The Legacy of The Sound of Music

Christopher Plummer just won an Oscar for a supporting actor role in Beginners. Congrats to him but to me, his most important role was as Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen that movie but I do know that my sisters and I know every single song and can reenact every major scene.

I learned many life lessons from The Sound of Music such as:

• nuns have your back
• don’t date a Nazi
• when you’re feeling unconfident and unsure, sing it out!
• don’t stand in a paddle boat
• better beware, be canny and careful when eager young lads me offer food and wine

But the most lasting influence the movie has had on me is a deep love for matching clothes.

Matching outfits made from curtains!

Matching sailor outfits!

My mom must have absorbed the same fashion lesson as my sisters and I often had matching outfits growing up. We wore them proudly. But as we grew older and entered different stages of life, matching outfits no longer seemed appropriate. However, my passion for matching clothes never died and I found an outlet. I’d like to share some photos as evidence in case you don’t believe how ingrained this movie is in my psyche.

Matching pajamas!

Matching pants!

Matching pinafores!

I call this the "Maria" dress.

I made these in 2004 (pardon the poor quality, these are webcam photos). It’s been eight years…I think it’s time for another set of matching clothes.

 

Lady and the Tramp

It’s a feast for these two lovebirds.

Remember when…

I’m feeling nostalgic. Let me take you  down memory lane called “internet 1.0.”

icq was the instant messaging platform of choice for non AOL members. I think I still remember my icq number (687683). I would have AIM and icq running side by side on our little computer that could (486 processor, 28.8 k modem). File transfers would take hours and if the transfer was interrupted, you’d have to start all over again (at least in the very early days). But it was the portal to and the training ground for greater things on the internet so it will always hold a special place in my digi-heart.

icq also facilitated the joys of tetrinet – a tetris battle involving up to 6 people. The strategic use of special blocks could make or break a game. It sucked when two “switch fields” were used on you consecutively and you end up no better than when you started. I delighted in the havoc wreaked by a well-timed “blockquake.”

Netzero provided free internet as long as you kept a window open that displayed their advertisers’ ads. Not a bad exchange, in my opinion.

AOL Instant Messenger wasn’t as “l33t” as icq (which wasn’t as l33t as mIRC) but that’s what most people used back then. AIM was how I learned about my namesake at Asia SF. I messaged her after I found out someone had already claimed my name as a screenname. I still haven’t met her in person but friends have. They say she’s quite good.

Before emoticons, lolcats and emoji, there was ASCII. People generally used ASCII to “draw” flowers, hearts and if you were a teenage boy, boobs.

Animated gifs + geocities = awesome. I learned HTML by building my own geocities page. I used to pore over issues of Car & Driver magazine to select the sports car that would be featured in my Car of the Month page. Knowing HTML is still helpful to this day though I can’t find much use for the blink tag. Also, remember when websites used to feature guestbooks?

Winamp, it really kicks the llama’s ass. Free mp3 player so you can play the music you pirated through Napster. Fact – I created my own winamp skin once using nothing but MS Paint. It wasn’t pretty but it was mine.

Tell me about your internet 1.0 memories. Did you have online friends? Did online friends turn into real-life friends? Were you an AsianAvenue member?

Resolution check in

Time to check in on my 2012 resolutions!

Reduce artificial sugar intake
I’ve made some improvements but I’m not where I want to be. I still get cravings which lead me to believe I have a sugar addiction. I still have ice cream cravings though when I indulge, I allow myself smaller servings than what I used to have.

More cardio exercise
Still can’t get into running. I ran three times in January and zero in February. However, I have gone snowboarding twice this month so that counts. I’ve also added a one-mile walk weekly. It’s not a significant amount but something is better than nothing.

Barre class 4 times a week
I’ve kept it up except for last week when I went zero times due to sickness and injury. I’m back to my regular schedule starting this week though and I’m going to squeeze in 5 classes when I can to make up for my break.

Kale in my smoothies
Heck no. I tried it once and I did not enjoy it. Once I finish my bag of flax seed, I’ll switch to chia seeds as I read it had more nutritional benefits. I’m changing this resolution to increase the nutritional profile of my smoothies.

Overall, I think I’m doing okay on my resolutions. I’m not achieving them completely all the time but I’m making strides which is what it’s all about.

A glorious holiday

I was lucky enough to get Monday off and I spent it doing a whole lot of nothing. It was perfect.

• 8:30 am wake up to pee and go back to bed
• 11:30 am wake up and lollygag in bed
• noon get up out of bed and decide to make the bed…at some point
• 1 pm poke around in the fridge for food
• 1:30 pm settle on grilled cheese with butter lettuce
• 2 pm  pm participate in the epic battle between plants and zombies
• 3 pm make the bed
• 3:45 pm head to barre class at Dailey Method, go back home
•  6:15  pm light kitchen cleaning, cook dinner
• 7:45 pm – 9:30 pm battle zombies with V by my side and set new high score in Bejeweled

Lazy days are the best.

I’ve fallen and I can’t get up

Okay, that’s an exaggeration. I can get up. I’ve been hurt and sick all week, pardon my silence. I’ve been a wreck for the past seven days. It all started when I decided to go to barre class the day before a snowboarding trip. I am not usually that sore after a class unless I take a class with one of the hard teachers (*cough* Teresa *cough* *cough* Jeanette) so I figured I would be fine. WRONG! The instructor introduced a new variation for thigh work and it BURNED LIKE THE FIRES OF HELL. I was seriously grimacing during the exercise.

Then after foolishly staying up until midnight playing plants vs. zombies, I woke up at 5 am to get ready for the road trip. I got to sleep in the car so I was good and ready to go when we got to Heavenly. As V and I were putting on our gear, we realized something was terribly wrong. I had forgotten to bring our snowboarding boots! *facepalm*

So V and I had to settle for rental boots. I never appreciated my own boots so much as I did this past weekend. I couldn’t get the rental boots laced tight enough without cutting the circulation off my feet. But riding with loose laces wasn’t a good option either. So I rode through the discomfort.

It was also my first time wearing a helmet and I wasn’t used to the extra weight on my neck. Two days of neck strain resulted in stiff, immovable neck on the third day. As if muscle soreness and stiffness wasn’t enough, I came down with a cold. I am so looking forward to the three-day weekend so I can recover and get back to normal.

 

 

 

 

A super Super Bowl

V has hosted a Super Bowl party for at least six years in a row now. I consider most of our parties joint parties but I think of the Superbowl as his party. He looks forward to it all year, it’s pretty much his favorite day of the year.

The menu has stayed consistent over the years: chicken wings and veggie tempura. Veggies go into the deep fryer first so vegetarians can have their food cooked in untainted oil. Then at halftime, the chicken wings start to come out. I don’t like buffalo wings (or sauce in general) so V always serves the chicken with and without the sauce.

Notice how the two kinds are completely segregated? V accommodates my prejudice against sauce. He is awesome like that.

But I also reciprocate the awesomeness. Each year, I create a football-themed dessert to cap off the food fest. The first year, I made Nutella macarons dyed Indy blue. Last year, I made Oreo cookie truffles shaped like footballs. This year, I made chocolate-dipped strawberries made to look like footballs. It’s my favorite Super Bowl dessert so far. It took some time to make and I had a little bit of a claw-hand after I finished piping the “laces” on but I enjoyed making it.

My inspiration was Shari’s Berries. Theirs look much better than mine but mine also cost much less. I was actually surprised at how easy it was to make these considering chocolate-dipped strawberries are always so expensive. But perhaps it was easy for me because I have several years of fruit-dipping experience. My sister and I worked at Novakovich Orchards dipping dried apricots in chocolate during Christmas time while we were in college.

Nevertheless, here’s the recipe:

Ingredients

• thoroughly washed strawberries with leaves attached. The leaves will serve as your handle when you dip into the chocolate
• melted semi-sweet chocolate. You can melt it on a double boiler or in the microwave. I put it in for 30 seconds, mix it, put in for another 30 seconds, mix, repeat until thoroughly melted.
• melted white chocolate. Use same melting process above. Don’t melt the white chocolate until you’re ready to pipe the lacing on

Equipment Needed

• tray
• parchment paper or wax paper
• fine piping tip
• piping bag or sandwich bag with a corner cut off to fit the piping tip

Directions

1. Line the tray with parchment or wax paper.

2. Pick a up a strawberry from the top and dip into the melted chocolate. Rotate the surface of the strawberry on the chocolate to coat as much of the surface as possible without getting chocolate on the leaves.

3. Gently shake off excess chocolate, carefully flip the strawberry 45 degrees up so the chocolate doesn’t drip down en route to the tray.

4. Place strawberry on tray.

5. Repeat until all your strawberries have been dipped.

6. Refrigerate the chocolate-dipped strawberries for an hour or two until chocolate is completely hardened.

7. Melt white chocolate and begin piping any design you want. You can even skip the piping and just use a fork to drizzle white stripes. If you were so inclined, you could pipe a skull and crossbones design. Your friends won’t know whether to beware or devour the strawberries.

I overspent

It’s $948.95. That’s 533% over my (theoretical, non-functional, unrealistic) budget. 

That’s how much I spent on unnecessary things in January. I didn’t include doctor visits and prescription but I did include my gym membership. The doctor visits and prescription are for my health so they’re necessities. I consider the gym unnecessary since I could use the free gym at our apartment building but I choose to go to a barre studio instead. I also did not include restaurants meals that cost less than $10 (per person). I consider those reasonable substitutions for home-cooked meals when V and I are just too tired and/or busy to cook.

Here’s the breakdown:

*My coffee expenditure would have been higher if it weren’t for the Starbucks cards I received for Christmas.

I’m going to set a limit of $450 for February. I won’t have to buy a new phone, probably won’t have time for a massage, and I’ll be eating out less. It should be doable…right?