Euphoria

Oh
my
.... god(s)

For as long as I can remember, events in my life have been celebrated with Peking Duck

... my sister finished her undergrad. It never occurred to me that we'd get this ridiculous feast because we're in Nova Scotia-- Antigonish. there are no asians, let along peking duck restaurants...

my MOTHER made it. from scratch.

she's not even asian.

I'm...so happy...

and full.
Double full. Which makes me double happy... the perfect cycle.

so much fur

This is my christmas.

One of them is "normal". Cuddly. Dog-Like. Barks only when appropriate (Jack. The white one).

Buddy (the brown, curly, bored looking poodle) is a bully. Territorial. Barks when anyone gets too close to whichever lap he's occupying. Or if you don't pay attention to him.

Then there's Willy. The weird, twitchy, neurotic, grossly overweight slug-with-fur and a hypochondriac's cough (you know. dry. un productive. chronic) that barks if you move too quickly. Or if you're too still for too long. Or if you breathe too loud. Aren't paying attention. If she's hungry. If you accidentally make eye contact. If she wants to see your eyes and can't. Or, god forbid YOU should cough...
She's the one with the ball in her mouth. She loves golf balls. She nests them. obsessively.

They set eachother off, with the barking. I... need ear plugs.

well what do you do with your free time?

Hypothetically speaking, lets pretend that a (few of my close) friend(s) have recently gone through divorce.

I have witnessed an awful lot of emotional high, low, and hilarity in the past few years.

I witnessed one man delightedly, defiantly...gleefully choose to use one of "the good" tea towels to mop up a spill. I was confused; apparently there are "tea towels" (used for drying dishes, wiping counter tops and mopping up spills) and then there are "tea towels" (not for use, but for hanging on a rack- god forbid you get them dirty).

Now, lets also suppose that a girl (hypothetically speaking, this girl) managed to steal one or two (maybe five?) tea towels out of the DRAWER BURSTING FULL of them in this man's kitchen.

And maybe she made for him a sustainable alternative to mopping up spills.

Having created something intended to be cute, that (as always) came out creepy...should she call them:
"T-Bears, the cuter sponge" or
"Sustainabears... re-usably clean"
or "The Good Ones"
because I don't know if I grabbed the good ones or the regular ones...
Do you think he'll be mad?
(this is all hypothetical anyway...)

Urg

Ethiopian food: check (so delicious)
Gelato: check (I had green-tea ice cream... also so delicious).
A relaxed evening with friends, movies, rum and eggnog: not check.

We got back to find out that Eric's aquarium has experienced a few..."issues".
spent a good chunk of time rescuing fish and mopping up fish-water.

Not relaxing. But we had the Rum and Egg Nog anyway.

One of the lobsters (he keeps baby lobters? wtf!?) refused to co operate. The following is a direct quote: "Lobster... you're an asshole."

I'll take care of him....

Also: I found a pair of jeans in my laundry that don't belong to me. They're about my size. Look vaguely familiar. But they're a brand of jean I've never bought or worn before and the pair that I thought they were are still in my drawer.
Who do they belong to? Anyone?
The only house guests I've had are from back in the summer-- and both Sue and Donna are tiny.
I have no idea where they came from; I'm totally wearing them right now.
Jean fairies.
Cool.

Death Hike

I was thinking today, about something that happened a few weeks ago (and then I realized it was a few months ago. What the hell).
But before I can tell you about that, I have to tell you about this:

I have this friend. Our friendship is based on scotch, Monty Python, and physical absurdity.
We used to, on weekends, go on "adventure hikes". Which, retrospectively, got re-named as "death hikes". Now, normally, when I say "I went on a death hike last weekend" people assume that I mean it was grueling. Long. Hard, steep climbing.
No.
We eventually figured out that, on all our hikes, one (usually both) of us would come very near to death. Multiple times. Per hike.

You see, I assumed that he was experienced enough not to attempt things that weren't already provably possible. And if he could do it...hell, I could do it.

He, meanwhile, assumed that if he attempted something beyond reason... I'd stop him.
Both of us were operating under poor assumptions.

The end result was idiocy like:
1) free climbing out of the devils punch bowl
2) clinging one-armed to his flailing body as he got pummeled by a waterfall in an attempt to keep him from being smashing into the rocks below.
3) him diving into a river to haul my ass out after I slipped off a rock face into it.

etc.

Part of the idiocy may have been exacerbated by the scotch and cigars we would (usually) remember to pack. Along with rope and a big-fucking-knife (boondocks saints style). Which we always ended up having to use (ie rapidly scaling a rock face with the on-sent of a thunderstorm).

Anyway: death hikes. You get the idea. This companion resides a continent away. It makes me sad.

A few months ago, I became obsessed with large fish and the idea of catching one. I mentioned this, offhand one day, and found myself with a fishing companion from work. He was excited "we can hike out to a good spot I know..." <-- I was hooked.
We drove to Chilliwack and started our hike.

Immediately I was forced to assess and re-catalogue our hike as a "walk". There was a path and no imminent death.
At one point, we had a bit of water (/puddle) that needed crossing.
I didn't think much of it- having nearly died in rapids too many times to count.

I also didn't think twice when my fishing/hiking buddy told me to "hang on a sec" and started wandering around like he had a purpose. I waited, remembering crossing raging rapids on hikes long since past, until I finally thought to ask him what he was doing (he was moving a lot of rocks).
His response: "I'm building you a bridge. So you don't get your feet wet."

*Clunk* <-- that was the sound of my jaw hitting the ground.

I was so confused.
I didn't know what to do. What was this? Was he joking? Insulting me?
was this...
Chivalry?
what...the fuck...?

I blushed. I actually blushed. I didn't know how to respond, and had been (for at least 20 seconds) just been gaping at him.

"...I... I can...jump that. Man.I mean...thanks?"

We moved on. my feet dry. I would have jumped it. I wanted to. It was really hard not to, but he'd gone to all the trouble moving all those rocks. I made myself use a couple of them, just to validate his effort.

He beamed.
I...
still don't get it.

I didn't catch anything.
Maybe next time.

... more skin

Ok.
So today I have a greater appreciation for "skin care" as industry.

My face is so...tender. Abraded. Puffy.
I call it "jiu jitsu face". From getting my head squished and my face kneed, and then a gi mashed all up in my grill, yo... (ha).

I put on chapstick. It took some of the searing pain out of my lips (which look like hell).

I could use...something...to soothe my skin.

Actually all of me. To soothe all of me. Something...

Morphine?

I don't know.

Skin

So: I have new beef with skin care.
here is an old post.

Oh...skin...
by Sheila Wynne Fung on Saturday, January 2, 2010 at 10:51pm

I know that there are various shower products and lotions "for men"; as opposed to those that are "for women".
I always thought they were the same products, in different packages, mostly to make the guys feel better about buying things like... shower gel. Moisturizers...that kind of thing.
I was surprised to learn two things recently.
1) "Men's Products" actually smell different. Not floral, or soapy (as I know "soapy" anyway). But... they smell more bracing. Like aftershave, except in shampoo form. Not a big deal, just surprising.
2) "Men's Products" assume (and I think produce) a different quality of skin. As in, texture. As in, "exfoliating" in men's product language really means "belt sander in a bottle".

Case in point: my brother warned me. "There's face wash in the shower-- try it. It's crazy abrasive". His wife cautioned me: "uh... use mine. It's a little more gentle."
I was curious: I used Joseph's.
*BAM!*
I was expecting the usual, gentle abrasion you get with other exfoliates... I think I actually lost more layers of skin in that one face-washing than I even knew existed. There are not that many layers to the epidermis. HOW DOES ANYONE WASH WITH THIS PRODUCT REGULARLY?
So do just men have tougher skin? or do their skin care products give them tougher skin? I don't know.
A few days later I thought my memory was exaggerating and I tried it again (idiot).
*BAM*
It wasn't exaggerating.
One more wash and I'm pretty sure my body would adapt by growing me a layer of armor over my face.
... which, now that I think about it, is kind of cool...


So: today-- tried that shimmering body lotion (mentioned a few posts back).

I'M FUCKING SPARKLY ALL OVER.
Who the HELL'S idea was this?
Who the hell takes ANYONE seriously when they sparkle? NO ONE, that's who.

I REGRET EVERYTHING.

:(

Crab Soccer

This is what we do for fun.
That stability ball has about 2-3 liters of water sloshing around in it, making its movements erratic and hilarious.
Those students are playing crab-walk soccer with it.

I had fun.

There was a moment when one of them used his feet to throw the ball to his teammate; his teammate was unprepared to move quickly from his hands and ended up taking a sloshing stability ball right in the face... They both had to stop for a moment, they were laughing so hard. Tears-down-face laughing. Fantastic.
Who doesn't need that, really?

Time Warp

It happened again.
It's Thursday (almost Friday) and 3 days have passed without me noticing.
Between my last post and now I have:
- panicked 5 or 6 times
- been anxious 9 or 10 times
- laughed more times than I can count
- cried once
- choked out one very large man
- been arm-barred by one (embarrassingly) small man
- been condescended towards by one irritating, unimpressive salesman
- been looked up to by a handful of heart-breakingly cute students
- walked into 2 (different) doorways (I was distracted)
- wished for 24 (at least) more hours in everyday
- terrified 6 determined little 4, 5 and 6 year-olds
- been heart-burstingly proud of that same group of children
- worried (furiously) about one person (I care about)
- watched 4 transformer cartoons...
- eaten one box of Ferraro Roche

A full couple days.

S

Gift of brilliance

A few of my students collaborated and gave me the most... useful Christmas gift ever. It's a "you're crazy enough to ride your motorcycle in the winter, so here..." care package!

A tight-fitting fleece (so warm! and it fits under my riding jacket)and a whole BUNCH of those little pocket-sized heat packets. Some for my gloves, my boots and some big square ones that could go...anywhere really. They just said "be creative" with those ones. I'm intrigued.

And-- I'm not sure on this part-- some nice smelling body wash/ lotion. With glitter in it. I... don't know how to feel about body glitter? I'm imagining being sparkly and then going to jiu jitsu and getting a whole lot of people in trouble with their girlfriends when they can't explain where it came from (because really...who wears shimmery body lotion? Weird). Maybe I'll hold off on that stuff.

Anyway the ride home from Ladner last night was *beautiful*. My hands were nice and toasty from those heat-packets and it just felt... fantastic. My body was extra tender from jiu jitsu yesterday morning so I was even more aware than usual of what everything was feeling on the bike. And there were so many interesting smells. Lumber yards, tree-cutting downs (Christmas related?), a bakery was making ginger-cookies... just a really interesting ride.

Girl vs. Giant Spider

I got to roll with Don today. A round was starting and he asked "who doesn't have a partner?"...and instead of doing the smart thing and letting someone else volunteer I jumped up: "Me!" (idiot...)

Don owns West Coast Jiu Jitsu. He's a black belt (in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu- kind of a big deal). He has trained all over the world with "the greats" like Gracie and De La Riva (in fact his school teaches De la Riva curriculum as well) and the idea of him wasting his time rolling with someone like me is just crazy...and I'm grateful for my good fortune (luck? hrm).

Anyway rolling with him is like trying to grapple a gigantic, super strong spider. That is also super flexible. And agile... so many limbs.
He was kind enough not to submit me; we just sparred, going for position. A strategy game, basically.

I was thrilled not to have spent the entire time on my back (or with him on mine). After the round he told me "Sheila- you're trying to play a "big-strong" game. And you're stronger than you look...but you're still not stronger than me. You need to play a more defensive, weaker game. If I push you, don't push back. Just go with it and take it into something that is to your advantage".

...
*sigh*
I knew this. And I've been actively trying to get more... soft, when I roll because he's right. I can muscle someone my size, but most of my opponents (here read: problems) are not my size and if I don't want to get squished...I'd better start being more like water.

I don't know why I even want to fight the spider. It would be so much easier to stay small and quiet-- let him tear someone else apart with his endless, spiny limbs. Beh.

Look! I made a friend!

It was love at first sight and I just couldn't resist. Stop judging me.

I found a circle of these in Stanley park back in the spring. My favorite part was the look on the man's face who'd agreed to take the photo when I asked (which I don't usually do...but the art in the Stanley park is so random. The week before these little guys went up there was a display of Pillows, scattered around in the grass. Giant, plaster pillows. Not comfortable at all).

Also: I witnessed today a *very* well executed roundhouse kick to the head. It was delivered with enough control not to knockout the unfortunate student on the receiving end. As it connected, I couldn't help a guttural "oooooouch!!" in response (which I'm sure didn't help anyone) and I did a little victory dance in an expression of my delight/approval for the student who threw it (who, until lately has only been throwing round kicks at knee level. This is a huge improvement).

The student that got kicked stopped and tore his head gear off- much to my confusion (he wasn't hit hard), when I realized that the guy's one toe (the big one) had been extended at a weird angle when he kicked...and he managed to poke his poor oponent RIGHT in the eye.
I mean, how demoralizing is that? he got kicked in the head. But it wasn't the KICK that hurt so much as the TOE IN THE EYE.

Jesus.
I don't know how I keep a straight face sometimes. It might explain why I spend so much of my time alone laughing hysterically. Just to get it out...

Anyway he was fine. Just a little grossed out at having had someones big sweaty toe jammed into his eyeball. Ew.

Well this is embarassing...

I'm so conflicted.
I feel triumph. Victory. And... like I should have been able to figure this out sooner.

I finally got fudge to work (third try). The problem wasn't the size of my pots (although, larger pots made for much less mess to clean up).
It wasn't a lack of candy thermometers (although, having two *is* pretty awesome).

It was the difference between slowly adding 3 cups of sugar and allowing it to dissolve as it went in (this way works)versus dumping 3 cups of sugar into the pot all at once and frantically whipping it until it all gets moistened and mentally cataloging it as "dissolved" at this point (this way doesn't work).

Anyway. I have delicious, velvety smooth, candy cane chunk-filled white chocolate fudge.
Huzzah!

I love the Internet

Me: "Holy CRAP there are fucking SHARKS the size of BOATS in the ocean."
Him: "Sheila...I thought you were reading about semiotics and Roland Barthes."
Me: "I was. But then I was trying to imagine which mythologies are currently ruling my life, and I had NO IDEA sharks were so big."
Him: "What does that have to do with Barthes"
Me: "Well clearly, the hegemonic grip of the ruling classes has made me think that sharks are a force I could, at least potentially, contend with if I had the right weapons and a chain-maille glove"
Him: "...Sheila... nobody is trying to make you think that. In fact 'the ruling classes' probably want you to think the exact opposite."
Me: "Hey, look! Sea Cows! neat!!"
Him:"...."

...fudge buckets

I've seen fudge made (successfully and unsuccessfully) many times. It looks simple enough.

What I didn't know is that it would expand so much while it cooked.
Or that my pots were clearly more suited to a batch half the size of the one I was attempting to make.
Or that burning sugar is a smell that lingers. Or that enough burning sugar on one hot plate makes for flames.

...
So spent a large portion of my day cleaning fudge off of...everywhere.
it's setting now.

I hope it was worth it.

Oh..jiu jitsu

There was a moment today, as I managed to gain a dominant position, when I was reminded (again) of how excessively I sweat.
A bead began on my forehead. It started a gentle roll down my face, gathering momentum as it peaked in speed right at the very tip of my less-than-pointy nose-- when it fell. From my face. Right onto the face of my unfortunate opponent.
He paused. Looked confused. Then aware...then revolted.

He let go of the arm he was attempting to work away from me, surrendering the grip he had fought so hard to place.
Wiped his face. Rolled his eyes.

"sorry" <-- I looked really sheepish. Allowed him to replace his grip.
"no worries. go!"

Life (the match) moved on.

At least it didn't land in his mouth...

I'm so pretty.

This...doesn't even make sense.

A convoluted cycle of me hating the National Student Loan center resulted in a 3 page post that I realized retrospectively was really boring and no one would want to read. So I deleted it.

The summary: when a system is created to fix a problem it should do so. Or, it should at least make things a little bit better.

When the system makes the problem worse, creates repeats of the problem that wouldn't have existed otherwise...or makes the problem now unsolvable...it's broken.

And the object of my pure, unbridled hatred.

RAH!!!

The Ugliest Unicorn

This is currently my profile picture on Facebook. I can't help it. It makes me laugh *every time* I see it.
Every time.

and again

The same class.
The same student... a much funnier gaffe.

We were playing dodge ball. You know the game-- it's so much fun!

Bryan: "look miss Fung!"
*I look
Bryan: "I have so many balls!"
...
*blink*
... *blink blink*
Me: That's great Bryan! Now throw them at someone!

eh heh...heh heh...

!

So difficult to keep a straight face sometimes.

Me: "have a seat, legs straight out in front. Reaching for your toes, stretch number two!"
* the class complies with a chorus of "Yes Ma'am!"

Leaning into the stretch, Bryan (a ridiculously cute 6 year old) beams as me while reaching his hands right over the tops of his feet, grabbing them by the soles.

Bryan: "look miss Fung!"
* I look
Bryan: "I can grab my balls!!!"

...
*blink*
...
*blink blink*
Me: "Wow! You're getting really flexible Bryan"
...so...hard...to not...laugh!

He means the balls of his feet, of course. I routinely tell them to pivot on the ball of the foot, or connect with it. It never occurred to me what it might lead to... *sigh*