Saturday, went to San Mateo to celebrate Carol’s, Jenny’s, and Nick’s (belated) birthdays.

First, I drove to Mod’s place and got a ride to the ramen place in San Mateo.  It was pretty good.  I thought the ramen noodles kinda looked like spaghetti, though.  But the miso soup base was good, as was the roasted pork.

After lunch, we went to Tapioca Express across town (is it in Foster City?).  We were there briefly, just socializing.  Then we went back to Mod’s place.  Some people (Shao, Nick, Jason, and Annie) swam, while others watched (or slept).  Then we hung out for a while in the living room.  Angela and Diana dropped by from their friend’s wedding.  After that, some of us went to get dinner at the Korean restaurant in San Bruno (or Belmont?) called Kaya.  It was good.  We had a lot of meat split amongst 6 of us, and it still came out below $20.  I don’t know if it’s because the girls didn’t eat as much, or they did give a lot of meat.  Anyways, it was good.  After that, we split up and drove home.

Today, nothing exciting.  Played games all day.  Work tomorrow.  Such is life.  When will I win the lottery? hehe.  All I need is $2 million.

Later in the evening, I went out to Fremont Central Park and tried out my new camera. I’m still so clueless about all the available settings. Maybe I should just leave everything in auto mode right now haha. If anyone is a pro at SLR or DSLR, please contact me if you want to give me a lesson lol. Here are a few sample pics.

Congratulations, Bryan and Sarah! 

Today, I went to their wedding. It was excellent. The wedding was at Christ Episcopal Church in Alameda:

The outside looks good, but on the inside is even more impressive. The ceiling was very high and gave this spacious grandeur feeling to visitors inside. The wedding service was short and sweet. Pastor Ed gave the message from Ephesians 5:22-33. It’s been such a long time since I’ve heard him give a message. Brings nostalgic memories hehe…

Afterwards, we went to the reception at HS Lordships in the Berkeley Marina. It was very nice. Some of us had prime rib, while others had salmon. The many skits and slide shows were very good. I am impressed by the effort many people put into this wedding.

Later on, our peers went to Puddingstone (Richard Yen’s house in Alameda) to hang out. It was so nostalgic for me. Today, I basically got to see so many people back at Gracepoint, people with whom I spent about 5 years of my life. I got to see Ray for the first time in about 3 years. He used to be my closest class peer ever since we met Freshman year at Berkeley. We used to share nearly everything, all our struggles, our hopes and dreams. However, as time passed, our lives got busier. He moved to Washington DC for law school, and we lost touch. I subsequently left Gracepoint, and all the relationships that I had were abruptly ended. How do people keep relationships alive? And when, say, a peer gets married, does the nature of that relationship change? Seeing all my peers and some leaders again really brought back many memories for me, and it is very sad for me that I am not able to continue those relationships. Even if I could go back to Gracepoint, everyone is in different places. Maybe it was this disillusionment of fleeting relationships that made me leave in the first place (among other things). Well, not all is lost, though. I am now keeping in touch with Jason and Eric again, two of my peers who’ve moved down to Bridgeway Church. Also, Ray promised to meet up after his BAR exam, and Jason Tarn said he’d do lunch/dinner with me sometimes. I do hope that we will be able to maintain our relationships in the future.

Perhaps today was a wake-up call for me. Over the past few years, I’ve been so focused on building material wealth, making sure that all my debt is in order and that there’s a future plan to amass more wealth. I never wanted to be filthy rich, but I wanted to be rich enough to not have to care about money, to be able to live a comfortable life. But maybe true wealth isn’t how much money you have in the bank, but how many true friends and rich relationships you have in your life…

For the past few days, nothing happened (as usual). Work, eat, sleep. Work, eat, sleep.

However, today, I got myself a new toy. Well, actually, I’ve been meaning to get a new camera for a while. After having read numerous reviews, I decided not to go with a point-and-shoot but instead invest in an entry-level Digital SLR. I went with this one:

It’s the Nikon D40. It has only 6.1 megapixels, less than the other new ones that have 8 or 10. However, it is also cheaper. With a 10% off coupon, I was able to get it for about $500 after tax. I haven’t fooled around with it too much, but so far, after having tried to shoot here and there, I am quite impressed with the quality of the pictures. I am getting to learn more about all the settings and what all the terms mean (aperture, focal length, etc). Maybe I should go sign up for a class on digital SLR hehe.

After a couple of beers/smirnoffs and shots of Captain Morgan, we went to play drunken wii.  It was really fun!  We first played some wii sports but then switched to Monkeyball.  Those monkeyball games require concentration or aim, so it was really funny when we couldn’t control where our monkeys went.  I eventually fell asleep on the couch and woke up when the last couple left.  It was about 1:00 am.  It was a weird feeling having woken up after being drunk.  I wasn’t sure if my buzz was gone, but at least I am able to concentrate, so I drove home.

Sunday, I woke up early to watch Wimbledon Men’s Singles Final.  It was a good match between Nadal and Federer, but in the end Federer won (again).  After that, I didn’t do much except played Guild Wars and some wc3 mod games.  Then I took a nap in the afternoon and continued to play games.

Today, I just woke up, went to work, and played a few games of dota afterwards.  Nothing much =)

At work, nothing much has happened. More bugs, more fixin’.

This past weekend, I went to Reno. We got 2 nights comp with 2 free breakfast and 2 free tickets to see their show. The show was “Dancing Queen” (they just sing Abba hits) so we skipped it. Overall, we lost money =( But it was fun. Sorry, no detailed narrations this time (like the vegas post).

4th of July, went to see Live Free or Die Hard with my dad.  I actually liked it.  Maybe it’s because there was a lot of techno stuff in there.  The action was good also.  Afterwards, we went to eat at Hometown Buffet.  No fireworks though this year (nobody invited me    )

Yesterday, we went to celebrate Kyle’s birthday at Kingfish in San Mateo. It was pretty good. I ordered the jambalaya. The prawns were huge. I couldn’t finish the dish, so I took some of it home. It was nice to see all the people again.

Oh, btw, I’m getting back into guild wars. I’ve been playing a lot over the weekend. I got this really cool sword out of a chest that’s supposed to be worth a lot. (If you play gw, I got a req 9 Elemental Sword).

Reno/Vacation next week! Can’t wait =)

Today, I went to work, then came back.  Traffic was really bad on the way there…took me 50 minutes!  At work, nothing happened really. Came back and worked some more, then played some dota/element td. How boring…I am so looking forward to the Reno trip right now!

Today, got up (kinda) early and went out with Mom. She dropped me off at Border’s in Milpitas at 9:30am then picked me up at 12:30. Came home, ate Panda Express that she bought, and played dota all afternoon. After that, went to Ben’s house and got a ride with Mod to go eat dinner. I got lost trying to get to Ben’s house lol. I’ve been there several times, but I have never tried going directly from 237 (always took 101 first). I took the wrong street (Mathilda instead of Fair Oaks). So, I kept driving down until I hit 280 and then Apple. I knew something was amiss, so I called Ben, and he guided me back to his house haha. For dinner, we decided to go to Todai seafood buffet in the Vallco mall in Cupertino (Ben, Jo, Tenis, Mod, and I went). The price was more than we had expected ($26 each!), but I think it was worth it. I ate so much sushi, crab, and lobster that I don’t think I’ll touch seafood for another month (or until Reno haha). The desserts were also good. They make the cakes into these small pieces, which I really like because it’s bite-sized, and if I don’t like it, I won’t have to finish a whole slice-sized piece. They also had creme brulee (and the guy blowtorched it fresh for us!). It was really good.

After dinner, we went to see the 10:30 showing of Ocean’s 13 at the AMC there. Man, I am still surprised some people just cannot do math. The ticket was $10.25, so I gave the girl $20.25, thinking that she would just hand me a $10 bill. Instead, she was scrambling for $9 and counting quarters to see how many she’d have to give back to me. So, I helped her and guided her through, saying the ticket is $10.25, I gave you $20.25, so just give me back a $10. Sorry to sound stereotypical, but I was pretty disappointed because she was Asian (and arithmetic usually comes naturally to us!). Anyways, about the movie, I’d have to say that I really liked it. It was less sappy than last time, fast-paced from the beginning, and they actually showed more stuff, like how they were going to carry out their plans in detail. Though, I would’ve loved to see Tess or Isabel again, but I guess Julia Roberts and Catherine Zeta-Jones got sick of it. Overall, I was very satisfied with tonight. It was very fun and enjoyable. Let’s hope for more of these nights in the future =)