New Hair.

I am absolutelamente LOVIN my new hair! Finally got sick and tired of ‘ol flatty and got me some bangs and layers for some ZING! Some PIZZAZZ! Some POW!

Roomies.

Made the dire mistake of having lunch with current roomie J and college roomie C who started lunch as strangers and ended lunch as kindred spirits after realizing their apparently uncannily similar harrowing experiences of living with me.

Americans and Their Culture 4.

In the end, though, Mr. Tour Guide Man loves Americans and their culture and would prefer em to Koreans and their culture any day despite their strange sodium related inclinations. He pronounced Americans as the only people who would strike up conversation in elevators, crack jokes during job interviews, and be sincerely polite to strangers. And despite all the grossly skewed generalizations, he did also manage to hit some true points and also give us some good historical information all along the way… though accuracy may have been slightly suspect.

Americans and Their Culture 3

I woke up somewhere en route to Niagara falls through Pennsylvania to Mr. Tour Guide Man ranting into the mic by himself about the failure of Korean society to discipline their children resulting in snooty spoiled brats that he’d really like to smack upside the heads and how he will never ever raise his children like Korean people do but will raise them like Americans do. This all to an audience of Korean parents with Korean children listening at rapt attention. He then helpfully posed the non-question: “People ask me such things as: ‘How do Americans discipline their children in order to have such well-behaved children?’” to which he not so helpfully answered that Americans are just all naturally good parents and that one look of their gentle good-parent eyes and one word from their gentle good-parent mouths will make any child apparently want to fold their own laundry, get accepted to Harvard, and make a billion bucks to send their good parents on an all-expenses-paid Mediterranean cruise.

Americans and Their Culture 2

Apparently the dangerous levels of sodium in their bodies causes Americans to be agitatingly, irritatingly, and unacceptably slow. This explanation was preempted by the non-question: “People ask me such things as: ‘Why is service so bad in America?’” in reference to restaurants, hotels, airlines and such, said “bad” service likely meaning that people in America are not hired by their looks (as is prevalent within some occupations in Korea). Because Koreans are a pretty impatient and intolerant brood, likely to go mental at an extra 15 minutes wait or an ugly flight attendant, Mr. Tour Guide Man informed us that we will all need to act cool and make like the slow death of bad service is actually a perfectly natural, everyday way of life in order to fully blend in.

Americans and Their Culture 1

Even before anybody asked about anything during any time at any location of the trip, Mr. Tour Guide Man was giving us examples of things we possibly could choose to ask about, along with things he would then say in reply to such ignorance. The first one of these: “People ask me such things as: ‘How old are you?’”, his answer: “I won’t tell you because you didn’t ask, but if you cared you would have asked.” This is generally how he answered the questions nobody asked for hours on end while we were contained in the bus en route across entire states with no way out. Which somehow meandered to the question in point for this post on our way across Delaware en route to Washington DC: “People ask me such things as: ‘Why is American food so salty?’” His answer was that Americans just love salty food and will overdose sodium for every meal (which may be true), and as proof, he told everyone that Americans sprinkle salt on their pizza before eating it. As if the cheese wasn’t already clogging up the arteries as they were and needed something extra to also simultaneously combust the heart for maximum eating pleasure. The Koreans all gasped in horror, as did us, the Americans.

Mr. Tour Guide Man

Hi everyone!
I’m back in California and uber-ready to share of my adventures in the East Coast, all of which were shared with this here Mr. Tour Guide Man, who, even after traveling together across nine different states over a period of a week, I still unfortunately failed to glean the name of.
It was of utmost surprise to all five members of my family when we arrived to find that the tour group would be comprised not just of a couple families, but more than 300 people in six separate buses. Also of utmost surprise was that the tourists were comprised of 99.9% (0.1% being my family) of Koreans from Korea who have never in their lives stepped foot in the US ever. In the end, we overcame the strangeness and loved every moment and got super close to all the people on our bus to the point that if any strange new person ever came on, all us OG bus crew would shun them as a mass.
But by far the greatest most awesome thing about our Korean tour: Mr. Tour Guide’s very informative and grossly incorrect lessons about “Americans and Their Culture”, a few of these gems I would like to honor as posts throughout the duration of this week so every one of you can be informed on how to be properly American.
Because as it turns out, WE ARE DOING IT ALL WRONG.

New York New York!

Dear World,

By the time this drawing automatically posts itself on Monday, I will not be sitting under flourescent lights in the office with the boys but absorbing vitamin D whilst shamelessly traipsing about New York city like the tourist I most definately am. See you next week, California!

XOXO
Susan

Be Still My Heart.

This is me discovering, with copious amounts of tween-style blushing, that I become helplessly attracted to boys that can do things I cannot. To explain via grossly run-on sentence: There’s something about a person within their professional space operating in their born medium doing what they are most passionate about in absolute ease and complete specialized knowledge and skill that is so wonderfully awe-inspiring. And hot.

Oh Deer.

To make up for some isolated incidents of tardiness in the morning (I hate hate HATE!!! being late for work but sometimes things happen boohoo) and in the charitable spirit of “assisting” my boss to quickly and permanently forget said incidents of tardiness, I've turned up the charm full throttle for the past few days, letting my voice reach levels of sweetness that it’s never reached before in lilting intonations that could soften a rock. Acting cute is hard work; I’m not sure if I’m more tired from that or from lack o sleep.

Bleh.

So tired I can barely feel my limbs.

Watching Karate Kid.

After being chastised by the masses for not watching “the best movie ever” that “was so awesome” and “made me cry” (actual quotes from actual friends), I made a point to go watch Karate Kid when I found it was showing at our local (two) dollar theater. If “The best movie ever” means squeamishly awkward child actors combined with a creepishly elderly and angst-ridden Jackie Chan mixed in with some ghastly loud rappish music cueing up every three minutes to act as a defibrillator to jump start a sadly long-dead movie, then indeed this was most definitely, inarguably the Best. Movie. Ever.

M Sleeps Over.

Conversation has the most delightful way of meandering around in the dark. There’s always so much more to talk about and all said stuff is so much more amazingly interesting and ridiculously funny during sleepovers when the lights are off and you’re supposed to be sleeping. While during the day or under synthetic light sources, any conversation with friends is liable to some moments of silence until the next thread is presented, conversations in the dark just never seem to run dry, flowing freely into more and still more wonderfully random territory until both parties pass out in sleep.

Six Pack.

After what seemed like only a few week run into his highschool football team’s summer training, my brother sent me a victory pictext of his new six pack. A super-defined, definitely legit, he-wasn’t-even-flexing six pack. Oh, how shocked and incredulous and incredibly jealous was I! I regretted with all my being that I did not join the football team in highschool. The reasoning being that if I had just turned back time to 20 years before I was born and then prevented my school's girl's football team from getting cut and then I went back up in time and joined that girl's football team, then I would have had a six pack in highschool, then I would have a six pack now. Instead I was spending all the energy I could have spent time traveling (or just joining the soccer team) on continuously eating under the ever-thinning guise of “I’m a growing girl, mom.”

Flat Hair.

For some reason this drawing reminds me of the hungry caterpillar.
Perhaps because my hair is hungry. Hungry for volume.

Cat Hats

This is a story about why one should listen to everything one’s mama says not to buy because it is stupid and will likely never be worn. This is a story about how one stupidly bought those things anyway. This is a story about regretful impulsive buys made as a teen that still haunts the closet. This is a story about cat hats. The End.

Fuzzy.

Doing engagement and wedding shoots for lovely people in love causes one to sigh happy sighs and wish likewise to be married.