OakMonster’s Den

LA Times - 2 men freed in L.A. girl’s killing
Police say the gunmen were firing in self-defense at a rival gang member when the girl, 9, was hit by a stray bullet that entered her Angelino Heights home.

A few days after a bullet from a gang shooting tore into an Angelino Heights home last month, killing a 9-year-old girl, police announced with much fanfare that they had arrested the two gunmen.

But the suspects — Cesar Zamora, 23, and Steven Castanon, 20 — are now out of jail and back in their old neighborhood, to the dismay of residents who held candlelight vigils to memorialize Charupha Wongwisetsiri.

Police released the men without filing charges after determining that Zamora or Castanon fired the shot that killed Charupha in self-defense when a rival gang member pulled up in a car and tried to shoot them in front of their apartment complex next to Charupha’s home.

Sure, I’m a little bit biased for the fact that the dead little girl is Thai. But still, gang members are allowed to shoot up the neighborhood, accidentally killing people, and walk away free men because it was a “self defense”?

What kind of a fucked up world is this!?!?!??!

My wake up call is 5:15 a.m.

My back up wake up call is 5:30 a.m.

Must leave the house by 5:45 a.m.

I’m dead tired. But my hair needs a bit of air drying time.  Yep.  Washed my hair tonight to keep my wake up call at 5:15 instead of 4:45.

Brandon decided to turn our wall heater on for the first time all winter.  I LOVE HIM!!!

Mother Nature has been throwing us some cold spell lately.  This morning, I stepped off my car on to the patch of grass on the sidewalk.  Itsy bitsy crunching noises came from under my feet.  It was 33F this morning, not counting wind chill from standing out there at the bus stop.  Yes, I know we SoCalifornians are wussies.  But DAMN that’s FUCKING COLD!

Upside to that is now I can sit in my office without having to throw on a ski jacket.

Sitting at my office I did and I finally put up the “I’ve moved” sign over at Blogger.  It’s a bitter sweet goodbye from my comfort zone into something new altogether.  Oh WordPress, how I both love and dispise thee!

Now that everything is here, the moment OakMonster.com is up on top of Google or after one month, I’ll delete that blog altogether.
So, what’s my plan for OakMonster.com?

1. Assign categories to ALL original posts (666 of them!  No kidding!)
2. Copy stuff over to “About Me” page and making THIS my home on the web.  (Yep.  So long, Geocities!)
3. Add more pages like The Dreamboat to the blog.
4. Creating title graphic for Hmm…Food…Good….oh wait, that’s NOT for OakMonster.com?!?

Oh yeah.  A lot more geeking out in the future. But for now, I must add the Flickr badge to the side bar and retire to bed or else I’d never wake up tomorrow morning.

YEEEEESSSS!

I can’t believe I have my own domain. Yey! And such warm welcome from everyone. Thank you so much you guys!

Along with the new format, I’d like to introduce a few new links.

Chris Rude Cactus’ fabulous wife, Beth Fish, started a resolution everyone can feel good about this year. Beth said:

I decided I would challenge myself to do at least one thing every single month to help a kid other than my own.

That’s just awesome! So, I promise Beth that I would list her “Do Good” blog on my blog permanently. (See Small Change banner on the side).  And of course, I’d also blogroll her regular blog as well.

While at it, I realized I too have other causes I support. I might as well give it its own section. Hence, the Karma Farm roll.

Another new comer is Kuri. Kuri and I bonded over an article by Joel Stein in the LA Times which he pretty much told people who write him to fuck off. LOL. Nonetheless, they left a blog entry open for people to comment about the article. Kuri said this:

I like this better, because I don’t care if Joel reads my e-mail. I only care if people see this message and then look at my blog, which is at http://kurinboism.blogspot.com.

Tickled by that post, I visited Kuri’s blog and found myself thoroughly entertained. So, here we are.

Anyhoo. Welcome everyone!

Alrighty. We’re moving here. Still working on it. Please ignore the potholes and such.

With any luck, kiddies, I will relocate the Den over to OakMonster.com over this LONG weekend.

Yes, we have MLK Day off. I’m sorry if I’m gloating. I used to not have it off, and now that I do, I take a little pleasure in rubbing it into folks who don’t. Hehee.

Telling you, man. I *AM* evil.

With the move on the way, you may see the lack of updates and perhaps even odd things at this joint. And when you peek at OakMonster.com, you may see different thing everyday.

In the meantime, I’ll keep the new adventure over at Hmm…Food…Good alive. I will update the look of that thing too. Eventually. When I figure out New Blogger.

As for this weekend? I have to figure out WordPress and CSS. If you want to help, please let me know.

I was just minding my own business, going through my daily blog reading list, and then *BAWHAM*, KorBua tagged me.

Because she’s like a twin sister I never had–and seriously, we shared the same birthday, 9 years apart–I must oblige.

6 WEIRD THINGS ABOUT ME

THE RULES: Each player of this game starts with the ‘6 weird things about you.’ People who get tagged need to write a blog of their own 6 weird things as well as state this rule clearly. In the end, you need to choose 6 people to be tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave a comment that says ‘you are tagged’ in their comments and tell them to read your blog.

1. Do. Not. Rock. The. Boat.
KorBua mentioned her motion sickness from roller coaster. I have an even worse case. I can get sick on a swing and a hammock, a carousel, or just spin a round or two in an office chair. When I was very young, I was virtually invincible anywhere, on a winding road or choppy water. As I grew older, I got increasingly sensitive to motion. It got to absolute worst, to me at least, when was in my early teens. I was just starting on ballet pointe shoes and we were learning to do our turns and spins. Even with that dancer’s head snap thing I’ve been trained to do my whole life–and never ever gotten sick spinning before–I couldn’t really handle the spinning motion. I faked that it was my toes that hurt to sit out here and there, but when I got home, I’d be out with a headache and nausea for an hour or so. Brandon said it was my mutant gene. LOL.

2. What’s in a name
I like to name things. I name damn near everything around me. My car is Merlin. My guitar is Dusty. Spiders are Freds. Crickets are Georges. My orchid plants are Cotton, Bubbles, and Pebbles. The one at the office is Dolly. At some point, the ficah in Amy’s office was called Earl. piano hasn’t revealed her name to me yet but she will.

3. Hair Art
My long hair is woe to the household. To help minimize the clog in the shower drain, anytime I wash my hair, any hair that came off in my hand, I’d collect it on to the shower wall. When I finish with the shower, I pick the Cousin Id 2D off the wall and drop him into the trash can. Once in a while though, I’d get inspired and I’d “paint” the clump of hair around, making an abstract mural.

4. Funny Words
I think the following words sound extremely funny: hoist and buoy. I don’t know why.

5. Like a Cat
I curl up. Anywhere. I’d sit Indian style in a chair. Like what I’m doing right now. I’d curl up on a couch. Actually I’d prefer to sit on the floor for that matter. I sleep all curled up. If it’s a long, straight drive, I’d put my left foot up on the seat and rest my elbow on my knee. I don’t know why. It’s just comfy for me when I’m all curled up like that.

6. Dancing Queen
When I have good, dancy song on my MP3 player, I “dance” to it in my head. And it’d probably bleeds into my shoulders and upper body…just a little. Oh yes, I’d dance on the street if I had the chance. And if someone would pay me. So, like Robin Williams said in “The Birdcage”, I “do an eclectic celebration of the dance!…but keep it all inside.” Can’t take the choreographer out of the girl, I tell ya!

..but wait! There’s more!

5 THINGS ABOUT OAKLEY THAT RELATIVELY FEW PEOPLE KNOW

1. Kinder-playah
In preschool–that’s Kindergarten 2, to you Thais–I had 2 boys fighting over me. LOL. I vaguely remember having a boyfriend then, but my KG best friend, Tammy, distinctly remembered there were two.

2. Again, Dancing Queen
I was THE choreographer back at Mater Dei. Sure, it’s a well known fact in my circle back home, but relatively new for you guys here. Heh. That is what happened when you weren’t a shy kid and were the only one to volunteer to dance and to choreograph. I was constantly doing dance recitals for the school and eventually, I ended up choreographing tons of the performances. Who else would incorporate Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation and the group dance from Encino Man into a pop-dance remix of Day-O?

3. Save the Cheerleader
Along the same line as #2, brace yourself for a shocker. I was the cheerleading captain for my “color” (aka the “House”, like in Harry Potter–my school is seperated into 4 color houses.) in 6th grade. Yep. The ugly, quirky, tiny little me. Cheerleading in Thailand (before they started throwing people around like the US) boils down to pretty people, standing out front and waving their hands about to lead the cheer. Compared to all the popular girls that got elected for other colors, I was the total Beast among the Beauties. I was loud. I was spirited. And I was nuts. I might not have won a popularity contest, but we got us the spirit award on Sports Day. My job was done.

4. Costume Shop
I can come up with all sorts of Halloween costumes from the clothing items I have in my very own closet. There are some of the items I never wear or haven’t even touched since I bought it that I kept “just in case”. The result? The rarely worn corset, silk shirt and hand woven net-y scarf came in handy when you need to become a pirate in a hurry.

5. Manly Oak
I drink milk and soymilk out of the carton at home. Hey, I’m the one doing the dishes so I am entitled to forgo the use of cups. Do I really want to add another cup to the sink to wash later? I do not think so. Ditto eating ice cream out of the carton. Except for the one vanilla ice cream in the freezer just in case I have to make dessert for surprise dinner guests.

And now, the tagging the 6 unfortunate souls: ‘Mazing Amy, Pond-ering, Olaina, Token Asian, Nicky and, it’ll be interesting to read what little Owen has to say.

If you want to share YOUR weirdness and secrets, go on ahead and delurk in the comment! I’ll take your participation there too.

Disclaimer: Rude Cactus, I was going to put you down. But I know you’ve been tagged recently. So you’re off the hook, buddy!

A quote from 10 Things I Hate About You:

Chastity: I know you can be under whelmed, and you can be overwhelmed, but can you ever just be, like, whelmed?

Bianca: I think you can in Europe.

That would probably best described how I feel right now.

As you’ve read, it has been a CRAZY weekend. Work hasn’t been absolutely quiet either. So I felt like I have just been “on” since Saturday.

I was going to blow off the steam by going running tonight but it just wasn’t in the stars. My healthy, veggie-filled Korean lunch started to hatch its own escape plan, making me a bit on the “urgh” side. I already told Shane I’d come over to talk marketing, so I left for the gym anyway.

I came home with all of the projects floating in my head.

Shane’s marketing strategies.

Olaina’s website–now that she’s given me a roadmap to follow.

Tomorrow morning, I’ll be at a seminar with Nhien at 7:30 a.m., meaning I’m leaving on the 2nd bus at 6:15.

The laundry.

The dishes.

By the time I got home to the half bucket of spaghetti Brandon left for me, I was spent. He had already gone to bed in attempt to sleep off the headache brought on by quitting sodas cold turkey. (More about our many attempts at this tomorrow.)

By the time I was done with dinner and watched Inside Actor’s Studio with Matt Damon, all my pent up energy was gone. In a hurry.

About an hour ago, I pretty much have been here, reading other people’s blogs.

I went from being overwhelmed to underwhelmed in 2 hours.

And now, I’m just…well…whelmed.

How was your day?

DSC02797
Originally uploaded by theoakmonster.

The Phromyothis celebrated New Year’s Eve in style. Wish I was there! (But soon, with the magic of Photoshop, I shall be there too!!)

More on the Flickr album. And yep, my mom is doing fantastically! She loves being at home. Her friends also appreciate the ample parking and freedom to hang out and be as loud as they want. Hehehe.

You know what I was going to say about this weekend? Of course you do.

Fan. Fucking. Tastic!

Well, except for the death of Mario Danelo. Everything else has been fabulous.

First of all, I went running on Friday. Well, I did “run” for 10 minutes straight at 3.2 (or was it 3.7??) speed before I started to run out of breath. That really surprised me given that the last time I tried to run, I ran out breath in the first 5 minutes. The machine is making me keep a pace, so that helps a bunch. I know I tend to start running too fast. Once a sprinter, always a sprinter, I guess. I really want to build endurance, and that’s my goal for my running.

I didn’t push too hard either. I mean, I could’ve kept going until I really ran out of breath before I stepped it down. Besides, I ran late to the gym so I had to clock in at 15 minutes, just in time before Shane had to close the shop. (Oh yeah, check out my handy work of the website for Shane’s gym, Pound 4 Pound Fitness.)

Gosh, that felt soooo good! I love moderate exercise. It clears my brain. But boy am I paying for it now. LOL. The muscles just above my knees are sore, making me walk funny.

Saturday morning, even before I woke up, the refridgerator was repaired. A busted relay was the cause. While I was gone all day, Brandon cleaned all the shelves in the fridge and put the booze back in. (All together now…Awwwww….) This morning, we restocked. And wow, it’s good to have the fridge back.

Later on Saturday afternoon, I loaded up my car with my little wheely cooler, ALL of my chick flicks, and 2 bottles of Proseco and headed up to LA to hang out with Nhien, Amy, Eva and Celeste. It was to be a potluck for us girls to pig out, get sloshed and watch a chick flick. I made a pit stop to buy the seafood and other fresh ingredients I needed to make the Italian fish stew, Cioppino. (Read all about this on my revived food blog, Hmm…Food…Good.)Nhien made a Spanish omelet tapas thing. Eva brought a salad and frozen strawberries so I could make them bellinis. Amy, Spanish ham and cheeses. Celeste made the famous breciolli, Italian meatloaf, but she had the cold so she didn’t make it to the shindig.

First up was Junebug, Amy’s Netflix entry. Not much of a romantic comedy or a chick flick we were hoping for, but a deep indy flick with quirks. It wasn’t horrible, but it wasn’t what we signed up for, I guess. So to clense our pallettes, we launched into the sappy magic of, one of my all time favorites, Serendipity.

This morning I was greeted first with a bad news about Danelo’s untimely death. But the day progressed into a different direction all together.

Like I said, we restocked the fridge. After that, Brandon and I went to see Eragon as a bonus to the real mission of buying Brandon some new pants.

Eragon is no Pan’s Labyrynth, we know that. (And seriously. Go. See. Pan’s Labyrynth.) But boy was I bored. I was merely curious to see how they are going to pull the book off. Well, they made it entertaining enough, but really left me unimpressed.

That leads me to the next rant. It was probably the Bad Parenting Day at the mall and we didn’t get the memo. In the middle of Eragon, a mom brought in her young, probably 5 years old or younger, son. First of all, they totally looked like they just sneaked in to this movie. Secondly, the kid was talking. And of course, they had to sit on seat down from us. Instead of telling her kid to hush in the theater, the mother told the kid to lower his voice…then SHE talked to him! So the kid said something and mom talked to him right back in her “inside voice”.

Okay. What is the matter with you? This is not the fucking Magic Johnson theater! Don’t be talking in here. And how bad are you to keep talking to your kid! I mean, you are setting bad example here and not to mention annoying the hell out of other folks. And oh yeah, let’s watch all the people burn up by dragon’s fire breath, people chopped up to bits and getting arrows shot through their bodies, and the dark wizard disintergrated into dust when he was stabbed in the chest. Good idea, mom.

After the show, Brandon came out of the restroom with a face. “That kid over there? He peed and flushed. You know how some urinal has that flushing wall of water in the back of the bowl? Well, after he flushed, he washed his hands in that.”

And the dad was watching as the kid played with the urinal water, handed the kid a paper towel to dry his hands, and they walked out.

See what I mean about Bad Parenting Day?

We quickly ran through the mall, got Brandon his pants, and headed home. It suddenly became dangerous–and disturbing–to be outdoor.

Indoor proved to be a much better deal. A Japanese lady reader at Thai-Blogs.com was looking for a friend of hers in Thailand that I didn’t know. But then another lady in the OC who went to college with the Japanese lady found that comment and wanted to be reconnect with her! Talk about small world! Who knows my blog can bring people together like that.

And finally, since we’re back to talking about blogs, I have mentioned that I’m bringing back my food blog, Hmm…Food…Good. This blog was going to be a team blog back then, but I ended up being the only one and it wasn’t as much fun. Now, I figured I got a few folks around here that would be interested, so I’ll hook it up.

I am also ushering in the new era of the OakMonster’s Den. Blogger and Blog*Spot have been kind to me for the past 3–going on 4–years. But perhaps the time has come for the OakMonster to strike out on her own.

Say hello to my future new home: OakMonster.com.

I’m nowhere near ready to cross over there yet. Still have much to learn on how to toy with WordPress and other craziness. But you will know when it’s ready.

In the meantime, come back to see me and go see the Food Blog too, if you’re a foodie.

Now that I told you what I did for the weekend, it’s your turn to share! Come on now, hang out and de-lurk a bit.

P.S. Demi-Boss - Is this enough reading material for ya? Hahaha!