beautiful . solitude

After many, many hours of searching and trying, I brought home something that were not along the lines of what I originally had in mind.

A pair of CLARKS.  With heels.  2" heels and 1/2" platforms, to be exact.

My venture of the day started with a fieldtrip to SAS, where a professional shoe fitter spent at least half an hour on me going thru the different styles and the sizes that cater best to my feet.  It turns out that I fall somewhere in-between 7 1/2 ~ 8, with one foot significantly bigger than the other.  My feet are also very thin (thickness-wise) and extremely bony, with very little meat at the heels.  This sort of feet are unsuitable for loafers (which were, unfortunately, my usual shoe of choice), because my heels do not fill into the backs of the shoes, and would end up slipping out with every step.  And then the backs would pop into my ankle bones because they stick out.  A lot. 

So all that would explain why I could never find the perfect dress shoe all these years.  After being stupid all this time, I realized that the solution to this problem would be Mary Janes (the strap) or laced shoes, and even better if with slightly lower backs.  Now the thing with Mary Janes is that, as much as I love them, I also love (and have the need) to wear stockings that are thicker than the average trouser socks, which do not mix very well with Mary Janes.  Not to mention SAS didnt have any Mary Jane style shoes.  As for lace-up dress shoes ...

I left SAS knowing that I most likely would not be returning.   I simply could not spend more than 100 bucks on a pair of shoes that I would only wear at work, unless I plan to work there forever.

Tho this is not the first time for me to be mistaken as a Korean, I have never had anyone who was so SHE MUST BE KOREAN to me in a very multi-cultural environment.  So the scenario was as follows --

Me helping two customers at the check-out line.  One was a returning customer who knew me and the other was ... some guy.  They were both Chinese, and spoke a dialect that sounded very similar to 四川話, but sounded a little different to me (tho it could be 四川話 after all, since the only 四川話 I ever hear is from 婆婆).

Man (when he first saw me): GASP, a KOREAN girl! (as if he has never seen a Korean girl in person before)

Lady:  No she's Taiwanese. (and proceded to ask me a whole bunch of questions, in Mandarin, about our winter merchandise.  I answer them)

Man:  But she speaks MANDARIN!

It's been a while since we've worked side-by-side, so when Mr. C asked which register I wanted to take, I chose the one next to him (it was also partially because I wanted to avoid the responsibility of having to returns on that other machine).  Business was steady, for the most part, but not overwhelming, so I was free to work on my other assigned tasks instead of having to hang out up front.  But then the ladies with the manic kids who wouldnt shut the hell up came to check-out with quite a number of items in their cart.  Like "old times," he came to help my bag the merchandise.  While I was only on item 3, he said:

"Let me do this (check the items) because I do this lightning fast.  You can bag instead." 

And he proceded to take over my register while I clumsily moved aside.  I was a little embarrassed to be thought of as slow, but then again, he didnt seem to be doing it all that quickly, either.  After we finished the handling the customers and had them sent out the door, I asked "so how was THAT lightning fast?"

"I dunno," he shrugged. 

Ah, back track.  So I had originally helped these customers with the stroller because one of the two would not stop crying and yelling at the top of his lungs.  The kids were okay for a while until the mother decided that she would not be purchasing the pair of batman slippers, which had been with the hands of one of the kids, for him, after all.  So he started to cry.  Again.  Actually I couldnt tell the two apart, so it could have been the other one.  Anyway, after experiencing such a high noise level at a very close distance, he decided to offer this toy car (which he had been playing with all morning) to this kid.  The kid calmed down immediately.

I had a dream last nite where I thought very hard to remember the cyworld username for the girl whom I thought came in between me and my previous boyfriend.  It was a coincidence that all of our usernames started with the letter H, but no matter how hard I tried to remember, I couldnt.

I woke up for a bit thinking about the issue and went back to sleep.  In the dreams that occurred afterwards, I came up with two names that began with H.  One was Herbig and the other was Herndon, and I just couldnt decide which one it was.

I still do not remember, and am thankful that I dont.  Herbig is Rebecca's married name and Herndon was the name of a student teacher that worked with our class back in second grade.  Kelley Hamrick is not my cousin, and George Clooney does not live in a dormitory-like apartment building.

I am just glad that I do not remember, and hopefully never will.

I know that things will never be able to go back to the way they used to be.  I knew, know, and should have known better, that NOTHING ever goes back to the way that it used to be.

It either advances or falls behind, and if the latter, eventually fades ... all the way, or to some extent, small or big. 

A long time ago, I had a dream.  And then one day, I was able to grasp it.  Out of pure luck, it came and landed in my lap.  It was perhaps one of the best dreams of my life.

I lived that dream for a couple of years, until one day suddenly, it died -- like the car from before. 

But no ... in reality, I crashed it.  I was the one who had been responsible.  Half of the car was gone -- not my half, but the other half, and a car cannot be driven when only half exists.  Like the relationship.  I had no choice but to let it go.  And for many many days, weeks, months, and years, I suffered -- dreamed -- bad dreams -- about the car.

Hey Teresa.

Hi.

Listen, I'm stuck at school right now -- they really messed up on my paper work.  Do you think you can find a ride to work -- or you can wait for me and we'll just go in late together.

Um, its alright I can find a ride so dont worry about it.  Are you doing okay over there?

Still in line -- been in line for the past three hours.  Apparently they messed up everyone else's paperwork too.

I slept weird last nite.  Went to bed at 9, woke up at 2, back to sleep at 4, woke up at 6 ... finally went to sleep again at 8 and woke up at 9. 

Uh, I went to sleep at 2. 

Why so late?

Trouble sleeping.  Typical old people problem.

I was gonna bring you some egg custards this morning, but totally forgot.

One of the managers told me about her cat today.  While she was on loan from the Ft. Worth store, she made arrangements for a friend to check up on her house and help feed her cat.  The friend wasnt much of an animal lover, and kind of didnt take into account that maybe the ac should be left on for the cat. 

Well, after a while (weeks), the cat got so overheated that she attempted to cool herself down by biting off the hair on her back.  The manager went back home two weekends ago and said her cat was a horrid mess, with weird bald spots all over her back, not to mention how her voice was coarse from meowing all this time (and not getting any attention for it, either).  Poor thing. 

She's now staying with someone instead of being home all by herself.  How come they didnt just do that in the first place?

So ... went to the hostess club last nite.  Its not really worth mentioning, except for how someone offered up to $300 for me to sit at his table.  What I rather think about is this:

Would they have ice cream at Taco Bell?

I dont think you should be eating or drinking anything cold right now.

I really love watching 康熙來了, but the English teachers they have on the show, and including the hosts themselves, speak CRAP English.  Which is FINE really, because not everyone needs to speak English well, if at all, but there is no need to mis-inform the general Taiwanese public with article rules and the meaning of names and what should or should not be a name ...

And wtf is that deal with English names and horoscopes ... like WTF!!!!! 

But yes, stop inviting these so-called ENGLISH TEACHERS to these shows!  They may be excellent teachers and test takers, but they are obviously pretty oblivious in the spoken aspect of the language.  Having any ABC on the show (like 潘瑋柏) ... or Non-ABCs (like 陳宇凡) would be a whole lot better.

For weeks I have had issues with the attachment function in my Gmail account, and have attempted to “solve” the problem by creating new email accounts.  But turns out that the problem lies on my end, and the culprit was my Avant browser (and yes, I am ashamed for realizing it so late, and not without the assistance of my trusty internet friend).  Which means that I have to get rid of it. 

So … what to use now?  Not a Firefox fan, hate Chrome, dont want to use Opera … the new IE?