The Motherland is near...

Countdown to Korea: 17 days.

Should I feel down on myself

that some stinky brat tried to hit me with some sort of green berry/fruit/acorn at the T station all sneaky-like (FROM BEHIND, that little wretch) and when I finally figured out that no, it was not the wind blowing these fruity nutty things in my direction at a torrential velocity but a stupid little maggot, I stopped and stared at her with ten or so feet between us, and she stared right back and said something probably way too adult to even be in her vocabulary (but this is Roxbury and what do we expect these kids to learn at a young age?) but my earbuds were happily sending to my innards sweet melodies by Radiohead so I didn't hear what she yelled out at me?

I continued walking home and I felt.... hurt. She targeted me - probably because I am the only Asian she's ever seen (not many grow in the hoods of Roxbury) and I was also wearing really obnoxious rainboots, which makes me an easy target for any hate crime.

I was seriously down. Any thoughts? Perhaps she threw little nutty berries at the next passerby but when I say she had the sneakiness down to an art, I mean she was, like, tiptoeing behind me and hurling these things in my direction, which, now that I think about it, her aim needs to improve because not one out of two actually hit me, and the nutty berries were like a millionth of my size so... she clearly sucks at throwing. MEHRONG! xP

So that was personal, right? Whatever. I'm actually over it now but thinking back to how I felt just an hour ago, man, was I hurt.

Anywho, audio tour for the Hamada exhibition is up and it is short and super sweet. Rather informative. Plus, I made the pretty slideshow, so if you need any sort of push, there it is.

I asked Tomoo-san (Hamada-san?) if he knew who KAT-TUN is... hahaha.

He said his 12-year-old daughter probably knew... Then I felt like an idiot.

mad skillz

LOOK AT WHAT I CAN DO!

It's very basic, not all that pretty but I did it so you should pat me on the back and be like "Wow, Justine, you're pretty awesome!"

Also, take our tours - otherwise the money we pay to do them will be spent in vain.

Sexy Kitchen Cabinets

The day started early - and ended rather early, too, as it is only 7pm and I am quite done - and included a preparation of finger sammiches (cucumber, turkey & muenster, portobello & goat cheese, egg salad), all too many finger sammiches, a detour to Arlington before commencing the planned event of the day: PICNIC IN THE ARBORETUM.

I won't bore you with the picnic in the Arboretum story. There isn't much to tell because I trust you can imagine a 70-degree day completely immersed in all sorts of nature. Lots of maples, lots of oaks, lots of trees I couldn't even begin to try to name, lots of flowers, LILACS!! An orgy of sights, sounds and smells to tickle the fancy of anyone not completely dead.

Anyway, back to Sexy Kitchen Cabinets. On the detour to Arlington pre-Arboretum, I stumbled across an appealing (because I aspire to be a totally respectable housewife) cover of Traditional Home magazine. I lost myself in a world of wall paint colors and restored historic colonials. But every other page turned I found myself at once ooh-ing, then gagging, then ahh-ing, then frowning.

What could have possibly made me so upset (besides the smattering of what I think was bad taste/cheesy accents in some rooms featured), you wonder? Or maybe you're not curious at all.

It isn't a matter of being upset, per se, anyway. It was a bit... off-putting?

We read Vogue, Cosmopolitan, GQ, Maxim, Elle, etc. etc. Heck, even National Geographic. And we expect certain things from these publications, including the content of their enclosed advertisements. We expect lots of shoes, handbags, accessories and designer clothing ads from such magazines (excluding NG, of course) and they're all sorts of sexed up - subtly, not quite so subtly. That's okay because sexy men in sexy jeans sells jeans. Sexy bitches in sexy blouses sells blouses. Sexy bitches' legs topped (bottomed?) with sexy shoes sells shoes. You get the point. (Pointed out NG as a non-fashion example. We know there's no sexiness in there - just lots of pretty pictures taken by not so glamorous folks.)

But sexy men "wearing" sexy tiles to sell... tiles?

What was so shocking in Traditional Home was in their advertisers. Sex sells. We hear it a lot and we are fed it all the time. But to superimpose tiles onto a bronzed and toned man's unbuttoned shirt (yes, I wish I had a picture of this guy's tile shirt) to sell your tiles through his hard abs and seering gaze is just WEIRD.

Same goes for the super-swanky bedding collection advertised (don't ask what companies these were - their marketing vision clearly didn't work out as planned) by a woman with long flowing locks rested on the pillow (but next to her face, as if placed there by the hair & makeup team participating in the shoot..) in a shift dress sitting upright with legs straight in front of her and in bed next to her, a scruffy hot gangster man with tattoos and guns for arms sleeping in a languid position, sheets twisted around his hot bod.

What was the point they were trying to make, exactly? I have no freaking idea.

I wish I retained more because I am dead serious when I say it was like this with every other advertisement - dripping with sex, sultry stares and... siding? Hardwood floors (ha, I said "hard" and "wood" - why don't they use THAT to their punny advantage?) Wallpaper?

But to end this rant and fascination, I leave you with my favorite ad that came at the very end, the inside back cover, from our friends at Kohler and their AWESOME ads. Upon further investigation, I can now see that the advertising of Kohler products is rife with creativity and awesomeness.

How fun it would be to work on these types of projects. This goes up there on the best jobs ever list along with working for OPI as a nail polish color namer. Come on: Melon of Troy? Bastille My Heart?

For other fun colors and fun color names vist OPI

Other fun magazines: Wallpaper, Juxtapoz

That's all folks.

I had a witty title but I forgot to write it down

It may or may not have had something to do with the swine flu. Hopefully not.

I'm going to take this opportunity to tell the two people who read this (that many?) that this Saturday will be the public opening of the Ali Cann-Clift and Marco Abarca exhibition at Pucker Gallery. Come one, come all. Free wine and water (free water! GET OUTTA TOWN!) Free art.... GOTCHA! Freedom to look at art. Ali will be present.

OperaBoston. I am not one to take to the "avant garde" when it comes to taking the classic(al) and making it "edgy" (*AHEM* American Repetory Theater) but OperaBoston did a splendid job - most especially with set design - with The Bartered Bride. Obstacles along the way to get to the point of enjoying the production but once seated (in different seats, mind you - what the heck is up with me and not getting the seats I was intended for?) the story was quite enjoyable. In a musical theater kind of way, which got me to thinking about how I used to really love musical theater and now I ask myself, but whyyyyy? The over-acting, the singing, the dancing. I must have gotten BORING over the years because now I find it difficult to get past the hilarity of people singing what they are saying -- never found it so hard to believe before; why now? Anyway, once over all of that, it was a great production. Orchestra and its conductor (too lazy to dig around for the night's program so just make up a name in your mind - we can call him Sassafras Humphrey) were wonderful, the leads I could have done without, but the character of the sss-ss-stuttering Vasek, betrothed to the already in love Marenka, was PERFECT. The most enjoyable character for sure.

Then as I was sitting in the middle of Act II (I actually don't know at what point, "the middle of Act II" just sounds good) I got to thinking about how the storyline is so dang universal and trite (and then the thoughts went further and on to Korean dramas... Of course). Girl is forced into marriage. Father is in debt. Girl is already in love with Poorboy. Parents cannot approve. Poorboy is SECRETLY rich. And dramatic irony after dramatic irony, the audience is forced to wait for the TADA moment at the end of Act III; while from the start of Act I we knoooooow that Girl will be in disbelief and, for drama's sake, it's not as if Poorboy will reveal to her immediately that he is, in fact, her betrothed, given the stipulations of the marriage contract ("Marenka will only marry the son of Micha" -- guess who "the son of Micha" is?), and thus relieve the tension and the hatefulness Girl now harbors for the "lying, cheating, will take $300 in exchange for the woman he promised to love and marry forever and ever" man she thought she loved. There was an entire scene devoted to Jenik repeating "Just trust me. Will you not let me explain?"

JUST F-ING TELL HER! WHY DO YOU NEED HER PERMISSION, YOU TWERP!

Onward. The Crystal Method at The House of Blues last night was pretty incredible. The lights, though blinding at times, were well done, and the guys were really into it - one definitely more fucked up than the other. He dropped his keyboard, and thus damaged some equipment, not once but twice and during the performance he just got progressively more and more aggressive and out of control. He also said some pretty lame crap - like how he didn't get his monitor checked before the show because he was so into watching the Sox game.

Okay. You are an anomaly unto yourself for caring about baseball when you doctor these sounds with all this magical equipment (maybe that's not anomalous - maybe I just don't think people should be as obsessive about sports as they are) but of course his comments met a dead silent audience. We had waited long enough just for your arrival onstage - now we all know it was because you were watching the stupid game - nobody wants to listen to you babble about your love for the Red Sox. We came to listen to music, dummy!

I'm just hatin'.

Tonight we eat pizza and collate postcards; then it's King Khan & the Shrines at the Paradise.

You kids have fun NOT seeing opera and live music like myself. Ha. I am so much cooler than you.

Swine and Pearls

Swine, always a favorite word of mine for no other reason than its sound and elevation of "pig" to a much more elegant word, has taken on a new connotation. A friend in Mexico City can poke fun at the "epidemic" or cusp of "epidemic" and I have a tough enough time making light of the matter, but is it something to joke about?

Marco Abarca will no longer come for his opening. A precaution, and a well-thought-out, totally rational and precursory decision at that, but are we overreacting? Underreacting? My heart truly hurts because someone so in need of the attention and good feelings a trip up to the U.S. would bring is now at the mercy of unpredictable circumstances.

But honestly, WTF: incredibly and inexcusably sad that people are still this dumb.

This is just shameful. Go to hell, Jay Severin, and catch all the VDs there are to catch in this world and beyond, for being the most ignorant asshole EVER.

But in more uplifting news: begins and ends with our children.

A hand-me-down  swatch watch from 1996 beeps, though its batteries are very much dead. Makes me wonder...

Too excited for Pops season. Swingin', Benny Goodman-in', ahhhh... Speaking of, and totally unrelated, The Crystal Method at the House of Blues is coming up. Gotta ready my glowsticks and brush up on my head-tossing, swaying-like-I'm-tripping-and-just-can't-help-it, killer dance moves.

P.S. Happy May Day to all (MAY? Whaaaat?) and to all a good night.

Fight or Flight

would make an excellent name for a band.

GOOD NEWS of the day: the prodigal roommate has returned, rolling off the bus and into my open arms and an evening of new friends and fun. Hooray!

RESTAURANT RECOMMENDATION of the day: Sel de la Terre. Don't we love the new, the old, and the old-but-new? We visited the newest Boylston Street location (sandwiched between L'espalier, with which ownership is shared, and some uber-swanky place with no-to-low lighting and lots of windows through which I have only ever spotted super rich looking people wining and not smiling.) They've got bicycles hanging from the ceiling in the bar area (I don't know why, but I do know that I would love to take one home to ride and not waste on ceiling art) and an upstairs dining area that is done up in a clean, masculine kind of way. By restaurant recommendation, I suppose I'm stretching it, as I didn't have anything but ice water and coffee... Heh. But I hear some German Riesling was orgasmic, as well as a red that someone else was drinking, as well as their mojito (which I did sip and, yes, it was refreshing.) Unfortunately, we had just eaten before we got there (the original plans, as far as I knew, did not include dinner) so it wasn't food that I was interested in; and alcohol is a no-no; so that leaves me with strictly and purely enjoying the company of new people and trying to guess what kind of company the private event people in the tables over worked for. I can also recommend the place if only for our server, Jack, who reunited with my roommate from many moons ago, and thus treated us to some cheese and hummus appetizer thing and was super smiley and attentive, even though we were a late crowd (boo! from the perspective of restaurant staff) and weren't all eating dinner (double booooo!)

Spring/summer is definitely in the air. Of course we will have all but five days of "spring" before a permanent sheen of perspiration glazes our bodies for months. Does a place exist where the four seasons get a fair share of the spotlight? I suppose geologically (astronomically?) nothing can be done of the imbalance but we all know everyone's favorite seasons are fall and spring so why deny us of enjoying it for an extended period of time? I suppose they are made more special by their temporariness, like all things exclusive and luxe. It's rather aggravating, though. We go from "Holy cow, it's freezing" to "Motherf-er, I'm so stinkin' hottttt" in no time at all. Is no one with me on this? Maybe I just complain too much.

There's so much to discuss this week!

• Phillip Markoff and his suspension from BU (because, why expel a murderer from your university when you can give him the same punishment doled out to those who may have only failed a class one semester or was caught smoking a joint?)
• Susan Boyle and how... not great... her singing talent is
• Marco Abarca flying from Oaxaca to Boston next week for his exhibition opening and how many are not as willing to welcome him with as open arms - I guess a pleasant smile will do. Are we at that point where we need to quarantine ourselves, or at the very least start wearing surgical masks? When do we collectively decide that's fashionable to do? Asian people do it all the time but they have an excuse - you know, China and their pollution problems.
  

At least Obama is in good health. Amen.

SOUND of the day

Birds tweeting. Straight up, the sweetest sound you can hear coming from a long and frigid winter. That mixed with giggles and laughter and street music. I don't even like birds much. It all stems from sighting a pack of turkey vultures (???) in the bare trees, 6 to 8 of them, directly after watching Hitchcock's The Birds. The movie came back into my life senior year of college when Professor Fogel, for a demographics in literature class, had us watch it and let us in on the secret that Tippi Hedren totally got pelted from all angles with real birds because Alfred Hitchcock was a demonic asshole who promised his leading lady that there would only be mechanical birds used in the shot where she gets swarmed and picked at and bloodied, and I think her fainting turned out to be a real reaction when she realized the birds were not all fake.

My dislike of birds also has a proportionate relationship with the amount of times I've been pooped on by them. I shudder to think of all those times - the beach, the steps of the Met, open-air market in Hawaii, before eating at Summer Shack...

Onward. A great sight for the day:

The dogwoods and cherry blossoms and magnolias are coming out to party for awhile (a short while for those magnolias - they're total party poopers, the biggest tease of all) and they make the world a happier place.

Speaking of happy places, Symphony Hall is a good one to add to the list.Last night, I had a date with Ravel, Stravinsky and Debussy and they were most excellent! On the program: Ravel's Le Tombeau de Couperin, Stravinsky's Pulcinella Suite, Debussy's Petite Suite and Stravinsky's Symphony in C. For the record, I am hardly a classical music buff, so don't believe me when I say I remembered all these titles off the top of my head (*ahem* bso.org*ahem*)

A guest conductor from Sweden (IKEA!), Susanna Mälkki, was lovely and graceful and very smiley. The Ravel piece, which came first in the program, was the most enjoyable, followed by Stravinsky's Symphony in C. There was a lot of fun use of plucking on the strings in all the pieces, which never occurred to me (as I have rarely seen a symphonic orchestra play before - maybe twice in my life - and clearly don't pay attention enough when just listening to the stuff) as an element of sound diversity.

But, as we all very well know, most good things have some sort of catch, and last night's pleasantness was interrupted 92398402 times by my illness. I made sure to be well stocked on medicine, tissues and cough drops (Cepacol mouth-numbing candies are bomb) but nothing could be done. Whatever it is that's caught in my chest and refuses to be set free played all sorts of nonsense games, consistently teasing me with an "I'm ready to come out now!" COUGH "Ha ha! Got ya!" every minute/minute and a half. I managed to quell the urges to cough until there came a swell in the music, aka more than just the violins plucking, or in those lulls between movements, but the self-consciousness and total shame kicked in when my first cough caused Ladies 1 and 2 to the front and Ladies and Gents 3-10 on all sides to pull this VERY snide half-glance -- it was like an instinctive twitch, as if their ears were tuned ONLY to my cough, so that Lady 1's half-eye was visible, and Lady 2's 1/4 profile flashed before falling back into place. Every single cough was met with half-eyes and pursed lips. Okay. I know, cough cough is sooo annoying. I know it totally sucks that I am in the second row and really close to the real music-makers. I AM SO STINKIN' SORRY! Jiminy Cricket! I bought these tickets a month ago, not exactly having thoughts of "Hmm... I will be all coughy and snorty and runny on the evening of April 23, let's go then."

It's not as if I don't know a thing or two about Concert Hall Etiquette. Here are your basics:

• Get up from your seat to let those inward from the aisle get to their seats - unless going around is more convenient. In that case, tell them, "You have legs. Walk around."
  
• Don't yell "You suck!" in the middle of a performance. That is just plain rude. If it really does suck, stand up, "PSH!" and walk out, making sure to slam the door behind you if it is a slammable door.
  
• If you are late and the performance has started, wait in the back. Unless you paid a fortune for your tickets and you think you deserve to see the show from the seats you paid for (case in point: the A.R.T. people being buttwipes and making us sit in the very back row of the Loeb Drama Center - frankly, no seats are bad in there - for Endgame with only the hope of going to our sweet seats down in front at intermission kept my dreams from being completely shattered... The play was one act.)

Nobody told me Rule #1 is stay home if you are going to cough throughout the performance. I was like that bratty teen mom who brings her 1/2-second old infant to the movie theaters to see an 11pm pyrotechnic-happy movie. The fire-eyes and steam-emitting-ears... Perhaps not quite as frightening as vultures sitting in trees/birds pooping on you, but really uncomfortable.

But I exaggerate. The silent curses were bad, yes, but the BSO experience was still an amazing one. Next up, Tanglewood. Who would like to chauffeur me the two hours out to Lenox this summer?

EXPENSIVE PURCHASE of the day (two days ago): my sweet new "mature" glasses. Glasses that actually fit my face, not squeeze on it from both sides.

SONG of the day: "Taper Jean Girl" by Kings of Leon

LONG-TERM PROMISE made today: Figure out if blogspot can accomodate an audio player that I don't have to pay for and that I'm not too web-illiterate to figure out so I can provide you with sound to go along with my ramblings!

COLOR of the day: YELLOW

PHOTOS of the day: All were taken by me. See how close we were to the stage in Symphony Hall?

PROMISE of the day

Korean and Japanese share common words, among them "yak sok" = "promise." (Besides some, like, conjugations and stuff, other common words that I have discovered: "inggi" for "popular", "ahreubaiteu" for "part-time job" <-- though I just wiki'ed that one and learned its etymology derives from German, of all languages.)

As I am suffering from a keep-everyone-in-a-5-mile-radius-up-at-night cough, after a wonderful evening at the BSO last night, I drank some cherry-flavored cough syrup (cherry is clearly the grossest cough syrup taste so why is it the most popular? Does anyone remember grape Dimetapp? Yum, it was like what my homies refer to as "purple stuff.") and passed out watching Zettai Kareshi (I am an indiscriminate drama-watcher. My limits are only anything not Korean, Japanese or English!) THUS no posts. My excuse for the day before is... nothing of note happened and thus the sanctity of this blog would be tainted with filler-rubbish. So, inevitably, this blog, if it does anything, will prove just how uninteresting my life can be.

Onto the theme of the day: my promise/yak sok of the day.

This is a two-part theme, as I will be recounting in excruciating detail all the good things that happened during my absence from this blog. GET PUMPED! Two posts in one day! Oooooh!

I know you are all on the edge of your seats, but you don't have to sit and click refresh from this page until a new post finally pops up like a gift from Internet Heaven. I'll be at work until 5:30.

WORD OF THE DAY: MULCH

It's fun to say (like filch and munch) and it smells lovely. If you are one of those people who does not like the smell of mulch, you probably don't like the smell of silicone spray or magic marker, either, and that makes you a butthead.

COP OUT of the day

The goal (since I have nothing more substantial to offer the web-perusing public) is to bring you "something" of the day and today's theme is - get ready for it... POST of the day.

HA! Bet you were expecting something earth-shattering like "Free Hug from the Author of this Lame-o Blog of the Day" but really, isn't the essence of a blog just a high-tech derivative of "Dear Diary, today I got a free ice cream cone at Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day. It was Coconut 7-Layer Cake and oh so delicious..." (fact!) So I am only reaffirming that my blog REALLY has no focused goal and feigning a purpose under the facade of what every freaking blog is up to anyway. Perhaps as the days go on I'll find my purpose...

So, for today's POST:

Behold: The Skirt from Hell

Looks like a skirt, smells like a skirt, but it is in truth the handiwork of the small children down in H-E-double hockey sticks who worship the Devil and do his bidding, even if it means hunching over a sewing machine to construct a deceivingly feminine and not totally cheap looking skirt. I hope all you devil children pricked your fingers, like, 40459823 times and had to wear thimbles like a loser.

Standing perfectly still, it makes one look like a true female (because we all know there are fakes out there) ready for spring already! (damn you, New England), but once the legs start moving, the devil skirt transforms into none other than a diaper. I kid you not. The part that can get caught between one's legs does so and inches upward toward the crotchal area; the sides then billow out like those horribly unflattering bubble dresses; and walking to and from work becomes a constant battle with all sorts of forces of nature. The right hand (left arm was busy carrying lunch) becomes a permanent fixture near the crotch tugging/pulling/picking and what is usually a sixish-minute walk from Back Bay T station to work becomes a neverending walk of shame (but not that kind), with thoughts of "I am wearing a floral diaper... I am totally wearing a floral diaper and everyone knows it!" on repeat, scrolling on an LED panel in probably red - maybe even doing an assortment of dances: it scrolls for a bit, then flashes, then wiggles and worms, and explodes!

I suppose a saving grace was I didn't do much walking around at work today. Instead, I designed some postcards, got a supersweet quote from PsPrint to print them, ate a homemade salad (tough times), wished instead for Chilli Duck's drunken noodles but it was raining and I am making a pitiful effort to save cashmoney.

Which brings me to Ben & Jerry's Free Cone Day!

Because if anyone should be responsible for filling the joy void in this world, it should be those two stoners who love all that is creamy, sugary and - dare I say it? - DIVINE. (Who is it who strongly dislikes atttributing heavenly adjectives to foods?...........)

Is it just me or does Free Cone Day frequently come when it rains?

I'm telling you, there ain't nuttin' betta than walking to Back Bay T station from Ben & Jerry's on Newbury wearing a skirt made by the Devil's offspring (you know they are all bastard children) with a sugar cone just piled high with coconutty, bits-of-chocolatey, cookieey goodness -- with the best part being the at-times-spittle-at-times-clear-vomit-projection from the Heavens that insists upon melting your piled-high coconut concoction. All over the hands. AH! NO HANDS AVAILABLE TO TUG/PULL/PICK AT THE DEVIL SKIRT!

All I know is it was clear that God and Satan decided to be friends for the day. Today, I got picked. Who knows how often They team up like this and who makes the cut for targets? And yes, I might as well make ridiculous, egocentric suppositions as having the mightiest (I don't think I even believe in God but I hear He's pretty Almighty) think of me and only me for a day because this is a blog after all. This is my teeny percentage of Internet realty and you are only a guest. I think I can afford to be a little self-centered on my own land.

TESTING

scoping out the place...