*REMINDER* this is indeed one of those boring, yesterday i did this and that, today i did this and that post, so dont read it if you want something insightful or touching.

^mcgregor always plays the most endearing male roles *sighs contentedly* and after this movie, im officially a renee fan! all the moving animals in her imagination made me smile .

bahhh, i should've posted sooner. so many things have happened, but i've forgotten a bunch of them . this is going to be a bulky, bulky post. *edit* bulky bulky BULKY post.

uc berkeley day one. merry was 45 mins late ! it took us two bart transfers to get to downtown berkeley, but it was ok because merry had a feathery chinese-kick-around-thing for everyone to play with. walked hella far along shattuck to barneys for burgers and then ate curly fries while waiting for angela, zach, and eric to get there. i dont know what was so "gourmet" about the burgers, but the serving size was generous and the burgers were deliciouslt satisfying (and i only had half!), so who cares?
         then walked hella far to jenny's co-op, which is super cool because you get to paint your room/door however you want! stole some grapes from the stock in their fridge and used some of the "use me!" labeled sunscreen they had near the door as well XD.
        walked hella far to eric and zach's apartment, which was, i swear, about 300 sq feet shared among 3 boys. when miranda recieved a prank call, janet took over and threatened to stalk the prankers down and slit their throats LMAO. anyways, after admiring the boys' resolve to live so... intimately with with each other for the next school year, we walked to angela's place to admire her suitemate's hella high ceiling.
        then we walked hella, hella far to patrick's place (stopped by a gelato place first). lifan and serena were there too so i tried to pitch the idea of sleeping over again like i did last year and turning into a tradition, but lifan looked horrified so i let it go. their place is SO NICE, but SO FAR. we went to check out the roof before we left, and i was so excited at the chance to play with the frisbee i got from outside lands! in my brash excitement, i flicked my wrist too much and the frisbee swerved RIGHT OVER THE ROOF. EFFFFF. ahhhh, it actually fell to the porch right below, but there were two wheelchairs there too and i didnt want to ask those people go through the trouble of fetching the frisbee for me, so we just left it there .
        picked up some pizza and brought it to garnet's apartment where we had some of her mum's homemade apply pie as well! by that time it was pretty late, so everyone went their seperate ways. i stalked angela back to her suite, and we watch hot fuzz before going to bed.

uc berkeley day two. angela swiped me in for breakfast *happy happy* then hung out with merry since angela didnt save us seats in her english class (i didnt want to sit through a chaucer lecture anyway =X). we played duece for like an hour outside the berkeley library. we wanted to play with punishments in which the loser, depending on how many cards they had left in their hand when they lost, had to high five the same number of people in the vicinity. it was perfect because there were a bunch of tour groups walking around, but alas, we were too chicken. if only janet was there to encourage us XD. then we followed angela to her asian american studies class which is taught by the most amiable smartly-dressed old asian man. he's actually from sf! grew up in western addition then moved to richmond XD. afterwards we parted with angela and followed jenny to her tae-kwon-do class... which we couldn't enter because it was in the gym and you needed an id card to get in T__T. *sigh* more duece with merry at the cafe outside the gym XD. haha, then we went to the asian ghetto for some korean food! i got the kimchi goosoo, which was ok =X. the menu was adorable though! in the back it had a couple of customer tips: "be nice to ajumma and she will give you extra." "learn the ways of the world (bribes, complements), and ajumma will give you bigger portions." "being rude to ajumma will..." and the tips went on
      after lunch i headed back to sf, and met angela at century 20 for a screening of Sex Drive. it was actually pretty sweet! the main character was ernest, and seth green and james marsden were hilarious in their roles. at any rate, i thought it was better than Pineapple Express, but not as good as Tropic Thunder. XD

biking. miranda had two bikes at her grandparents, so she lent me one and we rode to and along ocean beach . after we met up with merry on her bike, we were going to bike to Lowell, but one of the pedals on miranda's bike suddenly FELL OFF. merry, with her awesome biking skills somehow managed to ride it with one pedal to a gas station. miranda then asked the men there and they actually fixed it for free! or so we thought... 2 blocks later the pedal FELL OFF AGAIN. the gas station worked actually made it worse T__T. merry to the rescue! with her incredible biking skills, we made it to ggp where after a dead end and a trip to visit the buffalos later, we were playing frisbee near the polo fields.

afghani food. who knew such an exotic menu existed just 4 blocks from my home? not i! it was our last meal with miranda before she went back to the east coast for school, and she brought andrew too! i think my favorite dish was the borani badenjan (an eggplant dish), served with the delicious afghan bread that i could not get enough of ! we got like, 3 servings of the bread throughout the meal. mMmmm, it was so warm and carby and gooOooood
     sidenote. merry's pigeon. must mentioned that before all this, merry found a famished looking pigeon drinking sewage water on the street and soon found herself at the nearest liquor store purchasing some of the new g2 gatorade for it. ("it has electrolytes!") she poured some into the cap and left it on the street for the pigeon (who was so famished it didnt care that she was so close and actually did go for the drink), which left her with a capless gatorade bottle. too embarrassed to enter the restuarant with the bottle, she left it on the street outside, but when we left, someone had already picked it up .

eliza. several memorable sleepovers recently. 1. it was getting late, she was not thinking clearly, and i took advantage... she'd kill me for posting it on here, so this will just serve as a reminder for me. something involving hand to cheek action, and a lost game of duece. 2. i kicked her ass at mario kart, INCLUDING rainbow road. a once in a lifetime opportunity, so im going to treasure it, huzzah! 3. she screamed so loud when i told her a ghost story that it woke her dad up. he came barging in thinking winfield had tried to "do something" to her. winfield's impromptu explanation, "She thought she saw a monster." HAHAHAHAHA*dies*

asian art museum. eliza's dad is a member, so even though he was supposed to be present in order to get us in, we put on our disappointed faces and they made an exception, yayy! we got there late, so we had to rush through the japanese and korean exhibits (sadness!), but at least i got to take my time at the chinese exhibits . the silk garmets were so beautiful, i couldnt keep my hands away. good thing the glass was there to stop me! i remember there was this one artwork which from far away looked like a humongous painting of a red beast, but when you get closer, you realize that everything is EMBROIDERED. the threads had retained their bold colors, and when i got close enough to see the detail, it really was incredible. the description read, "The amount of working hours put into this piece is immeasurable..." no kidding!

church picnic. water balloons + cute little children + playful deacons = a whole lot of fun! frisbees + cliff = a lot of time wasted retrieving frisbees and balls, but still a whole lot of fun! there was also yummy barbecue foods, as well as multipurpose grills that were good as smore roasting stations as well . after the picnic, the younger people went to malibu for mini-golf. i was pretty bad, but it was still fun! afterwards, we exchanged our golfballs for tokens and played a game of arcade basketball between eliza, zsazsa, and i. in which i won . then to somewhere in daly city for some yummy pho. lots of sharing amongst our table .

Il Postino. part of sf's "film night in the park" project. it was held at washington square park at north beach, and because we got there super early because eliza thought dusk meant 6 even though they didnt really start playing the film until 8, we went to naia for some gelato first. it wasnt until the clerk had already scooped our order that i saw the sign on the register (half covered by reciepts mind you) that read, "cash only." luckily, the lady ahead of us was kind enough to treat us. but not before she said to the little boy with her, "these girls ordered ice cream even though they didnt have money!" LOL... ._____________. i still love her nevertheless . anyways, for 2 hours until the movie started, we staked out our spot, ate gelato, read magazines, and played "this or that."
         the movie itself. was sweetly humorous in the main character's witty remarks and blunt personality. his emotions were simple and transparent, but still incredibly touching and relatable. definitely a recommended movie, although Life is Beautiful still reigns as the BEST EUROPEAN FILM EVER. Pan's Labyrinth  is a close second.

winfield. havent seen him for what, almost 2 years, and he's just about the same . leana has stayed awesome as well. we just played a lot. first duece and phase 10, then learned to play rummy with leana too. there was also mario party 8 and olympics on his wii. the hours just flew by. i stressed out my arms so bad playing olympics (tails is super cute, ftw), i think i pulled something. the pain was so bad it woke me up several times that night -____-;. BUT IT WAS WORTH IT. even though i got my ass kicked. by eliza no less . BUT ITS OK BECAUSE I KICK HER ASS ON MARIO KART, MWAHAHAHA. afterwards, we picked up some ice cream at safeway and went back to eliza's house to play scattergories. after that winfield wanted to leave but i made him stay so i could tell a scary story. im hella good because i made eliza scream hella loud, and this was when her dad came barging in, ready to beat the heck out of winfield for whatever he'd tried to do XD.

^it was ok. i appreciated george clooney's attempts at comedy but meh =/. although i must say, he and zeta-jones are definitely very nice to look at =X

i lost my favorite dr grip pen at church this sunday, im so sad!! i hope i can somehow get it back this sunday >____<. if you've tried writing with that pen, you'd understand.

but aside from that, i've been trying to fill my days since summer school ended. lets see...

8/17. said goodbye to ernie D=. the pk's moving to RI, boo!! even if i only see him during the summer, he's such a sweet kid! i couldnt find a good time to say goodbye, so by the time i managed to say it, i'd already miss the group biking experience with the lowell kids at ggp, boo! at least i managed to join them for lunch (and that's the important part anyway, right?) we went to this thai place on 9th btw judah and irving, ordered crispy noodles, curry, pad thai, something with squid? ,and lotsa rice (you gotta pay ber bowl there! cheapos!). afterwards we went to merry's abandoned house (i only write this here because i know she doesnt read it) on the pretense of helping her feed junior (whom i terrorized in my attempts to pet him. he ran under the bed -___-;), watched some random stuff, enjoyed her mum's massage chair pad, and played wii sports! oh yes, we ate her pringles too (she asked us too!)

8/19. lowell kids again! got in for free at the metreon with screening tickets for the rocker but sneaked into tropic thunder instead. i had very low expectations, so it was very good in contrast! the lines were so ridiculous everyone jsut had to laugh out loud XD. ohohoho man i dont know how they think of such things to say XD. downey jr. was a VERY CONVICING black man. although... that last part with tom cruise probably has me scarred for life *shivers* T_____T

8/20. can you believe it lowell kids again??!! we wanted to squeeze in as much time together as possible before everyone left for college. (theresa's flying back this sat to st. louis, berkeley kids move in this weekend, and miranda returns to nj next week.... ). today we went to malibu for go karts, video games, bumber boats, and mini golf. we planned to get there at 11, but ended up arriving at around 2 instead . oh well, at least we got to play hearts on the caltrain! i wanted to walk there from the caltrain station, but when we inquired at a sports store, the guy there said it'd take 45 mins to walk through a sketchy neighborhood so... yeah, we took samtrans instead. anyways, malibu was was HELLA expensive but... oh well~ everyone got soaked after bumper boats, but we quickly dried off while playing mini golf under the sun! what else... nothing much, except we stopped by panera on the way back for dinner. on theresa's suggestion i got the brocolli and cheddar soup; yayyy more yummy food