I Used To Like The Dentist

I used to like the dentist. I used to like her because she kept a bucket full of small toys for good kids with clean teeth. I was a good kid with clean teeth. Was.

Everything went downhill after braces.

I was the poster child for buckteeth. My front ones didn’t just jut out, they jutted out and crisscrossed. In third grade, the dentist sentenced me to three years of braces—three years I tried embrace with an optimistic attitude. For example, I used those three years to perfect my art of color coordination. Only, I kind of took it too far when my yellow and green rubber bands respectively paid homage to vegetable bits and dental plaque.

Nevertheless, all was pretty much well until the dentist found my first cavity. The little sucker was hiding behind a metal band that encircled my molar. She patched it well, patted my back, and sent me off without a toy. I was no longer the good kid with clean teeth.

I went to see her today for cavity number two. She didn’t give me a toy. It’s definitely because I’m no longer of eligible age. But like I said, everything went downhill after braces. I used to like the dentist.

How do YOU Define Yourself?

It takes great courage to see the glass half full, a courage I struggle to find on a daily basis. Lizzie Velasquez puts into perspective a lot of my problems—problems I could have handled with more grace.

Thank you, Lizzie. Thank you in so many ways.

Haiku

Psst!

Hungry all the time:

my stomach pleads with my brain

to feed it some food.

 

Haiku of the day. My mantra everyday.

Maya

Today my cousins brought home a husky they named Maya. For the past six days, Maya was chained to the parking lot gate at their father’s apartment: hungry, lifeless, and possibly abandoned. After a trip to the vet, it was clear that the puppy was sick. I am happy to report, however, that Maya has since received her medication and immune-enhancing shots and seems to be recovering just fine.

Along with the news of her rescue, I also learned that a pet shop/pet hotel recently lost a dog of the same breed. My younger cousin insisted that Maya was not the one they were looking for. She is younger and weighed less than the facts listed on the missing poster. My cousin has yet to call the pet shop and clarify whether or not Maya is the puppy they are looking for.

Is she abandoned? Or is she simply lost? While Maya would be a lovely addition to the five Thai dogs, two Jack Russells, and one golden retriever my extended family and I own collectively, a big part of me believes that she is the missing puppy. As a dog lover, it’s hard for me to imagine a heartless owner leaving a pet for good. It is even harder for me to imagine an owner’s loss if Maya, the potentially misplaced dog, was not returned.

My mind is a sea of what-ifs.

It is not my place to tell my cousin what to do, especially since I’ve already asked her, multiples times, to make sure that Maya is not the dog of the missing poster. What pains me most is knowing that if we do keep her, the trivial love my cousin and her sister have for all new pets will soon fade. Three of the Thai dogs, theirs, are now cared for by other people. I fear that they won’t be able to move past the superficial love of soft coats and unconditional licks. Maya needs a love that stems from proper care—one that includes showers, attention, and picking-up after—one that even I, at 22, am incapable of overseeing.

Maya keeps to herself as though waiting to be reunited with her former owner. Whatever the future for this puppy, I hope it a good one. At the end of the day, a life is a life, and I can only hope my cousins realize the immense responsibility to see one through till the end, with or without them in it.

A Scientific Method

Two weeks into my winter vacation and I’ve consumed more coffee than my usual quota per academic semester.

Purpose: Is straight up “chilling” hard work?

Hypothesis: If chilling is hard work, then caffeine (from a drink of choice) is a necessary sustenance.

Materials: Prime environment for chilling, e.g., comfortable couch, fluffy pillows, and a good book. A mug of coffee.

Procedure:

1. Inspect the book’s cover. Do not judge it.
2. Begin reading the book.
3. Drink coffee when necessary.

Results:

Brother talks to himself. Loudly. He becomes his own cheerleader. It seems as though he is commentating his own online chess match. It is proving hard to concentrate. I drank two gulps of coffee as a result.

Simultaneously, my sister is playing the violin. She has repeated her specific stanza seven times. I refused to move from my prime environment. I took three more gulps.

Somewhere between reading the first ten pages and juggling my siblings, I emptied my mug.

Conclusion:

As demonstrated in the results, distractions generously provided by my siblings discouraged chilling. Coffee was consumed to maximize concentration necessary for chilling. Chilling is hard work.

Note: Throughout the procedure I maintained the art of “not trying too hard.” Trying too hard would have defeated the purpose of chilling.

#HoProblems

Chick flicks? Big fan. Spent the afternoon watching Hitch.

Man is insecure. Man has baggage. Man falls in love with woman DESPITE her flaws. Man temporarily loses woman. Man realizes his mistake. Man chases after woman. Bada bing, bada boom. Happy Ending. Oh, and Man has a best friend who simultaneously gets the girl. She is obviously way out of his league.

If only life were that simple.

My romantic comedy:

• Would star Jamie Chung… as me, of course! She’ll be the skinnier, way prettier version. Reality is already skewed to begin with.
• I’d have a career like Elle’s (Legally Blonde, but not that blonde). I’ll be pursuing a profession that seems effortless to the ordinary person. Little do you know that in all honesty, I work my ass off.
• Somehow, I’d be the perfect combination between Meredith Gray and Christina Yang.
• No, I have not decided what the profession would be.
• My love interest would be some dashing fellow like Will Smith or Josh Duhamel or Daniel Dae Kim. He’s clearly smart.
• Some “unfortunate” accident happens—the narrative hook. Yes, it ends with a resolution.
• Happily ever after.

The feminist in me wants you to know that I also find the story above extremely repulsive. Psh, happily-ever-afters don’t end with finding the man—they end with high-powered careers!

Ugh, so torn.

Oh, Snap.

Nothing screams Big Brother louder than Snapchat, hacked: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

Okay, maybe that was a slight exaggeration. But still, it’s kind of a big deal—not to mention, completely 1984-esque.

I woke up this morning to find that I was among 4.6 million Snapchat users whose accounts were hacked. The “altruistic” hackers kindly made public my username and telephone number (minus a digit or two) in the name of privacy. Apparently, their goal was to highlight Snapchat’s lack of full functioning safeguards. I was simply the necessary casualty. Hello, not cool.

Aside from Snapchat’s questionable commitment to user privacy, I’ve been mulling over a related problem of my own. Are you familiar with FOMO? I generally like to think that I’m unaffected by the fear of missing out. Facebook posts by my high school friends keep me updated about their lives but I’m not one to stalk or constantly pore over their pictures. I certainly don’t spend a lot of time wishing I was ‘partying it up’ with them or stressing over whether or not I was invited to in the first place.  That type of anxiety aside, I do admit that my phone is somewhat attached to my hip. Even though I’m not super interested in the “social media know-how,” I do like the feeling of its prospects at my fingertips. The side affects of being a Millennial, I guess.

Here’s the thing, I have yet to get rid of my Snapchat account. What’s my problem? FOMO. While I pride myself on lacking social media anxiety the delete button seems all too harsh. My best friend snaps me at least 20 goofy pictures a day. My other friends send me at least another 5. My dad snaps me too, occasionally. Come on, even my Dad! And Snapchat has this highly addictive list system where it calculates the users you send the most snaps to. I mean, hey, I’m all for its popularity contest. But where will I be if I leave it all behind? I can’t help the nudging feeling of FOMO and being forgotten.

Thanks to the hackers, tying my username to my phone number may help thieves connect dots making it easier for them to steal consumer identities and financial accounts. God, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Only, I see no better option than to exercise control and hit delete.

2014, you’re proving to be quite the wake up call.

Frozen…Solid!

(Photo: http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Frozen)

To ring in the ole’ 2013, my siblings and I decided to go watch Frozen, the latest Disney animated movie. Based on The Snow Queen, by Hans Christian Andersen, Frozen illustrates the relationship between two sisters, both of whom are princesses of Arendelle. The older sister, Elsa, has cryokentic powers that she is unable to control. After accidently injuring her younger sister, Anna, Elsa spends most of her time alone, afraid that she would hurt someone again. Like most Disney movies, their parents are quickly removed from the plotline—by fatal shipwreck. Eventually, it comes time for Elsa’s coronation. After a series of unfortunate events, however, she unleashes an eternal winter on Arendelle before fleeing. In an effort to save her kingdom, Anna hunts down Elsa in hopes of convincing her sister to return. (A more detailed synopsis can be found on Wikipedia)

Thanks to the catchy sing-a-long songs, I was immediately smitten. Who better to play the beautiful Elsa than Idina Menzel? But walking away from the theater, still wrapped up in the ooey-gooey magic of happy endings, I was relieved. Disney finally redeemed itself.

Taking a stand against most of its traditional princess stories, Disney chose to shatter the image of “love at first sight.” At one point, Anna’s real love interest, Kristoff, asks her in complete amazement, how she got engaged to Hans, the prince of the Southern Isles, after spending less than 24 hours with him. How exactly does one know? Call me a skeptic, but I’ve never been fond of Romeo and Juliet. It’s attraction, lust, and curiosity—the makings of love—but definitely not love. Hans is soon revealed as a power-hungry bloodsucker, 13^th in line to the throne in his own kingdom. Whoops, spoiler. And the act of true love? Plot twist: genuine sibling affection—duh!

Apart from my own vindication (you know, the part where there so such thing as real-deep-meaningful love at first sight) here’s what I also learned:

• My sister, Annett, is convinced they’ll make Frozen a Broadway musical. Ah, Disney, here’s your chance to profit more off our crippled desire for happy endings.
• My brother, Jei, wishes Elsa was a real human being because then he’d find a way to date her. Jei is 13. Don’t worry buddy, I thought Snow White’s Prince Charming was the shit at your age. What am I saying? I still do.
• Always name your snowman Olaf.
• There are way too many Lemony Snicket references here.

Just in case my rambling got you interested, here’s the trailer!

New Year: New Me?

I just spent a little over an hour deciding on a theme for this blog. Of course, after poring over dozens, I ended up picking the simplest one. Key word: low maintenance.

To be extremely honest, this is not my first blog. I have wined and dined plenty of first posts—most of which include a sincere sentence or two about my eagerness to see the blog through. Unfortunately, my attention span is severely limited. I lose interest in anything and everything extremely quickly. The blog never makes it to a second post and I end up deactivating it. Out of side, out of mind. Bottom line (and completely justified), it never happened. RIP.

But, here’s to a new year! Happy 2014! What better a new year’s resolution than to write—to begin again what I have failed to do so many times?

With the yearly promises of losing weight and making money, here’s mine:

I, Paula Ya-Jen Ho, promise (solemnly swear) to write one blog post a day. Together, the 365 posts, if not more, will make an online journal of my wildest thoughts and immature musings. It will be another voice of Generation Y. And, I will look commitment in the face.

For crying out loud, I am not getting any younger. I will write.