I attended 3 weddings this month, making for a total of 6 weddings that I've been to this year. I have one more in July, and then I think this year's wedding season will officially come to a close.

All these weddings make me think about various roles (jobs) that I've had at different weddings...from bridesmaid to guestbook sign-in. I think I've done just about everything for a wedding (except for an all important one)! One of my favorite jobs has been wedding coordinator (thanks MJ/JJ).

As for the job that I wouldn't do again...that goes to candle lighting. Never, never again. One should always check that the wicks are able to be lit because you may have a candle lighter who just can't get it lit...that was my experience exactly.

The last wedding of 09 is a Brazilian BBQ! I'm also expecting slushees and hot dogs! That's a first!

Though I enjoy working in SF downtown, I gladly welcome each Thursday when I get to work from home. My dining room transforms into my makeshift office. There are no interruptions (except when I run downstairs to do my laundry) and contact with the outside world is reduced to email.

It's not that I don't love my job. I do. But I always look forward to Thursdays.

This week in particular I really needed my WFHD. On Monday I stepped off the plane from TX and went straight to work. That probably was a mistake, but I needed to get back into the office after being out for a couple of days. I was able to catch up on things, which included returning a phone call to a therapist who has been working with a student of mine. What I didn't expect was a 40-minute berating in which I was faulted for my "missteps" in dealing with my student. Having no reserves to push back, I wound up holding back tears and trying to remain civil. "I hope you understand," said the therapist. To which I replied, "It's hard not to take it personally." I even tried finding our mutual point of agreement (wanting the well-being of the student). She told me this wasn't the point.

After hanging up, I tried to collect myself in the bathroom. I was startled by how red my eyes were in the mirror and immediately knew I needed to step out of the office. I made it to our front desk to tell our admin, who asked if I was okay. That question always prompts the floodgates to burst, and I couldn't hold back any longer. I felt sorry for the guy sitting in the waiting area who witnessed it all.

Ironically, I had told my coworkers there would be no tears this semester. I was within days of making this happen!

Thank goodness for Thursdays.

It's okay if you don't want to be near me after this. It seems I have come down with a case of athlete's foot. I seriously didn't know it until I happened to peek between my toes the other day. I showed my dad and he told me that I had fungus. I flatly denied it. But curiosity took me to Google (how all good medical diagnoses are made) and to my horror I realized that I had the precise symptoms of toe web (interdigital) fungus, which is athlete's foot!

This has made me the brunt of the jokes in my family. My sister slapped a sign on my door labeled "Unclean: Fungal Contamination Area - Enter at Your Own Risk!" I find it only mildly amusing. I marched myself to Walgreens the next day and bought Clotrimazole, antifungal cream. I've been applying it religiously, morning and evening so I can join the rest of society again.

A psalm of lament is actually a psalm of faith (so I've been told). It's been forever since I've tried my hand at poetry, but a school assignment put me back in touch last week.

Oh Lord, how long must we await Your return?
How long will hurt and sorrow
fill our present days?
How long until my restless longings cease,
when I shall see my completed salvation?
Darkness rules the day;
Will You allow evil to persist forever?
Direct my heart to praise;
my heart grows weary in the wait,
when brokenness is all I know.
Those who do not fear You
say that God is absent.
They say to us,
‘There is no God! Truth is ours to define!’
They live to indulge their own pleasures
in defiance of the One who has created them.
But You do not leave the wicked without witness,
the earth testifies of Your greatness.
In the presence of beauty
they must confess a Maker.
One day they shall see the error of their defiance,
that God eternal is seated on high,
and judges man according to their ways,
the wicked shall not prosper.
The Lord is good to all who love Him;
I believe there will come a day
when our hope is finally realized.
Oh, give us patient endurance and
hasten this day!

My Cal friends glare at me, but I have an affinity for Stanford that started way back. My grandfather graduated from Stanford, followed by my uncle. Every year growing up I went with my family to the week long summer camp for Stanford alum and family in Lake Tahoe. Stanford culture grew on me, which made me partial to the school, even though my college application was rejected.

On Saturday I braved Cal Bear territory in red and white for the NCAA Women's Regional. Luckily there were many others joining me in rooting for the Cards (Cal women can't play at their own regional). The guy sitting in front of me looked at W.Wu and I quizzically and asked if we were a little ambivalent? W.Wu had her Cal t-shirt on, and I was next to her with my Stanford one. "We're still friends," I assured him. Though admittedly I'm the poser because I never actually went to Stanford :)

Cardinal women are good. Jayne Appel is a monster. OSU has a fiery freshmen point guard, but Stanford just has too much experience to be so easily put off.

My love for donuts has been rekindled. Recently it has become somewhat of a ritual for my sister and I to make a trek out to Happy Donut on Sundays. We never plan what to order - we just start blurting donuts out to the Vietnamese clerk behind the counter. Most times we end up with a half-dozen or more (I'm convinced seeing donuts makes you greedy). Then we order two small coffees. I pair my old-fashioned chocolate donut with a cup of dark roast.

We took two hopeful converts along this Sunday, JJ and JC. We just might have won them over. Afterwards I saw JH at church who totally laughed because she had just gone that morning, too! I think she gets the donut thing. I actually went twice this week - Friday (aka mental health day) was partially reserved for Happy Donut. My mom warned me that this isn't healthy. I respond by faithfully eating my oatmeal still.

I told my mom that I'm taking this Friday off from work and she replied, "Mental health day?" To which I replied not only is it a mental health day, but it's pretty much a ME day, a day that I've craved for a long time. Some people think it's strange, but like this weekend when I sat in the car by myself for an hour and a half during the gap between a wedding ceremony and a banquet I felt totally energized. I had my laptop and my iTunes pulled up and was really loving being by myself.

I'm not sure what I'll do Friday yet. But I'll go with my mom's designation that it will be "Mental Health Day."

Most people don't know it, but I'm kind of a scared-y cat. In other words, I can be pretty wimpy, but I try not to show it (how wimpy I am). But I'll blog about it. I think that amounts to a confession of sorts.

So I went indoor rock climbing for the second time in life the other week. The first time I went was probably 5 years ago. I think I remember liking it, or thinking it wasn't that bad. So I took that experience into my most recent rock climbing venture but soon realized that when my palms started getting sweaty that I was a lot more afraid than I thought. Fears aside, I think I also realized that if I don't get something intuitively I end up having a hard time. "Plan your moves 3 steps in advance," I was told. Well, it doesn't work like that for me. I have to get it without thinking. So that makes picking up new things kind of hard if I'm not immediately good at it.

On that day I think I ended up being less of a wimp than my sister. Does that count? :)

Moving.

Click here.

Ah, the start of a new blog. There's something about new beginnings that I like. This move has been a bit overdue, but nevertheless, I've made the switch, and my xanga is now in the past. I'll be sure to have more to say than I did in recent months on my old site :)