[cross-post]

I just got news that my aunt has passed away yesterday. It doesn’t sound like she died peacefully, which breaks my heart even more. I feel for my cousins. They’d just lost their dad the year before. I’m grateful that I was able to see her and visit his site late last year on their home turf (CAN).

Just tweeted to the airlines about an air ticket to Toronto. Jetblue was the first one to DM me back. Thanks, Jetblue! Although you don’t have flights that go directly to CAN, you offered a couple other suggestions.

It seems that bereavement airfare isn’t always the cheapest ticket around. Huh. Go figure.

I await further instructions from the elders in my family. Ironic that my elders are not quite ‘elder.’

Any suggestions or ideas about travel airfare are much appreciated.

Thursday!

1. twice weekly garbage pick-up
2. bagels
3. email
4. random people who tell me that toilet paper is on sale at Ralphs
5. Terri – who passed my resume along to her contact at an ad agency
6. Gilmore Girls S5 – getting better and better…. except Kirk is still around. Arghhhhhhhhhh.
7. Target – always a goodie
8. my new reusable bottle – my RENT bottle has got weird white spots inside the bottle – so I guess it’s now just an expensive and useless souvenir
9. gift cards
10. socks that fit

$5.99 for 12 rolls at Ralphs - I guess that's a good deal...

What a week! And it’s not even over yet! The past three days (including today) has been crazy busy, and I’ve been lacking sleep. Meh. Today’s 10 is brought to you by things that help keep me awake on my commutes, while working, at home before bed.

1. Coke – Coke people – I wish you would just hire me.
2. audiobooks – currently listening to Peony In Love by Lisa See. I’m finally into the second part. No spoilers please! It’s taking me some patience to get through this. I forgot I don’t care for this narrator.
3. NPR – KPCC is having their fundraising drive. Think about giving!
4. chocolate – sure sure, I might get a crazy allergic rash on my arms after eating chocolate, but it helps.
5. Fresh Air – yep, another vote for NPR.
6. Marketplace – see #5
7. sleep – this helps tremendously. Too bad the older we get, the less we get.
8. running – can you believe it?!
9. my computer – it’s like a drug.
10. the cold – blehhhhhh.

Thanks to the SMPL and LAPL, I am, once again, full-up on books and audiobooks! w00t! I walked to the SMPL on a break from work, and stayed a little longer than I’d expected. I found their audiobooks section and was enthralled with the selection. The only thing I’ve got to verify is the transfer issue. At the LAPL, you can place a book On Hold and request that it get delivered to your local branch… FOR FREE. Looking at the SMPL website, it looks like transfers are $5 each! Jesus. So that’s how they keep the main branch so beautiful – they just gauge your wallet on the transfers.

On my table now, borrowed from both libraries:

• Peony in Love by Lisa See – audiobook
• Off Armageddon Reef by David Weber – audiobook
• The Crazy School by Cornelia Read – book
• The Second Assistant by who the frick cares; I’m a dumb person for borrowing it in the first place – book

More on The Second Assistant another time. I kind of don’t want to waste my time writing about it. I didn’t technically read the entire book; I skimmed it and got the gist of it. So I’m adding it to my list of “I Got the Gist of It” booklist for 2010.

Hey-o! Go Team USA hockey! Did you see that crazy game tonight? Men’s USA vs. Canada. They were skating like maniacs! So fast! It was like they were sprinting the whole time each line was on the ice. (Who are you and what have you done to our NHL players?)

Today’s 10 is powered by brunch and leftover homemade chili. I had a lovely time with Stefanie, Robyn, April, and Roberta on the Westside. Stefanie graciously hosted brunch at her place. Sometimes I miss living on the Westside. Sometimes. Today’s theme: saving money by not spending money.

1. free Pepsi – granted, I’m a Coke-lover, but I’ll take free cola anytime
2. homemade chili – I froze a small bowl of chili, defrosted it, and heated it up for dinner – YUM!
3. flowers – the FTH brought home flowers the other day – *heart*
4. my tiny teeny pot of Forget Me Nots – I finally opened the package and got this started. This was a party favor from Karen’s bridal shower (from a million months ago).
5. the Santa Monica Public Library – holy cow, have you been to the main branch? It’s beautiful! I could live there. No really. I signed up for a free library card, so I wouldn’t have to depend wholly on the LAPL for books. However, I think LAPL still trumps SMPL because transferring books from branch to branch is FREE at LAPL; it looks like it costs $5 per transfer at SaMO. Nazis!
6. Gilmore Girls – Seasons 5, 6, & 7 – Jen has graciously lent me the last of the GG DVDs. I am full-up on tv shows, books, and audiobooks right now, and it feels fantastic!
7. game night at Brian & Shelly’s – we were being filmed for a potential documentary and as incentive – free pizza, drinks, and company
8. my first Laker game – not quite free, but I did spend quality time with three of my friends
9. my Snuggie – seriously.
10. today’s brunch – yay food!

I’ve got another book to review, but let’s get this one posted now. It’s fresh in my mind. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Colllins is my 4th book read of 2010.

Battle Royale "Light"

Rachel raved about this book on her blog, and who am I to ignore YA fiction that gets good reviews? I was Hold #482794378271 at the LA Public Library, so it must mean it’s a popular book to loan out. Once I got it in my hands, again, it took me a while to get into the story.

Immediately I felt the book was light. It’s a like Battle Royale “light.” Not much blood, not much action. It’s also a little like Uglies – in that universe, teens are picked to become “pretty.” In this world, teens are picked to battle it out until only one stands. OMG, this reminds me of Highlander!

Katniss is the main character and hero of the story. Thank you, baby jesus, for a young teenage girl to be the protagonist! Thank you for making her the breadwinner of her family and the even-headed one. Thanks, Suzanne Collins! I don’t find a lot of action characters who are strong (young) women. In this post-Apocalyptic America, two teens (1 boy, 1 girl)  from each of the 12 ‘districts’ of America (Panem) are plucked to participate in the Hunger Games -kill everyone until there is only one.  The last one standing wins food for the entire district. How fucked up is this? (Awesome!)

While I find it a little too simply written (I’m not sure how to say this), Collins fills out all the details of Katniss’s life. You can imagine the details of the Capitol, where the Hunger Games are held. I started to get more vested in the story as soon as Katniss and Peeta (the boy tribute from District 12) set off in the Games. That’s when the action starts. I read the last 1/3 of the book in one night. Partly to find out what happens (it’s kind of slow) and partly to return it back to the library (it was due in 4 days).

Overall, it’s not a bad book. It’s a great premise. The end of the first book made me want to get the second book. I’d like to know what happens to Katniss and Peeta. So for that…

Grade: B

I reviewed my list and noticed that I hadn’t written a review for a couple of other books prior to The Hunger Games.

First up, World War Z by Max Brooks. I started to read this at the end of 2009, hoping to make it my last book of ‘09. Well… not so fast, Slowpoke Magee… I ended up finishing this in 2010. So I guess this book as the honor of being #1 on my 2010 reading list. (That’s numbered first, not ranked first. )

This is a sequel/follow-up to his first book called The Zombie Survival Guide. World War Z is divided up into sections that interview the survivors of a world zombie attack – before, during, after. It took a while to get comfortable in this format. There are some characters’ interviews that I didn’t care for, but that is how it goes. How else can you get heroes and villains in a book written via in-person interviews? If you listen to a lot of audiobooks, this would be up your alley. It kind of reminds me of those old radio shows like War of the Worlds.

I like that the book included military, political, and civilian accounts of the war. Some parts are pretty gruesome in description. I can’t imagine some of the stuff that happened in the book. I guess that’s why it’s been optioned to become a movie. :p

It took a long time for me to finish this book. In fact, I had to renew it from the library – that’s a bad sign. I’d only read it before bed, and it didn’t keep my attention for the first 2/3 of the book. Once Brooks got into the “fighting” and aftermath, it got interesting, and I was much more engaged.

Jerrod really liked this book – the only reason why I picked it up. I’m not too fanatical about it, but I’m glad I read it; it makes me want to borrow The Zombie Survival Guide, which may help round out the entire zombie war background and story.

Grade: B

Internet and cable tv are back up! After nearly 4 days of nothing, Charter figures out that some other Charter tech disconnected ‘the wrong box,’ ie. OUR box. Dumbass.

Tonight’s 10 highlights companies and/or people that I think give great customer service. You can bet Charter is not on it.

1. Nordstrom
2. Zappos

Wow. Ok. List finished.

Our cable and internet (related) have been down since late Monday afternoon. *eyes bulging* Yep, I’m in severe internet withdrawal. It’s as if I was a heroine addict, and I’ve been looking for a vein for two days.

Topics I’ve wanted to blog about include:

• my first Laker game – I know, scary, for several reasons
• book review – The Hunger Games
• CNY

Funny. All three topics have to do with ties… see? bringing it back to NaBloPoMo. *takes a bow*

I’m writing about this as I’m halfway through the 4th Season of Gilmore Girls. Jen generously let me borrow the series and I’ve been enjoying the show.

What I should have done was have a running blog commentary for each season or disc. Bah!

Here are some things I dislike about the show in general:

• Kirk – what an impossibly annoying ad useless character. (Don’t say comic relief, there doesn’t need to be a comic relief character in a show like this.) I refuse to believe there is such a person in a small white town in CT. No way. He’s kind of Jar Jar but he appeals to NO ONE.
• Lane’s mother – it’s almost as if the writers of the show had never met enough Asian mothers and decided on the “crazy Christian authoritarian psycho” Asian mother archetype. WTF. Not all Asian mothers are like that and this show supported the stereotype of crazy Asian mothers. Thanks, show.
• Lane – I have mixed feelings about this character. Finally in S4, she says “I have no spine.” And she confronts her mother, asking for a compromise, and then gets kicked out. Yes! Movement! Evolution, perhaps? For someone who’s got so much knowledge of music, you’d think she’d just take a page from a band and left at 18.
• Sookie – is she high in first couple of seasons? It seemed as if she was high the whole time.
• The “town troubador” – both of them. Jesus. Seriously? I have to fast-forward the times he shows up and starts singing. It’s like having a kind of intermission for the show, which I don’t think it needs.
• Lorelai’s choice of boyfriends – I first saw Max in “Kissing Jessica Stein” and hated him there. So this role just reminded me of that character. Then Jason the weasel face – so gross. Really, Lorelai? You can do better! You had some dates with Bella’s dad – he needs more work.
• Taylor Doose – what. an. asshhole. He is the douchebag politician, but in a small town. He makes it difficult for residents to anything – put up a sign, host a farmer’s market, get the inn fixed, etc. Plus he also uses his ‘power’ to get his businesses running, like the soda shoppe and the ice cream truck. Asshole.

What I really like about the show:

• Babette – Sally Struthers is fantastic as the Gilmores’ neighbor. She comes in small doses; that’s how you do comic relief or “an intermission” or to move the story along. Plus she calls it like she sees it. She calls Jess a punkass, which is what he is.
• Rory and Lorelai’s ideal relationship – this is nice to see, even if it’s unrealistic. It’s just nice to see mother-daughter bonding, fighting, talking.
• Richard and Emily Gilmore – they make me laugh. The way they have all these class rules – makes me glad I’m not white, old, or rich.
• Lorelai’s evolution/inn – I like that it took forever for her to fulfill her dream. Nothing comes that fast, and the show goes through so many seasons of her at the Independence inn before working on the Dragonfly. There’s an episode where we see she’s so struggling with money issues to get the contractor paid and all. The breakdown of both Lorelais – that episode is one of my favorites of this season. It shows that they both have a breaking point, that the stress of everything on their shoulders (work, expectations, perception of expectations) does make a giant dent on them.
• dialogue – the dialogue between Rory and Lorelai; Lorelai and Luke; the Friday night dinners – best stuff. So many great references! You have to really listen to their banter, and you’ll hear the knocks on politics, pop culture, et al.

Back to finishing Seasson 4…