Road Them Off

Another WTF to start off the day. A genius cut me off as I'm doing a 45 on a 35. Attractiveness rule #1, never cut off a lady who's running late for work.

Oh Bubble Tea

A great day today. The morning started out with some memories from the past and thoughts from the present, brought pain and understanding, and so forth.

My morning run was not tiring, it’s getting easier but I do need more music on my phone. It’s a work in progress.

Work went well, xbox.com shipped, not many happy faces due to the new design. I admit, the new site can use some improvement for organization and simplicity. Our designers either got carried away or felt that more pictures and more content will drive more customers. Talking about Google here folks, less is more. Point taken? Of course.

Met up with a good friend of mine, an honest and straightforward woman, she made me noodle soup for dinner. I was definitely excited to show her some general tips on sewing and basic stitching techniques. The woman craved for some bubble tea and so did I.  The drive must have felt good because sitting next to her, I began to figure it all out. It took me weeks to understand her harsh words because in the end, they were nothing but caring words.

We finally got our bubble tea crave met. We hit the road for another drive, had some great talk, dropped her off, then drove back to work to meet up with some folks for more work.

After dinner, everything felt so right, maybe the soup helped me spot where x was located. It was right here the whole time, why solve and look for x, when x was right here.

Thanks to bubble tea, I am a night-er again. Disappointed because Vegas is not available on Games for Windows Live. It would be forcing the nature of me to accept the 360 version, but what else can I do.

Jesus, it is 2 in the morning!

Xbox.com …

Can’t sleep tonight.

2:30 AM

2:52 AM
 

2.57

CUIT in Visual Studio 2010

Great success. I totally love it. Been using it on the side at home for UI automation, just for the sake of fun and personal entertainment. This stuff is very well implemented, much better than some of the frameworks I evaluated in the past.

CodedUITest or in short CUIT, is very well organized and architected. Internally at Microsoft, they had the add on version for Visual Studio 2008, a bit hacky to use, but the difference is little, now that I finally have my fingers on the final version, the extra work is not required anymore.

CUIT has an attribute that you might consider using when writing your UI test, [CodedUITest], which will initialize PlayBack and cleans up any UI resources after your test finishes execution.

You can choose not to use this attribute and stick with the unit test class attribute, which is [TestClass], however you will have to initialize and clean up PlayBack yourself. I find this handy if you have both CUIT and non-CUIT tests in the same class and you only want to initialize PlayBack for specific tests.

Regardless, I do miss Eclipse. I might consider going back for some Java development, sounds like a joke, but it could possibly happen. Who knows.

Chasing after show

Wow! It is a beautiful morning! Crashed early last night after having dinner with my best friend. We had some great conversations, discussed mostly about career decisions and various general talks. Our talks could go on forever until we crash at the restaurant, but things have altered for the both of us. She’s now a married woman, with a family to go home to.

As for me, I have grown out of it. It was a short period for me, fun times are slowing down, back to reality, back to what matters most in my life.

The three of us, somehow all come together, she moved far away, wanting to find something better than what Seattle offers her. Her struggles with finance, yet she continued to be happy, continued to make me happy whenever we are out. We both miss her, and waiting for her arrival in 2011.

Two of us are left, promising that we would stand by each other’s sides no matter what happens even though one is far away. We are set out to another challenge next year. Her accomplishments, I am still amazed today, a woman with so many potentials, so ahead of everyone. I am feeling nothing but admiration for her great accomplishments.

Both are set out to seek some new challenges, but me, what’s there for me but feeling like a little teenage girl. Running home on the weekend to see family, meeting up folks for lunch, dinner, and movies.

Have things progressed for me thus far this year? Not really, there were some ups and many downs, it took courage to walk away from uncontrolled situations. Some pain and agony were established. But some wonderful accomplishments too, accomplishments that many others were extremely amazed at.

A few more months, 2010 will be over, in a blink of an eye. I used to determine time, wanting to make it happen right away, but after 2010, I learned to let time determine me.

2009, nothing but fun, chasing after the shows, the beauty, the artificial days of you and I. 2010, facing consequences, moving back and forth after the shows, trying to forget consequences, learning to let go, learned mistakes from 2009, understanding them and enforcing maturity, no more open doors to  the wrong ones.

2011, waiting for you patiently, day by day. Year of the Rabbit, another year of changes, but this time for the better only.

Gotta run for dim sum with some friend. Early breakfast in Chinatown, how indifferent for me.

No edit this morning, later gangstas.

Length

This morning, I woke up, looked at myself in the mirror, revaluated myself, realized that I’m still short and still have some more growing up to do.

In the meantime, I’ll enjoy the immaturity while it lasts. laugh it out loud.

Telephone Call

22:49, very tired today. Accomplished quite a bit from work. Met some good women and had sushi for dinner. A phone call from a friend, talked for about an hour and laughed through the minutes.

I had my red sweater and black skirt on today. A bit sophisticated and cute looking, made me feel like a three year old again.

My hair is getting longer, miss the short bouncy hair I used to have a few months ago. This style looks somewhat more mature, I’m aiming for longer hair this year, past the shoulder, wavy or spiral curls, that would be an interesting experience. Autumn, season of changes, let this one be the first change.

Work is getting easier, lighter, tough work is winding down, more time for myself to write, to relax, the weekends are not as busy, but very lazy.

Seattle is very far away, every time a phone call to visit friends in Seattle, I then contemplate whether the drive is worth it, except when my dad calls, then the drive doesn’t make a difference, else he would get mad at me for not loving him enough.

Lately, I’ve been feeling mediocre. It feels right some days, but so wrong many ways. I don’t want to try anymore, I just want to give up. I might go for another drive, clear up confusions, reduce the stress, yet it’s still here.

Everybody has issues, how emotional and deep it is, doesn’t matter, it is an issue. If it’s not too painful, then it’s a long one. I have this pain that never seems to go away, everyday I pray and hope that it would just go away. Maybe it is a payment that isn’t finished yet. Karma? Can’t be, I’m wearing a bracelet that promises no bad karma from now on. It must be something else, regardless, I think I’m paying my deeds.

Eyes closed, hands together, legs crossed, find myself in a temple, quietness sets in, life seems so light, nothing else is the matter, it is like heaven.

Falling for Songs

The rain is falling and the sky is calm
While this blanket trying to keep me warm
A cup of tea with some great songs
Maybe more will come along
But for now, two songs will do no wrong.

Food On The Street

It is an addiction. You engage yourself in extreme need of attention seeking, which could be healthy, depends on the topic. Who knows, but only yourself can determine what is helpful and what isn’t.

A good example that I have found for those who simply observe, run after the riches, the bitches, the pimps, and the popularity, tend to drill down to one solo issue, desperation for happiness, but cannot bring these to themselves independently, so they use others to entertain and spice up their desperate needs.

It is only natural when one individual feels abandoned, an automatic constant return is to fight, win, and regain what was there before, but we are so blind to uncover the truth of who we are, what we need, and what we desire, and that is simply ourselves. We cannot alter another being, but we can alter ourselves because we can control ourselves better than controlling others.

Controlling, manipulation, of course, we have done this before, verbally, or physically. It is like swimming against the current, arriving or not, the experience is never pleasurable.

So what is it about change? I do believe I can change, and I have changed, growing up is changing, killing bad habits is changing, learning to be more mature is changing. Admit the wrongs, enforce the rights in your life is changing. We can all do this, we can simply change. 

Today, I declare a change in myself. I confess my faults, my mistakes, and my immaturity. I am thankful for this power, the ability to acknowledge that I am wrong and that I can change. This power is what keeps me moving ahead in life, and not staying the same.

My faults for many years, I used to think the world revolved around me, my father played an overprotective role model, catered to my needs, breakfast, lunch, dinner, all provided from top restaurants, drivers picking me from school, math tutoring, unlimited friends, unlimited access to extra classes that other kids dreamed of having. I had no enemies, I did not know what it was like to feel abandoned, hungry, and selling food on the street after school to make ends meet.

I was an innocent, unfortunately, a very clueless innocent. I’m glad things have altered, broken family, financial drop, market not the same, struggles we faced, then, I learned and yearned respect on my own, it is a change, and I am changed.

Autumn Rain

Redmond rains heavy tonight. After a full day of crazy activities, driving around, shopping here and there, it is so good to be home.

Nothing feels as good as home. Silence is needed right now, absence of humanity is clearly desired at this moment. All came in so perfectly.

Perhaps, I should journal up some interesting stories to keep the night busy, or another movie until I drop the remote control and crash like a bee.

Must write from the heart, must do it now. It is so difficult when my mind isn’t focused, must think from the heart. This sort of writing does not require the mind. Hm…Could be the wrong song, next.

I know there are better days, and there will be, and today is a better day. Strong rain drops, revealing a thousand lies. Dusty trees, dusty lives, oh rain, will you sweep them all away.

Very nice, totally love this, so 90’s Boz II Men. Haven’t heard this song for a while, but I did ace singing this on Lips.

Yawning, yawning, this is my 5th time. Sounds like an early crash for tonight. Usually 1ish or 2ish is the right time for me on a Saturday, but not tonight. The rain is too nice to stay awake.

I guess I am weird, keep on blogging about the rain, as if it is my second nature. Who would ever thought I grew up to love the rain more than the sun. Something is wrong with me in the heart.

Alrighty, closing this tablet, sleeping on the sofa, peace out world.

A dysfunctional social atmosphere (facebook)

I have never been a fan of social networking, have never wanted to add friends, or uploading photos for the rest of the world to see. The list goes on, but I should lay them out here for everyone to see. And then a few questions at the end to trigger your soul searching a bit.

I don’t like social networking. In high school, I was a quiet girl, hit by the American culture, confused about football team and cheerleaders, I decided to stay in my own world. I continued the same in college. I avoided any sort of communication period, so then the bird is out, the cage is open, Facebook is introduced, pressured by friends to have an account. Account was created, then the following activities started for no rational reasons.

Post pictures online to share with “friends”
Update meaningless status to gather attention using one liners
Liking other people’s status to give them a boost of self ego
Sharing funny and hilarious comments, presenting self in a way that is difficult to present in the real world
Adding favorite activities, but I barely execute on them.
Accepting friend requests from those I only talked for 5 minutes
Keeping in touch with friends and family faraway

While practicing the life of disciplines and healthy activities. I am going back to observing my behaviors and what fb has done for me. Let’s list a few.

Friends tag me in attractive pictures, oh yes, they are very attractive, all dressed up, with my superwoman dress, light makeup, a step away from the car, then there would be pictures taken from behind, from the side, and from the top, this is called friends taking pictures of each other so they can tag each other online. The game keeps on going, and I foresee this is not going to stop.

“Lila is feeling sick“ Two hours later, about 8 to 10 responses of “Get well soon” and “Drink orange juice”, I realized that I am being loved after all, how come all these years my “friends” never showed any of this until I’m on facebook? This is interesting, I’m liking this already.

“Yo, Lila, we party it up on Capital Hill, meet you tonight, don’t be late”, What happened to calling the telephone so you can hear my wonderful voice, did that suddenly go down the drain and now facebook is your new voice?

Sending private facebook messages when emails can be used with full complex HTML format and the ability to add attachment, oh wait, viewing email header too, that’s always neat. Geeky talk, but yes, I do occasionally look at the email header.

On and on, I could go forever with all the hilarious and silly moments on Facebook that I have had, but let me put a stop to this and think for a second. What have this all gained for me? A better career? A better personality? A better friend? A better “networking”? A better way to look good and healthy? A better writer? A better singer? A better pianist? A better coder? A better speaker? A better daughter? A better relationship with my friends? Or more importantly, a better Lila? I don’t think so, I sat down, with my 3rd cup of tea, answering these questions, and said to myself, Facebook provides nothing but a stable and dysfunctional social interaction amongst each other, which probably contributes to many miscommunication between peers, social breakups, and soon divorces.

I want to reduce my usage of facebook, so here is my paycheck to those who will miss !Lila’s presence on facebook. I introduce you the new and improved version of my notFacebook profile picture and my long and boring status update, which only serves one purpose, and that purpose is for myself.