judyonthenet

Since I won’t be in town to celebrate Halloween, I figured I’d talk about Halloween last year. We got married on 11-01-08, and like a lot of people, we wanted to have our rehearsal the day before. The day before being… Halloween! Because it was Halloween, it was a costume-mandatory event. It was like having a Halloween wedding without having a Halloween wedding, which is good for me because I’m too stuck-up and traditional to do something as offbeat as that. (That said, there have been some pretty awesome Halloween weddings. Offbeat Bride has many examples.)

One note about having a costume rehearsal before your wedding… Kelvin and I had the ambitious idea to make our own costumes, so a lot of the week before was spent working on the costumes because we are procrastinators. Word of advice: DON’T DO THIS. It took away time and thought from working on things for the actual wedding, which means I missed a couple details for the wedding because of chaos of mind. I feel like an idiot for not thinking this part through thoroughly.

Looks like a hurricane hit our apartment

Because of time constraints Hakone Gardens has, this was a rehearsal lunch instead of a rehearsal dinner. It was a Friday, so everyone took a day off from work to rehearse, which I really appreciated. (I took the entire week off!) That morning, the girls got manicures and pedicures at Sakura Nail Bar in San Jose Japantown. Word of advice: Don’t clip your nails immediately before your wedding! The salon ladies didn’t have much to work with for me because of that… another thing I did without thinking. It was nice getting pampered before rehearsal, and it was our moms’ first manicures too!

Kimi, me, and Kelvin’s mom getting pedicures

Anna and Sandra getting manicures

After manicures, we went straight to Hakone Gardens at noon. I think we were a little late, but we were the first ones there, except for our photographer and day-of coordinator! Aside from my mother and me, EVERYONE was late. Even the girls who were just at the salon with me. They took a different route than me, and it should have been quicker, but there was a massive accident on the freeway they took, lol. Eventually, everybody that was coming made it, and we did our rehearsal.

Flower girl and baby sister

Hanging out while we talk to Patty

Rodney leading my mom in, followed by bridal party

In walks the bride!

Getting fake married… almost like the real thing!

Patty says we’re supposed to wave at people, so we’re wavin’

The Rehearsal Party
Bride – Harley Quinn
Groom – Joker
Maid of Honor – Carmen Sandiego
Best Man – Invisible Man
Bridesmaid – Pirate
Groomsman – Himself/Robot
Bridesmaid – Wonder Woman
Groomsman – Tiger Woods
Mother of the Bride – Witch
Mother of the Groom – ??? Cabaret lady??
Father of the Bride – Surgeon
Father of the Groom – Surgeon
Stepmother of the Groom – Surgeon
Flower Girl – Snow White
Mother of the Flower Girl – I have “no eye-deer“…
Officiant – Priest
Video cameraman – Kankuro

Kelvin’s best man couldn’t make it to rehearsal, so he was the only person from the bridal party missing. Some interesting notes about the costumes:

-Kelvin and I were mostly successful in making our costumes. I made mine from a modified Burda dress pattern, and Kelvin got the pattern for his from a costume sewing pattern for Uncle Sam. His ended up being a little small, so his suit actually has no armpits. I didn’t have time to sew my collar or sleeves on, so the collar is pinned on, and the sleeves are just cut up stockings slipped over my arms! LOL, we’re ghetto!

-My dad was flying in from Taiwan and has no grasp on Halloween, so I bought the cheapest and easiest costume at Party City, which was hospital scrubs. I forgot that Kelvin’s stepmother works in a hospital… so of course she and Kelvin’s dad shows up in (way nicer) hospital scrubs.

-My mom, the witch, didn’t want to carry around a broom, so instead she brought a feather duster.

-Anna’s costume didn’t come with tights.

The bridesmaids

Our groomsman, Geoff, showed up last even though he lives like a couple freeway exits away from the venue, and because we were rushed for time, he couldn’t put on his costume during the rehearsal. Which is too bad, because he made this awesome and well-constructed robot costume. He was a procrastinator like we were, but I believe he did finish his costume on time. The problem was, he didn’t quite figure out the logistics of transporting his costume to the rehearsal venue. He has two vehicles: a motorcycle and a convertible Miata. Neither of these vehicles could hold his costume. What he ended up doing was taking his Miata, putting his costume in the passenger seat, and driving down the freeway with the roof down at 30mph so it wouldn’t fly away. I wish I could have seen him share the freeway with no doubt numerous other POed drivers. Geoff, I’m sorry for not letting you wear your costume for rehearsal, especially after all that effort.

WTF is this thing?

Hug it out!

Lunch was at C.B. Hannegans, just down Highway 9 from Hakone Gardens. Everyone was treated to a buffet lunch, courtesy of Kelvin’s folks. Because our photographer couldn’t make it to lunch, Ted joined us and took pictures for us. Pretty good ones in fact!

Robot is human after all

Chowing down

Princesses need to eat, too

Sandra and pirate Anna

An unfortunate thing about this rehearsal is that we rehearsed outside because the lady in charge of the gardens had told us it was going to be clear on our wedding day. She must have misread her weather report, as I had read before and after the rehearsal that rain was definitely coming the next day. Sure enough, the first major storm of the 2008-2009 winter season came on our wedding. (I think there was a random shower early in the month, but nothing compared to what hit us.) It would have been better to have rehearsed inside, but at least we got some nice pictures of the garden from rehearsal!

New thing I learned today: The term “hug it out” originated from Entourage.

This weekend! I’ve never been to (any part of) Hawaii, so I’m pretty stoked. We were originally planning for Maui, but Kelvin made a last-minute-without-conferring-with-me decision to book a place on the Big Island. (Which is cool… but why did we even bother deciding on Maui in the first place??) We got a decent priced deal with Kelvin’s auntie through her time share thingy. It allows up to 4 people, so Kelvin’s coworker buddy Avery is coming along, and I’m still holding out hope that my coworker buddy Ted will get some sort of rebellious streak and ditch work to come along as well.

TED. COME TO HAWAII. YOU NEED A VACATION.

(Yay. Kelvin’s new talking head plugin now includes me. I look kind of scary, tho.)

We ordered new rolling, carry-on luggage. For our honeymoon, we borrowed Kelvin’s dad’s luggage and discovered every possible annoyance a cheap piece of rolling luggage could have. Lesson learned, luggage ordered from eBags. Along with luggage, I ordered some more beach clothes (new dress, sandals, tank top, and swimsuit) and a Big Island guidebook. So, a bit of spending, plus this trip isn’t cheap. (Damn you Hawaiian Air and your lack of price matching. Southwest or Jetblue needs to fly to Hawaii.)

So we need suggestions on what to do there… we’ve stuck there the entire week! I know there’s volcanoes and nighttime manta ray diving. Anything else? Please let me know!

New thing I learned today: eBags charges tax in California.

When I bought my beloved Fossil purse from them earlier this year, no tax was charged. I guess they got a warehouse in CA, which is a bummer. Even with tax, their prices are still competitive, especially Bing or Fatwallet cashback doesn’t hurt either.

You’d think before going on my first year anniversary trip to Hawaii, I’d catch up on all my honeymoon and (1 or 2 wedding) posts. The next couple honeymoon posts require some video editing, and Kelvin’s been kinda wishy-washy about doing those, so I don’t know when I’ll get them done. At this point, not before our Hawaii trip. I also wanted to post about the music we used for the wedding ceremony, but that also requires a small video edit.

I’ve also been doing a bit of reading. I’m focusing on learning Python, relearning C++, and reviewing all the stuff I was supposed to have learned while I was in college. I’ve been sending my resume out more, so I need to actually live up to how I’m advertising myself. Thankfully, MIT has OpenCourseWare, so I can just go to the website to look over old materials. The downside is that most of the old websites are no longer there. Back in college, most classes used to have links to old problem sets and solutions from many previous semesters up. Now everything is all super-secure and requires a current MIT login; you can’t even see the current semester’s course materials. So I’ll just have to settle with OCW like everyone else in the world does. If I had known they’d get rid of public access to the old pages, I would have saved my problem sets.

I’m a little disappointed at how superficially I learned things in college. I didn’t really make an effort to see how things related to “the big picture”. Instead, I’d procrastinate, cram a whole bunch of information in my head and hope it wouldn’t burst out by the time the next exam came by. I’m hoping that now I’m older and have some free time, I’ll try to appreciate the information more and digest it a little slower.

That thinking didn’t keep me from cramming knowledge this weekend tho. Today I had my first phone screening since 2005. (It’s not my first interview tho; I had one in 2008, and I met up with another company recently to hear about their plans.) The talk ended up being very casual and mostly non-technical, so it was a bit of a wasted effort. The guy I spoke to was really nice, so I can’t tell how well I did. I’m assuming I won’t get to the next phase because, well, I’m a pessimist. (I also hate phone interviews. I hate not being able to see the other person smile, write stuff down, or roll eyes at me. Plus I tend to sound like a rambling idiot over the phone.) Overall, however, I’m feeling pretty good, as I don’t feel like not getting this job would be the end of the world. I think doing things on my own terms and timing has made me a lot less freaked out about job searching than what I’ve experienced previously.

Because this post is boring, I’m gonna add some random eating out pictures:

We went to Hungry Hunter with Kelvin’s aunt and cousin. The prime rib was SO good. It was also incredibly salty; I was constantly in need of water as I ate it. It must have been a savory salt, because it didn’t keep it from being delicious. My mouth waters just thinking about it, because of the deliciousness… and the salt levels.

Avery wanted to test out his new studio, so Kelvin and I had to dress up like “a nice couple”. (You can check out a few of the pictures here.) Since we had to dress up, I suggested Kelvin take me out to dinner, and he did! We went to Forbes Mill for steak and lobster. It also happened to be Silicon Valley Restaurant Week, so they had a fixed menu that was pretty reasonably priced.

Before getting hit by an ancient Russian dude, I took Sandra out to lunch to Tanto. They had a decent lunch special combo of shiyo ramen with a salmon rice bowl. Sandra is taking a pic here for her food blog.

Speaking of eating out, we’ve started watching Kitchen Nightmares. Definitely not a show to watch during dinner. In fact, I think I’m mildly paranoid of all restaurants I go to now.

New thing I learned today: What the 7 layers of the OSI model are.

I looked over some old data networking lecture notes, which tell me I apparently should have already learned this in 2004. Sigh for superficial learning.

Yesterday, I went to Mitsuwa with Sandra while she was in town. While making an unprotected left turn on a green light from Blackford to Saratoga, a Corolla zoomed through the intersection on a red light, hitting the front right corner of my car.

Their light had been red for at least 10-15 seconds. I remember watching the long line of cars across from us, also making unprotected lefts, and commenting how none of these people had their left blinkers on even through they were probably going to make lefts. I watched the second car turn on their blinker as the first, already blinkered car made its left, so I decided at this point to make my left.

Out of the corner of my eye, I must have seen the car coming, because I braked suddenly, said “Oh my god”, and braced myself for impact. (By bracing, I mean wincing and locking my arms.) Sandra kept complimenting me on my fast reflexes, to which I jokingly referred to my video game reflexes. Honestly, I don’t remember thinking about it (it happened really fast), so it must have been some natural reaction. If I had decided to go for the left earlier, or if I hadn’t braked… let’s just say I’m glad we didn’t have to test my side impact airbags. The Corolla didn’t brake at all going through the red, so it had to be at least 30mph. Really scary.

The Corolla had pulled over, so I reversed back out of the intersection and parked behind them. An old Russian couple popped out, looking very confused. The old man, who was driving, said “You hit me?” Sandra and I were like, “You ran the red!” He seemed disoriented and kept mumbling, probably in Russian.

Another man came up to us, followed by three boys whose faces had “whoa” expressions, asking if everyone was okay. I asked if he saw what happened, he’s like, “Yeah, I was behind him!” The confused man mumbled to him, and the witness gave him a stern, “You ran the red.” He gave me his name and number in case I needed a witness and then went back on his way. Good Samaritans do exist in the Bay Area! And he’s setting a good example to his kids… yay for humanity!

At this point, the old man was calling his son on the phone. I spoke with his son briefly, since his English was much better than his dad’s and the car insurance was under his name. I exchanged insurance information with the old couple, and we took pictures of each other’s vehicles.

Good thing I braked! Damage pretty minimal

I think their repairs are gonna be more expensive

Aside from the initial confusion and them almost seriously injuring me, the old Russian couple are actually nice people. I think the driver’s mind had been distracted thinking of other things; he didn’t seem particularly crazy or senile. Everybody was glad no one was hurt, and the old man was very remorseful for the mess he caused. He said he has a flawless driving record since ‘61, and this was the first time he messed up like this. Thank goodness Sandra was here, too; she totally helped calm me while my brain was all whacked out trying to figure out the situation.

Today, I took it to a nearby shop to get an estimate. Talking with the son, he said his family had a preferred shop, so I took it there soon after. (Coincidentally, it was like a block away from the first shop I took it to.) I met up with the old man there, who was still incredibly apologetic. He said he trusted this mechanic, who was unsurprisingly Russian. He kept offering me monetary compensation outside of the car fixes for inconveniencing me. I told him I don’t want his money, I just want my car fixed and for him to drive more carefully!

Now I’m just waiting for parts; I’ll be dropping off my car for the repairs next week. What a relief there were no assholes or hospital visits in this story. Everything was easily worked out, and everyone was A-okay. This could have been a much bigger headache… or worse.

The whole experience still freaks me out though. You can’t protect yourself from red light runners! In fact, when I drove home, there was an accident at an intersection near our apartment. Looks like a van was hit left turning by a car going straight. All lefts are protected here, so somebody definitely ran a red. Worse than mine, but all the passenger areas look okay, so hopefully nobody was hurt.

Glad this wasn’t me.

Scary.

New thing I learned today: A bumper absorber is a large piece of styrofoam in between the bumper cover and reinforcement beam.

The first reaction that most people, including me, had when they saw my damage was, “Whoa, there’s styrofoam in there?”

I made a couple orders with eBags recently, pending our upcoming trip to Hawaii (more on that later). One of them shipped, and I checked out the tracking number:

Sweet! Our luggage was already delivered! In Oregon. Last year.

Too bad my time machine is broken!

I guess UPS’s business is good if they’re reusing tracking numbers that haven’t been cleared out of their system yet.

New thing I learned today: A “charmed life” means a life of good fortune or invulnerability because of a charm or spell. The term originated from Shakespeare’s MacBeth.

I knew the basic meaning, but I didn’t look it up until today. I think of the term when I see people living awesome lives I’m totally jealous of, but it also refers to people’s luck in avoiding physical harm.