Category Archives: Daily

I did a stupid thing. I had two Dewers on the rocks at Oliver Garden last night. Finished the first one before we even got seated. I didn’t eat much during the day. A nutritious shake held me for the whole day. But, there was not much in my stomach by dinner time. The drinks went down too fast. I started to feel it towards the end of dinner and already feeling nauseated on the ride home. So a short and quick nap later, I woke up around 2am and got up at 3 to get some liquid. Stayed up till almost 7am. messed up the whole morning. shouldn’t do that again.

The saving matter out of this silly behavior is I found a few good apps on the app store. One of them is the Bible app that is free and allows you to download lots of different versions to the ipad and there are so many reading plans you can pick and choose. I downloaded the Chinese ccv version and the NASB and it already comes with the NIV version. I’m using Prof. Horner’s reading plan and the chinese bible. Started today. You are going to read 10 chapters a day. I shouldn’t have any problem reading in Chinese. It’ll take me double the time if I read in English. However, it’s been a while since I read any Chinese, my brain wants to change it to English thinking it’ll be easier. How weird. I can read faster in Chinese but it now takes a little more work for me to comprehend it.

Went to the Appalachian store and bought a pair of hiking shoes yesterday after work. It took a while trying on different pairs to find one that fits my feet comfortably. The clerk Tom was very patient, didn’t push me to make a decision even suggested that I walk around the store for a while to see if the shoes feel ok. Two sizes for each pair and 4 or 5 shoes later, I tried on the last pair and made the decision almost instantly. You just know it when you put on a pair that fits after trying on so many that just don’t fit quite well. I’m very happy about the purchase. Now if I can find an ideal bag to carry all my stuff including the ipad and keyboard, I’ll be all set.

Next week, Leo and I are going to North Myrtle Beach, SC for a week. I’m getting excited about it now. It will be refreshing to get out of the wintery weather for a short while and we can check out the 1-2 month long term renting in the future after I retire in the winter. It is very taxing to walk the dog in the icy streets in sub zero temperature. Neither the dog or the human enjoys this venture.

Got into a new interest lately after reading about survival gears. I got some paracord and made some bracelets with them. They are quite easy to make actually and practical too. Now each person around me has one. Survival and hiking gear and skills is a big field to get into. Very interesting too.

Christine

Christine

Picked up the “Disciplines of the Beautiful Woman” by Anne Ortlund from the shelf while talking to Leo yesterday. Remembered how much I liked the book when I first read it in my single days. I started reading it again and finished it in one night. It is a simple book and yet I can see why I was so impressed by it then. It was one of the first how to be organized book I read. In it she talked about using a ‘notebook’ with sections to keep the calendar, receipts, journals and reading notes. I started my own notebook after reading this book and had used it for a long while. I still like its functions but have not found away to incorporate the paper system with the electronic system together.

I like to type my notes and journal entries on a keyboard, but it’s still much quicker to jot down a calendar entry by flipping to the calendar page or to put a receipt or ticket on the day I need it. Now, the todo list is easier to maintain electronically as I can check off the completed items and the rest will automatically be carried forward without having to be copied again for the next day. But again I can’t attach pieces of paper to the todo list as I can with a paper system. Can I find a method to combine these two together seamlessly and easily?

I went on the web to look for a song that Anne Ortlund talked about in her book and accidentally found an interview her husband and her did in 2005 on youtube. They certainly were a dedicated couple to do God’s work and their bond was obviously deep with each other. She waited and let her husband be the one to start the topics, and filled in the details when needed. Very lovingly and respectifully. Just like what a christian woman should be. Her husband died in 2007 I found out and I saw another youtube interview of their son Ray Jr also a pastor. A christian family. Wonder how she is doing now.

Had a lesson with Tim but the one with Tony was mysteriously gone and instead he has two lessons with a couple that are Esther’s students at that time slot. I don’t really mind but I do in a way when I wasn’t notified or talked to when my lesson was cancelled. Anyway, nobody knew what happened between Monday when Tony last saw it and today when it’s replaced by someone else.

Tony talked about doing some group dances with me and a funny dance for Tim, him and I like the one in the commercial where three people were doing the tango together. That sounds like fun.

Going to Azteca with Sandy and Daniel tonight. She and I both like Sakura better but the men like the mexican food. We decided to have mexican tonight and plan for a sushi outing soon. We’ve been having dinner together for a few times lately. It’s great and I’m happy about it. But on the other hand, I haven’t got together with Connie for a long time. This is one of those things that a good notebook/calendar system will be good to remind myself about making plans with friends and keep in touch. Friendships take time and need time to cultivate. I often let them slide too much. One of those things I need to work on like my exercise or the lack of exercise. Good intention sometimes is not enough, or I should say it’s never enough.

Another complicated dream right before I woke up this morning. I was exhausted from the dream. But now I can’t remember what it was about. Made me tired all day. My eyes are killing me at work. Can’t wait to go home and take a nap.

Another day of not much success in the webcam world. GoogleTV won’t display the picture in 1280 x 960 resolution. Well, it does but you have to scroll down to see the whole picture. It’s supposed to have 1080 resolution though. It doesn’t make sense and a regular pc monitor will display it (albeit not the whole length either) but at least truer to the real size. A 640×480 picture fills most of the Google TV screen on the Sony 24″. Not nice. Don’t like these cutting edge technology, there is always something that doesn’t work right and yet there is nothing you can find when you google on it.

Two half day work sounds great but it is still wearing me out. The 4-5 hours kill the whole day, by the time I get home, I am as tired as if I worked a whole 8 hour day. The rest of the day is just finished, not productive or even fun. A nap will guarantee a late night and mess up the schedule again. oh well. Just one more year of this.

Jailbroke my iPhone yesterday and have been playing with it. The mywi does work and will probably shell out the $20 for it eventually. Other free apps are nice, the 5-column icons and the sbsettings I like. It saves the screen and fit all the icons on one page. The categories allows me to put more than 12 in a folder, I like that too. The sbsettings put the date and the memory on the top status area. And the mxtube allows me to download my own youtube video so I don’t have to rely on the 3g when I need to play them. That’s nice. I’m sure there are more I’ll find.

Got my two dance lessons today. One with Tim, and we worked on some new moves. One with Tony, he tried to teach me using my hip not just my feet and legs. The swinging motion. I probably got the idea but haven’t been able to put it in action consistently yet. I’m not used to him yet. It always takes a few times before I am used to the teaching style and methods of a new instructor. But I know I would learn stuff from him.

C got me new Arbon and it’s different from the ones she got me before. I will see if they are any different. I had nutrimin c before and now it’s RE 9 I think. I like the new bottles and they look better. It’s probably just new packaging. She said she and t may go to holiday inn tonight. I want to go but I had too much wine for dinner and enjoyed the conversation with Leo. So I am settled in and going to read and browse away.

Looked into the Free Books app and found Throreau’s Walking. Read a little in it. I think I like it. Wish I can speed read, there are so many books I’d like to read and I read so slow. So now I have the kindle, the ipad to read anything I like. It’s such a luxury.

Woke to a call from Joe, he explained what I need to know and prepare for mom’s legal affairs. That started the mad chase for papers and documents. Fortunately, I was able to find everything I need. Next, I needed to scan them. Went to the printer/scanner now next to Leo’s iMac, the scanner tried but won’t work. Spent half an hour trying and fixing, finally it scanned. Did about 30 pages or more of scanning. Put them on the dydns website so it’s easier for them to grab. Then put the rest of the documents in an envelop and out to the post office and mailed it. It took a few hours but finally it’s done. It has bugged me for a few weeks now about this whole affair. Every time my thoughts touched it, I get a minor anxiety attack. I’m so relieved that at least this round is finished. There will be a lot more to come I’m sure, but I am breathing a little better now and can read and do other things without this feeling of guilt hanging over my head.

After the post office, I went to Target and got a kindle case, a bluetooth keyboard (that I’m using now) for the iPad, and a sony clock radio/iphone player for the office. Everything works and I’m really happy. This means, I can now go anywhere and read and type with relative ease. And at a wifi hotspot, I can also surf the net. Life is so wonderful.

The Zaggmate keyboard is a bit small and would take some getting used to. But I think I’ll stick with it and take my time to practice typing on the smaller keys.

Since I didn’t go into work today, will have to do that tomorrow. But for the rest of the day, I’m going to enjoy some reading, meditating and maybe some spinning. yea!

I think the keyboard is finally fully charged. The blue charge light went off. At first, it wont pair with ipad and I almost thought it’s defective. I used another micro usb cord to charge and that may be a problem. So I used the one that came with the keyboard and within minutes, the blue light went off. And it paired fine with the ipad. Pretty happy about it. But I’m still hitting b for v.

Started on ‘Cutting for Stone” on audible and knitted for a couple of hours tonight. Interesting book. Watched the movie about Henri Nouwen. Surprised to learn that he was gay. Doesn’t change my fondness of his writings but a surprise to learn still.

6:15am
Just had a hiccup in the WordPress app on the iPad. It took an old post and published it instead of the one I edited. Good thing I subscribed to myself and was able to cut and paste it back using the browser for Monday. But then when I went back to the app and refreshed and saw two Monday posts, the deleted one magically appeared and two versions showed up. Not sure what happened, but at least it’s fine now.

Manfred woke me up at 5 and decided to get up and feed them and make some coffee. Tido had some can food and moments later, he threw up. I should know better than give him too much. Made coffee and when Leo took benny for his walk, I brought the coffee back to bed and tried to catch some thoughts from reading Griffin’s Ecstasy last night. I was too lazy to reach and get the iPad when thoughts hit me and now it will be hard to catch all of them again.

Read till almost two. The reading was good and it was about the love affair between Merton and his nurse Margie Smith. In Griffins own journal, he talked about the decision to include this in the biography and said he would use Merton’s own words for the story. He did and it was very honest and filled with conflicts between desire and conscience. The emotions in a love affair can be strong and irrational in the beginning for lay people, it can be devastating for a monk who has been kept away from women for over 25 years. He was human and it was hard to escape the human feelings. But he did manage to control the urges and desire and went back to the hermit life. And that must have taken a very strong resolve and self discipline. And the grace from God.