OakMonster’s Den

Well, shit. Nothing poops out a party like a military coup in your Motherland. What a downer on my celebration of the Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Check here for updates:

BBC International. Screw CNN in the US, they’re too fuckin’ slow.

19Sep the Blog. Someone’s quick!

Bangkok Pundit.

The ever so trusty Paknam Web Forum.

And, of course, the unconventional yet emotional reporting of our very own Gnarly Kitty.

Happy Talk Like A Pirate Day, Arrrrrrgggh! This entry be updated through out the days as me get more pictures.

Capt’n Bubbles, the Jolly Pirate of the South China Sea, welcomes ye ter the Talk Like A Pirate Day…Arrrrrrrrr!

First, see the Pirate Turtle Brownies that Captain Bubbles baked last night!

Then, learn to talk pirate.

And of course, no day be better than t’day fer a miliary coup. Thailand is having one now. Check yer BBC.com (because CNN doesn’t have ditty!)

Avast!! There be more on the way!

yarrgh
Originally uploaded by theoakmonster.

Tomorrow be
International Talk Like a Pirate Day.

Ye better strut your pirattitude out there or Captain Bubbles will come over and slap ye, ye mangy blige rats!

Arrrrggggh.

P.S. Check out my other internet borrowed baby, everyone please welcome my Trojan “nephew”, Joshua Heygood!

momandkids
Originally uploaded by theoakmonster.

Here’s the picture of us at the hospital the day before I left. That’s my oldest brother on the left and the middle one on the right.

She’s looking pretty good, y’all. Like I said, if she could yell at me to hang up the phone when I call to talk to her because I was wasting money, she’s doing swell.

And here’s one of my brother and his wife with mom.  (My sister in law is soo pretty!)

Yes. The Trojans beat Nebraska Cornhuskers to pulp yesterday 28-10. We didn’t have a good start to begin with, and on the 3rd drive of the game, this happened.

Surely an injury that ends this season. Please all wish Ryan Powdrell the best.

And pray for the Trojan offense to shape up after such loss.

Also, even before the game, there was another kind of pain many of the current USC students experienced outside the Coliseum.

Apparently USC sold 12,000 Activity Cards, essentially your season tickets for almost all home games, but only alloted 8,000 in the student section. The 4,000 seats have been sold out to general public.

The result was long line, near rioting crowd, and eventually a standing room only in the grassy area.

Sold out is right. Shame on you, USC!

I was on of the lucky fews who never have issues with seating all 4 years of college. I mean, I have never heard anyone complain about not being able to get into the Coliseum before. Then again, we had our good years but nothing like the Pete Carroll era.

I can’t even imagine not being able to get into the Coliseum! (Well, I would’ve been one of the first ones in line to get into the Coliseum to begin with. Heh.) Then again, my seat was guaranteed to me every single home game. The front row at 50 yard line, behind the players. The Marching Band is just over to the left. And I EARNED my seat there.

I was a part of Trojan Pride, the spirit organization. Rallies R Us, pretty much. And a lot more. I mean, we were in the Coliseum 2 hours before the game, scaling up and down the Coliseum putting pompoms on the seats. Some people came in to do just that to get seats, but a few of us actually are hardcore Trojan Priders who did everything from selling game shirts (well, *I* sold shirts. 4 days a week all through football season. Yes, all 4 years!) , to set up and did crowd control at rallies and making banners to go support other atheletic teams.

I’m sure since our football team has picked up for the past years, Trojan Pride probably has members out the yang during the football season. I wonder how that works for them nowadays. The first 20 can get in early? I have no idea.

Anyway. I digress.

It’s just not fair that with the especially fantastic team that they would oversell the Activity Card (or Spirit Card…I guess that’s what they are now) and jibbed the students. After all, they paid for their tickets it too!

Now, as an alum with not a lot of dough, I still have the best seat for USC games. At home. In front of my TV. Still yelling and screaming at the game.

The pig wasn’t roasted over open fire after all.

But in a permanent luau pit.

Oh yes. This guy built a luau pit in his back yard for this specific purpose.

And I actually didn’t eat all that much of the pig since I had been pigging out on appetizers through the afternoon. And 2 beers with no effects! I mean, wow. I am really becoming an alcoholic!

We were there from 2 until around 5 when they went to get the pig out. I didn’t see that part of the ordeal because I was watching USC kicking off against Nebraska.

Nonetheless, the Trojans win. All hail Booty, Jarrett, Smith, Moody and Washington!

And, oh yeah. I made little piggy cupcakes! Suddenly, I am hooked on a food fad I swore I wouldn’t get into: cupcakes. I figure since all the techniques I’ve found on the internet about shaping a cake into a pig, would take a lot of energy and skills, I’d just go with virtually trouble free pig cupcakes. I used Brandon’s mom’s Pig Pickin’ Cake recipe (yellow cake with mandarin oranges mixed in, frosted with thawed CoolWhip with vanilla pudding and crushed pineapple) and instead of the layared cake, I make the cups.

And now I’m hooked on making cupcakes. Crap…

I’m in a food coma and getting sleepier by the seconds so I won’t be long.

So I had ONE Irish Car Bomb last night, the drinking night with my coworkers. (Details later).

Tonight, I had a margarita and one BIG, FAT carnitas taco.

Have I mentioned that I LOVE PORK?

Especially bacon.

And carnitas.

And crispy skin roasted suckling pig.

And Thai 3-layered crispy pork.

And baby back ribs.

This Saturday, we are going to a Pig Party where there will be one big pig roasting over open fire. Gotta love the Greeks! Or Filipinos??? (Hmm….Lechón…) Wait, don’t the Cubans and Puerto Ricans roast pigs too??

Doesn’t matter. There will be a pig roasting over open fire.

Next to that pig is a pool. And a keg. And more booze.

This weekend is looking pretty good. Pork and booze, baby. And I already get a head start!

Sometimes you just take things for granted. From this past few days, I have come to appreciate many more things. Here’s the list, not in any particular order.

1. How much fun it is to get into a large box or a plastic storage tub.

Exhibit A

Exhibit B

2. Even more fun than that is once inside a large plastic storage tub, your friend pushed you at high speed down the aisle in the middle of WalMart.

See Exhibit B. With big ol’ Erik behind it. Oh I wish Brandon had a video capture on his phone!

3. Pixie Stix.

You all know by now that sugar is my drug of choice. THIS is my cocaine. A few tubes of these and I’m like squirrel on caffeine. (For those who’ve seen “Over the Hedge”, you’d know exactly what I’m talking about!) Celeste has seen what the concentrated flavored sugar could do to me yesterday when she brought in the Stix. Poor thing…

4. Frozen Yogurt.

What a blessing to those who don’t digest dairy product well! I mean, I ate 2/3 of a large serving that was left from visiting Penguin’s in Redondo Beach over the weekend. Usually, that amount in ice cream would’ve killed me. But not frozen yogurt!

5. Green Giant Simply Steam Frozen Veggies

When buying the entire bag of frozen veggies means that you’re going to eat it today and forget about the rest of the bag until doomsday, this small serving makes perfect sense. Perfect serving size for 2. Steam up in 4 minutes in a bag. Fantabulous!

6. Vanilla Soymilk

Soymilk itself is a blessing to me. (See #4). Being able to drink out of the carton because you’re the only one in the house drinking soymilk is such an empowerment. And no glass to wash! (By the way, that is my pre-breakfast. A few gulps of soymilk, another gulp with my vitamins, and a few more gulps after that. It would hold me over until a few hours into work.)

7. Giving someone a surprise present.

Last night we went over to my “Aunty” house to deliver her birthday present, a vase of chocolated covered strawberries arranged like they were flowers. We left it with her family so she could see it when she got back from work. She loves it–and sent a photo to prove. Then today, we surprised Big Boss with a present. You see, Big Boss mentioned a few times that he wanted to uproot his Bose sound system to bring to the office. Something to keep him company when he works late or on the weekend. So, our department got together and got him this for his birthday today.

8. A Hot Shower.

As you read about the lack of hot water over the weekend, we didn’t get it back until today’s afternoon. Last night, as I delivered the present to Aunty Tim’s house, I also mooched the shower. After days of boiling water and hauling pots and pans in and out of the bathroom, I believe I deserved a break. (Oh yes. 4 ranges on full power with 2 pots and 2 deep skillets of water. It took many trips to fill 1/3 of the tub, just enough to get in and stay warm while getting cleaned.)

Now, hold on to all the good feelings, folks. I’m about to start on the hot water issue. Literally.

Saturday, Brandon called the Apartment Manager to let her know about the broken water heater. She said the guy was already out but he needed parts which would be in on Monday. That was that.

Monday morning, still no hot water. Brandon got a call from the Manager, yelling at him and accusing him of filing a report /complaint with the police against her because the propety’s hot water wasn’t fixed. “I’ve been managing this place for years and I never have any complaints against me until you showed up,” was the extent of what she said to him.

Yep. This lady has it in her head that we are out to get her since we asked her grandson to close the window if they happen to smoke weed.

Oh yeah, she ripped us a new one for “accusing my grandson, a Cal State graduate with a good job, not a bum, of smoking weed.”

News flash, grandma. I know people who graduated from Harvard Business School, making banks, and THEY smoke weed. And they smoke good shit. Not the skunk ass your angelic stoner grandson “does not smoke”, the one with a horrible stench drifting out of their apartment window into ours. Funny, how the weed smoke stopped billowing into our place after we had that little talk. Anyways, after that, anytime we called with a request to get things fixed, we either get attitude or sometimes, like our A/C, nothing gets fixed.

With this water heater thing, it seems the broad must’ve smoked the entire stash of her grandson’s weed to get this level of paranoia.

Apparently, there’s something about the law that if you don’t have hot water for for certain days you are supposed to file with the City. Or something like that. And someone did file a complaint. on Monday and, as we found out later, another one was filed today.

But it wasn’t us. Brandon calmly communicated that point to here and that she should probably get the copy of that complaint from the City. Now, with this nutcase on our back, Brandon called the City to ask what they could do to calm her down. He left a message.

Today, someone at the City returned his call. The City cannot give out the name of the person who filed the complaint but they can let the Manager knows “no, it’s not Brandon” if she asks. The City also informed us that the Manager indeed has called them earlier, also yelling at them along the line of, “They can all boil their own water if they want hot water. I’ll get this thing fixed whenever I feel like it.”

I have a feeling we’ll be moving again next year. Unless something changed. Oh, I don’t know, like we get a new apartment manager who’s mentally stable?

All in all. As of this afternoon, we have hot water again.

And finally,

9. A warm bed. With Brandon in it.

Good night, my darlings.

Never Forget.

“Wanna bet we won’t have hot water tomorrow?” said Brandon as we walked pass the apartment’s water heater which was making horrific clunking noises.

Sure enough, Saturday morning came and there was no hot water.

I called Nora, letting her and her sister know that I would be there around 9:30 instead of 10 a.m. and that I needed to use their shower. Nora and I were going to the kick-off meeting for ONE campaign’s Orange County Group.

Talk about an appropriate social lesson before going to a meeting to learn more about a campaign to fight global AIDS and extreme poverty! Here I was, running out of the house, feeling icky and frustrated because I couldn’t have a hot shower. And out there somewhere, a kid is dying of thirst and hunger, and even AIDS.

Off to the OC. Had me a nice warm shower and little breakfast with Nora and off we went to the meeting.

Kelly, the leader of the pack, is very professional and passionate about the cause. There were a range of folks there including a guy who’ve moved from England, SOKA University students and 2 girls from my alma mater, Santa Margarita High School. Some are more passionate and politically conscious about the cause than others.

I mainly want to volunteer my time and energy to assist whatever programs they’d need me for. ONE is an awareness campaign, not fundraising. Being someone who’s not really involved in my community, I don’t really have much to start with. My circle of influence is quite small. So, I’m doing what I can. (See the banner? Yep. There you go.) But I will show up to support ONE whenever and where I can.

Nora is along the same line with how much she wants to get involved. But she has a little more range to spread the word with her big corporation work place and church.

Anyhoo. It was a great meeting and I’m looking forward to do more for ONE.

This is just another thing to make ME happy. Have I mentioned that I decided to be happy? I think I’ve done enough moping around and feeling sorry for myself and angry at the world. It’s time to get over myself and be happy.

Constant bitching can only make you happy during the time you were bitching. Then nothing’s changed. You either move on or do something about it.

…well, I will still be angry at the world here and there. I don’t think I can help that. Heh. It’s just too much fun to be bitter at the world once in a while. ;-D

Wishing you a fulfilling week to come!