little town, full of little people

i'm bummed tonight because i went to get a hair cut because i wanted an inch off and i ended up with 3 inches off :( and i was just loving my long hair. but. it's only hair, it'll grow back. and now the ends aren't crispy which is always a nice feeling.

don't let the smile fool you.

aside from thaaat.. aren't mondays fantastic? i'm always so ready to see everyone by the time monday rolls around. the 'sandwich artists' at the subway by work are getting to know me now. i switch up the bread, but they know everything else. now i just have to work on CVS man. i buy a raspberry arizona iced tea from him every single morning.. and at this point it's been 3 months, and we still act like strangers. i just don't know what to say to him. we're stuck in a rut.

time to keep practicing the french twist. i seem to have lost an entire thing of bobby pins.

p.s. don't you wish your brother was cool like mine? this is the song from mulan.

me: lets!

get down to business

to defeat

the hunssss

Matt: did they send me daughters

me: when i asked!

Matt: FOR SONSSSSSSS

me: for soooonnnssss

we can go anywhere

well, regardless of whether or not all of my friends up and left me to enjoy thanksgiving with their families, i continued on with the new tradition of sunday brunch, this time featuring the newest DC transplant, marc. in spite of his chronic tardiness (half an hour, friends), marc is good people. he's done lots of interesting things and i appreciate that i can talk about thailand and asia with him and he knows what i'm talking about and is happy to recount his own experiences.

if you've ever done anything that most of your friends and family haven't done, you can relate to the awful phenomenon of telling stories about moments and experiences that changed your life for all of 6 minutes before their faces glaze over and you've lost any hope of regaining their attention. it isn't their fault, but it does make you feel a little like an alien. that's why it's meant to be that i share a room with miriam, who will happily spend hours on end recounting asian fab stories with me.

while i'm on that though, it's a good time to say thank you again to those of you who stuck with me during blonde in taiwan. i was always excited to know that you would be just as excited as i was to learn new things and experience weird asian stuff. even though i was the furthest i've ever been from home, i did feel very connected, and that was all thanks to you.
now to all of these pictures. after brunch, i headed down the hill to rock creek park which is the park in the woodley park area. as you can see from the second picture, it's less of a park and more of a grassy hill with a four lane road in the middle. not quite zilker, but it worked for me today.

i counted 8 spiders crawling either on me, my book, my jacket or the surrounding area so i eventually headed home feeling creepy crawly. julie and julia is a really nice little fluffy book though. lots of swearing, which i wasn't expecting. but it's really entertaining and her writing is engaging and you feel like you really know her.

loook this is my name in chinese 梅根小姐

hear them ring

today was a lot of fun and very touristy. my mom's sister, aunt margi, was in town. she, her boyfriend [of 24 years or something, what do we call him?] and his parents and i roamed around downtown and ended up at the national gallery of art. lots of interesting paintings in there. we ended up in the creepy part for the first half.. lots of paintings of dead people and other creepy things.

they had to go to a tour at the capitol so i stuck around the american indian museum and had delicious lunch.. which didn't seem that expensive now that i'm used to DC prices. my totopos con pollo was $8. and deeeelicious.
apparently every single native american tribe in america contributed at least a little money to the museum, so they all own a little piece of it. their flags are hanging across the rotunda.

today was the 20th anniversary of the bill that approved it passing so they had a lot of cool stuff going on. i stayed to watch a family sing a couple of traditional songs and dance. in the middle, there's a giant 'sawdust carpet' made of colored sawdust. i wish i had taken a better picture of the thing itself. it was really impressive. and they're going to sweep it up in 3 days!

other than that, i'm just enjoying these lazy days. funny how you'd do anything to be able to take a nap at 4pm on a work day but napping all day long for 4 days gets kind of old.

i made cranberry sauce because i had so much fun doing it at becca's for thanksgiving. who knew it was so easy?

1 cup of sugar + 1 cup of water + 1 package of cranberries. boil for 10 min.

they start off shiny and then get dull and then pop open like pop corn as they heat up. and here' s the secret to making cranberry sauce: cranberries are sooo sour on their own. you neeeed to make sure every one pops open so it can be filled with sugar syrup. i just pop them with my fingers once its cooled down.
voila! it makes 2 1/4 cups.
here's a picture from the football game last week

let your heart be light

there was kind of an awkward moment at work the other day when someone asked if it was OK to put christmas music on and two people shouted 'NOOO!' but now that it's officially christmas season, i am christmasing it up. though this whole legitimately cold weather thing may be a little too much for me to handle. it's 40something degrees outside and my body is not having it. even with a fluffy hat, gloves and a wool sweater.

thanksgiving was a success at becca's. it was a lesson in turkey 101. it ended up taking two hours longer than it was supposed to.. probably because i can't stop myself from opening the oven to check on it rather than looking through the door. who has that much self control? no one. anyway we had a really nice time with a couple of nirav's friends from college. the pumpkin pie was a hit. i just covered it with whipped cream.

applied for a job today! time for a shower, flannel jammies, a glass of wine and a movie. hope everyone had a happy thanksgiving.

hot sun dancin' on the river

god bless country music. it makes me feel like i'm driving out to the lake.

wellll i made all of the food i'm bringing to becca's tomorrow for thanksgiving, and it was a bit hit or miss. i had a bit of a pie meltdown. the filling overflowed over the edges but i figured once it went in the oven, it would set up and be fine.. not the case. one edge collapsed and a river of filling flowed out of one side and burnt in the bottom of the oven. finally i just scooped a few spoonfulls out of the middle.

then when i was taking it out of the oven, i gouged the side of it with the pot holder. whoops! now it looks a little like the surface of the moon. but whatever, it will taste yummy. i'll just cover it with whipped cream and no one will have any idea. :)
the green bean casserole is perfect though! woo! and the macaroons, which i never ended up taking a picture of, are pretty, crispy and tasty.

today is a big day because one of the girls from my circle of friends in middle/high school had a baby! she's the first one. baby drew. 4 lbs and something ounces, he came a little early. i can't believe we're old enough to be married with babies.

did i mention that my family is having thanksgiving dinner at the tiny new house? here are the latest photos:

each one is different

funny how holidays make you homesick. i'm thrilled to be where i am. i've seen/done things that not very many people ever get to experience and it's all been amazing beyond anything i'll ever be able to explain.. but there are still those days when i miss my other life.

hugging little kids all the time is a big one. you don't realize how much you miss those little cuddly moments until you have no little kids to be sweet with.

joyce is getting so big! every time i see a new picture of her, her face is getting longer and her eyes look different. still cute as ever, but so big!

i got an unexpected call from taiwan this week from the kuo's. usually i call them on saturdays but this time they called me. they keep asking when i'm going to come back. i told them this summer, so i better find a job and start saving my pennies.

maybe it will be different when there's a whole new group of teachers there. for now, it just seems like everyone's there but me.
funny how i miss taiwan so much more than my family. probably because we talk just as much as we did in taiwan. now we're just an hour apart rather than a day apart. majjy sent me a bunch of hats, scarves and gloves today so i'll be toasty in this silly DC cold.

anyway enough of thattt. it's just one of those days/times of year i guess.

the prime minister of india arrived in the US today. it was president obama's first state arrival. the streets were lines with american and indian flags all around the white house complex. the ceremony was moved indoors to the east room because of the weather. it was good for the people inside, but it meant that the general public had to be turned away. a lucky few got to watch inside though. there's a pretty picture on the flickr page of mrs. obama and the first lady of india in their green and orange dresses to match the flag of india.

ooh and this prettier picture of the first couple at the state dinner, from if the lampshade fits.

night breezes seem to whisper

good newsss! my AC adapter shipped in a mere 3 days and i'm back in business. and thank goodness because i've been bursting with this story.

so saturday afternoon we had a little football game. we were supposed to lose big. the staff, while not overly athletic, far outmatched us. our strengths were an asthmatic and a girl who was on her high school football team. our two other prospects were both out sick. they had 30something people and we had 12. but we came out ahead in the first quarter with 2 touchdowns so we were feeling amazing. late in the second, the staff scored.

then we were in the 3rd (we were only playing 3 quarters), i was running up behind the guy with the ball, about to make an outstanding tackle and he elbowed me in the face by accident. my nose kind of hurt but i thought i was fine until i looked down and there was blood eeeeeverywhere. before i knew it, the entire staff was crowded around me asking if i was alright. i was mortified.

after a couple of minutes, the bleeding stopped and i sat on the sidelines clutching a very bloody handkerchief and watched the end of the game. we scored one more time, making it a final score of 3-1. they awarded me the game ball and i got to hold the trophy. two guys also lifted me up on their shoulders. i don't usually mind attention, but i was ready to just disappear after that. embarrassing!

so that was kind of an ordeal, but now everyone knows my name.

yesterday i went to brunch at tryst and then lunch with people from work at this place called baked and wired. they have cupcakes and coffee. we made a little stop at jcrew where i bought this top i've been thinking about for a couple weeks. it's much cuter/pinker in person.

(j crew.com)

anyway i have to get going but i'm thrilled to have my laptop back and i'm looking forward to catching up on what everyone else has been up to for the last couple of days.