hope

He never lets go. He just won't.

shaq who?

I absolutely LOVE the way how Andrew Bynum hustles on the floor. He's quick, has good hands, makes his free throws, and brings energy to the entire team. When (yes, when) we make playoffs this season, look to him to be one of the main reasons why.

And I couldn't ask for a better introduction to LA Kings hockey than watching a game in which they tied the Minnesota Wild late in the third period, sending it to sudden-death overtime, but they just couldn't get it done in the sudden-death shootout. I just couldn't help but think that they could have won had they used the Flying V or the knucklepuck. I know, wrong team. Hockey at Staples Center was surprisingly fun nonetheless.. thanks butch!

cindy & paul's wedding

indescribable

I will see you face-to-face one day.

Time lapse movie of an aurora display over British Columbia, Canada.

new york

Had a fun weekend in ny before I headed down to nj for business. Thanks mr. ku for housing me and for sacrificing yourself to sleep upon on a makeshift bubble-wrap mattress for two straight nights. Here's some moments.

One of the courses at the Otto. I can now proudly say that I've tried and tasted oyster and anchovy pizza, although I simply couldn't finish it. The TMNT would be sorely disappointed.

Washington Park. We waited for over a half an hour watching these street performers go through their song-and-dance just to see their final act, but it's hard to say if it was worth the wait. The guy in the red shirt on the far right actually jumps over the five people who are lined up in the middle.

What me and giancarlo had at Pamba's steakhouse that night. Sadly, this turned out to be one steak that kicked my ass. A huge red apple encased in a glass box hangs outside the 24/7 Apple store. Gorgeous.

Me, billy, andy at a diner. It's friggin 7am. We would proceed to wake up at 3pm the following day.

Me and andy slept on the air mattress while billy, being the rugged beast that he is, slept upon strips of bubble wrap.

Ground Zero.

Somewhere in the financial district.

Katz's Deli. Omg. This place is incredible for their pastrami sandwiches.

Outside of Katz's. And.. we definitely got our quarter's worth out of that horse. Yes, the bar was crowded at the time.

You're a good town new york. However, you ruined my sleeping schedule for the next two weeks.

dc

Flew to VA this past weekend for work. Tabbed it as a future vacation hotspot, check. One plane with maintenance problems later, I found myself stranded at washington dulles at midnight waiting for the 6am flight to LAX. It didn't take long to make the decision to either ride it out at the airport or go on a spontaneous date with an arabian cab driver around the city.

The White House was, disappointingly, a lot smaller than the White House I had ingrained in my head.

The backside of the Lincoln Memorial. Due to construction roadblocks, it was impossible to go around the front to see lincoln resting in his chair. Sigh.

Incredible. Mark foley once worked here. Turn around and see this in the distance:

It's not on fire. It kinda reminds me of the famous green beacon from The Great Gatsby.

Up close. The Campanile can't even compare.

Tired security guard takes picture of bemused asian boy at three in the morning.

Well, the night was too short. I have to definitely come back... future vacation hotspot #2, check.

johnny b. good

Take a wild guess who we came to see. Although I must say that I have a new-found appreciation for sheryl's rock-and-roll voice after hearing it in a non-"soak up the sun" context. It's a shame that such a pretty voice was wasted on a horrible song.

The view from our seats. Or should I say, from our patch of grass. Sorry guys, the VIP room failed to follow through. Shut up paul.

I'm pretty sure he was playing Why Georgia here. I could be wrong though. Here's the set list.

I know for a fact that john was playing Gravity here.. which is easily one of the best songs he's ever written. Since the outro line goes, "keep me where the light is," they added a nice touch by showering beams of white light onto the audience whenever that part was sung.

andy & ester + butch & roy = double date. Or one regular date plus two lonely but unashamed men.

Lastly, please remember to love people of all shades and colors. The End.

oddity

In a sequence of odd dreams I had last night, peyton manning threw for 741 yards in a single game but didn't get any touchdowns. Dreams rarely make any sense.

erik mongrain

A beautiful tune using the "lap-tapping" technique.

covered in rain

Why does the silence seem so incredibly loud sometimes? I feel that it has something important to say.

song of the week #11

Hello. Continuum's out. And it humbly proves to us that john can reinvent himself over and over again.

"You know, time is moving forward all the time and we know that. But it's kinda like running out of a continually burning hallway, and you can't go back and get your stuff and all I want to do is yell, 'I wanna go get my stuff!' People going, 'You can't, keep running!' This fireball's comin up behind you. Not exactly as Indiana Jones' as that, but it feels like that sometimes.

This is a song begging to go back." -JM

Stop this train
I want to get off
And go home again
I can't take the speed it's moving in
I know I can't
But honestly, won't someone stop this train

impersonations II

Wow, the previous guy is seriously weaksauce compared to frank caliendo. Andy fortunately got tickets to a sold-out show at the irvine improv and we were just blown away. I hope he makes it really big so I can tell people that I actually shook his hand.

He has a grip of stuff on youtube.. or check some out on andy's blog.

got ten minutes?

Incredible!



Impersonations (in order): Stan, Kyle, Cartman, Barney, Homer, Lovejoy, Mr. Burns, Smithers, George W. Bush, Jiminy Glick, Ed Grimley, Butt-head, Beavis, Hank Hill, Jerry Seinfeld, Jack Nicholson, Adam Sandler, Eddie Murphy, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sean Connery, Agent Smith, Keanu Reeves, Chewbacca, R2-D2, Yoda, C-3PO, Jar-Jar Binks, Boss Nass, Pee-Wee Herman, Woody Woodpecker, King Arthur (Monty Python), Knight Who Says Ni (Monty Python), Mario, Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Bobby, Robin Williams (Southern Guy, School Girl), Casey Kasem, Steve Irwin, Louis Armstrong, Uncle Rico, Kip, Napolean Dynamite, Pedro, Stevie Wonder, Jay Leno, Kermit the Frog, and Curly

song of the week #10

As a follow-up to andy's recent entry, john is back with some new stuff.

I'm friggin looking forward to his latest album titled "Continuum" which will be released 9/12. He recently hosted a program on Star 98.7 during which he plays his cd in its entirety, while also offering a brief commentary before the beginning of each song. I already downloaded the entire show, but because of legitimate pirating concerns, they audibly stamped each song midway through with a female voice that chimes, "You are now listening to John Mayer's Continuum on Star 98.7, in stores September 12th." It gets kinda annoying after a while (but let me know if you want it anyways).

He displays a lot of maturity in his songwriting as he takes on some very difficult topics, and his vocal skills jumped up a couple levels too. He records a soul tune which was interesting to hear. The guitar definitely took a backseat to the lyrics and vocals, an observation that can be attributed to his maturing as a singer-songwriter. I think he's making the statement that quality, intelligent songs can be created without needing his guitar to speak too much.

But seriously, it's good. I think it's his best album yet in terms of quality. I don't know how far up the charts it'll go, but it's a dense, dense piece of work that has a delicate mix of uptempo tunes, hints of pop, somber/pensive stories, and an honorable Hendrix cover.

Here's Waiting on the World to Change.

mile-high city

Away on business again. First stop, denver. I was surprised to find the weather scorchingly hot even here, but I guess no region is exempt from experiencing the weather anomalies this year. I would love to come back here during basketball season, flaunt my lakers jersey and soak in all the anti-LA sentiment (kobe was innocent), but I already stood out like a sore thumb because this city completely lacks ethnic diversity. I swear, I saw only two other asians while I was here.

Training was bearable, mountains looked gorgeous, food was excellent, and I haven't seen any snakes on a plane yet.

St. louis next, then back to good ol' pacific standard time.

new toy

So, I've been playing around with my new Bushnell telescope since I got it a couple weeks ago. Granted, it's pretty rudimentary compared to most, but a telescope was something that I've been wanting for a long time.

It sure beats squinting at the moon while trying to find the Sea of Tranquility. And if you haven't seen it yet, the moon magnified is reason enough to take your breath away.

But besides the Bears, the Summer Triangle and a couple other hard-to-miss celestial objects/constellations, the retarded light pollution (& can't forget the air pollution) blanks out most of the sky. Sometimes, I wish I just lived in the countryside. But still have high-speed internet access, of course.

This should serve me well for the time being until my desire for this can no longer be contained. Only $200k. One day!

rock's on the finger

Enough about weddings -- let's hear it for engagements. Congrats paul and tammy! You crazy lucky bastards.

angie & jude's wedding

Despite the lack of air conditioning in 110+ degree weather, these two couldn't have been any happier. How'd it happen? Boy likes girl for a couple years, skips the dating, pops the question. Crazy.



Cunningham guys more aged than last time.

dreary duty

It's time that I could no longer postpone my public service to this great country, which is why I'm currently at the courthouse serving jury duty. The compton courthouse. Out of all places, why the compton courthouse? Yes, justice must be served, even here.

I'm definitely one of the youngest people here, if not the youngest. I hope my youth is reason enough not to be picked to serve on a jury. Wearing a big fat tie-dye shirt could have helped too.

There are multi-colored signs posted all over the walls that says "We <3 our jurors." I hand it to them for trying to make this process as painless as possible, but these signs just aren't cutting it for me. Surprisingly, there's computer terminals with internet access, thank God. I've opted to pay the $12 all-day pass because it's a small price to pay to keep my insanity.

Thank you blogs, xangas, wikipedia, bensbargains, gmail, and google chat, for helping me through this day.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

edit:
I almost officially became juror #11, but I dodged the bullet! Thank you God!!

ursa major

A close brush with death this past weekend was a stark reminder of my own fragile humanity. Other than that, the escape to big bear couldn't have come at a better time. I never knew how homemade spicy tuna rolls can be so dang delicious. Thanks for the weekend comrades!

On a serious note, I now made it my life-long mission to find a suitable girl for the man who saved my life - joe song.

What do you say irene?

guitar talk

Man, I wish I could have conversations like these.

happy 4th!

floridurrr

Dang, d.wade is a hero here. Unfortunately, so is shaq. Still, all this just strengthens my pride and loyalty to my LOS ANGELES LAKERS.

I <3 LA!!

westside love

An awe-inspiring parade of thunderous rain one minute, followed by an 80% "i-can-breathe-water-through-my-nose" wave of humidity the next. Such is the capricious nature of summer weather in Raleigh, North Carolina. Which reminds me. I once had a mountain bike in college named Raleigh (that's its model name, and we were on a first-name basis). When I could no longer withstand my time apart from KFC, Raleigh and I took the #51 bus which went down Telegraph to the nearest KFC. In my haste, I jumped off and bought my treasure... at which point I came to realize that I had left him behind. 'Twas a very sad day as I patiently waited for the same bus to come back on its return route, and when it finally did, displayed no trace of him. Damn.

Bikes to airplanes. Business trips used to be a shiny and novel thing. Huh? Free trip and an expense account? Count me in baby. Now, I can't stand being away from California for too long. Delayed flights, crumpled clothes, frantically searching for your luggage as they’re carried out by the conveyor belts, receipts strewn everywhere.. these things slowly tax you away. Evaluating all of my cali-external trips as a conglomerate whole, it makes me realize how good I have it on the westside. Sure, we might have the most congested highways in the world, but that’s all the more reason to take the scenic byways. And just by the beaches alone, California kicks your ass.

Raleigh has some great-tasting shrimp though. Fresh evergreen trees everywhere. People say y’all a lot. And I saw rain in the middle of summer… what more can I say.

cherry bomb

Whole Foods offers the most delicious cherries I've ever tasted in my life. Tastes even sweeter outdoors while watching Sergio Mendes, John Legend and Indie.Arie get their rock on.