I woke up this morning to my blaring alarm, turned it off, and stayed in bed for another 10 minutes before getting up to take a shower. I stopped by BK and bought a croissanwich for breakfast. After I got into work, I had to deal with problems from my portion of the project. It was to be expected, but still, having to hear what's wrong with your stuff.. kinda sucks. My co-worker was really happy today, because he had won a contest drawing, and had received an oscilloscope as a prize (worth around $1K). I don't think I've ever seen him that giddy before.

For lunch, we went to Super Buffet. We had six people, so we piled into my boss's Highlander. I didn't think there would be room, but he raised a mini-backseat, which I thought was quite nifty. The quality of Super Buffet was the same as before, so I didn't eat much. I stayed late at work, and left around 8. The sucky part is that my boss asked me to work on Friday, since I still had to work with one of our guests, and they would be leaving Friday afternoon.

I caught the bus and walked to Whole Foods, but didn't buy anything. I headed over to Safeway, where I picked up some lettuce and some fruits. The lines were really long, with people doing a lot of last minute shopping (myself included). I noticed that the express line didn't have as much people, so I went over and lined up. Unfortunately, by the time I got to being the third person in line, the woman in front took a long time because she had to exchange some Coke bottles or something. Then the cashier had a problem opening the change drawer and disappeared for an ungodly amount of time. Everyone in line was wondering what happened to the guy; the people behind me eventually gave up, left their items and left the store.

I peered over to the other lines, and they were all short! If I had lined up anywhere else, I would've gotten through already. I spied one checkout counter which only had one person, so I rushed over... but *just* before I got there, a woman pulled in front of me with a cart. She was chatty with the cashier too, so that took time. Then the cashier hit the wrong key and needed an override. Additional time. Then when he finally scanned the last item, the woman pulled out a check and asked to cash it. WTF. I looked over at the express lane - the guy was back, and the line was moving. If I had stayed, I would've gotten out already.

After I got home, I played some Borderlands. But it crashed on me! ARGH. Luckily, I had just hit a save point right before. So I reloaded the game and was able to play a little more.. until Steam crashed on me. ARGH. I gave up. I tried to run Steam again, but got a error message regarding some DLL. So I tried re-installing Steam... and got a BSOD. I've never gotten a BSOD when trying to install a program before. Sure, running a program, but not while installing. *sigh*

A lot of Black Friday sales started early - i.e., today. Steam has a bunch of games on sale, and I bought Grid for $7.50. I checked my CC statement and noticed that my purchase from Brown Butter Cookies was still marked as "pending", even though it's been over a month! Crap.. I hope they got paid.. I don't want to make CT look bad ("your friend is a deadbeat!").

I had trouble waking up this morning, though I went to sleep early last night. Well, maybe not that early, since I probably spent a good hour tossing and turning. When I saw myself in the morning, I had noticeable dark circles under my eyes.

We had some visitors at work today, so we took them to Soong Soong for lunch. After work, I went to Valley Fair because I was bored. I did a complete circuit around the mall, but didn't go into any stores. I was done in half an hour, and caught the bus back.

My dad found out one of the sprinkler heads was broken, and water was spewing out. I was too tired to deal with it (and it was too dark anyway), so I just turned off the water for that part of the system.

After School released their 2nd single released today, "너 때문에" (Because of You).

Bleah.. back to work. For lunch, I ate the bread I bought yesterday. MK came by and told me that my PHP script was fully working, and that she was very thankful for my help. Dell is selling Left 4 Dead 2 for $30; both my brother and NaL each got a copy. I found the 3D pictures from the NVIDIA/EVGA event posted on Flickr. Ugh.. I'm so tired for some reason. I'm going to bed early.

I woke up late, and finished reading Dead Beat. I walked to library to return four books, and renewed Heechee Rendezvous online. I went to check out the new Target afterward, which just re-opened after 8 months of remodeling. Wow. I didn't even recognize it anymore. The entire Target store was now elevated above a parking lot, and the surrounding environment was completely re-designed. There were condos going up next to the parking structures, and it looks like they're going for the Santana Row look.

Target was packed with people, and the lines were crazy long. The interior looked pretty much the same, except they had started selling some produce. I walked home, stopping by Pak N Save to pick up some groceries first. I played some Borderlands to try and get some decent loot. It later crashed during multiplayer. This is the first time it's crashed on me. What the heck? I don't think I've changed anything in the system.

Ugh.. I can't believe it's Sunday night already, and I have to go to work tomorrow. Where did the weekend go? Weird.. I checked my credit card charges, and saw that Toyose didn't charge the tip. But it's not like I left a lousy tip or anything. Maybe they couldn't read my writing? Man, I hope they don't remember me if I ever go back.

The Garage

I went with my brother to Costco, and used my dad's card to get in. I bought a bunch of stuff in preparation for Thanksgiving at my uncle's; nearly $100 worth of food. Today I tried to transfer some files over the network, and got my first BSOD on Windows 7. LH called me around 6 PM to let me know he would be late, so I called MK in turn to let her know too. A little after 6:30 PM, LH picked me up, and we headed out to pick up MK. From her place, we took 280N, and I tried to think of stuff to talk about. I mainly focused on Japan and food, because I knew it was something both LH and MK were very knowledgeable about.

After arriving in the city, we were able to find Toyose without any problems. We parked across the street and headed towards the garage-like facade. But is it really a facade if it was once a garage? I didn't know what to expect, but the inside was.. cozy. There were no tables available, so we had to wait for a bit. Luckily, one table was finishing up, so we didn't have to wait long. We ordered the aloe soju (pretty good), kimchi fried rice, chicken wings, potato croquettes, and a kimchi pork + beef tofu stew. The food wasn't bad, but to me, there wasn't much difference between it and other good Korean restaurants. Still, I'd go back.

We went to the nearby Eggettes afterward for dessert. I remember VM raving about it on FB, so I had checked out the Yelp reviews, which were positive. I got a Mint Thai Ice Tea, and we tried the chocolate and honeydew egg puffs. They were much more flavorful than the ones at Break Time. After we finished, we headed back to the South Bay. LH dropped MK off first. But, as he was about to drop me off, we spontaneously decided to go to Jujubee instead.

The place was full, but as we walked in, there was one table they had just finished wiping up, so we got it (always getting that last table). I nervously, and hopefully, looked around, but I didn't see MJ. Damn. Now I wonder if I'll ever see her again. Maybe last week was fate's way of giving me one last chance? And as usual, I didn't take it. I think that's part of what kills me.

We ordered fries, and split a large bottle of Hite. LH told the mama-san that I was trying to learn Korean. She was very friendly (and her English was impeccable) and confirmed some of the stuff I learned from Pimsleur. I witnessed some drama when one girl came in, walked over to a nearby table of guys, gave one of them 'the look', and stalked out. The guy followed her out, and they were walking back and forth, clearly arguing. I couldn't hear it, but I could see the guy with his palms out in a placating manner, while the girl had her hand up ('talk to the hand') the whole time.

My company had an early Thanksgiving lunch at Soong Soong, since one of my co-workers wasn't going to be around next week. We ordered one of the set menu items, but it was way too much food. We ended up with six take-out boxes. When MK came by, we gave her two of the boxes. I stopped by Target and picked up some trail mix, then walked home.

I went to Subway and got the new Chicken Marinara footlong for $5. Meh. It was just regular chicken breast with marinara sauce (the same sauce from the meatball sub). Google open-sourced their Chrome OS today. Is it worth downloading, compiling, and installing, just to try writing a Hello World application for it? After work, I went to Whole Foods and got a burrito. I stopped by Safeway afterward, and picked up some toilet paper and soap. I received my DVD+Rs from Newegg.

I ate the other frozen dinner for lunch. MK came by again with the PHP code I had suggested, which ended up not working. I saw that I had forgotten to tell her where an end brace went (extremely important). I also added some additional code which I hoped would work in refilling an HTML form. After work, I decided to go to Valley Fair, but I just missed the bus. So, I went to McDonalds instead, got a Double Cheeseburger and a McChicken, then headed over to the bus stop. There was a friendly/talkative kid at the bus stop, and he asked me if I was Korean. Heh. Later on, I spotted a Nissan GT-R while I was waiting to cross the street. This is the second time I've spotted one 'out in the wild'.

I brought two frozen dinners to work, and ate one for lunch. I saved the other one for tomorrow. After work, I went to Target, but didn't buy anything. The new Star Trek came out on DVD today; I was seriously considering a pre-order for $10, but didn't get it. Now it's $15 normal price. I thought about going to Whole Foods, but when I stepped out, it sprinkled a little bit, so I changed my mind and caught the bus home instead.

Not in the Mindset

I deleted my Match and Chemistry accounts today. I'm just not in the mindset anymore. Yeah, it probably has to do with MJ, but in the meantime, I don't see myself replying to anyone, so why keep it up? I deleted my Friendster account, too. I'm on a deleting spree. I bought a 100-pk of Verbatim DVD+Rs for $21 from Newegg. Not a super deal, but decent. I brought a TV dinner with me for lunch. I helped MK with implementing a CAPTCHA in PHP. After work, I went to Verde and got the noodle soup with grilled chicken. It was cold, so the soup and hot tea helped. They had Hannah Montana and Sky High playing on the TV. After I got home, I continued reading book 3 of the Dresden Files. I received an invite for Google Wave, so I logged in and sent a Wave to NW. Shiny.

Distractions

I woke up early for some reason, even though I went to sleep late last night (or rather, early this morning). I did laundry, and cleaned out more of my hard drive. I also started coding for Maemo 5. I was able to port over a program and have it compile and run successfully (a complicated one, not Hello World). Now I just need to write a GUI and wrapper for it. In the late afternoon, I went to the bank, then walked to Safeway and picked up a crapload of frozen food, since my mom gave me a coupon which expired soon. I started reading more Dresden books. I also played some Borderlands co-op (second walkthrough). I tried to burn Zephyroth onto some TDK DVD-R discs, but the burn failed both times. I think the discs are bad. I gave up, threw out the discs, and deleted the ISO.

M & M

(Saturday) I spent some time cleaning out more old files from my computer, while listening to Rainbow's "Kiss". BC gave me a buzz to see if I wanted to check out the Apple store and get dinner. I said sure, so he came by around 6 PM, and we zipped over to Valley Fair. We were discussing the pros and cons of which iMac would be a better deal, and even asked one of the reps about the internal details (how many RAM slots, etc). In the end, BC decided it would just be cheaper and more efficient to build his own PC.

We went to grab some dinner at Lori's Diner. BC got the fish and chips, while I went for the Edsel Burger. The food was okay, but I remember the experience being better at their SF location, for some reason. We checked out some other stores as well, such as Gap, Sports Authority, North Face, Express for Men, Macy's, and Bose. I listened to one of Bose's noise canceling headphones, and was very impressed. BC dropped me back at home before going to see SeL.

Then around 11 PM, LH called me up to go out. We kicked around some ideas for places to go; I didn't really feel like going to Hue. What was the point, if MJ wasn't working there anymore? Finally, I decided on Jujubee, since LH wanted some place which would be jumping. LH picked me up about 20 minutes later, and we headed over. There were people outside, and inside was packed too. Luckily, there was still a small table open, so we were able to sit down. As we were looking over the menus, someone came over and asked if she could take our order.

We looked up - and it was MJ! Both LH and I exclaimed, "OMIGOD!" and she just laughed. At first, I honestly thought she had started working at Jujubee, but it turns out she was just there with some friends, celebrating someone's birthday. And Monica was there too (albeit in a different group)! MJ called her over, and she came to say hi as well. We chatted for a bit (well, okay, LH did most of the talking) before they went back to their respective tables. I was kicking myself for not busting out some Korean - I could've asked her to have a drink with us.

I was just shaking for a long time after that. Nervousness? Excitement? Cold weather? I definitely did not expect to see MJ (actually, I expected I would never see her again), and there she was, sitting right behind me. The real waitress came over to take our order; LH ordered a bottle of OB, and fried calamari (?). I also ordered the kimchi fried rice, but hunger wasn't really on my mind.

I was sitting with my back towards the rest of the restaurant, while LH was sitting facing towards the front - and towards MJ's table. He had a clear view and would give me little updates here and there. I think he was trying to help me determine if she was with any of the guys at her table, but couldn't tell for sure.

In the end, LH told me she put on some guy's coat as they were preparing to leave. So, she could be seeing someone. Damn, I'm feeling conflicted. Part of me wants her to be happy, but another part wants her to be happy with me. I tried to convince LH to join Match.com or Chemistry.com, because I didn't want him to end up like me. We sat a while longer before leaving. LH stopped at the Chevron to fill up, before he dropped me off.

I can't sleep. I really want to scream, but it's late and my brother is asleep, so I better not. I'll have to settle for mumbling obscenities to myself, and laying my head on my desk. I'm not sure why it's tearing me up so much - I always knew it would come to this eventually. Still, all in all, I would've rather seen her tonight and go through this (whatever it is), than not have seen her at all. Does that make any sense?

I found out SC just had twin boys! Congrats to her and M!

As usual, I walked aimlessly during lunch, and ended up going to Wendy's. The guy from China asked me for more directions regarding the bus, which I guess is my area of expertise. I received the NET10 phone at work today, but was surprised because I was expecting it to come on Monday. It's smaller than I thought (a good thing, in my book), and I have yet to activate it.

MK came by, and she told me that Taeko wouldn't be able to make it to dinner since she would be going to Japan. However, Taeko said it would be okay to have dinner without her, that the three of us should go out first. After work, I wasn't in a hurry to go home, so I ended up going to the Won Stew House next to the library. I ordered the grilled chicken bento. The rice was freshly made, so it was hot, soft and fluffy, which was good for the cold night. Afterward, I walked over to Target, then walked home. I finally completed the last lesson of Pimsleur Korean 1A.

I think I saw the club girl on the bus this morning. Not quite as clubbish as before, but she still looked good. I went to Subway for lunch. I stayed late at work to try and pound out another spec draft, and ate some instant noodles for dinner.