The Eight Days of Ugliness

I got my first pair of glasses at fourteen. Not surprisingly, my parents decided to go the cheap route, and with complete disregard for all teenage angst and their need to fit in, got me what, to this day, I think is the UGLIEST pair of glasses ever. And it didn't help that my brother started singing "Imagine," in homage of the late John Lenon, which he said I ressembled when wearing the glasses. GREAT.

I begged and begged to get contacts, and the parents finally gave in. Since then, I have NEVER been seen in public wearing glasses. And not even the black framed, artsy sorta glasses coming into fashion gave me reason enough to switch.

So fifteen years later I find myself in a situation where I absolutely have to wear glasses. Yes, I've decided to take the plunge and am getting lasik surgery in three days. Very exciting. However, the eight days preceding this long awaited, glorious, day have not done anything for my ego. In fact, I call them the eight days of ugliness. And here how it goes:

(Thurs) On the first day of ugliness, I jumped on a plane in Dallas and landed in Seattle with glasses on. My co-worker did a double-take. He said nothing. But I saw a little gasp. He was horrified by my appearance.

(Fri) On the second day of ugliness, I showed up at work with glasses on. During our team meeting, I kept taking my glasses off to take pictures--it was my co-worker's going away lunch. I admitted vanity and had to announce that it was my first time in 15 years wearing glasses, and that yes, I knew that the frames are crooked and uneven (I've sat on them many times).

(Sat) On the third day of ugliness, I realized another annoyance about glasses: you can't wear sunglasses! Unless you get the flip sunglasses that fit on top of your lenses. That would make me double ugly and triple dorky.

(Sun) On the fourth day of ugliness I got little marks on the bridge of my nose, testament to the pain and suffering that it is to have to support thick, heavy lenses on my nose in truly acrobatic fashion (remember, they are crooked as well).

(Mon) On the fifth day of ugliness, I decided to go for a run on Myrtle Edwards Park by my house. With every step, I felt the glasses bouncing up and down, hitting the bridge of my nose, causing annoyance and reminding me once again that I was wearing horrible glasses.

...And this brings us back to today, (Tue) the sixth day of ugliness, when while typing away at work, my co-worker came up to talk to me. All of a sudden, I heard something drop on my desk. And then I realized: MY LENS HAD POPPED OUT OF MY FRAMES!!!! Ghettoness had reached its limit! My co-worker turned around and went: "Dude, was that your lens?." And indeed it was. My co-worker quickly suggested I tape it to the frames. Was he kidding me??!!! Next thing I know, there were three people all trying to get the obstinate little lens back into the frames. A girl was finally able to loosely screw the little pin back in, and all three warned me that I had to be careful with it. And to go tape my glasses. A fourth person suggested I get an eye patch. What the (*&U$#@???

I get my consultation on Thurs and surgery will follow on Fri. I cannot wait to rid myself of these damn glasses!!! And I guess in the meantime I'll have to deal with whatever the last two days of ugliness will bring.

Pray for me. With a wedding coming up and a honeymooon just around the corner, I simply cannot afford to go blind.

"Ok Go--On Treadmills"

Emy, Charlie, Erica and Brian came over for dinner on Friday. After a couple of hours of conversing, Brian brings up a cool video that he recently saw on YouTube.

It's a bunch of relatively old dudes dancing to "Ok Go" (a song I've never heard of, but very catchy tune) on treadmills. It's actually quite well choreographed (as far as treadmill dances are concerned). Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeeR4Vnvs8U

My Almost Run-In with JT

On Wed and Thurs I went to Dallas to meet my new client. I went there with my 4 co-workers, all guys. After dining with the client, one of my co-workers somehow convinced everybody to go out to the Ghost Bar at the W Hotel.

It was like something out of Vegas, only the crowd was not as good looking. A lot of Midwesterners wannabes, but what did we expect on a Wed night, right?

Anyhow, at around 12:30, we finally left the bar, as we had a presentation at 9am the next morning (which thank goodness I did not have to present, as I am brand new). I was exhausted and was out as soon as I got to bed.

This morning, right before the meeting, one of the guys, who ended up staying until later nonchalantly informed us that right about the time we left, JT showed up with his entourage. Yes, JT himself, aka Justin Timberlake, aka the non-gay NSync member.

I CANNOT belive that I missed him but about 20 min!!! Is that bad luck or what?

Hooray, We're All Moved In!

Last Thurs we officially moved into our new condo. HOORAY! Very exciting.

The process of moving itself, however, is not exciting at all. In fact, it's traumatic and cumbersome, even when you use movers--which is what we did this time.

I had been packed for several days in preparation for the actual moving day. Needless to say, I was missing some essentials. So there I was at work. Wearing my Brazilian bikini bottom as underwear (if you know anything about Brazilian swimwear, you are aware that those tiny bottoms give you an instant wedgie) while walking in shoes that rubbed against my heel because there were no socks to be found. Lovely.

Anyhow, the place is still a mess, but we are all moved in!

Where There's a Will, There's a Way...And Where There Is Stinginess, There is Also a Way

So now that we are approaching the big day, Diesel and I realize that certains things have to be taken care of. One of them is learning how to dance. That's right. The white boy with no rythm and the Asian girl with no coordination will have to follow tradition and entertain the whole wedding crowd with our spasmsmatic dance moves.

I started calling dance schools to see who would take such horrible students such as ourselves. Apparently all of them do, as long as we're willing to pay them big bucks. The going rate is 100/hr, and apparently, we need about FIVE classes to get trained on dancing for our first song. That's a grand total of FIVE HUNDRED dollars!!! What the (*&#$(&##????

Indignant and stingy, I decided I would find a cheap way to do it. And indeed I did. With my beloved library card in hand, I put a hold on every single ballroom dancing DVD/VHS tapes available in the King County Library System. Cost: $0.00.

And then I remembered. Why have to even waste gas picking those up from the library if I could have them delivered to our house? So I Netflixed "ballroom dance" and found several beginner courses on DVD. I was ecstatic.

"How good and effective are these self-learn DVD's?," you ask? I have no clue. You be the judge at the wedding...

Bridal Shower

My friends Kristin, Tarah and Regina planned and hosted my birdal shower. It was lovely and the food was fabulous!

There were flowers, and everybody made their favorite dishes and gave me their recipes. We played some games all revolving around the "food/cooking" theme and the best part was that friends from different circles got to meet.

Thank you K, Tarah and Regina for a wonderful and memorable shower!