On a whim, I got a calligraphic pen last week.  I’ve been enjoying practicing these letters every day, although I have long way to go to get consistent shapes and spacings.  

I made chocolate truffles this weekend — pretty easy to do ingredient wise but somewhat messy.  The messiness part reminded me of trying to make a dog shaped candle in college and I ended up getting hot wax all over my hands and clogging the drain as the wax dried in the pipes.  Thankfully that didn’t happen with the chocolate but my hands were pretty greased up afterwards. I also tried making lemon tarts yesterday using a non-three michelin star chef approved recipe and the results were disastrous.  The amount of sugar and acidic lemon the recipe called for was like a punch in the mouth when I tasted it.  I guess there are some tastes that only 8 year olds can enjoy…

So last Saturday I biked to this brunch place with my roommate and he was telling me that he and Nick and another person were planning on going to Japan and then Malaysia in May and asked if I wanted to go. I’ve been letting this simmer in my mind ever since thinking, Sounds exciting! I don’t remember when I last traveled for fun before! Should I go? I should probably decide soon before tickets become expensive. I just heard on the radio that buying tickets 81 days in advance is the sweet spot in international airfare (51 for domestic flights). I wonder how much hotels and everything will be? Will my manager let me go? What is there to do there? Should I bring my study materials? Well, yesterday I found out I have to be around in May for an audit at work. Ah well. It feels good to be settled about things anyways. I guess I’m not really a traveler. Maybe I’ll try to do more cooking. I’ve been watching this show on YouTube called How to Cook Like Heston and I guess it made me want to … cook like Heston. I even ordered some chocolate and a melon baller from Amazon to try and make chocolate truffles. Along with fashion photography, watching these cooking videos is on my list of Things I’d Never Imagined as a Kid I’d be Wanting to Do as an Adult. What happened to all the exciting car chases and exotic adventures that movies like Die Hard promised me? Ah well. Today it felt good to just come home and cook a burger.

I finished my taxes on Saturday. I also biked 20 miles. I also did my laundry. I also recorded a video of me editing photos for a friend. I also played some board games. This is what you do when you want to procrastinate from studying. Regarding the video, I cringe every time I hear my voice. I feel it just sounds weak and sad and it doesn’t help that I say uh’s or um’s a lot. I think I say uh’s and um’s a lot during meetings at work as well and I’m trying to cut that out. Maybe if I start recording myself more often, with practice, I could sound better. Although if I’m constantly taking photos of myself I don’t think I’ll become magically more photogenic, so I don’t know…

Is SUPER pious. Or really tired. I can’t really tell.

There was a ghost who found a bow Belonging to an average joe He kept it close for it did seem Soft to touch, by sight it gleamed It matched his tongue and so he took the bow in hand around the brook He kept it close and eight years past And wore it often but alas Dull and tattered worn and weary The bow looked rather old and dreary It soon died; he held it dear And saw it pass from ghostly sphere Into the living realm it went To be made with dollars spent And found a home in one girl’s hair Where it did live, her daily wear.

I went hiking over the weekend and took my camera along.  Having to take photos without a model was more challenging than I thought and this was the only result that I liked from my Spray-and-Pray method of photography.  Actually it’s more like Spray-and-Pray-and-Adjust-Things-in-the-Computer-Like-Crazy-While-Wishing-I-Used-a-Smaller-Aperture-But-Did-Not-Have-Enough-Light-and-I-Was-Already-at-1600-ISO but I guess that’s kinda wordy.  Meanwhile, my model friend still is churning out the hits in the New York Times Fashion section.  I’m still waiting for that choice category where I could be in the fashion photo (maybe a category like plain red polo, or thinning hair, or plain business casual attire would do the trick) but I probably would be too self conscious to submit it.  Nowadays, people taking photos of me make me cringe a little.

The whether was really nice and my legs got a healthy enough workout that it was a little hard to get out of the chair yesterday.  I felt like an old man (which I learned is strikingly similar to a 35 year old who has a sedentary job and doesn’t work out regularly).

Getting back into the groove of studying has been slow.  I elected to take a break from my company’s study program for the spring sitting so my next exam sitting isn’t until the fall so I’ve been on casual study mode in the meantime which is quite nice.  I’ve been dilly dallying with various activities like jaunts to the bay area and cooking Gordon Ramsay’s cripsy salmon recipe.  I have to say, making mashed potatoes with vinaigrette and onions instead of garlic is a refreshing change since I’ve always made mashed potatoes with garlic and I’m normally a one trick pony when it comes to cooking.  Now I’m a two trick pony!  Or maybe a three trick pony since I’ve also been making Gordon Ramsay’s creamy scrambled eggs for dinner over and over again. Speaking of one trick ponies, I’ve been doing more of these bread and butter hedgehog paintings, this time with a panda!  Not quite the correct size relation with the hedgehog but details, details… So that’s what it’s like to be on casual study mode.  It’s basically like normal studying without the whole studying part.

This is my small group, “Seamless.”  I liked the name so much I was able to influence another bible study group at a different church to also be named Seamless (I think they’re still called that).  I’ve been with this group a little over a year.  I think it’s called Seamless since they wanted all parts of their lives to be without seams or delineations so there wouldn’t be a point where their spiritual lives ended and their vocational, marital, social lives began but I also learned recently that Jesus’ tunic was seamless so the soldiers taking his clothes wouldn’t tear them but cast lots, which fulfilled some prophecy.  I guess I never learned that in Sunday school as a kid.  Probably because I never went to Sunday school as a kid. Anyway, this was for a white elephant gift exchange, which I guess is sort of like casting lots for presents.  I got a spatula.  Prior to age 30, I would have been as excited about a spatula as a six year old boy getting a spatula, but now that I’m mature and wise beyond my years, my utility of spatulas have seen a sharp increase, especially since I started watching clips of Gordon Ramsey cooking eggs on toast on youtube and trying to follow suit (without the colorful language).  I even started adding butter to them to give them a “velvety finish,” as Gordon puts it, which I have to agree makes it better.  Although does it really matter if you season it after rather than before as Gordon suggests?  The scientist in me wants to do a experiment.  Or … an eggsperiment.  Ha ha ha, heh, heh, ehh … sigh. I woke up pretty early this morning and a bit tired since my small group and I were up past 1 talking about attractive celebrities, songs we liked, and whether we’ve ever had a bad date.  I didn’t remember any, although I can’t remember a break-up that wasn’t at least a little disappointing.  Anyway, I woke to the sound of my fire alarm chirping, which I thought would stop after I removed it from its wiring and placed it underneath the bed in the other room in desperation.  It still chirps!  It’s the tell-tale heart of fire alarms. Random: my friend just emailed and told me that this video reminded him of me.  I don’t look anything like that guy in my opinion.  

 

I found out yesterday I’m officially an associate of the Society of Actuaries (pdf). Yay, I’m an official nerd!  And I’m in the top 20 of their new associates!  (arranged alphabetically, minor detail) And it only took five exams, three college credits, and eight modules, over the course of five years. Actually come to think of it, it took a good chunk of grade school doing math problems to finish all these tests. And those Saturday mornings when my dad would teach me trig at home. I guess before that I needed to learn language skills and how to count, and how to move around, and how to breathe. I guess this took my entire life to do! Phew! Anyway, it’s nice to have something to show for all this work. Previously I only had my knowledge of Brownian motion to show for all this and we all know how bonkers people go for that stuff. Actually my knowledge of Brownian motion is pretty spotty. Something about drift… and brownies? Something about chocolate brownies and how they spontaneously move to my mouth? I don’t know, I may have forgotten it all. Speaking of eating chocolate brownies, my decent into nothingness has continued and I have lost over ten pounds since I started keeping track a few months ago, which is almost 10% of my body weight. I now currently weigh as much as I did in early college. I don’t have any surprising tips for any of you that want to diet. All I know is that I just started eating less and got busy with other things. Like Thursday I kinda skipped dinner (actually I drank a glass of pineapple juice from Trader Joe’s. Does that count?) to go out to get a frame for this painting I just finished for my small group’s gift exchange, which I’ll post later. My friend told me not to wear polo shirts any more because they make me look like a grandpa so I vowed to try to only wear them in private. Painting, as most creative acts go, is a very solitary endeavor and it’s a bit depressing in this regard. Occasionally, though, I’m able to get lost in it all and seeing everything come together is kinda satisfying. I think playing guitar and photography is also like that for me although it’s not really a creative for me. More like trying to learn something and getting lost in some happy place, trying to getting better at it. I haven’t quite found that happy place studying for these exams.  It’s been a long, hard slog, and I have two more rather large ones on the horizon for the Fellowship title my company wants me to get.  Back to the drawing board!  Er, memory card board!