Posts tagged with "self-portrait"

A Visit From Big Sister

Sushi with Misun

Misun, aka my big sis­ter, vis­it­ed from France yes­ter­day. We gorged our­selves on all-you-can-eat sushi, and I let her sur­prise me by choos­ing not to know what she ordered for us. Now I wish I had kept note so I could order the same things again.

Sushi with me

It was hard to argue with her about the bill. She kept insist­ing that she pay because she’s old­er (from her Korean cul­ture), and I kept insist­ing that I pay because I’m the host (from my Chinese cul­ture). I even used the argu­ment that if it’s the elder who pays, then she would always be pay­ing. Unfortunately, the host­ess took her side and refused my mon­ey.

She was only able to stay in Ottawa for the night, but before turn­ing in well beyond our bed­times, we caught up as peo­ple can only do in per­son. We’d been keep­ing in touch the whole time we’ve been apart, and now had the chance to fill in the details.

The time I most felt like I knew what it was to have a sis­ter was when we brushed our teeth togeth­er in the bath­room. Afterward, we com­pared grey hair, me laugh­ing at her three strands, as I have a steady diet of salt added to my pep­per.

Misun's note

When I woke up, I found this cute note, with our faces (includ­ing Dolly’s) drawn on it.

Versace Frames

Versace glasses

I want­ed a bold­er look this time, since my last pair is much more sub­tle. Actually, they’re still my cur­rent pair, as I wear one or the oth­er, depend­ing on the mood.

Following the trend in most of my designs, I’m going for more con­trast and stronger state­ments.

They did­n’t sit quite cor­rect­ly on my face (or most Asian faces, the sales rep told me, as we have nar­row nose bridges), because they don’t have nose pieces. The frames would be too low for my face and my eye­lash­es would brush against the lens­es, so I had to order some nose pads to add on myself, et voilà. A per­fect fit.

Versace logos

Of note is the logo on the arms. This is the first time that I’ve seen the Versace logo like this, but fur­ther research indi­cates that it’s an uncom­mon­ly used alter­nate logo. I thought it was because the reg­u­lar logo would have lines that are too fine for small rep­re­sen­ta­tions, but that does­n’t appear to be the case, as I’ve seen it even small­er on watch­es and bracelets too. Which is just as well, as I would­n’t care to wear any­thing with the Medusa’s head on it.

Boxer Briefs

Boxer briefs

She bought me these box­er briefs. Calvin Klein, body cut, light­weight cot­ton con­struc­tion.

Until then, all the under­wear I had were plaid XS box­ers from The Gap that I could only find online, or XXL from Gap Kids, dec­o­rat­ed with rock­ets, and bas­ket­balls, and skiers. I did­n’t think she’d find any­thing else that would work on my small frame.

So this is my first pair of box­er briefs, and they fit. My sexy under­wear, she would call them. I guess it’s hard to find my oth­er under­wear sexy when it’s meant for those 7–14.

Lost Among Friends

Wrapping pigs in a blanket

Thumbnail: Washing beaters
Thumbnail: cantaloupe seeds
Thumbnail: Making French toast
Thumbnail: Thick cut maple bacon
Thumbnail: Pouring smoothies
Thumbnail: Cooked waffles
Thumbnail: Cheesecake
Thumbnail: Cooked pigs
Thumbnail: French toast
Thumbnail: Cantaloupe slices
 

Sunday pot luck brunch was a lit­tle dif­fer­ent this week­end; instead of head­ing to Tim’s, I was at Pat and Jen’s. It was col­lec­tion time for a sit-up com­pe­ti­tion (where Julie destroyed every­one in both the largest total sit-ups and most improved over the last two months, win­ning $60), and we decid­ed to get togeth­er to see how every­one was feel­ing, per­haps com­pare a six-pack or two.

There were home­made waf­fles, fresh fruit, hon­ey bacon, French toast, pigs in blan­kets, smooth­ies, crois­sants, and cheese­cake. So much deli­cious food that I could eat, now that I’m on med­ica­tion to con­trol food induced flare-ups, and I hap­pi­ly gorged myself.

Waffle with fruit

It was such a lazy Sunday. Long con­ver­sa­tions sit­ting around the table, then hang­ing out and play­ing games for hours while the food digest­ed.

Pat lat­er told me he used to come here and read about what’s hap­pen­ing with me, but has stopped read­ing alto­geth­er. The rea­son — and he paused as he was telling me this so that I under­stood the grav­i­ty of it — was that he would rather hear things from me per­son­al­ly.

While this is far from the first time I’ve writ­ten about my friend­ship with him, it still amazes me. We rarely get any one-on-one time, even when I’m over at his house on the week­ends for food and con­ver­sa­tion, unless it’s on the phone.

Pat always takes such a con­cern about what’s going on in my life. He asks all the right ques­tions. He lis­tens whole­heart­ed­ly with­out inter­rupt­ing. He nev­er judges me. He calms me because every­thing he says makes so much sense. Just being able to open up, where I’m vul­ner­a­ble, and have him com­plete­ly accept what I’m say­ing makes me over­flow with emo­tion.

Maybe I just need some­one to under­stand me right now.

Self portrait

I think I’m going through a peri­od where I’m not get­ting enough social inter­ac­tion. My friends are too busy, or our sched­ules don’t work out. It’s left me con­fused and dis­il­lu­sioned.

Everyone seems to fit some­where, but I’m not sure where that leaves me. On days like this, when I’m sur­round­ed by peo­ple, it makes me think that per­haps I still don’t know where I belong.