Redemption's Not That Far and Darkness is Going Down

Hey guys!

Last post of 2013? WHAT? Crazy man... I really want to talk about this year as a whole, but that's for next week, so be excited for that.

This week was Christmas and stuff. I actually worked a few days this week. Which was interesting because they were just like, hey can you work, and I was like shoooooots, then I got there and I was like, wait, what am I even supposed to be doing. But it's alright because I found a lot of things to do. 

S/O to Jen's fake future baby. Everyone is just really concerned about him/her. (While it sucks that she had more health problems, I found that part of the story really really funny). 

Ummm, what else? I go back to Seattle in 6 days. Yup. I have to live things up while it's still warm, but I mean, I guess I'm excited for school to start back up. But not really, like, cmon. 

Christmas party tomorrow (we don't care if it's past christmas. It will always be christmas in our hearts).

And yeah, I'm gonna go back to watching twenty one pilots interviews and crying internally over the perfection that is.

See you in the 2014s.

Why This Week Was Awesome: CHRISTMAS!

Books Read: 13 (I REALLY RALLIED AT THE END OF THIS YEAR AND I'M SUPER PROUD OF MYSELF)

Times Eaten At Chipotle: 17 

Song Stuck In My Head: 

(THIS WILL CHANGE NEXT YEAR!!!)

My Post Last Week Sucked

And by last week, I mean last-last week because this post is supposed to be for last week. 

I am home-home, been for the past week or so, and my laptop died on me (in the middle of writing my papers!) last week so blogging was not on my mind. Plus. There was Christmas to be done. Doing Christmas is always one of those things that you're like "Let's do this!" at first and you are pumped and excited and then you do it and you're like "Nooooo" because you're stressed and tired and sweaty because of all the cooking that you are doing and all the walking back and forth between stores in the mall 'cause you keep forgetting to get gifts for people or you can't make your mind on what to get people and you absolutely hate it and kinda like it at the same time, and then it is over and you're like "Whew! Let's do that again!" because you realize it was actually fun and you can't wait to do it again next year. Like pregnancy. But I wouldn't know, I just heard. I am not pregnant. "Just in case you were wondering"--that's what the doctor said when I went to the Emergency Room a couple of days ago (yep, you can tell my Christmas was great because I went to the ER the day after...nah just kidding, the two are unrelated). 

I went in with back and hip pains that I had been feeling for about three days non-stop and like, I swear, everyone I encountered in that hospital all nonchalantly asked me, "Is there any chance that you're pregnant?" Only one of the nurses though was nice enough to pull me to the side away from my mom and whispered the question to me--everyone else nonchalantly asked me point blank, which was pretty funny given I was not expecting it at all the first time it came up that it took me a moment to answer. 

"Is there any chance that you're pregnant today."

"Wha...oh..what? Oh. Oh no. No. Yeah, it's a no."

Such has been my life for the past week or so--bed rest (read "Korean drama") and pain meds. 

I WANT TO BAKE SO BAKE COOKIES I MUST! (I made my cheesecake bites for Christmas...plus two loaves of yummy banana bread!)

Okay, I am leaving now. 

We shall be back for the Year in Review blog tomorrow.

Baiiiiiiiiiiiii

Risks Taken: 60 << Pretty good!
Books Read Since Graduation: 11  << Failure! I also got books for Christmas so...
Thank You Notes Written: 21 << Yay!

Meaning Maybe Defeating Them Could Be the Beginning of Your Meaning Friend

Hey guys!

Oh lawd. What did I even do this week? I don't even know. I didn't really do that much. I mean, I was out and about every single day, but there was nothing too noteworthy. But, with that said, it was still a good week. Tomorrow, I have to work at school, but that's alright, I'm excited. 

I think I said that I was going to talk about how my quarter of school went in this post. But thinking about it, there isn't much to say. It was good. I had fun. I went to a lot of concerts. That was about it. Nothing extraordinary, it was just good. Lot of good. 

I more am thinking about how the year went as a whole, but that can wait, we do have at least one more week of 2013 amiright? 

I realized that coming home can be stressful because all the problems that were here that you ignored because you were no longer there came back because you are now there. And not even problems that you can necessarily deal with, like, oh no I left my room dirty. But things that are issues in your life that you can't really fix, but that you have to deal with. And then you get away from them for a few months and you forget about them, then you come back and boom there they are again. Not that I'm complaining or that I'm saying that I don't like home or that I'm not enjoying myself. It's more that it's just interesting how that works. Two different worlds is basically what I'm saying. Yup.

Okay. I'm tired. BAI<>

Why This Week Was Awesome: The sun is a plus 

Books Read: 11

Times Eaten At Chipotle: 17 

Song Stuck In My Head: 

Late Last Fall She Ended It All

I. Am. Baaaaaaack!

I am! And I am wearing shorts! And am enjoying the feeling of the sun on my skin and my face!

It feels great to be home.

A'int it Good, Being All Alone

Hey guys!!!

Honestly, it's only been a week, but so much freaking stuff has happened. 

I really want to talk about how this quarter went, but maybe I'll save that for next week because I want to talk about my week.

Well, first, I blogged early on Sunday last week, which makes sense because Sunday night last week was kind of crazy and amazing. Last Sunday Jaime and I went to a concert (big surprise) called Jingle Ball which featured 9 big name bands/performers and it was amazing and we were in the fifth row. First of all, this concert was really different. Partially because we were seated and not in a mosh pit and also cause there were so many acts and they all only had like 4 songs to sing. 

I could go through all of them and tell you what I thought, but I'll spare you and give you some highlights. Fifth Harmony was on point. Icona Pop was surprisingly good. Austin Mahone made me hurt inside. Paramore was amazing and secretly turned me into a fan. New Politics were great. Jaime got to dance on stage with Flo Rida. And Fall Out Boy was perfect as always and I am incredibly grateful to have seen them twice in concert twice in the span of three months. 

I have so many more concerts adventures ahead, but I'll save those for later. 

After that, I spent this week with finals, which were alright. I watched The Holiday on Wednesday night which was WAY too emotional. Then on Thursday morning when I was supposed to go the airport, there was a entire saga of crazy, but it all turned out in the end and here I am. 

On the plane I finished House of Hades, which was way too emotional for me to even handle and I'm still really mad at the world because of it. 

Then I went to school on Friday and went around and saw everyone again, which is always really weird, but really fun and great at the same time. I'm glad that I get to do that, home life is such a different world than my college life and I'm super grateful that I have both. 

Why This Week Was Awesome: HOME!

Books Read: 11 (Like, the end of this year was a good one)

Times Eaten At Chipotle: 17 (17 BURRITOS IN THREE MONTHS I AM A GOD)

Song Stuck In My Head: We the Kings Perfection (and Paramore too though)

If You're Gonna Be The Death of Me That's How I Wanna Go

Hey guys!

This week was the last week of school. Which means finals are next week. Which means I SHOULD be studying. However, I'm going to a concert tonight. A very expensive concert at that. But that's alright. I'm excited. But not able to focus so much right now. Jen's post this week was really good and it made me really happy. I plan on posting something to that effect maybe next week. But I will, I promise. 

Why This Week Was Awesome: Last Week of School!

Books Read: 10 (Who am I anymore?)

Times Eaten At Chipotle: 16

Song Stuck In My Head: 

I am going to have to say goodbye soon

I wasn't very good with updating this yet again. Ugh. Why Jen why?

What has happened since I last posted? Thanksgiving weekend was fun. My friend Adrienne flew over from Boston so that I wouldn't spend Thanksgiving alone. We were originally supposed to meet up in New York with several other girls from our high school but that plan fell through. In the end, she was gonna stay in Boston and I was gonna stay in DC. Until her dad was like, "Why don't you just fly to DC and spend Thanksgiving with Jen there?" So instead of the two of us spending Thanksgiving alone in two separate cities, we had a very nice Thanksgiving weekend just the two of us together! Adrienne is one of the bestest friends I have, she and I are practically sisters. And because this Winter Break won't have many opportunities for us to meet up back home, and because she is looking to spend some of her summer break in Boston for an internship, having a few days together was great.

She got here on Wednesday and I got off work early to pick her up from the airport that afternoon. Then we went to eat Ethiopian food (YES!) and got to eat with our hands and it was spicy and it was good. We were both really glad that we had each other that weekend. We went to a nice Thanksgiving brunch at the LPQ in Dupont Circle (Organic bread basket with their different fruit and chocolate spreads? Yum!) before heading to the National Zoo for the day. Sadly, they don't have giraffes, but we got to see the afternoon feeding of the Giant Panda which was great. That day was the coldest day that weekend. It was mostly in the low 30s and high 20s but the wind chills dipped to the teens. For Thanksgiving dinner, we had made reservations at PJ Clarke's, a classic American cuisine restaurant. We chose not to do the traditional Thanksgiving spread. Instead we got comfort foods--french onion soups, a huge tub of baked macaroni and cheese with bacon and peas, and these short rib spring rolls that had mashed potatoes, short ribs, and green onions inside and which we dipped into a horseradish sauce. And of course, we had pumpkin pie for dessert and some tea! It was a nice dinner and we both felt sad that we were 5,000 miles away from home and family but we were definitely both very thankful that we were together. 

The bad part was I woke up with a cold on Thursday, which meant I was sick for the weekend. Going out every day did not help at all. 

On Black Friday, we slept in and trekked over to Rosslyn, Virginia to visit an awesome pho place called Pho 75. It was heaven. Oh my god, and I thought Pho 14 in Columbia Heights was money! This was better. After the pho warmed us up and made me feel a bit better because of my cold, we walked across the Key Bridge over the Potomac River to go to Georgetown. Now, Georgetown is a shopping destination. It is very much like Waikiki strip, only older and with a different kind of charm. So, of course, M Street was packed with people. But we weren't there for the shopping. We were there for the cupcakes!

DC is one of the first cities that started the whole cupcake craze. In fact, Sprinkles Cupcakes on M Street is one of the very first cupcake bakeries that skyrockethed the whole thing. And right down the street is Georgetown Cupcakes, known for their show on TLC. There is another cupcake place in the area called Baked and Wired, known mostly for their granola/crunola concoction which they call "Hippie Crack." Anyway, we wanted to do the ultimate taste test and finally figure out which cupcake bakery was the best. We both have heard people say that it is Georgetown Cupcakes hands down, but some have pointed out that the mere size of Baked and Wired cupcakes make them more worth your money. And of course, there are people who stick to Sprinkles because they are the ones who started it all. We wanted to find out! Our plan was to visit each cupcake bakery and to order a red velvet cupcake from each, along with one of their seasonal special flavors. The red velvet would be able to tell us which one does cupcakes best--it is a classic, and plus, we were sure that all three would have that flavor. 

So we hit Georgetown Cupcakes first and as usual, the line was out the door, around the corner, and up the street. We were prepared though--we hit Starbucks in Rosslyn first to get some drinks that would warm us up as we stood in line in the cold. It was well worth the wait I think. The cupcakes were adorable. Our seasonal pick was the caramel apple, so we walked away with that and the red velvet cupcake in a cute little box.

Next stop? Sprinkles! It was not crowded at all. Like, at all. There was practically no one there. But that did not deter us. We ordered our staple red velvet and then chose the cranberry orange cupcake as our seasonal flavor. Sprinkles cupcakes are all topped with these circular decorations with colors that indicate the flavor of the cupcake. It was different from Georgetown's colorful and creative sprinkles, shapes, frosting, and more. But again, we knew it would all come down to the taste.

So we walked over down to Baked and Wired and got in line for our cupcakes. Baked and Wired didn't have a line out the door but that is because they have a bigger space than Georgetown. Past the first room where you can get your cupcakes and other goodies (they are not strictly cupcakes, they have cookies, biscottis, brownies, and their granola stuff as well), there is also a separate room for you to get coffee and another one with bookshelves, lounge chairs and an entire wall filled with written-on napkins. It was very cool. We got the red velvet of course, but their seasonal flavor was pumpkin. And because we had already gotten pumpkin pie the night before, we chose to get their german chocolate cupcake with coconut and pecan frosting instead.

By that time, it was already 5ish and we had to rush over to the metro station in Rosslyn to go to the Tree Lighting at Old Town Alexandria in Virginia. It was another cute and charming little town, and we would have liked to stroll down King Street during the day but it was all right. The Tree Lighting was at Market Square which was packed! There were so many kids with their parents. Onstage were a town choir and they led the crowd in singing carols. We watched the mayor interview Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus onstage and it was just adorable how the kids ate up all of their words. It was cute. And after, the big finale, Santa and the mayor lit up the tree! It was heartwarming and Aid and I were both thinking of the Honolulu City Lights and our own trees back home. Again, we felt that sadness that we weren't home but we also felt glad that we weren't alone. 

After the tree-lighting, we made our way to the very packed Starbucks on King Street and found a table. It was time for our taste test! Now, the size of the cupcakes were a notable thing. Baked and Wired cupcakes were by far the largest, they were bigger than my fists. And the Georgetown cupcake was the littlest one, it was so cute. We tasted each one, evaluating the richness of the cake and the taste of the cream cheese frostin on each one. We both agreed that the Georgetown cupcake was the best red velvet, though it was small and it disappeared quickly. Its cake was the richest and its frosting the lightest, really airy. Both the Sprinkles and B&W cakes were pretty rich but they also had a weird texture, possibly because of their size. They were good, but pretty dense. As for the frosting, I think Aid said she liked the Sprinkles frosting better than the B&W one, but I disagreed. The Sprinkles frosting to me was just too much, it was hard, and it overpowered the cake. 

As for the seasonal flavors? We didn't eat those until the day after, but hands down the German Chocolate from B&W was the best. Georgetown's caramel apple was delightful, it had bits of apple in the  cake and the buttercream frosting was drizzled with caramle. As for the Sprinkles cranberry orange, the cake was also good but the frosting was nothing special at all. The German chocolate one was our favorite by far, it was probs even better than Georgetown's red velvet!

Saturday was a lazy day. We woke up late then went over to Eastern Market. We shared a plate of crabcakes and deep fried oysters at Market Lunch, and walked around the farmers market and the flea market. They were selling Christmas trees and the smell of them made me think of how much I love the holidays. We bought and split a gigantic Asian pear and munched on that as we looked at the crafts and vegetables there. We also visited my favorite coffeeshop in that area, Peregrine Espresso, to grab warm drinks. We spent quite a bit of time exploring Capitol Hill Books with its crazy unorganized-but-really-very-organized stacks and shelves of books. Three levels of just books and books in every corner, every shelf, from floor to ceiling, covered in books and these clever labels that help people find books. It was great. There were even books in the bathroom! All the language books were in there. And we found a huge copy of the seventh Harry Potter book with a label on it that said "Ron Dies." I always have a great time just browsing through Capitol Hill books. We ended the day with more Starbucks and then metroed back to school for more sweet and salty snacks and Korean Dramas. 

Adrienne's flight departed early the next day so we woke up very early and metroed to the airport where we had a Dunkin Donuts breakfast after she said goodbye. It was very lonely after having her with me for several days, even lonelier than I felt before she even got to DC for the weekend. But I was sick and all I could do was sleep all day, so I did, which helped not only my cold but also the gnawing silence that filled and surrounded me, like there was an empty space that Adrienne had left that was bigger than the space she had come to fill. It was a sad Sunday for me, and an equally sad Monday as I had to call in sick at work. I was just not feeling good from the no-rest weekend, so having a day extra off was helpful. I was also really gross and I didn't want the Congresswoman to get sick.

But I went back to work on Tuesday and it slowly began hitting me that I was gonna be leaving soon. The office work was the same, except I kept thinking of everything as one of my last tasks. I was able to go on a second Dome Tour after having gone my first time in the beginning of the semester. It was a good full circle--I first got to DC in the summer with a huge and nice view of the city at nighttime at our hotel. And now as my time is ending, I was able to do a full 360 again from the very top of the center of the nation's capital. I did not linger at any point of my view except for the perfect view of Cannon on the southeast side of the Capitol. Again with the mixed feelings: I am glad to be going home, but saddened that my time here is ending. Yesterday, I gave my last Capitol tour ever and it went great--I took them on the Speaker's balcony, all the Hawaii marks in the Capitol, straying from the path that the Redcoats prescribe, and also the House floor and the "secret" prayer room on the House side. 

I am coming home with so many stories, much more than I can really tell people. I am also coming home a different Jen, I think. This is a Jen that has experienced loneliness and sadness that I have never before felt. This is a Jen who has grown much in the past several months. This is a Jen who is, I hope, more mature, learned, independent, stronger. A lot has tested me throughout this semester and here I am. At the same time, there were many high moments this semester both in and out of the office. None of them would have been possible if not for the people I met along the way, the opportunities that presented themselves, and the endless support I got from back home. 

I am getting ready to leave DC, and I know I want to come back, and I will. I may not know how exactly just yet. But I think I will. As I say goodbye to this city on the 14th when I fly back home, I am confident that I will be very happy with what I got out of it, perfectly content with what DC has given me over the months I spent here. 

Note: This post can also be found in my other DC blog.

Risks Taken: 60
Books Read Since Graduation: 11 
Thank You Notes Written: 21 

One Awkward Silence, And Two Hopes You Cry Yourself To Sleep

Hey guys!

Erm, so like, what even were this week. I don't know, I mean, it was a lot of sleeping, eating, and do not much. I mean, I did a lot, but not really? I don't know. 

Nope, yeah, today's post is going to be nothing special. But trust me, I feel something brewin' real deep and it's gonna come out one of these weeks soon, I promise. Yup. 

Why This Week Was Awesome: Thanksgiving

Books Read: 9 (I'm honestly on a role, like, someone stop me)

Times Eaten At Chipotle: 15

Song Stuck In My Head: