Meat, meat, and more meat

America loves its bbq and nothing is better thab barbecuing on holidays. Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Arbor Day, all perfect days to take out the grill.

I knew I had a jam packed week. I went out Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night. However, I also knew that none of those nights would involve fire and meat. So I sent the following e-mail to S, B, C, and M.

Welcome back S and B.
I got my post cards and I am excited to hear all about your adventures. I'm sure everyone else is too! If you are not too tired shall we have a bbq on monday or sunday? Whaddya think?

Of course, what I omitted to say was "even though the both of you just came back from two weeks traveling around Europe, going to a wedding on Saturday, and must be exhausted, could you please host a bbq for your ghetto friends who lack any of their own bbq equipment and skills?"

In an attempt to compensate for my lack of manners, I ordered marinaded short ribs from the Korean grocery store. This task was not as easy as expected as there was a lot of misscommunication involved in the process. The woman who answered the phone could not understand English, nor very poorly spoken Korean. Luckily, I did understand her, so we managed to reduce it to a yes and no question session.

There is something very primal about sitting around smoldering coals and cooking meat. There were the three of us with beers in hand, as we ate hot meat as it came off the grill. Of course, we attempted to eat a few veggies, but really we were all about the beef that day.

Eventually, C and his friend N came and joined in the carnage. The old lady in apartment #1 had to close her windows. Maybe it was the sounds of chatting, or maybe it was the aroma of beef. Oh well.

At some point the food pile dwindled, and caffiene became a necessity. We walked to local 7/11 and Dunkin' Donuts for iced delights. When we got back, I fell into a deep food induced coma on S and B's sofa, with the ABC family orginal movie "Karate Dog" in the background.

And while I might go vegetarian for the next week, there is nothing better than the whole meat experience: the arranging of plans, the cooking, the eating, and the sleeping.

Trivial tidbit

My advisor just walked into the lab and asked me this question. "Evil Twin #1, can I ask you a weird question? Why do all the radio stations start with the letter W?" (Apparently, my boss also gets Fridayitis.) "I don't know, but I do know that all the radio stations on the West coast start with the letter K."

For the answer, I found this link .

God, I love the internet.

My future husband

It is a running joke that every man with whom I am even remotely linked to romantically is “my future husband.” Maybe it is because my dating life has been so underwhelming. Maybe it is ironic because I don’t really see myself as the marrying type.

S and her boyfriend D have been trying to set me up with his friend R. D and R are close friends who met in college. They are about as close as guys can be without being best friends. So contact between them is pretty minimal, an errant e-mail once or twice a month.

For the past 7 months, D told me that he thought he and his friend R would be a great match. 1) R is Korean/American. 2) Is not a traditional Korean. 3) Is on the prowl for a Korean/American girlfriend. 4) Is a workaholic and wants to be with someone who is not needy. 5) We have the same last name.

Well, that was fine and dandy, but what was in it for me? 1) He is 5’11. 2) He makes bank at Goldman Sachs. 3) He is a nice guy.

Normally, I would be skeptical about this set-up, especially because white people sometimes generalize (like I am doing right now) and assume that two Koreans will get along automatically. But I trust D, so I hoped for the best.

R lives in NYC and with his busy schedule, has had to cancel on a few of his visits to Boston. D and I had a running joke, “where is my future husband, D?” To which he would always answer, “I’m working on it, Evil Twin #1, I’m workin’ on it.”

So this weekend, R was scheduled to come to Boston. He would fly in and leave the next morning. D made reservations at the Union Oyster House for us, though we were not sure if R would show up. As it turns out, his plane was delayed due to the rain, but because he had promised to come he ended up buying another ticket on a different shuttle and arriving at Logan an hour late.

Five of us ate dinner, S, D, R, J (D’s and R’s college friend), and I. The boys sat at one end of the table and talked about the good old days, who was doing what now, and the latest business news. S and I gossiped about school. So far he was not the man of my dreams. He seemed a little stodgy, a little entrenched in the NYC rat race, a little status obsessed, a little old for just being 31.

After dinner, J went home and the four of us roamed around downtown looking for a quiet bar to talk. The Red Hat is a dive in Beacon Hill. Bruce Hornsby piped through the jukebox. It was well lit with overhead lights covered in green “Rolling Rock” emblems. The floor was a little sticky and before the night was over I killed a bug on the wood panel next to my seat.

We ordered drinks. I ordered a Bud light, D ordered a Sam Adams, S ordered a vodka gimlet, and R attempted to order a Blue Moon with an orange. He got a regular Blue Moon. Besides that it was a pleasant night. The four of us talked until 1 in the morning. He is a nice guy. He and I had a lot more in common than just being Korean Americans. He was from Chicago. He had lived in Japan for 3 years and gave me interesting travel tips. He golfs. But overall, no sparks. <>

Today, I got this following email from S:
don't give up on R yet. he was telling D he liked you, thought you were cute and "had a nice body." i think there may be potential! i think he just needs to open up a bit. D said he would take you out in nyc if you ever went there and he's interviewing for a position in providence......

It made me laugh. 1) Because I was wearing 3 layers of clothing on top that night because it was cold, so the twins were not out in force. He must be a butt man. 2) That S is looking out for me and thinking Providence might work out, but NYC is bad for the long term. 3) I thought of something R said that night. “When we get married, I’ll let you keep your last name.” Look at that, my future husband tried to crack a joke.

Pet Peeve

With the weather getting better, I am seeing more and more women wearing shorts these days. I'm not talking about the athletic shorts that you wear to the gym. I'm talking about formal pants that look like they've been cut off above the knee.

This might be the [un]natural evolution of the gaucho pant (but at least those look comfortable). I have to say that I disapprove. I can deal with cropped pants -- I even have a pair (although at 5'4" my "cropped" pants aren't really that short on me, they skim the ankle). Maybe I'm old-school. Despite what the style section of the NYTimes says, I don't think that anyone should be wearing shorts in the office -- even if you wear a jacket on top. It looks silly. What looks even sillier? The aforementioned outfit worn with pumps/stilletos. Who can pull that off? Well, I guess it's ok, if you want to look like a streetwalker trying to make it in the corporate world. Besides, knees are ugly. Save the shorts for the weekend, people!

Aahhh, I feel much better after venting...

Cancer cure

Each member of my family, including the newer additions like my brother in law, has the need to verify facts. In the seventies, my cash strapped parents never hesitated to plunk down a hefty wad to buy my sister a set of Encyclopaedia Britannica. And while they were definitely useful for social studies reports, more likely than not it was used to prove who was right after a dinner conversation. For instance, when my parents insisted the Mississippi was the longest river in the world, the Britannica said "the longest river in the world is the Nile or the Amazon." (To their defense their Korean dictionary defined the Mississippi as the longest river in the world.) Or after we watched the movie "Ghandi" and we wanted to verify he actually went to school in England. Or to find out if "El Cid" really existed?But then came the internet. Our lives became incredibly more simplified. So three Christmas's ago when my dad and I argued on the age of Linda Carter, we hopped on the information super highway and discovered that my dad was correct. Now why anyone would care how old Wonder Woman is insane but so is our family.

On occasion, a topic comes up that cannot be verified in the Encyclopedias nor by a Google search. So last night my dad called me:

Dad: Evil Twin #1, what’s goin’ on?

ET#1: Ummmm not much. I am about to eat dinner and watch TV. What’s up? (Understand readers, that my parents have just come back from being in Korea for over a month. I talked to my mother earlier that day to say “Happy Mother’s Day” and she had over an hour’s worth of stories.)

Dad: Okay so I read in the Korean news that professor at Seoul National University found cure for cancer.

ET#1: Ummm. I think I might have missed that one. Are you sure you read correctly?

Dad: Of course. Right, Mom. [Mom in the background confirms she also saw it on the televised Korean news.] Here I’m going to read it to you….

There was a long conversation in which I tried to interpret what my Dad was translating the newspaper article from Korean to English, which was taken from a scientific journal article that initially written in English by Korean people and translated into Korean by journalists.

Unfortunately, I am obsessive compulsive and I spent the rest of the night looking through scientific articles to find this one. I mean I do study cancer and if they these Korean scientist have found a cure I might have to find a new career path, right? Using PubMed and Google normally, it takes me only a few minutes to find an article. However, there was definitely stuff lost in the number of translations and after 4 hours I had to call it quits.

This morning I came into the lab and started my search again. This time I realized I had to stop looking for it scientifically. I typed in “Korean scientist cancer cure Baek.” On the second item that popped up, I found the story featured in the Korean Times and it cited the primary article. Yay, success. I found the article and forwarded it to my Dad. Now, if only I put this much energy in my own work maybe a Korean might actually find the cure for cancer.

Diseased

I think the diseases that I get are completely reflective of who I am. No, I am not riddled with VDs. Quite the opposite. This week’s ailment is conjunctivitis, pink eye. It is the disease that you get from water parks in the summer, the oozing eyes of kindergartners, and apparently walking around in molecular biology labs. I have to say that it is disturbing to see my reflection in the morning with my left eye encrusted with yellow goo. Not to worry it is viral, a product of a cold gone awry.

My one eyed self called my sister for a little of sisterly pity (normally, I would call my mother but she is still in Korea.) “Hey, there was an outbreak of pinkeye at N’s daycare.” Yes, me and the 2 year old share diseases cross country.

But it made me think. I remembered getting the chicken pox during Thanksgiving vacation senior year of college. I was quarantined in my dorm room, except to go to the pharmacy. Unfortunately, the medication used to treat chicken pox is the same medication used to treat genital herpes. So I am sure when the pharmacist saw a twenty-one year old coed go trying to fill this medication….. The worst part is that our health insurance was so poor that I had to by the generic version of the drug. I could not take the drug that had me swinging off a tree in a field of daisies. No, mine was the kind you got at the free clinic in the middle of ghetto.

A few years ago, I got an ear infection that prevented me from flying. Otitis media is normally reserved for babies, because they need to grow to have their heads to drain fluid properly. Or you could be a 28 year old female with a head cold.

When I went to the doctor’s office on Friday, I could not help but wonder if all of these childhood ailments are a reflection of my maturity level. What do you think is next? I kind of am hoping for boy cooties.

smaller than you'd think

For a city with a population of over 8 million people, New York is a lot smaller than it seems. About two years ago, I went to an ex-coworker's wedding and didn't know a single soul there. I made small talk with some people that were at my table. But once we ran out of things to talk about, I filled the awkward silence by pouring myself another glass of wine. I blame the bride and groom -- it was really good wine, not the usual crap they serve at weddings.

I got trashed. Not quite as bad as my most recent birthday, but I was seriously drunk. So much so, that I didn't object when one of the few single men ("FSM") at the wedding reception asked me to dance. He was a lawyer that had been at my old firm. He had left a few months before I started working there. He was a nice enough guy, and, given my extremely drunken state, it seemed like a good idea to join him and his friends at the after party at some club downtown. I say "downtown" because the wedding was at the NY Botanical Garden in the Bronx and Manhattan is downtown, relative to the Bronx. I have no recollection of where we drove to. I do remember being cold and him giving me his coat. What a gentleman.

After some more drinks at the club and dancing until the wee hours of the morning, I was in no shape to trek all the way to el barrio by myself, so he offered to let me stay at his place which was near Lincoln Center. Normally, I would say no. But, as a result of the vast amount of alcohol coursing through my veins, I said, "ok!". I think I might have thrown up in his toilet, but I honestly don't remember. I do remember the next morning when I had to do the walk of shame to the Columbus Circle subway station in the party clothes from the night before. Again, the gentleman, he walked me to the subway station and he asked for my number. My response? "Oh, just call the operator at work and they can connect you!" I think I may have still been drunk. In my head, this made sense as he did not have anything to write my number on -- in retrospect, I doubt that he took that as an invitation to call me. He never did.

Fast forward two years. My client tells me that the other party's lawyer will be calling me to discuss the transaction that I am staffed on. He tells me the laywer's name and gives me his contact info. I am instructed to call said lawyer if he does not contact me by tomorrow morning. Business as usual. I got a call earlier this afternoon:

Me: Evil Twin #2.

Caller: Hello, Evil Twin #2. It's [name that I did not recognize]. I'm not sure if you remember me.

Me: Uhhh... I'm sorry. I don't remember you.

Caller: We met at [old coworker]'s wedding. It's been a while. How have you been?

Me: Wow!! [in my head, Holy Shit! OMG, this is the person that's representing the other party...] Umm, ok!! How are you?

(I had translated the awkwardness I was feeling into an unusually perky speech pattern)

Caller: I wanted to call you before discussing the transaction. . .

At that point I tuned out, and in my head I kept saying to myself, "OMG, OMG, OMG, I have to negotiate a deal with a guy that I've made out with and whose toilet I think I may have puked in. OMG, OMG, OMG. God is punishing me.

The Times They Are a Changing...

My youngest brother is dying, or at least thinks he's dying, to go to Columbia. He's on the wait list right now and whenver I ask him about whether he's heard anything he sounds like a spurned lover that's coming out of an emotionally abusive relationship. It's high drama and extremes of emotion.

I'm not quite sure why he is sooooo enamored with Columbia. I mean, I loved my time there, but he's only been there about 8 times (my family would drive up in the fall and help me move in and then again in the spring to help me move out). I guess kids (he made those trips between the ages of 6 and 10) really are impressionable. All those road trips from Pittsburgh to NYC really affected him and he believes that 116th and Broadway is the only place to spend his next 4 years.

If he does get in, his experience will be totally different from mine (and by extension a fair number of our readers). Morningside Heights has totally gentrified. I think our class ('98) was the last class to have what I like to think of as a true Columbia experience. I remember eating soup (with a dirty spoon) late at night at Grandma's, making late night runs to Love's when I should have been studying (Balls is still bitter that I did better on the GChem exam second semester than I did first semester when I didn't even go to lecture second semester -- this proves my point that Lenny Fine's book was totally useless), getting a heart shaped bagel from Columbia Bagels one Valentine's Day (it was nice to know that someone loved me enough to give me their heart!), and getting so drunk at the West End during the Hukelau that Kentak had to give me a piggy back ride home across dangerously icy sidewalks and streets.

I was up at campus a few weeks ago to say goodbye to the West End. Nothing like cheap beer in plastic cups to bring back the college experience, except that the West End's last days included 3 baby strollers parked inside on a Friday night. The West End is now a Havana Central (a chain Cuban restaurant). Some places have closed and I don't really miss them -- Cannon's is a prime example. But some places are so tied into my college experience that it saddens me to think that I'll never be able to relive that experience. Columbia Bagels is no more, replaced by a high rise building. ET#1 and I made a pilgrimage to Columbia Bagels a few weeks before it closed forever. Nussbaum and Wu is a poor substitute. I am sad to report that another local favorite is closing. Unlike the West End, La Rosita served GREAT food. Even though I didn't frequent it as much as I should have, I will miss it. 20-20 hindsight, I guess. If anyone wants to head up there one last time to say farewell, let me know...

Saying goodbye.... to a backpack?

One tenant in many religions involves detaching oneself from material possessions. Apparently, this Evil twin does not follow all religious tenants. I love my possessions. Not all of them, but a lot of them. For instance, I loved our 1974 Volvo and cried when my Dad decided to give it throw it away. I love my purse that I just bought for my birthday. It is yellow, leather, not too femme, and makes me happy when I carry it around. Some possessions, I did not even realize I have affection for until I had to give it away.

My backpack is sage green with a leather bottom and has only a front compartment and main compartment. (The backpacks of today are way too pocketed.) It is the perfect size to carry books and a lunch. It has a handle on the top which holds my flashing light for when I ride my bicycle in the dark.

I don't know when the backpack was purchased. I imagine that my sister bought it at Mccaulou's on our back to school shopping spree. There are pictures of her in junior high sporting this canvas beauty, and since that was the only store we ever shopped in for school supplies it is a pretty safe bet. Being the younger sister, I often got hand-me-downs. Getting out of fashion blue corduroy knickers, made me a little bitter and jealous of my sister's things. (Its obvious by now I learned nothing at CCD). So when I got my sister's backpack, I cannot say I was thrilled. I tried losing it a few times, but it had miraculous boomerang technology. After a while I gave in because it was functional.

Over the years, it has needed some repair. Jansport used to have a lifetime warranty. You could send your bag into the company and they would fix the zipper, the fraying inside and the holes. The bag would return with a letter from you bag saying how much fun it had at backpack camp. Slightly odd, but it was very cute.

For the past few weeks, I have noticed that the zipper was not functioning. It splits apart in the middle of the zipper. It was time to send the bag back to "camp." However, I was horrified to find out that Jansport had changed its warranty to the normal life span of a bag. But what is the average life span of a backpack? Mine is over twenty years old. Do you think that is pushing it?

I am going to send it anyway. We will see what Jansport says. I hope it can be repaired, because I love my backpack. It has come to represent my very long academic career. It’s very "old school" and vintage. Okay that is an exaggeration there is nothing stylish about it, but maybe that is why I love it so.