requirement. So the Floradix boost was a help.
Calcium is another toughie. I don't think calcium is well absorbed from supplements either. Since I'm nursing I need twice the recommended calcium of a non-pregnant woman. 6-8 glasses of milk per day would do it! So I need to find an effective calcium supplement.

Are we hot or not?

I'm generally happy and satisfied about our wedding in Thailand. With the exception of the typical hassles, dramas and disappointments of a destination wedding, I was pleased with how it was organized, how it turned out blah blah blah.
But I hate my wedding album. My mom picked out the pictures for us and it turns out, she either discerns expressions very poorly or our tastes for pictures are polarized. Josh and I like pictures where we look genuinely happy together. I thought that this is something most people could agree based on prior experience that Josh and I had agreed on what makes a picture look good. Most of the photos that my mom picked for our album had expressions that were so affected or we appear pinched - so we're either gritting our teeth to smile or we look constipated. She claims we look demure. I looked at her wedding album and not one smile from her or my dad. She says that back then if you smiled for photographs, then you were a punk or a slut. Not one smile in her entire wedding album and practically not even one real smile in mine.

She also picked out the photograph for our thank you cards. I really like the sepia tone and antique look to the finish, but I don't like the picture. I look like a cheesy adoring mail order bride, with that weird insecure gaze fixed on my megalomaniac camera-loving but also tired white knight. See for yourself. Do you agree that I look like a total FOB? Why oh why couldn't she have picked a picture where we are both looking at each other or the camera?

Got back on that horse

So excited! Yesterday I finally got the motivation to start exercising again. It's hard when I take any kind of a break, in this case it was only 10 days but my slobby self got used to not exercising even though I felt terrible.
I revisited our marriage vows, one of them was that we are going to challenge each other physically. I think both of us need to be more conscious in fulfilling this promise to each other.
What's great about being in shape is how helpful it is in certain situations. Like when you're running to catch a train or a bus, you become so pleasantly surprised by your abilities. This morning, I ran to catch a train just for the hell of it and it felt GREAT. Because I got the exercise that I needed, I'm a much better and nicer person...but at what expense?
My dilemma is that Ari is generally right and so is my husband. And I generally believe everything I hear especially if it comes from a man. My husband and Ari generally agree on a wide variety of issues. But their expert viewponts diverge on exercise. What's a confused, gullible, easily-impressionable man-follower to do?
Is Ari right that exercising is like a form of socially acceptable cocaine? Am I just getting a feel good high at the expense of my knees in my old age? Have I been brainwashed in thinking that exercise is good for you? Are we dealing with an information cascade?
Or is Josh right that regular vigorous exercise is good for you in the short term and the long term?
My health and marriage vows are at stake here. I need advice!

Unbridled lust

(begin whine-y voice) It's not fair! (end whine-y voice)
My husband never wants anything and I'm always lusting after various goodies. He grew up in a household that recycled sesame seeds from bagels to be re-used in sesame chicken stir-fry (disclaimer: his parents deny this), while I grew up in a household that allowed each kid to have their own shopping cart and we put in any junk-y grocery item that fancied us.
My mother worked all the time and probably felt guilty so we could have almost anything we wanted. Back then, our whims were pretty inexpensive, not like the desires of kids nowadays. Ironically, even though our whims were satisfied, we grew up pretty poor during my early childhood. We lived in a one bedroom apartment in Queens but I never felt like we lacked anything. We were the total ghetto-fabulous stereotype -- we lived in a small cramped apartment but some of us wore expensive sneakers. Once a month, when my mother had a day off, she would take us to the Botanical Garden or some such activity and we were allowed to run amok satisfying any of our street vendor whims and to top it off, she would let us get anything we wanted at McDonald's. I must be the only person on earth who misses the old chicken Mcnuggets. I have fond memories of the dark chicken matter mash.
The way Josh grew up was completely different. As a result, he is so disciplined with money to the point where he doesn't event want anything. Help! I need an outlet. So I'm going to make a Christmas list (since we don't celebrate Christmas and I'm sure that I probably won't get anything from this list).
I WANT:

1. A knitting machine (with some really nice and exotic yarns)
2. Two really nice hairbrushes that costs like $50 each - a small one and a large one
3. A digital SLR camera with killer zoom lens that will be bigger than John Holmes'
4. A dual layer DVD burner or some other solution for archiving my kids' pictures
5. Software: font utility tool, various fonts and video editing
6. More diamonds mua hahahahahaha
7. A Sadie and Dazee collage similar to the one I have one of our wedding that is 4' by 3'.
8. Quarterly services of a professional photographer
9. Annual family portrait in oil

It's amazing I can get along so well with someone so monetarily disciplined. I got the cheapest one I could find and I'm pretty happy with him.

I'm pathetic

It's been a week and a half since I last vigorously exercised. I'm often grumpy, sleepy, tired, out of sorts and my knee hurts. I'm going to have to find motivation to start up again. I'm just a bad mom, daughter, and person when I don't get good exercise.

Facebook - You're a hypocrite and I'm a liar

Earlier, I ranted about how I could not use my real last name to sign up for a Facebook account. I surmised that "Star" is completely forbidden, as I could not add it as a middle, last, first or maiden name without some kind of appeal to Facebook. I shied away from appealing because I don't like bureaucracy and the wording of the appeal process seems so serious. To my foreign born sensitivities, this is a scary thing. I felt like I might need to appear in court or get notarized documents or be involved in something legally binding that I was going to ultimately regret. Like the authorities will take me away from my children or something because my proof to Facebook was considered counterfeit or whatever.
Luckily, someone else did the leg work so I can enlighten you about the appeal process. My sister in law shares the same last name as me and is apparently less paranoid than me because she went ahead with the appeal process (must've found it simple and non-threatening) and won! Hurray! A few days later, she's on Facebook as her real name.
But now that I've been using Facebook for a few weeks, I am really creeped out. I am relieved that I've used my maiden name. Only people who truly know me would be able to find me. And just for an extra layer of security, I made my profile private to just Facebook friends(but I like to refer to them as "friendsters" because I'm not really friends with them.).
But these privacy protecting measures are not good enough for me anymore, because Facebook is keeping tabs on a lot of online activity and sharing it willy nilly. I'm upset that on one hand, they treat privacy very casually by sharing your information while on the other they insist on this real name business (with a built-in appeal process and scary terms of use agreements no less!). If they are going to be privy to who I actually am and where I live, then they need to revise their privacy policies to treat my identity and actions as professionally and delicately as an online bank would.
Recently I scored a huge coup. I got the courage to appeal to Facebook for a name change to Cassandra Jupiter. In an unexpected whilrlwind, it was approved and my new name was activated in less than 24 hours, even though their noncomittal and slightly threatening (vis a vis bureaucracy) fine print lead me to believe otherwise.
I don't know if this is going to hurt me and my social networking goals in the long run but for now, I'm quite pleased that I was able to change my name and pull some wool over the Facebook nazis.

This is a first for me - I'm as pure as newly fallen snow

My sister in law apparently has an insatiable appetite for raunchiness. I look to you, dear readers to come up with suggestions for some racy blogs or websites that she can visit (for free) because I can not satisfy her. Luckily, she still "respects me as a person" even though she doesn't think I have "any raunchy" in me.

This one's for you, BS...

After some thought and soul searching, if my ANR post was not "dirty", "raunchy", "disgusting" or "exciting" enough, I have to say that I give up. I'm afraid what you're asking for would definitely be crossing a lot of different lines and we're both going to regret it.
I do have another ANR type story that you might like...
I pump milk at work and I use a "hands-free pumping bra" so that I don't have to maintain a grasp or pressure on plastic milk bottles and breast shields against my chest. In any case, if you're not familiar with pumping or what it looks like (it's totally wacky) -- below are two pictures of a model using the hands free pumping bra. Of course, the pictures aren't totally realistic. In the real world, you're not smiling when you're pumping, there's milk in the bottles, your nipples are not airbrushed, and so on and so forth.
In any case, someone at work had walked in on me doing this. It is one of the most humiliating experiences in my life. I know my vagina was on a display shelf in the hospital when I was giving birth and it seemed like everyone had a go with their fingers and hands (hopefully these were not gratuitous feels). Even though I reluctantly and publicly went to third base (skipping first and second to boot) with all these medical professionals, somehow there's nothing more humiliating than having co-workers see you half dressed and attached to pumping paraphernalia. The ridiculousness of the contraptions makes even a shameless person like me shrink like a wet witch.